No save + Random Death = Crazy Frustration

[Hansuki]

Well I understand quicksave acting like godmode in some games, when your game does not take the time to explain what killed you or why, having to restart the whole mission is a huge annoying pain - especially for stealth players who take longer anyway.

Two examples: 1st was in the hub, random guys start attacking and killing me, I die 3-4 times then just restart the chapter. Turns out landing on/near people with the cyberjump hurts them. Found that out the hard way.

2nd mission (I think), I'm in a room where I can bribe/kill an officer, there's a stone door that slides up when you hit a switch. Past the door is a hallway and bright light - I turn the corner face first into a Doom-style pig monster, then instagib....... forced to restart the level..... I could only sit and wtf?

Now I'm staring at the door again, wondering if I should go there again, I want to see what it was - if it was a trap, it sure worked, but without the save, I don't want to risk going back down there and having to start AGAIN. If its a secret, I dont want to pass it either....


TL;DR Games that can instakill need quicksave

/rant

[skacky]

Hello,
I'm sorry you're having troubles with the game.

Looks like you have discovered the Supreme Manduco behind the secret door. This is a rather tricky part of the game and you don't have to get there to actually finish the game in any way.

Concerning saves, the game saves when the mission begins, during the mission every 3 minutes, when you accomplish an objective and when you quit the game. If you resume a mission, you will begin again in your starting point like in Diablo 2 for example, but your progress will be saved.

If you are experiencing issues with saving, you can also run the game as an Administrator.

I hope this will help. Thank you for your patience. ;)

[Monsieur_Daz]

Yeah, if you have to restart the chapter, then it's just a bug. Here's the fix (http://forums.steampowered.com/forums/showthread.php?t=2027613).
I've been in your situation, and the game was driving me crazy...
I just enjoy it now =)

[Hansuki]

Speedy reply, thank you!

In that case Im more confused now than before. Before I had instagib'd in the secret room, I killed the officer instead talking to him, and the mission updated to go talk to Mentor. Then I checked the secret room and died. The mission restarted (It seems that I kept my exp) and the guy I had killed was back, this time I bribed him.

If the game saves when you accomplish an objective, it didnt do it that time?

Or it only saves exp/loot?

all the guys respawned too......




Couldn't I exploit this for infinite exps?

[skacky]

Looks like the game didn't save it this time. This shouldn't happen, thank you for your report. ;)

[Hansuki]

Last update; went into hall again, door locks behind you. Killed the monster but nothing happened, walked near the corpse and instagibbed again :D Level restarts, kept exp!

However, I'm abandoning that char because the stealth in this game is just way too slow and unforgiving. Stealth kills with silenced sniper cause others to aggro at me ASAP, which kills the class IMO. they dont even run over and check their dead buddy.

I'm running the game as admin now to fix the save problem (with a heavy weapons char, since that seems like the best way to not die) I'll repost if it happens when I get back to there again

[Hansuki]

UPDATE: got to the mission again, this time went with the hack panel option over the corrupt officer objective. I made it to the panel, successfully hacked, but died minutes later returning to mentor in glorious battle (ok I was hacking in the open like a noob and got gunned down), and suffered the final death (no resurector, even though I had 10)...............and mission restarts, exp kept (which is nice because I get 1000xp for chosing option 1 when first talking to mentor...EVERY TIME).


Now, I know this probably isnt intentional, and I may be a special case, but this seems all kinds of broken. If it is, and im supposed to 'grow' from my experience, I dont see how forcing me to replay is a better alternative than quicksave. It just means I'll have a ton of money, because those bank machines respawn too, and amazing skills for the whole campaign, from failing mission 1 several times?!

[skacky]

Hello again,
The Mentor XP dialogue is an exploit and it will be fixed in the upcoming patch. The fact that you died permanently while hacking is the result of the AI melting your Cyber Brain. We may nerf this to prevent a final death as some players find it too frustrating.

Again, we apologize for the inconvenience.

[Hansuki]

lmao I was just about to edit my last post:

I started out the door again just now and got final death from the first bank machine I hacked. I failed, but when I checked after coming back to life and talking to mentor (gaining another lvl) I had gained 10k currency, as though I had succeeded the bank hack.

Id nerf the hack melt, The hacked overlay is plenty punishment for failure. Suprisingly my original point stands - instant kill + no saving = frustration.

Glad to help flesh this bug out tho! Im gonna go hack/kill myself silly rich!

[Naity]

Don't nerf it too much ^^.

If I can understand the frustrations due to permanents damages (not bothering me that much but I rly see the point), I found this instant death in some cases of bad hacking just brilliant. It adds a lot of tense in hacking because the issue is not only a failure, it's the death (with the possible injuries it can makes). If you nerf both the injuries and the hacking system, this is gonna - IMO - lower the tense of hacking. Maybe, instead, make hacking more rewarding. Nerfing the permanent damages of death will aniway make hacking more comfortable.

Of maybe - as advised in another thread - split in softcore and hardcore :)

Beside, thanks for the game. I'm loving it so far (11+ H of games so far)

[kroonerman]

Don't nerf it too much ^^.

If I can understand the frustrations due to permanents damages (not bothering me that much but I rly see the point), I found this instant death in some cases of bad hacking just brilliant. It adds a lot of tense in hacking because the issue is not only a failure, it's the death (with the possible injuries it can makes). If you nerf both the injuries and the hacking system, this is gonna - IMO - lower the tense of hacking. Maybe, instead, make hacking more rewarding. Nerfing the permanent damages of death will aniway make hacking more comfortable.

Of maybe - as advised in another thread - split in softcore and hardcore :)

Beside, thanks for the game. I'm loving it so far (11+ H of games so far)

I'm going to disagree with you about hacking. Between the non-pause menu, and the (apparantly?) random chance of insta-perma-death while hacking, and the lack of cash/exp, I've pretty much stopped doing it.

I got tired of dieing, restarting the mission, getting to about the same point, and dieing again, all because of hacking. It wasn't really 'tense' for me, it was frustrating, since I couldn't tell when I was going to die, and when I was going to suffer nothing, and when I was going to get hacked myself.

[Naity]

the lack of cash/exp

For me that is the biggest problem that makes it less attracting. For the rest, you "just have to" never fail your hacks. The omniscients enemies bothering can be seen as another problem but I considere it independant of the hacking system (like making less lethal damages of hacking failures wont make ppls see you less and will still be somehow frustrating).

Once you have a strategy in place hack is not so hard anymore but you have to stay focus during it to increase your shield / reduce enemys strengh when one is getting higher than the other, watch your life, the upcoming viruses... etc.

Since the first mission's end I think I lost only one hack (which caused death nad constant penalty) but it was only caused by my lack of attention of the stats table :)

[AllWires]

Don't nerf it too much ^^.

If I can understand the frustrations due to permanents damages (not bothering me that much but I rly see the point), I found this instant death in some cases of bad hacking just brilliant. It adds a lot of tense in hacking because the issue is not only a failure, it's the death (with the possible injuries it can makes). If you nerf both the injuries and the hacking system, this is gonna - IMO - lower the tense of hacking. Maybe, instead, make hacking more rewarding. Nerfing the permanent damages of death will aniway make hacking more comfortable.

Of maybe - as advised in another thread - split in softcore and hardcore :)

Beside, thanks for the game. I'm loving it so far (11+ H of games so far)

I agree with this. Maybe make things easier to understand, but don't make the game too easy. I am so relieved there is a game like this with the true old school PC feel where the game is difficult and doesn't do any hand holding. I like having to always be on my toes, plan out every encounter, and make sure I don't do anything stupid!

This makes you think twice before trying to hack something you shouldn't be!

[MaddPhish]

Really this is just bad design, not some old skool real difficulty. There's nothing particularly rewarding for the risk of sudden death on every hack. So far the best way to go through the game is to grab the biggest gun, some good med skills and heaviest armor possible and plow through the enemies. For risking instant death in hacking you get reduced rewards for taking someone else and using them to shoot.

[Naity]

Agrees.

And aside from the frustration some stuff might cause to some players (like the completionist having the stats down forever) I don't find it amazingly hard either. It's rough, the self discovery in my opinion fits perfectly with the amnesic character, but I didn't find it a showstopper where I thought (so far) "oh my goddness, I am never gonna get through this" (in normal diff). And believe me, I am not an hardcore gamer. I find it so far even easier than Stalker on the same level of difficulty.

So the beauty in here is that I find the difficulty serves the game and not the game is an excuse to difficulty (like IWannaBeTheGuy or Wg Realms for the FPSs). It gived it a natural feeling of challenge - but not so much that one feels cheated by the devs).

:)

[Elenoe]

actually no problem with difficulty in that way. I managed survive much more bullets then expected, so there is nothing like "cannot get past that" as you said. The problem (and bad feeling is elsewhere)

1) stealth approach (as mentioned else where) is not that fun. Classic system, when you running around all compound just because you will have better sniper position for few guys and take them silently so no alarm if no one sees, or something similar.

Here you can be stealthy only until you fire your first bullet. Then you can (and must) survive just like any paced action game, just shoot them with precise shooting, no problem with that (didnt die once to that). Its just not very much stealth approach. This is not what I meant to do by very slowly crouching far from guy with shotgun (very accurate at loooong distances btw.)

2) permanent penalty... is not that bad idea, its just strange with combination with other mechanics. I understand it when I'm killed in action, because it is avoidable (at least next time). I have enough time to realize I cannot survive and I die. So its good death. Thats what difficulty settings are for. Too hard, lesser diff settings.

But I have same little problem as OP. After about 3 hours in mission (veeery slowly trying to take them silently) I found doors, got through, remembered to this thread, so expected monster.

I go forward, cast minions as meat shield before monster, nothing happens... Shot monster from behind wall, it died, nothing happens (except it was too easy for hard NPC). So I look at corpse and game restarted me in that very first dark lobby with gate. With no explanations. And the worst part is, I have my exp/money, It remembered main quest progress, but I lost side quests (for Chiangs guy) and all guards was restored!

Very annoying, so I just shot them all hard way, its faster and no such fun. Concerning that easiest way is be heavy armored tank with big gun indeed.

But back to monster, maybe there is something like death trap (needed to be disabled), or maybe the light (needed some protection). But no clue, not very much NPC to talk about it. Easy kill leads me to not actually kill that monster, maybe its held by that trap too, who knows. I wouldnt mind this (and even instant deaths) in other games too. Its not "oh its hard". But its really problem of instant deaths without possibility to avoid WITH permanent death penalty and WITH all NPC restarts (for us wants stealth approach). Those three things are just not compatible IMO.

Permanent death penalty you choose for games, where only mistakes make you dead. Instant death you choose where you respawn close (without NPC respawn and quests reverted) so you can try die another way, until you find way through. And NPC respawn / quests reverted are annoying all the time. It actually isnt even about "fearing about death" because you die absolutely without warning. And actually lead only to search wiki where another 300 players died in the same spot and with combined afford find out you need be wearing.../trigger.../approach backwards to monster... = not fun.

Its not "frustrating" for being hard, no need to nerf that. Its just strange combination of unavoidable instant deaths / death penalty / respawns.

[Hansuki]

Im thinking now of the Tenchu series of stealth games, where if you were spotted and all the guys come running, you get such a bad score you just end up restarting the level anyway, and if you die, whole level starts again.

I think the option to not use the reanimator should be included to avoid reviving in terrible situations and losing weapons due to glitches. I also think hacking deaths should be resurrectable - you still might get the fatal wound tho, it just would penalize you 30-45 mins of stealth play when you fail to hack the obj panel in level one :S