Make things more intuitive in general - Example included

[Arillious]

I don't want people getting frustrated and quitting over unclear game mechanics.

That sounds amazingly like something someone else said several times in another thread where you continually defend him. Wish i were a mod, I'd check I.P.s......

Once again, if a Mod wants to do this they can. Is it so hard to believe that 2 different people want the game to be good and think that a good population is a key element of the game being good?

[Arillious]

As far as games go, Salem is not exactly the most intuitive to learn if you're not coming at it from already having played Haven. I had a good break from haven and when I got here I could not for the life of me figure out how to make tanning fluid. There was no crafting option for it, and that's how nearly everything else is made. Completely forgot about left click item right click secondary item to combine.

Right now there's three ways to influence objects:

Crafting recipe,
Left click one object, right click second object
Right click one object and select option

Recipes are explained in the tutorial, and I'm fairly certain that the rclick for option issue is intuitive, but the lclick rclick part isn't taught at any point from what I remember, and it's something that could be done as a recipe but isn't.

Fence building as they're done in this game is fairly novel, and not explained anywhere in game.


Arillious does have a point here.

Thanks for the response. I was able to figure out those 3 ways to influence objects pretty easily, although I can see how someone might get confused with the right click one, left click the other. It was really when I created the sawbuck that I really saw the lack of any sort of direction glaring. There was not way to interact with it at all. Right click, left click showed nothing. Dropping logs on it did nothing. How is a regular every day new user supposed to assume that a fresh tree needs to be cut down and hauled over manually and then set on the sawbuck from there. This is the first time I had to add an object to another object not from my inventory.

[Tonkyhonk]

As it stands now, you will lose a lot of players early on because they simply do not know what to do. Standing around banging your head against the keyboard trying to do something simple is not fun for anyone.

well, people are making tutorials and guides to solve this.
those unintuitive examples you pointed out are, hard for gamers who are used to other kinds of MMOs, especially those who think they are so good at finding out how things work, when the truth is actually that many other MMOs work the same or similar way while this doesnt, and it must be reallly annoying for them to learn they cant solve it in this game. so, yeah, i feel for you. i remember how i struggled making a fire a few yrs ago.
(btw, haven players may be able to figure things out a bit more easily than others, but not too "naturally". this is much more complicated than haven is, and i know many haven players who didnt continue playing.)

you do have a point, but im not sure what kind of solutions other than some good tutorials you are looking for here.

btw, check my sig, that is one of the most unintuitive feature of this game

[baronbowden]

Youtube will be people's friend.

I know anyone these days first thing they do is youtube how to whatever...

For example try "salem building fences" see what comes up first.

90% of the population should be smart enough they will get fence building quickly if they don't figure it out themselves.... the 10% that can't are probably not smart enough to bother worrying about.

(not implying you are part of that 10% since you obviously figured it out eventually)

[Arillious]

you do have a point, but im not sure what kind of solutions other than some good tutorials you are looking for here.

Thanks for your post. I already recommended one solution, simply being a tooltip or a brief tutorial popup(Similar to the ones that guide you through learning the first skills and get you out and back to boston). This would probably only have to be done for the areas where new players are really struggling to understand.

An example of this would be the first time someone builds a a fence. I tutorial about simple fences would be nice, including how 2 squares are needed with cornerposts to build a gate and how you may need to dig or add dirt to certain sections.

[Tonkyhonk]

well, you might have missed reading this.
it probably wouldnt fit in with his aesthetics.

[Arillious]

well, you might have missed reading this.
it probably wouldnt fit in with his aesthetics.

In my opinion, a game shouldn't rely on outside guides in order to do standard game features. Like I said, while I was able to work my way through the roadblocks I faced, this post is simply to try head off potential problems with newer character's possibly getting frustrated and never progressing to the intermediate game. You have a short time frame to get someone hooked.

I think a lot of the people who have been around a while think I'm suggesting making the game easier. That is not the case. I like that the game leaves it to the user to build their character from the ground up. My problem is with the shortcomings with the UI and in game tools that sometimes make it very confusing how to even go about accomplishing basic tasks.

[Arillious]

Here's another person who ran into a road block when using the sawbuck.

http://forum.salemgame.com/viewtopic.php?f=5&t=598

If right clicking the sawbuck simply showed that it was expecting a fresh tree it would go a very long way.

[painhertz]

The game is in beta, not release so presumably before release tooltips for more obscure things like this may be put in but if they focused on nothing but tooltips and tutorials right now the game will never be released.

Also? As you just proved yourself, had you simply done a search for "sawbuck" initially this entire thread wouldn't have been necessary. "Hollow Logs" are a new feature and prior to their release upon the start of this world, there was nothing"but" logs that could go into the sawbuck so this is just a matter of documentation not catching yp to the updates yet.

[Arillious]

The game is in beta, not release so presumably before release tooltips for more obscure things like this may be put in but if they focused on nothing but tooltips and tutorials right now the game will never be released.

Also? As you just proved yourself, had you simply done a search for "sawbuck" initially this entire thread wouldn't have been necessary. "Hollow Logs" are a new feature and prior to their release upon the start of this world, there was nothing"but" logs that could go into the sawbuck so this is just a matter of documentation not catching yp to the updates yet.

Is beta not the perfect time to suggest ideas such as this? No where in my post did I suggest that the devs should focus on nothing but tooltips. I never even suggested that they should prioritize tooltips over other features or fixes. Your statement does not make any sense and you are apprently trying to make me defend a position that I dont hold.

As I have already stated many times now to refute the "You should of just looked it up" arguement... I DID look it up and WAS able to figure everything out using many different sources. I decided to write this thread after I had already figured everything out to give feedback from what I experienced as a new player. This isnt about me. In my opinion, the game shouldnt mandate that outside guides be referenced to do relatively simple things.