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General discussionRelease: Cultist Simulator(60 posts)(60 posts)
(60 posts)
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This is my favourite topic
Posted May 31, 2018
Hello madness, my old friend.

Cultist Simulator is now available at 10% off until June 7, 5pm UTC, DRM-free on GOG.com.

**Buy in the first week to receive the Perpetual Edition, which gives you access to upcoming DLC, planned to add new roles, characters, and legacies. This offer expires June 7, 6pm UTC.**

You got the fever again. It's been two days since you last ate but your research is more important. Gotta crack that ancient book, whose arcane language promises a glimpse at cosmic mysteries not intended for mortal minds. Just need to play your cards right: visit the right places, gain the proper insight, combine your madness with that of loyal followers, who would gladly sacrifice or be sacrificed in the name of terrible beings lurking at the edge of whispers. Don't worry about failing the first time. Worry about letting the moths escape.

Check out this piece for some insight into Alexis Kennedy's writing process during the creation of Cultist Simulator.
Make sure to also read RockPaperShotgun's review of the game, which awarded it the prestigious "Recommended" sticker.
Posted June 02, 2018
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Starmaker: Posted my review.

[char limit, v condensed version]

The main interactions in the game happen via a number of verb timer pods, like Work or Dream or Study. Put card(s) into a pod, start the timer, and in ~60s open the pod and take the cards out. Like a microwave. The bad: instead of placing cards into verb zones, pods have to be clicked open and closed, and cards taken out one by one. (You can click twice to take the whole lot, but then you'll have to look for them around the table, over or under other cards).

Expenses are also a pod, one that auto-refreshes and grabs a Funds card every 60s. To not die, you need to produce Funds cards faster than that. Other pods pop up and spawn penalty cards you need to destroy before they trigger a loss.

New characters have a choice of 2 jobs. One is menial labo(u)r, and produces 1 Funds each 50s (45 if you exploit a bug). It doesn't autorestart, so you have to pause the game as soon as it's done, or the cycle loses you money. Add the time to unload and load the pod and the time it's destroying penalty cards and not earning you money, and you're looking at 1 useful Fund every 15 min at best. 4 possibly productive actions for an hour of frantic clicking.

(There's a 2x speed button, but it eats into your reaction time and penalties pop up twice as fast, so the end result is about the same for twice as much clickling.)

For the other job to be at all profitable, your minion has to kill the boss. Minions are rare, recruiting attempts spawn penalties, and only 1 of 8 is a combatant with a chance to succeed (still small). Upgrading minions requires a lot of appropriate Lore, bought at random with Funds (hope you don't get a mundane book)... you see where it's going.

It is a realistic cult sim, the cult in question being an MLM pyramid. If you're thinking about joining one, buy this game: same soul-crushing bankruptcy-inducing self-actualization BS but way cheaper than an IRL MLM entry package. Otherwise, avoid it like crabs.
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Starmaker: What didn't fit: Alexis Kennedy wanted to remove the pause button. This isn't really pertinent to the current version, but it's a good indicator of what an exceptional game designer he is
and what improvements we can expect to see in future versions.
Well, this is basically the same problem as with other Alexis Kennedy games; it's an endless grind. Fallen London was grindy, Sunless Sea was EXTREMELY grindy and while it seems that Failbetter learned their lesson and fixed most of grindy stuff in Sunless Skies, Kennedy stays with "roguelike grind is The True Way".

It's kinda funny that someone who hates using the word "worldbuilding" is throwing term "roguelike" left and right despite none of his games being even remotely close to being roguelikes, roguelites or roguelikes-likes.

As with his other games there's a question to ask yourself before buying; does quality of text is enough (for buyer) to ignore quality of gameplay. For me and many others it is but it's completely understandable why it's a turn-off for most of the potential buyers.
Posted June 02, 2018
Let's see... An overly complex game with zero tutorial and a time-sensitive "one-time" offer that's likely to be mirrored in a different name once all the DLC is released and the company wants to make more cash from those holding out?

Yeah, no thanks.

If it had a tutorial worth anything I might consider it, but I currently can't see the point and by the time a tutorial is put in the "offer" will be long gone.
Posted June 02, 2018
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CelineSSauve: Let's see... An overly complex game with zero tutorial and a time-sensitive "one-time" offer that's likely to be mirrored in a different name once all the DLC is released and the company wants to make more cash from those holding out?

Yeah, no thanks.

If it had a tutorial worth anything I might consider it, but I currently can't see the point and by the time a tutorial is put in the "offer" will be long gone.
Exactly! Just like they did with Sunless Sea! Damn bastards, stealing your money.
Oh wait, they didn't.

It would literally take you half of the time you spend writing this bullshit to google reasons behind this decision. There's a lot of things to criticize Kennedy games for; "tricking customers into paying twice or more or whatever" is not one of them.
Posted June 02, 2018
If only games came with some sort of reference so I could know what keyboard shortcuts there might be.
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pmcollectorboy: snag
Try talking with your villain about your erudition... The timer stops when it's in a box. You'll get some mystery out of it, though. And your talk topic can be changed, so you can drag it out (and another one in) to make them wear at various rates, or pull them out once you have enough to boost.

Also, sometimes you get some glimmering or erudition from other events, like the fop house, or exploring the city by moonlight.
Post edited June 02, 2018 by mqstout
Posted June 03, 2018
Verdict after 13 hours: no.
Making everything RNG isn't a good game design.
Calling permadeath "roguelike" isn't a good understanding of what roguelikes are.
Two speed options (1x and 2x) in a game where your main activity is waiting isn't good game design (although it can be bypassed by Cheat Engine speedhack).
"Learn everything by yourself" work as long as you can easily tell if what's going on is bug or "it's a feature".

After 13 hours I have yet to have a moment of "oh my god, so this means... OH MY GOD"; this crazy moment when you're connecting small pieces of a puzzle and finally see a bigger picture. There's lot of cryptic and unclear stuff - but it never leads anywhere; just to more secrets.

At this point this game shows some promises that might be explored later on. For now, the weight of quality writing is overweight by quality (or rather annoyance) of gameplay.

Gonna pass for now and come back in half year to see what's changed.
Posted June 03, 2018
Permadeath would mean you have to start over from a fresh game state, but you don't.
Posted June 03, 2018
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reative00: Well, this is basically the same problem as with other Alexis Kennedy games; it's an endless grind. Fallen London was grindy, Sunless Sea was EXTREMELY grindy and while it seems that Failbetter learned their lesson and fixed most of grindy stuff in Sunless Skies, Kennedy stays with "roguelike grind is The True Way".
I'd argue Fallen London is good. It's grindy because it's World of Warcraft in a browser. Despite the grind, it is extremely respectful of a player's time. It has a high density of story per byte of text, a high density of story per minute of real playtime, and a permanent progression from hero to even awesomer hero.

Sunless Sea has Massive Problems, but it's not fundamentally bad. The beginning is resource-poor if you don't know how to kickstart the economy, ships are terrible, movement is glacially slow, harmless failures that are part of the story and failures that fucking kill you look exactly the same, and so do resource requirements that are and aren't consumed. It's all fixable and in some cases was fixed by modders. The "economy" is bad and pointless but mostly stays out of the way; what remains is a decent singleplayer game.

As for Cultist Simulator, its problems run deeper. Initially, I wanted to reply with a longish post on how "quality-based storytelling" is a shitty paradigm and makes for shitty games, but I've since heard an opinion I largely agree with:

Cultist Simulator is not a singleplayer game.

I provided the math in my review. The game was released May 31 and soon after posts and reviews started popping up with people reporting their acquired godhoods and such. It's not possible if you're doing your own research. It is possible, however, if a player goes into chatrooms as Kennedy himself advises, follows the instructions, then claims independent research and laughs at stupid plebeian "DotA guys". The grind is so long and the successes are so rare because an individual player is not meant to succeed by him-/herself; rather, one person is meant to discover a new thing, report in, gain community cred, and everyone else goes back to grinding. And that's partially because it's 2018 and it's common marketing knowledge games are supposed to be twitchable and youtubable and discordable, especially the first game of a new studio, and partially because Kennedy is a shit designer and the simulated cult is his own.
Posted June 03, 2018
It looks like crossover of Hands of Fate with Chaos Overlords with strong vibes of Illuminati card game.
Posted June 03, 2018
The frustrating thing is that this is exactly the sort of game that required a "WTF is" video.
Posted June 03, 2018
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HenitoKisou: It looks like crossover of Hands of Fate with Chaos Overlords with strong vibes of Illuminati card game.
Nice games.

Chaos Overlords deserves much love. Nice stories hinted in the text of the cards and a great dark near future cyberpunkish atmosphere. Good dark humour (the equipment of the cops!). Addictive gameplay, good music, fun as hell.

Hopefully Chaos Overlords 2 will be finished sometime.
Post edited June 03, 2018 by Carradice
Posted June 03, 2018
It's clear that this isn't a game for everyone. For me, this is the world's best version of solitaire.
Posted June 04, 2018
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Starmaker: Posted my review.

What didn't fit: Alexis Kennedy wanted to remove the pause button. This isn't really pertinent to the current version, but it's a good indicator of what an exceptional game designer he is
and what improvements we can expect to see in future versions.
avatar
reative00: Well, this is basically the same problem as with other Alexis Kennedy games; it's an endless grind. Fallen London was grindy, Sunless Sea was EXTREMELY grindy and while it seems that Failbetter learned their lesson and fixed most of grindy stuff in Sunless Skies, Kennedy stays with "roguelike grind is The True Way".

It's kinda funny that someone who hates using the word "worldbuilding" is throwing term "roguelike" left and right despite none of his games being even remotely close to being roguelikes, roguelites or roguelikes-likes.

As with his other games there's a question to ask yourself before buying; does quality of text is enough (for buyer) to ignore quality of gameplay. For me and many others it is but it's completely understandable why it's a turn-off for most of the potential buyers.
It depends on what you're coming to the game for, and what you describe as "grind".
This game is a lot more like Myst than it is Rogue Legacy.
Usually it's a pet peeve of mine how little developers include information about how to play their games and what various things mean, but there are a few very rare occasions where figuring things out is part of the charm that draws me back to the game. Cultist Simulator provides that for me, it's actually interesting to figure out how things work and what things don't. So far I'm on my fifth play through and each one has been intertaining in its own way because of trying diffrent paths, devotions, and various other aspects that the player can select during play. I've also found thus far that each new play I am able to advance faster through the game due to my prior player knowladge of how it works. For my exprience it's quite a bit like Myst where knowing what to do is most of the game and being told would spoil the point, it's like the punchline of a joke or the answer to a riddle, if you know beforehand it spoils the fun.

I'm sure it's not a game for everyone, but then again I can't remember the last time I played a game that was trying to be for everyone and actually delivered a rewarding exprience.

For me at least it's already pasted the "does this provide more entertainment - dollar for dollar - than a movie" test.
Posted June 04, 2018
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RoseLegion: Usually it's a pet peeve of mine how little developers include information about how to play their games and what various things mean, but there are a few very rare occasions where figuring things out is part of the charm that draws me back to the game. Cultist Simulator provides that for me, it's actually interesting to figure out how things work and what things don't. So far I'm on my fifth play through and each one has been intertaining in its own way because of trying diffrent paths, devotions, and various other aspects that the player can select during play. I've also found thus far that each new play I am able to advance faster through the game due to my prior player knowladge of how it works.
I was just describing Sunless Sea to someone in this manner. Your early playthroughs almost feel like a discouraging "waste" as you lose all your progress. Then you start to figure out those paths that work and move you along quickly, and after that you begin to learn how to carry on your progress with the mechanics give you (or, if unlike me, you're smart and do it the other way around ;) ).

Then you get really crazy and try to unlock the big "home run" sort of things that offer large concrete rewards, that you slowly sort of built your way up to understanding.
Posted June 05, 2018
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RoseLegion: Usually it's a pet peeve of mine how little developers include information about how to play their games and what various things mean, but there are a few very rare occasions where figuring things out is part of the charm that draws me back to the game. Cultist Simulator provides that for me, it's actually interesting to figure out how things work and what things don't. So far I'm on my fifth play through and each one has been intertaining in its own way because of trying diffrent paths, devotions, and various other aspects that the player can select during play. I've also found thus far that each new play I am able to advance faster through the game due to my prior player knowladge of how it works.
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Ixamyakxim: I was just describing Sunless Sea to someone in this manner. Your early playthroughs almost feel like a discouraging "waste" as you lose all your progress. Then you start to figure out those paths that work and move you along quickly, and after that you begin to learn how to carry on your progress with the mechanics give you (or, if unlike me, you're smart and do it the other way around ;) ).

Then you get really crazy and try to unlock the big "home run" sort of things that offer large concrete rewards, that you slowly sort of built your way up to understanding.
Yep :)

My last play ended with what I'd describe as a mid rage ending, but I could have avoided it and gone on longer trying for one of the harder goals I was just feeling implusive and decided to try something out.
Now I'm attempting things with some other starts even though I have a good method for one of them just because it's fun to explore and expriment.

I'm really enjoying the writing and the figuring things out, it's a refreshing change of pace from the games I've been seeing/playing lately and I love diversity it makes everything a more refreshing exprience for me.
Posted June 05, 2018
Whoa man. This game is starting to surprise me. I must've done something because I dreamt of something and caught a glimpse of a map of the game's... paths I guess? I picked up a fragment down near Way of the Woods. It says I can return there, but I'm guessing I need the proper lore and dream upon the card again.
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This is my favourite topic
Community
General discussionRelease: Cultist Simulator(60 posts)(60 posts)
(60 posts)