alt3rn1ty: There is an argument to say that if we dont wish to play multiplayer, then why should we get the results of the weekend missions in the exotic items store .. But by that reasoning, why do we get the (somewhat limited) amount of items that we can without being online?. At one time there was an update which did "expand" the amount of items available to us, but since then each update has not added anymore. Living ships being a major update and story line, you would think that Hellogames would at least add the Void Egg to offline players list of available items so that we too can participate in enjoying the Living ships quest, which (apart from acquiring the Void Egg currently) does not need to be online at all.
Another argument is that when I purchased the game in good faith a couple days after v1.1 (Foundation) came out, you could turn in progress in various milestones to Nada and Polo for rewards. After the Nexus was added for the benefit of the multiplayer customers, those of us offline customers got thrown under the bus because those features were stripped off of Nada and Polo and turned over to a couple of Nexus NPCs that do not work correctly unless the player is online. So WE got screwed over for the benefit of the multiplayer fans, which is particularly annoying considering that I was ALSO one of those people who took into consideration the fact that the game was listed both as Single-player only and NO online access required when I bought it. Now, neither is true. And even with editing your save game to access various quicksilver rewards (including the living ship egg, which is the primary basis of an entire update and offline players were F****d out of by Hello Games), there is at least one quest I know of that you can get stuck with which CANNOT be solved offline, because it requires building a component that the game will not allow you to build unless you're currently online (despite the fact that it's an NPC that gives it to you, and it doesn't actually require interaction with any other RL player). It's true that I only know of the one... but how many more are there that I do NOT know of?
When I initially got my account at GoG several years ago, one of the first things I did was by some favorite "Good OLD Games", including Might & Magic, Wizardry, Ultima, and Fallout. Gamers who know about gaming history will appreciate that all of these games share one sad feature in common - New World Computing, Sir-Tech Software, Origin Systems, and Black Isle studios (developers of those games) no longer exist. I can only thank my lucky stars that some jack-hole developer didn't code those games to require connection to one of their company servers even for single-player, or those games would be useless. I have no ill-will towards Hello Games, and don't wish them any bad luck, but if anything should happen to them, I want to know that the game I bought will still work as long as I own compatible OS and hardware, and I shouldn't need to rely on THEIR hardware to ensure my game works.
Some companies try to mollify customers by saying crap like "If anything were to happen, we would put out a patch... blah blah blah", but as someone that has worked for a company that was going bankrupt, I know from first-hand experience that the bank makes all the decisions at times like that, and there is no way they would allow the company to telegraph their imminent failure (and plummet their stock values) by releasing a patch that would let everyone know they were about to be closed down for good. If you think software developers don't give a crap about the customers any more, then imagine how much less the banks that are handling their finances will care!
MasterW: Excellent summary alt3rn1ty
BTW how do you manage to get 3450 quicksilver in offline mode?
Each time you solve a step in the main quest, you're asked to go back and notify Nada. He rewards you with 150 quicksilver each time. After 23 steps, you would have 3450 quicksilver even in offline mode.
