What turns you off playing Boundless?

[scrufola]

@Bones

This topic has 68K views , what does that tell you about the state of the game

That a thread bumped to the top for years gets a lot of views? I still think this thread is a bad idea because the first thing you see when you visit the forum for the first time is this huge “the game sucks” thread.

And to stay on topic: What turns me off is the constant grind to keep 1x2 portals running. There’s more fun stuff to do then minting stuff to buy Oort. I don’t like upkeep treadmills.

I more or less stopped working on new things because they would require new portals and I don’t feel like feeding more 1x2 portals.

[Talon]

I forgot some!

Health:
Having % based damage negated by flat #s is stupid. Full stop. You cannot excuse this. Fall damage armnor should be a + to the base speed you’re allowed to hit an object before you start taking damage.
There are 43 points available on the skill tree to increase one’s durability. Figuring out which is useful is an exercise in frustration - Between not knowing how much durability is actually necessary, and the absolutely bonkers amounts of damage jumping up and down causes once you have large amounts of health, I have found the optimum durability to be 0 + chugging revive brews + wasting 80% of every teaching pie I eat.

Dying:
XP as a defeat penalty is kind of awkward for new players. What it ends up doing is penalizing players that don’t want to play the game in a safe area. I’m sure a lot of my complaints would be alleviated by spending some hours in a regen farm grinding up to level 50, but no way am I doing that.
Not knowing how you died is also a massive downer - as I’m both dead (and forced to stare at the ground until someone feels like reviving me) AND I can’t reflect on what happened in order to not die in the future.
Homing shots are pure BS. Whether I can defeat an Elite Cuttletrunk generally rests on whether RNG decides to have it shoot homing shots or not.

Regen farms:
I hate the concept. You might as well have a dev standing in every regen farm offering to trade a 3 hour ban, some tools and regen bombs in exchange for materials and xp. I don’t have an alternate solution to the problem they were intended to solve, though, so I’m willing to live with them.
Related: People who say **** gatherers and build their regen farms on the surface. And then leave the game and let their gleam club fuelled beacon continue to raise its middle finger on any passing gatherer.

Unstable connection threshold is weird.
400ms ping is perfectly playable if all you are doing is gathering or mining.

Bright gleam. Too much of it literally hurts my eyes. So many people use too much.

Being defeated by being rammed by the corpses of wildstock.
Related: The fact that I can backpedal faster than a wildstock can charge.

[DKPuncherello]

@scrufola

first thing you see when you visit the forum for the first time is this huge “the game sucks” thread.

Maybe if the devs addressed some of these issues that would be good. I know James reads this thread and does in fact care. Low hanging fruit not being addressed for literal years is crazy. Examples of things that shouldn’t be hard to change:

Death XP. That’s a one line code change
XP from gathering. Another one line code change
Mass craft all. Probably at most a few hours’ work
Weather effects mod for all. Probably an hour’s work since it’s just an ini file or whatever
Meteor mod for all. Again probably an hour’s work since it’s an ini file
Float by default option. An hour’s work at most.

Top relatively-easy to implement QoL changes

I’d like to make a list of the top easy to implement QoL changes. Things that should take a few hours or less to add (not to implement or test). Nothing fancy here please. (I posted in general since I’m not suggesting these, merely collecting them, but feel free to recategorize this Major if you like) Please don’t post your criticism for ideas here, just list ideas. If you think an idea is a bad idea, feel free to make a fresh thread for it and post a link to it here (just to keep things organi…

[majorvex]

@DKPuncherello

Death XP. That’s a one line code change
XP from gathering. Another one line code change
Mass craft all. Probably at most a few hours’ work

I don’t know how to say this nicely, but this is a lot more work than what you assume it is - on a lot of the things you mentioned. Plus, when you change one value, you have to consider how that will effect everything else - then some of those things might need adjustments too.

There are some environment/weather type things that the values can be adjusted quickly.

The meteor mod is a couple of values changed in some clientnpc json files (if we’re talking about the same one).

Low hanging fruit was emojis.

[Rydralain]

@DKPuncherello

An hour’s work at most.

Vex mostly already said this, but… I would never advise assuming the work cost of a project when you aren’t familiar with the code base & engine. It’s hard enough to estimate things when you do know those things, I wouldn’t dare do more than make an educated guess at a likely timeframe.

Some of these are likely quick changes, but anything that’s a “likely quick” change is also a “possibly months of work” change.

But this is mostly just picking at your phrasing. Overall, the suggestion of finding “likely quick fixes” for the devs to consider/evaluate is a really good idea.

[tarranth]

(post withdrawn by author, will be automatically deleted in 24 hours unless flagged)

[Coolpants]

This thread isn’t about discussion or even for replies like the one I’m posting now… it’s been said several times further up that this thread is here just to give the devs a log of people’s issues with the game. Ignore the ones complaining and let people vent without recrimination.

[morey523]

What turns me off of boundless after 2 years straight of playing is the lack of hunting updates even though hunting things have been shown (titans, shields). Every update has been building wise. So maybe change the trailer for boundless as a building game that has mobs? I.e Minecraft. Because nothing new hunting has happened in game (no exo tools or weapons aren’t a hunting update they are product of the exos or gleambow event) The game honestly has been let’s please the builders but tease the hunters since the release of the game.

[DKPuncherello]

@tarranth

And just because you’re free to voice your opinion doesn’t mean you’re free from the consequences, such as being told that if you don’t like it, you’re free to leave.

“Whining” is good for the game IMO

[Talon]

To a limit. It becomes unhealthy after a point.

[morey523]

You will get whining and complaining when you get shown things and they haven’t happened in 2 years. Keep complaining and whining about building stuff but push aside the hunting aspect of the game. Yay rentals. Yay more building. HEY STOP ASKING ABOUT HUNTING. WAIT IT’LL HAPPEN. BUT give me more building stuff before that happens

[Stretchious]

@tarranth

And just because you’re free to voice your opinion doesn’t mean you’re free from the consequences,

Except that is EXACTLY what this thread is for. It is for people to leave feedback about what they do not like about the game. The only thing that would not be without consequence would be if whatever is written breaks the Code of Conduct.

The thread may seem negative to some, but it is not to the developers as they will be able to gain positive insight into those negatives.

My only recommendation for those that do not like reading any negativity, especially if you are unable to refrain from posting contrary comments, is that you may be better of muting this thread and steering clear of it.

[tarranth]

As has been pointed out, this thread is about voicing your complaints, so that’s what I’ll do.

Reduce the speed of chisels. I’ve lost count of how many times I’ve double or triple tapped with a chisel even with the lightest touch of the mouse. It’s quite annoying, in that at that point, you either need to break the block or use a forged unchisel tool to start over.

I’ve been playing for a little over a year, and others have been here longer. The trailer is what drew me in. But I see some things missing, like the protectors and Titans.

Another is the crafting of marble. Honestly, you should be able to make it from any type of rock, not just metamorphic.

And then there’s the lack of variety of monsters. Five of them, with the only variety being is that those on higher tiered worlds are more powerful and may be a different color.

Mass craft still is limiting. When you need thousands of refined rock, changing rock into stones can be very time consuming. You can practically click to the point of wanting to quit.

[almund]

For me Boundless is one of those games that goes to that category that it is hard to start up because it is not easy to play it short while. Logging to game usually starts with certain routine tasks that I have build over time

So when I have short time to play I might just choose not to start game at all because there is missing that initial short time hook to get me log in and keep me then longer than planned in game.

[Alexius]

If anyone still reads this, i sank many hours into boundless already, but both attempts to truly play it for a long time were cancelled due to several things that i think coul’ve been done better. Please share your opnion as well:

Returning players: There is nothing to return to, after a certain time you lose everything that you’ve build. If i want to play boundless for three months a year I would have to start from the scratch every time.

Dead-crafting system: It’s a shame that essentially all crafting activities are limited to put something into something and wait. Even though the game is well prepared for some active elements (boundless also have sorts of electricity, why not use it like in minecraft, to build machines and items that actually do things?)

Active elements: second point brings me to the third point, player’s creations are no doubt impressive, jaw-dropping even, but they are also dead. Except for a few blinking blocks which can possibly create some text, there is nothing that does anything. I know that comparions to minecraft are not exactly suitable. But it is fun to make light switches and connect them or to make hidden doors, possibly actually farm outside your house, maybe have some cattle even. Those are all side activities that can shorten farming time and also provide goals to the gameplay… something that players, who do not want to spend long months building trade empires or castles would probably appreciate.

Fast-Travel: while portals are convenient, they suffer from the same fate as player’s own structers, they have high upkeep and demand a lot of farming (for example for players who don’t join any hunts) from a person. Without a protal, travelling is hell. If somebody find a beautiful place on a planet and it’s in a remote area - without any portals, it may take many minutes to get to the closest one and even then the logistics to set-up one’s own are not that simple.

Population: i did not see that many people online. i only saw a handful of people while travelling across many worlds, or servers even. I did see many structures, which would point me otherwise. But today i just think that massive team effort enables a structure to stay build in boundless for a longer time period but for an idividual it is almost impossible to keep his lake-side residence intact.

Otherwise i loved the game both time i played, the creations are amazing, but there are the above mentioned loopholes which made me turn away. I would love to return once more, if any of these things were changed, or if there was any other meaningful (subjectively) development.

Alexius

[Gerentt]

@Alexius

Returning players: There is nothing to return to, after a certain time you lose everything that you’ve build. If i want to play boundless for three months a year I would have to start from the scratch every time.

Did you know this is fixed with the reclaim system? If your build expires you no longer lose everything. It now goes into reclaim so you can get back all your tools, ingredients, resources, building blocks etc. The only thing you lose IS the build itself but you keep all your stuff.

[dmjak]

One thing that turns me off playing is seeing the deserted shops. Even if people just moved to another area, players coming to shop in T2 and T2 worlds and finding nothing, gives the appearance that the bulk of the players have abandoned ship. It’s pretty disheartening when you’re just starting out.

[tarranth]

At this point, I think there’s more shops than players…

[Rolando]

I have the weird feeling that the game has been deserted and that the few former players will go into exile on their own planet selfishly. It looks like our own planet in a few decades. It is a sadness to see all these ghost places. My gaming experience today was depressing and made me lose the magic of discovery.

[DKPuncherello]

Come visit dkmall! I do my best to keep it active