audiovisual world regen. experienced by walking through terrain. once in a while a block fades back in. “oh, hi there block…how have you been?”
i imagine it as a nice element. although i don’t know how to settle it up, since it might be, blocks start appearing above surface first.
also - blocks might fade out of unclaimed landmasses. re-appearing somwhere completely else. it’s the laws of boundless’ magical nature 
There are a few things that are bothering me:
1. Personal experience
- I am a casual gamer, next to my busy working life. This limits the time I can put into the game:
- The game doesn’t have to be very complex, I play to relax so I like to build things more than grinding for many hours.
- Despite building and some grinding (as this is obviously related), I don’t like all those skill points, too many options and a few wrong choices and your screwed since you only have limited reset points.
2. Community & Players
- People are friendly, but that rate is decreasing while the game is getting more populair. So is the average age, that is decreasing.
- Like the social aspect of the game but the ingame chat is limited. New options are proposed and shown here on the forums, so that might get better over time.
- Some players keep on changing the world around you. I’m not online that often and it is quite dissapointing when someone decided to rebuild the area you are building next to. Or even removing parts that were build together. I’m wating for the private own hosted servers so that I can manage that myself.
3. Gameplay
- I was suspecting a more building and community type of game, but it seems like the game is going to some MMORPG kind of game. Afraid that I’m not going to like that, as that might reduce the focus of building.
- Portals load very slow. My internet connection isn’t perfect, but it became worse over time (have to wait over 10 sec for a portal to open). Recommended network speed (down/up) is quite high especially upload.
- Leveling and gaining XP goes way to slow. Takes ages to level now, multiple weeks to go up one level.
4. Communication
- There is no roadmap, we can’t provide feedback on future plans other than replying here on the forums. I think a clear roadmap with some kind of down/upvoting mechanism might work better.
- Not the be hard, but I think the dev’s aren’t playing the actual game enough to experience what players might experience in game. Also that makes player to dev communication easier, now only a few dev’s can be spotted online.
4 Likes
@james thanks for the feedback thread. The two largest turn-offs IMHO are the lack of story and the lack of conflict (combat aside). The world desperately needs context and this is hurting the gameplay as many have mentioned. Bits of history which can be read off of ancient tech, more findable story parts throughout the world are a part of this but I believe people need a reason to do what they do such as “rebuild after a catastrophic event”, or “collect resources before the titans return.”. What world shattering event are we avoiding or recovering from?
Re: conflict… People need someone to compete with or fight. WoW pitted two large factions against eachother which provides endless competition between the two groups. This provides rich stories which players felt apart of. Eve online pits player factions against eachother for various reasons which lets the players actively contribute to the history. Like others, I came to boundless looking for that feeling as a major component and it is still lacking.
This can (and should be) worked into the history of the world in phases and the world wipe for 1.0 can be justified in story. The events in alpha/beta can make up the history which seeds the story of the full release. For example: Recovery/Escape: We, the children of Oort chose flight over fight and searched for new worlds to escape the titans. The sanctum, with its limited range, found one group of habitable planets beyond the titans domain and is slowly waking people up with no memory of their horrific pasts or the Oort who aided their flight. Here we find tech, find ruins, find tests which hint at the past. Stories are softly embedded in the backdrop of the world (though not as softly as it is now). Heck, you could release descriptions of certain items/artifacts/statues of the past and hold chisel “recreation” contests where the winner’s chisel statue will be used after 1.0 as part of prefabbed structures… Etc. Next phase could be “the titans have found us” where you release titans/dungeons/stories into the worlds which enrich the alpha/beta experience and give you further history to build upon. Using this you can test events, dungeons, rare spawns, etc. You sate the thirst for plot of all of the players and build a group with a good understanding of this era while planting information in events which will be used much later. When release comes, perhaps the titans find the sanctuary and destroy it… Perhaps there is a titan weapon which collapses the portal networks or renders the planets inhabitable… maybe we have discovered a special device which inhibits titan portals and manage to bring it back to the sanctum but not before the titans have rendered our worlds uninhabitable. Perhaps such a device gave us the chance to take back our home system and 1.0 is all about establishing a beach head. Stories could be seeded by memories of the once-great pixel-gate or Munteen chisel collusim… Maybe instances allow us to visit ruined parts of our old planets to recover things in 1.0. Knowing this, players would be incentivise to create masterpieces now knowing that they might leave a perminant effect on the future of the world/game. Storyline wise, you say thst it takes a generation or two to return to the home system or to before the Sanctum finds planets safe from the titans due to some specialized formation or said ancient device which justifies the skill-losses. Some event could give our people time to prepare while the titans figure out how to portal in to wipe us out… I’m just throwing out ideas here but I feel like this is a writer’s dream.
With story and conflict, people have a reason to build/collect and feel alot more attached to the world. As others have stated, we need more in terms of goals and reasons to do what we do in-game. We also need better reasons for visiting towns/cities. Portal hubs provide this a bit but having large, beautiful towns riddled with georgeous structures and empty halls leaves me wondering if all our work will be left abandoned in a similar way. The trailer showed a bustling town but with the current game mechanics, present and planned that I know of, I cannot see any reason to visit towns besides shops. It would be nice if mayor’s or prominent members could commission houses for NPCs which wandered around… Perhaps these NPCs could provide the quests and stories snippets to help fill-out the MMO feel.
One way or another, I do feel that lore virtually absent currently and that Boundless is missing an opportunity in alpha/beta to build a history which people will become invested in. Also, while the world must be remade, this continuation of history would give all of us a real reason to become truely invested. It would be awesome to hear about the people of Elara (a player town currently being built in Alpha) and their synergy with nature referenced in the lore of 1.0.
This is a bit long but I hope you found it constructive. My wife and I also maintain a list of smaller items which could enhance the game but nothing compares to the above
6 Likes
How did fixing that “feature” make it to the top of the todo list? Why would you remove something people like before adding things people are asking for like signs? Or fixing the red gleam rarity?
If you are fixing the red gleam by, say, making it grow on trees at the same time, well then, maybe never mind.
But still, it would be better to add things people like than remove them. Even if you may consider it a “bug”, players may consider it more of a “workaround” to a problem.
5 Likes
Here are the few things that put me off:
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Music. Need more of it. Melodies, variation in soundtrack tunes, illustruous music for different occasions (doesn’t need to be a Hobbit soundtrack, but the thought of it makes me smile.)
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Funny, thrilling, phantastic, or mysterious story elements are missing for me. Each item type, for example, could be self explanatory to an extend with a curious little text, making the player want to delve deeper into the mechanics and phantasy style of Boundless.)
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Pofomans…as always. My PC is still a crappy little mixture between low and high end components. And also broken at the moment
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I know you developers are very busy getting the framework for Boundless together. But also implementing cool community ideas would be great.
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The colour pink. I’m sorry. I actually love the colour. But in my age it starts to remind me that I might not be the target group of the the game, disregarding how good the game is after all.
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Game Still lacks mysterious elements of wonder for me. Don’t get me wrong - it is very captivating seeing all the lovely, impressive and alltogether wonderful buildings, while strolling through the world. This is a very, very welcoming aspect for me still. But I want to see abandoned temples, that tell a story or even lost or hidden valleys.
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I fear the game becoming too poppy, in therms of colour. Too shrill or intense colours, for example the atmosphere of orbital bodies: Please mind it could appear like a cosmic street lantern if there are severeal planets or sub planet with differet coloured atmosphere surrounding the planet your on. It does it for me now, but sometimes I want to be struck in wonder while looking upon to the stars and seeing another world which make me want to find out what’s buzzing on its surface million miles away.
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Clouds, fog, wind. Would love that.
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And I miss the heck out of the original cover artwork of Oort-Online. It was telling a little story in it’s own way.
Now we have honest, transparent trailers which show the actual engine of the game and it’s gorgeous graphics. But I miss the inspirational feel of the original painted(!) artwork. Now that it’s gone, of course. -
Physics, mechanics, buildable (not craftable) machinery, would encourage me to play, because it give me aim for what I would like to do in Boundless. Would be maddenlingly motivating for me personally.
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I still don’t really know what’s really set into stone, or the other way round: what is prone to be left out of the game. What we most certainly won’t have. I don’t want to live in an illusion of things I think could be built, which again turn out to be impossiible.
If you’ve read it so far, thank you very much for your patience. Hope it helps.
3 Likes
Originally I thought like this… but that was because of my experience in Minecraft and other games where you have large faceless storage. Since I started boundless, I’ve come to really appreciate the fact that you have to plan your storage rooms and can search for items visually. It gives you a good reason to think about layout and allows you to give meaning to specific rooms. Yes, they can still hold huge numbers of blocks… but I dunno, to me it adds to the game to have to go through this activity.
7 Likes
I should have given an example because I certainly did not mean like minecraft. But, I don’t see why we cannot have storage that can hold the amount of items that match your “on person” inventory. So maybe something like 18 or whatever is the max amount a fully skill pointed person has when they put them in the inventory skill slots.
Additionally with the amount of colors that are planned only have 4 blocks starts to really hurt and require much bigger storage rooms. Considering that plots are at a premium now you can easily use many to build a workshop. So a bit larger “storage container” while not being minecraft size shouldn’t be horrible.
Hopefully I’m not deviating from the OP’s topic…
I’m curious how do you want it to be implemented. I think the 4 item types per storage was chosen so that it’s still big enough on the shelf and you can easily distinguish the items from afar. If you want it to be 18 items per storage, do you want it to still be displayed in a 1x1 shelf and divided by 18 (not really visible)? I think the current implementation of the storage is alright.
We could probably increase the efficiency of making storage a little bit by probably introducing some crates or boxes where visibility is not an issue since they are hidden anyway inside it. We just need to be careful for it not to be overpowered.
I haven’t taken much time to figure out and do a suggestion post… but basically I assume a box that could store same items but be marked kind of like the shop stand is with the item it has inside. This way we still keep a simple block for a storage unit but have different sizes (maybe like what Creativerse does with their storage) where different block levels can give larger storages.
Additionally items that lay down are not easily seen with wood storage on the 3rd or block height unless you start stepping back which then requires even more plot space.
Again I am not saying anything about huge amounts of storage or even asked for that. I just said 4 items per block is kind of crazy when you are shooting for 30+ planets and many different types of colors. Right now if you just keep one stack of every item type and the color it already uses a fair amount of storage blocks. They asked what we didn’t like and I just built a 2x2 storage room with a 3 high vertical storage block setup and it filled up the whole room without displaying all items.
1 Like
i’m sorry what? IT’S STORAGE XD…ur not killing great beasts with it …
How? wtf how can Storage be OP?? like huhh?? xD maybe it’s cause i play modded MC that it’s clouding how i can in any way how storage can be op?
An infinite source of storage so you never have to make a choice between throwing or saving is OP
7 Likes
an infinite amount of storage is only OP if it’s cheap and easy to manage and use…not even any modded minecraft does that xD
infinite amount of storage? how bout then it requires power and such?
could we all go back to topic please ?! the suggestion of an infinite amount of storage is “never” a reason to quit but only laziness!
1 Like
I’m only messing with ya 
i really already put my reason for not playing which is how slooow the level climb is…and the skill creep just IMO SHOULD NOT be a thing xD
When ever I interact with an item the item’s storage gui is tilted and after about an hour I start getting a headache
1 Like
First I’d like to say that I do really like the game. It is beautiful and I think there is a lot of potential going forward. Saying that, there are several things that are making it harder for me to log on and finish my build.
I was a backer when Boundless was Oort but I really started playing after Skysaga went on hold and I loved most of the features of that game. I especially liked the ability to go adventuring to gather resources to create my own small world and fill it with items that suggested the settlement had life. Building in Boundless is less satisfying because of the following reasons.
Plots
I hate the plots. I’m sure it is partly because at level 26 I’ve still got a lot to earn and learn about them but I find them limiting and finicky to use. I am a builder and explorer. it annoys me that I have all the resources I need to make my settlement from exploring but I have to keep completing pointless activities to make enough xp to level up and get a few more plots. The plots are then so small that I spend a fraction of my time building and it is back to grinding.
Another thing with the plots is that I feel that I waste a lot of them on protecting small pieces of building that stick out. I don’t want to have to make all my buildings a regulation size or shape! Don’t even get me started on making little pathways, piers or basements. Can’t make those as I need to place tons of extra plots to go even slightly below the ground level of my build because the plots sit on the ground so any pathways are below the plot and regenerate back to wilderness! I like my builds to fit in the landscape and not need to always be raised above it.
Decoration
I know from the art posts, that this is something that you are going to implement soon but I do feel that my buildings are lifeless shells when they are competed. I can make simple furniture but I want the world to look like my character actually lives, eats and enjoys his time at my settlement.
Farming will be very welcome and I would also like to be able to move and create with water.
Exploration
Finally I would like there to be more reason to explore my home planet. Perhaps there could be something to collect like lore, a way to create your own map of the world. or biome specific resources on each planet. There are many fantastic player created builds but I have no idea of the direction to find them or a reason to just head out into the world because I have everything I need close by.
I’m sure that some of the above niggles are going to be less of a problem in the future, as new features are added. But at the moment I am struggling to find the enthusiasm to grind the plots to finish my little lakeside settlement. I feel that my creativity is slightly hampered by a grinding mechanism and not lack of resources.
7 Likes