I’m still downloading this 847.3 MB patch on Steam and whatever new stuff it provides, I cannot understand how the developers were so fool to release it just when I’m about to embark on a three days business trip.
Anyway, does anyone know what new things it changes/adds?
Edit:
The version number in the options window is 1389.918
I have found the annoying in-jokes option switched on by default.
New stuff found:
There is a hint system. The player can call a (virtual) hotline and get hints about the puzzles he needs to solve in that specific part of the game. The hints are quite vague at first but if you keep asking hints about a specific puzzle, eventually the system gives you the explicit answer.
There is an additional phone in the hotel, in the lobby.
Characters can speak to each other and they sometimes automatically greet each other.
I’m curious to know what these changes were in response to. I know some of us on here wanted the playable character interaction but I’d like to know where the decision to add the hint system came from.
Maybe another thing they added now that time has passed and most hardcore fans have finished it, leaving perhaps slightly impatient novice players
I’m curious about that as well. In this forum Ron has been “pestered” enough by players lamenting more than one characteristic of the game but I don’t seem to remember too much wining about the lack of a hint system.
Probably it was a decision not driven by people critics but a consequence of some analyses made by the developers.
I just played around a little more with the hint system and it seems to be quite thorough and incremental for the most part. At a glance, it looks very good.
Some people do not take spending hours in frustration because they missed one crucial detail at first or because a red-herring led them the wrong way, as a badge of honor.
It is a bit presumptuous of some in this forum to judge them as “novices” or “impatient” or any other negative epithet.
Personally, I love the game, but got stuck twice, one of which lasted for about a week. During those long hours I was not having fun, I was not enjoying the game, and I was absolutely not being challenged by walking about aimlessly trying the same things over and over.
I could have used a built-in hint system that at the very least told me not to focus on solving a puzzle that could not be solved until the next act.
None of that makes me any less of a fan of the game, the developers, or the genre.
Good for Mr. Gilbert and Company for listening to their fans. Much appreciated!
I appreciate the introduction of a hint system as well. It is a wise acknowledgement of the fact that different audiences of players do exist (including novices, which personally I perceive more as a description than as a negative epithet) and that they need to be satisfied in different ways.
But that’s my point, why do you assume that it’s only beginners that find value in it? Isn’t that a but judgemental?
Oh, sure, in your mind you may be thinking that no self-respecting hardcore gamer would ever use a hint system, yet walkthroughs are extremely popular even though the market for interactive fiction and adventure games is sooooo small and replete to the gills with so-called hardcore gamers, fans and enthusiasts. Besides, that’s just another assumption you make.
Personally, I find some of the statements here (“us vs. them,” “hardcore vs. novices,” “those people,” “the rest,” etc.) divisive, unconstructive, and more than a bit naive and simplistic.
Anyway, I think the hint system is great. It is very unobtrusive, and goes out of its way to avoid spoiling the game.
If you´re having a problem with this already try go to some other gamer forums and brag there that you prefer to play on “very easy” because you just want get through the story and don´t really care for the gameplay challenge and having to die too much and try again, then watch for the reactions. Yes I know we´re supposed to be better than those who prefer to play those murder simulators, but in a sense we´re really not.
I never thought about this question. I don’t get any satisfaction in speculating about other people intents or alleged misbehavior.
What I can tell you is that dividing people in different classes can be a positive thing when it is deprived of any emotional weight. For example it’s a normal activity in statistics and marketing.
Having only very recently up closed witnessed what that way of thinking can and did lead to in my country just a bit over 70 years ago, that statement made me vomit just a little bit in my mouth.
I understand your point of view. Math and calculations are intrinsically quite cold sciences and activities, especially when they are applied to living beings.
I´m so sorry, and I really never intended to mention it here because I consider it a rather private thing, but it was only last saturday that I was there and I´m still a bit shaken to the bone so to speak.
‘Novice’ means someone who’s not as experienced. I didn’t use it in a negative way. I also wasn’t excluding the notion that experienced players might get frustrated (I did) - just that the previous theories about new players coming to the game might have formed part of the decision to add hints now as opposed to earlier.
I’m curious about why they added it but wasn’t saying it’s a bad thing.
But I don’t prefer to play in “very easy”. See where these unconscious biases lead you?
I like the hint system, yet I wouldn’t consider myself a novice. Such an assumption from you and others only serves to drive a wedge between us. That’s never good.
