DEV Feedback: Why the new cooking system is hard but great.


Guest jeffpeng

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Guest jeffpeng

I took Vigilant Flame as an opportunity to return to The Long Dark. I must admit that despite having a lot of challenges and achievements still ahead of me, I got a little bit bored of my favourite game. I was very sceptical about the new cooking system, but very much willing to give it a try.

Now, after a few weeks, I can say that I went from disliking it to accepting it and eventually wholly embracing it as an enhanced element of game play. I cannot say that the new cooking system made the game easier, but it made the game richer in so many aspects. I will try to give my opinions to a few things both as a player and a part time hobbyist game designer, both because I want to voice my thoughts about it, and also because the developers mentioned that they are always hearing about things that people dislike - but rarely about things they do like. And yes, all things considered I very much like it.
 

Why I believe initial reception was mixed to bad, and why this shouldn't be overrated:

Usually when a game is updated in a way that changes an in-game mechanic, players will expect things to get easier. Either in a quality-of-life way making the same result achievable with the same in-game resources, but easier from a game play perspective (less clicks, better UI, etc), or in an actual in-game way shifting around mechanics, but making things easier in total. Vigilant Flame did neither of that, but actually introduces an entirely new and comprehensive concept - and I commend Hinterland for the bravery to do so!

I think it is safe to say that cooking was a pretty straight forward and easy but dull and repetitive experience. Sit at fire, click button repeatedly, success, up to the point where you would wish for some automation just to not having to cook 1 kilogram of moose meat by hand 29 times. To ease that painful repetitiveness I imagine cooking times were tuned down pretty low. I mean, in all honesty: what's fun at that? And survival game set into the ongoing end of the world or not: Games are supposed to be fun.

But tuning cooking times to more realistic numbers (try frying a whole kilogram of meat in 20 minutes, good luck) plus making the system involve more interaction and planning made the game harder, period. And if there's something goal oriented players will dislike is making their goal harder to achieve.

Now it is in the essence of human nature to voice dislike and concern more strongly and louder than a agreement and endorsement. Also there will always be that tiny part of the player base that just wants to win harder and has little regard for how and why they achieve that. It's the same reason some people like to play games on the hardest difficulty settings and cheat their way through, while others pick the difficulty that suits them and face the challenge for its own sake. Also I am pretty confident that many people who shouted out their dislike an hour after the release came to like the change eventually - but failed to voice that as well. 

You guys at Hinterland did a marvellous job with Vigilant Flame - and don't let anyone tell you otherwise.

Why I believe that the system actually is amazing:

First of all it puts meaning into cooking in the first place. The Long Dark does a pretty good job of sticking to the important things without over-complicating things with unneeded details or too many options to chose from. Other games will present you hundreds of types of different foods to procure, The Long Dark will leave it at a mere two dozen (not counting beverages with other main uses such as teas and coffee), all of which have distinct strengths and weaknesses (for example salty crackers provide high calories for very little weight, but actually cost you a lot of thirst, while pinnacle peaches have a much worse calorie to weight balance, but actually also provide water and can be heated). The same can be said for clothing, weaponry, tools, and even available firewood. In short you could say: A key philosophy behind The Long Dark is to keep things as simple as possible while making them as detailed as necessary to provide an immersive experience rich in choices.

And to be honest: cooking simply lacked that, being a dull and, frankly, stupid click-button-repeatedly chore. This can still be said for simple crafting chores like preparing rose hips or making bandages. But while while procuring food is one of the cornerstones of the game, those task aren't and serve as mere chores you do when you either have need for the item, or time to kill. I also don't see how they could be done better since, while cooking does not necessarily require the immediate and constant attention of the player (or person for that matter) to work, all of those tasks do. Laying out some rose hips out on a table and hitting (meaning clicking) them with a knife wouldn't accomplish anything besides being that annoying level of detail The Long Dark masterfully avoids.

The way cooking works now it makes you organise around it and for it, and makes you come up with ways to use the time between putting on a pot of water and having it boiled to be potable. Some of those periods are long enough to actually do something in the meantime, like dressing up a rabbit, gathering more wood outside, mend or even partially craft clothes or perform above mentioned chores. It also encourages you to plan ahead and multitask instead of performing a linear set of activities. As a software developer you could say: The Long Dark is really embracing the concept of multi threading on a whole new level. :D In many ways this even makes "permafires" easier to sustain (cave dwelling 'lopers will know what I talk about).

This in and of itself makes the game more challenging as it requires you to plan ahead and keep track of time to make the most of it. Mastering this rewards you with food that basically cooks itself and frees up large portions of your time to do other things. Mismanaging this punishes you with long waiting times or even losing your food or water in the process. It's a basic concept of strategy games to reward the player for excelling at certain things, and it also encourages improving technique and strategy. Maybe some remember Blizzard's famous formula "easy to learn, hard to master", and the new cooking system is a prime example of embracing this style of design.

So, in conclusion: While The Long Dark hasn't gotten easier with the new cooking system, it has become better in that it enhances and emphasises an important part of the game the right way.

What the new cooking system actually changed besides cooking:

One aspect is that keeping track of fire burn times has become pivotal, as well as managing available firewood is more important now. It is true that you will require more resources to cook two kilograms venison now (94 minutes of fire) than before (40 minutes) on a fire with two cooking places. This even becomes worse with pot belly stoves (188 minutes), making them the now by far worst choice for cooking, downgrading them to mere heat dispensers protected from wind. And this 2 kg venison example is still true for stoves that have 6 cooking spots since you are not using 4 of them. But that also means that you can cook 6 kilograms of venison in 94 minutes instead of 120 before if you have access to such a stove. So, in short, you pay for the newly gained free time while cooking with firewood, and the place you cook at actually matters.

Which is another aspect. Before a fire was a fire was a fire, and in terms of cooking an indoor shelter would only be divided by either having a place to make fire or not. Now locations such as the Milton Manor or the Pleasant Valley Farmstead have gained a lot in value, while others like the Mystery Lake Camp Office of the Quonset Garage actually lost some of it for having only fireplaces with 2 cooking spots. I, personally, like this additional distinction in shelter quality (albeit I don't think some of those places should only have 2 cooking spots, but more on that later on), which, until now, had cooking not factored into the equation whatsoever.

With the introduction of the pot and the can there also is a distinct difference between cooking at home and cooking "on route" now. The pot is simply too heavy to carry around on casual travels, while the can is simply too limited to make an efficient cooking pot albeit light and readily available. It's again the same concept of choice and trade off to pick the right approach to the challenges faced, and it's evidence of good game design that The Long Dark does that.

But probably the most important thing that it changes is the fact that cooking two kilograms of venison and mending a military coat, which took 130 minutes before, now takes just the same 94 minutes to cook the venison while you can mend to the coat "for free" in terms of time spent (or cook for free, depending on how you see it). This not only allows you to spend more time outside, it requires you to spend more time outside - gathering wood. In turn this reduces your risk of cabin fever dramatically, but it also makes bad weather much more of a predicament than it used to be before. So using good weather to acquire firewood while using bad weather to do other indoor tasks has become more important and also more rewarding/punishing as well.

On the side lines keeping fires burning longer instead of lighting them in short bursts will save a good amount of matches (which can be a huge deal in the late game), but will eventually wear down your hatchets and hacksaws faster than you were used to it. This actually serves as a good example of how in game design turning a small valve makes the entire machine tick at a different pace.

Last but not least the new cooking system adds to the already well achieved immersion, which is one if not the key element for players that are more interested in the experience than actual achievement hunting - a description which probably fits roughly 50% of The Long Dark's player base, if not more. A dude from the Portal dev team said it pretty good (somehow like this): "Immersion is probably one of the things you notice the least when it's done right, but it is one of the most important things to make a game compelling to play."

What could / should still be improved:

While the new cooking system is amazing, I personally feel that there is still room for improvement. Most of these points have been raised repeatedly before by other people in some way or another, but I will list those I feel important to mention and provide my personal opinion on how to improve on the issue from a balanced game play perspective - and why it should be done.

  • Heating things up takes too long
    I can stockpile coffee and tea, but I cannot stockpile hot coffee and tea - but it still takes the same 25 minutes to heat them up. Same goes for canned food. I am not actually cooking these items, I am merely heating them up, without requiring to achieve a boiling point (which is the by far most energy intensive portion of cooking anything because, well, phase change). For comparison boiling 0.5 litres of water takes 19 minutes, while heating up 0.2 litres of coffee takes 25. I am somewhat fine with the fact that actually making the cup of coffee in the first place takes longer than just boiling water since you need the beverage to steep, but even then boiling times should be consistent with the normal water formula.

    Since 2 litres of water take 75 minutes to boil, 0.2 litres of water should take 7.5 minutes to boil. Add another 5 minutes to let it steep, and you arrive at 12.5 minutes to make tea and coffee, with merely heating it up would be capped at 7.5 minutes since there is no need for the steeping part, or even just 5 minutes since, yeah, well, no boiling required, as I mentioned. Also I don't see why using a pot for this would speed up the process if it doesn't for water. I would really like to see the 5 minute change since except for role playing reasons the only purpose of heating up your beverage is to combat the cold you are very likely to be dealing with on a timer already.

    As with canned food I think 25 minutes are a bit much, but I can get that from a game play perspective since heated canned food hits three birds with one stone (hunger, thirst, cold). Still, lowering this to 20 minutes with a can and 15 minutes with a pot, respectively, wouldn't break the game, and actually emphasise the value of these non-renewable food items as travel food.
     
  • Make eating raw meat pop up a confirmation box
    Probably the most requested change and certainly the most unfortunate design choice is the fact that trying to place raw meat ends up with eating it by accident much too often. Since there are very few, already dire situations when a player would actually want to eat raw meat, and swapping established button patterns for this specific interaction would probably mess more with the game than actually improving it, popping up a confirm box like we see when trying to burn an unread book should be the best course of action, at least when the action is prompted from the radial. I can get behind the idea that a person lacking the right amount of care could drink a bottle of unsafe water by accident, but not that the same person would eat raw meat by accident while trying to cook it.

 

  • While stoves are great, there are very few of them, and there is no in-between the stove and the campfire
    With putting new emphasis on how a shelter is equipped fireplace-wise, maybe upgrading the wood stoves and the fire barrels to 3 cooking spots would be a good idea.

    The main argument here is to provide key shelters with cooking options that outshine the camp fire just enough to make them the preferred choice if they were supposed to have an indoor fireplace in the first place. Both are fairly rare in the first place and usually reserved to safe houses. Plus: a player with advanced knowledge will realise that a campfire will provide better burn times (because being outside) while providing the same two cooking spots as the above mentioned. To offset this advantage in favour of the key shelters featuring either a wood stove or a fire barrel this would go a long way. I think it's a bad design choice to make a makeshift camp fire the superior alternative to a stationary indoor fire place as it is both unrealistic and actually counter-intuitive.
     
  • The "overcooking" margin should be relative to the actual cooking time
    It might sound funny at first, but actually overcooking and subsequently burning food becomes increasingly easier the longer it takes to cook it. When you cook a small piece of rabbit that takes 20 minutes you are less likely to pick a task that could end up taking 30 minutes longer than expected. If you cook a kilogram of moose meat this actually become much more realistic. Adjusting the mechanic in a way that the overcooking margin is 50% of the actual time to cook food / boil water (not applying cooking time bonuses gained from experience) would not only put in some realism, but also make it easier to multitask during longer cooking session while requiring more attention for short ones - again rewarding good organisation and planning instead of opportunistic game play.

    All things considered I am a big fan of the new cooking system and really, again, must commend Hinterland for taking brave steps that would have the potential to alienate players to make the game a richer, more complete and in good ways more challenging experience. I thank everyone that made it thru this pamphlet and I am keen on hearing thoughts on it from both fellow players and the dudes and dudettes at Hinterland.
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Fantastic analysis.  I think the cooking update is the most profound change to the game mechanics we've seen in years, while honouring and elevating the core themes of the game experience. I love it.

Personally, I'm not sure I agree with the confirmation box idea, but I would be happy with trading the "burn unread skill book" confirmation for the "eat raw meat" confirmation.  I think the "unread" status of the book should just be shown on the menu screen (uhh... if it isn't already... can't remember), no confirmation needed.

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Maybe instead of a confirmation box, we just require a double-click? Perhaps a click and hold.

Im right with you on your feedback. At first it proved to be challenging and "harder", but once you learn how it works you can actually squeeze in quite a bit of extra work and efficiency. 

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One piece of UI feedback - although this has probably been mentioned already somewhere in the forums (sorry I don't keep up as much as I'd like to):

The severe inconsistency between placing containers vs. placing food into cooking slots from the radial menu. With cans and pots, you *have* to left click; with food, you *have* to right click. To a person who has occasional (and even very mild) dyslexia, this is torturous. Is the situation similar with controllers? Can we make it right click for all?

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Maybe instead of a confirmation box, simply disable eating raw meat in the radial menu?  As @jeffpeng notes, it's an extreme edge case to eat raw meat.   Make folks eat it from inventory.

Jeff, nice analysis.   I've really, really enjoyed the cooking system myself.   The game feels much more alive to me now.  

Regarding done-cooking-but-not-yet-burned times (aka "ready" times), I agree they can be too short.   Did you know that ready times increase by +20% at cooking skill level 4, and are still at +20% at level 5?  Making a can of water at level 5 takes 26 minutes.  The cook time + ready time is only 62 minutes and it's a frantic click-fest to collect two cans of water before they dry up if you multitasked the job with an hour-long task (which are very common: sleep, pass time, read, craft, etc.).  If the ready time is 13 minutes (50% as per your suggestion) that's 39 minutes total... not much you can multitask with 39 minutes.  Cooking fish suffers even more than water from multitasking limitations.

Personally I'd love to see increases in cooking skill reward the player with greatly increased ready times, for more multitasking flexibility.

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Guest jeffpeng

I personally would love to see something more intuitive that blends better into the game than a confirm box as well. I just simply lack the right idea, and I'm pretty sure Hinterland wasn't aware of the issue, but also didn't know how to fix it "properly".

Of course you could make it some sort of twisted mouse button vodoo, but The Long Dark get's by without explanations other than item descriptions and immediate requirements how to cure an ailment, and it would be kinda sad if the text to actually eat raw meat would be something like "to really eat press the left mouse button and then hold it while drawing a smiley with the mouse".

The main reason why I dislike the confirm box is not only that it breaks the very immersive UI, but also because it actually alarms you that raw meat is a bad idea simply by asking if you want to eat it. Thinking back at it my first encounter with raw meat was like "wow, this has more calories, and I don't even need to cook it!", while my third or fourth went like "Damn, I'm dying" .... which was a lesson learned for life and many lives after. And imho TLD's learning curve is a big part of what makes it compelling at the start.

This is also the reason why whatever eating mechanic would need to be consistent with everything else you eat in the game. Maybe changing it from left click to left hold - like the time you need to draw a bow for a minimum shot, which is long enough to realise and correct your mistake by releasing the button early enough, but also quick enough not to feel cumbersome, so I actually quite like that idea. But again - it would have to be consistent for all foods and drinks, and that again would certainly annoy some people.

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3 hours ago, jeffpeng said:

"Immersion is probably one of the things you notice the least when it's done right, but it is one of the most important things to make a game compelling to play."

I really like this quote.

My favourite thing about Vigilant Flame is the way that it brings interaction with certain objects and tasks out of the menu and into the 'world'. For me, the more this can be achieved in every aspect UI, the better - as a general principle. I'd love to see t his expanded to other parts of the game, wherever it can be.

The first time I used the new cooking mechanic, it literally brought a broad smile to my face: it felt like I was cooking, not clicking menu items. And I can't emphasize too much how important this is, and how much better it is now from before for that reason alone. The extra strategic element of it - multi-tasking, planning, etc - that comes with it is obviously important to me as well - and I agree with everything in the post on those aspects -  but its the immersion factor that I like the most, personally.

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Guest jeffpeng
2 minutes ago, Ruruwawa said:

Regarding done-cooking-but-not-yet-burned times (aka "ready" times), I agree they can be too short.   Did you know that ready times increase by +20% at cooking skill level 4, and are still at +20% at level 5?  Making a can of water at level 5 takes 26 minutes.  The cook time + ready time is only 62 minutes and it's a frantic click-fest to collect two cans of water before they dry up if you multitasked the job with an hour-long task (which are very common: sleep, pass time, read, craft, etc.).  If the ready time is 13 minutes (50% as per your suggestion) that's 39 minutes total... not much you can multitask with 39 minutes.  Cooking fish suffers even more than water from multitasking limitations.

Personally I'd love to see increases in cooking skill reward the player with greatly increased ready times, for more multitasking flexibility.

Thank you for the right term. "Ready" time just refused to roll off my tongue. And I had a parenthesis in there somewhere that the cooking bonus from experience/levels should NOT apply to that - because in some cases that would actually make cooking harder rather than easier, as you pointed out very well. And yes I knew cooking skill improved ready time, but I was under the impression that was with level 5.

Actually my original idea was that the ready time of water would actually be calculated off of only the boiling portion, not both melting and boiling, but that would make boiling water in cans in outdoor situations where you squeeze in some opportunistic sleep ( :D ) nigh impossible, even without any cooking skill (18.5*2+18.5/2 = 46.25 == :(). So yeah, I see the flaw in that thinking. Thank you!

Maybe another approach would yield more favorable results:

  • Base ready time for water and canned food on 100% boiling time, except 150% when boiling in a can (18.5 + 18.5 + 27.75 = 64.75). You can even explain this with the reduced surface area (which plays a role in vaporising even boiling water, just not to that extent)
  • Still base ready time for meat on 50% cooking time
  • Add 100% of time shaved off of cooking times by improving the cooking skill to the ready time instead, and this way prevent any unwanted "disadvantages" from getting better at something meaning no matter how good you get at cooking, food will always be ready the same amount of time. You could even explain this somewhat realistically with the fact that cooking something isn't going 30% faster just because you know how to cook, but that you actually developed a better understanding when something is ready. I honestly know people that would burn every piece of poultry to a crisp just to make sure it's well done, and even at least one person that is oblivious to the difference between "hot" water that bubbles a little bit and actually "boiling" water.

In any case, thank you for your insights, @Ruruwawa!

Another idea that just came to my mind:

Add an inventory option to "slice" up raw meat in quarters of up to 250 grams using a knife and a bit of time (5 min?) This way you could actually prepare smaller meals for occasions when you don't have time to wait for the full thing to cook, have nothing to multitask and/or have more cooking spots than actually things to cook, with the drawback being having to invest a small portion of additional time and the heavily reduced ready time. But this way you could cut the time it takes to cook a piece of venison from 94 minutes to 23.5 * 4 /2 + 5 = 52 minutes (or 55%) using a two slot fireplace but would lose the ability to squeeze in a power nap since 23.5 + 23.5/2 = 35.25 is way too short for that (again: choices and trade offs), but still have enough to grab another branch or two, or prepare some rose hips for your sprained wrist. As this option would be buried in the inventory screen it would not confuse new players, but be something a real 'loper would know how and when to use. Plus I imagine that this would make some interesting uses in laying tracks for wolves to follow.

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1 hour ago, jeffpeng said:

Add an inventory option to "slice" up raw meat in quarters of up to 250 grams using a knife and a bit of time (5 min?) This way you could actually prepare smaller meals for occasions when you don't have time to wait for the full thing to cook, have nothing to multitask and/or have more cooking spots than actually things to cook, with the drawback being having to invest a small portion of additional time and the heavily reduced ready time.

Excellent idea!

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@jeffpeng "Ready" times wasn't my term... I got it from the UI.   It didn't click for me either at first, but TBH I don't have a better term.  Besides it's short and I'd guess that's important for UI / localization, so I'm good with it. :)

 

15 hours ago, jeffpeng said:

And yes I knew cooking skill improved ready time, but I was under the impression that was with level 5.

I think you're right.  I got the info about level 4 off the wiki a couple weeks ago, since I'd failed to notice while playing.   Looks like the wiki has be updated since then.

 

15 hours ago, jeffpeng said:

Base ready time for water and canned food on 100% boiling time, except 150% when boiling in a can (18.5 + 18.5 + 27.75 = 64.75). You can even explain this with the reduced surface area (which plays a role in vaporising even boiling water, just not to that extent)

Currently ready times for a cookpot are 20% longer than for a can (also, cooking times are 20% shorter).  So more math to add to your equations.  ;)  Math aside, as a RL cooking nerd this makes sense to me.  The nuances of cooking are almost always easier to manage in heavy cookware.   From the TLD gameplay perspective, this choice provides a nice tradeoff:  cooking efficiency or carry weight?  For anyone with a strategic approach to the game this sort of tradeoff is very welcome.  So I'm not in favor of making the can have superior ready times to the cookpot.

 

15 hours ago, jeffpeng said:
  • Still base ready time for meat on 50% cooking time
  • Add 100% of time shaved off of cooking times by improving the cooking skill to the ready time instead

Personally I'd prefer a simpler -- and far less "mathy" -- approach.  I'd point to the burn time bonus from the Fire Starting skill as an example: at level 5 fires last 50% longer.  If I think about fire starting in RL, I know some tricks to prepare the wood and tend the fire, and I might really be able to get 50% more duration out of the same fuel.  In TLD the tricks the player uses to extend the burn time are abstracted away.  But +50% burn time is indeed an awesome reward, with a meaningful impact on gameplay.

And that's the kind of reward I'd like to see from the high-level Cooking bonuses.   I've done plenty actual cooking on campfires and wood stoves in RL, and I know some tricks to keep food warm for a few hours without becoming ruined.  Like the tricks to eek more burn time, these can be abstracted away IMO.   So I want to see generous amounts of ready time to multitask in my level 5 bonus, not just a miserly bare minimum.  After all, the only upside for the player is food that doesn't get ruined.  On the other hand they pay a hefty tax in fuel for the fire.  Another tradeoff!  I think that's great.

 

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Guest jeffpeng
5 hours ago, Ruruwawa said:

Personally I'd prefer a simpler -- and far less "mathy" -- approach.  

Good point about the mathematics. I tend to forget that they don't come as easy to everyone. But I think we do agree on the point that becoming better at cooking shouldn't make managing it harder. So keeping parity of percentages of "Reduced cooking time" and "Extended ready time" should pretty much do the trick without making a calculator a recommended accessory to play. I really do value your perspective on this :-)

Overall I am very positively surprised of how well this pretty damn long post was perceived, and how open both the community and the developers are to suggestions and discussions.

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17 hours ago, Ruruwawa said:

So I want to see generous amounts of ready time to multitask in my level 5 bonus, not just a miserly bare minimum.  After all, the only upside for the player is food that doesn't get ruined.  On the other hand they pay a hefty tax in fuel for the fire.  Another tradeoff!  I think that's great.

This.

Also great thread, +1 to OP.

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I too have now run into the high level cooking = extra good at boiling water issue.

An hour activity gives me 3 in game minutes to get my boiling can before it burns away. Lower level cooking was way better in terms of ease of this, which kind of defeats the point.

I think ignore %. The time that cooking is reduced needs to be the same TIME that the not ruined/boiled away is also extended.

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Great post @jeffpeng. Two points I'd like to add:

  • Now you can cook at multiple fires at once, you can now A) set multiple fires with different wind orientations to pretty much gaurentee that, when the wind takes out one fire, another fire is still burning and B) you can set a series of fires to burn out exactly when things will be cooked.
  • I'm really glad Hinterland feel confident enough to make a significant and engage the community on it even if it proves devicive.

And lastly I too worry that getting better at cooking might make managing it harder. 

 

 

 

 

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On 7/25/2018 at 3:47 PM, jeffpeng said:

Of course you could make it some sort of twisted mouse button vodoo, but The Long Dark get's by without explanations other than item descriptions and immediate requirements how to cure an ailment, and it would be kinda sad if the text to actually eat raw meat would be something like "to really eat press the left mouse button and then hold it while drawing a smiley with the mouse".

I've seen people make the mistake of accidentally eating raw meat while cooking, and thinking to myself, "how is this possible?". Today I made that mistake with a fire.  Left side rock with a pot, and right side without. Cooking meat on both sides. Left click cooking pot to cook meat, right click meat in UI wheel to place on rock. I messed up trying to right click on the wheel and place the meat in the cooking pot but found that the pot is activated by left click to choose what to cook. I think some of the confusion can be removed if right clicking on meat in the UI wheel and dragging to a pot would work. It trains the brain in cooking with meat to always use right click. Anything else with a can or cooking/pot is left.

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Guest jeffpeng
5 hours ago, Stone said:
  • Now you can cook at multiple fires at once, you can now A) set multiple fires with different wind orientations to pretty much gaurentee that, when the wind takes out one fire, another fire is still burning and B) you can set a series of fires to burn out exactly when things will be cooked.

 

That is true, but having more than one fire at once also requires multiple instances of firewood. So this only really is a choice if you are drowning in firewood or have no prolonged need for heat. So I can see that being a thing in voyageur or even stalker at later stages, but hardly ever on 'loper. Then again a lot of things don't really happen on 'loper, so that's probably not the best kind of argument.

But it is a very good example of the tricks and nuances there are to learn with the new system, just like being able to use proximity heat to warm up beverages and canned food. Speaking of it: I think the proximity heat thing is a great thing, and I also like how it isn't explicitly documented, and the game doesn't stick your nose into it. You have to kinda figure it out on your own, and it has this "Cool, this really works" experience. It's a bit wonky that you have to "re-place" coffee and stuff next to a fire after lighting it, but I figure that's something that will eventually be worked out. So, yeah, considering that my previous point about not being able to stockpile hot coffee was only half true. You indeed can stockpile it as long as you got a fire going, which is something cave dwellers have been known to do all night or even round the clock.

I would personally like to see the game build more on these kinds of interactions as they make the world feel "alive" in a very silent, background-ish but exciting way.

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