Thoran's feedback

[Thoran]

My current progress:
34 achievements done, everything unlocked, got both slime keys, and too much money!

1) Positives
- Addictive
- Original
- Excellent art style
- Exciting possibilities with Slime breeding
- Excellent controls, being able to run and fly feels great too
- The only gun in the game should remind just about everyone of the Gravity gun in HL2 which might be the funniest weapon ever made

2) Negatives
- Addictive
- The Garden system isn't particularly obvious to understand

3) Bugs I found but couldn't report in the heat of the moment
- Teleporting while carrying a Largo causes the Largo to be stuck at the Ranch teleport pod; they tend to get out after a while but cannot be sucked or pushed out
- Corrals created on a couple specific spots seem to make slimes vanish, explanation : the corrals I've experienced the issue with where both located on the first spot to the left of each expansion. What would essentially happen is when I leave the expansion and come back, one or more slime would vanish. I've tried staring at the corrals until a slime actually leaves but it just wouldn't happen, hence my thinking it could be a bug.
- StarMails tend to "disappear/reappear" when waiting for the next morning
- In the Video tab, when changing the resolution and hitting apply, a prompt to confirm changes appears. By hitting escape, the menu disappears but the prompt remains and cannot be clicked, causing it to stay at the middle of the screen until it times out
- Gold Slimes seem to clip through just about everything, making the Hat trick achievement really hard to get (impossible even?)
4) Realistic suggestions
- The Garden could use of a little tutorial
- The Garden could use of a Vacuum much like Corrals for Plorts
- It would be useful to have an indicator of progress when fetching items for the Exchange
- Upgrades to allow storing more different items in the Vacuum

5) Subjective suggestions
- Make the house somewhat customisable, perhaps more than a still image in the future
- Implementing slime reproduction and growth
- I've seen one of the traders mentioning recipes, I'm unsure this will be a feature in game, but it would be great. Perhaps recipes could be used to create new ranch parts, gun upgrades etc. Seems like slimes are themed after things you could somewhat call materials, water, rock, gold etc..there could just be iron, wood, fire and so on.

This is a draft, I will add to it as I keep finding out stuffs to mention.

[CrazeePi]

I don't see what's so hard to understand about gardens. Did you think you were supposed to put chickens in the big machine or something?

[Thoran]

No, I was more referring to the fact that sometimes, my garden would lose its crops entirely. I'm now starting to believe it was in fact a bug, but without any instructions on how they work I really can't tell. I'll explain in more details what I've experienced with them and how I "fixed" it, maybe that'll help you understand why I came to that conclusion:
- I've initially setup 3 gardens, one in each expansion plus the main area
- Obviously first off didn't figure out where to throw the vegetables/fruits, would throw them straight on the soil, nothing happened. Quickly figured there was a "mouth" to throw stuffs in (again when you're testing you have to put yourself in the mind of a stupid person or better yet, be stupid)
- Crops would grow, I'd reap them, expecting that more would grow on top of the reaped ones. It didn't always; sometimes the garden would grant me a couple harvest before the crops completely disappear, sometimes one, sometimes none.
- So there's the issue: when do crops disappear, are they supposed to, does putting more vegetables/fruits in the garden increase the yield, etc.
It is that incredible to think one couldn't figure out entirely how it works? Hopefully you'll understand that not everything will seem obvious to everyone at first and testers are also here to report on that.
I'd also appreciate if you refrained from making that kind of comments. This is my feedback, it isn't up for debate, it's just a summary of my feelings about the game.

[Kiba]

Gardens only last for a few harvests. It's best to replant with one of whatever you reaped every time you harvest, that way they'll never run out.

[SpiralRancher02]

my garden would lose its crops entirely. I'm now starting to believe it was in fact a bug

Do you mean they stop growing, or the plant is still there but the fruits are gone?

After a while, the garden crops will fall out automatically. Search your ranch for any lying around.

[Thoran]

Got it all figured already, the point of my complaint is to say it wasn't obvious what was going on, not that I didn't understand eventually how it works!