Bugs, features, or other?

[nightguard]

I picked up this game a few days ago, and I've been enjoying it quite a bit. I've always had a soft spot for life sims, and the amount of option overload really appeals to me as well. That said, while this is certainly an ambitious project/game, there have been a couple issues that have me wondering.

 

First of all, while skills seem to be raised properly when actions or spells increase your subskills, they don't seem to reset back to their correct base value when the subskills go back to their base values. For example, I use Mathematical Acuity to raise my two lowest Befriend subskills, and notice an increase in the overall skill. (Funny that you can run the numbers on making friends, but hey, it's magic.) When the spell ends and the subskills returned to their lower value, I still had the increased Befriend skill until one of the subskills changed again, thereby triggering a new skill value check.

 

Some items and locations don't seem to unlock the abilities associated with them when acquired. I'm not sure if this is expected or not, but it's a little confusing. For example, I picked up the Epic: Kensab the Ilician, which has an ability tied to it that is supposed to increase your running subskill. However, I don't seem to have the option to use that ability, and it isn't a continuous ability either, as far as I could tell.

 

Lastly, it seems a little odd that you can't tell which day your exams are on. After all, these aren't pop quizzes, but scheduled midterms. However, the action simply says "Exam", and I couldn't find any indication of what exam it was until I actually took it. Given that most of your abilities focus around temporarily improving your skills, shouldn't you have some notice of when to make use of them?

 

That's all for now. I have to admit, I'm fascinated by what this game is trying to do. I've played other life sims before, but none of them attempted to breathe life into the various other characters in the world the way this one does, and I really appreciate the amount of work that went into making that happen. (My computer notices the amount of work that it has to do to make that all happen, too, but that's what a number box is for, right?)

 

~NightGuard

[Legate of Mineta]

NightGuard;

 

Thanks for raising these issues!

 

The first is a known issue, and we believe it is related to the Item exploit bug. I believe it will be corrected in Patch 2, due to release this weekend.

 

I just looked at Kensab the Ilician, and this is a bug. The Ability has an incorrect Type set which is preventing its use. This will be corrected in the first content patch. If you note any others like this, don't hesitate to name them so I can check.

 

For the Exams, it's been requested that the Class be named on the Calendar. It's a little more difficult than it sounds, unfortunately. If we can make the change, though, we will.

[nightguard]

I have a handful of additional items to address. I know there is an extensive suggestions thread in the main forum, but I feel that these are all either potentially bugs or features, and I'm not sure which, so I will continue to address them here unless directed otherwise.

 

In training your familiar, it doesn't appear to be possible to see how many skill steps your familiar needs to actually advance a level in a skill. When accessing the skill help page, it appears that the skill steps readout at the top of the page always reflects on your character's skills and advancement. Perhaps I'm overlooking an obvious source of this information, or it may have been an intentional design choice, I'm not sure. A little clarification in this regard would be appreciated.

 

When attributes improve, it reduces the number of skill steps required to advance a level in a skill, but does not appear to check if the skills that have changed in step requirement should level. I assume this is either something that wasn't considered or a feature, and will be perfectly content if the answer is such. Also, it appears that the skill in question will correctly advance to the next level after earning another skill step, even if you've already earned as many (or more) skill steps than needed.

 

That's all I have for now. I will probably start up a new character soon with an eye towards helping squash any bugs that I run across, particularly the troublesome 'missing actions' bugs. With all the options in this game, I can easily see where even an extensive beta testing process could have missed a few here and there.

[Legate of Mineta]

Night;

 

There is no place to see that, unfortunately. I'll see if I can get that information shown on the Familiar screen, though.

 

It was considered, but not acted upon, because of how the temporary increases work.

 

Our beta was over nine months long, and yet...still there are dark areas. And never mind the consistent rule: fix one thing, break another. Ah, the life of a developer.

 

Thanks!