Frostpunk 2 - Long Live The Oil

[cvv]

If all of this is as sandboxy as it should be it might actually be quite a solid improvement on the first game

Depends who you ask, definitely not for me. I'm not much of a sandbox person, never really enjoyed stuff like Skylines or Minecraft or some such - i.e. here's a bunch of toys and make your own fun. I've always preferred more structured, goal-based gameplay like Settlers or Anno. Absolutely loved the survivalist, rogue-like twist in Frostpunk 1.

F1 is in my Top10 of the last decade, F2 is my most anticipated game rn and if they actually plan to abandon what made the first game so unique and go for a more traditional sandboxy city building my face's gonna be tired and sad.

 

[Infinitron]

 

[Hellraiser]

If the gameplay trailer is just around the corner why not fucking release it instead of a few second clip showing a glorified screenshot of the fucking city?

 

[thesheeep]

If the gameplay trailer is just around the corner why not fucking release it instead of a few second clip showing a glorified screenshot of the fucking city?

We live in the age of teasers for teasers for trailers and announcement dates for announcement dates for announcement dates.

It's all a bit insane.

 

[Lagole Gon]

All these years have passed and I still laugh when I remember the first moral decision you make in the game.

Sending children to work (Nooo, children should learn, not work!).

Imagine this being a controvesial moral choice in an industrial revolution britbong all-hands-on-deck apocalypse setting.

 

[axx]

Sending children to work should be enabled in all games. They lack discipline.

 

[Nirvash]

Yes, sending the childrens to work... out in the polar cold, doing hazard jobs with barely any supervision of safety, truly a no brainer choice i guess.

 

[PanteraNera]

 

[-M-]

Nothing sells a game more than nonstop incessant whining into your ear about how bad you're doing.

 

[cvv]

Yea but when?

The fuck?

 

[-M-]

Yea but when?

The fuck?

The official channel (not IGN) says first half of 2024.

So probably June.

 

[mediocrepoet]

Nothing sells a game more than nonstop incessant whining into your ear about how bad you're doing.

"We have no idea how to market this thing" the trailer.

 

[Dickie]

Nothing sells a game more than nonstop incessant whining into your ear about how bad you're doing.

And call it the "gameplay trailer."

 

[Hellraiser]

Considering they did the same with the marketing of the first game my bar was already set low for the "gameplay" trailer for the sequel.

Only thing it revealed is that there is some kind of heat conduits, which might be built automatically without player input when a district is laid down. Everything else was already explained in more detail in the pcgamer shill piece based on the gamescon presentation.

I'll wait for more previews/shill pieces that reveal something about the changes they made to the gameplay, especially the district system and how oil factors into the game.

 

[cvv]

I just really fucking hope they aren't gonna strip most of the survival elements of the game in favour of massively boosting the political management aspect of F1.

If my main concern is with passing laws and managing people's morale instead of mining resources and managing heat/food, I'm out.

 

[Data4]

Looking forward to Steward!: The Stewarding.

 

[Infinitron]

Coming July 25th:

 

[-M-]

Been watching a good amount of the beta. Very different game from the original. Survival and city building seem to take backseat to politics and exploration. You zone districts instead of placing individual buildings. Time ticks by in days instead of minutes. There is no night time or heat map (temperature is in a small font in the corner instead of being front and center).

The politics are somewhat interesting. You start with two opposing factions to please: the Foragers (hippies) and the Machinists (industrialists). Eventually more extreme factions splinter off from them: Ice Bloods from Foragers, and Technocrats from Machinists. You make deals and promises to get laws passed (from a 100 member council).

Looks decent, just completely different from the original game.

 

[-M-]

https://store.steampowered.com/news/app/1601580/view/4203628368742496775

Release date pushed to September 20.

 

[cvv]

I played a few hours yesterday, visuals are jaw-dropping, sound design from the outer world, everything is so smooth and elegant and stylish.

I did have fun but I wonder if something was lost with the game being much more macro than F1. And I also wonder if the voting system (you can't just pass any law you want, you have to pander to and appease various factions to gain their support in the "Parliament") is gonna be getting on my nerves in a few days.

Verdict is still out.

 

[-M-]

Also played a few hours. Similar to the first in that the presentation, atmosphere, and production values are all very good, while the actual gameplay is serviceable but leans towards the middling side (No one thinks FP1 is a legit great city builder).

The city building aspect is even weaker in FP2. Everything is hex-based and you have to "frostbreak" the area you want to build first which becomes very annoying very quickly. In part because you can't just "frostbreak" one or two hexes, you have to pay for eight each time when you often need far fewer. Same goes for districts, everything is six hexes, and you have to expand by three. The way everything is predetermined never allows it to feel like "your" city. The only strategic planning you get to do is cramming all the districts close to each other for a heat bonus. Also, as far as I can tell you can't ramp up production by building a district around mulitple resource nodes. You have to build multiple districts that encapsulate fewer nodes each. It's very unintuitive and the tutorial does no favors in explaining.

The politics are fun, but begin to feel like a novelty after a few hours. You basically start with three factions that you try to appease in order to garner enough support to pass laws, but as the game progresses they become more radical and splinter into more extreme sub-factions which usually cause trouble for you (think hippies to eco-terrorists or neighborhood watch to secret police).

The game does lose something by giving the player a far less intimate attachment to the city with thousands of citizens opposed to hundreds in the first game. Days and weeks fly by in seconds and the only glimpse you get of your denizens are the lights like from time-lapse photography as they rush around the city. The entire time scale is rather poor here to be honest. It takes hundreds of people multiple weeks to build rather simple projects (first game it took 10 people a few hours to build a house). It's for gameplay reasons, I get it, but I couldn't help but laugh when in the prologue you're told to collect food for the blizzard that's due to arrive in...90 WEEKS.

So far it's a decent game, but I'd wait for a sale. Haven't finished the campaign but so far it's alright.

 

[cvv]

No one thinks FP1 is a legit great city builder

Yea that would be p. stupid because it's not one and never aimed to be one, quite obviously.

It aimed to be a unique narrative-driven builder/survival/feelz rogue-lite hybrid and it succeeded divinely at that.

 

[Mark.L.Joy]

Played a few hours, limiting factor is population so you are just moving sliders up and down while watching paint dry, dunno what else is there in the game.

 

[Dark Souls II]

>Survival-oriented post-apocalyptic setting where mankind's very existence is at stake
>You cannot lower the age of consent to increase birthrate

 

[cvv]

Played a few hours, limiting factor is population so you are just moving sliders up and down while watching paint dry, dunno what else is there in the game.

And Elden Ring is just twiddling your sticks and occasionally pushing a button. Big deal.