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Which Period Of A Career Game To You Enjoy The Most?


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I'm just curious to know if anybody enjoys any particular phase of a career game in KSP?

Are you like me for example who really enjoys the early days as the Kerbal Space Program struggles to "break the chains of gravity", scraping every last little fraction of a point of science from various biomes to unlock the nodes in the tech tree which will let you get your first little Kerbanaut into orbit, and then the Mun and Minmus?  Or maybe you enjoy spreading throughout the Kerbol system in huge ships you've had to assemble in LKO, planting your flags and setting up colonies?

As I've already said, it's the early game I enjoy the most, and indeed it's the early days of space exploration in the real world I find much more interesting than anything that came post Apollo too.

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After everything is done and it plays like sandbox mode.

Which is why I just play sandbox.

Or science mode. That's fun because I can direct my own missions and don't ever have to worry about grinding cash while still enjoying reasonable progression.

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After you made it into orbit, you just get glued to your screen for a few hours, progressing, without even knowing the time. You just get stuck in there, feeling like you are in the game.

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I really look forward to, and rush for the ISRU, whereupon colonization efforts begin.

However, I'm having plenty of fun carting around busloads of tourists, dealing with the sudden but inevitable rescue missions that result, and improving the local infrastructure to assist future rescue operations.

Breaking out of a flat spin 10km over KSC after a spaceplane broke its tail stabilizer on minmus, KAS delivery and installation of replacement LV-Ns to the surface of Mün.  Extracting tourists with a claw from a misshapen heap of wreckage 180 degrees away from the Minmus base.  Completing tours on a completely wingless spaceplane after a too-shallow ascent.

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My favorite is probably right when I'm going interplanetary. If you set the science gains just right and don't try to cull every last drop of science points from everywhere, it can be quite fun planning an interplanetary mission with mostly 1.25m parts.

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My favorite spot is the point where I'm making Mun and Minmus bases, and simultaneously going interplanetary. The first steps are a close second though, especially in my one save, where I built my first rockets using KIS. Talk about an achievement when I made orbit!

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My present game has been dormant long enough that I am already thinking about re-starting.  Presently I am playing with life-support for the first time, but though I am playing with Antenna Range I didn't have "line of sight" ticked, which I now perceive to have been rather the torpedo in my efforts at simulation.  If I restart, it will be at 10% science rewards and the correct settings for communication, and I will Treasure trying to do the most with the least, and see if I can do a Grand Tour probe with part count limits and with bargain basement engines.  That will be Fun.  :]

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1 hour ago, Just Jim said:

Later in the career, when you've unlocked the tech tree, but haven't been much past Eve or Duna... and start getting the really hardcore contract offers like building a base on Tylo....

Or get a contract to bring a class E asteroid to Moho of all places... 

Dear god, I must have slipped clicking Accept on that offer... 

I like the part of career where you fist leave Kerbin's sphere of influence and go to Duna or Gilly.

 

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The early game, the first Mun and minmus landings. I still remember feeling like Armstrong when i first landed Jeb for the first time on the Mun!

It is exciting but easy (well, easy due to years of experience) to play, then there are Duna manned missions and forth, they are funny too but start being mindcracking.

I also love the Jool System Mothership (for landing and possibly returning from most bodies there) part, although it requires too much planing, thinking and playing!

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I think its safe to say that everybody who plays career likes the early game, as after you unlocked the tech tree its the same as sandbox anyway

it is a shame the unlocking the tech tree does not take you out of the kerbin system if you play efficient, what probably all of the more experienced players will do.

for me after the early game of getting to orbit, most of the fun comes from multiple missions at the same time, it can we a bit of a laughter when you find a abandoned escape pod who totally missed its window to get the your station after you forgot to set a maneuver node alarm.

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I play a stock career every new update, then come post about it on the forum for many months, so I guess my favorite period of KSP career is afterwards, complaining about it.

 

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As most have stated, the early game is fun. Unlocking each new tech node at that point makes such a difference.

I also really enjoy the point where lunar bases, the first kerballed interplanetary missions, and tourist trips to both moons start. I love trying to come up with new ways to fit more and more tourists and trainees onto a single ship for the latter (and I feel like the mk3 spaceplane parts are kind of cheaty as far as how many kerbals they fit, so I don't use them).

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KSP career seems to break down fairly distinctly for me into three phases:  early, mid, and late career.  And my favorite one generally works out to be "whichever one I haven't done for the longest time."  :)

My career lifecycle generally looks something like this:

  1. I start a new career.
  2. Love the early career!  Everything happens fast, it's simple, it's laser-focused on each individual mission, just getting to orbit is a challenge.  Enjoy the heck out of it.
  3. After a while, the novelty wears off and I start wishing for something a little meatier.
  4. It's mid-career time!  Yay!  Hey look, I can do all this fancy stuff that I couldn't do in early career.  Get out there and start launching lots of missions!  Build a comm network, start hitting other planets to fill out the top end of the tech tree, set big wheels in motion to prepare the way for the Big Story Arc of late career.
  5. After a while, the novelty wears off and I start wanting to get to the real pay-dirt of late career where I can build big grandiose stuff (just what kind of stuff depends on the career-- I plan a different story arc for each one.)
  6. It's late-career time!  Yay!  Hey look, I can go anywhere and do anything.  Now I can do whatever I want!  Plow lots of blissful hours into setting up an extraordinarily elaborate system of mutually complementary missions to advance the grand story arc of the career.
  7. After a while, I've accomplishd the goals.  "I want to go there!" has morphed into "Been there, done that".  It's satisfying, but not exciting on a minute-by-minute basis, the way it was back at the start of the career.
  8. Go back to step 1.  :)

Basically, each time I move from early career to mid career to late career to starting the process all over again, there's an adrenaline rush of novelty.  So I guess my short answer to the question "Which phase of KSP career do you enjoy most?" is:  The next one.

It's the circle of life.

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2 minutes ago, Snark said:

KSP career seems to break down fairly distinctly for me into three phases:  early, mid, and late career.  And my favorite one generally works out to be "whichever one I haven't done for the longest time."  :)

Basically, each time I move from early career to mid career to late career to starting the process all over again, there's an adrenaline rush of novelty.  So I guess my short answer to the question "Which phase of KSP career do you enjoy most?" is:  The next one.

It's the circle of life.

[Edited by adsii1970]

This... this is how I describe how I play and the way I see the game.

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Early career.  Which is mostly what I end up playing.

Every new version, I'll start a career.  Then I add mods, so I start a new career.  Then I get bored and stop playing for a while.

Then I come back and start a new career.

 

My current career (13th since I started tracking them) has one mission completed, and two more planned.  It's been two months since I've played it.

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17 hours ago, Noud said:

I think its safe to say that everybody who plays career likes the early game, as after you unlocked the tech tree its the same as sandbox anyway

it is a shame the unlocking the tech tree does not take you out of the kerbin system if you play efficient, what probably all of the more experienced players will do.

for me after the early game of getting to orbit, most of the fun comes from multiple missions at the same time, it can we a bit of a laughter when you find a abandoned escape pod who totally missed its window to get the your station after you forgot to set a maneuver node alarm.

That is a very unsafe thing to say.  When I start a new career now, I give myself all the science so I can fund my program without going through that terribly unbalanced tech tree.  My career really begins when the tech tree is finished, not before.

Unlocking tech tree nodes is just annoying.

Edited by Alshain
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1 hour ago, passinglurker said:

You have no Idea how wrong you just thought :P

To the extent any part of the current career system is fun, I would actually agree it is early on. Much past that point, there is no possibility of failing at anything reasonable. The caveat for my play is I don't do stupid contracts. A contract could be very challenging, but if I cannot suspend disbelief that it belongs in my program, it doesn't belong in career.

Krazy Kwests don't cut it for me.

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I'm thinking on attempting a SSTO program in career to show that not only Mark Thrimm can do it. Plus I want to make a message to Mark Thrimm that supernovae industries is close behind him in terms of structure and planning. The trickiest parts of the program will be the planes, but I might just do mainly rocket SSTO's for the sake of it...

Also it's due to the face that I see to have the supernatural ability of construction rockets with SSTO status without even testing them, and then use them.

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