Has KSP... changed?

[henryrasia]

First and foremost: I adore this game and its developers.

But, I cannot help but notice how the vibe, the feel of playing KSP has changed. Not for the better or worse (if anyone shares this thinking let me know the adjective) but different.

Before it felt like a very funky game where you strapped rockets together and hoped for the best. Also the Mun and other places felt more gamey, more Kerbal. Also the lack of advanced things led people to come up with crazy (and very Kerbal) solutions such as the landing-leg-hugger docking style. Now KSP feels more real and human, much less Kerbal (and explosions and failures don't quite make up for it).

Do you feel the same? Is this good or bad? Or maybe the simple fact that I'm now experienced and KSP hasn't had its "campaign" developed that creates this feeling.

i am really curious of what veterans and newcomers think of this, so please leave a comment. Thank you.

[rotorwashed]

I think that its more likely that you've changed, that is to say you've gotten better. When I first started playing ksp it was almost entirely making (in retrospect) wacky contraptions that were extremely inefficient if they worked at all. If by some miracle I was able to get them into orbit I was equally as clueless with orbits and rendezvous. This all made ksp a very fun game, as I never knew what I was going to have to deal with next.

Now though, through thousands of trial and error flights and research, Ive gotten to the point where all my designs are streamlined and efficient. They are well balanced and work the first time almost everytime. on top of that orbital maneuvers and rendezvous has become childs play, I hardly even bother with maneuver nodes unless im transferring soi's. This has completely changed how the game feels to me. Instead of exploring the intricacies of building and flying spacecraft, I'm exploring the ksp world, finding anomalies and setting my own goals.

Its still extremely enjoyable either way of course

[AlamoVampire]

I think rotorwashed has it on the nose. I have been playing since just after .21 came out, and in that short time, the game went from feeling funky and clunky to feeling more like how historical videos show the early days of NASA to me. Still feel growing pains, but over all more smoothed out as I get used to how the game works. It still feels very very kerbal to me as some of the crap I come up with would so not work IRL. I think its more of how you are progressing as a player honestly

[OrbitusII]

I like henryasia's analysis. Yes, things have changed, but such is the curse of an in-development game. I think you're feeling nostalgia; every so often (like now, in fact) I wish that I could go back to my clueless building of rockets with the old textures and stuff in 0.16 (and before that the 0.13 demo). However, there are still moments when I do something so incredible that I can't believe my eyes, and I probably wouldn't have experienced those without the progress HarvesteR and the team have made thus far.

For me, the game has indeed gone from a funky game where you launch big barrels of explosives with little green men in them to a smart, well-developed learning experience.

[SkyHook]

The game HAS changed, and I think it's a good thing. The ragtag, slap some rockets together style of gaming for the game can get old very fast, and would be selling the genre short. There are so many silly, ragtag games out there. Besides orbiter, this is the only game that even comes close to a space simulator. And orbiter is for total nerds. I take this game relatively seriously, and I am glad that the game is growing with me. With that being said, this IS a game about little green men, so hijinks are just as fun

Edited September 3, 2013 by SkyHook

[Tiron]

The game HAS changed, and I think it's a good thing. The ragtag, slap some rockets together style of gaming for the game can get old very fast, and would be selling the genre short. There are so many silly, ragtag games out there. Besides orbiter, this is the only game that even comes close to a space simulator. And orbiter is for total nerds. I take this game relatively seriously, and I am glad that the game is growing with me. With that being said, this IS a game about little green men, so hijinks are just as fun

Well the depth was always there, it just wasn't quite so accessible as it is now. You can still just slap some stuff together and see what happens.

You could've always done the 'careful planning and much math' route, but it's a lot easier now with all the aids in the UI (maneuver planner, SOI change prediction) and all the mods to help you do the math (Protractor, Kerbal Engineer Redux) or even pretty much fly it for you (Mechjeb).

[Tophir]

For me there are two phase in the game, one where you first play the game and have no clue how to build a rocket or orbital mechanics, and another later on where you you know exactly how to build an efficient rocket and know orbital mechanics like breathing. The first phase is fun at first and then it gets old because it always ends in the same ... EXPLOSIONS! I am not saying explosions are boring but they get old if it is every rocket launch, so you then decide to learn some basics and start going places and after a few days of going places you get things down and it becomes instinctual almost, that also gets boring after a while though because there is nothing new for you. (With the new RaD coming in 0.22 I think that will help remedy that as you have something to work towards) In conclusion I think you are coming to the end of phase two and beginning to feel nostalgia to want to experience the KSP experience again.

[OtherDalfite]

I've been with this game for a while, and I can say it's changed, at least for me. Back in 0.14 or lower, the game always gave me a sort of special, isolated feeling when landing on another body (especially Minmus). Now, it all feels busy, like you haven't done a planetary first or made some groundbreaking discovery. I still really like the game, but it's lost an aspect of the pazazz that I loved about it.

[Plur303]

I've been playing since the release of 0.17. I like how the game is progressing and personally I dislike the whole "LOL so kerbal" attitude lots of players have.

Don't get me wrong, you are free to play however you want.

I just personally find the whole "LOL lets strap Jebediah to a SRB and crash LOL" crowd annoying. I enjoy executing very complex and difficult missions. But I admit the first few days I played the game I was just happy to reach orbit and some of my first designs were just laughable. I crashed hundreds of crappy designs to finally understand what a good design is. Truth be told I learned how to play the game from other online communities which are much more advanced than the forums.

[SkyRender]

There was a certain amount of inevitable ingenuity when the number of parts in the game was small enough to count on two hands. Then too, there's always been a great deal of fanfare when said inevitable ingenuity was no longer required; I remember the amount of rejoicing many of us had at the addition of landing legs and fuel lines. But I don't think the addition of new parts has really made the game any less inspiring of creativity. If anything, there's more than ever. Just look at players like Danny2462, who finds new ways to play KSP with every single video he uploads.

KSP just requires a new kind of creativity now. The only way it can get "dull" is if you limit yourself to the same problems you dealt with back when those problems weren't addressed by the newer parts.

Edited September 3, 2013 by SkyRender

[Dangerous_Beans]

i think Tophir's point can be extended to any game; you have an initial phase where you are messing around and learning how the game works, and then a phase where you understand the mechanics and can then pursue a more thought out strategy. that would defiantly match my experience with computer games, and even some aspects of pen and paper role-playing games.

even for a (hypothetical) shooter i have moved from "hey, i have a rocket launcher, blam-blam-blam! damn, need more ammo", to "ok, nearest gun is the impact rifle to the south, then i can loop around via the flack cannon spawn point to see what is happening in the central area".

so it isn't the game changing, it's how you understand the game that's changing, and maybe you like the initial phase more.

[maxpower]

I think both camps have it correct.

As you get better at the game, the feel does change. This was true back in the older versions, and its true now. Even before a lot of parts were added, once you get to the point where you almost never crash a ship anymore, the game doesn't feel quite as comical as it does when you start playing. Hell back when I couldn't get off the launch pad the game was all about having a laugh, but once I started actually being able to do things it took on a much more serious tone. Now its not about seeing how big a fireball I can make, or how many Kerbal's I can kill.... its about trying to NOT kill them. That makes it almost a completely different game.

On the flip side, the feel of the game itself has changed a bit over the last year. As new features were added, and the old placeholder parts/buildings/terrain were replaced with more realistic looking ones the game has taken on a more realistic feel. It still has its off the deep end charm, but its a much more believable space flight simulator then it use to be.

Personally I love the direction the game is headed in. I never liked the community created idea that the Kerbals were terrible engineers and that KSP should look more like an episode of Junkyard Wars then an actual space sim game. I don't want the space port to look like a broken down trailer park, or my rocket to look like something assembled from stuff found in a dumpster. The best choice the devs have made IMO so far with KSP is to tune out the "lolz so Kerbal" section of the community and instead shoot for a more realistic art style for the game.

[Meltro]

I think rotorwashed has it on the nose. I have been playing since just after .21 came out, and in that short time, the game went from feeling funky and clunky to feeling more like how historical videos show the early days of NASA to me. Still feel growing pains, but over all more smoothed out as I get used to how the game works. It still feels very very kerbal to me as some of the crap I come up with would so not work IRL. I think its more of how you are progressing as a player honestly

I think this. I'm in a similar boat (started at .20), and I've found my skill level has drastically changed my play. Six weeks ago it was an effort to get things into orbit. I was so terrible at docking and rendevous that my first manned Mun mission was repeatedly pushed back. Today I aerobraked a 500 ton interplanetary craft (from Jool!) into a stable orbit. It took me weeks to build that thing and get it into orbit with tons of extra crap pieces still attached to it. I built its 1,000 ton successor in one day to go refuel it, with half the part count.

Things have changed for sure. The terror of a maneuver that leaves your fuel tanks below 1% never gets old.

[bsalis]

Player experience is part of it, however I do still believe the feel of the game has actually changed over the versions.

It is more serious now, more polished, less cartoony, less simplistic. Both features, content and styling have been the cause.

For example, contrast the the differences between;

* The cartoony primary coloured KSC building to the current

* The cute 2D Kerbal crew live feeds, compared to the current 3D ones

* The feel of the physics between .15 and .16... it became more weighty with the rescale

* Simplicity, pre-planets and pre-docking, to what is available now

[Alguien]

Yes and no

Yes the game has changed because you have more parts and actually things to do, plus more experience

And no, the spirit of the game is still the same.

If anything the basics of the game are more easy now than before too, at least you don't get killed by the kommunist in the dark side of kerbin anymore

[AmpsterMan]

I think the feel of the game has changed a lot because a lot of the bug induced difficulty is being squashed with every update. Still, one's own skill changes the feel of the game regardless.

Early game challenges/rewards are hard to balance with end game challenges/rewards

[Moar Boosters]

I've only been playing since the summer steam sale so I've only seen one patch.

All that's really changed is my experience and the game feels very different to how it did when I first got it. In my first couple of weeks I was overjoyed just to get to orbit. My early rockets were very explody. Now I can achieve pretty advanced stuff like visiting multiple planets on a single mission and performing a Duna return in an SSTO.

I think it comes from the fact I knew nothing about astro-navigation before playing KSP, so it wasn't like picking up another FPS or RTS. Everything was new, and I learnt a hell of a lot in a very short space of time (thanks Mr Manley!).

[Whackjob]

Now KSP feels more real and human, much less Kerbal (and explosions and failures don't quite make up for it).

The Kerbal is still there and still just as strong, if you have the will for it.

This is a fat heavy rocket landing landing on its belly on the Mun with hand made legs. Your claims of Kerbal-less-ness is invalid.

[Kerbart]

I've only "joined" KSP with .21 (and the .18 demo of course) so I cannot really contribute to how the game has changed. Based on the comments, I don't think that it's bad that "clunky but cute" has been replaced by something a bit more polished looking. As for "more human, less Kerbal," I think that is mainly a result of the player adjusting to the game and have an altered vision on what "reality" is; because the Kerbal universe definitely is not!

The Kerbal world, with it's flexible parts and simplified drag model, tends to reward different design strategies that clearly have a Kerbal feeling to it. Yes, if there ever was a "LOLZ Lets see it explode" attitude it's far less in the game but failure still is an option, and with the limited stock parts you'll still end up with things blowing up spectacular in your face. It's more likely though that after many weeks of KSP you're starting to get used to rockets that are wider than high, parts falling off at launch and ejecting 5 stages (each of three or four rockets) on your way to the edge of the atmosphere. I'm getting used to it. But I'm still enjoying it.

[KevinTMC]

I agree that the change in tone is something that naturally accompanies the player's growth and expertise...and I think it would be a great idea if Career Mode was designed with this in mind.

I've made the case for this in other threads; but in short, there's room for an improvisational air, lots of trial and error and explosions, and even trips to the junkyard in the early phases of the KSP career. I refer the reader to the famous picture of the Original Seven...with Slayton and Glenn sporting spray-painted work boots. Very Kerbal, as was so much of the Mercury program.

It's only natural for things to get more professional and less reckless as the program develops (though still not po-faced! there should always be room for the whimsical touch in KSP, and Kerbals should always make the player smile), and Career Mode can reflect that in the new parts and technologies that it introduces later in the game.

Edited September 4, 2013 by KevinTMC

[zekes]

i... don't understand the question.

...The Kerbal I used to know back in 13.3 is still there. It's just more complex.

[GraviTykillz]

The Kerbal is still there and still just as strong, if you have the will for it.

This is a fat heavy rocket landing landing on its belly on the Mun with hand made legs. Your claims of Kerbal-less-ness is invalid.

I agree with you. as per my giant rover lander.

But to the OP ,I have found that the only thing that is constant is change .

[Whackjob]

I love giant rovers!

Honk, honk! Can you give me a ride to the Mun?

LOL NOPE

[softweir]

I have to agree with both camps!

Yes, this is one of those games where the player's experience of it changes enormously as their experience grows and they master the basics and then the subtleties of the game.

However it is equally true to say the game itself has changed, and a player coming to it fresh sees a VERY different game from the very early days in both style and content. Back in the days of 0.8x there were no such things as landing legs, nor was there any place to go to in order to land! Orbiting and going home were all you could expect. Kerbin's terrain was a crude placeholder - a basic sphere with minimal contours that didn't rotate (so one side was perma-day and the other perma-night) and landing on the night side was inevitable, bug-induced death! With absolutely minimal content we were forced to focus on kludging ships together, using fins for legs and whooping it up if we managed a decent sub-orbital hop and got back to the right side of the planet in one piece. Not to mention there were no game saves or time-warp, so every mission lasted only as long as a game session. And there were only three Kerbals. (Not to mention: C7 had yet to put the "aero-" into "aerospace"! )

To put it in a nutshell - the game was so basic and tiny it fitted in a nutshell! It is a testament to the brilliance and originality of the concept that it was so immensely enjoyable, so hard to master, so fun to fail at and so very, very challenging.

Nowadays the scope and complexity of the game tends to hide that essential, core brilliance. But it is still there. The game still challenges the player to learn about rocketry and aviation in a way no other game does, even though it wraps it up in a much wider range of auxiliary game mechanics.

As for the "feel" of the game... Personally, I have to admit I hardly ever look at my Kerbals during flights these days, so the charm has (for me) faded. It came back in buckets when Dan Rosas added so many new animations and all those cute groundcrew, but after a while I started to forget to pay attention to them and get back to the core game - making rockets and sending them places.

That will never get old.

Edited September 4, 2013 by softweir

[erkha343]

I always hoped that ksp would eventually be more Orbiter and less ksp 0.8

How it is turning out, neither early ksp or complicated Orbiter, some kind of middle ground, I like it.