Fifteen hours into Hardcore and I'm ready to get my map markers on the compass back

[Fnhatic]

Weaving aimlessly through the woods looking for a single POI or something is getting kind of old. I’m okay with the no player map marker, I can handle that, but trying to find a specific grave or something got pretty frustrating quite a while ago. Overall I’m enjoying Hardcore Mode but this is one feature that is just too frustrating.

Exploration is a nifty, fun aspect of the game (I would say it’s one of the biggest). But exploration without any benefit of map markers to ‘magnetize’ the player towards interesting things is just kinda shitty. This is the one and ONLY feature of Hardcore that feels actively antagonistic towards the player. I’ve actually found locations in-game that don’t even reveal themselves, because I didn’t stand in the magic pixel to uncover the marker, and I can’t even use the compass to find where that magic pixel is, since they don’t show up unless you’re literally standing right on top of them.

This is just pure irritating frustration that adds remarkably little except making exploration so tedious it’s almost actively discouraged. The thing is, the hardcore mode doesn’t even say that it’s going to do this. It suggests that the map no longer showing your location coupled with no more fast travel is what is changed. I doubt anyone asked for or was expecting the actual in-game locations to be so restricted that I don’t even get a map marker for a point of interest I’m literally standing six feet away from.

That’s just being shitty to the player for the sake of being shitty to the player. And frankly it reminds me all too well of most “”""“hardcore”"""" mods you see for other games, where the ‘hardcore’ features transcend ‘let’s do this to add a challenge to the player’ and actively become antagonistic towards the player, saying ‘fuck you for playing our game’.

Please give me back my map markers. I don’t care about not seeing my location on the map, or not having fast travel, but zig-zagging for 8 hours through the woods trying to find some grave hidden in a bush until my shoes literally fall apart is the opposite of fun, or compelling. It can’t even be said that this is a challenge, because it’s not like I’m under any kind of threat or danger while doing this. It’s just sucking away god knows how much of my precious time because how dare I want to go exploring.

[Kirksty]

Get good w map reading and learning the locations. That’s why it’s hardcore. This ain’t Skyrim brah.

[MattP598]

I’m fine with no marker telling me where I’m at, but for the love of God did they not have compass’s back then. I can never tell by looking at the sun which direction I’m going.

[darksouls5]

It’s funny everytime someone points out a flaw from this game, someone replies “this isn’t Skyrim where blah blah”.

Sometimes too much realism takes away the fun. I like realism in video games but man there’s too many broken stuff in this game.

Update: Yes I might be too harsh since this is hardcore mode so everything’s supposed to be hardcore and real. I’m still playing the game so i shouldn’t have judged jt yet.

[Wenceslaus]

But that is individual. For example I would be ok with even more realism - I do not need a marker for a POI at all. Or the whole compass.
So there is some compromise as for didferent people the same thing could be hardcore or just tedious.

[SirLoin]

That’s just being shitty to the player for the sake of being shitty to the player. And frankly it reminds me all too well of most “”""“hardcore”"""" mods you see for other games, where the ‘hardcore’ features transcend ‘let’s do this to add a challenge to the player’ and actively become antagonistic towards the player, saying ‘fuck you for playing our game’.

To be honest. Don’t you think there is a hint in the words “hard core”?
And if you don’t like it to be difficult, why choose it?

I find it extremely frustrating. Like moving into a new neighbourhod, where you don’t even know where the ic-cream van will stop (incidentally - my dad told me that when they ring the bell, it is because they have run out of icecream).
Eventually - by exploring - you learn where stuff is simply by looking at the landmarks and landscape.

Guess this is exactly how it was back then.
“Yeah. Follow the path for a two-day and then turn right at the crossroads where the big boulder is. Then on for about sunrise to mid day. At the great tree turn left and there it is. You can’t miss it”

[Kirksty]

It’s not a flaw with the game mate.

You just can’t handle the difficulty.

It’s not saying you’re a bad person but saying stick to something which doesnt require so much thought.

[Yettyen]

It’s not a flaw with the game mate.

You just can’t handle the difficulty.

It’s not saying you’re a bad person but saying stick to something which doesnt require so much thought.

Wow sweetie, you really know how to talk to someone.
with your post you said he isn’t a bad person but dumb af.

Maybe it helps, if you keep in mind, that people can’t hear your voice and read it how they feel, or what they expect to feel. Don’t know how to properly explain that.

Sorry for the off-topic.

[Fnhatic]

Guess this is exactly how it was back then.

What a horrible shit comparison. If you want realism like that, then we should straight up delete 98% of the points of interest, because there’s no such thing as chests in the woods with loot or pretty much any of the interesting things to find in-game. Funny how you don’t draw the line at ‘unrealistic’ at that point. Do you think there were actually camps in the woods with bandits everywhere?

There is literally zero purpose to the compass as-is. It doesn’t help you navigate whatsoever, it doesn’t help you get your bearings, it doesn’t show you anything at all to help orient yourself. At the very least if the map markers showed up more than 5 feet away it would be something. So why do we even have the compass at all right now?

To be honest. Don’t you think there is a hint in the words “hard core”?
And if you don’t like it to be difficult, why choose it?

Literally nothing about ‘hardcore mode’ ever said that they effectively DELETED all the POI indicators on the compass, so don’t you fucking dare even try to put this on me for not ‘understanding’ hardcore mode. Furthermore, their decision to make hardcore mode “all or nothing” is terrible for exactly this reason. Almost none of the other hardcore mode features are even as flagrantly anti-player as this decision was.

Are you people seriously claiming that changing the compass icon popup range from 3 meters to 10 meters is going to completely ruin the game? Or are you all just such stubborn fanboys that you literally measure your own self-worth by how zealously you defend literally any feature of a game you didn’t even make? Yeah I sure do see a lot of you coming up with actual defenses for why zig-zagging through the woods for literally thirty minutes is some brilliant feature that we couldn’t do without.

You guys are going to defend a terrible decision that basically put a bullet in the exploration aspect, but you’re gonna bitch about how that would be unrealistic, in a game where even in the HARDCORE mode, you can literally survive for weeks on nothing but a diet of wine and magic potions. Yep… no stupid fanboy double standards there at all.

[SirLoin]

Funny how you don’t draw the line at ‘unrealistic’ at that point.

I think you’ll find that I already complained about the lack of run-off from the roofs and guttering when it rains
I also said that I found it extremely frustrating. I did refrain from calling the developers “idiots”, but that’s because it is their game. They make the decisions.

That said - I really think you should lighten up a bit.

Do you think there were actually camps in the woods with bandits everywhere?

Nope. But then again this is a game where you are fighting bad guys - this is not a sim city game and as such a lack of bad guys would be rather irritating.

There is literally zero purpose to the compass as-is. It doesn’t help you navigate whatsoever, it doesn’t help you get your bearings, it doesn’t show you anything at all to help orient yourself.

Once I get one line aligned with a bearing with the help of the map, I’ll know what the other lines mean.
But yeah. It’s not very helpful. Might as well not have it.

…don’t you fucking dare even try …

As I mentioned. Lighten up. It gets very tedious if you keep reading a lighthearted comment and seriously try to read whatever spite into it you care at that moment.
Not to mention that you get to be the target of more lighthearted banter for you to hate on.

Are you people seriously claiming that changing the compass icon popup range from 3 meters to 10 meters is going to completely ruin the game?

No. But until they fix the gutter problem, I don’t think your problem should have priority.

Or are you all just such stubborn fanboys that you literally measure your own self-worth by…

I measure my self-worth by how I behave towards other people. You obviously don’t.

Yeah I sure do see a lot of you coming up with actual defenses for why zig-zagging through the woods for literally thirty minutes is some brilliant feature that we couldn’t do without.

It’s called HARD-core Mode. Nothing to do with scantily clad women.

You guys are going to defend a terrible decision that basically put a bullet in the exploration aspect, but you’re gonna bitch about how that would be unrealistic, in a game where even in the HARDCORE mode, you can literally survive for weeks on nothing but a diet of wine and magic potions. Yep… no stupid fanboy double standards there at all.

Lighten up. Oh - I already suggested that. But still. Consider this patch 1.3 on that advise.
LIGHTEN UP. BE CIVIL. If you don’t like a comment, by all means disagree, but DO NOT think us “stupid fanboys” because we don’t like the same stuff you do.
The world is full of people with diverging opinions, but we still manage to survive as a species.
Spiteful, hateful, abusive comments are fun for a while, but you do get tiresome.

[SirLoin]

This ain’t Skyrim brah.

Haven’t been at the Skyrim forums for a while, but I wonder if they have some guy there who writes:

“This ain’t Kingdom Come you know”

[Kirksty]

Would depend if they whined and complained about it not being realistic enough?

[Arburu]

For me its not that hard to find places on the game on hardcore mode.

[Kirksty]

I didn’t say anything wrong. He’s complaining about it being too hard, so it’s fair to say he can’t handle hardcore mode!

A better way to say it would be “I get frustrated with their being lack of map markers. But I’m willing to learn”, rather than the disrespect of trashing the devs.

For me I know pretty much most spots in the game. I’ve mastered it through many many hours. So getting lost when I do is always fun, which is what gaming should be about!

[Yettyen]

Like I said in private, it’s a matter of HOW one says something.

A better way to say

It’s not saying you’re a bad person but saying stick to something which doesnt require so much thought.

would also be, well…to not say it at all mabe?

For me I know pretty much most spots in the game. I’ve mastered it through many many hours. So getting lost when I do is always fun, which is what gaming should be about!

This is a valuable point of your view, this would have been totally enough, don’t you think?
This honestly makes you look more sympathetic then “you simply can’t handle that”.

This is really not about to blame you for anything, but to get along better in the forum.
It feels pretty toxic sometimes.

[Kirksty]

Please make this about the topic, not the person.

[Moopy]

I absolutely love not knowing exactly where I am. Using the sun, my familiarity of the land, and map markers is enough for me to find things without much of a problem. I think this type of map system is perfect for a game like this, with all its wooded areas in which you can easily get lost if you diverge from your estimation of where something is, especially at night. I can understand its not for everyone, but i’m glad they made this change. But you would think developers by now know that not all people like this stuff and would give you a bunch of check boxes at the beginning of starting hardcore. But then whats the point of playing hardcore if everything is optional…

[Boru9]

Exactly. I love getting lost in the woods. It makes the game a lot more slow-paced (along with the lack of fast travel), making it perfect for people who’ve already finished it and want to savour it again. It reminded me of the first day or two back in February when everything was new and exciting.

[Fnhatic]

I feel like literally 2/3rds of the people responding to this thread didn’t even read what the hell I was talking about and are just INVENTING arguments in their head. I’m not talking about navigating from one city to another, or handling the general directions of things relative to other things.

I’m talking about finding something in the middle of the woods, like this.

I didn’t say anything wrong. He’s complaining about it being too hard, so it’s fair to say he can’t handle hardcore mode!

So first you say “I can’t handle hardcore mode”, except then you say:

For me I know pretty much most spots in the game. I’ve mastered it through many many hours. So getting lost when I do is always fun, which is what gaming should be about!

So basically you’re cheating. YOU couldn’t handle hardcore mode either, you have to have played “many, many hours” of the game literally memorizing all the locations beforehand and already knowing where everything is.

That’s called METAGAMING. Only someone who doesn’t know shit about game design designs a game around the concept of metagaming. Your opinions have zero merit, oh, and also you’re an a…, like Yettyen basically said.

Tell me, does it actually cause you physical pain to hear even the tiniest complaint about this game? Why? Did you make it? Who are you in the credits? What vested interest do you have in this? If Hardcore Mode shipped WITHOUT neutering the compass to uselessness, would you be here whining about how the compass should be removed? Or would you talking about how brilliant it was to not remove it?

I’m guessing the latter, because you’re just a dime-a-dozen fanboy. Literally nothing about this game can ever be criticized in your presence. No feedback is ever good enough for you. Anyone who doesn’t agree with you is stupid and shitty, which you’ve basically said three times so far.

So Kirksty, since you’re SO smart, and I’m SO s…, go ahead and tell me how to navigate to that point I linked earlier WITHOUT metagaming, and WITHOUT wandering back and forth in the woods for an hour in the general location of the point, because the game literally requires me to trip over the grave to find it. Apparently ten years of backwoods backpacking experience isn’t sufficient to find one spot in a video game that is a mile deep in the woods, so I’m sure you have brilliant and masterful tips. Surely you aren’t just going to say “uh, stand on the end of that stream and aim in the general direction you think you should go and pray”, which is what the entire problem is.

Even if they just gave us back the cardinal directions on the compass it would do wonders.

[Boru9]

And how do you find places in the middle of a forest in real life? You use distinctive trees to orient yourself while checking the position of the sun where possible and look around for clues. Unless you’re one of those people who walks around a forest with a smartphone with GPS, but that wouldn’t be very historically accurate…