Surviving Mars

jaxxx

City builder type game based on Mars. Releases on the 15th. Made by same company behind Cities Skylines so that's cause alone for hope, plus there's 10% discount if you own CS up until the end of the month. Watched a few vids of it and it looks interesting.

Shiminay

I'm installing this now having watched a few of my usual streaming/YouTube peeps playing it. Looks like a good bit of fun. Like an upgraded and more detailed Planetbase

jaxxx

Bought it, installed it, still haven't played it!

Shiminay

I did a couple of "starts" with it to learn the ropes (amazing how many times I didn't connect things to pipes when placing it down, watch out for that). It's fun, I'm looking forward to getting properly stuck into it over the course of the weekend.

Sephiroth_dude

Would it be similar to the Anno series?

Shiminay

So, having played a bit of this, I'd say it's quite similar to Banished with a little bit more "engagement" whereas Banished could be left to idle a bit more. It's slow paced but that slower pace suits the game. You can definitely try to rush, but over-expansion will leave you way too short of resources way too quickly and unless you've picked a start with lots of spare rockets, or you've got fuel production up and running early, you'll have no easy way to resupply the essential early stuff like Machine Parts, Polymers and Electronics. I'm enjoying it though and it's just the sort of game to while away a bank holiday weekend

Lone Stone

i cant even get my first dome populated i keep running out of polymers and mechanical bits, 10 hours of restarts ! i should stop playing on hard.. hmm.. derp

Antar Bolaeisk

I'm doing okay when it comes to machine parts, polymers and electronics, I just get them delivered. I keep running out of metal though and the start-up costs to mining a new metal resource are prohibitive.

I haven't yet decided if wind turbines or solar panels are the better source of energy. On the one hand solar panels take a high amount of metal for maintenance and require batteries but on the other hand wind turbines require a machine parts production facility as deliveries can't keep up with the demand which needs lots of power necessitating more wind turbines which need more machine parts to maintain...

I keep hitting a wall about SOL 80 where there's a cascade of system failures.

Shiminay

I use wind to power the 24/7 stuff and have solar to give a boost when my factories and manned extractors are operational. Less than 3 rockets is tough. If you get lucky and get the automated extractors tech early then it's pretty smooth sailing as you can put all your colonists into the manufacturing plants and you'll probably avoid the worst of shortages.

Colonel Claptrap

Really enjoying this game so far.

One minor thing that bugs me. When I open the research screen it doesn't highlight the tech which I've just finished researching. I spend ages trawling through the techs trying to find the benefit. Would like to see a clearer laid out tech tree.

Starting a new game this morning. 150% difficulty bonus with Europe and politician. I'm going to take my time on this map. I'm finding the game very zen!

Shiminay

The interface really needs some work. It's almost impossible to manage citizens and drones and as mentioned, the research screen is a mess.

It's got Workshop support though, so I'm sure we'll see some interesting mods appearing soon, hopefully they'll help.

Colonel Claptrap

Patch released. Not much of note.

Gameplay: Workers properly select workplace based on their specialty
Gameplay: Scanning queue increased

Still no sign of a notification detailing recently completed research.

Any decent mods?

cichlid child

hi. Is there a way to repower your explorer if it dies on route? I know it says in game that one 2 vehicles can share battery but I cant seem to do if one of them is completely out of power. Enjoying the game anyway.

Shiminay

You have to send your Drone Rover to go and repair it.

jaxxx

I refunded it, weeks ago obviously. Performance was pure crap, despite my specs being more than enough. Pity really as I was looking forward to it.

Shiminay

That's a shame, I didn't have any performance issues with it myself.

They're still working on it actively and are taking mods and integrating them into the main game (with credit to the mod maker). There are some new dome shapes and the workshop has some very interesting stuff in it.

ShooterSF

Got this back when Epic were giving it away for free, only getting time to try it now as I'm off college at last. Love the subtle nod to Alpha Centauri when you quit the game

ShadowHearth

This is one of those games, that looked really crap in trailers, but game itself is amazing.
It came out on game pass, so I decided to give it a go. 60h later I have 2k people colony and hit the cap for domes.
Was thinking of getting dlcs, but ordered my
new laptop around that time. So when Xmas steam sale hits I'll get it for PC with all dlcs. Space race sounds very interesting.

Julez

ShadowHearth wrote: »

This is one of those games, that looked really crap in trailers, but game itself is amazing.
It came out on game pass, so I decided to give it a go. 60h later I have 2k people colony and hit the cap for domes.
Was thinking of getting dlcs, but ordered my
new laptop around that time. So when Xmas steam sale hits I'll get it for PC with all dlcs. Space race sounds very interesting.

This might interest you: HUMBLE PARADOX MANAGEMENT BUNDLE

Pay just over €16 you get the Surviving Mars expansions and a whole load of other stuff too. Including Cities: Skylines, which is also a brilliant city builder.