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naraburns  nihil supernum  1yr ago (text post)   3303 thread views

Friday Fun Thread for February 3, 2023

Be advised: this thread is not for serious in-depth discussion of weighty topics (we have a link for that), this thread is not for anything Culture War related. This thread is for Fun. You got jokes? Share 'em. You got silly questions? Ask 'em.

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I have been playing Icarus, alone (as always).

Its hard to know where to start discussing it.

First of all I'm loving it and playing the crap out of it (185 hours logged in just 1 month).

But second of all I do not recommend playing it.

Before I get into why those two things are at odds, I'll describe the game:

Shortest: Roguelite RPG action survival.

Mid: Get dropped off on a large map, built up items to survive, complete an objective, and then leave it all behind to do it again.

Longest: The survival mechanics are pretty standard. Pickup sticks and rocks, build basic tools. Chop down trees, mine some rocks and iron for better tools. Build some better crafting stations to unlock even better tools. Fight off the wildlife, hunger, thirst, and suffocation. But all of these mechanics are tight. They aren't trying to string you out on these mechanics for weeks on end. You are meant to progress through the stages of survival relatively quickly. Because you have to start from scratch each time you drop into a new mission. There is also a set of RPG type mechanics where you gain levels, each level gives you some perk points to spend on being better at some aspect of survival, and each level gives you blueprint points, which you use to unlock new buildable items. The planet you land on (called Icarus), has some nasty storms that can tear apart most buildings. So you are either building temporary shelters to huddle in, or sitting in one spot for a while trying to gather up resources for the more expensive concrete permanent structures. The planet also has some harsh environments. There is a temperate forest/river valley starting area. There is a hot desert area, and cold snow/tundra area. Both require some degree of preparation if you want to traverse them safely. Also polar bears are scary as hell.

If that all sounds great, you know why I am playing the game so much.

But now, the bad news, and why I don't recommend the game. I'm dealing with constant performance issues. The framerate can slow to a crawl during some storms (especially fires), and I'm playing on the lowest graphical settings (and have a decent rig).

This week in particular has been a rough week for the game. They just implemented some weather changes last Friday, and the changes were messed up in some way, and as a result there are nearly constant storms. If I hadn't already been playing on a map where I had a permanent base I might have just entirely dropped the game. As it is I spent most of my time playing this past week huddled up in a shelter while storms passed by. And before the latest update the 2nd highest tier of building material (stone) could withstand all storms, but after the update, only the highest tier building material (concrete) could withstand all storms. So if you want to have any permanent structures that won't collapse after a few hours you have to build up to concrete.

Overall this game has the potential to be one of the greats in the survival RPG genre. The updates are coming out every week, and the progress has been good. I'd suggest that people who are interested in this general genre keep an eye on the game, and keep an eye out for good deals on higher end graphics cards.

I'm playing on the lowest graphical settings (and have a decent rig).

Can you elaborate a bit here? Trying to figure out what my chances would look like.

Graphics card is probably my weakest link: NVIDIA GeForce RTX 2070

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