why FTL hates you.

[@ChannelMiner]

I still remember losing my guys to giant spiders, they are no joke! Blew my mind when I found out you can do this event risk free with a clone bay or any of the blue dialogue options.

[@Zectifin]

the problem people have is they think into the breach is a strategy game. its not. its a puzzle game. if you go in thinking you're playing xcom or FFT you're gonna be disappointed. Its one of my favorite games and I've probably played it 10x as much as FTL (and I love FTL).

[@progress_games]

1000% agree, and it’s such a cool puzzle game but it’s mislabeled by a lot of players

[@cooly1234]

Games with a higher skill floor in this ways I find interesting. Their mechanics are usually more intricate, or at least the mechanics I see are more intricate, as I may miss interactions in an easy game as you've said. And watching people point out the 74 mistakes a player did that led to their "unfair position" can be humorous (see: noita community). Into the Breach being a puzzle game, you've played the whole game once you win as every squad once (and perhaps a few more runs at higher difficulties). At least that's how I see it.

[@ghjong001]

I beat the game exactly once on hard mode (using the Red Tail) just to say I did it, and now play exclusively on Normal. Depending on the ship, I can get up to around an 80% win rate with a generalist ship like the Red Tail or the Man Of War, and much, much lower for the specialized ships like the Mantis B. I'm not actually interested in getting good enough to play at Hard; I lose just enough at Normal that it's fun, while still getting to play loose without getting stressed out over micromanagement or perfect tactics. I have a hard time explaining why I find FTL so much more fun than Into the Breach. It's not strictly because of difficulty. I think it's because ITB is a puzzle game that emphasizes the optimum choice within a limited set of moves, whereas FTL is more about keeping calm and figuring out how to manage the utter chaos that happens in the game. I might not survive the chaos, but I find it more fun than having to execute the perfect strategy.

[@hyphlix3003]

such a good vid i remember my first FTL playthrough. Was sublime... Until i was swindled by an enemy combatant!

[@progress_games]

Must’ve been such a surprise! Glad you enjoyed the video!

[@sl1ppey]

FTL is one of those games I've never tried simply out of fear lol. Not so much fear of losing, but moreso just not being able to figure out what I'm supposed to do. Maybe someday I'll be brave enough to try. Into the Breach sounds like something right up my alley. After playing so much Slice & Dice the "puzzle" type of gameplay for roguelikes is something that scratches a nice itch. Great video. I'd love to explore that finding of low-self esteem individuals not getting as much satisfaction from completing a difficult task. Also go try the fishTDX demo people! It's vastly improved over the first demo.

[@progress_games]

Yeah Into the Breach is so fine-tuned it's not even funny. 100% would recommend as a puzzle-roguelike. FTL is certainly not for everyone, but it's a lot more approachable than you'd expect and it's just so fun. I really enjoyed watching NL play and I learnt a lot about the game then. fishTDX demo plug 🔥🔥🔥

[@mikehopley]

Good video. I'd agree that FTL's difficulty is a big part of its magic, and also that it's much more of a strategy game than Into The Breach. A couple of thoughts about the difficulty that you may not have realised: You mentioned that only 24% of players have beaten the game, based on Steam achievements. This is almost certainly false. It's an artefact of Steam achievements being added over 7 years after release. Many players who previously beat the game have stopped playing by now. Those players will be counted towards the Steam player total, because they bought the game; but the achievement doesn't register until they launch FTL again. It also turns out that it's possible, albeit very difficult, to beat the game consistently. The best players have win rates of 95%+ on Hard AE, playing all ships about equally. The highest known win rate is about 98%. We don't know what the limit is, but I think we can be pretty certain it's above 97% and definitely below 100%.

[@progress_games]

That's a good point about achievements. I imagine that despite that the number still wouldn't be too high. Plus it's not including the stats from those who've played on different platforms, which I'd bet are way lower. Beating the game consistently is insane lol. I think I was more covering the average player's experience, but it just goes to show how finetuned the game really is. That if you play absolutely optimally, you can win almost every run. Would be interesting to see a neural network learn how to play and see that performance...

[@mikehopley]

@@progress_games I think a lot of winning consistently comes down to what you mentioned in the video: always learning, especially learning from your mistakes. There's SO MUCH to learn in FTL. A lot can be learned just by observation and experience, but for some things you have to engage with the community.

[@SiliconSlyWolf]

This is one of the many games, most of them deckbuilder games like Slay the Spire, where I started off amazing, I got to the second phase of the boss on my second or third attempt. Every attempt after the 3rid, I've never even see the boss. I'm to the point I see "rogue-like/lite deckbuilder" and just start clenching my teeth at the slim possibility it'll turn out like Backpack Hero or Tower Tactics Liberation.

[@DNLKTV]

I played extensively and beat a lot of roguelikes like Spelunky series, The Binding of Isaac, Nuclear Throne, Slay the Spire but FTL was always the one that did not click for me. I can tolerate brutal difficulty of Spelunky but in FTL it just feels hopeless when you lose to some stronger ship. In other games (not counting STS) mentioned above you can leverage your agility to get out of tough spots but FTL boxes you in and leaves no way to escape (last boss in particular). In STS I leverage my card game skillset in that place but in FTL I would just have to spend many hours trying to learn the best strats and stuff even for easiest difficulty. I would maybe 10 years ago but nowadays I am too busy for this stuff. Though 10 years ago FTL felt the same way so maybe it is not just "me" problem?

[@elfrangofrito]

Good video, will give fishTDX a try

[@ZacGunn]

Ok but what does Kanye think

[@progress_games]

I asked him what he thought then he made me watch the dark knight with no sound

[@sl1ppey]

@@progress_games Classic Kanye

[@adnanchy3078]

your editing skills not good contact with me for imporove your video editing