Zail's Tales: Outer Wilds - Chapter 15: Planning a Heist

[@LB_]

1:19:00 haha, funnily enough most players just assume there must be another invisible bridge there, and are pressured to test that theory due to the threat of the inhabitant behind them. That inhabitant almost never gets anyone so I'm pretty sure the devs just put them there to encourage players to test the invisible bridge theory. Though I have seen a few players end up trying to check behind where the inhabitant came from, thinking it's where they need to go, but that just leads to some secret shenanigans. The devs changed the design of the room to reduce the amount of frustration in that regard.

[@ZailsTales]

That exact moment of panic is actually why I hesitated! Proof you can never playtest all the rough edges away

[@LB_]

1:12:19 this section used to be much more interesting as there used to be two inhabitants here and if one saw you they'd call out and communicate with the other and they would perform a pincer maneuver on you. Really cool AI interaction. Unfortunately when the devs saw that a majority of players thought the stealth approach was the only viable path, they redesigned this area and removed one of the inhabitants, removing that interaction entirely, so as to try and make this approach easier. Stealth wasn't intended to be a good solution but I suppose they preferred reducing player frustration over encouraging the actual intended solution. Though, there is some debate about the devs' intended solutions in this regard and why they made the changes they did. Andrew Cunningham made an interesting video about it all that you might like after you've finished playing.

[@ZailsTales]

I've never been a huge fan of stealth elements in games that aren't built from the ground up to have them. If the devs took any stealth elements out of this game then I consider it an improvement. That is a cool interaction though, even if 90% of plays might not have noticed it enough to appreciate it

[@LB_]

@@ZailsTales Yeah a lot of people agree with you that it was a strange choice to add stealth mechanics to Outer Wilds. I think it's possible to make the mechanics feel better to players with some tutorialization but they didn't manage to pull it off well enough here IMO.

[@LB_]

2:02 Hearthians haven't developed color picture technology yet, that's why all the cameras and scouts they use take grayscale photos

[@ZailsTales]

That actually reminds me, when you go to the radio tower on timber hearth (that kicks off the expansion) Hornfels is on the audio recording there commenting on how stunning it is that the photos the satellite are taking are in colour. I guess it is a new technology that isn't in the ship's computer or scout launcher yet.

[@LB_]

1:08:18 hahaha... about that... 1:11:18 :) Fun fact, if you put the artifact on that bridge and then turn out the lights, it kicks you out of the simulation (as it does with any structure you can remove when your artifact is placed on it) but you'd still hear the spooky horn call out in the real world (maybe patched now but it did used to happen)

[@ZailsTales]

absolutely not an interaction I would ever think to try

[@LB_]

1:18:15 glad you figured out where the sweet spot was heh. This isn't the intended way to get to the Forbidden Archive the first time though, but it is intended for subsequent revisits, since you would only know about this invisible bridge after learning what's in the Forbidden Archive. If you don't already know the intended solution for the first time, you can either try to figure it out yourself or I can explain it if you want (or it will be explained in the Andrew Cunningham video I mentioned in the other comment).

[@ZailsTales]

I admit to a lucky series of discovers make this section easier for me. I wouldn't mind tracking you down on some other social media of some kind but trading contents in KZbin comments is pain because of the spam filter.

[@LB_]

@@ZailsTales Ah sorry, guess I should group comments up more... I don't really use any social media other than KZbin and Discord. I guess we could chat on Discord but it feels a little strange to interact with a KZbinr such as yourself that way, but if it is more comfortable for you then that's fine by me, I just have a fear of bothering people and KZbin comments felt less bothersome to me up to this point. For my Discord username handle just add a couple underscores to my KZbin display name.

[@LB_]

1:01:43 definitely worth finding all ship logs related to the Vessel and the Interloper before you go opening pandora's box. Unless you don't mind repeat openings, I suppose.

[@ZailsTales]

I want to get the ship log as close to 100% as i can stomach on both the main game and expansion before i pull that particular trigger.

[@LB_]

1:27:46 congrats on finally learning you can put down the artifact and walk away from it! Kidding of course XD

[@ZailsTales]

All according to developer intention

[@LB_]

1:28:27 just in time to be disappointed, that was close!

[@ZailsTales]

Not to butter my own biscuit too hard but I'm really happy how some of my loop ends/episode ends have worked out.

[@LB_]

41:20 I can't remember if you learned how to measure the integrity of the dam

[@ZailsTales]

If there is a way to do it other then just looking at how damaged it is and guessing I genuinely do not know or do not remember.

[@LB_]

@@ZailsTales There is a way, do you want to know?

[@ZailsTales]

@@LB_ Ohhhhh wait wait wait the scout launcher like on Brittle Hollow? I thought about this for like legit - 10 minutes

[@LB_]

@@ZailsTales :D

[@LB_]

44:00 yeah it is annoying that the game only lets you put things down when the player is firmly standing on the ground in gravity, and even then you can't put things down in the ship. Makes for some tedious routing when trying to bring certain objects to certain unusual places...

[@LB_]

1:22:22 OH NO

[@ZailsTales]

Yeah I was not expecting that. Worked out to be more dramatic this way though