relationships vs. seasons

[radar]

What did you vote for? and why?

I voted for relationships. I feel like its more interesting then food supplies changing and things getting periodically and predictably harder then easier through a cycle. Unless seasons are more complex than I'm imagining.

[AnarchOi]

I voted for seasons.
I feel like with seasons, more specifically winter, it will add an extra layer of difficulty and a sense of hopelessness something I believe this game should feel at times since it is in a post-apocalyptic world. Also I think seasons could add a twist to gameplay maybe during summer nights are shorter, less zombie activity, but higher stress for survivors because of increased heat and more need for water (if it'll be included in the game somehow), while during winter means longer nights making scouting missions take longer, more zombie attacks, and of course harder to grow crops.

[Woolfe]

Considering I was so vocal for seasons... I actually ended up voting for relationships...

I think I ended up going that way because I have already seen seasons in the mobile version....

My concern is that relationships might be a make or break sort of thing, where it might get so big that it can't be done well.

[Darth Revan]

I voted for relationships, for two reasons. On a base level, children are an investment that eventually might become a valuable resource. They're defenseless at first and can only perform minimal tasks (Such as making noise and gnawing at your food stores...) but once they grow up from infancy, they can already start doing certain tasks, and naturally, if you're BORN into the zombie apocalypse, you'd be trained from birth to excel at surviving.

My second reason is that it adds more emotional depth to the game. Survivors in Rebuild 2 really blurred together for me. They didn't really have too much personality, and relationships and kids are one way to make them memorable. The only reason I had to not lose a survivor in Rebuild 2 was because they were a resource, and except for my main character, I'd never really grow attached to anyone. Relationships can make me more attached to a character and enhance my immersion in the game. All that said, I did go for a "No dead survivors" challenge a few times, required a few save slots but I managed it a few times.

[radar]

If we get relationships, can we raise a child and develop time travel tech to send them back in time to prevent the apocalypse all Kyle Reese/ John Conner status?

[Shannon]

...and then the world becomes utopia and this game turns into The Sims. hee hee

j/k. But I do agree that children in the game would be a strange complication. I think Seasons sounds really cool.

[Woolfe]

I think it will depend on the campaign nature of the game.
Children should essentially just be a burden(altho a positive moral affect would be possible) whilst they are "young". So they eat and require protection, and losing them to zombies is going to mess people up.

But if it takes you a year or so to conquer each city, and you have to do each city manually, then eventually after enough cities, they could be present. It could be interesting actually if time does pass. Maybe your main character gets older, and eventually dies of plain old age.

Especially if you have to go back and revisit cities occasionally, maybe some other faction has built up and attacked, and now you have to rescue the survivors etc, that could be an interesting side machine, maybe one of the factions starts stealing kids to indoctrinate them. Maybe your faction can start stealing kids.... Maybe if you destroy a faction, you suddenly have kids to look after. Maybe you just regular find kids in the ruins at times. Potential potential.

The relationships should be more cut and dry. Good things and Bad things. People being dicks(cheating abuse etc) to partners, people dying, people hiding wounds then ending up killing partner as well, partners hiding misdeeds.. Lots of options to mess with moral or add to moral when things are going well. Maybe 2 characters have a major breakup that causes a large group of people to take sides. How do you deal with situation while the damn zombies are beating down your doors... More potential

[radar]

[giuseppepreston]

I would rather see relationships. I agree that in Rebuild 2, the characters all felt like clones of each other. This would add more of a realism factor in the fact that it may feel like your survivors are actually people. I love the idea of being able to have children too. I think it'd be cool if you could train kids in a specific subject their whole life, and when the kid come of age, they start out super awesome in that subject. Or maybe you could just train them to be very well-rounded. I would also like to see survivors have different attitudes towards other survivors in the group. Just remember, the whole game is about the survivors, not the weather.

[AnarchOi]

Relationships and children will be interesting, but I feel like its one of those things that if not implemented perfectly it just wont work. I honestly would prefer the relationships more than the children. Is the game going to be long enough to actually have multiple generations? And then what about age? Do our survivors grow old and die, and will the old even be able to fight? IMO Its just something that can become to complex. I do believe the only way children would work if its something like Woolfe mentioned and I really hope that the campaign is like what was mentioned where time does pass and we have to revisit territory to take care of new threats and such.

However relationships can work especially since there is a new "group" or "team" mechanic, so maybe going on missions with the same people over and over helps boost their moral and also gives them a stat boost as well. However if they lose someone they will suffer a big moral loss. The zombified spouse idea that Radar mentioned is really cool too! I picture it working as sending someone off on a mission and they see their dead loved one and decide they cant complete the mission and head back to base, or maybe they get so distraught they go just decide they want to stay with their deceased loved one and you have to send a rescue mission to get them back.

As stated there are many many options and scenarios that can play out and definitely is an interesting concept.