Scanner Room: OP gamebreaker or useful early tool?
Lulzes
Join Date: 2017-07-25 Member: 232050Members
Join Date: 2017-07-25 Member: 232050Members
I hope I'm not beating the drum about this too much, forgive me if you're tired of it.
However I like the Scanner Room, at least the idea of it, whereas some people seem to have either given up on it or don't see its point. It seems the devs have had the same sort of difference of opinion in the past:
My experience matches this progression, in a way. In my first long playthrough after getting back into the game, I built a Scanner Room early, and despite its frustrating bugs, I learned to use it to get a better idea of the landscape around my base. I ended up building a few bases just to put up Scanner Rooms to work out the local topography. The 3D map is great for finding caves and tunnels, e.g. Lost River.
However in later playthroughs, as I already knew the terrain and where resources where, I didn't bother with Scanner Rooms as much except when I needed to hunt for resources. At that stage, I didn't get as much pleasure from exploring for resources, and just wanted to get on with the task, so having the Scanner Room HUD chip made that much easier.
It's arguable whether first-time players might get the blueprint early and then rely too soon on the Scanner Room for resource gathering, but I don't think you can avoid getting drawn into exploration in the first few hours playing this game. There's always a balance between revealing too much, and not giving the player enough tools. Later in the game, resource gathering is a means rather than an end, and having the HUD chip makes it less tiresome.
Personally, I would argue for placing it later in the game, but making it a far more powerful tool. I've already suggested an idea to fix the menu, but I would go further: you should be able to scan for anything you have already manually scanned, be it flora, fauna or other natural resource.
I'd love to hear other peoples' experiences using the Scanner Room.
However I like the Scanner Room, at least the idea of it, whereas some people seem to have either given up on it or don't see its point. It seems the devs have had the same sort of difference of opinion in the past:
Jonas wants the fragments to be as early as kelp forest because he wants to see lots outposts with scanner rooms before hitting the Seamoth stage. Cory wants it much later because it's too powerful and might turn the game into "just follow the signal" scavenger hunt. Do what you think is right.
My experience matches this progression, in a way. In my first long playthrough after getting back into the game, I built a Scanner Room early, and despite its frustrating bugs, I learned to use it to get a better idea of the landscape around my base. I ended up building a few bases just to put up Scanner Rooms to work out the local topography. The 3D map is great for finding caves and tunnels, e.g. Lost River.
However in later playthroughs, as I already knew the terrain and where resources where, I didn't bother with Scanner Rooms as much except when I needed to hunt for resources. At that stage, I didn't get as much pleasure from exploring for resources, and just wanted to get on with the task, so having the Scanner Room HUD chip made that much easier.
It's arguable whether first-time players might get the blueprint early and then rely too soon on the Scanner Room for resource gathering, but I don't think you can avoid getting drawn into exploration in the first few hours playing this game. There's always a balance between revealing too much, and not giving the player enough tools. Later in the game, resource gathering is a means rather than an end, and having the HUD chip makes it less tiresome.
Personally, I would argue for placing it later in the game, but making it a far more powerful tool. I've already suggested an idea to fix the menu, but I would go further: you should be able to scan for anything you have already manually scanned, be it flora, fauna or other natural resource.
I'd love to hear other peoples' experiences using the Scanner Room.
Comments
If anything, the scanner room isn't powerful enough since you can't view the maps it generates unless you're actually in the room (PDA screenshots of the map notwithstanding). I don't have a problem with it being available earlier. With my playstyle I would likely wait until I had the Seamoth first, but given how much trouble I have even just finding the wrecks in the Safe Shallows and Kelp Forests even after several playthroughs I would very much appreciate the option to have the scanner room available fairly early in the game.
I first built it a long time ago and found it to be absolutely awesome because it mapped out all the Sandstone that contained Silver. (This was back when Silver was the rarest and most valuable resource.) But my excitement was pretty short-lived because I was only able to reach the letter 'S' items that one time. Every time after that, the limited list of ten alphabetically ordered items stopped well short of 'S'.
Now, that Copper is the new Silver, the letter 'L' is a bit closer to 'A' in the alphabet. I may try and build one in my new game and see how much it helps. Sadly though, I think I've heard people complaining the list stops short sometimes of even items starting with 'L'. I'll give it a try and post back my findings.
It is now an early game tool in the latest experimental. I completed the blueprint even before the Seaglide...
Why though? It will become a overused tool just like said in the OP. I don't get it...
Dunno.... Maybe now that copper is used for what seems like everything they decided to make it easier for players to find Copper early game?
Thank you for the awesome tip! I'll give it a try!
It's completely useless without the HUD chip. The map is indecipherable and there's no way of remembering which direction you need to go or how far to find what you are looking for. The HUD chip really should be integral to the scanner room like the drones are.
Even with the HUD chip it isn't that great a tool. Finding the bits is still quite confusing since the marks could be in a cave 200m below you for all you know. Not to mention the fact that the marks don't disappear when you grab the resource. I can't count how many times I've come across an empty mark because I already grabbed what was there.
Honestly, the game would be an order of magnitude better if they got rid of outdated gimmicks like the scanner room and beacons. Even the pings from the lifepods could go. We have all the technology in-game already to replace these with more challenging, entertaining, and immersive options.
1) Give us proper mapping capabilities like @gamer1000k mentioned above. The Seaglide, Seamoth, Cyclops, and scanner room all have 3-D mapping capabilities of some form. There's no reason at all this information couldn't be stored in the PDA for reference. Navigating can still be challenging since you don't have to give the map a GPS-like "you are here" function. It can be just like any old paper map where you have to decipher where you are from landmarks or celestial guidance. So if you go exploring you might have to periodically pop to the surface to get a bearing on the Aurora or one of the islands to make sense of the map.
2) Once we have mapping, all the pings and beacons can be tossed. All the messages we get say they are sending us coordinates to their location. So why not just send us coordinates? Tell me they're 1,283m from the Aurora on bearing 343. Make it an orienteering challenge to find things. Instead of beacons we'd mark coordinates on our map. If we wanted to physically mark a location we could simply use some unneeded uraninite to fabricate some radioactive poker chips we can drop where we need. Then, instead of a ping from a beacon a kilometer away, it's up to us to get back to the general area and use the scanner to find the chip.
3) The scanner room becomes pointless. With a real map we can note what areas are rich in what resources. Instead of relying on the scanner room we could turn the scanner into a hunting tool instead of just an ID tool. We already have this functionality in-game to some degree. How many messages do we get saying "scans indicate faint traces of Alterra technology" and similar stuff? What scans? If I can have a hand-held tool that can turn a couple chunks of titanium into a habitable base why can't I have a hand-held tool that can locate this titanium in the first place? Give the subs a general scanner that can be set to alert you to the presence of a chosen resource. Then let the scanner tool focus in to pinpoint individual outcroppings for harvesting. Now you have a reason to build a scanner and there's a new gadget to think of upgrades for. It could even be designed so that the scanner would only hunt for things it has already scanned. Which makes sense and adds the challenge of needing to explore everything blind at first, just like you really would.
I think the devs thought mapping would make the game too easy. And they'd probably be right if they did mapping like a GPS system where everything was tidy and automatic. But if they did a bit of research on orienteering I think they'd have an entirely different outlook on the subject. And this post was a really roundabout way of saying I don't much care for the scanner room. It's too awkward, buggy, and limited in function. I do still have one on my base. But it's mostly ornamental. I long for better options.
Totally agree. Several other survival games do this already, and it works well (although I still wouldn't mind an "easy" difficulty option with the traditional GPS style map available from the start).
On a more general level, I've noticed quite a few smaller games that intentionally hide important information from the player because the devs feared it would ruin the joy of discovery or make the game too easy. Kerbal Space Program did this with critical rocket design/maneuvering information. Minecraft didn't have maps at launch (but it didn't take long for mods to fill in the gap). On a related topic, mods that make this information available to the player are incredibly popular.
Once the Subnautica mod scene really gets going, I wouldn't be surprised if one of the first mods is to add a map to the game.
The Subnautica map isn't infinite, and it isn't completely random. Indeed, for the most part it is a relatively tiny fixed map. In my opinion, adding a map to Subnautica would be utterly destroy the game. In my opinion, the greatest fun in the game is from exploring and discovering all the new zones. But once you've played the game a few times, you pretty much know exactly where every zone is. You replay the game because the graphics and sound and gameplay are fun. Plus, since it is an Early Access game, it is great fun to see what they've added. But you definitely don't have the same exploration capability as you do in an infinite map that is randomly generated. So, I don't think there is much need for a map.
You have two categories of players:
1. New players - Adding a map would ruin the sense of discovery finding these zones for the first time.
2. Old players - Already know where every zone is
Can you name even one survival game with a small fixed map that adds a map to the GUI? Personally, I can't think of any.
7 Days to Die has two modes of play:
1. Fixed map for beginners
2. Completely randomly generated map for everyone else.
In early game the scanner room can help a newcomer much to find the needed resources for survival where a veteran doesn't need any help. So the scanner room could serve as a survival startup help for all that are new to the game. But then it would get too easy to find resources with the HUD if the range is too good and would have to get range cut, making it useless later in game.
A late game scanner room suffers from its range limit and the fact that most players are too experienced at that time to need a short range resource scanner.
In any case the scanner room has a good ranged holo map display of the local topology and 2 functional cams with a range that is a bit too short to use them as dangerous waters spy cams. The upgrade module concept is a bit weak and unclear how much it will help you.
Weaknesses and potentials:
The game also had some early concept of buried resources to extract with the terraformer and those could only be found with the scanner room, but it was probably dropped with the terraforming getting cut. Although buried resources could be virtually displayed and still be extracted with a special extractor tool. So it would work without terraforming. This concept was wasted and dropped from the game.
The next problem is the HUD magic that allows to locate any resource and which the devs consider overpowered and "just follow the signal". It's not really that important for veterans or experienced players who know where to find each resource types even without the signal, but more overpowered to beginners. And it might be unnecessary to have too, as the most important information on resources is the spot where to find resource rich places. That information is best displayed on the holomap and already works.
The greatest problem is the resource range problem. Best would be a rough holomap locator. That means the already existing holomap displaying the resources would need a 1000m range. But EXCLUDING the HUD info at that range !!! The HUD locator should only kick in when a player is within 10m of a resource.
Summary & suggestions:
EDIT:
This way we could find the scanner room tech early, but each components and upgrades would need extra tech to find to make it stepwise more powerful: HUD locator, more resource type modules
There are some great ideas in this thread. It's clear the HUD chip needs to be limited in range to reduce the spam of markers, but I'm not sure about upgrading the range, I don't think it's necessary. Re-working the sub-surface resources might be too much work for the devs, who are already working on fixing the menu, either by having two columns, or by having sub-menus.
I also don't think we need a map. Exploring the world is an integral part of the Subnautica experience, and after a couple of playthroughs the player is familiar enough with the map to not need one, it would be a shame speed up this familiarisation. The Scanner Room topographical map is possibly the most over-powered part of the module in that sense.
It's a shame the devs have pushed back the release date again, but I'd rather they spent the time on getting it right. Hopefully, once the feature-complete release is out, the Scanner Room will get some attention and polish before v1.0 launch.
1) Decrease HUD location to only work less than 30m near a resource (no longer overpowered follow the signal)
2) resource type selector (maybe better as type scan module) for different scan types, reducing the menu list
3) scanner room upgrade tech later to be found, allowing a quick first scanner room, but more potent stuff only later in game
If type scan modules are used, the scanner room can get upgraded very slowly to more powerful scanning stepwise with each module tech to be found.
I like this idea: the blueprints for a mineral scanning module are built-in (so you can immediately scan for copper, titanium etc) but you have to build modules to scan for fauna or flora, and later alien tech etc. You would have to make the range and speed modules more potent as you wouldn't be able to have 4 of them any more - or have more potent ones unlockable as you unlock other tech.
I'm in disagreement that it will destroy the game. If the map is blank from the start, a new player still has to explore to see what's out there, plus they'll be able to actually find it again without having to waste resources putting beacons everywhere (if they even manage to find the beacon fragments before they stumble across something interesting). Veteran players already know where everything is, and putting a map in the game won't change that. If anything, it would make the game less frustrating since they'll actually be able to find what they're looking for.
Not to mention that a proper map would actually allow players to see which areas of the map they haven't explored yet and encourage exploration to fill in the blanks. Right now much of the game is already "follow the signals" despite the dev's intentions since it's the only way to really navigate other than blindly swimming around and hoping you stumble across something interesting (fun for a few minutes, gets annoying pretty quickly).
As for survival games with fixed maps and an in-game map for the player:
ARK: Survival and The Forest.
I'm NOT a veteran (I rarely replay this game) and I literally make suggestion about area which short-circuit compass or all-alike corridor for the hope of getting lost.
No bullshit, it does happen...
...for the first 5 minutes of a difficult biomes and only persist in place with a minimal distance fog.
Even tortuous swimmer-only tunnel start being recognizable (I admit, this is because the repeated back&forth for oxygen make you memorize the ways)
Then I place a beacon and the place is forever localized (You'll kill me for saying that, but it's tempting to ask the beacon to be more costly or as alternative make the Scanner room camera drone into invincible moving beacon).
I might like for the scanner room to be the main/only ways to know where biome/wrecks/seabase are. Because I've discovered many as soon as I tumbled upon new biome
That's why I tend to avoid testing some Early-Access games too deeply. In that aspect, Subnautica half-random procedural generation do a good job renewing the fun.
Myself I see the Scanner room as an early tech or mid-game at worse. Because what the point of a system that you have to continuously improve if you only do it at the end when you learned to do without?
At first I saw little to no interest in its resources scanning ability, the range was too short and I knew that going into X biomes would give me X resources. (that's a good things, I only wish the Cyclops had an easy inside/outside storage meant to do mining)
Then the camera drone give you a sight but get destroyed easily and are costly to repair. I'm more encouraged to go myself, it make me only travel once.
To encourage me to use the scanner room... you would need to encourage me to stay at base (with management to do there) or to make travel by beacon more difficult (placing a rail of beacon, or something.
You'll guess that I don't want a minimap. Or have it linked to a late game item. Time-saving features are what should be very late game.
Did I mention I would see the seaglide as a faster, late game item? Now I did.
ARK has an option for procedurally generated maps now, but the default Island map (and the other official maps) are all static.
The Forest spawns you in a cave with the map after your first death, so it can be found almost immediately if you suicide (along with a bunch of other helpful items). Technically this first death doesn't count as a normal death as it implies your character blacked out and was brought to the cave by the cannibals, but after that the deaths show the normal death/game over/load last save screen.
Also, on the Subnautica Roadmap Trello, there's a card for possibly implementing a feature-rich minimap after 1.0. The YouTube description shows what they're considering.
Thanks! I bought The Forest but haven't found the time to even get started. I think you just gave me the tip that might "get me over the hump" to get into the game.
Thanks for the Trello link for SN! Wow!
I think it would be better to have instead a micro-sub that worked like camera drones but it could cover practically everywhere with just one mobile camera. This way you could justify needing maybe one total mobile debice that you could operate from your PDA, instead of having to access it from designated rooms you have to travel to beforehand, that have little else importance on the game otherwise.
Speaking of that topic, I realize when switching between two Drones tied to a SR located in different biomes causes delays, since the game is hiding the fact it's loading the terrain/data/surroundings around the camera. This causes some weird Fridge Logic: if I move Camera 1 495 meters from my SR to a different biome, then switch to Camera 2 that's located right outside my base, there is a very noticable delay before "connecting the feed." Are you telling me it takes 20-30 seconds to pick up the signal feed from a camera that's located physically just five meters away from me??
Don't Starve? Seven Days to Die? You might counter that neither are "small fixed maps" but Don't Starve maps the game areas as you move across 2D planes (not 3D) so you can travel the land much faster there than you can in Subnautica. Likewise, Seven Days to Die is also a 3D game, but you can't explore it in true 3D fashion the way you can in Subnautica. My point is, adding a map to SN won't affect gameplay performance, since having such a "tiny area" on 4546B to explore brought to players' attention is going to reduce interest in the game. In fact, I would counter it would increase interest in the game, as people could see where they've been in the world and see where they've yet to explore. Not to mention that the developers have added maps to Subnautica in the past but for bizarre reasons are not keeping them, despite the fact maps have been the standard in exploration/survival games since the past decade.
I don't have a problem with the Scanner room pointing out resources. Personally, I prefer not wasting time searching endlessly for sandstone to get a couple of silver just to build one wiring kit. That remains useful even late game when creating new bases. That being said, it *really* needs a fix for the stupid non-scrolling list. I think absolutely everyone can agree that's a very serious flaw, and when set in a world with super technology, it makes no sense.
Thanks for the mention of Don't Starve. Just bought it. I already own 7 Days to Die. But I find that game WAY too hard for me--and I play with the zombies turned off! Ha!
I mean it looks cool, but that's really about it.