- Make better starting video in steam
You need to show buyers that exactly is game, not just random ingame video. Now it does not explains anything. Should add appearing text to video like "huge world to exlore", "different enemies", "many various tactics and skills to defeat your enemies", "complex crafting system", "many interesting quests" etc etc etc. Buyer should get idea that game is about.
I think it's fine. Video shows the gameplay as it should, while the description tells everything you need to know. Things like "huge world to explore" or "different enemies" sound like poor attempt at marketing you often find on the boxed copies of games.
- Make better tutorial
You lose a lot of players in the start of game because of bad tutorial.
Recommendations: make tutorial simple, explaining and linear, teach one thing at a time. Remove tons of redundant stupid text. Remove red stealable objects.
Tutorial proposed example: move character, use objects, equip armor, use firearms, use melee, use psyonics, stealth/lockpicking, throw grenade, use cosumable, craft something, some follow-up quests after tutorial.
I agree, it's pretty bare bones right now. It teaches you some of the the basic stuff, but not all of it.
- Enlarge and replace font
Font is too small and too badly readable, and discourages player to read or even play the game. Significantly enlarge it from start by default, replace it with better reading tech-looking analogue.
You can already enlarge it in the options.
- Quest management
Quests guidance for players is horrible. Should add arrow guide in ui for current quest. Add separate ui to list available quests, explaining exactly what to do in each step and how to report.
Oh God no.
This is supposed to be a classic cRPG, where you are actually need to think and figure out how to solve a quest by yourself. Handholding and quest markers would take all the satisfaction and difficulty away. I think the quest log and NPCs give more than enough clues.
- World map
Add world map to game. Or Without it game is stripped out of strategic level. Add fast travel via world map -- no need really to travel manually like 5 minutes to fight like 30 seconds.
How exactly does the lack of map strips the game of strategic elements?
The map is there, you just need to discover everything by yourself. Hell you can even draw your own map if you want to. I can't even think how boring would it be to explore caves with a map, half of the fun is getting lost in them and emerging in different palces, it creates a lot of unique scenarios.
You already have means of fast travel in the form of trains and boats. You don't need to backtrack through empty areas all that much.
- Character present
Add dozen pre-build characters presets for new character. For each present show "nickname", portrait, recommended starting stats and skills, explaning what this preset character is good for. When character level up, suggest that to put points into, based on starting preset.
It's not a bad idea, I think it would help new players in understanding the game mechanics a little better.
OTHER SUGGESTIONS:
- rename difficulties from easy/normal/hard to normal/hard/insane
- make game much less punishing for misclick stealing/threspasing, maybe make prison instead
- explaing better to player what world of underrail is about
- optimize loading time between locations
- reduce redundant texts from npc, which does not explains anything and does not gives any insights about the world
- give hint to player about difficulty of current locations and enemies
- find ways to reduce annoying instant death of player in very first turn
- add some companions to player, game is too 1-vs-many
- make locked lockers always contains something average/good
- improve crafting ui, see how it is made in other games
- improve economics: player is too low on cash in start, and is totally flooded in middle of game, add some more expensive items and money sinks
- add more items types and slots for equipment
- make locations more linear via looping: it is not ok to go back from quest via all visited emptied locations
- add more animations and sounds for ui
- add some random encouners in game, like in fallout
Renaming the difficulties sounds like something entirely redundant. Doesn't matter how it's called, if it's the easiest difficulty setting then why not call it easy? Same with normal and hard.
The prison idea is not bad, it definitely sounds better than the whole town trying to kill you because you stole an empty buttle from a shelf.
I think the world should be explained in a natural way, as in by NPCs and by simple exploring, rather than flooding you with exposition.
Loading times are not that bad if you turn autosaves off.
I don't think reducing the NPCs dialogue to exposition/quest information only is a good idea. It's an RPG, I don't want NPCs to be merely quest/exposition dispensers, they should feel like real people with personalities.
There is a lot of hints in the game about how dangerous specific locations are. You can't have too much of that though, it would take away any difficulty or danger if you knew exactly what to expect.
There is a lot of ways to avoid dying so quickly. It all depends entirely on your build and you can't blame the dev that your 3 CON, no stealth, low initiative build dies a lot, that's the whole point of different builds, all of them have their strong and weak points. Not to mention you can do exactly the same to your enemies.
Game having no companions is a design choice as far as I know.
Locked containers always containing good loot would be boring. I like to think someone already took everything and locked it for the sole purpose of making me mad, or left a single lockpick inside as a mockery.
Crafting UI is functional, I don't really have any problems with it.
There are 2 huge money sinks in the game right now, but I do agree there should be another one for players who don't care about super steel or (almost) useless housing.
Adding more equipment/item slots would be pretty expensive, both money and time wise. While I would like to see shotguns for example, I understand that it's not easy to introduce just like that and there are more important things to do, mainly bug fixing.
The in-game world is pretty looped. I agree that bactracking is not fun though.
Animations/sounds are, again, expensive and take time. It's just low on the priority list, you can't have everything.
I like the idea of random encounters. The game world is pretty static, I would like something unexpected to happen from time to time, like a train kidnapping/pirates attack during fast travel etc.
