Hi LightningLockey!
I read it all and sympathise. I appreciate you taking the time to write down your experiences here - we certainly didn't set out to make this your second most miserable game experience ever
We know we need to do some significant work still on the tutorial, and we will. Part of the problem is indeed that this game is quite different from our previous endeavours, and we need to educate players a bit about all the things that you can do such as hiring companions or henchman, but also about what you cannot do too. I wrote a small piece about this particular issue here:
http://www.lar.net/2014/03/07/educating-players/However, it is a game that requires you to backtrack from time to time, and seek out solutions using the mechanics that are available for dealing with the situations that you encounter. We're making it challenging on purpose because otherwise people wouldn't experiment with the various systems (because there would be no need to), and discovering how to deal with a situation in an innovative manner using the available mechanics usually leads to fun gameplay.
This is definitely not the easiest design approach in the world, and the risk is indeed that people run into a brick wall if they don't try different approaches. Which is why we integrated so many ways of reaching your goals, but sometimes, it's possible that you have to abandon one goal, just because you developed your game in such a way that a solution isn't possible anymore. Which is fine by the way - the game's been designed such that you'll always be able to finish it, even if you kill everybody. But also such that you can finish it with very little combat (not recommended for beginners
)
Still we certainly don't want it to be too much of a frustrating experience , which is why there are different difficulty levels (which still need to be tweaked, this is just their first iteration). That together with a better tutorial (and in-game education that progress will only happen through exploration) will hopefully remove the game from your top 2 position.
Did you play on easy or normal ?
