Towns

[Dog Pants]

I just found Towns today, an(other) indie game in alpha. It's an isometric game of building a settlement which, I believe, is supposed to be a base for adventurers to use when delving into dungeons. There's a very obvious influence of Dwarf Fortress, and it's the almost first game I've found which does (the actual first being the equally ASCII Goblin Camp), but with an actual UI and graphics. It's a lot more basic, but it's also a lot younger. The potential is there though for more accessible DF style fun, although I've not seen any actual fun in the DF sense apart from my people getting so hungry they refused to pick apples and so starved to death. Certainly one to keep an eye on I think, and although it's not free I've not noticed any limitations to the alpha demo yet.

http://www.townsgame.com/

[Grimmie]

The lovable Sips from Yogscast did a good quick-play of this.

[media]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZgrUb0zW9Q8[/media]

[buzzmong]

Reminds me slightly of the first Settlers.

[Dog Pants]

I did like Settlers too. It's definitely more Dwarf Fortress in execution, but I can see that comparison.

[spoodie]

This is rather good and very much like DF, minus the brain curdling UI. I'm tempted to pre-order. The demo is limited to 20 days I think, but that's enough time to get deep into it if you use pause.

[Dog Pants]

Yeah, I got pretty far in 20 days. Enough to have mostly cleared out the first dungeon level and equipped most of my townsfolk. The main parts aren't even implemented yet - wandering heroes using your town as a Diablo-esque base being the main one. I'd like to see it get some RPS love and give the designers a boost.

[FatherJack]

I bought this after about two minutes of that video, when he laid down the stockpile. Visions of apples, woods and dead cow carcasses laid out in neat little rows filled my mind and I couldn't help myself.

Loving it so far.

[spoodie]

I've bought it as well. The two games I've played have ended in disaster. In the first game the people all stopped moving due to hunger. The second was going really well, was fast-tracking the town development. Until my little people hit an underground lake or something and all bar one drowned. I switched to underground view in time to hear the last dying scream. I left the remaining woman to her own devices, she committed hara-kiri by Froggy.

[Mr. Johnson]

I think I'm going to get this as well, I've always liked the idea of dwarf fortress but couldn't get on with it.

[Dog Pants]

How have you guys been buying it? The direct version is £10.25, Desura is only £8 but includes another download platform, which I can't be arsed with (especially if I have to launch it to play the game).

[Mr. Johnson]

I just bought it straight from the site as I didn't know I could get it anywhere else. Also my villagers always go on hunger strike the moment the food runs out (and it *always* runs out no matter how much meat and wheat farms I build), it's starting to piss me off. That might be what the game is after though.

[Dog Pants]

I've never had that problem. I build 6 farms, 3 windmills and 2 ovens/bakery tables and make sure I keep on top of the fruit gathering. Set the stock level to a couple of each type of pie and half a dozen loaves of bread. I usually end up with loads of flour, but at least they can go and cook their tea when they get hungry.

[spoodie]

I've been doing well with 4 wheat farms, 1 mill and 1 of each animal farm. Although 2 of my people died. Still, plenty of pies and bread lying around. You do know about the production button, right?

I'm struggling finding flint and iron, to start building the better stuff. Perhaps I should have a look at the dungeon? Also I'm paranoid about underground floods now, so testing the water stopping properties of wooden doors.

[FatherJack]

I've had hunger-lock a few times, which adds a bit of spice to it, knowing it can all go wrong.

The production button, centre-top lets you not only craft stuff (like bread) using the dials on the left, but also set a minimum production level to be always maintained using the dials on the right. I tend to stick to bread, so I can see what I've got on the one screen. But if you give them too much to do, like cut down the entire forest, they won't keep up the bread production and run out of food.

I go with a wheat farm per person, a mill for every five, and a bakers table+oven for every three, with the minimum amount of bread to be produced set at triple the population. That way I can arrange a dungeon sortie or two without running too low.

Your commands form a queue, plus they act on their own, but the net result isn't entirely logical. Auto-production seems a little lower down the priority than it should be - if hunger strikes all they will do is grab food, or freeze if there is none. They will always favour dig, till, chop, harvest and cut commands over the auto-produce, so you can literally dig your own grave with that.

Eventually hunger-locked citizens will starve, which if you have private quarters for them all will almost immediately be replaced with fresh new immigrants, but if you still have active commands, the cycle will repeat.

I haven't found a way to dismiss commands yet, so have to be careful about how much I ask them to do. Roughly the priority seems to be:

Dig, Till
Chop, Cut, Harvest (dropping the results)
Craft & Deliver (doors, walls), Craft & Drop (armour, food) including Auto-craft commands
Take away stuff that's in the wrong place
Put stuff in the correct place, including grabbing stuff left from Harvest and Chop

[buzzmong]

I haven't found a way to dismiss commands yet, so have to be careful about how much I ask them to do. Roughly the priority seems to be:

Far right option on the bottom bar. Drag a selection box and it dismisses them.

This is an alright game, needs a fair bit of work though.

[Dog Pants]

According to the website the next patch will let you set priorities, which should help alleviate food problems. It does need work, as Buzz says, but then it's only in alpha. I remember how Minecraft was when I bought that - there was no crafting at all in Survival. Possibly worth waiting for a few more version for more features, but I bought it to give it funding and publicity because I want to see where it goes.

[spoodie]

Something I found out last night: In an older version you could only put zones inside completed buildings. Now you can put them in open, but they suffer a production speed penalty. Don't know if that applies to personal spaces and sleeping, eating in the dinning room or the hospital. The game doesn't provide a lot of feedback on what's happening in that respect. In my current world all bar my personal space dormitory is in the open.

/edit
Wooden doors do not stop water, even when locked. I realised I could horse a test for this rather than waiting for a disaster.

[FatherJack]

Something I found out last night: In an older version you could only put zones inside completed buildings. Now you can put them in open, but they suffer a production speed penalty. Don't know if that applies to personal spaces and sleeping, eating in the dinning room or the hospital. The game doesn't provide a lot of feedback on what's happening in that respect. In my current world all bar my personal space dormitory is in the open.

I put down the areas first, then built walls, not knowing you couldn't do that before. I noticed the crafting speed up quite a bit once the last piece was in place.

As for other spaces, it might affect happiness, but also it prevents monsters that siege you just wandering where they want. Not sure if monsters can destroy doors, though - I did find two doors missing after a siege, but didn't see it happen.

[spoodie]

Monster do destroy wooden doors, I've seen it happen. Can't say for bone doors. I put bone doors on my hospital and bone candles inside, thought it was a nice macabre touch.

[buzzmong]

Anyone know if there's a way to remove/hide the roofs once the walls are built?