Gaming Research Issues: Rimworld
Today I'm feeling the frustrations related particularly to trying to test certain aspects of gameplay. Rimworld is one of the new darlings of the modding community, and game adaptation through modding is one of the areas I have written about previously, particularly where this falls into a literary area. Rimworld is now being adapted by modders into literary genres, for example Call of Chthulu mods to create a H.P. Lovecraft universe. One of the mods within this possibly allows the colonist-pawns to write books of their experiences; this is one of the gameplay areas I intend to test this week.
I've spent forty game hours and counting absorbed in a modded version of Rimworld, but right now, all I want to do is tame a grizzly bear. It's not a high aim, but for various reasons, I've become interested in the differences within the AI on animal taming. I tend to find wargs, and grizzly bears don't wander onto this particular biome often. So far, three of my woefully unprepared colonists have been killed in taming attempts and the bears accidentally destroyed. Another bear is on the map, so strike four is on.
Another failed attempt later though, the bear is not dead, just stunned, and I have the opportunity to rescue it. Doctoring an animal can form a bond, so I go for that, and have my little pawn Donaldson (a practising animal handler) carry its unconscious form into the dining room in a prepared animal bed to sleep off some meds while I do some preparation, letting the rest of the game play on around me while I work this part through. My best animal handler so far is Nathaniel 'Nathan' McCoy, so I leave him butchering the sorry dead in the same room, in case the bear wakes.
A short time later, I'm caught short by Donaldson (-Donaldson???) cheerfully skipping along with a pile of fresh meat. Where's he heading I wonder absently, before all the fateful alarms sound, and the red warning 'Grizzly Bear Revenge' floats across screen. I am now fully back in the room. The overzealous Donaldson-in-training has made the fateful error of bumblingly practising on my precious grizzly bear and botched the training attempt, causing the bear to wake up and attack everyone in the dining room, and losing my one chance at testing the blasted, blasted warg/bear comparison. Nathan, still seated at the butchering table, picks up his revolver, and, his eyes never leaving mine, blows the bears brains out with one carefully placed headshot. I swear he never even glances at the bear, blast his pixelated face.
For a moment, I consider euthanising him, which is an option under pawn operations, but he's my most skilled medic, bionics surgeon, animal handler, and food producer, and therefore the most valuable pawn on the map. In that instant, I know it, and I am almost sure, he knows it too. He is also my favourite colonist, despite his bio giving away his tendency towards being a lazy wimp, but right now I'm never going to tell him that. He loses yet more favour points by dropping the revolver, picking up the bear, butchering it while it's still warm, feeding it's meat to the wargs, and passing it's fur to Bluewolf, who heads straight to the tailoring section. My bear is tee shirts within three minutes of gameplay. For the record, I'm now up to fifty gameplay hours, no more bears have entered the map, may bees eat their hides, and Nathan is now a level 16 surgeon, making him untouchable. Somehow, he's still my favourite pawn. I think he reminds me of my brother?
