9 Year Progress

Almost 9 years ago, we got a list of things Ched hoped to be done with soon™. You can read about it here. There are still some unreleased projects, perhaps the biggest ones being more mission contract agents and drugs 2.0. Here's the remaining ones from that list:

Second contract agent (Medium) - ??%
Drugs 2.0 (Medium) - ??%
Starter jobs revamp (Small) - ??%
New casino game (Small) - ??%
Travelling 2.0 (Medium) - ??%

Travelling and drugs are functional as is, I can't see anyone complain too much about those, but what about the mission contract agents? What else are you looking forward to, aside from OC 2.0? Also, what updates not found on the list do you like the most? Personally I'd have to say it's the dark mode.

just get used to disappointment, its common amongst the torn release cycle. they dont have a proper project manager or project schedule - things are done basically based upon whatever someone can come up with and looks easy enough to pass off as a win. look at the chatbot shit, a feature nobody asked for and doesn't really enrich the gameplay at all. 

thats really simple to build, you just pipe in an openai api key and use some prompt engineering for character bio.

same shit with the 3d models, a feature nobody asked for at all. 

it sucks we won't ever get anything meaningful and that its whatever bullshit they can fart out but once you accept that its kinda freeing. all i'm praying for is a working chat after their 15 iterations deep of chat 3.0

those missing mission NPCs i've come to accept won't ever turn up, and thats fine i guess. people probably couldn't keep up with doing 7 missions a day, or 21 missions every 3 days. 

And yet we still log in every day, so they are doing something right... Load image: sick

Or we have just gotten used to being Chedded......

More missions would be sick. Not holding my breath though :p

Same thing really...

Who gives a f**k at the end of the day? Do you go to bed wishing you had better options on game for missions and then spend all night wrestling over it?

f**k no, you snooze your arse off as it's pointless...

Utter pointless... Load image: sick

I mean, there certainly are limitations to a text based game as a concept. I don't find the game as fun as I used to, but that's because I have more important stuff going on in my life. The game itself is eons better than back in the day. Remember the 1 hour downtime every night? Or that time Chedburn bought "an extra hard drive" to "significantly improve" server performance? I could go on, but if we don't enjoy the game today I don't think it's about the game anymore... I think we have just aged out from thinking it's as fun as we used to.

We definitely dont need more casino games.

Other than Chat 2, most of the changes have been positive.

Missions for playstyles other than attacking would honestly be my next move. I dont see any of the other listed projects as things that need urgent changing.

Models have been nicer but Im not sure anyone truely cared but some picky new players and Ched himself.

Actually getting some of these other user companies with viable perks would be preferred over some of these other listed plans.

Fun is where you make it. Not having fun, change your view point...

I've been here nearly 20 years and I still make fun for myself. If I didn't, why be here? Load image: sick

If u look at the developer list from then vs now, theres 2x to 3x more developers.  It also seems new feature release is speeding up, both wanted and unwanted stuff, at least staffing is growing.  All good stuff.  Keep buying DPs folks!!

I thought it was really interesting that Ched mentioned having ADD in the Xmas interview. I have it myself to a crippling degree, and this gave me a lot of insight into why Torn is like it is, and also into why I love it more than just about any other game I can think of.  I've always really appreciated how unique it is, and the attention to detail and commitment to change.  And the endless f**king dopamine. 

What am I hyped to see next?  I would love to see another change to RW so that people start fighting again, the termed meta is now more boring than chaining and fake wall slutting ever was.  Warring is the best part of the game, and where the vast majority of my interest lies, and it's currently barely functional in either ranked or territory form.  

BTW I still love the 3d models personally.  I think Torn has done a superb job of keeping up with the times while still retaining a sort of homespun charm, and parts of The Summoning were jawdropping to me.  If you went back 3 or 4 years, I think you'd be looking at a pretty noticeably uglier game.  No ticker; no dark mode; no dinky little OC 2.0 animations; no supply pack animations; no animations when you hover over the gyms, no flashing when you're being attacked etc. It all slowly adds up.  

Yeah I can imagine RW's being more boring overall. I'm glad I'm in a faction that always fights, unless there is a clear unfair match up. We sometimes offer much weaker factions to at least get some score, and sometimes we ask to get some score if we are significantly weaker. If there's even some uncertainty, we always fight.

The issues with RW's are largely player created after the mercenary debuff.

Drugs are functional? Without looking anywhere, tell how mamy drugs are out there? Apart from Xanax, Xtc, Vicodin, LSD(honestly useless unless you want to feel special with SSL) and Opium(Copium) all other are worthless.

Travel yeah its functional... but you can say in some way that Travel right now is same as C1.0... i mean no one said that C1.0 is not functional. But it was... idk how to explain contentless? Compared to C2.0

I think the 'Release' of Crimes 2.0 was the wake up call for me to temper my expectations to the barest minimum possible. What was it, ten years in development and it only released with one crime? On top of that, the removal of the majority of events in the game a year later?

That content in the list won't be seeing the light of day this decade at the very least.

Regarding drugs, no one uses them outside of Xanax and Ecstasy which is stopped being used once past the Happy jump threshold. The only other drug I can think of getting use, is Cannabis which became slightly more worth using since the boosted the Nerve gained from it.

So yeah, Expect nothing but the bare minimum. At least then, you won't be disappointed when new updates tend to be underwhelming.

I mean drugs doesn't take a lot of activity. Ched has talked about allowing the use of at least two drugs at the same time, but even that isn't a lot of "content" on its own. Travel also has limitations on how entertaining it can be.

I do hope that drugs get proper names for their function though, Xanax giving energy is kind of moronic.

The lore was recently updated to cover it though:

Load image

W PR answer. 

Ranked Warring is completely broken and fighting isn't really worth it, so factions mostly just make a deal like "sharing caches" and it's pretty much killed the reviving side of Torn and there are very few factions out there wanting to fight, and most of the time it's 1 side wants to fight and the other just refuses and "turtle" or fly out of spite. 

I don't think you can really "fix" this system without upsetting everyone that loves to print "free" money weekly, punishments for constantly terming is an option like you suggested in the past but as expected all the farms mass rebelled.

Personally think the map/territory/rackets is the best option to work on next, the city buildings for instance could give passive bonuses the factions surrounding them to shake things up a bit more too. Rackets are money printers too, change them to faction buffs instead of just cash related, some bonuses would be no good to the "big" factions while others would be really strong causing more map shakeup.

Apologies for the essay, just randomly decided to rant as I see what goes on.

I cant wait for new missions in ten years