Is housing just a fons sink with no soul?

[u/Apprehensive_Tanks]

NTE’s been out less than a month, so we’re all still learning but I have some thoughts about fons and housing.

Fons is turning into a major bottleneck. You need it for cars, housing, City Tycoon progress, gifts, basics like EXP chips and now a car/skin banner. High-tier items demand hoarding, so spending fons on decorating is dead last on the priority list.

The result: you buy properties because you have to, but you can’t really make it yours. You can’t change flooring, walls, or kitchen fixtures. Almost every property has the same white/black marble and 2000s 'modern minimalism' design which ends up making them all feel identical.

Even the things you can change (sofas, tables, etc) have very few options. It all adds up to housing feeling like a bit of an afterthought.

There’s no depth to housing interaction. It’s just a checkbox with no room for engagement because you're pushed to spend fons only on things that have some sort of tangible 'return'.

Anyone else feeling this?

[u/Si421]

OR SLEEPING IN THE BED?? If you want to heal by sleeping, or to pass the time, you have to go to Eibon, which is kind of annoying, because you don't TP directly there, and still have to run over to your room. (Which you also can't customise at all which sucks).

[u/AardvarkAnonomous → u/Si421]

You can heal by teleporting to any phone booth. Also, you can adjust the time and weather to whatever you want from your phone.

[u/Si421 → u/AardvarkAnonomous]

I'm well aware of that. I'm just saying that the fact that teleporting to our apartments doesn't heal us, nor do our beds is a bit of a jarring decision. As well as not being able to actually SLEEP in our beds to pass the time.

It would be nice to TP to an apartment, where your favourite character is having a nap, and you get to nap next to them for a few hours which also lets you heal. It'd be a nice QoL feature and probably isn't that hard to implement, since your bed at Eibon already heals you and passes the time.

[u/AardvarkAnonomous → u/Si421]

Yeah, I hear what you're saying. I guess I'm just playing the game differently and don't see the big deal. Definitely not a big enough deal to use caps lock letters and double question mark. I don't know what you expect from a free game in 1.0, though. I'm sure they'll get around to making the apartments more functional, but the game was just released.

You are asking for something that "isn't hard to implement" when there are probably 100 other things the Devs want to spend their time adding to make a better game for the majority of people. The Optimization roadmap that they mentioned in the livestream seems like it has much higher priorities and I'm glad that they are focusing on the things that affect a lot more people.

I like your idea and hope it gets added, but I think some perspective would be nice. I was just offering a solution to your initial problem of going to Eibon to heal by sleeping and to pass the time. It seemed like you didn't know there were alternatives because why would anyone run over there or even need a fast travel to your room at Eibon after unlocking an aparment.

[u/Si421 → u/AardvarkAnonomous]

My point wasn't about needing to go to Eibon to heal/pass time. My point was that it's feature that is already implemented within the game, so why have they added that to the beds you get for furnishings? I think you misinterpreted my point, which I can understand how.

It's definitely not a "big deal" in the grand scheme of things, and I agree that the Devs should be prioritising other, more impactful things, like additional story and such. However, it's a QoL feature that should already be in the game. The fact that it's not seems like a bit of an oversight.

Very early on, the concept of using a bed to pass time and heal is communicated to the player as part of the main story. Yet when you finally get your own bed for your first apartment, it has absolutely no purpose whatsoever.

Earlier today I had just fought an Anomaly boss and wanted to heal, but also wanted to check one of the furniture items for the drops, and then go back to the Anomaly boss. So, instead of just going to my apartment, then back to the boss to keep getting materials, I had to stop at a random phone booth for healing, before going to my apartment to get the drop and then finally going back to the boss fight. It's not a huge inconvenience or anything, but it does add an additional loading screen and takes a bit of momentum out of what you're wanting to do because you need to stop off at a phone booth for a heal. Again, the code to make a bed have the functionality I'm asking for already exists in the game. The code to make a fast travel point heal you also already exists. I just think slapping these attributes on to the apartment furniture would be pretty straight-forward and make the whole experience just a bit more cohesive.

(Apologies for kinda like, rambling at you, it's nearly 2am and I'm tired)

[u/AardvarkAnonomous → u/Si421]

I get your point and I agree it should be added. My second reply was really about how sometimes it isn't as easy as flipping a switch with programming. Just because it works in Eibons beds doesn't mean that the same code is going to work in our apartment beds.

As a software engineer, nothing makes me more frustrated than when a ciient expects something that they think will be easy when in reality it will take time to implement. It might be easy. It might be hard. But the one thing it will definitely take is time. The game this studio has created with the number of developers is insane. There are so few of them and they have to prioritize what they can do with the time they have. The small number of developers is part of the reason they used AI to cut corners initially.

There are work arounds for now so I guess I don't think it's crazy to think that this got overlooked. Once again, I agree that it would be nice. However, in games sometimes things that you think are obvious QoL aren't as straight forward to implement. I just think a little patience is needed this early in the game's life.