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[Ozyton]

I remember watching some gameplay of this a while ago and the concept was interesting. Unfortunately, from my understanding, the way the evolutions works is a little backwards, at least it was when the game first released. It's a little hard to explain but... as you evolve your progress is compared to estimates of 'actual' human evolution. This is fine, except it goes by 'golf rules' where evolving too quickly means that you won't get to unlock most of the evolutions or just lock you out of certain ones(). I imagine this is fine for most players but I'm the kind of person that needs to have 'all the things' so I would probably end up gaming the system to not evolve too quickly while still unlocking as many nodes as possible.

On another note, the playthrough I watched had the option to unlock metabolism early on, so I assume that's supposed to be the 'tutorial evolution' but the player completely misunderstood how the game mechanics worked and that node never popped up again, at least for the videos I did watch. Perhaps he was just unlucky?

[Cthulhu]

Starting to feel like the game's going stale.  I'm at the species that can control its emotions, which as far as I can tell doesn't really do anything, and likewise as far as I can tell I can craft most of the useful stuff.  It doesn't look like there's gonna be any way to like make stone-tipped spears, storage containers, or stuff like that.  Unless the game drastically changes when you hit the savannah, I dunno what else there is beyond running up the brain tech tree and evolving up to homo sapiens, without unlocking any major new gameplay aside from bipedalism.

I actually kind of liked the game more as True Monke.  Sticking to the trees, terrified of predators, the small, mysterious, frightful world.  Now things aren't as thrilling, I feel like I've got most of it down pat.  Haven't lost a monke in a long time, at the point where I actively chase the stalker cat cause I need to eat more meat to acclimate to it.

[scriver]

Sounds a lot like it's comparable to the real world now.

Final stage of evolution will be you sitting in an open environment office filling out forms and typing away and trying to hide the fact that you're looking at monkey porn instead of working from your co-workers and the middle manager monkey walks whenever he walks by in the isle between desks. Desperately fighting your co-workers for that one desk place that's angled so they can't see you watching monkey porn at all. As your stress meter builds ever higher you retreat to the water cooler, desperately trying to let off some steam with some chit chat with your co-workers about the new girl with the big red buttocks and what you would like to do with her, but oh no middle manager monkey suddenly show up and your stress meter goes into red and you hurry in shame and worry for HR consequences off to the toilets, your last refuge, to pretend to piss and maybe cry a bit. A booth is empty, you hurry over and open the door and BAM! Stalker cat. You died.

[Grim Portent]

Starting to feel like the game's going stale.  I'm at the species that can control its emotions, which as far as I can tell doesn't really do anything, and likewise as far as I can tell I can craft most of the useful stuff.  It doesn't look like there's gonna be any way to like make stone-tipped spears, storage containers, or stuff like that.  Unless the game drastically changes when you hit the savannah, I dunno what else there is beyond running up the brain tech tree and evolving up to homo sapiens, without unlocking any major new gameplay aside from bipedalism.

I actually kind of liked the game more as True Monke.  Sticking to the trees, terrified of predators, the small, mysterious, frightful world.  Now things aren't as thrilling, I feel like I've got most of it down pat.  Haven't lost a monke in a long time, at the point where I actively chase the stalker cat cause I need to eat more meat to acclimate to it.

That is more or less what happens. You get to a point that you're the apex and nothing is a real threat. The real challenge is in the early game, especially in the first run when you aren't clear on how things work.

[Loud Whispers]

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

MONKE

[nenjin]

MONKEIGH

[andrea]

Well, got kind of wiped out by stalker cat. I stillcan't quite understand how I am supposed to fight stuff, so if a stalker cat arrives either I evade, or even in a group full of pointy sticks everyone is dead.
Will get better I suppose, as I unlock more nodes.

[Glloyd]

Yeah, the problem with this game is that the early game is a blast, but the late game is a brutal boring repetitive slog. Part of the problem is that the best part of the game is swinging through the trees in the jungle, while in the late game you're just meandering around a desert. The other part of the problem is that there is no progression past the basic tools you can make on day 1. So at some point, the only new thing to do is find new areas and kill new stuff, and the former has the issue mentioned previously, while the latter is hampered by the lackluster combat (which really just becomes a chore once you figure it out/get enough upgrades to make it overly easy) and really simplistic animal AI that just adds to fighting feeling like a chore, because there's no real challenge in the actual hunting part of it. It's too bad. I got as far as Lucy, but I was never able to get the motivation to finish the game, because it just felt like a chore to play. But I had a great time with the first couple evolutions. Going on huge treks across the map as an ape was both terrifying and fun, especially once I realized that you could hold space while falling and grab onto leaves and branches and swing your way around like that.

I just wish they'd either shortened the length of evolutions, or added other features to the late game evos besides bipedalism to spice up the late game. Even new tools or constructions would make a difference. I guess that'd have to wait for a hypothetical sequel (although despite announcing that they were working on a sequel around launch, they've now said they're working on something else because of lacklustre sales [im assuming in part due to launching first on EGS exclusively, because I know a lot of people who'd never even heard of the game before it came to steam])

[Dunamisdeos]

For emotions, holding R trigger to put yourself in alert state lets you run faster.

Yeah, it does lack in end-game challenges. I just made it to Australopithecus, so I assume I'm near the end. I live in the Savannah, close to the

Spoiler: spoiler regions (click to show/hide)

Canyon, which is and/or the desert, which leads to the ocean

But I don't really run into anything that can challenge me (Mind you I maxed out aspects of my combat tree eons ago). I suppose that's the point, becoming the apex predator and evolving from there. There's a heat mechanic, but not much else. Loads of new wildlife to bludgeon and devour. I haven't run into the "evolving too fast locks you out" issue, though. I don't think that's possible. I'm a million years ahead of the curve right now, and the only thing I might have missed out on was that there was probably a swimming branch, but I avoided swimming like the plague because the waterlife is terrifying. Now I live in a place without swimming water. Becoming fully bipedal was the real snowball point for me.

[Glloyd]

Yeah, there is a swimming tree, but I can't remember any interesting unlocks. It was mostly just swim longer/faster iirc. Plus sprint swimming.

But I don't really run into anything that can challenge me (Mind you I maxed out aspects of my combat tree eons ago). I suppose that's the point, becoming the apex predator and evolving from there.

That's part of the problem though, the combat tree unlocks make combat so trivially easy it becomes a chore. That'd really due to the combat system though. There's no variance to it, so the only way to make your ape "better" at it is to give you more time to dodge/strike, so by late game you will just never be hit unless you're doing it intentionally to get the points for healing from it.

[Cthulhu]

Well, got kind of wiped out by stalker cat. I stillcan't quite understand how I am supposed to fight stuff, so if a stalker cat arrives either I evade, or even in a group full of pointy sticks everyone is dead.
Will get better I suppose, as I unlock more nodes.

The only way to fight is to counter-attack, where you dodge towards the enemy instead of away from it, otherwise the same as dodging.  NPC monke won't dodge or counterattack until you have the right neurons, so they're completely helpless early game.

[Dunamisdeos]

Yeah, there is a swimming tree, but I can't remember any interesting unlocks. It was mostly just swim longer/faster iirc. Plus sprint swimming.

But I don't really run into anything that can challenge me (Mind you I maxed out aspects of my combat tree eons ago). I suppose that's the point, becoming the apex predator and evolving from there.

That's part of the problem though, the combat tree unlocks make combat so trivially easy it becomes a chore. That'd really due to the combat system though. There's no variance to it, so the only way to make your ape "better" at it is to give you more time to dodge/strike, so by late game you will just never be hit unless you're doing it intentionally to get the points for healing from it.

Ya, agreed. I haven't found it to be a chore but it does not change from the start of the game. You just get upgrades that let you do it easier. Even big enemies boil down to "force it to attack you, counter, repeat 5 times until it dies".

I'm not too bothered by it, it doesn't feel like combat is meant to be the focus of the game. Otherwise we'd just run around picking fights with everything for funsies instead of roleplaying an evolving ape. If that makes sense. I still agree combat is less than interesting and could use some work.

[Yoink]

Team Crow Magnum

   
Why did this make me laugh so much   

[Dunamisdeos]

I'm not quite sure how to progress. I've hit Australopithecus which in theory is the very last before you win.

However, I can't unlock any neurons to progress. I'm not sure what feats I'm missing in order to evolve. I have a large number of pathways open, but they don't seem to unlock. Things for smell/hearing/injury/injury treatment don't seem to unlock despite it saying they need "more training".

I also have the mutations needed to unlock these things. Not sure what's up.

[scriver]

I've been playing this for some time. I named my species Homo Monkelus and resettled my tribe next to the hunting grounds of a big cat, found a hominid named Ken (and of course dumped my old mate for her) and got eaten by a big cat. Am I doing it right?