Editorial - Curious Case of Saviour Schnapps

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Spaceman
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Gamepressure write in defense of the Saviour Schnapps system in Kingdom Come: Deliverance.

Much ado about saving

After breaking down to you this lengthy outline of mechanics designed to make our decisions in games more impactful, I ought to get to the point, or rather the game that inspired this whole article – Kingdom Come: Deliverance. The Czechs from Warhorse also wanted to attribute more gravity to the decisions – not only the big ones that shape the world and the story, but also (and perhaps mainly) the small ones: risky actions such as pickpocketing, for instance. In order to do that, the number of possible ways of saving the game was drastically limited to beds, bathhouses and special (rather expensive) potions, complete with checkpoints during missions.

Saviour Schnapps in Kingdom Come isn’t a new idea, as a matter of fact. Older players may recall a similar solution being utilized in PlayStation version of Tomb Raider 3 – at the beginning of each level, the player would get a few crystals that allowed to save the game. You could find a couple more further down the road, but the game was still considered to be significantly more difficult than the PC version – sometimes even to the point of absurdity, if judged by today’s standards.


The decision generated much discussion. Even though Kingdom Come has probably as many pros as cons, the discussion was mostly fixed on the game’s saving system. The solution utilized in the game was a bitter pill, mainly for the PC players, who have developed an almost compulsive quick-saving instinct over the years. I’ve seen some truly paradoxical situations, where some core players, who usually bemoan the way video games have become way too simple because of the casuals, were complaining about this system spoiling the game.

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Let players play the game how they like. If they really want to restrict saving then put in an ironman mode.
 
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Savior Schnapps rather expensive?

The author didn't play the game much if he believes that. You can craft it at no cost but a few minutes of your time, could cost you a few silvers for buying Beladonna but by mid-game you should have stumbled on enough gardens/forest spot with it in it to make 100+ Savior Schnapps. Buying the final product is like ~60 gold which is one the cheapest thing you can buy beside food.

I really get the impression the people whining about Savoir Schnapps are just cheap lazy poor gamers.
 
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Savior Schnapps rather expensive?

The author didn't play the game much if he believes that. You can craft it at no cost but a few minutes of your time, could cost you a few silvers for buying Beladonna but by mid-game you should have stumbled on enough gardens/forest spot with it in it to make 100+ Savior Schnapps. Buying the final product is like ~60 gold which is one the cheapest thing you can buy beside food.

I really get the impression the people whining about Savoir Schnapps are just cheap lazy poor gamers.
The problem is the early hours of the game.
15+ hours into the game, you'll have thousands upon thousands and nothing will be a problem any more, including buying enough Schnapps.
I'm 40 hours in and I have 20k+, KCD economy breaks as easy as that of almost every other game. I don't even pick things worth less than 300 Groschen up any more.

But really early on - which is when most of these complaints stem from -, you simply cannot afford the Schnapps. Which leads to an ultra-conservative playstyle, since coincidentally, early on Henry also sucks terribly at everything. It's just not fun to play so careful. And if you die, you lose a ton of progress - which is extremely frustrating, especially early on.

The game opens up too early for its own good. The devs should have railroaded a bit longer (or make the prologue less lengthy, which would've been good anyway) until Henry got some more skills. Or give Henry some proper skills to begin with.
When the game opens up, players think that NOW is the time to explore, loot and plunder. It really, really, really isn't - or you're in for a very tough and lengthy ride. I unfortunately realized that too late.

What I ended up doing was installing the saving mod and my enjoyment of the game went up from "do I really want to play this game any more? Such a bother" to "Oh, nice! I can finally play the game the way I want to!".

Later on, when I had thousands of Groschen, I decided not to uninstall the mod, because buying the Schnapps would be a complete non-issue with such a bank account. It would only be a braindead bother to chat up every trader if the Schnapps would run low (queue loading time, queue dialogue, look for Schnapps, buy Schnapps), so I'm kinda happy I don't have to do that.
It's not like I'm saving every three steps, which is rather absurd. Just before major "situations", which is how you'd use the Schnapps anyway.
I'm still way below 300 saves.

In the end, for me the Schnapps would simply have been a bother that does not add challenge, just annoyance.

About the article:
The question is whether playing a game such as Kingdom Come for an hour a day even makes sense
You know an article is off to lose truckloads of credibility if the author is questioning how people prefer to spend their gaming time.
I'd have enough time to play for longer periods, but I prefer to keep each session to 1-2 hours max and rotate between 3-4 games most of the time.
 
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But really early on - which is when most of these complaints stem from -, you simply cannot afford the Schnapps.

You can afford the Schnapps, you get 4 for free (one is from loot). You can sell herbs or stolen loot to make money and buy some. Once you get to Rattay you can start crafting it and it cost next to nothing.

Saying it's cost too much is just trying to find excuses for your laziness and greed.
 
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Let players play the game how they like. If they really want to restrict saving then put in an ironman mode.

Sometimes, as in this case, a simple solution is the best.
 
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You can afford the Schnapps, you get 4 for free (one is from loot). You can sell herbs or stolen loot to make money and buy some. Once you get to Rattay you can start crafting it and it cost next to nothing.
What stolen loot?
You cannot go pickpocketing, as you suck too much in it and will get caught immediately.*
You cannot go picking locks, as doing that is almost as risky.*
You cannot go back to Skalitz for some "low level" enemies as you'd naturally assume as the bandits there are way over your level.
Picking herbs is indeed pretty much the only thing you CAN do. And what great fun it is, too! Look at a flower, press the button, watch the AHHHH-FFS-LET-ME-SKIP-YOU-animation for a few hundred times, interrupted only by moving back and forth between traders who will buy your weed.
If that is what counts as a fun time in a game for you, I'd like to point you at Farming Simulator 2018. For me, it was mind boggling which is why I just installed the mod and had fun instead of picking flowers.

You are right about the alchemy, but I hate crafting with a passion and never do it when not absolutely forced to in games. In ~50 hours of playing KCD, I think I crafted one potion for a quest.

There is also hunting, which is at least an actual gameplay activity, but I must admit I kinda skipped that in my playthrough.

* Now, if you play extremely carefully, wait until night, until people sleep, strip down naked for maximum sneaking and THEN move in to steal from some sleeping people, then you can actually get away with it without having to reload. But such a careful playstyle just isn't fun for most people. Well, or you do it at daytime and risk wasting your time.
In theory, you can let yourself get caught, wait until prison time is over and then just do it again somewhere else. Guards and whole towns forget your crimes. The game isn't nearly as punishing as you'd expect. The problem with that is that no player knows this, so just naturally reloads to the last possible point on a failure. KCD does a terrible job at explaining its systems.

One way or the other, my point stands that it is too expensive early on, except if you want to spend your time with boring stuff like picking flowers (don't know about you, but I got the game for the combat, which turned out to be rather disappointing, oh well).
And later on, you are swimming in so much cash that buying loads of Schnapps is such a braindead trivialty that you just want to get rid of it.
In both situations, you can just install the mod and play the game the way you want to.

Saying it's cost too much is just trying to find excuses for your laziness and greed.
No idea where you get greed from.
And I wonder if you think skipping the shitty parts of a game to get to those parts that are fun for you counts as laziness. It doesn't. That is called logic. Why waste time with something that is no fun to you if you can skip it?
 
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What stolen loot?
You cannot go pickpocketing, as you suck too much in it and will get caught immediately.*
You cannot go picking locks, as doing that is almost as risky.*

* Now, if you play extremely carefully, wait until night, until people sleep, strip down naked for maximum sneaking and THEN move in to steal from some sleeping people, then you can actually get away with it without having to reload. But such a careful playstyle just isn't fun for most people. Well, or you do it at daytime and risk wasting your time.
1. Why would you "train" lockpicking and sneaking in plain sight? As soon as you get your horse through the main story, bandit camps sidequests appear. Perfect to train sneaking and in some cases lockpicking. Apart from the miller's easy lock, you get a bed in the second caste (Talmberg? forgot the name…) and next to your room is a door also with easy lock. You may train lockpicking on it as each time someone enters the room or exits it, locks the door - basically no risk and you can save the game on that bed you "own".

2. Pickpocket is also easy to "train" if you know where. Sasau monastery, night, patients. They're all groggy - I was low pickpocket yet managed to improve pickpocket on them skyhigh. You just mustn't be greedy, pickpocket 1 by 1 item and none of those patients will wake up.
Don't tell me no player goes to Sasau earlygame - everyone who upon getting a horse goes for sidequests will go to Sasau while doing cook finding sidequest (the priest). Fastrunner reviewers however won't even bother.

Back to the topic. IMO there is absolutely nothing wrong with the save system in KCD. It's easy to adapt on and is far superior to checkpoint rubbish.
What went wrong is the amount of bugs on release that practically forced a player to get the save anytime mod.
 
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What stolen loot?

The first time I left Talmberg (in the intro) I was over-encumbered. Didn't pickpocket anyone (you can't anyway) and I lockpicked a single chest. I did strangle a Cumans in the intro and stole his stuff though and then stole a bunch of stuff from the Talmberg armory which was just laying around (couldn't open the chests). Herbs aren't the only thing you can "pick".

No idea where you get greed from.
And I wonder if you think skipping the shitty parts of a game to get to those parts that are fun for you counts as laziness. It doesn't. That is called logic. Why waste time with something that is no fun to you if you can skip it?

The refusal to spend money on Savior Schnapp is greed. In the early game, it is the only thing you are going to spend money on. There is no waste of time anywhere, the game is half-simulation. I bet you hate having to sleep, eat, repair your gear and wash yourself too because the game requires it.

And laziness is the refusal to learn how to play the game by using the easy way out (the unlimited save mod).
 
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