Every time I try to play an older strategy game, city builder, etc. I find myself completely overwhelmed with the sheer number of options, interactions, and controls with no handholding explanation. How do you typically familiarize yourself with these sorts of games? What are some good games to ease my smooth brain into /vst/ mode? Today SM Alpha Centauri completely kicked my ass to the point that I am unsure whether or not I successfully completed my first turn.
just finish an easy game and go on.
> I find myself completely overwhelmed with the sheer number of options, interactions, and controls with no handholding explanation.R T F MTFM
>>1791794Strategy games are hardly complex, unless you plunge right into milsims or something. You build a thing to unlock a new thing to build, you collect resources as fast as you can and you spend them as fast as you can to get stronger as quickly as possible, you mass an army to outmuscle the enemy, you do research to improve your army and economy... Just play some campaigns, look up some guides if you struggle, it only looks difficult on first glance. Then there's multiplayer that comes with its own challenges but those aren't related to gameplay complexity either.>SM Alpha CentauriThe game's so forgiving, that kid me could play it without knowing any English. So much stuff can be made to work automatically: the bases, the research, the formers. What you need to do on your own is explore everywhere and build bases everywhere.
>>1791794play turn-based strategy, retard
>>1791794In order to into strategy. First one must into the spreadsheet. Then the numbers will flow.
>>1791794Watching tutorials/guides or any other educational content on youtube helps. I remember getting into paradox games, they were overwhelming at first. But I liked history, especially the ww2 period, so I kept on going. I was playing hoi4 as the country of my origin, Poland. If you know anything about that period you will come to a realization that it's not a good country to learn the game as the strongest country in the game is coming for you in 3 years. Or maybe it's good for learning since you are the underdog and have to prepare for the inevitable. Anyway, just find a game/setting you like and play it. I've lost as Poland multiple times but I kept rethinking my attempts and I did start winning games eventually.I love learning new stuff about the game hence my "watch stuff on youtube" recommendation. I watch them even after having over 1k hours in my games. If you find a game interesting you will learn eventually
>>1791794>Today SM Alpha Centauri completely kicked my assyour own fault for playing an older gamea masterpiece of course, but these games didn't exactly hold your hand like they are designed to do today>How do you typically familiarize yourself with these sorts of games?just play on easy, as fp saidyou will pick things up as you play>What are some good games to ease my smooth brain into /vst/ mode?try civ5it's simpler than 4 and 6, and it's the first normieshit of the series, and a decent game overall with all dlcs
>>1792126>>1791794What anon wrote, read the fucking manual. Older games were designed before every UI element had a tooltip. If you want to learn the rule system you are expected to read. Don't be intimidated by it. You can go though manuals/ tombs a lot faster than you think. Once you have had a first read leave it open to alt-tab while you play and you will very quickly pick up the intricacies while you play.
>>1791794civilization 4, now it's 5 dollah/euro/shekels.don't read anything, launch the game, single player play now, easy difficulty, don't bother with any options for the map. then just play the game, tooltips are always present, it starts slow with just 3 things to do, research explore and build units. play as you see fit, with time you naturally understand what is required.
>>1791794I dunno about city builders, but for RTS the way I learn is by just making units and seeing what they're good against, what they're bad against, how they move, etc. Then the build orders come naturally based on when I'd want each type of unit out or how fast I can get away with teching.Only downside is that it takes a while to learn like this, but once you get the fundamentals and how it actually feels to play that's when you look at other people's guides.
>>1794016>But I liked history, especially the ww2 periodwish i had a friend like you, fellow ww2 chad
>>1794868I was hooked on ww2 stuff back then. I eventually branched out, I've stopped playing hoi4 and began playing eu4. That's probably why I started getting more interested in the medieval period. I'm kinda burnt out on the ww2 period since I've been limiting myself to this period alone for years. It's still interesting but there is a lot of interesting stuff outside of it
>>1791794They are all naturally overwhelming by design and end up being simple once you are familiar with the mechanics >How do you typically familiarize yourself with these sorts of games?If the fame you are playing catches your attention and you like it then you will naturally take your time to learn the game and yes that means spending lots of time reading and/or watching game plays and LPs
>>1792170What's your first language?
Play on the absolute easiest difficulty and treat it as a practice run. I do this for the first playthrough of any strategy game because it gives you complete freedom to experiment and learn. You can fuck up, break things, test the limits, and figure out precisely how each mechanic works. Then you can start playing for real the next time.I don't like reading or watching guides because the author will fill it with their biases and misunderstandings about the game, which can cripple your own development and understanding. It's better to get your knowledge through direct experience and observation of the game itself.
I've just bough Age of Wonder IVI've already restarted 3 times. I got like 30 turns deep and I've discovered how something works and that I could do something in a different way each time. Just start a game and learn, if you see that you have fucked something up then it's probably not worth continuing the playthrough and just start a new game. Unless you have spent a lot of time in your game. That's how I do it at least
Is World in Conflict worlth palhygi
>>1796171yes, but it is a role-playing game
>>1791794some of us come from the days where forum posts, gamefaqs, n got gud were all u had...we live in a time of endless wikis and yootoob... use these to your advantage OP...
>>1795003>I don't like reading or watching guides because the author will fill it with their biases and misunderstandings about the game,Yeah also it will just ruin the fun, metagaming tends to be a speedrun into making a game dry.I think maybe you can get away with selectively looking up stuff at the game Wikipedia if you're wondering about something, since some mechanics in strategy games can be obscure, but even that might be risky.
i recommend booting up ChatGPt and requesting an audience with johan anderssonhe's always listening
Spend a week reading guides and watching videos.Theorycraft the best min max options for another week.Start the game, quit and uninstall and move on to the next game.
543this, but post results to gsg(general strategy-gaming general)
>>1794868Once the US election is over, go to /pol/. You can make friends there who are into WW2 history.
>>1791794You just follow meta builds and guides and fake it whilst clicking randomly until you burn out your cartilage...>older strategy game, city builder, etc>overwhelmed with the sheer number of options>no handholdinglol, lmao
>>1802709>whilst clicking randomly until you burn out your cartilage...This shit again. You click to move the map, you click to break the pathfinding to reset it, and you manually control units with full micro.
