Snarks
Terrarian
Hi there, this is just me talking about minor stuff that irk me and possible solutions.
///Corruption thorns.
It's been a while since I last played the game, I remember the corruption thorns on the surface seemed to grow quite a bit and made the journey much more dangerous, right now the thorns seem to remain mostly very tiny and I can just run past the corruption without any issues. I checked to see if it was just my imagination and after watching a few videos, it turns out that it is indeed as it seems, the thorns are just 1 or two blocks big and they don't grow beyond that but in older versions they spread out similar to how the thorns in the jungle do.
It really is weird how the most vile biome in your world (depends on what you generate with) is weaker than a simple desert or a jungle (both over ground and underground). I'm not sure if it's a bug that no one cares about or a feature, but I suggest letting the thorns overgrow as they used to, that way it would be harder to traverse the biome, you can even play around and add some kind of rare "blooming" poisonous variant of the thorn that appears every once in a while. That way you can make the corruption a bit more unique since the jungle already has plenty of thorns, plus it will bump up the difficulty. Maybe aside from poisoning you, it can also give you a debuff which increases the spawn rate of Eater of Souls when you touch the thorn. Of course it would have enough visual differences so that you'll be able to tell it apart from normal thorns.
///Blood
The blood has changed in 1.4, before when you would hit an enemy or kill an enemy, many, large droplets would splatter all over the place. In 1.4 the game now plays a more tiny and subtle blood animation, to me it makes combat feel less engaging but the enemy dies, the chunks fly everywhere but all you see is a tiny pinch of blood appearing for less then a second and then disappearing, dismembering creatures that drop almost no blood is unsatisfying and weird. No, I don't have the disable blood/gore option enabled, the game just has a different blood effect.
Maybe keep the new blood effect but also add an option for the old exaggerated blood as well, you can have it like a slider that changes between no gore and blood, bloody and exaggerated blood that flies everywhere.
///Block blending
Some blocks blend naturally, others cut off very abruptly and look very block-ey when placed next to another block for which I assume they don't have the proper blending textures implemented, it really takes you out of the experience. I assume this is something that would be improved upon later.
However, I'd also like an option to toggle between block blending and not, for instance an item can be created, let's call it a "chisel" although that already exists in game, but anyway. When you click on a blended block with that item, it will make the block un-blend from the rest of the block around it, if they're a different type. You can make it scroll between different states of blending, for instance you click once and it un-blends only on one side and so on until you fully un-blend the block. It would let players have more options in terms of building.
///Grassy sand
I think the foliage around oasis biomes will look better if some of the sand blocks had a tiny bit of greenery on them when they're close to water, right now it feels like the plants are glued on top of the sand block in stead of growing from it the same way grass grows from a dirt block.
///Music variations
More music variations, the grassy biome has theme variations in each world, it also has a theme for when it's dark, some biomes don't have those luxuries, they have only 1 theme and that theme plays even when the sun sets, like the desert for instance. More music variety would make the game feel more dynamic and replayable.
///World generation
1.Ultra large worlds, I don't know why I want them, I just want them. Will they be added? Most likely not, I'm not dying for such a feature but it would be cool to have, probably too time consuming to implement.
2.An option to control how many chests generate and the rarity of loot. Terraria has a lot of items and almost every one of those items has a purpose, it has gotten to a point where I empty my inventory, then I walk for 1 min back to the cave, explore for another 2 min and my inventory is already full with items I found from chests, so I have to go back to the house, again. It sucks big time, there comes a point in which there are just too many options to choose from and too many valuable things to debate whether or not to throw away or keep or maybe go back home to deposit your stuff so you can pick up the items you found when you arrive at the same location again. The piggy bank helps, a bit, but not enough. The inventory got bigger over time, but it is not enough, and you can expand the inventory only so much before it gets too big.
An option to lower world loot would help out a lot, it would also make finding items feel more rewarding and will give you time to bond with the item as you use it for longer periods of time.
Speaking of rewarding...
///Damage re-balance, crafting material requirements, etc.
(Rant)
There was a time when I would mine for hours, I'd find only a chest here and there, usually I'd find crap, sometimes I'd find something valuable, when that happened, it felt great. It doesn't feel great anymore, it felt nice because it took you a while to find that item, from there on you knew you'd use it quite a bit before you got an upgrade, for me at least, it gave a sense of attachment to the weapons and armor I earned. How can I feel that sense of achievement and attachment again when I keep swapping items to the point of absurdity, you skip over so many weapons and tools and pieces of armor, it feels like those items are there just to have them, without thinking of, WHY? Why add slightly different and inferior items? Why does cactus armor exist? Why are there so many swords you pick up and discard for no reason. The items that do compete stats wise just add to the sense of anxiety. You find a good weapon, but you already have a vile thorn, musket, boomerang, mace, wand and so on in your inventory, all of which are good, just depending on the situation. WHY do I have so many items? I started playing an hour ago but it feels like I skipped a couple of armor sets and already have a bunch of fancy weapons. Do we really need to see almost every item there is in one playthrough?
Somewhere down the line Terraria just got too obsessed with classes, it's no longer you finding a unique item that spawns an enemy which fights for you, now there's a whole "summoner" class, there is a "mage" class and a melee class and so on. So now you start throwing hundreds of the same type of weapon, but slightly different so people can experience their class from early on in the game. It's actions done with good intentions, but built on a poorly though out foundation. Why have a unique and mysterious staff weapon in your game that takes a while to find, when you can have hundreds of them and make them available early on in the game with almost no harsh item requirements to create them.
Items loose their uniqueness and they become less memorable, items that were iconic are now skipped over or replaced a bit after you get them because you kill something or open a chest that holds the same type of weapon but better.
(End of rant)
As stated above, an option to lower the loot would help, sadly though to truly fix this you need to rework a lot of the game progression. Adding the new way of progressing, weapon stats, material requirements and so on as an option upon creating a world for people who like to grind would do the trick, but it would be too time consuming and I don't see it happening.
10 stars to craft a mana crystal, more hellstone to craft molten armor, give reason for items to exist again, make structures in hell damage you again, so the obsidian skull is needed more, make it so only dynamite can destroy ebonstone and so on. This can be an option when creating a world, like how master mode is an option, alongside lowering the amount of loot in the world, this can make progression feel more rewarding.
I get that there are people who dislike grinding for hours on end, but constantly being showered in items that you wonder where to place and what to do with is also not a good thing.
///Item stacking
If it's too much work to introduce loot generation options and more modes to play when creating a world, you can also just make more of the items stack. Boots, bands, shackles and so on, equipment items can be made to stack at least 3 times so I can finally explore without having to go to the house so often. There are just so many loot chests in the world that It's not uncommon to find 1 item 5 or more times in a short span of playing.
///Corruption thorns.
It's been a while since I last played the game, I remember the corruption thorns on the surface seemed to grow quite a bit and made the journey much more dangerous, right now the thorns seem to remain mostly very tiny and I can just run past the corruption without any issues. I checked to see if it was just my imagination and after watching a few videos, it turns out that it is indeed as it seems, the thorns are just 1 or two blocks big and they don't grow beyond that but in older versions they spread out similar to how the thorns in the jungle do.
It really is weird how the most vile biome in your world (depends on what you generate with) is weaker than a simple desert or a jungle (both over ground and underground). I'm not sure if it's a bug that no one cares about or a feature, but I suggest letting the thorns overgrow as they used to, that way it would be harder to traverse the biome, you can even play around and add some kind of rare "blooming" poisonous variant of the thorn that appears every once in a while. That way you can make the corruption a bit more unique since the jungle already has plenty of thorns, plus it will bump up the difficulty. Maybe aside from poisoning you, it can also give you a debuff which increases the spawn rate of Eater of Souls when you touch the thorn. Of course it would have enough visual differences so that you'll be able to tell it apart from normal thorns.
///Blood
The blood has changed in 1.4, before when you would hit an enemy or kill an enemy, many, large droplets would splatter all over the place. In 1.4 the game now plays a more tiny and subtle blood animation, to me it makes combat feel less engaging but the enemy dies, the chunks fly everywhere but all you see is a tiny pinch of blood appearing for less then a second and then disappearing, dismembering creatures that drop almost no blood is unsatisfying and weird. No, I don't have the disable blood/gore option enabled, the game just has a different blood effect.
Maybe keep the new blood effect but also add an option for the old exaggerated blood as well, you can have it like a slider that changes between no gore and blood, bloody and exaggerated blood that flies everywhere.
///Block blending
Some blocks blend naturally, others cut off very abruptly and look very block-ey when placed next to another block for which I assume they don't have the proper blending textures implemented, it really takes you out of the experience. I assume this is something that would be improved upon later.
However, I'd also like an option to toggle between block blending and not, for instance an item can be created, let's call it a "chisel" although that already exists in game, but anyway. When you click on a blended block with that item, it will make the block un-blend from the rest of the block around it, if they're a different type. You can make it scroll between different states of blending, for instance you click once and it un-blends only on one side and so on until you fully un-blend the block. It would let players have more options in terms of building.
///Grassy sand
I think the foliage around oasis biomes will look better if some of the sand blocks had a tiny bit of greenery on them when they're close to water, right now it feels like the plants are glued on top of the sand block in stead of growing from it the same way grass grows from a dirt block.
///Music variations
More music variations, the grassy biome has theme variations in each world, it also has a theme for when it's dark, some biomes don't have those luxuries, they have only 1 theme and that theme plays even when the sun sets, like the desert for instance. More music variety would make the game feel more dynamic and replayable.
///World generation
1.Ultra large worlds, I don't know why I want them, I just want them. Will they be added? Most likely not, I'm not dying for such a feature but it would be cool to have, probably too time consuming to implement.
2.An option to control how many chests generate and the rarity of loot. Terraria has a lot of items and almost every one of those items has a purpose, it has gotten to a point where I empty my inventory, then I walk for 1 min back to the cave, explore for another 2 min and my inventory is already full with items I found from chests, so I have to go back to the house, again. It sucks big time, there comes a point in which there are just too many options to choose from and too many valuable things to debate whether or not to throw away or keep or maybe go back home to deposit your stuff so you can pick up the items you found when you arrive at the same location again. The piggy bank helps, a bit, but not enough. The inventory got bigger over time, but it is not enough, and you can expand the inventory only so much before it gets too big.
An option to lower world loot would help out a lot, it would also make finding items feel more rewarding and will give you time to bond with the item as you use it for longer periods of time.
Speaking of rewarding...
///Damage re-balance, crafting material requirements, etc.
(Rant)
There was a time when I would mine for hours, I'd find only a chest here and there, usually I'd find crap, sometimes I'd find something valuable, when that happened, it felt great. It doesn't feel great anymore, it felt nice because it took you a while to find that item, from there on you knew you'd use it quite a bit before you got an upgrade, for me at least, it gave a sense of attachment to the weapons and armor I earned. How can I feel that sense of achievement and attachment again when I keep swapping items to the point of absurdity, you skip over so many weapons and tools and pieces of armor, it feels like those items are there just to have them, without thinking of, WHY? Why add slightly different and inferior items? Why does cactus armor exist? Why are there so many swords you pick up and discard for no reason. The items that do compete stats wise just add to the sense of anxiety. You find a good weapon, but you already have a vile thorn, musket, boomerang, mace, wand and so on in your inventory, all of which are good, just depending on the situation. WHY do I have so many items? I started playing an hour ago but it feels like I skipped a couple of armor sets and already have a bunch of fancy weapons. Do we really need to see almost every item there is in one playthrough?
Somewhere down the line Terraria just got too obsessed with classes, it's no longer you finding a unique item that spawns an enemy which fights for you, now there's a whole "summoner" class, there is a "mage" class and a melee class and so on. So now you start throwing hundreds of the same type of weapon, but slightly different so people can experience their class from early on in the game. It's actions done with good intentions, but built on a poorly though out foundation. Why have a unique and mysterious staff weapon in your game that takes a while to find, when you can have hundreds of them and make them available early on in the game with almost no harsh item requirements to create them.
Items loose their uniqueness and they become less memorable, items that were iconic are now skipped over or replaced a bit after you get them because you kill something or open a chest that holds the same type of weapon but better.
(End of rant)
As stated above, an option to lower the loot would help, sadly though to truly fix this you need to rework a lot of the game progression. Adding the new way of progressing, weapon stats, material requirements and so on as an option upon creating a world for people who like to grind would do the trick, but it would be too time consuming and I don't see it happening.
10 stars to craft a mana crystal, more hellstone to craft molten armor, give reason for items to exist again, make structures in hell damage you again, so the obsidian skull is needed more, make it so only dynamite can destroy ebonstone and so on. This can be an option when creating a world, like how master mode is an option, alongside lowering the amount of loot in the world, this can make progression feel more rewarding.
I get that there are people who dislike grinding for hours on end, but constantly being showered in items that you wonder where to place and what to do with is also not a good thing.
///Item stacking
If it's too much work to introduce loot generation options and more modes to play when creating a world, you can also just make more of the items stack. Boots, bands, shackles and so on, equipment items can be made to stack at least 3 times so I can finally explore without having to go to the house so often. There are just so many loot chests in the world that It's not uncommon to find 1 item 5 or more times in a short span of playing.
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