Lotaeri One Off - Vid 16 | Sunless Sea

Welcome to Fallen London my delicious friend, the fathom king sends his regards.

My wife caught me cheating with the doctor, and she took the child :( It was expected as she was a spy after all... At least I have my red honey business to fill the void with MONEY$$$$

The sunless gams feel like they're perfect for you and your love for eldritch horror though I understand it can be rather receptive once you get too far with the grind as you mentioned above. thanks for covering this. There's actually a game with writing that's just as good but has a similar gameplay loop but a stronger story I'd say called The House of Many doors made by a lot of people who left the company that made sunless sea & Skies. House of Many doors has its stability issues in terms of glitches and crashes so I can understand wanting to avoid it but it might be worth a look.

I hope you're doing ok Tim.

Oh hey, you're doing this.
According to my record, last time I played this game was in... 2017. I recall quite a few things, but much, much less than I should. I also didn't leave myself thorough notes on the game, as I've been doing for most games the last many years (but apparently not all the way back to 2017).
I remember that, financially, your first run is very slow, yes. But once you've got "heirs" going, you start with huge amounts of money. And if I recall, there are more than a few ways to make money, some crazy (smuggling sunlight, selling honey), including a virtually infinite money loop via trading certain resources. I remember grabbing lots of Port Reports, but they were more of a bonus. I remember that weaker engines were more fuel-efficient so that it was better to keep the starting engine and just buy a... thingy (that allows you to go full-speed without blowing up) and just go full-speed all the time. Only the final engine was actually better than the starting one. Madness.
In any case, the setting is really good, original and atmospheric. Loved that about the game.
Some of the questlines are indeed quite lengthy...
I'll be watching this later.

Just two things Tim, as I haven't watched the full video yet. First, you are missing an expansion called "Zubmariner" with like 7 underwater towns which are even more wacky, plus a new ending to find immortality. Second, there is another game called "Sunless Skies" which is a bit different, better in some and worse in others, though they're still faithful to the main recipe. You could wait for a sale and have a series of either one, with an expressed condition that you will probably not finish either. Plus the fun of these games is starting all over again after a long break, so doing seasons of the same playthrough might not be wise.

Hi Tim,
I remember that I started playing Fallen London in 2013, it is an exceptional world.
Tried to play Sunless Sea a couple of times, got some progress, but never reached a good ending. Similar with Sunless Sky.
I haven't really tried to play Mask of the Rose.
There will be a Kickstarter for Fallen London: The Roleplaying Game, there is a Quickstart available, but I haven't read it yet.
Have a great weekend!
Cheers Sir.

Ooo, excited to watch this Tim, appreciated!

OOHHH this was a happy suprise, are you sure you never uploaded a video of this game? i have this unnerving feeling that my first exposure to this game was from you, along time ago. During the modding of darkest dungeon days. How strangely the mind and memory works.

Well, I'm only about 5 minutes in, but I'll throw in my 2 cents in case I fall asleep before I reach the end of the vid tonight. I wholeheartedly agree with your assessment of the game, and feel much the same way. The world and setting is fantastic, but without a guide the grind is borderline terminal. All the research I've done suggests that the DLC adds quite a bit to mitigate the money woes, offering pieces to significantly more profitable trade routes than can be achieved in the base game. An alternate path is to completely ignore monetary gain and stick with the base ship and more or less ignore combat to focus on the storylines. The starting ship is balanced enough to allow slow but sustainable exploration through port reports and the occasional sale of discovered cargo. Once you uncover the map and investigate every port (or study a guide), you will find there are ways to extend your voyage significantly without draining your funds and can route your paths accordingly.

As I understand it the game expects you to die often until you figure these things out, and often a quick demise will provide better long term outcomes than eeking out a long decline (which will still ultimately result in game over). That or you can read a guide. Mind you, I don't recommend a guide unless you find yourself out of patience, unable to figure out how to progress a storyline, and ready to quit. It really does take much of the discovery out of the game, but unfortunately many of the decisions you can take will begin a death spiral to the unprepared or unlucky captain. This last point may be the most frustrating thing about Sunless Sea. Games with slow progression are not a deal breaker for me, but if they have slow progression and frequent pitfalls that send you to a restart it further encourages boring grind to minimize the significant risk of experimentation.