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Some issues I have with Niche Mobile


CatYarn

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I am at level 50, I have unlocked every gene, and I have been playing for three days. I am making this post because I noticed some fundamental problems with this game that should be addressed, and I didn't want this post to get buried. This is not about bugs, I have only encountered two, the first being that the game will crash after extended play time, the second? I'll get to that. The problem I have is with the island area's, specifically being that they level up in difficulty. Whenever you get enough food, the area levels up your world's level, which is required if you want to go to new islands and get new genes. The problem is that the skill levels your nichelings need in order to do the levels quickly becomes insane. For instance, my forest level is 7, and it requires 7 perception, and the max amount a nicheling can have normally is 6. Perception only gives you a small bonus, so it isn't too bad. I can't say the same for the rest of skills. If your nicheling doesn't have enough collecting, strength, or fishing, the amount of food you can get per expedition is cut in half or more. If your nicheling doesn't have enough heat or cold resistance you are unable to cross multiple sections of the map. The maps will often be set up in a way where it is physically impossible to reach the end without strength or temperature resistance, and if your nicheling isn't skilled enough the only thing you can do is waste your turns trying to cross a section, or click the abandon mission button. This is where the second bug comes from, Mountain peak had this problem, so I five nichelings trying to do this level, but only one could get through due to the map layout and I clicked the abandon mission button so many times it started refusing to work. Completing levels like this makes it harder to level up, which can keep you from new areas with genes that could help you with these levels. This also makes it harder to get food, which makes it harder to breed new nichelings and invite wild nichelings, which makes it harder to get better skills, which makes it harder to level up. Something that looks like it could fix this is the mutagen, but it has problems too, the main one being that its a finite resource. The only way you can get mutagen is through quests, and after fifty levels and unlocking every gene I have gotten a total of 52. This seems like a lot, but between three islands with multiple nichelings they can disappear very quickly. Not to mention it makes it harder to switch out older nichelings that are less suited for an environment for newer ones as the newer ones will never be as good as a super mutant. 

TLDR: The difficulty rises to an impossible amount without mutagen, which is scarce and finite. There are two main solutions to this. One, make mutagen earnable like food. Two, redo the difficulty increments with only unmutated nichelings in mind, as this will make it so that mutagen is a reward instead of a requirement to progress, which fits better with how it is currently earned. 

Also, bugs. Long term play can cause crashing, and repeated pressing of the abandon mission button can cause it to stop working. Both are easily fixed by starting over the app. I am using the most current version of the app, and an iPhone 7 on software version 14.4.2.

For anyone who bothered to read this mammoth, I am sorry if I was overly critical or missed something or if this was too long, but I didn't see any other comments on this and felt like it needed to be said. I like this game, I just think it has some issues. Thank you for your time, CatYarn.

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I've been running into these same problems. The game really slows down right around when you reach the second island. I even reset the game twice to try to use the mutagen more strategically but it didn't make much of a difference. I like a challenge but at this point in the game it becomes more frustrating than challenging due to the difficulty of breeding optimized nichelings without adequate food because your island level is too high. It feels like the ratio between the speed of islands leveling up and ability to level up nichelings isn't quite balanced. I want to see this game succeed because I think it's cute and has lots of potential, but I think players might be discouraged if some of these mechanics aren't tweaked. 

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  • 2 weeks later...

i agree, the game has some serious balancing issues that need to be sorted out. right now i'm having to keep notes on every trait i will need and the whole game is just breeding the same couple over and over to try and get the exact outcome that's necessary. i saw someone review on the ios app store with these same concerns and the devs replied with saying they want the game to be strategic, but this is kind of frustrating

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