Ginger Island again

[Miretar]

So I went back again. I made it through the volcano and got some lovely enchants.
I did a bunch of Qui quests, which were all very easy. The Galaxy soul rewards were great, but there is really nothing else I need.

my overall verdict is still thumbs down.
I feel like I’m dancing to the tune of squaw parrots.
I find no fun in the volcano dungeon.

Two more biggies, the Crystal cave quest & the dart game. Can’t get them, gave up trying. Pointless performance art in my opinion. Same thing with panning for a fossil.
So I won’t get all the golden walnuts. No perfection for me then—but hey, I refuse to get married just to get the missing Stardrop and perfection is still more arbitrary performance art. But I digress.

The thing I hate most are the changes to the mines.. I love mining. It suits my mood when I am incredibly stressed and need a boring, soothing repetitive action. That’s gone now, thanks to Qui’s mine reset.

I don’t mind the tougher monsters, but I do think it was tacky not to improve the loot drops. I can’t get excited over radioactive ore.i It’s the art. Certain levels were hard enough to see on mobile before, but now it’s impossible, especially the green levels. However often I go back, the visuals remain stubbornly arty and pretentious.
Even when I take the quest, wasting for staircases again, the reset to the old mine graphics is only temporary.
Not overall not a good design choice in my opinion.

 

[HaleyRocks]

Volcano trips become obsolete, once you unlock hte "mini-forge" from masteries... You still need to farm for Dragon's Tooth, though.

Galaxy souls do not come in the form of rewards and they aren't possible (rare) drops in the volcano dungeon... Only in Dangerous Skull Cavern or Dangerous Mines. Unless you mean the points to unlock.

Volcano dungeon is fun and it requires no staircases! Although it appeals more to speedrunners, or something.

Crystal cave is random; just reenter it once you fail and if you become lucky, there will be bigger delay inbetween the dings. Dart game is hard, but if you don't move your mouse during the in-game target is moving all by itself (you move your mouse once it temporarily pauses its passive movement) and remember to keep the left click pressed until the "crosshair" is fully minimized, then you can hit best. Fossils are easy to come by and even easier, once you enchant your pan. You don't need to manually collect golden walnuts for perfection either, since 1.6 onwards, you can opt to paying the local Joja parrot extravagant sums, so as you instantly earn them.

Marriage isn't for Stardrop reward, but for the cool factor of it being a nice, carefree relationship, which is effortlessly maintained, conveniently idolized and completely free of real life's "complications", "ugliness", "misadventures" and "accidents". Also, if you feel like, you can get a divorce and remarry, or remain single, post earning the benefits of x/y spouse.

As for mines, they can revert to their original state at will. Post finishing the Qi quest, if you interact with the altar at the last floor. The loot might not be better, but is more varied at least; you can now earn special items, such as pressure nozzles, randomly.

 

[FilthyGorilla]

but there is really nothing else I need.

The items there are really all up to choice to use, stuff like the deconstructors are amazing for cheap and fast fiber, stone, hardwood, and bars

Two more biggies, the Crystal cave quest & the dart game. Can’t get them, gave up trying.

Dart game can come down to some skill though is easier if you try to zone out and don't overexert yourself with trying to get perfect shots. Sometimes leaving it up to luck is workable
You can record or write down the order of the simon says puzzle, it also slows down the more you fail it so maybe keep failing? As counterintuitive as that may seem

When 1.6 comes in November you'll be able to just buy the walnuts, good for any you're missing.

If you really really want them now just use item IDs to spawn them in, they still count like normal

The thing I hate most are the changes to the mines.. I love mining. It suits my mood when I am incredibly stressed and need a boring, soothing repetitive action. That’s gone now, thanks to Qui’s mine reset.

Optional quest, you can just not accept it or decline it in the journal tab if you don't like it. Besides some ore you can get by just resetting level 1 it isn't at all required

I don’t mind the tougher monsters, but I do think it was tacky not to improve the loot drops. I can’t get excited over radioactive ore.i It’s the art. Certain levels were hard enough to see on mobile before, but now it’s impossible, especially the green levels. However often I go back, the visuals remain stubbornly arty and pretentious.

There's a balance that has to be met and the loot pools largely are made better. You can get iridium needles, stuff from sc treasure loot, autopetters, qi gems, galaxy souls.
Overinflating the item pool with progressively less useful items locked in the end game would just be boring

It's largely a matter of skill getting through them, you can use staircases or try a different control scheme in settings. Buttons and joystick with horizontal toolbar takes some getting used to but is strictly superior mechanically

Even when I take the quest, wasting for staircases again, the reset to the old mine graphics is only temporary.

Again, you don't need to take the quest, purely optional, if you're doing it for the gems then it isn't a waste of staircases
I don't really get your point about the rest to the old mines graphic only being temporary, you can just not accept the quest and leave the old mines be forever, this is again purely optional

 

[FilthyGorilla]

Volcano trips become obsolete, once you unlock hte "mini-forge" from masteries... You still need to farm for Dragon's Tooth, though.

As well as cinder shards to actually use the mini forge....

Once you get to level 10 of the volcano you get a shortcut there, nobody is running through the whole volcano for the forge, they're running through it for the cinder shards to use the forge...

You can use ponds for both teeth and shards but it's crazy slow and you still need to do the monster slayer goal for the fire sprites/sparkers

 

[Miretar]

Why isn’t the endgame content available to everyone, but only to those who have achieved “perfection”? I feel the same way about Grandpa. How come someone who has been dead for 20 years get to pass judgment on our characters?

 

[Lew Zealand]

So I went back again. I made it through the volcano and got some lovely enchants.
I did a bunch of Qui quests, which were all very easy. The Galaxy soul rewards were great, but there is really nothing else I need.

my overall verdict is still thumbs down.
I feel like I’m dancing to the tune of squaw parrots.
I find no fun in the volcano dungeon.

I had the same opinion of Ginger Island for years and still retain most of it as it's a large expansion outside of the Valley. The Desert is functionally the same but with the Bus Stop being right next to the Farm, it doesn't 'feel' as remote. However one you get the Obelisks for both and the Return Sceptre, they're easier to visit than Cindersap Forest or the Secret Woods, so that isolated feeling is eventually mitigated.

But I 100% agree on the Qi Quests as I do them for fun now but I have 100s of Gems and no need for them. And that's after buying stuff because I could, but I'm using almost none of it.

IMO the Parrot Walnuts require the use of the Wiki. This is the only place I 100% condone using it because I'm just not good at puzzles and inferring things. That said, I did finish the Golden Walnuts this time because I've read through the Walnut Wiki enough to know what Leo's Parrot's hints meant. That approached fun but only because:

I'd done most everything else I wanted to do in the game already. Left it 'til last. IMO this may be the way to play the Parrot Walnut game for people like me who really don't like it much. If you feel you have other things to do in game, then do those instead. But once you get that to a minimal steady state, then the Walnuts are a reasonable thing to do.

Two more biggies, the Crystal cave quest & the dart game. Can’t get them, gave up trying. Pointless performance art in my opinion. Same thing with panning for a fossil.
So I won’t get all the golden walnuts. No perfection for me then—but hey, I refuse to get married just to get the missing Stardrop and perfection is still more arbitrary performance art. But I digress.

It's all game design and frankly, I play the parts of games I like and skip the rest. Skipping things you don't like seems fine and I've never 100%ed another game. Except Pitfall II. Got a perfect score in that in college, haven't played since.

The thing I hate most are the changes to the mines.. I love mining. It suits my mood when I am incredibly stressed and need a boring, soothing repetitive action. That’s gone now, thanks to Qui’s mine reset.

I don’t mind the tougher monsters, but I do think it was tacky not to improve the loot drops. I can’t get excited over radioactive ore.i It’s the art. Certain levels were hard enough to see on mobile before, but now it’s impossible, especially the green levels. However often I go back, the visuals remain stubbornly arty and pretentious.
Even when I take the quest, wasting for staircases again, the reset to the old mine graphics is only temporary.
Not overall not a good design choice in my opinion.

As others mentioned, the Mines and Skull Cavern revert to normal after the Qi Quest is over so there's nothing to worry about. I did the Qi Mine quest again recently and unless you need Radioactive Ore, I don't have a use for it so I'll skip it from now on. I do regular Skull Cavern runs every once in a while now for the Loot Chests and to get rare drops from crates and barrels. It's kinda fun to have everything done for the day at 2pm and remember it's a high Luck day, so I grab my SC kit and teleport over with Lucky Lunch and see how far I can get before 2am.

Fun!

 

[MogBeoulve]

Uh ... doesn't perfection really only get you a cutscene that you view once, an overpowered yellow chicken, and a hat? Kind of underwhelming compared to everything else in the game, if you ask me.

 

[Giant Octopodes]

Uh ... doesn't perfection really only get you a cutscene that you view once, an overpowered yellow chicken, and a hat? Kind of underwhelming compared to everything else in the game, if you ask me.

Worth noting too that the chicken is truly not overpowered, and really only for fun and the generation of silly numbers. After all by the time you unlock it you've definitionally done all there is to do. You cannot possible "need" the money anymore, not that you ever could really. So it serves as a visual representation of hitting that specific accomplishment, which some people like but it's fair that it's not everyone's cup of tea. And also as a vehicle to more freely do that which is the only thing left at that point - putting a ridiculous amount of money on the screen and / or customizing the aesthetics of your farm to *exactly* that which you desire.

But that being said I'm *absolutely* excited to go after them on Meadowlands; though obviously by the time you get them you could have them as well as blue grass on any map of your choosing and farm or beach will always be better for omegafarming, the thematic fit between the golden chickens and meadowlands is quite strong. It's totally fair that not all aspects of the game are for everyone, last thing anyone should ever do is reduce the enjoyment they get from a game which has aspects they love by forcing themselves to engage in aspects they do not. But personally I enjoy them, I think it's cool that for those who have dropped 1000+ hours into it, he's continually giving them more and different things to do and varying ways to interact with the game. Both the Ginger Island update and 1.6 would frankly have been sold as DLC / Expansion Packs by any other studio, and it would have been warranted in my opinion, that it's free is super cool. To be fair though I do enjoy performance art :-)

 

[Lew Zealand]

Uh ... doesn't perfection really only get you a cutscene that you view once, an overpowered yellow chicken, and a hat? Kind of underwhelming compared to everything else in the game, if you ask me.

Well lets be fair, it's 100% Perfection. You're kinda done and what's left is either role playing, experimenting, or starting a new farm. Adding a load of new things might make it seem like a lot less than 100%. I think in other games, 100% means no new content so it kinds fits getting a yellow chicken that makes tons of Mayo.

 

[SurprisedPikachuBob3]

Why isn’t the endgame content available to everyone, but only to those who have achieved “perfection”? I feel the same way about Grandpa. How come someone who has been dead for 20 years get to pass judgment on our characters?

What endgame content?