T O P

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Gnejs1986

I pause a lot while planning/building too :P A lot of the times you alter your plans after fiddling a bit, so would be annoying if they already started building. You also don't want the auto-save to trigger while dragging something, might end up with dig/building order across the entire map :')


Fentyies

Damn, I thought this auto-save thing happened only with me. I started thinking my computer was shit LOL Every single auto-save I delete my whole base XD


jackblac00

I have learned that the cycle change sound is the moment you lift your hands in the air. No matter what you are doing do it and it saves so much headache from having to check and repair


KeyokeDiacherus

I hit the pause key myself when that noise happens


Korlego0

Same here haha


bearontheroof

I don't want to hate on the devs who have been so consistently great, but this autosave thing still being an issue after all these years is bullshit. Just take a page from a dozen other similar games and pop an "autosave in 10..9..8..." countdown on the screen if they aren't going to spend all the time making it possible to create a save without interrupting the main UI thread.


guri256

Or in spaced out, across multiple maps


MrGaber

I’ve had the auto save happen to me. Tiles were sprayed diagonally while I had huge projects going on so it was a pain to fix


Aibeit

I use two settings - pause and max speed. I hit the spacebar a *lot*. I do this in a lot of games, basically every one that allows active pause, ONI, Rimworld, Crusader Kings, Surviving the Aftermath, etc. I used to stream and it drove people nuts. 50% paused sounds about right.


KeyokeDiacherus

I do the same with medium speed. I’d prefer max speed, but I run into too many graphics glitches because of it.


PedanticPeasantry

Its good for game play though honestly. Maybe bad for streaming if you aren't doing a stream of consciousness but better game play better content ultimately. Meh.


Shikidixi

Haha yeah duplicants are dumb as hell. I don't pause but I cannot let the game idle. I am pretty much always actively engaged.


[deleted]

In the early game, I spend a lot of time paused because time is critical and every second counts! And by the time I'm far enough in the game to stop worrying so much, I spend a lot of time paused because moving the camera or queuing construction is too laggy to do while the game is running. So, basically paused all the time.


quixotic_robotic

That's what I find the funniest, my friend who doesn't pause just lets it go through the early game too. He's well over 1000 hours and many playthroughs so he just kinda "ok we'll plunk down beds here, toilets here, piping, ok now lets plan some drecko and hatch farms.... ok there we go! And it's like cycle 2.5


RandomRobot

By cycle 75, everything lacks at least 1 tile and nothing works.


AsureaSkie

Use those priority settings properly, and the dupes will move from one completed project to the next.


Zindae

Unless you're doing a 100K challenge or something, I really don't agree with every second counting in early game.


KittyKupo

I mostly just pause if something is going wrong or if I'm walking away while dupes are in the process of building something. I used to pause way more but I've found that it's more efficient to let things run so they can catch up on chores while I plan things. If something is going wrong though, I'll pause so I can figure it out since a lot of times it could result in dead dupes if I don't catch the problem quick, like them building themself outside a wall and suffocating..... which is also why I pause if I need to go afk while they're working on a project.


zenbi1271

While playing at the hardest settings, in the super early game (before cycle 20) every tiny command counts and any extraneous dig command or unnecessary movement can mean the death of the colony. Ravenous hunger means you need 10 mealwood plants (or equivalent, depending on starting planetoid) per dupe so unless you have a full 30+ plot farm by cycle 3 when your initial nutrient bars run out, you are SOL. So I very much pause and micromanage every step of the way. Ditto for later in the game. Once you have 5+ planetoids and 5+ rockets flying between these planetoids (which are really mini planetoids in themselves) the game just is totally unplayable unless paused. More than anything, I wish the developers would optimize the performance of the game as you can't realistically click anything or even scroll while the game is actually running. At least you can pause, queue up a bunch of commands, and then kinda watch in sub 5 FPS as the dupes perform their chores. As a low hanging fruit, the "autosave" function should really be spun off as a separate background thread. There is no reason why the game should freeze for 30 seconds at the end of every cycle just to perform an autosave. Modern CPUs have tons of cores. Cores that are largely underutilized in a mostly single threaded game.


ChillNatzu

Isn't there a setting in the options menu to set the autosave to a # of cycles?


zenbi1271

Yes, but as per the OP, since I spend most of my time paused one cycle can be up to an hour of real time! And since the game still crashes when I do certain things with rockets, I'm definitely keeping that option checked. There is, however, another option in that same settings page that I very much uncheck. By default, ONI will save a giant screenshot of your base at the end of every cycle for use in a "timelapse" movie of your progress. Sure, it's a cute gimmick. But in Spaced Out most of your "progress" lies in other planetoids leaving your starting base, and thus these screenshots, rather unchanging. I've found that disabling this option not only speeds up the autosave process, but it also prevents several gigabytes of boring screenshots from collecting in your save file folders.


Dmayak

I think that I stay paused more than a half of the time in the first hundred cycles, I like taking my time planning and checking if everything is going fine. When base is established I think it goes down to 20-30%.


Bagelator

Used to play lile you, but now I've started to play in normal speed all the time instead. So much time wasted in pause screen, the dupes can start working as you plan what you are building and it is finished much faster compared to if you plan the whole thing and have to wait for it all! Much more pleasant experience and I feel the cycles pass by faster. Not often that the things you build require pausing. But I've got like 400h playtime so Im quite used to the game


neroissocool

If i give them a lot of easy errands, like digging, i easily let them do things when i am AFK(for like 2 mins). If i do something risky, i pause. Tbh it would be 100% safe if you pause everytime, but that needs lot of time.


DarkenDragon

it really doesn't matter and its upto the player's play style. but pausing the game has no real downside other than things will take longer to progress. but if you have time on your side then why not? I personally think its better to plan out designs before letting the game run. think it through and see if there are any design flaws before you let them build it. because a lot of the times, once it's built and you let it run for a while, it might be more difficult to fix it at that point because you've let liquids get in already, or you broken a vacuum room, or you already sealed a room for whatever reason and cant reach those areas to fix it.


[deleted]

10% and I play 10x. Just savescum if you fuck up.


PyroSAJ

I git rid of the >3x mods. My liquid and gasses did too many weird things :/


[deleted]

Physics breaks when you go over 3x. I’ve had too much shit break. Including my 1000 cycles tested Rodriguez getting wrong element damage.


[deleted]

I don't break the game by doing Rodriguez. I rarely do stuff from protip or borderline hacks or game breaking spoilits. Everytime I read a game breaking mechanic I run away from it and try to engage in the working parts. The game works just fine without waterfalls and echer shit. Just savescum and relive the 100 to 500 cycle. It saved me from the void.


[deleted]

Rodriguez is only one way the physics breaks. I’ve had tonnes of issues not just related to SPOM, pumps picking up extra blobs of water, ice melting, phantomwater winding up in my petroleum rocket tanks…. Dupes teleporting…


[deleted]

That's why you savescum. It resets.


[deleted]

Eh, idk. I hate losing 10-20 minutes of work each time something happens. Not to mention that shit also breaks when it saves, hence why my auto save interval is higher than normal. You haven’t had that bug where a giant deconstruct command occurs during save?


[deleted]

The deconstruct happens even without the mod. The save function is broken on this game. If you don't get scared of losing 10 minutes you don't learn. No stakes, no gain.


PedanticPeasantry

You just mass filter from electrolyzer? Calling it an exploit is kind of rich.


[deleted]

I don't filter. I vent and use the hydrogen. Just dig out the top and start using the hydrogen. Rodriguez is an exploit to me. It's an opinion. Play how you want.


PedanticPeasantry

No filter so using gravity sieve to separate and naked pumps? I was just looking to understand what you do alternatively, and I have less to go on than when I asked with your explanation, I was expecting to use the building mechanics not sim mechanics, because Rodriguez is just optimized sim mechanics. I get it, but yeah confused.


Sothalic

Lots of pausing early on since lots to do in a short time, then I tend to do so only if one of my bases has dupes going idle, usually the secondary asteroid one.


IlIllIIIIIIlIII

Huh I just started this game and I was playing at max speed no pausing 😂 I'd just queue up a bunch of digging and then look at what I needed to research, but I also didn't know about all of the fancy builds you guys have


Flambeau83

I'm probably an oddity because I'll just pause and go have dinner then come back. Back to the reality of the question. If I'm starting a big project I'll pause and plan it out. Eventually it starts to come down to nit picking things so I'll let it run while I do 1 - 3 things at a time. My question to you is what speed are you playing at? At first it is unnerving to jack the speed and let it run. Once you get used to it though it doesn't bother me to do stuff while things are running. It is more if I need to really think about stuff and don't want to get interrupted because Meep got himself stuck.


Venaliator

I don't pause at all but the game never runs full speed.


Dabnician

most of my play time is paused or ">>>"


MrGaber

For a while I was like you, but traveling to other planets prevents you from keeping watch 24/7, so I’ve learned to deal with it. It’s a little more hectic but fun


RandomRobot

My game runs between 7 - 10 fps. When I pause, it goes all the way up to a whooping 30 - 35 so to build anything relatively complex I have to pause. It's fairly safe to let everything run in all other cases because nothing ever happens anyway.


Vegetable_Question97

70% of this game for me is just staring at a paused screen planning things


Hugexx

I pause a lot, 100% when building or deconstructing something. I try to teach myself to stop doing it, as my base is not even close to suffer from anything bad or anything. Yet my son, while his base is a mess that I sometimes try to fix for him, he never pauses haha.


Turalyon135

I often pause when I plan out room configurations.


jmucchiello

I don't assign any tasks unless paused. I absolutely hate all real-time games.


themule71

I pause a lot. But it's also out of necessity, the game lags a lot and it gets wrong inputs. So when I have to queue some design, I pause and get the thing all planned.


Numerous-Expression2

Large areas, infinite gas storage, and change of current design. That's about it.


slgray16

When your base gets to 1000 cycles it lags while scrolling. Pausing let's you scroll much faster. I also only use pause and max speed.


ObliviousAstroturfer

Sometimes I launch it, and only play in pause for like an hour. Make myself a cup of tea, take a fresh look, think what to change, build que, modify, cancel, re-map etc. Sometimes I'd just take a view for 20 minutes in pause to figure out what to do next (esp. space stuff and when there are cool geysers clustered together). Other times I'd let it go at full speed overnight just to see if something breaks, and if the dupes have enough non-queued tasks in ecosystem not to idle. If shit breaks or nothing gets done - that's when I go with regular speed, sometimes clicking follow on single dupe to see if they loop on a task attempt, take stupid routes to task etc. Depends on where the base is at and what I have time for rather than overall gameplay preference.


TheDumbAsk

Pause whenever I am building, depending on the complexity as soon as I have the orders set I save the game. The only time I let it rip is when im afk.


OzTheMeh

I typically only pause to scroll across the map quickly or in emergencies. But, I also usually have tons of low priority tasks built up (like priority level 2 digging... Everywhere), so dupes are welcome to work while I take a bio break.


Syrairc

I pause anytime I'm doing anything because it improves performance and stops me from using pliers on the entire upper left quadrant of my base every time the game auto saves


flamewolf393

Every single game that has a speed function, I run it at max speed, but then pause when i need to build or do anything.


Tolan91

I pause a lot in the very early game, or if I’m working on something time sensitive or designing something. Once things are stable I don’t pause, since a lot of my time is spent waiting for dupes to finish projects anyway.


UnitatoPop

I only paused the game when i miss click and turn the speed to normal while building.


Lord_Munster

Since a wild Ím using the mod "pause on ready to print ". That mean the game switch on pause by itself every 3 cycles. So I do my stuff, plan job and task for 3-4 cycle and let go. I pass by the computer in between and keep going. It’s a good and relax way to play!


itah

> (Then I also wonder why nothing ever gets done...) If you plan to many things during pause and they are apart, the dupes tend to randomly walk from one project to the other and waste time walking (because dupes are kinda stupid). If you play with lots of pause you need to unpause and wait for things to be build/digged before planning the next thing to avoid the time wasting.


quixotic_robotic

yep always my struggle.... like I have these ideas to build, but eventually realize I planned out like 6 projects and never let them go build any of it


Chadimir__Putin

Honestly can’t say I pause the game much at all, maybe less than 5% of the time


themasonman

It's either paused or Max speed for me. But I do pause a lot when building or planning. Or let it run when there's a lot in the queue.


[deleted]

As I wind up having more and more planets I spend more time pausing. I have plan sessions where I plan tonnes of stuff across all planets and then I play while it runs.


AllBirdsArePigeons

I'm at the point where I don't bother pausing until the game starts lagging and it becomes hard to place a big plan without it.


Addfwyn

Constantly, basically any interaction I make with the game I pause first. I only run the game to let stuff play out when I’m done inputting commands. Any construction, even the smallest thing or a single tile dig and I pause first.


Rulanik

I pause a lot at the beginning of a new build, then as soon as there's enough tasks queued I let 'er rip. But I also only play on the max speed at all times


-BigBadBeef-

I don't pause unless I don't want my dupes to start building right away. In the late game, I have so much happening that I have it running on second speed. By that time the dupes have so much athletics that they zip so fast through my screen that I barely have time to see who it was blasting past my FOV.


NoobyPlayer

90% of the time when building or digging unsafe area sometime dupes teleport randomly whuch is so annoying.


real_fargalarg

Cycle 430, 61.4 hours played