In this video, I really grind my gears. Consider supporting what I do: / zyllius Cogmind: www.gridsagegames.com/cogmind... store.steampowered.com/app/72... Cogmind Wiki: noemica.github.io/cog-minder/... leiavoia.net/cogmind/dataminer/
Many thanks to Dosh for introducing Cogmind! As I wrote in today's announcement about plans for the next two years (see "Cogmind Vision 2025"), it's really nice to have someone more deeply familiar with Cogmind, and roguelikes in general, able to share it with a wider audience of folks that might very well include many who could also enjoy this sort of game as much as we do. "We" as in myself the dev and all those who've been playing for many years and hanging out in the community (and of course more recently Dosh as well!). Welcome :)
is there a way to turn off the high pitched whine when doing anything in game? it sounds like my tinnitus. the sound that is played when letters come up in the log in the top left i mean.
@@johnsmith-sp6yl Yeah the typing sound from the log? There's an advanced config setting specifically to turn that off: just change the muteTextSfx value in the user/advanced.cfg file from 0 to 1 and you'll never hear it again. (Or you could replace the sound with something else in the game files if so inclined, though that is a bit more work since you'd need to source an appropriate looping SFX, but I could help you with all that if you're interested.)
@@johnsmith-sp6yl Haha well you may be in good company, since someone else has done an audio-based adventure version by replacing a bunch of the sound effects with... unique custom recordings and effects :) (I have yet to play that one myself, but did plan to do that at one point for a stream...)
I have to give props to a dev who is so singularly minded to develop one game over a long career. All of the times I have seen this level of devotion I have fallen in love with the game. It doesn't matter the genre or game style, the devs of these types of games always strive to make their game the best it can be regardless of popularity and criticism. Definitely in the league of Stardew Valley, Factorio, Dwarf Fortress, and Creeper World (that last one is a plug for my favorite RTS indie game). I'm sure to lose many many hours in the future playing this game.
As someone who loves a lot of different kinds of roguelikes, I just could not get into Cogmind. It makes a big deal out of being able to build yourself from components, but there's no actual choice in the matter- You can't 'build' toward anything, because it's all based on RNG. You're basically just screwed when it comes to trying to make any sort of build, because by the time you, say, get a full set of flight engines then one of your wings are 99% damaged and you'll crash as soon as you get into a fight. The game makes a big deal out of stealth and hiding, but you'll get spotted instantaneously and there's suddenly a level-wide alert going out. Hacking is impossible unless you're lucky enough to get a dozen advanced hacking suites. All of this adds up to just one strategy: You just tank up on propulsion and weapon slots so that you have a bazillion wheels to take hits for you and them blast everything with your weapons.
@@LordnotsirTav That's not true. The RNG simply makes it interesting and adds more skill expression. Streaking basic wins is easy, and there have been players who can simply streak the hardest victory type with no problems. You need to learn more and get better at the game before you can build a real build and not crash and burn immediately.
@@MrRandyFlaggTDM That's easy to say. But when "the deck you have" is literally nothing (or worse than nothing) for multiple playthroughs... It starts to become disheartening. Noita for example is a very RNG heavy game, and even it manages to put player skill front, first and foremost before any other means of survival. Don't get me wrong, I just LOVE LOVE LOVE the style of Cogmind and what it does. But I know for a fact that my absolutely limited patience will not allow me to touch the game. To go back to the deck analogy... I hate deck-building games like Slay the Spire. Why? I can do whatever I want with "the deck I have" and make it as optimal as I possibly can. The game can still decide that I am not allowed to attack or defend or do literally anything of note for 10 turns in a row. Here is your cue to say "git gud."
If anyone has the time and are up for quite the read, the devblogs for Cogmind are genuinely fascinating, going into excessive detail and airing all the hows and whys and whynots, strengths and weaknesses, for pretty much every decision the dev has made or thought to make and decided against, regarding pretty much every system and piece of the game.
I've played Cogmind off and on for years but I've ALWAYS read the dev news and updates. They're really well presented and truly interesting for game design.
The roguelike junk pile was simply embraced in Dungeons of Dredmor, by giving the player an item called the "Lost Wizard Key" which is a pocket dimension you can enter and leave on a cooldown. In there you can store items and craft in a room that's large enough to allow you to simply organize the items you find in a bunch of piles. There's no way to heal, cast spells, or use items in there, so it can't affect combat. I feel like it was a good way to encourage players new to the genre to adopt the roguelike hoarder mindset. It also put a band-aid on the games terribly messy crafting system. I imagine it wouldn't be too interesting to you since it's not doing much new or unique, but I can't recommend it enough to anyone who's first dipping their toes in the genre.
That's a really neat insight! I think I was actually thinking about Dungeons of Dredmor and asking myself if it was an *actual* roguelike, making the first/only one I've played and enjoyed. I think I was also thinking about that storage room and how that seemed to be a thing I was using it for as well :)
I was having a blast watching your adventures in Cogmind in our discord community and was hoping you'd eventually make a video, and here it is! Super excited for the future of this game still, even after playing it for over 1k hours. Kyzrati is an amazing developer, and his dedicated community involvement makes this game very special to me and many others. Hoping you eventually nail that ++ extended win, it's super worth the struggle!
Dosh you single handedly got me into roguelikes and i started with Brogue, now im going to be moving onto Rogue soon and i cant thank you enough! Im sure this will be a fine addition to my collection!
I consider it a personal mission of mine to assimilate as many as possible into the cult The whole Factorio thing is just so I can lure unsuspecting viewers into vidoes like this
@@DoshDoshington I mean, i dont even enjoy factorio, lord knows i've tried desperately in my 300 hours and several playthroughs at this point, but your videos just give me a tingly sensation of entering some hole-in-the-wall gamestore that doesnt have any windows to the outside, just a door and a small sign and its a bustling big room in there with ambiance, and, a community in the literal sense of the word. Where people know each other and get together regularly just to hang out and talk about things the are interested in, and even as someone who is only subscribed to passionate channels like you and Civvie, you two are still the only ones i can think of that have this great feeling.
Whoa, the moment this episode stated I could tell Dosh had a new mic. Super clear. Also just got done watching Towerclimb and La Mulana videos for probably the 3rd/4th time, so I'll take another one, thank you sir.
Cogmind's body part mechanics really remind of an old hidden-gem of a PS2 game I used to play called metal arms glitch in the system, it was a robot themed third person shooter that had a mechanic where shooting an enemy's body parts can cause them to dislocate or be destroyed altogether, affecting the flow of battle in funny and chaotic ways. It was a pretty fun but underrated game and I'm happy to know that there are games similar to it out there like this one.
Have yet to watch the video, but really glad you’re covering this game. It doesn’t get nearly enough coverage and the creator’s yt channel and development blog are great insights into game design
Love how Dosh just shows off a clip of him annihilating people with a frying pan for the segment talking about FPS Games lol. Man just ventilates like 5 peoples heads with a pan like its nothing without getting hit once.
You are now officially an Influencer! Congratulations! I didn't even make it 5 minutes into the video and I already had Cogmind in my cart and ready for purchase. The early descriptions you gave in this video, and your enthusiasm, were all I needed to hear. Well done sir, well done.
I love your factorio content, but man, I always look forward your deep dives into other games so much. Very thankful for you to expose me to so many different games and their context/history.
Seriously, the stories you can get from a run are sooo good. One time I fell down a vent entering Golgotha. I died of course, but when I looked in it was not as I expected. I actually survived the fall (barely), but my goatman follower apparently jumped off with me, and landed on top of me dealing a massive (and lethal) amount of damage 🙃
The part system reminds me of Battletech, funnily enough. That excitement at encountering a mech with a really rare and powerful weapon and mentally tallying up how many limbs and scout mechs you're willing to lose in order to get it intact.
Cogmind is absolutely great, I think another example of the future of roguelikes might be found in Caves of Qud. It has an incredible storytelling capacity while still retaining the incredibly complex mechanics
Weird, I find CoQ incredibly old-fashioned and ADOM-like. You can hoard, you can backtrack, you can go out-of-hand strong and the gameplay itself resembles more of a sprawling open-world CRPG with quests, factions and the like. Much unlike, well, tightly-designed single-purpose Cogmind.
If anything, cogmind and CoQ are antonymous. Cogmind is extremely well designed game revolving a singular goal with over a decade of effort put into balancing. Kyzrati considered cogmind feature-complete as far as 4 years ago, with the majority of time lately going into polish, balance and optional content. Caves of Qud has an identity crisis of what it wants to be with no definitive ending in sight. It tries to grant freedom to the player with a huge open world, but all the quests are very linear with only few options to complete them and no alternative routes. There's a good and potent mutation system which could go very far, but it's balanced so horribly that you would find same 4-5 extremely powerful general-purpose mutations in nearly every build. It tries to create an immersive world in which your actions have consequences, but as soon as you get your hands on a few shrodinger pages, you can level out any reputation damage with any faction and do whatever you want, ultimately meaning that there are no definitive choices of who you would want to side with. I've logged over 200 hours in CoQ, and any time of the day - i would pick cogmind over it.
28:57 You just ended my mental image of a robot stealthy utility robot instantly growing into a giant death bot and pulling 10 rocket launchers when spotted
I've been sorta avoiding this one despite my love for modern traditional roguelikes because its half-ascii, which discouraged me from further looking into it. This video is tempting me to get it though. Fun Fact: The Cogmind dev beat Rift Wizard, another tough-as-nails modern traditional roguelike on his FIRST TRY.
Yeah the half-ascii is off-putting (& I think it hurts the game due to non-animated screenshots & thumbnails being how ppl first see it). But it's the weapon effect animations that make me think the dev does have a sense of aesthetics, & so the art style is probably being quite deliberate & controlled. Ie: It was enough to get me interested in seeing *what else* they've got in-game that'll visually surprise/impress me. I guess what I'm saying is it's got a weird visual storytelling juxposition that gets people's attention with a _"Wait, did U see that? There's more than meets the eye here... What they doin?"_ curiosity. It resists being written-off as low quality.
This reminded me a lot of DoomRL! While I haven't played Cogmind to directly compare them, it also has this emphasis on using the tools and skills you have available at the moment to get through the floor by the skin of your teeth, giving a more tense tactical challenge rather than focusing on preparation. It's not nearly as mechanically deep as Cogmind but that also makes it much easier to pick up and learn. I hadn't played roguelikes in several years, and I remember hearing about Cogmind back then while it was in development, but I think this video has inspired me to revisit them and give this one a try.
Oh hell yeah, another Dosh video - and this one on a game I HAVE heard about! I followed development of this game from way back in 2013, far before it was released. I never got around to actually playing it myself when it came out in 2017 and kind of lost interest when I saw the end product (one review I remember being particularly brutal and turned me off instantly; couldn't remember why) and decided it was more of a game that was better in my head. I will say some of the "living ecosystem" parts are very cool, like the drill bots, or how cargo bots zip around hauling things from points on the map and how little repair drones will swarm places that've had their infrastructure been damaged by combat and rebuild. My tastes have shifted significantly since the year our lord 2017 so I might actually pick this up now. Thanks for the video!
In like 2015, I committed to beating ADOM on roguelike mode before exploring ToME and other pure roguelikes. Still working on it, so I must depart at 31:09, but I'm super glad you keep promoting these games. TYSM!
I've watched this video so many times now. I love your factorio content, but I also love Cogmind. The way you can drone on about it is great and I find it to be such a fun listen.
ok wow just from the first 3 minutes alone this game looks so cool man, absolutely reminds me of duskers and the whole being able to swap out all the parts of your body thing sounds fun, i'll probably be buying it once i watch the rest of the video.
"With only 15 sigix on board, they inflicted heavy losses on MAIN.C" is an incredible understatement. "...during the initial confrontation one of the aliens impaled three sentries with a single thrust of its Sigix Broadsword, flying across a hall at top speed to further smash them into a wall." "During their attack the Sigix used only one of these incredibly devastating weapons, which took out an entire wing of the Access Level from above the surface." "...It landed just above some hidden tunnels, and immediately after the doors opened and its crew emerged, both they and it were swarmed by a massive army of robots that burst from underground. The aliens in their heavily armored exoskeletons were unperturbed at first, leaving the relative safety of their ship to wade through MAIN.C's forces, slicing many in two with massive swords, firing blazing fast energy weapons capable of ripping pieces clean off the target..." "...One of the Research labs was completely obliterated during testing." They absolutely annihilated main.c. A singular scout without heavy weapons which hasn't even fired main ship armament has put against a gargantuan robot swarm which has been stockpiled by an industrial superstructure for over a year. Sigix are insanely strong.
Definitely glad to have another video at last. I can empathise about sharing achievements after finally getting into Inkscape over the Easter weekend and churning out a bunch of vector images.
nice I was just binge watching your videos on niche games today and now I have a new upload to watch. I love these non factorio videos, don't stop making them.
The alert mechanism reminds me of AI War: Fleet Command. Another niche strategy game that won't appeal to most people, and takes a few hours to settle into. But for the people it does appeal to, it's very special in making you feel like a galactically-oppressed underdog.
You actually assimilated me with this video, within seconds I was hooked on the graphics and sound design. Not only that, but the premise and gameplay sounds like something that I, totally a game dev, would suggest for another game (to be specific, a pay-to-win turn-based robot fighting game called Supermechs) and immediately get reprimanded by the entire community because it seems "utterly deranged." While I may not be able to play immediately, I sure will someday, and this will forever be a Dosh video I will never finish watching unless I somehow beat the game myself.
HE DID IT. HE DID THE THING WHERE HE INFODUMPS HIS EXPERTISE OF THE GAME IN A GIANT RUNON SENTENCE TYPE THING AND IM INVESTED IN IT NOW DESPITE NEVER PLAYING THE GAME. LETS GOOOOOOOOOOOOO THATS MY RU-vidR.
Ive found the games you talk well about have been the most fun and interesting things I have ever played. I got and played exapunks from the zachtronics video and it was probably the most amount of fun and interest ive had in a game for a long time. I will be getting Cogmine especially since it has a lot of things ive loved about other games. Keeep up with these amazing videos
This really was a video made for you, wasn’t it. The desire to share about the intricacies of the game you’re currently hyper fixated on while also giving advice how to play is peak gamer vibes. I’m glad you decided to record the whole thing.
Thank you for introducing me to such a wonderful roguelike, I dipped my toes into the rougelike genre when I first downloaded pixel dungeon on my phone and fell in love with it, I am having such a blast with cogmind
Yes, i keep refreshing your chanel until you post something, i got no friends. Edit: The fact that this comment got more likes and comments than the video that I posted on my other channel just amazes me. I hope that one day I can have this kind of community.
Thanks for playing mordhau. Our niche little community is slithering along like a garden snail and always loves getting some rep. hi carpet, if you're reading this.
Finally, someone talking about Cogmind, thank you. Underappreciated game. The developer is a very cool guy, you can tell he is totally dedicated to his work with all the passion.
I wonder if you might enjoy Caves of Qud. It gives me a similar feel with the whole "has actually rather expansive lore but you could go through the game and experience very little of it depending on how much you choose to pursue it" thing. Plus there seems to be similar themes of building your character through either mutations or cybernetics.
You could already do some pretty crazy stuff in that game, but the recent updates have been rapidly amping up the craziness with things like mechas, and plants that make you dream about being a completely different creature. Definitely recommend it.
I'm definitely getting this with my next paycheck. Even if I bounce off of it the first time, I always find myself going back to roguelikes months or years later and trying again. Tha ks for making this video
5:15 "and sometimes you get so unlucky that you'll fire at a grunt until it's nothing but a torso and a heat sink without ever hitting its core" man I haven't laughed so hard in a long time
I gotta say my favorite Rogue Like continues to be Slay The Spire because of the possibility to just start a run, spend like an hour on it and kill some time, all while just chilling playing a card game and enjoying all your favorite roguelike mechanics. I love it. But I can see how someone who's more into the classic style would LOVE this game to bits.
the side menu reminds me of cdda, will have to check this one out! love the whole scrambling to stay in one(important) piece as all the less important ones are tossed out also the idea guessing how much risk you can take, as well has what qualifies as risk being an integral part of the skill curve really tickles my brain even if im horrible at it pixel dungeon was a fantastic play, and getting to know the intricate mechanics after playing it for way too much was a lot of fun
Dude. You sold me this game. Which makes you an awesome influencer. It might be THE game for my 2024 and I would never find it if you didn't make this video. Keep it up!
I appreciate that this is much more a review than a playthrough. This actually makes me want to try it as oposed to marow that mad me want to run far away
