Graveyard Keeper [PC and XB1]

[Paingod]

there is a clear optimal upgrade path. If you deviate too much from it all you are doing is slowing your game down.

It's only clear if you deliberately follow the quests as you get them. If you revel in the open-ness you never know there's an upgrade path until you've spent days doing everything else. When I get back into the game I'm first chasing that objective.

[Carpet_pissr]

[here is no way to save that I have seen during the tutorial. Because of this the tutorial seems unreasonably long. I've already had to quit before the tutorial, which meant none of my progress was saved, which meant that the next time I tried to play, I had to start a new game, which meant starting the tutorial over. Not too happy about that, but eventually you get past it.

Arise, thread!

Many moons ago you crossed this out since you figured out how to save. FWIW it's still an issue in the game (too bad I didn't read this thread before falling into the same trap).

I just picked this up for around $4 recently, not realizing it was Stardew Valley with a tech tree. The part you wrote above almost made me quit. I too, went through the "tutorial" and well, WELL past it, assuming the game just saved for me. GAH! Really horrible design considering that
1. No mention that you have to sleep to save
2. No mention that you have a bed
3. No mention that you have a house

How was all that missed in the tutorial?!

WTF man. If I can expect more of this foolishness, I'm probably out.

I'm now wondering why I always had this game on my wishlist for so long, considering its metacritic score, which is pretty bad. That's very unlike me.

I probably will give it a few more hours, just to see if things open up a bit, but some of the things I've read (due to having to research how to $@#^#@%ing save a game!!) don't sound promising (these are not my comments to be clear):
- extremely grindy, maybe the most grindy game in existence
- the "NPC's only on one day of the week" juggling gets real old, real fast, and is extremely frustrating when talking to one NPC that only comes on a Sunday, requires something from another NPC that only comes on Thursdays...etc and apparently it spirals from there
- wiki is an absolute must due to the illogic of many game functions (but to be fair, this is true of a LOT of games, similar to this, like the Oxygen game, Rimworld and the like, etc).
- game is very unbalanced and pacing, design, etc is very uneven...

Other than the very close to inexcusable save function...unpleasantness, one thing that worries me that has happened, even with only a couple hours under my belt:
I was given a quest by my skull companion to meet an NPC somewhere (Witch Hill?) and MAYBE the day. Well, I missed that, primarily because I got distracted with the 28 other quests I had been given, AND after looking at the map, and asking my cranial companion, I have no idea where to go! Another NPC quest says I should talk to an Astrologer. When I eventually find what I THINK is his place...there's no one there. So I'm just supposed to wait (possibly a week?) for this guy to show up? Come on.

I just think there needs to be a LITTLE more direction.

Even having read all the negatives, I am still going to give this one more shot for some reason, I think mainly because I've just been eyeing it for sooo damn long, finally bought it, and feel I need to give it more of a chance. Stupid brain!!!

[GreenGoo]

Interestingly, I have recently been playing this again, although I've shelved it and moved on. However, I put about 300+ in game days into it about 2 months ago.

I used a wiki for literally every crafting item in the game. I had zero interest in experimenting with what combines with what to make what. Yes, the game is lacking in some areas (especially when learning the game), but overall it's quite good for a stardew valley clone. I can't recall a single bug.

I enjoyed it this time around, as the 300+ days should indicate. There is no time limit on anything, although as you are aware by now there is a 6 day week that cycles and certain things are only doable on certain days of the week. This can seem sucky as if you miss something you have to wait 5 days to do it again, but as noted, there is no time limit. No deadlines, nothing. Just do something else for those 5 days. There's no shortage of things to do. I will say that early game you don't want to miss praying for the masses. That's about the only thing I'd see as annoying if missed, as it's a primary source of faith throughout the game.

Oh, I also have all the DLC except for the Souls one, so there is a lot more content in those. I have no idea if any individual DLC is worth it, but I got them all as part of a deal, so it was a no brainer to pick them up. Zombie workers alone is worth the price of DLC. Not just because they do things for you, but because making and managing zombies is fun. It's not an entire game by itself, but it's a nice addition.

Yes the game is grindy, but only in the same way other Harvest Moon clones are grindy. It's basically a manual factory game, with dependencies on top of dependencies, but with some fun flavour text and NPCs. If you find factorio grindy, then this game might not be for you, especially as nothing can be automated until you get zombies.

Someone put together a google doc that mapped out the various areas and listed what to put where to maximize space efficiency. I loved this as it removed some decision making that might need to be changed later on as the game progressed. Some people might not enjoy being told what to build where, but I appreciated it. Especially in the graveyard itself.

Here's the google doc: GYK efficient space usage

[Carpet_pissr]

Thanks for the notes...I played some more after my post and it's still holding my interest, surprisingly!

In order to progress, I did have to do a bit of reading though, like where in the hell I can even create the "wood billet" that I needed for some other McDoodle.

As soon as it stops being fun, I will away...but for now, keep those bodies rollin', Donkey!

[GreenGoo]

Even after 300+ days, I never did actually finish the main game, although I was close. If I had beelined for it I would have finished, but I was busy doing side quests and stuff.

The dependencies are pretty widespread and get deeper the farther in you go, so it can get a bit complicated to do things from scratch. I tend to make more than I need and store the intermediate stuff for future use. It seemed to work pretty well. Don't be afraid to make lots of chests for storage. You should not have to manage storage at all (i.e. no shuffling from 1 chest to another) because you can build lots of chests and they are cheap. You're going to suffer because your own personal inventory is too small. You can get more carrying space but not til later in the game. Probably later than you are likely to get actually, depending on how it holds your interest.

Chests. I can' emphasize this enough. I avoided building chests because I didn't want to put them in places that might interfere later, but that was a mistake. Plus, if you use that doc I linked, you can put your chests in the indicated spaces and never have to move them ever again.

My impression of the game is that it is a manual factory game, with tech tree. Some colour (and occasionally funny) text, quests and npcs break up the manufacturing, but at it's heart it's collect resources, make stuff from them, make more stuff from that stuff, repeat.

Something I did pretty often early on was burn bodies with crappy stats. You can dump them in the river, but you don't get anything back from them. Burning them results in a burial cert and some resources that are useful. You can create funeral pyres across the road to the south from the mortuary entrance. Might take a little researching or game progression before you can burn anything, but it should be available early. I'm not convinced this was the best idea (I burnt a LOT of early game bodies) since you need to improve your cemetery, and bodies help with that. Except for low quality bodies. Those need to be disposed of some other way (river/pyre).

[GreenGoo]

As I mentioned, I played quite extensively about 2 months ago, so a lot of it is fresh in my mind. If you want to ask questions but avoid spoilers, you can ask here, otherwise just wiki everything. Literally everything. I had 10+ browser tabs open when playing.

[Carpet_pissr]

Even after 300+ days, I never did actually finish the main game, although I was close. If I had beelined for it I would have finished, but I was busy doing side quests and stuff.

The dependencies are pretty widespread and get deeper the farther in you go, so it can get a bit complicated to do things from scratch. I tend to make more than I need and store the intermediate stuff for future use. It seemed to work pretty well. Don't be afraid to make lots of chests for storage. You should not have to manage storage at all (i.e. no shuffling from 1 chest to another) because you can build lots of chests and they are cheap. You're going to suffer because your own personal inventory is too small. You can get more carrying space but not til later in the game. Probably later than you are likely to get actually, depending on how it holds your interest.

Chests. I can' emphasize this enough. I avoided building chests because I didn't want to put them in places that might interfere later, but that was a mistake. Plus, if you use that doc I linked, you can put your chests in the indicated spaces and never have to move them ever again.

My impression of the game is that it is a manual factory game, with tech tree. Some colour (and occasionally funny) text, quests and npcs break up the manufacturing, but at it's heart it's collect resources, make stuff from them, make more stuff from that stuff, repeat.

Something I did pretty often early on was burn bodies with crappy stats. You can dump them in the river, but you don't get anything back from them. Burning them results in a burial cert and some resources that are useful. You can create funeral pyres across the road to the south from the mortuary entrance. Might take a little researching or game progression before you can burn anything, but it should be available early. I'm not convinced this was the best idea (I burnt a LOT of early game bodies) since you need to improve your cemetery, and bodies help with that. Except for low quality bodies. Those need to be disposed of some other way (river/pyre).

Great info about the chests, thanks. Even though it comes up as something I can craft, I haven't even made one, not because I am worried about space, but because I was worried about material shortage. I already ran into a roadblock because I used up all the "easy" to find/get iron parts or whatever it is you find downstairs. Come to find out later I should have used those parts to build new tools, not to fix the graveyard, as I thought the tutorial was directing me to.

As to the open tabs, I get it, I'm not at 11 yet, but getting there. 4 currently.

One thing I have not really seen in the guides I have come across, is "YOU SHOULD PROBABLY DO THESE FIRST", which is a bit frustrating because the tutorial was so lacking. I ALSO read that it was intentionally lacking, trying to give you the full experience of the player character being thrown into an unknown, weird world and not knowing what to do. (yeah, right! )

Anyway, I think the first main...idea, is to work on whatever is required to get the church open, correct? In terms of putting "points" into my tech tree, any recommendations on which path to focus on in the early game? So many options, and so few points! Again, I burned a lot of my early available points on things that probably don't yet matter, just kind of dicking around. Then I realized I couldn't even make a damn wooden anvil (I think that's what it is), or a furnace.

But that's part of these games I guess. Another example: Burned quite a bit of energy and material to repair that body drop off portal for Komrade Donkey, only to find out that for the thing to work, I have to repair an INSIDE part as well (I assume, maybe even more!)...gah.

[GreenGoo]

Good job figuring out the inside and outside needs to be repaired for body chute. Many people miss that and wonder what is happening.

You're right that early in the game there is an "efficient" way to proceed, but that opens up as the game progresses and order doesn't matter (as much). You're still going to be gatekept by tech and resources at various points. Try not to get frustrated and just understand that the game will give you priorities that might be different from your own, because "gatekeeping".

Yes, getting the church up and running is important, but it could take awhile depending on how resources are gathered. Speed runners can open it on first day, but that requires a lot of weird behaviour that no new player would even think of, so don't sweat it.

There are iron rocks to the north in the swamp that will provide you with another source of iron that is pretty easy to gather.

west is a bridge. I'd recommend getting that repaired asap as there are quarries for stone and iron and marble over there that are infinite supplies. More importantly however, is an infinite supply of coal. You will be using hundreds and even thousands of units of coal as you play, so getting that source is important and will save you from having to cut firewood which is less efficient.

Trees are an infinite source of wood but you have to dig up the stumps for new trees to grow (they grow automatically, you don't need to do anything except the stumps).

Faith and blue research points are the most rare and also the most important resources in the game. Eventually you will have more than enough but early on you should be a little more careful in how you spend them. I wish I could remember the early game more so I could point you in the right direction.

Only need 1 teleport stone. Buy one early if possible.

Witch is in a swamp to the west over the bridge and through a maze.
Astrologer is by the lighthouse on the east coast. Same with fisherman.
Skull moves around a bit, but mostly is in the mortuary.
Singer/ms. charm is in the tavern.
thief is in the basement between cellar and lab.
priest is outside the church entrance.
Inquisitor is on witch hill, along road between your house and wheat fields to the east. Go through gate to the north on his day.
merchant is a little south and west of tavern in town, in front of barn.

Fishing is pretty standard, and fun if you like fishing in other games. Easy source of food for recipes, although garden is also a good source.

Carrots are the most important early game foodstuff. Donkey needs a lot of them, plus they are cheap and easy to grow, and cheap and easy to cook into useful energy foods. If garden isn't open yet, look into this.

[Carpet_pissr]

More great tips...

Jesus, 22 hours played already! Damn this game. I already played Stardew Valley and actually felt icky for finishing that for some reason, so I have no idea why this almost literal clone of that game has its hooks in me. It's like playing a timewaster, I think (or that's what my brain is thinking), and I feel almost guilty for that.

Anyway, question: you mentioned zombie workers being part of the DLC upthread...I just recently opened up the dungeon, and spoke with the chained up zombie there, which led to me finding his brother or whatnot, which led to lots of tech tree things opening up showing zombie workers. Are you sure that was exclusive content/funciton to the DLC you bought, and not part of the base game?

Things I wish I had known before I started:
LOOK UP THE PROPER WAY TO PREP/DISSECT A BODY ..I JUST now did this, and boy have I been doing it wrong. Now I assume I will have to do a lot of exhuming...
Coal. I STILL haven't found it, and I need to because the whole firewood thing is not cutting it (ha!).
Only buy tech tree...branches when I need something. So many times I've needed a skill contained in a locked tree branch, because I blew my blue wad on something that sounded cool, but completely useless to me for the stage I was in.
SMASHING stuff with the sword! My God...I just came across this little tip when I went to read up on body prep....there's a crap-ton of stuff to smash with the sword which apparently I had ignored up until hour 22! Even around your own house! This definitely should have been included in the tutorial dammit.

Question: I have finally been able to burn some bodies, but is there not a more permanent crematorium structure? I REALLY don't like having to manually build a pyre every time I cock up a body with my ham-fisted autopsies, only to have it disappear (obviously) after burning. I looked around the tech tree and didn't see anything to shoot for. Shocked that "crematorium" wouldn't be a thing in this game though.

[GreenGoo]

Anyway, question: you mentioned zombie workers being part of the DLC upthread...I just recently opened up the dungeon, and spoke with the chained up zombie there, which led to me finding his brother or whatnot, which led to lots of tech tree things opening up showing zombie workers. Are you sure that was exclusive content/funciton to the DLC you bought, and not part of the base game?

Pretty sure. DLC was Breaking Dead.

Coal. I STILL haven't found it, and I need to because the whole firewood thing is not cutting it (ha!).

Cross the bridge to the west, across the river. Head north along the river shoreline until you can't go any further. Head west (less than 1 screen's distance, I think). It's in a rock face (looking north) and is black. You should get a pickaxe option when you mouse over it. If you find the mine or the quarry, you've gone too far west.

Only buy tech tree...branches when I need something. So many times I've needed a skill contained in a locked tree branch, because I blew my blue wad on something that sounded cool, but completely useless to me for the stage I was in.

Yes. Omg yes. This should have been a tip. Sorry. Blue tech and Faith are both limited and gatekeepers for most of the early and mid game.

Question: I have finally been able to burn some bodies, but is there not a more permanent crematorium structure? I REALLY don't like having to manually build a pyre every time I cock up a body with my ham-fisted autopsies, only to have it disappear (obviously) after burning. I looked around the tech tree and didn't see anything to shoot for. Shocked that "crematorium" wouldn't be a thing in this game though.

No, there is no automated system/structure to burn bodies. Pyres are the only way. On the plus side, eventually you've have a zombie cutting down trees, another zombie bringing the logs to your yard, and yet another zombie cutting the logs into pyre materials (can't remember name. Billets. Looked it up). At that point you just need to carry the billets to the pyre location and build the pyres. It's still work, but I never found it overly tedious, and I burned a LOT of bodies early on. That said, tedium is in the eye of the beholder.

Yes, I would have expected an oven in the mortuary. Alas, no.

[Unagi]

Anyway, question: you mentioned zombie workers being part of the DLC upthread...I just recently opened up the dungeon, and spoke with the chained up zombie there, which led to me finding his brother or whatnot, which led to lots of tech tree things opening up showing zombie workers. Are you sure that was exclusive content/funciton to the DLC you bought, and not part of the base game?

Pretty sure. DLC was Breaking Dead.

Just to clear that up; Breaking Dead was released as a free expansion integrated into the base game.

[Carpet_pissr]

Anyway, question: you mentioned zombie workers being part of the DLC upthread...I just recently opened up the dungeon, and spoke with the chained up zombie there, which led to me finding his brother or whatnot, which led to lots of tech tree things opening up showing zombie workers. Are you sure that was exclusive content/funciton to the DLC you bought, and not part of the base game?

Pretty sure. DLC was Breaking Dead.

Just to clear that up; Breaking Dead was released as a free expansion integrated into the base game.

Well that DOES explain a lot...both the existence of zombies in my game, but also the fact that I saw no mention of a Breaking Dead DLC on Steam or discussed in the forums.

[Unagi]

Yep, exactly - if anyone tried to find and get that content, they would be searching a long time - only to find the searching was pointless.