Bag Mode removed??Madness...

The only thing I feel like this would really do is FORCE the rate at which people return to town and sell, which in turn makes farming faster. Yeah while gold returns are higher at a faster rate, I don't care about that. I like taking my darn sweet time playing.
If you want to promote List mode, then why don't you just add a way to switch between BOTH modes with a hotkey feature? It's absurd that I can't choose to waste my time with the IMMERSION it gives me to dig through MY mess, that I actually love so much. Removing bag mode breaks the immersion for me.

IF you do add a key-bind to toggle between the two, people who feel like they suddenly DO want to speed up the process switch to list mode. Now when I have something important to do soon this is my method. But when I get the time to sit back and just enjoy myself... I want to dive in and BE MY AVATAR. Let me have my mess back please. <3

Please hear me on this. I know Lord British favors immersion just as much. One player can make a difference and this suggestion should be one imo. But I am bias @Lord British @DarkStarr

 

See Darkstarr's post RIP Bag Mode, if you haven't already.
https://www.shroudoftheavatar.com/forum/index.php?threads/rest-in-peace-bag-mode.109261/

 

As a synopsis of DarkStarr's post (TL;DR)...

• Less than 3% of the player population used Bag Mode.
• Bag Mode had many bugs.
• Bag Mode produced many edge cases that had to be considered when making changes to the inventory system.

It was deemed that the effort required to maintain two separate inventory systems to support such a small percentage of the player base was not cost efficient.
I agree with Portalarium's assessment.

 

Ehh, well...****. I can see his POV, but it also sucks that inconvenience is a factor.

 

I didn't even know there was a bag mode

 

I don't.
It was a blow to the immersion of the game.

 

Time to move on I guess. Definitely not happy about it though.

 

IN FACT, a huge factor about how much time I SINK INTO THIS GAME REVOLVES AROUND BAG MODE! The more I think about this feature being removed, the more I get pissed off, because that means I get burnt out faster. I have ADD and OCD. With the 2 combined the bag mode really keeps me entertained and hanging onto what is a "loot-game" to me. If I didn't have OCD or nostalgia I would have moved on already probably.
It's not because the game isn't good, I just have issues in my brain that make me switch games often. The funny thing is this game, among very FEW games, can hold my attention for a longer period of time. It's a shame that a single feature elimination can make me feel like my world was sort of destroye. Maybe I'm too sentimental or emotional. Oh well... @DarkStarr @Lord British

 

I love to immerse myself in games that I play. So I understand the want to have features that help with that. It will be different for everyone what helps or doesn’t help.

For me, bag mode was actually worse for immersion because of the complete in your face break from realism it provides. Seeing all your stuff like that, in no way shape or form that could be considered realistic....I couldn’t get past that, so I just used the list mode to remove the “where is” frustration that I had on top of the realism break.

Not everyone has the same experience.

 

Not THE immersion, YOUR immersion.
Sorry LD

 

Bag mode made the game harder to play, so nobody used it. Farewell bag mode.

 

Yes it is a disappointment but hard choices have to made at this time. Not every game will have every feature we like and some we won't like as well. It has to be a personal choice.

 

I am a longtime Ultima fan. I loved the bag inventory from U7-U8 and UO. I simply did not KNOW there was a bag mode and I for sure was not alone. That and the fact that it was buggy and people who wanted to use it but rather waited for bugs to be fixed might have resulted in the mentioned 3%.

And majoria, yes not every game has every feature but we are not talking about random features of a random game but a staple of Ultima in the spiritual Ultima successor.

So yes I absolutely understand Ultima fans being disappointed with that decision. It's not worth huge drama, but acting as if people who are disappointed are unreasonable is not cool either.

How about an icon inventory in a bag UI? That would bring the best of both worlds, the free bag mode and the list mode. I am not a fan of lists Ultima IX had that.

 

Yes well bag mode did not work and the default was set to list mode. I am not saying I wasn't disappointed too of course but for me I still love the game and we take this away and then we add other things that I like very much. So one thing is not going to take me away from this game. We already gave our disappointment feedback and that is all we can do. The devs have to make the choices ultimately and they have reasons for what they do. They are not doing it to be mean to us. I'm sure they would do all they could for us.

edited

 

I wouldn't walk away from it either because of that. Like I said, it's not worth big drama.

I get a feeling this community has been shaken quite a bit over the years. Everything is taken so extremely seriously so quickly. Not directing this at you majoria, but every little critique is translated to some as bashing the game, hating it and quitting by some fans. Even my absolute favorite game has flaws and I would let the devs know what I would like to see changed or improved. Nothing wrong with that.

SotA is great, @Lord British and @DarkStarr and team (not Chris of course, he breaks stuff ) do an amazing job. Wanting bag mode does not take away from that. SotA is basically just now getting out of development (it always will be in dev, but you know what I mean) and there are years ahead to improve it more and more. IF they can put some bag UI with and icon grid in awesome! If not then not. But at least they know that a few Ultima freaks would like it.

No drama

 

I have to say, originally I had also thought that if Bag Mode were being shut down because of the numbers alone (only 3% using it) that it might not have been the best reasoning. Bag mode really wasn't sufficiently advertised, (was there even a loading screen tip for it?) bugs aside of course. However, I myself had never bothered switching from inventory mode over to bag mode because I already use bag mode on a regular basis on UO:F, and inventory mode gets the job done just fine.

Now, after running this bag mode bag art contest I can honestly say that I agree with Bag mode being removed 100%. This thread garnered nearly thousands of views, and still only a handful of entries. To me, this shows that there just wasn't enough community outcry to warrant keeping the mode.

 

@jammaplaya

If making bag art was the only reason to keep it in, then it probably wasn't really a good reason... :/ But probably a lot of people who would have liked it weren't into it for the bag art. But then, it was not just bugs, but bad implementation that kept it unused for a lot of people.

Still my view from the start was that the game should have only had one inventory mode or another. Being able to switch between them removed anything that was compelling about the bag mode anyway, and making it work well was obviously not a development priority.

I don't understand why people are surprised that it was taken out.

 

Honestly, I think the reason only 3% of players using it was because they didn't even know it was there. Like me. I found out when it's demise was announced. I was elated and super sad all at once.

 

@redfish I'm simply suggesting that if the prospect of being handsomely rewarded for minimal effort wasn't enough to push the community to show their support for the mode, then it probably doesn't have that much support. Not that everyone who likes the mode does so purely for bag art.

 

I loved bag mode in old Ultima games especially UO. Bag mode in SOTA was pretty crappy. I knew it was there, even tried using it a few times always went back to list mode. I won't miss it.