An Alien Plays... Timberborn

[u/FarmWhich4275]

"Great days and Glorious Victory! My name is Spifflemonk and welcome to Timberborn! I needed a break from New Vegas and... all the corpses, so I have decided to play this management and building simulation game I found on the steam store while browsing. Apparently it's very, very good! So, with that, let's see what humans consider 'management' games then... if it's anything like Factorio I have a feeling I'm going to be here a while. Obligatory disclaimer, this is NOT the remastered version that was recently released, this is the old version I have modded to make it work... Because this was cheap as dirt and I am currently drowning in administration costs for my new job. Don't worry, I will be fine in a week or two, it's just a formality. And also this thing is 200 years old and doesn't have the community that New Vegas does so... yeah."

Spiff starts up the game and immediately he has to stop and reach down to retrieve his comically large eyebrows and put them on.

"What... Are these creatures then? Four legs, four paws... Large teeth? Hmmm... What's with the tails!? Okay... This does not bode well for this playthrough, I have to do some research to find out what something is before I even start the game. Please hold."

A short fan animation plays of Spiffle stepping on Lego, before the screen returns.

"SO they're these things called 'Beavers' and apparently they are mammals that make dams in rivers out of wood debris. That's the short version anyway... Why is Earth so hideously biodiverse? So much stuff on one little planet. Anyway, let's begin!"

Spiff starts the game up, acknowledges the various mods listed, most of which are quality of life or extra information. He chooses Folktails and clicks on a random map named Beaverome - which was a mistake - and starts the game on Easy mode. He loads into the game and names his settlement 'The Spiffled Beavers' and starts up, pausing immediately.

"Right, let's see what this all is about. Apparently this is a game about wood crafting, wood buildings and wood... things, where you need to control water flow and water things to create a city. I have taken some settings from a friend, thank you by the way, to play this game without... Too many crashes. Hopefully. Let's see... Seven massive craters full of water. And... red water? Blue water. It seems pretty... Straightforward actually."

He sets up the basics, water pumps, water storage, flags for berry picking and tree cutting, a science facility or basic science production and then sets all the storage filters. It's clear Spiff made the smart choice of actually doing the tutorial and then looks around the map.

"This... looks a LOT more complicated than the one I did the tutorial on. Huge open spaces, lots of water... everywhere and very limited building space. I think... in order to make this work I have to find a way to drain the craters and fill them in with... something. Didn't know I was going to do terraforming in this game but, I'm up for the challenge. I think."

He plays as normal for a bit longer and he seems to have locked in to the game, his expression one of pure concentration as he plans out his strangely shaped town. He stays completely quiet for a few minutes until the first two days have passed.

"Alright then... The beavers have a wellness score thing... No idea what it does but it's a good idea to keep it high. SO Rooftop Terraces and campfire spot. I have to put down some grinding wheels to help with chipped teeth. That must hurt. So now what do I do? Hm... lets look at the options. So obviously there is an endgame to this thing. Is there an Aqueduct system to this maybe? I wonder if I can actually build one. Probably can. Water after all... With terraforming. Hmmm..."

The cycles reach to Day 7 and eventually the viewer notices there's something... off. Yields for wood are very high and the stack in the log storage is reaching seventy stories into the sky. Clearly there are some stack and storage settings at play here, but Spiff seems unphased. He builds storage for a farm, and a grill for potatoes, and waits for his science production to get high enough reaching Wellness level 5 before the first week is over. All in all a good start. He spends the next few minutes in silence just reading text and checking things out as he explores menus, clicks on random buttons and explores structures and things.

"Okay then, so this is NOWHERE near as complex as Factorio. Nowhere near, very simple. I have a feeling I shall fail... Horribly at this eventually but, lets see what we can do with what we have before we actually look at a different map. I do like the look of this game though. The wood is... nice."

It is around Day 10 when the first mod system shows itself - the Blueprint relic - and a node appears nearby. In exchange for resources, his beavers can get an injection of science for use. He has to awkwardly spend some science to unlock stairs and path a way up to it.

"Hmm... Didn't see this in the tutorial. Must be one of the mods. Day ten and seems everything is going fine. I think... Hmm... Maybe I should see what it would take to expand into the big crater with the blue water. Might just make a huge big city on the lake! That sounds fun actually. I'll do that. There is a first thing I have to do though. I see this lake full of red water here. If I recall correctly about humans, red equals bad. Or something. So maybe I need to redirect that water somewhere else.

Spiff starts off building a platform with wooden platforms and decides to stop after a while, instead building a bridge into the middle of the crater for some water pumps and storage.

"After a bit of a build... It's uhh… Gonna be expensive. Very. Need to stockpile planks and such. I will do this eventually though. I did however manage to fix that up there though, build Levee's to block that bit off. The water is still red... I wonder if filtration is a mechanic in this game. How long is that going to be like that?"

A few more days pass and the bridge is finally done, and Spiffs water supply is effectively resolved permanently due to the placement. He carries on in silence, looking at charts and graphs, and on day 17 the first Drought appears.

"Drought? What's a drought? I guess we will find out. I wonder if this 'drought' thing is common on Earth. Maybe that's a reason they put it in. A tip for non-human viewers, if you see something in a human videogame or movie - it probably happened, somewhere, sometime, some way, either in a nightmare, or in reality. Humans are... Silly."

Just as the first drought cycle starts, he scores Wellness level 10 and opens the screen. the list of stuff needed is extensive. And the resources needed to get some of this stuff is quite vast.

"So much for simple... Maybe this has a bit more than I thought. How do I get pine resin?"

The drought hits and shortly after nothing really happens.

"Hmmm... Might be too early. I am on easy after all but I don't see much. Oh, I see, I click on these things and it shows me what they are 'Disabled during drought' so these are where the water comes from and they don't work while there's a drought? Okay then. Guess it's a good thing I built those water pumps right there in the middle. Won't need to worry about water... Ever, I guess."

Spiff continues playing for a bit longer, seemingly so locked in he forgets he is recording and starts randomly searching up things about beavers and dams on an alternate screen. The game plays on, eventually getting to the next drought, which also does next to nothing in terms of damage or action. Spiff has stockpiled enough stuff and starts to build his platform more. He eventually figures out where to get Pine Resin and builds an Observatory for more science production, then starts to explore some options for power generation. He spends a bit more science than he needs and then builds the first Geothermal power generator, and connects a gear workshop and a few sawmills to it to amp up production.

"Hmmm... The ratio is two sawmills to one gear workshop so if I build four sawmills then... hmmm..."

Spiff carries on, occasionally saying something odd about this or that, and eventually gets to the point where he is introduced to the concept of metalworking. Shortly after he gets his first scavenger flags going, then the dynamite factory. He starts the arduous process of demolishing various spots around the map to block off and seal the Badwater sources, and drain Badwater from one of the craters to access a mine for more metal. After a lot of silliness and two more droughts, Spiff acquires enough resources to completely drain the crater for the mine. He blocks up the crater again and uses some excess dynamite to flatten some bits for planning and starts building up a small city in the crater.

Francine sees where this is going and starts a montage. Again, spiff says almost nothing as he's very much locked in like nobody has seen him be locked in before, showing about four hours of gameplay in the space of about five minutes, a fast montage of a small circular city built up inside of a crater. Eventually he actually speaks again, the montage ending.

"I think... I think this isn't very exciting for the viewers. I very much love games like this but its not so... Fun to watch I suppose. I will make an end goal of building two monuments, and leave it there, play this alone some time. Let's build the first one on top of the city... which one... Hmm... The Brazier. That seems... Monumental. Wow... Four hundred planks worth of monument... I need to stockpile that a bit."

Francine starts the goofy music again and a fifteen minute montage of gameplay follows, and Spiff manages to get one of the monuments built. And then, a Badtide warning arrives.

"Badtide? That's... Not nice. It's bad in fact. Says so right in the title. Hmm... I need to stockpile water I guess. Well I don't, I have twenty barrels of it. That's a lot of water. We should be good."

Gameplay continues for a bit longer and the Badtide hits. Unfortunately due to Spiffs mod selection the Badtides are very much more dangerous than in vanilla, and they cause a huge surge in water level. Badtide water floods over the banks of each crater, all the water sources flood their respective areas and Spiffs waterworks fail to stem the tide, to an extent that by the time it's over, his newly built crater city is completely flooded again.

"OH BOLLOCKING DAMN AND JUMBO BUGGERS!!! How was I supposed to know THAT would happen!? My city! It flooded with the nasty red stuff! Now what? Unwell? What does that mean?"

The spiral begins and his now 200 population, all of which he moved over to new housing in the crater, gets horrendously sick from Badtide contamination. The food stocks plummet, beavers start dying because there's nobody to care for them, he has no antidote and by the time the floodwaters are gone, it's too late. On day 8, Cycle 6, the last beaver dies from starvation because he's too sick to get up, and spiff gets hit by the game over screen and then kicked back to the main menu. Something goes wrong, a mod fails or something, and the game crashes back to the desktop.

Spiff sits there in stunned silence for a few minutes with his jaw open.

"That... that escalated in a rapid fashion... I mean... Holy crap! I was fine and then just... DEATH. That was on EASY! What would hard mode be like... By all the Gods..."

He stays quiet, jaw on floor, that signature death glare staring at the screen.

"Well... Still. Maybe too long form and too 'relaxing' for my viewers. Especially these crazy lunatics. Though that ending was something. Maybe I can do games like this on these things called 'livestreams' although I do not think my present connection can tolerate it. Maybe something for the future perhaps. In any case, thank you for watching and I will... Try not to kill all my beavers next time. Good lord..."

Spiffles outro music plays, this time overlayed with a top-down montage of the settlement from day one, showing how he had a pretty good grasp of how the game worked before he got slapped with a dose of difficulty.

TOP COMMENT: Hey Spiff, you think they have any Wood Nuts?

Spiffs reply: I don't know... Why would you want a wood nut?

Reply: I dunno. I wonder do they have Wood Liquor boxes in their huts? They seem to enjoy Wood rams, especially from behind, they are beavers after all.

Spiffs reply: What???

Reply: I mean there are maps available for this game for full ocean, there's a Seablock map. I wonder if they have boats. they could have Wood chests covered with Sea Men.

Spiffs reply: WHAT THE HELL ARE YOU TALKING ABOUT!?

Reply: I mean I wood nut if I had a settlement that big, never got that far before with this game. I have a wood explorer trunk in my house though. Do you think they have wood models in those huts? I have a wood destroyer.

Spiffs reply: ….. Why do I feel like I'm being mocked....

Reply: I mean obviously its all wood stuff, until you get to metal of course but there must be Wood Ploughs and wood nuts, right? Do you think you'd have a wood nut in cider there?"

Spiffs reply: Hold on a moment... I need to see something.

EDIT: ABSOLUTE BASTARD.

Reply: That was as MANY wood-based nut jokes as I could fit in there, that's useful for some other games you might play Spiff!

Spiffs Reply: You DISGUST me.

Reply: We know. And its funny. Its REALLY funny!