#however (as anyone who's tried to beat it knows) terraria has a LOT of progression - and it's all built to be extremly satisfying progress

[emmafaeru]

one of the things that's insane to me about terraria is it's lack of online prescence. it's the 10th best selling video game of all time. there's like 3 people who make videos about it. it's been around for 13 years. there's not even 400 fics tagged as terraria on ao3. 45 million people have played it. there are maybe 4 pieces of fanart somwhere if you really dig for them. and the crazy part is I totally agree. I have never wanted to create about terraria. I have rarely if ever wanted to consume content about terraria. this is a game I have a disgusting amount of hours in and I would give a very high rating of and I have never once gone feral over it like I have with other things I consume. terraria is this ball of awesomeness of a game mixed with this complete fucking undecipherable void of a prescence and i think it's insane

#if we're actually thinking about why though #1) the complete lack of story/worldbuilding/setting/ heavily discourages any attempt of a narrative #it would be like trying to write a captivating story about minecraft steve in minecraft block world #'but minecraft has so many stories thought up in it! like [insert minecraft smp]' #2) yes but consider that minecraft's relatively short - and frankly unfulfilling - progression #means that after you beat minecraft the only thing left to do is to create - either with yourself or other people #which incidentally is also why minecraft servers are such a big thing - becuase of that natural steer into playing with other ppl #however (as anyone who's tried to beat it knows) terraria has a LOT of progression - and it's all built to be extremly satisfying progress #which means when you beat terraria. you can beat it again! in any one of 2098456 ways you choose all of which give you a unique playthrough #incidentally this is also why in my experience servers are so much less of a thing in terraria #while the modding scene is sososo much bigger and relevant - tapping into that 'replay the thing but DIFFERENT' again type of replayability #I'm comparing terraria and minecraft btw because both are sandbox games but they have wildly different prescences #and often times people will write minecraft having more content down as 2d/terraria being more limiting creatively #but actually some of the prettiest builds in a videogame I've seen were in 2d/terraria #I think there's a more fundamental difference at play there #in the type of replayability that mc and terraria offer #one kind of forces you to create or play with others if you want more out of it #while the other offers this kind of seemingly endless well of challenges that never steers you in that co-op/creative direction #both are great in their own right #but it means that minecraft has more content 'staying power' as it is a space designed first and foremost to steer players into creating #and also most importantly - cooperating and playing with others to creat together #while terraria more often focuses on that core gameplay experience/challenge #while never steering/forcing players into that creating/co-opting space #unless they intentionally seek out that experience for themselves #see - the terraria builder community (not massive last time I checked) and server players (I don't think they exist) #also 3) eye of cthullu is stupid hard to draw in 3d without doubling over laughing #like 👁️ <- oh man look who's floating ominously!! he sure is gonna getchu!! #^ I ramble about things #also i still think terraria is better than minecraft. for the record