-Introduction-

Archaeology in its current state is interesting, but feels like a bare-bones (pun intended) concept that could be expanded on. Implementing the following ideas would make archaeology a much more interesting and lucrative venture.

-New Ancient Ruins Models-

More model variation for explorable ruins would obviously make things more interesting. Locked doors requiring material charge or specific keys would also add to the intricacy of searching for artifacts. Behind these locked doors would be bonus loot. Having new cave and underwater ruins that can’t be discovered with planetary maps, only monoliths or random exploration. These ruins would have better odds of having an incredibly valuable artifact.

-Remove Visor Scan Indicators-

Getting rid of the indicators revealing the location of the underground keys and chest would require you to physically excavate the area to locate the keys. This would cause players to reveal more of the ruins’ structure instead of just digging tiny holes to the keys, making it feel more like true excavation. Making artifacts more valuable and adding random loot containers would make it worth the additional time spent digging.

-Planetary Archive Changes-

Planetary Archives become a player community hub for artifact collection. Instead of the artifact swap system currently in place, you would put the artifact into the device and it would be scanned and recorded and then can be taken back out to be sold like normal. A new option will be available at the computer terminal in the archive structure that allows you to view all artifacts uploaded into that specific archive as well as which “scientist” contributed the discovery. This would allow groups of friends to work together to gather a large collection of rare artifacts and anyone who visits the archive could view what was there, sort of like a museum. It would also be neat if you could store other “artifact” type items like salvaged scrap, ancient bones, and deep space oddities.

-Nanite Rewards-

Introduce a new NPC artifact collector that is located at any “Planetary Archive” point of interest that sell ruins maps and keys to unlock doors in ancient ruins to access bonus rewards. They would also buy artifacts for nanites, which can be done after uploading the data to the archive.

-Conclusion-

An archaeology overhaul would be a fun and interesting content update and would be relatively simple to implement into the game. “`

Testing the limits of how complex I can make my freighter base before I get irretrievably lost or my processor explodes. I’ve got the “bones” constructed. Next up, filling in some of the spaces.