Co-op play, if possible, & a concern on the K-2.0 timeline.

[Oldman]

If co-op is enabled, I'd buy 3 copies of the game instead of 1. Not sure if this is possible, as it'd introduce an entire additional shell to the code and essentially restart things for you. But, before you say no entirely, I'd poll your fan base and ask how many additional copies they'd buy. If the numbers work out, then... well, you get the idea. Best of luck.

Kenshi 2.0... 1000 years in the past... that's interesting, but as a novelist and game developer myself, I am curious if that timeline will harm the player's sense of impact on the world, given that they know everything will fall to shit regardless. Feel free to ignore my concern, or swat me, as I am but a gadfly.

Doubts aside, I'm sure your writer(s) will be able to figure out how to let players leave their mark. They've built a thoroughly engaging world thus far. Anyway, best of luck.

[Hatsune_Neko]

Is there hope for Online, Multiplayer, Co-Op, Lan mod?

Copy of official answer for MP.

Online gaming for this title is not possible.
list of reasons.

Dev created the game as single player only
With the custom built engine, he chose modulus that allowed the freedom of single player over multiplayer. though in the core there is a tiny bit of MP functionality. the main core of the engine does not have it.

What does this mean?
It means that in the base engine there is basically zero options to add this feature. The modules the Dev used to create the games engine does not have the core coding needed.

Can MP be added as a Mod?
It is not possible due to the core engine.

But other game companies eventually had their games have MP due to modding
This is a result of their game engines already have the capability inside them. the parent company chose not to add the functionally. This is not a option with Kenshi.

But the Dev can add this after the game is finished?
In a way he could. but it would require scraping the entire game and starting over from scratch. Those are the words the Dev used. But he also said he could make Kenshi MP compatible, even so. The overhaul would require years. far longer then just starting over from scratch.

Maybe he will add it in Kenshi 2?
Kenshi 2 has been confirmed, it is using the same engine with Ogre 2.1, this means Kenshi will still not support MP.

So what are the chances of MP ever being added?
Basically, Zero.

[spacefiddle]

I know a lot of people ask about this and seem to want it, so I just want to say to the OP: I know it seems like a nifty idea at first, but you really don't want this. The answer given as to why not is always technical, and that doesn't connect with the motivations of the player asking.

So consider this: it would not be a good experience. Think about how much control of time is a factor in this game. Even with just two players, think of the flow of the game. You're mining some boring copper and want to hit max speed as your buddy is caught with his pants down and needs to micro his squad a little in combat. You're crossing some dangerous terrirtory and suddenly speed up for no reason. You're crossing boring territory and stuck at realtime speed. The map is HUGE, and altering timeflow is a large part of gameplay. There's never been, in any game, a good clean way to accomplish that kind of system in multiplayer. Do you ever pause the game? How much fun is it staring at PAUSE while the other player takes a bio and gets a drink?

These are specific examples, but they're far from the only ones. Then you have to consider things beyond the start of the game. Who gets the unique recruits? Who gets that Engineering Research? Who gets to clear which areas? What about faction relations? Sure you could have them independent, but then there's an ENORMOUS system rewrite to handle not only co-op but the possibility of opposing player factions. And if that happens, why isn't there pvp?

My point is to consider that since everything is online and multiplayer now, people immediately think of it; but I don't think it could every possibly apply to THIS game and its mechanics. It would be a hugely different game experience; it would be a different game.

Perhaps one day, Kenshi 3 or Chris' next non-Kenshi project would be designed with all these headaches in mind, and solve them. But when you see an answer like "the engine doesn't support it," realize that's really almost the LEAST difficult problem to solve.

[TrebleMuffin]

So consider this: it would not be a good experience. Think about how much control of time is a factor in this game. Even with just two players, think of the flow of the game. You're mining some boring copper and want to hit max speed as your buddy is caught with his pants down and needs to micro his squad a little in combat. You're crossing some dangerous terrirtory and suddenly speed up for no reason. You're crossing boring territory and stuck at realtime speed. The map is HUGE, and altering timeflow is a large part of gameplay. There's never been, in any game, a good clean way to accomplish that kind of system in multiplayer. Do you ever pause the game? How much fun is it staring at PAUSE while the other player takes a bio and gets a drink?

Well, what if just limit it only to specific CO-OP experience. Such as, there is a main person (host) that holds the whole game, and the rest people only can control specific squads that the host assigns. You can limit to a specific number of people such as 2, 4, or 6. Think of it as Divinity: Original Sin 2 multiplayer. The game-play would not be that much different form the original game.
As of the speed control, you can set so that all people have to agree on the specific speed. When someone wants to speed up, a notification would pop up. This way, it would allow people to micro more units. You can set a trade of for pause to half speed.
You don't have to go far from it such as have each player their own faction. That would be too much to reworked and balancing.

Basically, give people an opportunity to play with friends and build stuff together as ONE faction where the leader is the host (just like D:OS2).

[Hatsune_Neko]

adding MP in any form would require massive reworking of the game.

[spacefiddle]

adding MP in any form would require massive reworking of the game.

Yeah exactly. Treble: of course you could do those things, but then it would be a different game. That's the point.

[DanielS]

There's never been, in any game, a good clean way to accomplish that kind of system in multiplayer.

I agree with everything else you said, just wanted to offer up an example where I thought this was done really really well.

Defcon is a nuclear war simulator, intended for multiplayer. The way Defcon handles time management is that the players can all choose the time selector - 1x, 5x, 10x, 20x - that they want. Under normal game modes, the lowest option wins. If four people are playing, and one person wants 20x and the other three want 10x, the game runs at 10x. If one of the players comes under attack and needs to futz around to respond, they can slam the game down to 1x to set up their response, then bump it back up to 5x to let things play out.

It was a simple, elegant little system that suited Defcon perfectly.

Could be improved further in a co-op setting by adding coloured dots under the UI elements for the speed options, showing which players are requesting which mode. Allow an option to add a hover box showing the players requesting each option so you can match the color to the player, and to give colourblind people some access to the information too.

To be clear: Defcon was designed as a multiplayer game. Kenshi wasn't, which I think was the right decision, as was keeping and building on the existing engine for K2. I 100% agree that the multiplayer experience in Kenshi wouldn't justify the development time to implement for K1 or K2.

However: If the devs go on to make a Kenshi 3 and decide to rebuild the engine from the ground up with the option for multiplayer as a core part of the game, I think that they could make an excellent multiplayer experience for a Kenshi-style game.