Update: Trust
July 1, 2023
A funny thing happened on the way to viewing last month's sales data. One Hour One Life sold 36 copies in the nation of Argentina. This is the fourth biggest country in terms of units sold in one month. However, all of these sales only brought in $27 total. Because prices were set long ago, they haven't been adjusted based on exchange rate changes over the years, and Argentinian residents can currently buy the game for 78 US cents per copy.
You might think that is bargain basement price is driving sales over there, but I suspect something else is afoot. US residents who want multiple accounts are buying them in bulk by using VPNs and tricking Steam into thinking they live in Argentina.
And why would one person want so many low-cost accounts?
Because they are using the accounts to grief, and quickly getting cursed by other players, and their accounts are getting stuck in Donkeytown over and over. They escape Donkeytown via the purchase of a new account, which gives them a fresh start.
Of course, the price in Argentina can be adjusted, but this discovery highlights a deeper issue:
The curse system is great, insofar as it allows you to say, "I don't want to play near this person anymore," and have your wishes respected. Each person gets to decide what counts as "unacceptable" on their own, without needed consensus from others. Maybe one person doesn't like swearing, and another person doesn't like berry munching, and a third person really hates bossy players. Some people might like the drama of a murder or theft, while others might hate it. Curses allow us to avoid defining global behavior rules that must satisfy everyone.
The problem is that curses only work if you've encountered that particular player (or account) before. When dealing with a brand new, unknown account, they don't help you differentiate that account from other uncursed accounts---even accounts that you've enjoyed playing with many times in the past. Essentially, all the uncursed accounts are lumped into the same category: they are all unknown variables.
The new Trust system inverts this, allowing you to whitelist accounts that you feel belong to "good" players, from your perspective. By saying "I TRUST JANE SMITH" or "I TRUST YOU" to the closest person, that player is added to your eternal trust list. You will then see "+" symbols around their speech, and this effect persists across lives, with no time limit. This doesn't allow you to track specific players across lives, but rather shows you the growing group of players that you generally trust.
The other accounts in the game are either cursed by you---in which case, you've specifically caught them doing something that you dislike---or unknown variables---in which case, you can proceed with caution until you can determine their trustworthiness.
Aside from marking trusted player's speech, the Trust system has no effect on birth placement or other gameplay elements.
Cursing someone, of course, removes them from your list of trusted players.
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