|
Be honest, Purple... are you payed by the LP? Blimey I actually have a suggestion for a set of decent looking, decent playing, low-jank, low-bullshit games that you could do after this that are also among my personal favourites, if you're keen.
|
#
¿
Mar 24, 2022 02:38
|
|
|
|
| # ¿ May 10, 2024 22:10 |
|
|
I don't know why the hate for young Jimmy. The novel 'Jimmy the Hand' was awful to me after how much I enjoyed 'Murder in LaMut' and 'Hono(u)red Enemy', but I liked him as an actual fun, witty character when everyone else around was deadly serious and grim most of the time.
|
|
#
¿
Mar 24, 2022 03:10
|
|
|
The Kingdom actually does have an intelligence network, but it gets no billing. There is a scene in... Silverthorn? (Arutha's wedding pre-tragedy) where Hazara-Khan, who is a great minor character, reveals that he among about 4 people knows that Lyam is about to wed a princess of Roldem, a nearby Kingdom, and Kesh fears loss of territory or power. Arutha is stunned, but then he asks Khan about Kesh building ships in Durbin that violate treaties that they have with the Kingdom, and Hazara laughs out loud. I really like the scene.PurpleXVI posted:For all that the books insist that Jimmy looks up to and respects Arutha, there's never really any... point where Jimmy actually learns anything from Arutha or takes any lessons from him, except for, off-screen, learning how to use a rapier and play chess. There isn't much, that I grant you. There is one nice scene in Magician where Arutha is showing him to use a rapier while Anita watches, and Jimmy is very self-conscious because he has a crush on Anita. Apart from that... now that I think about it, there's not much. You all have a point. I have not read the later Feistverse, but the book where Jimmmy disappointed, for lack of a better word, me is in Prince of the Blood. It's 20 years on and he's an Earl, and while I really like the emotional arc at the start of the book involving a certain lady, Jimmy is very mature and serious in the rest of the book. I missed the cocky, brash smartarse. Kevin in Servant of the Empire might be a stereotype, but he's an irreverant, funny, charming bloke through the whole novel despite being a slave.
|
|
#
¿
Mar 24, 2022 23:15
|
|
|
raifield posted:My vote is for Birthright, even if I'm getting way ahead of things. The game is notable for having nothing in it that is depicted on the back of the box at all. The strategy portion is lightweight, the tactical portion is broken and mind-numbing, and the less said about the adventuring portion, the better. Yet I still play now and then, despite it being quite a strange, janky, and disappointing game. I actually want Purple to play a game that is fun and enjoyable, to some modest degree. Asking him to play another piece of shite seems somewhat sadistic and risks to burn him out.
|
|
#
¿
Mar 25, 2022 02:56
|
|
|
Torrannor posted:The Tsurani trilogy was imho just simply better written than the rest of Feist's novels, which might have something to do with the fact that he co-wrote it with another author. I haven't read more than the early stuff, but I consider Magician, both parts, to be my favourite fantasy novel. The Empire trilogy had a tough act to follow. I started to read the third one but what happens in the very first pages was so contrived it turned me off and I have not gone back. As for Jimmy... again, I haven't read the late books, but while what you say is very sensible I would point out that Amos, even after he enters into a very important position, is still an irreverant pirate. He's serious when he needs to be serious, but he still has personality. I felt that Prince of the Blood James lost so much of what made him Jimmy.
|
|
#
¿
Mar 25, 2022 14:24
|
|
|
PurpleXVI posted:Personally, with regards to Magician, I consider most of it mediocre, but the parts with Pug/Milamber on Kelewan are interesting to me. I did want to learn more about the Tsurani, even if they were formidable assholes for a large part. Magician just has so many moments that are very memorable to me; I can't explain it. Pug's being 'chosen', his... elevation, later on when he goes back to see his old 'boss'... I go back and re-read those sometimes even when I am not re-reading the books. It's hard to explain sometimes why we like what we like. In terms of games, Purple, I was going to suggest Eye of the Beholder, but someone else is doing those. So, I was going to suggest the trilogy (only in the sense that they are in the same engine) of Strahd's Possession, Menzoberranzan and Stone Prophet. The first and last game are in Ravenloft, while the second is obviously Forgotten Realms but they all play very similarly. Low jank, modest amounts of text, reasonably plesent GUI for games from 1994~ish. I thought that they might be a refreshing, simple change from what you have done recently. Given their length, lack of long text dumps and your update pace, each one should take you about a fortnight.
|
|
#
¿
Mar 26, 2022 01:00
|
|
|
I actually rather like the voice videos in this game. Kahooli is the god of vengeance, so it makes sense to swear a vendetta on his name. It cames up several times in even the few books that I have read.
|
|
#
¿
Mar 26, 2022 23:57
|
|
|
Sorry, Purple, I didn't realise that that was a book reference. I just thought that you were being cheeky. I'm glad that this game goes back to a more traditional use of Spell Points. I've never been fans of games where spells use health/stamina as it just feels like punishing the player for using its skills. Resource management is always a factor, but it shouldn't hamper the player in other areas. On another note, it looks this game is going to be another revolving door of party members. I'm probably in the minority here, but I get frustrated when a character leaves after joining. I'm boring like that.
|
|
#
¿
Mar 27, 2022 00:54
|
|
|
Guildenstern Mother posted:There's some party swapping, but its way more chronotrigger than chronocross if that makes sense. There's only a very few more. I will probably be burned as an apostate here, but I've never played either of those games.
|
|
#
¿
Mar 27, 2022 16:43
|
|
|
Hel posted:Why would you get burned for not having played either a 2009 DS game or one that releases next month? Unless I am woefully mistaken, Chrono Trigger was on the SNES and Cross on the PS1. They are both regarded widely as classics, but I have never played either.
|
|
#
¿
Mar 27, 2022 20:51
|
|
|
I think that the Mocker voice actor pulled what is called a 'Reverse Dick Van Dyke' where, instead of trying to sound cockney he ended up Australian, he sounds like an Australian trying to be cockney. To be fair, I can't do cockney either. My brummie's not bad, but I did grow up near Birmingham. Purple, I know that it's too early to talk about story, but how do you feel so far about mechanics in this game vs BoK vs BoA? I think that it's fair to compare the three games for obvious reasons, even though Return has a very different engine and presentation.
|
|
#
¿
Apr 1, 2022 01:43
|
|
|
I just found out that Denmark is the only country in the world that doesn't use UTC. Explains so much.
|
|
#
¿
Apr 5, 2022 00:02
|
|
|
THe problem with having magical healing and especially resurrection (D&D based-books are rife with this) is that, if it exists, why does anyone have to die or even suffer at all? I can't tell you how many D&D books I have read where in one death is treated as irrevocable, while in the next there are casual references to someon being brought back. It's very inconsistent. There was a reference in one of the early books to the death of Aglarrana's first husband, the elf king whose name I do not recall. Apparenlty a powerful priest passed by right after the king died, and this priest could resurrect those gone no more than an hour or so. The elves refused to let him do so because they insisted that the king's spirit was already in their version of heaven and they would not disturb his paradise. Whether that is actually how the elven afterlife works or not is not established as far as I know, but it raises another moral/theological question. In books where it is known, genuinely known as cosmic fact to the people in-setting and not just the reader/player, that here is an ideal afterlife, what's the point of living in the first place?
|
|
#
¿
Apr 9, 2022 18:38
|
|
|
PurpleXVI posted:Well, at least for humans on Midkemia it's a wheel of reincarnation instead, though ostensibly if someone has been an immense shithead in life, Lims-Kragma just dissolves their soul instead, and if they've been hyper-good they're elevated to some sort of one-ness with the cosmos that I don't believe is ever expanded upon. The most famous is probably where Father Nathan puts down Murmandamus's servant. One dark elf puts him in bed for weeks. Black Robe posted:In most settings you have to earn the ideal afterlife while you're alive. Same with most real-world religions when you strip them down to the essential points. No speedrun strats allowed. I just re-read the Avatar series and, especially in the last book, there's a lot of emphasis on the balance of Good/Evil and Law/Chaos and also on the fact that the role of the gods is to take care of their portfolio and that the afterlife is determined by faith, not morality. NeverWinter Nights 2 touches on this as well. As I understand it, the only way to maintain the universe is faith in the gods, and to keep mortals faithful it is necessary to punish faithlesssness in the afterlife.
|
|
#
¿
Apr 9, 2022 21:03
|
|
|
Torrannor posted:Which Avatar series? Google apparently only knows Avatar: The Last Airbender. There are three 'official' books in the trilogy and two direct follow-ups. I'm not going to lie: in my opinion, the first three books are mediocre, the 4th is good and the 5th quite good, but your opinion may vary. They are entitled, in order, Shadowdale, Tantras, Waterdeep, Cyrinishad and Crucible: The Trial of Cyric the Mad
|
|
#
¿
Apr 10, 2022 00:02
|
|
|
The fact that Pug is royal family by adoption doesn't hurt. One of the most moving scenes of the Magician books for me, and there are a lot, is when Borric is dying and he tells Pug about that. I just re-read Prince of the Blood. Still a very enjoyable book, despite Suli and especially Locklear being marginalised, but I smiled at the part where Jimmy is marrying into the royal family and Arutha remarks on that with his typical dry humour.
|
|
#
¿
Apr 11, 2022 23:18
|
|
|
malkav11 posted:Re narrative, like...one of the things that really struck me about Betrayal was that there was tons of text about all sorts of stuff in the game, be that item descriptions, party interactions, preludes to combats, all sorts of miscellaneous interactions in inns and random houses and such. In Antara, too, it was just kinda dumb a lot of the time. Return...maybe it's the move to voice acting, but it feels like there's almost none of that and what's there is mostly directly involved with the very basic main plot being told and the occasional minor sidequest. I agree. The writing was solid and the item and world description was well done.
|
|
#
¿
Apr 17, 2022 01:53
|
|
|
Aurium posted:I ran into the coins have weight problem while still in Krondor. I symapthise. I played EverQuest in the early days when there were copper/silver/gold/platinum coins, and few people had large sums of money. Coins had weight, the only place to exchange them was at city banks, and naturally it was a stupid mechanic that was removed.
|
|
#
¿
Apr 22, 2022 15:19
|
|
|
Evil Fluffy posted:This... actually would make a lot of sense. The gear system is very in line with (bad) D&D-themed computer games of the time. The spell names aren't Midkemia-based either unlike BaK, which draws on the actual Riftwar books for their inspiration in most cases and iirc a couple of spells in BaK exist in the other books. Sunray in particular is works the same way in this game as the Sunbolt spell in D&D, with Sunray being the AOE equivalent and which this game also has. If you are referring to the XBox action RPG D&D Heroes, I quite like that game. I wish that they would re-release it for a more modern, convenient platform like the Dark Alliance games.
|
|
#
¿
May 5, 2022 13:07
|
|
|
|
| # ¿ May 10, 2024 22:10 |
|
|
Purple, I definitely agree that you should have a break, but when you resume I still think that you should try a not-shite old RPG. They do exist, I swear. If you persist in your masochism, upon your own head be it. I wanted to show off that I know where one can find a version of Birthright that should work easily on a modern PC, but I just checked and it's not in English so a non-starter in this case. JustJeff88 fucked around with this message at 03:42 on May 6, 2022 |
|
#
¿
May 6, 2022 03:39
|
|