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 TheGreatEvilKing, What The Hell Is This? Black Geyser: Couriers of Darkness is... you know what, let's quote the developers. Developer Blurb posted:Chaos and despair spread throughout the Kingdom of Isilmerald. Its desperate people cry out, praying to the gods for help. But the force they face is no mere plague of the undead, or demonic attack Something far more sinister, far more primal is afoot. Avarice! In other words, it's a Baldur's-Gate inspired RPG about one protagonist and their quest to... you know what, I have no loving idea! I got a gold Steam achievement for making it to chapter 3 of what appears to be 5, and I still have no idea what the hell this game is about because nothing about it makes sense and the characters are all played by space aliens pretending to be human. Once again, this is NOT a good game. So if the story is idiotic it's at least fun to play, right? This is how the manual explains attack rolls.  Every single game mechanic is overly complicated. You know how in Baldur's Gate and D&D spells are split into spell levels? Well, spells in this game have levels... which are further subdivided between base level and "elevated energy" slots that don't share a cooldown because everything in this game is pointlessly confusing. Do I understand these mechanics? No, and I've played far too much Baldur's Gate. Audience Participation? Oh, yes. As is now tradition in these trash game LPs, I need YOU, the goons of Something Awful, to saddle me with some kind of moron who's going to go suffer this game on our behalf. So, character creation. You get to read the DEEP LORE of the races of Yerengal and figure out who the hell we are.  Game Manual posted:Humans were once a united tribe that roamed Yerengal for generations. The dark goddess of greed, Zornilsa, infected their hearts slowly with greed, avarice and jealousy. The single Elves! Game Manual posted:As the tribes of men fell to greed and the world was spoiled, the Green Goddess wept. The King-God allowed Tilindia to select a few tribes of man, those least affected by greed, to be her vassals in Isilmerald. Tilindia chose eleven tribes of man to claim as her own. Those eleven tribes were come to be known as elves as time passed. Elves share a special connection with nature, feeling an inherent connection to all natural things. Their generations apart from men have changed them physically; their narrow frames allowed them to move faster and quieter than men. Their ears grew pointed to better pick out distant or small sounds. The elves tend to be xenophobic and haughty towards the other races due to their chosen status imparted by Tilindia. Dwarves are where things get stupid. Game Manual posted:The Devil-god Rothgor was angry over the creation of the elves and the threat they represented to his plans to throw the world into darkness. He sent an incubus to impregnate elven women in an effort to steal the essence that lies within their wombs. The Elven mothers despaired, but the Green Goddess told her daughters to seek the first waters of Yerengal. They did so, but were trapped in a stone cavern when Rothgor sent demons to destroy them. The children survived the attack, but their mothers died. Men in the mountains found the babes and raised them as their own, but the Elven progeny were stunted and hairy. The children (now known as Dwarves) grew and prospered, sharing the love of nature from their Elven parents, but began to exhibit a preference for the depths of the world. Dwarves are very materialistic but have a strong connection to clan and family. They are stout and powerfully built, well-suited to exploiting the natural tunnels that form deep in the ground. Some people might ask "why are dwarves not allowed to be wizards in these lovely derivative games despite Norse myth being full of dwarf sorcerers" and hell if I know. Feldegug. You know the Pale Elves from Pillars of Eternity, or the 9 million snow elves in D&D? Game Manual posted:FELDEGUG No the frost elves don't get any bonus frost resistance, shut up. No, I don't understand how they rebelled if Dargalmir told them to rule themselves. Whatever! Tip of the iceberg! The last race are elephant people who look kind of like D&D 3rd ed orcs? Game Manual posted:RILLOW  Next, we have classes! The game has four "class groups" a la second edition D&D: Warrior, Outlaw, Priest, and Wizard. The game is also weird about spell lists, so I'm going to subject myself to whatever the hell you guys pick, with the exception of no multiclassing. They apparently had to release an emergency patch to buff it because it was so bad, and quite frankly I don't want to deal with this crap. Warrior Fighter: Generic fighting guy, uses all weapons and armor. If this wins we will be using Big Sword. Highlander: Barbarian esque dude who gets bonus damage with hammers and bonus fire and ice resistance. Templar: Human only paladin because that's how 2e D&D did it. Never mind that Mazzy made a crack about 3e D&D letting her be a paladin. If selected we will use Big Sword. Casts holy spells. Ranger: Bonuses to archery, casts druid spells. Outlaw Thief: You are a thief in an infinity engine game, so you suck balls in hand to hand combat. However, because this is a copyright-safe Baldur's Gate clone, you don't get sick rear end traps that instagib people and instead you have a few special moves that do okish status effects. You can backstab if the AI is generous. There's a thief NPC, please don't make me do this. Swindler: Supposedly like a thief but better at fighting because you con people? gently caress if I know, this manual SUCKS! Priests Cleric: You're like a D&D cleric, but without any good buffs, and also wizards can heal in this game. Why are you here again? Druid: You get nature magic including crapping out summons. Wooo! Shaman: You get bonuses to hand to hand combat against undead, but the templar is right over there. Also your armor sucks. Wizards Spellweaver: Generic wizard who can cast any spell in the game, even healing ones. Wintermage: Ice mage. Supposed to be a damage caster. Necromancer: Skeletons and lifedrain, the usual suspects. Supposedly gets a bone golem at high levels. Convoker: The master of spamming summoning spells. We can be male or female. We need a name for this intrepid warrior, and at this point I don't even care if it's something stupid like Dick Hertz or I.P. Freely. Lastly, submit a custom image for our hero., or I guess choose one of these:   The game accepts portraits in a 182x216 format, so I can't guarantee your picture won't be cropped. Join us next time as we begin our nonsensical adventure! Updates: None of this poo poo makes sense The Spiders are Cursed... by GREED! The Writers Clearly Have No Idea What They're Doing, Huh? Let's Not Do Any Sidequests Hamlin Fucks Us Over Disregard the Monarch Get on the Treason Train! Choo CHOOOOOOOO!!!!!! Transcendence Time for CRIME! Stop! You're not good enough! Apparently Worldbuilding is Code For Stereotypes Nerd Bait The Confusion The Bad Man Death of Motivation The Black Geyser Choose Your Own Waifu Misadventure Hamlin's Weird Fetishes Unwanted Negotiations THE DEVIL-GOD!!!! Postmortem Epilogue TheGreatEvilKing fucked around with this message at 03:30 on May 23, 2023 |
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Jun 8, 2022 03:40
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Oh dear, ground floor for another TGEK LP of a terrible isometric RPG. Let's start with a low effort character -  Inta Rume, a female Rillow fighter
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Jun 8, 2022 04:15
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Is that bottom male portrait ripped straight from the cover of Mystery of The Druids, that beloved cult classic adventure game? If so, picking that one. Name: Old Bob Willow Race: Human Class: Druid (of course). BraveLittleToaster fucked around with this message at 04:18 on Jun 8, 2022 |
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Jun 8, 2022 04:15
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BraveLittleToaster posted:Is that bottom male portrait ripped straight from the cover of Mystery of The Druids, that beloved cult classic adventure game? If so, picking that one. Custom portrait I was using for the OG playthrough, but yes it's available!
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Jun 8, 2022 04:34
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Rillow Highlander. No opinion on name, Mystery Druid portrait.
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Jun 8, 2022 04:58
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dervival posted:Oh dear, ground floor for another TGEK LP of a terrible isometric RPG. Let's start with a low effort character - Seconded.
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Jun 8, 2022 05:59
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dervival posted:Oh dear, ground floor for another TGEK LP of a terrible isometric RPG. Let's start with a low effort character - What was the other rpg? Also, I agree with this choice.
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Jun 8, 2022 06:24
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Elephant Druid named Merrick, mysterious druid picture. I was eyeballing this on Steam the other day, glad to see what I "missed".
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Jun 8, 2022 06:46
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female rillow Angryphant, Druid or Convoker, portrait as above depending on which gets you more animals to trample enemies with.
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Jun 8, 2022 06:55
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male human Swindler named Guybrush
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Jun 8, 2022 12:31
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evilmiera posted:What was the other rpg? Also, I agree with this choice. The one I was thinking of was Torment: We're Trying To Copy Planescape, but now that I think about it TGEK's Stygian LP fits that description too.
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Jun 8, 2022 14:22
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What is the most needlessly complicated spellcaster? Clearly that one.
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Jun 8, 2022 16:00
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Synthbuttrange posted:female rillow Angryphant, Druid or Convoker, portrait as above depending on which gets you more animals to trample enemies with. For a moment there I thought Co-worker is a class and I was excited for the office pranks and water cooler conversations.
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Jun 8, 2022 18:15
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marshmallow creep posted:What is the most needlessly complicated spellcaster? Clearly that one. There's a solid chance that it's an "everyone loses" kind of tie, but if not I second this motion.
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Jun 8, 2022 22:47
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So the depressing and well-written RPG was too good, so now it's a return to form, huh. I don't really have an opinion on the class thing since even the snippets we see of the races just outlines this as kind of a mess? That stuff isn't even remotely balanced with each other.
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Jun 8, 2022 22:51
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I was planning on picking this up next time its on sale guess not
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Jun 8, 2022 23:35
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Arcanuse posted:Rillow Highlander. No opinion on name, Mystery Druid portrait. This! Sweet. I was hoping for another Tyranny, but an isometric RPG is an isometric RPG.
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Jun 9, 2022 06:58
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dervival posted:Oh dear, ground floor for another TGEK LP of a terrible isometric RPG. Let's start with a low effort character - Yeah, this sounds dumb enough.
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Jun 9, 2022 07:26
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None of this poo poo makes sense So the manual presents the creation myth of the world as the very first thing. I'm omitting that, because it's a wall of badly written text about "Rothgor the devil-god" or some cliched fantasy poo poo. Instead, let's get into the meat of the game - and boy are we going to be disappointed and confused.  Inta Rume the rillow fighter was the most popular character, so off we go on our misadventures into the land of dumb poo poo. I took the liberty of cropping the provided portrait because I think it's funnier.  The very first thing we see upon loading the game is this fountain of a woman vomiting into her hands. It's an apt metaphor. We are the purple bald lady, by the way.  Suddenly we're approached by an NPC!  There's voice acting. It is incredibly bad. More notably, Beline here might remind us of a certain... someone.  : Sorry, who are you supposed to be?She reminds me of Imoen. I think it's the hair color?  : Har har, you are so very droll, Inta Rume. You'd better hope Lord Espen is in as good a humor today. You do know this is the day the lords of Isilbright are visiting? Please, don't answer.The voice actress is atrocious. : The lords are already here and waiting to be served. And for goodness' sake, don't forget to gather your things from your chest before you come to table.TheGreatEvilKing summary posted:
We can wander around the courtyard instead of doing the job we're supposedly... are we even paid?  Keep this guy in mind! He's a royal guard who works directly for the king. There's a whole manual entry on the king I'm going to leave for later when he becomes more relevant.  There's also a court mage who's entertaining people by casting spells but yells at us that we have work to do.  There's a whole detachment of royal guards. There are a bunch of generic "guards" as well, but we need to keep this in mind, because it's going to make absolutely no sense in a few minutes.  This is the other feature of the game.  It reminds me I could be reading Jack Vance. Sir Gavalon: Oh, Nifra! There isn't a lass on this whole estate whose beauty compares with yours! Or, uh, maybe the country... Yeah, I mean in the whole country! Nifra: That's very kind of you to say, Sir Gavalon. Your self-confidence is impressive! Sir Gavalon: Listen, my fine Nifra - When I return to the great city of Isilbright, will you accompany me? I vow to treat you like the lady you were never born to be! What is your answer?  I mean, I think this is supposed to be funny? TheGreatEvilKing summary posted:
It doesn't work. There's the obvious missed country matters pun, and I get the humor is supposed to be that Gavalon is obviously bullshitting to get in Nifra's pants, but it's not funny. There's no wit.  Goddamn it, fine, we'll go serve the drinks or whatever.  There's another royal guard in the hallway.  He literally yells "we will crush the rebellion" when you click on him. Spoilers: there's a rebellion.  This guard is low key one of the smartest people in the house.  In fact, the lords are all just down the hall with nothing between them and the royal guard stationed in the hallway. Keep this in mind.  Our chest contains a suit of armor and two swords, which we put on before serving drinks to an important political meeting.  We run with claymore drawn like an old school infinity engine game, because the quirks of the infinity engine are - oh, this game was made in 2021? And there are plenty of other Unity Engine games that don't actually have everyone run around weapons drawn? Huh.   Beline has been helpfully standing right here while all the lords demand drinks. The drinks are literally right behind her. I've cut the screenshots down a bit to make the dialogue more readable, so we've literally delayed the refreshments of an important political meeting for...  A loving looting tutorial.  I'm not going to show all the text for all the mead and whatnot. All of the nobles are snooty assholes and it literally doesn't matter what you give them.  Yeah, yeah, gently caress you.  The game fades out and we get this actually important dialog now.  : Yes, let's. We are convened to discuss the situation with Deron-Guld. What has been rumored and suspected for so long has finally come to pass - a council of nobles with mining interests in the town have declared themselves independent from the crown of Isilmerald.gently caress this is clunky. "Rumored and suspected"? Passive voice?  That's literally how the Magna Carta got created. poo poo, that's how the English Civil War began.  : And there are ways that kingdoms may crumble. I understand your feelings on the matter, Lady Larenthal, but Deron-Guld enjoys the sympathies of many important persons here in the north, and I number myself among them. What's more, there have already been defections among the Isilmerald nobility, most recently Aldnar-Astute readers may have intuited a problem here.  It's possible to read this as clumsy exposition or Larenthal idiotically trying to get a rise out of the host.  : Why, I will... : But you won't! : Whatever the loyalties of, er, the young lord of House Espen, the southern nobles have many legitimate complaints: heavy, some say ruinous, taxation; delayed shipments thanks to the crown's regimen of inspections and checkpoints; the king's insistence that Deron-Guld's military, even the town watch, must be trained in the north. It's quite a lot.: Yes it's all very sad, and I'm sure they toss and turn the night away on their beds of gold bars. Taxation and bureaucracy are simply the facts of managing a prosperous nation, of keeping our enemies at arm's length. How long would their precious mines keep producing without the king's protection?Probably pretty long because anyone who conquered the mines would want to, you know, get the minerals. I get what the game is trying to do here. Larenthal is supposed to be the stupid one who's protected from reality by her vast wealth. : Did you know, I heard this rebellion was prompted in part by a belief making the rounds in Deron-Guld... that the king himself is cursed.: Hahaha!: Oh my! What exceptional nonsense. Before you ask, yes, there is still a wizard outside doing real magic. I do not understand why everyone is laughing at the idea the king might be cursed. This setting has malevolent gods and demons and other nonsense. : All right, very amusing. But like Lady Virellyn, I am not unsympathetic to our southern friends. Surely some of Isilbright's rules and dictums could be culled, especially if it means avoiding war, a much more costly proposition than losing a handful of coin in taxes.: Wise counsel, my friend, but I fear the time for compromise is already past. The message from Deron-Guld was deliberately provocative, leaving the king no way to negotiate or save face. The time has come, lords and ladies, for us to commit our forces and our purse to our rightful liege and crush Deron-Guld.: Or... Ok. Let's stop here for a moment. I've been emphasizing the layout of the mansion and the meeting for one very important reason.  This isn't just one guy either - I counted at least four Royal Guard NPCs and none of these guys are royalty. There's no indication they might be traitors or in on the plot or any of this - the very first one yells at us that he's here with the full authority of the king. Nothing about this meeting makes any amount of sense.  I think this is supposed to be a meeting of politically savvy conspirators who are debating whether the king or Deron-Guld has the strongest position, but literally nothing about the situation makes any sense. Why are the royal guard here? None of these idiots has a royal title and they're all addressed as nobility. Is that standard practice by the paranoid king to keep an eye on his nobles? : You're asking the scullery maid? What does- Larenthal is of course correct for all the wrong reasons. These idiots are contemplating the kind of treason that gets their estates attaindered to set an example for the rest of the nobles in a situation where the king may very well be tempted to make examples of them to convince any other future Aldnars not to rebel. The less people that know about this the better, but these idiots also invited the royal guard in clear hearing range and loudly discussed going over to the rebels. Then again, we're a scullery maid who serves drinks in chainmail armor and a claymore. Nothing about this makes sense. Speaking of Aldnar, somehow he renounced his noble title but is referred to as "the young lord of House Espen". I don't even loving know. : Since I have little experience in political matters, for me the wisest course is silence. : Yes, a wise woman must always be cognizant of her own ignorance. Thank you for reminding us all of that fact, Inta Rume...  : Under attack by whom? : Did you see anything else? Do we know who leads them? : That one was far at the back. All I could see of him was his vibrant red hair, like a flame. : How much time do we have? Ok I guess they're the Scarlet Chorus or some poo poo? Somehow these guys were considering launching a rebellion against the king but they have no scouts or manned walls or anything that would prevent a bunch of bad guys from just rolling up out of nowhere and sieging the castle. These people apparently have enough wizards lying around that they can have one doing dumbass tricks to entertain the servants instead of say, using magic to predict danger or anything useful.  ...are you guys qualified to be conspirators?  : Calmly, my friends. Let's all go out to meet them. They're not bandits, after all.I'm very confused. One minute you're supposed to be canny politicians conspiring and now you're all blithering idiots. : Yes, go ahead. You have my blessing to speak on my behalf if it's of any use. Lord Espen immediately throws his guests to the loving wolves. What a hero. : Inta Rume, come with me! Make haste!TheGreatEvilKing summary posted:
 : But what is it, my lord? That sound-: The main gate has already been breached. The House of Espen is about to fall to the agents of Deron-Guld. Now never mind that, just follow.I probably already mentioned this place is crawling with guards both mundane and royal, but somehow they were unable to hold "the main gate" and were surprised by an army from nowhere. : And you, Inta Rume, ready your weapon. With all the time you've spent training under my master of arms, you must be able to defend yourself by now. A bunch of bad men run into the room and fight Lord Espen, Inta Rume, and a bunch of random guards including some of the royal guard.  This mage shows up and casts a bunch of evil red spells before Inta beats the poo poo out of him with a claymore.  We have an enrage ability and a trip thing. I cast the enrage and aside from playing a Baldur's Gate style spell chant sound effect it doesn't seem to do anything useful. Oh well.  It's time for some clumsy backstory.  Can you guess where this is going? It's going exactly where you think it's going. Of course, we don't get to take the intelligent route and connect the dots (the PC is secretly Lord Espen's kid) but we have to act stupid. : My lord, it sounds like the fight is coming to us. Perhaps we'd best ready ourselves.: Be quiet I tell you! You never saw her yourself, not that you'd remember, but if you had, she- : At once, my lord.: Time is short! Hurry! A dramatic cutscene begins and we are locked in the dressing room.  The Bad Men enter.  The Bad Man army is divided into distinct divisions who commit different kinds of war crimes. The footmen kill women and the cavalry kill children. The mage cadre creates fake uniforms for false flag attacks, and the medical division encourages public urination.  They kill off all the maids so we know they're extra evil.  : To be betrayed by my own son. Who wouldn't hide from such a terrible end?That's not a great comeback buddy.  : I've learned a few things you see, things your priests and man-at-arms could never teach. I have gained a new perspective, seen the truth of this world.We get it, you worship Sata - er, "Rothgor the devil-god" now. : So you were not even paid in coin to turn traitor against your own house, only pretty words. Kill me if you wish, but I promise it will avail you nothing. Every man pays for his sins, my son, and the price of a sin such as this... well.: Enough of your piety. It sickens me. But your last decision, at least, is the correct one. Hold still, Father. No! Not the incompetent father who made us perform menial labor!  We are then knocked out by the power of cutscene as a voice tells us the day's hardships are over.  We are going to be spending lots of time with these loading screens.  : That doesn't make any sense. : You don't understand, I have to save Lord Espen! There was an attack, and... : Oh hush, child. There's nothing you can do for him now.: But no more questions for tonight. There's a cot over there. You should try to get a good night's sleep. Tomorrow will be a very, very long day.TheGreatEvilKing summary posted:
That's the opening! It's not good and nothing makes sense. If all these lords are incompetent morons why is Espen hosting them at his estate to discuss treason? If these are all competent schemers shouldn't they realize that they can't negotiate with the invading army? Look, I'm not expecting all characters to make optimal decisions all the time and trying to be a nerdy pendant about how people can't react poorly under stress or whatever, but nothing about this makes any kind of sense. Why are there royal guards posted in the absence of royalty and why is the nobility openly discussing treason in their presence? If the kingdom is preparing for civil war and the estate is crawling with guards how did an army make it past the main gate? Castle gates aren't something you can just throw heavy infantry at and have them break it down with swords, and presumably someone would have seen - or heard - a massive army coming. If Aldnar renounced his birthright to join Deron-Guld why is he still called the "young lord of House Espen"? Now, some of the stupid actions of Aldnar are explained somewhat later - in that he antagonized all the noble families of the idiots at the meeting, who presumably still have money and soldiers - but literally nothing about any of this makes any sense. The worst of that isn't even hard to fix - the game shows an earthquake and the screen shaking when the Deron-Guld army somehow breaks down the main gate, but it never comes out and says something like "wow the evil badman army used devilry" or something. While "it's magic" is always kind of a lazy explanation, this is exactly the time it's appropriate. Aldnar is ranting about worshipping the dark powers, he brought a murderous army to get revenge on his father, it's not hard to fix this scene by having the guard running in shouting about a big demon that broke down the gate or whatever or how the bad guys used devilry to make themselves invisible. This isn't even hard, I came up with it at two in the morning. Whatever. Next time: The tutorial in the woods. TheGreatEvilKing fucked around with this message at 01:16 on May 23, 2023 |
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Jun 13, 2022 08:56
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: Nah I'd prefer to die alone.
: Yaaaaay! Wanton murder!
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Wow, that felt tedious. I'm getting definite Star Wars Prequel vibes. Trade Federations and councils and suchlike. Couldn't they have at least had the protagonist fight a little bit before shoving her in the closet?
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Jun 13, 2022 09:27
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I've had 'so you all meet in a tavern' introductions better thought out. Why even bother with the vague description of the political situation if you want to pull a in media res? Start with the brutal assault and gradually fill in the blanks later.
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Jun 13, 2022 09:50
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The moment that the nobles started talking politics I immediately went, 'ok, why do we care?'. They started their game with a pointless exposition text wall scene without any establishing context. I also like how they give absolutely no explanation for how an army just appears in the estate, but then use 'well, MAGIC' for how you get out of the situation. The dialogue with the guard urgently trying to give news of the assault is also incredibly uncanny because no one seems to be acting with any kind of emotion? It doesn't feel real. Albeit maybe it doesn't feel real because of the aforementioned abruptness and lack of explanation for any of it.
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Jun 13, 2022 10:36
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The game is teaching the player to ignore NPCs and exposition by immediately killing everyone we've ever spoken to. This will make it much less likely that the player will spot any future plotholes since they'll only be focusing on the quest log and assuming that anyone we meet is going to die pointlessly. Therefore the story doesn't need to make sense because the player's been taught not to follow it. Genius.
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Jun 13, 2022 13:05
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 ...but I imagine we still have time to sell our souls to satan I agree, no need to rush say what's that coming up to the castle gates?
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Jun 13, 2022 13:18
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Is... Is this game actually using the infinity engine? In 2021? Not that it's a bad thing, but why?
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Jun 13, 2022 13:28
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TGEK. Where do you find these things? I know us bad movie enjoyers have nanarland, is there an equivalent for cRPGs? Also is there one you'd actually recommend?
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Jun 13, 2022 20:31
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I guess you felt an ache your soul while LPing Encased. I'm glad you're playing a decent game but I'm also glad you're playing a terrible game for us. 
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Jun 13, 2022 20:57
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SIGSEGV posted:TGEK. Where do you find these things? I know us bad movie enjoyers have nanarland, is there an equivalent for cRPGs? Encased is good! I was alerted to this one by, of all things, a youtube ad. dervinosdoom posted:Is... Is this game actually using the infinity engine? In 2021? I think it's Unity, but they are desperately wanting to ape Baldur's Gate UI.
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Jun 14, 2022 00:40
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So my impression thus far is that this is made by fans of the original Infinity Engine games who clearly had no idea what worked out of what they liked.
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Jun 14, 2022 01:02
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Encased does look neat but the idea of dealing with hunger meters and so on seems exhausting to me, who is playing highfleet and hairy grog games on the side.
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Jun 14, 2022 01:02
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TGEK, why do you keep playing these? Did the LP god reach down and say "thou shalt play thine world's lovely games" so we don't have to? Was it a monkey's paw wish for new games gone (predictably) wrong? Did you upset a rando online gamer with a personal djinn who wished this on you? Did you play a cursed isometric RPG and now you must feed on terrible ones forevermore to satiate the hunger it gave you? We can help if you ask for it! Except for the people who find your suffering amusing, I guess.  The only thing that makes me think you haven't completely lost it is that you weren't the one who did Sandrah Saga. Just reading it was a matter of skipping some (escalating to all) of the Sandrah dialog for the first 80% of it and pure stubbornness for the last 20%.
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Jun 14, 2022 01:12
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 it's everything i dreamt and moreBut yeah, oof that into felt like a massive drag to get through. I can't imagine how much worse it is to play.
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Jun 14, 2022 01:45
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TheGreatEvilKing posted:I think it's Unity, but they are desperately wanting to ape Baldur's Gate UI. I thought the exact same thing. But it still looks cheap, somehow. And your summaries of the writing are so far 100% improvements over the actual opening act dialogue. The... World building, for lack of a better (worse) term, is also interesting in its sheer bizarreness. I mean I get that the BG series was sort of plopped on top of an existing mythology, but have these people ever tried writing any fiction before this? Based on the introduction post, I am expecting great and wonderful things from the plot going forward
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Jun 14, 2022 01:48
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That was... painful is the nicest way I can describe that intro. Can't wait to see how this goes!
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Jun 14, 2022 07:32
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0% resistance to depression and arousal effects, huh. 16 year-old me feels attacked.
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Jun 16, 2022 13:28
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 I somehow missed this
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Jun 16, 2022 13:32
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How is it that a human noble had a non-human illegitimate daughter anyhow? Oh, wait, I'm acting as if the people making the game actually thought about this.
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Jun 16, 2022 13:46
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nweismuller posted:How is it that a human noble had a non-human illegitimate daughter anyhow? Oh, wait, I'm acting as if the people making the game actually thought about this. I suppose it's like in TES in that the children take the mother's magical skin color, ears and teeth. Or they just decided that it's a bit more complicated with a large enough Mendel table they don't really have to bother with it. GIven the quality of some of the last games we've seen, at least there's no anti-miscegenation screed five minutes in.
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Jun 16, 2022 13:55
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You know, they could have built a plot-point out of the way rich & powerful people disregard "the help". Nobles wouldn't discuss treason with the royal guard in earshot, but they might discuss it in front of an invisible (to them) scullery maid. So there's your launch point: the PC, basically a background extra, overhears some spicy state secret which in turn propels the adventure they are thrust into. But they torpedo that possibility by having one of the nobles directly acknowledge and address the PC.By popular demand posted:Why even bother with the vague description of the political situation if you want to pull a in media res? Start with the brutal assault and gradually fill in the blanks later. How about this: we start with the building under attack, the fighting is desperate so it's all hands on deck including the scullery maids. A guard directs the PC to grab a weapon off a soldier's corpse and oh look, there's our inventory tutorial, and it also explains why our lowly servant carries a claymore. And then we jump into combat because combat is always good, and also because the writing sucks and you want as little of it as possible.
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Jun 16, 2022 20:40
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| # ? May 8, 2024 08:52 |
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The Spiders are Cursed... by GREED! Last time, we were deus ex machina teleported out of being trapped in the world's most inept treason meeting which was being attacked by Satanists.  Anyway, now that the game had us fight our way through a major action setpiece, it is now going to have us go through a tutorial for extremely basic poo poo.  Someone even wrote journal entries for all this crap!  : Excuse me, I was raised by... oh no. He's...It feels like there was one writer who realized how stupid this was and wrote in dialog to undermine everything the game is trying to do. : Dead as a ghoul.: More dead, actually.I get they're trying to go for wacky old lady who's secretly a superpowered mage or whatever. It doesn't work.  : Can't you tell I'm grieving? My liege was killed by his own son, Aldnar!This is just super awkward, because the game wants to make it seem like you were close to Lord Espen, but they avoid the elephant in the room that you were, you know, a servant who served drinks and were kinda denied your station. : Busy hands will dry your tears, girl.: Now, I'll be making a stew this evening. You'll be helping. I'll need you to go find some things for us. Remember how "serve the lords the drinks" was a hackneyed tutorial about how to pick poo poo up from chests?  gently caress! This is the longest I've seen a game do tutorials for this kind of basic crap, and it seems like these unskippable sequences are all for someone who's never played a video game before. I don't remember Pillars of Eternity doing this - I remember a few tutorial popups in the opening area with Caliscia and the ruins, but not this intrusive and unskippable to this degree!   Who is this aimed at? : Here. Put these on. It's a tutorial that you can put on magic items. Hey, wait a minute... The very first NPC you talk to in this abortion of a game posted:
Yes, this is a SECOND tutorial for equipping items. Just you wait.  "Guys I added 3 more stats to the hit roll, what else do we need for our Baldur's Gate clone?" "How about a competent writer?" "Nah dawg I was playing that minecraft game and it hit me: a crafting system!"  This is happening 10 minutes after a bloody massacre. Why is this so boring? Baldur's Gate had Elminster show up for like a minute after your father figure got massacred by an evil man with mystical powers, but we're going to be here a while.  This isn't funny. : Good, good. Now, off with you! When you've got everything on the list, come back, and I'll get to making that stew. I think this is supposed to be for the wizard origin, but you can loot an actually magical staff off the mage in the opening battle - notably before our tutorial that you can equip the gloves for stat boosts.  I legitimately don't know what the point of this thing is. TheGreatEvilKing summary posted:
 It's time for a sidequest.  : The druidic order sent me to heal this forest. There is an invasive species of spider I am to cleanse, but.. they have unfortunately got the better of me. I've been severely bitten, and they are venomous as well... I cannot continue. I considered approaching the cabin, but was repulsed. We have the stupid evil option but that screws us over in the long run. : Tell me more about these awful spiders.: Different chapters of my order have been reporting a disturbing trend in Yerengal's forest - new and previously unknown species are moving in, and mindlessly devouring and destroying our natural resources.Uh... what? They're spiders my guy. Are they cutting down all the trees to build a spiderweb? Is there like a spider mine where the spiders are digging for gold? Holy poo poo, can I play that game instead? Being a gold mining spider sounds awesome!  What. : Yes, I will clear out these Yellow Spiders for you.: Thank you for serving the Green Mother. There are four places in the forest where the infestation is thickest: a colony to the north and south; another bunch near a conspicuous bush, also to the south, and one by the old bridge to the west.TheGreatEvilKing summary posted:
 The only noteworthy thing about the spiders is that they explode into enough green guts to make like 10 of the little guys.  I'm skipping the rest of wandering around this unremarkable forest looking for ingredients and murdering monopoly man spiders, because it's dull and tedious and betrays the game's complete lack of pacing.  : Yes, your eight-legged nemeses will trouble the forest no more. It's time for our first greed decision! Early builds of the game had looting enemies advance the curse of greed, but 99% of it is just quest decisions. Negotiate for a better reward for engaging in dangerous hand to hand combat with venomous spiders? gently caress you, that's greed. Refuse the antidote for said spider poison? It's not braindead machismo, it's kindness! : No, keep the antidote for yourself. Who knows what perils you might face on the road home?: That is kind of you, beyond kind. I will mention you when I report this great success.You might be wondering why I did this. Am I going for a greed-free playthrough? gently caress no, I checked a guide. If you refuse the antidote here you get a unique weapon down the line, so the actually greedy thing to do if you know about it is to refuse the reward so you get a greater one. It's so drat clunky, especially as I've never actually seen a need for a poison antidote in this game. People are probably going to bring up the fairy tale of the golden axe where the moral is that short-term greed ruins things, but I think it's hilarious that the anti-greed behavior appeals to the greedy in me. TheGreatEvilKing summary posted:
Whatever. Back to... the Crone. gently caress.  At least we get a level out of it so we can do convoluted bullshit.   : How can you tell what's in my pack and what isn't?: Oh, let's say it's just a feeling. Like everything is where it should be. Don't worry, we'll get our exposition soon enough. : I'm getting hungry. Take what you need from my pack. But wait, if you already magically knew we had anything... Also if we were a scullery maid why do we even have a pack? gently caress it.  If I wanted to do a bunch of tedious steps to make food edible I'd go to the kitchen and make dinner. : I have to wonder what that Lord Espen even had your tutors teach you at his fancy estate. Oh well. Take this candle and get to drying. Then crush the dried herbs into powder, so we have something to season the stew with. Fuuuuuu  Look, I get that a lot of games have an alchemy system that you can interact with, but as I recall games like Skyrim don't force it down your throats unless you actively seek it out. I'm cutting this nonsense because you have to dry the herbs by consuming a candle and then crush them because this is boring and I hate it.  : There. It's on the fire. Now we have a few precious moments to spare. We should talk. : There's never enough time, and our time would be better served by discussing matters of import. (Bargain and Persuasion) But if I do that, I'll be subjected to Black Geyser writing. : Thank you. That's a valuable lesson.: I'm glad you find it to be. : Why did you save me from the assault on the Espen estate?: I kept an eye on Lord Espen. He was a force of balance in Isilmerald. His death means that balance has failed.Wait, what? This raises so many questions. If Lord Espen is a force for balance, why did you save him? If you have the power to watch the estate and send messages, why didn't you warn him about the magical teleporting legion from nowhere? Balance between what? What does a failure of balance even mean in this context?  Of course, the game has no answers and our PC is once again too stupid to think any of this. : Why is it that you're keeping me here and making me do all of this?: You weren't ready for Aldnar's attack on his father's manor. And I don't believe you were ready for the chaos of the world as it was when I pulled you from it.We literally fought a bunch of dudes in hand to hand combat with a claymore and survived.  Of course, what this really translates to is that we haven't sat through enough dull tutorials. : Who are you, really?: I'm afraid that is the one question I can't answer for you. : What is it that I must accomplish?: Pardon me. I misspoke. : Is the stew almost ready?: Ah, yes, yes. Almost ready, indeed.: Now. There's something you should know. : Is that a metaphor?: It is not.: The attack on the Espen estate was only the first spark of a consuming fire, I am afraid. Much will be lost to strife and war.: There are worse things than war, though. There is something you must understand, before you leave here.: A great and terrible curse has fallen over Isilmerald, and much of the rest of Yerengal. It drives men and women to madness; it starves the prince and turns the pauper to a life of desperation.I don't see what changes for the pauper there,  : Greed isn't a curse. It's just a vice.: Yes, yes, ordinarily you would be right. As mockworthy as it is, I can't say I completely hate the idea of a cursed land rent asunder by greed. There are plenty of mythological examples of greed, such as the dragon sleeping on his hoard. Naturally, the game will invoke none of that resonant imagery and will just do it's own uncompelling magic bullshit. : Ah! The stew is done. Now, just to let it cool. : Born and trained.: Aye, you have the rippling muscles and cocksurety.: The real test of a warrior isn't confidence or muscle. To stay alive long enough to become a veteran, you need a brain. You know what? I'm snipping out the rest of the "warrior class tutorial" nonsense. There's a command party option that gives a little buff to the rest of the party if you rest with them, which I figured out the first time after loving with menus and the game has a long involved tutorial with the crone joining your party and making you force attack a summoned worm. Snip!  The crone's stats, although I suspect she's actually a god or some poo poo. Holy poo poo, she has all 20s in her stats! That's higher than we're allowed to assign.  : Here, girl. This will warm you up after a long, long day.: I see that look in your eye again. No. No more questions for today. Eat your stew and get some rest! : I still don't understand what we have been doing here. : What's going on in the world that I need to be ready for?: Oh, conflict is to be expected, everywhere you go. Great things are coming. : So does that mean I am ready? : Is that all? : Are you telling me that... : But I'm not even a human! He couldn't be my father.People in the thread were asking about this, and this is the one question the game decides to answer. : Pardon, child. I don't wish to explain to you how babies are made. I trust you know. But your mother was, indeed, not a human. Wait, what? : You were born into a treacherous world, my dear. It was very important you not be recognized as Espen's heir before the time was right. Oh, the gods needed to resort to racial determinism, cool. No wait, that's loving stupid. : As well, the closely guarded secret of your mother's connection to Lord Espen ensured your safety until now. We haven't the time to go into the story in greater detail, but you are a true heir of Lord Espen. Knowing this should be enough.So Espen low-key married the rillow woman? And the gods themselves got involved to mess with the kid? But somehow all the gods were unable to protect one lone child, from, uh...  The sad thing is there's almost a good story here but it's all boiled into idiotic fantasy pap. : Aldnar. Aldnar took away my only family. Espen's a loving terrible parent! Remember, the player character is supposed to be his trueborn heir yet is raised as a servant who is socially inferior to Espen and all his noble friends. Aldnar is the publicly trueborn heir who was about to get - minor spoilers - disinherited by Espen and left with nothing because the gods told Espen Senior to gently caress a woman who looked like an elephant. Of course, instead of actually discussing any of these legitimate parental issues Aldnar just loving ranted about Satan and other dumb poo poo the entire time. : Thank you again for the sage advice.: Very well. Yes, yes, I have enjoyed our time together. You will find the path clear.: Be safe, my child.TheGreatEvilKing summary posted:
 We still really don't have a goal or anything. The game taunted us with a special purpose from the gods, but didn't bother to tell us what that purpose is or provide us with any information that would let us make an actual decision. This means that the psychic journal is going to guide us, but first, we have a new "Greed" tab.  As we go through the game the world gets more greedy and evil based on our decisions blah blah blah blah. Costs of living are on the rise! OoOoOoOoOoO!  We get a third level up and Inta becomes better at Big Sword.  The tutorial tells us we should go to the south or east exit so we can get to the next area, but also there's a random ghoul lying around. Why not.  Fortunately the next area has this random dwarf standing around staring at the random dead people and overturned wagons that are, uh, on fire.  : Watching the crows, are you? : Do you know why they were fighting? : I see some in the livery of Isilbright and their foes are also in uniform and therefore not bandits or fugitives (Seasoned Warrior)The more we get into the game the less sense it makes. Seasoned Warrior is the warrior-specific dialog skill which is supposed to represent being a military veteran and knowing about wars. We are a scullery maid educated to the level of nobility who as far as I can tell just kinda stayed at the Espen manor serving drinks all the time.  : You're a woman of war then, and lucky to wear no such livery yourself. Helgenhar is obviously our first party member, so let's get this over with. : Since we are on the same road, why don't we walk it together? This language is just so loving clunky. : Well, a series of very confusing events to be honest... (Tell him your story.) I like how we need to have a random dwarf on the road suggest a motivation to our character. : If only there was somewhere all my questions could be resolved...: This is the road to Isilbright you know, capital of Isilmerald and also the world capital of noble titles. : Seems like a good a place as any to go. Care to join me?: Excellent. Onwards to Isilbright!TheGreatEvilKing summary posted:
 Helg here is a dwarf fighter who is thoroughly unremarkable mechanically. Next time: Deterring sexual harassment with the power of urination.
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Jun 20, 2022 01:52
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