The Age of Decadence

Age of Decagence is a very difficult game to review due to the fact that pretty much everything is executed badly if not horribly. This means that all the wonderful, exciting and interesting ideas the game has feel at their best awesome (when you don't let the bad execution distract you) but tedious, boring and just plain bad at their worst (when you pay attention to details and execution). In short the game is a combination of old old school text based adventure games, turn based combat on a grid and general roleplaying. All of which will feel great and aweful during the course of the game. I really wished that the devs would get a proper budget for their future project because that game could end up being a real gem. Unfortunately with the resources they had at their disposal during the making of AoD, they didn't even get close.

Up front, I supported this game in early access after the first full demo was released (c. March 2012, IIRC). Wow, was it worth it. I consider this the best RPG in ages, equal to or exceeding the most famous releases of the 90s. The character you build matters and interacts with and affects the story in fascinating ways, the combat is satisfying, and I think the setting it fascinating. Being a single PC combat type game, it's probably got the most to offer for fans of Fallout. Plan on replaying multiple times with different builds in order to experience everything the game has to offer. And save lots. Lots and lots, especially if you plan to engage in combat.

Remember all those RPGs where you have to go talk to someone and then go back to your original quest giver? So you spend 10 min running around on the map? AoD has a fast travel fuction, where you don't waste precious minutes of your life doing just that. Not to mention, there are ways you can finish the game without getting in a single fight. And fights are actually dangerous. Story is great, the gameplay design is great, truly recommend this game. It is so rare for me to actually finish a game, and this one I've played three times over (and due to it cutting out pointless quests and traveltimes each playthrough took about 12 hours!)

Age of Decadence is a nice one. The weapons and armor is good, crafting and dialogue system is good too. But it falls short on so many things. The world feels SO empty!! After the first chapter( or mission?) there could have been recurring quests or dungeons. Moving on to other cities, the excitement kind of wears out after a little while. I mean the last place barely had any quests. Also during the text part sometimes it feels you're railroaded into a certain choice at the start; no second (or third or fourth) chances to change your mind after that. Someone here has mentioned about how selecting a choice leads to a effect that they didn't want. I first started the game as the assassin class and was disappointed about the amount of assassination quests available; maybe Skyrim did spoil us a bit much I guess. Combat is an area I have no complaints about. It's unforgiving and fun especially the part where you can use nets or other 'devices'. Stats and perks upgrade is kind of eye watering thing to upgrade with lesser availability of points to be assigned to them. All in all, the story and the concept is excellent and refreshing and fun, but it falls short of many things like quests, dialogue trees and liveliness of the cities and ruins that abound in the game.

Age of Decadence is one of the longest RPG in the making by a small and dedicated team (Iron Tower Studio). I remember reading about him about 9-10 years ago and since them I've waited for it to release. The game is set in a post apocalyptic roman empire like world and features turn based combat and lots of C&C. When starting the game you receive a warning that this game isn't some fantasy dragon killer simulator. When I first played the demo this year I died on the first quest, because I was stupid and tried to fight someone instead of running away. In this game, with a badly made build you can die easily. The thing that you have to remember though is that this is an Role Playing Game so that if you choose skills/stats related to the selected class (background) the game will be just fine to play. Sure, if you try to be greedy you will get killed if you are not prepared. This means that a change to the way you play this kind of games is required. Like a said above, a bad build is easily made if you don't think about the way a class is played. A merchant maybe should't get into fights and instead should try to talk his way out of problems or solve quests. Sure, you can try to spread into many skills but this may mean you will be unprepared for some future situations, so specialization I think is key. I would say this game is similar to Neo Scavanger on this part. In both games you have to think about what you are going to do. Eating uncleaned water or trying to fight a soldier without having some weapon training could be deadly in both games. Now that the role playing part is described, I think I should write a bit about story. If you read any of the other reviews, you will know this game is full of C&C (Choice & Consequence). Many of the actions you will take will influence the events that you will received in the future and how you will be treated. Kill a guild trader and you may find that an assassin will be sent after you. Believe the words of a shady looking person and you will find yourself dead in a ditch. The C&C part is probably the reason this game took so long to make, since every background should be viable and also different from the others. What this means is that huge ammounts of text are in this game and it's a lot of (great) reading to be made. I don't think there is any game with so much C&C. The only game that has a smaller amount of C&C is maybe the Witcher series, but not even them don't have as many outcomes and ways to deal with situations. Now that I think a bit, maybe Fallout 2 is a bit similar to it. Both are post apocalyptic games, with turn based combat and many skills that unlock different ways to solve the problems. Similar to Fallout New Vegas there is also a reputation system which opens or closes the way you gain access to some quests. Like I said in the beginning, the combat is turn based, with different type of attacks available for each weapon. Each weapon class also has different uses and special attacks (eg. you can impale with the spear). If you played Fallout 1 or Fallout 2 is should be very similar. You use action points to move, to make attacks, use items (like poison), etc. Related to fight is also a crafting & alchemy mechanic which can be used to turn the balance on your favor in the harder fights. I think that the fights are well made, with enemies trying different tactics to kill you. What is important also to fighting is avoiding damage, which can be made in two ways: dodge or armor (you can't max both since armor decreases dodge chance). This is a great game and I recommend it to any serious RPG fan. If you only played this kind of games recently, and didn't try older RPGs, this kind of game may seem harder to play but it really is not. It's a game that doesn't treat you like some brain-dead jellyfish. From my part, this should be the game of the year.