Even though it is in better shape than the first one, this game is still full of bugs. They seem unable to finish a game before releasing it. I guess they don't understand the principle to pay alpha and beta players to finish it. And look at this marvelous price for an unfinished game, wonderful. And people are buying, that's the most amazing. Otherwise, well, a useless feature arrived, the army management, and it's even worse than the kingdom management from the first one, because they didn't finish to polish it properly. They didn't improve the kingdom management to make it a proper managerial mini-game. It's as empty as the first one. That doesn't deserve the name management. You'll have a good character creation and various builds to make, which is the strong point of the game. Real time with pause, which is the most dynamic way to play an RPG, TbT are too slow and are more tabletop friendly, A-RPG don't feel like RPGs but more like FPS. As for the story, well, the crusade seems at the moment way less interesting than Nyrissa's story. That's a one star for the release of the game, because an unfinished game deserves no more. Like the previous one, maybe it'll get a 4-5 stars in 2-3 years of work done on this poor game.
I remember the first time I played it, before this remake. I had a bad PC that couldn't support high quality games. And at one point I was stuck with Geneforge, Avernum and Avadon. All three games (and serie) are worth spending some time in it. But the universe of Geneforge was something unexpected. This is not the usual fantasy world, this is more a science-fantasy universe. You are sent to an old island of your people for I don't recall why exactly (or is it the usual sinking of your boat that made you refugee ?), and you discover one of the research island facility of your kind. One that had gone rogue. While having plenty of possibilities to overcome challenges, you'll find out about your people, what happened in the island and some outsiders that are still on the island. And I was delighted by the way all of it was set. And I had fun dying while playing my "blood thirsty run". Even if I don't own this game, I own the original one, and I didn't hear anything bad coming from the fandom of this game. So, if you don't mind good old graphisms and good old mechanics (because you'll have to adapt to the way games were designed back then), this new good old game will please you.
It took me time to play this game, and frankly I don't know why... With Pathfinder and Torment, it's one of the best RPG of the last decade, by far (other games are great too, like Underrail or Battle Brothers but... graphisms). The game mechanics are pretty neat : you improve your skills by using it. That makes your specialization meaningful, from being versatile to highly specialized in few skills. As for spells, you create your own depending on how you want to fight. A battle mage can specialize in short ranged spells for example. There's plenty of factions, and most of them have an opposed one. Meaning, you'll build up favor and wrath quite quickly depending on who you choose to support. Gaining favor or wrath gives you passive and combat abilities. Your "fortress" is a "five locations" one, each one can be specialize (forge, library, training hall, infirmary) giving you specific bonus and research abilities. And you can hire merchants and trainers in them. Training is important, it gives you an edge in battles as well as allowing you to progress to the next level quicker. There's four different paths to follow (but you can choose more by being into compromises) : from being allied with one of the major faction or... following an anarchist path. Which allow you to replay the game many times. That's why 40-50 hours tp finish the game is not that short as you can start all over again. The story is pretty ok, quite original as we are "the bad guys" at the beginning, Fatebinder of Kyros, supreme chief of Terratus who's about to dominate the last remaining free lands, the Tiers. Overall, it's pretty deep. It always can be improved, but if offers a mix of different kind of gameplays that's refreshing. I'm not much into "5 stars" but this one clearly deserve it.
The games are inspired by a tabletop RPG. Even if it's not as fun as a tabletop RPG (most games aren't), you'll find some good things in there. Good tactics, pretty nice stories, and quite enough replay. The setting : a cyberpunk universe dominated by corporations. The first game is a simple investigation. The second game will also be an investigation with more interactions with the world and your companions. Adding a bit of fantasy in the story. The third one would set up quite a big conspiration with quite a deeper story than the others. Overall, it's a good Tactic-RPG with basic game mechanics, and prefer enhancing the game on the story. So, either you like it, either not. Mostly for fans of fantasy that enjoy mixing genres as we usually set up fantasy in medieval universes.
I won't say it is of the best writing quality, but it's still okay. That's mostly where is the room for improvement. It could be better written, especially when it comes to vampires. Otherwise, people who know already Vampire - The Masquerade should be fine with it, and people who like reading investigating stories should be fine with it. And if you enjoy both, you have quite a good production with this title.
While I was disappointed I couldn't find a good heir to the Black Isles era, I didn't know there was a team building a game like Pathfinder. It uses the same mechanics as Baldur's Gate : an adventure game with plenty of RP mechanics, especially with plenty of "hidden" check rolls. No game reach this level yet. Larian is far behind, Obsidian lack something really epic, Bioware is too far from its early standards. The big studios seem unable to offer a proper RPG, probably because their fan base don't know much about it and prefer action games. It is flawed. There's plenty missing, but they did a massive job to enhance game mechanics. First, your kingdom : either you leave it to the AI, either you manage it. Finally, we have a heroe with a proper fortress to manage. Too bad interactions with other characters are not that rich there. But otherwise, it feels right and good. Beware, some challenges can be difficult if your roleplay is "good" or "evil", "neutral" management seems to be way easier. Fighting. At last, a good turn-based game with pause that looks like Baldur's Gate. Even more interesting as Pathfinder as a pretty good set of rules, and uses character building closer to Nerverwinter Nights. This combat system is the best : you still have turn-based mechanics, but it is way more dynamic, making fighting even more tactical than classical turn-based game. Buff yourself, fight, debuff ennemies, buff again, fight,... There's a lot of ways to improve your attack rolls and dispatch ennemies, especially the strongest. Finally a game that gives challenge : you need your brain to overcome the normal difficulty. And that feels good. For once, a normal mode with challenge. Multiple endings depending on your choices. And I won't spoil you, you can litteraly skip a whole chapter with smart decisions. The hardest chapter. And without breaking the story and the role you played. A very fine job, hopefully most lessons will be learned for Wrath of the Righteous
... mostly thanks to all the datas you can read : real quotes, game specific quotes, the tech tree, the ability to create a wide range of units for different purposes, the videos when you finish a special project (which remind me of Civ II),... I hoped for quite a long time there will be a sequel to this game which replaced Civilization and Colonization at that time. But as Colonization "IV" with the engine of Civilization IV was quite a mistake, I'm glad they didn't waste the licence with a useless title. The game is good by itself, and don't need much more except enhance graphics, and they're still pretty decent. At this price, if it is the kind of game you like, give it a shot and run few games with different factions with different starting abilities, you may stay there for a while.
Like most players, yes, paying 60€ for an unfinished game is the work of crook. When you were a tester, before, you used to have discounts or even the game for free. This model is like tasting raw food at a restaurant, paying fool price, and wait a long time before being served and then realize that the customer next to you pay only 10-25% of the full price without having to taste before like you did. Give a Nobel of crooky capitalism to this studio, they've beaten EA games ! The game itself : -very poor animation level. You are far from current standards of most AAA games. And it seems to be the core of the game... -plenty of bugs but that's normal - music is not immersive... - no big bad antagonist presented. I mean, where is the new Sarevok or Irenicus ? BG implies some standards, this is one of them. - random loot : that's not RP friendly, loot have to be coherent with the monsters you kill. Finding a sword on an imp is irrelevant. - 4 people party. Those standards do not match the spirit of BG. 6 people party give more interactions between characters and allow us to test various kind of roleplay for our characters. With for, you specialize too much. - Turn based is quite slow even if they try to fasten it. Pillars of Eternity and Pathfinder succeed into bringing back RTwP. Larian should be able to do it too. - The dice system is the strenght of this game : that gives us no choice but to adapt, that's very RP friendly. To make it better, disabling save-quit-reload is interesting. Only thing, it shouldn't pause the game, we do not need to see it. It's a waste of time. To finish : the game will be good, yes, but it won't be with BG heritage, that's just bad marketing. Pathfinder of PoE are way better descendants. Just wait the full release, and wait few months or a year for a bigger discount, 60€ is way too expensive for that.
