***First off - Highly Recommended *** For just £4 currently you can own and play Return to Castle Wolfenstein Where as the latest Wolfenstein has stunning graphics for it's time, they lent heavily upon a more technologically advanced vision of the Nazi war machine, with Robots and Cyborg Super Soldiers Add in imposing concrete structures containing mysterious research labs and atrocities, along with gothic castles dawbed in Teutonic symbology and Swastika faced banners hanging. You have the reciepe for the nightmare B.J and his Squad face. The atmosphere of Return to Caste Wolfenstein initially feels a more tradional WW2 setting. As you lose yourself into the story and setting, you are greeted by a flashback occurring long before events of the current day, what implications could those events have on this time ? The scene is further revealed as you watch a meeting within the wood panelled offices of the OSA discussing the current situation. The quest begins. Here you are in an Old school FPS Adventure, you won't find any markers showing you where to head next, no cut scenes introducing a new threat, no red markers above enemies heads magically showing positions, just you and your wits. The German forces are dressed initially in their traditional WW2 uniforms and equiped with weapons for the time, you could be in Where Eagles Dare. You can take on the task utilising stealth, preventing soldiers from hitting the regularly placed alarm boxes on the walls, which call in back up. What is cool is, whilst lurking in the shadows you can overhear guards holding conversations discussing rumours and strange events occurring at other parts of the castle and down in the village. I would love to continue but your better off just playing this classic. Yes there's superbases and the hightech mixed with the unholy. Yes you will recognise characters, names and enemies . This game really holds up magnificently. At £4 too
I encourage anybody curious about this title to take a chance and dive in. The RPG itself heavily leans towward the Elder Scrolls style of RPG, although to me this is a step forward on all fronts. There's plenty of characters scattered around the world to converse with, fill out the lore of the land and of course lead to quests and advancement of the main plot / storyline. The combat is of a level where you fell you are actually using tactics and skills, rather than the hit or block and replensish health bland fair often the curse of this genere. You have a lot of free room to build your character and aren't linited to just one class. The World itself is interesting, with lots of books and stories to discover to fill out the gaps in your knowledge. I believe The Tainted Grail is an established tabletop game already. How accurate this RPG follows this I do not know, having zero knowlede prior to picking this title up, though not knowing anything about the World prior has not impeded me play in any regard. I also got a title Tainted Grail Conquest as part of the bundle which is more of a Roguelike card based / RPG Hybid - set within the same universe. Bottomline. If you are a lover of the Skyrim / Oblivion style of game but are frustrated that the engine and overall mechanics don't seem to be anything new, once you see through the veneer of the new graphics ( and new game breaking bugs ). And would like to see what RPG's can be produced before companies become too big, with too many agendas that are not related in any which way to fantast RPG. Well I strongly urge you to give this title a try, especially at the current price. It is punching well above it's weight in every regard.
Have looked at this for quite awhile before deciding to give it a go whilst it's on sale. Currently there is a slew of games all along this type of theme and it can be difficult to distinguish one from another as from the screenshots they all look like the same game. With the only real thing being the mechanics behind how you do things and how you manage your ever growing tribe. What sets this game apart primarily is rather than having a Godlikelike view from above whilst directing the placement of building, paths and tasks for your Tribe or villagers to perform, here you have a Character in game. You control your Character with W,A,S,D for movement and use the mouse to set the direction you are facing (Rotate) and mouse buttons to perform actions. You have a series of bars to manage your Health / Stamina and an Inventory similar to any RPG. So initially it's you alone who is tasked with laying the foundations and building the usual pattern of benches to expand what you can build - like games you've probably played before. What's great is as your followers arrive to join they also have a fully accessable inventory exactly as yours. You can direct what tasks your villagers perform as standard by a drop down menu. You get x2 tasks, say Woodcutting then Building depending on what job requires filling. This is an easy to pick up system and quite intuative. Icons above the character indicate any problems or requirements. So yeah, so far, enjoying my time with this game / sim. No issues, it appears complete as a game. How much you can sit back and automate things as things become more complex may be a concern ? But loving the amount of direct control you have as a player in this game. Recommended. Only downside so far is the writing can be too small to make out on the pop up messages.
Recently buying games on GoG is akin to playing russian roulette. I can well understand having issues launching really old classic games, but would expect something like Dead Space to launch at least, but no. Then you have to go through the process of attempting to make sense of the Worlds Worst Forum on Gog where your search could display anything. The same totlaly useless support page asking advising you to alter your cores on your processor, hey try messing with you directory that should be fun, maybe alter your Bios - all to get a game to work - well no thanks. This is happening on an increasing basis on this platform, the quality control is abysmal, so much so I am reluctant to use the platform again as it smack of a place going out of buisness, and down the pan. The is no option for refunds, or if there is it's well hiddne away. So buyer beware.
Talking about the actual game PWOR offers extensive options to build a character of your choice. The other characters within the game have their own motives and beliefs that actually feel genuine and understandable, not just going through the usual generic motions. Yes, the game can be very indepth (if you want it to be, though there are options to minimise this. Just as there are extensive options to customise difficulty - basically you can set the game up to play however you wish. ) It's an improvement over their first game not that that was bad, it's just they've learnt what worked and moved forward, just as they have done again with the Excellent Rogue Trader game. The 'Spyware' issue is something that applies to many games using this type of game engine and feedbacks system builds to improve compatabilitywith various PC builds / components. It is also entirely optional, yep 100% turn it off if you don't want to enter into this. Buy it or don't as always the choice is entirely up to you, but it's an excellent CRPG Top Tier infact.
From your Command Mech, control Air, Land and Sea upon massive maps (if you wish) Plays fantastic even now it belays it's age. One of those games if you have any interest in the genere it's a must own. 10/10
