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Shadowrun Shadowrun: Hong Kong - Extended Edition

Severian Silk

Guest
I'm in the "Extended" portion of the game. What's the best rifle for Duncan? I sold the Steyr Aug and I'm sort of regretting it. But the Colt has the ability to do 99% accuracy if the enemy has less than 25% health, which I have found very useful.
 

Severian Silk

Guest
I just completed the mission where you have to protect the little girl from the two corps. I sided with neither corp, so I had to fight them both. It was pretty tense. I had to start over a few times until I found a working strategy. There must have been 40 units on the screen fighting at the same time.

:shredder:

Also, I made the mistake of giving Racter a second drone. The extra drone was useless, and Racter no longer had a gun. So I was actually a man short.
 

Deleted member 7219

Guest
Hong Kong had some of the best encounters I've seen in a turn-based game. Made even better by the amazing soundtrack.

 

almondblight

Arcane
Joined
Aug 10, 2004
Messages
2,549
What's the best rifle for Duncan?

Did you keep the experimental laser sniper rifle? I found that pretty useful as a secondary rifle for him.

Oh, and it's worthwhile to buy Gaichu a throwing star, even if you already chose his throwing star upgrade (which doesn't actually give you a throwing star, just a fairly useless ability). He's really good with it.

Also, I made the mistake of giving Racter a second drone. The extra drone was useless, and Racter no longer had a gun. So I was actually a man short.

Yeah, but he never hits with the gun. At least another drone is an extra target.
 
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Severian Silk

Guest
I had to baby sit the drone during that mission, so that I could sell it when I got back to camp and buy something more useful. Babysit Recter *and* the drone since they were both grenade magnets apparently.
 

Jason Liang

Arcane
Joined
Oct 26, 2014
Messages
8,335
Location
Crait
Racter with a Sniper C Drone is probably better than Racter with a slivergun. IIRC he can equip a Sniper C Drone by the end of the main campaign.

But what's the point? How can you lose with Koeschi? Did you check Koeschi's inventory? It even comes with grenades!
 

Jason Liang

Arcane
Joined
Oct 26, 2014
Messages
8,335
Location
Crait
It's skippable. Nothing here at all for combatfag. Storyfag might take a look- it's a good 15 hour ride but it isn't something you'll be talking about 5 years from now.
 

Deleted member 7219

Guest
Best of the series so far, with the best companions, great ending and a nice epilogue campaign which should last you a few hours.
 

SCO

Arcane
In My Safe Space
Joined
Feb 3, 2009
Messages
16,320
Shadorwun: Hong Kong
It's like this: a bunch of retards complained about Dragonfall having too much combat.
Therefore this game is based around 'combat setpieces'. Problem is, combat in SR is super simplistic and it's systems are exploitable and not in a fun way 'there are 30 ways to win' like JA2. No. In here there 3 ways to win (without injury): magnet 'never fear grenades again' arm, grenade 'AoO for everyone' launchers and kiting. I'm also especially irritated how every single character moves along like a robot with you into ambushes and how you can't select another character to be the one you're controlling. Because Baldur's Gate interface is rocket science and would 'break the game' (i suspect literally - script triggers - and metaphorically - sniper rifle)

Also they removed very hard difficulty because of some 'BAWWWW' on the forums about 'missing 90% of the time'. And of course, the completely idiotic '2 ap system for enemies keeps being a thing and the AI is still pathetic enough to get confused by kiting and baiting so they use one to approach and one to get away behind the corner so they're not on the open while you haste your toons and play whack a mole in reverse on your turn (you're the mole with a gun).
 
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SCO

Arcane
In My Safe Space
Joined
Feb 3, 2009
Messages
16,320
Shadorwun: Hong Kong
Who can understand the mystery of the mind of idiots. I bet most of them are thinking 'this is good but if it was action based like monster hunter or kingdom hearts it would be better'. Which, granted, it might, even if by accident and as a bonus, it would prevent me from playing it in the hope of sophisticated TB combat.
 
Self-Ejected

aweigh

Self-Ejected
Joined
Aug 23, 2005
Messages
17,978
Location
Florida
What I loved most about dragonfall was the amazingly succint writing. Yes, other adjectives apply, and I *almost* used "amazing" but it is not amazing writing; it is writing that will immediately give you a firm grasp of the personality of the NPC with whom you are conversing with, and it is writing that will properly set up an NPC's characterization in a surprisingly few amount of paragraphs (and sometimes even with simple sentences).

For example:

- The teenaged girl who runs errands for the Turkish Coffee Bar owner. I *loved* conversing with her and even though HBS never finished her dialog, the little bits of conversations you can have with her really made me feel like she was living in this town you're currently adventuring in, and the way you can unlock bits and pieces of her past and her relationship with the TCB owner was very interesting.

However it does not lead to any extra missions, items, or anything of the sort. She was literally an *unfinished NPC*.

- Another easy example is the BTL-addicted woman with whom you can talk to throughout the game. As with the Turkish Coffee Bar owner's errand girl, talking with her does not lead to anything gameplay-related, but with the brief interactions I had with her I felt empathy for her and every time I wished there was something I could do to help her.

- The Player Characters, i.e. your Party Members, all had interesting backstories which utilized shlock and tropes, but were also written in believable ways. There were lots of interesting things you could discover about them that smacked of stuff a real-life person would have experienced:

Example: Dietrich's little confession about how he used to be in a punk band. The conversation you have with him about this subject, while brief, was more interesting than the reams of text that your brother spouts at you in Hong Kong.

- Even underdeveloped characters with trope-y archetypes, such as the Sniper party member (I don't even remember her name!), manage to make lasting impressions with her simple, but direct characterization and the way that this perfectly ties into the gameplay aspects of bringing her with you during missions.

Cool moments like getting the chance to morph your dog into a motherfucking Hellhound is pure Shadowrun shlock at its finest, and it was memorable and fun to play through.

There are simply too many examples of interesting and memorable stuff to cite from Dragonfall.

I have not finished Hong Kong and probably never will because every time either an NPC or a party member decided to speak it meant I had to read 2x/3x the amount of text than in Dragonfall, and it was always uninspired, trite and derivative of bad Hong Kong gangster/triad bullshit that... is not really very Shadowrun-y.

My god, I remember when you meet the Auntie who organizes your campgain missions... I simply can't think of a more boring NPC in any of the 3 Shadowrun games from HBS.

EDIT: Oops, sorry, your brother is the most boring one.

...so does what I'm talking about get fixed in the EE?
 

almondblight

Arcane
Joined
Aug 10, 2004
Messages
2,549
...so does what I'm talking about get fixed in the EE?

The EE doesn't change the base game, it just adds 5 new missions. I'd say these are somewhere between SR:HK and DF: DC in terms of design and writing quality, though combat is still fairly mindless except for 1 or 2 encounters.

They're worth playing if you've already slogged your way through Hong Kong, but I wouldn't say they're worth slogging through HK to get to.
 

Keye_

Educated
Joined
Dec 5, 2016
Messages
78
Just finished the main and bonus campaign.
I have played all (new) shadowrun games now, in order.
Some random thoughts on each:

- Returns was the decent, but was obviously the first one. Combat was even more simplistic than in DF and HK. In every departement did they improve on this game except one: atmosphere/aesthetic. Not that the atmosphere of the other games is worse, but Returns prefectly captured some sort of Noir-feel. They excecuted the muder-solving thing very well (until the bugs) and there are some great and memorable characters on the way. (the morgue guy, Jake armitrage, that ork policeman who you could give a haymaker and get fired at the end.) Very good atmosphere and felt like a good introduction to the shadowrun universe for people (like me) who were unfamiliar with it.

- Dragonfall was better in almost every way than Returns. More fleshed out companions, a more interesting central hub, decent missions, a very decent story and some good c&c. One of the most fun games I've played in recent years. Only real negative thing is that I had trouble with some bugs in this game. Especially the broken save system during the AI mission was annoying.

- Hong Kong is my favourite in the end. Combat was better, since I liked the encounters more. Still too easy, but in the extended campaign they at least tried to spice things up, which led to some very fun encounters. I liked the story less in this one. Dragonfall kept you engaged between missions through the dvds etc., in HK I was less invested in the main story. But I was more invested in the companions, especially Gobbet and Racter (didn't feel strongly about Is0bel or Duncan, killed Gaichû). Another thing I liked in HK was that this game had a good sense of humour: Gobbets food obsession, the noodle machine, messing with Duncan about the ghost, some funny dialogue options in general.. HK also had a lot of skill checks, although I feel that DF had more alternative solution to situations, but I might be mistaken.
The thing that makes HK my favourite are the missions. They were another big step up from DF imo. Great varitiation in runs. Some consequences (vampire queen, ghoul, runner team). Interesting objectives in general. It was in HK more than in the other two games that you actually felt like a shadowrunner and that made a big difference for me.
 

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