What game are you wasting time on?

[Redshirt #42]

Finished Gemini Rue.

I easily guessed who the hooded female character was and hence thought that the story was going to be predictable at first, so I didn't see the actual plot twist at the end coming at all.

Pretty nice adventure game overall (the controls and interface were horrible though). Kind of reminds me of Yahtzee's AGS games, especially 1213 (even though that's a platformer).

 

[laclongquan]

The Den is out of tutorial zone and start picking up anyway, so~

Klamath:
1. Toughest battle would be fighting several scorpions in a pasture. You can be surrounded and melee is deadly. See: ranged.
2. The geckos around the still is basic tutorial and wont trouble you much unless you trouble them~ I generally leave them until getting skinning perk anyway.
3. Ditto with the Robot. Melee is dumb but doable.
4. The rat battles around upper ground of Trapper Town is basic. nuff said.
5. The piggies underground can be a problem and should consume the last of your free bullets. A good idea to go back to buy some more, innit? Cautious poking around (because of piggies, see) should yield that pistol.
6. The King rat is actually the toughest in Klamath. Melee can be your dead sentence unless you choose to run then strike. Bullets seem to be the obvious answer here but a melee fighter can probabbly tough it out. Probabbly.
7. The golden geckos can be problem if you try to kill them all but not much if just kill one path coming and going. Leave the rest for when you get the perk.

Seriously, if you are not a dumb idiot who try to complete every fight the first time, you should have no problem with melee and absolutely no problem with guns and throwing spear.

 

[octavius]

1. Scorpions were not a trouble. Just use the "activate one a time" trick.

3. I got lucky with the Robot and hit it right in the CPU. Was disappointed that I could not take the strange armour from the killed pilot, though.

The only "problem" is the tediousness of it.

 

[Baron Dupek]

BTW. if you install Killtrap's patch and have high enough Science and/or Repair you can scavenge Advanced Power Armor from the dead Enclave trooper in Klamath.
Yes I know you can go to Navaroo like any of "git gud" goons in this thread but whatever.

While we're at Fallout topic - why there is so little info about Enclave mod for F:T? I gave it a shot few days back and boy - if you think St. Louis in original F:T is hard then you gonna enjoy this mod. Started with few level-ups to lvl11 but did not make situation better in any way. F:T was meh action game with little tactics flavor but here I got some dense situations and encounters like these from Apeiron games (Marauder: Man of Prey, 7,62 High Calibre) and it does help to have experience with Commandos series.

First mission is the friggin' prison escape, with automatic turrets, RPGs, heavy machineguns, armed motorbikes and lot of explosions. You have 2 people in prison and 2 outside but ya better start from the inside, put these shanks and shivs in good use, believe me...
Even though it get better and better with mission (base management, option to call airstrikes and backup with additional troopers) it still hard game that still test your wit despite giving more toys to play with. Truly overwhelming odds in wasteland world...
One problem is - game give you zero intel about any events or possible situations, so you can't prepare beforehand (plant explosives etc.). I got nasty surprise when my attempt of harassing prison guards was interrupted with APC that spawned on my back, should not set myself by the road. OUCH.
And like all russian games and mods - it encourage (i.e. force you) to save scum shit out of it and abuse and cheese or get shitfaced. Unless you git gut to russian level.

 

[octavius]

Fallout 2 improved after I reached The Den. I was pleasantly surprised that I could talk to Vic through a window, and come up with a plan to buy him free. Of course, later in the game I will return and show the slavers why slavery is bad for the health.

The random encounters can be a bit annoying (frequency seems to be higher than in F1), especially when my characters start right next to an SMG wielding bandit (Sulik died due to this). The combat AI still leaves a bit to be desired, what with those puny traders attacking bandits with their fists instead of cowering behind their guards like they are supposed to.
Companion AI has been improved from F1, though, with less chance of friendly fire, and the last handled item in inventory is now at the top instead of at the bottom, which is a huge improvement.

 

[Unkillable Cat]

octavius A few non-spoiler hints for what's up ahead (assuming you've never played Fallout 2 before):

# NPC AI may be improved, but they're still prone to going off on their own, especially Sulik. Study the NPC settings, determine a role for each one, and equip and instruct them accordingly.
# For your next (logical) stop after The Den, you will want to have Perception (PE) above 5. Mentats can help you do this.
# If you find what appears to be a very sturdy chicken coop, I suggest saving before trying to enter it.
# If you encounter a critter called a Wanamingo, RUN! You'll need really good guns to take one down, and be at least Level 12-13.
# Some random encounters may have a cave on the map that you can enter. Doing so constitutes a map change so you can do so to get out of a tough fight, but more often than not you'll be jumping from the frying pan into the fire.
# There's little point in going back to Arroyo until the game pretty much tells you to do so.
# Broc Flowers and Xander Roots have a use beyond Arroyo.

 

[panzertoter]

BTW. if you install Killtrap's patch and have high enough Science and/or Repair you can scavenge Advanced Power Armor from the dead Enclave trooper in Klamath.
Yes I know you can go to Navaroo like any of "git gud" goons in this thread but whatever.

While we're at Fallout topic - why there is so little info about Enclave mod for F:T? I gave it a shot few days back and boy - if you think St. Louis in original F:T is hard then you gonna enjoy this mod. Started with few level-ups to lvl11 but did not make situation better in any way. F:T was meh action game with little tactics flavor but here I got some dense situations and encounters like these from Apeiron games (Marauder: Man of Prey, 7,62 High Calibre) and it does help to have experience with Commandos series.

First mission is the friggin' prison escape, with automatic turrets, RPGs, heavy machineguns, armed motorbikes and lot of explosions. You have 2 people in prison and 2 outside but ya better start from the inside, put these shanks and shivs in good use, believe me...
Even though it get better and better with mission (base management, option to call airstrikes and backup with additional troopers) it still hard game that still test your wit despite giving more toys to play with. Truly overwhelming odds in wasteland world...
One problem is - game give you zero intel about any events or possible situations, so you can't prepare beforehand (plant explosives etc.). I got nasty surprise when my attempt of harassing prison guards was interrupted with APC that spawned on my back, should not set myself by the road. OUCH.
And like all russian games and mods - it encourage (i.e. force you) to save scum shit out of it and abuse and cheese or get shitfaced. Unless you git gut to russian level.

I thought it's chinese, not russian mod. Anyway, everyone on NMA forum says that it's meant to be played in real time and in turn based mode it's unplayable - true?

 

[Baron Dupek]

I thought it's chinese, not russian mod. Anyway, everyone on NMA forum says that it's meant to be played in real time and in turn based mode it's unplayable - true?

Older versions (2.x) - for sure are, there are bugs and else.
New versions (3.3)? No idea.
Chinese? If the original creator (GunnerShi) is - then yes but can't find info confirming it. People who made it working again (patches and mod launchers) are russians so... yeah.

 

[Great Deceiver]

Been 16 years since I last played this. I meant to do a full BG1+BG2 playthrough with BGT two years ago but I was burned out after BG1. Started a new Paladin for BG2, playing vanilla with only the fixpack and widescreen mod. Having fun.

 

[octavius]

Hmm...that Power Plant in Gecko in Fallout 2...it feels like the game is trolling me.

Also, raising cash is a severe problem. Few merchants, and they rarerly have much coinage.

 

[Modron]

Hmm...that Power Plant in Gecko in Fallout 2...it feels like the game is trolling me.

Also, raising cash is a severe problem. Few merchants, and they rarerly have much coinage.

Drugs. Drugs are the answer zero to little weight and high value convert all your heavy crap to drugs so when you hit San Fran/NCR and to a lesser extent Vault City you can convert all those substances into money/better gear.

 

[DeepOcean]

Thanks to CPY bros, I tried to play Mass Effect Prospermeda seven times to see if it is that bad and honor this ancient codexian practice but I was too weak and gave up not going very far on my first and last attempt. I'm a sucker for post apocalyptic settings and sci-fi, happily watching even some really corny Star Trek episodes but this is too much, it is bad even for Mass Effect standards on what I call the "rubber suit man syndrome."

The rubber suit man syndrome is a sensation you have watching sci-fi series or movies where the aliens, for being way too similar with human beings, are treated by your brain as rubber suit men instead of a fictional alien race and as your brain doesn't buy the fiction, it doesn't matter how much you try to take it serious, you can't stop eye rolling and facepalming at best or just laughing out loud at the worst.

You will very soon lose all the interest on the fictional world as you can't take it seriously even for a second. The Kett and the Angara, the two "new" races introduced on Mass Deffect share this problem, Angaran are much worse at this as you will spend alot more time with them. There is an scene where you meet the Angara for the first time and they talk on their lenguage and just 5 minutes later they are talking on perfect english with zero explanation not even the slightest of the handwaves, it is just so bad that I don't even have words.

Even Star Wars was wise enough to keep the alien characters as exotic background and let the main action to the human characters to avoid this problem. It is double awful because those are supposedly new aliens you are meeting on a completely different galaxy for the first time as on Mass Effect previously you could handwave all races speaking english because they are already in contact with each other for some time, on this game however, it is just bizarre bad writing that makes the previous Mass Effect games look like the works of a literary genius ( they were always sci-fi schlock but were fun schlock.)

This is even more bizarre as the aliens start speaking with human,or more properly, north american) speech maneirisms. The writers of this crap didn't even undertood the necessity building different speech patterns and ways of talking.

The characters talk like some teenagers trying to win the coolest of the cool competition on twitter, they don't talk on real phrases that can be said by a real human being but it is like you are watching characters exchanging twitter messages between themselves dubbed by some of the most akward voice acting I ever saw on a videogame. It is impressive how all of them are adults but they talk like the wirters that made them never talked with a real adult for their entire lives and don't know what this thing called conversation works.

There is the minority guy that talk like the cool guy of the guetto, there is the Asari scientist that apparently is a genius but don't lose any opportunity to act and talk like a Tumbler teenage girl, there is Miss hair cut, yes, Miss Haircut is a character which only feature you will remember is that her haircut was done by some edgy Hollywood hair stylist on crack, there is the female Turian that is the female version of Garrus and there is an old Krogan that is just the generic Krogan for Wrex.

It isn't much worthy to talk about the gameplay, I will say that the gameplay designers of Mass Deffect are as unimaginative as their writers. Most of the powers you use work on the exact same way as they did on the previous games and all those gameplay videos on the internet showing the new flexibility of movement is just a lie. The game still works like a mediocre cover based shooter on the higher difficulties with even standard mook enemies taking 5 shots to the head to die from an standard pistol, you have to choose between the most boring and formulaic coverbased popoamole of the higher difficulties or play on easy mode Rambo for babies of the lower difficulties but this time there is alot of Farcry towers and camps to clean full of Rubber suit men... sorry... Kett.

Please, EA, give the mercy shot.

 

[pippin]

Hmm...that Power Plant in Gecko in Fallout 2...it feels like the game is trolling me.

Also, raising cash is a severe problem. Few merchants, and they rarerly have much coinage.

I don't remember it being that complex. You should have picked the yellow card from the Vertibird crash site, iirc? That's one of the ones you need. And yeah drugs are the solution to your money problems (just like in real life)

 

[Modron]

I don't remember it being that complex. You should have picked the yellow card from the Vertibird crash site, iirc? That's one of the ones you need. And yeah drugs are the solution to your money problems (just like in real life)

Requisitioning the part from the first citizen (mostly just not annoying her) to optimize the plant fully can be kind of dicey,

 

[octavius]

Hmm...that Power Plant in Gecko in Fallout 2...it feels like the game is trolling me.

Also, raising cash is a severe problem. Few merchants, and they rarerly have much coinage.

I don't remember it being that complex. You should have picked the yellow card from the Vertibird crash site, iirc? That's one of the ones you need. And yeah drugs are the solution to your money problems (just like in real life)

No, it's a different card. But the problem is that you can't ask Festus and Harold about cards and forms, you have to steal them. And when you request an item from Storage, the dialogue option is some joke item, and not the one you supposedly need.

As for the economy, the problem is not aquiring valuables, but in liquidating them into coinage. There are several instances where you need quite a bit of dough, and you can't barter your drugs.

 

[Krivol]

There are several places to get some cash via selling stuff - like Redding (only once per game iirc), NCR and San Fran (those traders have usually more than 2000) but still, stimpacks are your money for a while.

 

[octavius]

There are several places to get some cash via selling stuff - like Redding (only once per game iirc), NCR and San Fran (those traders have usually more than 2000) but still, stimpacks are your money for a while.

Actually I trade looted weapons and armour for Stimpacks. Combat is harder than in F1, I think, and those Raiders are especially nasty opponents (at least as long as I don't have better armour than Leather). It seems obvious that the Raiders are employed to encourage Vault City to join the New California Republic, but I can't even talk to the First Citizien about it, even after I discovered the Raider Base.

 

[Krivol]

The plot is more complicated, and you have to prove it. Also, IIRC , it depends of version (patched or not and which patch etc) you play how to solve it (I mean you can't do something before something else in unpatched version IIRC).

 

[octavius]

So I need to smuggle some drugs (Jet) into Vault City in Fallout 2. Now it's very easy to just trade it to one of your companions since the guards only search The Chosen One. Is this a glitch, or are you supposed to do it this way?

 

[Unkillable Cat]

So I need to smuggle some drugs (Jet) into Vault City in Fallout 2. Now it's very easy to just trade it to one of your companions since the guards only search The Chosen One. Is this a glitch, or are you supposed to do it this way?

No, it's merely an alternative. Citizens don't get searched.

 

[Baron Dupek]

Cashier in Redding casino have large chunk of cash if you don't wanna travel south, but I don't remember when he replenish them.
Coming back here with upgraded car, AdvPower Armor, TurboPlasma and Gauss only to see what junk you sold here 20h+ ago make you a little nostalgic cause you don't need to deal with this shit anymore.

 

[octavius]

So I need to smuggle some drugs (Jet) into Vault City in Fallout 2. Now it's very easy to just trade it to one of your companions since the guards only search The Chosen One. Is this a glitch, or are you supposed to do it this way?

No, it's merely an alternative. Citizens don't get searched.

Yeah, I soon found out it was a moot point.

 

[Unkillable Cat]

A few more tips since you're still playing this ol' thing:

# Once you get the car you're good to go pretty much everywhere except New Reno. New Reno does things to your car. Make a hard save before driving there.
# The car trunk is a very large inventory space that works inversely to the player inventory. Every item in Fallout 2 has two ratings: A weight rating and a volume rating. The player inventory ignores the latter, while the car trunk ignores the former. Stuff items into the trunk that weighs much but has no volume rating, like ammo.
# You'll be meeting traders that have several inventories of stock. To directly access these other inventories, use storage items (shelves and tables) near these traders, otherwise you'll be talking to the trader and random chance will decide which inventory you'll get. The traders and their guards won't try to blow your brains out unless you're using the Steal skill.
# Consider getting the Explorer and Scout perks, as the Special Encounters in Fallout 2 are numerous, varied and quite fucked up in a good way.
# Save before accepting any offers about brain scans: They may or may not have a positive effect upon you.
# The game has an in-built formula for determining whether your character is good at sex or not. This may be important to your playthrough, so let me know if you want to know more.
# By our standards there's a bog-standard accessory item in Fallout 2 that, when put into an empty hand, boosts one of your stats by +1. I'm not gonna tell you anything more on this, so Deal With It.
# You'll run into an old adversary (note: singular reference, plural entities) from Fallout 1 that somehow gained the ability to talk. Just shut up and roll with it, the argument has been done to death a billion times already.
# While in a familiar place you'll meet a man named Dave, and by talking to him you'll learn why so many Codexers secretly laugh at Melcar for his avatar choice.

 

[the_shadow]

Unreal. Still looks bloody good, even better than I remember (but then I've been in retro mode for five years). Sound is still a decline compared to for example Doom.
Now let's see if the weapons are as wimpy as I remember...

The weapons aren't wimpy, it's just your enemies are *that* badass. The weapons in Unreal probably have the most unique and varied feel of any FPS I've ever played.

Anyway, I've shelved Spellforce 2 because I've found it rather boring, with more an emphasis on having your heroes whack monsters using the same skills, rather than much actual strategy (which is what I was expecting).

I've started Call of Cthulhu: Dark Corners of the Earth, and that is definitely not boring. The atmosphere and plot are second to none. Some negatives, though:

- The stupidity of the protagonist. I've noticed that horror games in general have the protagonist engage in stupid/reckless actions no-one in their right mind would to push the plot forward. The best example is sleeping in the hotel at Innsmouth after you've overheard a conversation about the owner planning to kill you that night, *and* having a vision about people getting killed in that room.

- It's rather contrived that your enemies' guns just evaporate into thin air. I know that they did this so the first 30% of the game is purely stealth focused, but it's so unexpected when you can pick up a firearm in the police station.

- The game is hard as hell, and I'm playing on normal difficulty. It's not just that enemies drain your health fast (which is completely realistic, admittedly), but that there are some places where the stealth system just doesn't seem to be adequate.

- The number of bugs in this game are atrocious, with numerous crashes. Sometimes the voice acting cuts out near the end of a sentence, which is weird. I'll give the benefit of the doubt and assume that this is because I'm playing a 10+ year old game on a new system, so these issues weren't present on older hardware.

Lots of people complain about the game turning into a shooter about half way through, but when I got a gun my first thought was 'Thank God'.

I finally got around to wrapping up Call of Cthulhu: DCotE, and honestly, I had to force myself to to complete the game. Between the numerous bugs (which included an *unbeatable* escape end-game sequence) and the difficulty, the game turned into a downright lousy experience. Unfortunately it was one of those cases where I felt obliged to finish, since I'd already made it so far. Survival horror really hasn't come that far since Silent Hill 1, a game that was less buggy when I emulated the Playstation version on my PC!

The last three games I've played (Eschalon 1, Spellforce 2 and Call of Cthulhu) have been subpar, which is rather disheartening.

 

[Lostpleb]

Gods Will Be Watching; one of the most well-written, emotionally engaging and violent puzzle games I've ever played.

This is also one of those few games out there for which achievement hunting is actually enjoyable. And there is even an extra epilogue chapter for anyone that can ace all the content, which is always a welcome incentive to replay a good game.