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The rumors of Obsidians death have been greatly exaggerated!
- Thread starter Jaesun
- Start date
Elzair
Cipher
- Joined
- Apr 7, 2009
- Messages
- 2,254
RE: Arcanum Combat
It is funny you damn Obsidian and Troika while praising Black Isle considering they are made up of mostly the same people.
Personally, I never saw a problem with Arcanum's combat. Yes, real-time combat was impossible; it was clearly a feature added solely to satisfy a demand by the publisher (I remember hearing about this in some interview). However, turn-based combat was the emphasis, and I think they pulled it off pretty well IMO.
NOTE: Most of my Arcanum experiences were with my fighter character; I never tried a technologist, and I remember my magic character being somewhat harder to play, but that is not unusual.
Arcanum's turn-based combat was not strictly slower than that featured in any other turn-based game. Personally, even the standard TB combat felt faster than the Fallout games. If you use the 'Fast Turn-Based' option, battles would go by much quicker.
Regarding Witcher vs. Arcanum, I think it is a very apples-to-oranges comparison, but I liked Arcanum's combat better. Witcher's combos took some getting used to, and it was a shame that only two weapons (really one weapon with two verions) were actually useful. Also, I don't remember allied NPCs being much help in a fight (other than as a distraction).
In Arcanum, the NPCs do make a difference (at least for me). The AI seems pretty intelligent (at least it doesn't do too much dumb stuff). Virgil will heal party members when they need healing, and party members do not seem to use uber powers against weak foes. Arcanum also has various monsters with unusual properties. All the rock monsters, for instance, seriously degrade your weapons with every hit, so it is best to use gauntlets when fighting them. Arcanum also has more varied options for controlling NPCs. Using the Function keys, you can tell party members to wait at a location, follow you, attack the highlighted creature, and more. This strategy can seriously help out in tough fights by allowing you to lure lone monsters to where your party members are waiting to gang up on it. I used this strategy extensively in the Portal fights and the Lord of the Damned fight.
Did you try "Fast Turn-Based"? It goes by pretty fast since the movement animations are taken out and I think the combat animations may be sped up. The limiting factor is the speed of the player.
Jedi_Learner said:
It is funny you damn Obsidian and Troika while praising Black Isle considering they are made up of mostly the same people.
Monocause said:
Personally, I never saw a problem with Arcanum's combat. Yes, real-time combat was impossible; it was clearly a feature added solely to satisfy a demand by the publisher (I remember hearing about this in some interview). However, turn-based combat was the emphasis, and I think they pulled it off pretty well IMO.
NOTE: Most of my Arcanum experiences were with my fighter character; I never tried a technologist, and I remember my magic character being somewhat harder to play, but that is not unusual.
Arcanum's turn-based combat was not strictly slower than that featured in any other turn-based game. Personally, even the standard TB combat felt faster than the Fallout games. If you use the 'Fast Turn-Based' option, battles would go by much quicker.
Regarding Witcher vs. Arcanum, I think it is a very apples-to-oranges comparison, but I liked Arcanum's combat better. Witcher's combos took some getting used to, and it was a shame that only two weapons (really one weapon with two verions) were actually useful. Also, I don't remember allied NPCs being much help in a fight (other than as a distraction).
In Arcanum, the NPCs do make a difference (at least for me). The AI seems pretty intelligent (at least it doesn't do too much dumb stuff). Virgil will heal party members when they need healing, and party members do not seem to use uber powers against weak foes. Arcanum also has various monsters with unusual properties. All the rock monsters, for instance, seriously degrade your weapons with every hit, so it is best to use gauntlets when fighting them. Arcanum also has more varied options for controlling NPCs. Using the Function keys, you can tell party members to wait at a location, follow you, attack the highlighted creature, and more. This strategy can seriously help out in tough fights by allowing you to lure lone monsters to where your party members are waiting to gang up on it. I used this strategy extensively in the Portal fights and the Lord of the Damned fight.
Honestly, I never finished either game. I got distracted by newer games, although I plan to finish both of them. I will say that Arcanum's story starts off a little slow, but it does pick up steam after a while.Monocause said:
Darth Roxor said:
Did you try "Fast Turn-Based"? It goes by pretty fast since the movement animations are taken out and I think the combat animations may be sped up. The limiting factor is the speed of the player.
MetalCraze
Arcane
Re: RE: Arcanum Combat
I wish Obsidian had at least 1/10 of the "same" people. Maybe in that case they wouldn't make such crap.
Oh look it got Avellone, Sawyer and Urquhart who don't really develop games there - mostly of the same people my ass (well ok Avellone does something in the writing department but so far both of his games where he has/had active role look like garbage - that's KotOR2 and AP)
Elzair said:
I wish Obsidian had at least 1/10 of the "same" people. Maybe in that case they wouldn't make such crap.
Oh look it got Avellone, Sawyer and Urquhart who don't really develop games there - mostly of the same people my ass (well ok Avellone does something in the writing department but so far both of his games where he has/had active role look like garbage - that's KotOR2 and AP)
GarfunkeL
Racism Expert
Re: NWN
Fanboy bashing fanboy! R00fles!
Micormic said:
Fanboy bashing fanboy! R00fles!
Are you daring to challenge Volourn?! http://volourn.mybrute.com
St. Toxic
Arcane
Darth Roxor said:
Considering that TW is made up of combat and little else (well, you could always try beating the game by picking flowers and gambling, I don't know) I'd take the handful of forced combat situations from Arcanum over TW's combat centered bullshit any day of the week.
But then, I also never really saw the problem with Arcanum's combat system. You could abuse combat initiation fairly well, and it could also be used against you if you weren't expecting it, but, other than that, it was functional enough as a means to an end. Realtime was clusterfuck useful only in situations where you outmatch your opponent completely, and the TB, apart from initiation, worked pretty gut. Animations be damned.
Lastly, TW is a frustatingly bland and boring chore, en allé.
MetalCraze
Arcane
I completed Arcanum in Fast-TB mode and while it was quite twitchy it was much more pleasing than TW's "click with the same interval only when we allow you while trying not to fell asleep and you must click in time". The only problem with Arcanum combat I had is the balance and companion AI which aren't really related to combat mechanics.
Vault Dweller
Commissar, Red Star Studio
- Joined
- Jan 7, 2003
- Messages
- 28,035
A surprisingly good overview.St. Toxic said:
doctor_kaz
Scholar
People who complain about the camera in NWN2 should be kicked in the goddamned balls. It's the same fucking camera as NWN. Where the fuck were all of these picky critics when that game came out? It's not Obsidian's fault that the engine they were handed sucked major ass totally incapable of anything but small blocky copy-and-paste areas. They fucked up the interface for NWN2, but it was still better than any Bioware interface since Kotor. The interface for NWN2 at launch is still a wet dream compared to the "improved for the PC" interface for Mass Effect. NWN was an absolutely wretched game and the only thing that redeemed it was Hordes of the Underdark and some of the premium mods like Kingmaker.
Re: Arcanum. The game did have pretty dull and repetitive combat, but Troika redeemed themselves more with ToEE and Vampire.
Re: Arcanum. The game did have pretty dull and repetitive combat, but Troika redeemed themselves more with ToEE and Vampire.
Re: RE: Arcanum Combat
Having Arcanum on fast TB didn't help a lot either. It only skipped the walking animations, but when you had a looking glass rifle (speed: 6) it still was as fast as a slug.
And please don't make me mention the retarded hit percentages (having 140% hit chance and not hitting 5 times in a row is superfun), fucking screwed balance (Oh, hey, welcome to the Void, where you meet 7 undead knights in every area, while each of them has 4 attacks per round that can instagib each of your characters!), fights being bland as hell (lookie here, BMC mines (have fun wasting bullets and weapon durability on ore golems that don't want to die every 5 seconds) , Thanatos (have fun shooting mobs of shitty gorillas every five seconds) and Vendigroth (have fun shooting mobs of shitty dryders every 5 seconds) ) and stupid companion AI (yes Virgil, try to use heal minour wounds on my 100% technologist that has 60% hp instead of attacking the monster that will die in one hit).
Having Arcanum on fast TB didn't help a lot either. It only skipped the walking animations, but when you had a looking glass rifle (speed: 6) it still was as fast as a slug.
And please don't make me mention the retarded hit percentages (having 140% hit chance and not hitting 5 times in a row is superfun), fucking screwed balance (Oh, hey, welcome to the Void, where you meet 7 undead knights in every area, while each of them has 4 attacks per round that can instagib each of your characters!), fights being bland as hell (lookie here, BMC mines (have fun wasting bullets and weapon durability on ore golems that don't want to die every 5 seconds) , Thanatos (have fun shooting mobs of shitty gorillas every five seconds) and Vendigroth (have fun shooting mobs of shitty dryders every 5 seconds) ) and stupid companion AI (yes Virgil, try to use heal minour wounds on my 100% technologist that has 60% hp instead of attacking the monster that will die in one hit).
MetalCraze
Arcane
doctor_kaz said:
No, sorry. Camera in NWN was terrible but still better - iirc the game made walls invisible rather than moving the camera right into your face when there was an obstacle in its line of sight.
doctor_kaz
Scholar
skyway said:
Wrong. NWN zoomed the camera up into your face if you were back against a wall. I can't tell you how many times I walked out of one area into another and found the camera two inches from my face.
doctor_kaz
Scholar
Micormic said:
I did adjust it. Just like I adjusted the camera in NWN2. I didn't have a problem with the camera in either game.
Forest Dweller
Smoking Dicks
- Joined
- Oct 29, 2008
- Messages
- 12,218
He's a troll returned from exile. Just ignore the fucker.
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