So I recently bought the GOG version of LOL2 and tried another walkthrough of the game.
So I recently bought LOL3 and tried another walkthrough of the game...because of nostalgia and so. Unfortunately it wasn't that enjoyable, so I took some notes.
Exploration and loot: There are hundreds of barrels with loot, hundreds of tree holes with loot, hundreds of chests with loot, hundreds of items hidden in every corner of the map. A paradise for any treasure hunter? No. Eventually you realize that 99% of these items are useless and only good for selling. So you spend hours and hours exploring every corner of the map, breaking barrels, fingering tree holes, breaking into buildings - only to find useless crap. There are even map sections which open up later in the game or change, providing new items, but in the end it's also mostly crap. You might as well run through them as fast as possible or ignore them completely. But if you do that, you miss 5 good items in the game... So go and find that needle in the haystack. It wears down quickly and becomes annoying.
Alchemy: There are hundreds of alchemical ingredients and recipies. But eventually you realize that 99% of the recipies are completely useless for the game. It's like the alchemy was put in the game only "because a good RPG must have alchemy", though with no purpose behind it. No other purpose than selling them at the various stores (it's as meaningless as all the items that are meant for 1-time-usage only, like "Dragon Blood" or "Mine pots" or "Fire crystals", which make a mini-explosion, but hardly any damage). The game would have been better without alchemy. LOL1 didn't have alchemy, and it was fine. In LOL2 they introduced alchemy, but it was mostly pointless there. In LOL3 they added even more alchemy, and it was even more pointless. Wtf?
You'd maybe think that crafting poison for weapons is more useful than other things: Wrong. Poison acts so slow on the enemies, it's useless. It was the same in LOL2. Made no difference. But woe to you if you got poisoned! Dead within seconds! Ridiculous. It's like they put this thing in and never spared a second thought about it.
Party banter: It was said that some of the familiars are more talkative than others, for example that Lig doesn't say many words, and that Goldie is very talkative. But in reality it's like this: The familiar only speaks at certain trigger points in the game. But these trigger points are the same for every familiar. So every familiar will say some words at these trigger points. The only difference is, that Lig says 1 sentence and Goldie says 5 sentences. That's a bit lame.
Weapons & Magic: They are fine. There are hundreds of weapons and armor with special effects, spells for defense and offense. Many of them come from LOL2, but here in LOL3 they seem to work better and you also get indepth descriptions about their effects (which LOL1 and LOL2 lacked). Most of the good weapons and magic are available in the guild stores. You don't find many good weapons in the environment. Once again makes an indepth exploration of the maps pointless.
Guilds: They are ok. The guilds actually provide you with all equipment you need for a complete walkthrough. Even if you only join 1 guild. Try it out, it really works. It is however stupid that they separated the Finches guild from the Mage guild and distributed the magic spells between them. Unnecessary, artificial complexity. 3 guilds would have been enough.
That said, you can complete the game also without joining any guilds. Health and Spell points rise up after some fights, but you don't get any visual clue when you gain a new level (other than seeing your increased points on your HP and SP bar). In that case your journal also contains no information about your level and experience. In that case you are also dependent on equipment which you find in the environment (because you can't buy from the guild stores unless you join them), and therefore forced to examine every corner of a map...
This walkthrough I only joined the Thieves Guild, but took Goldie from the Finch Guild as familiar (she was quite helpful actually). One of the great things about the Thieves Guild is, that you get items which make you invisible: Mask of Shadows (makes you invisible when standing still, but visible when running) and the Cowards Shield (makes you invisible unless you fight and then needs 10 seconds to make you invisible again). You'd think that one of it is sufficient, but it isn't. The effect is much better when used combined. It allows you to attack something and make you invisible immediately again. I could infiltrate and complete 2 portal worlds without any fighting because I wasn't detected by any of its inhabitants (the Ruloi World and the Shattered Desert). Quite relaxing was that.
The overall game experience however was only mediocre. The game has too much shitty filler content in it. Too much! You always think you miss out on something if you ignore this or that, and because of that the game really drags on. But in the end it's all unnecessary useless bloat. The core of Lands of Lore features a simple levelling system (which hardly changed since LOL1), with focus on weapons, armor, magic, and some riddles. They should have stuck to that and kept the game size appropriately, and then it would have been a decent 5 hour game with some replay value (and probably without broken guild quests).