Putting the 'role' back in role-playing games since 2002.
Donate to Codex
Good Old Games
  • Welcome to rpgcodex.net, a site dedicated to discussing computer based role-playing games in a free and open fashion. We're less strict than other forums, but please refer to the rules.

    "This message is awaiting moderator approval": All new users must pass through our moderation queue before they will be able to post normally. Until your account has "passed" your posts will only be visible to yourself (and moderators) until they are approved. Give us a week to get around to approving / deleting / ignoring your mundane opinion on crap before hassling us about it. Once you have passed the moderation period (think of it as a test), you will be able to post normally, just like all the other retards.

Underrail is actually quite good

Joined
Dec 17, 2013
Messages
5,103
Codex endorsed RPGs can be a mixed bag. On one hand, great ones are definitely well known here, but on the other, some people here actually think Morrowind is a great RPG, and voted for D:OS2 as GOTY. I got a bit burned with D:OS, which turned out to be way worse than Codex's reception would lead you to believe, but to compensate, Underrail is actually even better than you would think based how it's treated here.

I am really impressed with this game so far (about 20 hours in). I am not even going to dwell on the fact that it's created by one guy, but even if you don't take that into account, I've had more fun with this game than with most recent RPGs. Once you get past the tiny tile based maps and the frequent map transitions, everything is just really well done. The setting is cool, exploration is fun, necessary, and rewarding, the combat is excellent, character development is top notch, and even writing/dialogue is better than people make out. It's not a dialogue driven game, but there is enough to give you a sense of purpose and immersion, and unlike most modern games, it doesn't fall into the trap of over-exposition and is concise and to the point.

It's similar to Fallout 1 and 2, but even better in certain ways (and worse in others). The crafting system fits well into the game and adds a cool new dimension. I love how the initiative system actually kicks in right away (party with highest initiative gets to go first), whereas in F1/2, the party initiiating combat got to go first, and initiative only kicked in after the first round. This allows me to make a great gunslinger type character much better.

I've seen people complain about having to backtrack through cleared areas a lot, but I honestly see this as a good thing. It gives the world a sense of size and realism, as opposed to games where you can just fast travel through everything or go from point of interest to point of interest immediately. Plus in Underrail, there ARE well done ways of getting around quickly (boats, trains, etc), but you have to discover those stations first, and they don't go everywhere, so it's a very good compromise.

Anyways, great game, if you haven't gotten it yet, well worth getting.
 

Kyl Von Kull

The Night Tripper
Patron
Joined
Jun 15, 2017
Messages
3,152
Location
Jamrock District
Steve gets a Kidney but I don't even get a tag.
Is it still worth playing for those of us who aren’t total systemfags and combatfags? My little brother told me it was kind of meh, which has made me skeptical of all the codex love for this game.

Is someone who’s gay for dialogue trees a storyfag or a writingfag? Is one a subset of the other? Is there a fag taxonomy? Maybe a chart?
 

shihonage

Subscribe to my OnlyFans
Patron
Joined
Jan 10, 2008
Messages
7,157
Location
location, location
Bubbles In Memoria
Underrail does more to invent a better plasma rifle than to explore the ethics of a post-apocalyptic world. That's great, if you're into plasma rifle improvement. Many are.
 

Jarmaro

Liturgist
Joined
Dec 31, 2016
Messages
1,466
Location
Lair of Despair
It's good game, but doesn't have any worth reading story or dialogs, only combat and exploration. A bit tedious and eventually boring. But a good game overall.
 

Roguey

Codex Staff
Staff Member
Sawyerite
Joined
May 29, 2010
Messages
35,653
It's good game, but doesn't have any worth reading story or dialogs, only combat and exploration. A bit tedious and eventually boring. But a good game overall.

Some of that dialogue is pretty funny, but sure, it's not worth playing just for that.
 
Joined
Dec 17, 2013
Messages
5,103
It's similar to Fallout 1 and 2

fuck you idiot

And here I thought we were just starting to become chums, Darth Ratsor.

It's good game, but doesn't have any worth reading story or dialogs, only combat and exploration. A bit tedious and eventually boring. But a good game overall.

It has a decent enough story to play through. Lots of great RPGs don't have a great story, you just need enough to get the player into the world and to tie together the other aspects. Its story is way better than D:OS for example, or whatever the hell the story was supposed to be in Wizardry or Might & Magic.
 

Vrab

Learned
Joined
Aug 11, 2017
Messages
99
The only serious fault in Underrail that I can think of is at the very end of the game when the logic of what I have to do breaks apart a bit. At least I found myself running around not knowing how I'm supposed to do that which I'm supposed to do.

But otherwise a genuinely pleasant experience. World felt big and, before the map was introduced, there was genuine possibility of getting lost (at least I managed once or twice lol), which was nice. I haven't played it since that change so idk how it is now with the map. It invoked the memory old Fallouts at first glance, but it's not all that similar under the hood. It's mostly about similar visuals and starting city being essentially a vault.
 

Heretic

Cipher
Joined
Dec 1, 2015
Messages
844
If you're only 20 hours in, you know nothing about backtracking yet - backtracking through respawning hordes that is.
:negative:

But despite that, it is a fine game.
 

Jenkem

その目、だれの目?
Patron
Vatnik
Joined
Nov 30, 2016
Messages
8,846
Location
An oasis of love and friendship.
Make the Codex Great Again! Steve gets a Kidney but I don't even get a tag. I helped put crap in Monomyth
I played it when it first came out, was enjoyable but navigation was a pain in the ass and the backtracking sucked so I stopped.. was going to start again when the expansion comes out.. but that has been "coming out soon" for like a year and a half...

too bad, so sad.
 

Roguey

Codex Staff
Staff Member
Sawyerite
Joined
May 29, 2010
Messages
35,653
Lilura's crazy autism:

''this game is pretty cool, but it's not Jagged Alliance 2, so it sucks''. That's her review in a nutshell.

JA2 has too much of that strategic gameplay that I don't like, and it doesn't offer much in the way of exploration, which is a win for Underrail.

If you're only 20 hours in, you know nothing about backtracking yet - backtracking through respawning hordes that is.
:negative:

But despite that, it is a fine game.
I don't recall such annoyances, but I always paid the fast travel toll and hardly did much exploring unless it was necessary for a quest.
 

Kyl Von Kull

The Night Tripper
Patron
Joined
Jun 15, 2017
Messages
3,152
Location
Jamrock District
Steve gets a Kidney but I don't even get a tag.
...after those glowing recommendations I’m going to give it a halfhearted try. Replays are getting too boring and all the other stuff I got during the holiday sales seems unappetizing/mediocre (why oh why did I blow $20 on Spiders’ whole backlog!? That’s like two whole jugs of cheap wine). It’s either Underrail or let myself get dragged further into a discussion on the Bitcoin thread, and I think Underrail is probably more fun on a Friday night than explaining the virtues of paper money to unbelievers. Probably.

Any recommended settings for making it less of an eyesore on a 24” screen? Parts of the text seem to get cut off when I make the resolution too high, which is hell on my nerd eyes, atrophied as they are from a lifetime of reading text in low light environments. Mole men unite!
 

shihonage

Subscribe to my OnlyFans
Patron
Joined
Jan 10, 2008
Messages
7,157
Location
location, location
Bubbles In Memoria
Any recommended settings for making it less of an eyesore on a 24” screen? Parts of the text seem to get cut off when I make the resolution too high, which is hell on my nerd eyes, atrophied as they are from a lifetime of reading text in low light environments. Mole men unite!

Set screen resolution to 1366x768 or something like that.
 

Kyl Von Kull

The Night Tripper
Patron
Joined
Jun 15, 2017
Messages
3,152
Location
Jamrock District
Steve gets a Kidney but I don't even get a tag.
I’ve barely gotten started and already the writing is making me weep with frustration. Not that it’s awful, but it’s just so fucking lifeless. Someone should kick the translator in the nuts. For whatever reason, the lack of contractions in a post apocalyptic setting drives me nuts.

I never skip written dialogue in RPGs, yet that is my new MO for Underrail (and I didn’t even skip text in TTON). I see why people like the combat, though.

Underrail is like Fallout and Deus Ex. It will soon be like Wave Race 64, too. I talked it up in my review, but it actually sucks.
No one gives a shit about you or your constant blog plugging.

Of all the atrocities that go on here, you’re bothered by a little shameless self promotion?
 

Tygrende

Arbiter
Joined
Aug 2, 2017
Messages
872
I am not even going to dwell on the fact that it's created by one guy
But it's not. It used to be for the first 3 years, during that time Styg made the engine and the content up to Junkyard. Right now there's at least 4 people working on the expansion.

I also kind of agree with Darth Roxor, in that Underrail is not all that similiar to Fallout 1/2. The only true similarity is the turn and action point based combat system. If anything, I would call Underrail a mix of Fallout and Deus Ex gameplay-wise, but other than that it's its own thing.

Not even the settings are all that similar. Fallout 1/2 are truly post-apocalyptic, the events of are set relatively shortly (~80 and ~160 years) after the nuclear apocalypse. All the chaos, struggle, misery, etc. you see and deal with in the game are directly or indirectly related to the nukes destroying the world.

Meanwhile in Underrail it's been so long (several centuries ago, more than at least 200 years) since whatever event that made the surface inhabitable, most people don't even remember what surface is and there's only one faction that kind-of-cares about inhabiting it again. The metro system is a completly self-sustainable enviroment. All the chaos, struggle, misery, etc. you see in the game are completly unrelated to the apocalypse, they were caused by BioCorp's shenanigans and civil wars. You know how people like to call New Vegas post-post-apocalyptic? Underrail is basically post-post-post-apocalyptic.

For whatever reason, the lack of contractions in a post apocalyptic setting drives me nuts.
I never really understood the complaints about the writing, but this gotta be the most hilarious one I heard so far.
 

Jack Dandy

Arcane
Joined
Feb 10, 2013
Messages
3,039
Location
Israel
Divinity: Original Sin 2
I never understood people's problem with the dialogue. The game had lots of entertaining, varied characters. If anything, I'd love if they had more reactions to the goings-on in the world, or would just update their dialogue more often.
It's really more a problem of quantity than quality when you think about it.

Also, I never did understand the problem with respawning monsters. The only ones you'd get that aren't in Deep Caverns are some measly houndrats. And you'd dispatch 'em with ease.
Also also, never really did understand people's problem with Deep Caverns. But then again, I played with Cheatengine's speedhack so the problems of backtracking were pretty much gone.
 

Falksi

Arcane
Joined
Feb 14, 2017
Messages
10,538
Location
Nottingham
I seriously missed the depth of content which a better & deeper story would have offered, but it was still a solid & wonderfully atmospheric experience.

7/10 for me. Enjoyed it, great combat, didn't finish it, and probably won't ever return to it.

The foundation is there for a stunning sequel. More of the same, just get that dialogue & C&C rocking.
 

As an Amazon Associate, rpgcodex.net earns from qualifying purchases.
Back
Top Bottom