Wasteland Wasteland 3 + Battle of Steeltown and Cult of the Holy Detonation Expansions Thread

[RK47]

 

[fantadomat]

I see a lot of praise for the voice acting, and while some of it is indeed good, most of the voice acting sounds like it's done by nasally fat chicks trying to sound badass while reading off the lines written by tumblr dykes.

This character is soooo badass man, torture doesn't even phase her, locked in a freezer and lost her fingers to frost bite, no big deal it's a snack! Wonder how she ever got taken alive though? And yeah, losing a finger is totally the worse than that could happen.

(and even has the insult "shitlord" unironically used in dialogue.... )

Edit: has my dude rusty_shackleford been F5ing waiting for me to post for hours? He's ready with his silly downdoot less than 2 minutes after I posted in a dormant thread.
New ineptile game, yippee kay yay batman

Hows the writing and voice acting in ATOM though? Oh right, total garbage tier, that's right.

Good enough to fuck your wife and make you a son lol.

 

[Roguey]

This character is soooo badass man, torture doesn't even phase her, locked in a freezer and lost her fingers to frost bite, no big deal it's a snack! Wonder how she ever got taken alive though? And yeah, losing a finger is totally the worse than that could happen.

(and even has the insult "shitlord" unironically used in dialogue.... )

Cassandra Khaw dialogue detected.

La Loca looked pretty cute in Wasteland 2, shame she was turned into a vulgar self-insert. https://wasteland.gamepedia.com/File:Wl2_portrait_drillteam_C.tex.png

 

[JohnSmith24601]

You know your argument is on shaky ground when you’re desperately trying to silence others.

Oh, btw, Dildolos, I thought you said you were leaving the thread? You've said that like twice now. I’m just wondering when you’d make good on that.

 

[DeepOcean]

Ok, finished the game and I can say I had a nice time with it. First InXile game that I can recommend what was a real surprise as I was expecting the worst for this game as Im really, really not a fan of NumaNuma and Wasteland 2. This is the first InXile game that isnt amateurish garbage, it isnt dull and half finished as NumaNuma and Wasteland 2.

Not everything are roses, things like the bad combat balance (I really doubt Fargo if this game had a Q&A team at all or they really didnt play the combat), the lack of individual initiative, , HP inflation, the pratically blind enemies before combat starts, the excessive amount of skill points/attributes per level, the MMO tier item progression, the smaller scope of the game, the bad performance and etc were talked to death on this thread so I wont repeat myself and lets say many good rpgs arent exactly good examples on those areas either.

So, if all the things I mentioned above are bad, why am I recommending the game? Because despite that, there is a core of a solid game in there. The combat is flawed but the itemization is really, really good (no item fever garbage here), there is unique hand placed loot everywhere, the balance between the attributes is also really, really good, there are no dump stats on this game and pretty much all stats are useful to everyone, this would make Sawyer proud but on contrary of PoE, Wasteland 3 is fun to play. The itemization + character building is half the reason to play this game.

The other reason of why people should play this game is that the writing and choices are much better now. I would say that all of sudden, the writing on Wasteland 3 got exponentially clever in comparison with Wasteland 2. No, you wont chase radio towers for 20 hs, no, your ultra badass military rangers wont be wiped out by wild dogs and there isnt exactly a main villain wanting to destroy the world this time. The Patriarch is a very interesting and flawed character and the choice between him and Angela Deth is interesting because both are right, he is a liar and hypocrite but Angela Deth way, way too idealistic with no practical concerns personality that thinks everything is simple is also wrong.

Just to make things clear, this is not a realistic grim dark RPG, there is grim dark edgyness in there but there is alot of whacky stuff too, I was afraid this would be retarded like Borderlands but no, even in the most whacky moments, I could still buy it but if your sensibility for that sort of stuff is high, you might have problems here. Example:

There is a psychopath drug dealer that likes to wear a Santa Claus costume and he has a bunch of slaves wearing cotumes that are his elves that work making his drugs that he keeps under control with collar bombs. He likes to go on radio and sing his advertisement for his "gifts" with a Christimas carol song with custom lyrics as if it was written by a crackhead, this is the most whacky shit I encountered. Yes, if you have zero tolerance to whackiness, this will be a problem but to be fair this is a Wasteland thing at this point.

There are three things I would like to add about the writing. The first is I think this game needed more content for both Angela Deth and the Patriarch make their cases, the Patriarch saves your ass on the begining of the game and it was his proposal to begin with to save the Arizona rangers, his position starts as way too strong and the game doesnt work hard enough to make Angela Deth position more reasonable, her plan is ridiculous and based on only trust when she is dealing with ruthless warlords. She isnt a bad character but there is no real reason to support her.

The second, they dropped the ball with the Patriarch children, all three are weak characters, especially Liberty, her position should also be more reasonable, as things stand now, she is the LOL evil option as the game present her, she looks like a crazy rabid dog than a proper leader figure for Colorado.

The third thing, I dont think the world building of Wasteland 3 comes even closer to something like Fallout New Vegas or Atom for example in terms of being unique. The future 50's america and the gritty soviet post apoc are way more interesting settings, they tried with the 80's Reagan era stuff but I dont think they were successful into making an unique Wasteland setting, Wasteland seems to still be pulling its best stuff from other settings instead of making something unique and sorry, you cant make an entire setting being based on "Whacky TM" as that would be boring beyond belief. I really recommend people to play Beautiful Desolation to see what is an unique pos apoc setting.

Overall, I still think it is an above average RPG and it isn't a waste of time to play it.

 

[Saduj]

You know your argument is on shaky ground when you’re desperately trying to silence others.

You don't even have an argument though. Everything you've said is so subjective it boils down to "For some reason it is easier to use my imagination when I play a different game than when I play this one". Not one example of how the actual game mechanics support what you're saying other than strangely asserting that having more than one player created character turns them into "bots", which is just another weird opinion. And you started out by trumpeting the "story" in ATOM, which is weakest part of that game and compares negatively to Wasteland 3.

If you wanted to make a valid criticism that touches writing, you could have talked about side quest design. ATOM has many quests that involve going to multiple locations and having to figure things out a bit. Most Wasteland 3 quests involve going to one location and either killing a bunch of stuff or clicking on the right dialogue options.

Whether you find it easier to LARP when playing one game or another isn't relevant to other people. You wouldn't be accused of shitting up a thread if you weren't posting nonsense.

 

[Daedalos]

Ok, finished the game and I can say I had a nice time with it. First InXile game that I can recommend what was a real surprise as I was expecting the worst for this game as Im really, really not a fan of NumaNuma and Wasteland 2. This is the first InXile game that isnt amateurish garbage, it isnt dull and half finished as NumaNuma and Wasteland 2.

Not everything are roses, things like the bad combat balance (I really doubt Fargo if this game had a Q&A team at all or they really didnt play the combat), the lack of individual initiative, , HP inflation, the pratically blind enemies before combat starts, the excessive amount of skill points/attributes per level, the MMO tier item progression, the smaller scope of the game, the bad performance and etc were talked to death on this thread so I wont repeat myself and lets say many good rpgs arent exactly good examples on those areas either.

So, if all the things I mentioned above are bad, why am I recommending the game? Because despite that, there is a core of a solid game in there. The combat is flawed but the itemization is really, really good (no item fever garbage here), there is unique hand placed loot everywhere, the balance between the attributes is also really, really good, there are no dump stats on this game and pretty much all stats are useful to everyone, this would make Sawyer proud but on contrary of PoE, Wasteland 3 is fun to play. The itemization + character building is half the reason to play this game.

The other reason of why people should play this game is that the writing and choices are much better now. I would say that all of sudden, the writing on Wasteland 3 got exponentially clever in comparison with Wasteland 2. No, you wont chase radio towers for 20 hs, no, your ultra badass military rangers wont be wiped out by wild dogs and there isnt exactly a main villain wanting to destroy the world this time. The Patriarch is a very interesting and flawed character and the choice between him and Angela Deth is interesting because both are right, he is a liar and hypocrite but Angela Deth way, way too idealistic with no practical concerns personality that thinks everything is simple is also wrong.

Just to make things clear, this is not a realistic grim dark RPG, there is grim dark edgyness in there but there is alot of whacky stuff too, I was afraid this would be retarded like Borderlands but no, even in the most whacky moments, I could still buy it but if your sensibility for that sort of stuff is high, you might have problems here. Example:

There is a psychopath drug dealer that likes to wear a Santa Claus costume and he has a bunch of slaves wearing cotumes that are his elves that work making his drugs that he keeps under control with collar bombs. He likes to go on radio and sing his advertisement for his "gifts" with a Christimas carol song with custom lyrics as if it was written by a crackhead, this is the most whacky shit I encountered. Yes, if you have zero tolerance to whackiness, this will be a problem but to be fair this is a Wasteland thing at this point.

There are three things I would like to add about the writing. The first is I think this game needed more content for both Angela Deth and the Patriarch make their cases, the Patriarch saves your ass on the begining of the game and it was his proposal to begin with to save the Arizona rangers, his position starts as way too strong and the game doesnt work hard enough to make Angela Deth position more reasonable, her plan is ridiculous and based on only trust when she is dealing with ruthless warlords. She isnt a bad character but there is no real reason to support her.

The second, they dropped the ball with the Patriarch children, all three are weak characters, especially Liberty, her position should also be more reasonable, as things stand now, she is the LOL evil option as the game present her, she looks like a crazy rabid dog than a proper leader figure for Colorado.

The third thing, I dont think the world building of Wasteland 3 comes even closer to something like Fallout New Vegas or Atom for example in terms of being unique. The future 50's america and the gritty soviet post apoc are way more interesting settings, they tried with the 80's Reagan era stuff but I dont think they were successful into making an unique Wasteland setting, Wasteland seems to still be pulling its best stuff from other settings instead of making something unique and sorry, you cant make an entire setting being based on "Whacky TM" as that would be boring beyond belief. I really recommend people to play Beautiful Desolation to see what is an unique pos apoc setting.

Overall, I still think it is an above average RPG and it isn't a waste of time to play it.

Very nice and fair review. Kudos to you, sir.

 

[JohnSmith24601]

You know your argument is on shaky ground when you’re desperately trying to silence others.

You don't even have an argument though. Everything you've said is so subjective it boils down to "For some reason it is easier to use my imagination when I play a different game than when I play this one".

It's like you haven't even read anything I've written down. I feel like a broken record repeating my arguments.

 

[Owlish]

15 hours of content. 30 hours of loading screens. 60 American dollars.

 

[Quillon]

15 hours of content. 30 hours of loading screens. 60 American dollars.

quick fix: replace all other loading screens with little vegas ones!

 

[Mortmal]

Sure this game some flaws, but it's actually quite good. So good in fact that even after encountering a game-stopping bug at literally end game,.

Same encountered one gamebreaking bug at yuna speedway, with cordite in party he's challenging a guy, you have two choices killing a slave or modding one of the companions . The machine doesnt work and killing the slave doesnt finish the quest either . It was too good to be true, they had to fuck it up in the end.

 

[GentlemanCthulhu]

This is a surprisingly well-written review (8/10):

https://www.escapistmagazine.com/v2...-shakespearean-narrative-in-a-lifeless-world/

I especailly agree with the part about how the game world is constructed.

It’s difficult to view Colorado as anything other than a collection of bizarre locations for the player’s entertainment, rather than a place where people might actually live. In contrast to, say, the tilled fields of Fallout’s Shady Sands or the caravan drives of New Vegas, which are there almost exclusively for world-building detail, Colorado feels empty and lifeless. You encounter randomized merchants, visit a mine, help out at a bison ranch, rescue a family at a farmstead – all things that point to a wider society and economy, but they don’t feel like they exist apart from the player.

The art direction and presentation are questionable too. While some might dig the brash font, the hugely oversized UI, the blazing blue box around dialogue choices, the ostentatious way the combat grid unfolds over the landscape at the start of battle, the not-quite-cartoon-but-not-quite-real character models, and the oversized location and snow car markers on the world map, I found it all a bit too much. Perhaps it works better on consoles, farther away from the screen, but too often I felt like I was in a post-apocalypse as imagined by NASCAR, rather than playing a true successor to Wasteland or a spiritual successor to Fallout.

Ultimately, Wasteland 3 succeeds on its narrative, choice system, strong characters, and compelling factions. It stumbles in its lifeless world, inconsistent presentation, familiar gameplay, and technical side – it often feels like a snow-themed reskin of Wasteland 2, with many of that title’s limitations and janky systems. Nonetheless, designer Brian Fargo has here made the best post-apocalyptic RPG since Fallout: New Vegas. It’s just not as good as the one he made 23 years ago with Fallout.

Funny thing is, the game STILL managed to garner an 8 out of 10, both from the reviewer and myself, despite this. I think if Fargo spent some time developing the world of Wasteland to be less contrived and more thematically consistent (like how Fallout is!), it could really elevate this series in its next installments.

 

[RapineDel]

You are always incenstivized to open the combat scenarios without talking to NPCs. I believe I missed quite a few dialogue encounters because I chose to open with an RPG shot or a grenade. Otherwise I would be at a huge disadvatange since you will always have full party initiative (you'll get the first turn) when you catch enemies by surprise (and often out of cover) by firing the first shot.

This can be particularly annoying because of the long load times. I'll want to check if there's some dialogue/other options other then a combat encounter and if not i'll have to F9 and sit through another 30+ second loading screen again so I can properly set up for combat.

 

[Comte]

Anybody find that Ronald Reagan car?

 

[SoupNazi]

Anybody find that Ronald Reagan car?

Yeah. It's a fun tidbit and

Spoiler

you can insert his AI into your rover, but unfortunately other than a few quips here and there, and the ending slide for him, they don't do anything with it for the rest of the game. At least as far as I could tell.

 

[markec]

Finished the game and surprisingly its decent and better game then W2. Now to make this clear, I really disliked Wasteland 2, I thought it was mediocre game at best with very few positive things about it. After Torment and Bards Tale I really had no expectations for W3 so I didnt pay much attention to it. But after reading many good impressions on the Codex I got intrigued and decided to try it. At first with with Colorado Springs I started thinking this is a great game and that Inxile really learned from their failures, but the more I played it the more I cooled off.

First the base combat mechanics are decent, even if hp bloat is bad and balance is all over the place. The main issue I have with combat is how the combat encounters are structured. Basically entire game can be described as small arenas connected by looting corridors. This hurts the overall world design as most locations feel like a artificial fighting ground and not a real place. And its not like the arena encounters are something very creative like in Divinity, sure you have times when you can outflank a group, find a side passage and use your skills to your advantage but there is still very little creativity in enemy/terrain placement and AI behavior.

Which moves us to a world design, or lack of it. There are very few locations to find, they dont feel consistent and are lacking in content. Every single town in game is built around main quest and devs put little effort into expanding the world outside it. The locations that are there in game are all quite small (which ironically reflects the amount of time dedicated into building characters) and could have all easily been hubs of a single city. In the end all of this give you the impression that its half finished product, that they hurried to finish the main quest and ship out of the game, while only finishing 70% of it and only 30% of side content.

I also found tone wise the game to be all over the place, problem being that too many times wacky and serious moments clash. Good example being Aspen where you find lots of gore and instead of the game giving you time to soak up the horror and build tension toward first meeting with the leader of the gang, instead for some reason you get constant radio messages from him that sound like a even more wacky version of Handsome Jack. Similar thing is with graphics, there are lots of gore but at the same time the design of characters, equipment and environment is almost cartoonish.

Writing, dialogs and quests are decent just like voice acting, better then in W2 where I found writing going from poor to mediocre, but still nothing special. As said, the problem is that characters are underdeveloped, there is too little information presented to you why you should side with any of the main characters or what justifies their motives in general. There are lots of skill checks which is nice, too bad there are too few side quests.

Also maybe I got jaded with all SJW stuff and I see things that arent there. But this game seems to me to be filled with strong, badass female characters that often need to constantly swear to point out how much badass they are, which I found just cringe worthy.

Now somebody after reading all this bitching might ask how do I consider this game decent and not complete garbage.

Because despite all of its faults, combat is still decent, there are quite a few of interesting quests with lots of skill checks, some locations while small are fun and there are some intriguing characters and stories to find.

If they add more content to the game and polish some faults, this has potential to be a great game. As it is right now its quite decent, almost a good game, but not something I have any urge to replay.

I will still recommend it, If you liked W2 you will love this, if you like me, didnt like W2 even then you will be entertained, just dont have high expectations.

 

[Haplo]

I agree with most of the the above.
Its surprisingly fun and playable, though.
Hm, so like... 7/10?

 

[DeepOcean]

If the game had more content, maybe deserved more than that but the game has what for the main quest? The tutorial mission, The Garden of the Gods mission and the three main missions to capture the Patriarch children. It is very short when you take in consideration that of the three main missions to capture the Patriarch children, Denver is the only one that tries to be a quest hub and the other two are long combat sections.

Actually, most quests are secondary quests but they are very short too, with two or so combat encounters. Colorado Springs, is actually the only proper quest hub in the game, if the other areas were on the same level of Colorado Springs, this could be a great game. I have a suspicion that voice acting has alot to do with it, Wasteland 3 is the first Inxile game that is fully voiced then the game is alot shorter than Wasteland 2? Doesnt seem like coincidence.

Anyway, the game is good enough for me to be curious about the DLC,if they add the cut areas like SteelTown and they are proper quest hubs, it would be pretty nice.

 

[Lhynn]

The way you are framing it at the very least there doesnt seem to be a lot of padding. So thats a plus. I heard a lot of people complain about the game feeling short, which often tends to be a good thing, especially for a 30 hour game.

 

[Haplo]

Well, the Kodiak travels are a bit of a padding... exploration too, but its pretty barren overall. So +/-
The loading screens and multiple area transitions are a real nightmare, though (and I rarely complain about those things, wasn't bothered by PoE 1 & 2 or Kingmaker).

 

[JohnSmith24601]

You are always incenstivized to open the combat scenarios without talking to NPCs. I believe I missed quite a few dialogue encounters because I chose to open with an RPG shot or a grenade. Otherwise I would be at a huge disadvatange since you will always have full party initiative (you'll get the first turn) when you catch enemies by surprise (and often out of cover) by firing the first shot.

This can be particularly annoying because of the long load times. I'll want to check if there's some dialogue/other options other then a combat encounter and if not i'll have to F9 and sit through another 30+ second loading screen again so I can properly set up for combat.

To be fair, that's kind of your fault. Always have everybody in position before you open up the dialogue with your most tanky character. (Preferably one that has an animal bullet sponge companion) Also, when you see a motherfucker dressed up like a deranged dentist and he's tinkering with a dead guy's teeth in a dingy garage, light him the fuck up in the name of the Emperor.

 

[Infinitron]

 

[chemicalnatzy]

If the game had more content, maybe deserved more than that but the game has what for the main quest? The tutorial mission, The Garden of the Gods mission and the three main missions to capture the Patriarch children. It is very short when you take in consideration that of the three main missions to capture the Patriarch children, Denver is the only one that tries to be a quest hub and the other two are long combat sections.

Actually, most quests are secondary quests but they are very short too, with two or so combat encounters. Colorado Springs, is actually the only proper quest hub in the game, if the other areas were on the same level of Colorado Springs, this could be a great game. I have a suspicion that voice acting has alot to do with it, Wasteland 3 is the first Inxile game that is fully voiced then the game is alot shorter than Wasteland 2? Doesnt seem like coincidence.

Anyway, the game is good enough for me to be curious about the DLC,if they add the cut areas like SteelTown and they are proper quest hubs, it would be pretty nice.

Wasn't latest Bard's Tale also fully voiced?

Sent from my Mi A3 using Tapatalk

 

[GloomFrost]

If the game had more content, maybe deserved more than that but the game has what for the main quest? The tutorial mission, The Garden of the Gods mission and the three main missions to capture the Patriarch children. It is very short when you take in consideration that of the three main missions to capture the Patriarch children, Denver is the only one that tries to be a quest hub and the other two are long combat sections.

Actually, most quests are secondary quests but they are very short too, with two or so combat encounters. Colorado Springs, is actually the only proper quest hub in the game, if the other areas were on the same level of Colorado Springs, this could be a great game. I have a suspicion that voice acting has alot to do with it, Wasteland 3 is the first Inxile game that is fully voiced then the game is alot shorter than Wasteland 2? Doesnt seem like coincidence.

Anyway, the game is good enough for me to be curious about the DLC,if they add the cut areas like SteelTown and they are proper quest hubs, it would be pretty nice.

Dragon Age, Original Sin 2, Pillars 2 also fully voiced and they completely destroy W3 by the amount of content. W3 is a short game plain and simple.

 

[Fedora Master]

>Level 10 Toaster Repair

Spoiler

Spoiler

Worth it.