Age of Decadence Reviews

[Vault Dweller]

Currently I have a x1 leveled Mercenary specializing in crossbows, bows, and block as well as alchemy with traps and mercantile (?) as some dump stats to try to save me some health/money in the future. I focused on perception and then constitution, strength, dexterity, and intelligence. No idea how it's going to work out, but I managed to kill an assassin so far, and I may head to Feng's to see about this map and weird sphere.

You need one combat skill so specializing in both bows and xbows is a waste of valuable skill points. You need a free hand to use a shield, which doesn't work with bows/xbows (dodge works much better there, especially when the enemy gets close and you need to disengage). Perception is a good stat, but the main stat for rangers is dexterity. Alchemy is a good skill but you might consider Crafting instead of traps and trading. Basically, Crafting is about better weapons/armor, which you will need, Alchemy is about versatility.

 

[Whisper]

Currently I have a x1 leveled Mercenary specializing in crossbows, bows, and block as well as alchemy with traps and mercantile (?) as some dump stats to try to save me some health/money in the future. I focused on perception and then constitution, strength, dexterity, and intelligence. No idea how it's going to work out, but I managed to kill an assassin so far, and I may head to Feng's to see about this map and weird sphere.

You need one combat skill so specializing in both bows and xbows is a waste of valuable skill points. You need a free hand to use a shield, which doesn't work with bows/xbows (dodge works much better there, especially when the enemy gets close and you need to disengage). Perception is a good stat, but the main stat for rangers is dexterity. Alchemy is a good skill but you might consider Crafting instead of traps and trading. Basically, Crafting is about better weapons/armor, which you will need, Alchemy is about versatility.

About your topic - you can make Crossbowman with shield, just use hand crossbow and shield.
You can even do bowman build with shield, but its trickier, you need to waste 8 AP each turn, and have only 1 quick shot.

p.s.
Off-topic
Just wanted to say thank you for patch in Dungeon rats. Now 4 dex run is possible
Now we can say that game is finishable with ANY combination of skills/stats as long you as invest something in defence skill.

 

[ERYFKRAD]

Vault Dweller I bought your team's game a few weeks ago. I just committed to playing it in earnest last night. Gotta say getting through the tutorial without dying/savescumming felt pretty awesome. I felt like I can do this!, and I haven't really been into video games in years (the high off playing DOOM hot off GOG's servers may have helped). So far the combat can be a little repetitive (though shield bash has been invaluable when my guy cannot get away from a couple enemies), but I know that if I just try not to be two greedy I seem to get through it. Currently I have a x1 leveled Mercenary specializing in crossbows, bows, and block as well as alchemy with traps and mercantile (?) as some dump stats to try to save me some health/money in the future. I focused on perception and then constitution, strength, dexterity, and intelligence. No idea how it's going to work out, but I managed to kill an assassin so far, and I may head to Feng's to see about this map and weird sphere. Amazing job!

Look up Miltiades,, he'll set you up good.

 

[Axie]

 

[Tigranes]

Vault Dweller I bought your team's game a few weeks ago. I just committed to playing it in earnest last night. Gotta say getting through the tutorial without dying/savescumming felt pretty awesome. I felt like I can do this!, and I haven't really been into video games in years (the high off playing DOOM hot off GOG's servers may have helped). So far the combat can be a little repetitive (though shield bash has been invaluable when my guy cannot get away from a couple enemies), but I know that if I just try not to be two greedy I seem to get through it. Currently I have a x1 leveled Mercenary specializing in crossbows, bows, and block as well as alchemy with traps and mercantile (?) as some dump stats to try to save me some health/money in the future. I focused on perception and then constitution, strength, dexterity, and intelligence. No idea how it's going to work out, but I managed to kill an assassin so far, and I may head to Feng's to see about this map and weird sphere. Amazing job!

VD's comments apply for the optimal character, but there is plenty of flexibility, e.g. alchemy can be fine. The golden rule for most characters is definitely 1 weapon skill, though. The synergies might tempt you to go for two, but usually most AOD characters will use one weapon type forever.

 

[Giauz Ragnacock]

You need one combat skill so specializing in both bows and xbows is a waste of valuable skill points. You need a free hand to use a shield, which doesn't work with bows/xbows (dodge works much better there, especially when the enemy gets close and you need to disengage). Perception is a good stat, but the main stat for rangers is dexterity. Alchemy is a good skill but you might consider Crafting instead of traps and trading. Basically, Crafting is about better weapons/armor, which you will need, Alchemy is about versatility.

I won't have a chance to play past this point until Sunday, but my thinking is that perception is a great skill for both defence and offence (something about helping me hit more) and then I have my 50 HP meat shield. Dexterity is not too far behind as well as strength and inteligence for a decent alchemy score. I plan to fight ranged with a bow, switch to a shield when running out of AP to eat the return fire, throw chemicals to act as my "party members", and shieldbash and shotgu- I mean crossbow to the throat anyone getting too handsy. I wanted a character that could fight combats in a variety of ways and hopefully get some reward if only a big battle where the last guy barely alive manages to kick the ever-loving shit out of what's left of me because of what I did to his men. Then I would start some other SoIaF or Berserk-inspired character- whatever best serves a magnificent bastard persona. Thanks again for the game and making it so it could run on a 5-year old non-gaming laptop (I'm a new homeowner now and really don't have that much cash).

 

[Lithium Flower]

You need one combat skill so specializing in both bows and xbows is a waste of valuable skill points. You need a free hand to use a shield, which doesn't work with bows/xbows (dodge works much better there, especially when the enemy gets close and you need to disengage). Perception is a good stat, but the main stat for rangers is dexterity. Alchemy is a good skill but you might consider Crafting instead of traps and trading. Basically, Crafting is about better weapons/armor, which you will need, Alchemy is about versatility.

I won't have a chance to play past this point until Sunday, but my thinking is that perception is a great skill for both defence and offence (something about helping me hit more) and then I have my 50 HP meat shield. Dexterity is not too far behind as well as strength and inteligence for a decent alchemy score. I plan to fight ranged with a bow, switch to a shield when running out of AP to eat the return fire, throw chemicals to act as my "party members", and shieldbash and shotgu- I mean crossbow to the throat anyone getting too handsy. I wanted a character that could fight combats in a variety of ways and hopefully get some reward if only a big battle where the last guy barely alive manages to kick the ever-loving shit out of what's left of me because of what I did to his men. Then I would start some other SoIaF or Berserk-inspired character- whatever best serves a magnificent bastard persona. Thanks again for the game and making it so it could run on a 5-year old non-gaming laptop (I'm a new homeowner now and really don't have that much cash).

You would still be spreading your combat skills too thin, I'm afraid. Thankfully, there are a lot of long-range crossbows to accommodate your weapon switching strat. Just axe the bow skill and keep that hand crossbow+shield combo for up close, and use a heavier crossbow for long range. Not sure how well you will fare against other ranged enemies due to your lack of dodge skills, but other than that it sounds like a fun build that might be viable.

 

[MRY]

So I'm reading through this interview that Arnold Hendricks (Darklands and Barbarian Prince, the latter being a key inspiration for Fallen Gods) recently did on Steam, and came across two salient things:

(1) He has Dungeon Rats. (This was from looking at his Steam profile; he doesn't mention it. He's put in 561 hours on CK2.)
(2)

Third, an "early quests" tutorial mechanism should be present to teach players the game in easy stages, with programmed-in rewards along the way. There are WAY better ways of learning to swim (or play games) than just tossing the player into the deep end and calling out "good luck" as they trash and drown. The game should also have a library of pre-generated adventurers for building a party, which achievements for keeping weaker adventurers alive!

It's pretty interesting stuff, and not a long read.

 

[Lurker King]

Third, an "early quests" tutorial mechanism should be present to teach players the game in easy stages, with programmed-in rewards along the way. There are WAY better ways of learning to swim (or play games) than just tossing the player into the deep end and calling out "good luck" as they trash and drown. The game should also have a library of pre-generated adventurers for building a party, which achievements for keeping weaker adventurers alive!

Nobody will deny that presenting things easier at the beginning would increase the sales. The real questions are:

(1) Can you make the tutorial easy enough so that even a causal can succeed?

(2) Would this make the game better, or it’s just a gimmick to attract new players, i.e., is it making the game worse?

I think that the answer to (1) is “no”, you can’t make a causal to succeed in games like AoD or DR without ruining the systems completely, so it’s a pointless investment. Either you follow to this path consistently and start making games like Obsidian and Harebrained, or your stick to what you really want to do and don’t disappoint your core audience.

The answer to (2) is also a “no”. This would only make the game worse and it’s gamey as fuck. The world is not like a swimming lesson for the most part and the game world shouldn’t be present that way because you are not a child. I don’t know about others, but at least for me, one the main attractions of games like AoD and Gothic is that they have a steep learning curve. I got rooked instantly. You removed that to improve your sales and you ruin the whole experience.

 

[VentilatorOfDoom]

I also have an opinion on this.

1) it will turn out to be impossible to make a tutorial awesome enough to teach every last dimwit to succeed at AoD combat. Most people either don't have the stamina (i.e. dying 2-3 times->ragequit) or lack the brains (i.e. trying again and again for 50 times but never actually changing their approach yet expecting different results). In my first playthru I restarted Teron several times because I had to adjust my approach/stats/skill point distribution/order of quests. Not that this would have been necessary to progress in the game but I wanted to do the maximum things available there and thus had to start over 3 or 4 times. How many casuals are willing to spend the first 10h in the game doing that until they find the optimum route thru Teron for that particular char?

2) It's possible to cater to casuals and hardcore audience alike at the same time tho when it comes to combat. Take Mass Effect for example. Only 4% of players completed ME3 on insanity. ME3 was way easier than ME2 on insanity too, so I assume it was even less than that in ME2. Yet those games also include a "narrative" difficulty setting that even the most casual of casuals should be able to handle. So, as I see it, your choice as a developer is to either cater to the unskilled by providing lower difficulty settings or to tell them "good fucking riddance."
For the record, I'm not convinced including lower difficulty modes would ruin the experience. I don't care what story mode plays like when I only ever played the highest difficulty setting.

 

[PlanHex]

I think you guys are ignoring what he's actually saying and the context.
He's talking about Darklands, which plops you out like a naked baby in the woods with no starting quest other than "be an adventurer".
Between the vignettes, Feng's quest, Dellar's quests and the first quest for the factions, the "early quests" stuff is covered pretty well by AoD. The default characters for each of the backgrounds (except drifter of course) are also fine as pre-generated characters.
Comparing the two in this manner is silly. Not like you can run around the map screen looking for random encounters in AoD.

 

[Lurker King]

In my first playthru I restarted Teron several times because I had to adjust my approach/stats/skill point distribution/order of quests. Not that this would have been necessary to progress in the game but I wanted to do the maximum things available there and thus had to start over 3 or 4 times. How many casuals are willing to spend the first 10h in the game doing that until they find the optimum route thru Teron for that particular char?

This is another dumb down and gamey feature that we take for granted in cRPGs: the fights should be presented to you in a specific order to avoid that you should have the trouble to choose which fight is more suitable to your current level.

2) It's possible to cater to casuals and hardcore audience alike at the same time tho when it comes to combat. Take Mass Effect for example. Only 4% of players completed ME3 on insanity. ME3 was way easier than ME2 on insanity too, so I assume it was even less than that in ME2.

This doesn’t work. The harder difficult in these games don’t really make them more challenging in any meaningful way, just longer and even more boring. Harder levels in popamole games usually amounts to enemies with higher HPs, doing more damage, etc. It doesn’t improve the AI, fix a broken combat system or anything like that. I bet that those miserable 3% that choose insanity were probably desperate to have more challenge, but they made a terrible mistake. When the combat system and encounter design are broken, you should choose the easiest path to finish it as soon as possible. It’s like playing Arcanum. You should choose a mage and spam "harm" all the time, because it’s such a bore otherwise.

 

[Lurker King]

I think you guys are ignoring what he's actually saying and the context. He's talking about Darklands, which plops you out like a naked baby in the woods with no starting quest other than "be an adventurer". Between the vignettes, Feng's quest, Dellar's quests and the first quest for the factions, the "early quests" stuff is covered pretty well by AoD. The default characters for each of the backgrounds (except drifter of course) are also fine as pre-generated characters. Comparing the two in this manner is silly. Not like you can run around the map screen looking for random encounters in AoD.

You can have a f1 screen explaining the skills and other stuff like a game manual. There is no need for other tutorials, or special quests. The early quests in AoD are far from being a tutorial. If they involve fights, they are deadly. One bad build, poorly placed item or bad positioning is all that it takes to make causals die and ragequit.

 

[PlanHex]

That's not the point. In Darklands, you just start with no idea what you're supposed to be doing. He'd want to fix this by adding some starter quests that introduce the game, giving you some early goals to work toward with various incentives. Sounds like he means something exactly like the vignettes. It has nothing to do with how easy or difficult the combat is once you get going and my point is that AoD already does this.
He also mentions more pre-generated characters, as the game only has a single party of 4 people that are always the same, but AoD has one for each vignette, so that gets a checkmark too.

 

[Jason Liang]

VD is probably on this already, but I found that AoD compared well to Darklands in terms of having well-designed weapon/ armor systems. What AoD could probably have used from Darklands was Darklands encouraged fighters to carry and develop skill in a variety of weapons- Hammers against armor, flails against shields etc... whereas AoD is much less intuitive in that you shouldn't even pick up both a melee and a ranged skill- you're better off with only one, despite the "synergy" mechanic.

Were I designing a weapon system, cribbing from both AoD and Darklands, I would do a couple of things. I'd start with AoD's system, but try to balance the aimed shots a little bit better (so that head shots/ arterial strikes aren't vastly superior to everything else in the endgame, basically). While I would keep the flexibility of each weapon being able to perform most of the different attacks, I'd make them better at some and worse at others, so it's no longer best to use one weapon for every situation. Finally, I'd add skills that adds a small amount of points to all weapons like Light Weapons, Heavy Weapons, Martial Weapons, Rogue Weapons etc...

That and do something about the nets and bolas. They should be difficult to throw long distance, but if you try to throw them at melee range, they should trigger some sort of attack of opportunity.

 

[Fenix]

There are WAY better ways of learning to swim (or play games) than just tossing the player into the deep end and calling out "good luck" as they trash and drown.

Yeah, but my cousin teached my brother to swim just like that.
It is a fun and the best way to teach someone something.

 

[Goral]

lol
This steam review is something else: http://steamcommunity.com/profiles/76561197989737094/recommended/230070/

Game does bring some of the nostalgy back, times of Might and Magic series and even earlier.
But, the game corners you with being totally not user friendly. I could find a lot of things in first city only because I read guide on how to find them. Second city I played without any guides, and it is so frustrating to find any points of interest. There is nothing written about where slums are, I am not sure why I would want to get to palace, or arena. So after wandering for an hour and not finding slums that are needed for my questline, I give up.

 

[Lurker King]

 

[Goral]

Positive review which isn't positive at all: http://steamcommunity.com/profiles/76561198018847741/recommended/230070/

This guy has written so many lies it's not even funny.

Cons:

•You can play AOD on only ONE difficulty setting, and let me tell you, it can be difficult. You will die. A LOT.

•Combat can be frustrating. You will almost always find yourself outnumbered, and you won’t have any controlled-NPCs join you in your quest, so you’re almost always fighting alone. There are battles where you have AI-controlled NPCs on your team, but they can be pretty hopeless since you can’t control them at all.

•There is a huge shortage of alchemical items to create potions, bombs etc. Merchants don’t get restocked for a long time and ingredients in the wild are hard to come by. This gets a little ridiculous when you’re fighting alone almost all the time and when these items can level the playing field.

•You cannot improve your base stats. For e.g. if you generate a character with 40hp, he/she will ALWAYS have 40hp. Not sure if I like this system.

•You cannot drink healing potions in battle. The tutorial says it’s unrealistic to do this while fighting, but you do have quick access belt pouches that let you switch out certain items for 0 action points, so why not heal during battle? This feature makes battles unnecessarily difficult.

•While you cannot save in the turn-based combat system, the game auto-saves at critical points, so if you get killed, you can reload and try a different strategy.

•Not everything is clickable in the game world. Not all doors work. Only certain items can be interacted with. This is why games like Fallout and Jagged Alliance are superior – you can interact with almost every door, and most items.

•There are also some weird bugs in the game. Some quests don’t register the response you give, yet allow you to complete it. Then when you return to the quest giver (e.g. 2nd quest in Hector sub-plot) for the reward, they ignore you. Camera scrolling is also not consistent. Sometimes it gets “stuck,” and you have to move the camera forward/backward before it can side-scroll again, which is pretty annoying.

•The quest tracking system can be improved. There are no notes on who/where a certain NPC is, if you happen to lose track of your open quests (there can be quite a few). You also cannot make notes in your journal or annotate your map.
AOD is a fun game that happens to be marred by some lack of attention to the details above. It has pretty good replayability, but falls short of being one of the great ones. I’d recommend buying it only with a decent discount (50% or more).

6.5/10.0

In short, another guy butthurt that when he clicks on the enemy he doesn't just die but in fact he retaliates. And yeah, auto-save is a con, lol.

 

[ERYFKRAD]

Also people cannot differentiate between salves and potions.

 

[Old One]

How do we design a tutorial simple enough for someone like that? It's impossible.

 

[Jason Liang]

He still gave AoD 6.5 out of 10 though. That's quite a generous score for AoD.

 

[Goral]

Recent GOG reviews:

Quite simply the single worst RPG I believe I have EVER played.Indeed, the only positive thing I can say about this game, is that I'm glad it was on sale when I bought it. Even then, I still feel I've wasted money on an absolutely awful game.It's so badly designed and conceived, it beggars belief. An illusion of choice in that unless you follow specific character builds, you're destined for failure at practically every corner. That means little to no choice at all, much randomness, events and outcomes you're channelled or forced into, usually with no alternatives but to fight a battle that you will inevitably lose.This game really shouldn't be considered an RPG, because there is no role-playing involved. Yes, you have the freedom to choose how you build and develop your character, but unless you do so in specific ways deemed appropriate by the skill checks for each situation, it's an utter waste of time.Build character class A in a specific way, follow story path A in a specific way. Build character class B in a specific way, follow story path B in a specific way. Rinse and repeat.Through the 80's, 90's and 00's until the present day, I've played a plethora of good, bad and sometimes downright ugly RPG games, but this is hands down the only one that has compelled me to vent about how simply awful it is.
1/5

I hate to say it but, this game seems a lot less like an RPG than an adventure game with the illusion of choices. It's extremely text heavy, and it seems that certain skills are virtually essential to completing the game (i.e. lore). So, a lot of possible character builds appear to actually be inviable, and if you paint yourself into a corner, so to speak, you'll have no alternative but to restart the game.Unimpressive graphics. Also, load times are a pain. They're only 10-20 seconds, but when you have to savescum your way through practically every combat encounter, it is unpleasant.
2/5

:D :D :D

 

[Commissar Draco]

Recent GOG reviews:

Quite simply the single worst RPG I believe I have EVER played.Indeed, the only positive thing I can say about this game, is that I'm glad it was on sale when I bought it. Even then, I still feel I've wasted money on an absolutely awful game.It's so badly designed and conceived, it beggars belief. An illusion of choice in that unless you follow specific character builds, you're destined for failure at practically every corner. That means little to no choice at all, much randomness, events and outcomes you're channelled or forced into, usually with no alternatives but to fight a battle that you will inevitably lose.This game really shouldn't be considered an RPG, because there is no role-playing involved. Yes, you have the freedom to choose how you build and develop your character, but unless you do so in specific ways deemed appropriate by the skill checks for each situation, it's an utter waste of time.Build character class A in a specific way, follow story path A in a specific way. Build character class B in a specific way, follow story path B in a specific way. Rinse and repeat.Through the 80's, 90's and 00's until the present day, I've played a plethora of good, bad and sometimes downright ugly RPG games, but this is hands down the only one that has compelled me to vent about how simply awful it is.
1/5

I hate to say it but, this game seems a lot less like an RPG than an adventure game with the illusion of choices. It's extremely text heavy, and it seems that certain skills are virtually essential to completing the game (i.e. lore). So, a lot of possible character builds appear to actually be inviable, and if you paint yourself into a corner, so to speak, you'll have no alternative but to restart the game.Unimpressive graphics. Also, load times are a pain. They're only 10-20 seconds, but when you have to savescum your way through practically every combat encounter, it is unpleasant.
2/5

:D :D :D

Drop the N-Bombs Exterminate them all.

 

[Old One]

I think we have enough data to identify a pattern: AoD is extremely unpopular among people who are compelled to voice an opinion despite not knowing what they're talking about.