Review Bard's Tale disappoints GameSpot

[littleboy]

so it's mario set in a generic fantisy setting, with no mushroom people to boot, nice

 

[HanoverF]

so it's mario set in a generic fantisy setting, with no mushroom people to boot, nice

Nah, cause for what they are, the Mario games are quite good, this on the other hand...

 

[fnordcircle]

So how come this got a 6.7 but Fable got 9.1 x 1000 golden bananas at almost every site out there?

Review sites are such schills for thier advertisers, it's pathetic.

 

[bizarrofrank]

simplified inventory also means you can't use different weapons on different monsters? talk about severly limiting your tactical options. oh look a ice troll..wait im wielding a frost brand...doh! What strikes me funny is that this game is supposedly for us old gamers that actually bought and played the original game when it came out. The game looks like its gonna be super simplified for maybe the 1st time rpger, with modern references and all. make up your fucking mind has been...

 

[fnordcircle]

What strikes me funny is that this game is supposedly for us old gamers that actually bought and played the original game when it came out.

Where on earth did you get that idea? Just from the title?

Because nothing else anyone has said could lead you to that conclusion. This is supposed to be a BOLD AND DARING NEW TAKE ON RPG CONVENTIONS, not 'Bard's Tale I-III All Grown Up.'

 

[monkey]

I certainly see no reason to look forward to a Wasteland by inXile.

I don't know; if they bring back the entry format they used for the longer dialogue pasages in the original Wasteland (aka a book with a whole bunch of entries, some real, some false), that could have a sort of retro-cool vibe to it.

As long as the whole freakin' environment is as destructible as Wasteland (it seemed you could blow up everything in that game) and they include the Howitzer from Needles, it won't be a total loss... :wink:

 

[Country_Gravy]

I think the whole RPG industry needs a Howitzer. WTF happened?

This is just one more example of a shitty RPG being made and dumbed down for the 12 and under crowd.

I think I am going to just start playing chess instead of cRPGs. At least chess requires some thought.

I'm pissed.

 

[triCritical]

I think the whole RPG industry needs a Howitzer. WTF happened?

Its going down the shitter is what happend. This is probably the first year in at least 15 years that I have not bought a RPG. I am leaning toward bloodlines but its coming close. And I am just an average joe RPG fan..

Frankly, with the exception of a few shareware titles and a couple of gameboy titles the good CRPG, or for the neutral crowd, the nostalgic CRPG is dead. Its really sad. Heck they at least still make true adventure games although only 1-2 a year, but I rather have that many good/nostalgic CRPG's then the a bunch of morphed crappy ones.

 

[taks]

auto-inventory sucks. i didn't realize it would also convert uber cool items to loot in a single whiz-bang. after the auto-level idea, i suppose there will be auto-fight "just enter combat mode and go for a smoke, the game will decide your choices and let you know the outcome!" after that, they'll go for the auto-pilot mode - the game just plays for you... oh wait, we already have that; they call 'em movies.

taks

 

[triCritical]

auto-inventory sucks. i didn't realize it would also convert uber cool items to loot in a single whiz-bang. after the auto-level idea, i suppose there will be auto-fight "just enter combat mode and go for a smoke, the game will decide your choices and let you know the outcome!" after that, they'll go for the auto-pilot mode - the game just plays for you... oh wait, we already have that; they call 'em movies.

taks

That was sort of my take on KotOR. It talked so much about combat, and how it was cinematic. But IMO it was the games worst feature. It essentially was very mundane combat with nifty animations, which will eventually wear off.

Not to mention that your character was very limited in where they could go and what they could do, as far as interactive 3D went. They basically made a StarWars movie with very marginal input.

 

[jiujitsu]

I'm not surprised.

 

[Saint_Proverbius]

Where on earth did you get that idea? Just from the title?

Because nothing else anyone has said could lead you to that conclusion. This is supposed to be a BOLD AND DARING NEW TAKE ON RPG CONVENTIONS, not 'Bard's Tale I-III All Grown Up.'

Part of the hype said it was supposed to appeal to old fans as well as new. With features like the auto-inventory, though, I'm not sure how you can appeal to either.

I think the problem these days is that developers and publishers are catering to the lowest common denominator, thinking players are either too stupid or too lazy to do things for themselves. While pointless micromanagement isn't that fun, having no management at all is even less fun and limits what all you can do in the game. Like bizarrofrank pointed out, having the auto-inventory thing means you can never, ever have rock/paper/scissors resistances on monsters and weapons that do damage types because you're going to end up screwing the player in one way or the other if you do that.

 

[manco]

Yeah, it's like, games are all the same. I mean, you make a dood, then you fight some stuff, there might be cutscenes, some inventory micromanagement. I'd really like a game where you start the game, and the game says "ARE YOU GOOD OR ARE YOU BAD!" and you could say "GOOD!", and then you get a 2 hour movie ending! THATS THE FUTURE!

 

[Sol Invictus]

I guess I'll pass on this one and look at Dungeon Siege 2 instead. That game seems to be a lot closer to Diablo 2 than Dungeon Siege itself.

 

[FireWolf]

I just wish developers would quit making action games when they say they're making rpgs.There was a quite clear divide between RPGs and action titles way back in the day. Now its al real-time combat and streamlined interfaces. I've never felt overwhelmed by a title's interface. By what it expects me to do simply because I've always read a game's manual. To me that's part of the whole gaming experience.

Catering to the lowest common denominator is all well and good for something like bread but when you're specifically targeting a genre it tends to not be a great idea to also try to cater for a completely different audience. If developers want to attract new people to the RPG genre they shouldn't be advertising the points that make their game similar to other genres, but showing off the things that make RPGs different.

Stream-lining, auto-management, dumbing-down... God, even games like DOOM or Half-Life have more inventory management than Fable has to offer I don't see people complaining that the inventories in those games are cluttering and confusing. With all their cutting down on the choices the player has to make, why didnt they just magically give the player the new weapon at the start of each section. Better yet; just improve the weapon they're using already.

 

[RGE]

having the auto-inventory thing means you can never, ever have rock/paper/scissors resistances on monsters and weapons that do damage types because you're going to end up screwing the player in one way or the other if you do that.

I was under the impression that this was controlled by the summoned 'spells' that "each serves a fairly unique purpose", which I think is a better idea than having different weapons for different enemies. And apparently that part was "done pretty well".

I also don't think I'd mind seeing a wolf pelt, and then getting coins instead of a pelt. At least it explains how the bard is getting coins from an animal, something which the Diablo games didn't bother doing (and I didn't care about it then either). But the lack of things to buy for those coins sounds dull, and I didn't see many comments about the importance of dialogue choices that might give the game at least some replay value. I'm pretty sure that a slowpoke such as myself could make a 16 hour game last much longer, but I'm also a cheap bastard, so I'd prefer a 30 hour game that I could sink 60+ hours into.

All in all, I'm still not convinced that the game isn't worth getting when it's released for PC. Chances are that I don't have the same taste in humour as the reviewer, and then all bets are off.

 

[Fez]

Its going down the shitter is what happend. This is probably the first year in at least 15 years that I have not bought a RPG. I am leaning toward bloodlines but its coming close. And I am just an average joe RPG fan..

Same here, for me RPGland has become a barran wasteland, I tend to look back through back catalogues more to see if I missed anything worthwhile than look to the current crop. It's been the worst drought for a while. Hopefully something will appear to spark a new glut of worthy RPGs - and not just poor Diablo clones, thank you.

Despite its action flavour I am still looking forward to Bloodlines, there is a chance it'll be more than Rune with dialogue.

 

[Seven]

To me Bloodlines seems interesting, but I still have nagging doubts. On the one hand it's Troika, but on the other hand it's Troika.