Disciples: Liberation - "a new beginning" for the series

[Lacrymas]

I'm more concerned and appalled that the "digital deluxe edition" gives extra skill points and resources.

 

[Lacrymas]

So, 3 observations right off the bat that will probably ruin the whole game - there are healing spells, healing fountains can be used multiple times, and unused action points heal you for 10% of your health. The first problem is that every fight is self-contained due to healing fountains nullifying any need for resource conservation. The second problem is that even if they didn't, the most efficient tactics would always be to leave the last enemy alive until you can heal up your forces. If there is any appropriate use of Josh Sawyer's "degenerate gameplay" expression, it's here.

 

[Lacrymas]

More impressions - there is literally no explanation what is going on and why we can or should recruit any units at all. You open a portal to some city and you already have 4 pre-built buildings where you can recruit a unit from each faction. However, I don't see why you are given the choice to recruit literal demon worshippers that look like budget Cenobites and actual walking corpses. Then your character just casually says "oh, let's go to the necromancers, I'm sure they'll help us out!"

???

Maybe it's been too long since I've played any Disciples game and I'm totally lost when it comes to the lore, but it still seems like I'm missing some context here.

 

[lukaszek]

doesnt feel like im playing disciples game

writing doesnt match the setting. Setting appears quite grim while dialogs are written around children playing dnd.

More impressions - there is literally no explanation what is going on and why we can or should recruit any units at all. You open a portal to some city and you already have 4 pre-built buildings where you can recruit a unit from each faction. However, I don't see why you are given the choice to recruit literal demon worshippers that look like budget Cenobites and actual walking corpses. Then your character just casually says "oh, let's go to the necromancers, I'm sure they'll help us out!"

the way it goes, if you follow prompts you will head out to lvl3 battles without any army.
Whole start is just weird. You are a good guy? But then you seem to be sent to assassinate some sort of bishop for good reasons? But then it is just for money. Oh and bishop is a good guy taking care of orphans. But then why does do something(whatever that is) with their clothes in the sewer? Why would bishop do anything in sewers at all? So if you are good guy, why tentacles and being teleported to some angelic city(that was my impression). And then you casually start with: we need allies, lets grab necromancers.

Saying that its rollercoaster would be understatement.

 

[Lacrymas]

Yes, the dialogue IS from a typical D&D group! I also liked how our characters don't know who the bishop is or why they are sent to kill him but you have a dialogue option that goes "We are doing the right thing!". Make up your mind, lol.

 

[Infinitron]

Is this going to be an even bigger clown show than King's Bounty 2?

 

[Lacrymas]

It depends on what you mean by clown show. I lost the second fight in the second area you ever go to twice. I'm sure there's a way to beat it if you plan ahead a bit more and grab a different unit, but the enemies have the nasty tendency to force your rogue out of stealth with AoE abilities and that fucks me over quite a lot. I find myself spamming those healing spells I was complaining about, but losing out on damage. It's a death spiral exacerbated by the fact you sometimes (quite frequently) lose control of your units when they drop to low hp. A+ to the developers for having the balls to place such a tough battle at the start of the demo. It's optional, though, and the autosaves are generous.

 

[Lacrymas]

Turns out I'm dumb and you can field more units at level 2 and I just didn't see that. Scratch the last post. Also, the AI cheats. You can't have 2 of the same unit in the backline, but the enemies can.

 

[Rahdulan]

Played the demo. I think the problem is it's not bad enough to point at and laugh so the final result is "this is a mediocre game that works". Having nothing to do with Disciples beyond name drops is what annoys me the most, though. I also have very much the same problem I had with Disciples 3 did in a sense that movement adds practically nothing to combat and they should've just gone back to fixed slots. Disjointed narrative in the opening, if this is a proper game opening, as well as game giving you a taste of the city building... only to throw you out into the wild immediately doesn't really do it any favors. Basically, everyone else summarized it already. Nah.

 

[Whisper]

Is this going to be an even bigger clown show than King's Bounty 2?

I was wondering the same thing.

 

[Peachcurl]

Is this going to be an even bigger clown show than King's Bounty 2?

I would unironically be interested in this as well.

More specifically, I still have hopes that, while no real Disciples game, it may at least be closer to a good King's Bounty sequel than KB2? :/

 

[Lacrymas]

The only interesting thing movement adds is the flanking mechanic which you want to do IF the difficulty is high enough.

 

[ㅤㅤㅤ]

Disciples: American Libtardation might be the worst game I have ever played in its genre. The departure from the initial mechanical conventions of the Disciples games that began with the third entry has reached full retardation. It wants to be King's Bounty, but it does none of the things that made the KB revival work. There is only the one hero and she carries a pocket plane city with her that farts out units whenever they are needed and everything else a Disciples/HoMM city would do. You can heal up after every combat encounter so they are more or less stand-alone and there is no larger strategy the player has to have. Right after booting up the game you become very aware that the developers have no idea what they are doing. Within dialogue you have to press the next button after it has been said and it doesn't autoplay. You also just can't click on enemies to do a basic attack, you need to select an ability every time. The protagonist is awful and there is nothing you can do about it, no customisation at all. The plot is all over the place and seems to be written by several people without any contact with one another, locked into different wagie cages in a Canadian office, and then their boss assembled it all together. Some dialogue is fully voiced, other is not, there is no pattern to it.

The writing is just as bad as the rest of the game. Not only does it look like dogshit, not only is the combat brainless and deprived of anything that makes this genre good, but the writing is dreadful.

"[Liberation] is a dark fantasy, and Avyanna, to us, is a perfect fit in order to drive how dark this world is. I don't want to spoil anything and I really want the player to discover the darkness of Nevendaar, but I think [Avyanna] is spot on [for Liberation] as opposed to a blank slate protagonist. You'll feel more of her personality within the dialogue."

Very dark, only in a meta way instead of the traditional use of the word. The only good thing I can say about this mess is that the people who put the demo out must be fairly brave or stupid as it kills all interest anyone could have had in the game after playing it. Usually people show as little as possible of trainwrecks before launch and try to hype it up in other ways.

 

[ㅤㅤㅤ]

I'm more concerned and appalled that the "digital deluxe edition" gives extra skill points and resources.

The way everything works it feels like it should be a free phone or tablet game and I thought a popup asking if you want to buy in-game currency with real money would fit right at home in the game.

 

[fantadomat]

The departure from the initial mechanical conventions of the Disciples games that began with the third entry has reached full retardation.

Hmmm but the original two were not very good games. The best part about them was the art. The campaigns were very repetitive and the factions were very unbalance and the RPG elements were meh. Still a decent game for its time,but nothing amazing,the russian king's bounty are a lot better games.

 

[Reinhardt]

Big Guy? Seriously? At least make it Big Bad Muthuh or something.

 

[Storyfag]

I don't know which is more terrifying, this:

There is only the one hero and she carries a pocket plane city with her that farts out units whenever they are needed and everything else a Disciples/HoMM city would do.

or the writing sample.

 

[lukaszek]

The only good thing I can say about this mess is that the people who put the demo out must be fairly brave or stupid as it kills all interest anyone could have had in the game after playing it.

true, i did remove it from my wishlist

 

[markec]

Best thing about this and Kings Bounty 2, a two sequels of the franchises I care about, is that I get to save some money by not buying them.

 

[Lacrymas]

When I thought I could only field 1 unit, I was actually excited to try out different combinations of backline and frontline units, as well as tactics, to beat the paladin + priestess fight, but that feeling went away when I realized lvl 2 gives you more frontline unit slots and I haven't felt the desire to fire it up. It just goes to show how difficulty could be a deciding factor.

 

[karoliner]

I played 13 hours of the demo according to steam and finished the two areas available. Things i liked and disliked:

I mostly liked the gameplay, good unit variety and good amount of skills. It plays likes king's bounty or heroes of might & magic. Units skills give them very specific roles. Animation and special effects are well made but uninspired. Iconography is good you can guess what each status effects does just by looking at the icon. Music and sound effects are good.

All units cost leadership points except special characters. You get more leadership by leveling up and castle upgrades. Protagonist can equip weapon, armor, helmet, pants and boots separately. Plus she can cast lots of spells.

To recruit higher tier units you need better reputation with specific faction. You can get aroung this by recruiting mercenaries in the market which are randomly refreshed every 1 hour.

There is a plot i but didn't pay much attention. First you're some mercenary on a assassination contract and then you're recruiting an army. Why?

Artstyle is hit or miss. Enviroments are mostly good but some units are bad. There is a place in the undead lands of an altar with a throne of skulls surrounded by blood. That actually looks great but then you see the undead faction units and they look crap. And the succubus isn't sexy at all!. I think all the females characters should show more skin.

Special characters are either boring or unlikable.

Limited unit customization: special characters can equip 1 weapon and 1 shard. Generic units only 1 shard.

Dialogue is quite something.

 

[Reinhardt]

Looks like she's really into BIG boys.

 

[Archibald]

Vopenvolf

 

[Infinitron]

Fighting for the freedom of Nevendaar requires loyal companions. Get to know some of the diverse cast of characters you’ll be able to recruit during your journey.

 

[Reinhardt]

I miss portraits even more now...