ELEX ELEX II - Jax is back

[Modron]

 

[ERYFKRAD]

Still overpriced i see. Well time to wait on big sale to invest into this brahmin dungo.

No no, overpriced was urmom.

 

[Major_Blackhart]

So how is my waifu Nasty?

 

[rusty_shackleford]

Added safety mechanism for Skibor if he did not go to Irissa after he had guided Jax to the depot

this is the third time they've supposedly fixed the same issue now fyi

 

[VonMiskov]

I put around 24 hours in it.

It's a downgrade in almost every aspect compared to the first Elex which wasn't a masterpiece either.
- The plot is basically a copy of the first game with minor changes.

- You should play the first one to have at least some understanding of the world but in the end it doesn't really matter because if you played the first one you will be confused wtf happened in the mean time. Why an outlaw is leader of Berserkers, what happened to Clerics, overall what happened between E1 and E2, it's never really explained. Maybe it's all in the manual but boy am I bad at reading manuals.

- The factions shifted and new major powers are Berserkers who are now ex-Outlaw hippies and not technology hating mages. Albs are still Swedes with eugenics not banned, and Morkons are fallout like vault idiots. They are a major faction but mostly staying in their bunker. Clerics and Outlaws are now minor factions. There're also Claws but it's just thieves guild without skill tree connected to them although they are written like some kind of shadow puppet masters.

- Berserkers and Morkons have most quests to join the faction while Albs are having literaly one quest to join them. Lol. They run out of writing steam after these two first factions.

- Combat is laughably bad. Range combat is shit with enemies having hectic movement and some weapons having magic autoaim bullets (shotguns) and some not (rifles and bows).
Melee combat is god. You can find a shield that negates all damage. The game is trivial with it. I have abundance of healing items. While in E1 I struggled with combat (still being shitty implemented in it). Here I just waltz through enemies. Even without the shield you just roll back and attack an enemy and repeat.

- I did almost all side quest and didn't join a faction. Because of how the combat is done I don't know if magic is worth anything. My advice is put most attribute points in strength, condition and dexterity and skills in health, health regen and stamina regen. The rest of skills are almost useless and very situational.

- There is a ton of quest that will make you run through half a map to just escort someone or run from point A to B to A to B. There is a quest to escort one Morkon - Ivan from Berserk Fort to their Grotto and that fucker takes you through half the map chatting, even with a picnic half way through.

- Most of your companions are brain dead. And will just stand and watch you fight. If they are range combat companions they will shoot once in a minute. The only responsive ones were Falk who mostly melee and Caja. The rest just drool.

- There are probably just 3 patterns for enemies so almost all enemies are just reskins. Trolls, Patrons, Molochs, Giants etc. have the same pattern of attack.

- The performance in major towns is just abysmal. And sometimes the character is just unresponsive to commands. Sometimes you can cancel animations and sometimes not.

What I like:

- Exploration. I just like running through ruins but that's subjective.

- Not all quests are shit, some are decent, have an illusion of choice but probably it wouldn't matter in the end game. Just feel good that I can rat someone out or help him out.
And there is a ton of reactivity - if I did something prior to getting a quest Jax will acknowledge that or comment. There was a lot of love and effort put into that in otherwise shitty to mediocre game.
Very often after finishing a quest you will experience some aftermath, a scene of it, like people commenting about something you've done or just meeting people you did a quest that somehow affected them and seeing how it ended. That's something I rarely see in rpgs. But it's just a cherry on a cake made of shit.

 

[soulburner]

One thing I've noticed that's pretty cool. If you approach two NPCs who are talking to each other and it's something important you might also want to hear and you come up to one of them to initiate dialog, they will say something like "I'll be with you in a minute, hang on" and then smoothly continue the chat with that other NPC. I'm not sure I've noticed something like that in other RPGs I've played. Also, NPCs sometimes talk about things Jax did, makes the world feel a little more alive than it really is.

I'm gonna say something controversial. I liked the combat in Elex 1. I liked the combos, properly timing them to achieve the best damage and it somehow felt 'right'. When I hit an enemy, it looked like I really hit an enemy. In Elex 2 I kind of feel like my attacks are only reducing health/stamina, with no actual reaction to pain by the enemies/monsters, unless stunned.

Probably the most incomprehensible thing in the game is the flashlight. I mean... where is this light coming from? It's slightly behind and above Jax, because if you turn the camera around, you can shine the light on his forehead (but this might be a side effect of the static camera mod).

There is no sense of danger. The aliens invaded the planet and everyone's like "oh, the aliens are here, but whatever".

Also, I can't help but feel this game would be a lot better if we weren't Jax but some other guy. Rising in ranks within the factions from scratch feels weird, and the explanation that Jax spent an unknown amount of years in self isolation doesn't compute.

So far, I like the game a lot. I'm not sure if I like it more or less than Elex 1, but it's a very solid experience with a big "just one more quest before bed" syndrome. As much as I want to wait and hope for a performance update, I can't stop playing.

 

[Modron]

There is no sense of danger. The aliens invaded the planet and everyone's like "oh, the aliens are here, but whatever".

Probably doesn't help that there are only like 70 aliens in the whole world in chapter 1 at least (less if you don't count quests that spawn them), they should have had devastated smaller settlements/camps littered with corpses and lesser aliens throughout the world.

 

[Darth Roxor]

You should play the first one to have at least some understanding of the world but in the end it doesn't really matter because if you played the first one you will be confused wtf happened in the mean time. Why an outlaw is leader of Berserkers, what happened to Clerics, overall what happened between E1 and E2, it's never really explained. Maybe it's all in the manual but boy am I bad at reading manuals.

feels to me like you're bad at reading in general because what exactly is so hard to get about, for example, 'the clerics got booted by the albs'

anyway, i'm pretty sure the murky explanation as to what happened between the two games is their attempt to reconcile all the ways ELEX 1 could be played through, simply by not mentioning them too much to avoid defining too many 'canon' elements from the first game

 

[Peachcurl]

Added safety mechanism for Skibor if he did not go to Irissa after he had guided Jax to the depot

this is the third time they've supposedly fixed the same issue now fyi

At this point, I wouldn't be surprised if you intentionally killed skibor in your game.

 

[lukaszek]

There is a quest to escort one Morkon - Ivan from Berserk Fort to their Grotto and that fucker takes you through half the map chatting, even with a picnic half way through.

Spoiler

and then he comes back! Imagine my surprise when he did it on his own

 

[Angelo85]

Added safety mechanism for Skibor if he did not go to Irissa after he had guided Jax to the depot

this is the third time they've supposedly fixed the same issue now fyi

At this point, I wouldn't be surprised if you intentionally killed skibor in your game.

Well third times' the charm. My issue with Skibor has been resolved now with Patch 3 and I can finally continue to play. Happy!

 

[VonMiskov]

feels to me like you're bad at reading in general because what exactly is so hard to get about, for example, 'the clerics got booted by the albs'

anyway, i'm pretty sure the murky explanation as to what happened between the two games is their attempt to reconcile all the ways ELEX 1 could be played through, simply by not mentioning them too much to avoid defining too many 'canon' elements from the first game

Don't worry I'm able to read just fine. It's PB who can't write for shit. Suddenly Berserks who hated all technology made war with outlaws but let Rat be a leader of them and let Outlaw keep their guns. Albs lost, were fucked by Jax "killing" Hybrid but were able to destroy Clerics somehow. LOL. And Morkons who will C L E A N S E the world but are affraid of leaving their cave, have to resort to kidnapping people, torture them to submission, have problems with food, have laws that loosing people is bad because of B A L A N C E, yet have a faction that is responsible for killing not effective people. LOL. Yep. Great writing.

 

[Darth Roxor]

I haven't been to zerktown or moletown yet so I can't comment on that, but your point about the clerics is dumb. It's stressed multiple times over already in ELEX 1 that the clerics are on the edge of extinction, which is why they have to rely so much on combat bots to do everything, and it keeps biting them in the ass all the time as well (faulty AI turning berserk, bots being taken over by Albs, etc.). I was always under the impression that the Albs could just go ahead and steamroll them at any point and the only thing stopping them was perhaps that the cleric HQ was hidden.

So in the end the Albs went ahead and steamrolled them.

 

[Faarbaute]

And Morkons who will C L E A N S E the world but are affraid of leaving their cave, have to resort to kidnapping people, torture them to submission, have problems with food, have laws that loosing people is bad because of B A L A N C E, yet have a faction that is responsible for killing not effective people. LOL. Yep. Great writing.

This is giving me real The Omega Man vibes. Looking forward to it.

 

[VonMiskov]

And yet in Elex 2 Albs are exjunkies suffering from elex withdrawal, while their Ice Palace and elex extractors destroyed, they are forced to find themselves in new situation.

Also: There is suppose to be alien invasion but no one gives a fuck while talking how they will destroy other faction (Albs and Morkons) or have to defend themselves from attacks (Berserks) from Morkons* while being the most successful major faction controling most people and land.
*In the same time you as PC are told that Morkons wouldn't do it and it was some rebels but when you are in Morkon's HQ you are told that they want to kill all life.

 

[lukaszek]

albs faction looks like military camp on the move, could probably wipe every other faction with their bots.

clerics are in some ruins and in general look like wouldnt be able to defend themselves from anyone. Yet during story time they throw attacks with sophisticated robots and you wonder whether they pulled them out of their assess somehow.

In general those late story missions with factions attacking other factions are quite disconnected. Seriously, where did those troops come from. Skyrim had more believable world building

 

[soulburner]

Is Elex 2 available through GeForce Now?

 

[rusty_shackleford]

Added safety mechanism for Skibor if he did not go to Irissa after he had guided Jax to the depot

this is the third time they've supposedly fixed the same issue now fyi

At this point, I wouldn't be surprised if you intentionally killed skibor in your game.

I tried, he's marked immortal and your attacks go through him + he doesn't respond.

 

[rusty_shackleford]

feels to me like you're bad at reading in general because what exactly is so hard to get about, for example, 'the clerics got booted by the albs'

But it's not explained how at all. Albs were left devastated at the end of Elex and they're basically just a small military camp in E2. How did they destroy the clerics so thoroughly?


Furthermore, I simply dislike that they forced so much of the story on me despite it never being close to what I would have done with my Jax from ELEX. It feels like I'm playing someone else's save.

 

[Darth Roxor]

Furthermore, I simply dislike that they forced so much of the story on me despite it never being close to what I would have done with my Jax from ELEX. It feels like I'm playing someone else's save.

I get similar impressions at times, which is kind of funny, because it's an indirect praise of the non-linearity of ELEX 1. PB have been doing this shit since forever and nobody complained about it e.g. in Gothic 2, because there were much fewer avenues for player choice in Gothic 1.

 

[Darth Roxor]

guys i believe i may have triggered our special friend adddeed

 

[adddeed]

Nah you're just a moron and i feel obliged to reward you when i come accross your posts.

 

[HoboForEternity]

feels to me like you're bad at reading in general because what exactly is so hard to get about, for example, 'the clerics got booted by the albs'

But it's not explained how at all. Albs were left devastated at the end of Elex and they're basically just a small military camp in E2. How did they destroy the clerics so thoroughly?


Furthermore, I simply dislike that they forced so much of the story on me despite it never being close to what I would have done with my Jax from ELEX. It feels like I'm playing someone else's save.

For the clerics, they mostly self destruct because most of the member found out what calaan is actually is. Some still stand by its philosophy outside of the god, but for most people, if their god is utterly debunked, they are gonna left. Cleric was already in a bad shape in elex 2, the void left but the mass loss of faith and followers left them vulnerable even to weakened alb.

 

[Lyre Mors]

There's plenty of logical reasons for why the different factions do what they do, which become ever more apparent the more you delve into their particular situations through exploration and questing. A lot of things that don't seem to make sense initially are explained the further into the game you get. Despite there being some missteps here and there, this makes for overall good writing and world building for an RPG. Someone unwilling to pay attention to details and allow the game world to slowly reveal itself is going to get frustrated, but this is why we can't have nice things.

 

[Lyre Mors]

Oh, and on the topic of the lack of urgency in regards to the aliens: it has made sense to me so far in Chapter 1 because when the game starts, it's only been a couple of days since it happened. While the aliens appear to be hostile to humanity, no serious skirmishes have really occurred yet between them and the spread out communities (that I've seen or heard about, anyway). Seems like these loose and sparsely populated factions are fairly reasonable to wait a bit and observe what the invaders are doing before they rush out to fight them and possibly hasten their own deaths. And of course they are more invested at that point in their conflicts with one another. Yeah, this part is stupid, particularly from an outside perspective, but you know, people are fucking stupid, so I guess that's why it hasn't really created much of a sense of dissonance for me.