Oh, wow. After returning to this godforsaken place after a couple months, I was expecting to see Hammer & Sickle being talked about like crazy. This thread was on page two! And here's me being naive about all the Oblivion hatred dying away ;D
Anyway, I just got the game yesterday and wanted to post my first impressions. I've been pretty hyped up about this game since whenever it was first mentioned here on the forums, and had pretty high expectations. It's pretty enjoyable, but there's something about it that just doesn't seem very polished; it's not as smooth as I would like it to be, being approached and placed into dialogue mode is sometimes a little jittery. The game auto-recommended Very High everything/2x AF/High AA on my system, but it makes my computer reboot after five minutes of play. Knock the graphics down and I can usually play without problems, but the game looks AWFUL with those jagged edges. This comes from someone who usually sacrifices graphics for speed, extra FPS, and performance without really minding too much.
Combat is pretty fun, but it's not without its gripes, either. In one early mission, I sneaked under a window in crouch-mode and popped up, ready to kill the guy inside. The game, however, won't let me shoot through the window. No problem there - just click on it to open it. But when you open the window, it knocks you back a square, thus putting the guy out of sight. Move forward a square and the window closes. Try to open it again, and it pushes you back again - you get the idea. It put a hamper on my stealthy approach.
Sometimes, you will get shot at by invisible enemies that you can't target. In the previous mission, I killed ALL the enemies - except for Mr. Invisible, who kept taking rifle shots at me. Mr. Invisible also had a line of sight that went from one side of the map to the other. This made leaving the area almost impossible. To leave the area, you had to walk to the edge of the map and click the LEAVE button. You can't be in combat mode when you try to leave. With Mr. Invisible shooting at me, I couldn't exit combat mode.
Sometimes, when assigning ability points, they disappear and take half the tree with them.
Aside from bugs like this, the game is fun. I enjoy the combat tremendously, and the plot doesn't seem too bad so far.
Right now, I'm a little stuck though.
SPOILER:
So, I killed the arms dealer Konrad wanted dead and now have access to his weapons. I didn't find the dynamite. The American chick is in my party and she's pretty good. And now I'm stuck. I imagine I should get papers and ID from Konrad's mother, but when I try to talk to her, she screams about nails in her head and tries to kill me. This makes me think I should get morphine from the doctor and shoot her up, but I don't have the appropriate skill to administer it. I can only travel to the Hamlet. Any suggestions?
