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Lands of Lore - the Throne of Chaos

Zboj Lamignat

Arcane
Joined
Feb 15, 2012
Messages
5,520
The beta for Age of Decadence turned out to be pretty meh imo and so the Legend of Grimrock became my solid (and only) candidate for crpg GOTY.

The guys making that game today announced that it reached gold and so instead of :bounce:I decided to play some real time crawler and practice, preferably one I never tried before. I heard that LoL is supposed to be decline (I mean, look at that acronym), but anyway I installed the cd version and goddamn, I'm having quite a blast. Yes, the crpg mechanics are very basic, but the game has so much charm to it. And it looks absolutely awesome, definitely one of the best looking VGA titles I've seen. Love the music and voice acting as well.

I picked the furryfag guy and I'm getting my ass kicked by pretty much everything. He was supposed to be dodging blows, at least that's what he said to convince me to pick him, but somehow he doesn't.

Are part II and III really as shit as they say? I remember trying out II back when it came out, but can't recall my impressions.
 

Fens

Ford of the Llies
Joined
Nov 3, 2009
Messages
1,899
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pitcairn
it's a fun game and it doesn't take itself all that seriously, but without resorting to retarded "look at me, i'm funneh" jokes. there are hard enemies blocking your way, there are puzzles to solve and there is loot to... well... loot. also: decent length.

out of the three LoLs the first one has aged best. the hand drawn stuff still looks great, the animations are fluid and the interface does what it should and isn't in the way.



don't throw away green weapons
 

Aeschylus

Swindler
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Phleebhut
Divinity: Original Sin Project: Eternity Wasteland 2 Divinity: Original Sin 2
The beta for Age of Decadence turned out to be pretty meh imo and so the Legend of Grimrock became my solid (and only) candidate for crpg GOTY.

The guys making that game today announced that it reached gold and so instead of :bounce:I decided to play some real time crawler and practice, preferably one I never tried before. I heard that LoL is supposed to be decline (I mean, look at that acronym), but anyway I installed the cd version and goddamn, I'm having quite a blast. Yes, the crpg mechanics are very basic, but the game has so much charm to it. And it looks absolutely awesome, definitely one of the best looking VGA titles I've seen. Love the music and voice acting as well.

I picked the furryfag guy and I'm getting my ass kicked by pretty much everything. He was supposed to be dodging blows, at least that's what he said to convince me to pick him, but somehow he doesn't.

Are part II and III really as shit as they say? I remember trying out II back when it came out, but can't recall my impressions.
Combat in the early part of the game is pretty challenging, but you get stronger quickly, particularly if you get good at magic. Oh, and I don't think the cat thing is particularly good at dodging, but it gets to act faster than any of the other characters. Never played the other two games.

Oh, and Fens, you actually
don't need the green weapons as long as you hold onto the cube and do the tower before breaking the barrier. It's way, way easier.
 

groke

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SAVE THIS CHARACTER? NO.
Codex 2013 Codex 2014 PC RPG Website of the Year, 2015 Codex 2016 - The Age of Grimoire Serpent in the Staglands Divinity: Original Sin Torment: Tides of Numenera BattleTech I'm very into cock and ball torture
It's certainly more 'adventure' than 'rpg', but Westwood made such visually/aurally attractive games that it's very hard to dislike it. It's a lot better than EoB III, anyway. The latter 2 are hideous and so do not bear the same protection.
 

Zboj Lamignat

Arcane
Joined
Feb 15, 2012
Messages
5,520
Oh, and I don't think the cat thing is particularly good at dodging, but it gets to act faster than any of the other characters.
Yep, it turns out that he simply attacks quicker so the little furry bastard lied on the character choice screen.

I heard that LoL is supposed to be decline
I think it's rather fondly regarded over here. It's a nice enough game and definitely the best of the three.
I recall (not necessarily here) many people calling it decline or even Oblivion of early nineties. It is very simplistic, that's for sure.
 

Falkner

Thread Decliner
Patron
Joined
Mar 25, 2011
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658
Wasteland 2
Well, it's even simpler than Oblivion, so there you go.
I played it for a bit and got bored quickly, but it does look absolutely gorgeous. Better than Oblivion, at least. So I guess it wins.
 

empi

Augur
Joined
Mar 7, 2010
Messages
452
A fun, good looking game for mindlessly hacking down mobs. Good game imo. And yeah, from the little i played of the others, i'd say it's the best of the series.
 

Unkillable Cat

LEST WE FORGET
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Codex 2014 Make the Codex Great Again! Grab the Codex by the pussy
What Spellcaster said. LoL2 can be tricky because it's easy to lose out on cool things and places, and there are times where isn't exactly obvious what must be done.

I also haven't touched LoL3, and I don't intend to.
 

DraQ

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Chrząszczyżewoszyce, powiat Łękołody
Yep, it turns out that he simply attacks quicker so the little furry bastard lied on the character choice screen.


I recall (not necessarily here) many people calling it decline or even Oblivion of early nineties. It is very simplistic, that's for sure.
Calling it an oblivion is uncharitable, because LoL is genuinely fun and really charming, but in terms of RPG mechanics even a game like Skyrim looks like hardcore RPG compared to LoL.
 

majestik12

Arcane
Joined
Aug 2, 2007
Messages
2,196
The mechanics are simple indeed. But this is the case when less is more, a textbook example of good game design. Everything is well balanced, well thought out and fun to play. Also, the game has a lot of nice puzzles that are neither too simple nor too hard and make sense within the story and the game world (unlike DM2 puzzles, which are fun too).
 

Aeschylus

Swindler
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Well, part of the simplicity comes from the fact that it was build on top of an adventure game engine (the one used for the Legend of Kyrandia games) which allowed for little more complexity than 'left-click this'. Still, it is solidly designed and has some pretty excellent puzzles and dungeons.
 

DakaSha

Arcane
Joined
Dec 4, 2010
Messages
4,792
not going to get into a debate of whether its a good rpg or not but it was damn fun game. The production value was top notch back then as well. looked and sounded great
 

DemonKing

Arcane
Joined
Dec 5, 2003
Messages
5,958
The first LoL was clearly made by the same team that did EOB I & II and can probably be viewed as a spiritual successor to those titles. I remember it fondly as those were the days I would visit the big computer game shop in my home town and inevitably there would be a new cool looking title on the shelves I had never heard of before (these were the days before the interwebs) or at the very least a new gold box game! This was one of those titles I picked up "on a whim" on such a visit.

The subsequent titles were pretty poor, which was a shame as the series had a solid foundation with the original.
 

Tolknaz

Augur
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Divinity: Original Sin Project: Eternity Torment: Tides of Numenera Wasteland 2
LoL wasn't the spiritual successor to EoB. i read somewhere, that in the beginning it was actually developed as EOB III, but then Westwood and SSI had a falling out. Westwood then created their own new setting for LoL. LoL even reuses the same engine as EoB I&II (aka Legend of Kyrandia engine, which is a bit puzzling name for it since EoB games came out before LoK).
 
Self-Ejected

ManjuShri

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འ༔ ཨ༔ ཧ༔ ཤ༔ ས༔ མ༔
Never played LoL3, I'd like to hear something about it too.
It had potential but it was essentially unfinished, and by that I mean 'should-not-be-released' unfinished. It was very sparsely populated with quests and general and things to do, it just felt desolate and empty. Since the gameplay was essentially broken as to make the combat a non-issue, and what with the whole game being based around combat as there was nothing else to do in the game... Quite a shame too as there was lots of potential.
 

Unkillable Cat

LEST WE FORGET
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Codex 2014 Make the Codex Great Again! Grab the Codex by the pussy
LoL wasn't the spiritual successor to EoB. i read somewhere, that in the beginning it was actually developed as EOB III, but then Westwood and SSI had a falling out. Westwood then created their own new setting for LoL. LoL even reuses the same engine as EoB I&II (aka Legend of Kyrandia engine, which is a bit puzzling name for it since EoB games came out before LoK).

Something along these lines, yes. Westwood started work (and helped DreamForge finish, from what I can tell) EOB3, but were bought out by Virgin Interactive Entertainment and had to abandon the game. Westwood probably used the chance to make a game using the EOB "mold", but without the creative restrictions that SSI were imposing on them.

I honestly can't remember whether Westwood had a falling out with SSI and went to VIE, or whether VIE simply made them a better offer. Anyway, we got Dune 2 as a result, which set the de facto standards for RTS games to this day.
 

PetrusOctavianus

Educated
Joined
Dec 20, 2012
Messages
98
Lands of Lore is the next game on my play list, so I dutifully started reading the manual.
I had to laugh at the description of the game: "The Throne of Chaos premieres the Lands of Lore series of point-of-view fantasy role playing games". What the fuck is a "point-of-view" game???
Also, what is "Larger-than-Life™ [sic] spells"? And how can you trademark an expression like "larger than life"?

This is so stupid that I'm almost tempted to skip the game. But I paid for it, so I'll be damned if I won't get my money's worth.
 

Murk

Arcane
Joined
Jan 17, 2008
Messages
13,459
Hahaha, sounds like humor to me -- LoL has a lot of jabs at fantasy and tropes, not as much as Arcanum or Divine Divinity but still some.

Great game.

The kat guy acts faster than anyone else but isn't particularly specialized -- still, I like fast actions so I went with him. His magic can be quite powerful if you beef it up, but you do have to play as a furry =(

Otherwise I'd suggest going mage-bro.

Was thinking about replaying this recently so I might. It's by no means a shining diamond but it's just such a charming game.
 

PetrusOctavianus

Educated
Joined
Dec 20, 2012
Messages
98
Hahaha, sounds like humor to me -- LoL has a lot of jabs at fantasy and tropes, not as much as Arcanum or Divine Divinity but still some.

Heh, didn't occur to me that it may have been humour. I sure hope it is humour.

Great game.

The kat guy acts faster than anyone else but isn't particularly specialized -- still, I like fast actions so I went with him. His magic can be quite powerful if you beef it up, but you do have to play as a furry =(

Hey, I have a big, fat furry as avatar. ;)
 

Murk

Arcane
Joined
Jan 17, 2008
Messages
13,459
Well, I'm reminded of two scenes right in the beginning.

1) if you click on some burning sconces your character says "these scones are lit and lighting the room (or something)" and the elf with you says "uhh... I think you mean sconces?"

2) Early on a hot chick randomly tries to seduce you in the middle of the forest in a basically Jessica-Rabbit style of interaction which if you refuse she gets mad, turns into a bird, and flies off -- proving she was the witch Scotia who is known for being a shape-shifter.

It's cheesy humor but yeah.
 

PetrusOctavianus

Educated
Joined
Dec 20, 2012
Messages
98
Well, the intro sure was impressive. Very nice graphics and pretty good voice acting. Except for possibly Ultima 7, which I haven't played yet, Lands of Lore must have been the slickest looking CRPG to date when it was released in the summer/fall of 1993?
 

Grunker

RPG Codex Ghost
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Joined
Oct 19, 2009
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Copenhagen
I love Lands of Lore, though its system is very simple and the combat can get very banal. It's got fantastic graphics, environment and a real arthurian legend feel to it, like a modern fairytale. It was probably the first RPG I ever played. I'd say Mikayel is spot on:

It's by no means a shining diamond but it's just such a charming game.
 

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