Fowyr said:
Game about wizard's apprentice, you may travel back to Earth and in the magic world (can't remember name). 25% of the game - experiments with spell formulas, 75% - real-time battles on the various elemental planes.
Ah, yes, I remember now. I have it somewhere I believe, maybe one of those massive Abandonware game torrents. Thank you for the answer, I'll give it a serious try later.
Fowyr said:
Oh, never heard about them. *Googles*
King's Field and most other From Software games (Shadow Tower, Eternal Ring, etc) are pretty cool if you are into hardcore dungeon crawling, and they are very atmospheric and foreboding little games too. However, they are not classical dungeon crawlers in that they are fully real time and (horribly, the old ones) 3D, and most enemies, even the first ones, can kill you without sweating on it, so combat is much more about your skill than the character's, which mostly defines passive stuff like the damage you do and the damage you receive, etc. Basicaly you explore huge complexes solving puzzles, getting key items, and being thrown into more and more ridiculous battle sequences (in a game in which a battle with two basic guards can mean your doom) without any kind of roleplaying or storyfaggotry getting in the way. The first game's story is, more or less,
evil's victory is near, and only the magic sword hidden in the isle of blah blah will save us! But the ship taking you and your companions there is sunk in a terrible storm, and soon after you reach the island, barely alive, you notice the minions of evil have already fortified here! or some shit like that. Think, uhm, Demon's Soul, which is their newest game and kind of a spiritual sequel to the King's Field games, only King's Field is first person, much uglier, and more hardcore.
Fowyr said:
Hm. I heard about Hard Nova, this is not many RPGs with the SF setting, was always intrigued, but skipped this game again and again. How it is?
It is... weird, I guess. I like it, but I kind of understand other people might not. Basicaly, in some things you get lots of options (jeez, you can pick what kind of license your ship is transmiting and which character is piloting, which is using the turrets, etc) but at the same time you get almost no options in other stuff, like how ground combat is mostly your party and the enemies standing there, and you just pick in which enemy you want to focus and then press enter to make your character shoot while your companions shoot and the enemies shoot and people eventually die, you mostly just put their points where you need them and equip them, and hope it's enough. Very much, uhm, dice based.
It has a truckload of exploration, however, and you can win the game without ever visiting many of the places you can visit. On the other hand the game is actually kind of a dumbed down Sentinel Worlds, even if it is awesome as it is, so you may want to play first Hard Nova and then Sentinel Worlds. And the theme song is pretty catchy, if you somehow manage to get the sound running even in DosBox. :3
Since we are talking, uhm, Sci Fi games, have you played The Whale's Voyage? It's pretty cool too, beyond a character creation system I find most horrible because I can't help but re roll shit until my crew's faces are actually not revolting or something.
Fowyr said:
Maybe there is some games, but I not played them.
If you ever get a machine that can emulate a PS2 with a measure of success and don't mind playing with a japanese dictionary (and maybe previous research of the basics of the language) give
Hungry Ghosts a try. It's an incredibly atmospheric and scary dungeon crawling game set in the outer layer of the afterlife, since you have just died, and very inspired by different old and not family friendly nor politically correct views on the afterlife. And you are being judged, so the game keeps track of every scripted choice you make and the way you play to define what ending you will be getting and what fate awaits your soul. It's
awesome, and obscure as fuck.
And it's scary. Very, very scary.