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Playing PoE1: impressions

AdamReith

Arcane
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Oct 21, 2019
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2,114
Enjoy the Revolution! Another revolution around the sun that is.
Not only could critique of this quality have saved the industry, it's also quite cathartic to read.
 

Ol' Willy

Arcane
Zionist Agent Vatnik
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Reichskommissariat Russland ᛋᛋ
But there is some logic behind it: if you're playing a specific build, you get a unique set of responses, it increases replay value. Same with backgrounds, they add more flair to dialogues and make you want to try different ones on subsequent playthroughs. The bad part was that it was poorly telegraphed. I'm not even bothered by this as much as by, for example, a Barbarian who needs INT for AoE, but it gets in the way of role playing because you're supposed to be a savage brute, but you can get through conflicts using your wit. That's really off putting.
Doesn't look so.

Option 1 - help
Option 2 - nah, fuck the guy, I'm out
Option 3 (INT check) - persuade them to leave the guy alone without fight

It's fucking CLASSIC of RPG design man
 

Nano

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Messages
4,844
Grab the Codex by the pussy Strap Yourselves In Enjoy the Revolution! Another revolution around the sun that is.
- copy-pasted worldbuilding on the level on Harry Potter. fampyrs = vampires, ghuls = ghouls, ripped xaurips off kobolds, vithracks off ilithid and godlikes off planetouched.
And another problem is that illithids are hot and the vithracks are gross. Why would you replace tentacle monsters with spiders? Ew.
 

luj1

You're all shills
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They are literally the same except that vithracks have a spider head while ilithids have a squid head
 

WhiteShark

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Sep 17, 2019
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滅びてゆく世界
I think PoE would probably be tolerable if not for the complete absence of the "show, don't tell" philosophy. The arbitrary character stats that don't represent anything concrete in-universe are unforgiveable as well, but at least that's more easily ignored. I've never looked into PoE modding, but I wonder if anybody has made one that cuts out all the irrelevant filler flavor text.
 

Erebus

Arcane
Joined
Jul 12, 2008
Messages
4,862
One thing I liked about PoE and I found well-designed was how the classes (in particular Cipher, but also some other classes) match with the peculiarities with the universe (the souls, etc). Finally a game where unique class are not a name-swap with the classical Rogue/Priest/whatever.

Some of the classes of PoE are reasonably original (Cipher and also Chanter), but most of them remain way too close to D&D classes. The Wizard class is especially uninspired.

Animancy is cool, but I wish we had more ways of using it directly.


the worst : the fucking elven-town with the fucking elven-quests that have probably been done and done again since 1985.

The place is awfully generic, and the fact that we get there so late in the game makes it even worse.
 

Humbaba

Arcane
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SADAT HQ
Has he noticed yet that the PC actually never gets to cure or treat the monkey pox that got the caravan to stop and kickstart the entire damn plot?
 

Hobo Elf

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Platypus Planet
- copy-pasted worldbuilding on the level on Harry Potter. fampyrs = vampires, ghuls = ghouls, ripped xaurips off kobolds, vithracks off ilithid and godlikes off planetouched.
And another problem is that illithids are hot and the vithracks are gross. Why would you replace tentacle monsters with spiders? Ew.
The spider-illithids were one of the few parts of the PoE setting that I found enjoyable. Not very original, but they did look fun.
 

Harthwain

Arcane
Joined
Dec 13, 2019
Messages
5,571
Three fake "choices" for the same thing - "tell me about yourself".
No option 4 for "you had it coming" or to even just leave.
Sadly this is the industry's standard. A plenty of RPGs offer only cosmetic choices, because creating unique content outside of a "critical path" is too much work when you're making a role-playing game. Frankly, it makes me angry to just think about how stupid this is. :argh:
 

Kruyurk

Learned
Joined
Nov 16, 2021
Messages
516
Bester, if you keep playing until Defiance Bay (the first major city), the story takes you to a ruined temple where your character has soul PTSD again. I remember that a brick was missing in a wall under a window, not as if it was intended, but just sloppy job from the artist, you could see through a glitched part of the wall. And it is in a game with a fixed camera, just imagine the crappy masonry they get away with for the walls we don't see. This is why we must insist to have rotable cameras. Sorry I am too lazy to reinstall the game just to look for that missing brick, but I remember being vividly triggered at the time.
 

Grampy_Bone

Arcane
Joined
Jan 25, 2016
Messages
3,971
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Wandering the world randomly in search of maps
This is a quality thread.

"Expose the scene only if it's going to be important or if we're going to return a lot to this place?"

I actually blame George Martin for this. Because readers know all details should be important and Martin wants to subvooooooort expectations, he intentionally fills in every detail whether important or not and leaves the reader to sift through the detritus. I find it odious and unreadable, but the dude sold a shitzillion copies so what do I know.

There's also a lot of modern writing advice that says "Use every sense in every scene." Never mind that there are like a dozen senses such as spatial awareness, balance, limb position, etc. again it leads to massive word bloat as you experience every smell and taste of every part of every second of a character's life with no plot movement whatsoever.
 

Lhynn

Arcane
Joined
Aug 28, 2013
Messages
9,994
Has he noticed yet that the PC actually never gets to cure or treat the monkey pox that got the caravan to stop and kickstart the entire damn plot?
It does get resolved, pretty much immediately, and just when you do the caravan gets attacked.
Must have played through the starting dungeon at least 7 times, to try different builds and mix it up with the choices.
 
Joined
Jan 5, 2021
Messages
525
While you're not wrong, the slight (but important) difference here is that there are fewer companions and Aloth is the only arcane caster...
I'm guessing the devs didn't want to screw your party composition options with one dialogue line with high consequences
hold the fuck on bro.
josh stated no class is obligatory that was whole idea of balance.

and if you don't want to screw party composition, you can, you know, just use introductory dialogue without anyone attacking companion.

Not to mention that, in the worst case, you can still hire a recruit from the tavern and use them instead of Aloth. You will miss out on his quest and dialogue, but gameplay wise you should have pretty much the same experience.

I think PoE would probably be tolerable if not for the complete absence of the "show, don't tell" philosophy. The arbitrary character stats that don't represent anything concrete in-universe are unforgiveable as well, but at least that's more easily ignored. I've never looked into PoE modding, but I wonder if anybody has made one that cuts out all the irrelevant filler flavor text.

I find the game tolerable - mostly - when looking at it purely from a gameplay perspective. The stats that give you +1 to some other stat (so you have to keep jumping through your character sheet to find out what anything does) is really dumb (which I complained about in another thread), but they at least MOSTLY tried to fix the existing problems with Infinity Engine games, and (in my opinion) mostly succeeded. The camping system is great. So is the health/endurance system. The core gameplay is pretty great.

It's just a shame that all their efforts to improve the gameplay are stuck behind an extremely slow, lackluster and barely readable story, that you really have to trudge through in order to really get started playing.

Sadly this is the industry's standard. A plenty of RPGs offer only cosmetic choices, because creating unique content outside of a "critical path" is too much work when you're making a role-playing game. Frankly, it makes me angry to just think about how stupid this is. :argh:

I think Bethesda are the kings of this trend. Fallout 3 (and most other RPGs that let you be an "evil character") only really let you be evil in very specific ways. You can be a supervillain and blow up megaton while twirling your mustache, but short of shooting people in the face you can't really do anything truly evil. Even if you poison the water supply at the end of the game, the broken steel DLC just plain assumes that didn't happen and so the world never changes at all. You can't oppress people or set up manipulative, evil situations to your benefit. Your choices are random murder, random enslavement, or stealing tiny amounts of things from everyone until you tick over into "evil" karma.

I really want more RPGs where I can make choices that will result in genuinely evil outcomes. Especially if those outcomes benefit me in the short term. Even fucking Deus Ex let you take the easy way out by killing people rather than going non-lethal, and certain characters would support or chastise you depending on your actions. THAT'S much closer to real RPG gameplay, and Deus Ex isn't even a real RPG in the strictest sense.

I actually blame George Martin for this. Because readers know all details should be important and Martin wants to subvooooooort expectations, he intentionally fills in every detail whether important or not and leaves the reader to sift through the detritus. I find it odious and unreadable, but the dude sold a shitzillion copies so what do I know.

I blame Tolkien, actually. He is basically infamous for describing the intricate details of the party's bar crawls (complete with multiple pages of singing) before they finally rest for the night and continue again in the next chapter.
 

Ninjerk

Arcane
Joined
Jul 10, 2013
Messages
14,323
Has he noticed yet that the PC actually never gets to cure or treat the monkey pox that got the caravan to stop and kickstart the entire damn plot?
It does get resolved, pretty much immediately, and just when you do the caravan gets attacked.
Must have played through the starting dungeon at least 7 times, to try different builds and mix it up with the choices.
You get the water to make the berry tea and HEY SPARFEL comes out of the woods with an arrow in his back:


The best explanation that I think someone presented me with years ago when I had the same complaint is that your character doesn't have the rumbling rot but is having a reaction to the impending soulwynd or w/e the fuck they call it in this game
 

Kruyurk

Learned
Joined
Nov 16, 2021
Messages
516
Bester

So in summary do you recommend PoE1 or not? I havent played it yet but its another unplayed Steam game I have on my list
Why not try it for yourself if you already have it? I finished the game and overall enjoyed it. The criticisms about the overly wordy text and bland setting are justified, but it's not the fuming turd it is sometimes portrayed as.

In particular, I enjoyed the high lethality in Path of the Damned difficulty (the highest). It is hard enough so that choices regarding your party composition, character building, itemization, etc, matters. I don't think I would have finished it in a lower difficulty setting, because that is what kept things interesting in the long run.
 
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Trashos

Arcane
Joined
Dec 28, 2015
Messages
3,413
I agree that it is not a fuming turd, disappointing is what it is. But the lethality argument... I guess it depends on what you are used to. Several players found combat to be of the "death by a thousand paper cuts" variety, and I am one of them.

Path of the Damn of course plays better than the easier difficulties, but it was still too easy for a lot of us (or as compared to other prominent RTwP games). The game is missing about 2 difficulty settings tougher than PotD. PotD feels like "Hard" (ie, one level tougher than "Normal") at best.
 

Humbaba

Arcane
Joined
Aug 12, 2021
Messages
2,940
Location
SADAT HQ
Has he noticed yet that the PC actually never gets to cure or treat the monkey pox that got the caravan to stop and kickstart the entire damn plot?
It does get resolved, pretty much immediately, and just when you do the caravan gets attacked.
Must have played through the starting dungeon at least 7 times, to try different builds and mix it up with the choices.
No it doesn't, the PC never even consumes the herbs or whatever it was and never explicitly undergoes a healing process.
 

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