Codex Review RPG Codex Review: Pathfinder Wrath of the Righteous

[IHaveHugeNick]

So I wrote this huge rant disagreeing with Roguey because I didn't remember Wrath having walls of text, and then I remembered I just 11111'd through 90% of dialogue.

 

[Humbaba]

"NOOOOO THE DIALOGUE IS BAD"

...alright I'm with you on this one.

 

[ga♥]

Dialogue is bad, would be a valid criticism, if given the right arguments.
Dialogue is too long... I don't agree that dialogue in the PROLOGUE is too much exposition.

Is Morte first interaction in the Mortuary too long ffs?

 

[devoncop22]

So a person who has no idea what the strategic layer is for writes a review about the game where this layer is one of the cornerstones.

Now, tell me how you are not Kotaku.

I'm a role playing gamer reviewing a role playing game I finished and spent over 200 hours playing.

I guess it's just a elaborated schema to provide Roguey with free games, noone cares about the review.

I bought Wrath through Kickstarter.

Interesting mini review which I disagree with almost completely as having played both War of the Righteous and now belatedly tackling Kingmaker I believe Owlcat have produced two of the finest games in their genre available.

The text sections are in no way comparable to the huge walls of text in Obsidian games and the companions, especially in War of the Righteous are multi layed and engaging.

Always good to see the view of others though !

Just wanted to know who she was, didn't need her life story.

Quick tip.

Life is not just about what folks say, it's why they say it and their backstories....

That is what a quality RPG understands....

 

[Roguey]

Dialogue is bad, would be a valid criticism, if given the right arguments.
Dialogue is too long... I don't agree that dialogue in the PROLOGUE is too much exposition.

Is Morte first interaction in the Mortuary too long ffs?

It's too verbose in many places. The beginning was egregious. I'm to blame for a lot of that. Part of it was that I hadn't written prose in a long time. I found my stride later on. I am very sorry.

A separate, but equally large part of it was the exposition. Nobody likes writing exposition. You feel unclean when you've written it. It's boring and it doesn't advance plot or do anything worthwhile at all. Unfortunately, in this case, there was a lot that had to be conveyed for you to even understand what was going on. You had to know what a bîaŵac was before it struck. You had to know what adra was. You had to know what a Watcher was very shortly after becoming one. You had to know who Glanfathans were and why they would be mad at you for being in their ruins. You had to learn about animancers and the Saint's War and a slew of other things that led to the world being in the state it was in.

No one defends PoE. All this stuff is not necessary.

 

[Yosharian]

Tags: Owlcat Games; Pathfinder: Wrath of the Righteous

It's easy to forget what a surprise Pathfinder: Kingmaker was when it launched back in 2018. Its unlikely success turned Owlcat Games, a previously unknown Russian studio, into one of the primary isometric RPG developers of our time practically overnight. Released three years later, its followup Pathfinder: Wrath of the Righteous is viewed in a somewhat different light. The game is definitely extremely popular, including on our forums, but there's a sense that some players have grown a bit weary of the Owlcat formula. "The same, but even more epic and extreme" might sound good, but it amplifies the parts of a game that people don't like as much as it does the parts that they do like. In his review of Wrath of the Righteous, the esteemed Roguey reached a similar conclusion, though he ultimately still finds the game worth playing for fans of the genre. Here's an excerpt:

In my Kingmaker review, I hoped for a pseudo-isometric fantasy RPG without lengthy exposition dumps. Well, once again, that isn't this one. Walls of text are a frequent occurrence, which is made all the more exasperating when they're fully voiced. Lengthy books, notes, and letters you can collect in the world are fine — I could just do without the long monologues.​

​

Like Kingmaker, the journal entries are written by someone who isn't the player character. It soon becomes obvious that they're written from the perspective of the primary antagonist, which I believe may be a first for the genre. It's an amusing novelty, even if I found myself annoyed by the verbosity, though I'll admit it fits the character's personality. It also led to a giddy sense of pride when my character asserted ownership of the journal with the final quest entry.​

​

WotR has another colorful cast of characters, though this bunch is far more queer in both senses of the term. Owlcat wasn't afraid to be polarizing, though I found myself not ultimately disliking how any of them were written. As an example, Lann's Whedonesque quipping aggravated me at first, but as the game progresses, he behaves more seriously and gets less obnoxious with the jokes. I don't know if that was a deliberate character arc, but it worked for me.​

​

Naturally a game where the player character gains mythic powers to defeat a demonic invasion will be as ego stroking as it gets. The various mythic paths cover a wide variety of motivations: you can be a lawful zealot who corrects all wrong-doing, a tough but fair judge meting out justice with mercy, a free spirit who defeats demons with the power of friendship, a rival evil who wants to eliminate the competition, or someone just having fun. Unlike Kingmaker, there weren't any spots where I felt unsatisfied with the number of decisions available for the character I had in mind.​

​

The story covers themes of corruption and redemption. Unsurprisingly, your allies aren't entirely good or infallible, and some of your enemies aren't entirely bad. As a good character, I had to make some pragmatic decisions for the greater good. For example, early on I met a commanding officer who's revealed to have ordered one of your companions burned at the stake out of belief she was a secret cultist. My initial desire was to execute him on the spot (which would be justified and isn't considered an evil action by the game), but given the dire circumstances of the war, I decided I didn't have the luxury of being too particular about who my allies were. Sure enough, his presence had a beneficial effect on an event many dozens of hours later.​

​

Reactivity like that is abundant throughout the game. The first act has a soft time limit with changes to certain maps after you reach it (or a potential reward if you manage to initiate the act-ending quest before the event can trigger). The second act has reactions to how long you take and your crusade's losses and morale. The availability of certain companions changes depending on what decisions you make, and some can permanently turn on you. Your choice of mythic path will open up certain exclusive options (including at the end) and each has its own particular questline. Multiple companions can have interjecting conversations among themselves and with other characters. Sometimes characters you meet will react to certain magical items you have in your inventory. There's even an ending that requires meeting a very precise set of requirements to unlock (you're gradually given the instructions how to do it throughout the game, with the last set of requirements revealed at the very end; I would recommend against metagaming it the first time you play given that it might not even fit your character concept).​

​

[...] Before release, it was my hope that Wrath of the Righteous would address the biggest issues I had with Kingmaker and become an undisputed classic. Instead it's a whole-lot-more-of-the-same sequel that does some things better and some things worse. That's fine, but once more I find myself not wanting to go through it again even though I would like to explore more mythic paths and make different choices. Nevertheless, if you can accept that Owlcat is dedicated to filling their games to the brim with text and enemies and strategic management minigames, and you have the time to commit to it, then it's certainly worth playing.​

Read the full article: RPG Codex Review: Pathfinder Wrath of the Righteous

Roguey Completely agree with everything you said. WOTR is so disappointing in so many ways. I pretty much sped through Act 6 using Toy Box's Kill Everything On Screen button - the game had lost all challenge completely and I was so bored. Owlcat's approach to encounter density is baffling and utterly tiresome after 50 hours, let alone 100+. I#m not even going to comment on the rage-inducing 'strategic layer' that the game has.

I will not be pre-ordering Rogue Trader and I'll be very cautious before buying any further Pathfinder games if they make any.

 

[ga♥]

Dialogue is bad, would be a valid criticism, if given the right arguments.
Dialogue is too long... I don't agree that dialogue in the PROLOGUE is too much exposition.

Is Morte first interaction in the Mortuary too long ffs?

It's too verbose in many places. The beginning was egregious. I'm to blame for a lot of that. Part of it was that I hadn't written prose in a long time. I found my stride later on. I am very sorry.

A separate, but equally large part of it was the exposition. Nobody likes writing exposition. You feel unclean when you've written it. It's boring and it doesn't advance plot or do anything worthwhile at all. Unfortunately, in this case, there was a lot that had to be conveyed for you to even understand what was going on. You had to know what a bîaŵac was before it struck. You had to know what adra was. You had to know what a Watcher was very shortly after becoming one. You had to know who Glanfathans were and why they would be mad at you for being in their ruins. You had to learn about animancers and the Saint's War and a slew of other things that led to the world being in the state it was in.

No one defends PoE. All this stuff is not necessary.

Noone defends PoE because it's pretty much indefensible. They are not the same thing dialogues/narration side, and the fact you think they are well...
Personally, I think Wotr writing is lower quality than Kingmaker, but "dialogues too long" is just harbor of decline, not only for this game.

PoE had the backers NPCs with the shitton ultra low quality filling hubs and vomiting it on you when you talked with them, just to provide a bit of context.

 

[S.torch]

Nevertheless, if you can accept that Owlcat is dedicated to filling their games to the brim with text and enemies and strategic management minigames, and you have the time to commit to it, then it's certainly worth playing.

I don't understand this same thing that some people here keep repeating over and over again. If they don't like reading, and they don't like combat, then why do they play RPGs? Both of those things are the cornerstones of the genre. It sounds like some people just want some crappy, casual game that they can get through in 2 minutes with as little effort as possible.

The companions are much better, more memorable and friendly than the ones in Kingmaker. They were the reason this game got me so hooked in the first place.

And the game doesn't have a "management" mini-game, the crusade is a tactical addition to the story being told. Much more suited to an RPG being both less intrusive and satisfying to engage with, than Kingmaker's previous system which was more suited to the base management grind-fest genre.

This game is an improvement in every way from the previous one, which is surprising nowadays when the trend is to make everything worse. It is in all rules very similar to the relationship between Baldur's Gate 1 and Baldur's Gate 2. Games that have an equal amount of text and combat and are considered classics. And if those two are, I think Wrath of the Righteous is too.

 

[Yosharian]

 

[Roguey]

I don't understand this same thing that some people here keep repeating over and over again. If they don't like reading, and they don't like combat, then why do they play RPGs? Both of those things are the cornerstones of the genre. It sounds like some people just want some crappy, casual game that they can get through in 2 minutes with as little effort as possible.

Everything in moderation. If they had stuck to making an 80 hour game like they said they were going to do, it would have likely been excellent.

 

[Desiderius]

So a person who has no idea what the strategic layer is for writes a review about the game where this layer is one of the cornerstones.

Now, tell me how you are not Kotaku.

People slag on it without really engaging it for balense*, though in Roguey case it was unnecessary since the other analysis is nicely measured.

* - this observation got me banned from Steam/Owlcat Forums, in the latter case ironically the day after winning the award for max likes.

 

[ga♥]

But the game is 80 hours, its just that you played turn based :facepalm: when the game was designed with Rtwp in mind.

Anyway, game is too long, there's too much text... maybe the witcher 3 would be a better choice?

 

[Desiderius]

I pretty much sped through Act 6 using Toy Box's Kill Everything On Screen button

Vanilla already includes a wealth of these... if you don't suck.

 

[Yosharian]

But the game is 80 hours, its just that you played turn based :facepalm: when the game was designed with Rtwp in mind.

Anyway, game is too long, there's too much text... maybe the witcher 3 would be a better choice?

You seriously think there is nothing wrong with the encounter density in Wrath?

 

[ga♥]

But the game is 80 hours, its just that you played turn based :facepalm: when the game was designed with Rtwp in mind.

Anyway, game is too long, there's too much text... maybe the witcher 3 would be a better choice?

You seriously think there is nothing wrong with the encounter density in Wrath?

It depends, I think chapter II could have been done better. So mostly a problem of pacing than too much density. And I agree the chapter VI maybe is too packed, considering its just a corridor.

Beside the above, yes I think encounter density is fine. (I am ignoring the DLCs here).

 

[Heroic Liberator]

And the game doesn't have a "management" mini-game, the crusade is a tactical addition to the story being told. Much more suited to an RPG being both less intrusive and satisfying to engage with, than Kingmaker's previous system which was more suited to the base management grind-fest genre.

It's a barely fleshed out gimmick that detracts from the broader gameplay experience. And it couldn't have been any other way since they were developing a different game and not a HoMM clone. Could the latter have been implemented properly as a game within a game? Sure, but it's not like the devs have unlimited resources and unlimited time in order to do that sort of thing. Same shit as with the kingdom management system of its predecessor (or Deadfire's naval battles). It's not surprising when indie devs engage in this sort of overambitious feature bloat, but you'd expect proper studios like Owlcat (or Obsidian) to be more pragmatic in their approach to project management.

 

[Roguey]

But the game is 80 hours, its just that you played turn based :facepalm: when the game was designed with Rtwp in mind.

No it isn't. https://howlongtobeat.com/game/83856

Anyway, game is too long, there's too much text... maybe the witcher 3 would be a better choice?

Witcher 3 manages to be a long game with a lot of trash content that is thankfully off the critical path, as well as 450,000 lines of dialogue presented in a far more manageable way. I do prefer Pathfinder's gameplay though.

 

[ga♥]

But the game is 80 hours, its just that you played turn based :facepalm: when the game was designed with Rtwp in mind.

No it isn't. https://howlongtobeat.com/game/83856

Hmm? Even the link you posted says 55 hours to finish the game, this is obviously not doing everything.

Anyway, game is too long, there's too much text... maybe the witcher 3 would be a better choice?

Witcher 3 manages to be a long game with a lot of trash content that is thankfully off the critical path, as well as 450,000 lines of dialogue presented in a far more manageable way. I do prefer Pathfinder's gameplay though.

Yep, "cinematics" as you mentioned before. So decline.
They even added some cut scenes in the DLCs and I absolutely despise them.

 

[Roguey]

Hmm? Even the link you posted says 55 hours to finish the game, this is obviously not doing everything.

It should be 80 hours maximum, maybe a little over. As noted in the link in my review

For Kingmaker, we were aiming at about 80 hours per playthrough, and we ended up with 120. It was too big, and some of our fans even wrote to us [asking us to] please make the experience a bit more contained. Right now, for Wrath of the Righteous, we’re also aiming at about 80 hours, but this time around, we’ve properly done all the tables and everything, and it seems like we’re going into smaller amounts of playtime. But on the other hand, because of the Mythics and more choices and more effects those choices have on the story, the game is wider. You’ll be, on your first playthrough, missing more content than in Kingmaker. There’s more replayability.

That "120" figure wasn't minimum, it was more or less maximum. In that context, they said they were going to do 80 maximum and instead did at least twice that, blowing past even Kingmaker's maximum.

 

[ga♥]

Hmm? Even the link you posted says 55 hours to finish the game, this is obviously not doing everything.

It should be 80 hours maximum, maybe a little over. As noted in the link in my review

For Kingmaker, we were aiming at about 80 hours per playthrough, and we ended up with 120. It was too big, and some of our fans even wrote to us [asking us to] please make the experience a bit more contained. Right now, for Wrath of the Righteous, we’re also aiming at about 80 hours, but this time around, we’ve properly done all the tables and everything, and it seems like we’re going into smaller amounts of playtime. But on the other hand, because of the Mythics and more choices and more effects those choices have on the story, the game is wider. You’ll be, on your first playthrough, missing more content than in Kingmaker. There’s more replayability.

That "120" figure wasn't minimum, it was more or less maximum. In that context, they said they were going to do 80 maximum and instead did at least twice that, blowing past even Kingmaker's maximum.

You are wrong, Kingmaker is actually longer than Wrath, especially because of the time limits, as you simply can't do some some things before those trigger.
I just finished a playthrough with all the DLCs and it's around 100 hours, doing everything, and it includes the DLCs.

Beside playthrough does not mean you do all the sidequests, it just means you do the main quest. Are you complaining about OPTIONAL content making the game too long for real? So what would be the solution, remove the optional stuff? Its optional, its in the name.

 

[Kev Inkline]

Roguey ’s kingmaker review was shit, why did he write this one?

Now that I think about it, I barely remember what it said anyways lol

How's your mother?

 

[Roguey]

You are wrong, Kingmaker is actually longer than Wrath, especially because of the time limits, as you simply can't do some some things before those trigger.
I just finished a playthrough with all the DLCs and it's around 100 hours, doing everything, and it includes the DLCs.

Replays are typically faster than the first time. I do not trust your replay numbers. I know my numbers for each (112 and over 200).

Beside playthrough does not mean you do all the sidequests, it just means you do the main quest. Are you complaining about OPTIONAL content making the game too long for real? So what would be the solution, remove the optional stuff? Its optional, its in the name.

"Optional" content isn't optional when the critical path necessitates having certain levels and equipment to proceed without banging your head against a wall. You don't necessarily know how much of a particular critical path area is optional the first time you go through it. You can know what's best to do and what you don't have to do with with the metaknowledge of having played before. The guy doesn't say "the game will still be longer with optional content." He says "there will be less content than Kingmaker but there will be more replayability." He ended up being way-off on the first part.

 

[Spectral Pontifex]

The game is about 2 hours long when you use cheats to auto-win all the HoMM battles.

 

[ga♥]

You are wrong, Kingmaker is actually longer than Wrath, especially because of the time limits, as you simply can't do some some things before those trigger.
I just finished a playthrough with all the DLCs and it's around 100 hours, doing everything, and it includes the DLCs.

Replays are typically faster than the first time. I do not trust your replay numbers. I know my numbers for each (112 and over 200).

Even the website you linked have higher numbers for kingmaker than wrath, maybe trust that.
Anyway my first playthrough ever was around 120 hours I think. But I did everything possible (that was not bugged).

https://howlongtobeat.com/game/60050

Did you play Kingmaker turn based like you did in Wrath or RtwP?

Beside playthrough does not mean you do all the sidequests, it just means you do the main quest. Are you complaining about OPTIONAL content making the game too long for real? So what would be the solution, remove the optional stuff? Its optional, its in the name.

"Optional" content isn't optional when the critical path necessitates having certain levels and equipment to proceed without banging your head against a wall. You don't necessarily know how much of a particular critical path area is optional the first time you go through it. You can know what's best to do and what you don't have to do with with the metaknowledge of having played before. The guy doesn't say "the game will still be longer with optional content." He says "there will be less content than Kingmaker but there will be more replayability." He ended up being way-off on the first part.

If the people on howlongtobeat finished the game in 55 hours and you took 200 hours then maybe you don't necessitate having certain levels and equipment, as you say.

 

[Roguey]

Even the website you linked have higher numbers for kingmaker than wrath, maybe trust that.

Look at the averages and medians and the leisure times which more closely represents slow players like me. The rush playtimes are more or less the same (with the sole exception of main story).

If the people on howlongtobeat finished the game in 55 hours and you took 200 hours then maybe you don't necessitate having certain levels and equipment, as you say.

"36h Only main story quests on casual mode, no companion quests or optional content."
"77h 48m Story difficulty. Did most quests I came across."

Yeah you don't have to worry about difficulty too much if you're playing on "speedbump combat" mode. Of course that's going to go by quickly.