Shadowrun Shadowrun: Hong Kong - Extended Edition

[Animal]

Who else avoids every dialogue option calling Kindly Cheng 'Auntie'?

Me!

Really liking the amount of dialogue (they used the Truth method from Planescape Torment). Muzic is not that good.

I liked all Shadowruns' dialogues and I'm not the kind of guy who gets a hard on on text.

I also agree on the music. I even got annoyed at some bits and turned down it's volume.




Overall liking the game so far and the matrix stealth mechanic looks cool.

 

[Volrath]

Is it a problem ?
Fo1-Fo2 have 99,9% dialogs and 0,001% combat (can even have 0% combat if pacifist) and are in the dex top 3.

 

[Alfons]

I've found running without the Shaman pretty fine and dandy actually; the thing is to use the drone, which is actually insanely strong, to tie up entire groups and have your other party members eradicate them.
That drone, with the upgraded speed boost active, has 5 AP. Once you get the +1AP the rigger can use the speed boost and the + strength/movement boost, which has no cooldown, on the same round as the drone is turned on.
The drone's basic attack has a crit chance of 50%+, at least in my game and specced into melee.

Bonus point, some of the AOE magical abilities don't effect the drone at all.

Without aim on hard the hit chances are too low for my liking. The shaman get's sort of nerfed once she gets aim 2 but all you need to do is buy her an aim 1 spell. When you get the +1 AP she can give all your other guys aim in one turn or use haste and aim in the same turn creating a char with great accuracy and 4 AP or use it on the PC and have a guy with great accuracy and 5 AP. 50% crit on "in the open" or "flanked" targets is about average. 90%+ is about average for crit chance increasing attacks.
You can run without her, but the two times I did that showed me what a pain in the ass it can be, so I always take here and the decker as the safety net and cycle the other guys when they get new skills.

Does this have any significant improvements to the character building/inventory/upgrade system (I only noticed cyberware being talked about)? I didn't play Dragonfall all the way through because I chose the same class as I did in DMS (Rigger), thinking I'd be able to build it better this time but it just ended up being the exact same thing, so it got boring rather quickly.

Not really. everybody is talking about cyber and more specifically cyber weapons because those are the only true new addition to the game. Most of the changes are with the items. Some new spells, melee weapons variety, much more and better cyber, new drones etc. or maybe even without the "etc.", that might be it.

 

[Rake]

I've been playing for the past 6-8 hours and have seen like 2 or 3 fights. There's a lot of stuff to read.

 

[Darth Roxor]

The problem is that most of this stuff to read isn't very fun to read.

 

[Rake]

The problem is that most of this stuff to read isn't very fun to read.

I liked DF: DC well enough. Did HBS's writing declined that much from that?

 

[Icewater]

My game (or at least a particular mission) is completely broken. No way to complete the Misdirection mission. Maybe they patched it, but I wouldn't know since I took the GOG key.

How so? I was stuck on that one for a while.

 

[Volrath]

I liked DF: DC well enough. Did HBS's writing declined that much from that?

Codexers have post traumatic PoE information dump trauma.

 

[LizardWizard]

Me!

and the matrix stealth mechanic looks cool.

It's banal shit.

 

[Darth Roxor]

I liked DF: DC well enough. Did HBS's writing declined that much from that?

Ding Dong suffers from very heavy Pillars of Eternitis, that's all I have to say on the matter, really. Constant overexposition of everything, including completely irrelevant/pointless/meaningless backstories of every possible npc you meet. When it sticks to the task at hand, it's still good, but it gets derailed very often, and you barely ever miss anything if you just skip those derailments altogether.

 

[Zarniwoop]

How so? I was stuck on that one for a while.

Came in, talked my way past the receptionist, then disabled the security system and elevators with a drone and took the stairs to floor 27.

Spoiler

From there, I looked at/took everything I could. Closed the shutters. Used the computer to jack in to the Matrix, tripped the alarm and killed all the IC's inside. Then some security showed up in meat space despite supposedly being locked out by the shutters. Blasted them. The Russian dude said "we have killed all the security on this floor but they will send reinforcements" or something.

Proceed to another computer and open the main lab doors. Step inside, meet team of random Shadowrunners and agree to cooperate. Poison gas is released and security team spawned, I quickly jack in and disable all 3 vents. Then walk back into the lab to grab the prototype, while holding off a neverending assault of about a zillion other guards. When my char gets to the middle of the room, a wild explosion appears and the team starts talking about "there must be another team of shadowrunners around". You mean like the 4 guys we just met? The guys dodging the bullets and shooting back at the army of Knights Errants? YES THERE'S ANOTHER FUCKING TEAM AROUND.

Suddenly the other team who had been helping me deal with the Zerg rush up to this point vanishes and reappears on the other side of the lab in what looks like a boardroom. But the doors are locked and now they can't reach me. There is no way to open the doors. In the Matrix there is an unmarked terminal you can interact with but doing so just shows a message: ALERT ACTIVE, ACTIVE ALERTS TAKE PRIORITY OVER REGULAR SCHEDULES or some shit. The stairs I used to get up are no longer clickable. There's also an elevator control option which does nothing, probably because I fried the wiring downstairs with a drone, who knows.

So now I can't get out, there's no way to accomplish the last 2 objectives (Find repair unit and Find safe key), believe me there's nothing to click on anymore. And no way to get to or interact with my new "friends", and a constant stream of guards coming out of the goddamn walls.

Tried loading a save from earlier in the mission and the same thing happened.

 

[V_K]

Yeah, it would benefit greatly if all this flavour text got redistributed between more NPCs/points of interest. Would make the levels feel less empty too.
Hate to say it, but it looks like RPS review is pretty much on point.

 

[Zetor]

The Misdirection thing looks like a mission logic bug, probably guard spawns from cyberspace alerts interfering with the ambushes and the "don't spawn guards if shutters are down" logic. Here is how that mission is supposed to go (after entering the level):

Spoiler

1. Enter level, don't do anything in cyberspace yet (it's just the same space you could see from the ground floor, only entered from a different area).
2. Go to lab, get keycode for scientist#1 from lab computer, get keycode for scientist#2 from scientist#1's room, do stuff in both rooms as needed (I actually did keycode bit after the gas / KE were dealt with, worked fine).
3. Turn on shutters, walk into large lab in the NW with prototype, watch explosion and firefight on other side of the glass doors, click on prototype, let shadowrunners in, get the keycard from them
4. KE attacks at this point... deal with them, send decker to jack in and disable the gas vents
5. Game actually goes out of TB mode if both waves of KE are dead and gas vents are disabled, finish investigation at this point
6. Use the runners' keycard to open the safe in the central lab and get the thing
7. Head to elevator shaft in the SW corner (doesn't matter if you disabled the elevator or not, the group's using the other elevator shaft), click it, hold off KE for 3 turns until door opens, then exit through the elevator shaft
8. Some other stuff happens in the maintenance area, etc etc.
9. Mission over

 

[Grokalibre]

The problem is that most of this stuff to read isn't very fun to read.

The problem is that there is not much to do beside reading. Then move your character in order to read more. So yeah the writing's cool and all but gameplay-wise, resolving quests consists in moving your character to the big yellow button on the map. Incline!!!

 

[imweasel]

Of every NPC in the mission hub that wants to tell their fucking life story, I only found Stephen Dynamite's story even remotely interesting.

 

[Gozma]

The main writing hump is that there is too much plotting about having to get you set up at the point where you're in the normal Shadowrun gameplay loop where you have some kind of home base hub you keep returning to. Getting there feels really contrived because it's so obvious that everything keeps happening to keep you on a straight path to having a home base and a shadow running team and a bunch of vendors that have their own writing and you do random episodic missions one or two at a time and all that. Dragonfall's plot skipped a lot because you were just some shadowrunner already and it was implied you'd done basically the same shit before, and DMS had much more linear plotting.

Rachter is extremely fun writing btw. That drone salesman, the cyberware guy...

 

[Darth Roxor]

Racter is a cool guy, yeah

 

[Abu Antar]

Probably old, but there has been an update to the game. Was downloading when I started Steam.

 

[Durandal]

Currently trying to count how many NPCs there are that do not tell their backstory the first five minutes when you meet them
At least Dragonfall spreaded the backstory of your teammates out between missions, I sure as hell wouldn't tell anyone about my life as a teenage robot to some stranger I just met

 

[Animal]

Am I missing something or are the smartlink weapons exactly the same as the regular versions, only more expensive?

Where can I see the benefits of installing a datajack and using a smartlink weapon?

 

[veevoir]

Better to hit chance on smartlik weapons.

Also: all melee people who invest in charisma should also get a passive totem. +1 move +1 armor is insane.

 

[skyst]

Takes every opportunity to avoid combat the game throws at you.
Bitches there are too few fights.

Edgetards. Edgetards never change.

Thanks for implying that I was bitching about it.

 

[Vault Dweller]

First mission absoluetly sucks!

Title says it all. Was able to take out the cops and the hover drones buck was still getting shot at, and hit, by a sniper I couldn't see. Absolute bullcrap.

Either remove the sniper after he kills Carter and the two runners, reduce his hits, reduce the damage he does, give us better cover on the street, or move him to a spot that we can see him and take him out.

It's bullcrap that I'm getting hit by someone that I can't see.

Bad Qi Mission. Died 16 times on normal.

Title says it all. As of right now, I still have not finished it. It is my 1st official mission as a shadowrunner (after Cheng recruits you as a shadowrunner). My build is that of a melee mage with points in strength and willpower. I know I'm gonna be squishy in the beginning, but this is ridiculous. My team is taking full dmg and crit dmg from magical attacks irrespective of whether they are in full, half or no cover.

Any tips on how to beat this mission ?
I only died twice in the entire Dragonfall game, so this is bugging the hell out of me....

 

[hivemind]

Is the combat finally not banal shit boring ?

 

[Durandal]

Is the combat finally not banal shit boring ?

It's the same as DF:DC with some additional spells, weapons and cyberware, if that counts for anything.