MightyHoax
Educated
just finished the game as a human rigger - 14 hours. Despite the game being completely on rails I had barrels of fun. Great story and nice combat.
-
Welcome to rpgcodex.net, a site dedicated to discussing computer based role-playing games in a free and open fashion. We're less strict than other forums, but please refer to the rules.
"This message is awaiting moderator approval": All new users must pass through our moderation queue before they will be able to post normally. Until your account has "passed" your posts will only be visible to yourself (and moderators) until they are approved. Give us a week to get around to approving / deleting / ignoring your mundane opinion on crap before hassling us about it. Once you have passed the moderation period (think of it as a test), you will be able to post normally, just like all the other retards.
Shadowrun Shadowrun Returns - Dead Man's Switch Original Campaign
- Thread starter evdk
- Start date
Excidium
P. banal
Fuck those bug spirits though, what a pain in the ass.
Excidium
P. banal
What is this then:
http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=166129460
Though the editor itself doesn't support modifying items and skills yet I think
- Joined
- Jan 28, 2011
- Messages
- 100,361
GameBanshee review: http://gamebanshee.com/news/111973-gb-feature-shadowrun-returns-review.html
Hobo Elf
Arcane
Welp I tried playing a shaman/mage hybrid. Got the nuke spells from the Mage line and then went for spirit summons on the Shaman side. The summons are way too unreliable and I made sure to put extra points in summoning just to be extra safe. In the end they only caused me more trouble than they were ever worth. Honestly this game is just a bland and shitty game. I'm only 7 hours in but I have no more desire to continue. Mods aren't gonna fix this either since it's the core gameplay that stinks.
Tigranes
Arcane
- Joined
- Jan 8, 2009
- Messages
- 10,359
Playing for the second time you find that you just button-spam and skip everything except the combat. The superlinearity and limited environmental interaction means the only thing to do again, literally, is fight everything with a different build.
Absalom
Guest
Incorrect. As it simulates a virtual "cyberpunk" reality, it belongs in the simulation section.
Multi-headed Cow
Guest
They released 1.0.3 today. I thought that might fix my save game issue. It didn't. Clicking load game still removes all the interface and leaves me with that fucking elf.
Completely lost the urge to work on making modules and even finish the one I started, and am unable to even finish the fucking linear campaign it shipped with. Fucking Oblivion worked better out of the box and had better mod support.
Completely lost the urge to work on making modules and even finish the one I started, and am unable to even finish the fucking linear campaign it shipped with. Fucking Oblivion worked better out of the box and had better mod support.
Excidium
P. banal
Did you fuck over the OC files or what?
Multi-headed Cow
Guest
9:44 PM - MHC: I fixed it
9:44 PM - MHC: Apparently save(s) got corrupted somehow and prevented the load game UI from even starting
9:44 PM - MHC: But you couldn't delete them because Harebrained has Shadowrun uploading/downloading saves from the cloud, so if you manually delete the files it redownloads them on game launch
9:45 PM - MHC: But they don't list it as using cloud saves
9:45 PM - MHC: And don't give you the option to turn it off
9:45 PM - MHC: Because they know better than you
9:45 PM - MHC: But if you turn Steam to offline mode so it can't use cloud saves, then delete a pile of saves, then launch the game, then go online
9:45 PM - MHC: It worked
9:45 PM - MHC: And now for my prize I am not going to play this shitty fucking game
9:44 PM - MHC: Apparently save(s) got corrupted somehow and prevented the load game UI from even starting
9:44 PM - MHC: But you couldn't delete them because Harebrained has Shadowrun uploading/downloading saves from the cloud, so if you manually delete the files it redownloads them on game launch
9:45 PM - MHC: But they don't list it as using cloud saves
9:45 PM - MHC: And don't give you the option to turn it off
9:45 PM - MHC: Because they know better than you
9:45 PM - MHC: But if you turn Steam to offline mode so it can't use cloud saves, then delete a pile of saves, then launch the game, then go online
9:45 PM - MHC: It worked
9:45 PM - MHC: And now for my prize I am not going to play this shitty fucking game
imweasel
Guest
Bizarro Jimmy Olsen
Educated
The combat's not bad though, at least for a $20 game. I wouldn't mind seeing some mods that are basically just putting together teams of runners and doing combat-heavy missions. An entertaining half hour at least.
I've been reading about random encounters and random mission mods, but all I keep seeing are poorly written amateur attempts at cyberpunk noir so far. Here's hoping.
Wyrmlord
Arcane
- Joined
- Feb 3, 2008
- Messages
- 28,904
Come to think of it, Human Revolution, which had a largely similar character progression system, did a lot of things better than this game, despite being an action RPG.
Both HR and SRR are linear. But at least in HR, there were hub areas full of optional missions and a surplus of additional and more rewarding ways of completing the same mission. So the game's XP system actually made a difference. You got more XP/skill points for doing more things and thus got rewarded with a stronger character.
But the XP/skill points in SRR, or Karma, are pretty much points you get for progressing to the next point in the game. Apart from being very linear, Shadowrun Returns has simply very few alternative objectives and sidequests, such that the amount of Karma you have largely depends on how far you have gotten into the game. It can never be possible that you must work with a weak character later in the game because you missed side quests or that you work to obtain a strong character early in the game. Any two players with the same amount of progress have the same amount of karma.
In short, Shadowrun Returns' character creation and progression system is utterly bottlenecked by the linear nature of its campaign, which makes skill points just a token feature for giving it RPG credentials rather than something that actually has a role in the game. The game may as well just have you pick a class that goes on autolevel up after each mission.
Both HR and SRR are linear. But at least in HR, there were hub areas full of optional missions and a surplus of additional and more rewarding ways of completing the same mission. So the game's XP system actually made a difference. You got more XP/skill points for doing more things and thus got rewarded with a stronger character.
But the XP/skill points in SRR, or Karma, are pretty much points you get for progressing to the next point in the game. Apart from being very linear, Shadowrun Returns has simply very few alternative objectives and sidequests, such that the amount of Karma you have largely depends on how far you have gotten into the game. It can never be possible that you must work with a weak character later in the game because you missed side quests or that you work to obtain a strong character early in the game. Any two players with the same amount of progress have the same amount of karma.
In short, Shadowrun Returns' character creation and progression system is utterly bottlenecked by the linear nature of its campaign, which makes skill points just a token feature for giving it RPG credentials rather than something that actually has a role in the game. The game may as well just have you pick a class that goes on autolevel up after each mission.
Excidium
P. banal
That's what experience is.
Holy shit like almost every RPG ever. Why would people doing the exact same thing in the exact same way have different experiences? Regardless of it being linear or not, the order you do things shouldn't change that too much.
That you seem to think exp is some sort of resource you go hunting is just consequence of the retarded mission strucuture CRPGs tend to have.
So basically, you miss farming sidequests to make the game even easier?
Excidium
P. banal
I don't even understand what is the issue here, because the karma gain actually varies depending on which options you pick, and even if it didn't what's important is how you spend the karma and that is where the game fails, you basically just pump a handful of stats in a linear fashion for an almost unnoticeable benefit or an ability unlock here and there.
All I can do is agree that the way the game shoves you around is incredibly annoying and it could benefit greatly from being less linear, but if you had lots of ways to earn experience beyond the average it would be like TES which by endgame everyone is playing the same character
All I can do is agree that the way the game shoves you around is incredibly annoying and it could benefit greatly from being less linear, but if you had lots of ways to earn experience beyond the average it would be like TES which by endgame everyone is playing the same character
Wyrmlord
Arcane
- Joined
- Feb 3, 2008
- Messages
- 28,904
I am actually disappointed by you two's reactions.
In BG2, the sort of player who takes the pain of taking care of Firkraag, Kangaxx, and the Shade Dragon in immediate early Chapter 2 itself, while perhaps also doing it with a smaller party, is rewarded so much experience (and equipment) that Irenicus becomes a petty non-encounter. Whereas the player who goes for more even progression and delays some of those encounters is going to find a much more difficult Irenicus. Both those players, at the time of confronting Irenicus in the asylum, would have very different XP levels and very different experiences.
In Fallout, killing the Master before blowing up Mariposa or perhaps even before finding the water chip gives you so much XP that confronting the Lieutenant of the mutants becomes a cakewalk afterwards.
And in my favourite case, doing full open world exploration and doing all sidequests in Betrayal at Krondor at Chapter 1 itself gives you a richer party with higher skills and the best equipment, such as a Kahooli blessed Greatsword. A Chapter 9 party in Chapter 1 itself. Only, it requires you to survive encounters where you are outnumbered threefold.
This is one of the most common trade-offs many RPGs have you make - do you undergo intense difficulty early in the game for a much much easier time later in the game? That's why experience points matter; because they distinguish between players who took that pain and players who didn't.
How can you call this basic element of RPG design to be "farming for sidequests" and "retarded mission structure"? What is wrong with Shadowrun Returns is that you don't have this tradeoff. Your character will neither be stronger nor be weaker based on how much exploration or sidequests you did early in the game.
In BG2, the sort of player who takes the pain of taking care of Firkraag, Kangaxx, and the Shade Dragon in immediate early Chapter 2 itself, while perhaps also doing it with a smaller party, is rewarded so much experience (and equipment) that Irenicus becomes a petty non-encounter. Whereas the player who goes for more even progression and delays some of those encounters is going to find a much more difficult Irenicus. Both those players, at the time of confronting Irenicus in the asylum, would have very different XP levels and very different experiences.
In Fallout, killing the Master before blowing up Mariposa or perhaps even before finding the water chip gives you so much XP that confronting the Lieutenant of the mutants becomes a cakewalk afterwards.
And in my favourite case, doing full open world exploration and doing all sidequests in Betrayal at Krondor at Chapter 1 itself gives you a richer party with higher skills and the best equipment, such as a Kahooli blessed Greatsword. A Chapter 9 party in Chapter 1 itself. Only, it requires you to survive encounters where you are outnumbered threefold.
This is one of the most common trade-offs many RPGs have you make - do you undergo intense difficulty early in the game for a much much easier time later in the game? That's why experience points matter; because they distinguish between players who took that pain and players who didn't.
How can you call this basic element of RPG design to be "farming for sidequests" and "retarded mission structure"? What is wrong with Shadowrun Returns is that you don't have this tradeoff. Your character will neither be stronger nor be weaker based on how much exploration or sidequests you did early in the game.
Excidium
P. banal
It's a rather mondblutian way of playing games, you're just exploiting that the game doesn't acknowledge the passing of time. You spend a month solving every problem in the sword coast but not a second passes for Irenicus and the world patiently waits for you to advance to the next step of the main quest.
It's a retarded mission structure because games frequently put you on an urgent quest but the urgency is basically just larping (or a ticking clock which is about as bad)
It's an strange thing that you get rewarded for getting sidetracked instead of being punished for it
It's a retarded mission structure because games frequently put you on an urgent quest but the urgency is basically just larping (or a ticking clock which is about as bad)
It's an strange thing that you get rewarded for getting sidetracked instead of being punished for it
Wyrmlord
Arcane
- Joined
- Feb 3, 2008
- Messages
- 28,904
But it is possible to punish lack of urgency in games.
The mutant army keeps growing bigger and bigger in Fallout, for example. Go to the Cathedral too early and you find very few Master's Pets to fight. Go too late and there's a swarm of them.
Either way, that's not relevant. Because you do get punished for side-tracking. And that in the form of the greater time, cost, and effort involved in side-tracking. You have limited consumables in your inventory for which you paid much money. Do lots of sidequests and those consumables run out. Why shouldn't the player be rewarded for this?
Besides, this is nothing like - say - Skyrim where you cast Soul Trap on your horse endlessly till your Conjuration is 100 and you can summon two Dremora to win all fights in the game.
The mutant army keeps growing bigger and bigger in Fallout, for example. Go to the Cathedral too early and you find very few Master's Pets to fight. Go too late and there's a swarm of them.
Either way, that's not relevant. Because you do get punished for side-tracking. And that in the form of the greater time, cost, and effort involved in side-tracking. You have limited consumables in your inventory for which you paid much money. Do lots of sidequests and those consumables run out. Why shouldn't the player be rewarded for this?
Besides, this is nothing like - say - Skyrim where you cast Soul Trap on your horse endlessly till your Conjuration is 100 and you can summon two Dremora to win all fights in the game.
Spockrock
Augur
- Joined
- Jan 2, 2011
- Messages
- 457
I hate his reviews. He sounds like a person who likes RPGs for all the wrong reasons. Doesn't that site have other people? ffs
- Joined
- Jan 28, 2011
- Messages
- 100,361
Who is "he"? WUE is GB's main newsposter but he doesn't do reviews that often, I think.
Rake
Arcane
- Joined
- Oct 11, 2012
- Messages
- 2,969
And what are the "good" reasons to like RPGs?
As an Amazon Associate, rpgcodex.net earns from qualifying purchases.