Bard's Tale The Bard's Tale IV: Barrows Deep - Director's Cut

[Grauken]

I loved Anvil of Dawn, simplistic yeah, but at least superb graphics and the fighting was fun. Can't say the same about Stonekeep. And the combat system in Stonekeep was just dire

 

[newtmonkey]

Agreed, Anvil of Dawn is definitely the better of those two!

 

[KeighnMcDeath]

But that Lady of Tempest...

Jesus does she use beet juice dye and skin lotion or is she the queen of hearts sister? Maybe loosen that neckware you got there before you lose more oxygen to the brain Ms Mackey... mmmmmmkayyyy?

Asphyxiation isn't the in-thing at the formal elite dances and social clubs; or is it?

 

[newtmonkey]

Played some more of this today, mostly because I want to finish this before the "director's cut" because I want to play through it the way it was meant to be played originally, whatever that means in this day and age.

I was wrong about being 36 hours in, first of all, even though that's what Steam reports as my playtime. The game itself claims I'm 26 hours in, so I guess I left it running one day for 10 hours without realizing it.

One nice surprise: they nerfed that Rogue ability that automatically hides your whole party at the start of battle. Previously, you could literally spend rounds buffing and building up spell points while enemies shuffled back and forth (this ability basically made you INVINCIBLE). Now, you still get the attack damage benefit of being hidden, but enemies will attack during the first round (so now you are merely UNSTOPPABLE rather than INVINCIBLE).

The puzzles are retarded. There's simply no reason for an RPG to have so much of its content devoted to retarded puzzles. If you can solve the first block pushing/fairy golf/cog/rotating stone puzzle, you can solve the 25th one. Remove all the puzzles from the outdoor areas and keep them inside dungeons and other structures; this alone would improve the game.

Here's an idea for a fun puzzle that better fits an RPG. There's a part where you have to "figure out" how to enter a fortress because the front door is blocked. In reality, this means you travel along corridor-like paths solving block puzzle after block puzzle and fighting groups of enemies that just stand there waiting for you, using grappling hooks to get from one linear path to the next. Instead, how about opening the area up and giving you the option to either solve puzzles, fight encounters (or even sneak by!), or use your rogue abilities to craft grappling hooks and bombs to find alternate routes—or any combination of the three?

 

[newtmonkey]

So close to finishing this game, but the last parts of the game are a slog.

I don't hate the game, but nothing changes in it after the 15-20 hour mark. 30 hours in, I am still fighting the same enemies just with more HPs (yet the strategy has not changed over the last 20 hours and even RED DANGER encounters are a pushover) and still solving the same block pushing and gear sliding puzzles. The game at this point is pure filler.

The combat is braindead but it can still be somewhat satisfying on some level to optimize your moves so that you can kill every enemy in a single round or whatever. Leveling up means nothing after 15-20 hours in, as you have already developed a team of demigods by then.

I cannot overstate how annoying the puzzles are in this game. The outside areas and dungeons are functionally the same exact thing, because they are all linear corridors broken up by gear/block puzzles, punctuated by groups of enemies just standing around doing nothing. You will finish exploring a dungeon full of the same puzzles you've been solving for the last 20+ hours, defeat a boss who is no more difficult than any other enemy, walk outside... and face block/gear puzzle after block/gear puzzle. You will use multiple grappling hooks and bombs to access some secret area, see a chest at the end of the corridor I MEAN ROAD... and inside is 66 fucking gold pieces when you have 12,000 already and haven't bought anything since 15 hours ago. You will break down secret walls with your bard magic, thinking you're so clever for noting that the wall is different, only to be rewarded with a sack of flour or some fucking roots.

 

[Deleted Member 16721]

Are you playing on Hard?

 

[theSavant]

I thought about re-playing BT4 after the director's cut release to see the improvements, but when I read about all this shit again, it almost makes me delete it from my GOG account. And even if they make this wondersome "autosolve puzzles" song, I doubt it will make the game more enjoyable. Maybe a bit, but then there's still this thing, that the whole gameworld is corridors "punctuated by groups of enemies just standing around doing nothing", and this is just retarded game design in 2018+. Though it was also retarded in Dragon Age : Origins tbh... and many other games.

It all reminds me of how much better Wizardry 8 did mostly everything, with its roaming enemies, a world that just feels much more alive. Wiz8 has its flaws too, but everytime I think about replaying BT4 it gives me headaches, and memories come up of how much more satisfying Wizardry 8 is.

BT4 has a decent combat system though, and its combat is also faster. I could easily imagine a game like Wiz8 with the combat system of BT4. Would probably be enjoyable. Although I think programmers could easily make it so, that combat like in Wiz8 could be accelerated so much, that it wouldn't be annoying anymore.


Edit: the good thing is: if you have played it in its most miserable state, it can only get better when re-playing it after the director's cut.

 

[LESS T_T]

The code wheel got an official web version: https://www.inxile-entertainment.com/bt4-code-wheel

 

[Barbalos]

Not bad but not an improvement over the free one I was using online. That code wheel was a silly idea anyway, stupid really. I don't want to print shit out for a game and it's not real "nostalgic value" for me either. Still waiting for the Director's Cut, we'll see.

 

[KeighnMcDeath]

Weird my pic got erased...

 

[KeighnMcDeath]

But that Lady of Tempest...

Jesus does she use beet juice dye and skin lotion or is she the queen of hearts sister? Maybe loosen that neckware you got there before you lose more oxygen to the brain Ms Mackey... mmmmmmkayyyy?

Asphyxiation isn't the in-thing at the formal elite dances and social clubs; or is it?

The pic should have been:

ah well. Taht's what I get when I don't put it on imgur. Chokes the life right out of my posts.

 

[newtmonkey]

Alright, finished this one.

Overall, I liked it. It's not an amazing game by any means, and it overstays its welcome, but it's worth playing now that the performance and stability issues have been resolved. I liked it enough to push through the annoying puzzles and finish it.

As a followup to BT1-3, it both works and doesn't work.

In terms of story, yes, you get to run through and kill all the bosses from BT1-3 again ("for good") and then kill an even more awesome boss above them. You can also get the ultimate weapons from those games here. From a story point of view, it basically revives a "story" that was already finished, and then wraps it up with a SUPER BOSS above even the bosses from BT1-3. So I guess it works in some respect, since BT1-3 were just killing a super boss, then finding out there's an even more awesome evil boss in the next game, etc.

In terms of mechanics, it's not much of a followup to BT1-3 at all. It's a lot like M&MX in a way, as it has fixed encounters throughout the world but party building is heavily based on certain builds. With M&MX, this could leave you in a very bad situation indeed if you didn't pay much attention to how you built your party (even on Normal difficulty). In BT4, it doesn't matter at all because halfway through the game you have already developed superheroes (I used two practitioners, one rogue, two fighters, and a bard; replacing that bard with another rogue would probably have completely broken the game I think), and for the last 10-15 hours you are just assigning skill points at random because it doesn't matter if you choose to add another armor point (-1 physical damage) or another point of constitution (+1 HP).

I raged a lot about the puzzles earlier in this thread, and I still maintain that there are too many puzzles, but I'll admit that the final dungeon was a lot of fun. They finally (after 30+ hours) introduced some wrinkles into the moving stones and gear puzzles, and it felt nice to solve them. I still think that eliminating all the puzzles in the outdoor areas would have improved the game a lot. I don't think anyone wants to solve a dungeon full of puzzles, only to enter an outdoor area and then solve the exact same puzzles over again.

Character development is fun for the first 10-15 hours. At that point, earning even a single point of strength or an additional point of armor class really makes a difference, never mind reaching a capstone skill (i.e. advanced class) that gives you overpowered passive abilities. Compared to BT1-3, gaining a single level in BT4 (for the first 10-15 hours at least) is much more significant, and I think this is the single area where BT4 is clearly superior.

Graphically, the environments are very beautiful. Now that the performance has been fixed, it's a joy to explore. NPCs universally look horrible, while enemy models are generally fine. I had no qualms with the graphics.

Sound is fine. Party voices are uniformly awful, and I would suggest turning them off, but you can't (completely). The music is whatever. It's nice as background music. In contrast with BT1-3, bard songs are all played in battle so you won't be walking around listening to whatever song you bard is playing. In a way, this is the biggest difference from classic BT. In BT1-3, your bard plays a significant role as a buffer and his songs basically stay in effect until you play something else or reload your game or whatever. In BT4, your bard is basically no different from a "practitioner" (spellcaster) in that his songs only buff you within a single combat (having said that, bard songs differ from spells mechanically, and also are all buffs and do not do direct damage).

I'm glad I gave the game the second chance, and I would consider replaying it with the director's cut on a harder difficulty.

 

[Barbalos]

Nice writeup newtmonkey . I generally agree from what I've played so far, except I think the music is really good. Too many puzzles indeed. And the hideous characters are there own thing. But I like the combat so I may buy and play the Director's Cut next month. Performance did increase a bit from what I saw, settings are finicky but it's running okay now.

 

[newtmonkey]

Barbalos
Thank you very much for saying so. The music is good, you're right, but I guess I was just looking at it from a BT1-3 perspective, where your bard's songs were both combat/exploration buffs AND played in the background. BT4 separates songs as gameplay elements and songs as, well, background music, and I think it suffers in that respect.

The game is in a much better place than it was around launch, with relatively stable performance and very few bugs. I had one hard crash during battle at the end of the game, where I had to log out from Windows and log back in, but now that the game supports save anywhere, it's not a big deal.

 

[Barbalos]

Yea I had a few crashes as well, mostly from Alt-Tabbing. The performance was not too good tbh, til I fiddled with the settings a lot. But I think it's a fun game and I really like the combat. I'm playing on Hard too, Normal was a bit too easy, Legendary too hard. I think Hard is a good level. I'm using my 4 person party near the start, with a Bard, Fighter, and 2 Rogues. As someone mentioned I think doubling up on Rogues or Mages breaks the game.

edit: I had 20 degree temp difference from changing settings and the game looked basically the same. Very unoptimized graphics settings, that's at 60 FPS too.

 

[newtmonkey]

I ended up settling on "High" graphics settings mostly, capped to 30 fps, but that's the price I pay for playing on a "gaming" laptop.

Doubling on "practitioners" definitely makes things easy (that's what I had). I think if I had two rogues, it would have been laughable. As is, every battle from, I dunno, 10 hours in until the last boss, was trivial.

[Edit] I used a full party of six, so maybe that breaks it (two fighters, one bard, one rogue, and two practitioners). It never occurred to me not to use a full party haha.

 

[theSavant]

Any ideas for a different party? I played a similar one (2F, 2R, 2P) and it was a breeze. However I can't imagine many other party combinations without them possibly becoming masochistic in certain situations (like the Mangar fight in Sulphur Springs). Having a Bard instead of another Rogue (like you did) sounds reasonable, but other than that?

The variety in parties seems even more limited when you consider that some skills are kinda useless while others are essential:

useless:
- Physical Damage Spells for practitioners because of later enemies having high armor
- Summoning Spells for practitioners because they take too long to get going
- Ranged/Thrown attack for rogues too weak compared to 2 melee weapons

essential:
- Break Armor Attack
- Mental Damage Spells
- being able to put out as much damage as possible in 1 hit

Therefore I fear you'll always end up with the same party and skilltrees...

 

[Multi-headed Cow]

As timely as ever there, inExile.

 

[Multi-headed Cow]

Resurrecting this once again to get some bitching in. Figured I'd finally finish the game before the director's cut hits just on the basis of "I sure fucking don't want a director's cut to hose my launch day saves so I have to start over" line of reasoning. Fine and dandy, except I'm chunking along and got to THE VERY LAST MAP OF THE GAME and get stuck with a perpetual loading bug. Only other person I've found with the same issue solved it by changing all his settings to low, which I tried, and it still fucking does it. Eventually going to reboot and verify the cache on Steam too, but that'll wait until a moment where I'm not so fucking pissed at the game. Christ, the last goddamn map and it does that.

 

[KeighnMcDeath]

So, this needs more patching? I feel like this is the flex seal commercial of games.

 

[Multi-headed Cow]

Well they're releasing the director's cut in a week or so. And even though it was an absolute fucking mess at launch it's been relatively stable for me on the current version UNTIL now. It'll probably be as good as it'll get when the director's cut patch hits.

 

[Safav Hamon]

Looking forward to playing once the Directors Cut arrives so I can skip all the puzzles.

 

[Agame]

Looking forward to playing once the Directors Cut arrives so I can skip all the puzzles.

The first time you have ever said something I can agree with...

 

[KeighnMcDeath]

What if they lied and they add 3x as many puzzles? And you have to purchase their triple set of code wheels and hellraiser puzzle box?

 

[ProphetSword]

Looking forward to playing once the Directors Cut arrives so I can skip all the puzzles.

If you skip all the puzzles, is there any content left?