Jack Of Owls
Arcane
Ever play very highly rated cRPGs only to have severe immersion-breaking events in the early game absolutely destroy your desire to continue? This happened with Gothic 3. I discovered a cavern of a fairly large group of well-armed bandits or whatever the hell they were, and they didn't attack me on sight. "Bonus!" I thought. "They like me, they really like me!" I reasoned with Sally Field-accepting-her-Oscar levels of happiness. I can explore the side caves in this cavern, and my bandit bros will have my back. So I went down this long passage and encountered a group of goblins. Realizing that I was way too early level to challenge them, I did a 180 and hightailed it outta there and back to the main cavern where the bandit bros were. One of the runty little goblin-bastards chased me and I rubbed my hands in glee, thinking: "Hah! My bandit-bros are gonna beat your ass down then make ham stew outta your skinny little goblin glutes cookin' in that caldron they have in the middle of their cavern! PREPARE TO DIE!" So this wee little goblin finally converges on the group of well-armed bandits and what happens? They can't make a nick in the goblin. So much hacking and slashing from all sides and not a dent! Neither goblin nor bandit were being hurt in any way. I uninstalled right then & there. Say what you will about Oblivion but at least the radiant AI had some cool, believable features, like luring a tough foe to a group of guards or tavern patrons and have them make short work of them to help you along in the early levels. Sorry for this virtual stream-of-consciousness post. I'll stop now, having vented.
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