Weird West: Definitive Edition - top-down immersive sim action-RPG from Arkane founder Raf Colantonio

[Nikanuur]

Played a bit of WW:DE, came here to see what's new, ended up buying Blade Runner. ...these holiday sales, really...

 

[Roguey]

I finished this. Unsurprisingly, given my tastes in stealth action games, I didn't hate it, though I didn't really find the progression systems all that interesting and combat is more chaotic than it should be (it might be less chaotic with the first person mode mod, I may or may not find out eventually). Swen Vincke deserves a lot of credit/blame for making barrels a standard feature. This is the real-time BG3 all those annoying FOMO-driven social media people say they want but never actually picked up (they want the popular thing everyone else is playing to cater more to their preferences).

When I play this it looks like I'm going to have to count the number of white men compared to everyone else to see if this is just a case of people thinking that equality = oppression.

I didn't actually count, but the split between "white men" and everyone else seems maybe 50/50 (I know most NPCs are randomly generated though I have no doubt they're using some hidden quotas). Eh, it's their own made-up world, so they're catering their own preferences. It is funny how racism and sexism are still omnipresent in this made-up-world of theirs. Like how is that even enforced when there aren't many white men around to enforce this kind of power structure in this non-apartheid world where women and racial minorities are not legally second-class citizens? Liberal-wank fantasy.

Colantonio claimed that Avellone's contributions involved lore and sidequest ideas and didn't actually contribute any dialogue, but this one speech reads awfully Avellonian to me, though I could be mistaken.

And here's a letter that I believe had to have been written by a woman (no man would write this) though it's a bit Avellonian in spirit.

And finally here's a Fallout reference that happens near the end of the game that inspired some Rick Dalton-pointing.

 

[Child of Malkav]

Huh that's cool, I didn't find the crashed ship. Must have been a new addition maybe.

 

[Roguey]

Huh that's cool, I didn't find the crashed ship. Must have been a new addition maybe.

It's a random encounter (just like in Fallout) so whether or not you get it is well, random.

 

[Child of Malkav]

It's a random encounter (just like in Fallout) so whether or not you get it is well, random.

I know but I was thinking that maybe they added it in a new patch/update since launch.

 

[oasis789]

And here's a letter that I believe had to have been written by a woman (no man would write this) though it's a bit Avellonian in spirit.

simping is avellonish?

 

[Roguey]

simping is avellonish?

Afraid so.

Spoiler

 

[PanickedTushkano]

I played through it some months ago and overall I did like it. Not enthusiastic perhaps, but it's kind of difficult to pin down why. As per usual it's probably a mix of different things.

- As has been said, combat is very fast and pretty deadly early on. Various upgrades and game knowledge will help though. There are more than enough options.
- One issue is that throwables are extremely difficult to align in the direction you want during combat (with Mouse and Keyboard).
- Another is that every character has a few skills that are unique to them and after a few hours you exchange them for a new set, so it's kind of difficult to get used to them. Especially if you use stealth a lot and thus have less opportunities for skill use.

- Character and loot progression aren't all that satisfying. Weapons just upgrade, mostly in terms of damage, which makes things easier, but isn't interesting. Similar case with vests. All throwables are useable by everyone, so that's part of what makes characters feel a bit too samey. I feel like the character switching concept leads to some problems which isn't justified by the not overly interesting narrative concept. Skills vary between characters and they play differently, but it doesn't have much depth. And least not by itself. What makes them interesting is more how they interact with all the other stuff in the game.

- The story itself was motivating. It's a deadly world that doesn't mess around and there is a good amount of gruesome stuff going on. Which lends it some weight narratively speaking. The mystery of the main plot and the added variety of side plots did keep it interesting until the end. The main plot writing also was pretty solid.
- The characters are very diverse for no real reason. A bit weird, but mostly not a problem as it's not really based on our world or the traditional Wild West. But... at one point a character did thank my character for not ratting his family out for being cannibals, only to then use the opportunity to drive home the point that their skin colour was giving them problems, as well as his wife being the first female Sheriff... Which is odd, because half of all Sheriffs and Deputies in Weird West are female... And I frankly don't think that classical racism in terms of skin colour or anything like that ever really comes up otherwise. Mostly the game's narrative has the good sense to focus on the pigmen, cannibals and just generally shitty, murderous people as the main issues most people are actually worried about.

- Lots and lots of simulationism. Turn off a lamp and somebody will come walking to turn it back on. People walking their patrol paths, working out, going to the toilet or going to sleep during the night. Fire burning down the landscape and rain extinguishing it. Lightning being an actual thing. A lot of the time I just accidentally knocked over barrels of water and sometimes people. Some comedy potential in there. I once tried to get up to a roof only to accidentally smash through a window into the midst of some bad guys.
- Some choices seem to matter. Depending on actions taken some important characters may end up dead or with a bounty on their heads. I didn't kill off previous characters, but it seems like this might be a problem for progression, as the easiest way to get good equipment is to just go to your previous character and recruit them again, together with the equipment they still have.
- On the other hand I also once discovered a story location and murdered tons of cultists as they were sleeping in their beds. And that was one thing that the story did simply completely ignore once the plot moves on to that location. Would have been nice to be able to break the story, but I do understand that they wanted to avoid that.

- Pretty good, fitting soundtrack as well and some locations had pretty good atmosphere. But I didn't really like it aesthetically and environments were rarely interesting, not least because of that.

Overall it was still a good experience and an obvious case of lots of potential replayability. In spite of somewhat mixed feelings there is just a lot going on with a surprisingly large world and a lot of emergent gameplay and a complex interplay of systems.

 

[Abu Antar]

I tried it on console, via PS+, but I shelved it after a few hours. It's a game I could see myself playing with PC controls, but with a controller, it did not feel great.

 

[Fedora Master]

It doesn't feel good on PC either.

 

[ArchAngel]

I tried it on console, via PS+, but I shelved it after a few hours. It's a game I could see myself playing with PC controls, but with a controller, it did not feel great.

Yea I tried it on Xbox while it was on Game Pass.. its real time combat was too fast for the aiming level needed on the controller. In the end I had to go full sneak mode until it become too boring and too slow.

 

[orcinator]

The characters are very diverse for no real reason. A bit weird, but mostly not a problem as it's not really based on our world or the traditional Wild West. But... at one point a character did thank my character for not ratting his family out for being cannibals, only to then use the opportunity to drive home the point that their skin colour was giving them problems, as well as his wife being the first female Sheriff... Which is odd, because half of all Sheriffs and Deputies in Weird West are female... And I frankly don't think that classical racism in terms of skin colour or anything like that ever really comes up otherwise. Mostly the game's narrative has the good sense to focus on the pigmen, cannibals and just generally shitty, murderous people as the main issues most people are actually worried about

We really need a proper squad based ImSim style Tactical RPG where you handle racism in the Wild West.
Specifically in that you'll be playing as these guys:

 

[Taka-Haradin puolipeikko]

 

[Spukrian]

So I've played through Weird West on Normal and again on Very Hard Nimpossible.

Not sure what to say that hasn't already been said. Yeah, the combat is hectic and difficult; a steep learning curve for me at least, it wasn't untill the last two chapters of the nimpossible run that I felt had a good grasp of it. I liked the style of the graphics except for one thing: the eyes of the ingame models, they're just... creepy. I enjoyed the music a lot.

I feel the game could've expanded more on the concept of making your own story. I mean crafting and hunting is fun for a while, but I wanted a bit more.

I found the lore of the setting to be very interesting and I would've liked more of that in the game. I guess they could expand on that in a sequel but somehow I doubt there will be one.

Some funny/weird moments:
*If I encountered an overturned chair when I had the bountyhunter in my party she would always walk over it and turn it upright. Never saw any other NPC do this.
*You know how NPCs have floating text over their heads? Occasionally during my Nimpossible run floats would appear over my PC, never noticed this happening in Normal mode. The bountyhunter once had a float that said "Browse goods" or something like it.
*Once I was returning with a bounty to the sheriff while I also had a sidequest to release a NPC from jail. When I turned in the bounty the sheriff put him in the same cell as the NPC and then when I paid bail for the NPC, the bounty escaped! This caused the entire town to become hostile, because apparently it was my fault...
*At a point an undertaker gives me a quest to dig up stuff from a grave and after doing this there's a bounty on his head. After turning him in he just goes back to his old job as an undertaker.
*There's a certain NPC involved in the main quest in both chapter 1 and chapter 3. In my nimpossible run I killed him in chapter 1 only to read in the news in chapter 2 that he had been "feeling ill but is better now". He didn't appear in chapter 3 but I got credit for putting him under snakes.
*I once kicked a jug at random and it flew into my horse and knocked it unconscious.
*A cool thing that happened very few times was infighting. Once I had a bounty in a mine and when I got there I found them fighting wraiths and zombies, sadly the undead lost. Another time in an abandoned town I saw some graverobbers getting slaughtered by ridgebacks. Sometimes I would find places where the enemies aggro against rats for no reason at all (the rats weren't swarming).

Overall I enjoyed Weird West, but I don't think I'll ever replay it.