Category Archives: Impressions
Avowed – Veneer Off
I have added another 16 hours into Avowed (total: 32), clearing the entire second zone. And while some of what I reported earlier is still accurate – traversal is fun! – the game’s veneer is definitely rubbing off.
Combat, which hitherto has been fun, is now very rote. For the first half of the second zone, I respecced into a Ranger gun build and almost ended up abandoning the game entirely. There was… just no buttons to press. Sure, Ranger has a sort of vines CC ability, but aside from that, it was power attacks from pistols and nothing else to actively press. Technically I could have grabbed some more active buttons from Wizard as well, but Ranger is the only real splash-class, and trying to elevate your Intellect stat to the point where spells are relevant is a fool’s errand without just being a Wizard.
During the last half of the zone, I went into Fighter, first with a 2H weapon focus and then 1H with shield. Fighter had some more buttons to press – including a very satisfying Charge – and was a more dynamic experience overall with the Parry mechanic and blocking. The issue is that the DPS was just not really there. Avowed loves to throw groups of 5+ enemies at you, which is understandable considering Rangers/Wizards will nearly one-shot most of them from range in the opening salvo. As a Fighter, it’s not satisfying at all spending all your Stamina trying to block/dodge so many enemies. Although you do have two squad mates to help spread aggro around, the reality is that so do Rangers/Wizards, and those classes can actually eliminate enemies quickly. Which technically goes against the “gameplay” of Fighter, as if things die before you get into Parry chains or full attack combos, a lot of the Fighter-based weapons are useless. Which they are anyway, since they don’t kill quickly.
The other major issue that I glossed over previously was the world in general and interactivity in particular. Avowed is not Skyrim. Which is fine, most games aren’t. But as a first-person fantasy game that came out 14 years after Skyrim, Avowed is incredibly static. NPCs barely move (if ever), there is no world reactivity, there is no “stealing,” and every object out in the world is bolted onto the floor, aside from some breakable crates. To be fair, this is more an intellectual criticism, as I hardly noticed anything amiss in-game. But now that I have, I see signs of a Hollywood set everywhere. Which might have been fine, if this were not a fantasy RPG released in 2025 for $70 MSRP.
The final thing that is really dragging me down is the upgrade system and Unique weapons. I have been playing the game “as intended” when it comes to looting and experimenting, but have come to find out that the devs punish that playstyle. For one thing, all the respeccing I have done required me to upgrade several weapons that, oops, I am no longer using. Then I found out that all unique weapons in the world scale to the highest upgraded weapon you own at the time of pickup. What this means is that if the best weapon you have is Fine (blue quality), all the uniques you discover will be Fine. However, if you funnel all your upgrades into one particular weapon and get it to Exceptional (purple), those same uniques would have been Exceptional. And this works all the way into Superb (red) and Legendary.
Do you like exploring the map and picking up things organically, doing a few upgrades here and there? Punished! Because now if you decide to go with another weapon or playstyle, you will need to double (or more) the upgrade materials required to level them up. Which, let me remind you, is very necessary because weapons and armor get a debuff if they are more than a few “tiers” below the enemies you are facing. Also, remember that enemies and money is finite in this game, so it is very possible to just screw yourself and be locked into something that is no longer fun.
Which might just be the entire game itself for me, at the moment.
I don’t know, guys. Not everything I play needs to be Game of the Year material; lord knows I play plenty of trashy survival games for hundreds of hours. But, truly, Avowed feels like a game that would have been really great… in 2015. Or maybe 2010. Obsidian is not Bethesda, yes. But this also ain’t New Vegas. And between this and Outer Worlds, I’m thinking that Obsidian needs to stick to what they do best: iterating on the shoulders of better games, rather than trying to make their own.
Grounded was great though, so… ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
Avowed – Early Impressions
I have played about 16 hours of Avowed via Game Pass. Early impressions: mostly great!
Although I have not yet stepped outside the first area, Avowed is a very gorgeous game. More than that, it is a joy to walk around in. It cannot be understated how much I like a first-person perspective in exploration games, which is elevated further when the character actually feels competent within it. There are marked ledges with the stereotypical yellow ropes, but there is almost no areas in which I felt I could not reasonably scramble up. This isn’t climbing sheer cliffs BotW/Genshin Impact-style, but it’s enough to feel like the world is explorable. It honestly feels one step below Dishonored in how good it feels walking around – if more games could have shadowstep-like abilities, that would be great.
Combat also feels really, really good. I am currently focusing on a Wizard character which gives me, honestly, too many options. The great thing though, is that there is a lot of variety in builds (on default difficulty) and how you engage with enemies. For example, I was rocking the standard wand + spellbook loadout, but I didn’t like how short range the wand ended up being. So, I have a pistol + spellbook. Plus, I have chosen a spellbook that allows me to conjure up a magic staff to beat people with if things get too hairy in close-quarters. Honestly, I kill most things with alpha strikes from a bow and follow-up pistol shots, so I’m leaning towards respeccing more into the Ranger class altogether. Which is easy to do, as it only costs a small amount of currency to respec, which is another plus.
I’m not going to comment much about the story, especially given how early in the game I am. What I can say though, is that I like how the game takes itself seriously without also being too far up its own ass. Being able to view a glossary of all the Proper Nouns during a conversation is helpful, but it’s not always necessary either. Which is great! I did play the original Pillars of Eternity enough to get some of the references, and there were plenty of references to the second game I did not get, but still understood from context clues. I never fully expected Avowed to follow The Outer Worlds irreverence, but nevertheless I am glad the slapstick is relegated to only minor side quests.
Having said all that… yeah, I do have some criticisms.
First, enemies are finite – once you clear an area, it stays cleared. I’ve seen some people praise this as being “immersive,” but it honestly leads to un-immersive player behavior. For example, I was walking in an area and saw some of the lizard creatures battling with spiders. That is great dynamic happenstance (assuming it wasn’t scripted)! But instead of letting them duke it out and attacking the weakened victor, I immediately jumped into the fray because I realized that any incidental monster deaths was a permanent reduction in my possible XP. Now, I am assuming that there is a level cap that can be reached way before the end of the game proper. But this is also a game that gives you more abilities than you have points for, and thus I want to get any many as I can, as soon as I can.
It did occur to me that the original Pillars of Eternity – and most CRPGs – also have the “feature” of finite battles. So perhaps that is not entirely out of place. But even aside from the metagaming aspect, combat itself is fun enough to want more of. I’m seeking out more of these random battles because it’s fun to push the buttons. Which is great! But I hate the idea of knowing they are a dwindling resource.
Another metagame aspect I do not enjoy is the carryover of The Outer Worlds’ “unique item” system. Essentially, the progression mechanic in Avowed is to choose amongst the the items you pick up and then upgrade a few of them over and over. Indeed, almost all of the loot you get from battles and hidden treasures are simply upgrade materials. The problem is that Avowed is also peppered with unique items that have bonus effects that regular items do not. What this means is that if you really like using Bows as a weapon, you are wasting upgrade materials on any regular bow, and should use something else until you get a unique Bow. The problem with that strategy is that weapons are debuffed against enemies of “higher quality” than the weapon used, because… reasons.
So, remember how I said I was using guns instead of wands for my wizard character? Aside from my range concern, what pushed me towards guns was the fact that I found two unique pistols and no unique wands. Without looking it up, I don’t even know if I’ll find a unique wand in the second area either. Which means I either waste upgrade materials on a regular wand so I can keep up with mobs, or I do something else. Similarly, upgrading spellbooks feels bad because you are locked into getting bonuses to just four spells. You can spend your precious few skill points to memorize spells without needing a spellbook, but you don’t get those bonuses that come from an upgraded spellbook.
Pressing buttons feels good, but each level up (and item upgrade) leaves me feeling unsatisfied.
Overall though, I do anticipate playing Avowed to completion. Perhaps the Wizard life is not for me, and the Ranger will be straight-forward enough to feel satisfying to level. It also helps that I have those unique weapons for the ranger already. Will I grow bored of using just those though? Well, it hasn’t happened yet. And perhaps I’ll accumulate enough Wizard uniques by the time it does.
…and hopefully I’ll still have enough upgrade materials to get them up to speed.
Let’s see how it goes.
Impressions: Stoneshard
I’ve played almost 40 hours of Stoneshard in the last two weeks. My opinions are… mixed, but hopeful.
Stoneshard is a brutal, turn-based fantasy/mercenary game where death is always around the next corner. It’s one of those “you’re not the hero” kind of stories, although in practice that just means you can run into super high-level enemies early on if you aren’t careful. The general gameplay consists of taking contracts to do X inside dungeon Y within 3 days, and then returning for your reward. Eventually, the contracts dry up at your original location, so you have to trek to another town and start the process again, hitting harder and harder dungeons. The most recent update (0.9.1.0 – Rags to Riches) includes a caravan feature that makes moving through the world much easier.
The brutality of the game comes in two flavors: cascading failure, and time disrespect.
Let’s start with time disrespect first. The world is broken up into tiles that you move through, just the same as you would move through a dungeon. While you can click on a distant spot to have your character “hop” square to square quickly (outside of combat), the fact remains you still have to walk. If the dungeon is six tiles away, that’s six full screens you have to get through. There are a bunch of herbs, mushrooms, berry bushes and the like to occupy yourself with – you need to craft a lot of fodder to fuel your caravan – and there is always the risk of an ambush from bandits or hostile wildlife as well. So, it’s not always boring to travel long distances. Plus, sometimes it’s fun to kind of vibe with the very excellent music and ambient noises.
Here’s the thing though: you can only save the game when resting. If you travel for those six tiles, survive a few ambushes, clear an entire dungeon (including the boss), and then get bit by a hidden snake and die a tile away from town… you lose all progress since the last time you rested.
Technically, there are ways to mitigate this sort of disaster. You can buy/purchase bedrolls, which take an enormous amount of limited bag space, to create a one-time use resting spot outside of the dungeon. This will prevent you from having to re-walk to the dungeon, but of course do nothing about the dungeon itself or the walk back. Or perhaps you can bring two bedrolls, use one, stash the other outside the dungeon, and then use the second once you complete the dungeon. The latest update introduces the caravan, which you can technically park close to the dungeon and mitigate the worst of it, if you’re willing to burn a bunch of time (there’s a cooldown after parking the caravan). Of course, the existence of the caravan “workaround” calls into question why there’s no Quicksave, or a smaller Meditation Mat, or whatever.
[Note: there is a Save & Quit feature, allowing you to exit the game. This save is deleted after loading.]
It’s important to know about this sort of thing because Stoneshard has a lot of cascading failure opportunities. You have Hunger and Thirst, which necessitates bringing a waterskin and snacks. When you are hit, damage is dealt to specific limbs, which can develop wounds or even Bleeds; make sure to pack Splints for the former and Bandages for the latter. Oh, and limbs have a Condition meter that reduces your maximum HP until they are healed, which is another consumable. Even if you heal the damage away, you have an overall Pain meter that accumulates unless reduced by beer/drugs. Enemy abilities can Stun, Stagger, Daze, Confuse, Immobilize, Ignite, and/or Poison you. Fatigue, Intoxication, Morale, and Sanity are also things. And all of these typically compound on one another, like how Pain gives you a debuff at certain thresholds that constantly drains Morale.
I am not actually opposed to all these “crunchy” systems. Choosing how many healing items to bring to the dungeon is a meaningful decision, and rewards the collection of crafting components and otherwise planning ahead. What I am opposed to is how often and how quickly these interlocking systems go from irrelevant to run-ending in a way you can do nothing about. Bleeding out at the end of a fight because you didn’t bring any/ran out of bandages? Fair play. Getting Dazed (turns off all your abilities for a few turns), then Immobilized, and then chopped in half within two turns? Okay then. The slow descent into insanity works in, say, Darkest Dungeon because damage is usually spread amongst a party and you get worn down. Here, you often just get hit a few times and die.
Ironically, that scenario doesn’t play out that often because you are always, 100% of the time trying to lure enemies out one at a time. Which is super effective! And sometimes boring. I play an Electromage with a few finishing moves via Staff. Electromancy is all about low cooldown spells that can Knockback or possibly Immobilize enemies. I just cleared out a 3-skull dungeon full of bandits and only got hit once, by an enemy that had a charge+attack move. So, perhaps my experience is a bit more skewed than if I were straight melee, sword & board with heavy armor; perhaps there’s more survivable damage.
Anyway, that’s Stoneshard. It’s still in Early Access, has been for years, and the updates themselves do not come quickly. That said, this is a game that has good “bones” and I can see it meaningfully improving with some tweaks and enhancements. The latest “Rags to Riches” release apparently changed the game’s compiler, which destroyed all existing mods – if/when that gets fixed, I could see mods coming to the rescue too. I’m certainly looking forward to being able to Quicksave anywhere.
Decemberiment
Trying an experiment for December: just post stuff as I go.
Finished a second session of 1000xRESIST. It’s been a long time since I’ve taken so many screenshots. Looks like… 58 total, so far. Not really because of the visuals, although those are good, but rather the sometimes hilarious, sometime brutal dialogue.
And then you get into stuff like this.
That’s not really brutal, but most of what I’ve taken have spoilers so, yeah.
The experience has been great overall, although it is absolutely a walking-simulator style game. You walk around, talk to people, get pulled into crazy sequences, do some very light puzzle work with time skipping, and, uh, fly around by shooting at glowy purple things? It’s kinda weird.
The other thing I wanted to briefly talk about here is that I really, really enjoy the general weirdness of the made-up words/phrases it has. “Hekki ALLMO,” “Sphere to Square,” “Six to One,” “Hair to Hair,” and so on. A lot of games and/or media stick in random crap into dialog to enhance the “realness” of the fictional world, but many times it feels forced or otherwise a token effort. Think of all those fantasy games where people exclaim “By the [#gods]!” and basically nothing else. A Handmaid’s Tale did a fantastic job with its phrases; Game of Thrones had a lot of phrases, but, eh, sometimes felt more (ironically) rote than meaningful. 1000xRESIST lands much closer to A Handmaid’s Tale. Maybe it’s the repetition or something like the smaller scale of interaction.
Or maybe it’s just fucking catchy and evocative. “Hair to hair” is nonsense, but you could make sense out of it. Standing back-to-back? Being linked genetically? Regardless, it’s cool.
Frostpunk 2
I have played and completed Frostpunk 2 via Game Pass in about 15 hours.
Frostpunk 2 is a sequel to the original both narratively and from a gameplay perspective. New London survived under the Captain’s rule in this alternative history 1899 ice age, but with his death, the fate of the city now rests in the Steward’s (aka your) hands. With a much more zoomed-out perspective, you must carve out space for various districts, explore and set up outposts, and placate diametrically-opposed factions whilst also ensuring the city never falls to the cold.
In the original game, the “plot” was broken into various Scenarios. With Frostpunk 2, there is a single narrative thread composed of five Chapters, throughout which your city progress is maintained. This continuity resolves a lot of the issues I had with the original game, wherein tech tree unlocks seemed pointless considering you barely had time to research any of them before the Scenario was over. Continuity also makes your early decisions much more important, as you continue to receive the benefits of it for a dozen hours. For example, your scouts might discover wreckage and give you a choice: gain important materials, or get +800 Workforce permanently. Choosing the resources might get you out of an immediate crisis, but there actually is a “long-term” to consider here.
Of course, that also becomes a problem. Although I beat Frostpunk 2 in ~15 hours, realistically the game was over after about 8 hours. By the time Chapter 3 rolled around, I had maximized the citizens’ Trust, all Factions supported me, and I was running a surplus of every material with an immense stockpile behind it. I played on the equivalent of Veteran difficulty, and so it’s possible that this is an indication I should have challenged myself further. However, I doubt harsher RNG events and a poorer start will make some of the “binary” choices/tech less obviously OP. If anything, I am now much more savvy to which Laws are critical to unlock early and which can wait.
On the other hand, the likelihood of my playing again is kind of low. Having a strict narrative thread means experiencing the same events in the same order, exploring the same map, and maybe making different choices for roleplaying purposes. The game is extremely engaging in the moment – way “worse” than the Civilization “just one more turn” hour evaporation – but a lot of that depended on the consumption of novelty. There is an Endless Mode option available, although how interesting that may be is dubious; as I mentioned previously, there are actually ways to end up effectively infinite even within the base game. Best I can do is hope there are updates in the future that add new Scenarios in.
Overall though, Frostpunk 2 is an extremely slick and fun city-builder for the time I spent with it. Given how much was changed, it’s hard to say whether someone who loved/hated the original would find the sequel any better. It’s on Game Pass though, so it’s relatively easy to give it a whirl.
Impressions: Enshrouded
I actually purchased Enshrouded on a sale prior to Nightengale and a few other games, but had been waiting until I finished those, lest I be too enraptured by what was going to be the better game. You know, eating your peas and mashed potatoes before the pudding.
As it turns out, I needn’t have bothered: Enshrouded is not fun to play.
Believe me, I’m as surprised as anyone. Enshrouded has sold 3 million copies in Early Access, and is specifically called out by the Nightingale devs as one reason why they are reengineering their game.
Let’s get this big note out of the way: Enshrouded is not an open-world survival crafting game. I had to look at the Steam store page to double-check, but sure enough, it’s billed as a “co-op survival action RPG.” It’s an important distinction because the crafting, resource gathering, and survival elements are all perfunctory at best. Do you punch trees and collect fiber from bushes? Yes. Can you craft the cloth or metal scraps you need for practically everything? No. Those come from mob drops, or occasionally from destroying tents or other objects out in the world. After a while, you realize that you don’t really need much of anything from environment in comparison to mob drops, which is textbook Action RPG with “survival-lite” elements.
One thing Enshrouded is very good for is terrain deformation. Almost absurdly so. Nearly every inch of terrain can be dug into with a pick, and setting down base marker will allow rapid mining in almost any configuration. If you ever wanted a Hobbit-style house or Dwarven palace, this game is for you. Regular mansions are just fine as well. Build whatever you want! …provided it is within bounds of a Flame Altar.
This is important to know because general movement in Enshrouded is crap. Encounter a steep hill? Sometimes you can jump and land on individual pixels and sometimes not. If you aim your pick awkwardly upwards you can sometimes dig out a little ledge to help you climb. Double-Jump is a talent you can spec into as well. Things you can’t do? Build a box and stand on it. Or use the Grappling Hook – that’s exclusively designed to hook onto metal rings in specific places. Later on, you can unlock giant towers that you can fast travel to the top of and then jump off and use a “glider” to get around. But the glider handles more like a wingsuit weighed down with tungsten anchors than anything else.
The sad part is that all of this poor mobility is likely bad by design. See, the central conceit of the game is that a Shroud has billowed out of the low places of the earth, killing those trapped inside. Venturing into these low-laying placed causes one to be “Enshrouded” and will result in death after a ~5 min timer expires. Meanwhile, poking your head outside of the Shroud will rapidly add time back onto the meter. Thus, if it were easy to grapple up hills and/or build structures anywhere one pleases, it would trivialize (to an extent) the threat posed by the Shroud. So… I get it. But I also get that Nightingale feels so immensely better being able to climb/grapple any surface and glide for ages via umbrella.
As for combat itself… meh. There are a few different types of melee weapons, but no real “moves” per se. There are block/parry and dodge-roll mechanics, along with bows and magic. I have heard the latter was nerfed recently, but I’m not sure if the abysmal magic system currently in the game is the result of that or if they made it that way on purpose. You can craft wands and staves early-on, with wands having infinite “uses” (that consume item durability) but extremely limited range. I’m talking practically melee range, for some reason. Staves, on the other hand, consume both MP and “ammo” scrolls or whatever, which can only be crafted once you rescue the Alchemist NPC. Why can you craft a staff before you have the resources to use it in any capacity?
So, yeah. Enshrouded. I have played for about ~7 hours thus far and every play experience goes the same way: sprint on a road for several minutes to some location, complete a micro-dungeon, fast-travel back to base. Repeat. Or in my case, Quit to Desktop because the play experience is exhausting. The world is gorgeous but devoid of anything interesting, combat is dull, magic is pointless, and going from place to place is skibidi Ohio no cap, as the kids say. Honestly, I should have expected something once I saw “Athleticism” as its own branch in the Path of Exile-style talent tree. Oh, and the devs are extremely miserly with the talent points and level-ups in the general.
Oh well. At least these are solvable problems that will hopefully be ironed out during Early Access.
Impressions: Nightingale
I had low expectations rolling into Nightingale – a Mixed review score on Steam and its own game directors professing disappointment will do it – but the game was surprisingly good. To be fair, I only started playing until after the Realms Rebuilt reengineering, so perhaps I would have been less surprised with the original rollout.
What I do want to note for posterity is my current giddiness and wonder surrounding the principle conceit of the game: portals to fae realms. I have played a lot of survival crafting games in my time, and it’s not particularly often that the world itself (or the potential thereof) excites me. But this initial Abeyance realm? Very excellent first impression. And as I was exploring the island, I kept thinking about how many problems realm-walking solves. Usually, carving up the world into disjointed instances is more of a programmer shortcut than artistic design, but it simply synergizes perfectly here. The only other games that achieved this level of environmental design brilliance for me was Starbound and No Man’s Sky. Getting that same feeling in a non-sci-fi setting is practically unheard of.
Now, it’s important to understand I haven’t actually made it off of this tutorial island yet. All this potentiality in my mind is exactly that: a superposition of imagination not yet intersected with reality. I have no doubt the waveform will eventually collapse and we’ll see, yet again, that the cat died in the box. But regardless of what ends up happening with Nightingale, I do want to see more things like this. I think having a more fae and/or eldritch angle on the genre is an otherwise untapped vein of novelty.
As far as general gameplay, Nightingale again surprised me in several ways. Chopping trees breaks off chunks, mining ore chips away rock where you hit it; little details like that go a long way with me. I remember reading people complaining about combat and the AI, but so far it appears serviceable, if not robust. The pseudo-zombie Bound mobs run, crawl, lurch towards you from multiple angles. Your character can block, get knocked around from attacks, and have a dedicated dodge button. Non-standard traversal is also supported, with a Mary Poppins-style umbrella glide and rock-climbing picks that you can also throw at surfaces to grappling hook yourself up. Again, all on the tutorial island.
One huge innovation that I hardly ever see in any game is the fact that multiple different resources can be used in recipes. For example, one cooking recipe calls for two Raw Edible Plants – this can be satisfied with mushrooms, blueberries, barberries, etc, or mixed and matched. This may not seem like a big deal, but think about all the times you’ve had wolf meat in a game but couldn’t craft something because it required boar meat or whatever. Additionally, all these resources have specific bonuses associated with them. Gloves need Hide to craft? Okay, well, you can use Hide (Prey), Hide (Predator), or Hide (Bug), and they will confer +Stamina, +HP, or +StaminaRegen respectively.
Having said that, there are definitely some… let’s say opportunities for quality of life improvements.
I was able to recruit a follower NPC who helpfully assists me in combat and also picks up resources automatically. That’s great! Their inventory is not weight-based like mine though, it’s item-based. While this works out in my favor if I’m loading them down with heavy resources like wood or stone, they are just as likely to fill their pockets with leaves and twine, necessitating some awkward inventory management. Furthermore, while I greatly appreciate being able to craft from storage, could we craft from NPC inventory too?
Also, while I love the idea of “decorative” objects conferring a bonus to crafting stations and items created, it feels real dumb to have no control over which bonuses take precedent. Maybe this is a “problem” that gets solved later on with higher-tier crafting stations (that have more than two enhancement slots), but once I realized I had to move the Hunting Trophy across the house in order for the Training Dummy to grant my crafted Knife +Critical Damage, I wanted to throw the entire system in the trash. Like, what’s the design intention, folks? Am I supposed to have two separate Crafting Tables set up, one surrounded by objects that grant me 20% ammo per craft and +Damage on ranged weapons, and the other near objects with +Melee modifiers? Or is my “pick it up and place it in another room” workaround the design goal? Just… let us toggle which ones are active.
——
Having made it to the 2nd island, things are getting a bit more abrasive. The enemies are much harder, presumably tuned to be a challenge for players in Tier 2 equipment. But the only real way to get Tier 2 equipment is to gather Tier 2 essence to unlock the upgraded crafting stations. Meanwhile, surprise, the realm has a negative modifier that reduces your HP regeneration. The whole situation was a bit brutal. But now I’ve unlocked a bow that literally deals 100 more damage per arrow than I deal currently, using materials I can gather from my Abeyance realm. Which… is not the way that is typically supposed to work. Anyway, once that gets crafted, I’ll continue onwards to farm mobs for essence to unlock more crafting stations so I can craft the gear that will allow me to be actually successful in exploring the area.
Anyway, if I had to sum up the things I would like addressed over Early Access thus far, it would be:
- Toggle active Augmentations on crafting stations
- Craft from NPC inventory
- Sort by Weight option when viewing NPC inventory
- Remove or reengineer Hunger Meter (Food buffs mean you’re always full anyway)
- Reimagine the Magick/spells system entirely (it’s barely supported and boring to boot)
- Tighten up traversal mechanics, e.g. what can be climbed, grappled, etc
- Allow us to build bridges
Other than that, so far, I’m very impressed.
Arcane and Edgerunners
While on my vacation a few weeks ago, away from my PC, I finally found the time to watch both Arcane (e.g. the League of Legends-based show) and Cyberpunk: Edgerunners. Here are my thoughts:
Arcane: Season 1
An amazingly compelling and nuanced show that is better than it really has any right to be. Arcane is at a quality level that it makes you start thinking that Riot created League of Legends as a means to fund the development of Arcane, the thing that they wanted to make all along.
The overall show follows the life of Vi and Powder, two sisters growing up in the undercity slums, and how they try to survive amidst gang wars and oppression from enforcers from the city proper. A series of unfortunate events breaks them apart, and their differing paths through the developing tension between the upper and lower cities forms the backbone of the plot.
I really don’t know what else to say about Arcane. I have never played League of Legends nor have delved into any character lore to see if anything in the show is “accurate.” None it really matters, as the show stands on its own. In fact, outside of a few moments late in the series where there is clearly some “ultimate ability fan service,” you probably wouldn’t ever know it was based on a game.
In any case, whether or not you choose to invest the time in watching Arcane for yourself, I highly recommend at least listening to What Could Have Been and Goodbye. The overall soundtrack is next-level, with a wide range of genres and tempo, but those two in particular elevate the experience.
I am eagerly awaiting the release of Season 2, which is coming out soon.
Cyberpunk: Edgerunners
Cyberpunk: Edgerunners is a Japanese anime based within the Cyberpunk 2077 game world. It follows the life of David Martinez, a teenager who is thrust onto the merciless streets of Night City after a senseless tragedy. Mirroring the base game themes, we see how David tries to make a life for himself despite being surrounded by violence and corruption and cyberpsychosis at every turn.
I watched Edgerunners with the English dub, and that is something I recommend too – the quality is excellent, but the real treat was hearing the same sort of Cyberpunk slang (choom, gonk, flatlined, etc) that you do in-game. Indeed, seeing as how I watched the anime after having played the game in which they added Edgerunner gear as bonus items, it felt as if I were literally watching an in-game show.
Overall, I enjoyed the kinetic, violent affair, but recognize that it might not be for everyone (especially the squeamish). If you liked playing Cyberpunk 2077, you owe it to yourself to watch the show. If you didn’t, but enjoy the cyberpunk genre and are okay with over-the-top gore, then go for it. There is a ton of drama, tragedy, and an impeccable soundtrack (some of which come direct from the game radio).
Vintage Story – Modified
TL;DR: Mods help, fundamental issues remain.
While my Impression post went up on Monday, I actually wrote it few weeks ago. In that time since, I have downloaded the following mods for Vintage Story:
- Primative Survival
- Better Ruins
- A Culinary Artillery / Expanded Foods
- HUD Clock
- XSkills
- Carry On
- Animal Cages
- Prospect Together
As you may imagine from the titles, the mods add a lot of interesting elements to the game. Or at least would, if I was not still gated behind a Copper Saw. But let’s start at the beginning.
Once I had all the mods installed, I decided to go ahead and start a new game. I left most of the settings as the default, although I did increase the chances of surface copper, and also disabled class-specific recipe locks. Upon zone-in, I found a temporally-stable area, built a dirt house, found some clay, and basically got myself back where I was in my prior save within about 2 hours. While sifting some Bony Dirt, I actually got a Copper Hammer Head, which boosted me significantly into the Copper Age… sorta. I still needed to collect copper for a Pickaxe and then some for a Prospecting Pick, which you use as a method to determine what ore is nearby.
I then proceeded to spend literal hours of my limited gaming free time wandering around the map, prospecting stone to determine where copper might be. Now, you can find surface copper nuggets and then mark that area on your map due to the likelihood of there being copper deposits below there. However, that doesn’t necessarily mean you will find any before your Copper Pickaxe loses all its durability just smacking regular stone. No way of repairing tools, by the way.
Fast-forward some more hours, and I actually found a cave that had real copper nodes clearly visible in the walls. Yay! I collected those went back to base and… just stopped playing. I had enough for a Copper Anvil, which is necessary to create the Copper Saw, but I realized (via Wiki) that you need a Bronze Anvil to craft Iron Tools, and that making Bronze is a better use of your copper than making an anvil. After a few attempts at getting some Tin to make Bronze, I gave up. Arguably, I should have just made the goddamn Copper Anvil and then Saw and then seen what was what.
Fundamentally though, I just wasn’t having fun.
What about the mods though? Well, Primitive Survival adds a lot of food options, including the ability to chop meat into jerky, which helps with preserving food in the early-game. There is also some enhanced fishing capabilities that doesn’t rely on literal fish mobs spawning. The extra food stuff from the other mods didn’t really come into play because I didn’t enter the Wood Board Age. Or maybe I was just too dumb to understand the trick behind easier recipes or whatever.
Out of all of them, XSkills had the most promise. Basically, the mod adds character progression to the game, which is absolutely something I feel Vintage Story lacks. The default XP rate is abysmal, but you can boost it via editing some files. One of the skills grants a chance of collecting Resin from chopping trees, which is essentially all I ever really wanted from the game. There seemed to be some neat stuff in there, amongst the more generic +5% X and similar, but I didn’t earn enough XP to reach anything of particular note. I definitely recommend it though.
Weirdly enough, I do sorta still have a vague desire to play Vintage Story. I’m not quite sure if its the equivalent to Stockholm Syndrome, wherein you spend so much time understanding the intricacies of a game that leaving it makes you yearn for it more, or what. It is fun exploring the map and potentially discovering something amazing right around the next bend. The problem is that everything circles back around to an incredibly dull, “realistic” mining simulation and arbitrary gatekeeping. Fighting feels bad, the lack of armor options feels bad, it feels bad when your map doesn’t spawn any goddamn Horsetail which is the only early-game source of healing items.
It is entirely possible the game is simply not built for someone like me. And I guess that is OK. I’m not even sure what changes they could make in future updates to make it more palatable. Maybe a more cohesive early-game where you can make leather without needing Wood Boards, or perhaps more armor options with just Hides? Maybe not needing to already have copper to mine copper?
We shall see.
In An Age 
Avowed – What’s My Motivation?
Mar 18
Posted by Azuriel
I haven’t written much because I’m trying to work my way through Avowed. And it really is work at this point, because Avowed is not a good game. But I feel it is not good in a similar way that Bioshock Infinite was not good: the most frustratingly nuanced ways imaginable.
One example is with the combat system. I’ve talked about it all before, in that Ranger was strong but boring, Warrior was active but weak, and Wizard was both active and strong. About halfway through the 3rd zone though, none of it really mattered – even the Wizard became a chore. There are a lot of little reasons that quickly add up in the background until it hits you all at once.
Regarding the last point, Avowed has a really shitty talent/skill tree. It’s not something I’ve seen many other people talk about, but it’s one of the most uniquely uninspired one I’ve ever seen in a game. Seriously, look at this shit. Warrior has 6 buttons to press, Ranger gets 5, and Wizard… 21, technically. But look at the level 15 and level 20 bands, which is where one might assume you’re getting the biggest power boosts. Outside the active button, Fighter gets shit like… perfect (!!) blocks rebound arrows, and you deal 70% of the damage you received. Ranger gets increased crit chance (already 100% when you hit weak spots), and bonus damage on unaware enemies. Wizards get… increased elemental accumulation, but you have to spec into each element individually.
Oh, and on the ultimate level 20+ band? Fighters can… heal companions by 10% when you kill enemies! Rangers can… deal more stun accumulation with power attacks with ranged weapons! Wizards can… get fucking nothing, unless you want to learn Meteor Shower without a spellbook, which you never would because spellbooks give you like an 80% Essence discount on that otherwise meter-eating spell. Yes, Arcane Seal is something a Wizard can take at 20+ and effectively have infinite Essence regen. But at that point in the game, you effectively have infinite regen already from the hundreds of random vegetables you’ve collected throughout the game.
The other half of character progression is also shit. Getting Uniques out in the world has long ceased to be exciting. First time you replace a generic weapon with Unique? Fantastic. The second time? Frustrating, because you likely sunk a bunch of upgrade mats into the first one. Then you start to realize that none of the special abilities of Uniques matter all that much compared to the overall “tier” due to the asinine enemy “level” balance. If your stuff is blue and they are purple, you deal 35% less damage and take 35% more damage. Meanwhile, each time you upgrade a weapon or armor, you get silly shit like +9 damage or -4 damage received. Upgrading a Unique never boosts the special effects… why?
Finally, I want to talk about the story in general terms. I’ll throw a Yellow spoiler warning just in case, but the short version is: the game never answers the question of “what’s my motivation?”
The general premise of the game is that you are a godlike of an unknown god, working in the court of an Aedyran emperor. You are then tasked with solving the Dreamscourge plague problem in the Living Lands, an isle that the emperor is interested in taking over. You are sent over as an Envoy of the emperor himself, granting you leeway in resolving the Dreamscourge crisis in any manner you deem fit.
The problem is that all the Aedyran empire stuff just up and evaporates as soon as you step on the docks, unless you commit to being cartoonishly evil for the rest of the game. And if you do, all of your companions are from the Livings Lands, so they’ll be mad at you for everything you do. Having evil options in RPGs is a good thing even if players do not typically engage with it, but the problem is setting up your game to support it. None of your Avowed companions will leave you no matter what choices you make. There are no Aedyran or Steel Garrote companions, which would make such an evil playthrough more reasonable. And while I have not yet finished the game at the time of this writing, I haven’t really seen any good motivation to even care about the Aedyran side of things. Nobody is reminding you of your duty to the emperor, or even really questioning your loyalty.
This is not the first place Avowed leaned so far into “roleplay” that it fell directly into RPG mad libs. There are frequent dream sequences throughout the game where you are asked to choose how events in the past played out. Some of these choices lead to you getting one godlike ability versus another, but the majority of it is just… there. I understand that there are (presumably) people who like this sort of thing, but Avowed just sort of drops it on your porch and leaves. There’s no context, no sense of purpose. Again, what’s my motivation? Am I training somebody to be more forgiving or spiteful, depending on my dream answers? Or am I literally playing one-person mad libs?
I get that this may not sound all that different from all the normal RPG choices you encounter in the genre. In Baldur’s Gate 3, you can choose to free a gnome strapped to a windmill or send him flying by cranking up the speed. That choice doesn’t matter too much in the scheme of things, either way. Except, of course, to the gnome, and possibly some party members. But that at least has some immediate context and consequences and feels like a real choice. There are some quests vaguely similar to that in Avowed, but they all ring hollow. Perhaps in the abstract the quests are identical, and I’m just not invested in the world of Avowed in the same way as BG3 or Mass Effect or anything else. Or perhaps the devs simply were painting-by-numbers and forgot to include a soul in their creation.
And that brings me back to the Bioshock Infinite comparison from the top. There are some games in which I can understand people enjoying, even when I do not. League of Legends? That’s definitely of no interest to me, but I get it. Overwatch 2? Sure, I enjoyed the original for a time as well. Call of Duty? I prefer the Battlefield series, but a more arcade feel can be fun.
If someone says Bioshock Infinite is one of their favorite games though, my eyebrows go all the way up. Maybe the DLCs fixed the plot later, but Bioshock Infinite’s story was otherwise objectively terrible, like Mass Effect 3 original ending terrible. I feel the same way when I see people online say Avowed is a 9.5/10 or they are eager for another playthrough. I don’t even want to finish this first playthrough, let alone running around opening chest after chest of the same random crafting materials again. Some aspects of Avowed are fantastic genre improvements, like the feel of melee and the feel of exploration via jumping/traversal. Unfortunately, tragically, there is just no follow-through, no stuck landing.
The only way I can see Avowed being someone’s favorite RPG or deserving of a high score is if they simply haven’t played better games before. Which, given that many of my own favorite games came out 10-20 years ago, might be increasingly understandable. What a bummer.
I suppose there is still time in the 4th Act and resultant endings for Avowed to pull a miraculous redemption. Well, aside from the combat and itemization and character progression and world interactivity – those ships have already sailed. We’ll see if the plot payoff was worth the pain.
Posted in Commentary, Impressions
1 Comment
Tags: Avowed, Bioshock Infinite, Mad Libs, Obsidian, Plot, What's My Motivation?