• Tag Archives Action RPG
  • ArcaniA: FALL of SETARRIF

    Thoughts while playing the stand-alone expansion to ArcaniA:

    – Huh. The graphics look slightly improved.
    – Character animations have definitely improved.
    – The geography has changed. Weird.
    – All of my skills, equipment, and inventory were imported. Nice.
    – A few items have changed stats; Belial’s Scythe is mage-focused now.
    – What’s with this odd procession of fighting every single creature in the main game?
    – Oh no, not more dungeon tunnels.
    – Lockpick mechanic is gone… not that it matters.
    – Why is there so much powerful loot just lying around?
    – I guess it’s there for new characters.
    – Oh good, there’s more to this than endess red-lit tunnels.
    – Harpies huh… guess they didn’t want that female demon model to go to waste.
    – Panthers! Guess this wasn’t a total copy/paste job after all.
    – What a bizarre city layout.
    – I wonder if there are any merchants in this expansion.
    – If the antagonist never sent so much free XP at the hero, do you think they would win more often?
    – Ah, the ol’ “collect a bunch of crap scattered across the area to continue” quest. Yay.
    – A trader! Who sells… nothing but bandages and arrows. What the hell.
    – Playing as other pre-made characters as a change of pace is pretty gimmicky at the best of times.
    – This is not the best of times.
    – Oh, two more silent traders. I’m starting to think it would’ve been better without them.
    – I liked my old armor better. The things I do to kill enemies with a single Firebolt….
    – Possessed enemies can apparently melee attack through walls. Spooky.
    – A spoiled rich girl… can this day get any worse?
    – Rhetorical question; of course it can.
    – Lester’s voice acting has taken a major dive.
    – Actually, all the character’s personalities have taken hits as well.
    – Maybe all those people complaining about VA and characterizations were confusing this with the main game?
    – So. Many. Tunnels.
    – At least the trader in this mine sells something (potentially) useful.
    – So. Tunnels. First red tunnels, then gray tunnels and now… green tunnels. Such variety.
    – Why is it, again, that all these temple guardians are attacking the goddess’ chosen one?
    – Oh, it’s because a demon has corrupted them. When/how did that get down here?
    – Through the perfectly accessible back entrance staffed with two silent vendors of course!
    – “Is it my hair!?“. Maybe this was worth playing after all.
    – What color tunnel will it be this time? M-multi-colored!?
    – Traps! How unexpected.
    – Nice to see that Slay still works on trolls.
    – Sure am glad I maxed out Inferno damage. Nothing like killing 5+ enemies from across the screen.
    – What, no villain monologue? Weak.
    – It uses the same moveset as the last endboss! And the ending is just as abrupt!

    Yeah… so… don’t buy this unless you really like the combat system.


  • Diablo III – Update

    Found out was wrong with the bombardment build mentioned earlier after running through the game with a newly created hardcore character to snag that version of the 50-mil gold conquest: While I had the raw equipment, the stats were notably subpar and not enough of them were ancient. After addressing those issues it was able to handle T13 easily enough… but not fast enough to clear the last two seasonal hurdles (Urzael in 20 seconds and T13 Rift in 4 minutes).

    So, I made a Vyr’rasha Wizard. Though the Lightning Hydra version melted Urzeal quite effectively, the 4-minute T13 rift took much more time to clear due to the glass-cannon and luck-heavy nature of the build. Two things which make it not all that much fun to play honestly. Now that all the season rewards are won I’m going to test out the Spectral Blade build instead, as that seems less twitchy.

    Something else I tested out earlier was a way to make the Corrupted Ashbringer, a 2H-sword with quite a bit of flavor, effective. The only thing that came to mind (other than a Diablo II style dual-wielding Barbarian, which apparently isn’t possible here) was to adapt a Crusader Hammerdin build. And it didn’t take much adapting. Simply replace Fervor with Heavenly Strength, J’s Argument with Ashbringer (moving the former to Kanai’s Cube), Sacred Harness with Blessed of Haull, and Falling Sword & Provoke with Justice (Crack) & Shield Glare (Divine Verdict). Bane of the Trapped can also arguably be swapped out for Zei’s Stone of Vengeance, and with a Ring of Royal Grandeur Aquila Cuirass can be rotated in for higher survivability if necessary (the bracers can stay as either Nemesis or Gabriel’s).

    It’s not exactly a fast build, but it can handle T13 without issue and it’s kind of fun to have Hammers flying everywhere without having to constantly worry about finding groups of enemies to jump into or resource concerns; it’s more laid-back and measured.


  • Diablo III – Season Journey

    Despite my earlier misgivings, the facts remain that I both love collecting loot and don’t much mind mindlessly clicking things. So I went and bought the game+expansion (not the Necromancer though… not yet).

    Seeing a new season had started and that there were item rewards for participating in it, I went and made a Crusader and started playing through the campaign. Only at the end of Act 1 did it become apparent that the Season Acts do not match up with the Campaign Acts; you’re supposed to play seasonal characters in Adventure Mode (which was helpfully auto-unlocked). So that’s what I did.

    Despite wanting to make a Hammerdin, the loot table was having other ideas (Ancient Gyrfalcon flail) and I first ended up with a fire-based Blessed Shield build which was used to clear the first few seasonal hurdles and get the free loot. Seeing more ranks awaited and wanting to get to Greater Rift level 70 to unlock ancient primals I decided to keep going.

    Eventually the Hammerdin drops appeared, which let me switch to that and quickly hit GR70 at about Paragon level 512 with only 3 pieces of ancient equipment. There progress stalled a bit as further ranks required completing conquests, with all except the GR75 seeming out of reach. But then I realized there was a trick to completing the 50 million gold one: Just open 46 Horadric Chests at once, since each contains 1.1 million on Torment 13 difficulty. Since they were needed anyway in order to extract more legendary powers (awesome feature) and upgrade my gear enough to reach GR75 it wasn’t even a hassle.

    So here I am now with the season’s Conqueror rank completed at Paragon 643. The last rank requires completing three conquests and clearing a T13 Rift in under 4 minutes, so I’m pretty sure this is the end of the journey (while I do have the equipment for a speedy Bomber build, for some reason it only seems to be able to handle T10 easily). The last reward is only a portrait frame anyway, so it’s not like I’m missing anything. Now it’s time to go play the campaign and find out the answers to all these questions that have been raised by jumping around from area to area out of order.


  • Diablo III – First Impressions

    After ignoring this game for many years I decided to see where it was currently at… for reasons I don’t recall. After seeing that a trial version was available in addition to new DLC having recently been released, I said to hell with it and installed it.

    After nearly exhausting the trial with the Monk and playing a bit with the Demon Hunter and Wizard I’ve come to the following conclusion: If you want an immersive experience go play Titan Quest instead, if however you just want to mindlessly click on things while collecting loot then this game has you covered.

    The problems here (cartoony zoomed-in visuals, limited abilities, non-existent leveling options) all seem traceable to having a ‘console-first’ strategy. There’s some severe oversimplification, to the point that I don’t see much reason to play different classes beyond experiencing the specialized voice acting and flavor text (which, admittedly, is a nice touch). Regardless of the class you pick the combat cycle is going to be the same: Use one skill a bunch to build up resources then a second to spend them, while maybe tossing off a cooldown skill from time to time.

    Compounding matters is that skill damage is based on weapon damage. All skill damage. Use a skill to punch someone with a monk while wielding a club? That’s fine; the club’s damage will be used. Playing a Wizard? Go right ahead and equip a longbow or sword since your spells all use their base damage for some reason. A Demon Hunter? The arrow-based skills require wielding a bow at least… which ends up being not much of a requirement since the other skills (Throw Knife for instance) have no problem using bow damage. Moreover, what’s even the point of having all these different weapon types when you can’t make basic attacks in the first place? Cosmetic concerns I guess?

    The entire experience just leaves a bad aftertaste.


  • REZROG – First Impressions

    While the game has several extremely annoying bugs, for the most part it’s a fun (if repetitive) dungeon crawler.

    There’s all the multi-character persistence and loot of a Diablo-like game, with the turn-based and environmental traits of a Dungeons of Dredmor-like game. There are two unique aspects here. The first is that instead of doing one run/character at a time, you have immediate access to 7 characters (one of each class) which share loot and can be used at will. The second is death; if a character dies they get captured and have to be rescued by a different character.

    At the moment I have all 7 at levels 10-12 and have just reached the 11th dungeon. So far there’s decent enemy variety (each odd dungeon number introduces new ones) and skill variety (though I’ve only found 2 non-starter ones at the moment), but having to repeatedly grind the same area (even with the randomized layout) to overcome sudden difficulty spikes is annoying. Particularly since any time you fail to clear a level for any reason (death/capture, bug, menu exit) any items found/used or changes made since entering it are completely reset.

      I mentioned bugs earlier, and here are some of the ones I’ve run into:
      – Doorways becoming impassible after attacking through them.
      – Traps killing an enemy and making that square impassable.
      – Frozen movement when attacking crystals with a ranged skill.
      – The first page of the shared stash wiping itself on game exit.
      – Losing items transferred to a character with a full inventory.
      – The ‘consumables are 25% stronger’ roulette effect doing the opposite.
      – The ‘+1 move’ roulette effect actually doubling movement range.
      – XP skill books behaving oddly.
      – Entering a Boss level drains all of your money.
      Aside from avoiding those issues above there are a few other things to be aware of:
      – Do the first dungeon at least once with each character to get all the starter skills.
      – Run through it a few more times to hit level 3 and stock up on potions
      – Ice Slab is insanely good.
      – Skills can be added/removed to/from any non-captured character.
      – Weapon skills won’t work with 0 Durability weapons.
      – The random ‘destroy all crystals’ objective is extremely difficult.
      – There tends to be difficulty jumps every 2 levels.
      – Exit via the Esc Menu immediately if it looks like you won’t be able to finish a level.

  • Nier: Automata – First Impressions

    This game is quite a bit different from conventional RPGs.

    I’m not at all fond of the top-down shoot-’em-up elements, bullet-hell aspects, combo-heavy melee attacks, or save point system. The washed-out color scheme is a turn-off as well. On the other hand I like open world exploration and collecting things quite a bit. Some other positives would be the easily customizable control scheme, access to the Japanese voice acting, cool visual effects, and… that’s all I can think of right now.

    Maybe I’ll warm up to it in time.


  • Hyperdimension Neptunia Re;Birth3

    Taking place a little while after the end of the second game, this third installment in the franchise is basically a combination of the first two with an overhauled combat system. Making it easily the best of the bunch (once you install the re-translation project to reduce the terribleness of the localization).

    Character-wise, with the DLC, you get access to the whole cast and don’t have to jump through any hoops or waste any Plan space to unlock characters (although Uni, Ram, & Rom don’t become available until the last chapter). Story-wise there’s only some especially cringy moments in the 6th chapter or so. And as for the re-used assets… well, there’s still a ton of those.

    The most notable improvement here over the previous games though is the revamped combat system:

    Instead of having an EX Bar that the entire party has to use (and which has to be re-filled every time you enter an area), each character’s SP pool doubles as an EX Pool. Meaning now you can pull off multiple 3-bar EX attacks in a row. Even better, the game now tells you when an enemy you’re attacking happens to be weak/strong against an element and even specifies whether an attack you’re about to use is magical or physical.

    Another new addition is an in-game achievement system. By doing things with each character like running, jumping, taking damage, switching in combat, using items in combat, and so forth, that character will get stat boosts and unlock character-specific Plans to further boost their stats or add new abilities (like a 5th combo slot).

    Really, the only flaw with this entry (besides the localization and re-used assets) is that the DLC character Events are bugged to appear a chapter earlier than they should. So if you’re only able to get one of the three games, this would be the one to prioritize.


  • Hyperdimension Neptunia Re;Birth2

    It shouldn’t be surprising, yet it is: This sequel is in almost all ways worse than the first Re;Birth.

    The localization got worse (install the re-translation project modification to make it merely equally as bad), Nepgear is a far less engaging protagonist compared to Neptune, there’s a bunch of ecchi events straight out of an Agarest game, and the new themes are atrocious.

    No, I don’t want to be constantly lectured about how piracy and cheating is bad in this game I bought… especially when said game just so happens to include cheat items in its paid DLC.

    The only things this has going for it are giving the characters a couple extra combat abilities, Boss enemies not having any insane HP regeneration abilities, a Super EXP option which effectively eliminates level grinding (added by the DLC), and the somewhat large variety of possible endings.


  • Hyperdimension Neptunia Re;Birth1

    Huh. I sort of regret putting off playing this for so long just because I knew it had a trash-tier localization and suspected it was extremely grindy.

    It certainly has more than its share of issues (the awful localization, it is pretty grindy, the constantly re-used assets, mind-numbing/cringe-inducing plot developments, quite a number of auto-lose battles, a host of painful side-characters, tons of trap items to waste your limited resources on), and yet there’s just so much to collect while bap-bap-bapping away at enemies that I can’t help but enjoy playing it. Some advice:

    Picking up the DLC Pack is well worth it for the two extra characters alone, as they make the early-mid game much less punishing due to being notably more powerful than the two you start with, and you should limit your Plan creations to unlocking and adding enemies to the 16mb dungeons (the ones that cost 100+ are DLC content and can be saved for a second playthrough), removing the damage cap, increasing the jump height, and unlocking two of the CPU Candidate characters (who cost 1024mb each).

    Then on any potential NG+ playthroughs you can unlock the other character, the Colosseum, the DLC dungeons, and the highest level equipment (completely skipping all the weaker stuff, which is just a waste to unlock).

    One final thing that may be worthwhile to be aware of, is that pressing the L1 button will skip attack/transformation animations.


  • Nights of Azure

    A game I tried on a whim that ended up reminding me of a previous game I tried out on a whim.

    This is more of an arcade-like beat-’em-up/hack&slash though. Basically you run around killing hoards of monsters on your way to one objective or another while collecting the equipment or instant power-ups they drop. There isn’t anything to craft here and upgrades occur automatically as you and your summons level up. Combat on the face of things is pretty simple:

    You have a weak attack, a strong attack, a special attack, and a dodge. Combos can be made from weak->strong, weak x2->strong, and weak x3->strong, each ending in a different type of maneuver. Where the complexity comes in is that these combos change depending on which weapon type you have equipped (there are ultimately four) and eventually you gain the ability to switch weapons during combos. There’s also the transformation ability which lets you assume a powerful half-demon form with its own attack set, and of course the summoning system.

    The summoning system is also pretty simple at first glance. You have four servants you can ‘equip’ at a time, each with their own attacks and experience/stat values. You can summon any/all of these during battle and they’ll stay summoned until they either get knocked out or the battle ends. So why not just summon them all immediately? Because each performs a different type of ability when it gets summoned, meaning it’s often a good idea to wait until that ability will help you out. These servants will move/attack on their own, but you can give them general orders (attack any, attack my target, heal yourself) as well as make them use a specific ‘Burst’ special ability when necessary.

    So there’s a lot going on during battle, which is a good thing since the game revolves around combat. The bad part about the combat system is that it’s timed. You get 15 minutes to clear an area after you leave the safe zone; if you don’t you’re automatically teleported out. Boss fights at least aren’t timed, but still… timed anything is bullshit.

    That timer, combined with lack of things to collect, combined with the hack&slash nature of the game all adds up to an experience that just doesn’t grab me or make me want to keep playing.