• Tag Archives Third Person Perspective

  • Random GOG Games

    Posted on by Offkorn Comment

    Back during GOG‘s Insomnia Sale I picked up a bunch of games, then grabbed some card-related ones on a weekend sale a bit later. Due to the winter Anime season recently ending I didn’t really have much time to mess around with them. Some first impressions on the ones I did get a chance to play are listed below.

    Card City Nights: A card battle game where you build your deck from booster packs from various sets like a physical card game. It seems fun from the two matches I played, it’s just going to require a decent time investment to deal with all the variables like set variety and deck building strategy. I definitely plan on coming back to it later.

    Gothic 2 Gold Edition: Playing this reminded me of Risen, which turned out to be from the same developer. I’m only at level 2 at the moment (having cleared out most of the quests in the starting area), but it’s not really grabbing me so far. The main problem is the awful combat/movement controls; moving around is finicky and it’s difficult to tell if you’re close enough to something to hit it (or for it to hit you). The secondary problem is that, considering there’s a finite amount of XP and learning points all go toward increasing the same skills/attributes, I’m unsure what’s the most efficient way to go about building the character. I suspect it will get better once I get to a high enough level where boars can’t 1-shot me.

    HuniePop: I was under the impression this was a puzzle game with dating sim aspects when I grabbed it. It’s actually the reverse. The puzzle aspects are fun, but they’re really not worth dealing with all the dating sim crap.

    Icewind Dale: Enhanced Edition: While it’s certainly nice to have all the BGII kits available to choose from, the lack of certain basic configuration options really hurts it (not being able to set your fullscreen resolution is complete bullshit) and the GUI seems to have less options (in the original you could right-click an ability slot to change it to a different ability, here that doesn’t seem possible). I can’t speak of any other additions/changes just yet since I’ve only cleared the few quests in the starting town so far.

    King of Dragon Pass: There’s a lot of stuff going on here, and it will take quite some time to really grasp what does what and how to best manipulate the various options. After getting attacked by 100+ bandits on the second turn (the village started with 10 dedicated warriors) I decided to put it aside until I get a chance to read through a FAQ or 3.

    Renowned Explorers: International Society: Only played through the tutorial and the first mission so far, but this seems fairly inventive and like a lot of fun. The only issues I see at the moment are that it’s a bit difficult to choose how to spend your resources, and that while there are indeed multiple ways to win the conflicts, there is a clear best way to win them (winning in one of the other ways gives you a lesser or no reward) which can discourage particular playstyles.

    RuneStone Keeper: This has been compared to Minesweeper, and while that’s not a bad comparison it’s somewhat misleading. This is a lot less strategic than Minesweeper. What you get when you click a particular tile is completely random and you rarely get any sort of hint/indication as to what may be on it. A tile might be a monster, it might be empty, it might be a trap, it might be a shop/spell/tool. You never know and it’s very difficult (potentially impossible depending on what tools you find) to prepare for. The game may be good as a time waster, but I would not consider ever trying to play in a serious attempt to ‘win’.

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  • Dragon Age: Inquisition – DLC

    Posted on by Offkorn Comment

    Jaws of Hakkon: This one adds a new area to explore (that looks a bit like a cross between the Arbor Wilds and Crestwood) that contains a ton of tier 3 materials (some new some old), a few new tier 4 materials, a new ability for the Inquisitor that deflects projectiles, various new schematics slightly more powerful that what’s found in the default game, Astariums to unlock, skull shards to collect, a few War Table missions and agents, more Fade Rifts to close, and new Skyhold decorations to buy. It’s got a lot of stuff and for the most part fits into the rest of the game seamlessly, with the only real oddities being the tons of loot you find when closing Rifts and there being silverite scattered around instead of stormheart. Word of advice: Don’t take Sera with you when doing the quests here, as many are spirit-related and she does not like spirits.

    The Descent: This adds a new underground area to explore that’s not really anything like anywhere else which just so happens to have two immediate annoyances. The first it that using some (any?) texture mods causes the cutscenes that happen here to freeze the game, while the second is that to actually start exploring the Deep Roads Cullen cannot be assigned to any current War Table mission. That’s because there’s a special War Table in this area you have to use to unlock areas and do missions down here, and only Cullen can be assigned to the first one (you’ll need 64 power to eventually open all the side areas). Other than the new War Table, the area has some new enemy types, new schematics more powerful than the ones in the previous DLC, and a series of mugs to collect (like the main game’s bottle collecting). It does not have any new materials though, with just the same resources that you’d find in the Storm Coast scattered around spiked with a bit of silverite.

    Trespasser: The storyline portions of Trespasser remind me quite a bit of the Witch Hunt DLC for the first Dragon Age game (i.e. a sequence of somewhat forced events that ends rather abruptly). Thankfully, there’s more to this DLC than just the epilogue it tacks onto the main game (the new ending slides aren’t even narrated). The actually useful additions are the new ability upgrades you can switch between, the new Sigil loot that can be attached to most armor, and the extremely welcome upgrades to various quest and Wartable rewards; all of which have been inserted into the main game. Also possibly of note is that the ending makes it appear the next game will take place in Tevinter.

    So, are any of these worth the $15 price tag? No, not really. Jaws of Hakkon comes the closest probably due to sheer amount of content (repetitive though it may be), but you’re best off just buying the Game of the Year edition which comes with all three (along with some weapon/armor packs) for $40.

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    This entry was posted in DLC PC Video Game Related and tagged

  • Fable III

    Posted on by Offkorn Comment

    I’m not sure why I picked this game up after so long deliberately avoiding it. Somewhat unsurprisingly, it is indeed not very good. At the moment I’ve finished the Masquerade main quest and all of the side quests from before that point (except the Demon Doors), and the annoyances have begun to outweigh the fun parts.

    The game’s first and foremost issue are the visual effects, which are badly implemented enough to cause motion sickness. To fix that you have set the Effects slider to ‘reasonable’ or lower, turn off VSync (forcing it via graphics card instead), kill the mouse smoothing and reduce its sensitivity to about a quarter or so, and then save and exit the game. After that, open up the VideoOptionsConfig.xml file in the main game directory and change all the Blur/AA/DepthOfField lines in the first section to 99, then save the file and set it to Read Only. After all that it becomes tolerable to play; though the FoV is still an issue there doesn’t seem to be an easy way to alter that.

    Once you get past the technical issues, on come the gameplay and storyline issues: Combat is simplistic and gets old fast (particularly since there are tons of enemies in many encounters), the ‘side quest’ moral choices are set to extremes that I haven’t seen since Jade Empire (sign the petition or punch the petitioner; there is no middle ground), the main quest choices (when you get any choice) are ham-fisted, the quest progression in general is incredibly heavy handed and each and every one so far railroads you into a specific course of action, and of course there’s essentially nothing to spend the tons of infinite money you get from owning businesses on (there’s no armor and weapon augments are free; I currently have 10 million gold).

    That’s a lot of negatives. So why have I played this long? Exploration and collectibles mostly, which is to say silver keys, gnomes, books, and different outfit parts. While the areas are comically oversize and don’t really have much of use to be found in them (most chest and dig spot contents appear to be somewhat random, which is a bit of an issue in some cases since they don’t respawn), running around them looking for hidden treasure is still fun… or rather it was, it’s since lost its appeal now that all the main continent locations have been explored. The quest dialogue is also sometimes amusing.

    Not sure whether to keep pushing until the post-ruler portion of the game. Might instead go back to Dragon’s Dogma and finish the only unfinished quest (collect the last 2 Bitterblack armors), or perhaps start on Trails in the Sky‘s second chapter.

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    This entry was posted in PC Video Game Related and tagged

  • Dragon’s Dogma

    Posted on by Offkorn Comment

    I first played the demo for this game way back when it first came out for PS3. I didn’t get very far at the time because the controller keybinds were awful (all of them). Now that it’s finally been released for PC, and has almost-fully customizable keybinds, I picked it back up.

    At the moment I’m at the Wrym Hunt part of the main quest with most sidequests completed (working on the last Bandit one and holding off on Search Party), and somewhere around 34th level. So far it reminds me of Witcher 3 (the open world, the RPG elements, the primary/secondary weapons) crossed with a bit of Assassin’s Creed (the running/jumping/climbing on rooftops/ledges, that ‘find the medallions’ DLC content).

    The class variety is nice, and being able to switch around nearly at-will and share certain abilities between them reminds me of Final Fantasy Tactics. It’s unfortunate though that Pawns don’t have access to all 9 of them. I’ve mostly been playing as Strider/Warrior so far (to get certain Augments, while leveling as Assassin). The idea was to end up with Assassin, but I’ve been kind of annoyed by that class’ seeming lack of Magical Damage options and so may go with a dagger-focused Mystic Archer instead.

    Mage/Sorcerer honestly doesn’t seem like much fun to play so my pawn has been filling that role. Warrior, which I’ve sort of been ‘forced’ to play, also doesn’t feel very fun: The attacks are slow and it has a very one-trick-pony vibe to it. Fighter, Strider, and Assassin are pretty fun though; a mix of blitzing small creatures and climbing around on big creatures to stab them in the face (the pommel smash while climbing is the real deal-killer for Warrior) while using the bow against flyers or as a preemptive attack. Mystic Archer and Ranger are presumably similar, though heavier on the archery, while I have no idea what Mystic Warrior is like at all.

    Difficulty hasn’t been much of an issue. I wouldn’t say it’s all that different from Witcher 3‘s system, but the limited fast-travel options are a bit of a pain. Being able to zip back and forth between the main hub, Bitterblack, and the starting town is nice… but that still leaves huge swathes of territory to the north and west full of annoyances to repeatedly plow through. Once I’ve cleared an area I don’t really like being forced to re-clear it. I hear that’s not an issue in NG+ since you can buy new portable and re-usable Port Crystals, but I’m obviously not in NG+ right now and have only found two in the game world (in that cave with the old Arisen on the hillside and in Everfall).

    It’s definitely been fun up to this point, but I have the nagging sensation that it’s going to start feeling repetitious very shortly. Some brief notes:

    • Don’t sell anything other than Sour Beast-Steaks (let regular steaks sit in your inventory for a day or two).
    • Save everything else in the Inn’s storage because you never know when a quest or weapon/armor upgrade will need something.
    • The best way to quickly gain Class ranks is to kill low-experience (100 or less) creatures. Goblins and passive wildlife are both nice and plentiful.
    • You can go to Bitterblack Isle to change your class as soon as you get your main Pawn.
    • The first 100 levels provide the highest stat gains on level-up.
    • Check around for sidequests before advancing the main quest, as some of them are time-sensitive.
    • Avoid the optional Escort quests until you’ve both found the location they mention and have a portable Port Crystal to place there ahead of time.
    • Related to the above: There are actually multiple Healing Spring locations.

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    This entry was posted in PC Video Game Related and tagged

  • Grandia II – First Impressions

    Posted on by Offkorn Comment

    Bad. The first impressions evoked by Grandia II‘s Anniversary Edition are not good at all.

    First, there’s the controller issue. If you’ve got an Xbox controller you have to fiddle with some windows settings to get the game to recognize it correctly, and if you don’t then x360ce is required. Next are the audio issues. There are no volume settings. None. There is no way to raise/lower the volume of the BGM, effects, or voices either individually or all at once (besides opening up and re-mixing the .ogg files in a sound editor). This would be bad enough on its own, but ends up compounded by the fact that the effects are louder than the music which is in turn louder than the voices.

    What else is bad? The camera. While you can rotate the camera at will, you cannot manually zoom in or out. That appears to happen at random, with the default being ‘zoomed in as close as possible’. And speaking of things that you don’t have control over, here’s another: Storyline dialog. You can’t make it appear/scroll faster. Think ‘unskippable cutscenes’ except the scenes take place in the normal game field.

    One positive thing I can say about it is that it gives you the option to use the Japanese voices… but that’s all so far. Well, I guess I can also say that the battle system seems to be slightly interesting. Time will tell I suppose, though if either the storyline or characters aren’t at least decent I don’t think I’m going to get very far with this one.

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  • Tales of Zestiria – Conclusion

    Posted on by Offkorn Comment

    Unfortunately, the main storyline never gets any better. It actually gets worse as it progresses and the inconsistencies in the timeline start to really make themselves known (the dragon-creation segment and final confrontation are both pretty good though). The exploration aspects also start to lose their luster around the point you reach the desert area, making the final stretch something of a slog.

    Note that if you plan on doing a NG+ it would be a good idea to get all the Lords of the Land up to level 11 or so (the increased treasure rarity boon) so that you have enough Grade available to cover all the item/skill/stat importation options and have a decent amount left over for some enhancements.

    As for the Alisha DLC… well, it mostly consists of a lengthy ruin exploration (12 floors) that would be completely insufferable were it not for the Increased Movement Speed Boon. It’s still pretty annoying and the experience is capped off with a gimmicky boss fight where you have to kill both creatures at the same time to win. Storyline-wise it’s less an epilogue and more a continuation, seeing as how it goes and resurrects someone only to leave their plot-thread dangling with a ‘to be continued’. At least the character interactions it contains are pretty good.

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    This entry was posted in DLC PC Video Game Related and tagged

  • Tales of Zestiria – Delayed Impressions

    Posted on by Offkorn Comment

    Having now cleared the miasma from the second town I may have finally settled into a decent control scheme. Keyboard/mouse was a complete failure it turns out, so I ended up going with Y -> Merge, B -> Hidden/Seraph Arte, A -> Arte, X -> Blast, L1 -> Target Change, and R1 -> Guard. I also figured out why the system wasn’t clicking: I was treating it like an action game where each button press immediately executes an action. That’s not how it works. Instead, each button press queues up an action. That’s an important distinction. If the game would only stop arbitrarily switching around my battle party for plot-required battles the combat system might actually become enjoyable.

    Unrelated to combat, the storyline and cutscenes are still a bit of a problem. The former is almost painfully straight-forward (if a bit on the dark side) while the latter tend to be filled with these weird delays between character interactions that throw everything off. At least the characters themselves are still almost all enjoyable (the exception being that seraph that shoots himself in the head).

    Exploration is still a lot of fun as well, and there’s even some more things to collect now (Normins). Hell, even the equipment fusing system has become more or less transparent with time and experience. Now if only the available types of equipment were clear upgrades instead of Stat upgrades combined with different base abilities. In a sane game Void Rings and Fire Rings (for example) would both give the same bonus to magic defense while having different inherent abilities… yet here the Fire Ring not only gives a higher defense bonus, but it gives a magic attack bonus as well. But you can’t just whimsically replace the Void Ring with the Fire Ring because one resists non-element attacks and the other resists fire attacks. It’s annoying.

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  • Tales of Zestiria – Initial Impressions

    Posted on by Offkorn Comment

    Just started playing this recently. The last Tales game I played before this was either Xillia 1 or Graces f, neither of which I had trouble playing, and while I feel the combat here is reminiscent of Xillia… for some reason it’s just not clicking at all. The battles aren’t hard by any stretch of the imagination (on Moderate difficulty) but they consist primarily of button-mashing the same four/five attacks rather than using any actual strategy. It may be the control scheme that’s the problem.

    The equipment fusion system is also causing some consternation, as it’s pretty damn opaque regarding how the various attached skills mutate. The human/seraph fusion system on the other hand is pretty straight-forward, and it even has the benefit of looking great. Some other positives would be the scenic environments, semi-seamless battle transitions, and staple character interaction skits. Another negative would be the way your starting combo points steadily decrease as you fight battles, making visiting Inns to restore them something of a necessity. I’ve never been fond of rest mechanics and it’s no different here even though there seems to be some things that can only be unlocked by frequent Inn visits.

    If I can figure out a more natural control scheme this game just might end up being a great exploration time-sink. Maybe I’ll try Keyboard+Mouse out, since the primary issue here is being able to press four separate buttons (Arte/Hidden Arte/Blast/Guard) all more or less simultaneously (while still being able to move the camera around), which a controller can’t easily accommodate.

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  • Agarest War 2 – Endings

    Posted on by Offkorn Comment

    So I ended up going through all 3 endings and even wrote a walkthrough.

    First the Bad End: This ending is not as bad as its name might suggest, at least from a metagaming perspective, as while the story’s conclusion is certainly quite bad you do get access to a bunch of Guild Commissions that are otherwise only available to complete in the True End. Next the Normal End: It’s okay and you can get a couple Items that are normally only found in the True End from the final boss.

    Which leaves us with the True End. The path the story takes in this ending is remarkably dark. Quite dark indeed with a surprising amount of death, and whether the goals/conclusion justify that or not is debatable. The most surprising thing about this ending though is that Schwarz has somehow managed to become a decent person.

    Funny story:

    While on the third playthrough, my PS3’s disk drive decided to start refusing to read disks after I ejected the game once during a freeze. So I was left with a dilemma. Get a new PS3? Turns out they’re still remarkably expensive. Get the PC version? The save data won’t transfer. Fix the drive? I couldn’t find the right tool to open the case. Which left me with: Buy the game digitally from the PS Store and play it directly off the HD… which is what I did. It ended up running a hell of a lot smoother that way too and I never had another freeze.

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    This entry was posted in PS3 Video Game Related and tagged

  • Agarest War 2 – Third Generation Start

    Posted on by Offkorn Comment

    Second generation now complete. While the protagonist never gets any better where the heroines are concerned he does show glimpses of a decently entertaining personality when dealing with opponents, so that was a bit of a help. Less helpful is the front and center brother/sister incest plotline that makes up about half the main storyline of that generation.

    The third generation looks to be a return to the first, with the new protagonist being rather subdued. A bit too subdued perhaps… and goth as fuck. All these new characters being recently introduced (the elf girl from last gen, the new hero, and the ‘fake little sister’) though is playing a bit of havoc with my skill setup. I’m not sure who exactly I want to use in the final party, I don’t have any points left to train the new additions, and there’s still apparently two more new characters that will join. I was using Fiona and Eva (the Blackhole special move is a godsend) but now they’ve become kind of redundant with one another with Eva being just slightly better overall.

    Some general things I’ve since discovered:

    • In the upper right corner of the battle screen you can see if any extra enemies are set to appear later in the battle.
    • Out of the way areas of the world map often have glowing spots that pop up when you get close which contain Attribute+ items.
    • You can press R2 to skip attack animations.
    • Reinforcing and Enhancing your equipment makes a huge difference in combat, and most Enhancing at this level is pretty cheap relatively speaking (40k gold and some Ore to max out an item).
    • The free DLC dungeons are fantastic places to train/grind since they’re mostly populated with monsters from the next generation.
    • Agility is nowhere near as useful as it first appears. It only comes into play if two characters have the same Wait value, otherwise Wait alone determines turn order. Meaning you only need it high on one character to get the first turn.
    • Strength/Dexterity (melee) and Intelligence (caster) are pretty much the only stats you should be spending level-up points on. Vitality is only useful on low-level characters (the HP gain is not retroactive) and Mind isn’t really useful at all.
    • After completing a main story mission and heading back to town through the portals, leave the town manually to see if any events are waiting to trigger at the outside entrance.

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    This entry was posted in PS3 Video Game Related and tagged