xzar_monty

It's a good game, and I'm enjoying it, too. I think there are two big things in the game that can be a problem if you don't happen to like them: 1) The writing is really quite cheesy -- there is no subtlety or depth at all, and the dialogue choices are very basic. 2) The game doesn't care for your well-being or even survival, and it doesn't hesitate to wipe you out. Plenty or merciless encounters. For me, #1 is a bit of a concern, because I do appreciate good storytelling, but despite that, I'm still enjoying the game a lot. As for #2, I actually quite like the "very harsh/cruel but fair" approach.

I agree, the Burning Bridge section was one of the highlights of the entire game. It was just extremely well done, and I absolutely loved the way you could explore the bridge from three different points in time. I also think the Inquisitor storyline in BoW was really well done, too, and in fact it was one of those that might be worth a replay: I played a monk with a philosopher background and made my choices on that basis, and obviously a different character would make different choices. One of the things that made me carry on with SSS was Konstanten: I think his voice acting is superb. He sounds like a very likeable strongman with plenty of experience and a fairly simple but joyous (i.e. not nasty) sense of humour, and he was just a pleasure to have around. In fact, this sidekick thing may well have been one of the factors that contributed to me not pressing further with the FS: Fassina did not seem pleasant. Like, at all. I understand that she's very frustrated, and there's nothing wrong with that, but would anyone agree that when she talks, she sounds like a complainer? And that's just something I don't want in my group. (Ydwin was very good in BoW and made the story feel more substantial. I never had Vatnir in my group, so no comments on him.)

That is indeed possible. However, while playing the game, there was never a moment when I felt it was necessary to upgrade my ship. The Defiant could outrun all pursuers, and if I wanted to fight (which I obviously did), I could always choose the boarding option, which I greatly preferred over the rather lacklustre ship-to-ship combat. So, why upgrade? @Wormerine: Thanks a lot for that link! Josh's post-mortem was interesting indeed, although I did skip some of it. I was especially impressed by how forthright he was, and how he didn't seem to have any qualms about bringing up the failures of the game (ship-to-ship combat, for instance) and taking responsibility (for the narrative flaws, especially).

I understand why you feel that my approach (or at least this particular choice) is contradictory, so maybe an explanation is in order. I do indeed prefer story over pretty much everything else, but for me, one of the key elements of the story is the development / evolution of the main character. And once the level cap is reached in a CRPG, there's not much room for development. By the time I got to the Forgotten Sanctum, I had already done everything else (that I could see) in the whole game, and reaching that level cap made me lose interest, as I couldn't see anything significant happening for my main character or my NPCs. Also, the early part of the FS didn't grip me in the same way that the Beast of Winter did -- I mean, that was a fantastic DLC, a really good story. But yeah, who knows, maybe I did make a mistake in not going further in the FS. That's definitely a possibility. I also noticed the changes in sound when talking to Eothas, and I was pretty sure the inconsistency had to do with old / new lines. Thanks for verifying that. I agree with the lack of forward momentum. There is a contradiction in the very fabric of the game: on the one hand, there's this Eothas thing that calls for fixing ASAP, but on the other hand, there's this archipelago you might want to sort of explore at your leisure. Those two don't really go together. I didn't mind it very much in the end, but it definitely is a noticeable contradiction. Thanks for your comment, it was a good read!

Can be read in three to five minutes.

I just finished Deadfire, so I decided to gather some of my thoughts about it. All comments appreciated. It is obviously impossible to discuss these matters without spoiling at least something for people who have only just started, so if you're one of those, consider yourself forewarned (and maybe skip this entirely -- that's what I would do). Overall, I would say the game is a gem but with several flaws that keep it from being a classic. The fact I played it all the way to the end shows that it was definitely worth the money and very enjoyable. Graphics aren't generally that important to me (after all, I still enjoy NetHack a great deal and regard that one as a classic), but I must say this game looks lovely. Music was just good enough for the most part; the only theme that I thought was really good was the piano tune when confronting Eothas at Ashen Maw -- that was very simple but absolutely delightful. Much of the game was written quite well. I appreciate the ambition, although every once in a while I felt that at least some of the writers had tried to bite off a bit more than they could chew, vocabulary-wise especially. Eder, Xoti and Serafen were all delightfully written and extremely enjoyable. Xoti was, of course, a zealot and a fool that I did not particularly like as a person, but as a character, she was well-written. Eder and Serafen were well-written, well-acted, all-around enjoyable and good to have in the group. Aloth was less interesting than in PoE (his personal quest in particular was a let-down), but I kept him along for the whole ride all the same. I was indifferent to Pallegina in PoE and continued to be so in Deadfire, so I won't comment on her -- I know almost nothing about her story. Maia would have been the sixth one in my group, had that been possible, although her secretive and slightly cynical manners didn't actually endear her to me. Tekehu I only had for the Watershaper Guild, i.e. a total of one map, so I know almost nothing about him. The story started well enough but got a bit muddled, probably because of the way the game was constructed. On the one hand, you were sort of in a hurry to stop Eothas, but on the other hand, you had this archipelago to explore at your leisure, and there's a bit of a contradiction there. I was able to accept that in good grace and not care too much about that fact that the whole game sort of rested on an unstable foundation (starting point: you're in a hurry! no you're not!). I found none of the factions appealing, so I went to Ukaizo by invoking the sword and summoning the Floating Hangman. And I only did that because I had to: I had only found three of the five Blackwood Logs, and I wasn't going to go searching for the missing two. I was absoultely astonished by how short the endgame was after I sailed into the storm. After all, that northern part of the map looks rather big, comprising something like ten per cent of the archipelago, but it turned out there was almost nothing there. I loved Beast of Winter: really well written, really well thought-out and everything. Only the dragon fight was a bore: by far the most annoying in the game. The only serious let-down for me. I played maybe half of SSS and found it ultimately uninteresting. It was designed for people who like strategic battles (or battles in general) more than storytelling, and while that's perfectly fine, it's also not quite the thing for me. I played almost nothing of the Forgotten Sanctum, because my whole group reached level 20 right at the start of it, and I couldn't motivate myself to continue further on a side-track when there was nothing to gain anymore. Incidentally, I edited the XP gain before starting the game, and without that I would have reached level cap way sooner than I did. Level cap was a big problem for me in PoE and almost made me quit the whole thing when I reached it at the beginning of Act 3, and Deadfire clearly has the same problem, although this time I didn't think of quitting, I only went for the end of the main narrative ASAP. The naval battles were clearly something like an afterthought, because they are entirely unnecessary. You never need to buy any upgrades for your ship, much less a new ship: there is no reason to spend any money on any of that. Whatever naval fighting I did, I did it by boarding, and that worked perfectly well. This side of the game was not a problem for me, but it also wasn't very interesting. The sidekicks looked mostly like a waste of time for me. Maybe it was a question of time and funding? I had Konstanten with me for SSS, and his voice acting was really, really good -- he should have been a companion. The same goes for Ydwin, who I took along for the Beast of Winter. Really good stuff, but as there was so little of it, it was ultimately a disappointment. Rekke sounded like the beginning of a great story, but the story never continues. Money is a bit of a problem in the game in the sense that there's ultimately nothing (worthwhile) to spend it on. In the end I had almost 400K and an inventory full of unique items I had never used once and could have sold for a huge chunk of money, had there been any need to do so. The game system is balanced to such an extent that it becomes somewhat bland, and everything seems to work just as fine as everything else (at least on Veteran). I mean, I never used any traps once. I only ever used a couple of different potions. I almost never used any scrolls. There's so much stuff you just don't need, because other stuff works equally well, and that was a little disappointing. I believe this problem can be nicely demonstrated by the pirate map. Several of your bounties carry a piece of a map that you can eventually put together. It's a map to a pirate treasure, of course. That's a cliche, but it always works, which means that so far so good. But once you get that treasure, you realise that it's worth... nothing. You don't need the money, the gems are indifferent and the armor works as well as any other armor. Ho hum. The same goes for the combat system: the slate is wiped clean after every encounter, so there's never any reason to fear anything you encounter. I've been playing both RPGs and CRPGs since the late 1980s, and coming from that kind of experience, I couldn't help but find this a little bit disappointing. In the northwestern part of the map, there's a cave with ancient vampires (I mean fampyrs) in it, and this should be terrifying. But it's not: they have absolutely no power to harm you in any way that persists beyond the encounter. Now, the system is built upon reasonable premises and within them, it works really well. So there's nothing wrong in that sense. It's just that I don't think you can create a true sense of dangerous, heartbreaking and ultimately epic adventure with a system like that, because things are fundamentally too safe and everything is basically the same as everything else. (And I also know that other systems have their own problems, I'm not naive.) There was a lower level in Pahowane, and you can clearly get there somehow, but I never found out how. This may be a mystery that lingers long for me, and I think it's nice. So, yeah, definitely a very good game and well worth the time and money. I'm almost certainly never going to start it again, though. PS. Bonus points and a big thumbs-up for the chance to solve so many quests without violence. PPS. Seriously disappointed about the extraordinarly clumsy endings for some of the quests and/or the inability to do anything sensible with some items (Beza's pages, and that buried fruit thing on one of the islands). PPPS. Disappointed about the commercial performance of the game. It would have deserved a lot better -- so much effort went into this, and so much of it was clearly sincere and well thought-out. I'm sure there are some shattered folks at Obsidian, and I feel empathy for them.

Wow! Very good, thank you. I found the boreal dwarves on Deadfire, but Sagani was not referred to. Neither has there been any mention of the Grieving Mother.

Nope, that's Maneha. And yes, she's in a pub somewhere. Zahua is the monk from White March.

Judging by the lack of replies, I suppose the answer is no.

In general, whether a saying has obvious sexual subtext or not is not a matter of opinion. These things tend to be culturally defined and no one person's opinion matters. Meanings also change, but that, again, is not a matter of personal opinion. Like, the meaning "homosexual" in the word "gay" did not exist three hundred years ago, but it is very much an obvious meaning these days -- completely regardless of what any one person thinks about it.

Bascially what it says in the title. I'm pretty sure I've seen at least a reference to all other companions from PoE, but not these four. This is just out of interest, I'm not implying there should be refences to them in the game.

I think the equivalent of farmer's smartness exists in many European and Uralic languages (at least). I suppose it's eminently reasonable that it does, given how there have always been smart agrarian people who haven't received much in the way of formal education.

The two main -- and insurmountable -- problems are the graphics that become overly repetitive in about two minutes, and the lack of any sense of there being a party of adventurers. (I don't mean that every RPG should have a party of adventurers, it's just that NWN's henchman-type solution doesn't work for me.)

I follow computer games so inconsistently that I probably miss a lot. Although it has to be said that I don't feel like I'm ever missing anything: the little time I have for playing can be spent playing good games (like Deadfire and P:K within the past year). Entire years may go by without playing anything, so if there was something really good between, say, BG2 and PoE, I probably missed it. (I did check NWN but that doesn't count as good in my book.)

I'd say this is exactly how he comes across in the game. He's not educated but he's definitely street-smart. Or, given his background, agri-smart or rural-smart, however you want to put it.

I'm pretty sure what the OP meant with himbo is not what himbo means, unless the OP is quite confused. "Silliest thread for a while" award stuff.

I found it hilarious that I hadn't even heard of over half the games in that list that was 19 titles long.

For me the big question is whether I will end up preferring Pathfinder: Kingmaker or Deadfire. I have played most of Deadfire now but rather little of P:K so it's far too early to say. I think both are definitely good games. Some of the writing in P:K is extremely cheesy, and some of the design is punishingly harsh, but I'm fine with that. There is far more narrative and literary ambition in Deadfire, which I very much prefer, but the game also seems to be almost filled with unrealized potential, which is a disappointment in a sense.

By definition, you are correct. However, I fall into the camp that feels it is a useless waste of time simply because of the way the battles are designed. I have now tried it three or four times (which means that I have no longer played the game without ever once firing my cannons), and it just doesn't feel worth it. Boarding is much more fun, in my view.

I have to say I love reading discussions like this: the whole approach is so alien to my thinking that it introduces me to whole new ways of seeing the game. If I was a game developer, and I am not, I would be making some serious notes.

I understand what you're getting at, and to a certain extent I absolutely agree with you (I have essentially no experience with D2, so my only comment on that game is that it didn't interest me; I can't say anything about the items). My main point is that in balancing the game system to such an extent, Obsidian have also removed some of the edge from the game. All items work, all builds are feasible, and so much of everything is interchangeable. There is no question that a mythic item is significantly better than a fine one, but as you progress in the game, you will find plenty of first fine and eventually superb items which will easily allow you to compete with just about anything. I haven't found anything that made me go wow and think that this is something I'm going to hold on to. I realized the other day that it had been a while since I'd gone through my loot and checked whether anything was interesting. I had just picked everything up and then forgotten about it. There are so frigging many items, even unique items, that after a while they cease to matter -- I suppose I have never even tried 80 per cent of the unique items I've found. They're just something you carry around. Now, I absolutely agree that you can check everything out and optimize your party. But you don't have to. It doesn't really matter whether you do that or not. You'll do just fine in any case. (Again, I am happy to accept that things are different on PotD with all the challenges on, but I'm not interested in that, although I do agree that it's a viable way to go. I would also accept that you probably need optimization to deal with the mega bosses, but again, I am not interested. I think it's great that they're there, it's a nice idea, but I'm also happy that they're entirely optional.) Now, I understand that this is a perfectly logical result of the way the game is designed, and as such, it's somewhat unavoidable. But it still takes something out of the game, at least in my view. The problem was already there in PoE: the only two items that I really liked were Tidefall and Persistence, everything else was something you could use but could just as easily do without. There is a big difference when you compare the game to something like BG2 where some items keep you excited for quite some time (and yes, I agree that some items are overpowered, which is a different problem).

I agree: beating N down is most of all boring. That's the thing. It's such a grind. Incidentally, I am now at Bekarna's observatory, and there's a pretty tough fight there, too. But it's really interesting! How can you use the architecture to your advantage, and so on.

Oh, I completely own up to my ignorance on this point, no question. But you know, in retrospect this feels pretty weird: I have never felt any want or need to be able to swap Grimoires before. If anything, Aloth knows many more spells than he ever uses, and the ones he uses are very good indeed. I believe this, once again, reflects the perhaps-overly-balanced system of the game in general: everything is as effective as everything else. The same goes for items: for the most part, everything works just as fine as everything else. As I'm probably nearing the end of my playthrough, I'm beginning to feel that the storytelling in the game is good, it's very enjoyable, but the mechanics side is a little bland. There's no loot that gets you excited, because everything is as good as everything else -- my inventory is full of unique items I have never used that make me go ho-hum at best. It's not that anything is poor, it's just that everything is roughly the same.

I don't like to play this way at all. I don't like to see the dialogue options I'm not qualified for. It is very immersion-breaking for me, because the underlying mechanisms of the game become too obvious and highlighted. I prefer to "go blind" in this sense, it's much more enjoyable for me. Apparently there is way to deal with N without fighting, but either I didn't have high enough attributes or I didn't choose the right options. That's fine with me: I chose what I felt was best, and if that leads into a fight, I'm fine with that. (I wasn't looking for a fight.)

Their strategies are the same to an extent, but I suppose some of the messenger's relevant stats and/or defences must be significantly lower because that was not a concern. It is possible that I destroyed it before the safeguard even came on, or I may have been able to interrupt its casting without noticing it was about to come on. As I said, the safeguard (that is cast at least three times in succession for a total of about 360 seconds) does not make the fight that much more difficult, it only turns it into a grind that doesn't feel worthwhile. Running around and waiting for the NPC assistants to come on again feels fairly naff. The DLC is excellent, no question. It's just that this one fight seriously sucks, in my view. I did a bit of googling, and it appears that this is a fairly common opinion.