Wormerine

Yup.

Some things better, some things not. From gameplay experience, I think PoE2 is overall better (even though I did like so, of PoE1 systems). More refined system, more transparency in class progression, about the same length, but “less filler more killer”. Where I think PoE2 falls short is companions and narrative. Not that there isn’t a lot of good stuff to enjoy there - worldbuilding is probably better, as you won’t have to resort to book reading to understand broader context. Deadfire’s history, culture, and political situation is neatly conveyed through engaging quests, rather than plain text. I also don’t think story is bad per say - I enjoyed every minute spent in three of my Deadfire playthroughs. The game is very open ended though, and the narrative doesn’t have strong sense of progression. While PoE1 ending give an interesting perspective to everything we have been through, PoE2 ending feels like a set up to be followed up on. I felt there wasn’t sufficient pay off to our adventure in the Deadfire, and the ending made my gasp for PoE3. And with PoE3 not happening in foreseeable future I see it as a bad thing. in short, I felt the beginning and end were the weakest part of Deadfire. Everything inbetween is pretty darn good. And of course, all three DLCs strongly recommended. They are more of a smaller side adventures this time around, but we’ll worth your time. I would also recommend reaching for some mods. Not necessary, but I refuse to play without them: 1) Enhanced User Interface - adds some icons and colour coding to make game’s mechanics easier to understand. 2) Community Patch - might be a bit biased, but thanks to hard work of a wonderful folks in the community we got those lovely pack of tweaks and fixes. But being a shallow person that I am, it is a must for me due to unique icons made by @Boeroer to make skill trees a bit more exciting. 3) Deadly Deadfire (just xp!) - while the whole mode is great, I wouldn’t recommend it for first playthrough. I would, however recommend the file that just reduces XP by 25%. Due to the open nature of Deadfire it is too easy to greatly out-level available content for the vast majority of the game. While PoE1 had reputation of being perhaps to difficult, Deadfire swung the other way. The penalty to XP makes it possible to the enjoy all the content there is, without getting too ahead of the difficulty curve. The base game is still pretty easy for the most part.

Maybe. Considering that the presentation focused on combat, and yet they didn’t show how the combat works, suggests to me that they are still in the process of putting it all together. I can’t imagine how one button for skills would work, even with couple load outs, unless they go for Dark Souls like scrolling. Or command inputs like in fighting games. Anyway he bit that interested me more was:

You know you can play Skyrim in third person? Bethesda games famously allow for both first and third person control. All that’s been said and shown about Avowed so far point to it being first-person only, like Outer Worlds was.

And yet, still no Bloodbourne nor Demon Souls in sight.

Yes. The narrative since the first gameplay trailer has been "the combat has turned out rather fun, so we decided to focus on that". I am still not seeing what Obsidian is seeing. Maybe hands-on previews at some point in the future will turn things around. It seems that most still expect Avowed to be an RPG first and foremost.

Yes, it's been said in the early reveal that companions this time around will be mandatory. What they said than, is that by making them unavoidable, they can be better integrated with the main story - which makes a lot of sense. Personally, as I always gather all companions that I can, I don't mind it. It is logical, if that the game has to work without certain elements, those elements will have to be made more seperate. Whenever it is a worthy tradeoff, will depend on the quality of Avowed companions. At the same time, I doubt I will personally care, as I tend to collect Obsidian companions as if they were Pokemon. Frankly, I would rather have Obsidian decide from the get go that companions are mandatory, than do what Larian did - give players freedom to ignore companions, and than create "reactivity" to retcon those choice, because they made some companions necessary for the main plot.

In the video pickabale items and lootable opjects seem to have pretty unmissable shine to them. Personally, I don't see a good alternative solution. Unfortunately, as games became more visually busy, it became necessary to distinguish interactables from static decoration. Definitely doesn't look nice on screenshots or gameplay footage, but I generally don't notice them when I play. I would rather have those, that XRAY vision, that makes it difficult to enjoy the artstyle entirely.

Cool! Thanks for sharing. Oh come on, I haven't done a fanction-less runthrough so far. I thought those were really well done - so far I didn't have a character who wouldn't naturally lean toward one side. It would be nice to see the UI - it is difficulty to say at the moment how exactly it will work. There are skilltrees (which remix skills from PoEs to some extend), so yes, it does seem that abilities are seperate from the equipment. I didn't play the Andromeda, but I have rough ideas how it worked. I am not sure, if it would work well, if for example someone wants to go heavy into spellcasting, but I still struggle to figure out how the game plays (is there any stamina meter? are skills on cooldowns? etc.) The presentation from the DD, makes distinction between abilities and special attacks - not sure what is the exact distinction between the two. It being a singleplayer action game, opposed to class based tactical RPGs, I don't have issue with them changing things around, and will need to see more before voicing any concerns. At this point, I just have questions. Companions do seem rather inconsequential. It would be cool, if they could be called to use their abilities to aid you in what you are doing - maybe something similar to original Mass Effects. On a positive side, I was intrigued with all that was told about world and the story. Outside the presence of an archmage, it nothing unexpected, but still feels like a genuine Eora adventure.

Yes! That’s sound ideal.

Pffffff... Those are rookie numbers. BTW, it's been 3 years and still wait for Witcher3 video. At this point it will end up being a week long conference. Edit. I do think JA could be more concise. He tends to make interesting points, but overexplain and overargue them, likely in preparation for upcoming backlash. Noah, however, I think tends to put our quite interesting and thoughtful stuff. edit2. Though while not purely game oriented I tend to check out whatever hbomberguy and Folding Ideas put out.

The AAA Pillars of Eternity 3, obviously.

Finished Uncharted4 Stand Alone DLC Lost Legacy. After being rather lukewarm about the Thief's End I was rather surprised that I ended up enjoying the DLC rather a lot. Story is still good, though far more simple, but it makes up for it, by being a better game. Far better paced, and making far better use of it's gameplay systems. Finally, some fun puzzles, combat encounters are less linears (dropping difficulty to normal, and maxing aim assist I am sure helped as well). The big car chapter is so much more fun, than more linear sequences of T'sE. Even bombastic setpieces worked for me this time around, probably as they were well integrated into the story, rather than being the thing happening between story bits, like it felt like in the base game. I started Resident Evil2 Remake through gamepass. Eh, we will see. Gameplay wise it seems quite interesting, but I am really not enjoying the gore. I hope the title will soon stop trying to shock me with lavishly produced innards, and focus on the gameplay experience. Otherwise, I might nope-out in a session or two.

I dunno. It got some graphical uplift, but nothing groundbreaking. Either it is not remaster, or remastering 3 years old game is stupid. Pick whatever you prefer.

I think if done well, visually simple conversations can work. For example, Outer Words I thought worked really, really well. There were some neat stalistic choices there, that leaned into the artifice of the conversation system, and made it work, IMO. What was showed in Avowed, however, looked rather plain and unappealing. What you describe would take a lot of production - mocap, syncing animations with the enviroment etc. Would definitely be welcome, but I definitely see it as luxury, rather than expectation or necessity.

From what I understand, more or less yes. I would assume that’s why it’s $10 for existing owners, rather than new purchase like LoU1 was. The biggest addition seems to be procedurally generated rogue like.

Yeah… I think it might be what makes me cautious about Avowed. Even very combat driven titles (like Messiah of Might&Magic) had a bit more scope than what Avowed showed so far. My impression so far, may it be right or wrong, is: “we don’t have much to show”. There is a lot of talk, but relatively little shown. I still don’t know what the game really is, and at this point I am getting doubtful if devs know what Avowed really is. And with release meant for this year - I feel like the game has a lot of ground to cover before the release hits.

Yup. That said I learned not to judge the game by how it looks - I will be more interested in hand on previews. Quite often games that look great in trailers, play like crap, and games that don’t look that appealing in trailers, play pretty good. Combat seems to have a bit of “Skyrim” quality, but there is enough feedback from enemies getting hit, that I choose to stay optimistic.

Which is sad, as up to 2010 they were a publisher who would reliably put out fun and interesting titles. Than AssCreed/Farcry craze came, and their output became progressively more narrow and stale. Still, when Ubi allow itself to do something smaller, it usually ends up being great. It is just their bigger game that seem to be marketing/business driven.

Making sully blown cinematics for conversation is no doubt a big investment of resources. Personally, I tend to tolerate those basic ones better, than something like Baldur's Gate3 - I will probably get used to awkwardness of Avowed conversations and treat as I would a game like Pillars. BG3 for me, though, hit the awkward spot of sometimes having decent cinematics, and sometimes being awkward. I am still in wait and see camp (I mean I gonna play it on account of it being on gamepass and Eora). It could be good, but they are not really selling it to me.

Avowed out in fall 2024. Head to Avowed subforum to complain and argue.

Almost as authentic, as the one from the opening of the recent movie . Trailer confuses me. It's first person, but with third person bits (ala newer Deus ex?). The game seems a bit sluggish. But I played the crap of out of Indiana Jones and the Infernal Machine, so I am clearly not too picky when it comes to my Indie experiences.

I am still somewhat disappointed, that main focus seems to be on combat. It seems like it is going to be a much more action centric experience. Combat doesn't look bad, but I am also doubtful how much depth it will have. RPG nature of the game still seems to be mostly sidelined, at least as far as talking point go. One branching quest is shown, but it didn't fire up my imagination. The logo looks cool, though.