Wormerine

I never have defined my character as skillfully as OP (I hate writing my own bio, having to do the same for my character would be just as grueling). However, I do find it necessary to define who my character is (past, personality, personal believes and goals) to enjoy most Obsidian RPGs. That was the main hurdle I had to overcome when moving from Bioware games to Obsidian's. Never played or really knew about table-top RPGs at the time, so creating your character, outsided gameplay stats was an abstract concept for me. Something I complained about was that I didn't have a character I would care about - while was invested in the conflict of Bhaalspawn, hero of Jade Empire or KOTOR, or Shephard, I found it difficult at first to care about blankslates of KOTOR2, NWN2. By the time I played Fallout: New Vegas, I read more about roleplaying, and decided to do a bit of an experiment, and defined my character before starting the game - and found the experience to be immensely engaging and satisfying. PoEs are probably first games I really tried very hard to roleplay, though it is still challenging for me not to metagame (for example I killed Llengrath in PoE1 because I didn't want to miss on the hardest fight in the game, even though reaching a mutual deal, was what my character would be more willing to pursue). When playing Outer Worlds I never felt a need to define who my character is, and I think that is one of the main reasons why it felt more like Bioware RPG, then Obsidian's - most decisions I made were based on what I personally believed was a better choice, rather then being based on my character viewpoint. Being able most of the time to find the morally superior middle ground only reinforced that playstyle.

Or a Tyranny MMO.

Those didn't work for me. Gameplay is far to simple to engage. No amount of effects will make pressing forward with occasional jump excited to me. If one wants an effective escape sequence, then one needs more complex platforming to be able to throw something against the player. See, for example the excape from the tree sequence from Ori and the Blind Forest. In TR those are just noice to me, with no imaginative imput. Is this the right place to use Ludonarrative disonance? I think so. TRs are full of it. From the opening where Lara is lost, and by herself, but player is handholded throughout majority of the game, to death threatning situations, which are solved by mindlessly pressing forward with occasional unresponsivenes to your imput when Lara's scripted stumbles happen.

I am a big Raider fan, but the new series never appealed to me. I found characters and story unappealing, and gameplay is well crafted, but far to relient on flashy but shallow setpieces. I am somewhat curious about "Shadow". I heard it has little combat, and has more exploration then previous two games. It will have to wait for the new rig, though. Oddly enough, I felt that Dark Souls1 scratched my Tomb Raider itch. Exploration, and forboding massive ruins is what I remember of the old TR games.

Mass Effect trilogy. Outer Worlds made me crave some classic Bioware stuff. Plan was to play Mass Effect2, as it's been a long time since I played it, but as I didn't have a save to import, I loaded a half-way complete save for ME1 and completed that first. I also plan to continue over to ME3 - never played any of it's DLCs, and the last time I played ME3 was around it's release. I am curious if I will hate it as much as I did back then. I am surprised that I don't enjoy ME2 as much as I did. For all it's faults ME1 had scope, consistancy and immersion, which ME2 lacks. Small things, but they matter - changing how traveling works, means that Normandy leaves the station everytime you return to the ship . Being in direct control of the ship, just doesn't gel, with being commander, rather then pilot. No Mako sequences make the world feel small, even though content wise ME2 is most likely far more packed then it's precedessor. While combat is improved, it is still not a good action shooter. The only thing I don't miss is managing the inventory, which was a boring chore in ME1. Plot of ME2 has some odd plot choices and forced melodrama, which I didn't bother me before. There is also far less companion content then I remembered. Overall, ME1 felt much more grounded and immersive, then ME2. ME2 feels much more gamey, and faster pace breaks the illusion much easier.

My hot take is, that Deadfire has some of the best individual elements of any RPG I have played, but as a whole it doesn't come together as well as some other games. There is a lot of baggage that Deadfire is carrying (IE legacy), which doesnt serve its setting or goals, and some design decisions, which while I can appreciate, dont work in the game's favour. Its a game I can praise and complain about to no end.

She probably saw through that, and decided to milk you for as much as she can.

Interesting. I didnt feel anything of that kind. Are you referring to:

https://www.gameinformer.com/b/features/archive/2017/12/14/take-two-announces-new-publishing-label-private-division.aspx

Doesn't Outer Worlds IP stay with Obsidian though? I don't think the game is unfinished. There isn't a major drop in quality, and just like in PoEs I assume the finale was delivered with what was planned. I wouldn't explain shortcomings, with some conjured conspiracy theories. I found Bizantium disappointing, not because it was of lesser quality then other areas, but because it didn't feel like a major city - nothing of that kind was attempted earlier in the game, so relatively empty Edgewater didn't bother me because of the nature of the place. I get that Bizantium is more run down, then it is advertised as, but it just didn't work for me. As to finale itself - I thought it was fine. The gameplay didn't have enough depth to allow for satisfying combat encounters, but it is something one can throw against entire game. Companions showing up was fine - a budget approach, but that's expected. I doubt they had anything bigger planned. Perhaps, if one would initiate the attack (call for allies to join the fight), like it was in New Vegas it would be more effective. EDIT. As a side note, it is foolish to assume that because final stages come last, they were the last to be worked on. I remember Josh saying that it is usually the beginning of the game which gets designed last, as designers need to know what actually is in the game to set it up and teach players the mechanics. I would expect that the later the stages where developed the better they get, as devs get the feel of mechanics, world, and engine. It is for that reasons that DLCs and expansions tend to be the best content in the game, if they are not a pure cash grab.

Who knows how many civilizations passed between creation of Gods and the present day.

Bringing Sony exclusive to PC is something I am willing to buy into.

Well, there is no evidence to show that substantial amount of players won’t buy games on Epic. Games released there still sell really well, and with secured cash upfront and a better cut, it makes for a better business move overall.

Happens. Kinda like watching Isle of Dogs, while knowing Japanese, I imagine.

They had 1st party exclusives, which I think is a fair thing to do. There were also "unnoficial" exclusives, like Firaxis games, which were playable on steam only due to its functionality. The big difference is that Valve didn't pay money to game makers to add some value to their platform: they themselves developed titles for it, and other devs flocked to it, due to its popularity/functionality. It's not impossible that devs didn't like having to use steam as much as players did. People dislike Epic as they feel they are not being dealt with - deals are made between Epic and Publishers/Devs, and customers have a choice of waiting for wider release or caving in.

Makes a bit of sense. OW reminded me a lot of early Bioware titles (more so, then Obsidian’s previous games). Not Mass Effect, as by that point presentation and RPG elements where greatly reduced in favour of presentation, which OW doesn’t have, but some similarities are there. the question is, whenever a sequel with bigger budget means deeper game, or shinier presentation.

I am pretty sure that, no, you didn’t, if I remember the ending correctly.

Pretty much this. I love my Civ, but the “genre” has potential for more designs. For one humankind seems to go classless - as if no Civs. Either way, humankind goes against a juggernaut, so they better to something interesting really really well.

It’s certainly tackling the same theme as CIv, but there is inherent way Civ games progress. It’s all about positive feedback loop. What I am most interested to see is, if it is something they will try to tackle. Civ6 tried to fix some of Civ inherent problems, especially with Rising Storm expansion but I didn’t feel like they quite succeeded. RPShas written a nice article about it a while back. https://www.rockpapershotgun.com/2018/03/15/all-rise-and-no-fall-how-civilization-reinforces-a-dangerous-myth/

Wow, I actually disagree with quite a few of them: 1) setting - Deadfire all the way. A more unique, better realised place. 6) companions - I didn’t care about a single companion in Deadfire as much as I did about majority of companions in PoE1. While they probably got more content, a more linear and focused quest progression meant more coherent story arcs. 8) world map - I am torn on that - on one hand I feel that Deadfire’s map is simply more engaging then POE1 one. At the same time it hints at potential that was never quite realised. If it were more interactive with some procedural stuff it would be excellent. As it is it can feel more dead then abstract PoE1 map. 9) cities in PoE1 sucked. Gilded Vale had barely any content in it. Major cities were under developed. Stelwart was great but that’s White March. Neketaka on the other hand is a phenomenal, deep city. Even smaller areas, are better developed then most PoE1 content. 12) dungeons - before DLCs I agree that the game lacked a deep dungeon. However, PoE1 didn’t do great in that regard either, and Caed Nua sucked. Sorry. 15 levels doesn’t mean much, if they are boring, copy/pasted Enemies which I just fought on the surface. 13) I wouldn’t agree that side content of PoE1 is better then PoE2 but if we purely count things listed - sure. Bounties in Deadfire only worked when fought on land, and even so, it’s far to easy to outlevel enemies. 14) VO - Actually, I don’t have stand outs in Deadfire, in the way I had in PoE1. Perhaps it is a result of less engaging narrative and writing IMO. Actor can do far more with coherent story arc, then a small encounter. In addition, I don’t remember bad performances in PoE1, and while PoE2 is good for the most part, there are occasional bad apples. 18) I felt that one thing that suffered from per-encounter system was boss battles. I never found big battles in PoE2 enjoyable, and while megabosses and DLCs did a decent job in raising the stakes, I never quite enjoyed them as rapid, lethal encounters in PoE1 (and IE games)

xD I did that with ADOM. Frankly had to whip up dictionary again for Pillars1 as some of the descriptions went beyond my repertoire.

A really thorough, on point deep-dive into Disco.

Excellent. An incentive to purchase and dive back into OW.

Ever since I played Dark Souls I started to wish for a Gothic game using something similar to DS system - in many ways DS combat reminded me of what Gothic tried to achieve, but was quite horrible at. Still G1&2 are probably the best open world RPGs I have ever played.

Uuuu... Ex-Arcane people https://www.rockpapershotgun.com/2019/12/13/arkane-veterans-announce-weird-west/ so like Hard West, but hopefully good.