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casa

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  1. Guys, of course I can't judge the whole overarching theme and story before finishing the game, and afterwards it's easy to discuss all those interesting thoughts brought up in those 50 hours. However, if a game's writing or rather the delivery of it absolutely fails to grab the player within a timespan as long as some other games take to finish, I think it's very fair to say there IS something wrong with it, even without finishing. A good game grabs you by the collar and pulls you into it's story, any game that fails to do so after an hour or so should be called a failure when it comes to presentation. Of course that's subjective, and of course I've played games that took longer to warm up to, but I don't think I ever finished one that took this long. I mean, you can read up absolutely fascinating pieces of history on Wikipedia too, that doesn't mean it's great writing though. To me the game is so far filled with absolutely boring characters who I think are a chore to talk to - they might have interesting things to say in theory, but so have many people you're still not interested in chatting to because they leave you totally cold. As for waltc's point, I think I'm over the initial game pass issues, that was back in November, installing from Epic was easy and painless and I was very much looking forward to playing.
  2. I guess I haven't been able to find the overarching theme yet, but the writing I've seen so far is all but for older players and not as if by veterans if you ask me. Sorry, but as I said e.g. Parvati's plot is lost on me because it's teenage drama as far as I can tell, I feel it's targeted at a much younger audience than I am. By the way, if you thought I'm a "younger player", I'm not - I've left the 40 behind me. That doesn't mean I don't care for presentation and immersion though.
  3. That was my impression too. Not that I'm against new people, not at all - but ever since Bioware's storytelling went so far downhill after... hmm... DA:O or ME2 or so, I found Obsidian to be my safe haven, so I really hope you're wrong with this. I blamed Bioware's mediocrity mostly on EA, large size, metrics and all that, not on the talents themselves.
  4. Hmm, I think 10 hours is already a lot. And either you misunderstood or I misspoke, I surely talked to NPCs and of course companions, but felt like I'd rather avoid it because I found the dialogues so uninteresting. Every time I think "man, I don't want to hear all this but I have to". I normally wouldn't play a game actively avoiding dialogues because it's usually the meat of the game for me. But I logged out in the Unpredictable standing in front of Felix, knowing my next step must be talking to him, but I can't force myself to do it. Instead I just went into another VtMB playthrough last night only to get the Malkavian dialogue, and I'm having so much fun with it - even though the Gameplay around it is so utterly broken and I couldn't care less about doing all the fights and running around again. Who cares when you can't wait to talk to the next NPC. Maybe an unfair comparison, I might play Pillars again to find some middle ground.
  5. While I understand that not everyone (most) won't read the wall of text, it explains pretty much how and why I'm so disappointed with the writing, and I agree that Obsidian is known for excellent writing - that's exactly why I'm so disappointed. And honestly, if the game's storytelling doesn't grab me within the first 10 hours of playing it, I think that's already a good indicator. Also, if I wasn't such a huge fan of Obsidian's past work I wouldn't have written such a wall of text, and wouldn't still think if I should better delete it again. I'm sure I will at least start up the game a few more times and try to get into it, after all I paid good money for it and had high hopes, but my current feeling is that it won't grab me anymore.
  6. Okay, I know this will just be filed under another random complaint post, but now after about 10 hours in I can't see myself finishing the game anymore and I simply need to vent. The TL;DR version is that I think the game doesn't live up to the hype and I'm disappointed. You can move on now if you like. Otherwise, CW for boomer mentality. Now the long version. First the good: If you manage to get the game installed (Gamepass/Windows Store didn't work for me, Epic finally did) it runs beautifully, bug free and seems very well polished. The times of "bug-ridden, unfinished Obsidian games" are obviously over. It also looks better than on the screenshots, it's absolutely no ugly game and I like the art style, not even sure what this 1900's postcard design is called but I like it. I also have no problems with gunplay and all that, it's not what I care for the most but on the technical side there's really not much of an issue dispite some clunkiness in the UI that could've been a little better and minor nitpicks. As for the gameplay... it's handholding to the max, you can't possibly go wrong no matter how hard you try. Yeah, it's a "follow the marker" game... sad, but I can live with that when there's a good story to follow, that's what I play for. But as a looong long fan of Obsidian and the guys working there, having played so many flawed gems that barely worked but had such good storytelling and potential for more, I can't get over the mediocrity of this game now and how safe, unoffensive, easy and boring it is. Okay, let me take a step back - After I initially, a few months ago, tried and failed to get the game with the XBox game pass for PC because I was curios about the reviews, I gave up trying to install it until 2 days ago. I finally played and finished Vampire - Bloodlines for the first time (yeah, that late I know, I had it in my pile of shame since 2010) and frankly thought "come on, Leonard Boyarsky made this, made Fallout with Tim Cain, Arcanum... there MUST be something to my liking in Outer Worlds and I need it NOW! Screw that Epic boycott. Okay, I know those can't be compared, but I was definitely not looking for the Fallout in space, I wanted something quirky with great writing and that sense of humor and sarcasm I got to know from those games. And I wasn't prepared how flat TOW falls in that regard. It plays everything so safe, maybe in an attempt to offend absolutely nobody, that there's nothing left. The corporate/capitalism critique: Easy to get behind, who wouldn't. But it's getting old after half an hour really, and the only joke that put a slight smile on my face at all was the landing pot's arrival, probably the only time the game hurt someone. The NPCs and companions are so utterly boring, I'm sorry, but I found myself wanting to avoid dialogues, and this is new to me from this company. None of them are relatable, they all look and feel flat, have nothing interesting to say or I just don't get it. There was sooo much praise for Parvarti and how cute/lovely she is and her companion quest. I'm a sucker for lovely characters. And I love Ashly Burch's voice acting too, so I looked forward to reaching that point hoping I'd get somewhat emotionally attached to her and the game. Halfway there I even watched that Noclip documentary about writing compelling characters.... boy was I flabbergasted when her whole quest got drama-exposition-dumped on me only minutes after we actually visited the "quest marker", the timing alone was so bad it ruined it completely. And the amount of social media-drama... I never felt so old and disconnected before. That timing was so incredibly bad, there should actually be a patch that makes sure the whole thing takes a little more time, enough at least that it's believable that she spent a few days on her iPhone, but even then, it was so forced, one dimensional, trying so hard to grab me with a problem that really isn't a biggy that it completely fell flat and I was left with "okay, if this was that emotional highlight everyone is talking about I can stop playing now". Because even if I can't connect to Parvarti at all, she's STILL the most unique character/companion, the only likable I met so far. (Edit: I overthought that next (spoilered) part, I don't want to be the guy who sees "that stuff" everywhere, so after writing I hopped into the game once more to confirm the impression. No, not everyone looks like that, I might've gotten that impression mainly from some very colorful quest NPCs. Maybe my issue is simply that there's only a very small variety, the only stand-out ones that look like that, the rest forgettable? I'll leave it spoilered but in to get flak if necessary.) Yeah, sorry, optics and individualism play a part in games for me. It's not about making or including some sexy Skyrim-modded supermodel clichées, it's about a believable variety of different characters, I miss that here. As for the writing, there's a good example for what I think in the Noclip documentary about characters at minute 11.10 onwards, about Celia and how her script was changed, which left me speechless - and I think that script change is exactly my problem: Why wasn't she kept creepy and the story actually addresses that creepiness instead of making it all cute and nice? There is creepiness in the world, and that's how you write excellent stories - not by avoiding but by addressing it, giving players something to think. Games like FO and VtMB are full of creepiness and hard hitting topics, from thought provoking to gut wrenching. Putting a creep in the game doesn't equal supporting creepiness, but to create an opportunity for deep storytelling - like a... likable creep? So far I haven't seen anything like that, besides something outlandish like . I've experienced the same in the last Bioware games (I played), the absolutely non-offensive content, the bland, boring, avoid-pretty, life-and soulless characters with their tumblr-problems(*), an avoidance of any real social commentary, controversial topics or stuff to think about. I repeat again, including these topics doesn't mean supporting them. But leaving out everything that could possibly offend someone somewhere in a game means that there's really nothing left anymore, and this is exactly what happened to TOW I'm afraid. Despite that, I'm all for "woke" (maybe I'm even misinterpreting that word) content, if it's packed in great writing that's actually thought provoking and sometimes hurts a bit. But the no offense/just pretend it's normal route I think is the death of storytelling. Sorry for that rant, I know that's the point where people usually stop listening because I'm outed as a boomer or something. Anyway, as I said I'm only 10 hours in and this is my impression - if someone tells me now "hey, you got it all wrong, wait until XY!", I might play on and change my mind, but otherwise I'm afraid I can't finish the game because I'm so disappointed in it's writing. (*)I know this kind of language sounds like the typical hate-Youtubers, believe me I don't like them either, but at least everyone knows the meaning.
  7. Just chiming in hoping to get a notification when someone has figured it out. I've tried to install it via Gamepass for the last 12 days or so to no avail. It downloads, eats up 37GB space but when finished pretends it's not there. I've tried pretty much everything I found on reddit, MS answers etc. to no avail, redownloaded at least 10 times, repair-installed Windows, reset the store, did Registry edits... nada, niente. The one thing I didn't try yet and won't try is a complete Windows reinstall including wiping the hard drive. Since I'm not going to continue the MS subscription if it doesn't work, I guess it's waiting for Steam now.
  8. I only logged in here after a year or so to request exactly that, after watching the gameplay footage. The constant aiming at NPCs was the only thing spoiling my overall excitement for the game a little.
  9. Another yes please for the third person view, just for the statistics.
  10. I think the audience for NWN2 is pretty much split into those who prefer singleplayer and the multiplayer ones, maybe with the people enjoying custom made modules somewhere in between. I often read very strong opinions from one or the other side. For me, NWN(2) was probably the only good multiplayer and roleplay experience I've ever had, something on a level that is not possible in MMOs and won't ever come back because it makes no sense for a developer from a financial point of view. For the official campaign I couldn't care less, even if I enjoyed MotB I would probably never touch the singleplayer side of NWN2 again.
  11. Well, Beamdog said "Ask Obsidian", so I did.
  12. This is not a suggestion, this is begging. I already posted this in the NWN2 section, but I doubt anyone ever goes there anymore. After playing a bit of Beamdog's NWN1 EE I loaded up my old module (planned PW) that I gave up on some years ago and noticed how much I miss the game, the multiplayer and the world building. NWN2 was really a diamond in the rough, so much potential but so many bugs, bad luck, unfinished things. The last straw for me was the Gamespy shutdown, I had no hope to get any players anyway so threw it all in the bin. Well, since NWN1 just came back from the dead, sort of, there just has to be a NWN2 Enhanced edition. Period. I want it, I need it, and the world needs the NWN-style multiplayer, there's no other game that does it anymore. My beloved favorite developer, I'd kiss your feet if you'd even consider just giving it to Beamdog or whoever is willing, I'll include the ankles if you do it yourself. I'd be willing to pay even for a bugfix edition, with reenabled master servers and reintroduction to Steam, so some new players can experience this gem.
  13. After playing around with the NWN 1 Enhanced I need to bump this... so badly. I forgot how much I missed this game, the multiplayer and the building. I just walked around in a module (for a planned PW) I started building years ago and gave up after the Gamespy shutdown killed the last hope for getting players interested. It totally needs an enhanced edition, heck, just a bugfix Edition and reenabled multiplayer would be worth $20 to me. Please please please consider it, beloved favorite developer of all time, I'd be willing to kiss your feet even if you just gave the code to Beamdog or whoever is willing.
  14. Nothing to say about trackpads, but otherwise I haven't had any problems so far, about 10 hrs in. That's Yosemite btw, I don't know if there are any problems on older systems.
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