sorophx

huh, I didn't know the SNES and Genesis versions were different

I don't see this as an issue it only makes sense that a 10-foot tall ogre should one-shot my mage with a constitution of whooping 20 points. makes for a more meaningful combat experience, a little initial planning, strategy, protect the mages, use every rogue's skill available to keep him alive. but that would mean designing better encounters on BioWare's part, instead of sending waves of enemies 3-4 times bigger than the party. so, yeah, I can see why they decided to change whatever it is they're changing. I'm beginning to think Gromnir is right, Bio's goal is to cut corners as much as possible and just milk their player-base.

I was talking about older games, where there's not enough room to put paladins, barbarians, rangers, what have you. so they all had to be replaced by a single "warrior". as for mages, I remember playing both DarkSun games, and I don't remember mages being any good.

I think this isn't about making warrior easier or harder, or whatever. my issue is it takes from the game's variety. it's taking the CRPG back 20 years. when warrior was strictly a tank class, thief - damage-dealer, priest - healer, mage - well, mage was teh suck. I ask Bio, what about choices? what about customization? it's a game after all, not an interactive novel! but there's no answer. I'd rather play Witcher/Two Worlds 2, where there's no party, no customization whatsoever. but at least you get to play this one char the way you like. still better than having to control four handicapped Geralts.

I'd suggest Atlantica rather. but people do praise LOTRO.

there's a couple of free ones. the Star Wars animation series-based one. then there's the D&D and LOTRO from Turbine. and of course, Atlantica, which is basically a dumbed down version of WoW with an oriental flavor, but the combat is great (hint: it's turn-based, and you can control up to 9 characters)

yeah, Tig. if I ever get to making that Wasteland remake I've been planning, I'm going to beg you to be my beta-tester

as if any encounter in any BioWare game was ever better than those in IWD

oh, my machine is better than the recommended settings demand, I wonder why it's so hard to run games released in 2009 and 2010...

what an interesting read! thanks speaking of turn-based squad-based, I really want to try Frozen Synapse

Black Isle for instance. or Squaresoft, Enix, Atlus. or, I don't know, Microprose, Sir-Tech?

ok, to paraphrase, it wouldn't work because Bio doesn't know how to do tactical combat. they have trouble designing encounters as it is, making them turn-based would destroyl it completely.

a lot of jrpgs I've played recently had some sort of a hybrid real-time/turn-based combat, like FF's ATB. Breath of Fire, Wild Arms, Grandia, Radiata Stories, the Valkyrie Profile sequel. but these games are a couple of years old, so maybe the TB trend is back too slow for the modern gamer. also, the party's too small. while I think mixing strategy with role-playing is a great idea, giving orders to 4 characters and then waiting for a whole regiment of orcs to make their turn isn't very exciting.

full turn-based wouldn't work in a game like this. even the japanese developers don't make full TB games, unless they have "TACTICS" attached to them.

I encountered most of them in the very beginning, and they were very hard. I didn't feel like kiting one mob for 30 minutes so I skipped it. and when I decided to go back and do them, turned out I couldn't. the armor guardians were a little easier but still not what I'd call a good battle. one that I did like (but couldn't beat on my first attempt) was that guy in a storage facility, who turn into some demonic entity and summon a pack of minions. probably the most intense moment of the whole game for me, your whole party trapped in a small room with a dozen enemies, one of them a powerful mage.

wasn't that irony on WoD's part?

Baldur's Gate and NWN. I don't remember if DA had a lot of side-quests, but I skipped them all too (collecting phylacteries and pieces of that doom armor comes to mind...)

why, yeah why else would I play that piece of junk? not for the combat mechanics, that's for sure.

that's certainly not true in my experience. maybe that's because I tend to skip a lot of side-quests and avoid unnecessary battles.

dual-wield builds are more challenging usually. you can't tank at all and have to work on your damage output and hate control instead. this is how I like to play RPGs.

there's only one true Shadowrun video game, it was released in 1993. I still have the cartridge for my MegaDrive. and I still haven't beaten it. a sequel made by Obsidian is the game of my dreams

absolutely, it's my favorite build in every game that allows it

ahaha, exactly what I was thinking

supposing long sword/two-handed sword DPS is as high as that of two short swords, then no, they didn't. they just made warrior a lot more boring

how's the port? I heard some very bad things about it and Munch's in terms of performance