what is that abomination?

[tenser]

The game I mean - dumbed down version of first game with no permanent progression? WHY??? Are we moving back in time? First game was so much better...

[Habba]

What makes you think there is no permanent progression?

After each run, you unlock new features, such as Weapons, Perks, Powerups and Abilities. You keep the Crystals you find, so you'll be able to purchase permanent upgrade such as more Teleport Charges and More Health.

As you play the game, you'll unlock additional playable characters, such as Marie Curie, who can wield two small weapons at once. Twin Teslazi with Extra Bullets? Yeah, that's crazy.

Once you kill the final boss, you move to the next cycle, which has additional challenges, such as Champion monsters.

The game engine is also upgraded, so it has a better lightning system and dynamic shadows. The game looks so much better.

[tenser]

Thats per run progression - die, buy stuff for next run, risking you die in first stage and lose it all - repeat, it is like losing your save file all the time. Progression between runs gets you more items in a run but you are not stronger in subsequent runs, you just roll gear from bigger pool. 1st game had permanent progression, grinding anf farming and those were its best elements.

I do not get what upgrades are permanent, is it permanent or you buy it for the duration of the run? I understood it that you invest crystals at the beginning of the run and gamble - either you get further and reach surplus of crystals to make next run even easier or you lose all perks you bought.

[not sure about graphics, but I remember first game crashed quite a lot]

[Habba]

Currently, there are two ways to use Crystals at Wardenclyffe. You can buy temporary boosts for your next run: Perks, Weapons, and Ability. Purchasing these at Wardenclyffe will help you get further.

You can also buy permanent boosts, known as inventions. They provide permanent bonuses that will be on you forever, such as increased health or mech armor. They are obviously more expensive.

The game is currently in Alpha, so I'm expecting to see more stuff to become available for purchase.

[tenser]

where are inventions? [found it, its called research]

also is the amount of content bigger in this game? do other characters have separate upgrades or they all share same upgrades?

loading time is horrible, after beating one mission the game stopped responding, alt tabbing didn't help, i had to force close it with manager, no window mode either....

[edit] weapon upgrade[white and blue] makes game to stop responding, it doesnt go to reward choice screen just freezes the game.

one event didnt respond to clicking [couldnt spend crystals or batteries], i closed it with x

[Habba]

Originally posted by tenser:

also is the amount of content bigger in this game? do other characters have separate upgrades or they all share same upgrades?

There'll be more weapons, perks and events. Two more player characters as well.

Different characters will have different specials, for an example Curie can wield two small weapons at once, essentially doubling her fire rate on small weapons. This will make small weapons a lot more powerful, and change the way you play.

In the future, each character will also have a special sub-set of perks only they can have. This will be implemented later.

Originally posted by tenser:

loading time is horrible, after beating one mission the game stopped responding, alt tabbing didn't help, i had to force close it with manager, no window mode either....

[edit] weapon upgrade[white and blue] makes game to stop responding, it doesnt go to reward choice screen just freezes the game.

one event didnt respond to clicking [couldnt spend crystals or batteries], i closed it with x

What sort of a system do you have? How often does these occur? Are they frequent, or happening only occasionally?

[tenser]

Weapon upgrade bug happened every time. Loading time is also always long regardless what I run in background. Then game itself runs fine [within mission] I have windows 8, radeon r7 200 and i5 with 16 gb ram.

[Tyrian Mollusk]

Originally posted by Habba:

You can buy temporary boosts for your next run: Perks, Weapons, and Ability. Purchasing these at Wardenclyffe will help you get further.

Yuck. I dislike when games suggest we gamble throwing away outside-run resources on hoping the next single run will go well enough to make that worthwhile.

[tenser]

I agree I am always after going from 0 to hero in the long run. Like the more you play the more powerfull you are and only optionally add difficulty. Kinda like fallout 4 or dark souls 3. I actually dont even like roguelikes or roguelites as an idea, its very close to just losing a save file due to power shortage which is a nightmare for gamer. Thing is that many roguelikes and roguelites have OTHER elements that I ACCIDENTALY like and I play them EVEN THOUGH they are roguelikes/roguelites not BECAUSE I am after that genre. Similarly to pixel art which I don't like but some pixel art games are just good games EVEN THOUGH they are pixel art. [like salt&sanctuary which is best 2d souls games I know] or borderlands which is best looter shooter I know even though I don't like the graphics. Developers often mix what people WANT and what people ACCEPT.

And games definitely need to run like a charm as first priority. If someone else did that before they should just repeat same thing in a new game. If synthetik runs fine or lost castle runs fine, I expect a new game to run just as fine if not better. I never understood how game development can run back in time - like FIRST they make grim dawn and THEN they make chaosbane which runs worse and is less complex.

[Habba]

Originally posted by tenser:

I agree I am always after going from 0 to hero in the long run. Like the more you play the more powerfull you are and only optionally add difficulty. Kinda like fallout 4 or dark souls 3. I actually dont even like roguelikes or roguelites as an idea, its very close to just losing a save file due to power shortage which is a nightmare for gamer.

Roguelites and RPGs are like brothers. They are made of the same stuff but work differently. The carrying idea of roguelites is that it's fun to see where you character developed into. RPGs, more or less, are about optimizing your character the way you want. If you take an RPG, and simply add permadeath, it will be frustrating. If you take a roguelite, and never reset the character, it becomes bloated.

Roguelites allow a much more wide spectrum of character development, especially regarding penalties and negative modifiers. I wouldn't expect an average RPG player to make many characters. I'd believe most people just roll it once, and then keep playing that single character for as long as they play the game. That quite effectively negates the exploration of builds.

Originally posted by tenser:

And games definitely need to run like a charm as first priority. If someone else did that before they should just repeat same thing in a new game. If synthetik runs fine or lost castle runs fine, I expect a new game to run just as fine if not better. I never understood how game development can run back in time - like FIRST they make grim dawn and THEN they make chaosbane which runs worse and is less complex.

Grim Dawn and Chaosbane are not from the same developer...

[tenser]

My favorite roguelike so far is sword of the stars the pit - I never won once in 100 hours. I wouldn't mind it to have lower difficulty, not penalize you with less recepies when you play on easy [you are forced to play normal+] and have a save system. Maybe then I could actually finish the game. I do absolutely love the game mechanics and progression though.

As for multiple builds completely not true - I had 20+ characters in dark souls 2, played new vegas and dead space 2 7 times in a row, finished gothic 2 around 3 times within a week, same for risen 3. I play every class in every hack and slash I own, grim dawn I played all iterations of twin class system [thats 15 characters in vanilla game] so if game is good I am gonna replay it without roguelike mechanics and check every possible build. Its not bloated, its complex. [not necessarily hard though, fallout 4 can be hard or not, can have survival or not but it always stays complex]

sometimes you play once or twice [if there is bad guy/good guy thing like in mass effect or dragon age] but thats because game is dumbed down in its core - in dragon age inquisition I'd play more times cause there are more possible character builds [I'd buy that but it needs 3rd party account and I despise it]

I know they are not same developer but games set milestones - like I dracula genesis has 480+ pieces of unlockable content, you have something like 30... so its like 16 TIMES less... and its exactly same genre - top down shooter, same with synthetik which has content through the roof and runs better.

It is just simple comparison of 2 games 1 is earlier and does things better, another is newer, takes more hard drive space, has less content, runs worse and costs more.... Clients compare available options: Do I want A or B, which is better deal? Chaosbane for 60$ or Grim Dawn for 6$

[Tyrian Mollusk]

Originally posted by Habba:

I wouldn't expect an average RPG player to make many characters. I'd believe most people just roll it once, and then keep playing that single character for as long as they play the game

That comparison of roguelites to RPGs pretty solidly ignores the entire clearly-relevant Diablo-style ARPG genre, where respecing a character or making new ones just to explore builds is a core part of the experience. Really, what roguelites do is ruin the ability to explore and play with builds by forcing you to deal with whatever the game happens to allow you on a given run.

Personally, I look at roguelites as an offshoot of arcade games: and I mean actual arcades, where you'd put a quarter in, not just the style of game. A run ending is par for the course and the game's job is to be entertaining enough and have good enough game play that you'll come back and play again, hopefully with meaningful variety that old arcade games could never have handled.

I'd rather be able to just configure my characters and play how I want instead of always dealing with the per-run-drop system and "grind out the game you bought" aspect of roguelites and their meta progress, but ARPG game play has gone nowhere, whereas roguelites have at least been taking top-down shooting (and some occasional other genres) and doing some nice things.

[tenser]

Also there is wide variety of roguelikes from shooters, through card games to turn based rpg's, many of those are well put together, like monstertrain, but I am always after that progression element, like in monstertrain i want all cards and all factions and then I play for real, or in darkest dungeon I ignore progressing with bosses until I fully upgrade town. i always grind to make the game as easy as I want it to be. Similar with dark souls, before I play I first "fix" the weak character by grinding and only then I try to proceed. I don't really "need" that mechanic that deletes my progression in any circumstances.

[creighton_dragon]

all the comparisons are pointless. Another two month delay means its time to move on and find something else to play

[Habba]

Originally posted by Tyrian Mollusk:

Originally posted by Habba:

I wouldn't expect an average RPG player to make many characters. I'd believe most people just roll it once, and then keep playing that single character for as long as they play the game

That comparison of roguelites to RPGs pretty solidly ignores the entire clearly-relevant Diablo-style ARPG genre, where respecing a character or making new ones just to explore builds is a core part of the experience.

Indeed, Diablo-like games are a hybrid between RPGs and Roguelites. Especially the first Diablo was very much build like the original Rogue. At that time, procedurally generated levels were not yet a thing for non-ASCII games. After Diablo II, a new breed of RPGs spawned to imitate the success of Diablo 2. That still defines the ARPG genre even today.

Originally posted by Tyrian Mollusk:

Really, what roguelites do is ruin the ability to explore and play with builds by forcing you to deal with whatever the game happens to allow you on a given run.

Yes, they very often force you to play sub-optimal builds. The focus of gameplay is shifted from playing that build to making the decisions leading up to that build. I think the main idea of Roguelites is to make player do tough decisions involving varying levels of risks. A skilled player can manage these risks. Should the player fail, it should happen because of a risk they failed to manage, rather than merely having a bad luck at RNGfest.

Originally posted by Tyrian Mollusk:

Personally, I look at roguelites as an offshoot of arcade games: and I mean actual arcades, where you'd put a quarter in, not just the style of game. A run ending is par for the course and the game's job is to be entertaining enough and have good enough game play that you'll come back and play again, hopefully with meaningful variety that old arcade games could never have handled.

The roguelite genre is bit divided here. Arcade games provide no progression between play sesssions. Some roguelites only provide progress in sense of unlocking new content, but keeping the player power level at 0. Others will give a gradual power progression to the player, in order to keep player progressing forward, allowing the player to compensate their skills with permanent power progression. I'm a fan of the latter system, in which the player can advance even with a low skillset. However, Slay the Spire is a great example of the former system.

Originally posted by Tyrian Mollusk:

I'd rather be able to just configure my characters and play how I want instead of always dealing with the per-run-drop system and "grind out the game you bought" aspect of roguelites and their meta progress, but ARPG game play has gone nowhere, whereas roguelites have at least been taking top-down shooting (and some occasional other genres) and doing some nice things.

This is partly the reason why players can buy perks, abilities and weapons at the start of the run. It allows the player more control over their build. It is costed expensive to prevent the player doing it over and over again. I think it is in the spirit of roguelites to allow players to place 'bets' on their runs.

[CryoDrago]

What are you all babbling on about? Don’t you know how roguelikes/lites work? You’re supposed to lose all of your items and upgrades when you die. They’re punishing, yet rewarding. That’s what makes them fun! Try Risk of Rain 2. That game’s a prime example of what roguelikes are supposed to be!