What is this?

[Osmium]

I accidentally left my Humble choice subscription running for a few months longer than planned so I ended up with this game. The art seemed cool, so I installed it. I played for half an hour and I'm not enthusiastic about coming back.

The tutorial was pretty, but the dialogue and story is pretty bad. I got to the part where you get overwhelmed by creatures and die. I got speared through the heart with a tentacle thicker than my thigh. It was similar to how the android Bishop gets taken out by the queen alien in Aliens. I thought "Well that's weird. Why did I go through the character creator if they're gonna kill me off?" Then a guy walks up, holds a red orb next to me, and I'm good as new.

Look, I'm willing to accept that I was healed by magic, but what happened to the foot wide hole in my chest? The armor looks exactly the same. Why dramatically impale me through the heart, handwave the injury like it was a papercut, and then forget to redraw the armor with a hole in it? I didn't make them stab me in the heart, the game writers decided to do that in a cutscene and then ignore all continuity. They could have incapacitated me any number of ways for story reasons, but chose the one that would 1) instantly kill me, and 2) leave a permanent mark on my body / armor.

I got to the settlement and talked to the person introduced as "the old white guy" before turning it off. Is the quality of the rest of the game like this? The gameplay so far is a 4 out of 10. Writing is a 1.5 out of 10. Graphics are maybe an 8.

[GATO SWING BATA-BATA]

Give it a bit more. You may, or may not maintain that opinion. Over 2300 hrs. and I still can't get enough, but that's me. The character load out builds are fun, gameply great, but again, that's my bias talking.

[LT2483]

The "main" story is awful and cringe inducing, but takes a backseat once you hit the first world, thankfully. Worlds have their own stories/lore, which is far better.

As for gameplay, you haven't experienced it yet. Again, until you hit the first world, you're in the tutorial. I would say it's very good, but I get if people don't like it.

So yeah, you can probably already guess my recommendation - get to the first world, play it for a bit longer, see how that feels. If you still don't like it after that, then fair, just drop the game and move on. But R2 absolutely starts out with the worse the game has to offer, so you may still like it if you get past the intro.

[Osmium]

Thanks for the replies. I figured most of the people here would be those who liked the game and would have some reasoning for continuing to play it. "Cringe" is a good descriptor for the experience so far. The story was clearly written by a lesbian her freshman year in high school. There have been three women (including my own character) who clutch an injury, drop to their knees, and moan in agony before yelling "What do you mean?! I'm perfectly fine, leave me alone!" in the first half hour.

Geez ladies, I get it, you're all strong independent women who don't need anyone else, especially a man. No need to exaggerate your pain to bait sympathy so you can either snap at your companions for not minding their own business or for being uncaring monsters if they ignore you. Making one character like that is cliched and amateurish, but literally every single female so far? Someone lost a bet. There's no other explanation.

I'm normally the type of person to speak to every single person in a settlement or city to soak up the atmosphere, but I ended up quitting when I realized I had to talk to more of these 1 dimensional cardboard cutouts to find out where to go. Wait no, even cardboard is 2d. These characters are loose pieces of thread. I'll give it another shot and try to get out of the tutorial and into the real game.

[Hermit Wizard]

It's a video game.If you want reality go outside.

[Osmium]

Originally posted by Hermit Wizard:

It's a video game.If you want reality go outside.

I want it to be internally consistent with good worldbuilding, smartass. In fact, I prefer fantasy stories with magic and futuristic technology, but they need to make sense within the rules of the setting. If the rules are arbitrarily enforced or obvious consequences aren't considered, then it's just lazy writing by someone who wanted to create a picture or scene without knowing how to get there.

[Sigmar]

your characters..... "friend" .... is the only DEI hire clown show but becomes a merchant and has some decent stuff to buy as you progress through the game, the red orb is a dragon heart and anyone who uses them more or less becomes immortal/able to get back up from being dead. the other girl is a powerful psychic, on par with haruhi suzumia in terms of potential power, you meet in the first game.... and your MC is the mary sue/marty stu power fantasy that can become as busted as you feel like making them
oh, and "old white guy" is at least a couple hundred years old, possibly thousands.... hes been around since before the world ended and time gets a little screwy when you hop between worlds long enough

[Mazzle Dazzle]

Originally posted by Osmium:

I accidentally left my Humble choice subscription running for a few months longer than planned so I ended up with this game. The art seemed cool, so I installed it. I played for half an hour and I'm not enthusiastic about coming back.

The tutorial was pretty, but the dialogue and story is pretty bad. I got to the part where you get overwhelmed by creatures and die. I got speared through the heart with a tentacle thicker than my thigh. It was similar to how the android Bishop gets taken out by the queen alien in Aliens. I thought "Well that's weird. Why did I go through the character creator if they're gonna kill me off?" Then a guy walks up, holds a red orb next to me, and I'm good as new.

Look, I'm willing to accept that I was healed by magic, but what happened to the foot wide hole in my chest? The armor looks exactly the same. Why dramatically impale me through the heart, handwave the injury like it was a papercut, and then forget to redraw the armor with a hole in it? I didn't make them stab me in the heart, the game writers decided to do that in a cutscene and then ignore all continuity. They could have incapacitated me any number of ways for story reasons, but chose the one that would 1) instantly kill me, and 2) leave a permanent mark on my body / armor.

I got to the settlement and talked to the person introduced as "the old white guy" before turning it off. Is the quality of the rest of the game like this? The gameplay so far is a 4 out of 10. Writing is a 1.5 out of 10. Graphics are maybe an 8.

The beginning is super weak. When you travel to your first realm the lore is actually really cool pretty much universally. Its kind of a multiversal story so its kind of has its own rules for each universe. Also the characters through the interactions with the crystals basically become immortal like all of these games that borrow the soulslike formula that are consistent with the healing items and what not. The gameplay also kinda sucks until you get 2 archetypes, and 4 rings and an amulet. This game is all about builds and tweaking things to play 100% the way you want to play. And then you crank the difficulty up as you go to make it as challenging as you can take it. There are a ton of very unique mechanics and puzzles throughout the game that give you something to engage with at all times and it keeps each run fresh for probably a few hundred hours. I definitely recommend you stick with it and maybe get some dlcs and unlock some other archetypes.