Bellwright 230 hours in...A review

[Quasidivine]

Bell Wright Evaluation, Review and Critique
This is a review of the game Bell Wright.

I will do my best to put into words, my playing experience in the 230 Hours I have put into the game. This my first game of this genre so some aspects were new to me. From this stand point I will try to give a kind of brief look at what stood out the most, and end with a few suggestions.

PROS
The game is pretty, they did a great job with sunrise and has a very natural feel to it. I feel they captured a medieval feel very well. The music is good for background music and at times strangely dark for no reason. The motion of the character is a bit stiff unless he is attacking.

Falling is not the end with this game, a feature I prefer to other games and their fall 3 ft and die approach. You also do not die of hunger or cold, merely get weaker. In fact eating food helps you maintain high HP and Stamina…an interesting approach. You also do not need sleep. I liked the animal behaviour and was happy when I finally landed a head shot on my first deer.

Combat with the bow was nearly perfect. I liked the two button set up and felt the weapon gave me a fighting chance over all. The shield too, seemed to work in an understandable and realistic manner. The game makes it clear why you will not be meleeing several opponents at once as a single player, at least not under normal circumstances. The game quickly becomes not only survival but managing your resources as well. At first when I started playing I felt things were balanced heavily in the enemies favour. Once I discovered armour smithing, the odds became more even and I realised that the damages made sense, especially if compared to real life. An arrow to the head is never pleasant.


Labourers in a small settlement work well, which honestly surprised me. They typically do their jobs as I ordered. The tiered building system spreads progress out considerably, so you can see your settlement grow over time. For the most part the interface was intuitive and easy to use, with a few exceptions.

CONS

Combat was tricky if not impossible to master due to swinging a weapon and it’s random like feel. Often I could not move my mouse at all and get different results each time. While the mouse system works well for shields, it does NOT work well for the weapons. Instead it should be which direction you are walking in. Your minions also seem ill equipped to fight. I myself stood and watched as my armoured peasant with the Lord’s sword in hand, fell to a measly wolf.
As a result of their incompetence in battle, I ended up becoming John Rambo, and solo killing all foes in my war path as few could survive my bow and counter fort strategies.
The bow, turned out to be the superior weapon but it to suffered from a few flaws, such as, being near a wall or NPC blocks the players view….Big no no in the heat of battle. Being to close to a wall when drawing prevents drawing for the player, but not the enemy. Also shooting a target from far away makes the dmg numbers impossible to read. More notable hit and miss graphics and sounds would also be better for the bow. Critical hits should also have their own effect on the enemy. More so than now.

I noted that enemies also had super natural abilities like walking through bodies of water on the bottom of a lake or river. They could also teleport through walls if given enough time. Especially at the Lords castle. Enemies could also turn on turbo mode while in full plate armour and presented what seemed to be endless stamina supply, something as a player I did not share. The enemy also seems to garner more damage from head shotting me, than I do head shotting them.

The interface did have a few shortcomings in regards to not only the search but the lack of a scroll option. My main camp consisted of at least 50 buildings and scrolling through them was done solely with a mouse…. A rather tedious process. The search option was terribly awkward and all but unusable. I would prefer to type out the item and have the item show up instead of the strange filtering system that exists now. Messages over night also go by too quickly to read.

I also feel there was a bit lacking when it came to managing the workers and buildings. A specific to your target building or peasant menu should be made available. For example with buildings being constructed there seemed no way to readily decide which settlement it was part of, on the building itself, until it was completed which made errors in this regard all the worse because workers would not help build them. It also feel it is strange you can give a worker an order from the menu, from a distance, but you can not feed them. If you can talk to them from a distance why restrict the feeding?

Workers also had a tendency to wander off, go collect something from across the map while dropping loot due to weakness or what have you. Why would other labourers not pick up the dropped loot? All in all dropping items was a strange mechanic and should be left out in future versions. Additionally as my settlement grew my workers seemed less and less interested in building. I would really appreciate an option on the workers themselves where I can click on a work station assign a worker and they would go do that job.


Buildings and building locations were an exercise in frustration as seemingly invisible objects blocked me from building in a majority of locations. Building freedom is a must in future versions. I would unlock these big impressive buildings and have no where I to build them on. Also a lack of foundations, prevents the opportunity to build on non even ground, something all the other towns seem to do with relative ease. If it were up to me, there would be no building limits at all except maybe a distance from towns limit, and even then the existing one should be shortened for things like signposts or fences.
Also the rocks…called platforms…should be something I can build on. Plenty of fort opportunities were wasted on this no build area. Also I think smaller objects such as standing torches should be movable.



Suggestions and Requests


Time. This game is wonderful at wasting time, often in ways that seem overly needless. For example when crafting a house the hammer animation hits nine time each. Instead, as a character gets better with his skill, the number of times to hammer should lesson by the skill amount he has. Also skills seem to play no real part in the ability of the NPC to do their job. Harvesting doesn’t seem to be greater, or at least not by a truly notable amount. Using the method above, wood cutting, shovelling and other time consuming tasks should be lessened with more skill.

Seasons. I believe there should be more time before the first winter. Let the player become more used to how to do things. Also with winter food spoilage should slow down with the coming of snow. Winter should be longer.

Settings. I believe there should be a setting for hunger, time flow and seasons.

Labourers and Apprentices. Again with more skill should come title. Instead of only using freeing villages to acquire skilled labour, an NPC should also be able to become an apprentice by you giving them books to learn from. Merchants run around at times and are difficult to pin down. Elders should be at the village icon on the map to make them easy to find. Why do injured characters still walk around and not lay in bed? Option to…stay near base to prevent wandering off and injuries.



Loot. It is pretty hard to justify killing 4 guys in full plate armour and having none of it show up as loot. It’s really quite silly actually. If you want to keep it balanced, just have it only wearable by your villagers. Also bandits who shoot you with arrows should drop the arrows and bows they use. A take all option would be great too.


All buildings and structures should have HP so the enemy can attack them as well. It would also present a repair option in addition.

Movement. Why no swimming? Movement speed reductions due to armour should only take effect in battle. The map is simply too big to walk around in full plate armour, or to cheese it by unequipping armour all the time. Why have stables if there are no horses?
We need a stealth option, especially when detection can mean your doom.

The story is sorta ho hum. Due to the length of time it takes to build your self up, I will be 90 years older by the time I get an army. The story, like much of the game is very slow paced. I have freed all the villages, taken out the lord and his crew and no story ending showed up. I am assuming that is because this is early release.


Summery. I loved the game and for what I paid, I certainly got my money’s worth. I sincerely hope they make mods a part of the game as the fan base will no doubt, not disappoint, only adding to the games popularity. Slower paced than any other game I have played but relaxing too in a way. Even in it’s current state the game was a good purchase. I rate it a solid 7/10 Stars

[Misper]

There's some good feedback here I'll bring up to the devs

[tamu1997]

some fair critiques, but also quite abit you seemed to have not picked up on as a player in regards to:
combat (melee) - find their dev blog on it. melee is about timing and you can easliy take on multiple at once without any cheese/hacks
time - harvesting skill gives higher chance for gathering extra resources
assigning building being built to outpost - you can do this, not sure where your issue is
loot - been addressed and it negates crafting
movement - already addressed for future(some nearer than others :) )

[Quasidivine]

Tamu,please keep in mind, this is my first time as a player going through the game. I did not choose to, go to the devs page, because this feed back is about my first take on the game. From the beginning, I took notes, 75% of which I left out of this review as I eventually caught on. This means I played the game , as is, no homework and just saw how it was. As mentioned before, combat was random, not ill timed. without moving my mouse I can swing 2-3 different ways depending on how the computer felt like swinging. I wanted a , WADS , input for weapon, and use the current direction system for shield. This way, my attacks are precise! Once I was in full plat armour, multiple people fighting became quite reasonable, however, as a newbie with nothing but a club and a crappy wooden shield the task was nigh impossible. As mentioned harvesting skills did not give that notable of an increase, which is why I suggested less hits when cutting wood, or less swings on construction, etc. It would save time, speed up game play and really make those books useful. Again you may have misread my earlier statement. Yes you can assign a building, but the building itself does not have an ability to be assigned while being constructed. For example that white build icon that lets you put the materials in a pile, could have an option there to assign which village should be building it. Loot on enemies , would not negate crafting. Even if it was one piece at a time, it would make it something worth gunning for when out hunting bandits. A pair of boots here, a half dozen arrows there, and of course a piece of plate on the really tuff guys. Crafting alone is time consuming, which is one of my major complaints. Yeah I can micro manage, or do it myself, but lets face it, there is only soo much entertainment value in watching my character smith a piece of plate..... As far as movement, again, no forums, no dev pages, just my initial impression of the game. Lastly, is there an official ending to the game, or do I free all the towns, kill the lord and his cronies and well, annnnnd that's it? For now of course =)

[tamu1997]

I didn't look at anything outside the game prior to my first playthrough either, which is why I said you are missing some things as a player. You could/should have figured out how to melee with a simple club against 2-3 of the first bandits you came across. Your attacks and blocks will always follow the direction you choose if you are doing it correctly. If you, now after playing, read their dev blog about combat with the gameplay examples, you'll see what you were doing wrong. Did you figure out the riposte system?

You should be able to intuit that if you can loot gear, you don't need to make it. Crafting is something you set up your villagers to do not take your time doing. Its kind of the main mechanic of why you have a village in the first place. Of course there will be things you might want to knock out yourself real quick, but the late game items that take awhile to produce are for your crafters.

I'm not knocking your post all, some good stuff. But you just missed some things.

[macbraveheart68]

Allow me to retort.
just my 2 cents. after several hundred hours myself.

skill and tool upgrades should lower build times but your really not supposed to be building by the time it matters. still taking 8 hits to chop a log with a fine axe seems a bit silly when you could do that with stone of bronze. each tier should lower the actions

melee is something you have to commit to, and better yourself. I hate bows for anything but hunting. the most important thing is to make sure you don't build armor or weapons too uneven. the enemy is able to use as you unlock up to a certain level. so a super sword or hammer against cloth armor can be painful. works the other way also.

if there was swimming. then they would be able to swim also. which makes the map and the bridges a rather useless feature. would massively impact defensive strategy everyone would just b line to the destination. even just animals swimming would allow them an escape or possibility to die in an area you can't reach. this would really suck in the case of boars.

the seasons at present really only matter for the first couple years, unless other things are implemented there really isn't any point. if that changes then 100% agree. that is the first challenge. make it trough winter without losing too much health and stamina to fight.

the loot system is just the way it is. now as you progress to building those higher armors maybe they could become part of the drop. but perhalp wearing a dead guys armor is something your people have a fearor superstition of. think of all the battle sites around the world. weapons and armor are still there. you'd think if nothing else they would have gathered all that stuff and melted it down .also if you cant't craft an Armour you can't repair it. I think from what i've seen armor will eventually have points hopefully used items will be allowed to be re worked giving resources

there is an indirect stealth option. if they can't see you they don't attack I did this when I found my first couple iron nodes they were well Guarded I'd sneak up position myself and mine lucky that sound doesn't seem to travel. load up and run like hell. you can use the trees and rocks to hide.

buildings do get damaged if the Raids are successful. abandon some used up camps and you will see they take damage.

lastly spoilage isn't a problem. you are just making/ harvesting to many things consistently feed yourself and your people the best you can offer. 3 solid meals gives you a full day of feed troops. this is extreamly important on long marches. limit the variety available and they will march a long time and you can throw togeter a outpost dump food and have them resupply if they run out. at present I think they can be consuming 3 items and take 7 more with them thats 3 + days march

[Quasidivine]

Tamu"You could/should have figured out how to melee with a simple club against 2-3 of the first bandits you came across. Your attacks and blocks will always follow the direction you choose if you are doing it correctly."...Again I would not have commented on it, if i did not find a flaw with it. The shield direction combat worked well, but the sword did not. Nor the club. I could not count on the direction of my mouse when I needed it. I have had plenty of practice and it has been a consistent problem through out. Oh and the 1st 2-3 bandits killed me. As far as gear goes, no, it makes 0 sense to see a guy in full plate armour NOT drop a single piece when I defeat him...none what so ever. That stated a nice work around would simply be to have a Loot Skill, which would be a nice half way between both of our positions. If by riposte you mean block and counter, I had a pretty good grasp on that but again direction was an issue.:::::::Braveheart, in regards to swimming, if you read my original post you will note that enemies and even animals go under the water anyway. I especially noted this when I blocked off bridges, and they came from behind to kill me. Also if skills don't improve until the part of the game you no longer need them, then what is the point in being able to improve them at all? Your point seems a bit...off? Plus you can buy books so that the skills become higher tier more quickly than through use alone. I currently have 68 signs , it gives you an idea how big my settlement is. I'd give you a total population, but I have as of yet to see it recorded anywhere. As far as things degrading, no, I have not noticed it at any of my camps. That being the case, with dozens if not hundreds of people, food gathering/spoilage is certainly a major consideration. At one point I have had over 3000 spoiled food!!!. Your take on armour as loot is wildly off with exception of perhaps being able to melt broken pieces down. Or maybe trade? Armour can be repaired by people who can not make the armour itself. If you have ever personally hammered the dents out of your own helmet, you would know what I am talking about....something I have actually done. Balance does not make sense when going for reality. Either a target has armour , which in turn, upon defeating him you can take, or he is not wearing the armour and therefore you can not take what he does not have. Shooting for realism in construction and then failing on looting does not make a lot of sense at all. To the appearance of even seeming....pointless? This is why I suggested alternatives, such as parts of armour, a handful of arrows or even scrap that can be traded... As far as weapon and armour development I used counter forts to supersede my inability to have good gear, a strategy which won me the day to great effect, allowing much of my food provisions for my settlement. Also, for some reason I have asked multiple times now, does this game have an actual ending???? Did I miss a quest of not deliver the papers to prove I killed him to a person who has of yet to ask me for them?

[Yria]

ever heard the word paragraph quasi ?

[RePence]

I recommend turning off Smooth Blocking in settings to make melee more manageable. It makes it so you block when and where you click rather than just from moving the mouse.

The workers wander off if they're hungry, looking for something to eat.

For the most part it just needs more streamlined progression and interface right now.

Interface-wise, making deliveries and such would be more convenient if all settlements were displayed in one list, rather than having to go through them tab by tab.

Would also be nice if the backpack and log sling were available earlier to make it less of a slog going back and forth for items.

[Quasidivine]

Yria, Yes I have. Have you ever heard of the word troll?