Please convince me to keep playing.

[Tom]

I've played this game for about 90 minutes now. Next time I launch the game it will likely pass the 2 hours mark for Steam refund, so now I'm not sure if I want to continue.

My problems with this game are:
1. After 90 minutes, I'm still as clueless as when I started the game. I find it hard to care for the characters or the story if I am continually kept out of the loop. I know the story is going to unveil itself eventually, but it has just taken too long.

2. So far the combat has been rather dull. Defeating enemies doesn't give me any sense of achievement or satisfaction. It would be bearable if every combat moves the story forward. But so far it feels like chores.

I am not sure if I want to continue playing now. I don't want to give up this game so easily, especially seeing that it has gotten excellent reviews. But I also don't want to risk wasting money.

Please convince me if the game will get better, and if it's worth giving up my right for refund.

[Youthful Idealism]

...if you don't like the combat, and don't like any ambiguity in your story, I'd say give up.

Don't get me wrong--it's a great game. But, just because it's a great game, doesn't mean it's for everyone. Read the reviews and decide if engaging in (to you) unfun combat is worth pursuing a story that both gains clarity and ambiguity.

[tommy salami]

honestly, 70% of the reason why i loved the game was simply for the scenery and the feel of the game. i think it's one of it's most eye-catching, playable aspects and just makes it thoroughly enjoyable. the plot took me two playthroughs to completely understand, but even then it does get a lot more interesting the more you play. however, if the combat is a big factor in your book on whether or not the game will be enjoyable, you might find yourself much more frusterated then need be. i'd say give it a chance, it's a really good game. :D

[<-SHTF2-> ToBiden]

Artwork and music will only get greater. That is the part of the game which is flawless.

Combat is another story. It gets a lot more fun the more functions you unlock, but you have to be prepared to go out of your comfort zone and recombine them a lot. When you make battles a bit harder you will temporarly lose some functions and be forced to build another way. Honestly it is quite great from a theoretical standpoint. I can however see it not appealing to quite some people.

Story is very vague and stays vague. If you can't get into those kind of tales don't bother, but you can make it a bit more concrete by unlocking details on the function bios by using them as actives, buffs and passives. Every time you do this for long enough you unlock another part of three.

In conclusion I can tell you it is worth for the art and music and the combat is deeper than it seems in the beginning, although I am not sure if that will be enough if you hate it entirely. Story might appeal to you later on, but it is unlikely if you find it too vague and out of the blue (exposition is something Supergiant Games just doesn't do I guess). The game alone is worth it, though.

[Noble]

The reality is, is that if you don't like the game from what you've seen so far, then it's probably not your cup of tea.
In that case, you should probably refund it and get something that would appeal more to you rather than regret and try going into a niche that you wouldn't prefer.

[boneitis]

Your intake of this game as outlined in your #1 and #2 points is simply going to have to be approached from an entirely different angle in order for you to possibly enjoy this game.

I don't say that as an elitist or fanboy (both roles to which I nonetheless happily assume), but in the sense that I'd say Transistor's way of exposition isn't going to mesh with how you seem to be expecting to experience the game.

So, of course, the main "plot" is going to revolve around you investigating and pursuing the Camerata. However, Transistor is so much more than that.

* As said earlier, it's the colorful, cyberpunk scenery. I can actually spend minutes at a time just running around aimlessly and 'Q' flourishing, just enjoying the colors.
* It's the neat, refreshing combat system where each skill has 3 modes to operate in and have been developed for every single permutation of combined skills (so, appreciate it insofar that it has been very well fleshed out with decent pool of overall count of skills appropriate to a ~6-8 hour campaign and not overwhelmed by trying to come up with something on the order of MMO-scale complexity). And, IMO, a novel combination of real-time and turn-based.
* It's the emphasis placed on the soundtrack of the game, with optionally a harmonization melody imposed onto just about every track in the game by the main character's hum, due to her being a singer but having partially lost her voice and can not talk (and I'd say cut the developers some slack and enjoy the exposition, there are way too many pointless discussions of people trying to dissect "she lost her voice... how come she can still hum and grunt?" kind of stuff). Like with the scenery, I can spend a minute here and there toggling the humming. It's also neat to be able to indirectly interact with other player ghosts with the running around and humming.
* Despite being an unfortunately short game, it's the amount of atmosphere and lore they still obviously spent an appreciable amount of effort to construct as shown by the optional OVC terminals and 3x lore unlocks for each of your skills that don't get in the way of players just wanting to play the game (I'm one of those people that loved the Datalogs in FF13-1).

Your approach in point #2 is going to have to be adjusted. You're not pitted in specific battles due to an immediate task to be completed or obstacle in your way. A large aspect of the battle encounters serves to be a revelation of the evolution of some entity referred to as the "Process" (and its ties with the Camerata), which is a game-long exposition and process, since it/they is/are as mysterious to the Camerata utilizing it/them as it/they is/are to the player during the playthrough. The best, not-so-similar comparison I can come up with right now is, perhaps think Star Trek Borg? /shrug. (IMO not really a spoiler, especially for someone looking for a reason to stick with the game.)

Anyway, if you can switch gears a bit, you might be able to have some more fun with the game. Or, you can refund it, no hard feelings! Heck, you might even consider trying out Bastion and even in the future rebuying Transistor. They both regularly go on sale for dirt cheap, anyway.

[Mr.Hamborgur]

late game with all the skills unlocked means it'll give you greater ways to mix how you want the battles to work out. For me what stood out of this game was the setting/characters/lore and figuring out just what was happening to this world. If combat is the only thing that you look to for most games then it might be worth a pass.

I would highly suggest looking up a clip of gameplay late game (ideally spoiler free) to get a sense of how you can match and play with upgrades. With limiters it makes battles much more frantic as you might be in a rush to kill spawn cells before they double up and or respawn again.

It's a very methodical tactical game.

otherwise another option is to pick this game up at a later time when it's cheaper.

[Tom]

Thank you guys for the reply! I didn't expect to get such friendly respond, and for that alone I'm willing to try out this game more. It must have done something beautiful to attract such a friendly community.

I guess I did start the game with a wrong mindset. To pursue a completely spoiler-free experience, I deliberately avoided any information about the game before I started it. So I didn't know what kind of game I was getting into. The opening kind of aroused my curiosity, so I spent the rest of the time expecting to know more about the story, missing other goodies the game has to offer.

I'll probably start the game over and try to play it in a different mindset. Again, thank you guys for the kind replies.

[boneitis]

Sure thing!

But yeah, I'm a crotchety old man who kind of hates AAA titles these days and even thinks the indie games are kind of saturating the market. Transistor was such a breath of fresh air to me, particularly alongside all the stuff that comes out lately. That's mainly where I come from in my love for this game.

Of course, Transistor can't possibly be everybody's cup of tea. I wish you the best as you press on~~

[Unrealbr]

Keep playing, the game is amazing!!!!!

[Blackadar]

Originally posted by Tomwelcome:

I've played this game for about 90 minutes now. Next time I launch the game it will likely pass the 2 hours mark for Steam refund, so now I'm not sure if I want to continue.

My problems with this game are:
1. After 90 minutes, I'm still as clueless as when I started the game. I find it hard to care for the characters or the story if I am continually kept out of the loop. I know the story is going to unveil itself eventually, but it has just taken too long.

2. So far the combat has been rather dull. Defeating enemies doesn't give me any sense of achievement or satisfaction. It would be bearable if every combat moves the story forward. But so far it feels like chores.

I am not sure if I want to continue playing now. I don't want to give up this game so easily, especially seeing that it has gotten excellent reviews. But I also don't want to risk wasting money.

Please convince me if the game will get better, and if it's worth giving up my right for refund.

I feel the exact same way as the OP.

I like the visual aesthetic but for heaven's sake I have NO idea whatsoever what is going on and I'm getting to the point of being past caring. All I know is my name is Red. Yeah, an hour in and I know my name. This isn't progress.

I'm finding combat to be both dull and occasionally difficult. I don't really understand it, the additional functions seem to do nothing (or I have no idea how to activate them - for example, I added bounce to something but it doesn't do anything different than it did before) and it seems far more a nuisance. I'm almost tempted to just use an invulnerability cheat but I don't think the game has anything else to offer if the combat doesn't resonate with me.

It's far too late to ask for a refund (bought this in a different sale period) but I'm simply not getting the love. I feel like I'm playing a clunkier, crappier version of Bastion. I'm not going to go study YouTube videos for a 5 hour game either, so I'm hoping someone here has some very quick suggestions. Otherwise, this is relegated to the scrap heap.

[boneitis]

I would refer you to my first post in the thread addressing many of the OP's points. However, if you find the combat dull and can't interface with their chosen methods of exposition, it may well not be ultimately enjoyable for you.

For quick suggestions, I'd say to solicit EZ-win function setups and battling tactics from other players, although this might more or less cut the combat system as something to find charming about the game. I can't quite help you here, since my first playthrough was such a long time ago, and I'm currently doing lore unlocks where I'm often having to redo builds from scratch.

You can inspect move effects by inspecting the base, Active function and seeing how it will be modified in the Upgrades section with each function added to it. The only thing I find overly clunky about this game is the user interface, which could have used a lot more polish. I'll concede that it's an absolute chore to set up your skills and tinker with your setup (especially during a lore unlock playthrough, which I am finally almost done with), but once you're good to go, gameplay is pretty snappy, I'd argue.

This might seem like a stretch, but I would compare the presentation of Transistor to that of Half-Life 2 (one of the greatest games ever made, IMO) in a certain aspect. Of course, in contrast, HL2 does a really good job of placing you into very tangible situations where you can very well see what you need to do in order to advance the plot. However, it's pretty difficult to really see the bigger picture of everything going on without reading stuff on wiki pages, especially with a single playthrough. I only really got a grasp of all the HL lore and atmosphere from reading along with the wikia chapter summaries as I played every few chapters and reading the HL2 coffee table book. Similarly, some postgame wiki reading has helped me gain a more comprehensive feel for the world of Transistor. Anyway, the HL2 coffee table book is a really neat read; it describes how a lot of their design decisions were meant to induce particular emotional and psychological effects on the player that were eerily spot-on for my playthrough (and some of which I didn't realize until reading about them).

Perhaps it's in this aspect of HL2 of taking in everything about the world through your senses as if you yourself are the main character that I think Transistor resonated with me so much. Dare I say, there's a bit of a parallel of how Gordon Freeman has zero dialogue in the games with how Red has her voice taken and has become mute; the exposition approach likely to result from such parameters lends itself to an incredible potential of "passive" lore/atmosphere impartation but with a unique type of immersion that differs from other voiceless-main-character RPGs like Skyrim that place a lot of emphasis on nonlinearity and the player's ability to project a personality onto the character. This is where a large amount of my appreciation for Transistor comes from.