Not as good as the first...

[Macdallan]

I don't like the inventory system in this one. The first one did it better. How can you go from something decent to something worse?

I also don't like the move/action points very much. I never like games that let you move, or act, but not both. Arcanum did it right, movement points separate from action points. You can have a slow fighter that might be so good at combat that he gets in 3 or 4 swings but can't move quickly, or a fast character that can only take one or two attacks in a round even with a fast weapon because they're clumsy, or just not that good at fighting. This game makes you move, or attack, and if you have to get close to fight all you can do is move or wait. It's bad.

I find I'm really annoyed that you can tilt the camera a little but whenever the enemy acts it pulls the camera back to overhead. Why wouldn't you leave it where I put it? I wanted it there for a reason.

Saving after every turn, fine, but don't tell me about it and don't toss crap up on my screen. Just silently save in the background and let me keep playing. I feel like gameplay is slowed down because of it.

The screens are too bright. The white background does not look good. Again, the first game had better aesthetics. The characters just don't look good. I'm sure they could be re-designed to be better. There's a lot of detail, but their bodies and faces just look... well poorly done. The combat interface also looks like it was hastily designed and I really don't like it very much. So far none of the characters are interesting. They all do basic attacks from range or close up, and there is little beyond how they look to say that one is any different from the next even though their stats differ.

Towns are... boring. The interface is lacking, not interesting at all. Shopping is annoying and poorly designed. The icons are tiny for the items, why? You have a HUGE screen area you could put them in. You should have some way, other than the cryptic abbreviations, to see what items work for what characters. Let me select who is buying and put a red tinge on items they can't use. Make it easy to tell what items work well for which characters.

Full plate has no protection against crushing damage and adds +2 ap to all weapon actions? Um... no. Full Plate protects well from crush and slash damage, and less well from piercing damage if the piercing damage has enough oomph to punch through it. It should not have ZERO damage reduction to any damage type, but arguably less against crushing than anything else.

You can't seem to shoot over things that are low enough to shoot over... you can't even try with a penalty to the shot.

The pin on the map instead of a group of characters. Feels lazy. Add figurines or something interesting, please.

Ridiculous ambushes. One room dungeons and still get ambushed by multiple enemies multiple times. Where are they coming from???? Nowhere. They should have to walk in from the only entrance, or unexplored areas only. They should not just appear. Yeah, maybe one sneaky thief but not 3 or 4 fully armoured beastmen stomping around. Ambush frequency is crazy, I had one dungeon where I got no less than 10 ambushes, and 6 or 7 were right at the end when I had one character left standing. I don't mind a few ambushes but when you're down to one character it gets tedious.

Now because of those ambushes I also noticed that ranged combat, partially due to the lack of "pin" mechanics like the last game had are way, way too good. You can walk away for a round or two, then shoot and repeat that all day. My single, wounded, archer survived all the ambushes I just mentioned and won the map. Felt good to pull through, but also felt cheesy because I knew I could handle 4 or 5 more similar ambushes with only a small chance of failure.

On that note, some of the random encounters are just plain lame. I came across an altar with a dagger on it. I had no choices other than reach for the dagger on the altar, or leave the dagger. Really? No other options? How about cutting a tree branch and brushing the dagger off with that? Using another weapon to knock it off the altar? Shooting it with an arrow (tricky, but you get the point)? Using a cloak and two people holding either end of the cloak run the cloak along the top of the altar and knock the dagger off? How about simply being able to check it for traps, or toss a rock at it to see what happens? Nope... just two options, one boring (leave) and the other likely to result in failure and negative consequences. Spikes shoot up and impale your arm if you fail. Um... can't we see the holes the spiked come from?
Wouldn't plate armour or bracers give you a chance to avoid an injury? Nope. Zero imagination went into these, and two options seem like far too few. I don't expect 10, but only two? A coin flip? In this day and age we can do better than this.

Abilities, equipment, etc. are all in the same four slots. Yes, you're limited to four slots early on. You get more randomly through level up. Yes, you gain equipment slots by gaining a level. Makes no sense to me, but whatever. Anyway, you want to wear armour, helmet, shield, sword? Okay fine - but that's it. You can't carry a bow and a healing potion as well. I didn't like the 4 of each tier limitation of the first game either, but at least you could have some variety. At least some items have multiple uses, and can be re-used after a fight. For example healing potions can be used 3 times, and on the character carrying it or someone else, before running out. When the battle's over it's magically re-filled. Saves some micro-management which is good considering how much I dislike the GUI for inventory.

Injuries don't heal over time. They can't be healed by any character. You can't go to a temple or find a healer or priest to fix them, or make them go away faster. There are no items that can remove them that I've seen so far. The only two ways I know of are to find a random encounter that happens to fix an injury, or to level up which, as noted above, is a really, really silly reason to suddenly be completely healed. As if something like melee training for a day or two is going to suddenly make that broken hand all better instead of worse. I think they should add healing if a character sits out a quest or two, if you pay at a market or training ground to have it healed since there's likely SOMEONE who can heal at one of these two locations, and this world DOES have magic, after all so there ought to be some kind of healers that can do this, or at least make your injury heal a little faster, or if you find magical means to heal the injury. The first game handled this fairly easily as I recall, you had to sit out a fight. Don't sit out? You don't heal. Simple, and forced you to use another character, or one with an injury.

Crashes. Lock up crashes happen while on the map. The MAP.... when you're doing nothing....

Weapons that have multiple attacks? Um... really walking away from the mechanics of the first game. Also some weapons seem really overpowered early on. I found the flame hammer and got a -1 ap per swing skill on a character who also has +2 str if he moves before he swings.
Um... he's OP as heck already often taking tough enemies out in one attack action because he takes TWO swings. And sets 'em on fire. And sets the TILE on fire somehow....

Also seen some huge crits, 70+ damage. I thought I saw one for 279, and that was in one of the first fights. That's crazy at level 1 or 2. Nothing's got that kind of health in the early game. In the above single character scenario it was crits that killed off all three of my characters. They seem practically invulnerable unless they get hit with a critical, but a crit can put down even the toughest of my entourage in one shot. Seems a bit out of balance when two heavily armoured, shield toting warriors get mowed down by a couple of rats that get a lucky crit.

Also, what's up with the requirement to stand on certain spots to end a level? Just end it once I kill everything, please. Taking 2 or 3 turns to wander to the marked spots is silly and a waste of time. Again, another thing the first game got right and for some inexplicable reason this one didn't.

And, to end off, the AI is pathetic. Some of them just stand there while you repeatedly shoot them or blast them with magic. They don't run, they don't attack... they just do nothing. Now I get it when it's a zombie, maybe once in a while they'd just stand there, but not other enemies, even the little nurgle critters that stand around in groups of four... they're dumb, but not that dumb.

Fix these issues and this would be an easy 8/10, right now I struggle to give it anything over a 5. Honestly the more I play the less I like this game compared to the first. I know that the first one isn't perfect, but this one should be better, not worse.

[BigRowdy]

I agree completely. This is another money grab developer. They have never responded to a single post.

[Macdallan]

Odd thing is, BigRowdy, I still don't hate it despite all the flaws.

[Rabid Urko]

Totally different publisher and developer to the first.

[Macdallan]

Originally posted by Rabid Urko:

Totally different publisher and developer to the first.

Yeah, it doesn't feel the same so that's no surprise, but you'd think they'd check out the original and build on what worked instead of changing so much about it that it almost feels like a different, inferior, game. Kind of like the Borderlands pre-sequel not really grabbing people as much as the 1st and 2nd games did. (Fingers crossed for #3....)

[BigRowdy]

Originally posted by Macdallan:

Odd thing is, BigRowdy, I still don't hate it despite all the flaws.

Me either. lol. But I tink it is because I am a random experience junkie. I kinda hate story driven games....

[BigRowdy]

Originally posted by Rabid Urko:

Totally different publisher and developer to the first.

Completely aware of that. The responses and discussions on this page are hoping that the devs take notice.