@BelgarathMTH it's different than choosing the evil path in Baldurs Gate. You still can be righteous and fair to your subjects (or soon to be.. ). There are several paths you can follow, some are more evil than others.
@BelgarathMTH To the discerning eye, Chris Avellone's very creative initial concepts are still apparent throughout the game, despite many of them being brutally mutilated by the confines of Obsidian's later, suboptimal design choices. The really awkward claim that Tyranny's universe is one in which evil won is but one example of appalling incompetence carelessness, coming from either Obsidian or Paradox. At the point the player enters the game, nobody can say they won just yet in Tyranny, nor is either side explicitly 'evil' in the traditional sense of the word. The realms are at war; Kyros' empire is driven by 'good' intentions, and so are the rebellious Tiers. It is for you to determine whether you agree with either side, or call their shit, turn your back on both and strike it out on your own, so as to realize your own ideals of 'good'. As a Fatebinder, the protagonist is initially a free-roaming slave, a soldier subject to Tunon's will; until they ascend to power themselves and become his equal, they are bound to play by his rules. This doesn't mean they have to be consistent in their judgements or can't stretch the rules far and wide to suit their personal ideals. What, if at all, you chose to define as good and evil, or lawful and lawless is generally up to you in Tyranny. The game does not force you to perceive its universe as a bipolar struggle of infallibly good fairies and indisputably vile witches. One is free to interpret the world as they please: whether you want to play an animal fetishist activist favouring the well-being of Beastmen, a ruthless executioner following laws to the letter, a lenient judge who is as merciful as legally allowed, a rebel fighting for the Tiers' freedom or an outcast trying to shape the realm to their liking is your choice. Unbearably, choices hardly ever make any difference (with a few notable exceptions), which is the way Obsidian does things, but despite its many shortfall the game is still worth playing through. I compared it to @David_Gaider's awesome Dragon Age: Origins, which is to be seen as a recommendation. I'd say that Tyranny feels a lot like a non-D&D Planescape: Torment that was drafted by Chris Avellone, but finished by his interns rather than the man himself. Which, actually, happens to be quite an accurate description of the game's production process
disclaimer: i techically shouldn't be doing this because i finished the game only once and it's one of those multiple ending games but i believe that any game should be as good as possible on the first playthrough and i'd rate it just on that first playthrough anyway. there may be strong language. the review is subjective which isn't reflected in every phrase (you can append "i felt that / for me / i think" everywhere)
*** WRITING *** points: 4/30
overall writing style is bearable because there's an overall aura of competence and also some classic crpg lightness (for example, the positively dumb-sounding names, ranging from bleden mark across kills-in-shadow to dangling participle); but, overall, with regard to content as opposed to form writing is unsatisfactory
most importantly, and i absolutely pin this to writing: the dark setting is somehow not dark enough. it's not sadistic enough, not dirty at all. i got this experience of "clean evil". something evil is happening but it doesn't penetrate my decode-obvious-statement part of the brain. obsidian is not making old-school video game morbidness great again...not winning in the tears, grit & viscera department. does your gut react to the depravity of archons, to the inhumanity of the magic of edicts? do you sense the pervading tyrannisation? are you suffering it yourself, being indentured to an overbearing non-binary asshole, or are you getting high on evil as you plot to become the next overlord? i didn't get ANYTHING. so flat. corny baby decision. forced tarkis arri begging. weak.
world-building is established through expository Q&A dialogue; storytelling-style expository dialogue is mostly okay ("go on. go on. go on."), but both persist throughout the game, and without this there'd be some rather underwritten-looking convos. it's not an honest effort to deepen the dialogue tree. i treat it as filler which is unacceptable.
PC is a hero of mythical power and era-ushering significance but i felt no weight to his epic protagonism, no tragic conflict, no tension of any kind; in this game i wasn't a roleplayer, questioningly tracking the thread of my virtual destiny ("will i become evil? when do i switch sides? oops look what i did - is this what i want?") - i was a technician in a chinese textile factory, picking one of several spools of thread in front of me and disinterestedly unrolling it, looking for defects
i saw lots of forced single-answer progression as you near the resolution of a quest, which happens at many points in the story where you could reasonably change the course of action, maybe show compassion or perhaps execute a stratagem (i haven't noticed [lie] answers doing much and i've reloaded to explore outcomes), but instead of that, if there's anything, it's usually a banal aggressive option "(betray faction) imma kil u nao [Attack]" or something like that; plot development is ultra-literal, you absolutely know what's gonna happen
the nitty gritty of follower npc character development is something i couldn't devote enough attention to, i brute-forced half of their dialogue, but i noticed that it's not bad, except for the off-color kills-in-shadow "alpha" "beta" animal behaviorism dreck; i liked that there are no naggy follower quests, but there should be more consequence to follower reputation
third act is rushed; storyboard epilogue was pathetic, no synthesis of choices to a meaningful coherent end-state
many other negative points
*** GAMEPLAY (minus combat) *** points: 8/20
making some choices, navigating the story, despite the no good very bad impression that i got of the writing as a whole is at least slightly entertaining
absence of real side quests is acceptable for me because of the structure of the campaign; this is innovative for an isometric rpg and it's a net positive for me
some tinier aspects of gameplay are well done: traps are good, rune puzzles are okay, hidden stashes are great (purple on purple was a nice old-school touch)
character building is pretty good, especially real-time skill learning. lots of sophistication there, it sets a high mark.
doing stuff on spires? meh.
generally, in this game the gameplay is very much contiguous on bad writing and just not good enough. lacks real non-combat challenges. skill checks look to me like fake obstacles (the athletics requirement is so contrived). reputation managing aspect is something that may or may not be a thing and i didn't do it. i got nothing from the rep system apart from seeing the consequences of reputations scores in dialogues; the system is a nice technical achievement but it didn't provide any satisfaction for me (because i wasn't engaged with the story and characters)
economy is good in the beginning but soon it becomes broken; missed potential here. needs more harshness in the strategy segment, everything is too convenient (you find better items so often that you don't have to bother with crafting, upgrading is fairly cheap, skill trainers are too accessible, choice of who you can hire is not tied to reputation and it should be...)
no item ownership (no theft) is unacceptable for me, whatever the story excuse might be (how about a reputation penalty - doh!)
*** COMBAT (i played only on hard) *** points: 7/20
basic combat mechanics are decent, lots of promise; better than PoE
spell system is innovative, robust, and sets a mark for future rpgs but enemy spellcasters are boring, weak and inflexible, and they didn't have to be
despite a visible conscious effort to make combat smooth, tactical positioning is jittery; lots of bad disengagement choices on the part of AI
scandalously few enemy types (different human behave differently of course and i accept that as legitimate variety, but it's not pronounced enough) and poor encounter variety
beginning is hard but it's like enemies don't get tougher as you progress...no thinking required: a few opening aoe salvoes and turn on autopilot works best but monitoring the combat can be tiresome, however this is a UI issue
technically, graphics are amazing, art style less so
there's a veneer of boredom and lifelessness over everything...game feels dead. can't pin it down but the environments feel dead, artificial...like a staged scenery. a big factor i think is that the areas are quite small
live animated characters in dialogues are a great thing. sets a new standard i think
copper / bronze / iron and no steel or gold etc. is so-so. somehow doesn't convince me; could have gone for a real bronze age feel with iron weapons being an uber scarcity
i don't like the visual character design, especially some standard uniforms. strict color coding is a bit garish: red guys, purple guys etc.
item art is great, love it
music & sound: pretty good
*** PERFORMANCE AND UI *** points: 7/10
combat is a bit difficult to follow accurately, lots of small elements, progress bars, timers to keep track of (you can easily forget to use a skill which has replenished etc.) so the learning curve if you want to fully micromanage is a little bit steep and there was no need for this in a short game such as this. if combat was much tougher and actually required micromanagement it would be uncomfortable. i tried it on the hardest difficulty level and didn't like it because of this.
loading is a bit slow and maybe a bit too frequent (loading between spires sucks)
it's not buggy
*** RATING *** 4 + 8 + 7 + 11 + 7 (+ 3 bonus for being an isometric rpg) = 40/100
i disliked the game. instead of a summary, for the most important part of the review look at the 'writing' section. with very good writing, gameplay would've scored higher too and it would've be a very good game, in spite of mediocre combat, but it's very bad instead, making for a rather bad game. it was also probably rushed. on the other hand, it has some brilliant featurs, such as real-time skill learning executed decently and great spell creation system.
there is evidence that the game is rushed and missing a large chunk of story. there should have been 5 acts originally and there are only three. in the artbook that comes with the game, there are illustrations from five chapters...
so don't buy it. or buy it but don't play it now. better to wait, i'd say at least 6 months.
I'm kind of looking at Tyranny as the Icewind Dale 2 of this particular engine. Pillars of Eternity managed to cover both BG and Icewind Dale 1 over the course of the main game and two expansions. Torment, though coming from a different studio, is going to fill the Planescape void. Tyranny seems to me much like IWD2. A easy way to cash in on something that is already successful. Not to say it's bad, it's just that I was always shocked by how quickly this game got made. I feel like I heard about it, and 5 or 6 months later, it was released. There is nothing wrong with milking an engine or formula. There is always going to be an audience who wants more (just look at something like Might and Magic 7 and 8). All in all, best not to expect too much, and enjoy it for what is.
Oh boy. What need I do to get a copy of that analysis, @David_Gaider?
I don't really get the luxury of being a game reviewer. Anything I say about someone else's game will be viewed as either biased or coming from someone who himself is standing on questionable ground (as in: I'm not allowed to say anything about someone else's game unless my own games are perfect in their intent and/or execution).
Indeed. Many a journeyman would think that they've already mastered their craft, but a master never stops learning. I regard both your own personal bias and questionable ground as a looking glass that allows you to take special note of whatever you feel is most relevant to you and the work you do; things such that your usual game reviewer would most likely disregard under a purposed veil of ignorance, or due to a lack of personal investment in game design. I for one certainly take far more interest in people's own feelings and opinions than any purportedly unbiased assessments of factuality, as the latter I could easily outsource to a mathematician, should I ever so desire. An arbitrarily perfect game may be a tempting ideal to aim for, but I'd argue that an even perfect-er, incomparable game experience is one that manages to perfectly express you the designer, in all your paradoxically imperfect perfection. To that end, I would offer you my own biases and questionable ground to confront with yours, so that you may benefit from the discourse. I've become somewhat attached to Beamdog's adventures over the years and won't deny you my help if you would have it. You know where to find me in case you'd ever like to have someone analyse your analyses, so as to help you uncover any valuable introspection potential that might sneak beyond the confines of your attention. In a way compliant with NDAs, if need be
Started playing late last week, on friday IIRC, and on sunday evening I had poured in 33 hours of gameplay, most of that during the weekend. I don't know how far I am, mid act 2 I think, nor how much I have left, but someone wrote above that this was a short game and that surprised me since I don't feel that way at all.
I loved the idea of the Conquest intro, but hated the execution. The ultra-slow moving animations made me hate it, and I really wanted to love it! They should have made the transitions between 'acts' appear immedately, and just kept a moving background or something. It's almost as annoying as listening to irenicus for the umpfteenth time.
I love the magic system but would have preferred more non-direct damage options. It feels like 75% of the options are different damage spells and only very few are buffs. I like that I can finally do some buffing before battles since I think they idea of "in battle" and "per enouncter" spells are ridiculous and immersive breaking (Hey look, there's enemies over there. Quickly now, cleric, throw a buff on us before we attack! No can do, charname, we're not in combat.. ), so Tyranny is alot better than PoE in that regard.
Looking forward to the rest of the game. I've messed up my char alot but it doesn't matter. There's enough magic to go around so that I can dish out some pain even though I wasted four talents on ridiculous "strike from stealth and cause poison damage". Not even sure that my cool plan of stacking poison damage on top of eachother even works (unseen advantage + poison dart, about 11 poison damage per tick which is way too low for the talent investment).
I wonder why PoE and Tyranny even bother with stealth mechanisms.. the battles doesn't seem to encourage anyone to actually use it. Sure, you can strike for a killer first attack, but then? Nothing. You can't go invisible again and you also move like a fricking turtle, so even though you keep a char in stealth why the rest engage the enemy, you will never be able to sneak up from behind and BS the mage since you will move to slowly to reach them before you are seen and the stealth is broken. Weird system.
I think the writing is great, among the best I played so far. I couldn't disagree more with what other have written above about the writing being bad or lacking. The conversations with the companions are great and full of good storytelling. Sure, the beastwoman is a tad cliché, but it's still kinda funny to have her and I liked the way they implemented the beastmens way of talking in bursts or words ("Hunt. Kill. Rut. Play." ). I also don't agree with the character being oblivious to things he or she should know in the world they are in. I don't remember a single conversation where I felt me as a player not knowing was the reason for stupid answers in dialogues. My high-lore character is very knowledgeble about faction customs and know how to greet them and respond correctly to gain their favor, when he chooses to. I can also choose to offend them deliberately at times to gain their wrath (which I think I want since that too can unlock abilities and doesn't lower the favor you have with the same faction for unknown reasons).
Very incoherent post here, just some random thoughts of mine.
Edit: Btw, what I forgot to wrote in the above ramblings was that I feel the battles are kinda boring but not so boring that it kills the game for me. At level 11 (IIRC) most battles are about executing the same exact combination of spells and abilities over and over again, wait for the last of the cooldowns to end, then moving on to the next battle and execute the same pattern again. PoE was exactly the same but PoE had its ridiculously strong debuffs which you could hardly buff against. Tyranny has very little of that. Except for the very early portions of the game, most battles have been very easy on normal. Again, exactly the same as PoE. But the repetitiveness of the battles doesn't stop me from craving more and more of Tyranny! It was a long time ago I felt this way about a game. I haven't read anything about the story but I really, really want to turn on a certain ally of mine and just take the world for myself, haha I hope I get that chance, currently I am playing him, pretending to be his ally.
I think the writing is great, among the best I played so far.
May be people simply expected too much? I know, I did. I was prepared to be a "true ruler" as I see it in declared setting - deceptive, manipulative, reasonably evil. Yet, decisions are too simple and small, no real planing or strategy.
Take Act 1, for example, where you have to set argument between Scarlet Chorus and Disfavorite about vanguard. Since it's a dangerous task and obviously many will die, I expected to be able to send SC first to clear the way and in hope to get rid of as many of them as I can. Then Disfavorite would finish the job and get the glory. But all I could do is to side with one army or another.
Sure, my expectations is my problem but it still disappoint.
May be people simply expected too much? I know, I did. I was prepared to be a "true ruler" as I see it in declared setting - deceptive, manipulative, reasonably evil. Yet, decisions are too simple and small, no real planing or strategy.
I thought that is part of what made the Tyranny story interesting. You aren't some super-powered hero. You're a cog in a debatably-evil invasion force. You have a boss, and your boss has a boss. The only true "power" you wield is legal, not magical.
You aren't personally leading the invasion of the Tiers. Your primary job is to remind the actual invasion commanders that the Overlord is getting impatient with their games. If it seems like a lot of the decisions you've made in the beginning of the game are meaningless or minor, it is because the job you were sent out to do was simply to break the stalemates and get those with actual power to finish their job.
That being said, there definitely could be some room for improvement. There are occasions later in the game where it just feels like something is missing or unfinished. The First Act is pretty solid, but as you move towards completion, it isn't nearly as polished. The story is all there, but how it is told through environments and interactions seems a bit more rushed and hollow.
I think the writing is great, among the best I played so far.
May be people simply expected too much? I know, I did. I was prepared to be a "true ruler" as I see it in declared setting - deceptive, manipulative, reasonably evil. Yet, decisions are too simple and small, no real planing or strategy.
Take Act 1, for example, where you have to set argument between Scarlet Chorus and Disfavorite about vanguard. Since it's a dangerous task and obviously many will die, I expected to be able to send SC first to clear the way and in hope to get rid of as many of them as I can. Then Disfavorite would finish the job and get the glory. But all I could do is to side with one army or another.
Sure, my expectations is my problem but it still disappoint.
Regarding your spoiler, when you are siding with one of the armies over the other, you are effectively giving them the glory. However, I think the game never manages to give the impression that they're actually armies. instead both the SC and the Disfavoured comes across as not much stronger than yourself, and you just have a bunch of henchmen at your disposal. This is one of my major issues with the game and how the war and the armies are presented. It's probably engine limitations, but hell, even SoD did it's best to give the impression of an army by having looped movements of soldiers walking in and out of screen etc to make you feel like there are more of them than actually there.
Put in on hold for a week or two, so still in act 3. I agree that it feels more rushed in this act than in the previous. Gonna pick it up again this week I think, so hopefully I can finish it soon. Have to admit my passion took a downwards turn after a while. The maps became a bit repetitive and the quests so simple that my ~level 13-14 character just waded through without even needing spells or consumables at all. The whole part with the jagged maw and the stone archon etc, just doesn't feel that great.. for me who choose the edict of storms path, the story about this renegade archon never felt explained enough for me to bother about him. Apparently I must have skipped some info, because when arriving there I had no idea who the archon was or why he has cast into the gorge by Kyros etc.
One good thing about the writing though, after a while you start to realize everyone are equally evil. There are no good sides in this battle and the Disf. that might come across as the "good" side in the beginning are just evil bastards who deserve to die just as much as the scarlet chorus. It's a war, after all, and there are no 'good' attackers/invaders. Not even myself, no matter if I saved Lethinan's crossing.
I thought that is part of what made the Tyranny story interesting. You aren't some super-powered hero. You're a cog in a debatably-evil invasion force. You have a boss, and your boss has a boss. The only true "power" you wield is legal, not magical.
You aren't personally leading the invasion of the Tiers. Your primary job is to remind the actual invasion commanders that the Overlord is getting impatient with their games. If it seems like a lot of the decisions you've made in the beginning of the game are meaningless or minor, it is because the job you were sent out to do was simply to break the stalemates and get those with actual power to finish their job.
Good points. And I do not mind at all to be "not-such-a-hero" ("The Chosen One" is a good thing but only one of many in the genre). The problem is, that simple move - sacrifice one to give the glory to another - looked so obvious from everything game promised before (serious politics! You will handle complicated matters!) that bland absence of it felt as inconsistency. For me at that very moment all complexity and seriousness were gone. I can forgive some plot holes, but here it looked like (in theory) complicated intellectual game dropped the boll and become "just another RPG with a primitive plot only accommodating gameplay".
As I said - expectations is a horrible thing, can ruin anything
It's almost as annoying as listening to irenicus for the umpfteenth time.
u w0t m8?
all joking aside, after reading the reviews i'd like to try it, but still on the fence. probably need a new computer though, PoE was pretty laggy on my potato.
I'm currently playing the game and seem to be a fair bit into it. Here's a run-down of my experiences so far:
I'm a member of the Scarlet Chorus, with a background as a pit fighter. I made a name for myself when I slew the Queen of an enemy rebellion in single combat, and have been known as "The Queenslayer" by both sides of the rebellion ever since. As a Fatebinder, I tried to be fair and open-minded in deciding conflicts and debates, which has, at times, both pleased and angered members of both the Chorus and the Disfavored. However, I have typically applied Chorus doctrine (i.e.: being practical, letting captured enemies live in order to be recruited) to settle many disputes. Although I got along well with the Disfavored and their leader through the early portions of the game (often better than I did the Chorus and their sinister and obnoxious counterpart), I ended up siding with the Chorus on attacking the Citadel after word was leaked of a possible truce between the Disfavored and the rebels. However, in the course of taking the Citadel, I came to distrust the Chorus leaders as well (and there was always some underlying tension between them and me anyway), and turned on them when they tried to join me there. I ended up letting the rebel leader live and accepted Eb into my group (who I had previously talked with under a truce). But now I'm left not knowing WTF I'm supposed to be doing, having made enemies of basically EVERYONE outside of my group (and perhaps a few within it too) - which both intrigues and unnerves me at the same time.
My thoughts on the game so far: 1. The party NPCs are really unique and interesting, and their colorful portraits do a great job of bringing them to life - all in all, a big improvement over PoE in that regard. 2. I really like the extent to which not only you can develop your background, but also the role that it plays in dialogue and action options throughout the game. For example, characters repeatedly refer to me as "The Queenslayer" because I famously killed a rebel queen in single combat very early in my military career, and my background as a pit fighter enables me to challenge other characters to single combat in dialogue options. 3. The basic premise of the game is also really unique and interesting. When you think about it, it's basically the reverse of typical RPG storylines - you are a henchman of the big boss villain, trying to stop a young, rebellious upstart from becoming too powerful. It would be like playing BG1 as Angelo. I also like other ways in which the game defies RPG conventions - for example, the orderly, "honorable" knights of the Disfavored are arguably the more villainous of the two main armies, as they just summarily execute any enemy prisoners that they take.
I agree with some of the complaints that have been made about the combat, but I appreciate that so far into the game, the quests haven't seemed to be unnecessarily prolonged with endless dungeon crawls and waves of enemies (*cough*PoE*cough*Dragon Age*cough*), and have just been limited to a few encounters each.
Now that the game has been out for a while, I'm curious to see others discuss their choices and experiences playing it - though I ask to still be mindful of spoilers, at least about the later portions of the game.
Comments
Give it a try.
To the discerning eye, Chris Avellone's very creative initial concepts are still apparent throughout the game, despite many of them being brutally mutilated by the confines of Obsidian's later, suboptimal design choices. The really awkward claim that Tyranny's universe is one in which evil won is but one example of appalling
incompetencecarelessness, coming from either Obsidian or Paradox. At the point the player enters the game, nobody can say they won just yet in Tyranny, nor is either side explicitly 'evil' in the traditional sense of the word. The realms are at war; Kyros' empire is driven by 'good' intentions, and so are the rebellious Tiers. It is for you to determine whether you agree with either side, or call their shit, turn your back on both and strike it out on your own, so as to realize your own ideals of 'good'.As a Fatebinder, the protagonist is initially a free-roaming slave, a soldier subject to Tunon's will; until they ascend to power themselves and become his equal, they are bound to play by his rules. This doesn't mean they have to be consistent in their judgements or can't stretch the rules far and wide to suit their personal ideals. What, if at all, you chose to define as good and evil, or lawful and lawless is generally up to you in Tyranny.
The game does not force you to perceive its universe as a bipolar struggle of infallibly good fairies and indisputably vile witches. One is free to interpret the world as they please: whether you want to play an animal
fetishistactivist favouring the well-being of Beastmen, a ruthless executioner following laws to the letter, a lenient judge who is as merciful as legally allowed, a rebel fighting for the Tiers' freedom or an outcast trying to shape the realm to their liking is your choice.Unbearably, choices hardly ever make any difference (with a few notable exceptions), which is the way Obsidian does things, but despite its many shortfall the game is still worth playing through. I compared it to @David_Gaider's awesome Dragon Age: Origins, which is to be seen as a recommendation. I'd say that Tyranny feels a lot like a non-D&D Planescape: Torment that was drafted by Chris Avellone, but finished by his interns rather than the man himself. Which, actually, happens to be quite an accurate description of the game's production process
for this review i use the "tried and tested" grading method from my SoD review https://forums.beamdog.com/discussion/57120/siege-of-dragonspear-my-rantview/p1
disclaimer: i techically shouldn't be doing this because i finished the game only once and it's one of those multiple ending games but i believe that any game should be as good as possible on the first playthrough and i'd rate it just on that first playthrough anyway. there may be strong language. the review is subjective which isn't reflected in every phrase (you can append "i felt that / for me / i think" everywhere)
*** WRITING ***
points: 4/30
*** GAMEPLAY (minus combat) ***
points: 8/20
*** COMBAT (i played only on hard) ***
points: 7/20
*** AESTHETICS (details, atmosphere, graphics, sound) ***
points: 11/20
*** PERFORMANCE AND UI ***
points: 7/10
*** RATING ***
4 + 8 + 7 + 11 + 7 (+ 3 bonus for being an isometric rpg) = 40/100
i disliked the game.
instead of a summary, for the most important part of the review look at the 'writing' section.
with very good writing, gameplay would've scored higher too and it would've be a very good game, in spite of mediocre combat, but it's very bad instead, making for a rather bad game. it was also probably rushed.
on the other hand, it has some brilliant featurs, such as real-time skill learning executed decently and great spell creation system.
so don't buy it. or buy it but don't play it now. better to wait, i'd say at least 6 months.
Which is a long way of saying: "fat chance".
I regard both your own personal bias and questionable ground as a looking glass that allows you to take special note of whatever you feel is most relevant to you and the work you do; things such that your usual game reviewer would most likely disregard under a purposed veil of ignorance, or due to a lack of personal investment in game design. I for one certainly take far more interest in people's own feelings and opinions than any purportedly unbiased assessments of factuality, as the latter I could easily outsource to a mathematician, should I ever so desire. An arbitrarily perfect game may be a tempting ideal to aim for, but I'd argue that an even perfect-er, incomparable game experience is one that manages to perfectly express you the designer, in all your paradoxically imperfect perfection.
To that end, I would offer you my own biases and questionable ground to confront with yours, so that you may benefit from the discourse. I've become somewhat attached to Beamdog's adventures over the years and won't deny you my help if you would have it. You know where to find me in case you'd ever like to have someone analyse your analyses, so as to help you uncover any valuable introspection potential that might sneak beyond the confines of your attention.
In a way compliant with NDAs, if need be
I loved the idea of the Conquest intro, but hated the execution. The ultra-slow moving animations made me hate it, and I really wanted to love it! They should have made the transitions between 'acts' appear immedately, and just kept a moving background or something. It's almost as annoying as listening to irenicus for the umpfteenth time.
I love the magic system but would have preferred more non-direct damage options. It feels like 75% of the options are different damage spells and only very few are buffs. I like that I can finally do some buffing before battles since I think they idea of "in battle" and "per enouncter" spells are ridiculous and immersive breaking (Hey look, there's enemies over there. Quickly now, cleric, throw a buff on us before we attack! No can do, charname, we're not in combat.. ), so Tyranny is alot better than PoE in that regard.
Looking forward to the rest of the game. I've messed up my char alot but it doesn't matter. There's enough magic to go around so that I can dish out some pain even though I wasted four talents on ridiculous "strike from stealth and cause poison damage". Not even sure that my cool plan of stacking poison damage on top of eachother even works (unseen advantage + poison dart, about 11 poison damage per tick which is way too low for the talent investment).
I wonder why PoE and Tyranny even bother with stealth mechanisms.. the battles doesn't seem to encourage anyone to actually use it. Sure, you can strike for a killer first attack, but then? Nothing. You can't go invisible again and you also move like a fricking turtle, so even though you keep a char in stealth why the rest engage the enemy, you will never be able to sneak up from behind and BS the mage since you will move to slowly to reach them before you are seen and the stealth is broken. Weird system.
I think the writing is great, among the best I played so far. I couldn't disagree more with what other have written above about the writing being bad or lacking. The conversations with the companions are great and full of good storytelling. Sure, the beastwoman is a tad cliché, but it's still kinda funny to have her and I liked the way they implemented the beastmens way of talking in bursts or words ("Hunt. Kill. Rut. Play." ).
I also don't agree with the character being oblivious to things he or she should know in the world they are in. I don't remember a single conversation where I felt me as a player not knowing was the reason for stupid answers in dialogues. My high-lore character is very knowledgeble about faction customs and know how to greet them and respond correctly to gain their favor, when he chooses to. I can also choose to offend them deliberately at times to gain their wrath (which I think I want since that too can unlock abilities and doesn't lower the favor you have with the same faction for unknown reasons).
Very incoherent post here, just some random thoughts of mine.
Edit: Btw, what I forgot to wrote in the above ramblings was that I feel the battles are kinda boring but not so boring that it kills the game for me. At level 11 (IIRC) most battles are about executing the same exact combination of spells and abilities over and over again, wait for the last of the cooldowns to end, then moving on to the next battle and execute the same pattern again. PoE was exactly the same but PoE had its ridiculously strong debuffs which you could hardly buff against. Tyranny has very little of that. Except for the very early portions of the game, most battles have been very easy on normal. Again, exactly the same as PoE. But the repetitiveness of the battles doesn't stop me from craving more and more of Tyranny! It was a long time ago I felt this way about a game. I haven't read anything about the story but I really, really want to turn on a certain ally of mine and just take the world for myself, haha
Sure, my expectations is my problem but it still disappoint.
You aren't personally leading the invasion of the Tiers. Your primary job is to remind the actual invasion commanders that the Overlord is getting impatient with their games. If it seems like a lot of the decisions you've made in the beginning of the game are meaningless or minor, it is because the job you were sent out to do was simply to break the stalemates and get those with actual power to finish their job.
That being said, there definitely could be some room for improvement. There are occasions later in the game where it just feels like something is missing or unfinished. The First Act is pretty solid, but as you move towards completion, it isn't nearly as polished. The story is all there, but how it is told through environments and interactions seems a bit more rushed and hollow.
Put in on hold for a week or two, so still in act 3. I agree that it feels more rushed in this act than in the previous. Gonna pick it up again this week I think, so hopefully I can finish it soon. Have to admit my passion took a downwards turn after a while. The maps became a bit repetitive and the quests so simple that my ~level 13-14 character just waded through without even needing spells or consumables at all. The whole part with the jagged maw and the stone archon etc, just doesn't feel that great.. for me who choose the edict of storms path, the story about this renegade archon never felt explained enough for me to bother about him. Apparently I must have skipped some info, because when arriving there I had no idea who the archon was or why he has cast into the gorge by Kyros etc.
One good thing about the writing though, after a while you start to realize everyone are equally evil. There are no good sides in this battle and the Disf. that might come across as the "good" side in the beginning are just evil bastards who deserve to die just as much as the scarlet chorus. It's a war, after all, and there are no 'good' attackers/invaders. Not even myself, no matter if I saved Lethinan's crossing.
Loved the magic system, it did kind of make path of the damned a cakewalk though.
Still annoyed that Obsidian refuses to add any romances to their games but whatever.
30 to 40 hrs of gameplay at most per playthrough. So pretty short for a CRPG.
Oh also content gating for no reason besides forcing replays is bad design.
As I said - expectations is a horrible thing, can ruin anything
all joking aside, after reading the reviews i'd like to try it, but still on the fence. probably need a new computer though, PoE was pretty laggy on my potato.
I'm currently playing the game and seem to be a fair bit into it. Here's a run-down of my experiences so far:
My thoughts on the game so far:
1. The party NPCs are really unique and interesting, and their colorful portraits do a great job of bringing them to life - all in all, a big improvement over PoE in that regard.
2. I really like the extent to which not only you can develop your background, but also the role that it plays in dialogue and action options throughout the game. For example, characters repeatedly refer to me as "The Queenslayer" because I famously killed a rebel queen in single combat very early in my military career, and my background as a pit fighter enables me to challenge other characters to single combat in dialogue options.
3. The basic premise of the game is also really unique and interesting. When you think about it, it's basically the reverse of typical RPG storylines - you are a henchman of the big boss villain, trying to stop a young, rebellious upstart from becoming too powerful. It would be like playing BG1 as Angelo. I also like other ways in which the game defies RPG conventions - for example, the orderly, "honorable" knights of the Disfavored are arguably the more villainous of the two main armies, as they just summarily execute any enemy prisoners that they take.
I agree with some of the complaints that have been made about the combat, but I appreciate that so far into the game, the quests haven't seemed to be unnecessarily prolonged with endless dungeon crawls and waves of enemies (*cough*PoE*cough*Dragon Age*cough*), and have just been limited to a few encounters each.
Now that the game has been out for a while, I'm curious to see others discuss their choices and experiences playing it - though I ask to still be mindful of spoilers, at least about the later portions of the game.
For anyone who may be curious, here's some of the voices behind the game: