Open World RPG Archives - Page 36 of 41

Witcher 3 Impressions

May 21, 2015 by Belghast

Losing Time

Last night I had these plans of coming home, and hopping into Final Fantasy XIV and working on crafting once again while chatting away with my Free Company folk. However when I got home absolutely none of that actually happened. I had left the GOG Galaxy client up on my screen during the day, and when I sat down at my machine it was the first thing I saw. I had fixed myself a sandwich and chips and I thought to myself… I will just play Witcher for a bit while I eat dinner, and before my wife gets home. It seems like moments later she had gotten home and was hollering up at me. When I say it seems like moments, it quite literally feels like I had just sat down at the screen. In reality about an hour passed between starting Witcher and taking a quick pause to see my wife off to church before returning to playing again. Then next thing I know it… my wife is back home and heading to bed and I have managed to lose another several hours.

To say the game is immersive is a bit of an understatement. The last game that I can remember losing entire nights to was probably Skyim, and that is a fairly apt comparison at least on a few levels. The funny thing is I have just now moved to the “second” area of the game. I say area because while the game has open world aspects it is not exactly completely open world. The first “zone” is called White Orchard and it is made up of this huge sprawling seamless area with lots of villages and locations to explore. This gives it a traditional open world Elder Scrolls feel, the problem being that the entire location has a bounding border drawn around it. While I have not pushed my luck when the game starts telling me to turn around… I am imagining that there is some sort of “slaughterfish” like mechanic that you encounter.

Gorgeous Environment

The real triumph of the game is the environment, and just how real it feels to be roaming through. What makes the game world so compelling is the fact that everywhere you look there is action going on. Nothing is static, and the weather patterns effect every last blade of grass it feels. The only problem with this is at times you feel like you are suffering from a bit of sensory overload. Like I said yesterday once I started playing I pretty much hopped off the path immediately and this is very easy to do, and at the same time rewarding. When they were pitching this game I remember them saying that it would take either 20 hours or 200 hours depending on your gameplay style and after finishing White Orchard I can see why this is. The main storyline in the zone was relatively straight forward and only actually required me to complete a few quests to get through it. However I spent the next four hours working on various treasure hunts and exploring the world.

The map system works very similar to Skyrim except that you have missions of interest that you have yet to explore marked as question marks. Now these are not ALL the locations in the world, and there are a number of other “hidden” things that you can find wandering the countryside, however if you explore each question mark it seems like you will get most of the content you would care about. That is ultimately what I spent my night doing was wandering around completing these question marks. The game has a waypoint travel system that allows you to pop from road sign to road sign, and I used the hell out of this functionality allowing me to get close to the destination that I was looking for and either taking my horse the rest of the way or just wandering of foot. Pretty much anytime I saw monsters on my minimap hud I dismounted and took them on. After some gear and some levels things like the Drowners and packs of Wolves became trivial, but the big monsters were still insane especially anything that spawned near a “guarded treasure”.

The Story Is Good

The thing that I find most interesting is that the game manages to make the narrative just as interesting as the free form exploration. There is some crazy shit going on in the world of the Witcher, and as this game is my first experience of that world I am trying to soak it all in. The game does an awesome job of giving you just enough of a primer in the setting for things to make sense, but also is unapologetic at times for talking about things that you have NO clue what is going on. There was a point in the game where I had to answer a series of questions, each of which I think represent choices that were made in earlier games. Knowing nothing about the setting I made my choices and it was interesting to see just how they played out in that discussion. I have a feeling that those choices will ultimately color what the final results of the game end up being.

There was talk at one point of them rebooting the earlier Witcher games using the Witcher 3 engine… and I really hope this happens. The engine itself is extremely robust and I can see the modder community is going to have a ball with this game. This might dethrone Skyrim in that department, pending the game itself is that extensible. The best review that I can give the game is the fact that I had to pry myself away from it last night to go to sleep. I alt tabbed and noticed it was 10:30 and realized that if I did not stop then… I would likely end up playing until after one in the morning. The funny thing about this game is that it literally came out of left field for me. I had no intent to purchase it, and am only now playing it because I got a free copy with my video card. Now I am looking forward to playing through everything the game has to offer and will more than likely purchase the season pass so that I can play the DLC as it releases. I keep harkening back to this, but I think if the game keeps up at this pace and level of quality that it might very well be that go to game like Skyrim for losing myself in the world. The only fear I have is that since this is so narrative focused, I am not sure if it will have the same sort of universal replay-ability that the Elder Scrolls games have had for me.

Mistakes Were Made

May 20, 2015 by Belghast

Thing that Happened

The last few days have been extremely strange for me, in that I have been processing a sequence of events. I wrote over the weekend that we had a bit of car trouble and found out there was a recall on our Pontiac Torrent related to it. In a sequence of events we also found out that an earlier repair was in fact the source of a recall as well, so in theory we should be getting reimbursed for that work also. Monday we scheduled an appointment with our local GMC dealer to get the new recall taken care of, but in the meantime my wife started looking at vehicles. Both her Torrent and my Jeep Grand Cherokee had been paid off for well over a year and we were just reaping the benefits of no car payment. Other than the recent recall however hers was in extremely good condition. Mine on the other hand had some issues. All of which were largely minor: cracked windshield, broken drivers seat, and in desperate need of new tires.

As a result I had been looking for some time and kicked around all sorts of ideas for vehicles. That said I have always been extremely happy with the Pontiac Torrent and fully intended at some point to get around to looking at the Chevy Equinox the modern cousin. In my wife’s searches she stumbled across a phenomenal deal, the kind that you can’t really say no to. So part of me felt like the time table of events was extremely quick, but by the same token I also felt like we had to jump on the deal while it was available. As a result I am now the proud owner of a shiny new 2013 Chevy Equinox with a truly silly list of amenities that I never actually expected any vehicle I owned would have. I mean this has silly things like heated seats and a backup camera that makes driving a car kind feel like an arcade game. I have yet to even figure out half of the things that are in it because I really have not driven it enough for it to feel “really” mine yet. Last night I turned over the keys to my Jeep and I admit I was a little sad to do so, mostly because I guess I was more attached to that vehicle than I realized. I think more than anything I am just trying to wrap my head around the notion that I have a new car.

Crafting to Eleven

Before the World of Warcraft raid I managed to pop into Final Fantasy XIV long enough to push Culinarian to eleven. This means I now have every craft to that tier, and can start getting rid of my early gear. In fact it just dawned on me that other than fishing I have started literally every class in the game. Right now my sights are set on pushing everything past fifteen, which is apparently where the interesting and unique abilities come into play from each crafting profession. Up until this point they have all seemed to have exactly the same things: a success buff, a durability heal, and an ability to increase quality. The positive about this setup is that right now all of my hotbars look essentially the same, so through muscle memory I can hit the ability that I need when I need it. One of the things that I do like about crafting is that your control points seem to regenerate each time you craft an item. I was half expecting them to work like gathering points and regenerate over time or per harvest. This makes crafting a much shorter game, which I like significantly better.

While I have joked for some time that crafting in Final Fantasy XIV is a black hole… I am here to report that this is actually a literal thing that happens apparently. I cannot tell you the last time I ran an expert dungeon for poetics, nor can I really tell you the last time I was in non-crafting gear. Because of the whole automobile thing, I ended up at a car dealership Monday night instead of attending our raid. So quite literally for the last several times I have played the game I have done nothing but crafting. The thing that shocks me is just how surprisingly “okay” I am about this thing that is happening. I am finding that I really do enjoy the crafting system, and there is something oddly gratifying about it. I expect by the time I hit 50 in every profession I will have a serious hatred for some aspects of it, but other than the fact that it is a constant gil sink… I am completely fine with turning money into crafting ability. I keep thinking about the final destination being an amazing place where I can craft anything I need on a whim.

Mistakes Were Made

I did a thing last night that I knew better than to do… but ultimately did it anyways. First off I feel like I need to get some baggage out of the way. The Witcher franchise and I have a very checkered past, namely I have been told by friends that I trust that it is this amazing experience… then I attempt to play it and it feels like shit. The first Witcher game without a doubt has the most cludgy controls I have ever experienced, and I quite literally have not made it out of the tutorial fight even though I have tried to play it multiple times. So I thought I would just skip the first one and start with the second… the problem being for whatever reason I cannot get Witcher 2 to load on my machine at all. It will boot up, but never actually starts and apparently this is a known issue with Windows 8 and that game. So I had planned to completely write the series off and skip the third one, given my lack of success with the previous two. Then several weeks back I ordered a new video card, and low and behold it came with a free copy of Witcher 3 delivered through the GOG Galaxy client. Of note I have to say I am a big fan of the Galaxy client so far, it is extremely clean.

Last night after the raid I decided to fire up the game, expecting to play for only a few minutes. The end result is that I played for an hour and a half without pause, and also without realizing it. The game is really good, like Skyrim good and runs beautifully on my system. There is a certain amount of narrative faffing that happens in the first few minutes of the game, but quickly you are dumped into a living world setting with only some vague suggestions on what you should be doing. From there you can choose to follow the directions on the map, or just wander off on your own finding interesting things in the countryside. Given my history with Elder Scrolls Games, I immediately hopped off the beaten path and started wandering around. I found a Wraith guarding a place of power, defeated it… claimed the power of the location and apparently earned my very first ability point. The entire sequence of events felt extremely natural and engaging. Additionally I completed a handful of quests that involved using my “Witcher powers” to find clues. Again it felt extremely nice, and I am finding myself getting enamored with the game without actually meaning to. I’ve been switch hitting between 360 controller and mouse and keyboard, and honestly I think I like the 360 controller the best so far. Looking forward to playing a good deal more of this over the coming nights.

Flower Power

April 30, 2015 by Belghast

Bad Brain

This morning I am struggling a bit to get started with my normal blogging process. Right now I am going through what I generally term as a “low spot” in my mental health. I have been feeling depressed and generally disconnected from the world lately. It is like I am staring out a window and watching the world go by in fast motion. Additionally I seem to be focused on only the bad things. Like I could have a dozen normal conversations, but my brain is heat seeking in on the moments that don’t go perfectly. Analyzing them, breaking them apart, wallowing in my imagined failure. What frustrates me the most is that I have a pretty awesome life, but when my brain is on a down cycle it certainly doesn’t seem like it, and my internal critic has been working overtime.

The thing is, it wouldn’t be quite so bad if my brain would just stop with statements like pointing out that I have gained weight, or that I am failing to live up to this or that goal. It always has to be the bully and take things one step too far. My brain is telling me constantly that I am an imposter and that no one actually likes me, and that at best everyone simply tolerates my actions. My brain is kicking things up another notch over the last few days, and incessant about telling me that the world would simply be a better place if I no longer existed. The thing is… I know deep down inside my core that my brain is a liar, but man… is it relentless. I am not expecting anything from this, but I figured I would open up a bit more into my own personal struggles. No one likes hanging around with someone that bums them out, but maybe me talking about it helps someone else who is struggling with the same demons. I know my brain is wrong, and that this will pass in time… but right now, it is pretty hellacious to live with 24/7.

Flower Power

Last night was yet another running of the second static in our Final Fantasy Free Company. We are still struggling a bit to gather up the eight people needed to raid, but hopefully as people continue leveling and gearing that will change a bit. Ultimately I would love it were I able to be an optional in this group, since I have my group that meets seriously on Monday already, and our secondary night on Saturday before the podcast. That said at raid time we managed to gather up seven people and attempted to pug an eighth. That didn’t go terribly well, because while we were talking about the fights he ran off and pulled some golems. I mean on one level I get it, because we had not said much in the game chat, and were sorting things out on voice chat… but taking it upon yourself to pull is rarely the right answer. After a few wipes he refused to resurrect and we kicked him, abandoning duty and bringing in Ashgar. From that point on the night seemed to improve.

Things were far more tense than they should have been, and there was a bit of an outburst on Teamspeak but other than that things fell in place fairly well. I would be bummed that this team managed to get turn six in a single night of tries, whereas it took our team two nights… but this group is leaning heavily on past experience. When we tried to do each turn we tried really hard to go in as a blank slate and figure things out as they happened. It was cool though to get another raid boss killed with this group and we moved on to Turn Seven. There are a lot of moving parts in that fight, and largely the group still needs to figure out how best to control the Renaud freezing action. It is a really fun fight and even more than turn six, it came back to me quickly as we started going through the motions. I am starting to wonder though if I should be running Paladin on these fights since Damai is a Warrior main. Not sure what additional benefit having a Paladin would give the group since it has a slightly different skillset. Would at least give me practical experience doing stuff as my “other” tank class.

Another Outpost

The other game that I played a significant amount of yesterday was State of Decay Year One Survivor Edition. I am back to playing Marcus after going on some crazy misadventures as Maya. When I last played I got the radio announcement that a military presence had been spotted on the outskirts of town. Having done this song and dance before I knew that it was best to take Maya over there to check it out. Additionally at that point Marcus was doing the whole “not sure how long I can go on” thing, meaning he was exhausted and needed to be rested. Around this same time I got reports that two hordes of zombies were getting close to town. I’ve found the best way to take out a horde is vehicular zombiecide. So I laughably grabbed the Pizza Delivery car and took the the roads running them down. This ends up stirring up quite a few additional zombies in the process, but far less in my experience than trying to put down a horde with gun fire.

After quelling the two hordes I moved on to the Military encampment and it went just as well as it had in the past. The military wants everyone to stay inside and shelter in place… which is fine and good until the zombies try breaking down your door. The military house was next to one of the survivor houses I was working on gaining trust with. Unfortunately the person that normally gives me quests to complete to gain their trust was not available, so not sure exactly where they wandered off to. About this time I got a frantic radio message from Lucy telling me that her brother was trapped and needed my help. He had managed to get himself pinned down in a barn, and I had to ride in and save the day. This actually was tougher than I thought it would be and ended up having to clear about nine zombies to get to him and save him. By this time Maya was going through her whole “too exhausted to continue” routine, but I managed to finish things off and get back home with Jacob. So there we are, back home and ready for another jaunt out with Marcus. Hopefully I will get in and play some more tonight.

Year One Survivor Edition

April 29, 2015 by Belghast

State of Decay

Back in June of 2013 I was completely amped with the release of State of Decay on the Xbox Live Arcade. While I am not traditionally a console gamer I spent a good deal of my time out in the loft playing this game at launch. When it came out that September of the PC I was even more excited because it meant that I would be spending more time playing it. Since then I have picked up the two expansions… that I have woefully not spent much time playing. This has been one of those titles that when it goes on sale I sent copies to friends, considering it is as close to the perfect zombie survival game as I have ever played. The only flaw however is the fact that this game desperately wants to be multiplayer. In fact when I told my friends last night what I was playing before the raid… the immediate response was an excited question asking if they added in multiplayer.

While I did not take the best reference shots, because I was too busy playing the game… I did dig up one of the screenshots I took playing the original steam release in the above section, and now directly above this paragraph is a screenshot from the Year One Survivor Edition… which is essentially an HD Remaster more than anything. I definitely find screenshot two more appealing. The first screenshot uses a lot of deep shadow to mask the extremely muddy textures, whereas the second shot is more willing to let you see things more naturally. Another thing that I really dig is that the game has some nice Depth of Field going on in the YOSE edition. You can see this in the second character on screen but even more so below in the shot of my character climbing the tower in town to scout for a view. The world feels more “real” which makes it all the more creepy as you are wandering the wastes looking for resources.

Year One Survivor Edition

The biggest thing I have noticed while playing is that the controls seem much more responsive. I am playing the game using the exact same black wired xbox 360 controller I did the first time, but this time around everything feels more fluid. If this were just shooting I would think potentially it was me, since between the times playing this game… I played a lot of Destiny with a controller, which has greatly improved my aiming. I am noticing it especially when I am driving a car however, that things feel more controllable and less all over the place. Additionally the melee combat feels more responsive. This is aided by the fact that our character has now learned how to use a knife, instead of simply kicking zombies when your melee weapon breaks. Stupid as this sounds, it feels even more “walking dead” thanks to this little motion. This works unbelievably well when your companion holds the zombie and you finish them off with the knife. I did a lot of this in the lake area before moving into the town for example.

I did not make it terribly far last night, because I was playing for about an hour before and after my World of Warcraft raid, but I did manage to get far enough in to remember why I liked this game so much. Since it had been so long since I had last played, I opted to just restart the original campaign, as it tends to be the best way to ease into the game. Additionally while running around yesterday at lunch I picked up a Xbox One copy for my boss, so I am figuring he will want to discuss what is going on in the game. He is not much of a gamer but picked up the Xbox One because his grand kids also have one… and is a huge Walking Dead fan so I figured State of Decay was just about the perfect game for him. I am one of those people that can do something, but struggle to talk someone through it… unless I am doing it myself. I figured the only way I could be of any help to him was to actually be playing the content myself.

Making Progress

Like I said earlier I did not make a ton of progress, but after having played this multiple times I feel like maybe my play is a bit more focused than it was the first time. As a result I have already rescued one group of survivors, cleaned out the veterinary clinic, built an outpost, built a sleeping area, built a workshop… and am working on building trust with a second group of survivors. Not too shabby for about two hours of play if I do say so myself. The whole “knowing what you are doing” aspect definitely speeds things up, as well as having a basic understanding of the lay of the land. The first time I played this game I was having to constantly check the map, whereas this time around I can navigate at least somewhat based on landmarks. I remember on my first play I overshot the church by a huge margin, crashed my car… had to get a new one… and finally made it back to the church at night. This time I went straight there, knowing there was no real sense in exploring until I had done the introductory stuff at the church.

This is still a really great game, and like I said at the start of all of this… the only weakness is it would be so much more enjoyable were I exploring with my friends. The bane of my existence is just how fast melee weapons break. I feel like this is a game about me searching for my next weapon, more than anything else. I rarely use guns, and prefer to take on the zombies in close range… in part because it doesn’t summon more zombies to the gun shots. Additionally I really do not want to summon a zombie horde down upon me. That said I did at one point clear out a couple of hordes with a random car, which was extremely gratifying. The other strange thing I have noticed is that I no longer fear the zombies. The first time I played this game I was scared to death of interaction with them. Every time I would search a location I would take the time to carefully board it up before proceeding. Now I just deal with the zombies as they come… so in a way it feels like the transition someone would have to make in this world. I understand it better, and therefore I am less concerned by it. Still having a blast after all of the time I have played the game in the past, which is quite the compliment to the developers.

#StateOfDecay #YOSE #UndeadLabs