Putting the 'role' back in role-playing games since 2002.
Donate to Codex
Good Old Games
  • Welcome to rpgcodex.net, a site dedicated to discussing computer based role-playing games in a free and open fashion. We're less strict than other forums, but please refer to the rules.

    "This message is awaiting moderator approval": All new users must pass through our moderation queue before they will be able to post normally. Until your account has "passed" your posts will only be visible to yourself (and moderators) until they are approved. Give us a week to get around to approving / deleting / ignoring your mundane opinion on crap before hassling us about it. Once you have passed the moderation period (think of it as a test), you will be able to post normally, just like all the other retards.

The Dark Eye Blackguards - turn-based tactical RPG set in The Dark Eye world

Minttunator

Arcane
Patron
Joined
Sep 26, 2012
Messages
1,649
Location
Estonia
Codex 2012 Codex 2013 Codex 2014 PC RPG Website of the Year, 2015 RPG Wokedex Strap Yourselves In Codex Year of the Donut Codex+ Now Streaming! Divinity: Original Sin Project: Eternity Torment: Tides of Numenera Codex USB, 2014 Shadorwun: Hong Kong Divinity: Original Sin 2 Pathfinder: Wrath
Thanks for keeping in touch with the players and the best of luck on your next project, Io! :bro:
 
Self-Ejected

Bubbles

I'm forever blowing
Joined
Aug 7, 2013
Messages
7,817
Just finished it, 77 hours played. Managed to beat every battle in the game on hard, which actually wasn't much of a problem (having an archer-mage PC helped a lot though). Hardest part for me was the end of chapter 1/most of chapter 2, when I didn't know how to best build a character yet. Worst thing about hard mode was that Magic Resistance was basically useless; even with 19 MR most enemies would still get 100% hit chance on group wide spells, which is insane.

Something was very obviously cut from the endgame, but I liked it well enough. I played 90% of the game after the latest patch, so I can confirm that there are no horribly unbalanced or bugged fights in chapter 2 onward. Overall, the gameplay has a lot more longevity than MMX; if there were any quests left, I'd go do them right now.

5/5, would play Blackguards 2.
 

Name

Cipher
Joined
May 24, 2013
Messages
866
Location
Glorious Nihon
My experience with game is that it starts out strong, and then going downward till the end.

1.encounter design is awesome in the first chapter, it constantly whoop my behind and I have to use environment frequently to win. Then it got more monotone and repetitive, until when with more developed characters I can one hit most mooks, the game decides to rely on respawns to provide challenges!

2.story has a engaging premise, but with chapter progressions it just became so incoherent with only one well set up twist and many more coming out of nowhere. I blame the episodic structure.

3.choices and consequences? except that one companion, are there any more consequences? It's advertised to have three endings, what are they? I can only count two at best depending on that companion.
 

Cadmus

Arcane
Joined
Dec 28, 2013
Messages
4,264
This looks really good, I am sold on the game and will try it when I'm done with PST and such. For some reason it reminds me of Disciples 3 if it wasn't shit.
 

Infinitron

I post news
Staff Member
Joined
Jan 28, 2011
Messages
97,232
Codex Year of the Donut Serpent in the Staglands Dead State Divinity: Original Sin Project: Eternity Torment: Tides of Numenera Wasteland 2 Shadorwun: Hong Kong Divinity: Original Sin 2 A Beautifully Desolate Campaign Pillars of Eternity 2: Deadfire Pathfinder: Kingmaker Pathfinder: Wrath I'm very into cock and ball torture I helped put crap in Monomyth
Played and finished this on Hard. Initial thoughts:

I think felipe and Roxor's whole "it's called Blackguards but they aren't actually evil!" complaint is missing the point. They're not supposed to be. I do agree that "Welcome to the Emirate of Mengbilla, now let's raid a slave caravan to save some random woman's son" quest should have been rewritten though.

Although it was a nice callback that her son ended up being a Prophet.

The game was well-written and well voice-acted, and the plot had some interesting themes and elements, but it was ultimately unsatisfying. They should have tried harder.

Combat - lots of fun, but has some battles that would give Josh Sawyer a heart attack. Karnifilo Frenzy is OP as fuck, cheap to upgrade and trivializes entire battles. Meanwhile the Fireball costs a shitton and does piddling damage. Lots of endgame enemies seem to have high fire resistance. It's kind of nasty that the game gives you Zurbaran as a kind of "fire mage" by default but fails to support that build.

I generally dislike it when games give you the ability to upgrade primary stats on level-up, and doubly so when you have to use the same point pool and choose between them and derived stats. It was a good idea to give the Special Abilities primary stat prerequisites because it gave you a sort of baseline to aim your character development at.

Ultimately though, it seems your performance in this game in the toughest battles depends more on your mages' choice of spells than on your fighters' builds. It's definitely easier to go wrong with that and accidentally gimp yourself with a poor spell selection. Although, if you can get over your hoarding instinct, consumables can serve as a replacement. Poison your weapon and paralyze 'em.

One last thing. If Bailiff Lasca was played by a real life actor, he would totally be a scenery-chewing Jeremy Irons in full "Dungeons & Dragons" B-movie villain mode. That is all. :)
 

deuxhero

Arcane
Joined
Jul 30, 2007
Messages
11,326
Location
Flowery Land
Half off on Amazon again. Still holding off as I think it will reach $20 with the DLC in the summer sale (or at least be the same 20).

edit: Also bundled with the DLC, The Dark Eye: Chains of Satinav and Memoria for 30 on Steam now. Are the other 2 any good?
 

Name

Cipher
Joined
May 24, 2013
Messages
866
Location
Glorious Nihon
Half off on Amazon again. Still holding off as I think it will reach $20 with the DLC in the summer sale (or at least be the same 20).

edit: Also bundled with the DLC, The Dark Eye: Chains of Satinav and Memoria for 30 on Steam now. Are the other 2 any good?

Buy them! These three games range from good to great, and I constantly heard the company is not having enough sales to live their capitalism lifestyle.
 
Self-Ejected

Bubbles

I'm forever blowing
Joined
Aug 7, 2013
Messages
7,817
Not "might be", is.

Mind you, after all the press complaints about the riddles being too hard, I rather doubt Daedalic will match that quality again.
 
Self-Ejected

Bubbles

I'm forever blowing
Joined
Aug 7, 2013
Messages
7,817
The German voice acting is also very good; objectively Daedalic's best.
 

Modron

Arcane
Joined
May 5, 2012
Messages
9,934
Memoria might be the best adventure game of the last 10 years hands down.
Only just started Memoria myself and I am enjoying it but I can't see myself rating it over Primordia.

Memoria wins by attrition because it's longer.

Plus, it looks great and has no achievements in the vein of the deponia games that basically require you to play the whole game in one sitting. So yeah probably best Daedilic game, we shall see how they weather new ownership.
 
Last edited:

DalekFlay

Arcane
Patron
Joined
Oct 5, 2010
Messages
14,118
Location
New Vegas
Oh man that $30 bundle is tempting, all I own is the first adventure game. I already spent my "allowance" for the week, though.
 

deuxhero

Arcane
Joined
Jul 30, 2007
Messages
11,326
Location
Flowery Land
Holy fuck that fight with the group of tigers.

I managed to win it in good health, but it's so luck based (hope you don't go after the tigers, hope you don't get knocked down, hope you don't get mass of wounds), but once none of those things happen its pathetic as their HP damage is terrible and they like ganging up on the guy with Double Vision on him.

edit: What's the wheel of death do?
 
Last edited:

Name

Cipher
Joined
May 24, 2013
Messages
866
Location
Glorious Nihon
Holy fuck that fight with the group of tigers.

I managed to win it in good health, but it's so luck based (hope you don't go after the tigers, hope you don't get knocked down, hope you don't get mass of wounds), but once none of those things happen its pathetic as their HP damage is terrible and they like ganging up on the guy with Double Vision on him.

edit: What's the wheel of death do?

Breath fire. I think you can reverse/mess the rotation to avoid/redirect the fire.
 

As an Amazon Associate, rpgcodex.net earns from qualifying purchases.
Back
Top Bottom