Eschalon: Book III

[Unkillable Cat]

I did better than that - I found a bottleneck of 3 squares, put down two barrels to reduce the bottleneck to one, and was planning to blow her up with both barrels.

Except the roach queen doesn't seem to be able to squeeze through a 1-square gap.

47 arrows ended her reign of filth.

 

[Hobo Elf]

what is gameplay similar too? are the games long and tedious?

Gameplay is exactly the same it's just that the world and quest design is so much worse compared to Book 2.

what barrels? those back in the other tunnel?

There are 3 kinds of barrels to be found. Those with an open lid, those with the lid closed and barrels with some red tag on them. These are the explosive barrels. You can pick them up into your inventory and drop them wherever you want. This is important since there are lots of secret areas you can only access using explosive barrells.

 

[Luzur]

what is gameplay similar too? are the games long and tedious?

Gameplay is exactly the same it's just that the world and quest design is so much worse compared to Book 2.

what barrels? those back in the other tunnel?

There are 3 kinds of barrels to be found. Those with an open lid, those with the lid closed and barrels with some red tag on them. These are the explosive barrels. You can pick them up into your inventory and drop them wherever you want. This is important since there are lots of secret areas you can only access using explosive barrells.

i remember what the tnt barrels look like from Book 2, and i got her now.

still, i am running out of stuff i can kill, those fly swarms in the swamps i can only handle one at a time, i am dead if 2 of them corners me, not to mention the slimes in the forest (i used Lilith as a shield on the beach area).

 

[Unkillable Cat]

The Dwarf Foreman in the mine seems to have some nice treasure, I don't think anyone will miss him...

 

[Luzur]

The Dwarf Foreman in the mine seems to have some nice treasure, I don't think anyone will miss him...

i already swindled him, didnt have that kind of phat loot, also made some way into the Guild (figuring out the way to open it and tnt'ing the residents like a pro), but the second level is way over my head without tnt barrels.

 

[muds_animal_friend]

He's tough though. Disappointed with Book III so far. It seems very linear. Even one of the side quests was in fact part of the main quest. Quit after reaching the second half of Moonrise with the intention of doing something more productive instead but then I rolled some really great stats on the Book II character creation screen ...

 

[Baron Dupek]

I restarted my Book II because archery wasn't that good. Should come with magic instead of cheap, broken weapons that can't hit shit.
Still liked it, mostly for exploration.

Tried to get Book III but seems that I should pass...

 

[Hobo Elf]

Archery is good, but the problem is that you can't merely focus on it. To be able to succeed with melee and ranged characters to a greater degree you have to have some complementary magic to go with it. Predator Sight and Dense Nimbus are important, I find.

 

[StaticSpine]

what is gameplay similar too? are the games long and tedious?

Gameplay is exactly the same it's just that the world and quest design is so much worse compared to Book 2.

I'm not familiar with the series and the site is down so I can't try the demo version, that's why I'm asking.

 

[DalekFlay]

I really liked Eschalon 2. Looking forward to getting this at some point when I feel more like playing video games again.

They're definitely explore-fag games. Luckily I am an explore-fag.

 

[Major_Blackhart]

I too enjoy good exploration.

 

[Daemongar]

I completed 1 and made a bit of headway through 2 but I'm getting some bad vibes on 3. What is the verdict on 3? Is it a patch away from GOTY or is it a failure?

 

[Unkillable Cat]

I'm hearing terms like "rushed" and "lack of sidequests" used for Book 3.

Doesn't exactly bode well, though I doubt it'll be a disaster on a Mass Effect 3 scale. Could possibly be an Eye of the Beholder 3 scenario.

EDIT: Still no word on when their website will be up. The most recent update from Basilisk Games gives no ETA, it's all GoDaddy's fault and ineptitude from here on.

 

[Yoshiyyahu]

Did anyone find the Spring? I have the 3 other items, bolt, wedge and fence-looking thing, but I cannot find the Spring anywhere.

Nvm I literally just figured it out. Kinda bullshitty how it was hidden, but oh well. Dat old skool hardcore design, eh?

Edit: And then the game just kind of ended. Meh. I felt like I was in the final stretch of the game, but the ending just came so suddenly I didn't even expect it. The whole game just felt rushed. This is certainly the weakest entry of the series.

What's the password for the tree thingy in Elderoak Forest? Is this what I am supposed to do to get to the Astral plane or whatever it is called?

 

[Hobo Elf]

Did anyone find the Spring? I have the 3 other items, bolt, wedge and fence-looking thing, but I cannot find the Spring anywhere.

Nvm I literally just figured it out. Kinda bullshitty how it was hidden, but oh well. Dat old skool hardcore design, eh?

Edit: And then the game just kind of ended. Meh. I felt like I was in the final stretch of the game, but the ending just came so suddenly I didn't even expect it. The whole game just felt rushed. This is certainly the weakest entry of the series.

What's the password for the tree thingy in Elderoak Forest? Is this what I am supposed to do to get to the Astral plane or whatever it is called?

No, you need to find all 4 widgets to get to the mountain area. Figuring out the password will lead you

Spoiler

to the other half of the druid's dungeon.

The answer is

Spoiler

Spirits. If you talk to the ranger leader he will give you a quest and a piece of paper with a rhyme on it. You can buy/find a book with the same passage as in the paper as well as the answer.

I completed 1 and made a bit of headway through 2 but I'm getting some bad vibes on 3. What is the verdict on 3? Is it a patch away from GOTY or is it a failure?

Well unless they patch in new regions, side quests and dungeons then a simple bug fix isn't going to cut it. It took them 3 years to make this game, a game they already had a familiar game engine to use and all the assets and resources done as well. Hardly anything new was added. Took me 16 hours to beat the game with 4-5 hours being aimless wandering due to how cryptic the main quest was. Something tells me that they only worked on Book 3 as a side project just to finish the trilogy and are concentrating all time and effort on their new projects. If this is the way Basilisk wants to treat their games then I guess piracy will be the only answer for their future games.

 

[Yoshiyyahu]

Did anyone find the Spring? I have the 3 other items, bolt, wedge and fence-looking thing, but I cannot find the Spring anywhere.

Nvm I literally just figured it out. Kinda bullshitty how it was hidden, but oh well. Dat old skool hardcore design, eh?

Edit: And then the game just kind of ended. Meh. I felt like I was in the final stretch of the game, but the ending just came so suddenly I didn't even expect it. The whole game just felt rushed. This is certainly the weakest entry of the series.

What's the password for the tree thingy in Elderoak Forest? Is this what I am supposed to do to get to the Astral plane or whatever it is called?

No, you need to find all 4 widgets to get to the mountain area. Figuring out the password will lead you

Spoiler

to the other half of the druid's dungeon.

The answer is

Spoiler

Spirits. If you talk to the ranger leader he will give you a quest and a piece of paper with a rhyme on it. You can buy/find a book with the same passage as in the paper as well as the answer.

I completed 1 and made a bit of headway through 2 but I'm getting some bad vibes on 3. What is the verdict on 3? Is it a patch away from GOTY or is it a failure?

Well unless they patch in new regions, side quests and dungeons then a simple bug fix isn't going to cut it. It took them 3 years to make this game, a game they already had a familiar game engine to use and all the assets and resources done as well. Hardly anything new was added. Took me 16 hours to beat the game with 4-5 hours being aimless wandering due to how cryptic the main quest was. Something tells me that they only worked on Book 3 as a side project just to finish the trilogy and are concentrating all time and effort on their new projects. If this is the way Basilisk wants to treat their games then I guess piracy will be the only answer for their future games.

Tyvm. I found one of the widgets but I had no idea what to do with them. I lost track of the main quest so I started wandering around, trying to find a way to the Astral planes or w/e.

 

[Zed]

I was gonna buy this but people say it's worse than previous games in the series, and I found the Book II demo to be dull as hell. Never has exploring towns been as boring as in that game. Huge locations filled with nothing.

Still, I like how the game executes the TB combat. It looks pretty fun.
I guess I'll wait for a sale or something.

 

[Gord]

Hm, doesn't sound too well. I was looking forward to it, but now I wonder if I shouldn't wait for a sale.
If it feels rushed and empty although they delayed it several times (I think by about half a year in the end), something's wrong, imho.

Probably I'll just replay Book 2...

 

[muds_animal_friend]

Huge locations filled with nothing.

In so far as I'e played it, Book III is practically bursting at the seams with ... nothing. If you didn't like Book II you won't like Book III. The gameplay is exactly the same (at least Book II added some survival elements Book I lacked). I actually prefer Book I over Book III so far.

 

[V_K]

I think most gripes people have with Book 3 (and Eschalon series in general) come from inadequate expectations. People see isometric perspective, open world and towns and expect the game to be a "classical RPG" - while in fact it's just a thinly disguised dungeon crawl. And as a dungeon crawl Book 3 is probably the best one in the series because they finally realised where the game really shines (exploration) and put it in the center of everything. You literally have to search every nook and cranny to get anywhere - and personally I love it. But I can kinda see why some may find it confusing and/or exhausting.

As for other issues:
Sidequests too few and uninspired - exactly as in previous two parts.
World too small - about the size of Book 1, and I'd take it over the empty planes of Book 2 any time. The ending does feel rushed though.
Linear - not quite true, it's less open than previous two, but you still can do certain things differently and visit certain places out of order (if you can survive them of course).

 

[Gord]

So for someone who liked Book 1/2, prefering Book 2 and didn't feel that either book has been particularly empty (rather somewhat plausible), is Book 3 worth getting at the current price or should I rather wait for a sale, since it's noticeably worse than Book 2?

 

[Hobo Elf]

Wait for the sale unless you are really hurting for games to play.

I think most gripes people have with Book 3 (and Eschalon series in general) come from inadequate expectations. People see isometric perspective, open world and towns and expect the game to be a "classical RPG" - while in fact it's just a thinly disguised dungeon crawl. And as a dungeon crawl Book 3 is probably the best one in the series because they finally realised where the game really shines (exploration) and put it in the center of everything. You literally have to search every nook and cranny to get anywhere - and personally I love it. But I can kinda see why some may find it confusing and/or exhausting.

Yeah but the game fails completely at exploration. The problem being exactly that you have to search every nook and cranny to beat the game. That leaves you with nothing more to see in future plays. In a real exploration game, like Gothic, I'm still stumbling upon things I never saw even after my 100th playthrough. You think you are thorough but then there's always something new to be found.

You feel like you are mr.smartypants because you stumbled upon a little area and manage to figure out the sometimes obscure puzzle, but then that feeling of triumph can sour up when you realize that every single moment like this is directly tied to the main quest and there's hardly anything optional out there to discover. You are essentially discovering the all the rides in a amusement park. Congrats.

 

[V_K]

Well personally I think that Book 3 is noticeably better than Book 2, but I seem to be in the minority. It's shorter and less ambitious, but for a game like that it's actually a good thing. Also much more puzzle-heavy, and those puzzles are harder - might be not to everyone's taste. So it's your call.

Yeah but the game fails completely at exploration. The problem being exactly that you have to search every nook and cranny to beat the game. That leaves you with nothing more to see in future plays. In a real exploration game, like Gothic, I'm still stumbling upon things I never saw even after my 100th playthrough.

To be honest, I find Gothic boring as fuck exploration-wise because of tiny gameworld and no real incentive to explore. So I guess here we have a severe case of "to each his own" . Also it's always much easier to explore everything in one playthrough in a 2D tile-based game than in 3D one, so it's not exactly fair to compare them.

You feel like you are mr.smartypants because you stumbled upon a little area and manage to figure out the sometimes obscure puzzle, but then that feeling of triumph can sour up when you realize that every single moment like this is directly tied to the main quest and there's hardly anything optional out there to discover.

Actually, no, there's quite a bit of optional content in Book 3 - it's just that you can never tell if it's optional or not until you piece everything together. For me it adds to the fun (also it's more old-school ), but I can kinda understand why for someone it may not.

 

[Hobo Elf]

I wouldn't call the world of Gothic tiny. It may not have the raw land mass as a generic TES game, but it's sheer quality every step of the road. The size of the world is magnified due to the quality of POI's that you can find around the world. Most of it is meaningful and fun. As another extreme I'll use the more recent TES games where you have a huge land filled with nothing but generic procedurally generated content. In the end it feels flat, boring and really claustrophobic because it's all the same lifeless shit.
I'd be interested to know what exactly do you consider to be good incentive to explore seeing how Gothic is one of the rare cases where exploration actually does reward you in meaningful ways.

Also, a game's exploration isn't automatically better if its in 3D. Baldur's Gate, Fallout, Arcanum, Divine Divinity, Vogel's games; they are all 2D and yet they have lots of exploration going on for them. Much more than most 3D games.

 

[V_K]

I'd be interested to know what exactly do you consider to be good incentive to explore seeing how Gothic is one of the rare cases where exploration actually does reward you in meaningful ways.

Three things:
1) Relevance to the plot. I like adventure-style plots where you're not given exact instructions, but have a rather vague goal and must explore the world to find clues and means to achieve it. Think later Wizardries or Magic Candle games.
2) Environmental puzzles. Kinda like the above, only on smaller scale. See that locked door? Now try to figure out a way to open it. Gets me every time .
3) Emergent narratives, esp. when they are tied to the world's lore or plot.
Now my memory of Gothics is quite rusty, but IIRC of those three Gothic maybe does the third - and it's not very good at it. At best you just get some loot or crafting components - and I'm the opposite of a hoarder.