Finally played this after picking it up at the Christmas sale. Very impressed overall.
It's an interestingly "lite" RPG - sometimes to its detriment, sometimes not. It's thus interesting that it's had a lot of Codex attention and seems to have overall redeemed HBS here, and I've been thinking a bit about what it does right, particularly compared to the other games this year.
The writing grabbed my attention quickly, despite it being seemingly full of pitfalls. The setting is fucking idiotic (especially the stupid Cthulhu bullshit Jesus Christ) but for some reason it's growing on me even though I should know better. The companions are Biowarean to a fault, if better-written; Glory, the cold and distant young girl who must be coddled into opening up about her tragic past at the hands of the intolerant patriarchy and a string of evil manipulative cis men. Eiger, the tough military veteran who eventually softens up and reveals why she can't trust some unproven rookie, but eventually comes to respect you. Dietrich... actually, Dietrich just fucking owns. Blitz mostly just seems like a manager ran into the room at one point and shouted "WE'RE RELEASING IN A MONTH AND YOU FORGOT A DECKER NPC YOU IDIOTS". Still, I liked them all. It wears its tropes and influences on its sleeve, but for some reason it all fits with the game's pulpy, not-altogether-taking-itself-seriously vibe. I actually cared about Glory (once she started actually fucking hitting stuff anyway urrrrgh), I wanted to prove a good leader and get Eiger's respect, and I want to get drunk with Dietrich and talk about smashing the system. It all works. I guess that's the difference between being a good pulp writer who knows the medium and how to use it, and being a fat cat lady company who hate video games and want to make
very serious and artistic Joss Whedon films.
Same with the plot. I think, overall, it was a mistake that the overarching story was set up as stopping a big bad evil dragon. I didn't give a shit, and I know that everything wasn't as it seemed, of course it wasn't, but that still means I spent 90% of the game not giving the slightest shit about the main story arc. That's stupid. The end few missions were fun, though, and everything up to that point worked as a superb excuse for the meat of the game; exploring Berlin, getting to know the Kreuzusausage, and doing dirty deeds for money. And it was extremely my shit.
The setting and atmosphere were extremely well-done, and the dialogue and individual stories of the runs were consistently excellent. In particular, some of the diplomatic solutions are extremely well-done; thinking in particular of Marta and Vauclair. They're not as simple as having the right skills and options available; you need to have paid attention to items, other dialogues and computer logs to know the right things to say, and then approach the conversation in a way that convinces the person. I had to reload once or twice to convince Marta despite having taken all the necessary steps, simply because I pissed off either her or Glory by saying the wrong thing. I never
did convince Vauclair. That's good stuff. The choices were consistently morally grey in ways that weren't usually stupid, albeit generally lacking consequences. This didn't bother me as much as it usually does, more on that later.
The combat wasn't anything amazing, but I enjoyed it a lot - in particular, Wasteland 2 is downright embarassing by comparison. Usually short and to the point, with fun skill synergy and a good range of options, I can imagine it playing out very differently if I go back through with a different character and team. It was consistently fun and satisfying. The endgame was short on challenge as RPGs often are, degenerating into what Gozma (I think) called "a showcase of look at what my cool RPG mans can do", but that's fine when it's done rewardingly. And lining up and killing four people at once with three chain shots in one round was very, very rewarding.
One problem I had - I'm new to Shadowrun, so I don't know if my build was just inefficient, but I was playing as a ranged/melee Street Samurai without too many other skills (body, some biotech and charisma for dialogue checks), and I had to give up putting karma into melee about halfway through, as it was the only way I was going to get level 7 in pistol for chain shot. I don't know if that's normal or if Dragonfall is just a bit stingy on the karma front, but I've seen people say DMS gave out more, and coming back from - say - Blitz's mission with no monetary reward for a measly 2 karma definitely stung a bit.
The art and sound design are gorgeous, barring a few ugly portraits/character models (Lofwyr's giant fuckin nose wtf
). The environments sometimes looked a wee bit too sterile, but I guess that could be an intentional decision. Consistent and pretty, not much else to say. The soundtrack was great and fit the mood perfectly.
The quest design - tied in with the writing, which is why I put it several paragraphs later, eat my dick - is easily the game's strongest suit. Filled with multiple paths, making good use of the Matrix (though I feel like the Matrix itself is a bit limited - maybe you can do more as a player Decker? Either way, HBS seem determined to improve and overhaul this area in Hong Kong), with non-lethal options, skill choices abounding, optional objectives, side jobs for the Lodge and the Schoggerdoobies, all the good shit. Other than one fairly anemic sewer quest where I wandered backwards and forwards shooting boring ghouls to turn boring switches for what felt like hours but was probably only about 20 minutes, I guess, which is yet more proof that sewer levels are fucking terrible even in otherwise great games. Other than that, the quest design encapsulates the game's less-is-more design; it works very well within the limited systems it has, meaning that there's no filler, no bullshit, just minute-by-minute straightforward, good, varied content. I don't have as much time as I used to for gaming so I appreciate this a lot; wouldn't want every game to be that way, but I'm glad some are. There were strong hands guiding this project and everything has been placed and done very deliberately; the opposite of the feel I get from the bloated and flawed Wasteland 2, which I
did like well enough.
Back to the elephant in the Matrix, then. The design. I've seen HBS' games dismissed as "tablet RPG-lites" many times, and frankly, I understand the criticism completely. Everything is simple and straightforward, often frustratingly so. The party system is caught in a weird limbo between party-based and single-character and can't seem to make up its mind which it wants to be; henchmen can pick up items as long as they're in combat, but not otherwise, and you can't offer to give them anything. You can "loan" them items from your "stash" at the start of each mission and that's it. You don't control what they put points into. Oh, you want Dietrich to be able to cast fireball? Too bad, he's not levelling spellcasting today, he's levelling throwing weapons instead.
Some panels and computers in the world let you step aside so Blitz can hack them, but not all. Why? Because HBS doesn't feel like giving you a freebie on that one. It's a very artificial and frustrating limitation that consistently makes the player feel like he's not really controlling a full party. Environmental interaction is similarly limited. You can blow some stuff up but not other stuff. You can summon spirits from some things but not what looks like the same fucking thing to me. You get the picture. Similarly, the interface is rather poor and limited, and isn't always consistent in what buttons do what - it's very obviously designed with tablets in mind.
The good news is that HBS seem to have taken all of this into account and are promising to improve upon it for Hong Kong. In line with the improvements that seem to have been made from DMS to Dragonfall, that speaks very good news about a young developer eager to listen to feedback and improve its games based on criticism; if this keeps up, and if Hong Kong is the same improvement upon Dragonfall that Dragonfall was on DMS, then it'll be the best £15 I've spent in a long time.
In short: 8/10, makes Brian Fargo cry, not as good as Original Sin but closer than expected
as to how people preferred D:OS.
last 5 quests were just me running from one "active icon" to next one throwing shitty looking spells in the meantime. Maybe i chose shitty class (elf/Mage) but waiting 4 rounds to cast another fireball is just fucking shit.
