Game News Age of Decadence Released on Steam Early Access

[LundB]

He makes some good points in the second part of that review, it's not necessarily very pleasant to be constantly confronted to binary choices in order to progress to further along the way, to then inevitably be confronted with a situation requiring a skill that you don't have, and to be practically guaranteed to die because of this. It feels like a series of continuously cheap dead ends. That's not what I would call rewarding gameplay.

Playing the demo, I've been noticing this. To be honest, the game feels a lot more like Long Live the Queen than say, Fallout. There's a big difference between needing to make an intelligent character build and needing to metagame to figure out the puzzle of what exact stat to raise at what exact time. I'm not sure the latter makes a game more of a 'hardcore RPG' (if it does, I heartily recommend Long Live the Queen to all AoD fans as an incredibly hardcore RPG). I'm not far enough along yet to decide whether or not I like the game personally, and while it doesn't make something a hardcore RPG I also don't think the Long Live the Queen-esque system makes a game inherently bad, but I definitely think it's a bit derp to dismiss anyone's complaints about the way things work as them 'not understanding how to play a hardcore RPG'.

 

[Bubbles]

If this was meant to be a Fallout clone, things must have gone wrong very early on.

Does Long Live the Queen give you much choice in terms of side quests or being able to use multiple different skills to get past a situation (various combat skills vs. negotiate vs. hide vs. run away etc.)? Stuff like being stuck in a 1-to-20 odds situation in combat and spending three hours to squeeze out a win strikes me as very different, gameplay wise, to a pure stat checking game.

 

[LundB]

Does Long Live the Queen give you much choice in terms of side quests or being able to use multiple different skills to get past a situation (various combat skills vs. negotiate vs. hide vs. run away etc.)?

Yes, often there are multiple skillcheck 'options' to get past the same situation, or sometimes failing one will lead you to a chance at passing another, which will provide a different outcome than passing the first or failing both.

TBH I see both as more puzzle-game than RPG in many ways.

 

[Jack Dandy]

I'll have to second LundB- couldn't find a way to get my point across so far.

It's a shame too, because I think the setting is very interesting and the writing is cool.

 

[Johannes]

Long Live the Queen seems interesting. There, it seems to me, the gameplay is all about maximising and optimising your skill gain patterns, with lots of variables. And the theme of the game suits that very well, as a young queen who has to decide what to focus her, what to learn. This is good, at least on paper as I've yet to try the game.


But for AoD it doesn't work as well - the core gameplay appears to be turn based combat, and otherwise navigating your way through a dangerous world. But in reality the main challenge is about assigning skill points in just the correct sequence to pass the skill checks presented to you. Cleverly noting stuff and hints the game gives you, is secondary, since it's only hard on the first try, and the game is so hard that any character, even a smartly played one, is bound to fail constantly unless given prescience by earlier tries of the player.
And it doesn't fit the narrative of the game like it does in Long Live the Queen, or say, Quest for Glory, since your character is actually never pausing to practice the skills he gains. The players constant want for more skill points is not in line with whatever motives the character would realistically have. Of course, this would be a common complaint against RPGs without learn-by-use systems, but it's most striking here when you can play non-combat to such a degree, and the world tries to present itself as realistic and gritty. In a heroic game it is in line with the narrative better that the character gains a powerup by simply slaying enemies, than here.

 

[Black]

The first reviews are in! So exciting!!!

http://attackofthefanboy.com/reviews/age-decadence-review/
"The Verdict: I don’t want to ‘master the system’ I want to play the game. I just wish The Age of Decadence would let you do that."

wish you had gotten this, huh?! Better learn from Oblivion 3 III developers.

 

[Tigranes]

So, impressions. I played R1 extensively and experienced the learning curve, until I could finish that demo with most characters; now I've played through R4 with several abortive characters, and finished with a typical combat-oriented assassin (Dagger/Dodge). Long story short: I see no major revolutions from 18 months ago, but I do see that just about every change made is for the better, and the game comes together much more as a complete product. It does look like there's more work to be done in Maadoran and probably later parts of the game.

Quests / Writing
Teron is in large strokes the same as R1, from what I remember - still good, still the paragon of reactivity made all the more interesting by every character class covering every different angle of one main plot. Maadoran feels like it is more empty (mainly due to large buildings and the scale issue, but consider for instance how soulless 'Noble Homes' area feels), but I need to play with more characters to see what I missed and how it pans out differently.

It's interesting that the writing is done very well in the micro-level characterisation, i.e. why x is a pragmatic bastard in a very specific way and why they do what they do, but in terms of plot, you go through Teron and you go through Maadoran and you still feel like there's not much of a big story - whether 'epic' or not - which gives you a sense of where the world is moving. There's a power struggle between the lords and factions, but not a specific plot or specific event that it is leading up to, for a lot of the time you play in R4. I think that is a significant weakness; when we could only play Teron it felt like Maadoran would ramp things up, but when you play Maadoran it feels like things are deferred to Ganezzar.

In fact, I'm convinced that I just didn't read something VD posted, and that Maadoran is not feature complete - fighting in the Arena takes basically over 50% of the game-time there, and my combat-oriented assassin wracked up ~9000 gold ere the end with nowhere to spend it on, the only selection of merchants selling the same things as Teron, and no alchemical ingredients & only one batch of crafting materials available. I can't imagine this is how it will be on release.

Combat / Difficulty
As an assassin, coming back into it 18 months after R1, it was still quite difficult to beat fights with a combat-oriented character. Which is fine. I'm not sure myself what the best balance is. On one hand, if you focus SPs on combat and you've died a couple dozen times while learning the game, you can make it through. On the other hand, I think a lot of players will have a pretty legitimate point of frustration: I've reloaded several times, I think I understand how the game rules work now, I've built a combat oriented character, but now I'm at a stage where it feels like I'm not strong enough to force a combat resolution with Miltiades' ambush, the thugs behind the tavern, the refugees, the beggar-bait, the bandit camp or the outpost.

In other words, it's all good saying you shouldn't expect every fight to be winnable and sometimes you should run away or seek a cowardly resolution, I'm all for that. But I can also see how it sucks if you build a combat character, you don't do that so that you're too weak and pussy out of all the fights, you do it so you can get into difficult but winnable fights more than half of the time.

Obviously, this depends on player competence. I remember in R1 about ten characters got into this bottleneck but once I 'mastered' how it all worked I could build characters that are really a force (though still not unbeatable). Basically, the question becomes this: for a combat character to be decent but not all-conquering in AOD combat, how many reloads and restarts do you need? Right now, I expect it'll be dozens of reloads and several characters for many players. Is that by design? And, separately, is that good design?

I personally enjoy the current difficulty, but I'm willing to reload dozens of times in other games, and I have a personal enthusiasm for AOD that makes me want to grow to like it. The most obvious solution is keep the current difficulty and introduce a slightly easier one, but I know VD in the past has said hell no to that.

It does feel like THC has been modfiied a little bit so that both you and your enemies aren't swinging in empty air as often, which is great.

Flow
Or, teleportation. Long story short, apart from minor areas I think it's now basically a non-issue; there are enough options to opt out of it and enough transition screens.

UI / Polish
Better than R1. Not immeasurably so, but any improvement is a good one and it's getting close to release-ready in my view. Still some bits and pieces, most of which I'm sure has been mentioned:

• Character creation: the character model is still far too dark. The skill tooltip should be visible when hovering over the +/- icons, too. A 'click' effect when selecting backgrounds is needed. Huge gap in the middle in the first screen.
• Dialogue screen: the text wraps a little too close to the scroll-bar when the latter does appear, there should be a little more of a gap. The gold text and the options text again run too close to the top corners of that box. The dots between each option looks odd and is not necessary. If you really want it, use a dot that is central, not a period.
• Trade/loot screen: great, but right-click should close the window.
• Traits & Ranks have no tooltips.

Bugs / Performance

• If you scare Rhaskos away with Streetwise, then choose to go get some poison, there's no dialogue option to get the poison from the Assassin's Guild alchemist, and the journal still shows 'talk to Rhaskos'.
• If you fail the Critical Strike check on the bandits outside Teron and get beaten up, it says you get 5 points in Dodge - but what does that mean in the new 1-10 system?
• The plain turban worn by one of the thieves in Levir(?)'s enclave has no icon graphic.
• Quest flags for 'talk to darista', both Reporting In and The Black Widow, don't disappear after you talk to her.
• Game crashes occasionally, often when going into menu or the map; when it does the game instance stays and has to be manually killed, otherwise slowing the computer down. Loading times are also a little long.
• A few typos - e.g. the house between the assassin's guild and the healer in Maadoran spells 'deliveries' wrong on the door tooltip, and the Basil / etc quest dialogues have some missing punctuation.

Next is a scoundrel / swindler Praetor.

 

[J_C]

Holy shit this is amazingly awful:

My first issue with the game (and there are many thus far) lies in the descriptor. Why bill a game as a ‘low magic , post-apocalyptic fantasy world, inspired by the fall of the Roman empire’ when there is no magic and the the definition of post-apocalyptic has been stretched to mean ‘post-war’?

So let's see.
Low magic: the magic in the game is very rare, it is not pushed into your face, but there are talks about demons, and there are places where it is hinted at you that there are mysterious devices and magic. So low magic check.
Post apocalyptic: ummm, so AoD is not post-apocalytic, but post war. Than Fallout also must be post war, since we are after a great war. Fucking retard, post apocalyptic doesn't always mean a nuclear or zombie apocalyptic. In AoD, the world is destroyed in a great war, ala Fallout. So post apocalyptic check.

At this stage in game development and marketing, titles such as Fallout, , Rage, and Last of Us, terms like ‘post-apocalyptic’ carry with them a weight of expectation.

Fucking what? So as I thought, post-apocalyptic must mean nuclear war or zombies.

I regularly play through titles on harder settings for a challenge, and there are some fairly simple ways to increase difficulty without it feeling like the AI is unreasonably strong.

Correct me if I'm wrong, but the Awesome button difficulty is stiill in the game right? Then fucking use it you imbicle!

My pre-made character died in his first fight, in the first round,

GOOD FUCKING RIDDANCE

Knowing that the game is designed to be hard, and expects players to invest in their character’s appropriate skillset, I rolled a rogue and made sure I had good sneak, steal and lockpick abilities, raised my dodge skill, and ignored things like craft and lore. Feeling better suited to explore the world of AoD, I headed out and successfully completed the introductory mission – infiltrate a merchant’s room and steal their stuff. My next mission involved persuading some guards to look the other way while the thieve’s guild moved some contraband. Oops…I didn’t have any points in streetwise or persuade, which meant I had to try to steal a document. No problem, I’m a thief. Oops again…I need a disguise skill to be able to steal the document. I failed, despite my relatively high steal skill, and was forced to run away. Oops again! My Dexterity isn’t high enough for me to be able to run away, so I die.

So you were a thief, but didn't have anything but stealing. No disguise, no streetwise, no persuade. Go play some more Skyrim, where Thiefing is a one skill class. The only thing I agree with is that mission dialogues should have some hints about the the need of certain skills. ("My good lad, there must be some armor or clothes you can use to blend in with the guards if you would like)

 

[Infinitron]

All the people whining about difficulty should consider the fact that the game might become considerably easier later on, once your character has reached a certain threshold of competence. Learn how to survive the harsh early game, go on to become a powerhouse.

(Can Vault Dweller confirm this?)

the character model is still far too dark.

Turn off HDR.

 

[hiver]

But for AoD it doesn't work as well - the core gameplay appears to be turn based combat, and otherwise navigating your way through a dangerous world. But in reality the main challenge is about assigning skill points in just the correct sequence to pass the skill checks presented to you.

Not if youre playing a combat build its not. -edit- (well, except the combat skill checks)

Cleverly noting stuff and hints the game gives you, is secondary, since it's only hard on the first try,

Never noticed that its much easier on consequent playthroughs myself. - (in combat, that is)

and the game is so hard that any character, even a smartly played one, is bound to fail constantly unless given prescience by earlier tries of the player.

Youre bound to fail even with prescience.

And it doesn't fit the narrative of the game

What, with a narrative of a brutal and dangerous world where youre not the chosen one?

like it does in Long Live the Queen, or say, Quest for Glory, since your character is actually never pausing to practice the skills he gains.

Because in this game you are not a manager of some club, association, group, faction, or society?

The players constant want for more skill points is not in line with whatever motives the character would realistically have.

So...you uh... dont want to develop and improve whatever skills and knowledge you have in real life?

Of course, this would be a common complaint against RPGs without learn-by-use systems, but it's most striking here when you can play non-combat to such a degree, and the world tries to present itself as realistic and gritty.

And succeeds in that in its own abstracted way very well, as ive explained above.

In a heroic game it is in line with the narrative better that the character gains a powerup by simply slaying enemies, than here.

Yeah, here there is no "power ups" since you always run into a "power downer"

Since youre not supposed to be the "power one" at all.

All the people whining about difficulty should consider the fact that the game might become considerably easier later on, once your character has reached a certain threshold of competence. Learn how to survive the harsh early game, go on to become a powerhouse.

(Can Vault Dweller confirm this?)

I highly doubt it

Better yes, but a "powerhouse"? I just dont see it.

 

[ColCol]

I don't know, the game is difficult, but at the same time I can beat all but one of the combat encounters in the demo. I don't feel I ever optimized (or had to optimize) my characters.

 

[felipepepe]

Not really speaking to the particular difficulty of AoD, but people blaming the very nature of chance on a game's flaws or bugs always pisses me off. In XCOM, I've had back to back 95% shots miss, and more than once. The sort of chances you're talking about aren't even unusual, that's a fairly average failure. 60% is barely better odds than even. For every time that you notice "unfair" rolls, I guarantee the CPU had just as many bad outcomes itself. You just didn't notice them, or chalked them up to your own superior planning/skills.

Funny you talk about XCOM. Here's a popamole whining about Nu XCOM:

Why do posters here like the randomness in this game? Even the lead designer says "That's XCOM" when a very low-percentage shot hits or a very high-percentage shot misses.

The fact that the game boils down to a random number generator takes away ALL the tactics .
I've had times where I critted 2 different enemies through high cover, and I've had times where 1 low rankinig mook killed 2 of my guys. I never get the feeling I'm out-smarting my enemy, it always boils down to dumb luck and odds.

The Nu XCOM team saw that popamoles are extremely frustrated by rolls, so it decided to lie to people. When you're playing on fucking NORMAL and on Easy, the game actually increases your % to hit (if it displays 60, it's actually 70%), and has a "no frustration" measure:

"On Normal and Easy modes, there's a bad streak breaker," says Gupta. "It's stronger on easy. On Easy, it's very hard to actually lose soldiers, and the fewer soldiers you have the stronger this effect becomes, so if you start losing it builds to compensate. Of course, the aliens themselves have weaker stats on Easy and Normal too, and on Classic or higher difficulty settings this effect doesn't exist. Believe me though, on Easy, if you miss three times in a row you're not going to miss your fourth shot. It can be a 1% chance to hit and you're not going to miss that shot."

AWESHUM, eh? Is this you want, UnknownBro ?

 

[Infinitron]

Vault Dweller You need to update the DOWNLOAD THE PUBLIC BETA link on your homepage: http://www.irontowerstudio.com/

Also, have you considered updating the game's Wikipedia article?

 

[Zeriel]

Not really speaking to the particular difficulty of AoD, but people blaming the very nature of chance on a game's flaws or bugs always pisses me off. In XCOM, I've had back to back 95% shots miss, and more than once. The sort of chances you're talking about aren't even unusual, that's a fairly average failure. 60% is barely better odds than even. For every time that you notice "unfair" rolls, I guarantee the CPU had just as many bad outcomes itself. You just didn't notice them, or chalked them up to your own superior planning/skills.

Funny you talk about XCOM. Here's a popamole whining about Nu XCOM:

Why do posters here like the randomness in this game? Even the lead designer says "That's XCOM" when a very low-percentage shot hits or a very high-percentage shot misses.

The fact that the game boils down to a random number generator takes away ALL the tactics .
I've had times where I critted 2 different enemies through high cover, and I've had times where 1 low rankinig mook killed 2 of my guys. I never get the feeling I'm out-smarting my enemy, it always boils down to dumb luck and odds.

The Nu XCOM team saw that popamoles are extremely frustrated by rolls, so it decided to lie to people. When you're playing on fucking NORMAL and on Easy, the game actually increases your % to hit (if it displays 60, it's actually 70%), and has a "no frustration" measure:

"On Normal and Easy modes, there's a bad streak breaker," says Gupta. "It's stronger on easy. On Easy, it's very hard to actually lose soldiers, and the fewer soldiers you have the stronger this effect becomes, so if you start losing it builds to compensate. Of course, the aliens themselves have weaker stats on Easy and Normal too, and on Classic or higher difficulty settings this effect doesn't exist. Believe me though, on Easy, if you miss three times in a row you're not going to miss your fourth shot. It can be a 1% chance to hit and you're not going to miss that shot."

AWESHUM, eh? Is this you want, UnknownBro ?

I only play on Classic, and I remember reading a lot of threads complaining about how the RNG was "unfair" after release. Having seen the RNG go both ways, it kind of pisses me off. People never complain about when the RNG dice rolls go their way in the same, equally ridiculous manner (in XCOM, this is leaving a rookie out in the open and all the aliens miss him, which I have had happen more than once).

 

[Zetor]

City of Heroes' streakbreaker was an OK 'RNG-busting' implementation. In the end, it reduced frustration, and - since it applied to enemies as well - didn't make the game easier at all.

 

[serch]

Well, I'm playing an unoptimized mercenary build (int of 8 to get a taste of alchemy, crafting and lore). Last time I played in Teron (with a better fighter) I had to opt out of one of the two first fights (assassins or ruffians) as I didn't have the HP to do both. Now, with the healing salves and venom that basic alchemy provides you (I know is demo cheating) I can beat all of them, so I wouldn't say difficulty have increased. It's basically the same for me you just have to run when appropriate.

 

[Gozma]

haven't played anything since the combat demo, waiting for the whole show before I buy, we exist

 

[Jim the Dinosaur]

Where do you stop? Do I make it easier just for you? How about the guy who's a bit less experienced? For him too? Someone new to RPGs? Why not, eh? What about his mom and the old lady across the street? Surely they too deserve to know some happiness that comes from crushing your enemies and seeing them driven before you.

I seriously don't see how you can possibly find a slippery slope here. Soccer moms aren't going to be playing your demo or reading reviews of your game, fans of Arcanum and Fallout (like you said, dirt easy games) are for obvious reasons.

he doesn't want the game to be anything else than what it's about.

imagine being a musician and making this awesome rock album. then some idiot takes one of your choruses and remixes it into some shitty dance song for the masses - and you fucking hate dance music AND the masses. how would that make you feel?

C'mon dude, it's not like AoD easy mode is going to make the game appeal to the gaming masses or that adding skill points makes it into a different genre of game.

But then again I wouldn't even care if the possible changes were that radical, because I never really see the problem with offering customizability in just about every aspect of a game, so whatevz.

 

[hiver]

Where do you stop? Do I make it easier just for you? How about the guy who's a bit less experienced? For him too? Someone new to RPGs? Why not, eh? What about his mom and the old lady across the street? Surely they too deserve to know some happiness that comes from crushing your enemies and seeing them driven before you.

I seriously don't see how you can possibly find a slippery slope here. Soccer moms aren't going to be playing your demo or reading reviews of your game, fans of Arcanum and Fallout (like you said, dirt easy games) are for obvious reasons.

As a very big fan of Fallout games i see no problem in playing AOD - as AoD, not Fallout.

Do not use some supposed general group blanket statements as some sort of evidence for anything.

YOU and the few others are asking for YOURSELF. Not for the fans of Fallout or Arcanum.
Because it is YOU who want to devour the "content" of the game WITHOUT applying any effort at all.

C'mon dude, it's not like AoD easy mode is going to make the game appeal to the gaming masses or that adding skill points makes it into a different genre of game.

What? Of course it will.

What that kind of thinking will end up as, is a game whose backbone has been pulled out - a game where none of the skill checks mean anything at all - where there is absolutely no choice to be made - because all of the choices are easy and possible.
Which in the end WILL mean that most of people like you will crap over what was left as unsatisfactory, not engaging enough, not narrated enough, not cool enough, not fantastic enough, not this and not fucking that - forgetting that it was YOU who wanted guts of the game to be pulled out so you wouldnt be fucking bothered.

Forgetting that with disemboweling the game - YOU destroy huge parts of the gameplay that you would supposedly like to experience in the first place.

 

[a cut of domestic sheep prime]

The game is pretty short for a single playthrough. Without any challenge, I think you could make it through the first 60% - shown in the beta - in about 2 hours or so - maybe less.

Really, as long as there is a way to opt out of or run from a fight there should be no problem. Now, some missions practically force it on you - the rather difficult fight against the Dartans in the imperial guard quest line for example, but I think most of them have decent solutions if you plan and think a bit.

Really, so long as players are told beforehand how hard it will be, I don't see a problem. Just communicate it in all your marketing.

I think the difficulty of the first town is about right. Players who have built a crappy character (eg, 10 strg, 10 dex, 4con...and everything into the merchant skill, cuz I'm a merchant!) should see early on that their character sucks my balls and needs to be redone. It's not like they have to get halfway through the game for it.

Also, a lot of gripes seem to come from the many skillchecks and the metagaming required to win them. However, I think that's more of a player mindset problem than anything. People want to pop that mole. They want to win every little challenge. AoD isn't a game like that. AoD is a cruel bitch of a game. You never get the feel of - I'm godlike and can take on anything. It's the complete opposite of power-fantasy games like Geneforge or BG in which the player character ultimately becomes an unstoppable bad ass feared by all. Sure, you get that feeling sometimes, but then a really difficult fight comes along and reminds you that you are just another human. Heck, even if you become the champion of the arena, you are told it's only a matter of time before someone kills you. You are always human, always fighting for your life or running for it. There may be a few nearly unavoidable fights that are too difficult, but I think those should be handled case by case and not with a difficulty slider. If you have to add a slider, make it just add 20 extra hitpoints at most to the PC or something simple like that. A cheat for those who don't want to admit they are cheating.

 

[Infinitron]

It's the complete opposite of power-fantasy games like Geneforge or BG in which the player character ultimately becomes an unstoppable bad ass feared by all.

To be fair, like I said, we haven't seen the late game yet. We have no idea how it's balanced.

 

[a cut of domestic sheep prime]

Eh, I hacked the demo a while back to see how easy it would be with 10 in every stat and I still died if I didn't think. I rather doubt the last 40% of the game will suddenly turn a cakewalk. Could be wrong though. BG and Geneforge get you so powerful that it was almost impossible to lose a fight. Heck, in BG EACH CHARACTER could beat the game singlehandedly and you have a party of 6. :O

 

[Infinitron]

Eh, I hacked the demo a while back to see how easy it would be with 10 in every stat and I still died if I didn't think. I rather doubt the last 40% of the game will suddenly turn a cakewalk. BG and Geneforge get you so powerful that it was almost impossible to lose a fight. Heck, in BG EACH CHARACTER could beat the game singlehandedly and you have a party of 6. :O

I'm not talking just about the fights though. Actually, more about the skill checks. Are the late game skill checks "inflated" so you always need straight 10s despite it not making sense? If not, your character may eventually reach a point where he can pass every check of a skill he's invested in without any worries. Then he can start expanding into other skills. Etc.

 

[Zeriel]

I don't see how that wouldn't be the case. If skill checks didn't eventually require 10s, why would you even be able to raise your skills to 10 in the first place?

More importantly, VD isn't going to suddenly abandon his design philosophy of gating a lot of content behind different character development paths in the endgame.

 

[hiver]

Ive agreed with the Tigranes post above. Its very close to how im coming to see the game overall.

The issue of metagaming a bit too much IS there. But the solution is not to remove it or allow any sort of easy mode.

The solution is to provide more gameplay and to adjust specific situations. For example, playing as Assassin you get only three missions from your guild - if you go and play just that. The third one gets you out of Teron.
I already suggested adding some small missions/quests/tasks that are simply integrated into the game - and into that faction gameplay.

There are other specific things you can pull off that dont get you any SP - that should. Not a lot but some.
And there are things you do that dont have any skill check that should.

I think this needs to be done to adjust the new skill system - since the player would need the option to gather a few more SP while he waits to gather enough points to upgrade a skill. But this needs to be folowed by aproximately equal number of new situations where those skill points would be demanded. This would make all of it more fluid - while it would not make it any easier or less demanding - if done right, which im sure VD and the team can do.