Review RPG Codex Review: Darth Roxor on Disappointment, thy name is Pillars of Eternity

[Lady_Error]

Blaine spent 1000 bucks on Wasteland 2? Why?

Enthusiastic Kickstarter backer.

And Lady Error have you played MMX: Legacy? It's very good, and superior to Wasteland 2

Yep, I loved it. Maybe even more than POE and Wasteland 2.

 

[Vault Dweller]

Nobody really expected fallout or jagged alliance, that a retarded strawman as i already explained so it has no meaning when it comes to quality of the game.

I don't know who expected what (nor do I care). I simply let people know that IF they think this game is like Fallout (whatever they think Fallout is - a serious PA game, a strong role-playing game, a game where you can talk your way past the obstacles, etc) or Jagged Alliance 2 (a squad based game with tactical depth), they might be disappointed.

You made a series of inane assertions how its good based on the fact that you enjoyed it, nothing else...

What else matters?

 

[Kz3r0]

According to Obsidian themselves, they put another million into the game (and got paradox to foot the physical goods bill), so 5 million total.

Which means 4 million is enough funding for a small-to-mid sized Obsidian team for 2 years.

And instead of a better BG you get Poe.

 

[Rake]

I'm still in Defiance Bay, and i dislike combat in this game very much. I agree with almost all of Roxor's and Felipepepe's earlier critisism. But whoever says DA:O is a better game than PoE, is on drugs. (or just edgy). DA:O wins against PoE in a couple of areas (magic, creature abilities,player motivation) but it's combat is even more boring/samey and takes longer, encounter design is the same levels of shit, characters/writing is worse, setting/plot is worse, itemization is worse (and i loath PoE's itemization). Plus, graphics/music/UI is worse as well.
Saying that, Sawyer should had played DA:O before making PoE, in order to know what to not do. PoE is Obsidian's DAO, an IE spiritual successor made for modern audience, and fails in similar ways. But judging by the guy, since DAO is a 10/10 modern masterpiece if you ask the Biodrones, he propably would have copied it even more closely.

 

[Zorba the Hutt]

PoE is Obsidian's DAO, an IE spiritual successor made for modern audience, and fails in similar ways. But judging by the guy, since DAO is a 10/10 modern masterpiece if you ask the Biodrones, he propably would have copied it even more closely.

I'm guessing the next Codex review will be much more positive, as VD's Codex review of DAO described it as a "pretty good role-playing game" but he never fails to rip BG a new one.

 

[Black]

DA:O was Codex's goty of that year.
Never forget.

 

[Hatred]

Normal is fine. I have had several challenging fights during the game. If you think I'm a bad player, you can challenge me to 1x1 on any RTS you want.

If you want to fight people man to man Ireneaus and you are issuing the challenge on the 'dex then it should be in prestigious Turn Based Combat surely. I eagerly await your correction.

 

[Lady_Error]

If you want to fight people man to man Ireneaus and you are issuing the challenge on the 'dex then it should be in prestigious Turn Based Combat surely.

Codex Chess Deathmatch

 

[jewboy]

I just remembered the other thing I hated about DA:O. respawning monsters. My god. DA:O really was the start of the true decline for Biowhore. Jesus. Forgot those morons were actually serious about turning "the spiritual sequel to BG2" into WoW. At least WoW had much more interesting monsters though. Darkspawn...ugh.

It's scary how the once critical VD actually gave DA:O a somewhat good review. VD is such a good writer too at least imho. Such a shame that he adopted a Good For What It Is stance in all his modern reviews except maybe for his glorious DA2 reaming that remains a true work of art in itself.

 

[Shadenuat]

I just remembered the other thing I hated about DA:O. respawning monsters. My god. DA:O really was the start of the true decline for Biowhore.

Wat

DA:O didn't have any respawning monsters.

That thread is about Inquisition.

For a studio that made kotor and jade emprah, DA:O was as inclined as it gets

 

[jewboy]

Oh sorry. Didn't notice that. But that was the other thing I hated about the game. Even if they weren't truly respawning there was such a continuous stream of boring samey monsters to fight, at least in the beginning wilderness areas that it made me ragequit in frustration. And no mods apparently have been created to trim out some of that fat.

 

[valcik]

jewboy:
Respawned monsters bothered me much less than my own party being repositioned before fight. When my rogue was sneaking deep into enemy teritory, while mages stayed behind on well protected spot guarded by warrior, my pofessional approach was completely ruined with first enemy approaching. Suddenly I've lost control of my party, being interrupted by fucking cut-scene; with my party teleported and surrounded by enemies in the most stupid and meaningless spots. This is what pros at Bioware calls a tactical combat? Where's the tactics in this?

 

[jewboy]

PoE is Obsidian's DAO, an IE spiritual successor made for modern audience, and fails in similar ways.

This. Exactly this. The comparisons with the Baldurs Gate series or the Icewind Dale series are ridiculous. Not even close to the same kind of game. It feels different. It plays different. It is different.

 

[ZagorTeNej]

I'm still in Defiance Bay, and i dislike combat in this game very much. I agree with almost all of Roxor's and Felipepepe's earlier critisism. But whoever says DA:O is a better game than PoE, is on drugs. (or just edgy). DA:O wins against PoE in a couple of areas (magic, creature abilities,player motivation) but it's combat is even more boring/samey and takes longer, encounter design is the same levels of shit, characters/writing is worse, setting/plot is worse, itemization is worse (and i loath PoE's itemization). Plus, graphics/music/UI is worse as well.

Here's how I'd break them down (based on my opinion/preferences and experiences with both games obviously).

Advantage PoE:

-Character Creation (attributes, classes, races, backgrounds etc. it absolutely blows DAO away in that regard)
-Character customization
-Skills
-Stat/skill checks
-Reactivity
-Exploration
-Lore
-Setting
-Plot
-Cities and settlements (aside from Orzammar DAO is pretty awful in this aspect)
-Alternate paths
-Better written companions
-Sidequests overall
-Has guns
-Visuals (graphics, art direction etc.) and UI
-No level scaling
-No kewldowns
-Vancian spell system
-Music


Advantage DAO:

-Set piece/boss fights
-Monster abilities
-Magic system and mages
-Trial-like event (don't want to spoil PoE's for you)
-Antagonist (I mean Loghain obviously, not a big bad dragon)
-Overall C&C (people forget how solid DAO was in that aspect)
-No all-powerful crafting
-Origin stories



So I consider PoE to be better overall but depending on how much importance you place on things DAO does better I don't see someone saying he enjoyed DAO more an especially controversial statement. Then again I do consider DAO to be a good game (not great or classic but good), no matter how much Codex flip-flopped on the game it isn't Oblivion and the comparison with it shouldn't be considered as unflattering.

PoE is Obsidian's DAO, an IE spiritual successor made for modern audience, and fails in similar ways.

Yeah, they're both plagued by "has to be more accessible" modern design school dogma and taking inspiration from MMOs (and other multiplayer focused games like Diablo 2 and its clones) when it comes to things like mechanics and itemization.

To me they both feel like modern games in many aspects underneath the old-school facade.

Saying that, Sawyer should had played DA:O before making PoE, in order to know what to not do. But judging by the guy, since DAO is a 10/10 modern masterpiece if you ask the Biodrones, he propably would have copied it even more closely.

You're probably right but the guy does seem to have a chip on his shoulder when it comes to Bioware so there's a possibility he might have tried to differentiate more in order to show how it should be done (in that sense, him playing DAO before PoE developement could have been a good thing).

 

[Athelas]

Seeing the Codex debate the merits of DA:O vs PoE...it brings to a tear to my eye.

A pungent, decline-filled tear.

 

[ZagorTeNej]

Seeing the Codex debate the merits of DA:O vs PoE...it brings to a tear to my eye.

A pungent, decline-filled tear.

You don't see the similarities between them?

 

[Athelas]

Seeing the Codex debate the merits of DA:O vs PoE...it brings to a tear to my eye.

A pungent, decline-filled tear.

You don't see the similarities between them?

I wasn't actually saying one was inferior to the other.

 

[Gangrelrumbler]

They both included big warlike guys as original content donut steel race.

 

[Don Peste]

If any of you speak Spanish, you have to check this out...
https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/40099524/33bits.png

Spoiler

 

[karnak]

If any of you speak Spanish, you have to check this out...
https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/40099524/33bits.png

Spoiler

Your post made me fondly remember "Maniacos del Calabozo" in Micromania magazine.
Even though I'm not spanish I enjoyed seeing that someone was already trying to define a theory and history of RPGs in the early 90s.

 

[hiver]

Nobody really expected fallout or jagged alliance, that a retarded strawman as i already explained so it has no meaning when it comes to quality of the game.

I don't know who expected what (nor do I care).

Why say what you say? Why mention it at all then? Never crossed your mind? Rlly?

I simply let people know that IF they think this game is like Fallout (whatever they think Fallout is - a serious PA game, a strong role-playing game, a game where you can talk your way past the obstacles, etc) or Jagged Alliance 2 (a squad based game with tactical depth), they might be disappointed.

The point is there is no reason to think anyone had actually expected that, (and you say yourself you dont know or care right there) but you still use this to make a point that its a good game if the players dont have those bad expectations.

You made a series of inane assertions how its good based on the fact that you enjoyed it, nothing else...

What else matters?

And there we have it. Indeed, for you, nothing.

So your whole review is what i called it. And every review you ever made, apparently. Be kind and shorten the future ones to "i liked it" or "i didnt like it".

When i see answers like these, once you manage to stop using fallacies in ever sentence, you start to look a bit strange to me, as if you actually believe all that and actually dont even know or see what you are saying...
As this whole thread is literally example of how emotional engagement and levels directly subordinate higher brain functions and logic, so are you and your review.

Every game or anything else ever made is good because someone likes it. Anything at all. That includes BG1 you know. F3, Obliblion, DO:S, any game EA ever made, Mass defect 3 ? Awesome. Throw in every example of horrible shit game as you will. All good.
Someone liked it and thats all that matters. According to that Escher case brain.

-
quoting for posterity.

 

[Seari]

I realize that this is totally off topic (haha like that matters here) but with all of these favorable DA:O to PoE comparisons maybe another look at that game would be in order. I could never get past the the area or city right after slogging through the initial wilderness area with all those boring identical monsters. I can't remember if it was the annoyance of all the incessant trash mobs before it and then again after it or the annoying constant cooldowns or some other annoyance that I no longer remember. Are there now any mods or cheats that reduce or eliminate the trash mobs and cooldowns or whatever other annoyances made me ragequit and rageuninstall that mess of a game? I always heard that some of the fights against dragons etc were kind of fun but never got that far due to the unendurable boredom of the initial combat.

I actually really did enjoy DA:O, but only after some extensive skyrim level modding. The most most important of which were Combat Tweaks(spells/talents and combat rebalance), DA Redesigned(makes the NPCs look less goofy),Circles Be Gone and Personal Annoyance Remover. I do remember that I also used a mod that made the game incredibly difficult, which is also probably why I enjoyed it.

 

[DeepOcean]

Sawyer removed hard counters for silly reasons, hard counters were "overpowered" on Infinity Engine games because of shitty encounter design... hohoho... all those skeletons/gnolls/bandits trash mobs grouped together, just waiting to be webbed/horrified on BG 1 wilderness areas... now...place those black talon archers all spread out and on a tactical position and prepare to be buttraped by ice arrows. Spellcasters were dangerous but only shitty players didn't know what to expect from them, low level ones mostly used hold person and horror as crowd control and fireball/pillar of fire as AoE, they were dangerous but if you had a single cleric/druid on your group and kept people spread out and having some archers with quick bows to keep interrupting them was nice too... I had more fears from the rare and deadly really good enemy archers with four attacks a round with those ice/fire arrows aiming for my spellcasters.

You could alpha strike enemies with web and fireball but that was more of a choice than something required and if you weren't a casual rest spammer, really inpractical to do all the time. Anyway...when I look to PoE spell casters... man... first, PoE has some decent protections for a mage like hardned veil for a quick and urgent defense and the second and third level spells that can make the deflection on a mage become decent enough to stop mages from be cut to shreds by the first arquebus fire volley but the only defensive spell I saw mages cast was spirit shield, completely useless spell... when they casted protection spells at all. Couldn't Obsidian program mages to cast hardned veil as their top priority for giving them time to cast more protection shit?

Another thing... on Infinite Engine games... the ai wasn't exacly THE best but... while the holding person spell was a really useful weapon against mages, if said mage wasn't a person or really powerful to pull hard spell protections... it wouldn't do anything and you would waste a cast but on PoE, mind bending from the cipher can be cast pretty much non stop by higher level ciphers on all targets, all the time, especially if you have more than one but I didn't see a single instance where an enemy priest cast protection against paralysis, actually I only saw one instance of priests casting that globe of protection spell (he died anyway afterwards by concentrated arquebus fire but was more useful for his friends than 99% of the other priests). If priests, mages, druids and ciphers (didn't see a single instance of enemy ciphers using mind lance or using mind binding or using puppet master on your tank.) actually used the useful spells.

I saw mages casting web to just cast minolleta's useless missile afterwards, the ai casting chill fog upon you and their own guys and boy... with the engagement system and weak Ai that promotes enemies and your guys just making a ball on some point, I think the Ai spell casters would actually help you by bombing their own guys with the more powerful spells if they used them anyway. Ai spell casters are so vulnerable that Durance wasn't kidding when he said arquebuses made spellcasters useless. On any difficulty bellow Path of the Damned, they can be cut like dogs and on Path of Damned, you just need some debuffs and disables from your wizards/ciphers before cutting them like dogs.

I had Durance, Aloth, Grieving mother, Éder with Adra Bettle figurine for tougher battles, my character as a cipher with biting whip and rogue I created using arquebuses. Grieving mother cast mind binding on mage, PC and rogue fire, mage dead, Aloth cast Curse of the fetid Caress on other mage followed up with a pistol with marking, Durance with his +10 accuracy with Arquebuses fire while my PC and rogue reload, mage highly hurt. PC and rogue reload, mage dead. I wouldn't have a problem with this working so well at lower levels but I didn't expect this to work so well on the whole game. I used mostly the companions with their shitty stats but I can imagine the kinda of steamrolling you can do with a full player made group.

 

[Vault Dweller]

Nobody really expected fallout or jagged alliance, that a retarded strawman as i already explained so it has no meaning when it comes to quality of the game.

I don't know who expected what (nor do I care).

Why say what you say? Why mention it at all then? Never crossed your mind? Rlly?

For comparison. It's a squad-based turn-based post-apocalyptic RPG with dialogues (i.e. not a shoot 'em up). Two obvious questions are 'is it anything like Fallout?' and 'is it anything like JA2?'. The answer is 'no, it's not, don't buy it if you expect it to be like these games'.

The point is there is no reason to think anyone had actually expected that...

Never said anyone did.

, (and you say yourself you dont know or care right there) but you still use this to make a point that its a good game if the players dont have those bad expectations.

See above.

You made a series of inane assertions how its good based on the fact that you enjoyed it, nothing else...

What else matters?

And there we have it. Indeed, for you, nothing.

So your whole review is what i called it. And every review you ever made, apparently. Be kind and shorten the future ones to "i liked it" or "i didnt like it".

A review is nothing but 'I liked it, here is why' or 'I hated, here is why'. It would be dishonest to like a game yet rip it apart (every game has flaws) or hate a game yet give it a favorable review.

A good reviewer (and I'm not saying I am one) should explain why he liked or disliked it, so that the reader wouldn't have to take his word for it but be able to form his own opinion based on the info provided. I believe I've done that and even though it's clear that I liked the game, the review contains plenty of warnings. I explained the setting, character and combat systems in details, so that people can decide for themselves if the game is for them. Beyond that...

Every game or anything else ever made is good because someone likes it. Anything at all. That includes BG1 you know. F3, Obliblion, DO:S, any game EA ever made, Mass defect 3 ? Awesome. Throw in every example of horrible shit game as you will. All good.
Someone liked it and thats all that matters. According to that Escher case brain.

As a wise man once said: 'Odds are, something you like very much sucks. Why? Because this is RPG Codex.'

Anyway, yes, beauty (and other things) are in the eye of the beholder. What differs are the reasons given to support one's opinion.

 

[roshan]

I love how the bar for this game is steadily dropping... First it was expected to be the next BG2 and rated 10/10 on release, then everyone was arguing about it's merits relative to BG1 with most people seeming to think it was mostly a bad imitation, and now the point of comparison has dropped to DAO, which it is apparently a worse version of... Never has the decline been so quick.