Bay 12 Games Forum

Yeeaaah, I may personally be pretty comfortable suspending the program and leaving the computer on (/only putting it into sleep or hibernate mode) for hour/days/weeks/months, but from what I understand that's fairly uncommon computer use behavior and probably not something one should expect from users, heh.

Also haven't gotten around to actually playing the game yet, so I can't say how well the game reacts to being paused (and then suspended via process explorer or whathaveyou) and alt-tabbed for a lengthy period, nor how it reacts to the computer going into sleep mode or being hibernated, etc., etc. It's very much common for programs to not handle being out of focus and inactive for lengthy periods... poorly. Plus sometimes you'd really rather it just not be eating the resources, y'know? It's very nice -- and in the case of folks like sappho a borderline requirement -- to not actually have to do that.

I've acceded to steam, m'self. Everything else (that isn't nothing or specific game related ala MMOs, anyway) is a dealbreaker and means the game won't get my money, or even my playtime (if it's free).

My GFWL experiences were... bearable, but unpleasant. The games (usually) worked, but they worked a lot better after GFWL got squished. Round two just makes me hope MS doesn't manage to make proprietary anything I actually care about.

Mostly because better'n half the time the campaigning for the next one starts immediately when the last one ends, poh. Or before it does. It's basically what the corps try to do with holidays, except entirely successful.

So even more nonsensical and "not a thing".

Huh? No, there's actually quite a bit questioning sander's jewish beliefs, apparently. Double checking to make sure I wasn't misremembering sanders as identifying as jewish gave me a first page full of things asking whether he actually was one, despite his own claims. Definitely seems to be a bit of blowback vs bernie vis a vis jews.

Still haven't got the game, but watching a few videos... man, that fishing minigame. It caused hella Breath of Fire flashbacks. Pretty sure the general system is used in several different games, but goddamn if I don't associate it most strongly with BoF. Pretty sure it was one of the PSX ones that used pretty close to that exact system -- only apparent difference is that SV doesn't have the fish shadows to land the hook on/near.

So, spoil me, here. Is... is there a merchant you can fish up?

Heh. Yeeaah, not so much.

Started up a new psishot myself -- my first one was also my first whitehoof, and I found out 15-20 levels in that that was perhaps not the most wise of combinations :V _{they can't use mindstar mastery, since they're undead. Psishots offhand mindstars. Whoops.}

First thing I've learned after giving it a shot is that vaporous step is actually incredibly good, quite possibly one of the best teleport talents in the game. Basically a self-activated spatial tether except it blows up other people when you trigger it. Also it heals you and regens a substantial chunk of steam after the first talent level of the second tier. Y'do have to be pretty careful about positioning, though... if you're not in LoS of the tether point when you trigger it it just kinda' putters out. Actually using it to see what happens is about the only thing new I've done so far, though... mostly building the same otherwise (maxed iron blood, working on metal star, obviously upping the psyshot talent as available, doing tinker things). Probably going to try to actually use the dread/fear actives instead of just getting mechanical arms and using that to boost damage/survivability. _{it's pretty freaking incredible for that, though -- basically beyond the flesh, except (short) ranged, hits two targets, and effectively gives you resist all vs. targets they hit. Beautifully powerful, they are. Only uses a single mindstar for the damage output, but shit, load that thing up with global slows on melee hits or +100% daze chance and see how much of a difference that makes.}

Also doing the normal addons now, so it should be a bit more interesting. Remembered kinda' belatedly several of them won't exactly work without the maj'eyal map being there, but... eh.

E: Also wow, explosive shell on a psyshot. I'm having flashbacks to phase-warriors, 'cause I just projected a barrage of melee hits in an AoE on the other side of the room :V

... well, no, there's very few that can't be solved by nuking them. It's just not a very good solution in almost every case. It's usually an incredibly terrible one, really.

Weellll... not everything. You can leave some things alive, at the end. The very end. Doesn't make much of a difference gameplay wise, but the option's there. And it is, at least, fairly well reasoned why you're actually murdering everything that moves. There's some hefty fluff reasons why less aggressive options aren't really available, which is at least something.

I will say I was pretty disappointed when they didn't let you Somewhat unfortunately, it didn't let me go full murder mode when I actually wanted to

Also somewhat unfortunately, I don't really get to blame halflings for everything that went to hell in the embers campaign. For once, they weren't the primary culprit

E: I will say, I actually kinda' liked how everything tied together, once the whole thing was laid out. Somewhat surprisingly tightly constructed series of events. Plotwise everything is significantly more interconnected than the main campaign was, and almost all of the zones fit tightly into the narrative. Thinking on it in retrospect, it's actually pretty well done. Kinda' pulp steampunk/lovecraftian, but still. There's not much branching or alternate options, but it's pretty solid regardless, imo.

E2: Honestly, my mind keeps coming back to it and sorta' boggling at how stark the difference in the writing/zone lore/etc. is between embers and the rest, now that y'all've got me thinking about it. Like, maj'eyal campaign most of the zones are largely self-contained, there's not really much connection between them and when there is it's mostly fairly weak. In embers, pretty much every zone (I'd say bar maybe two, the forest and the infinite dungeon entrance) is connected to at least one other zone very strongly via lore (and in at least one case via gameplay), and they ultimately all spiderweb their way back to the final zone and the campaign's last act. The lore bits explain boss motivations, character motivations, why you're doing several things, generally sets the stage up where the player is actually acting fairly sensibly given the situation they're involved in and why they're largely forced to, as opposed to the very murderhobo ethos of the rest of the game... it's honestly what I'd call actually pretty damn good for video game plot and setting writing. Perhaps bit linear and light on direct character conversation/interaction, but I don't actually think the campaign suffers for it.

It's... y'know, it's almost like System Shock 2's log data, or something fairly similar in implementation. It's a pretty strong showing, if y'ask me. I wouldn't say the texty bits detract from the experience, in the least, and definitely adds to it if you're paying even minimal attention. Compared to the original where you can mostly just ignore the text and you'll miss barely anything directly related to what you're actually doing (it's much more setting/world exploration than narrative/plot), the difference is pretty close to night and day.