Dungeon Lords Collector's Edition is quite good!

[theverybigslayer]

THERE IS FURNITURE IN CE!!!
AND NOW
YOU CAN BUY IT AND MASTURBATE

 

[kris]

special catered AD here.

1. However, it feels very much like Gothic 2 in the impementation.

2. but it is more varied and interesting than the one in Gothic 2, a game I really liked.

3. Your stats and skils have a huge influence on your success in fights,
4. Your skills and stats have a noticeable influence on your combat ability.

5. and it si balanced well so that each decision is important and needs thought.
6. Story There seems to be a good story here,

7. There are trap and lockpicking mini-games which are well done and mostly stat based, very similar to the ones in Wizardry 6 and 7

8. Size Seems to be a very large game. I am only in the first city and the map has many other citiies and areas on it.

1. Classic for advertising, compare/mentioning a game that is welliked by the target audience.

2. Once more, this time adding "I really liked it"

3. RPGCodex catering again, mentioning a RPG love child feature.
4. More, but since you also talked about "hectic" and "combomoves" I wonder if this is really true.

5. What is balanced well? Which decisions is important in what way?

6. Heh? Your saying the story is good, but you don't even know the story? :D

7. minigame = player based. Not to forget I don't like them.

8. Uh wait, you hardly begun the game and now write about how good it is?

Of course considering you like Morrowind and this game I can only assume your taste is entirerly different from mine.

 

[Sol Invictus]

They're called plants, people.

www.hypecouncil.com

 

[Walks with the Snails]

Hmm, I'm not sure whether to feel humbled that they actually do exist or vindicated that it didn't work. In practice it does appear rather slimy, though. Enjoy that $5.15 an hour for being corporate shills, guys.

 

[Trash]

All this bitching and I still don't know whether the collectors edition is worth it. Anyone really tried it apart from yelling "plants" ?

 

[Deathboy]

I tried the 1.4 patch and found it improved the game drastically.......

BUT

U must remember I was an original DL fanboy (with shags), if I was to be completely honest i'd say they have moved the game from pus to playable. As has been pointed out it took them over 6mnths to do it so do you really want to give them your money?

I'd rather see PC gaming go away completely rather then dumping unfinished buggy shit on the players and then casually taking six months to work on the patch and a new edition at the same time.

 

[Surlent]

This reminds of that recent penny arcade comic. I bet Everquest2 is next in line.

 

[ixg]

check my sig about my opinion of dungeon lords..

boy im glad i never bought it!

 

[almondblight]

I liked the Oblivion plant that spent the first half of his post trying to get "cred " by gushing about Tim Cain. "I love Fallout, Arcanum, Bloodlines, I love Tim Cain, love him, I'm a Tim Cain fanboy and Oblivion will rockers your sockers!" Another thing plants say often is "I'm just looking for a civilized discussion but I know that's rare here."

 

[theverybigslayer]

I hate Arcanum, I hate Bloodlines, I love Dungeon Lords. So what?

 

[theverybigslayer]

check my sig about my opinion of dungeon lords..

Yes that is retarded.
The correct way: I LOVE Dungeon Lords.

 

[LlamaGod]

I hate Arcanum, I hate Bloodlines, I love Dungeon Lords. So what?

We already know you're "special".

 

[theverybigslayer]

We already know you're "special".

Thank you, Patrick. :wink:

 

[HanoverF]

True, but this can be argued both ways: if the CE is really good, and people don't buy it, publishers might take that as an indication that giving extra time to get it right isn't worth it.

And if we buy Brotherhood of Steel, Interplay will make Fallout 3!!!



Logic > U

 

[HardCode]

True, but this can be argued both ways: if the CE is really good, and people don't buy it, publishers might take that as an indication that giving extra time to get it right isn't worth it.

If said game company can't tell the difference between putting out a good product for the customers first dollar, and putting out what should have been the first product and asking for the customer's second dollar ... well then, they don't deserve to be in business.

 

[Voltare]

i have the c.e......the damned thing is still unplayable( damned goblin thing attacks me from halfway up a wall ----what....they couldn't afford decent collision detection?)

 

[Shagnak]

U must remember I was an original DL fanboy (with shags)

In my (our?) defence, that was before the "final" game was released and any potential we saw was purely theoretical. After release I could see just how little had been finished. I can't think of a worse example of an unfinished game being foisted on the public by a major name.

As for DL under patch 1.4...it sure is better than the original release. But it still isn't the game we were promised.

The CE is a cynical attempt to get more dosh and in the process shaft those that spent money on the original expecting a finished game.

My opinion of Mr Bradley and Co right now?
What a bunch of cunts. How they can front up to interviews and spill the same old shit is beyond me.

Chest-thumping moralisation aside now...
Yes, it is possible to have a bit of fun with DL. I got about 60 percent into the game (my estimation) before I gave up. Some of the dungeon bits were fun in an old school way, but the vast majority of it was empty and bland, like eating a sugarless meringue.

Now that 1.4 has been released I intend to get together with Deathboy and do some MP and see what fun I can eke out of it before I launch it into the sea or something.

Another positive thing I can say about DL is that it is better than Fable:TLC. I'm not certain what that says. It's like comparing the smells of two really bad farts. Both smell like shit but maybe one of them you can weather for longer.

 

[galsiah]

And if we buy Brotherhood of Steel, Interplay will make Fallout 3!!!

I said "It can be argued both ways." because it can be argued both ways. Clearly neither argument is logically water-tight, or it wouldn't be able to be argued both ways.

If said game company can't tell the difference between putting out a good product for the customers first dollar, and putting out what should have been the first product and asking for the customer's second dollar ... well then, they don't deserve to be in business.

Usually the publisher has the final say on these things, since it's their money. If every publisher that didn't deserve to be in business went out of business, there would be very few left. The money needs to come from somewhere. Big budget games require a lot of funding, and the people / companies doing the funding are unlikely to be computer games experts. If current publishers go out of business, they'd likely be replaced by similar ones before long.

Either the industry needs to head for more low-budget, indie type games (which is unlikely to happen, but would be good in many ways), or publishers need to be dealt with as they are. Publishers often know little about the specifics of game development, being more concerned with generic management / sales / media. If publishers can be educated, that would be great. If not, they need to be dealt with as they are - even if they're stupid.

Not buying a quality version of an originally buggy game sends mixed messages. Publishers might very well be too stupid / not look hard enough to know the real reason for the lack of sales.

 

[Dhruin]

Character development system is skill based and very well done.

It's ok. Not as good as D2 system though.

You are both giving it too much credit: it's dreadful. It's a muddy puddle - big enough to cover the road but only half an inch deep. Bradley simply threw in every class he could imagine with a 5x multiclass system and hoped noone would notice how bad it was as they marvelled at their awesome (and nonsensical) fighter/paladin/ninja/samurai/jedi master.

Here's a question for the cheer squad - let's say I don't want to be fancy ninja/samurai/jedi mix - I just want to be the best heavy fighter I can. Give me an example of a build and the depth of specialist skills and attacks my fighter will have at the end of the game.

 

[K8tdog]

Here's a question for the cheer squad - let's say I don't want to be fancy ninja/samurai/jedi mix - I just want to be the best heavy fighter I can. Give me an example of a build and the depth of specialist skills and attacks my fighter will have at the end of the game.

Don't know. I am playing a basic fighter now and i expect that if I continue to refuse specialization that I would just continue improve my current skill set.


Question:

Which is better a great game that lasts 7-10 hours with zero replayability -or- a game that holds your interest for 40-50 hours but eventually gets old 3/4 of the way through?

Assume the same cost, genre etc...

 

[Solik]

You're going to lose your job if you continue to be that obvious a plant :\ I mean, that comment didn't even fit in the discussion.

 

[Dhruin]

And your current skill set is...? Any character gets two standard melee combos when they get Heavy Weapons to level 5. That's it. Your two combos for the entire game.

You can get a tiny handful of passive automatic skills - Crushing Blow, for example. You'll still be mashing with the same two combos from back at the beginning of the game. If you think that's a good system with depth, then there's not much to discuss.

Which is better a great game that lasts 7-10 hours with zero replayability -or- a game that holds your interest for 40-50 hours but eventually gets old 3/4 of the way through?

Assume the same cost, genre etc...

If DL holds your interest for 40-50 hours, good luck to you. I don't have the time to waste on DL - I could live with the shallow class system if the dialogue was great, or the story had some interesting twists, or varied side-quests, or varied locations with worthwhile things to explore or different solution to quests to try...or anything other than repetetive combat with random spawns.

Actually, a couple of the dungeons are OK but I don't so much go for those dungeeon-hacks with diabolic traps and puzzles but somehow moronic low-level monsters seem to survive and get around OK. I know that's part of the "old-school" appeal but these days I generally want something with some intelligent design.

 

[Vault Dweller]

Here's a question for the cheer squad - let's say I don't want to be fancy ninja/samurai/jedi mix - I just want to be the best heavy fighter I can. Give me an example of a build and the depth of specialist skills and attacks my fighter will have at the end of the game.

Don't know.

Great answer. Very motivating.

Which is better a great game that lasts 7-10 hours with zero replayability -or- a game that holds your interest for 40-50 hours but eventually gets old 3/4 of the way through?

Assume the same cost, genre etc...

A great game that lasts 7-10 hours with zero replayability isn't that great to begin with. In fact, it fucking sucks. Does that answer your question?

 

[jplestat]

Actually, a couple of the dungeons are OK but I don't so much go for those dungeeon-hacks with diabolic traps and puzzles but somehow moronic low-level monsters seem to survive and get around OK. I know that's part of the "old-school" appeal but these days I generally want something with some intelligent design.[/quote]

So what would be your example RPGs with "intelligent" designs?

BTW... part of the reason that I like Dungeon Lords is because it is a dungeon hack at heart, a game type that I particularly enjoy.

 

[crufty]

I recently downloaded nethack 3.4.3. Boy, it sure is great! They've really improved it since the last time I installed it. I would say it's like a text-based Diablo, but turn based.

1. Magic system. Different types of magic and different ways of casting spells. There are spell crystals, scrolls, books and runes. Each type of magic uses a different system. Magic interface is done by hotkey and works well. Have not done a whole lot wioth magic, but it seems to be well done. One negative I have seen is it is unclear what positive effect addition intelligence or skill in a branch of magic has on individual spells, though the game makes it clear it does. Might have to use them and see the difference.

2. Monsters I have not played the whole game, but so far the monsters are very varied. They look excellent from the standard rats and snakes to hellhounds, skeletons, zombies and trolls being some of the things I have encounted so far. Their attacks are very different and interesting. Some have breath weapons and can make you gag, which is a cool effect. The hellhound breathed inky smoke which obscures your vision and can gag as well. There are humanoids with swords and magic users who cast spells at you. There is also a good variey of types of encounters froms swarms of rats and bats, to very difficult one on one encounters and bosses

3. Graphics Really quite excellent. The water is blue, very stylistic looking dungeon walls and doors. Cool dungeons. Great looking monsters--espicially the 'E'. Consistently surprised how good the graphics are. Quite possibly the best of any RPG I have played to date. The player character and other NPCs move about in a very realisitic fashion--shop keepers won't let me out of their shops until I pay!

4. Character system Kind of a little bit of a throwback. So many games now start with a generic character or a forced one. Here you have a reasonable number of race choices at the beginning and several basic class archetypes like fighter, thief, mage, though the manual indicates that eventually you develop into many different and varied subclasses. Character development system is skill based and very well done. XP and leveling give you advancement points which you use to choose the skills your character will have as well as increasing base stats. Increasing the skills has a very noticeable effect on your characters strength, and it si balanced well so that each decision is important and needs thought. Good variety of skills and some are only available to certain classes.Very good system, and gives the game replayability as you can come up with very different builds

5. Story There seems to be a good story here, and the quests have been fairly interesting and varied. Dialogue choices are of the category type instead of branching dialogue but it seems to work well. Someone looking for a complex conversation system like Planescape Torment or Fallout will not find it here, but there are a few conversations and they add to the storyline and depth of the game

6. There are trap and lockpickingwhich are well done and mostly stat based, very similar to the ones in Nethack 3.4.2.

7. Areas So far there have been a good mix of dungeon, mines and more dungeon areas. Better mix here than Diablo which is almost entirely in Hell.

8 Size Seems to be a very large game. I am only in the first level and the map has a single staircase down which no doubt leads to limitless maps.

9. Stability Excellent, has never crashed on me and I have not seen any bad bugs

10. Interface Is OK, could be improved a little here and there. Map is OK, and gets slightly better without scrolls of forgetfulness, but could be improved. Merchant window interface is not as streamlined as it could be. Combat system definitely takes a bit to get used to, but I have grown to really like it. It has depth, and is tied in well with your stats so it does not seem all strategy. Dialogue and update windows and fonts are done very well and have a lot of polish, as any terminal font would.

Overall, I am having a great time with this game. If you liked Diablo 1 and 2 I think you will have a blast with this game. It is now a pretty polished product. It is a shame it was not released originally like this it may have been a big hit. It is a very good hybrid of some old time RPG elements with a more modern action combat system, butone that works well. But it is not a Gothic or Morrowind type game. It definitely feels and plays like a good stroy driven RPG with an excellent character development system that lends itself to many different builds and setups so replayability is excellent. And it is fun.