Juan Carlo

I've never not played a game on torment, so I can't compare to easier difficulties. Personally, though, I think the Geneforge games are easy enough on torment that playing them on anything less would be too easy. Avadon on torment is hard, but ultimately just right, I think, as it doesn't have as much hitpoint bloat as some of the avernums. This means that even though they are a challenge, battles are usually quick enough that they don't become too tedious (save for a few optional boss fights). Avernums on torment aren't necessarily hard (although parts of Avernum 5 on torment are super hard), but they can get a bit tedious just because, as games, they tend to have tons of trash mobs and hitpoint bloat (especially Avernum 5, whose torment is near broken, I think, not because it's hard but rather because it just takes so bloody long). So I wouldn't recommend playing Avernums on torment unless you really want a challenge and don't mind if your game time balloons up to 100 hours or so. Although, that said, Avernum 4 is probably the easiest game to beat on torment--even easier than the Geneforges--so there are exceptions.

OK, we've established that canisters don't seem to affect your gameplay like previous geneforge games, but if you use too many will they change your ending?

I did it as a singleton agent on torment. The secret is to just not bother trying to wipe everything, but instead try to keep moving, grab the items, and only fight when you are cornered. Plus, save whenever you drop out of battle. Even if you are cornered you can always just run back to the exit, so there's usually no danger in it. The main goal is the boss ghost lady (can't recall her name) as she drops a pretty awesome stat belt (I think it's +2 all stats, or something like that). She's actually really easy, though, as geneforge 1 boss AI can be a bit wonky at times. When I fought her she would just heal every time I damaged her, and given that I did slightly more damage than she could heal, she kind of just got stuck in a heal loop and healed herself continually until she died. I don't even think she attacked me at all. It was a bit anti-climactic. Almost as good as when bosses occasionally get stuck repeatedly blessing themselves while you beat them to death.

Originally Posted By: Triumph Real choice requires meaningfully different options, with meaningfully different results. In G3, the "choice" of factions seemed meaningless because the two factions were competing so hard to outdo each other in brutality to each other. That's what was unsatisfying. Yeah, but sometimes life is unsatisfying and you have to make terrible choices between the lesser of two evils. There isn't always a better choice. Why can't a game reflect that? Games rarely do, which is why I think Geneforge 3 was so refreshing. Plus, deciding which faction to join wasn't a matter of total agreement as much as it was really breaking down various moral ideals and weighing their value against the potential costs. Which, to me, is when choices get interesting. You may value something like freedom for example, but at what point will you decide that the cost is too great? G3 doesn't explore these ambiguities perfectly, but it at least makes you think about this stuff which is more than most games do.

Originally Posted By: Lilith I don't think there's anything particularly admirable about throwing the player for a loop for the sake of doing so. Consequences need to be predictable to some extent for choices to have any meaning at all: otherwise you're just choosing a path arbitrarily. Well at least as far as ME3 was concerned I don't think it's ending was all that unpredictable. The games had been setting up the fact that the Reapers were an unstoppable force for 3 full games, so even if it might be a bit cruel to have the player go through the work of collecting all sorts of resources/factions in ME3, having all this be more or less pointless in defeating the repeaters isn't exactly surprising or unexpected. They were unstoppable after all. It's only narrative convention which made players expect anything thing different. We are used to video game narratives which hype up the big evil as unstoppable yet ultimately allow the player to succeed against all odds anyway, so when a game finally followed through on the hype people got mad, eventhough there really was very little that was deceptive about this on the surface. But as far as moral choices are concerned I don't think that it is always easily predictable either. The best of intentions often have horrible unintended side effects. You make the best decision you can given the available data, but that does not guarantee a particular outcome.

Originally Posted By: HOUSE of S You've mentioned "surprising" twice now. Why does an ending have to be surprising to be good? Can't a good ending also feel like an epic culmination that you've been seeking? It doesn't necessarily have to be surprising to be good. There are lots of reasons why I play video games and my capacity to enjoy games with other wise terrible writing or uninspired mechanics is pretty large (there can be something comforting about playing a solid, familiar, genre game that does nothing new). However, for something to really impress me, I think, it has to do something that I haven't seen before which makes me stand up and notice in some way, or challenge my expectations, or make me think seriously about a topic in a new light or, in the least, just do what it's trying to do really really well (and even though I've played scores of enjoyable video games in the past few yeas, I can probably count on one hand the number that have done this). Books often do this for me, movies sometimes (but less than books), but video games very, very, rarely do it (even though, as I said, I quite like playing video games regardless). Partly because, obviously, the goals of video games are often way different than the goals of books/film (i.e. games don't just have to tell stories. Some are more conceptual and others are just pure mechanics, which is all fine), but also just because (let's face it) as a storytelling or conceptual artform video games still just aren't that sophisticated (for a whole host of reasons that we could mull over for ages). I mean, early film wasn't very sophisticated as a medium either, but it only took film a decade or so to go from "Man washing a Donkey" to "Trip to the Moon" to "Passion of Joan of Arc", whereas games have kind of been stuck in a mire of simplicity for 30 years (which is a bit of an exaggeration, but still kind of true)--especially as far as narrative is concerned. Video game writing tends to not be very good, and even the best stuff usually isn't on the level of the writing in other mediums.

Originally Posted By: HOUSE of S I think it's really a question of narrative exposition versus atmosphere building. The former is easier to support in a linear game, whereas the latter is easier to support in an open world game. If "plot" means "people physically doing stuff while the player watches and/or participates" then it only means narrative exposition. But "plot" is really more than that. Geneforge 1 has very little narrative acted out; neither do E/A 1 and 2; but it would be absurd to suggest that they have less plot development than linear games like G3 or A5. (G2 I won't argue.) Well A5 has next to no plot development (or it does, but it's pretty simplistic and generic) and it's incredibly linear, so I don't think lack of freedom necessarily goes hand in hand with plot development. But I agree that plot isn't just narrative exposition. Geneforge 1 had an interesting setting and world, but I guess my problem wasn't so much that it didn't have a plot but rather that it's plot was far too dictated by player choice in an easy and predictable manner. And it just wasn't that interesting. The game never really subverted my expectations or intentions in anyway or did anything that I didn't expect or put me in any memorable binds or anything like that. The factions are all pretty readable on first glance without much depth to them. Plus, I just don't think it was as well written as the later Geneforge games. The characters aren't as well developed and I don't think there are as many interesting quests, but that can probably be debated (I don't think I was ever as involved in anything in G1 or as interested in the outcomes of any given quests, for example, as I was in playing the various factions off each other and seeing what would happen in G4). Which isn't to say that I disliked G1. It was a good game, I think. Just not as good as the later Geneforges.

Quote: you're forced to trust the enemy you've been fighting against for the past three games and accept one of the options they offer to you, no matter how successful or unsuccessful you've been at building up a force to fight against them" Which is partly what I liked about it (and kind of jibes with what I've been saying about G3). I think a Rock Paper Shotgun defense of the ending addressed this point really well, especially this part: Quote: And then the choices themselves. Of course anyone is welcome to dislike the options, or dislike that they’re there at all, but to suggest they’re not relevant to the games isn’t fair. There was certainly a failure to properly define that it all comes down to the creation of Synthetics, and their eventual destruction of Organics, and I am confused by how an apparently ancient Synthetic race is the one arguing this. But as Shepard herself appeals, this is the result of an ancient race having lost its way. They firmly believe that what they do is for the good of the galaxy, and that they’re preserving these races in Reaper form, but they do not see how evil their actions have become. They’re wrong. But they’re wrong from a position of enormous power, and it’s a power that not only dominates the worlds of Mass Effect, but also the player. Those three choices – those are what you get, from a wayward god-like species that’s in control. Don’t like the options? Hell, maybe that’s the point. http://www.rockpapershotgun.com/2012/03/19/whats-right-with-mass-effect-3s-ending/ Put this way, I actually think being "wrong from an enormous position of power" pretty accurately describes both factions in Geneforge 3 as well. I do think ME3's ending has some flaws (one being that it does render all the faction uniting/resource gathering in the earlier portions of the game moot...although, at the same time, I don't think the ending would have worked as well or been as surprising if the game hadn't fooled you into thinking it would make a difference, as underhanded as this may be), but as I've said before I think it reaches so much farther than your typical video game ending and does so much that is unexpected that I can't blame it if it doesn't obtain everything it is reaching for.

Originally Posted By: Dantius Originally Posted By: Juan Carlo (especially in the era of Mass Effect 3 where fans will petition developers to change things if they don't like the way a game ends) Quick interjection: The petition, by and large, wasn't to change the ending, it was for Bioware to actually write an ending beyond "Normandy crash-lands on planet following red/green/blue explosion". None of Jeff's games have had this problem, or anything anywhere like it. Nah, Me3 had an insanely long ending with tons of closure (did no one play the part where you literally say good bye to every character who ever appeared in the game for like 2 hours straight?). It just didn't have a conventional Bioware ending (every Bioware game ever has basically ended in the exact same way, so I think this threw people a bit), or for that matter, a typical video game ending (video game endings tend to spell everything out for you in a neat package, which ME3 did not). But the petitions were very much partly about dissatisfaction with the content of the ending, not just supposed "lack" of an ending. There were several petitions, but the main one included the demand for an added "heroic ending which provides a better sense of accomplishment" (e.g. "Wah! I want a happy ending but didn't get one!"). Even the creator of Dragon Age argued that its main problem was not having a "happy" ending. I had no problem with its ending and thought the petition was silly. But this is probably off topic.

Originally Posted By: HOUSE of S I'm fine with not having obvious heroes and villains, but "shades of grey" requires having more than 2 shades, which is really all G3 had. If there were at least creative ways for the player to wriggle out of those dilemmas, even if both of the actual factions were unpleasant, that might have been more satisfactory (witness the cult popularity of G2's "kill all the leaders" ending). Well, I mostly just liked how the limited choice forced unintended consequences on you. I very much tried really hard to do good in that game, but ended up doing much less than good despite my best efforts, which I admired. It's really rare for a game to do that to you (especially in the era of Mass Effect 3 where fans will petition developers to change things if they don't like the way a game ends). G3 is one of the darkest RPGs I've ever played for just that reason and I really admired it for that (even if I think it has other shortcomings as a game). Which I guess just comes from my preference for interesting plot over freedom. Geneforge 1 and 2 had enough options that you could basically almost entirely dictate what story you wanted the games to have. You could basically get to know each faction, pick your favorite, and the endings would more or less follow from that, which I personally don't like as there's little element of surprise to that. I like a game to have some push back and control over the narrative, to occasionally confound your intentions, and to surprise you, even if this comes at the cost of freedom. Quote: Also, G3 had the worst combat balance of any Geneforge game. This is true. I'm not in anyway arguing that Geneforge 3 is the best Geneforge (I much prefer Geneforge 4 for both plot and gameplay and have yet to start G5), I just think it's really underrated in the series and is somewhat a turning point in terms of Vogel's writing ability (which, like I said, I think took a huge leap in quality from Geneforge 2 to Geneforge 3 and only got better as the series went on).

Originally Posted By: HOUSE of S but Obama remains a pragmatist and a centrist. So true. It always boggles my mind when I hear people call him a socialist or talk like he's some sort of extreme liberal. Have they not been paying attention to what he's actually done (or not done)? He is one of the most "Conservative" presidents we've ever had--and I don't mean "conservative" in terms of ideology (he's definitely not an ideological conservative), but rather in demeanor. He's actually proven to be pretty reluctant when it comes to making sweeping changes of any sort. Even the health care bill, his one big action in his first term, was so diluted and compromised from his original vision (which itself was a diluted and compromised version of Hilary's plan that the Obama campaign mainly embraced during the primaries just to appeal to moderates and distinguish himself from her) that I'm not sure how anyone could call it radical in anyway (it's basically just the Romney plan, after all). He's to the right of every DFL president we've had in the past half century and has proven himself willing to compromise on just about everything. Although I actually think the dirty little secret that the smarter portions of the GOP establishment realize (but will never admit openly) is that Obama isn't really all that bad for the GOP. It's only the conservative talk radio/cable news factions that make him out to be a villain, but that's really just motivated by ratings. Unfortunately, though, talk radio and cable news seems to be the main motivating force these days in the conservative movement in America. The William Buckleys of the last century are gone, replaced by idiot talk radio sorts who are really more motivated by creating sensational headlines for ratings than they are motivated by any sort of rational commitment to conservativism as a viable political ideology. You could dismiss this as harmless entertainment (and at it's heart stuff like Sean Hannity, Glenn Beck, Rush Limbaugh, et al really are primarily entertainment and theatrics rather than any sort of intelligent political discourse), but unfortunately this type of thinking and style of discourse is coming to define the conservative movement in the 21st century. We are already seeing the effects of this via the tea party movement (which is basically stubbornly committed to a bastardized, overly simplified, sound-bite friendly version of conservativism which ignores reality at all costs for the sake of a wrongheaded commitment to ideological purity), and if the rational portions of the the GOP (which do exist) don't nip it in the bud I think the party could end up disintegrating or morphing into something truly terrifying. While the DFL has wisely kept the Occupy Wallstreet movement at arm's length, the GOP rather foolishly courted the Tea Party movement for votes and gave them too much power, which has had a lot of unintentional consequences for them. We already saw a lot of tension between the old guard and the newer, crazier, grass roots elements during the GOP primary when the GOP establishment very nearly lost control of the party entirely, so it will be interesting to see what happens going forward. Right now the GOP seems to be motivated enough by Obama hate to keep an uneven alliance until November. But if Romney loses I think a very bloody civil war could break out within the party, and if the more unreasonable elements ultimately win, it could be bad for everyone--conservative and liberal alike.

I prefer non-linear, but I don't mind linear as long as they have a good story and plot. And if forced to choose, I'll actually take a good plot over an open-world any day. So people often complain about something like Geneforge 3, for example, just because it's more linear than the earlier ones and only has two factions but personally I think GEneforge 3 is when the series got interesting. Sure it was linear, but what it sacrificed in freedom it gained in moral complexity and the fact that there was only two (very imperfect) factions forced you to make some very hard choices at times. Plus, the writing quality took a huge leap between Geneforge 2 and 3 and remained consistently strong for the rest of the Geneforge series. I actually think the later Geneforge games (everything from number 3 onwards) are some of the more morally ambiguous RPGs out there (the only other series which can rival them on that point is maybe the Witcher games). I like that there really is no good or bad as much as just various shades of grey, which is really refreshing given that "morality" in most RPGs usually comes down to absurdly black and white choices like "will I give the puppy a treat, or drown it in a bag."

I started that "couch to 5k" running program like 6 months ago and can highly recommend it. It's structured really well so it's the only exercise program I've ever really stuck with. When I started it running 3 minutes at a time would kill me, but it increases things gradually up to 30 minutes--which, honestly, is about all I can take before I get bored. I do it 4-5 times a week (depending on how much time I have), but the actual plan only calls for 3 times a week so it's quite manageable, even for lazy people. Plus, I use a treadmill and TIVO shows to watch during it so it's not so bad (I have a pretty short attention span, so my biggest problem with exercise was always just getting bored midway). Anyhow, it was pretty painful at times (especially mid program once you start running for longer periods), but once you get used to it it's not so bad. There are still days when I feel too exhausted and unmotivated to do it, but I've just learned to force myself as I find that it actually gives you more energy afterwards (that whole endorphin thing really does work). There's like a million different versions of it, but this is the plan I used: http://www.coolrunning.com/engine/2/2_3/181.shtml

Originally Posted By: ξ Not Spidweb's finest, but not its worst, either. It was a little hit or miss, but I'd rank it somewhere well above A4 and a little below A1-3, GF1, and Avadon. I'm nearing the end of A5 myself and these are basically my thoughts. I'd probably rate A5 and A4 as my least favorite spiderweb games, although I'd argue A4 is better than A5 just because its plot is slightly better (not by much, but it at least has momentum once you get to mid game) and it's WAY less tedious to play just because, while it doesn't have as interesting of encounters, it at least has less HP bloat. To its credit I do think A5 has some interesting boss fights and challenge areas (way more than A4) and it's nice that it's set in a new location, but it's marred in my view by its lack of an interesting plot, linearity, massive HP bloat on higher difficulties, and prevalence of a bit too much trash mob combat at times. People who finish this game should get some sort of medal (especially on torment). However, I do rather like the skill system, items, and training availability, though. It seems that the possibilities of what you can do in constructing your characters and fitting them out with items are much greater than in A4. Plus, the Geases make for an interesting touch.

No one's posted about this yet? Avernum 4-6 are featured in the new pay what you want (minimum 4 dollars) Groupees bundle, along with Oddworld Abe's Oddysee and Exodus, Hamilton's Great Adventure, and Red Orchestra. If you pay at least 6 dollars you also get Garshap: http://groupees.com/bemine3 All games come with steam keys and drm free downloadable copies. That's a bloody good deal as they are all pretty good games.

Yeah, I finally killed him. Thanks, though. It would be much easier if you could actually see the flash, but I never saw it at all.

I'm doing this right now and having a hard time with it. I've looked and looked but I can't see any sort of "flash" or "sparkle" or anything marking which shade Moref is supposed to be in at any given time. Does anyone know what this is supposed to look like and when it's supposed to appear? I've had all the servants on screen at one time at the beginning of the round (which is when it's supposed to appear, right?), but I still can't see anything. It also doesn't help that the room is bigger than the screen, so at any given time "x" number of servants will be off the screen. EDIT: Also, do you get a message every time you kill a servant with moref in it? I've been killing slews of them round after round, but I only usually get a message the first time. It's hard to gauge if I am doing things right or not if I don't know whether I'm actually killing the right ones or not.

Originally Posted By: Death Knight If you don't follow jeff's hidden way of playing, your screwed. None of the new games have that, which is good. In the Geneforges you really can't go wrong as long as you only invest points in those areas which are cheapest for your class. While not as obvious as skill trees, perhaps, the fact that shaping skills are incredibly expensive for agents, for example, does provide some degree of guidance. I'd say a bigger problem is probably inconsistency between games. It's a bit confusing, for example, when parry is super overpowered in one game, then nerfed beyond all recognition in the next, or bows are awesome in one game, but suck in the next (etc, etc). Which is a problem with alot of spiderweb games (i.e. balance swings all over from game to game, so even though a game might have all the same skills as other games in the series, that doesn't mean they are actually the same). But this isn't really something that skill trees could fix. Quote: Being solo has more disadvantages than advantages. Of course, you could always use magic and magic to make your attacks stronger. But I recommend Shaping. If you created a thahd for actually no reason and put it in your front lines, it can be suicidal for the creation but it takes the enemy's turn... Nah. By far the easiest time I've had with the Geneforges was playing as either a solo agent (with maxed mental magic, and battle magic as secondary) or a solo servile (with maxed mental magic and melee as secondary). Daze, Charm, and terror make these games incredibly easy--especially charm as most bosses will spawn creations during fights, allowing you to charm them and turn their own creations against them. And in the earlier games nearly everything is susceptible to terror (even bosses). Like I said, though, maybe it's just personal preference in the end. I hate having to manage creations and reload every time one dies. Plus, having 5-7 of them really does slow the game down significantly as each one has to play its attack animation in combat (I guess I'm too impatient to be a shaper).

I've beaten them all on torment except the 5th (which I will start soon). I did the first as a solo agent, the second as a solo guardian, the 3rd as a shaper, and the 4th as a solo servile. I prefer playing solo, though, as combat just takes too long as a shaper. Playing as a shaper in G3 I just got bored watching every single one of my 7 creations move one by one, and stealth portions of the game were agonizing. I think they are, for the most part, FAR easier than most of the Avernum games on torment, and certainly alot easier than Avadon, mainly because (especially in the later games) there are usually several different ways to accomplish any given task, so they are all pretty exploitable. The avernum games all seem to be designed with a fairly rigid traditional party structure in mind, but with the Geneforge games every fight has to be tailored so that it can work with anything ranging from a solo melee fighter all the way to an 8 party shaper. Which I think is why the boss fights tend to be a bit less elaborate (and a good deal easier) in the Geneforge games than they are in the Avernum games. Which I actually prefer. I like Avernum and all, but the Avernum games are so absurdly long that they always tend to wear out their welcome around the 50 hour mark (and they often tend to be packed to the gills with filler, trash mob, combat). But the Geneforge games all took me around 30-40 hours to complete, which is just the right length for an RPG I think. Quote: I don't like where Jeff's games are headed. Avadon and later avernums are on torment easy, but battles gets way too long. Monsters have too much hp. Like fighting slits in A6. If I positioned spellcasters right, I had no chance of dieing but it took 5 turns to kill one. And there were like 30 of them. I actually think Avadon's torment mode was just right, and even Avernum 4 (while a bit too easy on torment) didn't go crazy with the hit points to artificially jack up difficulty. However, I am currently playing Avernum 5 on torment and it's awful. Mice take like two to three turns to kill and most boss battles take forever. I really hate it when designers assume that increasing hitpoints makes things harder. It doesn't make a game harder, it just makes it longer. Which is another good thing about the GEneforge games. None of them have this "hit point inflation" problem on higher difficulties. I think they are just about right on torment. Unlike in some of the Avernum games, if you are going to die in Geneforge you tend to die in the first round or two of any given combat situation rather than, say, dying after 20 minutes of hacking away at some boss with 8,000 hit points.

It could be that your anti-virus software is silently killing the games before they start. My anti-virus software (I use Ad Aware) for some reason detected Geneforge 1 as a trojan and would auto-kill it everytime I tried to start it so I had to tell it that it wasn't a virus by hand. I don't know what sort of anti-virus software you use but you should check its logs and see what it's detected lately. If you see the .exe for the game in there that's probably your issue.

Amnesia is in the top 10 games of the past decade, I say. I don't think I've ever played a game that does immersion better than that one. It's very rare for me to get so sucked into a game that I actually stop strategizing and "gaming," so to speak, but "amnesia" is one of the few games that did that for me. It's really quite brilliant. All the other games are good too---except maybe "Bastion." To me that just played like a mediocre, free2play, browser aRPG--only it has the whole voice over gimmick, which is neat for maybe an hour or so, but once it gets old all you are left with is the gameplay which isn't very good. If you want to experience Bastion just save your money and have a friend narrate everything you do while playing "Spiral Knights" occasionally pausing to play a Cat Power song. It'd be more or less the same thing.

I finished. Over all, once I got past the slow start, I enjoyed the game. It was kind of easy on torment....or at least until the very last boss' fortress which was a bit more what I expected from playing a spiderweb game on torment. The last hallway leading up to the final boss was pretty crazy with its constantly spawning Golems and the enemies who can charm you (although the final boss is really easy if you have a priest with divine retribution as it takes the spawning orbs out every turn before they can move). I fired up Avernum 5 and just played the start of it and there already seems to be a huge jump in the quality of plotting/writing between the two, so I'm looking forward to playing it (although I might take a break and play Geneforge 4 first). In Avernum 4 you are just sort of dumped into the world as random adventurers with no backstory and little to draw you in during those early portions of the game before the main plot kicks in (the plot doesn't really get going until you hit the great cave, which can be like 20-30 hours in depending on if you are doing all the sidequests and exploring), but Avernum 5 has more of a set up in terms of your backstory (e.g. you are soldiers for the empire who are dumped into the world and immediately betrayed, setting the plot in motion from there) which is nice and provides a bit more "hook" to the earlier portions of the game.

OK, nevermind, I found a fix to get it to run full screen on widescreen monitors. Just do the following (solution borrowed partially from forum user "sea"): Download the Microsoft Application Compatibility Toolkit. http://www.microsoft.com/en-us/downl...s.aspx?id=7352 Launch the 32-bit version, create a new custom database, then a new application fix. Navigate to the affected game executable, select it, and then, on the second page of fixes, select both "Force 640x480x16" and "ForceDirectDrawEmulation." To make sure the fix stays, right-click the database and select "Install" which will apply the fixes when you launch the game outside the Compatibility Administrator. This will force the game to run in full screen on a widescreen monitor everytime you start it without having to change your resolution every time.

I downloaded the demo out of curiosity and that does generate the .dat file and properly ask if you want to change the resolution at start up. However, whether you select "change resolution" or not at the start up, the game will run in a letterbox format (with black bars on top and bottom). This seems weird as other spiderweb games where you can't set the exact resolution (e.g. Avernum 4, Geneforge 3) will fill the screen of a wide screen monitor if you select "Always change resolution" at the start. So is this just a quirk of Avernum 5 and something we will have to live with?

I can't change the resolution on my steam copy of Avernum 5. You can tell it to change on start up, but it doesn't. It's just stuck on the default resolution. I did some poking around and unlike the other spiderweb games, the steam version of Avernum 5 doesn't seem to be generating a .dat file in the save games folder when you start it (which I assume stores things like resolution information). I'm not the only one with this problem either. There are a bunch of people over on the steam forums reporting the same thing, and we've already tried most of the usual stuff like deleting and redownloading, etc, etc. Any suggestions?