Avernum 4 Observations

[Ming]

So I've been playing some Avernum 4 and reading about it here and have some feedback on what I like and dislike (not much on the latter).

 

I'd be interested in hearing your thoughts, especially if you've been testing Avernum 5.

 

For perspective, I owned Exile: Escape from the Pit, and bought/played through some of both of Nethergate: Res. and Blades of Avernum. Played through some of the other demos, and a GeneforgeIV CD is in the mail!

 

Likes:

 

Graphics - smoother graphic movement, battle animation, better textures and shading overall. I put extra weight on this aspect as it has improved the gameplay feel for me more than anything else. The dislikes I have (below) are small concerns since I like the new look so much.

User Interface - Aside from picking up items, everything seems to work much slicker and more intuitively. I like the Journal icon on the sidebar, for instance, more than the list of quests in the character screen in N:R.

Ambient sound effects: They might not have changed much, but I still like the various background effects. (I haven't heard that annoying "crying boy at the market" yet!)

Job Board: Very cool idea. Get quests in one location, too rather than running around.

Area descriptions: As usual, the Spiderweb Soft. descriptions of areas and rooms add much to the feel of the game. Perhaps my favorite aspect of the SS games. For some reason the Avernum IV conversations and descriptions seem better than ever.

 

Dislikes:

 

Less PC Character Models/Portraits - I miss the cool looking female Slith wizard and additional human faces / bodies from Blades of Avernum. There is no tough-guy looking human fighter anymore, just the goatee'd dude who looks like a strong puff of wind could knock him over (yes, I know he's "wiry" - ha)

User interface - something about picking things up and/or clicking on items to pick up or identify seems to include an extra step compared to BoA and N:R. A lot of dragging and dropping into inventory. Maybe I've yet to figure out the trick.

Load Game: Double clicking load game doesn't load my games. It's a click, move, click checkmark extra step.

Graphics: Characters appear a bit too..."upright", especially when moving. I'd like to see more crouching, springing, striding and battle-ready stances.

 

Neutral:

 

Sounds - Just OK.

Icons - seem a bit dated compared to the rest of the engine, perhaps just because I've seen the same icons in N:R and BoA. Maybe its that the leather armor icon, for instance, doesn't seem to share the same depth of shading that the Geneforge engine provides.

 

Overall it looks great, and I'm hyped about Avernum 5. I have to wonder if any of my dislikes were addressed.

[wxxqut]

I've also played Avernum 4 for cuite a bit.I also played Geneforge series and A1-3.My opinion is that A4 has much improved compared to other Avernums.There are a lot things that I liked and few that didn't.

 

Likes:

 

1)The thing that I liked the most is that it uses Geneforge engine(first Spiderweb game whic I played is A4 followed by G1-4 and then A1-3),I got so used to it that I had trouble to adapt to Avernum engine.

2)I also got used to Geneforge movement (one click where I want to go)that I liked it very much.

3)I to liked new graphicks ,battle animations,and the looks of the game thats different from previous Avernums.

4)I very much liked that if you want to talk to somebody or open a box you just click on it,you dont have to use talk icon or right mouse button to do that(which annoyed me)or if you want to pick up something from the ground you open inventory and drag it where you want.

5)quote:

_________________________________________________

originaly writen by Ming:

 

Job Board: Very cool idea. Get quests in one location, too rather than running around

_________________________________________________

 

Agree 100%

6)Descriptions of caves, rooms, people and strange events give the felling to game.Really liked it.

 

Dislikes:

 

1)There should be more characthers of common people like townspeople, merchants,...not just boring two female and two male characthers, its annoying to me that everyone looks the same.

2)There are a lot of weak boring monsters that attack me on every step.I can't get passed from one town to another without being attacked by bandits, chitraches, rats,...I hope in A5 will be less.

3)There are no boats or elevators.It would have been much better with them.Glad they are back!

 

Overall very good.I would rate it 9.7

Its my favourite Spiderweb game.

 

Can't wait till Avernum 5 will be out for windows.

[Student of Trinity]

Beta testers aren't supposed to reveal details about the game before release. But I'm pretty sure Jeff has already stated here somewhere that there will be a few more player character models in A5.

 

I'm pretty sure that A4, like the Geneforge games, lets you pick things up by typing the letter of the little 'box' in which each object shows up, after you type 'g' for 'get' stuff. So 'g' then 'a' will move the first visible item from the ground or container into the inventory of the active character.

 

The graphical complaints: yeah. Jeff gradually upgrades his graphics, adding or improving a few things every game. So whatever you don't like will probably get improved at some point, but not everything you want may get done by A5. G6 will have further improvements.

 

I really liked A4 too, since it was my first real exposure to Avernum. I came to Spiderweb for Geneforge 1, and found it hard to get into the more primitive-looking Avernum games. A lot of the people who had already played the Exile series, then their remakes as Avernum, found the plot of A4 too familiar and straightforward.

[Ming]

Quote:

2)I also got used to Geneforge movement (one click where I want to go)that I liked it very much.

Wow, that is certainly my favorite aspect, and I forgot about it completely. I often click as far away as possible and grab for a sip of coffee while they move.

Quote:

Beta testers aren't supposed to reveal details about the game before release. But I'm pretty sure Jeff has already stated here somewhere that there will be a few more player character models in A5.

Oops, on the beta thing. Good to hear about more player char. models though! And even if he doubles up the portraits on one model and just changes the color scheme I won't complain.

Quote:

I'm pretty sure that A4, like the Geneforge games, lets you pick things up by typing the letter of the little 'box' in which each object shows up, after you type 'g' for 'get' stuff. So 'g' then 'a' will move the first visible item from the ground or container into the inventory of the active character.

I've always ignored those little letters, so thanks for pointing that out, I'll see if keyboarding it will actually make things faster, sounds like it will.

Also...up on the Avernum 5 page I saw a screenshot that had what I think is a new Slith portrait (since A4): http://www.avernum.com/avernum5/images/Avernum5CrateAmbush.jpg

More portraits, yay!

[Randomizer]

A4 and A5 have two groups of quests. The job board which is based on the dispatcher of A3/E3 idea and there are quests that you get from talking to people. It's easy to miss them if you take the wrong dialog branch or find that you got one and didn't notice it while playing.

 

Jeff did do what he said about adding more character graphics especially for the nonhumans. Still it would be nice to have a few more. There's always A6.

[Ming]

Quote:

Originally written by Randomizer:
A4 and A5 have two groups of quests. The job board which is based on the dispatcher of A3/E3 idea and there are quests that you get from talking to people. It's easy to miss them if you take the wrong dialog branch or find that you got one and didn't notice it while playing.

I liked that the job board can be empty, but then something (like where you've been on the map?) triggers more postings to it.

Quote:

Jeff did do what he said about adding more character graphics especially for the nonhumans. Still it would be nice to have a few more. There's always A6.

It never occurred to me that it was probably pretty lame to have a full Slith party with two character portraits. Those Slith, they all look alike 'ya know.

I guess Jeff's idea was that he needed a single portrait to match with a single model and have each one be unique, but really, a different colored loincloth and different portrait would be fine for me. Same goes for the Humans. Bring back all of the old portraits Jeff!

[Spidweb]

Avernum 5 has far fewer trivial monsters, both in the wild and in dungeons.

 

There are 6 new character graphics. 2 human, 2 nephil, 2 slith.

 

- Jeff Vogel

[Xaiya]

Quote:

There are 6 new character graphics. 2 human, 2 nephil, 2 slith.

That is good to hear (or...read).
Whey did you remove some (a lot) of the graphics in the first place?

[Ming]

Quote:

Originally written by Spidweb:
Avernum 5 has far fewer trivial monsters, both in the wild and in dungeons.

There are 6 new character graphics. 2 human, 2 nephil, 2 slith.

- Jeff Vogel

Great news, Jeff. Another reason why I love this board is the chance to read feedback from the programmer himself.

Now I'll just have to keep myself busy with the three games I bought until early 2008...!

[Lilith]

Quote:

Originally written by Iffy will bring you warm fuzziness.:
Whey did you remove some (a lot) of the graphics in the first place?

Because scaling up the graphics from previous Avernum games would have made them look ugly, that's why.

[VCH]

Quote:

Originally written by Thuryl:

Quote:

Originally written by Iffy will bring you warm fuzziness.:
Whey did you remove some (a lot) of the graphics in the first place?

Because scaling up the graphics from previous Avernum games would have made them look ugly, that's why.

Thanks tips.

[Jeran Korak]

Quote:

Originally written by VCH:

Quote:

Originally written by Thuryl:

Quote:

Originally written by Iffy will bring you warm fuzziness.:
Whey did you remove some (a lot) of the graphics in the first place?

Because scaling up the graphics from previous Avernum games would have made them look ugly, that's why.

Thanks tips.

It shouldn't be to hard to create more character portraits. There are thousands of them for games like NWN and Baldures Gate. And you can edit the character figures in paint if your desperate.

[Ming]

Well, those were mostly fan-made rips of other artist's work. If you look at the original Baldur's gate, there were about as many as in the Avernum series. Very well painted and beautiful, but the portraits were limited.

 

It's not like Jeff can just go in to the NWN:Vault and steal some portraits for the games he sells.

 

Besides, I'm guessing he wants some sense of consistency in the portraits that look like the work of Phil Foglio.

[Venatrix Avia]

I'm having a lot of gameplay issues with A4 so far. Some of these issues are probably just a matter of my having to get used to the new engine, but some of them seem rather more serious than that to me.

 

For example:

 

I find it really hard to distinguish the stuff lying on the ground that you can (and might want to) pick up from the stuff that isn't "really" there but is instead just kind of painted on.

 

In the older engine, you could use the right mouse button or the keyboard to see what items were in a room and available for manipulation. In this engine, you're just somehow supposed to intuit -- presumably through some mystical sense which I, sadly, was born lacking -- which of these random blobs of pixels represent actual manipulable objects, and which are just there for atmosphere or color or what have you.

 

I have no idea how one is supposed to make this distinction. They all look the same to me, and the situation is not helped by the fact that you need to be standing quite close to something for it to show up as an option when you type 'g.'

 

I'm still struggling my way though the demo, and I have to say that so far, much of my gameplay seems to consist of trying to pick up items that don't really exist (even though they sure look like items!), or finding out on a replay that I'd previously missed an item that was only one square out of my reach when I'd tried to "get" in that location before, etc., etc.

 

It's really not fun.

[m4mitchell]

I too really dislike the Avernum 4 engine. I've tried to like it, and I played through the demo when it first came out, but it just fills me with feelings of frustration and loathing.

 

I spend *so* much of my time either scrolling the side of the screen so that I can see my destination. When I played it originally, there was also a huge amount of lag, which would get worse as time went on. That was machine specific, rather than game specific - a friend of mine played it on her computer, and had no difficulties - but my laptop was still relatively recent, and it shouldn't have happened. This doesn't seem to be happening with my new laptop, however.

 

Back to the game - I dislike that items are often hidden by walls, especially important things, such as trapdoors. I really don't like the fact that spells no longer have letters attached to them - yes, I can still press 'a' in order to select the first spell, but it's difficult to know which letter to press when it comes to the later spells.

 

It's also *really* inconvenient that enemies no longer have letters attached to them, as it makes casting spells in battle more tedious because one has to select the enemy with the mouse each time. When characters are bunched up together, it can be a pain to move the mouse into the right position in order to be able to click on the intended enemy.

 

I also really dislike how the new graphics look. I've tried to like this game, and I've tried to like Geneforge, but the engine just makes me angry and frustrated. I would play the other Avernum game for hours upon hours upon hours, but with this I'll play for 10 minutes, get really annoyed, and quit.

 

(I'll still download the demo for A5 when it comes out, though. Yes, I'm an addict.)

[Randomizer]

Jeff fixed A5 so you can attack and target monster using the keyboard as well as the mouse.

 

For spell casting try using "c" to get a table with all the spells you can cast and then pick the letter. I found that I remembered most of the spell letters for mage and priest casting after a few days of playing.

[Sss-Chah]

i hate using the mouse in games, unless they're first person shooters.

[Ming]

Quote:

Originally written by m4mitchell:
I dislike that items are often hidden by walls, especially important things, such as trapdoors. I really don't like the fact that spells no longer have letters attached to them - yes, I can still press 'a' in order to select the first spell, but it's difficult to know which letter to press when it comes to the later spells.

Of the things you wrote, this is the only one I agree with. My guess is that the editor Jeff uses is in 2D (like the editor for BoA) so he cannot see how bad this is when he's making the game.

I hope that the playtesters for A5 let Jeff know when a trapdoor is "hidden" like that (there's an important one in the very first town of A4, and that' just wrong). There is nothing good or realistic about having the POV hide an object.

Venatrix Avia, I also miss the ability to click on an object on the ground to examine it, rather than using the "pick up" option. I wonder how hard it would be for Jeff to add that back in.

[Synergy]

Apparently you are not wholly familiar with the perverse sense of humor that our beloved game creator thoroughly enjoys sharing with (inflicting upon) us, the game player.

 

-S-

[Randomizer]

Quote:

Originally written by Ming:

Quote:

Originally written by m4mitchell:
I dislike that items are often hidden by walls, especially important things, such as trapdoors. I really don't like the fact that spells no longer have letters attached to them - yes, I can still press 'a' in order to select the first spell, but it's difficult to know which letter to press when it comes to the later spells.

Of the things you wrote, this is the only one I agree with. My guess is that the editor Jeff uses is in 2D (like the editor for BoA) so he cannot see how bad this is when he's making the game.

No, Jeff does it deliberately to have a good laugh at his players. I just found a canister in A5 hidden behind a pillar 3 days ago that you can only find by moving the cursor over the hidden areas (you need the item inside to finish a quest easily). Get used to the idea of scanning the entire map this way whenever there is the slightest possibility of something being hidden by an object or wall.

[Venatrix Avia]

Hmm. I think that I don't mind having to move the cursor around to find hidden doors or containers so much. It's really just a kind of equivalent to all of that head-banging required to find the secret doors in A1-3, isn't it?

 

The impossibility of finding objects bothers me far more, as one can't even play "hunt the pixel" with the mouse in an attempt to find them. In fact, now that I think of it, the engine would be much improved for me if objects worked like doors and containers -- if they became highlit when you ran the mouse over them. That would solve much of my frustration with the engine right there.

 

As things stand, though, the only brute force method of finding objects I can think of would be to put your lead guy in each square, and then repeatedly press "g." That's too much bother, especially since (as far as I can tell) there's no easy way to close the inventory window once it has opened. You have to use the mouse each time, which is very slow and inconvenient. Really, I think that my annoyance with the engine would be reduced a great deal if only it were possible to just hit 'enter' or something to close the inventory window, rather than having to direct the cursor to that check mark each and every time.

[Randomizer]

ESC, the escape key, tends to work as a way to close most windows. The get command, "g" will usually work within two squares of any party member. It does get boring, but there is a limit to the amount of items you can get to sell for money.

[Dikiyoba]

Looking through all the graphics (in Data file for Windows, no idea for Mac) to identify and seperate the objects/items (obvious since each item has two graphics--one for when it is on the ground and the other when it is in your inventory) from the terrain and other non-pickupables might help. And hopefully after a bit more exploring, you'll recognize which things are items and which aren't.

 

Dikiyoba.

[Zummi]

Whoa..new graphics for A5? Nice..I hope he makes custom graphics for some of the equips that are worth mentioning..Demonslayer and co.

 

I'm tired of seeing the EC as a lump of green metal..it'll be better if it was a spiky, better looking, lump of green metal..

[Venatrix Avia]

Randomizer, I could have sworn that I tried ESC, and that it did something completely different (sent me to the main menu, perhaps?), but when I tried it again just now, it worked! Boy, do I feel foolish now. Thank you very much!

 

Dikiyoba, thanks for the tip. I'm sure I will get used to it in time. As I hope you can tell, I really do want to find this game more fun than frustrating, since I've enjoyed the others in the series so very much. There's definitely good will for the franchise built up in my mind, which is the reason I'm willing to put in the effort. Had it been the first I'd tried, I suspect I would have written it off as "not for me" early on, but I'm now sufficiently invested in (addicted to?) the world that I really do want to play this game.

 

I'm glad to hear there will be more character graphics introduced in the next one, especially since I favor all-nephil parties. Right now I basically have a party of clones in different colored loin-cloths wandering through the caves (the other nephil sprite I find too dark to be easily distinguishable from the background, so I'm left with only one option). It works, sure, but it's a little unsatisfying on the gut emotional level.

 

ETA:

Okay, I just tried the workaround for fudging the character graphics mentioned here again. This is another thing I'd tried before, but hadn't been able to make work. Well, today is my lucky day, I guess, because it worked fine for me this time. Yay! (I must have been totally out to lunch the day I tried all these things before or something, I dunno.) Anyway, thought I'd add that, both to forestall the advice, and also to direct any new readers to that trick.

[Randomizer]

If you are in the regular display ESC, escape key, does send you to the menu of save game, preferences, etc. It doesn't work all the time, but it works enough so I don't have to use a mouse or the correct key.

[Locmaar]

Quote:

Originally written by Randomizer:
[No, Jeff does it deliberately to have a good laugh at his players. I just found a canister in A5 hidden behind a pillar 3 days ago that you can only find by moving the cursor over the hidden areas (you need the item inside to finish a quest easily). Get used to the idea of scanning the entire map this way whenever there is the slightest possibility of something being hidden by an object or wall.

I stumbled across an alternative I had forgotten about. If you hit 'u' for 'use' the secret little things will show up with a letter of the alphabet conveniently placed beside them. That sure helped me a lot.

[Ming]

Quote:

Okay, I just tried the workaround for fudging the character graphics mentioned here again. This is another thing I'd tried before, but hadn't been able to make work. Well, today is my lucky day, I guess, because it worked fine for me this time. Yay! (I must have been totally out to lunch the day I tried all these things before or something, I dunno.) Anyway, thought I'd add that, both to forestall the advice, and also to direct any new readers to that trick.

I'm only in the beginning of A4, but does this imply that it is very difficult to play with Human characters? I haven't been doing so badly with an all human group so far (fighter-type custom, rogue-type custom, shaman, sorcerer).

[Randomizer]

A4 is the first of the Avernum games where experience decreases significantly when your level is higher than the monster's level. So as you get higher you get fewer level increases. The skill bonuses of nonhumans and especially the nephil more than make up for the lower levels due to XP penalty. You don't really get penalized for having high XP penalty since the associated skills that get added on are more than the skill points you would get for more levels using a lower penalty or even a XP bonus.

 

You can play with humans, but you don't get all those nice weapon skill bonuses and gymnastics to avoid damage if you play a nephil.

[Venatrix Avia]

Ming, I'm sure you can do fine with a human party. I'm just partial to nephil characters because I like using ranged attacks and moving quickly and Trying Not To Get Hit . That's always my preferred strategy, because I am a card-carrying coward.

 

So I find the gymnastics and dex and missile bonuses you get with the nephil really hard to resist. They're basically tailor-made for what's always been my favored tactical approach, is what it comes down to.

[Drayk Armitage]

You can play with humans -- they're just close to 100% inferior to Nephils. In the end this doesn't make a massive difference outside of Torment, though.

[Ming]

Thanks for the feedback, I still am early enough in the game that I could swap out for a Nephil for at least one of the characters. Oddly enough I had one initially, and felt he was progressing poorly so I swapped him out with another human! I hadn't considered how he might benefit later in the game.

[Randomizer]

Quote:

Originally written by Yama Toman?:
You can play with humans -- they're just close to 100% inferior to Nephils. In the end this doesn't make a massive difference outside of Torment, though.

It's even worse in Avernum 5. You really should be given an experience bonus if you run with humans in your party.

[Drayk Armitage]

Personally I'd just be happy if the Nephils weren't overwhelming better than the Sliths. Although having playable humans would be nice.

[Synergy]

The slith is improved! The nephil continues to dominate. The poor human continues to languish, except it is even more accentuated now with no inherent bonuses and the need to work harder for Battle Disciplines. I keep complaining to Jeff that humans are so boringly and unattractively unuseful as PCs, and that I would love a reason to choose one. So far, the only practical reason is so you don't have to look at four fuzzy or reptilian faces on your screen.

 

-S-

[Ephesos]

Quote:

Originally written by Yama Toman?:
Although having playable humans would be nice.

[Lilith]

An easy way to give humans an advantage would be to let humans start with up to three traits instead of two (or let nephilim and sliths have only one trait), but that might shift the balance too far in the other direction.

[Drayk Armitage]

So basically, non-humanity would be a trait. Sounds balanced. In A4, 2 trait humans would be chosen over 1 trait nephils, but 2 trait nephils and 3 trait humans would each offer advantages.

[Randomizer]

I was pushing for humans getting bonus skill points which keeps the generalist nature of humans, but giving them less than the skill points needed to raise nonhuman skills.

 

The option of an extra trait might be too much depending upon what was chosen. Even with the extra experience penalty, a divine touch, elite warrior, with one other major trait could be come extremely powerful without using skill points.

[wxxqut]

I dont see the big differnce betwen humans and non-humans, I mean I played with 2 humans, 1 slith, and 1 nephilim.My human and slith warior were evenly matched and I think the human was even a little stronger.

 

But I wouldn't mind 3 traited human and 2 traited non-human characters.

[Randomizer]

Wait until you play A5 and the difference becomes glaringly obvious about halfway through the game. Seriously, A3 was the last game where playing a human was better on all difficulty levels and that's only if you weren't out to get extra encounters with Empire troops. A4 was better to be a nephil on torment difficulty.

[Skippy the bush kangaroo]

While not strictly a race comparison - I've always preferred Elite Warrior to Slith as pure 'traits'. The XP cost of Elite Warrior is lower and, all other things being equal, a Human Elite Warrior will last much longer in a fight than a Slith (parry is great). The Slith can dish it out with a pole weapon, but he just can't take it. And, at the end of the day, a Slith is no use if he is dead because he got beat on and couldn't avoid all that damage. Nephil Elite Warrior - great; Nephil, Fast on Feet, Elite Warrior - even better.

[Randomizer]

Nephil elite warrior divine touch for A4 and A5 is better as a fighter since you get increased blademaster and pick up sharpshooter. Fast on feet isn't as helpful since those extra AP can't be relied on to help when needed. Increased health through tough constitution is useful later in the game.

[Shaken]

The graphics in A4 just sucks, it's not avernum, it's..something different, in a bad way.

 

So I guess A5 won't be much better, imo.

[Celtic Minstrel]

The one major thing I missed in Avernum 4 that hasn't been mentioned is the lack of elevation.

[Ephesos]

Quote:

Originally written by Celtic Minstrel:
The one major thing I missed in Avernum 4 that hasn't been mentioned is the lack of elevation.

For what it's worth, this has been discussed, and Jeff is bringing it back for A5.

[wxxqut]

One more thing that bothered me in A4 is that map is totally unaccurate.You get out of the map it says that you are milles from the place you actually are.It is hard when you don't have reliable map.

 

Hope Jeff improved it in A5.

[Drayk Armitage]

The map is actually pretty accurate -- once you figure out which part of the icon that shows your location actually points to your location. It's not obvious (and I don't even remember without looking at it).

[wxxqut]

And which part of the icon shows your exact location?

[Alorael at Large]

Quote:

Originally written by Yama Toman?:
(and I don't even remember without looking at it).

Pick somewhere where you know where you should be on the map, look at the map, and figure out what part of the icon represents where you should be.

—Alorael, who generally doesn't use the map. In A4 he knew where he was from too much time wandering in A1 and A2, and in A5 he just didn't get lost terribly.