Avernum EFtP, a faithful remake?

[Andariel]

hey!

 

Out of curiosity, I'd like to know if Avernum EFtP stays true to Avernum 1 (and Exile?). Apart from the engine, what are the main differences between the 2 versions? Are differences in the good or the bad side?

 

I know by experience that remakes always stray from the original versions. Is it also the case here?

 

Do you recommend playing Avernum 1 (or even Exile?) instead of (or at least, after) EFtP for someone who doesn't care about its old graphics, or one can easily forget about it?

 

 

 

[Earth]

storywise A:EFTP and A1 (which is remake of Exile 1) is mostly same, few things have got changed (like what happens at Fort Avernum), new sidequests, etc.

 

its not needed to play A1/E1 unless wants.

 

Exile1-3 might not work on modern comp so playing those might need tweaking.

[Randomizer]

Every time Jeff remakes the game he adds new content. Avernum 1 had Bahssikava added as a three level dungeon. This time there is a new town and most other towns and forts have a lower level added.

[nikki.]

Really, it's pretty faithful; aside from the added dungeons/floors, there's really not all that much difference. The only two things I can really think of are the way skills are now handled, and the rather incongruous inclusion (in my opinion) of something slightly spoilery;

 

Click to reveal..

Under Formello, there's an Empire agent working with Avernum. It stuck out for me because, at this point, Avernites have been pretty open in their hatred of the Empire in previous versions.

 

Still, it's not huge: if you liked Avernum/Exile 1, you'll almost certainly like this.

[Necris Omega]

If plot's your big hang up, everything really does feel as it should, save for one thing (okay, two if you count Niocin's concern, which I can see) -

Click to reveal..

At the very end, when you're going to take down Howthrone, Garzhad shows up. I wouldn't mind this, except the results of the fight make it seem as though the assassination was entirely his to allow. Uh, no, this was made possible by MY HEROISM, not some big bad LETTING it happen. Really a change I didn't like at all.

 

Some of the dialog is also pretty disparaging of your own characters and their merits, which I didn't appreciate either.

 

Bleh.

[Andariel]

Are you sure about that?

 

It's not really what I'm getting from the old fans I saw in the forums...

 

They say that Avernum is somewhat Avadonised, some even say it's dumbed down... The skill progression is more assisted, no more recruitable NPCs, no more alchemy, no more survival-system (food and rest system), health regeneration, game's less challenging, stuff like that, you know?

 

Seems like those changes could impact on game experience, no?

[Jerakeen]

Jeff has moved away from requiring players to make too many character building decisions before they've ever played the game, so if you consider that dumbing down, then yeah. If nuts and bolts are your thing, you may be disappointed. But if you enjoy actually playing the game without necessarily agonizing over where to put each skill point, it's an improvement.

[Alorael at Large]

Is A:EftP somewhat like Avadon? Yes. The graphics are more like Avadon, or the second Avernum trilogy, and not like the originals. There's a skill tree, although it's not much like Avadon's skill tree. There are far more bosses that use unique abilities and tricks that require some degree of strategy or puzzle-solving rather than just slugging it out.

 

But character building is freeform, not class-based. The skills in the tree are Avernum stalwarts. There are mage spells and priest spells, and three levels of each, just like Avernum.

 

People who want A:EftP to be just like A1 will be disappointed, because it isn't. If you want to play A1, play A1. But this isn't just Avadonization; it's Jeff learning from his experience as a designer.

 

The skill progression is very different. You get far fewer points to begin with, and the progression is linear, so you don't have the A1 problem where you have to gain several levels to have the points to raise the skill you want. It's harder to start out with a completely useless character because you make so few decisions upfront.

 

There aren't recruitable NPCs anymore. I don't miss them; they were strictly better than your PCs, but required weird gameplay to optimize, and I never used them. But yes, they're gone.

 

There's still alchemy, and you even still go to regenerating herb patches to harvest the stuff you need. There isn't a skill anymore, which I'd say is for the best. Actually devoting yourself to alchemy was always a bad investment except for being able to get knowledge brews, and now you can get the elixirs you want without having to make your characters worse at everything else. But yes, there's more reliance on NPCs for it.

 

The Avernum series never required food until A6. In A1-3, you needed food to rest, but you almost never needed to rest. I played through the original trilogy without bothering to carry food or recover by doing anything other than walking around outside. The new recovery system is different, but I'd hardly call it dumbed-down.

 

As for being less challenging, the general response has been that this game is more challenging, sometimes much more. If you play on the highest difficulty, you'd better optimize your party aggressively. On normal, it's just sometimes hard. On casual, of course, for most people it isn't so tough, but that's intentional.

 

—Alorael, who really recommends downloading the demo. Spend an hour, get through the early parts of the game, and you'll see how faithful it is and whether you like the engine yourself. No amount of discussion here will convince you, so let the game speak for itself.

[Earth]

new skilltree makes it bit complicated to get good resistance (especially mental) to fighters unless spends points to skills to unlock resistance but then those points are away from their main thing aka weapon skills and spell which cures all harmful effects is gotten lateish game.

[Aoslare]

Originally Posted By: Andariel

It's not really what I'm getting from the old fans I saw in the forums...

A few people have billed themselves as "old fans" and been very loud about complaining. But as it turns out, they were mostly people who played A4-A6, not actual fans of Avernum 1 or Exile: EFTP. From what I have seen, the people who have stubbornly liked the other games (A1 and Exile) have mostly had positive things to say about AEFTP.

[Micawber]

In addition to the pros/cons mentioned above, A:EftP actually does fix a couple of annoyances from A1 (the missing quest log, the few monsters who used to be able to attack through walls). Unfortunately at the same time it introduces new annoyances (characters constantly being immobilized, combat across different levels of elevation is broken). Some other problems from earlier games are still around (F10 key doesn't work again, a few trainable skills are worthless). But none of these things is big enough to stop the game from being enjoyable.

 

Alorael is right. If you want to play A1, play A1. If you have been playing A1-3 for the past decade and want to experience a new engine, play A:EftP.

[Earth]

few times my party's fighters attacked enemies with swords who were higher than fighters were (Giant castle for example) and Pyrog's giants hit my casters from above and my party's casters threw lightning sprays to giants although giants were much higher, in A5 and A6 spells were bit useless when attacking upwards.