Zoria: Age of Shattering

[1998]

Full release on 7th March, there is even a demo!

It's a squad and tb based RPG, but it also seems to have some degree of exploration. I didn't follow the development too closely, and the trailers don't show much but it looks interesting enough to give it a shot.

As for woke content, here is the team:



And the party used in trailers/screenshots

[rusty_shackleford]

Been waiting for this for a while, expecting it to be a fairly decent hit unless they drop the ball.

[The_Mask]

Oh no... Romanian names... oh... no...

[Tweed]

Well, they at least look human.

[rusty_shackleford]

Well, they at least look human.

The nicest compliment romanians have ever received.

[Ratcatcher]

:informativescu:

[maidenhaver]

>While still turn-based, this freedom of movement and quick ability use almost makes it feel closer to an action game. -RPGamer

Turn-bastards will never recover.

[rusty_shackleford]

I was hoping rtwp would become more popular after IE/NWN-style rtwp was taken out back and shot. DAO was quite fun.

[Tweed]

DA:O was taken out back and shot instead and we got DA2 and Cisquisition instead.

[Konjad]

I'm giving it a try but... uh... I don't have good impressions...

[Acrux]

I just realized I've been ignoring this because I thought it was a mobile game thats being ported to PC. It turns out I had it confused with another game, Vendir: Plague of Lies. They really need to start coming up with better titles than Made Up Word: Noun of Noun Modifier.

Personally, I think Tactics Chronicles: Age of Fallen Darkness would be pretty good.

► Show Spoiler

[Magick]

They really need to start coming up with better titles than Made Up Word: Noun of Noun Modifier.

Yahtzee of Zero Punctuation / Fully Ramblomatic always complains about those sort of game names, and does a dry heave whenever he reads them:

► Show Spoiler

[Konjad]

The only postive thing I can say about Zoria is that combat can occasionally be a bit challenging if you start falling asleep and forget to drink health potions.

The game is in 80%+ all about combat, but it's a very average combat with lots of trash encounters. You just move a few meters and have another few enemies to kill in turn based combat in which you usually have two movements per character, an it can be move-attack, two attacks or move further. Some skills etc, it's stuff you've seen in lots of other games. Here it doesn't have any special quirks or anything, it's very average in this regard but also unfortunately not very tactical. It's not grid-based and freedom of movement always allow you to hit the most vulnerable enemies first then finish the rest. Besides considering once in a while which skill to use there's nothing to think about in fights. What about the rest of the game though? The other 20%- of the game is dialogues which are so generic and unimaginative that I have a suspicion they were written by software like ChatGPT then edited to fit the setting. It's not only boring, it feels like copy-paste of random bad fantasy fan-fiction. It's terrible. Characters, quests and story... well, what even is there to say, imagine "ChatGPT write me a generic fantasy with cool heroes, evil enemies, and awesome quests" and this is exactly what you would expect to come out.

[rusty_shackleford]

was considering this until I found out it has diablo-style random itemization loot puke
disgusting




I don't understand how devs are willing to put the least amount of effort possible into core mechanics of their game. I must assume they therefore hate RPGs.

[1998]

The only postive thing I can say about Zoria is that combat can occasionally be a bit challenging if you start falling asleep and forget to drink health potions.

The game is in 80%+ all about combat, but it's a very average combat with lots of trash encounters. You just move a few meters and have another few enemies to kill in turn based combat in which you usually have two movements per character, an it can be move-attack, two attacks or move further. Some skills etc, it's stuff you've seen in lots of other games. Here it doesn't have any special quirks or anything, it's very average in this regard but also unfortunately not very tactical. It's not grid-based and freedom of movement always allow you to hit the most vulnerable enemies first then finish the rest. Besides considering once in a while which skill to use there's nothing to think about in fights. What about the rest of the game though? The other 20%- of the game is dialogues which are so generic and unimaginative that I have a suspicion they were written by software like ChatGPT then edited to fit the setting. It's not only boring, it feels like copy-paste of random bad fantasy fan-fiction. It's terrible. Characters, quests and story... well, what even is there to say, imagine "ChatGPT write me a generic fantasy with cool heroes, evil enemies, and awesome quests" and this is exactly what you would expect to come out.

I only just finished the prologue, and yeah I don't think it will be a particularly good game. But ChatGPT writing? Come on now...that meme has to go away.




That **** is anything but AI writing...

[Shillitron]

I was hoping rtwp would become more popular after IE/NWN-style rtwp was taken out back and shot. DAO was quite fun.

Updated my "Rusty-****-Takes.txt"

it's over 12 gigs now.

[rusty_shackleford]

I was hoping rtwp would become more popular after IE/NWN-style rtwp was taken out back and shot. DAO was quite fun.

Updated my "Rusty-****-Takes.txt"

it's over 12 gigs now.

What's wrong with my statement?
Time-based RTwP is good, especially if it has a lot of triggers.
Aarklash, DAO, Tower of Time, 7.62 high caliber, etc., It has the positives of turn-based and the positives of real-time combined.

[Shillitron]

Time-based RTwP is good

What do you mean by time based?
Are you saying rounds vs cooldowns are extremely different and completely shake the foundations of RTwP?

You just **** on IE games to be edgy. It's old hat.

[rusty_shackleford]

Time-based RTwP is good

What do you mean by time based?
Are you saying rounds vs cooldowns are extremely different and completely shake the foundations of RTwP?

You just **** on IE games to be edgy. It's old hat.

IE games(+NWN, KOTOR 1 & 2) are round-based, they aren't actually simulating time.
It's not "cooldowns", it's "my guy takes 1.82s to aim and fire his gun because he's a quick draw and manages to blow the other guy's brains out because he's just a bit slower".

Some of the most skill-based stuff you can do in the IE games were mechanics that skirted the round-based restriction e.g., dodging dispels, because the dispel projectile traveled in real-time, and the characters moved in real-time.

[Shillitron]

Time-based RTwP is good

What do you mean by time based?
Are you saying rounds vs cooldowns are extremely different and completely shake the foundations of RTwP?

You just **** on IE games to be edgy. It's old hat.

IE games(+NWN, KOTOR 1 & 2) are round-based, they aren't actually simulating time.
It's not "cooldowns", it's "my guy takes 1.82s to aim and fire his gun because he's a quick draw and manages to blow the other guy's brains out because he's just a bit slower".

Some of the most skill-based stuff you can do in the IE games were mechanics that skirted the round-based restriction e.g., dodging dispels, because the dispel projectile traveled in real-time, and the characters moved in real-time.

12.1 gigs now..

[1998]

That game really feels like it was designed with RTwP in mind. There is no combat design, no positioning, no environment. Just every enemy rushing towards you. At least it's very fast tb.

[1998]

Finished chapter 2 (~20 hours in) and I am actually quite enjoying it.

It's all about exploration. Loot/itemization, tons of other bloat (I think I got now around 30 companions...), skill progression, Kingmaker-like missions for those 30 companions not in your party, base building is all garbage. Combat is serviceable at best, it's pretty fast-paced at least

Exploration happens on a DOS-style map, with tons of locations, unique dungeons, and quests. There is way more backtracking though and you uncover the whole map pretty quickly. But once I learned to ignore all the bloat (loot is useless, you can always very readily craft way stronger equipment), and focused on my 4 char party just crawling through dungeons and exploring new areas was actually quite fun.

It reminds me a bit of Black Geyser. Not that they are very similar games, but if you can ignore all the jank and focus fully on exploration, you can have a decent time, so far at least.

Not expecting too much for the mid/late-game though.

[1998]

Finished (~35h). Verdict still stands, for exploration **** it might be worth it.

The game is clearly designed around you managing 30-40 companions, why anyone would do that, I don't know. I assumed they come into play at some point (Defending the Keep etc.) but nope. There is no reason not to stick to you 4 men party.

That also means that you have a ton of materials to craft only top gear for your dudes. Especially once you found the initiative crystals and slapped them on every piece of equipment the game is broken.

All effects stack, Equipment, shrines, even different potions. Final boss couldn't make a scratch on me.

[Lhynn]

Played it for a lil bit and found it to be utterly dull.
How do you **** writing this badly?

[1998]

Played it for a lil bit and found it to be utterly dull.
How do you **** writing this badly?

ESL, with a very limited vocabulary. That's why everyone is talking exactly the same, and there are tons of mistakes in there. They should have written it in Romanian and MT it.

[rusty_shackleford]

This got a DLC, it looks to just be a class with no additional content?

[1998]

Would actually be interested in new content, but that, why even bother. Maybe to prop up the deluxe edition or whatnot