Junior Adventurer's Guild - April: Mars: War Logs

[Valter]

I nominate KOTOR 2.
You WILL BE judged by your grandma, and you will BE THANKFUL for it.

[Tangerine]

It is about that time.

Arcanum. It'll win eventually.

[Tadeusz]

I nominate Atom RPG: Trudograd.

[1998]

Storm of Zehir for me

[logincrash]

I nominate KOTOR 2.
You WILL BE judged by your grandma, and you will BE THANKFUL for it.

I'm gonna vote for KotOR 2 for the gayest reason possible - May the 4th be with you.

[Finarfin]

Nominating Neverwinter Nights 2

[Valter]

Storm of Zehir for me

I don't know much about the game, but why not just say Neverwinter Nights 2?

[logincrash]

Storm of Zehir for me

I don't know much about the game, but why not just say Neverwinter Nights 2?

It's a standalone story campaign in the NWN2 engine.

[Tadeusz]

Someone needs to nominate Mask of the Betrayer for the full NWN2 set

[Valter]

Just play all of NWN2 like a real man

[1998]

Storm of Zehir for me

I don't know much about the game, but why not just say Neverwinter Nights 2?

Nobody wants to play the OC (besides me probably)

[1998]

This month flopped

Can't **** too much on that statement, but we had to slog through to get to TECHNOMANCER

[1998]

Just play all of NWN2 like a real man

I would, nominate OC yourself

[1998]

It is about that time.

Arcanum. It'll win eventually.

It was very often my number 2 vote

[Oyster Sauce]

Finarfin - NWN 2
Logincrash - KOTOR 2
Tangerine - Arcanum
1998 - Storm of Zehir
Tadeusz - Trudograd
Valter - KOTOR 2
cdx abstains

[Finarfin]

Just play all of NWN2 like a real man

I would, nominate OC yourself

******, are you purposefully ignoring my posts? I already nominated NWN2

[Valter]

Finarfin - NWN 2
Logincrash - KOTOR 2
Tangerine - Arcanum
1998 - Storm of Zehir
Tadeusz - Trudograd
Valter - KOTOR 2
cdx abstains

I can't believe @cdx is ******* dead

[Vergil]

I'm confused is the voting being done different this time?

[Oyster Sauce]

I'm confused is the voting being done different this time?

Just making a note for myself because thread creation on mobile is annoying. I'll get around to it

[Vergil]

Just let me pick the game and save the hassle

[Finarfin]

Just let me pick the game and save the hassle

maybe some DRAMAtical Murder huh?

[Vergil]

Just let me pick the game and save the hassle

maybe some DRAMAtical Murder huh?

I would never betray my friend Oyster in this way.

[1998]

Just play all of NWN2 like a real man

I would, nominate OC yourself

******, are you purposefully ignoring my posts? I already nominated NWN2

Indeed missed it. But not on purpose.

[Demonic Fate]

Decided to sit down and grab that badge from my early-Act 2 save before the month was over. Ignored any new sidequests and beelined the main quests, which I never do. Thoughts:

- I can forgive a lot of things to a small budget first-time game, but wasting the worldbuilding opportunities of side quests is not one of them. I was actually very intrigued by the setting and hoped to learn more about how Mars worked, so I was colossally disappointed when all the side quests were absolutely generic stories that could have taken place in any generic slum setting. I don´t mind if they're fetch quests / kill quests, but use them to show how the water economy works, how the guild is governed, how people feel about religion, stuff like that. Not 'please make a john pay up' or 'kill the monsters that are attacking my crops'.

- The #2 reason I had lost interest was the ridiculous brown everywhere. Peak comedy was reached when in chapter three I was sent to a hydroponic farm called 'Green Hope'... and it was still utterly brown everywhere. I almost typed "2008 was a weird time" but this one came out in 2013, the same year as Bioshock Infinite. The "gritty and realistic" fad should have passed by then.

- The romance quests are the most hilariously... 'half-assed' isn't even appropriate, more like 1% assed. Two conversations, declaration of love, kiss. I guess they were terrified that putting cute women in the game and not letting the player 'romance' them would have disappointed people, but something tongue-in-cheek like Witcher 1 playing would have been less cringe.

- Combat actually got a bit more enjoyable in Chapter 2 with technomancer powers providing some variety. However, fighting in the maze-like areas of the slums was an utter pain due to the camera getting constantly stuck, and another reason I decided not to finish most sidequests due to the backtracking involved.

- I did like that Honour provided a faction with actual shades of grey morality to side with; though it was funny that you're on the personal payroll of a top military leader and you're still going on missions armed only with scavenged crowbars and nail guns.

[Element]

Late to this.



It started off quite well, I generally enjoyed the combat despite the dodge rolling and some of the side missions in the POW camp. But the leg work got tedious quickly, and some of the side missions would force you to sweep areas you've already covered by unlocking a new batch of highlighted toolboxes and scrap heaps - those were infuriating. I lost interest in the story about half way through the game, I don't really know what happened - we killed the old boss, his friend takes over, same as the old boss, back to .. whatever it is that they do in the guilds, I guess?
5/10. It's a big drop in quality from OOaM.

[gerey]

Finally managed to summon the will to finish it, and I enjoyed it for the most part, though I would call this an RPG in the most loose sense of the word. Even something like Dark Souls has more RPG mechanics than this, and more reactivity.

I do like that the game doesn't go "hurr durr the evil despot will make the nation a shithole", the protagonist does acknowledge the benefits of a strong leader. The first chapter was fun, reminded me of Riddick a bit, going around the prison, doing favors for the prisoners and plotting your escape. It was nice to have a protagonist that sounded proactive and had a goal in mind.

I did enjoy the combat, simplistic as it was, though I wish there was more to it beyond rolling and spamming attack. The mechanics themselves are sound, it just never really clicks as well as it should. The "sneaky" skill tree was mostly useless, stealth being very poorly implemented and traps not really ever that useful.

The low-tech weaponry and guns were an interesting angle, as was the ability to craft your own weapon to suit your needs, but as with everything else, the crafting is undercooked, with few recipes and too many resources thrown at you. Best I can say is that at least all the various consumables you can craft are useful.

I guess the best way to describe the game is "unfinished", there was a lot of potential here, from the premise, the worldbuilding, the combat, what the story was trying to accomplish, but most of it is squandered due to a lack of resources.

The party members are one-note - there was potential there, especially with Devotion and the bounty hunter, but beyond a few short conversations you never really get to know them or care for them. I did like that both of the "romance" interests were good-looking, which would also remain the case in their next game, Bound by Flame, but eventually they got consumed by the woke virus and had to make all the women ugly in later games. Then again, the blonde woman being the cumdump of the whole Technomancy was a bold move not even BioWare ever dared to pull.

As others have said, the side quests were a boring slog, basic bitchwork that don't really ever let you explore the interesting world that was created, the voice acting ranges from passable to horrendous, the writing is mostly serviceable, but veers into stupid at times. The backtracking was probably the worst part of the whole game, doubly so since all quests were "go there, kill stuff, go back".

I guess the only thing I can take away from this game is that I wish the devs had more resources to do justice to the setting and premise they were going for.

@Oyster Sauce, gimme my badge.

[J1M]

First off, I'm shocked this was nominated. Calling this a game is like saying that child that has taken all of the ingredients and mixed them together in a bowl and then poured it on a table has baked a cake.

For me the most striking thing about it was that I felt as though the game was written and recorded before they decided that it would take place on Mars. Nothing about the game has anything to do with Mars or a War. Technically there is a Log.

Not sure why the protagonist said this line in a tone that implies its a bad thing:



@Oyster Sauce badge please.

[rusty_shackleford]

First off, I'm shocked this was nominated. Calling this a game is like saying that child that has taken all of the ingredients and mixed them together in a bowl and then poured it on a table has baked a cake.

For me the most striking thing about it was that I felt as though the game was written and recorded before they decided that it would take place on Mars. Nothing about the game has anything to do with Mars or a War. Technically there is a Log.

Not sure why the protagonist said this line in a tone that implies its a bad thing:



@Oyster Sauce badge please.

I suspect it was originally part of technomancer (it takes placing during the middle of the game), and they just cut it out to get a smaller game out.

[CornCake]

Mars Chore Logs complete in only 3 hours. Slop goes down faster when you skip nearly all cutscenes. @Oyster Sauce please award me my slop badge if ya don't mind mate.

► Show Spoiler

Game has mediocre combat that copies Witcher 2 yet somehow adds more faults. Only 5 enemy types across the entire game (minus bosses) with the technofaggots only stunning the **** out you. Wasn't hooked at the beginning so I skipped most cutscenes except when I saw a meme. Environments looked okay but everything was a ******* corridor. Ridiculous amounts of copy/pasted npc models.

Done with the slop games, only good games left now. Good ******* riddance.

► Show Spoiler

Every ******* woman has bug eyes like the fallout show boot.

► Show Spoiler

Look, triplets!

► Show Spoiler

I saved all ammo so I could shoot every boss to death. Worth it.

► Show Spoiler

This rivals Ride to Hell Retribution in how bad the sex scene was.

[rusty_shackleford]

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