Tyranny

[Disgustipated]

New game coming out from Obsidian. I may not have time to check it out on release because of a little game called Civ6, but this game looks interesting, and will be on my wish list. My main concerns are that Chris Avellone left Obsidian, and he was a big part of my favorite Black Isle/Obsidian games. My other concern is the high fantasy setting. I wasn't real big on the setting of Pillars of Eternity and couldn't get into that setting as much as I would have liked. I do really like the prospects of dialogue and choosing your path whether it be good or evil.

I don't know a lot of details about this game other than what's on the wiki page. Feel free to add in more information.

 

[Disgustipated]

I went ahead and pre-ordered. I will play this on Thursday. It's better for me at least, to play these types of games right at release. So I don't have the temptation of looking up spoilers since there usually isn't much information about the game right at release. I tend to have a bad habit of looking stuff up when I get stuck, rather than figuring out the problem. I run the risk of making mistakes and having to replay hours of the game, but it is more fun this way I admit. I just don't have the discipline sometimes.

While I understand the desire to have a top down level game, I still would like to see characters faces as I interact with them. Yeah it's Bioware-ish, but it's still a good thing to have that cinematic type experience. I get more involved in the dialogue, characters, and storyline this way. But the game still does look fantastic. I'm looking forward to a real role playing experience. At least as far as Crpg's are concerned.

I will play the day after release. I may try to squeeze in a Civ 6 game or two, I was hoping to finish out my achievements, but that won't happen.

 

[GoodSarmatian]

It certainly looks interesting, and I consider myself an Obsidian fan, but I won't really have time for it just yet with Civ 6 and soon Dishonored 2.
As much as I loved Pillars of Eternity, I'm not really a fan of the Infinity engine type RPG. It's the real-time-with-pause combat in particular that I don't like. While it worked well in Dragon Age: Origins, I feel it's too much hectic micromanagement if your party has six instead of four people. If I have to pause almost every second to make it pseudo-turn-based, the game should just have a turn-based combat system to begin with.
I also agree on the perspective, but making it look similar to Dragon Age would probably require resources that current Obsidian doesn't have.

 

[Maniacal]

The entire point of PoE is that it is a modern old school CRPG like Baldur's Gate (which was made by some of the same devs who are or were at Obsidian).

It's not my favourite combat system either but it was a lot of fun playing PoE and I really want to play Tyranny but I just don't have time right now, and I still need to play The White March expansion.

 

[PhroX]

I found PoE was trying a little too hard to be old school when it came to the game mechanics, but was a solid game overall. As such, I've pretty high hopes for Tyranny - they've not got the expectations of backers as to exactly how combat is supposed to be, and from the streams and dev diaries it seems they've addressed some of the issues (4 man party, cooldowns instead of Vancian magic etc.), while the storytelling side is always Obsidian's strong point.

 

[Maniacal]

Yeah been watching a preview steam by CallofCthulu and the combat is much better and really cool. It really builds upon the CRPG genre and is beautifully written, designed and drawn.

 

[Arakhor]

My copy has now finished downloading, but I'll probably wait until the weekend to try it out. It does look really good though.

 

[Akka]

Barely started it (less than one hour in the playing), but so far it's very promising. The writing is good, the background looks well-designed, and the concept is really refreshing and fun. I'm enjoying waving my arbitrary authority around, and the promises of political machination mixed with battlefield excitement makes me eager to see more.

Here is hoping it'll hold up to its promises.

 

[GoodSarmatian]

Yeah been watching a preview steam by CallofCthulu and the combat is much better and really cool. It really builds upon the CRPG genre and is beautifully written, designed and drawn.

Oh, didn't know that. I kind of assumed it's mechanically more like PoE. Maybe I'll get this instead of Dishonored 2 which appears to have dishonored (haha, see what I did there?) itself with performance issues on PC.
A fantasy RPG with a backstory where the Dark Lord won seems rather fitting this week.

 

[PhroX]

Put a few hours in last night. Combat is similar to PoE, but feels less clunky and fiddly. I think a lot of this is simply going down to a 4 man party so you're not constantly having to micromanage. Story wise, I'm liking it. So far I've managed to pretty much tell everyone to go screw themselves, before getting an achievement for kicking prisoners off the side of a tower. Which is fun.

 

[Maniacal]

Oh, didn't know that. I kind of assumed it's mechanically more like PoE. Maybe I'll get this instead of Dishonored 2 which appears to have dishonored (haha, see what I did there?) itself with performance issues on PC.
A fantasy RPG with a backstory where the Dark Lord won seems rather fitting this week.

It is similar to PoE, but builds upon that.

 

[Akka]

I find the setting much, much more interesting than the PoE one, and rather better used too.

 

[Arakhor]

I've played through the character creation now. I'm really impressed so far.

 

[GoodSarmatian]

I got it this morning and started a game.
Very good first impression so far. Really like the conquest choices. You're the bad guy, but don't have to be that bad. I hope I'm not forced into pointless cruelty at some point. The Chorus makes me feel like I'm forced into an alliance with Caesar's Legion.
Combat and character system are much improved from PoE, but I'd still prefer strictly turn based combat. It would be perfect with combo attacks.

 

[Disgustipated]

I'm enjoying my game very much. It starts off a little slow, lots of dialogue in act 1 and not much action. Be patient, it really picks up in act 2. A lot more interesting decisions to make in Act 2 as well. Really is a good role playing experience. I got to kill a baby. You can't ask for more role play than that. If decisions like that make you squeemish, you are warned now. It's an interesting decision. You can argue the needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few. I haven't tried to see how viable it is to take another path regarding the baby. I'll save that for another play through.

Combat is a little less clunky as mentioned above. 4 really is a good number, it worked well in DA:Origins (still one of my favorite CRPG's), and it works well here. It's a little tough at first, but now my party is so OP I may have to bump the difficulty level up. Normal is becoming like easy. I got a "tidecaster" (I won't spoil the name) in my party, and she's just amazing. I was reading a post on the official boards that magic is under powered, but I'm happy with it so far. Although my main character is a rogue like archer, and she tears things up quite a bit, and she may get more kills, but the mage really softens things up. I'm running 2 mages right now. Although I'm almost to a point now I don't need a healer, but it's nice to have. I may get rid of him though and just keep the difficulty on normal which has become fairly easy. Supposedly the combat "scales", but I'm finding my party is getting pretty strong. Defeating my second havoc was much easier than the first.

Be sure to talk to Sirin and get her back story. I find her character back story to be one of the more interesting ones.

edit: Supposedly people are saying this game is 20 to 30 hours, but I'm at 32 hours and still in act 2. I've been reading everything though, and I'm not the fastest reader. The only thing I haven't gone through yet is the dialogue with the beastwoman companion. Although about 45 minutes is probably idle time.

 

[Akka]

The game is pretty good overall, but it sadly doesn't manage to hold all its promises.

The writing is very good and the setting is excellent (far more compelling than PoE actually). The illusion of freedom is also great, and the replayability (though artificially forced by the following flaws) is rather impressive.
But there is some deep flaws in the design, as the only true decision is made in act 1, and all act 2 is basically one of four railroaded path following said decision. It seems the writers forgot their own premises and forgot player agency in making the story. The ending has some great part, but is pretty underwhelming as the game crash back hard on the usual RPG cliché settings, going completely against the entire concept of the game.

So again, pretty good game, but missing its own mark due to some rather incomprehensible decisions to go against its initial idea.

 

[Disgustipated]

Finally finished act 2.

I did want to say I like the spells in this game. I know it was a controversial decision to take away friendly fire. And I can see it from both sides. Yeah the game is easier in many ways, almost too easy. But then again, it's real fun using all these cool spells. I just love the giant boulder, it's one of my favorites.