Kingdom of Amalur: Reckoning

I'm kinda psyched that this game would be good from a story perspective (with Mcfarlane and Salvatore involved)... hope that turns out to be the case.

Chauntecleer wrote:

I'm kinda psyched that this game would be good from a story perspective (with Mcfarlane and Salvatore involved)... hope that turns out to be the case.

Not to rain on your parade, but McFarlane had nothing to do with the story and Salvatore only wrote the backstory. So far, the history seems rich, but the writing is very much par for the course video game writing.

... Great, I'm pissing all over your first post. Lol. Sorry dude.

garion333 wrote:
Chauntecleer wrote:

I'm kinda psyched that this game would be good from a story perspective (with Mcfarlane and Salvatore involved)... hope that turns out to be the case.

Not to rain on your parade, but McFarlane had nothing to do with the story and Salvatore only wrote the backstory. So far, the history seems rich, but the writing is very much par for the course video game writing.

... Great, I'm pissing all over your first post. Lol. Sorry dude.

I thought that's how we welcomed people?

I remember my first post. One of the regulars molested me.

Lot of people pay good money for that, and he gets it free. GWJ is an amazing community.

Lol no worries at all. That does make sense -- I just read their names on the promo material and didn't read any more of the info on it. Still looks like a pretty decent game though... right up my alley.

I like the races, the art style (if blocky) and the spirit of the combat system (we'll see if it gets old). I just want a better view, a la Dragon Age or even Fable. God, I never thought I'd be asking for the camera from Fable.

hah! thought they were doing something clever and minimalist with a black screen, given that you start in a body bag - but no, turns out theres an ATI related graphics bug :S Oh well!
(post processing borks things up on ATI cards it seems).

Also - wasn't paying attention but didn't realise this was an EA published game, using an Origin login (for the pointless crossover ME3 DLC stuff). Yet it's on steam.

Huh.

I wonder if we can expect it to vanish without a trace come the first whiff of paid DLC content?

stevenmack wrote:

Also - wasn't paying attention but didn't realise this was an EA published game, using an Origin login (for the pointless crossover ME3 DLC stuff). Yet it's on steam.

Huh.

I wonder if we can expect it to vanish without a trace come the first whiff of paid DLC content?

It's an EA Partners thing, 38 Studios is the proper publisher.

Montalban wrote:

I just want a better view, a la Dragon Age or even Fable. God, I never thought I'd be asking for the camera from Fable.

Yes, I just did another chunk of playing and I was attacking things off the side of the screen in melee and all sorts of situations where it didn't want to show me where I was going unless I babysat the camera. I get the impression it's trying to be helpful, but doesn't quite get there.

Playing the game with mouse look on PC has been a delight, with the exception of very tight areas like merchant's houses. The angle that the camera pulls back to is very good for engaging combat and managing large groups.

finished. Pretty neat - definitely see the Fable comparisons. Some annoying bugs though - sound issues mainly (occasionally I'll attack in silence only to have the audio catch up a few seconds later). Overall though - not too shabby. Nice to see a game with a bit of colour in it as well for a change.

stevenmack wrote:

(occasionally I'll attack in silence only to have the audio catch up a few seconds later).

That's uh... fate...sound. Fatesound. Sound at the speed of fate. Yep.

stevenmack wrote:

finished. Pretty neat - definitely see the Fable comparisons. Some annoying bugs though - sound issues mainly (occasionally I'll attack in silence only to have the audio catch up a few seconds later). Overall though - not too shabby. Nice to see a game with a bit of colour in it as well for a change.

There was a post from the Devs stating that the demo was forked from the main build a few months ago and does not have the polish and bug fixes that where included with the release copy of the game

http://forums.reckoning.amalur.com/s...

Unfortunately the only way to get both the demo and the game out the door on time was to branch the demo off of the main game a few months back, then try to copy over bug fixes from the main game to it where possible, while cutting out all the bits of the game that should NOT show up in the demo in order to get the download size down to something reasonable.

As a result, a great many polish bits and bug fixes from the main game didn't make it into the demo (some particualrly noteworthy fixes relate to audio cutting out or being significantly delayed). It's frustrating for us because we want the demo to be as shiny as possible, but in the end of the day we wanted to focus the bulk of our bug fixing and polish efforts on the final game rather than the demo. Hopefully you'll thank us for that on Feb 7th.

Fair enough - that answers that then

I really enjoyed the demo and my wife noticed. I think I know what I'm getting for Valentine's day this year

Huh. Just logged in on the title screen and got all my ME3 stuff. That's kinda easy.

Guess I might play a bit later then since I have it.

Just want to point out to those who were in the Bastion thread that this demo did not start at my natural resolution, but instead spread and morphed my desktop as usual. Silly games.

Stele wrote:

Just want to point out to those who were in the Bastion thread that this demo did not start at my natural resolution, but instead spread and morphed my desktop as usual. Silly games. :D

Mine started at 1600x1200, which I thought was kind of novel as 4:3 ratio is 'unfashionable' now, especially for a console port.

Nice touch in the demo: if you've completed the Well of Souls you can skip that part and get to the open, timed section. I wanted to try some different combat abilities and that makes it much less time consuming.

Hah, when you charge the stave attack you float. Great.

Another neat bit: in the "Moves" section of the demo you can view a video of all the weapon skills or abilities. Pretty useful UI implementation, no?

A lot of spot-on impressions of the demo. I played through the escape-the-dank-dungeon opening and maybe 10 minutes out in the open. Quit early because it was getting late but at the same time I didn't feel Amalur's setting, story setup or opening quests digging its hooks into me.

More thoughts...

Camera: I felt the camera was resisting me on numerous occasions and I felt like they hadn't decided whether they wanted me to manage my own camera movements 100% or whether they wanted their smart system to guide me to what they wanted me to see. The result is a camera that is kind of kludgy and floaty all at the same time.

UI: Feels like it is missing a final coat of paint. I'm not a big fan of the font face they use and the UI in general has a chunky feel to it. It functions rather nicely with almost no lag and pretty good design thought put into it. It is borderline ugly and makes the overall package look dated.

Everything else: The combat is responsive and fluid. It's not going to make you want to shelf your copies of Bayonetta or Ninja Gaiden, but it's nice little system they built considering the scope of the entire game. The RPG underpinnings look solid as well, although I didn't see anything too exciting with the locked Fate cards beyond "+n% to criticals" sort of deal, which was a bit disappointing. Maybe there are some cool abilities that I missed or it's all tied up in the class skill trees.

So yeah... everything I've seen and played looks really good. Unfortunately, I think I changed my mind about buying this and perhaps waiting an extra month or so. My pile of shame is enormous right now and their selling point of giving me a gigantic 100+ hour open world is actually pushing me away from their game.

Maclintok wrote:

My pile of shame is enormous right now and their selling point of giving me a gigantic 100+ hour open world is actually pushing me away from their game.

I think that's my main problem, for that amount of time, it needs a good hook to grab me in. The intro builds up the war and an evil overlord who's name I instantly forgot, the early game makes out that you're special, but the demo seems to tell you it'll get to your place in the world later, right after you do this escort/fetch quest.

Also with the Bioware dialogue wheel, which now seems to be an EA standard for their developers, is there any consequence to choosing the "renegade or paragon" options besides just the following NPC response? I can't say I'm opposed to standardising yes/no/investigate/speech check options.

Without fully knowing that there is a ton of content behind the game the overall production value from the demo screams $15 XBLA title. It's horribly generic. Maybe the combat engine sets it apart in the final version.

Scratched wrote:
Sparhawk wrote:
Scratched wrote:
Sparhawk wrote:

If any one is buying this game and not using the TF2 per order bonus items...let me know. Maybe we can work something out.
The game is a bit too expensive for as much as I like it right now. So can't really make myself pay the $60 for it right now.

Hmmmm, how long does it take for promotional items to become tradeable?

Am not so sure anymore. I thought after 3 days or so. Will have to look it up.

According to the TF2 wiki:

Additionally, items that are awarded in Genuine quality upon pre-ordering a game on Steam are initially untradable, but generally become tradable once the game is released.

Ah good then

Stele wrote:

Huh. Just logged in on the title screen and got all my ME3 stuff. That's kinda easy.

Guess I might play a bit later then since I have it.

Just want to point out to those who were in the Bastion thread that this demo did not start at my natural resolution, but instead spread and morphed my desktop as usual. Silly games. :D

There's another unlock at the end of the 45 minutes.

Interesting game. Definitely feel the lack of polish in the demo. I also had some major issues with graphical glitches, wonky camera movement, and two serious video related crashes. But I liked the combat system and the punchy animations, as well as the lack of a really structured class system. Although I have some reservations on how well multiclassing would really work in this game. The UI was quite bad though and I couldn't care less about most of the dialog, although some of the quest plot stuff was interesting. I liked the quest you get in the Hall of Ballads. The world design reminds me a lot of the Overlord games but with less gags.

Not gonna pick this up any time soon with my pile. Definitely have to wait for reviews on this one, and even then I'll probably only pick it up if it's got good reviews and goes on a big sale.

Having heard the interviews with developers of this game, where they were talking breathlessly about 'innovations' and 'fresh approaches' that seemed anything but, I wasn't that enthused by the game. The fact that it looked like a WOW wanna be didn't help either. There seem to have been a few games recently that have learned the wrong lessons from WOW and I could see Reckoning being one of them.

Now I've played the demo I'm impressed. The unoriginal tropes were kinda comforting once I'd taken the plunge and swam about a bit. The game looked a lot less WOW like in motion and the stuff they've taken from WOW works great. The combat is enjoyable which, for me, puts it head and shoulders ahead of WOW in terms of the singleplayer/antisocial gamer experience.

I may be purchasing this game in the fullness of time.

PC demo wouldn't work for me--after character creation the UI shows up fine, but the screen is otherwise black. It's an issue with ATI cards, probably. I won't be purchasing it for PC, which means I won't get it at all any time soon, since getting it for 360 or PS3 would mean a trip to a store.

I think the biggest question now that we have seen all the skills and destinies is how is everyone going to build their characters?

I am torn between these two:

Shadow Caster destiny with a Bow and Scepter. Going for an arcane archer feel. Not sure I am too keen on how the arrows work needing a time out between volleys.

or

Pure Archmage destiny with Staff and Chakrams. I really want to see how the "Fate Echoes" pets work out and the staff animations are pretty cool looking.

conejote wrote:

PC demo wouldn't work for me--after character creation the UI shows up fine, but the screen is otherwise black. It's an issue with ATI cards, probably. I won't be purchasing it for PC, which means I won't get it at all any time soon, since getting it for 360 or PS3 would mean a trip to a store.

Turn off Post Processing and it will work fine. Should be working in the retail version.

I was probably to harsh at first..once I got into the timed part it started to shine more...it's certainly worth playing from what I've seen...combat is enjoyable..not sure it's $60 worth...more like $30

I thought it was a decent entry into the action RPG market. I will preorder and play with builds and crafting. Probably concentrate on might and finesse in round 1. I never finish a game so if I get my average 25+ hours in it will have been worth it on my personal cost of movie tickets to game time ratio I typically use to determine value.

garion333 wrote:
Stele wrote:

Huh. Just logged in on the title screen and got all my ME3 stuff. That's kinda easy.

Guess I might play a bit later then since I have it.

Just want to point out to those who were in the Bastion thread that this demo did not start at my natural resolution, but instead spread and morphed my desktop as usual. Silly games. :D

There's another unlock at the end of the 45 minutes.

Which unlock is that? I thought there was just a suit of armor, a chakram, and the magic helmet.

(...spear and magic HEL-met!)