Arkane's Dishonored

Ah, of course. I'd forgotten that you were allowed blink for that achievement, but in hindsight it's kind of obvious given some of those outsider segments.

Gravey wrote:

Gameplay-wise, all-stealth no-kills (no-powers no-UI) was huge fun. I don't get the pushback I received earlier in the thread over desiring to play this way. The game catered to it superlatively. Dishonored is an eminent stealth experience, up there with the best with them, and sorely needed in a video game landscape that can at best offer hobbled "stealth-action" compromises. That Dishonored is also a stealth-action compromise is even more remarkable.

For me there's a couple of things going on there. They don't use any one choice as the challenging one, so through the course of the game there will be some approaches that are easier and some that are harder, but with different combinations at different times. So in some areas combat is easier and stealth is hard, and in other areas it's reversed. Plus there are multiple tools and approaches for everything, so it's not just stealth, it's what kind of stealth. Possession is a different experience from blinking around on the rooftops. So if someone, like me, was expecting stealth to be the challenge mode, some parts feel too easy.

Having all of the powers makes you very, very versatile. So if you switch to the absolute best for any given encounter, the game is easier. And you can do this because they made it possible to play with any style. If you stick with just one focus, some parts become harder. Which is the opposite of the usual thing of the specialist being stronger...but then, I made a point to collect all of the runes, so I didn't have to specialize, or at least I could acquire all of just the non-lethal powers.

Not sure if I had a point, but there you go.

Gremlin wrote:

Having all of the powers makes you very, very versatile. So if you switch to the absolute best for any given encounter, the game is easier. And you can do this because they made it possible to play with any style. If you stick with just one focus, some parts become harder. Which is the opposite of the usual thing of the specialist being stronger...but then, I made a point to collect all of the runes, so I didn't have to specialize, or at least I could acquire all of just the non-lethal powers.

Not sure if I had a point, but there you go.

I get what you're saying. Edge's Still Playing article on Dishonored addresses that same thing:

I’m sympathetic to criticisms that Corvo is overpowered, but I think the result is a fascinating relationship between him and the world he inhabits. Far too many games feel like a character has been built first and the world they inhabit subsequently constructed around their abilities. This is why, for all Uncharted’s artistry, its ruins have always crumbled contrivedly over the millennia into pieces of chest-high cover. Even games much closer to Dishonored in spirit are not immune. I loved creeping around and bypassing security systems in Deus Ex: Human Revolution (and yes, hiding in the loo), but its buildings were so riddled with man-sized air vents that I worried at times for their structural integrity. . . .

You succeed in Dishonored not because of glaring, suspension-of-disbelief-ruining security flaws, in other words, or because the world has been built in lockstep with one or two key abilities. You succeed in Dishonored because a world has been built, and Corvo been given a broad array of skills with which to subvert it.

By the end of the game I had so many unused Runes that I could have made a man-god out of Corvo—but that was Arkane's deliberate reward to me for exploring so much of the world. But then I guess it fell on me to look at the suite of tools the game provides for me, decide on which ones best support the way I want to play, and stick with that—saving experimentation for a later playthrough (which the game also tacitly encourages).

Not sure what my point is either. Um, Dishonored gives the player a non-playercentric world, a diverse array of tools, and as much currency as the player is willing to find through exploration, to employ as many of those tools as the player is interested in. Sometimes balance suffers for it, but it would be a lesser game without it. I guess?

That Edge article puts that very well, and it's definitely one of the games greatest strengths. Even Portal suffered from an environment which was obviously constructed around your ability. I'm not just talking about the tests either, but once you escaped as well. If at the end GLADOS had said "congratulations on passing the real test!" I would have believed her. Since the lab was so obviously constructed by the Developers to have a specific solution for me, in-Universe it appeared as if GLADOS had specifically created the outside of the test to be navigable by Chell.

Wow. I'm really enjoying this game.

I had a shaky start. I like the story and I really like the art style but I wasn't sure the two went together. It seemed a bit too cartoony for the serious nature of the game. I also had trouble with the stealth. My idea of being directly behind someone and the games seemed to vary somewhat and, apparently, the move to guard position with my sword, that I invariably did instead of my desired action, was a very noisy thing to do.

I was resigning myself to this being one of those stealth games where blundered my way through levels with the style and finesse of a poorly co-ordinated bull elephant when it suddenly clicked and now being stealthy and neatly exciting take downs like I was born to the job.

Best moment so far. I set one guy on fire in a group of three, slowed time, blinked down to the group and throttled the other two was they gawped at their combustible friend.

I didn't use the "Slow Time" power at all during my first playthrough, but I used it a ton my second time through. It is epically awesome. I loved leaving traps two steps in front of my attackers, running around entrenched enemies, and generally solving all my problems with the stoppage of time. It does seem a little over powered to me. I'm pretty sure I could beat the game with only slow/stop time as a power. In fact, that sounds like it would be a blast...

Higgledy wrote:

I was resigning myself to this being one of those stealth games where blundered my way through levels with the style and finesse of a poorly co-ordinated bull elephant when it suddenly clicked and now being stealthy and neatly exciting take downs like I was born to the job.

Heh, yeah I think Dishonored is a brilliant stealth game. So much so in fact, that I'm finding my high chaos run almost more difficult: sure I could kill that guy, but it's so much more rewarding to sneak past him. Of course when I do get caught, I don't reload: that's when the killing starts. So it has sped up the pace of play, that's for sure.

I also got too used to the Strong Arms bone charm on my last playthrough, so now choking takes sooo looong. So it's stabby stab, a lot.

Zudz wrote:

I didn't use the "Slow Time" power at all during my first playthrough, but I used it a ton my second time through. It is epically awesome. I loved leaving traps two steps in front of my attackers, running around entrenched enemies, and generally solving all my problems with the stoppage of time. It does seem a little over powered to me. I'm pretty sure I could beat the game with only slow/stop time as a power. In fact, that sounds like it would be a blast...

QFT. Now that I'm also experimenting with runes (I avoided them all on my first rune), I'm finding it hard to think of anything as attractive or useful as Stop Time. I can't think of anything that, for instance, Devouring Swarm or Windblast, could achieve, that I couldn't accomplish with a little time-stoppin'. So good.

Anyway, speaking of violence:

"I choose this one! It worked well!"

Finished my high chaos play last night, and that was a markedly different game. Not wildly different, in terms of "your actions affect the city!"—other than the last mission of course, I only noticed a few more rat swarms in the Flooded District, and one group of survivors was now weepers—but different enough. The changes in Emily and Samuel seemed a little abrupt, but if it had been my first experience with the game, maybe I wouldn't have noticed as much.

Return to the Tower was much more interesting in high chaos! The story does like to dump on the player, and not be shy about making them feel bad for killing so much. But then the game does at least reward them with a more atmospheric end level. The final action still fell as flat on its face as it does in low chaos though: talk-blink-press button-credits. Ah well, you can't win'em all.

I also did the Granny Rags/Slackjaw missions, which culminated in a nice little climax when their stories come to a head. It's cool that the whole thing just plain doesn't happen if you don't pursue those missions—qv. the podcast crew in their Dishonored spoiler section way back: "How did you get the sewer gate key then?" "What key?" It's a gutsy way to make a game. Don't bemoan "missable content", but think of it as a story that's always a unique consequence of each play.

I also also chose to fight Daud this time (well, I tried to backstab him but I guess that isn't allowed), and I'm very glad I did—speaking of so-called missable content. Dishonored has very clear things to say about violence, through the chaos system and through Daud, who mirrors Corvo/the player so much—Serkonans, assassins, touched by the Outsider, and desire to be powerful. But I never got the sense that I was being hit over the head with BioShock/Spec Ops/Far Cry 3 sentiments of "video game violence is bad and you're a bad person for liking it". It was more of an interesting meditation on violence itself in pursuit of goals and its consequences—more like Far Cry 2, except in Dishonored you always have the choice to still achieve your goals but go the other route. Take what happens to Martin and Pendleton, in both low and high chaos. (This goes hand-in-hand with the meaningful decision to make it a chaos system and not, say, a morality system.) That meditation is also contrasted in Daud's last statement and the Outsider's at his last (?) shrine. So now I'm really looking forward to The Knife of Dunwall.

I bought the Dunwall City Trials DLC because it was half-off on XBL. Is it any good? What's the appeal?

Isn't that MP-only? I didn't buy it. Probably will grab single-player content, though, at least if it's good.

It's not multiplayer, it's a collection of challenge rooms.

The appeal, for you at least, Blind_Evil, is that it was half-off. As for if it's any good, you're in a good position to tell us.

Just tonight I noticed that on the wall in Coldridge Prison, in the last hallway before the place-the-explosive-here room, is scratched the phrase "It is better to be a coward for a minute than dead for the rest of your life". Very subtle!

Less subtle, but also finally noticed tonight: on my previous two playthroughs, I kept seeing those three smokestacks on the skyline, from various angles throughout the game*. I had always wondered if I would ever visit that area of the city in a mission, but never seemed to. Where were they, I wondered, that prominent landmark? Now as Samuel steered me into the Hound Pits for the first time for the third time, I looked up and realized: oh. Numbskull.

[size=9]*I remember reading somewhere that the team at Arkane mapped out the missions on the city beforehand, so that all the locations would make geographic sense relative to each other. So seeing Burrows' table in your visit to Somewhere Else, on a second playthrough, is pretty neat.[/size]

IMAGE(http://i.imgur.com/ykzT5Ljl.jpg)

Small preview of the Daud SP DLC
http://sneakybastards.net/theobserve...

Sounds pretty good

Gravey wrote:

It's not multiplayer, it's a collection of challenge rooms.

The appeal, for you at least, Blind_Evil, is that it was half-off. As for if it's any good, you're in a good position to tell us. ;)

Crippling Monster Hunter addiction removes me from that position!

Blind_Evil wrote:
Gravey wrote:

It's not multiplayer, it's a collection of challenge rooms.

The appeal, for you at least, Blind_Evil, is that it was half-off. As for if it's any good, you're in a good position to tell us. ;)

Crippling Monster Hunter addiction removes me from that position!

Ha, I guess we'll never know then. I'm holding out for next week's expansion.

TheGameguru wrote:

Small preview of the Daud SP DLC
http://sneakybastards.net/theobserve...

Sounds pretty good

I have never been as excited about delving into the gross heart of the whaling industry.

Alien Love Gardener wrote:
TheGameguru wrote:

Small preview of the Daud SP DLC
http://sneakybastards.net/theobserve...

Sounds pretty good

I have never been as excited about delving into the gross heart of the whaling industry.

Right? Makes you just want to roll around in some whale blubber, doesn't it?

...no? Me, either.

I started another play through yesterday, this time going after Slow Time. Not sure how some people think the game doesn't have replay value, I'm having a blast all over again.

At $30 on Steam this game is a steal for anybody that missed out during the Winter sale.

I want to do another play through. About half way through my first game I felt I was getting reasonably good. I'd like to do the beginning properly and perhaps go for a no kill achievement. I'd also like to do a blood and thunder run killing everything in sight and using all the toys :).

ICYMI, here's Arkane's developer commentary posted back on April 1.

"If you waited long enough behind this guard, he would actually die of old age."

That was great :D.

That was hilarious. And now I have to boot it up again. Goddammit, Gravey, I was going to try to actually play something else for a while!

That's silly, the new DLC is out today! Everyone should play this now!

Indeed, I believe so.

I'm impatiently waiting for a non-spoilery review from the first GWJer to finish Knife of Dunwall.

So who's playing it? I just finished the slaughterhouse. It feels good to be back in Dunwall, rolling around in gore, making little whale guts angels. It's the prettiest of hellholes.

Seriously though, I can't wait to hear what the people who found *reading* about the whale industry in the main game depressingly gross make of that level. The inside of that slaughterhouse? That was f*cking horrifying.

One minor question about one of the overheard conversations:

Spoiler:

When discussing what to do with the strike leader, did the butcher who suggested dropping her into the machine-what-makes-cans say noone'd ever know, or noone ever knows?

I'm pretty sure he said knows.

As if that abattoir didn't put me off eating the whale meat cans ever again.

The slaughterhouse was numbing.

Spoiler:

I'm glad we're given an option to euthanize the whale. I did it gladly.

Mini-review:

I finished the DLC some moments ago. Blink stopping time makes the game easier, but it also makes using Blink so much more fun. Leaps of faith? No more! Leaps of certainty is more like it! Pro-tip: the time stopping mechanic also works in mid-air, as long as you are not touching the movement keys.

I really enjoyed the experience, though it is a little short. If I'm being honest, however, that's more to do with how much I love this game, rather than a lack of content. Exploring everywhere, doing everything possible, it took me a bit under three hours.

Completing it unlocks another difficulty mode, so aside from the standard replay the game lethally/non-lethally, there is some additional incentive to go through again. And, since there are no intervals this time around (no pub stops), it's much easier to do another playthrough. For each mission, you choose your equipment and go.

Daud is an interesting character, but you don't learn much more about him than you'd get from encountering him in the main game. That being said, it's still very fun to see what he does while Corvo is doing his thing. As usual, I'd recommend reading everything you find.

If you liked Dishonored, there is no reason you won't like this. Hell, depending on what you liked about the game, the DLC might even be more your style.

Thanks for the review, Hyetal! I'm going to finish my ghost playthrough, then I have to go to Hawaii, and then I'll play the Knife of Dunwall. Stupid Hawaii!

How the heck do you get the ghost achievement on the core game? I have undetected and no kills on every mission, I didn't kill anyone by virtue of any side mission action, unlocked the other achievements related to it but for some reason ghost is staying locked.

edit: hrm I see clean hands is also locked still, somehow I've killed someone indirectly o.O

krev82 wrote:

How the heck do you get the ghost achievement on the core game? I have undetected and no kills on every mission, I didn't kill anyone by virtue of any side mission action, unlocked the other achievements related to it but for some reason ghost is staying locked.

edit: hrm I see clean hands is also locked still, somehow I've killed someone indirectly o.O

Did you get the checkmarks for "Didn't Kill Anyone" and "Ghost" at the end of all nine missions? Before the last patch, sleep-darting/choking out Granny Rags would also invalidate the Clean Hands achievement.

I'm being as careful as I can: I didn't attack the assassins in the intro, I'm not doing the Granny Rags side missions, I'm knocking out as few enemies as possible and being very careful about where I stash the bodies (e.g off the ground—but not too high up!). I still have three missions left, but so far the end mission stats screens are suggesting I'm on the right track. But I'm not out of the woods yet.

Eurogamer's Dishonored Diary[/url]][...] if you're a stealth player going after no deaths and no alerts, then you can't help associate Sam with the most nerve-shredding part of the whole game. Because Sam's the man who gives you your stats.

When you're trying to finish the game undetected, the Mission Stats screen takes on an almost mythical quality. You can review your objectives in your journal mid-mission, but there is no way to see whether you're successfully pursuing your real goal of clean hands and total discretion, so while you only see the Mission Stats screen once every couple of hours, you're always thinking about it. [...]

The Mission Stats screen tells me whether I just wasted hours of my life or not. And to me, it's Sam's screen.