Dungeons & Dragons: Dark Alliance

Nope, it's on everything right now. Possibly part of the problem...

Aside from everything else, I thought we left the whole "token one (1) femme character who is also the archer in a group full of blokes" trope back in the early 00's of videogames?

Roo wrote:

So, when this comes out fixed for consoles in a year and a half...maybe?

I'm really sad listening to everyone's woes with the game. It's like the first movie they made called "Dungeons & Dragons"...I tried so hard to watch it. There was a Beholder. There was Jeremy Irons. Nothing could save that movie.

I hope all of the massive complaints they get force them to fix this, though.

Not even Jeremy Irons chewing the scenery can make up for the heinous act of turning a Beholder into a glorified guard dog. Finger of Death the lot of 'em and let Kelemvor sort them out.

pyxistyx wrote:

Aside from everything else, I thought we left the whole "token one (1) femme character who is also the archer in a group full of blokes" trope back in the early 00's of videogames?

I imagine they wanted to stick closely to Salvatore's work but boy did he not have a good track record with his depictions of women. The only other woman introduced in the early arcs was a prostitute who then became mega jealous of cattie-brie and then stole a sentient sword because it was mind powering her and tried to fight orcs and died.

b12n11w00t wrote:
pyxistyx wrote:

Aside from everything else, I thought we left the whole "token one (1) femme character who is also the archer in a group full of blokes" trope back in the early 00's of videogames?

I imagine they wanted to stick closely to Salvatore's work but boy did he not have a good track record with his depictions of women. The only other woman introduced in the early arcs was a prostitute who then became mega jealous of cattie-brie and then stole a sentient sword because it was mind powering her and tried to fight orcs and died.

I think it's still very much an en vogue trope. I'm a bit surprised the dev is Canadian and not Eastern European.

I wonder if the game really started as a Drizzt-focused title and ended up a coop beat em up game later, thus falling back on tropey setup. Pure speculation.

garion333 wrote:
b12n11w00t wrote:
pyxistyx wrote:

Aside from everything else, I thought we left the whole "token one (1) femme character who is also the archer in a group full of blokes" trope back in the early 00's of videogames?

I imagine they wanted to stick closely to Salvatore's work but boy did he not have a good track record with his depictions of women. The only other woman introduced in the early arcs was a prostitute who then became mega jealous of cattie-brie and then stole a sentient sword because it was mind powering her and tried to fight orcs and died.

I think it's still very much an en vogue trope. I'm a bit surprised the dev is Canadian and not Eastern European.

I wonder if the game really started as a Drizzt-focused title and ended up a coop beat em up game later, thus falling back on tropey setup. Pure speculation.

I'm not sure how much input Toque actually has on the story since D&D has their own story team dedicated to this sort of stuff and are very specific about direction and what can and can't be used. Extremely disappointing, though.

Anyone managed to get online co-op working? I can't figure out how to get into a friend's game.

Jonman wrote:

Anyone managed to get online co-op working? I can't figure out how to get into a friend's game.

Make your session public/friend only or invite. Then open the character sheet and there should be a party tab all the way to the right. From there you can send invites.

Took me a while to figure it out as inviting using the Xbox button did not work for me and friends. They couldn’t join as they saw the “join game”being grayed out. So far at the conclusion of each mission we all get disconnected and have to rejoin. We tried changing who hosted to see if it made a difference, it didn’t.

For a game about combat the combat sure is bad.. its difficult to move your character around..feels like I'm always stuck in mud and forced into a specific direction.. made even worse when you swing your weapons.. you are stuck into the direction you pressed the button.. which would be ok if the game didnt stick you in that direction for a few frames after each swing..

You have to lumber around and perfectly line up your character and then combo to kill even simple lowly monsters.. I can't imagine how awful it must get.

I mean, hell... anybody else noticed that you can't even just stand still? Or at least I couldn't. Anytime I stop moving my character keeps sliding just a tiny bit in the last direction they were moving. Tested this in the hub and out adventuring. Utterly absurd.

Who playtested this and thought "yup, this is good, press the gold master and we're good for release"?!

Farscry wrote:

I mean, hell... anybody else noticed that you can't even just stand still? Or at least I couldn't. Anytime I stop moving my character keeps sliding just a tiny bit in the last direction they were moving. Tested this in the hub and out adventuring. Utterly absurd.

Who playtested this and thought "yup, this is good, press the gold master and we're good for release"?!

The same person who said "yeah, $40 sounds right for this".

I agree that the combat isn't great (Catti-brie can literally plink away for minutes at mini-bosses from outside their aggro range without them, or anyone else even moving). The structure seems solid, though, and the stuff that's not great seems like the kind of thing that can pretty easily be fixed (before their planned paid expansion - did anyone mention that they had an expansion planned and on the store already?).

Had at least some fun last night; was playing as Drizzt along with two friends who had Bruenor and Catti-Brie, and a lot of the really frustrating issues just feel a bit less frustrating when you're playing in multiplayer. The camera still utterly sucks and it's hard to find an enemy, but when Bruenor is drawing aggro it just gives Drizzt more time to move around and get in hits from behind, and it's a bit easier to play. Bosses still suck and it's generally frustrating, but actually enjoyed myself a bit.

While I'd like to believe they'll fix this, I really think the fact they made a 3D action game with the camera so close on your character means the game's kind of screwed and they focused more on having good-looking character models and animation over gameplay. With that tight of focus, it's going to be hard to play the thing regardless. It's vaguely like a PSX title was back in the day before they figured out how to make cameras work properly.

Ooof, it's really not great.

AI is soooo stupid. Everything is clunky. The controls don't work half the time (Catti-Brie's aimed shots only sometimes respond to button presses). Frame-rates are awful with all the sliders pulled way left.

Still, fun times with a buddy.

Was planning on trying this out tonight. Is this worth it?

Dakhath wrote:

Was planning on trying this out tonight. Is this worth it?

If solo, not really.

If co-op, then totally.

Jonman wrote:
Dakhath wrote:

Was planning on trying this out tonight. Is this worth it?

If solo, not really.

If co-op, then totally.

I’ve played 10+ hours solo and it’s still quite fun, despite ALL its flaws. Set the difficulty on the lowest setting, (use the high level gear exploit to actually get good gear without too much grind), unlock a bunch of moves and feats and it is good. There’s some really solid elements to the game

MilkmanDanimal wrote:

While I'd like to believe they'll fix this, I really think the fact they made a 3D action game with the camera so close on your character means the game's kind of screwed and they focused more on having good-looking character models and animation over gameplay. With that tight of focus, it's going to be hard to play the thing regardless. It's vaguely like a PSX title was back in the day before they figured out how to make cameras work properly.

Yeah, I am not sure they executed on the good-looking character models and animations. For example, Cattie-Brie appears to have elongated and super skinny arms that barely fit in her gloves. Been having fun though, given the price (GamePass).

So played on occasion, and this is as much a "fun with more people" game that has ever been. It's pretty awful single-player due to the difficulty spikes, bad camera, and "down you're dead" aspect of it, but it's been OK with two people, and genuinely a good time with three. It's still not a good game, but it can be a fun game, notably when you look at the recommended difficulty level the game tells you you should be playing at and then ignoring it utterly and choosing one level of difficulty down. It's still dumb, clunky, and badly-designed in all sorts of ways, but it's enjoyable with friends, largely because their ability to save you helps you not get whacked unfairly by stupid bugs and bosses who are suddenly five times as hard as they seem like they should be.

Well I'm having more fun than I expected with this game. Even playing solo I find it quite fun, multiplayer is a mixed bag because I've been matched with parties way above my level and I'm just trying not to die and barely damaging enemies. Drizzt feels easily the most fun to play IMO, just faster and less "clunky" than the other two melee characters.

Or as is the case so far tonight, repeatedly putting my level 12 into groups with level 1s. Are so few people playing that matchmaking is so skewed?

I'm playing Co-op with an out of town buddy. We had our second session last night and as I get to grips with the game, I'm grokking what it's laying down a little more. Some of the initial jankiness was just me not understanding how the stamina system works - and as I unlock the ability tree I'm starting to see it get less button mashy and more considered.

It's still buggy as f*ck, and the AI is dumber than a bag of sand, but there's some fun to be had here.

I played the tutorial and a few mins of the beginning. That was enough for me, sadly. I'll come back later.

So random update for the two people still playing this, it did seem like I was constantly getting matched with level 1's, but that's a bug, if you look at your party in the shared space before a mission, it will frequently just show them as level 1, though their gear score/power level or whatever will show correctly. Once you actually start a mission it will show their actual level.

I know this thread's dedicated to the new 2021 game "D&D Dark Alliance", but Black Isle / Interplay just released a PC port of the original "Baldur's Gate: Dark Alliance" on Steam. I don't know if the PC port is any good, but thought it notable to mention here.

2021 game is not fun. Free on gamepass and still not worth the time. What a dud.

The original one looks fun!

The original was really a lot of fun in the era in which it was released. I played a ton of it and its eventual sequel. Also picked up the EQ themed games that used the same engine. However, I am not sure I am going to drop $30 on a very old re-release. I might pick it up for $10.

Similarly, I did not care for the 2021 title. Twas disappointing, but I uninstalled after only 10-15 minutes of experimenting with it.

I really tried to like the new game. I love D&D, I really dig co-op games in general, I hadn't played a solid brawler in quite a while . . . and it was utter garbage. Bad graphically, the gameplay was repetitive as hell, and your abilities would drain your stamina, which would be annoying, except you could easily trigger your abilities just moving and fighting, and you'd find yourself barely able to do stuff because you'd accidentally done Drizz'ts stupid flippy face stab thing 19 times and now you couldn't even @#$!!! move.

It was a very frustrating game.

The original was great, and I have very fond memories of it; I was playing it on OG Xbox many years back, and my then two-year-old son wandered into the room, looked at the TV, and just sat down on my lap, utterly transfixed by what he was seeing. Realized at that moment he was going to be a gamer, and we've had many hours over the years having fun in front of various games, and it all started with BG: DA.

i killed most of the bosses & tougher creatures in the 2021 version by standing at the edge of each arena and spamming them with arrows without crossing whatever triggers them into engaging in combat

It is...not a good game.

It is a very bad game, but I found some enjoyment in it as a co-op vehicle with a buddy.

After a while, I could see the framework of a good game with an interesting progression system that is made entirely obsolete by awful combat action and the stupidest AI ever (see Pyxi's comment above).