Drakensang - English Demo Available

The camera is giving me gip though. Especially when entering the cave, it seems to get caught low down and makes it very hard to see what is coming up. People complained about NWN2 camera but once I had the camera mapped to WASD and the mouse for movement it was perfect for me. I think Drak needs an option to map the camera to WASD, that would help for me.

Camera and walking are a mix of ASDQWE and mouse.
Don't even think about walking with the mouse. No point & click. Look with the mouse, run with the keyboard. That's much more comfortable.

The rather slow running speed can be fixed with MySQL command.
 
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I played for 20min.It looks good but hasn't captivated me.Maybe it's the soundless dialogs maybe it's the awkward animations I'm not sure.I deleted the demo and I don't plan on playing it soon.
20 minutes ? Are you sure you're in the right genre? ;) I guess it took me an hour to find the first fight.
 
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20 minutes ? Are you sure you're in the right genre? ;) I guess it took me an hour to find the first fight.
Hell yeah !Of course I'm in the right genre.but I'm not really in any mood of playing I just tried Drakensang in desperate hope of being interested in anything,it just hasn't hooked me.The game was also too bright for my taste.
1 hour to find the first fight?
There are some guards who invite for a fight at the beginning.If you follow the main road for about 5sec you can find them.

Is the game fully voiced,Or like in the demo only the first thing the NPC says?

Edit:If it took you so much to find a fight ,are YOU sure you're in the right genre?:p
 
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Why would anyone accept a letter of recommendation from a nobody?
That has to do with TDE rule set background. There is only a a very small number of mages in Aventuria and because of that they are automatically a person of authority to most of the officials in the middenrealm. Besides that Rhakorium Muntagonus is one of the most famous mages in Aventuria and well-knwon specialist for reptile magic. He has been mentioned in various TDE books and the 2-monthly TDE print newsletter "Der Aventurische Bote". So actually he isn't a nobody, only a nobody to person outside of the TDE community.

Concerning Salina, she is personally known to the guardsman who checks the letters of recommendation.

The camera is giving me gip though. Especially when entering the cave, it seems to get caught low down and makes it very hard to see what is coming up. People complained about NWN2 camera but once I had the camera mapped to WASD and the mouse for movement it was perfect for me. I think Drak needs an option to map the camera to WASD, that would help for me.
I remained playing with WASD. Simple to explain.
When you move the camera by holding right mouse button and your character is on the walk, s/he follows the movement of the camera. So the only thing left to do, is holding W and the right mouse button and then move the camera by moving the mouse the way you want to walk along. I get used to it after some time and personally i prefer it a lot over NWN2.

Is the game fully voiced,Or like in the demo only the first thing the NPC says?
In Germany it only has been the first sentence. But that's a decision that would be up to the local publishers I think. If THQ and Eidos would say to make it fully voiced that imho could be done different compared to the german version.
 
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1 hour to find the first fight?
There are some guards who invite for a fight at the beginning.If you follow the main road for about 5sec you can find them.
I know, but I decided my character is too weak to win. I returned later with 2 party members.



Is the game fully voiced,Or like in the demo only the first thing the NPC says?
Usually only the first sentence. A budget decision.
Edit:If it took you so much to find a fight ,are YOU sure you're in the right genre?:p

I was in a patient mood. I even set the combat to "Stop after every turn". ;)
 
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Rakorium's novices explain who he is. This guy was so getting on my nerves. I would have liked to rename him "Mud".
 
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It gets darker

There are a few very dark, threatening, locations. Most of the locations in Ferdok though will also be bright and nice.

I thought the locations in Drakensang were overall very good. But I can imagine some not liking them. The gameworld is definitely lighter than most other fantasy worlds. I thought this was a nice change.
 
Amusing comments

Reading this comment thread is highly amusing.
Voted best RPG of 2008, plays better (and even looks better) than NWN2, has lots of good dialog (who cares if it is all spoken...everyone forget how to read?)
Yet, reading this thread, it is like people have nothing better to do than complain.

I mean, what do people WANT?

After a few issues starting the demo (the game does NOT like D3Doverrider), I found the world gorgeous, a lot of mechanics engaging. Great PnP sensibilities (like the dice roll random name, character sheets that have so much min/max features, it is insane) great spell effects, fun combat....

I will definitely buy this
 
Played the demo for quite a while. It strikes me as a cross between Dungeon Siege and NWN. The number of skills, stats, and abilities can be quite daunting to reconcile. The tooltip descriptions helped immensely, however, and it is a thoughtful touch that they inlclude the actual calculations that go into deriving certain stats.

I like how ALL advancement is attained from a single experience point pool that you can draw from at any time (not just at level ups). Like D&D, changes to your "core" abilities like STR, DEX, etc. are infrequent, but not impossible. However, unlike D&D they can be modified at any time granted you have the high number of experience points required.

I too share a bit of concern about the rather bright and sterile outside envrions (complete with the Ravel-ish incidental music), but the few dungeons I saw were plenty atmospheric. It's really not that big a deal with me. Nothing wrong with living in a fairy tale every now and again!

Dialogue was competent, if unremarkable.

So yeah, I'm looking forward to this one. Not like I am for Risen of course, but this should deliver a solid CRPG experience.
 
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Well that's why demos exist some people love it and will buy it some don't.
(who cares if it is all spoken...everyone forget how to read?)
That's hardly an argument.
 
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I found the atmosphere a bit too "bright and cheery"

Gotta take the good with the bad when using the DSA license - the complex and excellent character system and balance is just as much a part of it as the overly gleeful setting. DSA is your basic fantasy fare - only it's so much more happier about it. I dunno, I kind of like it with "gritty" being all the rage right now - compare it too Dragon Age's doom 'n gloom setting which is visually much like every other doom and gloom setting out there. At least this game's going against the grain there (not taking WoW's cheeriness into account)

But my impressions basically fit everyone else's and are unchanged from playing the German demo (preview); this did not knock me off my feet, but it looks like a competent and well-done cRPG that could be of some mild interest if the quests and plot are any good.

Those character animations in dialogue are really, really annoying, though.
 
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Reading this comment thread is highly amusing.
Voted best RPG of 2008, plays better (and even looks better) than NWN2, has lots of good dialog (who cares if it is all spoken...everyone forget how to read?)
Yet, reading this thread, it is like people have nothing better to do than complain.

I mean, what do people WANT?

I want the good dialogue you talk about. I haven't seen it yet. These are some very early impressions from the very first area(s) and frankly, the dialogue is ordinary at absolute best.

I'm not saying it won't knock my socks off later but my first impressions is "awkward".
 
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Balance

The balancing is alright, though it doesn't feel like the pen&paper original at all.

You heal way too fast, and once you become decent at healing and making potions, it is possible to enter every battle with a fully restored party. The game still has a decent amount of difficult battles though.

I also felt that since Drakensang has less skills than the pen&paper game, you raise those skills very quickly since your choices about what to do with your experience points are limited. There were also too many items that raise your stats.

One thing the game does well is handling money. It takes a long time until you really feel rich, and there are always some very expensive items to look forward to.
 
I think some of the awkwardness with the dialogue is from the translation to be honest. The game looks pretty deep, I don't want to play too much of the demo because I want to enjoy the retail release.
 
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I think some of the awkwardness with the dialogue is from the translation to be honest. The game looks pretty deep, I don't want to play too much of the demo because I want to enjoy the retail release.
This is possible. The German dialogs had a unique style. A slight fairy tale touch and old fashioned sort of humor. It certainly requires an experienced translator.
 
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I wanted to try something in the full version and had a few minutes with the English demo after that.

- It seems the demo includes the patches. AA is in and the controls are identical, including camera and quick bars.
- Therefore I honestly don't understand how anyone can have serious problems with the camera. Q / E (alternatively: RMB + l / r) rotates the camera around the selected party member(s). The wheel zooms and (RMB + f / b) controls the vertical angle. That's all pretty much standard, especially if you play a shooter once in a while.
- The high-res textures are not in.
- The voice acting is unremarkable and clearly worse in English. Sounds like they didn't hire Worf as narrator. ;)
- The dialogs also lost some of their magic.
 
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Shooter? I've come to understand these camera mechanics are tied to MMOs. It's the first time I've run into them, third-person shooters I played definitely don't work that way.

I'd like it if it were easier to just take one camera angle and stick to it. The game is obviously not designed for that, and I do not particularly enjoy having to fiddle with the camera every time I turned a corner.

It almost makes one miss 2D.
 
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Shooter? I've come to understand these camera mechanics are tied to MMOs. It's the first time I've run into them, third-person shooters I played definitely don't work that way.
I don't play MMOs. If you're saying that's the way they work you're probably right. Then it's a clearly better example than my shooter, which I only used to refer to the ASDW + mouse controls. In such a setup you already have the left hand close to Q and E.


I'd like it if it were easier to just take one camera angle and stick to it. The game is obviously not designed for that, and I do not particularly enjoy having to fiddle with the camera every time I turned a corner.
A little bit of fiddleing is unavoidable simply because the game cannot know which character you choose to be the lead after the next corner, and because you are able to examine every spot in the corner. ;)
The camera should be reasonably close after the corner if you run with QWE because you keep adjusting the camera on the fly.

I'm not saying the camera is great. I just don't see how it's any worse than in comparable games. If you play a party RPG you have to expect certain manual camera control. I remember I had more problems with KotOR, for example.

It almost makes one miss 2D.
Yes, but these times are over, unfortunately.
 
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I had issues with the camera as well. I tried checking the options, but I couldn't find anything dealing with it.

The problem is that the camera "lags" behind the character when moving with WASD and finding a comfortable perspective was not easy.

Not a deal-breaker for me, personally, but it's very easy to see how it could be annoying to a lot of people.

Then again, it COULD be the result of not being aware of the right setting in options. But as a default control scheme, it's certainly awkward.
 
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