Eschalon: Book III - Preview @ Examiner

Myrthos

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Examiner delivers a very positive preview of Eschalon: Book III.

What this title really accomplished during the playthrough, was land the marketing message for the game thus far; made us yearn for a title that we could put a ton of time and care into a character, while being challenged and rewarded. Eschalon: Book III comes at a time that is extremely conducive of indie success, and it won’t be hard to imagine this finale being one that becomes the most successful for the series, and perhaps gets gamers to take a look in the old way-back machine for some context to newer and upcoming titles. One thing is for certain about Eschalon; this Examiner thinks it’s worth it to check out, and RPG fans will be well at home with this title.
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I agree the author sounded very positive. Unfortunately, he didn't really say anything in his whole article to actually describe the game. It was so vague that it could have been about anything. The only thing I took away from the article was that the repair skill can only be used in camp; at least at early levels.

BTW, welcome back Myrthos!
 
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The author sounded pretty ignorant about RPG mechanics and didn't provide enough detailed info to be of much help, to be honest.

But I really enjoyed my time with the first game - and I still mean to get back to it and finish it.

It's one of the best indie RPGs out there.
 
Yep, I loved Book I, Book II not so much. Book II seemed to get bogged down by all the conditional play mechanics and lost focus.
 
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I am not sure if it is good or bad that I won't have time to replay Book II before Book III releases, because I thoroughly enjoyed it and having but positive memories.

As for the preview ... it really is a mess, but that is always the case with these things IMO. He is writing for a different audience than us, needing to explain the graphics and so on.
 
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As for the preview … it really is a mess, but that is always the case with these things IMO. He is writing for a different audience than us, needing to explain the graphics and so on.
I always try to stay clear of the Examiner as they are more of a tabloid gaming site. They always take one story and make ten articles from it.
 
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It wasn't terrible, Nameless, I just didn't like it as well. Where I felt it fell apart was in all the conditional playstyles. If you only kill monsters by holding their face to your butt and farting, then you'll get 23% more experience at the end of the game for the Foozle title, etc. This seemed to distract BW from making a better game. Since Book I outsold Book II and this was the primary difference, I'm hoping it disappears. Both games were kinda small too, so I hope for a much larger play area with more spells, skills, etc. BW kinda hinted in the past, that he would move away from crpgs for his next series, so this will be the last game of his I play for a long time, perhaps. He may have changed his mind.

Off topic-I keep hoping Steve Peeler will make a crpg one of these days. His mixed genre games seem to do okay, so he may stick to what works. I've never played any of his stuff since the crpg aspects are pretty lite.
 
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Eshcalon 2 was otherwise really good, but the "classes" were completely unbalanced. Magic was over-powered, but a rogue-type character build was useless. You were better off in not even trying to use a bow as a weapon.
 
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It wasn't terrible, Nameless, I just didn't like it as well. Where I felt it fell apart was in all the conditional playstyles. If you only kill monsters by holding their face to your butt and farting, then you'll get 23% more experience at the end of the game for the Foozle title, etc. This seemed to distract BW from making a better game..

Huh?

"The conditional play-styles" were difficulty settings. You could play the game as a hard-core RPG where things like food were extremely important. Or you you could play it with an easier setting. These are the settings, and you have to choose at least one out of four:

1. Food and water are required for character's survival
2. Equipment deteriorates with use.
3. You can't save or load when diseased, poisoned, critically injured, or with enemies nearby.
4. Things like lock picking and trap disarming are not partially randomized, but entirely dependent on your skill.

Of course one had to choose all of those, if you wanted to have a realistic RPG experience. I somewhat wonder how you can think of them as "you have to kill everything by farting" rules.

I hope the third game keeps the hardcore options. In Book 2, if you wanted the maximum score, you played the game through with the hardest settings. Which is perfectly logical.
 
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