JA2 Reloaded - No TB Combat!

[GothicGothicness]

There are a lot of real-time strategy games set in modern environment... company of heroes, commandos and so on.

There is only one turn-based game with great combat set in a real modern world... and because of these stupid people doing the remake it will remain that way.

 

[DArtagnan]

There are a lot of real-time strategy games set in modern environment… company of heroes, commandos and so on.

There is only one turn-based game with great combat set in a real modern world… and because of these stupid people doing the remake it will remain that way.

Not to be pedantic, but CoH and Commandos deal with WW2 and not modern times

 

[DArtagnan]

Dartagnan may enjoy these debates that go on forever, but I do not. Suffice it to say I strongly disagree with you. I've given you enough reasons why. If that is not enough for you then go read the other forums where this game is being discussed. Almost every post is similar to mine because I, like them, loved the gameplay of Jagged Alliance 2. The story and characters were fine, but the TB combat was second to none out there. If they had mixed in some of the elements from TOEE's system it would have been perfect, but they didn't and went with this "Plan & Go" craziness.

All I can say is if you buy it then I hope you enjoy what you get.

How wrong you are.

I despise going in circles with no progress.

Call it a compulsion about wanting to reach an understanding - and I don't know if it's healthy or not - but I can't help myself. At the very least, I want my message clear and received.

But enjoy it? Quite the opposite.

 

[JemyM]

There are a lot of real-time strategy games set in modern environment… company of heroes, commandos and so on. There is only one turn-based game with great combat set in a real modern world… and because of these stupid people doing the remake it will remain that way.

Do you call Baldur's Gate a RTS or do you acknowledge that a pauseable game is neither of the above?

 

[GothicGothicness]

I have tried to play baldurs gate many times, but what happens is you pause you give orders.... and everything becomes chaos as soon as you unpause. There are other games which such a system such as Kotor which I also play. IMHO it sucks... but I know there are a lot of people here who like it.

But no matter what you think of that.... there are several fundamental differences between JA and these games. First of all you can handle several squads with up to 6 persons in each one.... I don't think this is possible in a pause scenario... you'll have to pause and scroll like crazy... still after you unpause you're not going to be able to handle and respond to everything. Your characters might be very far from each other too, so you're not going to see what happens to them.

If you keep pausing every sec to try to manage this, it is just like a turn-based system except much more troublesome. There are also wait and interrupt mechanics and lots of other things.

IMHO I think it is impossible to transfer to a real-time pause system without making it suck. Of course I also hate real-time pause system so that makes it even worse for me personaly.

 

[DArtagnan]

Pause to play works like shit unless the games have a strong AI system. The original Baldur's Gate didn't - and the scripts were highly flawed and inflexible.

Even with the latest scripts of the newest versions - there are a few significant issues left. Things like effective use of stealth won't work comfortably, and you have to control it manually.

This is exactly why turn-based is so popular, because it allows players to have full control without stressing the mind.

You CAN do real-time (with or without pause) efficiently - but then you HAVE to have competent AI, and even with competent AI - you must still accept that the player will lose the sensation of full control.

There is no way around that, and if you want to be fair and informed - you simply have to acknowledge that a multi-entity combat system will have disadvantages either way.

Personally, I prefer turn-based in singleplayer games - and real-time in multiplayer games. This is for MULTI-ENTITY (player controlled) combat.

Maybe one day, I'll see a deep and complex multi-entity combat system with the sensation of control intact, but not so far.

 

[skavenhorde]

How wrong you are.

I despise going in circles with no progress.

Call it a compulsion about wanting to reach an understanding - and I don't know if it's healthy or not - but I can't help myself. At the very least, I want my message clear and received.

But enjoy it? Quite the opposite.

Sorry, didn't mean to assume you enjoyed it. I only thought that because some people love debating any topic and I would have thought that you were one of those kind of people

I'm not one though. Can't stand it actually. I tell my opinion, give a few reasons why and move on (normally).

 

[DArtagnan]

Sorry, didn't mean to assume you enjoyed it. I only thought that because some people love debating any topic and I would have thought that you were one of those kind of people

I'm not one though. Can't stand it actually. I tell my opinion, give a few reasons why and move on (normally).

I enjoy the opportunity to share my thoughts, and I enjoy an exchange with open-minded people - like yourself

I don't enjoy exchanges that go in circles, with no common ground. I'm sure I'm somewhat responsible, but I can't help believing what I believe.

So, while I do enjoy speaking my mind openly - and I'm not one to avoid a confrontational exchange - I don't enjoy the actual frustration of not reaching an understanding. This is often the case with people who're not able to see things from the opposite side. I tell myself that I can do that, but you can't ever really know - and I think the blame should be shared

But it's a compulsion to speak against what I think is false and wrong, no matter what the consequence. Enjoyment isn't even a factor.

Anyway, I know this is boring stuff - just had to explain.

 

[Maylander]

Overall I prefer real-time-with-pause unless the combat is challenging enough to warrant turn based. I consider it painfully boring to sit through turn based combat where I know I'll win by a landslide, so I prefer to just smash through such fights in real time (takes less time), but pause where it's needed.

That's why I consider combat in Baldur's Gate a lot more fun than Fallout - I don't have to use turns to kill a rat.

The games where I really enjoy TB systems usually include some sort of mechanic to skip fights where my character(s) and/or army is vastly superior to that of the enemy (e.g HoMM series).

 

[skavenhorde]

Anyway, I know this is boring stuff - just had to explain.

No, not boring or I wouldn't have finished reading it.

I've wondered why you've posted in some epic sized threads that just seem to be going nowhere. Now I know and as they say "Knowing is half the battle! Go, Joe!"

Now with all this talk about the awesomeness that is JA2, I'm going to have to reload it and experience the fun of this TB again. Damn, I was almost finished with Fallout too

 

[DArtagnan]

No, not boring or I wouldn't have finished reading it.

I've wondered why you've posted in some epic sized threads that just seem to be going nowhere. Now I know and as they say "Knowing is half the battle! Go, Joe!"

Now with all this talk about the awesomeness that is JA2, I'm going to have to reload it and experience the fun of this TB again. Damn, I was almost finished with Fallout too

JA2 and X-Com are my favorite games in terms of the combat system.

They CAN be slow and dull at times, but I would never give up the level of control and sensation of being "smart" in a tactical sense - just to alleviate my boredom when things get trivial.

It will always be a compromise no matter what, but I've had way too much fun in TB games to abandon them.

This goes for strategy games as well, and especially grand strategy games.

I've played Hearts of Iron and Europa Universalis, for instance, and I don't care what anyone says - they don't get ANYWHERE near a good TB game, like Civilization or Clash of Steel.

The fascination of combat and strategy, to me, is very much about control and that's exactly why I could never get really comfortable with the RTS genre. What's funny, is that I'm actually a very fast player and I do pretty well. But I simply have too much invested in having control - and 9 out of 10 RTS games leave me feeling out of control.

Company of Heroes is probably the only fast-paced RTS that ever "made up" for this lack of control, with fantastic unit AI and an extremely powerful sensation of actually being at war.

 

[Alrik Fassbauer]

I have tried to play baldurs gate many times, but what happens is you pause you give orders…. and everything becomes chaos as soon as you unpause.

This describes very good my own impressions I had with BG.

If you keep pausing every sec to try to manage this, it is just like a turn-based system except much more troublesome.

This is what I do with Dragon Age. Pause almost every 2-5 seconds (depending on the fight's difficulty) … This is nothing but a chore.

If I had had *real* turn-based combat, then things would be far easier for me; the SYSTEM would halt the combat for me, and I would be able to scroll and watch every move without having to think "what do I do next ?" because some idiot of NPC destroys my carefully layed out plans with a sudden change of tactics. The emphasis is on "sudden".

In turn-based combat, planning can be done in a much more relaxed fashion, imho.

 

[screeg]

And Keep from the Borderlands is another piss poor module to adapt for the same reasons that ToEE was a bad choice.

Well, they use the setting from KotB, but there's a lot added to it. The original module was basically a blank slate for the DM to fill in, and that's what the modders have done. Lots of non-combat content, interesting NPCs, etc., and a ton of new maps. I created around 40 myself, and I wasn't the only one doing graphics. Also the demo is about half the projected finished mod, probably 12-15 hours of play.

 

[JDR13]

Fair enough Bill, fair enough. But I'd argue that quality writing and dark humor were also integral to Fallout 1 & 2 and Bethesda completely abandoned those.

I don't agree that they completely abandoned those things in FO3. They didn't try very hard with the humor, but people claiming that the writing was far superior in FO 1&2 are either exaggerating, or blinded by nolstagia.

 

[skavenhorde]

Try hard and failed as seen in Fallout: New Vegas. They thought more blood and exploding heads was dark humor.

In New Vegas there are funny bits mixed in with the tragic.

Spoiler

For example: When you go to Black Mountain you'll read silly letters about a ghoul having trouble with a nightkin who wants him to get his car going. Plus you have Tabitha herself which is just insanely funny as she walks off with her robot lover, but you will also read logs on the computer about the devastation after the bombs dropped. Chilling logs mixed in with the ludicrous.

I do not remember almost all of the quests that Beth made. I think I'm trying to block them out I do remember the republic of Dave and the comic superheroes quest. I actually liked the start of the superheroes one. It ended too quickly with too many unanswered questions for my liking.

The Republic of Dave is ok since there are actually real world micronations out there that are just as silly. There's a video from That Guy With The Glasses that's pretty funny about a group of internet personalities taking over the micronation of Molassia. It's called Kickassia The acting isn't that good, but it's still pretty funny to watch.

As for F1 and 2, even the molerat king was better written than most of Fallout 3.

 

[JDR13]

To each his own, as you like to say.

I was a big fan of the original Fallouts, but I'm enjoying the quests in FO3 just as much, if not more, than those in FO 1&2.

The writing may have been a bit better in the older games, but I'm finding some of the locations much more memorable in FO3.

 

[skavenhorde]

I got one word for you, Lamplight That made no sense what-so-ever and was annoying as hell to boot.

I'm not saying the whole game was bad or I wouldn't of kept playing it. I'm just saying they need to fire their writers

The Cthulhu nod was a nice addition. They didn't really do anything with it, but it was nice. Even the Lincoln Memorial quests weren't that bad, but then you have to go back to the main quest and think WHY???

Your right though, to each his own. Just play New Vegas and you will see the difference first hand.

 

[blatantninja]

I have tried to play baldurs gate many times, but what happens is you pause you give orders…. and everything becomes chaos as soon as you unpause.

I can't disagree with that! I'm not very good at combat in most games anyway, so it didn't bother me too much. For me, BG was always more about the exploration and story than anything else.

 

[JDR13]

I got one word for you, Searchlight That made no sense what-so-ever and was annoying as hell to boot.

Doesn't ring a bell, I don't think I've done that one yet.

The Cthulhu nod was a nice addition. They didn't really do anything with it, but it was nice. Even the Lincoln Memorial quests weren't that bad, but then you have to go back to the main quest and think WHY???

Are you referring to the Dunwich Building? I thought that was pretty cool, but you're right, they should have taken it further. I know there's a quest from Point Lookout that fleshes it out a bit more, but I haven't gotten there yet.

There are a lot of memorable locations in FO3, imo. I think my favorite so far is the Museum of Technology, but I still have some locations I haven't explored yet.

 

[skavenhorde]

Doesn't ring a bell, I don't think I've done that one yet.

That's probably because I got the name confused with an area in New Vegas. I just went to Searchlight and finished that one.

I meant Lamplight. Hey at least I got the light part right See what I mean by trying to block them all out

Are you referring to the Dunwich Building? I thought that was pretty cool, but you're right, they should have taken it further. I know there's a quest from Point Lookout that fleshes it out a bit more, but I haven't gotten there yet.

There are a lot of memorable locations in FO3, imo. I think my favorite so far is the Museum of Technology, but I still have some locations I haven't explored yet.

Yep, the Dunwich building. I also finished the Point Lookout quest and it still is underwhelming. But like I said a nice nod to Cthulhu.

The locations I never really had a problem with. Except that the world was missing something. Some kind of sense to it. Especially when NPCs started talking I just went, "Ugghhh. Please shut up. You're ruining the scenery."