Wasteland 3 - Review @ Game Rant
 

Game Rant reviewed Wasteland 3:

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Lies I finished the game in 40 hrs and the overland map doesn't have many locations. I've said it before Wasteland 2 was the bigger game. Yes my subjective opinion.:p

Did it live up to your expectations?

Hmm - I'm 49 hours in the game and just visited the first City and the Bizarre …
I replayed 6 hours, so I have 43 hours yet.

Somewhat it's improved over Wasteland 2 but bugs and memory leaks were a constant problem. I had a few crashes as well. The latest patches fix some of them.

Back to the load time problems it seems most Unity RPGs all have the same problem. I wonder if it has to do with how the engine loads assets for the next area?

I played on the easiest setting just for the story. I dind't want to waste hours in TB combat. As everyone already knows I'm not a big fan of TB combat in RPGs.

Also it only has two large cities, one ski resort, and a bunch of other smaller locations. The second city isn't even a big city just two hubs. So yeah not a huge playground.

Don't get wrong whats there is enjoyable but with a bigger budget I expected bigger cities, and more locations. Heck ATOM RPG with a smaller budget did it better.

I think that explains it, I'm playing on the second hardest setting and I have to visit a doctor now and then :)

Just completed WL3 today. I think a lot of the reviews oversold it for me. It's definitely an improvement over WL2 in a lot of things and I had a good time but the whole thing felt too consolised and it was waaaay too easy, even on Ranger mode. Everything felt doable in a single playthrough itself (minus the branching paths) The vehicle sections felt very gimmicky and the technical side of things is a mess. I think Original Sin 2 and Disco Elysium ruined RPGs for me. But I feel like I might be a little too hard on the game? Idk. Writing a review tomorrow.

This is exactly how I feel. But on the other hand, loved the length. Kinda burned out on 100 hr games these days.

I don't know how long the game will end up being for me. It doesn't keep track of hours on Xbox, I don't think, and I'm not close to done yet. But I can say that I don't at all mind not having huge hub areas. I like varied, more focused areas. Denver, for example, is the aiport and the government building, but there's a lot to see and do in each, imo. The Machine Commune in particular I really enjoyed.

Yea this is the only way I can stomach a TB game. Play it on easy so hours of my life don't dribble away in the painfully slow and dull TB combat mode.

I played on hardest difficulty and beat it just past the 50 hour mark, but that's considering I had to redo about 5 hours of game because the game bugged and corrupted my party. Also, without exaggerating, I'd say about 10% of that time was spent in loading screens. The loading times got worse and worse the further I got in to the game and by the final stages of it, those loading screens were taking literal minutes on a good quality SSD.

Someone in a previous post asked if it was worth it - I paid £1 as a first timer Gamepass on XBox app, so for me yes. For its intended £60 price tag? Hell no, not in a million years.

All in all, if the game had been bug free, I think it's a good game, but it's neither huge nor essential, much less in its current state and the fact that they just keep patching the console version while the PC one is broken as fuck. Still today I successfully replicated the bug that completely breaks your characters and essentially the whole game simply by using a basic game function such as swapping characters in and out of the roster.

Finished Wasteland 3, it probably took me about 50 hours. Loved the game. I really didn't run into the performance issues that many folk seem to have run into, and I'm thankful for that. The game didn't bug out or crash on me once, loading screens weren't too bad, and I guess I got lucky in many ways with that. :)

I did pay for the Deluxe edition to support the developer - I want more games like this to be made and that's my way of letting people know it - and I thought it was well worth the price. (Something like $60 for 50+ hours of playtime and the possibility of replaying it again in the future when it gets patched to all Hell was quite worth it for me.)

Also, I want to go rescue a kitten and name him Major Tomcat now.

My Major Tomcat died today. :(
He was poisoned and the interface on Xbox is god awful for things like administering antidote to a non-party member like an animal companion.

Nice one @yemeth. A lot of user comments I'm reading highlight the lack of challenge, and from the vids I've watch it looks an absolute cakewalk.

I think I'll be leaving this one for at least a year or so whilst they iron the bugs out, & hopefully increase the difficulty with a patch or three.

Tag me in your review mate, be interested to read the full one.

The problem, more than the combat difficulty itself, is that you can always enter combat in full advantage, placing your units in advantageous spots, and you will always have a full first turn before the enemy can react. Weapons are very lethal, and everything is oneshot-able, and for example, a well placed rocket launcher shot and couple of sniper shots here and there will see the entire enemy team wiped before they can even fight back properly. You could think "What bout bosses or big monsters, such as Scorpitron, 6k HP, huge scary mech with annihilation weapons?" - don't mind the weapons, it won't get to use them as it still gets oneshot by a sniper in the highest game difficulty.

That also allows you to completely ignore the initiative stat and max out your shooting/damaging stats. If the initiative system mattered at all, characters wouldn't end up so minmaxed, and combats would be more challenging/balanced. In the few instances where I've got jumped on with my characters out of cover (ie, after a scripted conversation), the enemy can actually apply the same treatment to you - before you can even act, you've lost 3-4 units, making it all a mess that would be difficult to win from there. However, even in those instances you can just take different conversation choices before the combat itself to be the one attacking first.

TL;DR, whoever takes the first turn in combat wins, and you can always take the first turn.

Yes exactly. Not to mention the fact that sniper rifles are OP as fuck. You can deplete 60% of a scorpitron's HP if you sneak attack it

It seems like games release in three stages these days:

1) Early access: bugged fragments of the game. You should expect bugs and balancing issues throughout and when you complain about them you "take part to the development of the game". Even though you'll have to pay the full price, you are not a customer, but rather a "supporter" or "developer".
2) v1.0: bugged entire games with serious balancing issues. Bugs are kind of expected these days and complaining about them helps little, although now you are not "taking part to the development" any longer. You are a customer.
3) "Definitive" or "Game of the Year" edition: close to what the game was supposed to be at release. Still some bugs and balancing issues but now they actually get fixed pretty quick. If the game was PC exclusive, it often gets published on consoles, and vice versa.

Sounds like I'll wait for the definitive edition with this one and spend my time on being frustrated with BG3 EA bugs. At least I know what to expect :P

I'm 16h in the game and have a very great time on standard difficulty so far. I can make up to 2 or 3 mistakes in battles and still win - for me the balance is perfect. I don't want to reload just because no mistakes are forgiven.

Wasteland 3 makes so much things right, that the games annoyances are easily forgiven.

I don't know why things the following things occur in a release version:
- within fog of war enemy and NPC models are not visible, but their weapons are
- I can see interactable items through walls, that feels like cheating, but far more annoying is that you may send a single PC into an enemy horde because "container" is behind a wall inside an unexplored building
- related: if I send a PC to interact with something it walks alone even if all PCs are selected
- related: all PCs switch their view to NPCs I'm starting to talk to - combined with their "moving sound" this is absolutely creepy

Quality of live features:
- I've not found a way to switch to turn based mode without attacking - very annoying when dealing with patrolling enemies
- I want a key to display the enemy line of sight (exploring mode)
- not all items are accessible with an item group
- would love some kind of stash within my inventory where I can place items manually on positions of my choice
- would love a filter for weapons and armor the currently selected PC can actually use (without penalty)

It's there. On Xbox it's R3. Look in the tutorials or Google it. You missed it.

And you don't need a key to display light of sight. The game shows a circle of detection range by default.

The second patch was released today.:)

Wasteland 3 - Patch 1.1.0 Now Live - Steam

I just passed the 30 hour mark. Took care of Valor, still have te other two to take care and then I guess there will be a finalle. I guess I've spent more hours with side quests than the main one.

I like the game, I like the combat, but it all feels a little bit unballanced and disjointed. The type of mood/setting/humour didn't allow me to feel immersed in the game.

But I enjoy TB combat and progression systems, so I didn't lose interest inthe game yet.

I'm playing on normal difficulty and it feels a little bit easy. Maybe because I level up fast and got equipment near the beggining that I'm not finding any better until now.
The level up makes all the characters the same, except for their specialization. You'll invest in their main weapon skills and other skill (for example, lockpicking, mechanic, etc). The attributes… Priority to coordination to get extra APs. Then awareness/strength/speed.

OTOH, the quick progression actually helped to keep interested in a game that otherwis wouldn't keep me interested. The loop of wanting to try a new perk, a new weapon/armor, etc helps to keep interest, but unless they can keep this going on until the end, I can see how too much too soon might leave half the game without this hook to keep interest. I already have maxed out most attributers and relevant skills and I'm still only finding weapons and armor worse than what I already got 20 hours ago. But still have mods to try, as i level up the weapon/armor mod skills.

Also, I'm not young already, so I guess I don't have the same energy and concentration levels as before, when most of my game playing is at night, when I'm tired from work and it's late, finally daughter is sleeping and I can play 1 hour or 3, not getting all the hours of sleep I should get. So that means I'm less patient and not needing to be too challenged when I just want to relax and enjoy. But i can tottaly understand why pople might be disappointed with the easy combat, even in higher difficulty settings.

And talking about patience, those loading times are really annoying. It's been some time since loading screens were an issue for me. I use a fast SSD and the game always takes 43 seconds to load. No matter if a city or a small location. And when I know i have to go to a town map, load a location, get the reward for finishing a mission, load the town map again and then load the main map again… I usually end up cutting short my playing session with this game then and there.

If I had to rate game now, before finishing it, I would give it a 7 out of 10.

I've been playing it on hard and the difficulty seems pretty good there. There are some pretty tough fights where I have to use everything at my disposal, although advancement is pretty fast too so I imagine you could always try to outlevel them. But even some fights that I technically outlevel can be challenging.

I haven't found the thing about offense winning the fight in the first round to be true. At least on hard enemies can have a lot of hp and there are often many of them. I might kill one or two a round but when there are 10 you have to consider defense and survival too. On the other hand, I also haven't found it true that enemies wipe you out beyond the point of recovery on their turn. Yes damage can be high and enemies can often do surprising things where suddenly half your party is down. But combat healing and revival is also much stronger and easier in this game than in WL2. You can very easily recover from a bad turn and get everyone back on their feet and while you can't keep doing that forever, it does add an interesting level of tactics to the game, even if it does have a very gamey feel to it.

It's been a few days now since I finished the game, and all my thoughts have settled. When I think about the game, one image comes to mind, time and time again. I try to focus to think of other things, but I can't, it's always the same image, blocking every other thought I have about the game. Every. Single. One.

https://i.imgur.com/dn2IYyg.jpg

I finished it yesterday and have to say I wonder how some people claim it's an 80 hour game? If you play the battles extremely slow perhaps, otherwise nope. I played on the "Normal" difficulty (Wastelander) and found it too easy, would have chosen Ranger if I could be bothered to restart but that will have to wait for the next playthrough. I did activate Friendly Fire though, it just feels too stupid to have your teammates in your cone of fire without hurting them.

I finished around the 40 hour mark I believe, I restarted once but it was early. Steam says 51 hours but I probably left in on once in a while while doing other stuff too.

The biggest improvement over WL2 is the character building and the battles, many more special abilities and perks makes it a much more interesting experience and all weapon types feel viable with the right build. I liked the story and dialogues as well. I also liked that all skill checks were definite and not save scumming compatible.

I agree with Couch that WL2 felt like a bigger game, and judging by the time it took me to complete that one it is (I have 100hours logged on WL2 and 56hours on WL2 Directors Cut, I believe I only have one single playthrough on DC).

All in all I really enjoyed the game and I really can't see how anyone would consider 1,5$ per hour of enjoyment a hard sell (assuming you do one playthrough), but opinions obviously vary. I WOULD have liked it to be longer, but didn't feel cheated either.

The loading screen? Damn annoying when going somewhere in the city after the point were you're not exploring it anymore, but 30 seconds every now and then never bothered me. I only reloaded a couple of times, if you're a real scummer this game would have taken those 80 hours without problem. You reckon that's how some reviewers managed it? ;)

An absolute recommendation from me but with room for improvement for sure.

Well it was inevitable.:biggrin:

Wasteland 3 - Accolades Trailer

Even the thumbnail of the accolade trailer has the loading screen splash art. You end up growing fond of it it.

Well the problem itself is the Unity engine. Basically how it loads the assets for the next area. To bad no one has figured out a way to make Unity similar to AnvilNext 2.0.

Open simulated worlds with very few load screens.:)

I'm glad I didn't preorder this. :)

Not bashing the game. I'm definitely getting it eventually, and I think it's going to be significantly improved after more patching, but it obviously wasn't fully ready to be released when it was.