Wasteland 2 - Early Access on Steam

Couchpotato

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Wasteland 2 is now available for Early Access. Here are the details and a new video.



Here’s the thing: we’ve got a sequel to the classic Wasteland 1, one of the original RPG's and the godfather of the Fallout™ series. Like the original, this one’s a turn-based, isometric, story-intensive exploration of the radioactive wastes of the American Southwest, heavy on choice and consequence. 20 years we have been waiting for the moment to have a sequel to Wasteland and the moment is near.

Now, time was we could get a publisher to do the beta for us… but like the United States in 2112, those days are long gone, a windswept, radioactive memory. Like the Desert Rangers risin' from the ashes of the old world, we’re building a new community, a new reality for the world as it is: from the Kickstarter community to the Steam community, this new world only works when people are weighing in with their ideas and impressions.

We’re starting out at $59.99 and you’re going to get a lot for your money over time, including a truckload of digital extras, including:

— A free copy of Wasteland 1 - The Original Classic
— Two digital novellas set in The Wasteland world
— Mark Morgan's Wasteland 2 OST in digital format
— A digital concept art book

* We expect the final release price will be lower, but the free copy of Wasteland 1 and the extra goodies are exclusive to Early Access

You also are joining our indie dev team. Your participation is going to make this game better.

We’re looking for your input to help us tailor the remainder of the development process into the best experience we can deliver. The audience input has been hugely useful throughout the process, and we want to make sure your voice is heard clear through to the end. Do you see areas where you could improve the art? Systems? Dialogue? Find anything that’s broken? We want to hear it; because we’re going to fix it.

This game’s basically feature-complete. We’re including 30% of the game levels so you can see how Wasteland 2 plays: AI, gear, inventory, creatures, line-of-sight, exploration, world-maps, fast travel, dialogue, and more. Oh yeah: you’ll also get to test out the combat system. Hell, that’s a big part of the fun here. We’ve got a cartload of quests, memorable characters, NPCs who’ll be happy to join your party for a price (or for vengeance), and all the explosive fun of a radioactive monk without any of that actual radiation. During this early access phase we’ll be adding even more content in the form of new levels, killer weapons and NPCs and of course fixing those pesky bugs that the programmers put in the code. (We keep telling them to stop putting them in because they’re just going to have to take them out later.)

What’s missing? We still have UI to improve on, more skills to add, more player choice, more SFX and of course more areas to explore and we will hone these elements based on your experiences.

We’re offerin' an Early Access and Kickstarter Backer-exclusive site so you can report bugs and deliver your feedback. This is where you get to interface directly with the development team and shape the direction of the final candidate for release. We’ve been making games for a long time—some of the members of the team were on the original, back in ’87—and our decades of experience have taught us that the best measure of quality is the happiness of the customer.
More information.
 
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I seem to be one of the few that likes early access but I don't want any of the extra junk so $60 for early access is just to much IMO.
 
I bought the 15 dollar game from kickstarter and paid for beta access thats another $20. BUt i think that deal has passed. :/
 
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Game looks good in that trailer! My biggest worry is it's going to be too damn short.
 
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Replayable is a dirty word for me when it comes to story-driven RPGs. Sandbox RPGs are replayable. Dunno, I guess it depends on what they do with their design. I replayed Fallout 2 many times. I think I played it all the way through three times in a row, trying different things, and several times more a few years later. I could tolerate a short story arch, if there were a lot of other things I could do to kill time before moving things along. I just really hate being led by the nose through an 20 hour interactive movie and then being told I should replay it and try to make it seem slightly different than it was, last time.
 
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I agree that a lot of games claim tons of replayability but rarely ever actually inspire me to play more than once. I haven't replayed an RPG since BG 2 and FO:NV is the only modern one that tempted me to do it again, till I hit the DLC after beating the game. I'm hoping WL2 avoids that by blocking off entire maps based on choices. If the mechanics are good and the story is interesting, missing a good chunk of story, depending on how often they block maps/how much impact choices have, will probably inspire a second play through.
 
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10 or 15 dollars will be realistic price for W2. It will come down after 1.0, few patches and a couple of Steam weekend/holiday deals.

W2 is not an AAA game, not that professional, especially in graphics. Devs needed a lot of help, input from us to make it right and it's far from done. They are asking for more input to mess the game up as little as possible.
 
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i tend to see it the opposite way. sandboxes are not replayable. They just bore you with the same repetitive mechanics

the story driven ones, as liniar as possible, but with ramifications, those are the ones that have good replayable value. Or the ones with such an interesting skill tree that clearly separates it into >=2 playstyles.

Take Of Orcs and Men and play it

Every game should strive to hit a good replayability grade if they claim to have "good story with meaningful choices"
 
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Story driven games do not come with repetitive mechanics? Every game comes with repetitive mechanics. That is the base of a gameplay.

Prefering to endure the same repeated mechanics to trigger a change in storyline is a matter of taste.
You can even enjoy repeating the same mechanics for no change in storyline so...
 
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10 or 15 dollars will be realistic price for W2. It will come down after 1.0, few patches and a couple of Steam weekend/holiday deals.

W2 is not an AAA game, not that professional, especially in graphics. Devs needed a lot of help, input from us to make it right and it's far from done. They are asking for more input to mess the game up as little as possible.

What in the world are you talking about? The devs got a lot of input from fans because it was a crowd-funded game, not because they needed it to "make it right". And beta/early access is a part of that collaborative promise. Have you been following this game's development at all?

And if you are really concerned with AAA graphics, I am not sure this is the best site for you to frequent for gaming news. In terms of gameplay, C&C, and content, this certainly appears to worth every bit of the AAA price tag to me. People have mentioned 10-20 GB for the beta download, which to me means there must be a lot of data. Sure, it could probably be fine-tuned, but it looks to me like most of us are getting exactly what we wanted.
 
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No RPG is replayable in my case. Sandboxes definitely not, and story based ones, maaaaybe if there are different stories, but most of the time I don't care to play again to experience the other stories. Very few exceptions in all my years of RPG gamer, like Quest for Glory 1 I played twice... KotoR I think I played twice (or actually I think I just reloaded to a point where I could choose the other ending or something). So, to me a short RPG is indeed a short RPG.
 
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I think it's just speculation based on the length of the Beta, I think it's 6-10 hours, and it being 1/2 of the game (I think). We won't know for sure till it's finished but I can see why people might be concerned.
 
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What in the world are you talking about? The devs got a lot of input from fans because it was a crowd-funded game, not because they needed it to "make it right".

And if you are really concerned with AAA graphics, I am not sure this is the best site for you to frequent for gaming news.

My thoughts exactly. Just didn't bother to write them down, don't feed the Troll and all that jazz.
 
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I'm not sure where people get that it'll be too short or such. InXile mentionned that what they released was a PART of Arizona area (and keep in mind there's also the Los Angeles area that isn't released at all)...and the released part is faster\shorter because it is more linear than the rest of the game.

In any case I'm not too worried about the game size :)....

Side note...Damn is it cold this morning, went down to -32c (-26f for you americans out there :p )
 
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Quebec, Canada in a town about an hour north of Montreal... -30s happen every winter, but normally not this early.
 
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The description says it contains something like 30% of the maps, so there should be plenty still to come. Last weekend I went to visit my hometown in Montana and it was -30 degrees F. Awfully cold! I guess some places in Montana were colder than the South Pole at that point!
 
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