Shadowrun HK - Impressions Thread

It looks pretty good for what it's going, art style is great, only thing I'd improve is char models, really do look a bit outdated.
 
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Finished it. Great game, step aside BG II, I'd say this is my new favorite crpg.
The end mission could have had a stronger build up/climax, but "meat" of the game: dialogue, runs ( side quests), characters were all excellent.
Definitely step up from Dragonfall, except for slightly weaker/involving main storyline.
Hope they come back to this, on a new tech…Larian's engine plus Shadowrun?

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At the expense of BattleTech? Nonononooo!
 
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Definitely step up from Dragonfall, except for slightly weaker/involving main storyline.
Hope they come back to this, on a new tech…Larian's engine plus Shadowrun?

DOS2 doesn't have a cover system does it? Also, I really don't want them to mess up dialogue in order to enable co-op.

HBS has said when they do another SR game it will likely be in a new engine, but of course that will require more funding than another expansion.

I think HK was a great game, but not a fan of the "improvements" to the Matrix. And combat is way too easy. I posted a long review on Neoseeker if anyone is interested.
 
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DOS2 doesn't have a cover system does it? Also, I really don't want them to mess up dialogue in order to enable co-op.

HBS has said when they do another SR game it will likely be in a new engine, but of course that will require more funding than another expansion.

I think HK was a great game, but not a fan of the "improvements" to the Matrix. And combat is way too easy. I posted a long review on Neoseeker if anyone is interested.

I forced through those IC segments, but yeah...don't really know what they were thinking there.
But characters, Gobbet in particular, are a great improvement, and player dialogue much more relatable( plenty of more down to earth humor: Oh, look it's the idiot brigade..)
There any good mods for it? I think I heard of a few good campaigns, NWN style.
 
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HBS has said when they do another SR game it will likely be in a new engine, but of course that will require more funding than another expansion.

Well it would be hard to rise up to the Game of the Century. :p

But I agree, for most part...best part about both games is how "compact" they feel...you have a hub, main story, couple of side characters and "runs".
Inventory/item management, crafting, grind for loot, etc is usually done better in other genres and adds too much hassle to most rpgs.
 
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I forced through those IC segments, but yeah…don't really know what they were thinking there.
But characters, Gobbet in particular, are a great improvement, and player dialogue much more relatable( plenty of more down to earth humor: Oh, look it's the idiot brigade..)
There any good mods for it? I think I heard of a few good campaigns, NWN style.

Unfortunately the SR editor never really caught on to the extent NWN did, but I need to check out the user generated content again. Problem is a lot of mods are works in progress. Also, content made for Returns, Dragonfall, and HK are not compatible with eachother (at least not without some tinkering by the creator)...

A lot of the mods i've tried are rather combat heavy and tend to lack a lot of what appeals to me about HBS campaigns... Jacked Up was a cool one made for Returns but it appears to have been abandoned. Was playing Mercurial, which seemed pretty good.
 
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I just finished the extended edition of Shadowrun: HK (34 hours) and thought I'd add some personal impressions to the thread. I played a bitter dwarven street samurai with a morbid penchant for cutting things up and bringing the corporations down a peg or two. :)

Pros:
- Excellent writing and level of detail, especially during dialogue with NPCs.
- Great cyberpunk atmosphere, tears in rain, neon gloom.
- Accessibility is very high as the game never gets too difficult.
- Good array of moral choices for the player to create different outcomes with quests. (Gaichu)
- All quests felt meaningful and relevent to the overall story; the NPC personal quests were all reasonably memorable (Gobbett's was one of my favourite quests in the entire game..)
- Features one of my all time favourite and arguably most well conceived NPCs from the trilogy; the quintessentially cyberpunk Racter, joining the likes of Glory, Coyote and Dietrich as excellently written characters.)
- Some additional depth in the extended section for players wanting more..

Cons:
- Slightly frustrating and tedious real time Matrix sequences (Especially toward the end, though I didn't mind the hacking mini-game so much..)
- Weakest story of the three games for me (My interest had started to wane by the Walled City mission)
- Combat wasn't especially challenging and felt a slight step down from previous games. (Particularly Dragonfall) Koschei and Duncan practically won the final battle by themselves.
- Has the least memorable soundtrack of the three games for me.
- Club88 felt too empty of content; more options and events should possibly have ocurred here.
- I experienced a couple of fairly nasty bugs, something I didn't really have with the previous two games. One of them was almost a show-stopper...(Disappearing main character after completing the ASIST mission) causing several rewinds/reloads.

I enjoyed parts of the game quite a bit, notably the philosophical chats with Racter and Gobbet's last atmospheric final mission. On the whole, to be honest I was happy to finish without exhausting the extended optional content fully as the main quest and story had started to drag somewhat for me. Still, it might be worth investigating with another class in the future with a view to explore other quest outcomes.
 
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On the whole, to be honest I was happy to finish without exhausting the extended optional content fully as the main quest and story had started to drag somewhat for me.

From your pro's and con's I wouldn't have guessed this conclusion, but I felt the similar. The question now is what this made you feel that this "drags" and imho that is the amount of irrelevant text.

I mean if you are completely objective you have to admit that a big part of the time you spend in the game was with reading text, actually, the most part with a wide margin.

You mentioned that the Combat was not challenging (but it sounded like you were ok with it) and you didn't like the real time hacking (which also was just a tiny part of the game, and might actually have been optional at some points), but if the rest of the game was excellent, I think the conclusion would have been different.
 
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From your pro's and con's I wouldn't have guessed this conclusion, but I felt the similar. The question now is what this made you feel that this "drags" and imho that is the amount of irrelevant text.

I mean if you are completely objective you have to admit that a big part of the time you spend in the game was with reading text, actually, the most part with a wide margin.

You mentioned that the Combat was not challenging (but it sounded like you were ok with it) and you didn't like the real time hacking (which also was just a tiny part of the game, and might actually have been optional at some points), but if the rest of the game was excellent, I think the conclusion would have been different.

I think I understand Pessi's point. The game is very good for what it is. However, the game tends to be very heavy in terms of story and because the game mechanics are not "amazing", i.e. combat is not challenging and the mini-games are OK, the game tends to go on. To be honest I had the same feeling with Dragonfall, which I think was way too long for this kinds of game.

But possibly Pessi doesn't mean any of this, so I'll let him speak for himself :)
 
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To me, both SR and SR: Dragonfall seemed pretty short for RPGs. I haven't played SR:HK yet, but I'm surprised to see anyone say they felt those games were too long.
 
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Well, they can be too long and too short at the same time.
They were definitely too short to make proper use of the character system.
 
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The question now is what this made you feel that this "drags" and imho that is the amount of irrelevant text.

I think it is a number of variables really. Much of the subjectively irrelevant text can be safely ignored or skipped at ones leisure, which I did for some of the minor encounters. Naturally I didn't do any of this for the key NPCs or quest content as I found most of that compelling and well written.

That said, the story did stop engaging me, unlike the previous two games. I also think that perhaps generally my time spent with this game engine and setting was getting too much and it was a little too familiar coming from Dragonfall which I certainly think is the peak of the trilogy.
You mentioned that the Combat was not challenging (but it sounded like you were ok with it)
Dragonfall definitely had the more intense and memorable fights, but to be honest combat isn't the key motivator for me playing Shadowrun - I'm more into the mood of the setting, the role-playing choices, characters, music and writing. The game delivered this for the most part - but overall, it is my least favourite of the three.
Pladio also pretty much got what I was trying to say on the combat and the sensation of the game 'dragging on". Part of that is simply my reaction to it.
and you didn't like the real time hacking
Best read that part again Kordy, I said I didn't mind the hacking mini-game, which was basically like a symbolic version of Simon. :) It was more so the real time stealth Matrix exploration sections that could get a little tedious. One of the later missions is also very heavily reliant upon it, more so than normal.

I also agree with JDR on the Shadowrun games in that they are relatively short experiences compared to many AAA titles. For me, Shadowrun Returns was 16 hours, the Directors cut of Dragonfall was 27 hours. I take Kordanor's point on making a more complete use of the character system too.

In any case, I was more so just posting an overview of my impressions than making too many hard conclusions about the game. I did read daveyd's review on Neoseeker though which I do recommend if anyone hasn't done so already and has completed it. :)
 
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