Shadowrun Returs - Thoughts?

[Realitycrash]

Hey, what do you guys think of the new Shadowrun game?
I haven't gotten that far yet, but I can remark two things:

Positive - You can play several different 'stories', and they can be user-generated, which leaves plenty of room for replay-value.

Negative - So far I haven't found much use for any form of magic or close combat (even as Physical Adept), it just seems that gun damage, even at low skill-levels, hit equally as hard or more. You never have to buy ammo either. Maybe this changes later during the game but right now I have a hard time figuring out what sets a Mage apart from a Street Samuari. Why SHOULD I use magic if a rifle-shot seem to work just as well? There isn't any Area of Effect spell yet, nor any mind-domination spell or anything that seems to compensate for my skill-point investments. It just seems to be 'Flashy gun-shots'.

 

[masticina]

well never played shadowrun before and kinda started out with a rather harder build. Shaman. Hey it sounded kewl a cybershaman.

But I am taking learning how to do things with a stride! Summoning my little friends and of course making sure I have a decker with me on missions. Playing the field so to say.

Look because I haven't played shadowrun I can't say if this game is balanced. I just go with it and learn on my way! And so far I an enjoying it!

The pro of a level editor means that we will see quite a longer future for this game.

 

[Gethsemani_v1legacy]

Guns are definitely a bit too powerful, especially on low skill levels. It evens out a bit for shamans (lots of nasty spirits), riggers (lots of nasty drones) and mages (AoE out your nose) but as far as I can tell melee just isn't worth the investment.

All around I thought Shadowrun Returns was a pretty nice game, the official story is serviceable and hits the right Shadowrun vibe. My biggest complain is really that some areas have you going around in combat until every last enemy has been killed, which makes for some really awkward party management when you have cleared out a room but still have to reload, use heals and prepare for the next room while still stuck in turn based.

 

[spartandude]

its by no means a fantastic game but im having alot of fun, its just has some issues it needs to sort out.

1. the terrible save system
2. balancing guns, magic and melee
3. the cover system needs some tweaking, some things which look like cover arnt for some reason.
4. interacting with environment during combat, having elevation and being able to do something rather than stand around.


however i do love the little bit of P&P style descriptions they have going on, its doesnt change anything but its a nice little touch

 

[Smooth Operator]

How to put it, at $20 it is good but not refined.
You get only the most basic of options, the game doesn't stop sound on pause nor does it have a mute option so if you do alt-tab you need to go into sound options every time and put the sound down to 0 and once you go back to play set to what it previously was, also no tool tips (there is a good help menu but that does require you to go through it and memorize everything in the game before using it... that is 1980s way of doing things not 2013), consequently you can get almost no extra info out of your surroundings, there appear to be no key shortcuts for anything and obviously no control options or rebinds, the game doesn't make clear what regions are intractable and what aren't on top of that mouse input seems to lag and often clicks don't register (very strange for a game that does it all via mouse), no combat or text log (if you missed any piece of floating text or it was unreadable where placed you will never know what happened), no save system (unless you do a whole region at once you loose all progress), your party members aren't controllable until combat yet their positions are critical when entering combat, and guns are superior to everything else (also seem to be instantly useful to anyone regardless of skill), though it looks like an exploration RPG it works entirely on level by level basis, once you go to a new area there is never a way back, no voices of any sort not even for flavor, people are also saying it isn't true to the Shadowrun style of things but that I really wouldn't know about.

To anyone who feels these annoyances spoil the game I do suggest to wait until patched or modded, but otherwise there is a very cool RPG going on for the price point.

 

[Realitycrash]

well never played shadowrun before and kinda started out with a rather harder build. Shaman. Hey it sounded kewl a cybershaman.

But I am taking learning how to do things with a stride! Summoning my little friends and of course making sure I have a decker with me on missions. Playing the field so to say.

Look because I haven't played shadowrun I can't say if this game is balanced. I just go with it and learn on my way! And so far I an enjoying it!

The pro of a level editor means that we will see quite a longer future for this game.

I'm trying out a Rigger/Shaman. Figured I could go for two drones and one spirit, but right now I am having trouble using the Summon Fetish item. For some reason it doesn't work? No idea why. I just can't click and use it even though I have the skill-points invested.

And overall, guns seem fairly unbalanced.

 

[Lil_Rimmy]

For me, the game was bloody amazing. I do think everyone complaining here had the same problem as me (and anyone who ever played wizards etc. in the old D&D).

See, the way the game is balanced is that at the start, straight up fighters kick ass. But slowly the other classes overtake them. I was a rigger, and the only reason I survived some fights was the fact that my drones could distract the enemy. I was about as tough as a soggy notepad.

But the more I progressed, I started to get badass drones that meant I tripled my moves every turn and I could mortar, machinegun, grenade and heal, all just from my robots. What's that? Your shitty shotgun can only attack 2 times a round? Say hello to 2 drones with their own AP!

And the same seemed for mages. As a Rigger, I LOOOOOVED support mages, as their buffs and heals were ridiculously good. But even the normal mages and Shamans became kickass towards the end. The amount of abilities they have, the huge list of spells, and so on.

At the same time, all the straight up fighters are getting are falling behind, because although they kicked ass at the start, you have started to overtake them.

But yeah, melee is friggin' useless. With guns, you have 2-3 attacks a round, more with specials. With melee? 1-2 AP to charge at enemy, 1 to hit or 2-3 to use the GOOD abilities, doing the same DMG as a gun and then getting shotgunned to bits at close range next round. They would be much more useful if they could attack and move as 1 AP, so you would actually have fast-moving melee fighters, meaning that they would be USEFUL!

Anyway, I loved it, but the save system is retarded. Towards the end, there is this one mission that requires a decker, I won't go into detail but basically I transitioned to the next stage without him, and the game failed me. Restart? Fail. Reload? Fail. In the end I found the "Revert" button on your save file, so I had to restart the mission from the top.

Stupid fucking save system.

 

[thetoddo]

I'm having a lot of fun running through the campaign with multiple builds. The writing is spot on, which shouldn't be surprising considering that the campaign's writer was the same guy who wrote the P&P rulebooks. The writing is full of references to the P&P game, but I don't think you'd lose out on much if you don't immediately know why the Universal Brotherhood is bad news or why Echo Mirage was such a big deal (both were major "holy shit" moments when they first were mentioned for me as a fanboy) though when one of these things was mentioned early on in the game I figured out the general shape of the ending right quick.

On a gamplay level I agree with a lot of the criticisms, but Lil_Rimmy is right that the classes besides samurai REALLY open up in terms of power towards the end except for the physical adept, hopefully they'll patch it so that they're competitive at end game. Decker also falls a little short in meatspace but drone control is a natural secondary specialization as both are Intelligence based skills and drone/marked target is a valid lifestyle choice.

All in all I'd say that the campaign is a fun story and a great tech demo intended to show modders what can be done with just the base tools (which I think was the designers' intent). I look forward to the mod community's campaigns and any other stories Hare Brained puts out.

 

[masticina]

well never played shadowrun before and kinda started out with a rather harder build. Shaman. Hey it sounded kewl a cybershaman.

But I am taking learning how to do things with a stride! Summoning my little friends and of course making sure I have a decker with me on missions. Playing the field so to say.

Look because I haven't played shadowrun I can't say if this game is balanced. I just go with it and learn on my way! And so far I an enjoying it!

The pro of a level editor means that we will see quite a longer future for this game.

I'm trying out a Rigger/Shaman. Figured I could go for two drones and one spirit, but right now I am having trouble using the Summon Fetish item. For some reason it doesn't work? No idea why. I just can't click and use it even though I have the skill-points invested.

And overall, guns seem fairly unbalanced.

This games makes you grab to the Manual indeed.

I found that to summon them you have to choose the fetish, click it so it shows up in its little side screen THEN click on a tile on the field somewhere withing range. What I am "stuck" with is my totem stuff, erm.. its..weird to me. But I am sure I will learn how to use it. And yes adding more characters on the field gives you more turns to do things. In the begin game it isn't as quick but later it really powers up!

This game is good enough for me not to give up. I love how I need to think and plan.. in how many games does that still exist these days.

 

[Fappy]

Haven't played too much of it yet, but I have enjoyed what little I have played. Issues I have had with it so far:

- UI seems clunky
- Sound design is wanting