Grimrock

entro wrote: Rule #1: Exploration is encouraged. Up until the ice lizards. Now exploration is punished, because these G-D snow raptors will spawn endlessly and surround you in a narrow hallway if you dare to backtrack for something you think you might have missed.

Rule #2: There is sometimes more than one way to approach a level. Up until the ice lizards. Now you'd better have done everything in the order we decided, or it's death by Clever Girls when you have to backtrack.

Rule #3: While there is challenging combat, this game is more about thinking than reflexes. Or, at least, it was. Because now you're drawing dinosaurs in to square rooms so you can do a ridiculous square dance for five minutes each, one-by-one. Maybe for half an hour, because they spawn endlessly, of course. Somehow. Dripping out of the walls, I guess.

Rule #4: You don't have to grind in this game. Well, until you do. See #3. When people talk about grinding, that's what they mean.

entro wrote:Or unless you've made it to Level 10 but have no food.....

entro wrote:I'm posting this because LoG was such a breath of fresh (dungeon) air in so many ways that I really hope the developers can avoid what felt like a slap in the face for their future projects.

I proudly paid for the game, started my first run on Hard, and enjoyed the hell out of myself for eight levels. But now I have no interest in trying to finish the game.

My issue isn't with the puzzles (which are, except for the one we're all thinking of, fantastic), or that the game requires patience or lateral thinking. My issue is that starting with Level 9, the designers decided that some basic rules they've skilfully and subtly taught the player through hours of excellent gameplay up until that point should just go out the window, because that will make it more "challenging."

Rule #1: ]there are seriously maybe 8 that are there initially, and if you go charging in balls out and die from that, you miss the fundamental theme of this game: you are TRYING to be killed by the mountain, and it is up to YOU to adapt to survive.

Rule #2: every puzzle has only 1 possible solution, and though you may have to backtrack through areas of the dungeon to receive items you need to open a door, every level plays out pretty linearly.

Rule #3: almost every enemy can be killed in 4 complete rounds of action or less. if it is taking you too long, you specced your characters incorrectly and are now dealing with the consequences of that. almost everyone playing the game had a similar issue when they first started playing, but, through trial and error, they realized they made a mistake, and restarted quickly to rectify the situation.

Rule #4: "grinding" means that you are doing an unnecessary task in order to give yourself an advantage, in the video game world, or that you are performing a mundane "trash task" that the game throws at you to either force you to learn a specific game mechanic (in this case, how to deal with swarms of challenging monsters) or to artificially lengthen the game.

Rule #5: there is seriously MAYBE 1 item that most astute players MAY not have on them when reaching this puzzle. some people may not have any rocks on them, but by the time i noticed how many pressure plate puzzles there were in the game, like you know, the second level, i started hording the rocks found in the game like crazy just so i could have a trash item to place on them as needed.

Rule #6: there are no areas in the game the completely and permanently block you from backtracking.

I feel like the designers should have prepared me better for what might happen if I find myself in this state. Make it difficult for me to find more food, sure - put a challenge in the way - but, impossible? That's just vindictive, and done in poor faith.[b]vindictive means they are doing this to get revenge on you. there is no way possible this can be true. secondly, it is not impossible; you just made a bad decision somewhere earlier.[/b]

I knowingly started a old-school game on Hard, I get that. And I loved it and built a pretty good party, and despite that ended up in an unwinnable state. I feel as though the game is saying, "Oh, you didn't make all the decisions we secretly wanted you to make, so sorry your hours of gameplay are for nothing. Better start over."by the time you get to level 10, there are absolutely no surprises left in the game. you should know by that point "if i take this item, there is a 95% chance that a door will lock and at least 3 monsters will spawn that i have to kill before i can get out." preparation is the key to victory. it is not the developers fault that you did not prepare yourself.

I won't, though. Such a brilliant game at the beginning, such an absuive exercise in pointless twitchy grinding at the end. A thoughtful game like this should be able to ratchet up the difficulty with something more than spamming enemies (that's modern FPS territory) and expecting me to be a mind-reader.if dealing with 3 ice lizards in a fairly combat controllable location is a game ender for you, i dont know how you got past the first set of 3 uggardians...

Best of luck with future endeavours, Almost Human. We need more games like LoG, but I feel like it would have been nice of LoG was also like LoG the whole way through. I'll keep recommending the game, but I'll also be telling people they shouldn't expect to necessarily get a full game out of it.why shouldnt they expect a full game? just because you rage quit because you could not adapt to the mechanics of the game world does not mean there is not a full game that you purchased, unless you are one of those people that think if a tree falls in the woods and no one is around that it doesnt make a sound. in which case, hey man, i guess we all have our crazy cards in some way or another.