Saturday!
Wasteland was a game that I played on my Apple IIe. I absolutely adored it. It had a sense of humor, it had interesting mechanics, and it even attempted graphic violence. Now, since its graphics were only a little better than Wizardry, it had to resort to depicting the graphic violence through text… but, hey, that was enough to upset the censors in the 80’s. “Gila Monster turns into a red mist.” “Bandit is flattened into a red paste.” “Rat explodes like a blood sausage.”
Now, of course, 25 years later, it’s more giggleworthy than something worth writing your congressman about.
The sequel has been 25 years in the making and now, finally, the game is out of beta.
I loved Wasteland, I loved Fallout, I loved Fallout 3, and I loved New Vegas. I can’t wait for Fallout 4… and I’m remembering all of Brian Fargo’s games and remembering how much I loved each and every one of them. I can’t wait to play Wasteland 2.
If only I weren’t addicted to Heroes V…
So… what are you playing?
You know there’s a Planescape: Torment II (IReport
You know there’s a Planescape: Torment II (ish), it’s not a sequel exactly, coming out, right?Report
Yes. As for that one, I’m sure they’re going to screw it up.Report
Probably, although I believe some of the original creators are on board and the gameplay trailer looks good so far.
XCom: Enemy Unknown and Shadowrun Returns (especially Dragonfall) have helped my cynicism a bit,
I’m also currently afraid and eager (there should be a word for the sensation of both anticipating something and hoping it won’t turn out an awful disappointment that destroys your childhood retroactively) for Beyond Earth, which is Sid Meiers’ Alpha Centauri-esque new Civ game. (Civ 5 is great. I mean it took a year to go from suck to great, but it’s been awesome since).Report
ye of little faith, jaybird. i think they have a decent shot at doing something good.
i have to wait until my boxed copy of wasteland 2 arrives; nearly 10gb download is about 1/3rd of my monthly allotment on this connection. bleh.Report
There’s actually a fairly decent history of recent reboots being unusually adequate.
As Morat20 mentioned, there’s XCom, and both Shadow Warrior (one of my guilty pleasures from the 90s) and Tomb Raider had major shifts of perspective, but kept enough of the core to survive. I’m also hopeful about Beyond Earth, although I gave Civ5 a miss due to the early problems and the one-unit-per-hex issue.
If only No One Lives Forever wasn’t stuck in licensing hell – literally no one knows who owns it anymore with mergers and such, so there’s zero chance of a reboot.
And there’s the two turn-based party shooters, Wasteland and Jagged Alliance, from Kickstarter. Time will tell on those, but no obvious red flags. Isn’t there also a new Baldur’s Gate?
However, of all of them, Planescape:Torment seems to me like the hardest to get right.Report
although I gave Civ5 a miss due to the early problems and the one-unit-per-hex issue.
Steam has regular sales for the whole thing (Civ 5 + the expansions/DLC’s) and you should really pick it up. I paid something like 20 dollars for the whole thing and have put in near 300 hours. The one-unit per tile thing requires some changes in how you attack, making terrain and which units and how you approach a problem considerably more important.
It DOES make certain cities just a real PITA to take — I remember one particular Mongolian city that had mountain on two sides, which meant I was heavily restricted in how I could get units and in out. I ended up having to bombard it from the sea to soften it up. I could have human wave’d it, but it would have killed like 2/3rds of my entire army — including garrison units. That was WITH a tech advantage. Stupid terrain…Report
Muneco,
Civ5 isn’t worth it, just pick up Civ 4 and play it again.
That said, I think I have to write a review of Hatoful Boyfriend…
And The Yawhg….Report
Civ5 isn’t worth it, just pick up Civ 4 and play it again.
Your wrongness cannot be overstated. 🙂
Seriously, Civ 5 is excellent. Admittedly, I play with all the expansions (not that I can recall their names, but the overhaul to religion and to the cultural victory stuff was really good and made a huge difference), so I suspect the base game is not quite so good.
Since you can get the whole thing on Steam for cheap, well…certainly worth the cash, especially if comes up as one of the winter sale items.Report
Yes, Civ V with all the DLC and both expansions is worth it. As has been mentioned before, Steam is selling the complete version for cheap.Report
One unit per cell is the best part of Civ 5 because it forces you to make tradeoffs and makes combined arms really valuable. Stack of death is lame. Per @morat20, it should be a PITA to take certain cities. There’s a reason why Switzerland can afford to be neutral. I agree that the G&K and BNW expansions improve the game 1000%.Report
Yeah, don’t buy the base Civ 5. Grab the whole package on Steam. heck, wait for a sale. (You have Steam, right? If you’re on a PC, why don’t you have Steam and Good Ole Games just sitting around?).
I’ve only got about 300 hours in the game. I’m currently nerving myself up for Crusader Kings 2, and really, really, REALLY wishing someone would add a GUI to Dwarf Fortress.Report
morat20,
nope. no steam.
it’s not on gog, either (did check).
(and seriously, I buy games when they’re a dollar or two. $20 seems excessive).
/cheapReport
As soon as I can chase my nephew off my machine, I’m buying Wasteland 2. He’s over playing Torchlight II with his cousins. These weekend LAN parties are starting to become a regular thing.Report
Wasteland 2 is worth the $39.99 on the strength of the opening vignette alone. I’ve played it as far as the beginning of the second mission and I like what I’ve experienced of the storyline so far. The game has some quirks (I couldn’t quite figure out how to use my skills and the camera takes some getting used to), but I readily concede that most of my difficulties could have probably been eased had I bothered to read the instructions rather than just dive right into playing.Report
XCom is probably the best example of the heights that a rebooted game can aspire to… but I’m thinking of EA’s execrable offerings: Syndicate is first to mind. The brilliant thing about Planescape was that it was so very, very rich and allowed you to play as Lawful Good in one playthrough and Chaotic Evil in another and both felt like that was how the game was designed to be played (preaching to the choir here, I know).
I don’t see them recapturing that. They’ll come up with a way that they want the game to be played and that will be that. Instead of exploration, it’ll be didactic.
Grump grump grump.Report