First let me say that I'm an avid game player, and was playing Dungeons and Dragons back in the late 70s and early 80s, and was a Dungeon Master for a group of friends for about 10 years. I've also been involved in creating computer role-playing games. I think I have a good understanding of playing these kinds of games both on the computer and not.
Many of my comments are from experiences in both playing and designing. You may not agree with what I say and that's you're right. We'll just have to agree to disagree.
All in all, "Eschalon: Book I" is one of the best games I've played in the last few years. Interesting,
generally well balanced, and easy to understand and play without having to have memorized
a complex set of manuals.
That being said, here are my comments, in no particular order, on Book I:
- I like turn-based games. i like being able to easily pause to get a drink, go to the
bathroom, answer the phone, etc. Real-time games, even those with "pause"
features are always problematic. Also, in turn-based games I can stop and think
what to do in a given situation. I hope Book II is also game based.
- The main feature that I thought was missing was the ability to shrink the game from
full-screen to window mode and back again without having to leave the game. While
playing, I sometimes needed to check my calendar, look up some document, or something
else and I couldn't do it without exiting the game. I found it annoying.
- I like the save and restore feature. One of my favorite games is Diablo II. But, I really
hate the fact that if I save and restore the game, everything resets and all the monsters
are back. Other games I've played, like the Baldur's Gate series, not only reset, but were HARDER
after the restore - there were more monsters or they were tougher. According to the designers,
this was intentional. So, if you had trouble defeating a group of monsters and reloaded from
a save, the game was tougher. That always seemed silly to me. I like being able to save and
restore to the exact moment of the save, with everything exactly the way it was. That way, when I do
need to exit the game for some reason (see above) things in the game are the way I left them.
I hope that this feature continues in Book II.
- I found that Book I was very easy to play, that the quests were easy to do, and that
the puzzles were all easy to figure out. I think in Book II, I'd like a bit more variety,
especially as the game progresses. Maybe a few tougher puzzles later on. I think
this game bordered a little on the "too easy" side and could have been a little harder
but not a lot. I really don't like hard games... But, I like games that mentally challenge me
on some level.
- The balance of treasure, seemed off. At some points, a monster was easily dispatched
and the treasure was good; at other times, a difficult monster was dispatched after a
tough battle and there were only a few measly gold coins to be had. Also, at the early
stages of the game, when gold is most needed for healing and/or mana potions, it's difficult
to find whereas at the end of the game, there's a lot of gold to be had when you don't need
it any more. All that gold in the Goblin Citadel is almost pointless at that point.
At the end of the first game, I think I had 17,000 gold coins! This seems off to me.
I've always read in the D&D books and other places that treasure should be doled out sparingly
in order to give the players incentive to take on quests, etc. I've always thought that reasoning
absurd. The players are there to play. Of course, they'll take on quests. If they weren't going
to take on quests why show up for the gaming session, or buy the game? It just seems silly...
When running dungeons, I always made sure that the players had close to what they needed...
but not always enough encouraging some interesting methods of getting by with what they had, or
finding inventive ways of getting more. But, in the end, I think doling out 4 or 5 pieces of gold
after killing a horde of goblins is just wrong. I hope the balance between treasure and monsters
is better in Book II.
- I dislike having things in a game that are totally useless like the boat near the lighthouse. I've read
here that it might be a link to an add-on later. When I'm playing, I assume that everything I encounter
has a purpose and anything that gets highlighted when the mouse runs over it MUST have some use.
I spent a great deal of time in the first game trying to figure out what to do with the boat only to find out
here that there's nothing that can be done... yet... I just find that annoying. It would have been better
if the boat weren't active in any way until the add-on came out. Then you could redirect the character
there and the boat would be active.
- In the vein of useless things, I found that shields and the shield skill were totally useless. Maybe others
were able to make use of them but I found that most of the time I had to remove the shield in order to have
both a weapon and a torch available. Or, I was using a bow or magic, both of which precluded the use
of a shield. Having a shield, or the shield skill, proved totally useless for me. This is something that's better
for a game where there are a party of characters so you can have one character hold the torch, and the
fighters have their hands free to use a shield. Also, with a party of characters, the one character holding the
torch allows the fighters to use the bow with light available. I really hated the fact that every time I used a
bow the torch went out so that I was shooting in the dark. And, while spells may be used to take the place of the torch, that just means fewer mana points for fighting monsters, and a greater need for potions. In one instance, I was walloped to death when the spell went out and I couldn't hit the monsters without the light. Pausing to cast the spell to create the light again cost a turn, and I still got walloped.
- Also, many items seemed to have no use such as salt, urns and the food items (except for the one
apple that's needed). I'm ok with having some items be useless - I just don't like opening chests after
killing a tough creature like a taurax, and finding two pouches of salt, dried meat, and a flask of ale - all
fairly useless items with no or little value. See my comments above about monster to treasure balance. Yes, I know you can reload to get different items but that's not the point, really.
- While I'm thinking of it - I really prefer parties to single players. I like the Spiderweb games like Avernum
for that reason.
- While I'm thinking of it - I like Eschalon better than Avernum.
I always found that the Avernum gameswere juvenile while Eschalon seems more adult. It's better thought out, the dialog with characters is
substantially better, and overall it's a more enjoyable experience.
- Skills costing 3 points to learn at the start seems wrong to me. I know a lot of games do this and it
sort of makes sense to make it cost more to learn a new skill than to gain experience in one you
know. But, the way this game is designed, it feels wrong. I found that it was impossible
to do well in this game without a core set of skills: Alchemy, some weapon use, either Elemental
or Divination magic, Pick Locks, Cartography, and either Light or Heavy Armor. That's 18 points
to gain those skills at character creation! That means that at the start, you really don't have
enough points. I think a better balance is needed. Maybe giving out a few more points at character
creation, or more points each level, would help.
- Along those same lines, the balance between skills and attributes, and how they affect game play
seems imbalanced. For example, my first character had Dexterity of 25 and no Pick Locks skill. Most
chests and doors I encountered, I had a 30-40% chance of picking open and was usually able to
do so in a few tries. My second character had a Dexterity of 15 and a Pick Locks skill of 5. Most of the
chests and doors I encountered, I had a 10-20% chance of opening and it took many tries. This seems
imply that Dexterity plays a more important role in picking locks than knowledge of how to Pick Locks. That's
just wrong. No matter how dextrous you are, if you don't know how locks work, you're not going to be able
to pick one, at least not easily. On the flip side, you may not be extremely dextrous but knowing how the lock
works, and knowing how to use the tools properly should allow you to pick many locks fairly easily.
- The way the automapping worked annoyed me. There is no way to scroll the automap to look at other sections
to figure out a good path from one place to another, or to locate a particular place so you know whether to go
north, or south from the current location to get to where you want to go. I found this annoying. If I'm an adventurer
and I'm making maps as I walk, then I have a sheaf of pages with maps on it that I can flip through. I should be
able to do the same here. Also, I really wish there were a way to annotate the map so if I find some object or
person that I want to go back to at a later date, I can annotate the map and mark the location. I hope the mapping
improves with Book II.
- I wish that items that are fully identified in my inventory would autocombine. That is, when I buy a healing potion
I wish it would autocombine with the other healing potions in my inventory. I especially wish they would autocombine
with the potions in the quick use slots. I spent a great deal of time in both games playing with the inventory, combining
like items. Personally, I'd rather spend that time playing the game, not fiddling with the inventory. Why can't the game
do this for me?
- BUG: I have music turned off in the options (set at 0 volume). That means music should be off AT ALL TIMES. There
are various points in the game where the music comes on, regardless. For example, when my character is waylaid
outside Blackwater by the mercenaries the dialog pops up, and there's music. No, no, no, a thousand times no.
What part of "off" is too complicated to understand? Have I made this point yet?
- BUG: If I have a spell readied, save the game, exit the game, and then come back later and restore the saved game,
either there's no spell readied, or there's a different spell readied. Usually it's the second one in the spell list.
- Sort of BUG: at least it seems that way. I was using the Queen bee stinger as a weapon. The listing in the inventory says it's poisoned. Yet,
after many hours of game play, many battles, and many hits on opponents, not one of the opponents was poisoned. Not one. Not even
Lilith who supposedly is very allergic to the poison from bees. Hitting her with the stinger should have resulted in a quick death, or
at least quicker than with a sword. In fact, I never saw an indication in the scrolling text that the creature I was facing had to make a
saving throw vs poison. So, while it says in the inventory list that the stinger is poisoned, that apparently means nothing in game play.
- Places to sleep/rest: It was very odd, on occasion, as to where the game would let me sleep or rest. For example, near Blackwater
I would get a message about it not being safe to rest there. But, if I took one step away from the wall, the game allowed me to rest.
That's kind of odd... also I should have been able to sleep at the inn in Blackwater. Why not? If I'm in one of the abandoned cabins,
or other sleeping quarters that were abandoned, I should be able to rest there in many cases too...
- BUG: About halfway through the second game, the smith from Blackwater (Gunther?) disappeared. The smithy was empty so
nothing could be bought or sold there. That became real annoying when the smiths in Aridell and Bordertown were out of money
and I was trying to sell items I'd picked up so that I could afford potions.
- BUG: At one point, moving from Blackwater to Vela, I got stuck in a grove of trees just north of Blackwater and couldn't get out. Just
northeast of Blackwater there is a mountain range. I went north just at the western end of the range into the section of the map with
Vela. In fact, I appeared to have walked through the mountain. I found myself in the middle of the trees. I only had two squares to
move to, and couldn't even move back the way I came into the map I came from.
- BUG: Encumbrance. I've often thought this was rather silly in D&D and usually ignored it unless the characters were carrying a whole lot
of stuff or tried to pick up something extraordinarily heavy or tried to jump a chasm loaded down in armor or something like that. For
example of how silly it is, try taking a bag of 1000 quarters (which weighs less than 1000 gold coins) and try and carry it around, and
also carry around a sword, a torch, some flasks, etc. I'm betting most people can't even lift a bag of 1000 coins without a lot of effort.
To take this analogy even further, try carrying around 50 empty glass bottles... or try to stack 5 jars together in a bag... as far as I'm
concerned, it's a silly concept in the game and should be eliminated. If it isn't, at least try and get it right... Spears do not weigh 1
or two pounds, and 1000 gold coins weighs a hell of a lot. I think the concept of encumbrance should be eliminated in Book II.
To exemplify how badly encumbrance is handled, and how silly it is, one only has to look at this bug. I had just killed a goblin
in Vela. It dropped a bag. I took the loot out of the bag and found myself overburdened. According to the game, my maximum
weight I could carry was 80 pounds and I now had 82.3 lbs. Okay, so I had to drop some stuff. I opened my inventory and dropped
a spear (weight 2 lbs) and a book (weight 3 lbs). The weight I was carrying should therefore have been 77.3lbs (82.3 - 5).
According to the game, I was now carrying 80lbs. Hmmm. I still couldn't move even though I was not over the limit. So, I decided
to quaff a healing potion. A potion supposedly weighs .3 lbs so that should have brought me down to 79.7lbs and hopefully low
enough to move. Actually, my weight went UP to 82.4. Huh? So, I've dropped 5lbs of items, quaffed a potion weighing .3 pounds,
and I weigh MORE than before I got those items out of my inventory?
Ok, so I opened my inventory and took one of the 50 empty flasks I was carrying (each flask weighs .1 lb according to
the game) and separated it from the rest of the flasks into a separate inventory slot. That was actually an accident - I let go of the
mouse key too soon. But, putting the flask into its own slot dropped the weight I was carrying down to 72.8lbs. Hm...
So a flask weighs substantially less when by itself (about 10 lbs less) in a slot rather than when stacked with others?
(How do you "stack" flasks anyway? Empty glass jars don't fit inside each other.) Just to see what would happen, I took that single
flask, and merged it back into the stack. Theoretically, I should have gone back up to 82.4lbs. No, I went up to 78.9 pounds.
Another example: I started a brand new character (Rogue). After picking up the nearby cache of items, I had the following:
Item Weight (in lbs)
------------------------------------------
Sealed Note .1
Lock Picks (3) .3
Mana I potion (2) .6
Healing potion (2) .6
Traveler's Shirt .5
Pants 1.0
Leather Sandals 1.0
Iron Dagger .7
-------
Total: 4.8
yet, the game claimed I was carrying 5.4 lbs!!
Trying to make sense of all this leads me to the conclusion that encumbrance should be ignored in Book II. If you can't get it right,
don't do it.
- The magic system is strange to me. As a magic-user gets more powerful, the spells he can cast should become more powerful. In this
game, there's hardly any benefit to casting a spell once at level 3 than 3 times at level 1 - the same amount of damage is done.
There should be a difference. Also, more powerful spells should do more damage. For example, Fireball is a more powerful spell
than Fire Dart. But, Fireball at level 2 costs more than Fire Dart at level 4 but does about the same amount of damage. Yes, I know
Fireball is an area effect spell but, frankly, it was hardly useable that way. Most of the time, if two creatures were together, and not
obscured, they were right next to me causing me to take damage from the spell and so it was pretty useless. Fire Dart proved to be
more effective throughout the game than any other spell (including Deep Freeze which most of the time had no effect). Btw, I found it
very hard to learn new spells since I could hardly ever afford to buy them and found very few as treasure. I think the magic system
needs work for Book II.
- Traveling. Ok, there are the quick travel areas (Aridell, Blackwater, Grimhold East, etc.) and there are a couple of teleport devices here
and there. But, most of the time, traveling around the map was extremely slow and tedious especially in Crakamir. I know there is a
magic portal spell that can be learned but I never had enough money to buy it, and never found it. There should be an easier way to
move around the map and more portals. In Diablo II, portal spells are fairly cheap and easy. My biggest complaint about Book I is
the inordinate amount of walking across empty areas that needed to be done to move between various points. There should be a better way....
- BUG: Ok, I robbed the repository. I encountered the shady character and his henchman, as I tried to head north through the narrow passage
at the top of the Blackwater map. Killed the guy and his henchman. Went on and adventured, went back to Blackwater to load up
on potions and other supplies, and then headed east from Blackwater. Near the road sign at the eastern part of the map, I got attacked
AGAIN by the shady character and his henchman demanding that I return his property... I didn't see them again after I defeated them the
second time.
- When you pick up a scroll/spell from a treasure chest, there's no way to find out what the scroll does unless you can figure it out
from the name. In other words, if you're in a shop, you can right-click the scroll in the merchant's inventory and get a description
of the spell. But, if you do that with a scroll in your inventory, you read the scroll and it disappears from the inventory. Unless you happen to find the same scroll in a merchant's inventory, you can't figure out what the spell does unless you learn it first.
- Books: it becomes very difficult late in the game to remember which books you've read and which you haven't. It's no big deal
if you find a book as treasure to read it since nothing happens if you've read it before. But, If you see a book in
a merchant's inventory, it costs money to find out whether or not you've read it before. Maybe the game could keep a list of the books
you've read that you can access as you play or maybe display the book with a different border if you've already read it?
- Here's a challenge for you: Restore a game you're in the middle of playing. Take a look at the stats, the other information on the screen
and see if you can answer the following question: What day of the week is it? You can turn on an option that will display night/day but
there's no way to tell what day of the week it is. How do you know if it's the first day, the 3rd day, or the seventh day? How do you know
how many days you have to wait if a merchant tells you to come back "next week"? This became a big problem in my second game: all
the merchants were out of mana and healing potions, and the ingredients needed to make more. So, I was stuck without any potions. Also,
at other points in the game, the merchants said they were out of money and to come back "next week". If you play through an entire game
in one sitting, it might not be much of a problem to keep track of the days, but if you only play for a short time each day, and come back to
the game several days later, how do you know what day of the week it is?
Although this sounds like a lot of complaints, it just seems that way because I'm trying to point out things that might be
improved for the next game. All in all, I enjoyed Eschalon: Book I and, like I said earlier, I like it better than the Spiderweb games (Avernum).
But, it could be better, I think.
P.S. I hereby volunteer to beta test Book II.
I've copied your post to our "ideas stack" to be sorted and discussed!