my feelings after finishing a game

acoustibop · Post by **acoustibop** » February 20th, 2008, 4:51 pm

Actually, you can have a big battle at the end, DamienThorn.

What sort of system are you playing on? I'm playing on a very middle spec machine - Athlon 3200+, 1GB RAM, ATI 9800XT and it plays beautifully - I don't think it's ever crashed on me. Mind you, I am playing the Linux version on Gutsy.

DamienThorn · Post by **DamienThorn** » February 20th, 2008, 6:23 pm

I just got my Destroyer title too. That battle was also way too easy. Using the rule 3: "Use the backpack Luke, use the backpack" they couldn't event hurt me with they 3% hit ratio. But yes, that was better battle than the Gramuk. Maybe the place wasn't that great, but it still made some strategies possible.

My system is very low end. 1.6GHz Duron, 512 MB of memory and Ati Radeon 7200 (yes, the second most old of the radeon series

). Most of the crashes occured when my graphic card crashed. Some games don't crash for that, the screen just goes black for few seconds when the driver resets graphic card, but the Eschalon did crashed. Well, I really can't blame the game for that.

Just a few level up/sound-freezes, which could be real bugs.

Some more words about difficulty. Most of the games has the problem with different play styles. I like to play slow, explore every corner, find every secret path and do all the quests and I hate to play same game again. Some are just opposite to me. They run the game through once and then they play it again and again and again to find all secrets. Because of that, most of the rpg games are way too easy for people who like to find all secrets with one run and maybe too hard for fast runners.

If you could select the difficulty of the game it would help, but I would like to separate difficulty and playstyles. You should be able to choose overall difficulty and your playstyle. So you could select overall difficulty medium and select that you are "slow player", when you would receive little less xp from quests and monsters and you wouldn't be too powerful at the end of the game. Or you could select that you like to ignore sidequests, when you would receive more xp from main quests and enemies and maybe compensate that with selecting difficult for overall difficulty. And so on.

Another thing which I would love to see in games would be the possibility to adjust difficulty few times in the game. The game could ask if you like to decrease, increase or do neither for the difficulty for example every 10 hours of gameplay or on few fixed occasions. This way player could make his/her game more difficult if it is too easy and same opposite. There is always problem with difficulty selection before the game that you select the wrong difficulty and have to reset or bear with too easy/hard game.

acoustibop · Post by **acoustibop** » February 20th, 2008, 7:42 pm

Actually, I always rather liked the Radeon 7200, DamienThorn, and carried on using one long after it stopped being the current card.

In Linux, it seems you have to be running the proprietary ATI fglrx driver to run Eschalon, and the minimum card that is supported by the fglrx driver is the Radeon 9550. However, in Windows (if that's what you're using), AFAIK all Radeons are supported by the Catalyst drivers, so I would have thought that any Radeon should run the game.

If it wasn't for your videocard, I'd recommend trying Linux for Eschalon; the requirements are lower than for Windows.

silverkitty · Post by **silverkitty** » February 21st, 2008, 4:16 pm

I just counted the clash of armies in front of the citadel as the final battle, and whacking the boss as denouement.

realmzmaster · Post by **realmzmaster** » February 24th, 2008, 8:53 pm

I understand that many felt the final boss was a little to easy. The final boss probably could have been a little tougher. But, not all leaders or bosses got to their position by being physically strong. Some leaders and bosses got there by being cunning, buying power, being sneaky, powerfully persuasive or charismatic.

The leader or boss then developed followers some very powerful and loyal, others not so powerful but plentiful great for cannon fodder to throw at the enemy and wear them down through sheer numbers.

But after wading through massive amounts of creatures in Dungeon Siege 2 to get to the final boss only to find out he is invincible for the first part of the battle. You have to use a special way to damage him. The second part of the battle you can damage him, but he has massive amounts of hitpoints and devastating attacks. The battle took a long time and you cannot save. If you save it puts you back at the last city you visited and you have to start over because the monsters respawn.

Eschalon is a breath of fresh air. The boss was a little easy, but the journey made it worth it. You could save anytime, even during the final battle! The different endings were fun, too!

Daemian Lucifer · Post by **Daemian Lucifer** » February 24th, 2008, 9:56 pm

True,the boss himself doesnt need to be some extra tough super being.But he could surround himself with extra tough guards(like the ones that attack you in the palace,for example).

silverkitty · Post by **silverkitty** » February 25th, 2008, 12:37 am

and he only had two forms. I thought it was illegal to have fewer than three.

Unbeliever · Post by **Unbeliever** » February 25th, 2008, 7:21 pm

What Daemian Lucifer said.

The Destroyer battle is *MUCH* more fun (and challenging) than Boss Goblin.

THAT is what the final battle SHOULD be like...

hanako · Post by **hanako** » February 27th, 2008, 9:16 pm

I thought the boss goblin was a bit easier than I would expect for a final boss, but not a complete pushover. Of course, I never had much in the way of strategy leveling up and was probably far weaker than those of you with skill in minmaxing.

("Boss battle! Time to use that incinerator fuel I've been hauling around all game, whether it makes sense or not!")

krisklef · Post by **krisklef** » March 11th, 2008, 7:47 am

Finally finished, the easiest and simplest way I could. (Haven't been to Darkford or achieved "destroyer", however that happens.) Tend to agree that the boss battle was a little anti-climactic, but I think that is because the player has so many ways to reduce enemy to-hit until it's almost nothing. The, um, special attack of the boss creature is a serious consequence in a single-character game, if he lands a few blows. (I got paralyzed, went down to five HP, and restored with just enough time to quaff a healing potion, a tense experience!)

I agree with the comment by damienthorn above, about the apparent difference in difficulty as experienced by the explorer/role-player and the power-player. I like that this game doesn't aim the difficulty level solely at the player who maxes the character's abilities using all available tools.

The battle in front of the citadel was really engaging because of the number of low-level enemies, mixed in with a few high-level ones, and assisted by allies. Perhaps the ultimate confrontation might have that flavor in sequels?

Already looking forward to a replay with a shadier character.

Once more, bravo to Basilisk Games for a great story-driven RPG with lots of great elements! I eagerly await the sequel!