Shadowrun Returns Options

[TheCheshireKhajiit]

So Khajiit started playing Shadowrun Returns today. This one doesn’t care for the third person isometric perspective for an RPG but the game seems solid otherwise. Liking the skills and dialogue. Still have to get accustomed to the way things work (like for instance Khajiit’s character was fighting a “hellhound” alone and tried using a medthing to heal but this one couldn’t figure out how to make the character use it and she died).

[SubRosa]

So I started playing Shadowrun Returns today. Only took me about two years since I bought it. Null sheen chummer.

January is going to vote Dunky!

I know this is the weakest of the SR computer games. So I am trying to keep my expectations low. But it does have some headscratcher issues. The mouse is insanely over sensitive, and there does not seem to be any way to adjust it. At least not built into the menus. Maybe I can find something in the .ini files, if I can find those.

It is also really unintuitive. At character creation or when leveling up abilities, you buy the ability to use a power, like Killing Hands. But that does not give you the power. You have to go to a merchant and actually buy it from them too! And it looks like you can only have about 5 spells? I am guessing if you go over, you have to remove the excess? And just lose them forever? Unless you buy it again?

Likewise, the player's stash of items you can carry is ridiculously small. It is something like 5 or six items, and then you cannot have anything else? Thankfully weapons and spells are counted separately. But that is crazy.

It took me forever to figure out how to cast a spell. You select it from your inventory of stuff, then click on who you want to target. Which may include yourself. Or in the case of a Physical Adept, you cast it, then go to your weapon list, and pick it out of there. Weird system.

The mechanics of the game do not feel anything like Shadowrun at all. Though granted I have not played it beyond 2nd or 3rd Edition. It has all the same attributes: Body, Quickness, and so on. But the skills look completely different. And each is tied to an attribute, and cannot go above the attribute's value. So you are forced to raise both the attribute and the skill. Magic is apparently doable by anyone. You just have to put some points into Spellcasting and buy a spell. I did not see that coming. I played around with that just a little, and found there are only 4 totems to choose from for Shamans? Just 4? So January is not going to be a Raven Shaman after all. The Combat Pool and Hacking Pools are gone. The rolling six sided dice and having a target number seems to be gone. It looks like everything is just a straight percentage chance of success. But the allergies for metahumans seem to be gone, which is nice. I always thought that was annoying. Still, the nuts and bolts of playing it does not feel like playing Shadowrun at all.

I am playing January, so I am going Physical Adept. I had to give her about an extra 100 karma with the console after character creation to get her to the point where she is not useless, and able to actually do physical adept stuff, like hit people and make them fall down. I have read that the Physical Adepts are really nerfed in this game. Those people who said that are right! She has not gotten too far yet. I did meet a merchant who had some more clothes to sell. They all looked terrible, so I stayed with what I started with for now. I was able to buy a machete however.

Which is another thing that really annoyed me. You don't get any items or spells or abilities at character creation. Then the game immediately throws you into combat. This is fine if you plan to play a character who is a gun-bunny, as it gives you a submachine gun and a pistol. Not so fine if you want to play a physical adept or a magician. I cannot even imagine playing this game as a decker.

In the real Shadowrun, part of the character creation, and in creating your own archetype, is choosing how much money have to start with for starting gear. So you can start out with at least a sword, or assault rifle, or body armor, or array of spells, or whatever your character needs to do what they do. This felt like a kick in the teeth.

Still, the world-building in the game is top-notch. This is the world of 2050-2060 that I played in back in the old pen and paper days. They have the slang down, the artwork for characters looks just like from all the rulebooks, the factions I know and hate are all there: Universal Brotherhood, Lone Star, Halloweeners, etc... They get an A+ review from me for that.

And the mod support, is not good. It is a Unity engine game, and that goes with the territory sadly. I found some mods. Installing them and getting them to work is a crapshoot. Even simple things like adding new character portraits is difficult. The best way is to replace an existing portrait with your custom one, and give it the original picture's name. Otherwise you literally have to break out a hex editor to change the code in our picture. Great move guys. Ever hear of games like Neverwinter Nights that were made 20 years ago, that have using a custom portrait built into the game?

So the setting is fun. The fights are ok, all turn-based, isometric stuff. It looks a lot like the new X-Com games, or Wasteland 2. The game itself is really poorly made though.