GreedFall – Review. One step away from…

Greetings StopGame.Ru! I know, all of YouTube, all game portals, everything that could be crap with reviews, guides, etc.d on GreedFall. Trying to be relevant, I post the review as always – last. So, if you’re an old oyster like me, enjoy reading.

A lot of buff is expected in the text version

Text version

GreedFall role-playing game in the genre action, developed by French studio Spiders and published by Focus Home Interactive. The game takes place in a 17th century fantasy world. The player, along with other colonists, mercenaries and treasure hunters, explores the remote island of Tir Fradi, where the locals fight against invading colonists using mythical creatures to protect them. The game includes such types of mechanics as: combat, diplomacy and stealth. The player’s decisions affect the game’s story, as well as the relationships between the various factions that have settled on the island.

The plot centers on Lord De Sardet. (I’ll make a reservation in advance that my character was male, and the entire narration will come from a male perspective). De Sardet-Emissary from the commercial commonwealth – a very prosperous state whose goal is to develop exclusively through business and trade relations with neighboring states, while maintaining neutrality on all other issues. De Sardet, along with his cousin Constantine, the son of the king of the Merchant Commonwealth, is sent to the island of Tir Fradi in order to develop their colony, establish relations with the local islanders and, most importantly, find a cure for malichor. A disease that, like a plague, covered the capital of the Trade Commonwealth, Siren, taking with it many lives and threatening the further prosperity of the state.

Your face when you are sick with malichor

Having arrived at the place, De Sardet as an emissary will have to constantly make difficult decisions, which in the future will reflect the attitude of other states and local inhabitants towards the main character and the trading community as a whole. In the world of GreedFall, the player will have to establish relationships with 5 factions: Thelema – religious fanatics whose goal is to convert as many people as possible to their faith. Bridge Alliance – people who devote themselves to science, completely deny religion, which is why they are constantly at enmity with Thelema. Coin Guard – the army of the commercial community and the guarantor of the neutrality of the state. Despite the fact that the coin guard is part of the Trade Commonwealth, the main character will still have to gain authority from the local warriors. Navts are local sailors with their own strict and specific rules, usually responsible for organizing and transporting people by sea, and of course the local residents of Tir Fradi – islanders.

But it’s not a bad idea

And already at this point there is one complaint about the game. Playing as an emissary, a seemingly important representative of the state, the player is forced to carry out tasks like an errand boy for local residents and not only. Moreover, despite the fact that all residents know De Sardet’s status, they can afford to be rude to him or even refuse to communicate with him. And this causes some bewilderment, even though the game world is original, but it was based on the architecture and fashion of the 17th century, and therefore the relationship between subordinates and the official should be appropriate for greater harmony.

The local blacksmith is so harsh that some cousin of the governor has nothing to do with him!

In terms of gameplay, the game also turned out to be quite varied. The first thing the game greets us with is the creation of your character. Customization may be scarce, but the ability to create your own character is always good. The game also offers you to choose 1 of 3 classes: Warrior, Engineer and Mage. And then distribute the skill points into characteristics. The game has three types of pumpable attributes: Skills, responsible for the character’s combat characteristics, such as: increased damage from one-handed light or heavy weapons, two-handed weapons, firearms, magic, and so on. The game also does not limit the character to a certain class; the player is always free to create a hybrid of different skills. Next come characteristics, basic attributes for all RPGs such as: Strength, endurance, agility, accuracy, spiritual strength. And the last thing is talents, perhaps one of the most important attributes in the game, since all of them can significantly change the style of play. For example, charisma will help you become a real emissary, and achieve your goals with the power of words. Hacking will help you get hold of useful things, and energy will allow the player to get through high obstacles or narrow passages.

I wanted to make a gallery, but I still couldn’t figure out how to do it :/

De Sardet does not travel the world of GreedFall alone. The game has a system of companions, with whom you also need to skillfully build relationships, even romantic ones, because everyone has their own views on the events taking place and on the player’s actions. So, for example, the daughter of the local leader Siora may lash out at the governor of the Bridge Alliance colony, which she will warn the main character about on the approach to his estate. You can’t upgrade your companions, but you can and should equip them with good armor and equip them with equally good weapons. The character can take only two companions with him, the rest will wait for the main character in the camp or in his estate.

Companions are upgraded automatically… although this doesn’t Bonnie-Bingo-Casino.co.uk really help them.

The world of GreedFall is big, but not open. Tir Fradi is divided into several large zones, in each of which the player can find additional tasks, treasures or minibosses. In addition, the player will be able to set up camps in certain places, which can later be used as a movement point, gathering his companions, or storage. Traveling between zones, the player will meet traveling merchants who will offer a good assortment of weapons, armor and consumables, as well as a place to improve their equipment. The journey between the zones itself will take some time, it all depends on whether the player travels on foot or uses the services of a caravan driver. As you guessed…dynamic changes in the time of day are also present in the game and, moreover, some quests are associated with this, and the player himself can waste a certain period of time moving between locations or resting in a camp.

Map of the island… large, but not open.

Despite the fact that GreedFall is a B-category game, there is plenty of content in it. I had to spend about 8 hours just to clear all the quests in the starting city and in the colony itself before I could set off on my journey with peace of mind. The quests themselves try to be varied. Here you will find covert penetration and murder investigation, extortion and much more. Of course, the implementation of these quests leaves much to be desired, but it’s better than killing 10 boars and fetching them, although you’ll still have to run a lot.

But what really deserves praise is the level design. When completing quests, the player will be able to choose how to complete this level: Secretly using sneaking or dressing up in enemy clothes, storming or using his talents. Using the latter, the main character can climb over certain fences, break fragile walls, or open a door by hacking. While traveling around the world, the player will also encounter certain places that will require the character to have a certain level of one or another talent, so that the character can shorten the path or even find something new and valuable.

Many people criticize the lvl design, but the game really has many ways to complete the quest.

I would also like to praise the improvement in armor and weapons. By visiting a blacksmith or possessing special talents, the player can improve the characteristics of his equipment, but in addition to the characteristics, the equipment itself will also change visually. The system is not new, but it’s quite nice to see it in a game of this level. Moreover, the developers tried to make sure that the visual changes corresponded to the parameters being improved.

A subjective advantage of the game is the fairly simple leveling system. Yes, many may expect complex and cumbersome skill trees in the style of Path of Exile from an RPG, but personally I wanted casualness, so as not to waste time thinking through the character build and spend more time in the game world.

Modest but practical

There are also a lot of negative aspects in the game and we won’t even talk about minor bugs, of which there are plenty in a game for $50. We’ll talk about the combat system and partners. I note that I played on an extreme difficulty level and everything said will apply specifically to this level.

Partners – perhaps in many games you shouldn’t expect any miracles from artificial intelligence, but in GreedFall everything is much sadder. If in most games, partners can either be controlled or at least given commands, here they are the most automated dummies who die almost immediately at the beginning of the battle, rarely having time to use at least 1 of their abilities before dying. They deal damage in half and in 2 persons they can and will be able to kill 1 enemy, but they are of very little use.

But everything would be fine if the combat system itself were adequate. The first thing that catches your eye is the number of simultaneously attacking opponents. The game is not shy about spamming the player with a hail of blows from different sides, so the hero can be attacked by more than 2 opponents at the same time, attacking at the same moment. Realistic? Yes, but we’re playing a game. Because of such an ingenious solution to complicate the battle (in addition to, of course, increased damage to the main character and reduced damage to opponents), the player has to fend off attacks every now and then, trying to somehow knock out a window for himself to strike, which is why the battle turns into a chaotic and fussy clicking on the keys. The second thing that bothered me was the spam of similar attacks from some types of monsters and their constant evasions. Standard situation: The player makes a dash towards the enemy to strike, but as soon as the character swings, the enemy immediately leans back and constantly has to catch up with him.

"Fair Fight"

Another disadvantage of the combat system is target focusing, or rather the lack thereof. In fact, it exists, but the game itself decides when to change focus from one target to another and on whom to place it, thereby depriving the player of the opportunity to prioritize certain types of opponents in order to quickly eliminate them and create more comfortable conditions for further combat.

One of the features of the local combat system is the binding of opponents to a specific location. If, in the heat of battle, the enemy leaves the conventional boundaries of the arena, his health will be instantly restored, and he himself will stop attacking you, beginning to return to his original place.

If the battle seems too difficult for you, and your teammates have fallen in battle, try to kill as many opponents as possible and, as soon as you feel defeat approaching, leave the arena. Thus, your partners will be resurrected with full health, opponents will stop attacking you, negative effects such as “poisoning” or “burn” will disappear from you and you will be able to continue to enter the battle, but with numerical superiority since defeated opponents will not be resurrected.

And it seems like you’re fighting one, but the mark is on the other.

Perhaps many reproached the game for its facial animation and I am inclined to agree. The faces of the characters are so clumsy that there is no emotion of joy in the game. All characters are either neutral, or gloomy, or completely evil. Due to such poor facial animation, the characters’ dialogues are extremely difficult to perceive, because when the player hears laughter, and there is a stone mine on the character’s face, it looks extremely ridiculous.

Animation problems affect not only the face. There is also no animation in such details as: Collecting loot, extracting resources, and character going down the stairs. The latter is extremely funny, since when going down from the second floor to the first, you can notice that the character’s legs do not reach for the steps, but try to walk on a flat surface, and only thanks to physics the character goes down jerkily.

When I read the tone of the text, and this is only half.

But despite the animation problems, the game looks nice and stylish. The developers chose an interesting network and were able to implement it. The cities, as well as the costumes of the characters, look very colorful, and the gloomy autumn landscapes only complement the overall picture, which is why the world of GreedFall looks extremely attractive, and the desire to study it allows you to close your eyes to some problems in the animation.

Optimization in the game is still good. Unfortunately, at ultra settings I experienced some discomfort; as soon as I lowered the quality of the shadows, stable 60 frames did not leave me for most of the game.

The music in the game is also good. It was clear that the developers invested part of their resources in purchasing high-quality compositions. Music accompanies the player almost always. Each city has its own unique composition. There is also sound during exploration and combat. The environment, shots and clinking of swords sounds rich and pleasant, the only thing that strains the ear is the constant groans and screams during the battle.

GreedFall had a great chance to take pride of place among category B games and leave its mark in the history of RPG games. The developers were well aware that the gaming market was hungry for good RPG projects. Spiders has chosen the setting perfectly, adding the necessary content and mechanics. Here you have partners and factions. A large number of different quests, colorful opponents and beautiful landscapes. While playing GreedFall, I, like many others, had the feeling that I was playing Dragon age: Origins or Risen 2.

But lack of budget or time takes its toll. A game for 50 dollars can be forgiven for not having advanced graphics, clumsy facial animation, and not many bugs. But in the case of GreedFall, the game looks technically crude. The game can be addictive, but when you play it you understand that this is not a product you want to pay money for. Buying a game or not is a difficult question and everyone must decide for themselves what is more important to them: Original and stylish networking or technical performance. Personally, I do not recommend purchasing the game, at least not at full price.

By the way, De Sardet didn’t know that there was another way to find a cure for malichor; it was enough to just give this article a plus, but you still have the opportunity to do it for him. Thank you for your attention, more good RPGs in your life and see you soon..