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Shadowrun: Dragonfall |OT| Choose Your Enemies Carefully

Durante

Member
The club is going pretty laggy.
No, I'm not talking about a normal performance issue. I'm talking about 6-8 FPS on the starting map on a 3.6 GHz i7 and a 660ti. I never noticed any drops below 60 FPS in the original campaign. This has to be a bug, but I can't find anyone else who is experiencing it. Very annoying.
 

AColdDay

Member
No, I'm not talking about a normal performance issue. I'm talking about 6-8 FPS on the starting map on a 3.6 GHz i7 and a 660ti. I never noticed any drops below 60 FPS in the original campaign. This has to be a bug, but I can't find anyone else who is experiencing it. Very annoying.

Besides SUPER long load times (compared to my memories of DMS) my performance is pretty normal. I don't have FRAPS going though, but I'm normally pretty quick to see drops in FPS. I wonder what is up with that happening to you.


Also, this is embarrassing, but even though I have played the original campaign twice, I still have no idea what Smartlinked weapons do. Can anybody tell me what advantages they have?
 
Going to dive into this over the weekend. I loved the first one. I'm sad the OT is just three pages.
15 bucks for ~10-12 hours of isometric CRPG goodness in a cool setting? This is a no-brainer, folks.
 

DiscoJer

Member
I loved it up to where I am now, but now I constantly (seemingly) have to do decking. I hate decking. I really wish they had made it optional.

Guess I will shelve it for now.
 

Durante

Member
Going to dive into this over the weekend. I loved the first one. I'm sad the OT is just three pages.
15 bucks for ~10-12 hours of isometric CRPG goodness in a cool setting? This is a no-brainer, folks.
I think Harebrained made a mistake by marketing it as "DLC" on Steam. These days (and for good reason) people probably don't expect "DLC" to be larger and have better mechanics than the base game. I think they should have just sold it standalone as a sequel.
 

Vlodril

Member
Any ideas what the password is on the information kiosk at the hard times quest(the one with the missing weapon shipment). Must be blind but i cant seem to find anything in the surrounding area.

Being a few hours in now and must say there is a marked improvement over everything. Was not a fan on how they handled the ks but i hope they continue with the series (although i think they are making a tabletop or something?).
 

Donos

Member
Damn, just thought "fuck the first campaign, i'm just buying Dragonfall" but then Steam reminded me that i need the base game -_-.
 

Durante

Member
So I "fixed" my performance issues by running the game on my laptop/convertible, which is about 1/5th as fast as my desktop but runs the game perfectly. Go figure. However, now I can play in bed which is perfect for a lazy sunday. Also, the game has support for multitouch in Windows 8, and it's only the second game I know of (after Civ V) which does that, so that's nice.

Anyway, I rerolled my character since I figured out in the first larger battle that going with 1 in the "Body" stat is too glass-cannon-y for the level of challenge present in this game.
 

jblank83

Member
I don't really see it as being that much different from Deadman's Switch. Instead of having optional side runs you could do or not do (though you still get those), you have a number of ones you have to do in order to raise a certain amount of cash. Technically it's not linear, but you still have to do most of them to get enough cash.

There is a lot more choice, and that makes it much better than Deadman's Switch, which was extremely linear. There is much more optional content. There is also more interactivity, such as with password entry in computers. It's a small feature, but one that fleshes out the experience. Then there's saving, skill balancing, and other improvements to the game.

Overall, Dragonfall is the game that Dead Man's Switch should have been. I was disappointed in the first half of Shadowrun Returns. It was alright, a light amusement, but nowhere near the RPG I wanted. Dragonfall is a big improvement.

It's still not the game I wanted. The combat system is still a little light. The interface is still kludgey here and there. It's still not quite as big and sprawling and free form as I want in an RPG. However, it's a big improvement on the first attempt, and weighty enough to be satisfying. And given the level of development funding and the retail sticker price, it's as much as I could hope for in a world that was previously without a Shadowrun cRPG in a long time.
 

CrimsonN0

Member
I loved it up to where I am now, but now I constantly (seemingly) have to do decking. I hate decking. I really wish they had made it optional.

Guess I will shelve it for now.

Huh, I don't think I've reached a point where you have to do decking.
Though, I guess I have been doing a lot for side options during missions to get more data or to avoid some fighting, but you don't seem to need it.

What kind of characters did everyone make?
This time I've gone with an Elf Shaman, but I seem to hardly ever bother summoning.
Usually put up some Lightning/Fire Walls and then shoot long-range magic at stuff.
 

Durante

Member
I'm doing a Decker/Mage this time around. I was skeptical whether a hybrid would work out, but so far the Karma seems sufficient (as long as I don't spend on anything else).

I've played for a bit longer now, and I really like the amount of background information you can get on your party. Especially the sequence where you can read
the aura of Glory
if you are playing a mage was really rather gripping.
 

Talyn

Member
I think Harebrained made a mistake by marketing it as "DLC" on Steam. These days (and for good reason) people probably don't expect "DLC" to be larger and have better mechanics than the base game. I think they should have just sold it standalone as a sequel.
I agree. I can understand why they did it this way from a technical standpoint but from a sales standpoint it runs counter to casual consumers' expectations. (Casual in the sense that they're not diehard Shadowrun fans and may only have read about the game in passing and don't realize that this DLC isn't DLC in the typical DLC sense.) It also seems that releasing it as DLC has hurt review coverage which is the last thing they should want, given they are hoping to release more "DLC" expansions down the line but only if this does well enough to make it feasible. Personally, I'd love to see them continue in that vein, fleshing out the engine along the way (like better inventory management for everyone that isn't the main character) for yearly campaign expansions.
 

Sanctuary

Member
Loving this game so far. The writing is almost Obsidian tier too (although there are grammatical mistakes as well as typos).

What kind of characters did everyone make?

Taking the typical "Mage/Sorcerer/Wizard" route first. Shaman seems really solid too though, but I think I'm going to be a Physical Adept on my next run. I'm not entirely up to speed with the classes yet, but they seem to be the "Monk" types of Shadowrun.

On a sidenote, are there any characters with stand out names such as Dances With Clams?
 

cj_iwakura

Member
Any ideas what the password is on the information kiosk at the hard times quest(the one with the missing weapon shipment). Must be blind but i cant seem to find anything in the surrounding area.

Being a few hours in now and must say there is a marked improvement over everything. Was not a fan on how they handled the ks but i hope they continue with the series (although i think they are making a tabletop or something?).

Well, it's based on a tabletop. Shadowrun V5 came out around the same time Dead Man's Switch did.
 

AColdDay

Member
I cannot get over the fact that I'm on a quest to find a way to play the "ancient"
DVD disc
, so I'm trying to find a
DVD player
in a junkyard. I love this game.
 
So I "fixed" my performance issues by running the game on my laptop/convertible, which is about 1/5th as fast as my desktop but runs the game perfectly. Go figure. However, now I can play in bed which is perfect for a lazy sunday. Also, the game has support for multitouch in Windows 8, and it's only the second game I know of (after Civ V) which does that, so that's nice.
XCOM:EU/EW does too.
 
Do Physical Adepts need points in Strength/Close Combat/Melee?

I played an adept for the first campaign and unless I am gravely mistaken, yes, you definitely want to pump a lot of points in there. Most adepts chi power suck by the way, but killing hands is very powerful.

Haste->run to baddie-> killing hands his face-> rinse and repeat.
 
I think Harebrained made a mistake by marketing it as "DLC" on Steam. These days (and for good reason) people probably don't expect "DLC" to be larger and have better mechanics than the base game. I think they should have just sold it standalone as a sequel.
100% right. Big mistake to sell it as "DLC"
 

Miletius

Member
I've put a few hours into the campaign now. I have to say, I'm really impressed. The first campaign was good, and many of the limitations I let slide because I saw the potential. Now it really feels like the potential has been realized.

Had a hard time deciding which character to go because of all the skill checks. Settled on a Phys Adept/Mage this time around, really happy about it.

Minor Spoiler about spells
Really happy to see expanded spells with focus on control, gives you a reason to put in some charisma as a non-shaman

But I'm already looking forward to another run as with a different character because of the skill checks.
 

Xater

Member
I cannot get over the fact that I'm on a quest to find a way to play the "ancient"
DVD disc
, so I'm trying to find a
DVD player
in a junkyard. I love this game.

Yeah that was pretty great.

Finished this yesterday and really enjoyed it. I liked the first campaign but this was way better.

Also ending spoiler:
I made a deal with a dragon :eek:
 
I keep forgetting my Surface Pro 2 can run games, should try this and Civilization 5 in touch screen mode.

I knew it wouldn't but still bummed there no character transfer/story relation. First game ended with all sorts of cliffhangers/future set ups.
 

epmode

Member
I waited on playing the original game because of the shitty save system. Now I'm going through it and I'm having a good time. It's obviously created by people more familiar with mobile gaming but their heart is in the right place. I'm pretty excited to finish it so I can start Dragonfall.

I agree with the comments about Dragonfall being DLC. It's likely that Harebrained ran out of Kickstarter money during the development of Dead Man's Switch and they figured they'd need to sell the second campaign separately but I feel like they'll make less money this way. It would probably benefit them most as a standalone game given free to Kickstarter backers.
 

goblin

Member
Huh, I don't think I've reached a point where you have to do decking.
Though, I guess I have been doing a lot for side options during missions to get more data or to avoid some fighting, but you don't seem to need it.

What kind of characters did everyone make?
This time I've gone with an Elf Shaman, but I seem to hardly ever bother summoning.
Usually put up some Lightning/Fire Walls and then shoot long-range magic at stuff.

That was my character for Dead Man's Switch, and I really warmed up to Summoning by the end. Partially because I was drowning in tokens. Summon abilities can be pretty clutch -- until you get cocky and they break free, anyway. I didn't find walls as useful later on, but Haste is always great.

I just beat Dragonfall as a Human Rigger. I never touched rigging in DMS, and was pleasantly surprised at how effective the A and S class drones were; their ability to go through vents ended up being a godsend. I put points into Charisma and Conjurer for Etiquette options but, overall, the campaign did a pretty good job of spreading out skill checks and allowing you to use your other runners' skills when applicable. There were a few spots I noticed where I wasn't able to and felt like I should have. I ended up wishing I had
put some points into Biotech
.
 

KiTA

Member
So is the original Shadowrun Returns worth snagging, or should I hold off for the combo pack with SR: Dragonfall?

I see they have Deluxe out which has... another campaign? Or is Dead Man's Switch the original campaign?
 
Imagine what could be done with an AAA budget and more ambition.

Don't have to imagine, just 100% wouldn't get made by big publishers in this climate which is why this was kickstarted. Look how much trouble Kingdom Come Deliverance had, even though that looks more appealing. And it'd become a TPS or FPS, which is not what fans would have wanted which could lead to lesser sales even if it's more ambitious.
 

Odrion

Banned
Additional campaigns or levels as DLC seems odd in this day and age. Why do you want to restrict those kinds of goods behind two separate paywalls? Sell that stuff as standalone content.
 

Decado

Member
Since the patch game out I'm playing the first game. It's actually a good reintroduction to more traditional RPGs. Not as complex as some of the old school ones, but hardly an action-RPG. Would love to see a full blown sequel with a bigger budget. Maybe using the same engine (I'm fine with it overall, but I want bodies to stay on the ground, good death animations etc.).
 

cj_iwakura

Member
I totally encourage using this playlist during the club(or any related mission):
http://www.neogaf.com/forum/showpost.php?p=102673514&postcount=456

djtiesto was kind enough to create it. Great stuff for Shadowrunning.

  • 1) Tokyo Rose - Vice
    2) Converter - Lost Years
    3) Nick Force - Faded Love
    4) Labtracks - Driver (Domestic Technology's Miami Vice Remix)
    5) Mitch Murder feat. EeL - Galaxy Train 1989
    6) Lazerhawk - Space Is The Place
    7) Perturbator - Miami Disco
    8) Power Glove - Motorcycle Cop
    9) Kavinsky - 1986
    10) Lueur Verte - Night Slasher II (Perturbator Remix)
    11) Droid Bishop - Light Years
    12) Bestrack - Stamina
    13) Anoraak - Nightdrive With You (Grum Mix)
 
Just started and forgot how much I loved the original, feels to jump back in.

Quick question, at the end of the first mission, is there a way to kill the main enemy or does he always scamper off?
 
Just started and forgot how much I loved the original, feels to jump back in.

Quick question, at the end of the first mission, is there a way to kill the main enemy or does he always scamper off?

I'm not sure but I think he always scampers off because
his running off is crucial to meeting him later and using him to find out what the hell you just walked into
 

Sendero

Member
I've played for a bit longer now, and I really like the amount of background information you can get on your party. Especially the sequence where you can read
the aura of Glory
if you are playing a mage was really rather gripping.
I just started the campaign, and was also surprised by that moment, since Returns didn't had anything similar at all. So much potential to fulfill.

So far, I'm enjoying this story more than the original. But it's not all good, as I found that the Quick Save is not reliable: Had the game unable to reload from it a lot of times now.

So, I'm sticking to regular Saves. Also, the Shaman's Totems have missing text in most of the descriptions. And might be wrong, but seems that both "Great Mother Idol" and "Bear" do the same (at least according to the text). - GOG version.
 

AColdDay

Member
Lame, the game flagged me for killing
Stahl
even though I let him live. Apparently it is a common bug because I've seen others online complaining about it. I doubt it would have made much of a difference, but I could use those creds, man!
 

Sanctuary

Member
I'm just hoping that there's more to the game engine than what Hairbrained was able to push out of it since Pillar's of Eternity is using it.
 

Steaks

Member
This expansion is legit way better than the original game. Glad they took their time with it. Would have done way better as a standalone though. Hopefully they can retool it so it is?

Easily the best 15 dollars I've spent since the last 15 dollars I've spent.
 

epmode

Member
So I'm almost done with the first campaign and I can absolutely confirm that they didn't iron out the manual saving bugs. I ran into three separate gamebreaking situations in a later level that were only resolved by reloading from an autosave and completing the level without manually saving. REALLY ANNOYING.

Details :
The first time it happened, my team wouldn't follow me in to the cult's hideout even though I opened the door for them. The crazy thing is that the security camera thing remarked that I had a bunch of people without the appropriate clothes so I assumed everything was fine. When I went down the elevator (which is a point of no return,) they weren't with me. Had to reload. This happened twice.

The bigger problem was with the next level and that ridiculous bug/Matrix mess. Apparently, I caused a bug that ONLY showed up when I finished the entire goddamned fight and extracted my team. I was outside the building when the story refused to continue. I guess I'll replay it tomorrow.

edit: I also had a problem with the
graveyard mission. One set of ghouls didn't spawn so I had to replay the entire mission.
 

Sanctuary

Member
Have a quick question about karma generation; do you only get it for completed objectives/contracts, or do enemies killed play a role at all (such as reinforced waves if you allow it)?
 

DCDW

Member
hit one game breaking bug myself with Dragonfall. There's a start of one mission where you choose to meet a contact at a place of your choosing. At this point I thought it was just a jumping off point for the quest and as such went to do some other quests first. Get back into the city after doing the other quests and now there's no contact to meet and I don't have enough for the Alice payment (stuck @ 45,000 after even converting my personal cash to the mission) and there's no more quests to take, essentially having the game come to a screeching halt with no way to progress. Having seen some posts on the Valve game forums, it seems it's a bug other people have come across. There has been developer response on those forums though, so I imagine there will be a patch at some point.
 

Durante

Member
So is the original Shadowrun Returns worth snagging, or should I hold off for the combo pack with SR: Dragonfall?

I see they have Deluxe out which has... another campaign? Or is Dead Man's Switch the original campaign?
Yeah, Dead Man's Switch is the original campaign.

I keep forgetting my Surface Pro 2 can run games, should try this and Civilization 5 in touch screen mode.
It works really well with touch, and it also runs without issues at 1080p with Intel HD4000 graphics.

Have a quick question about karma generation; do you only get it for completed objectives/contracts, or do enemies killed play a role at all (such as reinforced waves if you allow it)?
As far as I know, you only get Karma for completing objectives.
 

Xater

Member
I'm just hoping that there's more to the game engine than what Hairbrained was able to push out of it since Pillar's of Eternity is using it.

The engine has nothing to do with how complex a game is. Unity is very flexible and can do all kinds of games. This is just the game they decided/had to make. They didn#t get as much money as Obsidian did.
 

Chairman Yang

if he talks about books, you better damn well listen
I'm liking this a lot, but so far, not much more than Dead Man's Switch. I'm annoyed by the etiquette dialogue options, in particular. Some seem nearly useless, and some are ubiquitous. That was the case in DMS, too, but it's something they should have fixed.

I mean, when an RPG asks you pick a bunch of skills/etiquettes, you should be able to trust that you'll get a decent amount of use out of those skills. That doesn't mean the skills have to be functionally equivalent or equally powerful or that you can access all the content with all of the skills, of course. It just means that you shouldn't be penalized for going into a game blind (rather than consulting a FAQ or wiki). Dragonfall utterly fails at this. I almost feel like I should hoard skill points, then reload and assign them to win skill checks, just so I'm not arbitrarily penalized with missing interesting content.

I don't know, maybe things will turn around later, but for now, etiquettes like
Academic and Shadowrunner
have been bland and nearly useless. By contrast, I've been faced with a huge amount of
Security
checks. And
Biotech
checks too, bizarrely enough.
 

Durante

Member
Yeah, I generally enjoy skill checks in RPGs, and consider it a good thing if you can't pass all (or even a majority) of them with a single character, but so far they seem very unevenly distributed. It's made up for a bit in that they are often only marginally useful (or, actually, provide no gameplay advantage at all), but there's still some nice content I've seen after passing skill checks that I wouldn't want to miss. I do wonder, is there a "fallback" way to get deeper into Glory's backstory without
being a mage
? That's one thing that would be bad to miss.

I do feel like it may be hard to balance the amount of skill checks across everything, since it makes sense for e.g.
Biotech
to be far more commonly required in dialogue than some other skills. It should at least be balanced in such a way that skills with more common checks have less direct gameplay impact. I did notice some more variety than in the original campaign though, with e.g. quite a few opportunities for
Rigging
checks which I don't remember featuring there.

In any case, I personally do like the campaign much more than Dead Man's Switch (which I also liked, don't get me wrong!), for quite a few reasons:
  • If there's one thing I like about the Bioware RPG formula, it's the interaction with party characters. That's much more involved here than in DMS.
  • Saving anywhere and at any time is a huge thing for me in cRPGs. Just that option being available makes the entire game seem more full-fledged to me.
  • The size of maps, exploration and variety of tasks beyond combat is much higher than in DMS. Even just in the first real mission (the hotel), there's a plethora of small optional stuff to do and discover (on a set of large interconnected maps), which simply wasn't there in the original campaign.
  • This one is a personal preference thing, but as a PnP Shadowrun fan, I feel like the entire story setup so far is more "shadowrun-y" than DMS was. I also prefer the Berlin setting.
 

john_hbs

Neo Member
hit one game breaking bug myself with Dragonfall. There's a start of one mission where you choose to meet a contact at a place of your choosing. At this point I thought it was just a jumping off point for the quest and as such went to do some other quests first. Get back into the city after doing the other quests and now there's no contact to meet and I don't have enough for the Alice payment (stuck @ 45,000 after even converting my personal cash to the mission) and there's no more quests to take, essentially having the game come to a screeching halt with no way to progress. Having seen some posts on the Valve game forums, it seems it's a bug other people have come across. There has been developer response on those forums though, so I imagine there will be a patch at some point.

If you are still encountering this issue, (as a number of folks discus here: http://steamcommunity.com/app/234650/discussions/0/558749191140556457/)

It is possible there was a missed cash drop at the Rabbit-hole terminal you access via the U-Bahn.

If the issue persists, hit us up at info@hbs-studios.com
 

john_hbs

Neo Member
So I'm almost done with the first campaign and I can absolutely confirm that they didn't iron out the manual saving bugs. I ran into three separate gamebreaking situations in a later level that were only resolved by reloading from an autosave and completing the level without manually saving. REALLY ANNOYING.

Details :
The first time it happened, my team wouldn't follow me in to the cult's hideout even though I opened the door for them. The crazy thing is that the security camera thing remarked that I had a bunch of people without the appropriate clothes so I assumed everything was fine. When I went down the elevator (which is a point of no return,) they weren't with me. Had to reload. This happened twice.

The bigger problem was with the next level and that ridiculous bug/Matrix mess. Apparently, I caused a bug that ONLY showed up when I finished the entire goddamned fight and extracted my team. I was outside the building when the story refused to continue. I guess I'll replay it tomorrow.

edit: I also had a problem with the
graveyard mission. One set of ghouls didn't spawn so I had to replay the entire mission.

Looking into these. Thank you for pointing them out.
 

Raxious

Member
Such a shame, I'm playing this game on a Surface Pro, but apparently you can't scroll over the map with touch commands. The only way to change the camera's position is by resetting the camera on the character.
 

john_hbs

Neo Member
Such a shame, I'm playing this game on a Surface Pro, but apparently you can't scroll over the map with touch commands. The only way to change the camera's position is by resetting the camera on the character.

In the options menu, did you try setting the "Input Type" to touch? (Also, are you full-screen or windowed? Trying to reproduce the issue here).

We really appreciate the feedback folks, thank you!
 
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