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Legend of Grimrock - April 11th PC release [Mac/iOS later]

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Zarovitch

Member
Holy shit, that sounds familiar...
Obscure NES first person RPG?

Yes it's a first person RPG. I remember casting the spell OOO to open water
to reach an underwater city. There's one spell to fly in a city in the sky. A labyrinth with minotaur i think. So much memories.

About the auto ammo, maybe they implement it, but i don't count on it, the seems to be an old school game all the way.

Is there someone here that will draw the map or you will use the auto map?
I'm not sure what i will do yet, i fear that teleport trap or changing direction trap will make it to hard.

it's sad this game is not available for the easter egg weekend.
 

Ohmwrecker

Neo Member
Yes it's a first person RPG. I remember casting the spell OOO to open water
to reach an underwater city. There's one spell to fly in a city in the sky. A labyrinth with minotaur i think. So much memories.

About the auto ammo, maybe they implement it, but i don't count on it, the seems to be an old school game all the way.

Is there someone here that will draw the map or you will use the auto map?
I'm not sure what i will do yet, i fear that teleport trap or changing direction trap will make it to hard.

it's sad this game is not available for the easter egg weekend.

I can confirm that ammo is automatically picked up if your character is / was actively using it. Two examples:

1. You've got throwing knives equipped on one of your characters, and come across a fresh new throwing knife.

2. You just shot the hell out of a creature with arrows from your bow, you run out of ammo, the enemy dies, and now the arrows are on the ground. Walking over the arrows will toss them back into the hand that previously held the arrows.

This does not work however with enchanted arrows (unless they match the type you're currently using), you still have to pick those up manually if you find any. Also, enchanted arrows turn into standard arrows once shot, so they must be picked up manually since the conversion back to a normal arrow makes them different than what you shot.
 

Sinatar

Official GAF Bottom Feeder
Is there someone here that will draw the map or you will use the auto map?
I'm not sure what i will do yet, i fear that teleport trap or changing direction trap will make it to hard.

Hand drawing maps is purely for the curmudgeonly nostalgia crowd. Automap all the way for anyone with sense.
 

Minsc

Gold Member
Sinatar said:
Hand drawing maps is purely for the curmudgeonly nostalgia crowd.

Or the people who want the old-school mode achievement unlocked on Steam! Nice touch with the graph paper PDF included with the game too. :) Though these days, you can probably just run the game windowed and have a youtube next to it showing which way to go to unlock the achievement in an hour's time, so I agree it'd be great to see shots of people's mapping skills. Especially if they disable auto-map for their first playthrough.

:lol It's a deal.

Do we know yet how many floors the dungeon has?

I think it was 10, and I expect the first couple to be pretty simple.
 

Sentenza

Member
Hand drawing maps is purely for the curmudgeonly nostalgia crowd. Automap all the way for anyone with sense.
You know, I'm probably as hardcore as you can get, when it comes to RPG.
I am in the RPG Codex branch of thinking, when it comes to hating the dumbing down in modern roleplay games (well, except I don't hate any game in any genre released in the past 10 years like many of them do).
And yet, auto-mapping isn't really something I ever complained about.
I'm really fine with it. I blessed its introduction since the early '90s.

Now, GPS and minimap on screen... THESE are things I can fiercely dislike.
Damn immersion breakers and a plague with a very bad influence over quest design.
 
Or the people who want the old-school mode achievement unlocked on Steam! Nice touch with the graph paper PDF included with the game too. :) Though these days, you can probably just run the game windowed and have a youtube next to it showing which way to go to unlock the achievement in an hour's time, so I agree it'd be great to see shots of people's mapping skills. Especially if they disable auto-map for their first playthrough.

The only option, really.

10 print outs to begin with it is.
 

Zarovitch

Member
I think Wizardry 7 got how auto mapping should work, the more stats your character have in mapping the more the detail are visible in the map.

Concerning Grimrock, i'll decide the day i'll start it.
 

Minsc

Gold Member
The only option, really.

10 print outs to begin with it is.

I tried to find where I read 10, but I think I imagined that, they seem just to want it to be a surprise. One of the developers said:

Some people could consider it a spoiler to know the exact number of levels so I won’t answer it here but it’s on par with DM/EOB/CSB.

And that they are in the same ballpark for size as DM levels. There's a review here that seems to indicate the exact number of levels though, if you want to know.
 

Sinatar

Official GAF Bottom Feeder
After hand drawing maps in Might and Magic 1 I wanted to punt my PC out the window. No nostalgia here on that regard, automapping was a glorious thing.
 
I tried to find where I read 10, but I think I imagined that, they seem just to want it to be a surprise. One of the developers said:



And that they are in the same ballpark for size as DM levels. There's a review here that seems to indicate the exact number of levels though, if you want to know.

Found the answer at the official site's forum, but yeah, it also says it in the interview.

Drawing the map was half the fun of Etrian Odyssey, so I'm hoping to carry that over to LoG.
 

Woo-Fu

Banned
Now, GPS and minimap on screen... THESE are things I can fiercely dislike.
Damn immersion breakers and a plague with a very bad influence over quest design.

So you're saying that magic systems are OK if you only use them for giant honking fireballs, but if you use spells like Detect True North and Detect Life you're breaking immersion?

Seems to me that any magic system that is worth a damn could duplicate the functionality of GPS and minimap without breaking a sweat. :)
 

Eusis

Member
I may try for no automap anyway, but there's only one way I'd outright prefer manually mapping over auto mapping: if like Etrian Odyssey it were part of the program itself, and thus can mark exactly where you are on the map. And that's a setup that only really works on the DS, because I'd probably get annoyed trying to do this on a PC with a mouse, bringing up the map every time I needed to edit it.
 

Sentenza

Member
So you're saying that magic systems are OK if you only use them for giant honking fireballs, but if you use spells like Detect True North and Detect Life you're breaking immersion?
Actually I have nothing against "detect north", as I'm completely fine with a basic compass, and by the way no, what I'm saying is that "detect life" or "Spot your next objective" can practically, in a very tangible way, ruin the gameplay and the quest design.
And no, it isn't a matter of realism, so giving to these things a cheap magical explanation doesn't change a thing. It's about how they can substantially influence your behavior, the way you move through that virtual space.
 

Minsc

Gold Member
I hope you can turn it off.

It's very selective and only works on ammo you're currently using for weapons you have equipped, so it shouldn't be a problem, we got this explanation earlier:

I can confirm that ammo is automatically picked up if your character is / was actively using it. Two examples:

1. You've got throwing knives equipped on one of your characters, and come across a fresh new throwing knife.

2. You just shot the hell out of a creature with arrows from your bow, you run out of ammo, the enemy dies, and now the arrows are on the ground. Walking over the arrows will toss them back into the hand that previously held the arrows.

This does not work however with enchanted arrows (unless they match the type you're currently using), you still have to pick those up manually if you find any. Also, enchanted arrows turn into standard arrows once shot, so they must be picked up manually since the conversion back to a normal arrow makes them different than what you shot.
 

naib

Member
Been following this for the past couple months. I think I first saw it here in the Steam thread? I dunno.

Anyway, watching that gameplay vid has my hyped! Think I'm going to preorder direct.
 
I think the first game to have infuriating dungeon design with pits and teleports for me was Phantasy Star.

Seriously? Fuck Medusa's Tower.
 

Minsc

Gold Member
I still hope there's an option to turn it off.

Yes, I hope so too, i'll never say no to something being an option. I was trying to think of uses to not auto-pick up, and I guess it does add a little realism if in the middle of a battle you can't magically replenish ammo by running over the floor, or if you want to use ammo as markers to track where you've gone, having them picked up automatically would defeat that.
 
I literally just found out about this today and can't believe they made a game in this style, words can't describe how happy I am. Looking at these screens I'm just slammed with rushes of Eye of the Beholder 2 memories.
 

Woo-Fu

Banned
I think the first game to have infuriating dungeon design with pits and teleports for me was Phantasy Star.

Seriously? Fuck Medusa's Tower.

Pits, teleporters, tiles that change your facing instantly when you step on them, poison gas filled tiles, tiles that don't show properly on the minimap, tunnels and rooms that aren't actually possible without some sort of n-dimensional magic, tiles that extinguish light-sources, tiles that make you unequip all your gear, anti-magic tiles, anti-regen tiles, mana-drain tiles, anything to prevent you from making your way to the MacGuffin.
 

Zarovitch

Member
I literally just found out about this today and can't believe they made a game in this style, words can't describe how happy I am. Looking at these screens I'm just slammed with rushes of Eye of the Beholder 2 memories.

I feel the same. It's been a long time since i was hype that much for a game.
If puzzle are as good than ElderGeek tell, i'll be very happy.
 

Minsc

Gold Member
Some nice tidbits from RPS:

Health can be regained by mixing potions, but the ingredients are incredibly rare for the bulk of the game, and sleep will be your primary means of getting better. But of course sleep near monsters and they’re going to take a chunk out of you to wake you up. The other thing to be concerned about is food, which is again sparingly available. In fact, I’d say they get this perfectly right, making it feel like something you need to be worrying about, without ever making it tiresome. I always had just about enough. They don’t drink, however, which is odd, but preferable.

You’ll have to start thinking with teleporters if you’re going to figure a lot of them out. They’re inventive, and they’re often tough. In fact, in reviewing the game weeks before it’s released, and thus lacking the option of spying a walkthrough or asking a chum for a hint, I’ve developed an amazing technique for solving the hardest elements. What you do is write an email to the developers saying, “I am completely stuck, and have no idea how to get past this.” Click “send” and at that exact moment you’ll notice what you were missing. It works without fail.

The game’s played from a first-person perspective, but your squad is stood in a 2 by 2 formation, meaning you’re going to want to think about whom you have at the front, and at the back. The front two are going to take the brunt of the attacks, while being able to dish out melee. The back two won’t be able to reach if given a sword or mace, but are ideal for firing off spells or arrows. Get this balance wrong, and I’d imagine you could have a fairly tough time getting deep enough down the mountain in which you’re trapped.
...
The combat’s really tough too, with monsters able to kill you in a few swipes from very early on. That’s nothing Dungeon Master didn’t do, but gosh it’s a bit of a surprise to have a game be so mean to you so early on. A great surprise, I should say – wow, games are too easy now, aren’t they? You not only have to develop your own techniques for avoiding attacks, but also discover the most judicious application of your gang’s collection of skills.

Edit: OT is up, let's move discussion there.
 
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