[rabb1t]

Ok this is odd, I could swear we had something going on Titan Quest already.

Anyways... I was kind of expecting Prey to hold me a few weeks and close the gap between now and Darkstar One's release mid-August. Sadly I finished Prey in like 1 day. So I was considering picking up Titan Quest.

The reviews seem to like it ok, say it has like 30 hours of play, but did stress that the AI was kinda dumb and that nothing scaled. (So you could replay an area several times, but you'd get the same kind of loots every time.)

I really enjoyed the randomness of Diablo 2 and the Dungeon Siege loot system. (Though I hated how totally linear the DS series was in level design and how its graphics and sound were really dated for when they came out). I don't think Titan Quest is random in level design, so that will be sad, but I can't think of anything else I'd even consider playing at the moment.

I was wondering what peeps thoughts / opinions were of Titan Quest.

[Spirit]

I haven't picked this up yet, but it's definitely on my "to do" list. I'm really buzzed about the level editor, I saw some footage of a dev showing it off a while back, it looked great.

[Sancia]

I picked it up this week, and so far the camera-angle combined with the insanely stupid AI has kept me from playing it for more that about 30 minuter total

[Cylus]

I've played through most of it but haven't gotten around to finishing it. If you enjoyed Diablo, you will like it but don't expect an earth-shattering game. The locales are very nice looking but the gameplay seems to stutter a bit from a wacky loot system and stupid AI. There are a ton of different class combos so that will keep people busy and trying new things.

Unfortunate for the summer gaming community, it is one of the better games out currently

[rabb1t]

Originally Posted by Cylus

Unfortunate for the summer gaming community, it is one of the better games out currently

*waves hello to new dev poster*
Yeah. Seems most of the good games that should have been out around now have been delayed; Yours included.

[Snake]

Theres a demo i downloaded off of fileplanet, you could check that out before playing if its still up

[rabb1t]

I did, and in the missing comments that I swear I posted, I mentioned that it kept crashing like every 5 min to 4 hours. No prob so far, so the patch must have fixed whatever was wrong.

Anyways...

The retail version is more interesting (than the demo) once you hit 8 and can dual class. I think it forces a 2nd mastery on you, but you don't have to actually put any points into it (so you can pure class or split to 2).

It has its good points, and it has its bad points.

As one reviewer put it - it does really make me long for the more established games of its type - Diablo 3 (there are rumors Blizzard is working on it), Neverwinter Nights 2, etc.

It should be good enough to hold me till NWN 2 or Dark Messiah does come out, or I get into the Vanguard beta

Figure I'll have fun with it till the Summer is over in a few months, then likely ebay it.

[rabb1t]

Lebel 11 on my fav character so far. The game gets more fun as you progress and get more skills built. I'm getting more into it as I look forward to more abilities.

I think what would have really made the game more fun is if they had more abilities early on. Maybe it was the classes I chose but I really don't have a lot of abilities that I do. There are a couple of ones which are passive, but other than that I just have one I 'switch on' as it were. No real 'press and boom' kind of skills yet.

[rabb1t]

Hints

- You may want to start several characters and decide which 'classes' you like.

- At now level 22, it seems easiest to focus on a few skill lines from each Mastery. It seems most beneficial to open new abilities instead of heavily focusing on single abilities. This may be different for casters or peeps where skills don't follow 'lines' as much. (Some classes seem to have 2 connected skills and that's it for the line.) Be wary of skills that don't increase in % to go off as you put skill points in them.

- You can re-spec at main cities from Delphi and on (you will probably be around 12 th), but you can't change your Mastery choices. (Thus you are stuck with the 2 "classes" you have chosen for your character). It costs like 250g a click, but at the point I got to the respec person I'd sold only magic loots and had like 100,000 saved up.

- It is next to impossible to gauge a weapons ...um... coolness/ability? by price. I find it is best to look at the item's required level (ex: level 3, level 8, level 15, etc.) and if it has no level to look at the required stats. Pretty much going by level ensures it will be better compared to a lower level item. However, rarity can mess things up if you go by just the level.

- If you remove the item in your 'off hand' to compare weapons it makes the damage listings a bit more accurate. (Be sure removing your off hand item won't prevent putting something back on.) This way you can empty your hands, place one weapon in, then swap it with the one you want to compare to. I've found this is the most accurate way to judge weapons without looking at the vendor value (which seems just wrong sometimes.)

- It appears that some vendors are 'capped' at what they will pay. For example, if you have an item at 35,832 true value, but the vendor is capped at 25,000 it will only show 25,000. If you have a few items which all cap at the same value, hold onto them! Don't sell them yet. Wait to find a vender with a higher cap so you can see their true value. (I just got to China, ~lv 28 now, and the Babylon vendor is the first I've seen to exceed the 25,000 cap.)


Confusing / sad things

- I miss the simplicity of left click / right click. TQ has like 10 hotkeys and, even though I don't really use them yet, I really liked Diablo's simplicity of having an attack set to one key and a second thing set to the other key. I find it a pain to move my hand to the keyboard in this type of game.

- As mentioned it is very difficult to know what is better for your character when compared to what you have. The only thing I've determined is to go by level.

- Some zones can really plummet in FPS. Not sure why, and thankfully I've only seen this happen a few times. I think it is when the game moves a lot of baddies all at once, or when there are a lot of 2d particle type effects going on.


New / different things

- There are physics. I've noticed as I've put more pts into strength critters fly farther sometimes than they used to. Now if I get a good shot on em they can fly all the way across the screen. hehe. Sometimes they fall down a pit (usually they are already dead anyways) or sometimes they will collapse onto something.

- They have set items!!! However, they don't seem to be 100% fixed sets. As example, I've seen 2 'bracer' parts to the set I'm currently trying to assemble; yet the pieces had slightly different stats. All the same things they did (like say +str, +resist, etc.) but the numbers were a few pts different for each in a couple of the boosts. Kinda nifty.

- Not new, but they kind of have "sockets". You collect up these bits of various things. Some things only have 3 bits, some have 5, but you can 'pile them on top of each other', and like collect em up. The more you collect of that set, the higher the effect. At any time you choose you can put one of these on an item (some only go on certain items) but I think you can only have 1 per item. I tried putting on a second onto an item and it tossed it into my offhand weapon.

[Kckelley]

I was thinking of picking this up to hold off boredom while I wait for Vanguard and Spore. I've decided to stay away for now, but we'll see how long that lasts.

The hours I can sink into a diablo type game scares me.

EDIT: I wanted to ask those who have the game.... How is the loot system compared to Diablo? Doing runs and getting loot (trying to complete sets ect.) was what hooked me the most. Does TQ deliver in that regard?

[rabb1t]

I'd say it probably has too much loot (esp junk loots). There are tons of ways you can tweak yourself. I don't recall too much about Diablo, but I find myself holding on to one or two good items for quite a while. Like I've got this one shortsword kinda thing (it looks like a jawbone) that I've had for like 7 levels now. (I think it is a 'rare' item.) I've pretty much swapped the other items at the rate of maybe 1 per level. I probably make at least 3 to 6 sale trips back to town during that 1 level though.

I'd totally recommend it if you liked Diablo.

I still haven't gotten outa Grece, heh. (There are like 3 continent areas in the game.) Edit: Finally got out of Grece. I think I was almost lv 20 by the time I did.

The game seems to get more and more addictive the higher I go. Esp since I can 'respec' whenever I choose. If one ability seems like it may work out better than another, np I can go swap and try it out. I have only swapped a couple of abilities, mostly because I thought I'd like them by their description but I didn't like em. But the option is there if you want to change your style for how you built with your 2 Masteries.

[trevana]

Ive though about picking it up this week. Might try the demo first though.

[rabb1t]

The demo really isn't as cool cause I think you cap at around level 6. The game doesn't really pick up speed until around level 15 after you've gotten your second class (level 8) and have some points to really start spending here and there and have a few abilities you can do.

The demo gives you an idea of the play style though - how Diablo-ish it is.

I do have to say though, after totally finishing it on the first setting 2x now, and getting about 2/3 the way through half a dozen times it is starting to get kinda boring. As I think I said above, it isn't randomized, so once you have been through an area you pretty much know what that area is going to be like every time though.

But meh, it's one of the most fun games I've played in quite a while.

[Paleghost]

Just picked up this game and the exspansion. Very fun! My friends are going to pick it up as well, so we will probably have a blast.