ElegantTrout Plays - Grim Dawn (First Impressions)
Short post for today due to a very, very busy schedule.
Grim Dawn. It's an action RPG by Crate Entertainment. It recently came into my radar of games that I should get around to playing. I mean, I've had it in my library since it's Early Access days around 2013, and it was officially released early this year February 25. Crate Entertainment being comprised of veterans of the genre. Several founding members being from Iron Lore Entertainment, creators of the popular 2006 aRPG Titan Quest. On top of that, they also hired Eric Sexton of Blizzard / Diablo fame, for his extensive knowledge of lore development.
With 10 hours in, how does the game feel? Is the story good? How are the mechanics? And finally, how does it compare with popular aRPGs like Titan Quest, Diablo 2, and my previously reviewed Torchlight 2? These are the questions I'm asking myself as I go deliver justice in dark, ruined world of Cairn.
Since story is something that develops over the course of game time, I'll withhold that until my actual, full review of the game. In the meantime... The early game. Not a lot of games get this completely right, especially RPGs of any kind. So, that's what I'll focus on.
It doesn't hold your hand. While this can be a particularly good thing -- since it can give you a more satisfied feeling of figuring things out yourself, it doesn't mention a lot of helpful stuff as there's no real tutorial. Not much in the way of explaining what buttons do what on the inventory screen, how crafting components work, and the different damage types. On top of that, it looks like the constellations are pretty annoying to have to go through initially before familiarizing yourself with it. If there was a sort function for that which sorted it by what it could give, that'd be great.
The game itself feels a bit dated and multiplayer can have some latency issues (at least, in some of my games). Compared with a lot of modern games, the looks aren't as sharp -- but my god, the world looks fantastic. If there were more variations of mobs, I think it'd be even better!
Apart from that, the masteries (classes) are really interesting. At level 2, you get to choose between: Arcanist, Demolitionist, Nightblade, Occultist, Soldier, and Shaman. At level 10, you can choose another mastery, creating a dual-class character. For example, a Nightblade Arcanist is called a Spellbreaker, and an Occultist Soldier is called a Witchblade. Fairly cool stuff. Reminds me of a lot of gestalt stuff when I used to play D&D and Pathfinder heavily. Each class has a fair amount of skills to invest points into to improve or modify it, and none feel particularly useless. With an attribute point and 3 skill points per level, there's a lot of room for fun builds and theory-crafting.
So far, I've tried out the Commando (Soldier + Demolitionist), Conjurer (Occultist + Shaman), Arcanist, and I've seen my friend's Blademaster in action (Nightblade + Soldier). Though I didn't have so much of a fun time as an arcanist, the other classes were up my alley. As a conjurer, I had 3 summons out at the same time -- which is great for having aggro/threat not on you. The commando had some uber powerful firestrikes with minor AoE damage. And well, the Blademaster seems to have it all. With a couple dashes in the repetoire, high single target damage as well as a wide damage spill AoE, it's easily one of the more potent classes early game. Seems like health is a pretty big issue though, maybe because of the threat you generate so easily.
Lore is absolutely fantastic in the game. I can't help but read things as I go along. It sheds some light on the history of the world and some characters in it. It also seems to be important, as reading can definitely clue you in to secret stuff. Lots of side quests to keep you busy too. A few of them also affect who goes back to your camp, which means you have a choice of merchants with different specialties. And man, I love choices.
Son of a slith.
I tackled on the Act 1 boss with a friend, and while it was fun, I had a few concerns. The beginning location was a bit difficult to find without peering through all the unexplored areas, and the finale to Act 1 felt like a long, long trek through an underground lab. I mean, the commute was intense. The boss himself was actually a great two-stage fight, complete with epic fight music and boss dialogue.
Not bad, Grim Dawn. Not bad at all. Full review sometime, for sure!
