I bought this game on a whim. I knew nothing about it. It was in my Steam Queue, something I rarely look at unless I’m bored with my current gaming stash and looking for something new or interesting.
Honestly, it doesn’t look like much. I thought it was going to be a turn based strategy or real time strategy during the colonial time period.
Whole. Lee. Shit.
I haven’t been this engaged with an RPG in a very, very long time. Like Dragon Age: Origins very, very long time.
Speaking of Dragon Age, the developers of this game were definitely inspired by that masterpiece (more on that, later).
So, what is GreedFall?
GreedFall takes place in a time, long ago, where exploration is in the hearts of most free men, science is still an unknown domain, and where magic and strange beasts occupy the lands.
The story begins in Serene, where a corruption has consumed the area for quite some time. The early symptoms grace your face, as well as entangle your family. Your mother is afflicted, in the late stages, referring to herself as “dying” rather than having an “illness”. It’s also loosely implied that your father was killed by the disease.
While they didn’t outright come and say it, the tone and body language changed when the mother mentions the character’s father.
The game does the story telling mechanic where they assume you know a lot about the world. They go into detail through dialog and context in that dialog. Sometimes they spell it out, which can be annoying sometimes (it comes off as bad writing, in certain spots). But overall I think the world building is really well done. You’re also launched into a tutorial that doesn’t feel like a tutorial, but it took me about two hours to get through it (you get some juicy story bits and interesting side quests during the tutorial). After the 120 minutes, you’re greeted with an achievement (yay!) and the official introduction of the game’s title.
Gameplay wise, the combat and questing is like The Witcher 2 and The Witcher 3. The quest style, is very reminiscent of those games, and the combat is exactly like those games (from what I remember, it’s been a few years), which leads to some frustrating experiences. I hated combat in The Witcher, and the combat in GreedFall brings flashbacks. While not as bad (for example, you can kinda pause the game to issue attacks and commands) and, for better or worse, the combat moves really fast, it is still fun, which is nice.
The dialog, as I mentioned earlier, is hit or miss. But overall it’s pretty good. I completed a quest where I had to smuggle some cargo, much to the disapproval of the ship captain. So, the quest went about it in a way that the captain of the ship didn’t know (he had given you a warning about doing it and explicitly stated not to do it, but wasn’t involved the rest of the quest). Later on, you have a conversation about the smuggling while the captain is in your party. I thought, “Huh, that would have been a great time to have the captain scold you for disobeying and putting his crew at risk of the law. Oh well. Minus 20 points, Gryffindor.” – Son of a gun if not two seconds later, after you get the next quest objective, does that captain do that very thing. I was tickled to pieces.
So, remember when I mentioned Dragon Age? Well, that was one of the things I loved about that game. The character banter and the favor/disfavor of the companions in your party. This game does the same thing. Decisions or actions you make on a quest impact party, town, and faction favor of you, and will later come up in interesting ways. Sometimes it’s dialog, sometimes an ambassador or foreign diplomat will send assassins your way.
Aside from Dragon Age and The Witcher, I’ve seen influences from Victorian era architecture/literature, Dishonored, and a little steam punk.
The sound track is fine, but I don’t really notice it. Admittedly, I hate how modern audio is done in games and movies, so I usually turn it down to 50%. But it hasn’t been noticeably repeating or annoying in anyway. The graphics are really good most of the time, with some weird blurring from time to time that seems to resolve itself. I’m still getting the 144hz settings tweaked, and that’s been a little frustrating, but nothing game breaking.
The boss battles are very SoulsBorne, where you hug the crotch and dodge, duck, dip, dive, and dodge. It’s a little more involved, I was able to parry, stun, and stagger a few times. OH, btw, you get a few ways to chain together attacks.
Quick attack, heavy attack, firearm/accessory attack, skills, and magic. You can heavy, quick quick, firearm, quick, dodge, heavy, quick quick all day. That was really the key to not getting my ass kicked, was learning how to chain together attacks and keep the opponent staggered or stunned. Otherwise, you get mauled.
Yes, dear cousin, absolutely epic.
The side quests, companion quests, and main story has been fantastic. There is a ton of lore to learn about the world and a lot of exploration to be done.
My big, big tip for the game if you’re a fan of loot:
Pick the technical class. I missed soooooo much because I didn’t have the lockpicking skill.
You start the game with character creation and class selection. You get melee, technical, and magic to choose from. You can evolve your character how you see fit, you’re not stuck to that class the whole time. After that you’re thrown into the world!
This is a hardcore RPG wrapped in a Victorian era skin. I don’t think I mentioned all the influences I noticed but man this game is truly inspired.
Dragon Age
The Witcher
Dragon’s Dogma
Dishonored
SoulsBorne
It really is a beautiful mix of gaming influences and, in my opinion, came out of nowhere. It’s been a really great experience so far and I’m going to check out what else the company has done when I’ve wrapped this up.
