WRATH: Aeon of Ruin (a new game from 3D Realms)

[Noiser]

If Civvie said shit against it, I will certainly be playing it s2

Edited March 21, 2024 by Noiser

[Firedust]

Some thoughts after completing the game:

Guns are great, ESPECIALLY the railgun (or its equivalent I should say). Problem is, the level design and combat aren't really up to snuff - you're basically fighting enemies in the same kind of setups ad nauseam and the level size only exacerbates the daunting monotony of the process. Practically all of the secrets are all about jumping onto a random ledge and then jump-dashing onto a faraway platform. It certainly has the makings of a great game - the eldritch setting is pulled off very well, and weapons feel pretty fun to use, but goddamn does it lack variety. Can we please have some more enemy types? Please? Or at least try to figure out a way to put the player under pressure rather than just abuse teleporter triggers incessantly? No? Okay. As a result, I had to take like 7+ breaks from behemoths like the priory, thinking when it'll be over already. The big switchup in episode themes though certainly helps cleanse the palate. Textures look slick and mesh fantastically well together, by the way! Powerups, on the other hand, are largely negligible if you're good enough at dodging enemy projectiles in the bigass areas you're usually taking engagements in.

Obviously, everyone's mileage may vary, but for someone looking to give the game a crack, I'll probably recommend to play it piecemeal over the course of like a month, otherwise you might be burnt out in no time.

I wonder what exactly went wrong with the dev cycle being as long as it was, but it looks like a bad case of mismanagement, tough choice of engine, and spending way too much time building bigass levels (instead of focusing on maybe adding more variety to combat setups). Lord knows. However, I feel that it's never good when a game reveals most of its hand too early and then you're out there doing same shit for hours on end.

5.5/10 I guess (hey at least it's not Graven lmao)

Edited March 24, 2024 by Firedust

[Tetzlaff]

10 hours ago, Firedust said:

Can we please have some more enemy types? Please? 

 

How many enemy types does it actually have?

[boris]

There are 15 enemy types, plus 3 bosses. The Prowler is only used in episode 2 AFAIK. The Lurker is an aquatic type, so it's only used in bodies of water. And the Keeper is used very rarely (at least on medium difficulty), I've seen it maybe in 3 or 4 fights.

 

Doom 2 has 17 regular enemy types (depends a bit how you count), Quake 1 has 13 regular enemy types.

[Tetzlaff]

So that's not that bad. The effect that gameplay can get a little bit stale after longer stretches of time is something I often experience in Doom map sets, or for example Serious Sam. I still enjoy coming back after a break.

[MrFlibble]

Are they going to polish the content after the release? I gather that the original developer left the project, right? Basically, is user feedback going to result in map updates or gameplay balance changes in the future?

[boris]

There have already been a few patches and hotfixes. Personally I'm not expecting bigger changes, considering how long the development was. I would not have been surprised had the team working on Wrath been Embracer'ed right after release.

[Firedust]

11 hours ago, Tetzlaff said:

 

How many enemy types does it actually have?

The problem doesn't lie with how stacked the enemy roster is per se, but rather a combination of how they are used (very homogeneous set ups), what progression and difficulty curve are like (by the second level of each episode you've probably seen it all), and level length (they are very big and largely repetitive bar the visuals; although within each episode, there are two or three that lack anything substantial that make them stand out in their own way). Obviously, this is all subjective, please keep that in mind.