I seem to remember that Sig has played Arcanum, more than once.

Just wondering but what do I know. Why did the M&M X Legacy post turn into a Wizardry Post?

Sorry, oldman - your topic did get derailed.

This was Sig's topic and she introduced Wizardry 8 into it. However, yes the topic did detour and I contributed.

Yes, SharonB, I’ve played Arcanum (with a character editor) and liked it a lot. It’s very different from Wiz 8, of course.

Sorry, Oldman, I did detour my Legacy topic. It all started back on page 1 when I contrasted the arrow-shooting in M&M 6 with that in Wiz 8, and then I got into trying to talk Pokey into playing it. And the monetary delay in getting a Steam download of Legacy didn’t help.

If anyone wants to continue talking about Wizardry 8, please feel free to start a new thread. I really enjoy reading these detailed descriptions of games.

Yup, it’s fun---at least, with an artificially-beefed-up party. I must be in the mood for a throwback game like this. And I’m glad I didn’t actually have to upgrade my RAM to get it to run decently. I think I’ve only done this grid-based movement in adventure games before, but I’m fine with it in this, and it’s good that you can see your progress on the mini-map and area map, and can even watch yourself move on the opened area map, which is efficient for backtracking. I also like how the game forces you to do the turn-based combat as intended, which, along with the pop-up tips, makes you gradually get better at it. Visually, I like everything I’ve seen so far a lot. Being such a noob at this, I just went with the default pre-fab party, but they seem fine. I like how the “max of 2 at a time” companion system works, with characters joining and leaving you at certain times, and giving you bonuses while they’re with you, and initiating some dialogue at certain times. And pickin’ up all the lore books and shrine buffs and such that are scattered all over is fun. And I appreciate how I haven’t run into an NPC that I shouldn’t have talked to, or a barrel of liquid that I shouldn’t have had someone drink. Oh yeah, the game also forces you to find all the skill-trainer NPCs, in order to keep raising your skills. My mage chick could use a double quick bar with all the spells she’s learning---I keep having to reassign those, but that may be a minor gripe. I’m just about to clear out the 3-floor lighthouse of its snake-body enemies before relighting it, so we’ll see how that goes. You know how it is...an adventurer’s work is never done.

Glad you're liking the game, Sig. Have fun with it - keep us posted on your progress.

Thanks, Marian. Got the lighthouse deal done and will be heading out of the starter town again soon, to gradually make our way to the governor at Castle Portmeyron to the north. Tally-ho!

Onward and upward! Nice work on the lighthouse!

One more mention of Wizardry 8. It is on sale at GOG for $1.99 till Mar 11. I'll be getting it at this great price.

Thanks, Pokey, that's a hard to beat price

Turned out that Cursed Ruins wasn’t exactly optional. Did as much as I could do in it before checking the GamePressure guide, and found it’s connected with the promotion quest for paladin, so I left it for now. Liberated Castle Portmeyron, which completed Act I, but there’s more exploring and some other things I wanna do before moving ahead with the main quest, which you do by having this guy at the castle fly you to this place on a big great-looking griffin. For instance, I wanna get to the expert shield trainer in Seahaven, the path to which was blocked by a guard, but is probably accessible now. And there’s another interior I wanna do---Mysterious Crypt, I think it’s called---unless it turns out to be connected with some other promotion quest. Beefed up my party more with the trainer/editor, so we’re nice and awesome now, which makes it even more fun for me---I only save and quit when I’m dead tired. Oh, I bought a pack horse as one of our 2 companions, so now have twice the inventory space for loot items. Guess that’s all the highlights for this entry.

More space for loot is always fun

Well, the main quest is branching out as the plot thickens. We have plenty to do in our quest log and are soon to have even more, no doubt, cuz we finally got to Seahaven, even though it wasn’t far, just inaccessible till now. It’s interesting...the gameworld isn’t that expansive compared to something like Skyrim, but, because of the nature of the gameplay and how it’s structured, it feels big enough, with all of the interiors and backtracking and such. Took that griffin ride to the Elemental Forge, cleared it of baddies, and got our first permanent blessing from one of the dragon gods---this one lets us see paths in the wilderness that others can’t see. I’m hoping that, when we get the water blessing, that’ll let us get out to this cool-looking shipwreck off the coast, to explore and loot it. Yeah, L4L, I like our horse companion, who looks like a real horse before you pick him up, is named Aonbarr (I think it is), and used to be a warhorse in his younger days. We had to send him back in order to take that griffin ride, but have since picked him back up, and, even though he’s got an attitude, he was glad to see us.

The game continues to be really good. I would encourage anyone who thinks they would be turned-off by the grid-based movement or the turn-based combat to try it. As most games do, it gets even better when you start hittin’ a lick, so to speak---getting better at the gameplay, getting hip to its conventions and such. It’s been crashing a bit (I think because I’m pushing its envelope with my RAM spec), but I quicksave so frequently, it’s not really a problem. I have all but two of the permanent blessings, which let you do things like see additional paths in the woods, walk in shallow water, use teleporters to get to other areas, and detect enemies in your vicinity sooner. Right now, I’m working on activating the rest of the obelisks scattered around the gameworld, cuz, when activated, you can use them to teleport around, from one to another. Almost every thing you see would make a good screenshot. I just explored this pirate fortress town called The Crag (because it’s located on this coast with these high rocky cliffs) and, for a lifelong pirate motif lover like me, walkin’ around that place in the daytime was like the greatest thing I’ve ever seen. They really did a masterful job on that.

It's great that you are having so much fun!

The pirate fortress town sounds really neat.

Sig, I'm glad you're enjoying it. Maybe I should give it another look one of these days. I do remember being backed into a cul-de-sac at one point and not being able to fight my way back out, being blocked by enemies I couldn't beat. Maybe that's why I gave up on it. Anyway, game on!

Hagatha, I hope you do give it another chance. There’s other things I like about this game that I haven’t even mentioned, like all the loot you get from fights is automatically picked up. Why don’t they do that in every game? Of course getting loot is fun, but is picking it all up all the time that much fun? You should consider using the latest CheatHappens trainer/editor for this game---after beefing up your party members and giving them plenty of skill points, money, and camping supplies, you don’t even need to run the trainer every time you play the game, and enemies should worry about running into you. You know, cheating, even in offline, single-player video games, always gets a bad rap, even from my best friend, who knocks me because of it, but nobody ever talks about the good things about it, all the things besides making it just plain fun, and I could write a book about that. Just to give a couple examples from this game, when I replay it, I think I’ll create a party of 4 spellcasters, to see more spellcasting, but also to divvy up my favorite spells between their 4 quick bars. This is not the recommended party if you’re playin’ it straight, but, with the trainer, you can really have any party you want. Also, I just changed a quick bar assignment for my mage chick from Fire Blast back to the less-powerful Fire Ball. Why? Because I like the animation of the latter better, and, with my party, there’s no worries. We just activated the 8th and last obelisk and are now gonna use the clues they give you to find a treasure that you get for activating them all, which will complete that side quest. After that, I think I’ll knock out getting the last two permanent blessings, before doing some other side quests we’ve picked up in our travels, before getting back on the main quest. It’s surprising how much there is to do in this relatively not-that-huge gameworld. Lemme end with two things I’m really looking forward to---namely, exploring inside my first shipwreck, and doing this side quest we picked up, where you rescue these captured animals from some poachers, after which you can pick up a dog companion named Spike, who spots secret doors for you. Fun stuff.

I think sometimes people forget games are supposed to be fun! Of course, "fun" is different for everyone!

Finished the main quest and all the active side quests I had in the log. It lets you keep playing after you finish the main one, so I wanna explore a little more and do any side quests I may have missed, but also wanted to try some other gridders, so I snagged “Elminage Gothic” for 5 bucks and actually regretted it. Suffice to say that, if I were to review it, nobody would touch it with a 10-foot keyboard, and rightly so. But then I tried “The Quest” and it’s a lot of fun, at least with CH’s trainer/editor. Wanna start a topic about that and mention some of its niceties, but I wanna play a little more of it first.

Wow, Sig, if you are regretting a $5.00 game, that speaks volumes

Sig, have you played The Legend of Grimrock? That is grid-based and one of the best games I've ever played. There's a Grimrock 2 now, I believe.