ELEX - Review

[NewDArt]

Except that PB's games have always worked that way in regards to using a better weapon.

I do agree that the stat increases are high, but I assume that's because PB wanted to limit the amount of upgrades on any given weapon. It would be sort of reduntant to have a War Bow VII for example.

The unintuitiveness is certainly valid though. I complained about that from the very beginning.

I honestly don’t remember using crafting stations to upgrade weapons in other PB games. I mean, an upgrade is not a new weapon in my mind. It’s just a little bit better which would be quite useful in Elex in the beginning stages.

I think it would be much better with limited upgrades that actually helped instead of being an optional way of getting to wait for it. By the time you have the stats required, chances are you’ve already found a similarly powerful weapon elsewhere, rendering the system close to redundant.

To each his own, though.

 

[JDR13]

I honestly don’t remember using crafting stations to upgrade weapons in other PB games. I mean, an upgrade is not a new weapon in my mind. It’s just a little bit better which would be quite useful in Elex in the beginning stages.

I think it would be much better with limited upgrades that actually helped instead of being an optional way of getting to wait for it. By the time you have the stats required, chances are you’ve already found a similarly powerful weapon elsewhere, rendering the system close to redundant.

To each his own, though.

Not in your mind perhaps, but PB obviously doesn't see it that way.

I'm not saying one way is better than the other, but weapons have always been linked to stats in their games.

And I disagree about the system being reduntant. Upgraded weapons were almost always more powerful than weapons discovered through exploration. Whether that's actually a good thing is certainly subjective though. I'd have preferred the unique weapons to be stronger.

 

[NewDArt]

Not in your mind perhaps, but PB obviously doesn't see it that way.

I'm not saying one way is better than the other, but weapons have always been linked to stats in their games.

And I disagree about the system being reduntant. Upgraded weapons were almost always more powerful than weapons discovered through exploration. Whether that's actually a good thing is certainly subjective though. I'd have preferred the unique weapons to be stronger.

As I said, to each his own. I’m not trying to force anyone to agree.

I don’t remember weapon crafting upgrades from their past games, so I didn’t know their crafting upgrades always worked so stupidly. I did know that different weapons required different stats, though. I just didn’t expect an upgrade to be functionally a new weapon requiring nearly twice the stat power because I think that’s a terrible idea.

I had a very different experience, though. My upgrades were minor at best compared to the rifles I found. Of course, it didn’t help that merchants actually sold upgraded versions like crazy and it helped even less that the economy was broken, so buying the weapons was a nonissue. Meaning the skill is even less valuable.

Also, the Redeemer rendered all other weapons utterly redundant and had unique advantages.

Anyway, you think the skill is very useful and that’s cool with me.

 

[Carnifex]

I got a few games as gifts this season, including this one. I'm much more into turn based these days, but I will be trying Elex sometime soon, I imagine!

 

[JDR13]

As I said, to each his own. I’m not trying to force anyone to agree.

I don’t remember weapon crafting upgrades from their past games, so I didn’t know their crafting upgrades always worked so stupidly.

I had a very different experience, though. My upgrades were minor at best compared to the rifles I found. Of course, it didn’t help that merchants actually sold upgraded versions like crazy and it helped even less that the economy was broken, so buying the weapons was a nonissue. Meaning the skill is even less valuable.

Also, the Redeemer rendered all other weapons utterly redundant and had unique advantages.

Anyway, you think the skill is very useful and that’s cool with me.

Yeah, that's fine. My experience was very different, but I'm not trying to contest what you're saying. I was just pointing a few things out.

Any upgrade was the same in their past games. My point is that PB treats the upgrades in Elex as a new weapon hence the stat increase. It's not tied specifically to crafting.

Also, the Redeemer was far stronger than most of the other named weapons in the game. PB did a very poor job in that aspect imo. Most of the named weapons were underwhelming compared to their requirements.

 

[NewDArt]

Yeah, that's fine. My experience was very different, but I'm not trying to contest what you're saying. I was just pointing a few things out.

Any upgrade was the same in their past games. My point is that PB treats the upgrade as a new weapon hence the stat increase. It's not tied specifically to crafting.

Also, the Redeemer was far stronger than most of the other named weapons in the game. PB did a very poor job in that aspect imo. Most of the named weapons were underwhelming compared to their requirements.

What other upgrades are you talking about?

Ok, that sounds like another case of incompetence from PB

 

[JDR13]

What other upgrades are you talking about?

Ok, that sounds like another case of incompetence from PB

I mean upgrade in the context of swapping one weapon for another with better stats.

 

[NewDArt]

I mean upgrade in the context of swapping one weapon for another with better stats.

Oh, I'm specifically talking about upgrading an existing weapon - not swapping it.

Also, I'm not sure if the Gem upgrades and other modifiers require better stats as well?

Never actually tried those, as they weren't necessary.

Anyway, my point is that since this weapon modification system is new for PB games - there's no way to know or expect that modified or upgraded weapons are considered new or different weapons afterwards. Well, not until AFTER you pick the skill and realise that.

I think that's the same point Rune is trying to make as well.

I guess you think any PB fan should just know that would be the case, or?

 

[JDR13]

Oh, I'm specifically talking about upgrading an existing weapon - not swapping it.

Also, I'm not sure of the Gem upgrades and other modifiers require better stats as well?

Never actually tried those, as they weren't necessary.

Anyway, my point is that since this weapon modification system is new for PB games - there's no way to know or expect that modified or upgraded weapons are considered new or different weapons afterwards.

I think that's the same point Rune is trying to make as well.

I guess you think any PB fan should just know that would be the case, or?

I thought what I was saying was pretty clear from the beginning, but perhaps it was the way I worded it.

PB treats the upgraded weapon as a new weapon. I don't think it's really that hard to understand.

Seeing as how a new weapon has required better stats since Gothic 1, I never expected anything different.

I guess they could have included something in the game to make that more clear before spending a skill point on crafting, but I don't see it as that big of a deal especially since the game auto-saves quite frequently.

*Edit* I misread part of your reply the first time I read it. As far as knowing that they would be treated as new weapons, no I didn't know that. It doesn't surprise me though, and I think it fits PB's way of doing things. As I said, they should have included something in the game to clue the player to that.

 

[NewDArt]

I thought what I was saying was pretty clear from the beginning, but perhaps it was the way I worded it.

PB treats the upgraded weapon as a new weapon. I don't think it's really that hard to understand.

I don't think it's hard to understand either. I mean, I understood it the moment I saw that was the case - which was long before we had this exchange

I'm saying it's hard to KNOW before you actually see that's how they do it - as they've never had a system like this before.

Seeing as how a new weapon has required better stats since Gothic 1, I never expected anything different.

Meaning, apparently, you knew or expected a modified weapon would represent a new weapon in this way.

Again, I don't immediately recall any other RPG doing it like this. Plenty of RPGs require better stats for new weapons though, but not modified or upgraded existing ones. At least, not that I can recall.

To me, upgrading or modifying a weapon implicitly means you get to have a better version of the same weapon and you can obviously use it RIGHT after you upgrade it - like you always could.

I guess they could have included something in the game to make that more clear before spending a skill point on crafting, but I don't see it as that big of a deal especially considering that the game auto-saves quite frequently.

I don't think anyone is saying that it's a big deal. Just that it's illogical and a terrible system.

So, it's not a lack of information that's really the problem - but the way they're doing it so counter-intuitively. Instead of having a shit system - I'm saying it would be better to have a good system that's also in line with how it works elsewhere.

In that way, you don't have to actually bother much with information.

But that's just me.

Anyway, enough of this

 

[JDR13]

See my edit above.

 

[NewDArt]

I wasn't "surprised" so much as annoyed - because I'd just wasted a skill point

But it wasn't a big deal - and the game has plenty of skill points. IIRC, I didn't bother to reload - because I knew I'd want to modify weapons eventually. Never actually did that much, though.

Anyway, whatever

 

[JDR13]

A lot of it boils down to PB doing a poor job with the skill descriptions in general. It really is somewhat embarrassing I think and caused a lot of confusion for people.

Some of us had a lengthy debate about it shortly after the game was released. Fluent tried to explain that it was done intentionally to make the game more hardcore or some such nonsense.

 

[Dasale]

Weapons upgrades are better done with multiple weapons, a farmer bow can have better stats than a hunter bow for example (not sure it's a good example, it's just for the idea). To have a softer increase of attributes requirement, and exploit crafting it's the way to do it.

But because of costs from the various crafting and the number of useful special weapons, I suppose it's not useful that often.

 

[NewDArt]

A lot of it boils down to PB doing a poor job with the skill descriptions in general. It really is somewhat embarrassing I think and caused a lot of confusion for people.

Some of us had a lengthy debate about it shortly after the game was released. Fluent tried to explain that it was done intentionally to make the game more hardcore or some such nonsense.

I loved a lot about the game and I'm still planning to replay it - but it really does have some unfortunate "features".

I wish I had Fluent's ability to take everything bad about something and turn it into something meaningful.

Thankfully, I can enjoy games even if they have flaws. Always loved PB and likely always will - but I think they need to adjust a few things for Elex 2.

Anyway, I'm still enthralled with Division…. Love that game and gotta get back to exploring for more intel

 

[Dasale]

Skills description are a tiny detail and never in this case it should have quote anything about attribute requirement, it would make the game look awful.

Some skills description definitely misguide me, but few at the end, there was some ambiguity between skill level and character level, but well read I don't think there was ambiguity.

Many troubles come mainly from uncommon mechanisms, like meta skills for dialog check which is an excellent design but misguided me at first play, my fault.