Shadowrun Returns

I finished Shadowrun Returns this afternoon, and while it is hardly one of the greatest games of all time, I really liked it. I thought they did a good job of capturing the feel of Shadowrun fiction. One of the nicest things about the game was the length. It feels like it is rare to find a isometric, turn-based RPG that clocks in under 40 hours. I estimate I finished Shadowrun in 10 hours or less. It isn't that I don't enjoy the sprawling epics, but it is hard to get a game started when the estimated time to completion is 80 hours. It was also nice to play a game where there is not really any filler story, it moves along at a good pace with only a few, quick side quests.

The story is nothing special, but it isn't completely predictable. It was enough to keep me interested. The combat was good, although it was probably a bit too easy. I really liked the way they integrated netrunning into regular combat. This is one of those things that just works better on a computer in my experience. In all the combat was good, tactical fun, somewhat akin to the old XCOM games in feel. The world is not very deep, it is a hub game, you won't be doing any real exploring. But, that was actually a relief, not every game has to be a sprawling, open world time sink. The world was tailored to fit the tight story and to help keep up the pace.

If you have not played this, I suggest you do. I think you can play it on almost everything now, possibly even your microwave.

Comments

Hex Crawls

Those of you who have been reading this blog know that I have never run a megadungeon before. I have always used more realistic dungeon settings, keeping all underground areas to a minimum and keeping the over all size of castles and the like fairly small. There is another style of gaming I have never indulged in: the hex crawl. I have never seen hexes as discrete chunks of the map. I always just used them as a guide to find distance if they were present and not worrying about themif they were not. I have always taken a more continuous view of overland maps. This is another streak that will be ending with my upcoming OSRIC game. I will be using James M's Outdoor Map as a starting pont in my campaign. I will be heavily modifying it for my purposes but most of the features will stay the same. I will be adding my own versions of Castles Blackmoor and Greyhawk to the map. I have been struggling with how a hex crawl works. How do I know if they find features in the hex and isn't 5 m

Traveller: Session 5

This is part of an ongoing campaign. You can find the other sessions over on the sidebar. This session was run on October 27, 2022. This session contains secret communications between me and the individual players. This means that these recaps do not cover everything that happened in the session. I will be reporting only the information that all players had access to. 131-1116 After the council meeting ended, Nashu, Archduke Ishuggi’s chief of staff, pulled him aside. Following the revelation that Yuri Lang, the emperor’s would-be assassin, had been a member of Archduke Adair’s intelligence service and had been involved in a combined operation with Gateway Intelligence, she had the staff run overlap checks on all recent contacts. The goal was to determine if there were any more unexpected connections between people that could be a threat to Ishuggi or the emperor. She learned that, in 1113, Yuri Lang (“Baron Pazi”), Zurzi (Archduke Bzrk’s chief of st

Wilderlands: Session 36

This session was run on May 1 st , 2023 They continued heading east towards the beach with the rock rolling along beside them. They were not sure where they had washed ashore with respect to the various port cities on the coast, so the best plan was to reach the beach and then decide how to proceed from there. Around noon, the skies darkened and white flakes began to fall from the sky. As it was around 85 degrees, they realized that it could not be snow. It turned out to be ash. The ashfall was quickly mixed with a moderate rain. They discovered that the rain stung when it hit unprotected flesh and raised small red welts. Drex found shelter in a hollow beneath the roots of a large tree and they waited out the acid rain for a couple of hours before resuming their journey. They reached the water as it was getting dark and spent an uneventful night camped just off the beach. In the morning, they could see masts on the horizon to the north, but nothing to the so

Circle of Dar Janix

Search This Blog