Kingdoms of Amalur

[Yoda]

This game is far and above all others in terms of animated doors

[PaleRobbie]

Really liking Amalur so far.  The combat and loots keeps me coming back, and the number of quests is simply staggering.  I can see why some people don't like it, but I'm liking it way more than Skyrim right now.

[Fyle]

It seems that the problems with Amalur will come end game when you can easily cut things down in one swipe.
I'm enjoying it more than Skyrim in some ways, but it doesn't put me in awe in the same way. For the most part it's more good old fun as far as hack and slashing mobs and cycling thru loot. But, it doesn't put you there in that world.

I'm now 20 hours in and going strong. Gonna make a character to max out each skill set ( finess/might/magic ) .

Since performance cut Skyrim short for me, I'm really appreciating how smooth it performs all round.

[Yoda]

In the first village, did anyone find the Fae's moans of pain to be... orgasmic?

[PaleRobbie]

I think the characters are rather flat, but I really like the ideas in the world.  The idea of the Fae just reenacting situations over and over again is really interesting, especially given the main character's ability to change fate.  The groundwork for a truly awesome world is here, and I'm hoping that we get to see more things from Amalur in the near future. 

[zMKnightz]

In the first village, did anyone find the Fae's moans of pain to be... orgasmic?

I did... told the wife I don't know why she's laying on the ground but she seems happy about it.

[D-Rider]

I have absolutely no idea why people are comparing this to Skyrim of all things.  If anything, this game is a refined Dragon Age 2.  Push a button, awesome shit happens, except now you're doing it fantasy Ireland instead of some grimdark shanty town.  Both games are fun enough to actually play, but they both suffer from weak narratives.  Amalur suffers less as the main story and most of the side quests are mostly inoffensive and generic as opposed to offensive and generic DA2.

I get that Skyrim is the latest big bully on the block for some RPG players, but at least make a comparison that makes fucking sense.

[Kevadu]

I'm going to have to completely disagree.  While I don't think the Skyrim comparison is perfect by any means, this game is still a lot more like Skyrim than it is like Dragon Age 2.  Dragon Age 2 was a completely narrative and character driven game that focused on telling a story not just in the main quest but also in the relationships with your party members and even in many of the sidequests.  The game suffered (a lot...) from the reuse of dungeon locations, but I actually liked its storytelling.  Most importantly, the NPCs were actually developed and had personalities.

Amalur puts pretty much zero emphasis on characters (to the games loss, I feel).  The people you meet are nothing more than icons on a map who hand out quests.  You really feel like they don't serve any other purpose.  And while it's not quite as open as something like Skyrim, it's still a big open world that feels closer to those sorts of games than it does to Dragon Age...

[Yoda]

Does anyone else experience some weird frame rate hesitation during attacks? Not even exclusively during combat, but doing barrel busting as well.

[Fyle]

Does anyone else experience some weird frame rate hesitation during attacks? Not even exclusively during combat, but doing barrel busting as well.

I have an occasional 1 second freeze at random times. I'd say about once every 30 min. to an hour. No complete freeze or serious slow down yet in my 20 hours playing on a fairly new PS3.

[Britton]

Has anyone run into any big bugs/glitches yet? I'm about 7 hours in and haven't found any, but I've found DOZENS of threads through Google about people lsoing the ability to fast travel because of one buggy quest, some others have experiences an area in and around one town where almost every quest os buggy and a few others. It'd really suck to run across one of these.

[daschrier]

I think the best comparison is the customization of Skyrim with the gameplay design like that of european games such as Divinity 2.

Game is very fun, wish it was a bit harder, even when playing on hard. Only died a few times when I was playing carelessly.

[bigdeath]

I honestly find Skyrim's combat a bore and its quests are not any better than Reckonings. In fact, the Radiant quest system I find far worst than Reckonings quests. Some of the side quest are quite enjoyable mini stories such as the widow in webwood.

@ D-Rider: I think your off calling Reckoning DA2. It has far more in common with Skyrim. Both are heavily focused on the open ended nature of the game and the story and specific characters suffer for it. Skyrim's main story doesn't stand out anymore than this game and in both most NPCS have no development and are nothing more than quest givers.

The reason the story and characters seem so empty is because the game is not focused on character development. With the huge amount of content, storyline and character development (if there is any) will suffer.

DA2, being a Bioware game is heavily focused on its characters. In fact, its more focus on its characters than even its story. Most who enjoy the game like it because of the character focus, e.i. All that dialogue between the characters.

Its as if your saying if a game actually has good fast pace exciting combat than its a dumb down game. I'm am continually amazed at how the elder scroll games get away with their crappy combat system. It makes the game repetitive and boring after a while. Worst still, Reckoning shows that there is no reason an Open World RPG can't have a great combat system.


That said, the game is a bit too easy even on hard but the game is very dependent on equipment. If you just use generic white unupgraded armor/weapons you will get plenty of challenge in this game on hard. If the game gets too easy just switch to using crappier equipment. It makes a LARGE difference.

P.S.

I love how you can just respec you character at anytime for a low cost. So instead of making a new character you can just switch from Warrior to Mage no problem in the middle of the game if you want to see what a high level character of each class is like without starting the game over.

I have no idea why Skyrim doesn't let your respec your perks but I love how Respecing in Reckoning is both easy and cheap.

[Yoda]

There's almost TOO much loot. Before you exit the tutorial dungeon you upgrade your leg armor at least 3 times alone.

[zMKnightz]

There's almost TOO much loot. Before you exit the tutorial dungeon you upgrade your leg armor at least 3 times alone.

Depends on your character type. The tutorial has 3 armor sets... base mage, rogue, and warrior.