I’m not reading your spoiler, but good to know there’s another solution when I eventually replay this.
Just to report back for anyone else interested, I did pick it up and I feel like the load times are not great but serviceable on the Switch Lite. They annoy me a little bit, but overall not enough to take me out of the game.
I installed this about a year or so ago while reading this thread. Never played. Checked here to make sure the version I have is the latest super duper version (as if I’d know a difference since I haven’t played.)
Starting it up this morning. Even found my notebook mouse to use for it. My approach: just wing it. Do what feels right at the time. No worries of winning of losing, just doing. No reading “97 things I wish I had known before playing…” articles. No idea how to build a character, so a bit higher on the brain side and chose Charmer as my sig. The one thing I took from reading through is there’s no one “ideal” way to play your first game. So I’m just going to see what happens. Diving in now, wish me luck.
I support this, but please do yourself a favor and save regularly because it is possible to lose the game rather quickly and you don’t want to have to replay everything to try a different path.
Save often. That’s what you’d like me to think. I’m a hard boiled cop I think and that’s the oldest trick in the book. Well, the oldest one I can remember. Since I can’t remember anything past about 10 minutes ago.
I agree it is better to just go in blind. There are a couple mechanical things that weren’t obvious to me at first. The biggest is that for white skill checks, you can retry them when you increase the skill involved or plot things can unlock them to try again. So early on there’s definitely no reason to worry about missing a check. Sometimes it’s useful to miss them.
When I started out I was hesitant to try the low chance ones and that can stunt your progress.
If you are going to do a low % check, make sure you have some healing items on hand, though. I died a bunch early on from that
A lot of people died in the first room because there is a skill check there that can cause damage right at the start of the game so if you have 1 hit point…RIP.
There is also a non-standard game over here. Instead of shooting the strap, you can instead aim the gun at Cuno’s sister and shoot her.
55% off on Steam right now, and an update with new achievements and a few secrets to find.
I was going to make a joke about the original major update being a “Mostly Final Cut” but I’m just happy to see more content since I did install it when that original big update dropped and still have yet to launch it - now I have even more reason to give it a second replay (not like I needed the incentive, but here it is).
For people who aren’t allergic to Epic, it’s 10 currency cheaper with the Coupon in there.
It’s a little surprising that this game has been out for well over two years, and yet there is a mistake on the very first screen. The text says “conscience,” but the narrator says “conscious,” and the word should clearly be “consciousness”. It happens again not long after, too.
English spelling is notoriously difficult. Not that it matters since it is really easy to read misspelled words.
“Only warm, primordial blackness. Your conscience ferments in it-- no larger than a single grain of malt.”
I agree the narrator mispronounces the word and consciousness would make sense, but so does conscience, given that the game is mostly about (re)constructing your moral belief system.
Too much a stretch. From the context which goes on from there it’s clear that consciousness is meant. Anyway, for a presumably non-native English writing staff the game is an astonishing achievement, miles better than basically anything else ever done in the medium.
DE is the perfect visual novel. Like the Dreadnaught to battleships before it, DE’s presentation kills the old flatland style of visual novel dead.
Not that the old style will go away, cuz they’re dead easy and cheap to make
I fell out of this game twice. Once during day one, and again on a different playthrough in Day 2. I just felt like I hit a wall with progress and then I was finding seemingly random people and places that wasn’t fitting my narrative. I really need to jump back in. It’s been months, so I’ll probably start yet again. Third time’s the charm?
Absolutely – you could drop the game into a Twine or Choice Of style game without losing a single mechanic, but the game never feels that way.
b-b-but muh “open-world RPG”
If you’re trying to get into the game again, here are some light mechanical spoilers that the game doesn’t do a great job of explaining:
- Passive checks, where your skills talk to you, are more important than active checks since they can give you new dialog options. You unlock 85% of the passive checks for a skill when you hit skill level 4. Getting skills to level 4 is much more consequential than almost anything else you can do with a skill point.
- Money stops being important on day 3. Until then save your money so you can pay for your room. You should be able to do this easily by picking up everything you see and selling some of it in the pawnshop on day 2.
- Despite what the game tells you there are almost no time limits. Feel free to do any sidequest, they all tie back into the main plot in weird ways and give you bonuses on a late game check.
Also, spoiler for an overpowered build if you want to make the game way easier:
- Art Cops, who have 4-6 Conceptualization and internalize Actual Art Degree early on, will get 40+ extra skill points over the course of the game. Plus, it’s a funny build.