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[indigo-cyclops]

I wanted to like these games, but the developers simply went over their heads. I'm not the sort of person who picks on games for niggles like polish. Many of my favorite games would be called "flawed gems", ambitious yet lacking in certain areas. These two games just failed at the implementation of every single gameplay concept, though. The shooting mechanics feel like I'm in a 90s corridor shooter from hell, the graphics look like the work of a DeVry student project, the quests are incredibly uninspired, the "dialogue choices" are as meaningless as Bioware's, but without the competent writing.

I can see what you mean about the writing, but I'm chalking it up to poor localization. I personally disagree about the uninspired quests, and I think this is an ambitious project (both games) that deliver some really fun, interesting gameplay. Yes it's buggy, but I think the game looks quite good for its obscurity, and probably budget/time/talent.

I think you're being too hard on it and expecting too much. EvilLore's disclaimer should have shown that these games aren't AAA and have problems, but are rewarding in the end. But again, I do see where you're coming from.

 

[subversus]

No they're pretty poorly written (perhaps even worse) in Russian. Sometimes hilariously bad.

 

[indigo-cyclops]

No they're pretty poorly written (perhaps even worse) in Russian. Sometimes hilariously bad.

Ha ha wow then that is just something... im surprised because I've played worse games by native speakers, in terms of writing and dialog.

 

[Sinatar]

Is there any way to force dialog forward? The text speed seems designed for illiterates or something.

 

[Diseased Yak]

Is there any way to force dialog forward? The text speed seems designed for illiterates or something.

Esc key skips forward on dialog.

I ended up getting Xenus 2. So far I'm really liking it, though it's hard as fuck. Just went up the road from the start village and got swarmed by armed bad dudes. Did help an old man out by swimming out and getting his shit from under water. Dude can't hold his breath for more than 10 seconds though it seems hah. Graphics are a mixed bag when pumped all the way up, but I'm liking what I'm seeing for the most part.

Definitely can see me sinking a lot of hours into it.

 

[Parham]

I just purchased The Precursors on GamersGate and it's downloading right now. Should I make any modifications to the game before I start?

 

[Munin]

This thread fizzled out pretty quickly. I'm guessing people realized the games aren't very good after all?

 

[-tetsuo-]

This thread fizzled out pretty quickly. I'm guessing people realized the games aren't very good after all?

Obscure PC games aren't exactly the most popular at GAF. I'm holding out playing it, hopefully by the time I come back the performance will be better.

 

[Kade]

Thanks for making this thread. I've played both games and recommended them to STALKER fans I know but most replied with shit along the lines of "This is too low budget for me".

 

[firehawk12]

Strange that I missed this thread. One of the boxes has Maxim on the cover? :lol

 

[Ceebs]

This thread fizzled out pretty quickly. I'm guessing people realized the games aren't very good after all?

Been busy with other games. I'll dig into Precursors sometime sometime next month probably.

 

[EviLore]

Played some more of White Gold. Knocked out a couple quests, exploring underwater caverns and securing an automobile from paramilitaries. Good stuff.

Did anyone figure out how to patch these games and still
maintain the localization and everything?

Going to try this now:

it's also possible to use the russian 1.1 patch on top of this version...but remember to backup the resource.qrc english text file from the game's root folder.

 

[EviLore]

Yeah, russian patch appears to work fine. Didn't have to replace any files to retain the english localization, it looks like.

 

[Brannon]

I play it in bits and pieces, but as soon as that sound bug is fixed, I'll be on it hardcore.

 

[Baloonatic]

The sound effect bug has made me put it aside for a while. What exactly causes it?

 

[Sinatar]

Yea the 1.1 patch didn't fix the sound bug for me either.

 

[-tetsuo-]

Yeah, russian patch appears to work fine. Didn't have to replace any files to retain the english localization, it looks like.

Does it improve performance from what you can tell? Fix the sound dropping out?

 

[Zenith]

Have you tried playing the game with sound hardware acceleration disabled?

 

[Alex Connolly]

I just purchase The Precursors on GamersGate and it's downloading right now. Should I make any modifications to the game before I start?

I'm nabbing Precursors tonight, cannot wait! Eastern Bloc gaming is awesome, they seem to roll with either a deadly seriousness, or a terrific smirking humour. Or both.

 

[Brannon]

Have you tried playing the game with sound hardware acceleration disabled?

How do you do that? I can't find that option anywhere in the menu screens, unless it has to be done via config or something like that?

 

[Dick Laurent]

I got the sound bug aswell now. this fix by sundogIII worked for me, at least temporarily. not exactly sure how it did anything though, I didn't bother trying to do [edit: trying to do the lines one at a time] them one at a time.

"In VIDEOOPTIONS.ini change these values to the following:

SMOOTHFPS=1
RENDERLAG=1
LIMITFPS=60
DISABLE_ROTATION_MOTION_BLUR=1"

make sure it's the videooptions.ini located in c:\users\public\public documents\white gold\ini and not the one in the game directory. I changed it back again and the sound is still working fine, so uh.

the game.ini to change game field of view is in that directory aswell, someone asked about that earlier. it's standard_fov and mechanical_fov at the very end of that. mechanical is vehicles.

 

[Zenith]

How do you do that? I can't find that option anywhere in the menu screens, unless it has to be done via config or something like that?

You do it in control panel.

 

[Dick Laurent]

hehe. just did the diving mission again, for the.. divers. done it before, but man diving and underwater stuff in games is scary as shit. anyone seen the monster the divers talk about? I'm not sure it exists, I've done this mission before and the underwater caves are confusing as fuck, so if there is anything else down there I probably would have ran into it by now. I've thought maybe also it just is a shark or something outside the caves in open water by the sunken ship or something, but I've not seen anything there either. my favourite part of this game is the underwater stuff though, just jacking a boat and exploring underwater. probably helps that anything underwater really fucks me up. it's terrifying. hehe.

the audio went to shit again while I've been playing today (been playing pretty much all day). and it seems to fix itself every time I screw around in the videooptions.ini. turning on smoothfps alone isn't optimal though, but it doesn't seem to matter a lot which of those things I turn on and off. only buffering 1 frame probably helps performance over 2, not sure. been playing with first person field of view of 80 now, seems to me this is the optimal fov. vehicle fov also at 80.

damn, this game is awesome.

edit: I've also been fooling around with the russian version aswell and seeing which version works better with what file combo. I think I definitely prefer this newer gfi english text translation to the one wesp extracted from the russian version. but the russian version of the game is a lot more stable and seems to run better/smoother. there must be a ton of audio missing from the english version, the russian sound file is 1.8 gigs and the english one is 350 megs. hehe. it's probably all voiced stuff, walking around in the russian version you'll get random villagers just talking among each other all the time while you walk around, not just while talking to people. but sadly the russian sound file doesn't work if you just drop it into the english install directory. the overall optimal game install is probably the patched russian version with the gfi english text file dropped in, although I do enjoy what little there is of the awful english voiceover, and there are bugs in the text again that I think wesp fixed in the other translation. hopefully he'll do a new text patch for the newer version aswell. I don't think he's bought this version of the game yet though, doesn't look like it on the deepshadows forum.

 

[Zenith]

remember to press Use on the clams in the water caves (and anywhere else) to get them to open so you can take their pearls.

 

[Dick Laurent]

yep yep, clamming for pearls is awesome. have you got any good places to search? it seems mostly clams are around the beaches where there are npcs, and not so much completely random places. but I've never really explored that much randomly underwater on the map, mostly just around the three big islands.

 

[Alex Connolly]

Spent only a few minutes with Precursors, but damn it runs smoothly and damn does it look great! Hoping I can find the Russian language files, because that'd be the only thing I'd change from the localised version.

 

[Dick Laurent]

you mean the russian voice audio? it probably isn't compatible back to this version, the xenus2 white gold one isn't.

 

[Alex Connolly]

Fair enough, and it's not like the English VO is unbearable...I've just gotten so used to the STALKER voice work - English VO notwithstanding - and would like to enjoy it at least aurally in the game's mother tongue.

 

[indigo-cyclops]

Yeah, russian patch appears to work fine. Didn't have to replace any files to retain the english localization, it looks like.

Lore did you just let everything overwrite or did you keep the resources file in tact?

I gotta startup Precursors again real soon..

 

[Dick Laurent]

Fair enough, and it's not like the English VO is unbearable...I've just gotten so used to the STALKER voice work - English VO notwithstanding - and would like to enjoy it at least aurally in the game's mother tongue.

if you want to spend more money though, the yuplay.ru version is pretty cheap ($8, russian title is Предтеч&#1080. you could just copy over the english text file from this version to that and play with russian audio, I just tested it now and it works fine. when I take a break from xenus2 I'll definitely play it like this.

the drm on the yuplay version is starforce (not the crazy old type with the driver install) with 3 activations which can be uninstalled.

 

[indigo-cyclops]

if you want to spend more money though, the yuplay.ru version is pretty cheap ($8, russian title is Предтеч&#1080. you could just copy over the english text file from this version to that and play with russian audio, I just tested it now and it works fine. when I take a break from xenus2 I'll definitely play it like this.

the drm on the yuplay version is starforce (not the crazy old type with the driver install) with 3 activations which can be uninstalled.

hmm, might have to try this. There's almost no audio in my games and its just weird at this point. I'd love to hear VO during the NPC conversations as well.

 

[Alex Connolly]

I can manage rumbling through with the silent NPCs. Tell you what, though...I foresee a nice big fan mod for this game at some point. It's great fun as is, and much more jovial and tongue-in-cheek than I expected, but a tightening up of the script would go a long way.

Still, fantastic game thus far and runs on maximum settings on my HP Pavilion DV6. It's been a long time since I've been able to play a game at such settings. Gorgeous.

I was out doing the

Spoiler

beacon deployment mission

and was buzzing home in my jalopy when I got attacked and killed by some strange gorilla-like beasts. They bashed and flipped my crappy buggy and that was the end of me. Awesome stuff!

 

[Dick Laurent]

RPS impressions on Precursors http://www.rockpapershotgun.com/2011/01/04/wot-i-think-precursors/

 

[Alex Connolly]

I hope folks are enjoying either as much as I'm enjoying Precursors. Jank, for sure, but great fun and undoubtedly the biggest contender for a slew of mods down the road. An upgrade to diversify character models would be a nice start. I'd take that first over the NPC voice issue - but I wouldn't say no to that one, either!

Got savaged by

Spoiler

sabre-tooth dogs

on the second main mission from Reedtiger, twas glorious. Moreover, I blew a heap of my cash on trying to upgrade my assault rifle! Nabbed the module, then apparently wasn't proficient enough to attach it.

Goodbye, what, 800 credits? Precursors, you're a harsh mistress.

 

[Dick Laurent]

upgrading your lockpicking once you can find a ton of crap around the first city to sell for armor/weapons, and a lot of the locked boxes will have lockpicks in them aswell, so you're not going to run out of lockpicks, rather you'll gain a bunch. also use the standard auto rifle on the dogs in that mission, the shotgun is stupid against them even though that's what you receive for it hehe. upgrading the reloading speed is very useful there aswell.

also, let me tell you how I move around in both precursors and xenus2. I jump everywhere, but not only jump, if you barely tap the run button just as you jump you can zoom around on foot very well. almost q3a speed on this, and you hardly use up any stamina at all for each jump. very useful to do if you get overwhelmed by those dogs early on, you can just outrun them. and also around the random spawning monsters in the wasteland outside the first city. it's useful to be a bit of a monkey overall everywhere in these games. hehe, and it's fun too

I put a bunch of screenshots in the full screen pc screenshots thread earlier, take a look. it's such a beautiful game http://www.neogaf.com/forum/showthread.php?p=25254873#post25254873

 

[Alex Connolly]

Thanks for the tips, Dick. I'll check out that thread, too. The more people see of both, the better!

 

[Dick Laurent]

Got savaged by

Spoiler

sabre-tooth dogs

on the second main mission from Reedtiger, twas glorious. Moreover, I blew a heap of my cash on trying to upgrade my assault rifle! Nabbed the module, then apparently wasn't proficient enough to attach it.

oh forgot to comment on this, there is a technician in the marketplace next to the spaceport and he's got 100% rate on upgrades. so that's a much better solution in the beginning to upgrade weapons. it costs 100 credits per part at that guy. he also sells the sniper rifle [edit: I guess they all sell the sniper rifle actually, the inventory at the vendors maybe is adjusted to your level, not sure]

 

[Alex Connolly]

Master Laurent, you're now my official guide to these brilliant games. I'm looking forward to getting my assault rifle modded without the sheer embarrassment of watching my newly purchased module crumble in my hands in front of the vendor.

 

[lastplayed]

Downloaded Precursors tonight and soon discovered the flickering ATI screen bug. But after a quick search and fix I was back into it.

From what I've seen so far it looks great and runs beautifully, although I can't seem to get any AA options to work (seems to be a trend with my card).

It's a shame there's so little English dialogue though, even more background noises would be nice, it gets so quite when talking to people.

But the hilarious translations make up for that, I think my favourite so far is "After that I couldn't feel any smell at all for a year." :lol

 

[Alex Connolly]

We need to spread the word of these glorious games, Last! Poimandres just gifted me Xenus 2, so I'll be jumping between Precursors, Xenus 2 and STALKER for my Ukrainian kick. The sound issue is a big one, but also a little more in the way of cleaning up interfaces and perhaps a few tooltips? Anyway, awesome game.

A Precursors anecdote.

I went to Casterley's bar last night and talked with one of the clientele...he drunkenly offered to

Spoiler

spill the beans on a treasure cache if I drank a few brews with him. After slamming them, he told me to get and come back when I was a real drinker...because goddamn, I was all over the shop then. Most drunk I've ever been in the game. Stumbling around, trying to get out the door was a mission in itself!

Think I'll stick to the hallucinogens. Bugger his stash!

 

[Flunkie]

Oh hey what's this? I just bought both of these?!

Yep, I'm in for a treat, it seems like.

I should start The Precursors first, no?

 

[Alex Connolly]

Ah, Flunk old friend, you're in for a treat. I dunno, actually...Precursors is apparently more stable. But you can't go wrong with either, I'm sure.

 

[Flunkie]

Ah, Flunk old friend, you're in for a treat. I dunno, actually...Precursors is apparently more stable. But you can't go wrong with either, I'm sure.

I have never got a chance to say it until now, but congrats.

 

[lastplayed]

We need to spread the word of these glorious games, Last! Poimandres just gifted me Xenus 2, so I'll be jumping between Precursors, Xenus 2 and STALKER for my Ukrainian kick.

It's funny how they keep referring to themselves as "ex-USSR" on their website. Is it really that preferable to "Ukraine"?

edit - ah, I see it's when they're comparing themselves to the rest of the CIS.

But yeah, there really is something special about these games. I remember playing Boiling Point when it first came out and loving all its little quirks.

 

[Aon]

Played a whole bunch of precursors following the RPS write up. I just got to GLI and realised all the soldiers in the democratic union are not in fact men. at first I was a bit dismayed that the game has provided me information on these crazy aliens but now I'm enjoying the chance to write my own bad sci fi in my head during those lengthy hyperspace jumps

I'm sort of saddened by the number of planets which just kill you on approach though. I wonder if I'd feel like the world was bigger if there was just one system with all the "real" planets instead of many populated mostly with fake planets.

Are there any later narrative elements which take advantage of all those systems?

 

[Alex Connolly]

Played a whole bunch of precursors following the RPS write up. I just got to GLI and realised all the soldiers in the democratic union are not in fact men. at first I was a bit dismayed that the game has provided me information on these crazy aliens but now I'm enjoying the chance to write my own bad sci fi in my head during those lengthy hyperspace jumps

I'm sort of saddened by the number of planets which just kill you on approach though. I wonder if I'd feel like the world was bigger if there was just one system with all the "real" planets instead of many populated mostly with fake planets.

Are there any later narrative elements which take advantage of all those systems?

I really do hope some modding project down the line tightens up the script a little, but without losing the flavour of the dialogue. Oh, and hopefully an option to fast-track dialogue. I play at a leisurely pace as is, but since the background music is almost mute during conversation, being able to hit a button to skip to the next section would be great.

I'm so busy just exploring on Goldyn that my sole venture to Sunax has been the extent of my intergalactic journey!

EDIT: And I'm wondering what Evilore is doing with Killzone 2 when he's got both of these kicking about on his hard drive! :lol

EDIT 2: Thanks Yak! I reread the two pages of this thread and came across the ESC key fast-track dialogue thing. Cheers.

 

[Flunkie]

Started with White Gold.. audio problems right off the bat. No weapon or vehicle sounds, and background music is the only thing I hear playing.

Woo. Liking the game so far, though. Got Cowboy as my first Perk, and while the aiming sensitivity could be turned up, it's fairly enjoyable. There's nothing more I love in a game than a good iron sight. I wouldn't necessarily say it's good here, but satisfying. Well, it wou be anyways, if I could hear my own damn gun go off.

 

[Alex Connolly]

Great timing, Flunk. I booted up White Gold for the first time just then, too. Didn't have quite the sound issues you had, but there are some some hilarious lack of synced audio at times. Nabbed the Cowboy perk as well for my first perk upgrade. Kinda want to do the Evilore route and sink a few points into my swimming capabilities to explore undersea locales, too.

But glorious. Jank of the highest order, glorious and wonderful.

Going between Precursors and White Gold is a breeze, considering they've pretty much the same interface, controls and whatnot! Keep me posted on your progress, Flunk!

 

[Alex Connolly]

Flunk, I ended up having your weapon sound issue...but then, after reloading a save a few times, it fixed itself! Looking forward to a patch, though.

EDIT: Sound issues aside, my Xenus 2 update:

So far, I've

Spoiler

wandered around, fought a barracuda with a knife under the sea, talked to a guy who had a car accident dodging a "chupakabra" and hitting a giant UFO-enhanced spider - a spider that ate a baboon, no less - as well as got someone's car back for them, taken a job getting photos of a smuggler's camp, fell of a cliff and parachuted down into the water, taken a job from said smugglers, driven a slow smuggler's boat over to another island in the dead of night, mistaken for an enemy and knifed my contact and his henchmen, failed the mission, taken a zodiac inflatable and roared back to the first island. And shot a cobra.

All within the space of about half an hour.

 

[Dick Laurent]

A guy on the DeepShadows forum put up a program a couple of days ago to extract the .GRP resource files from Precursors, so that will hopefully help modding quite a bit. Actually, not sure if it isn't just a virus yet. Hehe.