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Comment by flkiwi | Hacker News Reader

Having just started (and slogged through the interminable intro piece that is tonally completely unrelated to the main game), I'm keeping an open mind, but it feels like this is scratching a very particular itch for a very particular group of gamers who have been largely ignored for a decade or more. It's not bad at all and I'm looking forward to seeing where it goes, but the turn-based approach feels _very_ old (in both good and bad ways), and the dialogue system..

"We leave tomorrow." click A "Huh" click A "We must drink tonight" click A "You're a bad influence" click A "Huh" click A

Someone will probably tell me this is the convention in the Final Fantasy style and that's FINE, and this would go a long way to explaining the reaction. It feels like a well above average game that is a GREAT game to a subset of gamers because they haven't had a game like this in so long.

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The game is actually quite innovative compared to the average game. The combat is turn based but it has a large dodging/parrying element akin to Sekiro. The limited consumables but being refreshed on resting at a flag(bonfire), and flask also seem directly inspired by FROMSoftware games. The ability to use your other party members when other ones die feels fresh and makes it feel like there are no "never used" party members. The aiming option in fights feels like it draws from P5. They turned the limit break mechanic into kind of a party super meter, which I'm sure has been done before but feels fresh.

The dialogue is actually humerous(which is unusual for a game), the story is mysterious and intriguing, the music is great. Interesting take that this is average or derivative and just appealing to a certain type of gamer--can't say I agree.

Again, I didn't say it was average and in fact went out of my way to say that I felt like it wasn't average at all but that it was perhaps less groundbreaking than the excitement for it lets on because it appears to share traits with a particular genre that has been neglected for open world games. I also didn't say "derivative" but I would note that, for every feature you're listing as innovative, you're providing an example of where the mechanic can already be found. And, from my perspective that's *perfectly fine*, but it also contextualizes the game as more of a loving homage than genuinely groundbreaking.

> "We leave tomorrow." click A "Huh" click A "We must drink tonight" click A "You're a bad influence" click A "Huh" click A

Good, makes me want to play the game more. As someone that likes to pay attention to story and dialogue, I like to be able to control the flow of dialogue.

In a lot of cases, games like this give plenty of options for dialog speed and automatic continuation. As long as those things are in place, it seems like it should make everyone happy at relatively little development effort. I'm split on this. If there are voice overs, it's insufferable to make me press a button to continue every single line. If it's text only, it feels more natural.

There's few things I dislike more in 3d games than selecting dialogue flow. Especially if there are important hint inside. Cinematic scenes should be a quick break from the flow of the game, but those feels more like reviewing forms. Either gives me a proper cinematic, or a journal/note/description thing for me to read.

I don't mind if there's meaningful choice that can affect later gameplay, but clicking through lines of dialogue feels like an unnecessary step. (Again, I'm completely open to the response that this is just how it is in this genre, but from a more general audience perspective it feels strange.)

Likely a business decision to save on VA billable hours via nostalgic RPG trope.

VA = "voice actor"? Because, if so, that's the funniest part: having to click A after someone responds, in spoken words as well as onscreen, "Hmmmm". It's almost charming, but it seemed deeply, deeply unnecessary to me. (Also just a quirk so far.)

You're right, I missed that you were talking about the click-through dialogue specifically for the special event dialogues

> or a journal/note/description thing for me to read

It's incredibly hard to please everyone. I don't like reading in games, the UX is awful. If I wanted to read I wouldn't have started a game in the first place, I read books not games.

Not saying your opinion is not valid, but just voicing that this might be good for other consumers.

For me - journals/notes/description and even video scenes - is something I cannot focus on, so ignore most of the time.

However selecting (even fake) choices keeps me engaged and more "role playing" as if I am saying those lines and live through the dialogue.

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