I booted this game up with low expectations, needless to say i am incredibly pleasantly surprised , I remember having tried wasteland 2 early in its life and bouncing off of it.
Wasteland 3 Really does just a fantastic job of balancing the serious themes of the story with the more wacky and outsider humor. In this way i would describe this game as "Lutheran Fallout" It rejects the modern action oriented first person RPG design by giving a nuts to butts classic CRPG experience instead, the game takes place in an isometric perspective, with very xcom inspired combat, cover system, hit chances, etc.
What the game is really good at though is giving interesting permutations of the story and meaningfully different paths that the player's choices throughout meaningfully affect. These choices often lead to unique battles not seen if taking a different path. This is so refreshing as there are very few instances of being forced through the same situation with slightly different dialogue.
These battles rip the kitchen sink from the wall and brutalizes the player with it , on hard difficulty i was constantly being tasked to do the same; finding ways to exploit the games spiderweb of combat systems and mechanics to be able to overcome certain fights. Get deep enough into the weeds especially as a completionist there will be a vast toolbox of death dealing instruments to discover and upgrade. Spending the first half of the game scraping through encounters makes melting people in the mid game all the more satisfying
I also really enjoy how the game rewards the player for exploration; lots of neat unique weapons, armor, and gizmos to equip, customize, and discover. The best equipment is off the beaten path and the game has many paths that are very... Unbeaten
This game is not perfect however and the first set of issues arose from playing on series x,
The menu and ui is not made with controller in mind, by the hour mark i was realizing just how much faster the game would play out if i could just click on things, i won't exaggerate when i say that controller menuing added ~hours to the runtime vs the speed and precision of the mouse. Another console specific issue is how absolutely mercissley screwed up the targeting was at times, enjoy wrestling with the game to allow you to shoot the person you want to, oftentimes i'd have to reload a fight because of the game snapping to a target across the map when i had already been hitting another enemy spamming A to attack them, the game would send my targeting to the another mook 8 ap of movement away to attack because it decided in between my button presses to target a random enemy and screw the whole strategy.
Another issue with controller is any attack that arcs in a cone, you cannot move the camera when attempting to aim it, meaning that if its a long range weapon you will not be able to see your target on screen while trying to line it up or while the attack is being delivered, I really wish the camera centered on who was getting attacked because i would often not be able to see the results of my attacks. Denying the satisfaction of seeing the enemies blow up or vaporize while also denying critical information to make informed decisions about tactics.
The issues with the games controls really brings it down score and pacing wise ;75 hours could have been 60 (seriously)
there are also a few other nitpicks
-Hyper situational perks that have no use 95% of time (looking at you; pressure cooker, how many fucking cars did i even fight in this game? 3? Maybe ?)
-RNG based loot can play unintentional favorites leading to situations where certain party members embody a walking apocalypse, while the rest of the squad look like weeny hut jr. employees by comparison .
This game is awesome, do yourself a favor and play it with KBM. Controller is a straight up inferior experience
Wasteland 3 Really does just a fantastic job of balancing the serious themes of the story with the more wacky and outsider humor. In this way i would describe this game as "Lutheran Fallout" It rejects the modern action oriented first person RPG design by giving a nuts to butts classic CRPG experience instead, the game takes place in an isometric perspective, with very xcom inspired combat, cover system, hit chances, etc.
What the game is really good at though is giving interesting permutations of the story and meaningfully different paths that the player's choices throughout meaningfully affect. These choices often lead to unique battles not seen if taking a different path. This is so refreshing as there are very few instances of being forced through the same situation with slightly different dialogue.
These battles rip the kitchen sink from the wall and brutalizes the player with it , on hard difficulty i was constantly being tasked to do the same; finding ways to exploit the games spiderweb of combat systems and mechanics to be able to overcome certain fights. Get deep enough into the weeds especially as a completionist there will be a vast toolbox of death dealing instruments to discover and upgrade. Spending the first half of the game scraping through encounters makes melting people in the mid game all the more satisfying
I also really enjoy how the game rewards the player for exploration; lots of neat unique weapons, armor, and gizmos to equip, customize, and discover. The best equipment is off the beaten path and the game has many paths that are very... Unbeaten
This game is not perfect however and the first set of issues arose from playing on series x,
The menu and ui is not made with controller in mind, by the hour mark i was realizing just how much faster the game would play out if i could just click on things, i won't exaggerate when i say that controller menuing added ~hours to the runtime vs the speed and precision of the mouse. Another console specific issue is how absolutely mercissley screwed up the targeting was at times, enjoy wrestling with the game to allow you to shoot the person you want to, oftentimes i'd have to reload a fight because of the game snapping to a target across the map when i had already been hitting another enemy spamming A to attack them, the game would send my targeting to the another mook 8 ap of movement away to attack because it decided in between my button presses to target a random enemy and screw the whole strategy.
Another issue with controller is any attack that arcs in a cone, you cannot move the camera when attempting to aim it, meaning that if its a long range weapon you will not be able to see your target on screen while trying to line it up or while the attack is being delivered, I really wish the camera centered on who was getting attacked because i would often not be able to see the results of my attacks. Denying the satisfaction of seeing the enemies blow up or vaporize while also denying critical information to make informed decisions about tactics.
The issues with the games controls really brings it down score and pacing wise ;75 hours could have been 60 (seriously)
there are also a few other nitpicks
-Hyper situational perks that have no use 95% of time (looking at you; pressure cooker, how many fucking cars did i even fight in this game? 3? Maybe ?)
-RNG based loot can play unintentional favorites leading to situations where certain party members embody a walking apocalypse, while the rest of the squad look like weeny hut jr. employees by comparison .
This game is awesome, do yourself a favor and play it with KBM. Controller is a straight up inferior experience