Wasteland 2: Director's Cut

I enjoy the game but too many skills, not enough clarity on how to use them. Some dumb decisions like Field Medic skill can't stop a bleeding wound (which is literally what a field medic would do).

I lost interest mid-playthrough. Everything feels really flat and linear - both story and gameplay. It ends up being a turn-based combat simulator instead of an RPG.

The best of the games from the kickstarter renaissance period. A lot more fun than pillars of eternity.

It is an old-school RPG game like the first game of the series. However, bugs in the game are old-school level (you can’t see some skill checks from item and you need to use bar, annoying loading sound, visual bugs, people who wouldn’t surrender when they have to, etc.). Plus, the game feels half-finished in many aspects and it is half-finished at some parts like impossible safes, losing the water mechanic at the second part without an explanation. Unfortunately, having a Director’s Cut without fixing these problems makes everything even worse. At least, they did not sell any DLCs. Even though game isn’t really old, there is no sneak option and you are forced to fight in most of the situations. Other than that, NPCs don’t comment on many important things in the game like arrested guy situation. Difficulty is another problem in this game. I played it at hardest difficulty but it was poorly designed in many ways. First of all, combat difficulty is horrible. Most of the weak enemies can one-shot you while your men are so weak and I do not why but you can’t hit someone from the same cover’s different side. Secondly, skill check spike is really bad. At one of the skill check requirements, requirement goes from level 2 to level 7. The other aspect of the skill check is randomization with critical errors. You will find yourself saving and loading occasionally, just to meet skill checks (after spending many skill points and giving up from combat skill points, definitely it isn’t rewarding). Numbers of hit ratio, success rate, armor rating and damage are all wrong by the way. Although, I had more damage and armor from enemies, they easily doubled my damage in most of the situations and I failed 5 times in a row at 90% (and many fun situations like this) at skill checks. At least, leveling via radio system is a good idea. However, there are many basic design mistakes like ambiguity of toaster items usage, lack of reaching to incapacitated team member’s inventory, easiness of miss clicking to loot at a dead body, rare weapon drop (you fight with people with armor, ammo and weapon but most of them don’t have those items), wrong cloth descriptions, inconsistent shooting before combat (your men can’t shoot at the same time), team members who don’t care about the mines they have seen, followers that you can’t dismiss or tell them to wait, movement at places like bridges, selling only high level health items which only people with high level medic skill can use at the end and fake walls (like Hollywood sewers). A lot of missions are inconsistent and don’t make sense and a lot of main choices are forced a bit much. [spoiler]I still don’t understand why the hell my helicopter crashed when it was out of fuel. With the style of writing, it feels too edgy. And there isn’t a lot of choices while some skills are useless most of the time. For example at the Canyon, when you meet the couple who are being robbed by raiders, you can’t say that they are with you or when you find a sick woman your doctor doesn’t even try to examine her, she/he just says she is too far gone. Other than that, if you kill people at Canyon without leaving survivors monks can learn about it magically. Plus, there are many annoying things like the prison event which game forces you to leave the area and punish you for it. Unfortunately, game depends so much on surprises in combat which becomes annoying quickly. By the way making every character model shredded like there isn’t any food problem or anything in a post-apocalyptic world is a great idea. It really helps with immersion. And cannibals are people who have pigs just in front of their doors, it makes sense, right? Of course, you can’t warn Citadel after the antagonist tells you all of his plans and saying he will attack there tomorrow.[/spoiler] I do not know why they added many different mechanics while changing or deleting the existing mechanics instead of fixing the game. There are quirks, cutscenes, voice overs, graphical improvement and precision strike ability (which is useless most of the game at higher difficulties; because your rangers are blind). The UI at Director’s Cut is really bad. You can’t see the water radiation suit you have and charisma haven’t explained properly. Other than that, energy weapons are useless in this version. So, try it if you do not have any decent RPG to play, this game is pretty mediocre.

LİAR!!!! NO TURKISH LANGUAGE SUPPORT

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6 / 10. Good ideas, less than ok implementation. Wasteland 2 is something different in today's times as it focuses on something that I feel is often forgotten and namely: the plot. While it is cliched by today's standard and forced in some key points, it still delivers a solid and believable scenario. The atmosphere is there. The writing is good. The CNPCs react naturally to the environment and events so the atmosphere is very immersive. There is, sadly a big and forced letdown: the writer forces the idea that there's no good ending to your actions, and in certain event you are deprived of the logical answer just because you should not be able to get the good ending. This is quite questionable and brakes the player immersion. Sadly these things are the only things that are way above the average, because the gameplay is as generic as it gets for a modern-day TBT (and yes, this is mostly a TBT with RPG elements). If you've played any modern TBT, then Wasteland 2 is just that. Basic AP based commands, a cover system that becomes pointless after the early beginning and a aimed / focus shot system which has such a laughable hit chance that it doesn't come into play before the first half of the game. So, the gameplay elements are not bad by themselves but there's something that limits the play field and slowly drags the game into limbo. This is balancing! The balancing in this game is atrocious and it affects every single aspect of the game. The most problematic balancing aspect is related to character development. The game is mostly made to resemble a CRPG. Well, in a typical CRPG, if you try to metagame (min-max in today's terms), you'll probably spend some hours looking over the stat system, come up with a personalized build and for the most part you're sticking to the plan. Well, Wasteland 2 is anything but typical, as attributes don't synergise with skills (with some exceptions) and useful perks are a few and with high requirements. Combining this with a forced mentality that there isn't a good choice, you'll end up with a mediocre yardstick character. I restarted the game once because I figured out that my build was too balanced for this game, but after a while in the second retry, I just gave up and made heavy use of a character editor to constantly shift my stats around, as the game has very big spikes in requirements. This has left me with a very bitter taste as I don't want to use editors to adapt to what should not have been present in the first place. Initiative is overemphasized and single-handedly destroys all the squad based tactics and character planning. Having less than a certain threshold means that your characters are likely to shoot once every 2-3 turns and this is just bad. Creating specialized characters means that all CNPCs will be underwhelming compared with the main team and become mules or skill characters with almost no contribution to combat. Incorporating leadership means you'll be loosing a specialized combat character and focusing on some weapon skills can be detrimental. The way experience is divided, means that you should get as many characters on your team as possible. This in turn slows the gameplay by a huge amount as having to manage every character is quite demanding. And that's one of my biggest gripes with this game: it's extremely slow. The combat is slow (and you'll probably skip the cover system altogether to reduce time), melee weapons drag it way to much, skill checks are made every couple of steps (containers, NPCs, minefields, etc.), rearranging your inventory and distributing items is a drag, and the list goes on. I wasn't expecting to spend 120+ hours playing this game. 60 hours of content would be more than enough. There's just too much wasted, non-quality time. I cannot end this review by talking about the slew of hardships that constantly chip away at your sanity and degrade enjoyment by a lot. We can list bugs, 0% or 11% chance of opening containers with level 10 skills, VAX and friendly fire, minefields, weight limits, junk items that are not junk (an the other way around), the inability to save mid-combat, hidden dialogue choices, removing a core CNPC midgame, constant encounters, etc. Wasteland 2 was one of the games that I was looking forward to so I went in with high expectations. Sadly, at the end of the game I was left with a long list of letdowns and frustrations so I cannot give this game a high mark. It has 8 to 9 potential, but under current conditions, I feel that the 6 mark is quite much. And this is the Director's Cut. I dare not imagine how buggy the base game is. Do I recommend this game? Yes! But only if you have a lot of time on your hands and generally are very patient and resistant to stress. It offers a good experience overall, but due to constant annoyances, chances are that you will put the game down somewhere before the second half of the game.

An unabashedly old-school RPG that actually has role-playing in it. What a weird idea! I've grown tired of the Fallout series just regurgitating the same content in an experience that feels a mile wide but an inch deep. The writing of Wasteland 2 vastly outstrips anything from the last several Fallout games, giving a setting that feels vibrant and alive despite being a post-apocalyptic wasteland. I actually care about the people in it, and it doesn't feel like I need to make choices just to have an optimal ending (especially because a lot of the choices are very gray without an ideal solution). It's a bit rough around the edges, yes, but I thoroughly enjoyed every minute of it and can't recommend it enough.

TLDR: If you haven't played Fallout or Fallout 2, and are thinking of giving Wasteland 2 a go - don't. Both of the original Fallout games are vastly superior, cheaper, and pack a metric ton more replay value. Wasteland 2 is essentially a love letter to Fallout 1 and 2, which is apparent in just about every aspect of the game, with perhaps one major exception - in Wasteland 2 you play as a ranger, and as such are expected to always do good. There is no karma system, no deliciously selfish quest or dialog options, which immediately takes the sting out of this scorpion's tail, and makes it feel like a toothless imitation. But it doesn't stop there, oh no. Wasteland 2 is a game entirely without polish - everything was made exactly to standard, and not a millimeter more. The dialog is samey and much too wordy, and you get an absolute minimum of opportunity to shape your character through dialog options, which are 99% the same for any set of characters. Doubly unfortunate, as the quest details are hidden in these winding paragraphs, and would you know - the quest log is basic at best, too. In general though, you go to a linear map, find baddies there that you kill, in order, then push a button, use an item, or bring something back with you. Minimal variations on fetch-quests that get predictable very fast. What about the combat, what you'll spend the majority of the game on? Where the challenge comes from? Well, aside from firing weapons, you can take cover and heal your guys with the appropriate skills - that's it. The cover system is terrible to behold - most solid walls or mountain faces offer no cover, while a knee-high cactus almost never fails to provide it. And there's no difference in cover either, not to mention that you weirdly get a bonus to hit even on the enemy side of the cactus. In most encounters it doesn't matter though, as most areas have no cover at all, giving you the choice of simply standing your guys in a row and firing until one side is dead, or playing cheesy and baiting the enemy through half a level, back to a couple of barrels that happen to count as cover. The atmosphere then. Surely a game that draws (let's not call it 'steals') from Fallout is oozing with atmosphere? It starts out that way, and the first four hours were really cared for - I even felt a little something for some characters that died, because it had been set up properly, and I felt responsible. After that - flatline. I never again had the feeling that my choices mattered, not once. BARE. MINIMUM. I really feel that this game is a special curiosity. I've never come across a game so unpolished, that still manages to fulfill the basic requirements of the genre. I could go on about how the few NPC illustrations are reused and mismatched to the descriptions, how confusing quest descriptions had me routinely turning to guides (where I saw many other commenters complain about the same), the poorly balanced and unintuitive skill system... apparently the game was buggy as hell when it came out too, which at least has been fixed - to a minimum. In conclusion, don't buy this game. If you really want the Wasteland experience, buy Wasteland 3 - I haven't tried it, but I can't imagine it's any worse than this. Oh, and if you think this review is too long, you will most certainly not like the (length of) dialog in Wasteland 2!