Anarchic Fox on 20/12/2023 at 10:12
I am a freedom seeker, a friend of the speakers of the forest. I found Roadwarden by searching for games similar to Disco Elysium, and Roadwarden is the game that I wanted Disco Elysium to be.
Two thirds of the way through the game I was assessing my finances and gathering a team to tackle a grand adventure with tenuous relevance to my character's duties as a roadwarden. Then a character I respected asked me not to go, and so I didn't. A week later I was beaten to within an inch of my life, tied to my horse's saddle, and sent into the woods unconscious. Two days after that I was again beaten severely, this time in the common room of a luxurious inn. Yet I felt a deep satisfaction with everything that happened those two days: one beating marked a victory, and the other a noble though naive endeavour.
Roadwarden is a low-numbers RPG in the spirit of Paper Mario, with minimal but hard-won progression. The game's three archetypes are Fighter, Mage... and Scholar. The character sheet tracks both combat and sewing ability. You have a single suit of armor for the entire game, a leather gambeson, which I grew to respect and cherish. There are melee weapon upgrades, whose value all pale in comparison with that of a block of soap. Every combat encounter is a distinct vignette, something like a hundred in total. Its Journal makes other games' quest logs look primitive in comparison. Its text is solid and occasionally inspired, its characters rich and nuanced. It, um... will teach you new vocabulary.
I've played the game once. It will be some time before I feel ready to play it again as a different class, because the game I played felt so true to who I am. My experiences reflect those of the Scholar class, whose chief abilities are literacy and alchemy. I suspect the other classes play much differently. I had already planned to buy a shield next time I went to a Renaissance festival. Now I also plan to buy a gambeson.
Sulphur on 20/12/2023 at 11:09
Having never been to a renaissance festival, I feel compelled to ask: is it a normal thing to dress up in preparation of getting the tar beaten out of you?
Roadwarden is on the list... let's see, the Steam category I have filed it under is 'Now'. What this means is that I will play it after I have played the game that precedes it, which is, lessee, Tunic. But before Tunic is Bully, and before Bully is Asscreed Origins, and before Asscorgis is my innate inability to focus on what I want to be doing in the present moment, like some sort of temporal version of Zeno's paradox where I have to decide what to do with the time but time passes as I decide, so by the time I do, the time is already gone, and so we must start over. Let us see.
Anyway, a haiku:
A roadwarden falls
Forest breathes green moss on a
journal updated
Thirith on 20/12/2023 at 12:50
It's also on my list (ironically also only after I'll be done with one of the more gargantuan Assassin's Creed games, though the end is in sight and the DLC will have to wait until much, much later), but the comparisons with Disco Elysium are a big reason why I'm a bit wary. Disco Elysium is one of my favourite games of all time, and I want to make sure not to expect something too similar and then feel disappointed because the game can't, and shouldn't, be Disco Elysium.
But hey, by the time I am actually done with AC Valhalla, I may well have ended up a doddering old fool who's forgotten the last ten years of my life, and then my preferences and expectations should no longer be such a problem.
Anarchic Fox on 20/12/2023 at 13:24
Quote Posted by Sulphur
Having never been to a renaissance festival, I feel compelled to ask: is it a normal thing to dress up in preparation of getting the tar beaten out of you?
Wearing costumes is fun! :D
Quote:
Anyway, a haiku:
A roadwarden falls
Forest breathes green moss on a
journal updated
Oh, that's good.
Quote Posted by Thirith
It's also on my list (ironically also only after I'll be done with one of the more gargantuan
Assassin's Creed games, though the end is in sight and the DLC will have to wait until much, much later), but the comparisons with
Disco Elysium are a big reason why I'm a bit wary.
Disco Elysium is one of my favourite games of all time, and I want to make sure not to expect something too similar and then feel disappointed because the game can't, and shouldn't, be
Disco Elysium.
They're dissimilar. Disco Elysium's themes are lofty, Roadwarden's are homely. Disco Elysium's setting is quite fanciful, whereas Roadwarden's is grounded. In Disco Elysium the only physical need is sleep, but Roadwarden focuses much more attention on your body. Roadwarden has functional combat, Disco Elysium doesn't. So, my comparison to Disco Elysium also tells you that, as much as I enjoyed it, it wasn't what I hoped it would be. We discussed my reasons why over in its bespoke thread.
Aja on 20/12/2023 at 15:36
It's only seven dollars, so I'll give it a go! And unlike these losers I won't be playing through a giant Assassin's Creed game first. ��*♂️
Sulphur on 20/12/2023 at 16:02
No haiku for you! ���*�
Also, I will have things to say about Asscrogans shortly, because I can't just have 80+ hours of this scooped into my brainpan without it slowly oozing its way out my ears somehow.
