Shadowrun: Dragonfall - Director's Cut

ABSOLUTELY Brilliant game!! The Storyline, combat and overall atmosphere made it one the Games of the Year and my FAVORITE RPG of 2015.... Gives me goosepimple thinking how good it is. I wish Harebrained Schemes would make another Shadowrun game in the same vein because the knocked it out of the park with this game!

I loved Returns and the one starts off with a bang, and has one of my favorite video game characters [Eiger]. Eventually you set into a rhythm of taking quests, going around to everyone in town to check if anyone has something more to say, and remembering the different shops to look for upgrades at. The quests start to loose focus and feel forgettable, even when the writing of them is good, because it just won't have a strong enough connection to the story. Then I hit a brick wall of a difficulty spike mission. The first one felt more real, and had a better flow overall. I warn against the people who tell you to skip Shadowrun Returns, I think it is a good deal better than this one.

Has all the ingredients to make for a great game but needs about 2-3 extra layers of polish. Even though the combat is rather disappointing, it did manage to draw me in and be a bit addictive. It depends on the mood I guess. I fondly remember the bad ending as an awesome thing I missed (since I wanted to pass the speech checks, and wasn't very familiar with the lore, or paying attention to the cryptic hints of Absinthe), but on second playthrough it seemed cartoonish and abrupt. But was I glad I brought my loyal dog along :)

A very linear RPG-lite style game. You do get to create a custom character but the world is tiny and boring. It feels very static. For example, NPC's generally dont move except those you fight and there is not enough combat and its very rudimentary. I did some reading into the game before playing and the posts made it sound like the game is hard... it isnt and no, you dont need to be a great thinker to win. For instance, you are not supposed to be able to kill the boss in the 1st level, and rather, you are supposed to wait a few turns and then run away. In my very 1st play-through, without even knowing how anything works aside from cover, I was able to take him down (he basically runs away)... I wasnt even trying... All I did was send continuously flank him and he went down fast. I used the summons on the tattoo guy and a drone for decoys. The next 5 missions were also a laugh when it came to combat as were the "matrix" missions. It felt like a game for kids. That said a few missions had no combat at all. Just talk to NPC A then do something at point B and talk to NPC C etc. That said, they did try to write a good backstory to the NPC's though the plot was nothing special. That said I just couldnt get myself to play it after about 15 hours. Its just too easy, slow and boring. Some people compare this to old infinity engine games... it has no relation. I replay BG, NWN or PST every year (at least once with new mods usually using new builds). They are great and tons of fun. This is not at their level. Other compare it to XCOM and although combat is similar, its too limited. In XCOM you have a z-axis (height), and actual 3D (you can run behind cover in any angle). This game has a fixed camera thus you can only take cover in one angle. You also cant destroy cover as far as I can tell. So lets just call this a 90s XCom-lite style game.

A serviceable RPG at best the combat is okay, the story is good but the game engine is clunky and awkward you have to be really precise about where your cursor is and where you click. Numerous times I clicked on a NPC only to have my character run towards them instead of attacking, this goes for movement as well, trying to get a character to run behind cover and then bam they are one square away and exposed. There is an over reliance on combat and not enough actual roleplaying. You can't customise your teammates, you inventory is severely limited, certain fights suffer from difficulty spikes. I have never seen my team go first all enemy teams get the first move and always seem to have the drop on you. The world is static and bland which does the tabletop version a great disservice. I keep reading that this one was an improvement over Shadowrun Returns but I can see it.