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[Moghjubar]

and somehow the magic just seems underwhelming. 

There were some magic spells that were like "why would you use this when theres a better option?".  In the end on my dorf mage I had blind and confuse and rotated them + some fire/lightning and had a shaman to haste me.  I had some interesting results with silence though, seems sometimes enemies would ignore me when I used it.

I did get kinda confused at first and picked up a bunch of the melee-mage shit and ended up not using it at all (and game was pretty lenient after I got blind on difficulty even on hardest difficulty)

[Deon]

I can't believe how much the backers on this game got cheated. I loved, -loved- the genesis version of the game. When the original kickstarter came out, I noticed a suspicious lack of actual gameplay details regarding, specifically, what sort of game they would design. (I even asked that question of them, via the kickstarter venue for doing so, and was basically told "A shadowrun game!!!!!!" in so many words... ... ...) So, being of a suspicious nature when it comes to my limited money, I did not back. I have backed many other projects, but the wierd, perpetual failed business history the guy in charge of it had, combined with the refusal to give any actual gameplay details, had me suspicious.

Now, it appears the gameplay is basically a PC port of a mobile game, released first so as to (hopefully) minimize fan backlash. Saves were nixed; obviously because saves wouldn't work as well as checkpoints on a tablet, there's no map screen, and the whole gameplay experience just screams "tablet squad tactical game!!!!" - which is, to be frank, what the game really is. It lacks any real balancing or depth by pc standards, but would be an amazing ipad/android game. Which is what it -really- is.

I feel bad for the backers. I can only hope that most of them enjoy the character creation tools. With people like Deon on the job, I'm sure that in a year or two, there will be better stuff out of the fans then anything the actual makers could come up with.

Good thing you were not cheated . I don't feel cheated either.

And I agree with your thoughts, almost ALL of this game's problems come from the fact that it's a tablet game, including limitations on editor. But it's okay, we already figured out how to hack item stats with hex editor and do other silly things. I am just glad that this game is released, rather than not.

[Neonivek]

almost ALL of this game's problems come from the fact that it's a tablet game

I am starting to think anytime a game title pops up and mentions that it is also on tablets... that you should reconsider.

[Bdthemag]

Am I the only one who thinks that the full $1,836,447 they got for this game wasn't entirely spent on the game? Honestly, it seems to me that the minimum of $400,000 was what the intended to spend on the game and the rest they just pocketed. This simply just does not feel like a 1.8 million dollar game. I'm not exactly calling them dishonest, because as far as kickstarter campaigns go there wasn't really anything fishy about it (besides the whole tablet game thing), but I feel that many developers making games on kickstarter are just using it as a way to present a project they either could of already made, or one made with minimal funding and just pocket the rest for future projects.

[Shadowgandor]

almost ALL of this game's problems come from the fact that it's a tablet game

I am starting to think anytime a game title pops up and mentions that it is also on tablets... that you should reconsider.

Unless you're going to buy it for your tablet that is.

[Darkening Kaos]

   I see the campaign as more of an advert for something that can be done - showing off every option in a minimal kind of way so that when the modders start publishing, they can focus and expand on a particular style of campaign, chopping out what doesn't work for them.

@Deon; What is the largest map the editor can handle?

[Domenique]

Am I the only one who thinks that the full $1,836,447 they got for this game wasn't entirely spent on the game? Honestly, it seems to me that the minimum of $400,000 was what the intended to spend on the game and the rest they just pocketed. This simply just does not feel like a 1.8 million dollar game. I'm not exactly calling them dishonest, because as far as kickstarter campaigns go there wasn't really anything fishy about it (besides the whole tablet game thing), but I feel that many developers making games on kickstarter are just using it as a way to present a project they either could of already made, or one made with minimal funding and just pocket the rest for future projects.

Considering that it took time to make the game * manpower + gifts to the backers + Kickstarter takes a certain amount + there's also taxes. = fair enough amount of cash was used. In my opinion, everything is in the right place.

[Deon]

Am I the only one who thinks that the full $1,836,447 they got for this game wasn't entirely spent on the game? Honestly, it seems to me that the minimum of $400,000 was what the intended to spend on the game and the rest they just pocketed. This simply just does not feel like a 1.8 million dollar game. I'm not exactly calling them dishonest, because as far as kickstarter campaigns go there wasn't really anything fishy about it (besides the whole tablet game thing), but I feel that many developers making games on kickstarter are just using it as a way to present a project they either could of already made, or one made with minimal funding and just pocket the rest for future projects.

Considering that it took time to make the game * manpower + gifts to the backers + Kickstarter takes a certain amount + there's also taxes. = fair enough amount of cash was used. In my opinion, everything is in the right place.

1.8 millions which turned into something like 1.2 millions after kickstarter and taxes is nothing for 20 people company .

[Draco18s]

I'm a backer and I don't feel cheated.   

Me either.

I haven't finished it yet, but I've enjoyed the time I have put into it.

There are a handful of things that make me go "why did they do that?" but nothing that invokes buyer's remorse.

[hemmingjay]

Am I the only one who thinks that the full $1,836,447 they got for this game wasn't entirely spent on the game? Honestly, it seems to me that the minimum of $400,000 was what the intended to spend on the game and the rest they just pocketed. This simply just does not feel like a 1.8 million dollar game. I'm not exactly calling them dishonest, because as far as kickstarter campaigns go there wasn't really anything fishy about it (besides the whole tablet game thing), but I feel that many developers making games on kickstarter are just using it as a way to present a project they either could of already made, or one made with minimal funding and just pocket the rest for future projects.

Considering that it took time to make the game * manpower + gifts to the backers + Kickstarter takes a certain amount + there's also taxes. = fair enough amount of cash was used. In my opinion, everything is in the right place.

1.8 millions which turned into something like 1.2 millions after kickstarter and taxes is nothing for 20 people company .

It was actually closer to $1 million after they paid for their overhead and it had to be made in a year. Further, a big chunk of their income has to go to MS for the license. Additionally, this isn't some indie made game with borrowed assets. It's a professionally developed game with assets crafted in every element of the game that have to jive with the abundance of lore. The game system had to be unique to adapt to the many platforms while still feeling like a Shadowrun P&P. The music, art and legal fees alone eat up several hundred thousand, then there is coding, testing and salaries for 22(i believe) people, which was probably something tragically low like an average of $25,000 a year(just over $500k) while living in a somewhat expensive city.

I've noticed that almost all of the people that talk of being cheater were not backers, which leads to the conclusion that they are merely trouble makers. Let's not pretend it's genuine concern, it's merely an effort to get a rise out of a group of people or to persuade them to share in your disdain.

The game turned out how I expected a small budget, pen and paper reboot to come out, and in terms of art I am pleasantly surprised. I am happy that the world of SR will be available to mobile gamers even if it means the first iteration of this series is a bit dumbed down. I believe it was more that the budget caused it to be dumbed down and they saw that as an opportunity to release on ipad than the other way around. There is a great article on what they learned from the KS here: http://www.gamasutra.com/view/news/197132/QA_Learning_from_Shadowrun_Returns_Kickstarter_success.php

[hermes]

Oh man I got burned by the save system AGAIN.  In the S. Union, talked to a bunch of people, bought some stuff, went upstairs, investigated, went downstairs, quit - 'cos there had to be a save somewhere there, right? - NOPE.  What the hell were they thinking??  About half an hour of play and it doesn't save?

I really love the dialogue and the atmosphere, but this "save" system is kicking my ass.  Very, very stupid design.

[Draco18s]

I really love the dialogue and the atmosphere, but this "save" system is kicking my ass.  Very, very stupid design.

Actually the save system is very well designed, you just weren't paying attention.

It works like this: every time you get the loading screen, it saves.

Every time you don't, it doesn't.

It has to do with the fact that it would be a nightmare to save a "mission" (the safehouse is a mission too*) in a partially completed state; hundreds if not thousands of variables need to be cached and then later read back and every mission would need a different set of variables saved: every NPC's health status, location, armor damage, conversation trees, ammo counts, facing...every interact-able, movable, alterable, triggerable object...

*In fact, every time you visit the Seamstress's Union, it's a different mission.  They built the rooms once, but added the NPCs, dialog trees, and such, separately, and each exists independently of the others.

[Shadowgandor]

The save system has been made to work well with the game, but that doesn't mean the save system itself is done well.

[nenjin]

Yeah, I'm still 50/50 on how I feel. There are times I'm in to the campaign, and even with its shortcomings the charm is obvious.

But then there are times....yeesh. "Hey chummer, got a run for you. But you gotta do it now, you walk out the door and it's gone." "Ok, let me go visit the shops quick." "Oh, that drone I wanted, sweet." "Hey Chummer, you'll need 3.5k Nuyen to hire runners for this job. I know everyone has given you money to do this up to this point, but, well, hope you randomly started saving your money!"

*grumble* *grumble* *rolls back 20 minutes*

Don't even bother heading over to the SRR forums. People there aren't interested in hearing negative reviews. They want it to be allll bubbly and happy, yay! Mostly though, everyone has their hopes pinned on UGC (even when they claim they think the game is "perfect") or that HBS is going to pull some sort of hat trick and continue developing the game. Even though they've made very clear that ain't gonna happen.

So yeah. I'll definitely be a bit more wary of backing famous IPs on Kickstarter from here on out. What I wanted as a fan, which I didn't think would be that hard to make, turns out to be impossible with $1million. (Or impossible when someone is dead set on a tablet game. Or impossible when someone is deadset on a narrative linear story game.) The sky is never the limit, but at times I feel like Shadowrun Returns bumped its head against the roof and just stopped.

[Deon]

Just wait for our campaigns Nenjin, you will get at least random shadowruns in mine .