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[KaguroDraven]

I hope I'm not the onyl person on these forums to absolutely adore the Geneforge games. For the uninitiated the Geneforge series have a basic idea and branch off into something epic and fun. The idea at it's most basic is, a group of mages found a way to make life itself useing magic, calling this art Shapeing and themselves Shapers, they proceeded to use this to take over a decent portion of the world as well as limit how much magic 'outsiders' learn. They experiment with their magic, akin to the scientific method in many ways, to improve it's use in many areas, and with one invention, the Canisters, everything eventuilly goes to hell.

[Cthulhu]

No link, no actual gameplay description, no screenshots...

:|

[Yodamaster]

It is absolutely amazing. =O

http://www.spiderwebsoftware.com/products.html

[Frumple]

The last time spiderweb software got a thread.

The couple of geneforge games I managed to play were... pretty solid. RPG-style thing, plenty of dialogue, things to check out, etc. Could draw parallels, in a general gameplay sense, with baldur's gate, arcanum, so forth. Kinda' an indie/low-key entry to the genre. Not terribly graphically impressive, exactly -- the fellow's been using the same engine more or less for all the games -- but plenty to do in pretty much all of 'em. Been too long since I've played the thing to really give anything besides a general recommendation.

Fellow also did the avernum and exile stuff.

[KaguroDraven]

Ah sorry.http://www.spidweb.com/geneforge/index.html That is the site of the company that makes the games. The gameplay itself is simple but fun, you click where you want to move, take turns in combat(with Action points for movement in combat and actions). Just clicking on the enemy uses your weapon, swords, maces, wands, batons(kinda like liveing plant guns that shoot thorns not bullets), etc. Or you can use a decent number of spells from 4 main catagories, Damage based ones, Mind ones which mainly revolve around debuffs or even temporarily bringing an enemy to your side, healing, and buffs. The stats cover a long list of things, with four basic attributes, Str Int Con and Cha(not 100% on this one, been to obcessed with DF to play recently). with tons of skills. There are your basic weapon specialisation skills, combat skills, etc. Skills for which magic you specialize in. Skills for which types of Shapeing you do best, Battle for tanks, Magic for glass canons, Fire for a mix(over simplifying but it works.). And then you have the two non-combat skills, Mechanics is almost a necessity in each game just to get through traps, it can also be used to break into tons of houses,chests, etc. and Leadership, which opens up new dialouge, being the story buff I am personalily I usually get tons of this as it opens up alot.   Out of combat you basicly walk around and talk to people, travel, sneak for stuff. Take missions from the different factions in the games, most of which eventuilly lead to directly harming another faction.  Puzzles aren't too common though, and the later games introduce an ok Crafting system, which I personally couldn't break through at first, which can make the best items in the game as well as many lesser items and potions. You get a max of 7 creations at one time, and they are invaluable for the game, weither you just have a few strong ones or more weaker ones, they will always be of use. The stories are fantastic, in my opinion, and very openended with atleast 15 endings per game if not more. And to stop the whole canon 'thats not how I wanted my game to end' thing the develoupers change canon just enough each game so none of the endings in the last one where canon.

[mipe9]

I personally didn't like Geneforge, I don't know why, but something in the game just.. bugged me. I was probably 'spoiled' by Avernum/Exile 1-3 [Great RPG series by spiderweb software). I liked more a 'grid' based movement instead of free-to-move-whereever-you-are style (this is also the reason why I haven't finished Avernum 4-6).

Also, the game was probably meant to be played several times (because there *were* several endings), but I never felt like it. Also, being a slight perfectionist, I always had to put all my points to Mechanics (lockpicking, basically) and whatever the speaking skill was called. And because of that, all my creations were weak etc.

I would personally suggest people to either play exile or avernum and skip Geneforge.

[KaguroDraven]

Unforchunately I have only been able to play a demo of Exile 3 so I can't give my opinion on that, though what little I got to see was very fun.

[ductape]

i want to know more about these games, and what one to get for a first go at it. I probably wont play them all, i just want to play the best. Do i need to start with the 1st of a series or can i just skip ahead. Which series?

[Thendash]

I haven't played a whole lot of the geneforge series, but if it's anything like the avernum/exile series then it don't matter too much where you start. Each game is connected to the others by the fact they're in the same world but they're at different times and usually don't reference the other games too much. I'm a huge fan of the Avernum series, started playing spidweb games with exile 3 that I got on a shareware disk with my windows 95(or maybe 98) computer.

[Metalax]

I always preferred the Exile series over the Avernum reboot, it always felt that some details in the game world got left out in the transition to the new engine, and I was particularly annoyed by the drop from six to four characters in your party. Geneforge I found a bit odd and never really got into it the same way as the other games.

Another thing to look at would be the Blades of Exile/Blades of Avernum games which were essentially a developers kit that allowed you to play player made modules/scenarios. While there were a good deal of rubbish modules made there were also large numbers of high quality modules, some of which were as large and detailed as any of the main games in the series.

[Lap]

The early geneforge games suffer from an extreme bias towards the actual class that can do the most gene summoning or whatever they call it. Trying to play as the other classes was both harder and also less fun in that there was less specific content for them.

I have not played the later geneforge games to see if they are any better. Bottomline, play the class they designed the game around and you'll have more fun.

[Neonivek]

The early geneforge games suffer from an extreme bias towards the actual class that can do the most gene summoning or whatever they call it. Trying to play as the other classes was both harder and also less fun in that there was less specific content for them.

I have not played the later geneforge games to see if they are any better. Bottomline, is play the class they designed the game around and you'll have more fun.

With that concept they should have just built the other classes so they either have more or less focus on geneforging...

It does sound like an actual fault of the game.

[a1s]

I've decided to give geneforge a go. Is it worth it to play the first one? (rather than say starting with the (probably) more polished GF5) would I be lost in the story?

[Lap]

I remember them having separate stories so it doesn't matter much. That said, if you want to play more than just one of them starting from the first is easier than doing the latest and going back.

[BigD145]

Spiderweb and Ambrosia. Good times. I don't think I ever got beyond Exile 1-3. I do recommend those.