Thanks!

For me, battle in Shadows is better than Kult. In first game all you had to do is to get certain combination of items you never use or has no benefits other than learning attunements locked in them, then choose better compatible with said attunement armor or OP weapon making you practically untouchable or ending fight in clickfest where you could bypass rapid blood loss and enemy hits by seconds of animation. In Shadows you need more strategy - correct selection of skills for your character, armor and weapons often have advantage fighting specific type of enemy, for others are pretty weak or is gear exclusive and useful only for named puppet so I think it's quite improvement - playing Dialbo style clickfest will greet you with game over screen and bad choice of skills tree will make your game even harder or force different strategy, also there is no insta-win weapons, armor or other equipment.

I am confused...

In the advertisement (underlines added by me),

First there is this:

"Shadows: Heretic Kingdoms, a heavy hack'n'slash action RPG with a two-sided twist, just received a price-drop, free DLC for everyone who owns the game, and a few tweaks and updates! To make the deal sweeter, the game is also 50% off for the next week! "

Then there is this:

"On top of the permanent price-drop, the game is now updated with plenty of tweaks and bug fixes"

Is there a permanent price drop or not?

Full Disclosure: I am tapped out so it makes no difference to me either way - I just wanted to make sure I understand what is being presented here...

Yep, it used to be 30 bucks, but now it's 20 with a limited-time 50% sale to bring it down to 10. So it got both a permanent drop and a sale on top of that.

Ahhh.... both in effect.

Thanks for clearing that up for me. :-)

so book 2 release is expected to be "soon". where "soon" defines something between next month and 1000000 years, right?

Not this year, at any rate. They're aiming for 2016.

thanks

If you mean the "unnecessary walking between point A and point B" sort, then no, not really.

Some areas have features that can't be fully explored or dealt with on your first visit because you need to come back with an item or information that is found elsewhere, but when you do this, the new encounter or section(s) that are opened up will be level-appropriate. (The key found in an area filled with level 10-ish monsters will open a new section with level 10-ish monsters, etc.)

The performance issues have mostly been related to controllers, and the recent patches have helped out there.

As for the combat...

It is somewhat slow-paced compared to the usual "frenzied button masher" style that most games of this sort seem to favor, but that's deliberate - you have time to think and strategize, and to maneuver, and you'll need those.

Combat can seem repetitive at first when you only have one puppet and they only have one or two active skills, but that changes when you start adding more puppets to your party, since each one will bring their own independent set of active skills to the group in addition to more becoming available to each puppet as you gain levels. Making full use of the character-switching mechanic to employ all of the puppets' abilities (and similarly with the realm-hopping that you can do by switching to the Devourer) makes for combat that is anything but static.

I suspect that the other reason why people complain about static combat is that there's a tendency to stick to a single puppet and use it constantly. This feels more natural initially since you play a single character in most games, but in this case it means that you're missing out on half (or more) of your abilities and options. Once you break the "I'm playing THIS character" mindset, it becomes much more engaging (and this is also why you want that time to think about what you're doing).

A related point, since it can also cause a bad initial impression: some puppets have naturally fast or slow basic attacks (and Kalig, one of the three puppets you may start with, is downright ponderous), but aside from the fact that attack speeds will improve as time goes on, this is also part of the multi-puppet dynamic - if you want fast/light rather than slow/hard-hitting basic attacks, switch to someone who has them. The slow/hard-hitting ones are likely to be better against big, tough enemies though, so even Kalig's relatively glacial basic attacks have their uses. (If you can't wait for someone with faster attacks, pick Jasker as your initial puppet - his attack speed is much better and improves more rapidly than Kalig's does. Evia is somewhere in the middle.)

Thanks for those insights! I already bought the game before reading them, but it's good to know that the criticism about combat is not necessarily shared by all and that the combat mechanics can be seen in a positive light, too, if you try and adapt to them.

I take it the first Book is already finished, polished and complete, ready to be played? Or are there good reasons to wait until Book Two is released, before starting my playthrough of the game?

I also caved in and paid 1 EUR extra for the soundtrack, even though I couldn't find much info about it. Is it any good?

The developers are working on an overhaul that will update the game to a newer engine and rework some areas and systems, but that's still a couple of months away by the looks of it and the current version of Book 1 is complete and fully playable as-is.

I like the soundtrack, but that's going to be an individual taste thing. Getting it for 1 Euro is a great deal though!

Oh, ok. I'm not in a hurry, I think I'll wait for the overhaul then. It sounds like the GOG version of Heretic Kingdoms: The Inquisition will receive an update with bugfixes very soon, so I could play that one in the meantime.

Great news that they finally got to an end with the legal issues. Never thought that day would com. The free DLC is a nice Bonus too. I am looking forward to Book 2 :)

If I buy game today would I get free dlcs or it's only available for people who brought it before promo?