So, any of you played the latest effort from Spiderweb yet?

I have played it and my impressions so far:

Turn-based cooldowns on basic abilities are a real turn-off for me. One basic ability can take anywhere from 6-12 turns to recover! Seriously! This makes a game challenging but in the most annoying of ways. Yes, they reset once a given combat is over but in the case of harder fights this mechanic gets really annoying when you're stuck either slinging arrows at the enemy or whacking on them with your sword while waiting for your abilities to recover. What's worse is that these cooldowns apply to spell casters such as the sorceress or the shaman. Imagine being able to cast a decent spell every 6-12 turns. Again, this makes for a challenge but in the wrong kind of way. And I thought D&D style spell casting was difficult...

Game looks great as far as graphics go but there are tons of recycled elements in the game. I don't mind since this is an indie game and JV is limited on funds. The character portraits look a LOT better now. Anyone remember the old Avernum character posters? Yeah....

So what are your impressions?

It seems interesting and I'd probably enjoy it but I perfer Eshalon Book 2.

Karl

I might try it, but then again I haven't finsihed most of my games from them.

Exile 1 I only played 1/3 through due to the word guessing xconvo system and a few other things.

Exile 2 was good and had a better convo system(with highlighted words of interest so you didn't have to try every bloody word in every paragraph), and I finished about 1/2 of it.

Exile 3 had an even better convo system(highlighted and Clickable words in paragraphs) and an even better story. I finished this one all the way through.

Blade of Exile's demo campaign was good and I was going to buy and play the full game but I never did for some reason.

Geneforge was pretty good, and last tiem I played I got about 1/3 of the way through while siding with the peaceful servile town(the first one in game that you meet)

I also played about 1/5 of Geneforge 2 and like BoE I never finished for some reason.

I haven't played the Geneforge 3-5 games yet but I hear good things and may someday get to buying/playing them.

Avernum 1-3 I demo'd mainly because I bought the originals and didn't want to buy them again for better(for some worse) graphics.

I did buy Avernum 4 though, and while a good game it had several low points like unlimited arrows for bows/etc making the bow too "easy" a weapon IMO. I did like the job boards and optional linked quests(the ones where you have to go to mutiple areas to complete them) though. I think i've played about a third of this one.

I still have yet to play Avernum 5.

Oh yeah, and I demo'd Nethergate(the original).

Did I leave anything else out?

I love old-school RPGs and I love indie games but the demo for this was just bland to me. Oh boy, castles and empires. Oh boy, a dungeon filled with rats and giant spiders. Oh boy, click on the enemies and they die. Oh boy, warriors and mages.

If I sat down to make an indie game doing the typical fantasy genre would be the furthest thing from my mind.

Alot of people like this sort of stuff though pal. :P

And it's this kind of stuff that made Spiderweb Software what it is today.

I like it too, I just don't want it in every fucking RPG ever made, which a lot of people seem to want. That baffles me.

More to the point though why would I play Avadon instead of the hundreds of other fantasy RPGs that look, sound and are written better? I love indie games when they offer me experiences I can no longer get elsewhere, or could never get elsewhere. Avadon is not giving me this, it's saying "here is another typical fantasy RPG only this one looks and sounds much worse."

Some people like one genre or setting more than others I guess.....just look how popular the FF games are for an example.

Also some people like a good story and not just graphics, and many like the graphical style of Jeff Vogel's games. Yes Avadon might be somewhat your typical adventure fare, but it does it well it seems(from the info and shots....etc)...and to some this is all that matters. Not shiny graphics or indie gimmicks.

And I am among them, hence GOG being my main community right now. That doesn't mean crappy graphics is a positive though, or something I look for. Bad graphics is something I tolerate because the gameplay or story are amazing, or something I can't get with great graphics. Avadon, in the demo anyway, did not show me anything amazing or unique. It was standard fantasy fare to the point I was falling asleep, the writing was simple and bland and the combat was typical strategic RPG combat.

Maybe it gets better?

Well some have said the later games are the best ones of the SW games, and I agree, but I still don't think it could be as bad/boring as you're saying. Also again, alot of people like familiar settings....hence why so many keep buying the newest FF games, when they're basically almost the same thing ad nauseum.

The demo areas are much blander than the rest of the game story-wise, imho. At the start your character is completely in the dark about the main plot, and is merely a pawn. It's only later that you get to understand what's really happening, and make a difference.

I finished Avadon yesterday and overall I liked it. I think it does suffer from the bland beginning (and bad graphics, but then again those are common to every Spiderweb game) but it delivers an interesting story and tactical challenges.
I liked the Geneforge games better though, mostly because of their much greater originality.

Does the writing remain rather bland throughout? How much does the world open up? If I favor choice and consequence and exploration over anything else in an RPG would you say another Spiderweb game would be better for me? I haven't played any of them.

Thanks in advance for any answers.

The writing gets more interesting (because there were more interesting things to write about), but if you don't like the descriptions from the beginning of the game, then you're probably not going to like the rest of Jeff Vogel's writing.
The gameworld is made up of the titular fortress plus three towns, each with about 5 wilderness areas attached. Those areas are quite big but the game is rather linear so you'll visit most of those for the main quest. Contrary to previous games there aren't that many purely optional areas.

If you like choice and consequences and exploration, then I'd say the Geneforge games would be better suited for you. Their story are self-contained so you don't have to start with the first game. Actually I'd recommend the fifth one because you can choose between five different factions, it features big gameplay improvements (imo anyway) and a good number of optional areas to reward exploration.

The good thing about Spiderweb is that each game has huge demos so you can get a feeling for whether you'll like the gameplay. Since they're always the start of the games, however, they usually don't feature much choice or exploration. They do open up later on much more than most games.

Thanks, I'll try the demo for Geneforge 5 then and see if I can get to liking the writing.

I have not played any of the Spiderweb games yet. In the past, I am a bit turn off by the graphics (which is very strange actually, 'cause I have played many DOS games with worse graphics and do not feel bothered by them), but from what I see there is a bit of improvement in Avadon.

I also heard that Spiderweb games are long, maybe about 100 hours or so (can't remember where I read that, but I did read something like that). The thing is I am not ready to invest that many hours for a game, and there is always a chance I get bored if a game is too long.

So how is Avadon in terms of game length? If it is too long I do not think I am interested.

The price does not help either. At USD25, it might make more sense to spend it on up to four GOG.com games.

Anyway, I am downloading the demo soon, and maybe I'll play it a bit.

Avadon is actually much shorter than other Spiderweb games.
Game length will depend on whether you do all the (many) side quests and on what difficulty you play on; you'll probably never die on casual, but you'll probably have to redo battles quite a few times on torment.
Overall, I'd say that, accounting for play style and difficulty, the length is probably between 25 to 50 hours. It took me about 40 hours to complete the game on hard doing all the sidequests I could find.