My Impressions: Quest for Infamy
Overall, it feels as though this game should be the freeware while Heroine's Quest is the game you'd actually pay for. It's not terrible, just overtly committed to being bland and tacky. Detailed impressions follow:
It's slow. It's ever so slow. The prelude takes forever for all the animations to play out, and even when you start the game proper and turn the speed all the way up, you never sneak-zip across the screen a la QFG - every screen walked is a bit of a chore.
The sneak animation (and pretty much all animations and general look) appears to be copy-pasted from QFG. There's "homage" and then there's this.
You have to run up to every object you look at (or try to interact with). GENIUS game design custom-made to discourage exploration. Holy shit. Quite the first impression.
"This is a fine sword, even better because it was free". Well, that's not an exceptionally good joke, bu- "You stole it." Yeaaaaaaaah. Thank you, game. So much funnier that way.
"Gosh, what a sissy". "You could, but you don't want to smell like a dirty dirty whore". I see the humor is taking directions from Quest For Glory 4.5. Lovely.
I have no idea what voice the actor for the hero is trying to do. I think it might be "anti-hero without sliding into outright gruff cliche" but what it actually amounts to is "oddly strained".
Cemetery. One tombstone gets the "what a rotten way to die" reaction, the rest are literally "there's no point in getting to know them - they're quite dead". Of all the places to depart from gaming tradition in favor of absolutely nothing.
Nitpicky - the area is called "Volksville" which is a take on... you get it by now. But you're actually told what all the nearby locales are called, and it's all generic stuff like "South Woods".
Our hero is apparently hobbit sized - or all the buildings are made for giants. The sort of perspective issue you wouldn't expect from... an actual game.
An obligatory gritty execution to welcome us into the town. So much gorier and thus edgier than QFG, you see.
The sheriff is apparently the main bad guy, and he's ever so growly. Growls are a fair replacement for actual acting, much less menace, right? (You're called in for a big menacing conversation with the big bad right after he executed a guy, and it's literally "sup? Drop by my office for a more indepth conversation when you have the time". Excellent use of time and effort)
Oh yeah, forgot to intro the story - having shtupped the baron's daughter, you flee into a small town ruled by , which is cut off from the world with the mountains on one side and a broken bridge on the other (what do you mean, "there are more than two sides?" Don't be ridiculous). Of course you're already making plans to settle down and start training as a brigand/rogue/warlock before you even know that you're stuck here.
Nobody has a lot of praise for the QFG combat system, but I think it combined player skill and player-character abilities adequately. The QFI battle system isn't arcadey at all and has absolutely no room for player skill - you just select your move, you and the (always so named) "Enemy" exchange attacks, keep going until one of you drops. And the early game enemies are incredibly tough, compared to your skills and equipment. At the very least, there's apparently no combat death - you just awaken on the same screen after a combat loss.
Sneaking doesn't seem to do anything when it comes to avoiding enemies. At 50/100, arriving on a screen with a random enemy encounter in sneak mode or at full run gives the exact same result - the enemy comes after you within three seconds.
You have to choose your class after the prologue by choosing a mentor. Two give you lame and annoying mini-games, the third just sends you on the first quest without one. Huh.
I think I'll talk more about this game's sense of humor / what exactly "infamy" means if and when I finish it. Still, clicking on a fallen enemy has our Rogue urinate on it. What a card.
Actually, let me talk about the sense of humor for just a bit. Half the "funny" descriptions in this game are "this is a very impressive building / natural scene. Let me talk about how impressive it is in a mocking tone. But you don't really care / and then you fart". Fu-nny.
Oh wait - this game does have insta-deaths. For clicking the hand symbol on a horse. Apparently you try to steal it in full view of the owner (don't have that as a quest, nor can I think of a use for a horse). Brilliant.
There's actually a second cemetery, filled with undead and the obligatory tombstone funnies. Odd.
Peeing on things is apparently this Rogue's trademark. The game is so slow that even things that could have been somewhat funny are rather torturous as you wait for the animation to play out.
Seems like you can't get stat increases by continuously sneaking around once you hit 50. Running is a bit faster though, so that's nice.
An LSL reference right after I finished that game. Hah.
Just to cement the utter lack of taste on display, there's a Doctor Who reference. Joy.
Closed the game (quitting properly) to check something in the instruction manual. Trying to restart the game gives me a "the app is still running" message, and I can't seem to find it in Task Manager.
Stat increases and special moves are thrown in the moment you actually choose a class. Maybe that's why the early combat was so difficult?
The inn is a former adventurers guild. There's a moose. There's a check-in desk, complete with a check-in ledger. You can't sign your name in the ledger (much less sign it with a flourish).
One of those games that fuck up your resolution if you try to alt+tab out of full screen mode, but some of the screen exit prompts in windowed mode are so small you're constantly clicking outside the game and switching to that.
You have the option to try and steal something at every shop interface, and the response is always "you can't steal anything because the shopkeep is watching you".
"Let me be pointlessly cryptic". "I kinda hate you". I dunno - something about the voice acting rather sells these lines. If the game was a bit less fond of this type of humor (which I associate with early 2000's videogame webcomics), that would have been actually funny.
The backgrounds are decent. I'm in the mood to appreciate a nicely drawn forest / mountains combo right now. On the other hand, there are very few intractable spots. Stuff that looks like something that should give you a unique reply... does not.
I'm just completing the narrators jokes for him, because they're so goddamn hackneyed. (And moments after I write this, the game subverts things a bit. Thanks, much appreciated)
Oh hey, a sultry warrior woman in a skimpy outfit that the Rogue ogles. So different from the sultry sorceress in the skimpy outfit, or the bardmaid etc etc, you got my point. This is the captain of the city guard though, so you can't even fall back on "oh, it's a fantasy archetype" - the city guards generally aren't dressed in battle bikinis.
"I have no idea what you're trying to do with this goat SHEEP [insert Wales joke here]". It's not just the voiceover / text discrepancy - it's the weird emphasis on SHEEP!
Oh. Oh, right. Quest for Glory 4. Well, the gypsy accent is a touch less offensive here, oddly enough.
So some random combat encounters have you revive on the same screen. Others teleport you back to the healer and deduct some funds. Others just kill you dead. Welp.
Combat encounters reset you from running to walking. Fantastic.
Giant mazes of identical rooms with frequent enemy encounters was something QFG didn't have FOR A REASON. The reason being - it's not fun. At least you can rush past most encounters, unless you get stuck on a door.
Combat is still terrible - on easy difficulty and with fairly well trained skill. A large part of how annoying it is is the fact that player skill has no effect on the success or failure of your actions. Combat would be boring even if it wasn't so stupidly difficult.
Oh hey, at least you get a fast travel map (wonder what the other classes get. It will be a mystery, because I'm not replaying this).
Grr, mixing Victorian costumes and homes with Medieval Fantasy costumes and weapons. Pet peeve.
I have so much stuff, and no convenient chest in my hotel room to leave it in. No idea what to do with most of these things.
I like the idea of library research, but I'm basically throwing keywords at a librarian and getting exposition dumps in return.
The way the game occasionally makes you move just to get a generic "you can't do that" reply keeps dashing my hopes and expectations
Someone might have an actual girls with guns swords fetish. Which... fair enough, reasonable as far as fetishes go, but still. Maybe not the best place to display it?
The second time the game made me laugh out loud, and it's still just a pop-culture reference out of nowhere. But still, that was pretty good.
Boom! Absolutely modern portraits on blokes that are based on kickstarter backers / artists. Mmmmmmmmy immersion :wah:
It takes a lot of effort for me to notice bad voice acting. This isn't "put it up on youtube" caliber bad, but there's a lot of "yep, I'm sure reading some text right now" sort performances.
Is that the Monkey Island theme homage in the dockside bar? Apropos, I suppose.
As far as random wackiness goes, the camel story is actually pretty good.
Holy shit, no "confirm / deny" when you misclick on "delete save". Holy. Shit.
Wait, what? I stumble into some Treants... the scene skips, and "you stand and watch the treants burn". Was that supposed to happen? Probably not, but that's a very odd bug.
Oh hey - and when I approach the burnt Treants, the game hangs up - probably because they're supposed to talk to me but are currently dead. Welp.
Anyways, after a bit of googling to solve that particular bug:
A certain quest giver sends you right into a trap, and you can't even mention that in further conversations with them.
At least acrobatics don't have a chance of dropping you straight into a chasm if you misclick or don't position your hero correctly (unlike Heroine Quest)
As far as I can tell, the lockpicking minigame is a take on the Betsheda style lockpicking... except you basically tap each tumbler twice and that's all there is to it. You have to be fast enough to tap them all before they fall, but still. Also, some locks don't require the minigame, and are all the better for it.
Robbing the bank is actually quite easy, all things considered. The loot? 50000 coins. The best armor costs 1200.
With the best armor and sword, the fights get relatively easy. Still boring though.
Triangle pegs puzzle. I'd rather be doing the tower of Hanoi all over again. And I'd rather do anything except the tower of Hanoi.
Hurray, a maze section. A maze section that starts with the direction to go "East" - except just clicking on the left side of your screen takes you back to the maze exit, and you need to find the special "further into the maze" east spot. On the same note, the final two steps of the dungeon should never be "East, West".
"You can't go in there... yet". Thanks, game. That's obviously all the detail I need about what's probably going to be a boss battle arena at some point.
"Marlon gave you this free sample of Moonshine" - no, he did not. I got this particular batch of moonshine from a totally different place.
Oh hey, the library had a complete solution for the triangle peg puzzle. Thanks for including it in the game and then having a solution that completely.... seriously, what the shit?
A sneaking mission with (as far as I can tell) only one solution that involves killing all the guards. Welp.
I can finally take an item I need for a puzzle, now that I know I'm going to need it. I'm not a fan of this approach in general, but at least you can be consistent about it - I have a hundred different items that I never used and will never use because they're there for puzzles on different class paths or whatever.
The fast travel map only has 5 locations (one totally irrelevant, as far as I can tell) The fortress I'm heading to is like a dozen screens away from the nearest fast travel point.
Curse your sudden but inevitable- ah, who cares.
So the bad guys knock the Rogue out, leave him untied and with all his weapons, explain their evil plot, and bugger off, leaving one guy behind to dispose of him get killed. Welp.
I'm not sure what the skill limit is. I lockpicked the most difficult door I found at the time and got the Master Thief achievement at 100 Thievery, but here's another door that eludes me at 202.
My fast travel map is gone - apparently so that I can get all the encounters up to the climax in proper order.
Your enemy is not the "Good Guy". The game refers to him as such, and I think this gives us a glimpse at the issues at the empty heart of this premise. Had he been an apparent "Hero" that the people lauded, that would have made for... well, not a particularly fresh and novel twist, but something.
New enemies in the finale, at least. New enemies that don't get a description when you look at them. Huh.
You get to gather some allies to your cause for the final push, which is a trope I love. It's only like 5 guys though, and half the town doesn't even react at all.
Time to settle for the final conflict - fatal exception, this application is shutting down. Weeeeeelp.
Takes some trickery (using fast travel to sidestep the bug) but it's handled. A lot of combat in the city. Still easy, still boring. This reminds me - I think it's been hours since I've had an increase to my combat stats. And I've been fighting a LOT.
One door to the library goes "the final battle is probably not the best time to visit the library". The other leads you into the library, where the librarians still give you the exact same spiel.
Hmm. If getting through the main gates and recruiting all the allies would have meant each guard is handled by someone else, (not that I'm sure this is the case) then that's good game design. More than ME3 ever did.
Aww, my smoke bombs don't work here. Even though people gave me some specifically for this battle.
Clicking on a lackey "one of Tyr's arrows". Clicking on an arrow "one of the lackeys". Welp.
The guards suddenly get the monks growly voices. Odd.
I wonder if any of the other classes would have had the chance to meet the secondary villain before this moment. First time I'm seeing him, at the climactic confrontation. (And the last, obviously)
(Same question about some of the prisoners I freed to help me out)
"Smeghead". This game is made by those kind of people. Very much so.
The main villain is still utterly terrible in every way.
The "hero" isn't terrible though. Not quite a fascinating personality, but still interesting enough (more so than the hero of QFG / Heroine Quest)
Ah goddamit, the error catches me again during the ending sequence. Oh well, the rest can be seen on youtube.
It's slow. It's ever so slow. The prelude takes forever for all the animations to play out, and even when you start the game proper and turn the speed all the way up, you never sneak-zip across the screen a la QFG - every screen walked is a bit of a chore.
The sneak animation (and pretty much all animations and general look) appears to be copy-pasted from QFG. There's "homage" and then there's this.
You have to run up to every object you look at (or try to interact with). GENIUS game design custom-made to discourage exploration. Holy shit. Quite the first impression.
"This is a fine sword, even better because it was free". Well, that's not an exceptionally good joke, bu- "You stole it." Yeaaaaaaaah. Thank you, game. So much funnier that way.
"Gosh, what a sissy". "You could, but you don't want to smell like a dirty dirty whore". I see the humor is taking directions from Quest For Glory 4.5. Lovely.
I have no idea what voice the actor for the hero is trying to do. I think it might be "anti-hero without sliding into outright gruff cliche" but what it actually amounts to is "oddly strained".
Cemetery. One tombstone gets the "what a rotten way to die" reaction, the rest are literally "there's no point in getting to know them - they're quite dead". Of all the places to depart from gaming tradition in favor of absolutely nothing.
Nitpicky - the area is called "Volksville" which is a take on... you get it by now. But you're actually told what all the nearby locales are called, and it's all generic stuff like "South Woods".
Our hero is apparently hobbit sized - or all the buildings are made for giants. The sort of perspective issue you wouldn't expect from... an actual game.
An obligatory gritty execution to welcome us into the town. So much gorier and thus edgier than QFG, you see.
The sheriff is apparently the main bad guy, and he's ever so growly. Growls are a fair replacement for actual acting, much less menace, right? (You're called in for a big menacing conversation with the big bad right after he executed a guy, and it's literally "sup? Drop by my office for a more indepth conversation when you have the time". Excellent use of time and effort)
Oh yeah, forgot to intro the story - having shtupped the baron's daughter, you flee into a small town ruled by , which is cut off from the world with the mountains on one side and a broken bridge on the other (what do you mean, "there are more than two sides?" Don't be ridiculous). Of course you're already making plans to settle down and start training as a brigand/rogue/warlock before you even know that you're stuck here.
Nobody has a lot of praise for the QFG combat system, but I think it combined player skill and player-character abilities adequately. The QFI battle system isn't arcadey at all and has absolutely no room for player skill - you just select your move, you and the (always so named) "Enemy" exchange attacks, keep going until one of you drops. And the early game enemies are incredibly tough, compared to your skills and equipment. At the very least, there's apparently no combat death - you just awaken on the same screen after a combat loss.
Sneaking doesn't seem to do anything when it comes to avoiding enemies. At 50/100, arriving on a screen with a random enemy encounter in sneak mode or at full run gives the exact same result - the enemy comes after you within three seconds.
You have to choose your class after the prologue by choosing a mentor. Two give you lame and annoying mini-games, the third just sends you on the first quest without one. Huh.
I think I'll talk more about this game's sense of humor / what exactly "infamy" means if and when I finish it. Still, clicking on a fallen enemy has our Rogue urinate on it. What a card.
Actually, let me talk about the sense of humor for just a bit. Half the "funny" descriptions in this game are "this is a very impressive building / natural scene. Let me talk about how impressive it is in a mocking tone. But you don't really care / and then you fart". Fu-nny.
Oh wait - this game does have insta-deaths. For clicking the hand symbol on a horse. Apparently you try to steal it in full view of the owner (don't have that as a quest, nor can I think of a use for a horse). Brilliant.
There's actually a second cemetery, filled with undead and the obligatory tombstone funnies. Odd.
Peeing on things is apparently this Rogue's trademark. The game is so slow that even things that could have been somewhat funny are rather torturous as you wait for the animation to play out.
Seems like you can't get stat increases by continuously sneaking around once you hit 50. Running is a bit faster though, so that's nice.
An LSL reference right after I finished that game. Hah.
Just to cement the utter lack of taste on display, there's a Doctor Who reference. Joy.
Closed the game (quitting properly) to check something in the instruction manual. Trying to restart the game gives me a "the app is still running" message, and I can't seem to find it in Task Manager.
Stat increases and special moves are thrown in the moment you actually choose a class. Maybe that's why the early combat was so difficult?
The inn is a former adventurers guild. There's a moose. There's a check-in desk, complete with a check-in ledger. You can't sign your name in the ledger (much less sign it with a flourish).
One of those games that fuck up your resolution if you try to alt+tab out of full screen mode, but some of the screen exit prompts in windowed mode are so small you're constantly clicking outside the game and switching to that.
You have the option to try and steal something at every shop interface, and the response is always "you can't steal anything because the shopkeep is watching you".
"Let me be pointlessly cryptic". "I kinda hate you". I dunno - something about the voice acting rather sells these lines. If the game was a bit less fond of this type of humor (which I associate with early 2000's videogame webcomics), that would have been actually funny.
The backgrounds are decent. I'm in the mood to appreciate a nicely drawn forest / mountains combo right now. On the other hand, there are very few intractable spots. Stuff that looks like something that should give you a unique reply... does not.
I'm just completing the narrators jokes for him, because they're so goddamn hackneyed. (And moments after I write this, the game subverts things a bit. Thanks, much appreciated)
Oh hey, a sultry warrior woman in a skimpy outfit that the Rogue ogles. So different from the sultry sorceress in the skimpy outfit, or the bardmaid etc etc, you got my point. This is the captain of the city guard though, so you can't even fall back on "oh, it's a fantasy archetype" - the city guards generally aren't dressed in battle bikinis.
"I have no idea what you're trying to do with this goat SHEEP [insert Wales joke here]". It's not just the voiceover / text discrepancy - it's the weird emphasis on SHEEP!
Oh. Oh, right. Quest for Glory 4. Well, the gypsy accent is a touch less offensive here, oddly enough.
So some random combat encounters have you revive on the same screen. Others teleport you back to the healer and deduct some funds. Others just kill you dead. Welp.
Combat encounters reset you from running to walking. Fantastic.
Giant mazes of identical rooms with frequent enemy encounters was something QFG didn't have FOR A REASON. The reason being - it's not fun. At least you can rush past most encounters, unless you get stuck on a door.
Combat is still terrible - on easy difficulty and with fairly well trained skill. A large part of how annoying it is is the fact that player skill has no effect on the success or failure of your actions. Combat would be boring even if it wasn't so stupidly difficult.
Oh hey, at least you get a fast travel map (wonder what the other classes get. It will be a mystery, because I'm not replaying this).
Grr, mixing Victorian costumes and homes with Medieval Fantasy costumes and weapons. Pet peeve.
I have so much stuff, and no convenient chest in my hotel room to leave it in. No idea what to do with most of these things.
I like the idea of library research, but I'm basically throwing keywords at a librarian and getting exposition dumps in return.
The way the game occasionally makes you move just to get a generic "you can't do that" reply keeps dashing my hopes and expectations
Someone might have an actual girls with guns swords fetish. Which... fair enough, reasonable as far as fetishes go, but still. Maybe not the best place to display it?
The second time the game made me laugh out loud, and it's still just a pop-culture reference out of nowhere. But still, that was pretty good.
Boom! Absolutely modern portraits on blokes that are based on kickstarter backers / artists. Mmmmmmmmy immersion :wah:
It takes a lot of effort for me to notice bad voice acting. This isn't "put it up on youtube" caliber bad, but there's a lot of "yep, I'm sure reading some text right now" sort performances.
Is that the Monkey Island theme homage in the dockside bar? Apropos, I suppose.
As far as random wackiness goes, the camel story is actually pretty good.
Holy shit, no "confirm / deny" when you misclick on "delete save". Holy. Shit.
Wait, what? I stumble into some Treants... the scene skips, and "you stand and watch the treants burn". Was that supposed to happen? Probably not, but that's a very odd bug.
Oh hey - and when I approach the burnt Treants, the game hangs up - probably because they're supposed to talk to me but are currently dead. Welp.
Anyways, after a bit of googling to solve that particular bug:
A certain quest giver sends you right into a trap, and you can't even mention that in further conversations with them.
At least acrobatics don't have a chance of dropping you straight into a chasm if you misclick or don't position your hero correctly (unlike Heroine Quest)
As far as I can tell, the lockpicking minigame is a take on the Betsheda style lockpicking... except you basically tap each tumbler twice and that's all there is to it. You have to be fast enough to tap them all before they fall, but still. Also, some locks don't require the minigame, and are all the better for it.
Robbing the bank is actually quite easy, all things considered. The loot? 50000 coins. The best armor costs 1200.
With the best armor and sword, the fights get relatively easy. Still boring though.
Triangle pegs puzzle. I'd rather be doing the tower of Hanoi all over again. And I'd rather do anything except the tower of Hanoi.
Hurray, a maze section. A maze section that starts with the direction to go "East" - except just clicking on the left side of your screen takes you back to the maze exit, and you need to find the special "further into the maze" east spot. On the same note, the final two steps of the dungeon should never be "East, West".
"You can't go in there... yet". Thanks, game. That's obviously all the detail I need about what's probably going to be a boss battle arena at some point.
"Marlon gave you this free sample of Moonshine" - no, he did not. I got this particular batch of moonshine from a totally different place.
Oh hey, the library had a complete solution for the triangle peg puzzle. Thanks for including it in the game and then having a solution that completely.... seriously, what the shit?
A sneaking mission with (as far as I can tell) only one solution that involves killing all the guards. Welp.
I can finally take an item I need for a puzzle, now that I know I'm going to need it. I'm not a fan of this approach in general, but at least you can be consistent about it - I have a hundred different items that I never used and will never use because they're there for puzzles on different class paths or whatever.
The fast travel map only has 5 locations (one totally irrelevant, as far as I can tell) The fortress I'm heading to is like a dozen screens away from the nearest fast travel point.
Curse your sudden but inevitable- ah, who cares.
So the bad guys knock the Rogue out, leave him untied and with all his weapons, explain their evil plot, and bugger off, leaving one guy behind to dispose of him get killed. Welp.
I'm not sure what the skill limit is. I lockpicked the most difficult door I found at the time and got the Master Thief achievement at 100 Thievery, but here's another door that eludes me at 202.
My fast travel map is gone - apparently so that I can get all the encounters up to the climax in proper order.
Your enemy is not the "Good Guy". The game refers to him as such, and I think this gives us a glimpse at the issues at the empty heart of this premise. Had he been an apparent "Hero" that the people lauded, that would have made for... well, not a particularly fresh and novel twist, but something.
New enemies in the finale, at least. New enemies that don't get a description when you look at them. Huh.
You get to gather some allies to your cause for the final push, which is a trope I love. It's only like 5 guys though, and half the town doesn't even react at all.
Time to settle for the final conflict - fatal exception, this application is shutting down. Weeeeeelp.
Takes some trickery (using fast travel to sidestep the bug) but it's handled. A lot of combat in the city. Still easy, still boring. This reminds me - I think it's been hours since I've had an increase to my combat stats. And I've been fighting a LOT.
One door to the library goes "the final battle is probably not the best time to visit the library". The other leads you into the library, where the librarians still give you the exact same spiel.
Hmm. If getting through the main gates and recruiting all the allies would have meant each guard is handled by someone else, (not that I'm sure this is the case) then that's good game design. More than ME3 ever did.
Aww, my smoke bombs don't work here. Even though people gave me some specifically for this battle.
Clicking on a lackey "one of Tyr's arrows". Clicking on an arrow "one of the lackeys". Welp.
The guards suddenly get the monks growly voices. Odd.
I wonder if any of the other classes would have had the chance to meet the secondary villain before this moment. First time I'm seeing him, at the climactic confrontation. (And the last, obviously)
(Same question about some of the prisoners I freed to help me out)
"Smeghead". This game is made by those kind of people. Very much so.
The main villain is still utterly terrible in every way.
The "hero" isn't terrible though. Not quite a fascinating personality, but still interesting enough (more so than the hero of QFG / Heroine Quest)
Ah goddamit, the error catches me again during the ending sequence. Oh well, the rest can be seen on youtube.