Plants vs Zombies.

The big problem with the game is that the combat and mechanics are just awful. It's like Fallout Tactics in that you can switch from real-time combat to turn-based, but both are just awful. I sort of want to suggest cheating so you can zoom through all the combat portions and skip to everything else. It's really frustrating because the worst part of the game is in the very beginning, right after you finish Tarant. You have to go to this abandoned dwarf clan that is this massive dungeon that takes forever and is really hard. It's awful. If you can get through this, the rest of the game (until about the last 1/4th, which is bad again) is pretty interesting. If you're not going to cheat, you should probably be a wizard and put your points into necromantic white and black. Harm is easily the best spell in the game and you should abuse it. You should also put all of your points into charisma and persuasion. This lets you have more party members and if you've got a lot, you can just stand there and let them fight for you. This is what I always do. Also like I said before, you should play as a half-orc. You won't get the full impact of the game unless every single person in it hates you.

Also the Shrouded Hills part is pretty boring and is a lot like Arroyo in Fallout but longer. If you can make it through that and get to Tarant, you've made it to the best part in the game. Tarant is pretty much the whole point of Arcanum. It's New York City in the middle of the Industrial Revolution and it's supposed to be huge and disorienting and sort of intimidating. Other places like Dernholm and Caladon are interesting, but Tarant is What The Game Is About, so I guess if you get there and you don't like it, you might as well stop playing because it's the most important part.

So I guess that's it. Cheat if you feel like it, be a half orc, put points into charisma and magic, and be tolerant of a really bad combat system.

i'll take your advice here. i actually had already started playing the game as a human bandit, and got through shrouded hills entirely, but i'm finding this playthrough a little rough(even on easy) and i think i'll need to start again.

i still think it's a strong general idea for a game, but its design is really clunky. the item system is overwhelming until you figure out what is useful and what isn't, and the map design is bland and expansive to the point where you'll get lost very easily without constantly hitting the map. it's fairly difficult to play without the aid of a walkthrough, if only because there's so much space and impertinent npcs/items that you never really have a clear idea of what the important things are in each area of the game. i can appreciate a game that endeavors to have lots of shit for your characters to do, but i don't think this is really the best way to go about it.

despite this, the game does have definite charm and is surprisingly well-written. the music is at times truly outstanding. i wouldn't even think about laboring through this game if i didn't find the positive merits rewarding. i guess it's kinda like square's saga games in a sense, because there's something distinctly likable about the game, but you can sometimes miss it due to how utterly confused you are about most of the time.

What part are you at? I think Tarant is really well done and that it's overwhelming and confusing is sort of the point. I think what they were trying to do with Tarant was make it an 1880s New York in the eyes of an immigrant who just came in from Ellis Island. You're this outsider who doesn't know anything in the epicenter of everything and you're just supposed to wander around taking it all in for a few days.

But yeah, playing a tech character is like playing on hard mode. Apparently they get better later in the game but I've never had the patience to see if it pays off. I always play as a mage because they start out really strong and stay that way throughout the whole game. There are people who swear by tech characters but I think the idea is that ultimately you'll be able to do anything with either field. It's still a lot easier using magic though.

I think my favorite thing about the game is that none of it is throw away fantasy garbage, it's all a reflection on something in real life. Some of it is simplified and stupid, like the Boil, but it's all something that anyone playing the game could in some way relate to. I guess the Fallout games were like that too. I can't really remember because I haven't played them in a long time. But yeah, the fact that the game is saying something about our world is what makes it good and interesting, regardless of its terrible mechanics and that it is sometimes disorienting.

update to 1.0.7.4 and then install the unofficial fix patch.

you were right about arcanum chef. it is a pretty neat game if you can get anywhere in it. it's one of the few semi-recent fantasy[ish] games that doesn't make me ill. the writers of the game are pretty intelligent and manage to do a lot with the story despite being somewhat hindered by the fairly stale fallout-style dialogue.

the key is really just NOT touching the technology route your first time through the game, since that whole development track is a huge convoluted mess that requires a fairly close understanding of the game. i made myself a swordsman magician and i just go around disintegrating everybody.

although i don't like how easily shit in the game can get fucked up. some drunk picked a fight with me in a bar and i had to kinda avoid that town the rest of the game because random citizens and guards would attack me whenever i came back. you need to save really often, and probably use a walkthrough since it is exceptionally easy to get lost or miss important things entirely just by exploring on your own. i don't think it works terribly well for a lengthy rpg to be so unforgiving and vague as to all the extra stuff to do in the game, but it's possible to look past all that if you approach the game right.

also i found the fairly well-known infinite money glitch on my own without having read it anywhere!! i break dem gammes

are there any good pc games like Civ that aren't part of the europa or aoe series

early total war games maybe? (pre-SEGA)