I got a chance to play a few minutes.
The connection was smooth despite me being in Canada, and the other guy being in Europe.
- REQUEST: An in-game chat feature is desperately needed, using the Steam overlay is cumbersome.
- REQUEST: Dialogue doesn't work very well. Player to player dialogue conversation works fine, but player to NPC Dialogue is almost impossible to follow for the second player.
Players need a way to keep track of the conversations other players are having with NPC's. It's especially bad because we can see only one half of the conversation and don't know what our ally says. This is a big deal that needs to be addressed. - REQUEST: There needs to be a way to assign a second companion to the control of the other character - preferably a way to assign a specific companion so you don't end up with one player controlling two mages, and another character controlling two fighters.
- I experienced a couple odd desyncs. Desync #1 - I snuck into the basement of the Legion cook while my partner stayed upstairs. When I came back up, my partner wasn't moving, and his companions were invisible - that is, their armour was there but their bodies were invisible. It turned out that the other player wasn't there at all, but was in the barracks.
- Desync #2 - I was south of Esmerelda's shop and found more invisible companions. I checked the map to see where they were, and saw them entering the crime scene room. At that point, my game froze up and I could do nothing - not even use the Steam Overlay - except alt-Tab out. I suspect that what might have happened is that the game tried to trigger the "Star Stone Lightning" effect, but I was out of range. My partner didn't see the Star Stone Lightning happen at all.
- REQUEST: The minimap should have an indicator showing the direction of your partner, because it's really easy to lose sight of them, and having to bring up the big map to track them down can get old if you have to keep doing it. This is disabled by default in single-player, unless you split the party members up.
- REQUEST: Players NEED to be able to use local waypoints when their partner is not around. It's fine if everyone needs to be together to travel past a loading screen, but I should be able to go between the harbour and the statues without my parnter being at my side.
HAven't been playing a lot yet, essentially explored around with a mage Roderic and a ranger Scarlet.
A few things :
- The yellow / orange difference when hovering above a container or item can be hard to tell, maybe, when you're about to interact with someone else's property you should have a clearer hint. Maybe a good ol' red?
Yes, this.
- The ranger starting abilities feel quite weak compared to warrior or mage. Essentially not having an AoE hurts a bit. With the standard skill points, a mage is quicker than a ranger, while having both a heal, and a kinda ranged AoE spell.
Yes, at the moment, Rangers are not useful. They're complete garbage against the Undead, which make up 75% of the enemies in the Alpha. Once, both Roderick and Madora got themselves killed, and even though it was just Ranger Scarlett against a single enemy Undead Archer, the fight was AGONIZING. It took forever and I used up all my health potions before I could beat it.
- Has Lockpicking been put into the game yet ? I couldn't find how to use it. Maybe an item is required ?
You need to buy a Lockpick skillbook from the Arrow merchant. There are so many questions about this. Honestly, Larian should remove the Lockpicking skillbook, and simply automatically grant you the skill once you put a point into lockpicking.
- The ultimate decision being always given to the "dialogue intiating" player feels a bit harsh of the co-op player. If it is score driven, a [Failure] indicator on the argument should appear; as it stands it just seem like the other player ultimately says "It's always going to be my way".
Maybe it's just my imagination, but it seems to me that when controlling Roderick, almost every time I get into an argument, Roderick's argument wins. Maybe it's just confirmation bias, but it might be bugged to always go with the first guy's decision as winning.
