Together RPG - Shadowrun - 2/1-->4/1

[Exhuminator]

Any tips or tricks I should be aware of

[MrPopo]

Any tips or tricks I should be aware of, Popo? And how do I save my game?

You save your game by sleeping in a bed (this also heals you). The first one takes a little effort to unlock, the others are more obvious.

The biggest tip is to play it like a standard point and click adventure game; keep your eyes open for things you can pick up. Talk to NPCs and try and exhaust dialog with them, as many times you need to use the right keyword on the right NPC to learn some new keyword which is used to actually unlock something in the story. Finally, the combat in the game is very simplistic for the first half; just hit the fire button as fast as you can. In the latter half you get some expanded options available but the core gunplay stays the same. Due to how things work you can't really dodge enemy fire.

[Ack]

Well, I spent a good chunk of the weekend playing Shadowrun on my SNES. I'm having a blast! At first the controls were clunky, and I'm still having some consternation with them, but I've slowly gotten used to most of them. The biggest issue I have now is switching between shooting and magic on the fly, since locking onto an enemy and then rapidly switching to magic causes me to still be locked onto them as opposed to me. Healing during the troll fight in the arena was a pain in the ass because of that.

As far as plot goes, I have to call the Dark Blades mansion and have also cleared a couple of floors of the Drake Tower, though this is slow going. I've completely wiped out the arena and killed the hidden Octopus. I'm using a T-250 Shotgun and a Mesh Jacket for my equipment, and my stats are:

Body: 13
Magic: 9
Strength: 6
Charisma: 6

Firearms: 7
Computers: 6
Negotiation: 6
Leadership: 6

Heal: 6
Powerball: 1

I've also picked up the Wired Reflexes upgrade, so I can shoot that much faster. I've cleared out the Shaman's shop of all magical items, and I have wiped out a bunch of enemies in the Plaza in the Downtown district but have not yet entered.

[MrPopo]

Making some good progress there Ack. I agree that switching between magic and firing is still fairly clunky even though you can get used to the rest of the interface. It's the type of thing where if this involved a PC you'd hit the C key to switch between combat and non-combat, and then left click is fire and right click is use equipped magic and you could quickly go between enemies and yourself since the mouse is such a fast device.

[Ack]

Well, I've now taken down Drake and have taken out the guards to the Akemi Plaza. Looks like I am about to have this one in the bag. Looking forward to it.

I've really been enjoying myself with this game. Shadowrun does a convincing job of making me feel like I am in the world, but only a small part of it. It feels like there is a much larger expanse of Seattle and the world as a whole. There are also a lot of bugs, some of which can be abused massively for the player's benefit, but they only serve to make the game more interesting to explore.

[MrPopo]

What spells do you have now?

I remember when I did my playthrough I managed to force my way all the way to the top of Drake Tower before getting to the Dark Blade. Made the rest until the Volcano seem much easier since I had banked a ton of karma as a result.

[Ack]

Spellwise I have Heal lvl 6, Powerball lvl 1, Summon Spirit lvl 1, Freeze lvl 6, Invisibility lvl 6, Armor lvl 1. I don't see much reason to use the offensive magic, and armor seems redundant with Invisibility and Freeze already maxed out.

Both my Body and Magic are around level 17. I have the assault cannon, full body suit, and the dermal plating, so I can do up to 20 damage and have an armor rating of 8. I probably spent more time grinding and exploring, so I'm pretty ready for war. I found the volcano actually really easy, because the enemies weren't able to do any damage to me until level 3(when one troll decker pinged me for 1 damage), and even afterward were never able to put enough hurt on to stop me. That final floor I used invisibility to slip past the big checkpoint at the start, and all of the nagas and Drake were susceptible to Freeze. I did use the Jester's Mask on Drake...not sure if I should have saved it for later, but considering how big he was, I wanted to bring him down quick.

[MrPopo]

Using the Jester on Drake seems the way to go. I never ended up getting Freeze, but Invisibility is so crazy busted it doesn't matter. I ended up rarely using it and instead just spammed Heal so I didn't feel like I was cheesing the game.

[Ack]

I've tried to use Invisibility only sparingly. It's pretty much over once you get that spell. Freeze is also really nasty against bosses though. You can easily lock one in place with it, and he'll never move again. I may have to use Invisibility more when I rush Akemi, but we'll see how it goes.

[Ack]

Boom, done. I just cleared out the Aneki building and uploaded the Anti-AI program. The ending was a bit anti-climactic, though with a couple of nice touches in the final level(like Troll Deckers riding the elevators on certain floors). I'm glad I polished this one off. Now to start playing one of my birthday presents..

So who is still playing some form of Shadowrun? The SNES release really is a short game, folks. You can blaze right through it.