Game Club 199X - Wasteland (PC-DOS, C64, Apple II)

[xerxes]

FFFPHHGHH!!! (frustration noise)

Maybe we should just call this game, Guess What You're Fucked.

Too far away to hit somebody? Guess what, you're fucked.

Visit the wrong town? Guess what, you're fucked.

Walk on the wrong kind of grass? Guess what, you're fucked.

Why? Because this game auto-saves with every damn step. So unlike a normal RPG, where you have the option of starting with your last voluntary save, there's no hope of correcting your mistakes.

I'm gonna try again, this time making copies of the entire game file for each time I want to perma-save.

[Deleted]

I have to confess that I don't have the patience nor the focus to play Wasteland to a substantial degree. I really like the game's style and appreciate what it contributed to the field of RPGs. However... I really have no idea where the crap I'm going or what I'm doing. If I had an FAQ, I'd have a lot more focus, purpose, and motivation, but I'm not going to violate the rules here. I'm just going to bow out of this one, and I should note I won't be a host on this podcast. Someone else may be bold enough to offer their two radioactive cents, however...

[annoyedgrunt]

Here are a couple tips I figured out that may help.

- It doesn't seem like time matters in the game if you're not doing a quest, so it's easier to just hold down escape on the map screen until everyone heals. No expensive doctors.

- If you want to change everyone's weapons it's quicker to initiate a combat round and do it through that menu.

[xerxes]

Dec 6, 2011 11:16:55 GMT -5 sotenga said:

I really have no idea where the crap I'm going or what I'm doing. If I had an FAQ, I'd have a lot more focus, purpose, and motivation, but I'm not going to violate the rules here. I'm just going to bow out of this one, and I should note I won't be a host on this podcast. Someone else may be bold enough to offer their two radioactive cents, however...

I think Snarboo is gonna replace Mumbly Joe (i.e., me) as the master of ceremonies this time, and Zogbog really wanted to give it a shot. So no worries there.

But as far as quitting!? Goonies never say die, my friend. Goonies never say die.

[Sketcz-1000]

I was interested to read that you couldn't use an FAQ for this, under the rules. Which is cool, because that's how we played games back in the day. I tried this a long time ago, with a few FAQs, and map, and I was still stumped. I also wrote about it on the blog (reposted below).

Is Wasteland still playable today? Can it be done in a month? Or is it one of those games that you and several friends needed to play through for a year or more?

Ultimately, having a variety of skills which can be used anywhere just blew my mind. I spent a while trying to use everything everywhere, just in case. I prefer Wasteland to Fallout 3, truth be told, because the complexity is delicious. It's just a little too strong. Plus, random battles in the towns drove me nuts.

Also, I spent several minutes confused as where to search for that rope to enter the cave. I kept standing adjacent it, and searching the block next to me, which yielded nothing. Eventually discovered I need to search the block itself, not the more obvious adjacent block.

MID-EDIT: oops! Turns out these tips have already been given by several peeps.

Some tips:
* Ditch every single starting character. They're all crap. Re-roll an entire team, and keep re-rolling their stats until you get a decent set (I think INT is meant to be the most important, since that then allows more Skill Points to be distributed).

* Before ditching the old team, trade all of their weapons to one guy (so he holds them), then get him to give them to your new team before letting him go. That way you start with an arsenal to sell for easy money.

* Read an FAQ on which Skills are essential. Because there are a couple where you need one proficient guy otherwise you can't complete the game. Also, several are decoys which are generally useless.

MY OLD HG101 BLOG WRITE UP:

Wasteland
The granddaddy of PA games and a revolutionary RPG as well. I put a lot of time into this a while ago via DOSbox, getting about a quarter the way through. It features a rich and complex gameplay setting, unfortunately let down by confusing controls and fiddly menu system. Everyone has a variety of skills chosen from a massive pool which can be levelled up (eg skill with handguns, rifles, lockpicking, swimming, etc), plus used at any time, and there are numerous items (several of which are useless duds) that can also be found. The problem though is when and where to use them. An early example is a rope by a mountain side, where it’s implied you need to use someone with a high perception skill to enter a cave. Problem is, when using a skill you need to select the block is starts on and the direction it goes in, and choosing the block with the rope and a neutral direction doesn’t work, you need to select the adjacent block and face west. It sounds trivial when describing it, but as the game progresses you’ll find yourself using every skill and every item on every block while facing every direction, just in case, because it’s never obvious how and where anything is needed. Which is tiresome. A slick remake which streamlines this, but without dumbing it down, would be excellent. Followed by sequel Fountain of Dreams, while Fallout is regarded as its spiritual successor.

[Vokkan]

So... what skills are needed or not? Kind of bad advice just telling people to look it up in a FAQ in this thread.

[Sketcz-1000]

One guy needs bomb disposal, or explosives or whatever it is for a bomb scene at one point. Also one person needs swimming, apparently. Sorry... Can't recall the rest off hand.

[annoyedgrunt]

Observation seems to be a good skill but I'm not sure if everyone needs it or just the lead character. Same with climbing.

[Deleted]

Dec 6, 2011 21:33:53 GMT -5 xerxes said:

Dec 6, 2011 11:16:55 GMT -5 sotenga said:

I really have no idea where the crap I'm going or what I'm doing. If I had an FAQ, I'd have a lot more focus, purpose, and motivation, but I'm not going to violate the rules here. I'm just going to bow out of this one, and I should note I won't be a host on this podcast. Someone else may be bold enough to offer their two radioactive cents, however...

I think Snarboo is gonna replace Mumbly Joe (i.e., me) as the master of ceremonies this time, and Zogbog really wanted to give it a shot. So no worries there.

But as far as quitting!? Goonies never say die, my friend. Goonies never say die.

Ah, it's not like I'd be quitting GC9X wholesale. I await to see what next game the randomizer picks and hope it's not the setting of Fallout with the mechanics of early Ultima titles.

Eh, I'm being harsh. If you insist, I'll try Wasteland some more, but don't expect me to make any meaningful progress (if ever) until others have gone farther than I am and tell me exactly where I need to go. I suppose I'll impart three somewhat transparent tips based on what I've tried out:

1: Do not go immediately north from your starting position. You'll come across a radioactive field around a terribly hot desert area and you will die. Start by checking the towns to the west instead.

2: Avoid the church. The game itself warns you that you're not strong enough if you head there sooner than later, and if you take a couple more steps... well, MAYBE it's worth it at least once to be perforated by evil nuns.

3: If, for whatever reason, you bring it down to melee combat and the monsters in question are too far away, keep in mind that you have to select "run," and when you switch to the overhead, you move in the direction towards the baddies to club them. Though, from what I understand, it's best that you stick to missile combat when possible.

Now I have a question that's really stupid... how the hell do you switch weapons and/or reload? I haven't read the manual as close as I could have, but if someone could give some simple inventory management tips, I'd be glad to hear 'em.

[Feynman]

Dec 7, 2011 13:11:30 GMT -5 sotenga said:

Now I have a question that's really stupid... how the hell do you switch weapons and/or reload? I haven't read the manual as close as I could have, but if someone could give some simple inventory management tips, I'd be glad to hear 'em.

First, to answer your question, there are two ways to change weapons, and one way to reload them.

Changing weapons, way 1: Press a character's party number key (1, 2, 3, etc) to open their menu screen, then press enter to access their inventory. Use the arrow keys to scroll the inventory pages up and down, find the new weapon you want them to equip, and press the number corresponding to the inventory slot to open up the item management menu. From there, Press E to (E)quip the item. You can also (T)rade items between party members this way, or (D)rop items.

The other way to equip weapons is to press the E key when walking around to activate (E)ncounter mode, which acts as though you are in combat. From here, simply press W to access the item menu and switch weapons as in method one. To reload weapons, when in an encounter, whether a real battle or a mock battle activated with the (E)ncounter command, simply use (L)oad/unjam to command a character to reload or unjam their currently equipped weapon. This requires having the appropriate ammo in that character's inventory, of course.

Now, the second thing I need to mention is, DO NOT NEGLECT MELEE ATTACKS. In the beginning of the game, unless you have played the game before and know what you're doing, money and ammo are scarce, and you're going to rely on melee attacks for the early game. Even if you do know what you're doing, it's better to focus on melee at first simply so that you can save money and get powerful equipment earlier, as handguns are mostly useless and sell for a good price.

Because melee is so useful, ever character you make should have at least one rank in the Brawling and Pugilism skills (and two ranks in brawling is very useful if you have the extra skill points). You'll get a lot of use out of it in the early game, and even at the end of the game, melee remains a very effective option.

Anyhow, a couple tips of my own:

1. Make sure every character you create has at least 15 IQ. Accept nothing less! Your initial skills are hugely important, and you want as many useful skills in your party as you can get.

2. Give one party member the Gambling skill, and make sure he has high luck. Once you're tough enough to survive in Vegas, Gambling will make money problems a thing of the past.

3. Make sure that you have the Lockpicking, Safecracking, Bomb Disarm, and Alarm Disarm skills in your party. These are very important skills. Note that not every party member needs to know all these skills, and it's not a bad idea to spread them out between a couple different party members.

4. Since melee is so effective, seriously consider using your level ups to increase everyone's Strength scores to at least 15 or so in the early game. This will help you take down enemies very easily.

5. DO NOT IGNORE YOUR AC RATING. Armor is a big deal when it comes to surviving. Even one extra point of AC makes a big difference.

6. In fact, there's a very useful sidequest you can do early in the game to get some decent armor. Use of the Perception skill will allow you to find a pump in the abandoned house in Highpool. Buying an Engine from the Rail Nomads (it costs a few hundred dollars) and (U)sing it to fix the pump will reward you with four suits of leather armor and some other supplies, increasing your party's survivability by a good amount.

Wasteland is an awesome game, and it's cool that Game Club 199X isn't only about console games... there are a lot of really great PC games that deserve attention too, such as, for example, Betrayal at Krondor. Not that I am at all suggesting that Betrayal at Krondor should be a future episode or anything, even if Betrayal at Krondor is totally awesome.





Betrayal at Krondor

[annoyedgrunt]

I'll second the use of melee attacks. One character I rolled was was both super strong and super smart (though slow and not very agile) and he's making all sorts of creatures in the desert pop like blood sausages.

[kisai]

Wow, I played this when it came out, back in the day. PC RPGs were strictly for the hardcore. Wasteland was just a little blip in a sea of other RPGs, but it was distinct for not being fantasy based and the descriptive violence.

I didn't finish it, though...

[jorpho]

Dec 4, 2011 1:06:46 GMT -5 Discoalucard said:

Any of you fine young lads feel like doing up an HG101 article for this when you're done? (And a bit about that sorta-kinda sequel Fountain of Dreams too)

You'd want to include "Escape From Hell", too, which uses the same engine, if memory serves.

Is it possible to start a new game without reinstalling from scratch? I ran into that problem the last time I poked at FoD; I have no idea if it applies to Wasteland as well.

[xerxes]

Thanks feynman and Sketcz, we need all the help we can get.

I still haven't gotten anywhere significant. Has anyone found an early quest they think is a good start?

I can already tell you that going to Darwin is a huge, game-ending mistake this early on.

Also, this is probably a good time to say that we never intended Game Club to be a 30-day marathon to the finish. Just play it on a regular basis for one month. It's meant to get us OVER steep learning curves so we can try things we'd otherwise ignore.

[annoyedgrunt]

Dec 7, 2011 21:12:00 GMT -5 xerxes said:

I still haven't gotten anywhere significant. Has anyone found an early quest they think is a good start?

You've probably already done this, but just for the record;

I first went to Highpool which is to the north-west of the starting point. Go in to the first building you can and find a memo. Talk to the kid in the south west corner of the town about the topics on the memo, giving you a quest.

The memo also mentions a broken water pump which I don't know how to solve. However, I did find a second quest that won't allow you fix the pump once it's over. You initiate this quest by standing on the bridge across the stream and moving down in to the water.