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Overall I fucking loved it but there was a few parts of the ending that felt a bit anti-climatic. I get they wanted to structure the story is such a way that even players who fucked the investigation up could find the killer, but it is weird that there’s really no way to really solve the case before shit goes down and then you just, find the guy. But I guess that feeds into the narrative that no single person is really in control of much outside of themselves.
Also didn’t like there wasn’t a “I’m turning I my badge” option for Harry (if there was one I didn’t see it). That seemed to fit the best into my RP. But idk maybe Harry wants to sober up entirely before he makes such a decision. I did get Kim to agree to be my partner tho which made me happy. I also also expecting as sort of “trial” at the end where my psyche makes an analysis of what kind of cop I turned out to be, but we just got in the motor carriage and left.
Kinda tempted to reload a save from before I encountered Ruby cuz I’m pretty sure there’s shit I missed, I was playing things kinda safe cuz I was sorta RP Harry as trying not to fuck things up and I think that bit me. Also I’m bummed I never got to meet with Steban again, don’t think I timed that right.
Anyway I’ll probably do a fash play through in a month or so.
Also didn’t like there wasn’t a “I’m turning I my badge” option for Harry (if there was one I didn’t see it). That seemed to fit the best into my RP.
You got sorry cop first run like, 2/3rds of us, didn’ya?
The analysis about what kinda cop you are is Kim’s report to your partners where he recounts the past few days to them.
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I don’t think that was me. I attended the first commie reading group meeting but missed the second cuz I triggered the tribunal.
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I also missed commie part 2 because of the tribunal, but you should definitely go back to before you went into the cave in order to tie up all the threads you missed, including that one. Commie book club part 2 is one of the best scenes in the game.
I also recommend, time permitting, a second playthrough where you save scum or cheat engine to pass every single red and white check. There’s so much cool stuff you can miss just by not rolling some dice good.
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So my concern is, the game says I only have 5 days, yet Rhetoric didn’t give me the “get organized” mission till day 4, and the group doesn’t meet till after 10. Is there a day 6? Cuz I’d kinda have to put off finding Ruby till Day 6 to attend the second meeting. I assumed if I went past day 5 the event would just trigger.
Also is it okay to bring Kim to the commie meetings? I didn’t for the first one and I don’t want him narcing.
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I think the real climax of the game is the showdown with the mercs. I could feel it was coming and I prepared accordingly with all of the armor (as an aside I was proud to have found all of it.) I really thought I could resolve it without anyone dying, but nope. Super intense moment in the game where everything came to a head just before I was ready. I’d even guessed that the real culprit was on the island, but it didn’t matter at that point, everyone was ready for blood. The die was cast at that point and afterward all that was left was to create a giant, burning message in the street, go through the motions of solving the case, and reflect on what I’d learned and what was coming next. I think the ending act was mostly a denouement and really coming to terms with reality.
However, the scene with the phasmid was truly unexpected and magical. I think I cried a little and got pretty breathless. It was the perfect thing to inject a little hope and sense of possibility as everything else sort of fell apart, or fell into its next stage. The confrontation with your old team felt pretty perfunctory at that point, just continuing to check off boxes as the future began take shape around you.
Still sort of think it was a weaker part of the game, but by that point I was well satisfied and sort of just enjoying the refractory period.
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I think they did a good job of making the cryptid seem far fetched while still leaving room for weird “supernatural” stuff like that to exist, with other stuff I can’t remember the name of being pretty out there. I think the crypid was even in the game’s trailer but I had forgotten about that by the time I got to that part.
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I went as heavy as I could into the shivers skill after having it trigger a couple times. That shit was very much my kind of supernatural. The city having a ghostly consciousness the connected everything or was constructed from everyone in it and the physical manifestations of their thoughts and actions was seriously rad.
I haven’t played this yet and am stuck on the character creation screen. What build should I do that’s inland empire focused? Do I need endurance? Is encyclopedia useful or can I just look it up on a wiki?
Your default equipment limits your Savoir-Faire skill, so if you want to be a criminal you need to take off your pants.
They’re not really like RPG stats. They affect the chance that you’re able to do certain things. But most things have multiple ways of doing them. So you can kind of tailor it to the type of person you want to be. I didn’t find myself using the physique stuff as much, but there were times it was useful. It really doesn’t matter all that much.
Alright as far as I can tell these are skills that are smart to invest in: perception, logic, visual calculus, physical instrument, volition, empathy. Inland Empire is definitely interesting and useful, plus there’s a lot of items that boost it.
Endurance isn’t bad. Encyclopedia is meh. I don’t think there was any skill that was straight up useless, but I used Visual Calculus and Empathy a lot.
3333 is what I went with. There’s items to boost your stats and the primary game mechanic is coming back to try again later after you fail a roll. With an even spread all of your character’s inner voices will get an even amount of screen time so you’ll really get to know them.
Encyclopedia can get you a thought cabinet perk that makes it easy to make money, giving you some money every time you pass a passive encyclopedia check, but just pick what abilities you think fits the character you want to try and play. The game is incredibly lenient on character builds, and there are even some thoughts that only chime in when their stat is too low. So if you want to do an Inland Empire build just pick other stuff that you feel makes sense. Might not be the answer you’re looking for but I really don’t think there is a need to try to make a build unless you’re trying to hit the dialogue trees for a specific skill.
I recommend at least 2 Endurance, but you don’t need to focus on it any more than that unless you want to use it for a Physical build (i forget what term they use to categorize the red abilities).
This is good to know. I’ve fucked myself over hard in old school rpgs by not investing enough in some skill that shouldn’t have mattered as much as it did.
Does a 5421 stat spread make sense?
Another point, unlike like other RPGs that end to reward dumping a ton of point into a handful of skills, DE tends to reward a more jack of all trade approach, so as you play you probably want to dump at least a few points into other skills. But having a lot of points in one or two is still a viable thing to do.
