Hell it is me, with some big news! Patch 1.9.7.13 launches TODAY, and let me tell you: this is one tasty update packed with new features, balance changes, and quality of life improvements - including some that folks have been asking about for a LONG time. Ever been hesitant to grab an item or activate that card because you can’t quite remember what it does, exactly? Well no longer – because we’ve added ITEM DESCRIPTIONS for every collectible, consumable, and trinket in the game!
This is actually the reason I never finished the game. I pretty quickly got sick of looking every item up and/or constantly stopping to take notes about what items did.
And I really like roguelikes a lot. But it felt like there was so much to have to memorize and for me in broke the otherwise fast pace of the game.
Another victory for patient gaming!
All of the updates and content expansions and so on and so forth have really made Isaac unmanageable in that regard. Throw in the fact that there are quite a few item drops that are objectively detrimental in basically every situation so that a not insignificant fraction of the item pool is just trash drops that nobody in their right mind would ever pick up, and it gets ridiculous quickly. Once you have enough unlocked that you’re regularly getting runs down into the lower sub-basements of hell, unless you’re an absolute guru the meta is literally just to meta. Know a couple of the game-breaking combinations off the top of your head and cross your fingers that you’ll run across all of the components. Ignore all other risks.
This is in stark contrast to e.g. Dead Cells, which is why I’ve got such an immense respect for the latter. If you’re willing to adjust your play style slightly, every single drop in Dead Cells is a viable weapon that can be deadly in the right hands. You could be wielding a legendary golden abyssal trident, sure, but you can also just as well beat the shit out of all the boss monsters with a pair of frying pans tied together with some rope. It must have taken an immense amount of work to get all of that even vaguely balanced and ensure that there were no duds, wheras Isaac’s strategy seems to be more just throwing shit at the wall (probably literally…) to see what sticks, with a garnishing of deliberately adding things to troll the player for the lulz.
This is actually the reason I never finished the game. I pretty quickly got sick of looking every item up and/or constantly stopping to take notes about what items did. And I really like roguelikes a lot. But it felt like there was so much to have to memorize and for me in broke the otherwise fast pace of the game. Another victory for patient gaming!
All of the updates and content expansions and so on and so forth have really made Isaac unmanageable in that regard. Throw in the fact that there are quite a few item drops that are objectively detrimental in basically every situation so that a not insignificant fraction of the item pool is just trash drops that nobody in their right mind would ever pick up, and it gets ridiculous quickly. Once you have enough unlocked that you’re regularly getting runs down into the lower sub-basements of hell, unless you’re an absolute guru the meta is literally just to meta. Know a couple of the game-breaking combinations off the top of your head and cross your fingers that you’ll run across all of the components. Ignore all other risks.
This is in stark contrast to e.g. Dead Cells, which is why I’ve got such an immense respect for the latter. If you’re willing to adjust your play style slightly, every single drop in Dead Cells is a viable weapon that can be deadly in the right hands. You could be wielding a legendary golden abyssal trident, sure, but you can also just as well beat the shit out of all the boss monsters with a pair of frying pans tied together with some rope. It must have taken an immense amount of work to get all of that even vaguely balanced and ensure that there were no duds, wheras Isaac’s strategy seems to be more just throwing shit at the wall (probably literally…) to see what sticks, with a garnishing of deliberately adding things to troll the player for the lulz.
I really like Dead Cells but I never got that run where I was able to finish it. I need to get back to that game as well.
Same, I enjoyed the gameplay but every item drop was far less exciting because I’d need to pause and consult a wiki before making a choice.