Back to Grimrock 2
Posted: Sun Jun 25, 2023 4:04 am
I randomly saw someone play Grimrock 2 on Twitch. They were playing a mod, the House of Hardabar I think. Anyway, it rekindled the old fire I used to have for this game so I decided to reinstall it and play it through again (I downloaded that mod too, although have not played it yet). I played the crap out of this game back in the day, including mods when it first came out, but it's been 4-5 years since I've touched it and had forgotten lots of things.
Went with just regular hard difficulty. Ratling rogue dex build and insectoid rogue strength build in the front row (for quickness); both dual wielding light weapons and backstabbing of course, then a minotaur barbarian in the back who was built to throw and do alchemy, and finally a human battle mage in the last spot (skilled, fast learner; I prioritized getting light, invisibility, forcefield and meteor storm spells quickly). I was happy with the party, but maybe a full wizard would have been better early and mid-game for more mana (late game it doesn't matter, for me at least, as I always had enough mana and was regenning it fast enough). And a minotaur strength rogue in the front instead of the insectoid might have been better too, but I didn't want two of the same race because then I would have had to share the skulls (and omit insectoid's race food bonuses - not that those helped me much).
Early game was no problem. Had to reload the first boss fight with the trees (viper roots) a few times. The knife throwing rats in the first or second dungeon also gave me some trouble, as well as getting surrounded when I jumped into pits (I made it a point to jump into all of them). Another super tough mini-boss battle was with the stone golems in the Twigroot Forest (the area you enter from the Forgotten River) because I did it fairly early. Next I explored the general areas of the Forgotten River and Sleet Island, which were no problem. Then the Ruins of Desarune, which were tough, especially the ice elementals in the meditation spire room (maybe there's an easy way to do that fight, but I just found an area to hide in and ventured out to do hit and runs at them with lots of saves in-between). I had also forgotten how huge the Ruins were; I thought I was just popping into another dungeon to check it out but then they kept going on and on...
After the Ruins, the Bog felt easy, and the other areas were no problem. I should have gotten the rope from the early gold key stash though because jumping into pits and then having to use healing potions just felt like a waste. The semi-final boss battle, the dragon at the top of the castle, was no problem. I took him out on first try and I think he was only able to summon two waves of enemies. The real boss fight in the Trickster's Lair was much harder. I still got it on first try, but had to use all my healing shards and healing potions to get through it. (Got the Island Master down to about quarter health right at the start of the fight, but then lost track of him and had to fight mostly his clones until I finally squished him at the end).
Guess it's now time to take a look at some of the mods that have come out in the last 4-5 years. But yeah, great game, still holds up, and I just wish they would make a third one in the series. I think it would be pretty easy in principle (not necessarily in practice) to upgrade (more spells, more weapons, more races and classes, towns and shops, maybe NPC's that you could talk to and even recruit as a fifth companion... yeah, just the same basics as the old game but with more, new stuff).
Went with just regular hard difficulty. Ratling rogue dex build and insectoid rogue strength build in the front row (for quickness); both dual wielding light weapons and backstabbing of course, then a minotaur barbarian in the back who was built to throw and do alchemy, and finally a human battle mage in the last spot (skilled, fast learner; I prioritized getting light, invisibility, forcefield and meteor storm spells quickly). I was happy with the party, but maybe a full wizard would have been better early and mid-game for more mana (late game it doesn't matter, for me at least, as I always had enough mana and was regenning it fast enough). And a minotaur strength rogue in the front instead of the insectoid might have been better too, but I didn't want two of the same race because then I would have had to share the skulls (and omit insectoid's race food bonuses - not that those helped me much).
Early game was no problem. Had to reload the first boss fight with the trees (viper roots) a few times. The knife throwing rats in the first or second dungeon also gave me some trouble, as well as getting surrounded when I jumped into pits (I made it a point to jump into all of them). Another super tough mini-boss battle was with the stone golems in the Twigroot Forest (the area you enter from the Forgotten River) because I did it fairly early. Next I explored the general areas of the Forgotten River and Sleet Island, which were no problem. Then the Ruins of Desarune, which were tough, especially the ice elementals in the meditation spire room (maybe there's an easy way to do that fight, but I just found an area to hide in and ventured out to do hit and runs at them with lots of saves in-between). I had also forgotten how huge the Ruins were; I thought I was just popping into another dungeon to check it out but then they kept going on and on...
After the Ruins, the Bog felt easy, and the other areas were no problem. I should have gotten the rope from the early gold key stash though because jumping into pits and then having to use healing potions just felt like a waste. The semi-final boss battle, the dragon at the top of the castle, was no problem. I took him out on first try and I think he was only able to summon two waves of enemies. The real boss fight in the Trickster's Lair was much harder. I still got it on first try, but had to use all my healing shards and healing potions to get through it. (Got the Island Master down to about quarter health right at the start of the fight, but then lost track of him and had to fight mostly his clones until I finally squished him at the end).
Guess it's now time to take a look at some of the mods that have come out in the last 4-5 years. But yeah, great game, still holds up, and I just wish they would make a third one in the series. I think it would be pretty easy in principle (not necessarily in practice) to upgrade (more spells, more weapons, more races and classes, towns and shops, maybe NPC's that you could talk to and even recruit as a fifth companion... yeah, just the same basics as the old game but with more, new stuff).