When Wasteland 2 first stepped onto the (relatively) unknown Kickstarter platform, I remember how strange it was typing that name into a headline without attaching a radioactive heap of speculation in the paragraph below. That Wasteland 2 might exist one day seemed like A Big Deal. Every now and then, as I’m writing a fresh headline I pause for thought again. Wasteland 2 is playable right now, a single playthrough of the final release will apparently take around fifty hours and Linux support has now been added. It’s important to remember, from time to time, that though the vampires of nostalgia nibble away, some meetings of past and present are as exciting as they are unlikely.

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Wasteland 2 might be in its “final stretch” of development, but that doesn’t mean all systems are go just yet. inXile is still hard at work on ironing out kinks, smoothing rough edges, and even overhauling the entire inventory system. The mighty kicker of starters does, however, have an estimate of how long a single> playthrough will last you: 50 hours. Exploring all locations and missions, however, will take “quite a bit longer.” One such location? The entirety of Los Angeles (and outlying areas), which is not part of the ongoing beta. If you think Wasteland’s been looking a little too>, er, wasteland-y, this ought to make you gleeful as Aberforth, the goat Alec nearly murdered.

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Continuing adventures in the beta (i.e. unfinished, thus everything I mention is subject to change) of inXile’s post-apocalyptic RPG Wasteland 2. Previous instalments are here.>

Things I have: an android’s leg; a giant toad’s eye; enough painkillers to keep an entire Oscars ceremony’s worth of celebrities calm for at least a weekend; a dirty, torn shirt of unknown origin.Things I do not have: much of a clue as to what I’m doing. … [visit site to read more]

Continuing adventures in the beta (i.e. unfinished, thus everything I mention is subject to change) of inXile’s post-apocalyptic RPG Wasteland 2. Part 1 is here.>

And so our merry band of four – wait, suddenly we’re a merry band of five. Angela, a grizzled but approachable senior Ranger, requests to join us just as we prepare to step into the irradiated desert sands proper, as we’re on the trail of a mysterious killer, someone or something that murdered Ace, a comrade of hers. She speaks of experience and adventures past, of how something ain’t right and how we look like the stuff that stories are made from. She speaks suspiciously as though we might have heard of her before, a long time ago. Nah, can’t be. … [visit site to read more]

A few months ago Wasteland 2 and my PC got on about as well as Piers Morgan and Wayne LaPierre, but as of a recent update I’m glad to say that inXile’s old school cRPG is as smooth as butter on my machine (though I do have to turn SSAO off, but I’ll stop talking about that before I before you). This means I am now free and able to play a game that is both sequel to Fallout’s post-nuclear predecessor and, let’s be honest, an alternative Fallout 3.

Let’s see how we do. … [visit site to read more]

I emerged from Wasteland 2‘s beta with a fair number of irradiated gravel bits in my gamerly boot, but there’s no denying that it’s a solid foundation. (And hey, it’s a beta. If you go into a bug hunt expecting to not get dirty, then I can only advise that you re-calibrate your expectations.) Improvements, however, take time, and inXile’s been diligently ironing out Wasteland 2′s kinks ever since the beta started. So surely it’s almost done by now, right? Well, kinda. All that remains is the “final stretch,” which will last three months and change if all goes according to plan. There’s a new beta build en route too, for those still in the business of picking at the pie before its done cooling on the window sill (or another equally quaint metaphor of your choosing).

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