Eschalon: Book I Hands-on Preview

Basilisk Games forum member Gallifrey is offering his impressions of Eschalon: Book I, after giving the game’s upcoming demo a “look and feel” test. It sounds like he really liked it:

NPC dialogue is extremely well done and detailed. This is not the two or three line sort of dialogue you see in most games, there’s a fair bit of exposition (but not quite to the degree of Planescape:Torment!). You’re given a fair bit of setting detail in their dialogue and descriptive text, much like how a DM in a PnP game might deliver it all. Also nice is that there isn’t one All Knowing NPC who tells you everything about your quests and such, you pick up pieces of history and clues from everyone you talk to and so you as the PC put it together yourself.

There’s a nice sense of having to be equipped and prepared for your journeys. You’ll want to be well stocked in things like potions and torches and yet you will still need to make judicious use of them and be clever in your questing in order to make your supplies last.