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Evil Genius 2 |OT| Subtitle blown up by do-gooders; please stand by
- Thread starter Poodlestrike
- Start date
- OT
Are you waiting for a particular review?
There's already a bunch here - https://opencritic.com/game/11142/evil-genius-2-world-domination
I found the opposite? I'm up to a capacity of 75+ with only a handful of lockers in. Did you do the staff+ research? It goes up pretty quickly.
This is exactly what I needed for a modern Evil Genius. It's slick, it looks gorgeous, it's everything it needs to be and more. Some of the charm and personality is missing, or perhaps different, but it's still lovely.
I love that the Casino is now part of the base.
Research seems a bit slow but I am looking forward to multiple floors. Am also finding I need to spam lockers like EG1 even after 2 research levels of pop cap.
Some negatives:
I am finding the map really annoying. I have to keep opening it, working out which areas don't currently have a scheme running, and then keep running it. It feels very fiddly. The change to always eliminate your minions is actually very welcome and makes things much clearer.
I'm kinda sad they changed the way items get brought in. I love the animation in EG1 where the minion dramatically opens the box and out pops a massive generator.
The mining is different now and more similar to other Dungeon Keeper style games. I understand why but I always loved the dynamite explosions in EG1.
I love that the Casino is now part of the base.
Research seems a bit slow but I am looking forward to multiple floors. Am also finding I need to spam lockers like EG1 even after 2 research levels of pop cap.
Some negatives:
I am finding the map really annoying. I have to keep opening it, working out which areas don't currently have a scheme running, and then keep running it. It feels very fiddly. The change to always eliminate your minions is actually very welcome and makes things much clearer.
I'm kinda sad they changed the way items get brought in. I love the animation in EG1 where the minion dramatically opens the box and out pops a massive generator.
The mining is different now and more similar to other Dungeon Keeper style games. I understand why but I always loved the dynamite explosions in EG1.
I'm having the opposite problem right now: I have a lot of minion capacity, but my refill rate just doesn't cover the missions + death by intruder decrease in minions...
Is there anyway to increase the minion recruitment rate (outside outright buying 5 minions for 10K)?
So after having played way too much yesterday, I think I like this one better than the original, though it is not without irritants.
First of all, it nails the tone. It's campy in all the best ways. And the dialogue scenes did make me laugh a few times, so that's a win.
But on a first play, it's hard to tell which rooms can be small and which need room to grow. The control room is getting silly-huge, and so is the training room. Meanwhile, the minions seemed happy enough to only have that little place to eat from the tutorial.
I also really wish the game had an Evilpedia or something to look up what things do. "You have unlocked the ability to designate an area to automatically tag agents!" Great! ...where? (It's on the vertical menu you open in the bottom left.)
Also a quick warning, unless you have some Muscle going, probably avoid the "I, Roboticist" side story until you do. There's a base invasion that wiped out all my minions, ALL of them, early on in that one. On the bright side, I learned how expendable the minions really are since the base was up and running soon after and repelled the second, bigger invasion later in the story.
Still, for a game I played THAT much on launch day, it must be doing something really, really right. Having the game autosave is great, but it also means fewer pauses where I can go "Maybe that's enough for today." at.
First of all, it nails the tone. It's campy in all the best ways. And the dialogue scenes did make me laugh a few times, so that's a win.
But on a first play, it's hard to tell which rooms can be small and which need room to grow. The control room is getting silly-huge, and so is the training room. Meanwhile, the minions seemed happy enough to only have that little place to eat from the tutorial.
I also really wish the game had an Evilpedia or something to look up what things do. "You have unlocked the ability to designate an area to automatically tag agents!" Great! ...where? (It's on the vertical menu you open in the bottom left.)
Also a quick warning, unless you have some Muscle going, probably avoid the "I, Roboticist" side story until you do. There's a base invasion that wiped out all my minions, ALL of them, early on in that one. On the bright side, I learned how expendable the minions really are since the base was up and running soon after and repelled the second, bigger invasion later in the story.
Still, for a game I played THAT much on launch day, it must be doing something really, really right. Having the game autosave is great, but it also means fewer pauses where I can go "Maybe that's enough for today." at.
Wonder could we get DLC adding Hank and Mr. Burns as Masterminds... that would be so cool.
Pro Tip: Rotating the Camera in Build Mode
- Default camera rotation is mapped to Q & E. But in Build Mode Q & E cycles through menu tabs.
- Edit menu cycle in Key Bindings (Options menu) to something like L & R arrows.
- Q & E now rotates camera in Build Mode.
Loving the game so far. The entire presentation package is so fresh & bright. It just pops with personality.
- Default camera rotation is mapped to Q & E. But in Build Mode Q & E cycles through menu tabs.
- Edit menu cycle in Key Bindings (Options menu) to something like L & R arrows.
- Q & E now rotates camera in Build Mode.
Loving the game so far. The entire presentation package is so fresh & bright. It just pops with personality.
I'd say it's been a bit unbalanced. The low level investigators in particular are pretty OP for their level.
Played around with it a bit, feels like old times. I do miss a couple of minor things from the original though, like the minions interface. But oh well.
Also, the world missions seem worse than in the original, but maybe that's just because I didn't even leave the tutorial yet.
I also fucked up my first base lol, because I instinctively build rooms for the future (and I remembered that in Evil Genius some rooms can become stupid big), so when the tutorial went "Let's build an Inner Sanctum", I actually didn't have any space anymore. Oops.
I feel that having Red Ivan as one of the geniuses is some clever joke by the devs, considering in Evil Genius Red Ivan was the one henchman you'd avoid no matter what because of his tendency to blow up your base haha.
Also, the world missions seem worse than in the original, but maybe that's just because I didn't even leave the tutorial yet.
I also fucked up my first base lol, because I instinctively build rooms for the future (and I remembered that in Evil Genius some rooms can become stupid big), so when the tutorial went "Let's build an Inner Sanctum", I actually didn't have any space anymore. Oops.
I feel that having Red Ivan as one of the geniuses is some clever joke by the devs, considering in Evil Genius Red Ivan was the one henchman you'd avoid no matter what because of his tendency to blow up your base haha.
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No kidding, to me this seems like the one change that is clearly a step back. The previous interface showed every class in one screen and you could also see pieces moving along a path as they trained. Now we have three "skill tree" menus that you tap through. Yuck!
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I don't understand the change either. In the first game this was not only a very clear and fun visualization, it was also super compact. Now you have to click through three screens just to change the amount of minions of one type you want to recruit, while in the original you could simply do that in the same window.
I find it so close to the first Evil Genius that I'm sad there is no real novice in it. Some problems remain the same of the old game. The need of so many lockers (and power generators if you want to have fun with traps) was the first thing to remove from the first Evil Genius, in my opinion.
Also I think the old way to do research of new items was more fun than the one we have now.
Also I think the old way to do research of new items was more fun than the one we have now.
I think Evil Genius 1 had a great idea for research but it was deeply flawed: Recipes didn't follow any logic between the test subject, testing tool and final result, so it was simply trial and error. After a few mistakes, it was faster to alt-tab out and check a wiki before researching (which is never a good sign). Is it disappointing that EG2 didn't try to iterate on this and simply went for the research tree that every other game has? Eh, maybe. But it is still better than the original, I think.
If I remember correctly, the research of the original Evil Genius was also a bit random due to AI researchers that you couldn't control having to "decide" to investigate specific items. Sure, EG2's solution is the boring one, but it's far more reliable and clear than the way it was done in the first game.
Wow, an official thread? Honoured! On top of leading social for this one, I got to write a bunch of stuff for it too 😊 Any bugs or questions feel free to ping me in this thread and I'll try my best!
I've played 10 hours and found no bugs yet, which is a huge improvement from EG1, where I saw characters getting stuck, quests failing to complete and very frequent crashes to desktop. None of that from EG2 so far. 👍
OP
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This is basically where I'm at - that and the new minion tree. Is it a flavor downgrade? Sure. But this is a lot more sensible and expandable. Lets 'em have a lot more research and more variations on minion progression. In this one, for example, technicians don't train into Scientists - before, all minion classes followed identical progression patterns to fit in. Here, there's more variety, and potentially, more minion types post-release without breaking the interface, lol.
I'm still chewing my way through the tutorial (VERY long, feels like you're basically on rails for a while) but I think it's a winner, a few quibbles like the above aside 👍
EDIT: Note to self, do not send out all your technicians on missions at once. My entire cafeteria broke out into spontaneous blue flames.
Also, does anybody know if the minion traits do anything?
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So, I've been playing as Zalika and I got into a pretty elaborate war against old man Jubei. Storyline spoilers: After quite a few missions (including one where I had to defeat him personally as he invaded my lair) I got a mission that said something like "Kill Jubei in the world stage". I completed the scheme, and got a cutscene with Zalika feeling slightly bittersweet about winning but Jubei being dead. Then the questline ends. Huh... I was expecting it to end with my recruiting Jubei, not killing him. Does anyone know if he's actually dead?
Not by default but go to settings and you can set it there. I use 1 for the Genius and 2 for the Henchman it works perfectly: the first press selects, the second focus on them.
I have only done Barracuda's quest; it worked like this.
first there was a side quest to know the char. After that it appeared 1 side quest to kill Barracuda. After I advanced the main story eventually it appeared another side quest to recruit Barracuda.
i'm trying a 2nd crime lord but i think every crime lord would work like this.
I think they do. I'm pretty sure there was one that said that had strong punches and i think he did more damage than other security guards.
OP
OP
Iiiiinteresting. I wonder if they're all like that; there's a lot of traits that seem... well, useless, at first blush. Or at least difficult to take advantage of; since you can't direct specific minions to perform specific tasks or even direct them to receive specific trainings when slots open up. I know I had one minion who "dreamed of being a Genius," which would be fascinating.
I am at work so I can't confirm but wouldn't the minion manager tab be for directing minions into specific training?
Maybe I misunderstood the tab.
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Maybe, I'm not sure. Haven't messed around with that yet, got wrapped up in Outriders the last couple days.
Been playing this a lot. The traits and how unclear they are are probably my biggest complaint. As far as I can tell changing the manager tab to a class type does not put them first for training mabye it puts them in a pool to be picked from but I'm not sure. The work station assignments like putting someone on food works as I usually saw the same people on it after I moved people with food traits there but I dont know if that trait does anything. Then I get some units that are both Crack and poor shots.
Only thing I have really noticed so far is I have that red 1 on build objects for hours of gameplay now but nothing is new when I click on it. Number will still update when I unlock more but it never goes under 1.
Some of them are, yeah! Some are fun, some have little things associated with them. The ones with gameplay association usually has stuff written there :)
I thought for a moment that my savegame was bugged because I kept getting a constant stream of P.A.T.R.I.O.T investigators, even after finally killing Agent X. Turns out it wasn't a "bug"! Apparently I had failed to notice some planted evidence left behind by Agent X! As soon as I got rid of that, the incursions stopped.
Strangely, there are still very frequent events popping up in North America (costing me money of heat spikes if I don't counter them). I would have expected these to stop after completing the storyline. Do you think that could be a gameplay bug, V_Ben?
Strangely, there are still very frequent events popping up in North America (costing me money of heat spikes if I don't counter them). I would have expected these to stop after completing the storyline. Do you think that could be a gameplay bug, V_Ben?
Yeah I bought the game 6 years ago and put it down fast too. I un-hid it from the library and checked it out. 10 hours of gameplay later and it's just so fun. I'm not sure how long it'll last but it's great to fill up the world map with minions and base build
Oooooookay, I was really confused about those. I had a bunch in my base before realizing I could delete them I just assumed they were things that my Minions were dropping from being engaged in combat.
I don't know if this gets tutorialised later but I've got basic minions developing specialisations to working in certain rooms, with changes to their outfits to boot. It's a nice touch.
It is, I unless I am missing something it would be cool if I could say click on a chef hat minion and get the details from there so I could assign them right then and there to kitchen duties so they dont go global. I did it a few times by looking up their name when my base was smaller.
Hm, I have a feeling I've entered the "Coast to victory" phase now. Super Agents barely even make it past the front door, then they hit a Paywall, allowing me to send all my Henchpeople to wait for them on the other side. And since one of those is Iris, it ALSO means every orange-clad minion in the base. Iris so far is the MVP Henchbot.
Also today I learned that while you CAN use the Interrogation chair for interrogations, that little hint in the tutorial about "You can only use the chair for now..." is worth taking note of. As is the fact that you can draw other floors inside rooms if you want to create hybrid rooms.
So anyway, my jail has a Shark Tank now. For interrogations. And since a captured agent has over 100 Resolve, but only 10 Vitality, they are much shorter interrogations. Every week is now Shark Week at Maximilian's.
Also fun, a corner is ALSO made of corridor, to fit a camera. And the jail is set to auto-tag "Capture". And the exit goes through an Armory with a table. So, basically, if they escape, they'll get spotted and Team Muscle will rush them. ...then they get the Shark Tank for being troublesome.
They'd get that anyway, but now I'll watch at normal speed, just to be sure.
Also today I learned that while you CAN use the Interrogation chair for interrogations, that little hint in the tutorial about "You can only use the chair for now..." is worth taking note of. As is the fact that you can draw other floors inside rooms if you want to create hybrid rooms.
So anyway, my jail has a Shark Tank now. For interrogations. And since a captured agent has over 100 Resolve, but only 10 Vitality, they are much shorter interrogations. Every week is now Shark Week at Maximilian's.
Also fun, a corner is ALSO made of corridor, to fit a camera. And the jail is set to auto-tag "Capture". And the exit goes through an Armory with a table. So, basically, if they escape, they'll get spotted and Team Muscle will rush them. ...then they get the Shark Tank for being troublesome.
They'd get that anyway, but now I'll watch at normal speed, just to be sure.
i'm playing the mad lady scientist. At the start i dealt with agents by spaming minions and by using her ranged attack to kill them. If i rememebr currectly you can buy 3 minions for 10000. So try to just get as much money from the world map so taht you have a higher income. Once you can get rank 2 boradcasts yo ucan easily get a trainign area with dozens of guard trainers.
That said IMO the only muscle monions worth anything are martial artist and hitman. Security gaurds and merc die extremely easy. For these 2 classes to be anything worthwhile give them some weapons. 10 security guards armed with ranged weapons do quite a bit of damage!!
V_Ben My first impressions bellow after around 23h of game time;
I'll start by saying that i usually play strategy games since it is my favorite genre;
I'll also begin with what i didn't like:
- Tutorial has severe pacing problems - the ammount of restrictions might make it easier to learn the game but it slows gameplay a lot.
- Tutorial misses a few concepts -> i still don't udnerstand traps (enemy agents just seem to breeze through them) and took me quite a while to understand a few minion related things like tech can build stuff. I also don't udnerstand stats at all.
- Tutorial doesn't mention that you can make such a labyrinthic casino that the non super agents will turn back without ever figthing you.
- I can only have 1 side mission which is a pity specially when doing minion recruitment quests where I had to wait quite a bit.
- Some hencman are very weak/unbalanced. I have the radio girl and she is absolutely useless. Jubei on the other hand is absolutely incredibly with his teleport and high damage output.
- Some UI issues like not explaining what the itens from loot do and lack of tooltips. For example what does Smarts stat do?
- Prisonbreaks are so often that make big prisons unrealiable. THis is because when a prisoner tries to escape all prisoners being tortured/brainwashed are released as well. Also there is no "defense" inside the prison tab which IMO feels like someone missed there. I know i can make an armory inside the prison but it doesn't, imo, meld well.
- It seems we can't recruit every hencman in 1 playthrough - I get the replayability idea but it is also a missing opportunity to just have this huge "avenger infinity war" type of team
- The humor/puns/references are good. It has made me chuckle a lot
- The basic gameplay loop of deal with agents in lair -> go make some trouble in world map -> expand the lair ->rinse and repeat; is quite good. I specially like the super agents work like curve balls to my plans.
- Minions usually really do a good job on what to priority .I barely have used my EG "focus here" button.
What I loved:
- The animations are spot on! it feels like i'm a cartoon vilain and i revel in it!!
- THe voice acting is superb, specially for the Genius and Henchman
- the storyline and side quests are quite entertaining!
- I played 23h in 5 days -> Is this game triggering a 6C51.1 in me?
On the side note as you see the above I think the quality of the content is rather good i wonder if the DLC won't suffer from being under budget. I can't see how a campaign with a new genius, 2 new henchmans and 2 new minions are just worth 25€; assuming off course the quality bar remains the same.
You can, but you need to execute one of your existing henchmen if you already have a full set of five.
Thanks! I've tried setting it up previously but didn't work at first, I think I didn't apply the bind changes that first time. Now it works like a charm :)
And that is game.
Maximilian, Crown Gold, Medium Difficulty: Complete!
So if V_Ben is looking for feedback, I have some.
The Good (as in quality, not morality)
Maximilian, Crown Gold, Medium Difficulty: Complete!
So if V_Ben is looking for feedback, I have some.
The Good (as in quality, not morality)
- This is definitely the game I hoped it would be, the idea of the original given a polish and tried again
- The music is fantastic
- The voice acting is campy and that fits
- Traps being self-triggering is good
- Iris is the MVP Henchbot, Eli, Dr. Ming, and Sir Daniel are nice, too.
- Power requirements. My entire second floor was a power station. That's a bit much.
- Janet Bombe is kind of... meh. Maybe Emma can get more use from her, but she does what Eli does, except worse.
- No idea of what rooms will need space to grow and what will not. (Training rooms get HUGE! Control rooms, too!)
- Research stalls hard when you need a new minion type. It's easy to cap out research fast.
- The ending dragged out a bit, never thought that firing a Doomsday Device could get old, but... I won already.
- Did they really need to name the penultimate Main Objective for Max "Trigger Warning"? That's not funny. This game is about fun evil, not petty real evil like that. Do better.
Okay so is the achievement that requires having One Billion Dollars actually doable? I'd suck if it can't be done in certain islands and it requires playing on easy.
I'm on my second campaign and that achievement is one of the few I'm aiming for but... I'm already using over half of one floor on treasury and my cap is 3 million.
I'm on my second campaign and that achievement is one of the few I'm aiming for but... I'm already using over half of one floor on treasury and my cap is 3 million.
Oh, I forgot one thing that nagged me a bit.
Can we get a list of possible schemes when we click on a region on the World Stage? Some of them can be huge, like the Russia area, or sometimes the schemes hide behind the region icon. That's annoying if it's an objective scheme.
Add to that, a list of objective schemes for the entire World so I don't have to hunt the entire map to find out where that one scheme that progresses a side story is hiding would be nice. Put that on my island's icon, maybe?
Can we get a list of possible schemes when we click on a region on the World Stage? Some of them can be huge, like the Russia area, or sometimes the schemes hide behind the region icon. That's annoying if it's an objective scheme.
Add to that, a list of objective schemes for the entire World so I don't have to hunt the entire map to find out where that one scheme that progresses a side story is hiding would be nice. Put that on my island's icon, maybe?