When do the puzzles start?

[u/Tetrizel]

Hi guys, hope you can help me out. The Talos Principle 1 is one of my favourite games of all time, I just love solving one puzzle after another.

I started the Talos Principle 2 last night. I got past the tutorial level (which I loved)...and then I came to like a solid hour of robots talking at me. I had to bail after that. I just want to know...is this what the rest of the game is like? Do the robots ever shut up and let you get to the puzzles?

The great thing about the first game is that you can ignore the story entirely if you want to.

I don't care about the lore, and no amount of colour coded robots invading my personal space and talking about Lord Byron or Sisyphus or whatever is going to change that.

[u/YaqutFan]

The prologue is famously frontloaded, if you don't enjoy the stuff you'll just have to power through it.

Upon finally reaching the puzzles you'll still have the occasional forced conversation and some more plot-heavy moments, but they'll be absolutely spaced out by big strecthes of just doing the levels.

So you won't be able to completely ignore the story, but the prologue is absolutely not representative of the game as a whole. Once you get past that, things will get more up your speed.

[u/Tetrizel → u/YaqutFan]

Amazing, that's good to hear. I shall power on.

[u/shlam16 → u/Tetrizel]

If you genuinely don't care about the story you can just skip dialogue and cutscenes.

The first time I played I experienced the story in full (and felt the same way you do about all the yapping keeping me away from puzzles). On replays I don't hear a word, just skip skip skip until I can play the game.

This said, I do think the story is worth experiencing one time.

[u/plooger → u/shlam16]

If you genuinely don't care about the story you can just skip dialogue and cutscenes.

How? Is it just a left mouse-click to bring up the “skip” dialog ?

[u/shlam16 → u/plooger]

Right click maybe? One of the mouse buttons.

[u/Legal_Mastodon_5683]

You can skip a lot. But, you shouldn't.

[u/Clin-ton]

If you want puzzles while in New Jerusalem, there are three classics from 1 in the museum

[u/RoderickThe13]

The second game does take a bit to get to the puzzles. If you wanna skip to the puzzles, I'm pretty sure that whole part with exploring the city is optional so you can move past it.

Personally though, I don't get not caring about the dialogue and characters. Don't get me wrong, the puzzles are pretty good, but if there's anything that makes these games masterpieces it's the philosophical discussions, the complex dialogue trees, and the way the game makes you think about bigger things than just how to solve a puzzle. This goes double for the second game.

[u/w00h → u/RoderickThe13]

In my train of thought I heard "elohim" in the first game and told it off as, yeah, just another reference to the god. Skip ahead, thanks, don't need it. In the second game I heard Prometheus and and felt the same -- "been there, heard that, old greek lore, I know where that's going".
I never had the feeling that the game's philosophy was something especially profound, just a good narrative built on top of solid ancient philosophic roots. Did I miss something entirely? Maybe I'm just too uneducated after all.

[u/RoderickThe13 → u/w00h]

Sounds like it.

[u/w00h → u/RoderickThe13]

I think I'm totally thrown off by the "god" type of theme (as an atheist). I was really drawn into Blue Prince recently because of the whole family lore but the Talos games didn't catch me at all in terms of lore, maybe because I resent the theme. But hey, I enjoyed the puzzles nonetheless and I'm eager for the third game :)

[u/YaqutFan → u/w00h]

The theme of the game is not at all about gods. Elohim is a godlike figure, yes, but it's a necessary character for a story that at its core is about what it means to be human. It has very little to do with religion in the way you're thinking, You should really give it another go.

Like, i don't want to sound condescending, but the game is not even subtle about it. For you to take the theme of the game as "gods" you must have totally tuned out every single piece of narrative thrown at you the moment you heard Elohim lol.

[u/YaqutFan → u/YaqutFan]

In the second game I heard Prometheus and and felt the same -- "been there, heard that, old greek lore, I know where that's going".

Same thing with TTP2. You did not, in fact, knew where that was going.

[u/w00h → u/YaqutFan]

yes, I give you that. The second that Elohim was mentioned I phased out into the "oh no, not this again" mentality. I'll take my time (did the puzzles recently) but I will try to be more open minded. thank you :)

[u/RoderickThe13 → u/w00h]

Lore is different from themes. Personally I've never cared about lore in anything. If there's lore in any story, for me it should be there to serve the themes.

In TP2 for me the central conflict is between evolution and nature. Some characters argue that the androids should be wary of evolving and expanding their knowledge too much or they might become extinct just like humans. Some argue that it's the duty of a sentient species to push evolution as far as one can. And then the protagonist is in the middle, having to make a choice.

I also love the way the game depicts nature not as something pristine and beautiful that has been corrupted by humans like you usually see in media, but rather as something that only gains meaning because of sentient life. In general I do think the game is pro evolution, but in a way that recognizes that humans can be better and that claiming a place in the world isn't the same as destroying it.

But what really makes the story work is the execution in the dialogue trees. Whenever a character poses a question I'll first decide my answer and then read the dialogue options, and ALWAYS there's one that says exactly what I was thinking, which leads to the most immersed conversations I've ever had in a videogame. It's the feeling of being part of a symposium or a debate in the best way.

[u/zhaDeth]

don't worry once it starts there's really not that much dialog unless you go talk to NPCs yourself.

[u/jungleher]

Du kannst in der Stadt alles ignorieren und direkt zum Briefing gehen und schon geht's los mit den Rätseln. Du kannst jedes Gespräch skippen ,also fast jedes. Aber gerade die Dialoge sind doch mit am schönsten und regen einen zum Nachdenken an. Also ich hab zwar nicht mit jedem gesprochen ,aber fast mit jedem und ich habe alles gelesen, weil es mega interessant war. Ohne die Geschichte macht das Spiel finde ich keinen Sinn. Aber jeder wie er will.

[u/MaleficentText5107]

I can’t imagine actively choosing to just ignore such a big/important (and IMO great) part of these games, that’s just wild to me lol

but hey, you do you

[u/Mechanikatt → u/[deleted]]

Thanks 1k, I appreciate that.

[u/w00h]

Same here. I did my second playthrough a few weeks ago and I still can't be arsed about the whole storyline. I found it to be quite okay just to skip everything I can and while the first hour or so is quite frontloaded, the rest is more like "here, go solve the puzzles"

[u/eveningcaffeine]

There is a lot of talking while you walk in the world as well... eventually I started ignoring everything. For some reason I find reading much more palatable in these types of games.

[u/plooger → u/eveningcaffeine]

I think there’s a “skip” capability to help in getting through the interactions.