Tigranes

" I am obviously unhappy that the game has already predetermined exactly who is going to be in my party first playthrough." It hasn't, only your mental compulsions.

I like some degree of separation. I have never been on a developer forum thinking "man, I wish this discussion was merged with Youtube comments on the latest video" or whatever. I like being able to choose if I want to be on reddit or here, if I prefer a forum or a social media platform, or voraciously gorge all of them. What would be cool is to look at what isn't possible under current umbrella, and figure out what platforms or whatever need to be added to support it. Given Obsidian has some kind of relationship to Pathfinder and they've been thinking about POE tabletop for a while, something like Kennyrules' suggestion sounds great. Providing a central platform for uploading and distributing mods to Obsidian games - and thus giving them some backing - would be great, though this is probably only worthwhile if any upcoming Obsidian release is actually going to be modfriendly. Centralising the drip of information when there's a new crowdfunded game is probably a useful goal, but you're not really going to get people to stop using FB or Twitter just by having an Obsidian info hub. People will just link to the latter in the former, because people are platform loyal for other reasons. But overhauling the largely pointless Obsidian website to provide a one stop shop for game related info - or doing it here in the forums - might be a cool thing for the fans.

As I said before, switch to five isn't actually likely to massively change how tactically complex the game is, or how your play experience feels in the way some people seem to think. As someone who's played IE games, POE, and many other RPGs ranging from full party to 3-4 man party to solo (and 8-man parties where permitted), the difference between 5 and 6 just isn't a big deal. Imagine someone said they think 7 is the magic number and it's a travesty POE only had 6. Obviously something changes once you go down to 2 or 3, but up here, it's less significant. The reason a game like FF8 is much less tactically complex is down to the design of the combat and character system, not the 3-man party; it wouldn't be more complex or entertaining with a 6-man party, just more tedious. Hence the question is what they're doing to the rest of the systems, not the party size in itself. Neither is 6 some kind of holy grail, there's a fair number of variance throughout RPG history. Exception is if you have this magic lineup that you insist on creating every single time you play any party WRPG and it absolutely needs 6 people, but in that case, take the opportunity to try some different compositions and build types. You'll find it's more enjoyable, and, uh, tactical.

Read the manual, play the game, figure it out as you go. The most fun way.

This is the kind of stuff I want to see more and support on KS - crazy but interesting stuff that really wouldn't have hope of being made otherwise. And when it's this crazy and interesting I don't mind if the end result doesn't turn out to be the greatest game ever, it's still worth a punt from me. Seems like a lot of the game is already up and running as well, representing some kind of proper development.

Stop letting your FOMO take over your entertainment, until you're wasting time looking stuff up and running back and forth for that tiny marginal bonus that you'd never notice anyway instead of having fun. Stronghold, for better or for worse, just isn't that big a deal in POE, and adventures in particular can easily be ignored entirely.

Historical.

No idea if it'll be good, but I hope so, would be lovely and would be happy to buy upon release. MCA participating means nothing, he's endorsing and helping out with every bloody RPG known to man at this rate. We'll see if he actually has a substantial role to play this time.

That's new to me too. It's a great experience to find new things in this game, like the first time you talk to the former companion now dead in one of the earlier areas (I think this is one most people know about now, but nevertheless). Or the whole cube business as you carry it half of the game.

I'm glad you're spelling out your views and bringing supporting material. To sum up: 1. You often say "newer games are better because..." then present another sweeping generalisation instead of supporting argumentation. E.g. saying "we have better artists, better writers, better programmers today than ever before... everything is excelling because the younger generation has more access to everything and are being fed to create" doesn't actually give the reader any reason to be persuaded of this. You're just asserting that writers today are better, they have more 'access' to everything (do they? how do I know?), and they're being 'fed to create' (I don't even know what this means). I'm simply not being given any actual meat to chew on and think "you know what, at least that bit is true, newer games do have the benefit of X specific thing that they didn't used to". All I see is slogans. 2. You still can't help but insert at every opportunity patronising assumptions about people who disagree with you. Every paragraph or so, there's this unfounded assumption that this is "people who realise newer games are obviously better vs. people stuck in the 90s with nostalgia goggles incapable of seeing the obvious truth". Nobody wants to be talked to like this. Imagine if I kept telling you that "old games are obviously better and people who don't understand that are just dumb sheep, and the reason for it is the older generation just was more hungry to create." Would you ever be persuaded? 3. I know there're plenty of idiots out there who will tell you newer games are all crap and you're an idiot for liking them, or that the original Mass Effect was amazing and any change to it is sacrilege. But I don't see anyone like that here (usually). Why pick the most stupid of opposition to argue with, especially if they're not in the room? E.g. I've actually played the old Fallouts recently, I'm not speaking from 20 year old memories. I'm not inherently opposed to, say, the switch of camera perspective in the new Fallouts. For someone like me you're giving no reason to be persuaded. 4. If you really want to have a reasonable discussion about these issues, then you need to actually debate the bits that you gloss over by saying "it's obvious". First, abandon this unfounded and insulting assumption that people who disagree with you are disagreeing in bad faith (e.g. that they are just arguing for old games to 'protect their favourite eras'). Second, tell us specifically what you feel has improved about, say, the visuals of games between 90s and 10s. For example, I am firmly of the belief that while technical fidelity of game graphics has enormously improved in those years, this has been accompanied by a general decline in artistic style, resulting in a more monotonous and unimaginative set of visuals - and so the results are mixed, rather than any one period being 'superior'. This doesn't mean going back to pixel graphics is necessary to achieve better visuals, but I would be able to discuss how the switch to 3D, for example, brought about numerous changes in game production processes that contributed to this monotony. Do you see how such a substantial discussion would be markedly different from just saying "it's obvious newer games are so much better in every way and you'd have to be insane to deny it"?

Of course you're free to argue games are generally better now and that old games tend to be overrated. But if you want to argue that point, then argue it, and respect people with other opinions by not starting with the premise that your argument is already proven and people who disagree must be incapable of objective judgment. Otherwise why would anyone want to engage with you? Surely you can see how ridiculous it is to say "most people are unable to be objective about these games, but I can, and I'm here to tell you that yeah older games were better for Mass Effect and stuff but its just your bias for all those other times." I never played any of the Mass Effects, but it would be like me tellng you that's your nostalgia goggles and you just can't accept "progress" (whatever that means) and you're just in an 'occultic' mindset and it's proven that Andromeda is the shiznits. Talking that way doesn't really let you persuade anyone or open up debate. (For what it's worth, I would agree that in the RPG space some indies have put out very creative and charming stuff recently, much more in line with the best titles from ye olde days - but you look at roughly the 2003-2010 period or so and that's a long and fallow period of mostly super-shallow 'cinematic' gruel.)

You just can't stop ranting about these goggles other people must have at every opportunity, can you? "People who say older games are better are wrong, except for these games where I agree with them, there it's not biased!" Let it go, man. From a purely money-making standpoint, they might be thinking that we can't exactly get Obsidian to make five more South Park games and make them even more widely accessible, so let's just leverage the success of the first game with a cheap sequel and rake in easy cash before calling it a day. I thought the Obsidian SP was awful, but yeah, I can't see the sequel greatly pleasing those who enjoyed the former.

Avellone in his later years at Obsidian was no longer taking a big role on a project, instead writing little bits and pieces here and there. Since he's left, this trend has actually intensified, and you can find his glowing endorsement on every RPG under the sun and 'advisory' or contributory roles for every other RPG. Who knows how much of that is down to him or Obsidian or whatever. As far as I'm concerned he can take my money ASAP once he decides to actually write a full game again - and if he doesn't, he's irrelevant.

"They" didn't change it, the new Thief is an entirely new developer that hopped on the franchise - and did a thoroughly mediocre job of it. For more of the real Thief, The Dark Mod is now standalone with a ton of excellent community-made missions in the spirit of the originals.

As a backer, my considered opinion is that I don't want weekly updates and the like to be a standard for kickstarted games. I think they are an unintended consequence of the crowdfunding model with a clear risk for oversaturating, part of the current attention economy where anxiety over intangible 'engagement' drives excessive communications (of which one of the side effects is the ridiculous overblown controversies about some promise or feature or other we get every now and then). 'Getting feedback' is not an unalloyed good; I donated so Obsidian can be freer from outside interferences or interminable PR makework that is a part of the publisher model, not to replace that with unhelpfully excessive 'feedback' or incessant updates. I'm sure some folks really want them, and I'm sure that in some cases, this does drive up sales and visibility in a way that is profitable. But that's different from the common reasoning that 'everyone's doing it so it must be necessary' (which is, by the way, not generally true in any kind of marketing), and that doesn't mean I, as a consumer and backer, should bend over my preferences. And given the OP started this thread by arguing the updates we already get aren't substantial enough, there's not much leverage in claiming it ain't much.

At some point it's counterproductive to overshare. As Sedrefillos says I'd prefer if they didn't waste time on tons of updates, just go work on the game and let us know every now and then when there's something to share. I paid them to make a good game, I didn't pay them to knock on my door and do a jig and give me weekly updates. "I don't think requesting an update about the game is a bad thing or anything people should get offended about. The OP doesn't seem like they were meaning to attack anyone. " Nobody's offended and nobody's attacking, as anybody with eyes can see. Having a different opinion doesn't mean they're scrooges born unto the world expressly to be negative about everything for no reason.

POE seemed to be designed, from the start, as a combat-centric combat-heavy game... which, really, is what BGs/IWDs were. I certainly wouldn't mind them adding more meaningful noncombat gameplay - and making the CYOAs actually matter instead of tiny little injuries nobody ever gives a crap about.

One of the unfortunate side effects of crowdfunding is the excessive and mostly useless nitpicking, so I'll try not to add to that. I think on the whole it was a very coherent campaign, with stretch goals and rewards much less likely to cause grief for the development process. Whether I like them or don't care about them, I'm not so fussed about the stretch goals we miss out on. Most important thing is a good game, not a long list of features they have to tick the box on. I think the money they got is a good haul for a sequel coming well after the initial honeymoon period of game crowdfunding. But I wonder whether fig's investor model is going to eat significantly into the profits in the long run, and cause more sustainability problems as they try to then make POE3.

Not "soon" anymore. It was released there 10 hours ago as well. Enjoying it a fair bit, even though I think going from the resource management / map exploration / events mix of the first game to a more standard RPG style hasn't really helped the game. We're lucky to have plenty of reasonably 'tactical' RPGs / pseudo-RPGs, some turn based, some with survival mechanisms, etc., alongside more actiony fare these days. The combat, more or less, retains the quite very fun formula they worked out with the first game.

I liked the POE monk. It is quite powerful. So eh.

They didn't look particularly great in Tyranny - 3D models rarely look better than painted portraits, and the watercolours should fit the rest of the game better too.

Because life is mostly a void and filling it with sound and fury has become a practical solution where prostitutes are expensive and a conviction...

It looks like Eder is holding Maia by the scruff of the neck there! Its always Eder it seems...I personally can't unsee it as Eder holding Maia's ponytail. Nobody can see the one lying on the bench looking up Maia's skirt? Great positioning, really.

This might well become my only Day 1 purchase of the year, along with Battle Brothers. Glad they've improved on the formula, and hope they get enough sales to keep making.

Nah, oby has been devoured by bruce, his antithesis