nikolokolus

As happy as am for myself that I'll get to play a (hopefully) pretty cool game in a year and a half, I'm happier that Obsidian gets a chance to make game and IP that they can truly call their own.

Since we know that souls are constantly being reincarnated, that sort of implies to me that bringing somebody back from the dead would be anathema -- interfering with the gods, or "the plan," etc. -- I guess it really does come down to the cosmology of the game world and how that ties into the mechanics of death. Personally, I always thought "raise dead" and "resurrection" was a little trite in the Dungeons and Dragons settings, especially in the CRPG derivatives of the ruleset. I know most people will never go for a "true death" system (except on expert mode maybe?) but maybe there should be a successive penalty for each resurrection? In 1st ed. AD&D I seem to recall you took a permanent -1 constitution penalty and had a finite number of resurrection attempts (and % chance of success) based on constitution. Maybe something like that could be implemented, so dying isn't something that just gets brushed off as a minor inconvenience?

Not knowing what the core game will be like, I tend to favor an expansion that integrates into the main game somewhat seamlessly (like BG1 xpac, or Dead Money for FONV, etc.) But when this arc is done, I think they should reset the franchise and make the next game start fresh. new continent/land, new part of the timeline, whatever) I think the single character trilogy thing has been kind of done to death.

I don't think promising a modding toolkit is going to be in the stars right now. It sounds like they still aren't completely sure how assets are going to be bundled with the Unity engine.

People usually tend to act in their own self interest. How that meshes or conflicts with other peoples' self interest is usually where you get judgments about "good" and "evil." To whatever extent PE allows us to have varying faction relationships, will largely define how villainous or heroic our character(s) are perceived. Being "good" or "bad" from a player's perspective should really boil down to how you conceive of your character concepts and what their motivations are. If on the other hand we're dealing with issues of true psychopathy, that kind of thing probably should be treated harshly by the game world -- like an insane paladin, wantonly killing infidels by the thousand for his vision of a "greater good." (I guess insane paladin is kind of redundant though?)

Here's a novel idea for everybody who doesn't trust Obsidian to deliver the game in a manner which they find acceptable, don't pledge. I don't even mean that in some snarky, butthurt way -- This whole Kickstarter thing is entirely voluntary, and you should only back a company/idea you really believe in.

I voted "other" none needed

As the elves say, "chillax"

George Ziets was a key developer for Mask of the Betrayer. Nuff said

Man this fit of nostalgia really makes me want to reinstall the whole kit and kaboodle ... god, this is going to take forever. Edit: Yup forever ... btw, Anybody remember if there are any niggling issues with the install process? I seem to recall there being problems once upon a time? Just to be safe I'm doing the Main install + patch, XP1 + patch, XP2 + patch. Seem like overkill?

Interesting, but no chance.

Reactivity is great, but it can become a real mess when massive branching events get carried across multiple games. This is why I tend to favor storylines that terminate at the conclusion of a game + xpac, and then make a true sequel in another part of the timeline, in another part of the world. For all of The Elder Scrolls' failings as an RPG system, they get this part correct when it comes to keeping their lore tidy.

Actually I think their pitch had more to do with three simple things: Compelling characters, tactical party based combat, and a 3rd person axonometric POV of the game world. In the spirit of the old IE games. That doesn't preclude innovation or changing things up that didn't work particularly well in those old games.

I get the idea of reusing assets and not having to reinvent the wheel, so to speak, so you make a good point. I don't know, maybe I'm still leery because of that pitch video?

Tahvo Ukkonen lets his axe and sword do the talking -- google translate not needed.

There's just something "off" about that project ... and I mean aside from the spartan details about gameplay (although I guess we know it will be a first person, party-based game). The "two games for the price of one" gimmick really has me scratching my head. If the medieval fantasy game raises 1.85 million you get one game, if it raises 1.9 million you get one medieval fantasy game and a sci-fi game ... which splits the funding, so you get two 950K games. And how is this a good thing exactly?

Prohibitions against alcohol use are very old. It's not completely unreasonable to expect some societies will have prohibitions against specific mind-affecting substances. But yes, some societies will allow and even encourage the use of certain mind altering substances, particularly for religious purposes. I completely agree that societies have long had prohibitions and social mores concerning the consumption and/or abuse of alcohol and narcotics. My only point is that rigid enforcement of drug laws and having a black market is a somewhat modern conceit, mostly arising in post-industrial societies. Also, in a world with the accepted use of magical elixirs that make you stronger, heal your wounds, make you invisible, etc. How would one even know what a narcotic looks like? Would the concept of illicit drugs be something a society would even think about? I don't know the answer of course, but it's something to think about.

That would be fine.

So who is totally making a Barbarian character on their first playthrough?

That is good.

Wrong!

What is best in life?

I'm this happy

Out of world references all come down to the type of game a developer is making. It worked in Fallout because of that game's satirical tone. In this game we have no idea what the devs aim to do, but my guess is that they will mostly be playing it straight. As a matter of preference, if there are subtle references to out of universe things I'd rather they weren't other video games and video game characters (Things like the Obsidian Order, etc.)

There's nothing wrong with people wanting this game to be less focused on single-minded combat and dungeon crawling. I happened to like the IWD games quite a lot, but I realize it's not for everyone. That said, I get the feeling that people really aren't taking the time to read the front page for the kickstarter, and then subsequently not taking the time to carefully read the updates. If they were, then I'm not sure how one could get the impression that PE is going to be some kind dungeon crawler ... now if they just skimmed and glossed over things then, I could see it, but all the information is there. As to why so much attention has been paid to mechanics vs story. Say what you want about storytelling in gamesm but if somebody gets the mechanics and the gameplay wrong, it won't matter how good the story is. Ultimately it's the foundation of the entire gaming hobby, despite some companies and their idiotic contention that games are actually supposed to be cinematic flip-books, where the player is more passenger than driver. Secondly, there probably isn't much story to share at this point in the development cycle, so we're just going to have to take it on faith that they want to write a compelling narrative to go along with good gameplay.