Llyranor

YOU're a jerkface. Only, that isn't your face.

I was a big fan of PST's mortuary, though I guess as a whole it wasn't that popular.

Urg, I can't think of a single Bioware game where the intro wasn't botched. Even KOTOR's 'HEY, WE'RE UNDER ATTACK' was driven into crap by making it an awesome tutorial. 'USE THE MOUSECLICK TO OPEN THE DOOR, BUT BEWARE OF ENEMY FIRE!!!'

HI DOES THIS THREAD STILL HAVE A POINT?

Erm, yeah, what time this Friday, dawg?

Maybe it's just me, but I would have preferred it if Obs had decided to cut one of the planets in KOTOR2 and focused their resources on the ending instead.

LOL ALL CONSOLES R 4 KIDDIES

Because cliff racers attack in packs.

Me too.

You'd rather have 40 hrs than 20 hrs. I'd rather have 2 choices than 1.

So, instead they should should maintain the status quo of linearity with rare instances of possible player input which marginally influence the gameplay? Sorry, I don't bite. .... Withholding content? How about plausible choices and consequences that are actually significant?

Heh, sounds like FO3 all over again, alright. Sometimes silence just means silence, and we just end up jumping the gun and drawing (possibly) unfounded conclusions.

Yes, actually, it is. The length of Oblivion is merely a function of the need to meet its stated goals of an open-ended CRPG with a weak (weak because one can completely ignore it) story. Length is just a by-product of the elements which I listed before. What you are arguing is that Moby **** is superior to Billy Budd based simply upon the fact that the former is a full-fledged novel while the latter is merely a novella, and that the quality of the story and how each story achieves its goals are moot. <{POST_SNAPBACK}> I think this sums up my opinion pretty well. Length as a result of the design, rather than a goal. You create your story, construct good design around it, work at it to make it complete. Length is a side-effect. As opposed to assigning a minimum length, then building from that. Whoops, not enough content, add more. Sure, ideally, it'd be great to have a longer product with the same consistent level of quality, in a ideal world. Corners get cut, but some people are willing to accept that.

So you wouldn't be able to add more gameplay or quality to, say, the NWN OC without making it longer? Right.

NWN was all about the toolset for me. The OC was wasted time as a whole. When it comes from a professional product which I *paid* for, that's not very acceptable. Did I argue about making Charwood longer? Giving it more content != increasing its length.

Actually, probably yes. Charwood was the only part of NWN I found even remotely worthwhile. The rest of it turned out to be time wasted. There IS such a thing as negative value. EVEN then, that's not a fair question, since had Bioware only made a mod lasting a few hours, they would have invested relatively more dev time into that alone.

Whoops, my bad. How would they have done that, though? Delay the game by 1-2 yrs? Or spread the dev time they had into a 40 hr product rather than 13, essentially diluting it? Hey, ideally I'd love to have longer games that came with no strings attached, but realistically I don't see how that's done without expanding resources. When the cost of development has multiplied in the past years, can you afford to allocate more resources? Where does full VO come in, next-gen graphics? A game of any length can be hurt if it ends abruptly. Case in point, KOTOR2. The result is an incomplete experience. You may argue that it takes a certain amount of time to ensure even that, but I disagree, and there's probably no right answer anyway. Call of Duty took me about 10 hrs, and it gave a complete experience. The final level felt very satisfying and I was quite pleased with the whole experience. Had the game been longer, I might not have been so pleased. But that's a FPS. Yet, I find it still applies to RPGs. Take, again, Pirates of the Sword Coast. It gave me a complete experience. 10 hrs. Good amount of exploration, good amount of story, and an ending that felt appropriate and not rushed. On the other hand, it cost me 10 bucks. Would I have paid 50 bucks for it? Probably not, but that may have had more to do with it not being mindblowing, which has to do with what I think of standard Bioware storytelling. I probably wouldn't have bought the BG saga for a massive pricetag way back had I known it would be relatively disappointing (even if it'd come with a guaranteed 100+ hrs of gaming). Like I mentioned in my previous post, I definitely see the argument for wanting a lasting value out of your game. Perhaps games should come with various pricetags? Is it silly to allocate the same one to every game, then expect them all to arrive at the same lasting value. "Okay, we need to make a 50-hr game, even if it'd probably make a better 20-hr one, let's add in more dungeons" Is that because you're going to be charge 50$ anyway? In that way, I'm looking forward to Obs' digital distribution modules.

Heh, I'd have preferred NWN be accompanied by a couple of short mods like Charwood than the 60-hr epic awesomeness it shipped with. There's definitely room for shorter products nowadays, what with digital distribution and episodic content. Some people may not like it, but it can promote a more consistent approach to quality control. A 40-hr game can afford to have a 5-hr segment that's complete crap and still receive favorable reviews. A 10-hr game can't. Pirates of the Sword Coast was in many ways more satisfying than the BG saga. I think another issue people have is regarding money. It's understandable how when gaming budgets are limited that they'd want to spend it on something that gives them lasting value, and thus they allocate an inherent value to quantity.

Yep, but more != more good stuff Take mreku's example again. "one-dimensional characters" and "Standard 1A-story" makes for a poor 13-hr game, but a great 40-hr one?

Bing bing bing. Devs should work their way up and ensure quality throughout the entire game and slowly build on that and make the game as long as they can support with their resources rather than fixate on an arbitrary length and cut corners.

Nope, they removed it.

Heh, game hours are not all made equal. EDIT: Hmm, you know, maybe I'd be less adverse to having long games just for the sake of it if CRPGs generally had 'good non-repetitive gameplay'.

Heh. Maybe someone competent should get hold of that German mag.

Hehehe, isn't this reminiscent of FO3's announcement?

Hey, I want longer quality games too!