Magnum Opus

Well, yeah, it WAS hyperbole. I don't know that I could have made it more ridiculously blatant without naming names or getting outside of the scope of the game entirely. I HAD hoped, by its o-so-obvious use, to convey just how much I dislike characters in-game peddling real-life products (ie. DLC). Hyperbole, exaggeration... fairly common tools used to highlight a point of view. At least, so I thought. But how you then turn around say that there AREN'T any issues with this sort of practice is, quite frankly, baffling to me. Clearly there are, given how often you see the point raised on message boards, and I for one feel about them strongly enough to go off the rails a bit just to make that point. Still, if I have to be one or the other, can I be the Hipster? They sound so much more... I dunno... "mature" than the Steam Fanboys, age-wise at least. Just one step removed from Grognard. I'd dearly love to be a grognard someday, but maybe hipster will have to do for now.

The Witcher 3, for me. For a few reasons. 1. CDPR has a far better handle on storytelling, for my dollar. Their games offer rich characters without turning them all into caricatures of one vice/virtue or another, the choices often have real consequences (not to mention the "set piece" choices, which are excellent), but most importantly, CDPR understands that there's more to a world than battle arenas and plot-point cutscenes, strung together by corridors. Their worlds are, and have been since TW1, far more reactive and alive than anything I've ever seen from Bioware. CDPR has always given me the impression that they realize the world they create has just as much character as any NPC, but that this same world is the one which ties the entire experience together. The player never "leaves dialogue" with the world, so there are always sights to see, nooks and crannies to explore, people to bump into and/or shove out of the way, storms to send the locals scurrying for cover, etc etc. It's that sort of attention to detail which sets The Witcher series apart, IMO. Bioware writes good/sometimes great characters and comes up with wonderful Moments of Drama, things taken straight out a hollywood blockbuster at times, it seems, but those highlights have virtually nothing to bind them together. There is Game, and there is Story, and sometimes the two work in direct opposition to each other. There is no consistency to game rules if they get in the way of a Moment of Drama, so basic gameplay suffers. CDPR manages to give me both and far more often, with there being only one single moment of Drama-induced silliness that I can recall (looking at you, Letho-in-the-ruins) 2. Business model. Origins was the game that, for me, really took Bioware down a notch when it came to my opinion of their business model regarding DLC. The non-enchanced game was littered with in-game, in-character hooks that, every time I passed them by, would scream (sometimes even in the dialogue screen itself) "BUY THIS DLC!!" Too blatant. Where Bioware seems to nickle-and-dime me or content, CDPR has (to date, anyway) offered content for free. Upgrades, expansions, new story modules... none of them trivial, but all of them for free. Even the base product has "value added" written all over it with soundtracks and maps included from the get-go. More for the collector's editions, naturally, but with the basic game, you still end up getting more for you money. 3. I enjoy having a little "male-time" now and again, without having to worry about LGBT issues, or whether women are being given equal screen time. Those are definitely worthy issues and addressing the wider issues is all well and good, and yes the battle should be fought, but sometimes it's just plain nice to put it away for a moment and enjoy a singularly "male" experience. Women need their girl-time, men need a night out with the boys. That's what this game represents for me, relative to modern Bioware's social justice sandbox. So there you go. Vote explained.

Am looking forward immensely to Pillars of Eternity. Got Wasteland 2 via my Pillars of Eternity pledge, so I'll play that once I can get it from Other-Than-Steam. Dragon Age: Inquisition... ehh... well... I'll admit that it appears to be something of a step in the right direction, relative to DA2, but in the final analysis, right now it looks like it's going to be one of those games that I'll only buy if I don't have anything else to 1) play, and 2) do. It will not be a game I'll be making time for, but if the time appears and I decide to play something but nothing else (new or already played) really grabs my interest, that one will be somewhere near the top of the list for sure! DA2 was like that for me. I played it, start to finish, but only once and even that was a chore. Ultimately I look back on it and file it into the same category as I put Ruins of Myth Drannor, way back when: A game with redeeming features, but that's about it. The possibility always exists that the game will garner favourable enough reviews/feedback that the situation will change, but that's what I'm looking at from these games right now. In terms of Other Games, which was not part of the scope of the initial question, The Witcher 3 is a must-play-it-nownownow game, and Shadow of Morder is looking more and more like a sooner-rather-than-Whatgamewasthatsupposedtobeagain? purchase for me. That one has me intrigued with some of the things it's attempting to do, most definitely. Very much a surprise, too, since it literally wasn't even on my gaming radar until a couple weeks ago, possibly because my attention has been on smaller, lesser-known titles and the indie scene for the past several years. Can't think of anything else in the immediate future offhand, though. hmm.. maybe Risen 3. Risen 1 wasn't too bad, Risen 2 I'm struggling to find time to get into; haven't formed an opinion with that game yet. So... maybe Risen 3. Depending.

Finally got around to buying DA2 this spring ($7.00 off Amazon) and found it to be a worthwhile purchase. On paper, DA2 and DA:O are virtually identical, but DA2 pared virtually everything back. The characters were good enough -- liked some, disliked others, was surprised by one, but didn't feel any of them were compelling enough to even make the effort to reload when one of them ended up leaving the roster, to see if a different dialogue option would have made them stick around. The joinable NPCs were easily the best part of the game.... which is actually part of the problem. They're too obviously the best part of the game. The overall justification for Hawke was virtually non-existent. Champion of Kirkwall didn't seem to mean anything to the setting, it certainly didn't mean anything to the gameplay, and if anything, I'd say Hawke himself could have been replaced by some other character who simply happened to be in the right place at the right time. The overarching story of DA:O at least had a point, something to work toward. Can't say the same for DA2, which turned out to be an exercise in quest fulfillment until there were no more entries in my quest log. Still, there were enough world-scale events going on that I'm glad I played the game. I doubt there'll be any repercussions in the next game, but it's good to have "experienced" the start of the mage-templar conflict, and to have "seen" what red lyrium does to a body. Combat in the two games... again, on paper, virtually identical. Subtle changes only, some of which would never even show up in any preview. But those changes meant the difference between me playing through one game many, many times with many, many different characters, on all but the easiest difficulty setting (DA:O), and me playing through the other game precisely once with my favourite character class, while bumping the difficulty down to Easy halfway through simply to get the fights out of the way as fast as I could (DA2). More importantly for BioWare, those changes meant the difference between me buying every major piece of DLC there was for Origins (Witch Hunt, Stone Prisoner, Warden's Keep, Golems of Amgarrak, Leliana's Song, Return to Ostagar, and even the Darkspawn Chronicles) vs. me not even looking to see what else was available for DA2. On paper, DA:I seems to be hitting the right notes with much of what they're talking about. There haven't been any huge, glaringly red flags, at least, not the way there were with DA2's development. Maybe they're just hiding them better this time around. Will wait and see just how much Awesome! makes it into this iteration of the DA franchise before taking the plunge. I would have seriously regretted buying DA2 at full price, I know that much.

Why are you assuming that the PC will be using grimoires? I mean, I doubt we're going to be using red lyrium bows, carry full body shields, or run around shirtless with spike armor. NPCs often have a wide range of visual elements that have nothing to do with the PC or companions. I'm not assuming that PCs WILL be using grimoires. I'm assuming that the possibility exists that they (or someone else in the game world) MIGHT use grimoires, because of that video with the mage doing obviously magicky things with the book, with the book being sort of off to the side somewhat, as though the mage were using the book as a facilitator or catalyst, rather than it being the target of the spell. Was a visual cue sort of thing on my part. HIGHLY speculative, and most definitely NOT to be taken as factual... or even likely, for that matter. The entire post was speculation; If grimoires, then X, Y, and Z.

Makes as much sense as a staff. FEEL THE MAGICAL POWER OF WOOD Aren't staves just supposed to focus your magic? Like freezing in arcs or spirit bolts. I think it's harder to do with your hands. Oi... hate this kind of argument. It's MAGIC. The actual mechanics behind the process of shooting a lightning bolt out of a body's arse are precisely however the designers want them to be, and that's the end of it. The effects of being hit with a jolt of electricity should make sense -- electricity having a real world analogue in... well... electricity, but the process by which that electricity is generated is the stuff of pure fantasy. MY objection to the giant floating grimoire lies in the fact that games have used that sort of visualization for far too long in a meta-story capacity for me to even come close to taking it seriously. I see the floaty-book of doom as an almost comical visual aid, precisely the same way I see the large golden exclamation point floating over a quest-giver's head. It's not REALLY in the game world, it's just there for the sake of player convenience. That's an impression that's been formed over many years, and many games: Things like that are for the benefit of the player, not part of the player character or game world. It's as if they feel the animations of the character in deep concentration and waving his arms in mysterious patterns through the air with lights flickering around him isn't enough to convey the sense of "it's magic! WATCH OUT!" and have to reinforce it with the floatybook. That's my immediate perception. On a even MORE personal level, I also prefer a more "first principles" approach to the portrayal of magic: the more normal/run down/shabby my mage seems BEFORE casting the earth-shattering, soul-splitting spell, the more impressive the magic itself seems. If a grimoire is involved, I'd personally prefer to see him pull it out of his backpack, flip a few pages distractedly, or maybe even sit wearily on the ground with the book open in front of him if it's a really big spell, and THEN open the gates of hell. But that's just me. As a side note, however, it would be awesome to see them "break the fourth wall" with the floating spellbook, and have the mage, when in times of close combat, simply fling the book itself at some unsuspecting creature's head. Book that large has to weigh a fair bit, and could at least stun an unsuspecting peasant, if not end up cracking his skull open. (and yes, as mentioned, the "fourth wall" thing is only my current perception of what I saw in that vid. Whether it really IS meta-story information, or if it's a real game-world book, is not for me to decide. Even without that perception, though, I'd still find it funny to have my mage bludgeon someone to death with his spellbook. FEEL THE POWER!!)

Voted "No" for this poll, but in retrospect, I think I did that just because of the way games have implemented such things recently. I don't like having across-the-board bonuses for NEW characters being applied based on what I did with my OLD character. ME2 did it that way, and it simply ticked me off. Yeah, I ran through the game with my imported ME1 Shep at first and it was good, but then I wanted a NEW Shep starting in ME2, but ended up getting all this extra crap that I didn't want because I'd already been through the game once already. A user-initiated run of Heart of Fury mode? I enjoyed that for IWD immensely. Can only conclude that it's not the very notion of NG+ that I dislike so much, but the arbitrary and ham-fisted way it's been implemented. Import an old character into a new game? Cool. I know what I'm getting with that scenario. Having the game unlock achievements for me and then apply bonuses to all characters I create after that? No. Nonononono. No.

I notice that sort of thing too. Then the moment passes and my attention is drawn to more immediate and interesting concerns, like how much money I can get for that interesting but ultimately useless-to-my-party dagger and whether I REALLY need to sell it or not, or whether I've got enough storage space to indulge my inner packrat. Is not a high priority, let's just say. I would rate the aesthetic presentation of the forest/desert/mountainous regions of the world much higher than the mere fact of their existence within the world itself. It's not even such a pressing concern that I would bother trying to justify an incongruous forest by saying "it's a MAGIC forest". No, it's just... there. Accept it as part of the setting and move on. There are so very many other shortcuts that NEED to be taken in translating a fantasy world into a finite medium that I'm not going to worry about something like that at all.

If they're going with a style of name that's fairly unique, then a name generator might be useful, only to avoid being the "Roy" in a world full of "Alahammadasharan ar G'mazzera The Forsaken"s. But not having a full range of characters at my disposal drives me NUTS no matter what the software does. It doesn't apply to just names, either. A saved game field should always give me the punctuation needed to write a meaningful, literate description. Bloody HATE the recent trend where you aren't given, for instance, an apostrophe, a colon, or a semi-colon.... sometimes even more than the convention where you're not allowed to type a description at all (that's the best way I know to end up with a great big mess of saved games where you can't find the one you're looking for) We've got a keyboard for this game. Please let us be able to use it.

Was always partial to the more mythologically inspired beasties, somehow. Manticore, yes, but also griffons, chimeras, basilisks, gorgons (the hawt-bodied lady with a face full of butt-ugly, not the D&D bull-like one), hydras (am personally hoping for hydras in this game). And not a single one of these things should be included as a playable race or a pet of any kind. And certainly not as a romance option. Not even the hydra.

You and me both.

Mixed feelings, I suppose. Am glad that I won't have to justify to myself just how it was that a Khalid/Yoshimo -type character COULDN'T be raised from the dead or resurrected, in those few instances in a game where such things were encountered. Am not-so-glad with what has been the replacement method of deal with "death" in modern games, which is to say, the party either lives or dies as a unit (with fallen members popping back up after a battle is done -- which, incidentally, happens FAR more frequently than the occasional instance of a fallen party member being inexplicably un-raiseable). In short, death mechanics in moderns games have been so random, arbitrary, or nonsensical at times that I don't even feel anything when the plot line DOES take that character away, because I know they were just a plot device to begin with. Reloading never bothered me, since the act of reloading was never an in-context construct to begin with (aside from ToB, where it was just an easter egg/ bit of humour... "Bondari reloads..." ) As I see it there are drawbacks to Raising the Dead, and drawbacks to what has taken over since they decided that allowing characters to die was a problem. All in all, I find that having to ignore a few societal inconsistencies and justify a few Unraisables was a small price to pay for a game that I found to be mostly consistent in its treatment of death, otherwise, rather than having everything left up to the whim of the writers of the story and heavy-handed mechanics that bore no resemblance at all to what they were supposed to be portraying. Am hoping that PE is the game that convinces me that non-raisable characters really is the way it should be done, however.

I find the phenomenon of a "shared fantasy" (or, in the case of those who believe in it a little too strongly, a "mass delusion" might be a more accurate term) to be fascinating, personally. It's easy to see how it can come about, with (for example) papa Tolkien ultimately being one of if not the single most influential creators of modern fantasy, and with media of every stripe conforming to the general ideas laid out (some elves have big droopy ears, some don't, but Elves Have Pointy Ears!!!), but I also find it vaguely disturbing at how many people buy into it without even realizing... until someone comes along and tries to change one of the more basic tenets of the faith. We see it with elves, with guns, with Monks... even with how magic is supposed to be, of all things. For the record, I'm loving the slightly more modern take on fantasy that PI appears to be taking, for precisely the reason you mentioned above: the conventions of the genre have been used and reused to the point where they're getting stale. As a side note to the writers, it seems as if the setting will be home to what are (according to the genre) conflicting forms of power: magic vs. science. Am very interested in seeing what if any elements regarding this conflict are put into PE from a philosophical PoV. Or even if PE's world will HAVE this conflict, as such. Arcanum dealt with this line of thought, but that setting had the two sides both well entrenched and well developed.

We're dealing with player preferences, which are personally and emotionally driven. If the player does not associate gunpowder with a medieval-Europe -inspired gameworld society, then the inclusion of gun powder will rub them the wrong way. And lets face it, historically inaccurate or not, guns vs. swords appears to have become the dividing line between "medieval swords n' sorcery" (with sorcery/magic being offered in opposition to science) for games. That its an emotional, or at the very least, pseudo-historical issue (not real life history, but gaming history... which is really the only history that matters here. Real life Medieval Europe has precious little to do with anything here other than aesthetics, so I don't know why people keep bringing that up), doesn't mean it isn't valid, however, or that it won't cause someone to dislike/avoid the project if they feel strongly enough about it. This is why logic fails you. Because this is not a logical issue.

With the presence of ample foreshadowing, clues, and hints of what's coming -- not to mention an alternative way of "dealing" with the issue (ie. make sure that it's an optional encounter to begin with, make sure there's an opportunity to RUN when things get out of hand) -- then I think unwinnable encounters are not only ok but actually add something to the overall believability of the setting. My characters -- assuming they start out at the familiar "n00b dirt farmer" status level -- should NEVER attain so much power so quickly that they can defeat anything and everything the world has ever produced. Ever. Or, if they DO manage to acquire that much power that quickly, they should utterly self-destruct in in-fighting and/or insanity because they don't have the experience necessary to wield it. So yes, unwinnable encounters do, IMO, enhance the sense of a "greater world" as well as keep me on my toes for the ever-present threat. There are, however, quite a few clauses and stipulations regarding their existence. Many of them have to do with the nature of the games in which they appear -- a linear story-driven game is a poor choice for such things because invariably the mechanics and "belts of immortality" end up showing, thus more than ruining whatever amount of believability was gained. Also, in such games, they end up coming across as being way too forced for my liking. ('course, that holds true of most things in linear, story-driven games, I suppose... ). So, while they can be fun and will bring a certain amount of fun to the game, IMO, the amount of work necessary to pull them off in a convincing fashion might just be prohibitive. ... to say nothing of making the fight itself plausible. Anything SO powerful as to be literally unbeatable is very likely going to have a WWIII-style arsenal of firepower at its disposal, and making sure that the party survives long enough to flee in the first place might itself be something of a challenge. Ultimately, this idea falls into the "good idea, but very hard to implement successfully" category for me. I do, however, advocate having areas that are simply too hard for my party. There's a great deal of satisfaction in coming back to a castle later in the game where you previously got spanked and then showing the all-too-smug bastages just what you've learned while you've been away. Again, though... needs to be somewhere else to go and something else that can be done in the interim.

On a related note, I'm also curious about the number of enemies we'll have on screen at once, as well as the size of those enemies. Am still more than pleased with the screenie, tho. Will allow myself a quiet moment to bask before the other questions start intruding too much.

Just had a little artgasm when I saw that. The graphics are (as expected) gorgeous, but the statues are what got me. Beautiful people depicted as rotting, decayed, but still alive... ooo, imagination's all afire now. Want.

Wasn't really a spell so much as a spell combo for me. Pair of wizards, each with Spell Turning and either Protection from Fire or Minor Globe of invulnerability, and a pair of Aganzzer's Scorchers... cast at each other. Bouncing back and forth between them. Woe to the beastie that walks between. good times. Lot of prep work, and completely fried more than a few of my own party members, but SO worth it. Alternatively, the Summon Cow spell in BG2. Especially as part of an area-effect Wild Surge.

To the true Old-school RPG fan, any updates should come on a monthly basis via the gaming magazines they subscribe to or not at all. It's the whole "instant communication" thing that's got them off their nuts, I'm sure of it. Well, I'm mostly sure of it. Partly sure, anyway...

I'm just having a blast watching what else my $250.00 pledge is going to end up getting me, in addition to what I actually put the money down for... is gonna be like Christmas whenever that package finally arrives. You guys are bloody awesome!

The only example listed in the OP where I feel there's any validity is the one where the "alternative party being more powerful disturbs him". That's ultimately personal preference, whereas the other points listed are by no means certain (how do optional party members preclude the existence of NPC-specific items, exactly?) Unfortunately that's the point which, while the most valid, is also the most petty. There are always going to be choices that have to be made between powergaming your way through the adventure and doing what you feel is the most fun. Do you wear the gnomish magnetic clown armor even though it makes you look like an idjit? Or do you keep the cool-looking but not as effective black leather? Do you hop around the wilds of Morrowind like a kangaroo to max out your Jump skill, or do you realize that there's nowhere TO jump that you can't get to by other means and maintain the dignity of your character that you profess to value so much? It's all up to the player. Some people will loot absolutely EVERYTHING that isn't nailed down, run back to town to sell it when they get too full, and then have the gall to complain that "it's not fun, I need more inventory slots, weight limits are stupid, the game is broken". Pro-tip: It's not the game that's broken under such circumstances. Gaming in general might be culpable in that for the last 30 years they've actually rewarded obsessive-compulsive behaviours in their audience -- not infrequently they've even demanded it in order to beat the game -- but ultimately it's up to the player to rein it in long enough to have fun. If OP values companion interaction more than squeezing the last drop of power and customizabilty out of their party members, OP will use the provided NPCs. We will trust that they will do what makes them happy, rather than insist that the developers FORCE it upon them, to the detriment of what everyone else wants.

Actual singing has been such a rarity in games that I wouldn't mind a little more bardic flavour, either. I actually liked Leliana's song, but dear lord was that sequence ever painful to watch. Keep it in the background, tho, and I think it could add a fair bit of ambiance, personally... particularly since you've already got orchestral scores as regular walking music. Would prefer it NOT be based, egg-like, on some real-life group.

I don't know... I thought you read it right. Not least because I personally see the above quotes in the OP as being more than a little disingenuous: While they speak of "just showing" how there are a scant few and threadbare RPG elements in the CoD-audience games, they've also been openly moving to shooter-style combat -- or at the very least, hyperactive twitch action combat -- while at the same time sweeping those RPG elements they're claiming to have under the rug like some dirty little secret. Maybe they were just speaking hypothetically, in which case I can't fault the above quotes, but what they've actually been doing has been a lot more than "just showing", from where I've been sitting.

It had just over 1000 likes when I saw something about this yesterday, so I don't think it's too much to ask at all. Even if Facebook is creepy/voyeuristic by nature.

I want to know if I can get the original PE logo (ouroboros) on my t-shirt. Silly thing to want to know, I realize, but there it is. I really liked that design.