spacekungfuman

I just wanted to say thank you for making New Vegas. It is the best game I have played since Arcanum, nearly a decade ago. I didn't think a game like this could be made now, with the broader audience, the oversight of the horrible teams at bethesda, and the awful FO3 engine, but you proved me wrong. For the first time in a long time, I just played a game and loved every minute of it. Keep up the good work!

Only thing you can do is buy New Vegas but not Fallout 3 and the next Fallout (4?) by Bethesda. I don't think there's really any other way to support Obsidian without supporting Bethesda's Fallout(s). To be fair, I could argue that the core gameplay of Fallout 3 and New Vegas is the same, and that actually New Vegas is in a lot of way a refinement/correction rather than a revolution, but I don't really want to start a debate on how you feel on Fallout 3. The core gameplay is not what I'm buying this game for. I thought the mechanics, engine, and overall feel of FO3 were pretty terrible. But the worst part of that game was the writing, which I found less tolerable than the broken english you see in some translations of Eastern European games. I believe that the gameplay of this game will be terrible, because FO3's gameplay was so bad, but I am counting on quality writing. I literally could not bring myself to play past the first conversation with the Sheriff in megaton in FO3. I could not say to the sheriff "I'm looking for my father. Middle-aged guy. Maybe you've seen him?" because my character concept was not a mental deficient. If I had an intelligence score of 1, then I could have chosen that, but my character was supposed to be smart (int 9) so I stopped playing, and replayed FO1 instead with a low int character, to relive the alternate script to a 10 year old game which was better than the main script of Bethesda's so called AAA blockbuster game.

I would pirate the game and send Obsidian a check, but the sale is probably more valuable than the cash. I wish that there was an "I think Fallout 3 was a travesty and that Bethesda should not have purchased the license" edition. . .

I know this might sound ridiculous, but I really like Obsidian's games and can't stand Bethesda's, and I want to know if any method of buying the game would be more beneficial to Obsidian than another. Does Obsidian get more money from each sale on steam for example, or does the profit breakdown work the same no matter where I buy it from?

What reviews are you reading? I'm seeing complaints about control, cover mechanics, and the AI. These are complaints about the combat system, not that it involves stats. Remove the action combat and have it work like a traditional rpg like KOTOR, and then all these complaints would drop away and the reviews would focus on how many things Obsidian got right with the RPG side of the game. This is not a topic about stat based combat vs player skill based combat. While both may have their places in different games, the bottom line is that the combat system is causing this game to get some very poor reviews from some of the largest review sites, and the text of the reviews makes it VERY clear that the combat is what is bringing the numbers down. In a perfect world, everything would be flawless in this game, and the reviewers would have had nothing to complain about, but given budget and time constraints, and the fact that Obsidian has tons of experience building stat based combat systems and very little action combat development experience, going with what they knew for combat would have been better for the company and for the game's sales.

Obsidian was in a tough position on this game. Wanting to do an action/stealth hybrid makes perfect sense for the genre, and action rpgs like ME1/2 and Elder Scrolls/FO3 have been massive crossover successes, in part because they pull in gamers other than RPG players. But the added appeal is a two edged sword, and with the increasing "sophitication" of the 3rd person shooter genre in recent years (seriously, it has exploded these last 5 or 6 years), the bar to entry into the genre is a lot higher than it used to be. As other people pointed out, Bioware already felt the backlash of making an action rpg in this space, and moved ME2 away from RPG mechanics to please the action gaming set (many of whom probably consider themselves to be RPG fans at this point thanks to all the crossover games). With limited development resources and vast RPG experience, Obsidian may have just been better off making the best pure RPG that they could, pulling in all the RPG fans, and potentially grabbing crossover fans based on the setting and the more favorable reviews that the game could have gotten. And to anyone who thinks a game can't sell with choice and consequence as the main mechanic, just take a look at heavy rain. . .

TLDR summary: Reviewers like Alpha Protocol's role playing aspects and hate its action combat. Would the game have been better off as a traditional RPG, where the strong role playing mechanics are all that would matter? So the reviews are in, and the scores are not pretty, but an interesting theme has emerged. Although there is some criticism on the writing, voice acting, and characterization (which should all be taken with a grain of salt, given that these same reviewers were pleased with all of these aspects in Fallout 3) the actual role playing mechanics of the game are receiving a ton of praise. People seem to love the choices and consequences, enjoy the character and weapon customization systems, and be excited and quite taken with the dialog system. Where things turn bad is where the game turns away from the genre (and Obsidian's) roots, and veers towards an action game. The combat is being panned, both from a control perspective and regarding enemy AI. Obsidian (and other roleplaying developers) have released plenty of rpgs in recent years that actually feature pretty lousy combat (pretty much any aurora engine game) but it never comes across as a major criticism because the FEEL of the combat is not the point in those games. Role playing game combat is more about decisions (both before and during combat) than control or AI, and as long as you get the other aspects of the game right, and the combat system crunches the numbers and animates well, noone ever seems to complain, unless they are complaining about the genre itself. The difference in expectations for rpg vs action combat probably accounts for a lot of the negative reviews this game is getting, and the decision to go twitch seems to be proving disastrous. To be absolutely clear, reviewers seem to think Obsidian NAILED the role playing aspects of the game. If Alpha Protocol were a more traditional RPG then this would be enough, and the reviews would probably look very different. But once the action combat is thrown into the mix, reviewers don't seem to care how well the role playing works. Essentially, these core elements (which on their own would make Alpha Protocol a strong role playing game) are being relegated to second class status, and treated as nothing more than nice features which cannot redeem a shoddy action game. So my question (to fans and developers) is simple. Was this a mistake? Should Alpha Protocol have been made into a traditional RPG which could rest on its strongest mechanics, or was it right to try and make an action game, which shifts the focus away from Obsidian's core strengths as a role playing game developer? TLDR summary: Reviewers like Alpha Protocol's role playing aspects and hate its action combat. Would the game have been better off as a traditional RPG, where the strong role playing mechanics are all that would matter?

I hope that Obsidian doesn't go with full voice acting. They probably have a limited budget to work with, and I'd hate to see the amount of dialog in the game limited by the high cost of having every line recorded.

I really hope that this turns out like KOTOR, only without the publisher censoring and rushing. Sure Fallout 3's engine and combat are horrible, but so was KOTOR's and look at the gem they produced then. As much as I HATED combat in FO3, and would love to see turn based (or at least stat based) combat in this game, I reccomend Obsidian sticks with the **** combat and engine, and just focuses on story. The company needs to turn out a game where the story and characterization is not hampered by bugs and poor engine optimization. Of all of FO3's faults, the writing was the worst, and it is the one that Obsidian can fix with the least effort, and the least chance of breaking anything. I mean, you guys could probably write a better story in your sleep than the horror that was FO3.

Its NOT autoaim that I'm asking for. I'm asking to replace player aiming with character aiming. Stat resolved combat. That's all I'm asking for. The aiming portion is not to avoid having to aim, but to make it so that character skill and not player skill determines hits.

This is essentially the KOTOR/JE combat system that I'm asking for. While that is not a great system at all, at least its stat based, and there is precedent ofr very successful games using this sort of "move in real time, hit with stats" system.

I really don't understand why so many people care about the animation of aiming/attacking coinciding with if you actually hit. Games had an attack animation and a to hit roll that did not go together since animation first began. As far as it being little gain, I'd say giving people the option to play the game as an rpg instead of an action rpg is a pretty huge gain. It would basically set a new standard in the industry, and show that it is possible to make a game that appeals to old genre fans and newer fans/fans of different genres.

I'm not asking for the sticky targeting or target lock because aiming is hard. I'm asking because I'm looking for an alternate gameplay style that is more akin to BG than Doom, where you select a target, and then the character hits or misses based on their stats, instead of hitting/missing being based on me aiming. Its a different style of play and a different style of game, but if it would not be that hard to enable it in AP, then everyone wins.

I'm aware of this, and its exactly what I'm asking to disable. I'm not saying change it for everyone, or even make sure it works throughout the whole game perfectly. I'm just asking for an unsupported option that would take as little work as possible, to just make the game more of an RPG for me. I will buy the game either way, but I would be VERY happy if this option was made available. I'd also bet the option would increase sales, since then the game would have something for everybody.

Just a simple request here. No condescending polls or debate over which type of combat is the best. I just want to know if at this point in the game it would be possible to make an OPTION to enable a sticky targeting system, and have the chance to hit be based on the characters stats. I know that weapons stats are in the game, and I assume the AI must use some form of lock on targetting, so I would think the building blocks are there. Maybe it could even be released for the PC as an unsupported addon or something. But if it is possible with the engine and the stat system to make this happen, it would be greatly appreciated. Once a developer responds, I will not post other than in gratitude if this turns out to be possible. We already had enough vitriol in the last thread. Thank you.

If you want to only control one character in a party based rtw/p system, then you are asking them to abandon tactics. Either the fights are hard enough to require micomanagement of the party of they're so easy you can sleep through them with the party on AI. It's just like the problem of trying to balance fights for play over the shoulder and iso. If the fight can be won in over the shoulder, it will be too easy with real tactical control in iso. The only solution as I see it is to balance the game on hardcore to be a challenge if you micro manage and use the iso camera, then let you scale difficulty down if you want to sleep walk. And regarding FF, when I don't want Ian to kill dogmeat in fallout, I don't give him burst weapons. . .

Agreed. Making decisions about rationing magic is part of the strategy. I think the best solution is to orient the game around resting before and after dungeons, and balancing the dungeons around a single rests worth of magic. Since we're playing a party based game, that may well mean only using low level spells for trash fights. What's wrong with that? Di - How can you even claim a semblance of balance in the game with friendly fire off? A lot of people on the official forums are really latching onto my suggestion to nerf resistances/reflex saves, because they make the game too easy, and yet you want to play without them? No class is supposed to be the best solution to every problem, and under the current implementation of combat, that's exactly where we are. There should be enemies fighters can't beat but mages can and vice versa.

Disable AI, or set all members to puppet mode. I always play no ai, puppet mode and still have that happen sometimes. I know of a lot of people who have this problem, and its pretty serious.

I agree that random challenging encounters is a better way to go. They really need to be dangerous though. In all the time I played NWN, HotU, NWN2, and MotB, I never had my buffs stripped. . . Its not about the player's mage. Its the enemy mages that need protection. Agreed 100% I like the idea of semi challenging fights weakening you up for a big fight, so you need to win efficiently in the first ones. Fights just seem to end VERY fast for me on this engine, especially in NWN2 with full party. Maybe its just my characters being so much stronger than the enemies. I find that a whole queue of orders gets ignored if I click on another character, as everyone runs over to the active char. It only happens sometimes, but god is it annoying when it does. Again, its the enemy mages that need protection, or better AI to use what they have. They need better AC too. Yes, bleeding or status effects are probably the best way to go, because they avoid a reload.

I know a lot of work must have gone into the tactical camera for MotB. Would fixing this be a bigger job than that? I just ask because I'm hoping SoZ provides an icewind dale feel, but the engine might not be up to that right now. This might be going to far, but do you think its viable to make a game engine that could be equally developer friendly and hobbyist friendly, or will there always be compromises to let the community get involved too? There sure is a lot of content for NWN 1 and 2, but none of that content has combat as good as in the ie games, which is a shame.

Here is my list of suggestions (Codex approved) 1. A small number of tactical fights is vastly better than tons of trash fights. 2. Please disable resting anywhere but in safe places. 3. Please add BG style autopause options. 4. Please make enemy spell casters smarter, including removing your party's buffs. 5. Introduce spell duels like in BG2. Ironically this requires making some buffs stronger so that a fighter can't just pummel the mage like in the NWN2 OC and MotB. 6. Replace the general stance of the character being very powerful with one where the party at its best is just strong enough to overcome the fights they face. This will make character development more meaningful, and fights more memorable. From a design standpoint I think that combat is just too fast paced and easy for tactics to really matter in most encounters, and I'd like to see this rectified. The reason this is an "issue" is that if they don't make the encounters like this in SoZ, then the encounters in SoZ will NEVER be tactical, because the design of the module is not something up for fan base modification. As far as the actual combat engine goes, I'll list the problems. 1. The aurora engine auto follow needs to be eliminated. Even with MotB's improvements, your characters still all drop whatever they're doing to run over to the active character. This should replaced with an IE like system where each character is controlled totally individually. I should not have to order everyone to stand still during combat to select another character. 2. Mages need more effective protection. Using the currently available protection spells, wizard duels are impossible unless you make the choice not to physically attack the enemy wizard, since a decent melee character will destroy the spell caster before 1 or 2 spells can even be cast. 3. Enchantment and crafting need to be changed. They were both so overpowered in the OC and MotB that your characters became extremely powerful, to an unreasonable degree. The dragons were not even challenges. 4. The death mechanic NEEDS to be changed. Right now there is no penalty for a suicide rush, as long as one character survives. 5. Immunities and reflex saves need to be made less overpowered. As it stands, it is MUCH to easy to make a character than can effectively stand in the middle of a group of enemies while the mages cast burst spells that the tank is immune to via resistances of reflex saves. This tactic should not be viable, or at least it should be much harder to pull off. If suggestions like these are incorporated into the game, then SoZ will have the best gameplay of any NWN2 game yet. We already know from MotB that Obsidian can craft an awesome story with this engine, and all that is left is for the combat to be as enjoyable as the story.

In this case I am correct, because I actually understand how the underlying code that governs combat and states works in the IE and Aurora. Responsiveness, in this context defined as how quickly the game updates states after player input is given, is consistently faster and more reliable in IE than Aurora. Josh - Is this something that can be fixed, or is Aurora just fundamentally flawed? I know you outgrew IE eventually, and have experience with the custom engines that were being made for VanBuren and maybe Torn, but based on how Aurora turned out, do you think it is actually better in terms of gameplay (ignoring visual) than ie? Given how much time and energy you had to put into modifying Aurora for KOTOR2 and NWN2, do you think on the whole the engine has been an impediment, rather than a blessing, to game design?

You posted a hilarously biased poll that contains the following line, "I like Oblivion, so my vote doesn't count." and you are telling me that opinions can't be wrong? But, you just said... This thread is very lol. The poll is a lark, of course. But the discussion in the topic has lead to some legitimate points being made on both sides. But to be honest, I think your reply was immature. You decided to make a game that differs fundamentally in terms of gameplay from every game you've made so far as a company, and every game that Black Isle made before you. It should not come as a shock that some of your fans would be skeptical of this decision. If you want to say the game is just another entry in the deus ex fps style, that's fine, but be honest about it. This is clearly not a game made to appeal to your hardcore fans, and that's fine, but don't act like it is ridiculous to want a company that has only made games in a certain style to make more games in that style. Just like a lot of rpg fans like "old" gameplay because it is the type of gameplay in the games we have liked in the past, I'm sure there are plenty of Obsidian fans who like your "old" style of games, and there's nothing wrong with not jumping up and down with joy when you go in a different direction.

The reason Rogue and Hack and whatnot are that way is because P&P RPGs are that way, so why not play P&P RPGs? I mean, they encompass the general type of gameplay you seem to enjoy, there are plenty of good ones on the market, and social interaction can be worlds better in them than in a video game RPG. Because the time commitment is very large for PnP. I used to play a long time ago, but it would not fit my life. Also, I can play a game on the PC while my wife surfs the web on her computer, vs having to spend hours totally focused on a pnp compaign every week out of the house. But that's besides the point. I like playing PC RPGs with stat resolved combat, and while PnP is similiar, it is a different experience. You only control one character, and the simulation aspect of the combat is generally weaker. You tend to just stand there hitting each other or making things up on the fly, which is fun, but different from playing a bounded game like BG.

Now you said something interesting. Choices and Consequences, dialog, character development, etc are a seperate issue from statistics. The real question, and this is subjective, is what makes a game an RPG to you. Here is an excerpt from a discussion I had with Josh about this very issue. You are saying that only the second part matters. Crash and I are saying the first part is of critical importance. There's no right or wrong answer to this question, but tradition actually dictates that the first is most important, as the second type came into the picture much later. If Doom was totally unchanged except for giving the player choices about what to do in the world, what would you call it? The answer will basically end our debate either way, because we finally have clarity on what your position is.