Starwars

Urgh, that preview makes it sound all kinds of horrible, and in all the ways I was actually *not* expecting. Well, I was expecting fetch quests, but still...

Alongside Amnesia, I've been playing some Mirror's Edge which I received as a gift a while back. It's... cool. It's quite fun when things click and the adrenaline is up. But I must say that most of the time it feels more like I'm fighting the controls than working with them. Perhaps I just need more practice.

I think I'd prefer the log to be on the left but all in all I'm very pleased with how the UI looks currently actually, I don't have any problems with it at all. At least not the "playarea". I think it looks quite good overall and I have no problems at all using it. Personally, I hope most of the remaining time spent on UI stuff is within certain UI elements like spell selection, maybe the inventory and stuff like that. Just throwing my cents in the mix.

I agree myself that the "Infinity Engine feel" can be a bit too limiting at times. But, that's the way it pitched it and there are people crying murder every time they stray from that even a little so... Also, I wonder how "accurate" that video above still is. We know that they've toned down a lot of the animated elements (the moving grass for example), at least in the beta. I'm definitely hoping there will be a lot of stuff like that to make the world feel vibrant though. For what it's worth, at a face value, I think Dyrford feels pretty good for the small town it is at least. There is some movement among NPCs, but not too much, I think it feels pretty good for a small village. Hoping they'll do a lot more in the big city, more movement and such. But I guess we'll see.

Hard to get a good grip on that from the beta. I'm gonna have to assume that there will be reactivity from NPCs and such based on your choices. There is also a reputation system in place for different faction in the world, so even if we won't be able to join them (no idea if we can), there will at least be some sort of reactivity attached to them. It doesn't look like there will be any real changes from day to night unfortunately. It doesn't seem like the devs would have enough time for it any way but I would've liked to see at least something simple where some of the commoners will be "cleaned up" from the streets and shops will close, but it doesn't look that way. I'm not 100% sure though that there will be *no* effect at all. Monsters attack only the player at the moment in the beta. I'm thinking most of the complexities will come from characters and whatever the in-game factions will be (though again, there is no such thing from within the scope of the beta). Not so much from wildlife and an "eco system" so to speak. Most of what PoE does is within the scope of the IE games in one form or another, I wouldn't expect it to stray too far from that.

Replaying Amnesia: The Dark Descent. Don't remember much of it actually which bodes well for being scared again though of course it won't have the same impact as the first time.

You'll have to clarify what you mean by that.

Thanks Brandon, it'd be great to have little mini-updates like this to see what's going on!

You might want to put a spoiler tag on this or hide the pictures for people who don't want to see anything more than what's in the actual beta (I know I didn't). Awesome work though, will be cool if modders can hit the ground running once the full game is out.

It's not really strange Sensuki, how much playtime do you have for the beta now? And that's hearing the same, what, three or four tracks over and over. My opinion hasn't changed much, except that I think I like the wilderness music more than before. I think the tracks all work really well for what they're for and I like that they're fairly low-key and in the background. The exception for me is still the combat track which I think is more overbearing and feels more repetitive than anything else.

What are you talking about? Nobody is commenting on what it is like to be a woman. Are you so poor you cannot even pay attention?

My girlfriend has talked a lot about this, the difference of walking around (mostly in the evening but sometimes during the day as well) alone versus when I'm with her. She feels that some men seem to feel "invited" to comment or whatever seemingly just for the fact that she's walking around alone. Whereas when I'm walking with her, people see that she is "taken" already and thus it's not OK to encroach upon another man's territory. It's a pretty harsh view but unfortunately I think it holds true for many people. I don't go out that much but a few times I've been "accosted" by drunk women outside clubs, shouting after me and stuff like that and it's... I feel it's pretty creepy. I'm sure there are guys who shrug that off, think it's all fun or whatever but I found it pretty annoying and not OK to be honest. And that is just a small, small sampling of what I think many women are faced with in every day life. If I were a woman out late at night I would... well, first off I'd do pretty much anything to *avoid* being out at night I think (which is so very wrong in itself, that it has to be like that), but you bet I'd take long walks to avoid men.

The crystal shard attack puts a hurt on me, but yeah, the real problem is indeed that... yep, I can't see my bloody characters in the middle of it all. At the very least, if they're not gonna tone down the spell effects, at the *very* least, character selection circles should cut through all the effects so we can at least get a grip on where we are.

This was already posted but I think it's still the best piece I've read about this entire trainwreck. Well worth a read. http://www.popehat.com/2014/10/26/ten-short-rants-about-gamergate/

Yeah, I don't quite understand the implementation. Is it supposed to be like that where you click on them and read a story? It feels pretty weird to me. It'd be nice if that could be an option also, toggle the backer-thingie on/off. It's a bit too "easter-egg" for my liking, though I could see myself playing through once with it on.

I had a problem like this also (exiting the Ruins, going back to town, saving, and then going back to the ruins again), though it seemed a bit random whether I crashed or not. Eventually I "got through" after a few crashes.

I always viewed it as a sorta standard (and by now, kinda homage or tongue-in-cheek) RPG thing. Like "let's go back to my previous questions..." though that's more due to the structure of dialogue.

The doors that lead into the "heart" of the Skaenite dungeon are giving me trouble. I found a Dungeon key which I assume is the key to unlocking those doors. Previously I've always done it with the Rogues Mechanics skill. But with the key, I can click on the door(s), after which they become unusable. I can still highlight them via tab, but they become un-clickable. As such, there is no way into the final area of the dungeon.

This is just for the sake of playing the beta, does anyone know of a work-around or solution for the big which makes you stay in combat-mode throughout the Skaen dungeon? From the log, I'm wondering if it's a problem with a Skaenite boar companion somewhere. Just wondering if anyone had found a temp solution to this?

How do you guys feel about the sounds so far? The blips, the clicks, the steps, the creaks, the hits etc. I think this is an important part of the game's atmosphere. I quite like many of the sounds in themselves but I think many of them feel quite "sharp" to the ear and a bit unpleasant at times. I guess the game is still in the process of being mixed but I think a fair amount of the sounds could do with being turned down in the mix to avoid "attacking" the ear. Some sounds, I think one of them was opening a bag of grains (not 100% but it was a container), are kinda harsh on the ears. The ambient sounds are really nice I think, they work well within the environs and bring the music to life, as it should be I think. The generic hit sound can get a bit repetitive. Justin mentioned it as a possibility (but could make no promises) that we'd get more sliders for the audio volume, and I'd just like to say again that I'd really like that personally. The footstep sounds I really like so far, the splashing in water can get a bit obnoxious. Think most of the footsteps could also be turned down slightly in the mix or, even better, if we could get a slider for that *also*. What do you guys think?

I think they are fine as is, but some simple filter could be applied just to soften them up slightly but I definitely think they are fine as they are. And they really feel "old-school" to me as well, it's rather nice.

I don't think the forum "groupthink" is that much of a problem. If OEI wanted to, they could send out a poll or something to *all* the backers if they wanted input on something specific. I'm sure they're well aware that they've gotten to know many people on this forum and what preferences they have. It's up to OEI to evaluate what is being said and discussed and see if they feel they need to change something. As long as points are being made in the discussions, then I think it's worthwhile for OEI to read through. Personally I quite like the melee engagement mechanic, or at least the idea of it, but either the combat is too fast or I am not a good enough player to really work with it at the moment. Especially not with the faster enemies.

It would be interesting if they slowed enemies down by a lot (I guess maybe even the player party in combat) and see what difference that makes. Like you say, it's staggering how fast some mobs zoom between the game auto-pausing at start of combat, and me pausing not even a second later. Again, I know the slow-mode is there but it should feel more manageable at regular speeds.

I would love a walk toggle also.

I understand the reasoning behind getting rid of pre-buffing but I have to admit that I kinda miss it also, at least to an extent. I also find the combat situations go past so quickly that there's barely enough time to do any buffing once you're actually in combat. Perhaps there could be some sort of compromise there but I'm not sure what it would be. I think that's one point I find interesting though. We have a wealth of things to use in our arsenal but since combat goes so quickly, there's a load of stuff I simply don't use. Perhaps that's just me being inflexible though. Aside from that, for me, a lot of the problem is just... again, everything feels chaotic and messy still. It's *so* easy to lose focus on what the hell is happening in this game during combat. The visual clarity is still the number one bandit for me in regards to the combat system.