Drowsy Emperor

DA3 could be good if you're allowed as an Inquisitor to torture and burn every single NPC (and the PC) from the previous 2 games.

Can't you gay romance people just go and play Dragon Age 2 again? No?

I'm just waiting for this thread to evolve into the "we need gay romances" from Bioware forums. Waiting with a shotgun.

BG NPC's may be cardboard cutouts but that was what they could do at the time. I just thought they'd add more quests and areas, and maybe new characters, but romances, really I read it on the BG forum

At this point I'm more angry that they tampered with the original game in such a manner. BG has a special significance for me and I can't believe that they did the same thing Bioware would do - its just so endlessly lame and misguided to even think that that would make BG1 (an archetypal, naive DnD adventure) a better game. Their job was to update the game and add some new content - and that's the best they could come up with? Bleh, whatever. Thankfully there will be an off switch for all new content.

There is no way to do this right. A real romance is half intangible thing where the stuff that's left unsaid is as important as the spoken words, where gestures and looks play a huge role, where subjective and indescribable feelings dictate the flow or lack of it. Its so complex and evolving, that an interactive computer game version cannot be but mechanical and crude. A non interactive romance is which the player is basically having a story told to them can be good, but what's the point of that in an RPG where choice is the ideal?

I play games to relive a part of my childhood fantasies, for nostalgia reasons and to get away from real world misery, social statements, politics etc. Stuffing ideas/beliefs down people's throats (like Bioware does) will just induce a knee jerk response (like the ones you can see on the Baldur's Gate forums now) so its counter productive at worst, ineffective at best. Its particularly bad because its always tacked on, never an integral part of the game itself. They could just make a game with a gay protagonist that revolves entirely around the gay issue and end this lunacy once and for all. Besides the gey agenda thing is in every newspaper, on TV, on the internet, in bookstores (with entire shelves just devoted to it), on the street (parades etc.)- are you seriously suggesting it needs more exposure? In games no less?

I have a suggestion regarding romances. NO ****ING ROMANCES! Ahem. 1. Romances in RPG's are a game of "choose the right response to get laid". There is absolutely no player involvement in them apart from accepting to be romanced or refusing, and he/she has absolutely no influence on the flow of the "romance".This makes no sense. Why can't I dictate the flow of the romance? 2. Its never been done decently apart from: a) Jaheira (although that romance isn't 100% perfect) b) Fall From Grace - which wasn't a real romance but a subtle thing, that was good exactly because it never happened 3. When it was included "just because they could" (like with BGII and PST) it could be seen as flavor, making rich games even better. When it was included "because everyone was yapping for it" like with Mass Effect and Dragon Age it made average games worse. (They couldn't bother making better squad AI or the shooting more responsive in ME, but they had the resources for blue alien sex scenes? WTF?)

Who the hell wants romances in BG1? WHY? Its a BG2 thing, like the only game where it was done halfway decently - where does this idiotic need to a romance in everything come from?

Its got the coolest intro ever

I DON'T BELIEVE IT, FFS! THEY ACTUALLY INCLUDED A GAY ROMANCE IN BG1EE. ****ING MONKEYS! That's their enhancement? Jesus christ, a year of work on an old game they just needed to polish up and they have to include such irrelevant bull****, just because some retards badger for it every single time. What the **** is wrong with Bioware employees, its like everyone who spent a day working there is incapable of making a game without gay romances, and feels compelled to include it every****ingwhere. What's going to happen if they get to do a Super Mario remake? Is it going to be Mario or Luigi? WTF!

Player housing means nothing in of itself. In BGII it was a few quests designed for a class/profession. It made a sort of sense that your character would, as his power grows, be noticed among his peers and receive some sort of status symbol. The De Arnise keep was a bit more complex than that but essentially similar. Housing resolves was sometimes problematic rejoining with NPC's during the Baldur's Gate games. Although it made more sense for them to go their own way and wait in a particular location than sit around in a house of some sort as if they were your spouse. it also allowed the designers to centralize a lot of character interaction making sure the PC was exposed to as much dialog and interaction as possible at all times. Considering no game can manage to be as absurdly large as BGII, where you could find new content on your third playthrough - the more content the player skips in a game that can't afford to skip content the worse the end experience is going to be. So in a way, its a good mechanic and partly necessary. Besides, just because Bioware made it annoying with Mass Effect and Dragon Age doesn't mean Obsidian will too.

1. Mixed turn based and real time with turns in the background doesn't work - see Arcanum. 2. Full turn based has very limited appeal. 3. The reason RPG's resurrected back in '99 was precisely because BG1 came up with real time with pause gameplay. Its the key innovation that keeps the game flowing and prevents it from turning into a chess match. 4. I liked TOEE a lot. It had a great combat system. However, the fights turn stale when the enemies are too weak/insignificant, too slow, have annoying status effects - ultimately in any situation when the player feels he doesn't have full control. When you watch the same 10 zombies shuffle your way at the rate of two steps per minute only to murder your favorite character for the third time you start reaching for things to throw at the monitor. Turn based is still good for games that require modern weapons. Real time wouldn't make much sense in that situation (yes, I'm looking at you Fallout Tactics) as it would be impossible to control. Otherwise, its history.

No full voice acting. Hire voice actors from Planescape Torment and Baldurs Gate II. That is all.

That's fine, I was just saying we don't need what passes for grimdark fantasy today, which is nothing more than a spin on the standard fantasy setting anyway. Considering they have a finished map of the world, I think the setting is pretty much decided upon and I don't know how much they're willing to change it if its already typical fantasy (and it certainly seems that way from the names on the map). I hope its not, because that would pretty much beat the whole point of kickstarter as an opportunity to do something different. It says three races there. Anyone wanna bet which three?

I recall that Torment had no need of race variation or cheap political subtexts to be successful. That's what we're going for here folks, leave your poor man's RPG's at the door. This entire line of thinking was started with the Witcher, which was fine as the concept was original at the time. But then Dragon Age had to include it, and now we can't have an RPG without foaming at the mouth racists in it. Its annoying now, so skip it. Forget these crude ideas, and give me a good personal story a la Torment.

Heh, did you ever read much about the Eberron setting that got made for DnD 3.5? The Orcs, Goblins, etc were the nature lovers and had previously had the classically inspired great civilised empire.. the elves were split between a "mongol horde" group and an "uber-fantasy version of egyptian style ancestor/death worship" (for the simplified explanation). Gnomes were information manipulators, spies, bankers and mercantile masters... That and dragons were not simple "big magic beasties to kill" but were more likely to be Magnificent Bastard manipulators wrapped in engimas, and hidden in the shadows pulling strings over centuries.. Eberron is nice, certainly better than the vanilla setting. I remember reading it and thinking that not everything was as clearly explained as it could be.

Don't forget to post your impressions when you start playing Startopia

Aw, this warms my black heart http://www.gog.com/en/news/gog_loves_dd_the_baldurs_gate_series

919,786 baby I want this game, like, yesterday If you screw it up I'll never play one of your games again... my stapler,where's my stapler

Startopia is unique. It has its share of problems, but its really the sim I played the most of all (although I'm not exactly a sim nut). Its good in the same way Dungeon Keeper is good. Its a better sim than DK but the mechanisms of conflict are worse.

For me 2 options are best: 1. Only humans with other races and creatures being extremely rare (like a fairytale eh) 2. No humans or traditional races (like Talislanta) for a completely alien and otherworldly feel Considering all the talk about souls, its pretty certain that the game was considered with humans at least in mind. Its just that I'm tired as hell of the dwarves, orcs and elves. I can't stand them any more. But I would settle to some other new race, as long as it isn't derivative.

Almost 800000 now, its going to get funded and not even break 48 hours. Considering how vague the video is that a real show of faith by Obs customers. This is it Obs, it takes balls to stake your entire reputation on this game but that's exactly what you did. With this and Wasteland 2 its now or never for old school RPGs.

Almost 500000 in the piggybank there is no way this is not getting funded. Practically all the biggest names in RPG design are working on this so I think its time to continue where ToB, Torment and Fallout left off. And there are some big shoes to fill.

I definitely consider myself superior to the people you just described. Anyone willing to kill because they believe so much in their ethnicity, religion, culture, or history belongs in a mental asylum. It's so sad that there are entire countries full of such people (and I blame nurture here, not nature), but it doesn't change the fact that many of the citizens in places like Serbia and Libya, for example, need long-term mass counselling by trained professionals. Impossible of course, which leaves time and the innocence of younger Serbs and the Serbs not born yet as the only healers. Don't get me wrong I thing the USA is walking a fine line itself (more so than any other developed country) - but the USA is still so superior to any country whose government or society encourages violence to "protect societal fabric" (this phrase is one of the most insidious and evil I've ever heard) that it's not even a contest. Now enough of this - I'd like it if you took your Serbian nationalist Muslim hating to another forum - maybe the KKK or something would suit you. Ever think about easing off the pills and booze? Or just learning to read? I was pointing out the entire issue from their perspective just a few posts above, even supplied a justification of sorts, but then you're too self righteous to notice that. There are all sorts of people in this forum, but man, you really have issues you need help with.