PixyMisa

If anyone is keeping track of just how wrong Wulf is, the Wasteland 2 Kickstarter is fast approaching $400k after just 12 hours - with three backers at the $10,000 level.

Completely wrong. People are asking for a spiritual successor to Planescape, not necessarily a sequel. That would be nice, but everyone knows it's unlikely to happen. To put it another way, what you're arguing for is yet another game that's been lobotomised to fit consoles and handhelds. The thing is, there's plenty of people cranking out those games. Hardly anyone is producing good party-based RPGs, and there's a real demand for those even without AAA production values. I didn't finish Torment until 2007. The first time through, I thought I'd hit a bug that made my game unfinishable, and gave up. When I picked it up again years later, I liked it just as much as the first time through... And it wasn't a bug, I'd just misread something. Anyway, whatever. You have your console and handheld games. Those are everywhere. Some people would like a good, solid, party-based RPGs. If you don't, you don't. You might want to reconsider what allusions you cast about if you ever plan to leave your parents' basement. Perhaps. But there are a lot of them, and they make good money, and they're prepared to spend it. So why not produce the game they want? Order of the Stick, a stick-figure comic about Dungeons and Dragons - can't get much nerdier than that - raised $1.25 million. Now, they handled it brilliantly, but it's just a comic. A new game along the lines of Baldur's Gate or Torment... There's a lot of people who want that. A few thousand dollars in a month? Are you kidding? There are individual people out there who will put up a few thousand dollars by themselves. I'd certainly put up a few hundred if there was a nice reward level available. Some games cannot be played on every platform. That's fine. That's a good thing. As for accessibility, that's a worthwhile consideration, but relatively easily handled. Text that isn't fully voiced can be made available through a screen-reader program. No. No. Completely wrong. That's precisely the type of game that gets published by the big existing publishers. What Obsidian need to do make this work is find a niche that isn't getting served well by the current system, and it so happens that their expertise overlaps such a niche perfectly. As noted, other devices can take a running jump. An old-school RPG can be made accessible to handicapped people to a large degree without abandoning the concept - which is NOT true for the average console release. Except, your protestations aside, that is what everyone is asking for.

As I noted on the other thread, I'd love to see a new game in the Infinity Engine style. No need for it to be a sequel, or D&D, or anything licensed at all, but that really was the golden age of RPGs for me. Think it over, bring back that project you really wanted to do, put it up on Kickstarter, and take my money! Oh, and a really important thing: Take a look at the Order of the Stick Kickstarter project. It "only" raised $1.25 million, but that's 21 times the original goal. Rich Burlew (the creator of OotS) handled it brilliantly, with daily updates, new goals and rewards that turned the drive into a social event.

A lot of people have said a lot of things I agree with. A story-driven RPG A party of 4-6 characters (six being, of course, the perfect number!) Original IP A distinctive setting Turn-based or active-pause combat Isometric or third-person graphics Limited voice acting (some voice acting would be very much appreciated, but there's no requirement for every line to be voiced) Some things just aren't likely to happen in any reasonable budget or timeframe. No console release. No sequels to licensed properties. No fully-voiced 3D spectacular. But that's just fine with me. Dragon Age 2 was a console-release licensed sequel fully voiced 3D spectacular, and it was about as inviting as mouldy porridge. As for settings, people have mentioned the works of Jack Vance, Gene Wolfe, Charlie Stross's Laundry books, and Phil Foglio's Girl Genius. Any of those would be awesome if you could swing it. A game that has you hopping between worlds, trying to fit your existing skills to new environments each time - that would be sweet, but might be beyond the initial scope. Personally, I'd like to see a game where there are two, three, four possible lead characters, and you indirectly pick one and your party forms around you, and the game plays out differently depending on that. Somewhere between Planescape: Torment and Icewind Dale in that respect. Chris and team: If you think you can put out a solid party-based, story-driven RPG, I'll join in funding it. If you think you can put out two, I'll kick in for two. If you can do one a year for the next twenty years, I'm there. Put together whatever ideas you have, come up with a Kickstarter drive, and TAKE MY MONEY!!! Oh, and if you think you can do a NWN-style system with a server module and persistent worlds, take my money twice!