Ieo

One of the first things I will do when I get the game is turn off the music. I apologize. But I play games in a room with other people doing other things. Nah, that's understandable. I used to turn off all my sounds in college because I had a roommate. But that was also before I had good-quality headphones.

I felt this was more appropriate here than the live music thread per se. Still not expecting this scale, but... For all the flak MMOs get here ( ), I love the orchestral score of Lord of the Rings Online and am looking forward to the new score coming with the Rohan expansion. Making of (especially 3:47): http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_NNlmNiluPQ and 2:25

I like Edair and Cadegund well enough--some of their personality comes out in the posture as well. Edair looks a bit skeptical, wary, peering around the corner, practical, and not interested in drawing attention to himself (as Sawyer said). Cadegund is all shiny and confident, whether that confidence is supported by worldly experience, priestly duty, naivete, elitism. Forton, despite that painful-looking knee, looks a bit tired but ready to fight. Maybe he's world-weary, but Sawyer (I think) did say that he's into mortification of the flesh and, uh, drugs ( ). I expect him to have an interesting past... I think drawing old people is difficult; I rarely see it done realistically well across art genres. Forton actually looks fine to me in this regard.

I think the point here is that everyone is entitled to their opinion. Some people don't like string quartet, some people don't like death metal, and some people don't like Justin Beiber. And that's ok. I make it a point to feel confident and reassured enough in my own tastes and opinions, and just accept the fact that not everyone will share it. So long as those same people realize that opinion and tastes also do not constitute fact. Not everyone can even agree that the music score of a CRPG is important. But that makes me cry.

One of the best easter eggs in BG:

I wouldn't expect something of this scale, but-- Heroes of Might and Magic IV (operatic) (orchestral) (woodwinds esp.) (my fave, though I think this is the short version)

Of course, it's the performance gestalt that's the key. Example: Recorded telephony narration, like an operator, is often done with a real voice--synthetic voices are extremely off-putting. Makes you cringe. But haven't you noticed how jarring a full sentence of that pre-recorded human voice narration is? It's easy for the human ear to pick up the "unnaturalness" of this sort of thing even despite the "real" recording of individual elements. Performance with live instrumentation has specific imperfections and transitional characteristics that carry genuine immersive and emotive presence. A swelling high note with a scratch on a fiddle, like a broken voice, can carry quite a lot of emotive punch right there. A very slightly off-tune or off-beat instrumentation in a tavern means the players are having fun and are probably as drunk as their clientèle. It's much more "present." P.S.: I'm not saying that synthetically composed music is bad or far inferior, of course--I do enjoy it. I'm just saying merely recorded individual notes is not the same as a live performance either.

Yes, that's one big plus to the stronghold (I'm sure we'll make it to $3m at this point ). My question related to that is how travel to the housing works, if you can choose different locations, etc. Travel by the BG map was fast-forwarded in-game time, so I'm guessing PE will work similarly. Basically that would be an issue of "convenience" as well as accessibility if you happen to be in a questing area (e.g. mega dungeon). My ideal scenario is--basic inventory with paper doll, extended inventory with map area pack animal mechanic tied to camp/rest mechanic (especially without D&D style Bags of Holding), fully extended inventory with the stronghold. Well, it would be nice.

Oh, agreed, any of the tiers with in-game addition should be removed from a Paypal option after KS. Digital tiers I have no problem with, especially if the add-ons are also kept open alongside Paypal continuation. It's those middling-high tiers with extra stuff like the collector's book/signed swag that Obs should either remove (the exclusives) or significantly raise the price for those particular tiers.

I guess the only downside of doing that is it might remove some of urgency that often leads to a surge in pledges as Kickstarters come to an end. Especially if they confirm that the reward tiers will stay exactly the same on the paypal site for a long period of time. That's understandable, but easily alleviated by saying the higher tiers would be removed--e.g. everything above level $80 or something (with physical add-ons still available). Or remove specific rewards, which can be tricky. Absent removal of actual tiers, then raising the Paypal prices would be easiest, I imagine. Edit: You're out of your mind if you believe that. Half the cost of games these days is to publishing and advertising. Which PE was able to skip over entirely by recruiting us with their kick starter website, and we do most of the advertising for them. His worry isn't about funding. It's about the project management timescale. The funding-content model we see on KS isn't a pure linear relationship--Obsidian most likely would hire more devs/artists horizontally to cover their bases and stay on track for the spring 2014 release. Personally, I wouldn't mind some delay into 2014, but it's generally a good idea to maintain a project plan right up to that point and then decide whether they need to push back or not.

You're mixing up proper inventory UI and a piece of loot---Bag of Holding was loot itself. And I hope there aren't magical containers in PE. Quite OP.

Were you able to attack the other player if you joined a multiplayer game? I'm fairly certain Baldur's Gate never had PvP--the mechanics didn't support it. I think there was a mod, but that's hardly official. I don't see how pause would work well if at all in the IE games for "PvP." Real PvPers play MMOs. Or proper PnP. IE/PE is neither of those. Bugger. Consider the dev interview quotes on the useless complexity of debugging co-op/MP mode with no content value: RETURN ON INVESTMENT IS NIL.

Please read up this thread, and do a search for "voice" threads.

I'm fine with this too. The key is to maintain a certain level of exclusivity for the "fairness" bit, and the "store" period would have to end at some point as well. @nikolokolus I think a lot of people overestimate the profitability of goods related to Project Eternity. Niche market. Subtract production, storage, distribution, etc. Best leave that calculus up to Obsidian...

About died right there.

I'd rather not see dragons in PE either. SUBVERT THE DOMINANT PARADIGM.

Stretching! I like it. Sagani's IWD-style concept art had a simple black bar across her eyes (which I really liked) but the newer group concept art had her face covered in a different style of tattoo, so I wonder. The monk's belly tattoo could be his faction mark or some soul thing. Maybe both... Oh, but tattoos! Maybe PS:T tattoo powers?! Joyous...

Glad you like it. More fans for the genre, huzzah. 2014 is plenty of time..

Yes, it's the twisty distortion thing in the bridge closest to the viewer! The lines, well, it's really hard trying to describe these perceptions without the terminology. But yeah. No biggee.

I am somewhat resigned to this, but there are cases where games have been able to overcome my need for customization by grabbing my interest in some other way (usually story), though these games typically lack any replay value for me - to give an example of one, the original Deus Ex had only a small amount of customization compared to what I prefer, but it was more than enough to keep me interested until the story and other mechanics picked up all the slack plus miles more. I am hoping this turns out to be the case with PS:T, and that I just need to give it more time - worldview and personality are a large part of what I need to be able to define in a character, so that may be enough once it gets going more. PS:T starts off a bit more slowly because you're just trying to get the hang of mechanics and making sense of the crazy world. It does buckle down eventually, when you make enough choices to make a difference in your alignment. (And PS:T does have a lack of replay value compared to BG for most people, I suspect.) Per worldview and personality--given the heavy emphasis Obsidian will place on reputation instead of alignment in PE, you should be fine in that regard. The only difference is that personalized character, with depth, takes time to develop, while the visual personalization is all front-loaded.

The trope has to do with the implied ascetic lifestyle that goes with being a "monk" in the religious sense... So I think extricating a pure class from the gestalt understanding may be difficult. Then again, the Amkethran monks seemed well-dressed enough--for being little sprites. More Amkethran monks! Infiltration and acrobatics--ninjas?!

The only thing customizable in PS:T--the most important part, IMO--is your character's worldview and personality. Alignment is purely incidental to your in-game choices. PS:T is quite niche, a cult favorite; think of it as unraveling a 100-sided Rubiks cube. I suspect that your obsession with visual personalization will impede your enjoyment of the storyline, though. Also, per portraits--I have no doubt that PE will allow custom portraits. All IE games allowed this (except PS:T which was a unique beast). Obsidian has been quite clear that they want the players to make their own experience with the game--where there is an opportunity for options, they want to do it if possible.

I just read that as Mini-Morte. That's a whole other level of disturbing. Your own grimoire talking smack at you, its creator. Geez.

Maybe it's a totally different style native to PE. Maybe he got tired of posing for the artist and started doing a form and was caught in the middle of it.... (although that would imply the artist has a photographic instantaneous skill in drawing, which kinda destroys my idea)