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Huh. The OP is pretty much dead in the water without even looking through the rest of the thread. "Better combat system" has absolutely nothing, zero, nada to do with "...particularly regarding the quality of animations and spell effects." So OP is primarily talking about eye candy. He's not talking about actual combat system with mechanics, math, class/mob balance, degenerate gameplay, and all that jazz. Meh, move along. Nothing to see here.

I don't believe it was any comment in an official update, but it's possible I was thinking of a different KS as well. Anyway, the edit window is closed so let's just ignore the questionable "Didn't Obsidian already admit in one of the updates or something that they used up the KS funds already?" question. Even with/without that, I wouldn't want a further delay or even additional crowdsourcing at this point.

Fair point, I'll endeavor to dig and either quote/correct. (This forum doesn't make it easy to search for dev quotes, alas, especially with cross-posting from the other forum too.)

Per the OP. Absolutely not. There'd be no more funding. Didn't Obsidian already admit in one of the updates or something that they used up the KS funds already? You can't expect more "quality" without the resource backing, or are you expecting a herd of unpaid interns paid in air? Do you really think merely the addition of "time" is a feasible business maneuvre? (Answer: No.) In relation to that, I also said "no" to another Kickstarter/fund request for the simple reason that there's absolutely no guarantee that additional funds+time will somehow make the game that much better if they ran out of money the first time, and represents additional risk in project management. It's better to make the game core a good foundation and sell a solid base to further fund additional content, even with necessary compromises. Maybe we have fewer wilderness areas. Fine with me. Maybe the initial live instrumentation promise must be nixed; okay, I get that. This is still an unproven product, and crowdsourcing is 100% dependent upon good faith. It's better to add to a solid core product based on its own earned funds, IMO. (Though I wouldn't want Obsidian to actually cut produced content into DLC or something, but I'm pretty sure Obs said they wouldn't do that...) Most importantly, transparency is important to maintain trust and understanding for an imperfect production schedule.

I'd like to ask about the live instrumentation goal in the KS as well.... Were the funds exhausted in favor of other game stuffs? Or is this just the initial stage in planning everything out before final performance like someone else suggested? Anyway, good stuff. Having significant chunks of ambient background noise between the music loops would be great too.... and having especially shorter music loops (or no looping, only intro) for combat initiation sequences. Not a fan of most combat music. (Edit to add: That is, the stretch reached with Paypal funding. Did that count?)

Okay. ^-----That thing must get into the game somehow. Easter egg puzzle that unlocks a bit of content? Come on. Please do it.

Outsourcing distro, I called it. Beautiful art assets there. Now to really dig into those class details...

The current PE forums are subdivided thusly: (1) Announcement and News (2) General Discussion (NO SPOILERS) (3) Gameplay & Mechanics (4) Engine & Technology Because there were never any spoilers to be discussed up to this point anyway, the fact that the "NO SPOILERS" tag exists on this General subforum implies there must be a SPOILERS subforum in the future. Yes? Uh, does this forum software support spoiler tags? That would be nifty... The #3 and #4 subfora I expect will have to evolve once the game is released--maybe #3 would move onto "tactics," and #4 for "hacking" (mods, scripting, custom portraits, etc.). But if there's going to be a General discussion with spoilers, I think tactics makes sense there instead. Then what use is a General forum that's "no spoilers"? Here's what I propose.... (1) Announcement and News = same (2) Support (NO SPOILERS) = Tech support and general questions about the game (3) General Discussion (Spoilers allowed) = spoiler tags would be nice; gameplay tactics; companion discussions, etc. (4) Hax0rz = (insert better name) modding, scripting, customizations

Hm, so I missed where Chris Avellone is in all of this, maybe...

Nope. Those weren't fundamental parts of those games. See sig for interviews and quotes. Josh Sawyer himself said that it turned out very few players ever used that function, AND it adds a ton of technical problems. Selfish short-sighted hyperbole won't win you any points. Since you're not part of this project in any form anyway, you don't belong here. Shoo, little troll. :D

I think it's funny that this thread has descended into another "why for/why against" thread, but I can't say I didn't see that coming, along with the noobs who start more threads about it, I guess. All those posters who say "I don't understand why blah blah blah--" this has been rehashed to death with explanations in previous threads, in circles (which is why it's pointless). See below. Basically this topic has officially entered the console/multiplayer/tablet realm of "They made their decision so accept it." You guys (and gals) who want to live your anime-dating sim "I spend lots of money on gifts and maybe I'll get lucky after this date" fantasies can go ahead and write a fanfic mod for it. C'mon, you live for that stuff, and no one's stopping you. Heck, I'm cheering you on, see? (And I really don't consider Deionarra a game romance by any stretch of the imagination--that non-party NPC was written solely for the sake of the primary storyline, as Arkeus points out. Unless PE would have been written with that kind of storyline, it can't work. That was content unique to PS:T.) For the new people who have no idea about the previous arguments brought forth, save yourself some time and educate yourself. http://forums.obsidian.net/topic/61515-romance-and-friendship/ (page 11 http://forums.obsidian.net/topic/61515-romance-and-friendship/page__st__200) http://forums.obsidian.net/topic/61676-the-unofficial-pe-relationshipromance-thread/ http://forums.obsidian.net/topic/61768-unofficial-pe-relationshipromance-thread-pt2/ http://forums.obsidian.net/topic/61886-unofficial-pe-relationshipromance-thread-pt-3/ http://forums.obsidian.net/topic/62215-relationshipromance-thread-iv/

Shut it. For the new people who have no idea about the previous arguments brought forth, save yourself some time and educate yourself. http://forums.obsidian.net/topic/61515-romance-and-friendship/ (page 11 http://forums.obsidian.net/topic/61515-romance-and-friendship/page__st__200) http://forums.obsidian.net/topic/61676-the-unofficial-pe-relationshipromance-thread/ http://forums.obsidian.net/topic/61768-unofficial-pe-relationshipromance-thread-pt2/ http://forums.obsidian.net/topic/61886-unofficial-pe-relationshipromance-thread-pt-3/ http://forums.obsidian.net/topic/62215-relationshipromance-thread-iv/

Truth. I was particularly excited by Sawyer's promise of exploring themes of institutionalized racism, class struggle and religion. That's because we already knew the direction of the game in terms of those "mature" items, as they were covered (though not thoroughly) in previous updates and interviews. The one factual item that Obsidian had remained silent on besides the earliest "maybe if it fits" official comment was the companion interaction vis-a-vis "romances." We now return you to your regularly scheduled "I came late to the party and didn't back the KS but will make an opinion-vomit anyway" threads along with mechanics arguments and "Why isn't this D&D I thought I backed a D&D game this sucks" QQ comments, so on. Mods, people. I'm most interested in knowing just how the modding capabilities will be documented--maybe a gung-ho player will be able to create an actual 3rd party tool for modders much like WeiDU.

Good news. Also..... FFS, write your own romance mods and be done with it, folks. This is one huge reason why there will be mod support: Player content. BE DONE WITH IT.

Thanks for the update. I know I'm in the minority on the forums for NOT wanting additional stretch goals, but I always believed more would just add too much risk to a complex "public" project of this nature. There's already so much riding on this Kickstarter for Obsidian, who has to deal with specific reputation issues in other realms, besides the ridiculous expectations from those of us who backed it, and the ship date is already moved (which ultimately is fine, but again, that incurs more cost already in man-hours). I'm not familiar with the nitty-gritty of project management, but there's a crapton of stuff behind the scenes that 99% of backers simply aren't privy to for decisions like this, and I respect that. Let's look forward to a wondertastic core game. Oh yeah, the Earth godlike. So cool. I think it'd be fine to introduce more godlike options in subsequent installments of the franchise, honestly. Edit to add: I'm positive that Obsidian will let us use custom portraiture a la BG/IWD, so don't worry too much about how you like these.

I prefer numbers. Simple and straightforward, real easy to keep track of and chat about in shorthand. Pillars of Eternity I, II, III, IV, V, VI, etc. = PE2, PE4, etc.

Planescape: Torment. There were, what.... 3-4 required battles in the whole game? So basically I'd play similarly to PS:T, assuming PE has anywhere near the textual depth; the "replacement mechanic" for me would simply be more dialogue and faction options, probably making it more of a solve-mysteries/problems-and-deal-with-politics thing.

Heheheheheheheh eehheheheheeeheheeeee

Edair? Edér? Hmmm. Warrior/fighter, rogue/thief? Hmmm. Hmmmm. Oh, beautiful henge-like ruins thing! And that's all I gots since I'm tired. Good night.

This sounds like entering the scifi realm. Astral bodies in fantasy realms, to me, are more abstractions and with lore related to what's visible rather than the hard facts of solar system layout. Fantasy realms typically talk about the fuzzy edges of "worlds," not "planets."

Since I'm not getting PE from Steam, it's irrelevant to me. If they're required for Steam, then I'm sure they'll be easy checkboxes to implement in the game. I suppose it's just a matter of immersion-breaking popups and whatever. That said, I dislike the concept of achievements in SP games, period. Ignoring the whole tracking-the-player bit (ugh), "achievements" are, in a sense, another type of motivational content that SP games shouldn't need; on the other hand, in an MMO I play, there are lots of in-game achievements along with those bell-ringing popups. I don't mind them in MMOs because the play is completely different from SP--it's additional "content" in the MMO genre when quests are always linear and without impact to any storyline (whether one treats achievements as bragging rights or for OCD completism).

I did not read all the other posts, so these points may have been brought up already. Crowdfunding itself is irrelevant in this discussion so I'm ignoring that part. You seem to be fixated on the overall budget aspect. The biggest reason why I backed PE at all was due to the pedigree of experience. A whole studio of AAA-experienced folks are involved here, from project management to art design to mechanics implementation and actual programming. What did those other two game project teams/companies have, on KS? Not a fraction of that experience; their leaders and team members do not comprise complete firms the way Obsidian is, which means to say those two games are far more "indie" than PE. You can have someone who designed the tabletop version of a game be the president of a tiny little firm, but that hardly translates to experience in both the business side of things (budget, project management) and actual computer programming and design. So with the whole "pedigree of experience" in mind, overall budget is only a small part of the big picture: First, experienced computer game developers on the business side of things must know how to CALCULATE needed resources. Then they must know how to LEVERAGE said resources, including both money and time. Review Update 67. They must know their employees' capabilities and common potential pitfalls in the development process. Again, those other two projects didn't have the AAA pedigree PE has, which means since their companies/teams have holes in overall business and high-level development experience, I wouldn't have expected more than something linear and "short." Despite the common funding source from Kickstarter and the fact that these projects "made a lot of money" from that source above their requirements (which, again, may have been inaccurate if they don't estimate needs correctly in the first place), I don't see anything else similar between PE and those projects that would invite fair comparison of final products. Now, as for Obsidian asking for additional funding for more companions and such, I still prefer that they didn't and kept such content for proper expansions; whether those expansions might be crowdfunded in the future remains to be seen, though ultimately I wouldn't mind if the base game is quite polished with most everything people had come to expect in the Kickstarter. Expectations are already--and dare I say "unrealistically"--high; by adding more funding and time delay, I honestly think that increases risk.

They're still writing and designing stuff. The "heart" of a good RPG varies from person to person, sort of a pointless question, honestly. You have to look at YOUR favorite CRPG and then decide what YOU loved most about it, but that hardly translates to a general qualitative assessment of other games. Like my favorite game is PS:T, so the "heart" there is a combination of both quality and quantity of reactive textual content--excellent storytelling and great depth in party members. That may not be true for the PE backers who came primarily from the BG/IWD end of things.

My favorite minor NPC in a CRPG doesn't even have a proper name. Man, that tongue-lashing so early in the game... I was taken aback, confused, amused, and immediately fell in love with the cant.

TOO MUCH TEXT. I HOPE PE DOESN'T HAVE THAT MUCH TEXT. MORE ANIMATIONS PLOX! I enjoy the gamut between PS:T and MMOs, so I'm not worried, and my playstyle actually isn't ideal for MMOs anyway since I prefer experimentation and not min-maxing the stupid numbers. I'd love to replay PS:T to see if I missed anything, but it keeps crashing on my system. WTB PS:T:EE? As for the Having Time issue... well... eh, it'll work out. Instead of going to see that 3-hour self-aggrandizing Insert Tolkien or Star Wars Franchise Pre-Sequel, I'll just play a game.