Darkpriest

Well TW3 will be the closure for The Witcher series with this protagonist for sure... the question is, will they abandon the world for something new or will the keep to the world but say some other story, like Ciri.

The portraits are not bad, but some are meh... TBH I'd prefer portraits more in line with BG... these lack focus and "personality" to me... they are veering too much into "artistic portrait" to me... that kind of art style was okish when it was showing the full body with the background like in IWD, but still I find the BG style superior

well ok, TW 1 was quite **** when it comes to relationships, but in TW2 it got slightly better, lets say that relationships are the weakest point of the series still given that both series have **** "relationships" other points are in plus for the TW (yeah it's kind of silly that 30ys old people argue about maturity in games... but I bet there are older lurkers here on the forums too :D)

I assume it's done that way so you can see weapons easily at a glance... remember that the same types of weapons will be used by your opponents, and I'd rather have slightly oversized weapon heads than being forced to pause and zoom in each time a new encounter happens.

Not that it's mandatory to strip those types of things from any game you put it in, but a well-done romance really should resemble a well-written friendship. The two have a lot in common, really. But, that, and a lot of stuff can take place "off-stage." If you're a developer, and your idea of putting in a romance is taking your already well-written character and just tossing in love-making and cuddling stuff, then you shouldn't "put in romance" at that point. Well you can have a whole "romance" off stage too, in your head for example.... to me there is no compromise... it's either done good with a lot of dialogs and NPCs having their preferences (so no to a human female banging every race in the multiverse, just because a player can be any race) and most likely influenced by character's stats (someone might love those charismatic people, sometimes someone might love the intelligent or strong, but really, would you ever date someone repulsive, because he spoke some cheap one liner a couple of times?) If you want your character to have a romance with some NPC, work for it and adapt to their preferences and not just pick 3 lines and bang the NPC of your choice...

You realize more than half the Obsidian userbase overlaps with BioWare, right? I mean, you have 400+ posts. I do realize that people played Bioware games in the past, but how much of the userbase that overlaps is still content with the direction that Bioware is taking, is a whole another question right? I myself was really enjoying Bio games until ME2 happened.... that was like a warning sign, but then I still pre-ordered DA2 - got burned hard, then gave another chance as I wanted them to provide good RPGs and still had ME3 pre-order... again bad choice... so now I am not even considering buying any new Bioware game, even though I like their past creations. If pitched against each other, the DA:I looks like a material for teenagers vs a well done game for mature audience TW3. Those at Gamescon could see the difference. As a result, there is no contest between the two games if there would be a choice between one or the other. The only "advantage" of the Bio game is that it will have all this LGBT stuff material to romance, and the "illusion" of choice where it comes to your race/gender/class, which in reality I assume that it will have ZERO impact on the story flow. I have no doubts that DA:I will be an improvement over DA2, (it even copies some of the solutions from the TW2 actually) but it still feels like a mediocre game, while TW3 feels like a really good game with a potential to be a legendary game.

TW3 - no contest here. I leave DA:I to Twilight teens

Not touching the DA:I with a ten feet pole, maybe in 3 years when some gold edition will be available for 5$ Bioware is not seeing my money after disappointing DA2 bangland and ME3 shooter, which i pre-ordered thinking that those will be actually RPGs So Wastland 2 and PoE it is for me and then Witcher 3

oh.. so it's a card game... well I guess I will pass on this one then... (much dissapoint)

especially with some tactical part in them and prefer rather difficult than ez mode

Well.. I can tell only from my experience... I am currently at ~5,3k MMR in DotA2, and in my off time from DotA i play things like Path of Exile, X-COM, All the classic RPGs, recently Divinity OS, Played M&M X, HoM&M each of them. I also love RTSes, like SC, Warcraft, WH40k: Dawn of War, Company of Heroes, C&Cs, and Total War series. I rarely play shooters,, the most recent shooter was ME3, and I even dabbled in Multiplayer option there, but they get boring for me real fast, so I tend to avoid them. I have quite a few friends who share similar tastes. DotA players rarely go to find their multiplayer fix elsewhere (the cool thing recently was heartstone for a while), but they also like single player games.

is there a link to another vid?

After a long deliberate thinking process i came to a conclusion that I have another version of a romance, that I could possibly dig, in some future installment of the series.... there are certain NPCs that have distinct preferences, for example a human female that can get attracted to a human men only; an orlan gay, digging dwarves and orlans; etc. so if your character does not meet the preferences of a romancable NPC you land in "a friend zone" or in a "sorry, but you stink and leave me be" zone. So even if you try clicking the correct "romance me" dialog options, and yet your decisions and your gender and race do not fit the preferences of the NPC you get nothing. It could also be possible that for example some character options would be out of luck for romance (for example: death godlike, Amu's of any type, etc.)... that could be one of ways making NPCs more believable, and could also lead to some better dialog writing... but if I will ever hear of an idea that my PC should romance everything with ease, then I will tell them to go play some dating simulator or sims... RPG with believable NPCs and good writing is apparently not for them.... As it is now, if I can pick between romances or use dialog lines and quest space for something else, I pick the latter.

Haha, that's why I said "Let's leave Carthaginian religion be." Don't want to go near that mess. I wonder what's the view on slavery then? I mean I would expect it's a normal thing and such a culture would probably use slave labor for mundane works and maintain their men in dominant positions in politics, trade and military (here you can even give a splash of Spartan culture in that regard). Number of slaves after all is also a tangible proof of wealth

Yay! NPCs still all killable, maybe some with a pop up warning for plot critical NPCs when not on super hardcore mode (this character is extremely influential and you might need this person in the future) or something along this lines?

@Sarog Sacrificing infants is still in there?

This is equally true - I would argue more true - of elves and dwarves. But Obsidian is including those, and we trust them to do a good job. There rest of your post doesn't make sense to me. You seem to praise Obsidian for doing new, creative things with the races they've chosen to include, but assume that if Obsidian were to include orcs they would not be able to do similar creative things. There's nothing inherent to orcs and goblins that would suddenly make Obsidian incapable of creativity. You're arguing from a double standard. I've never seen anyone do anything interesting with Orcs or Goblins(the ONLY exception for Goblins is, funny as it sounds, Harry Potter) , but I HAVE seen them do interesting things with elves and dwarves, repeatedly. The Witcher is a good example. The fact that it pulls from a deep cultural wealth of Polish/Baltic mythology that is LOADED with elves and dwarves is what gives it substance, whereas Orcs and Goblins as we think of them effectively date from, as others have said, Tolkien's works. The PoE world is being built in a renaissance period. The powerhouses of the time in reality were states like the Dutch Republic, The Hanseatic League, the Italian states, France and the wealthier parts of the H.R.E. The nomadic steppe peoples had been pushed out of the Russias and their time was O-V-E-R. The arab world was FAR past it's prime(it's widely held to have peaked around 1100-1300. This isn't to say that everything in the PoE world must derive from the Earth at that time, but rather that it's not the eternal middle ages seen in pretty much every other fantasy setting. If you cast Orcs as any of those types of civilizations, they'll just be what they always are: low-tech, low-rent tribal militarists with some goofy priest-driven theocratic structure bolted to their seat of gov't. Want to cast them as the monolithic empire with a higher level of development but retaining the same silly themes? Maybe ripping off the Ottomans/Fatimid Egypt and some far eastern culture? Congratulations, you just made the Qunari! Tolkien's Orcs are no better than demons. They're animals. They're inspired by a version of the nomadic steppe peoples that never existed except in the imaginations of historical revisionists of the romantic period who saw those events not as the mass, gradual migrations that they were but rather wholesale demonic invasions by monster people. They are not fertile material for creating an interesting, intelligent, high-performing, thought-provoking race of people. They're always going to be a fantasy re-fit of the Arab, the Hun, the Mongol, the Turk, or the Oriental. Make me a well-written nation of Orcs based on 1600's Holland/Venice and I'll accept that they might be useful for something other than providing guilt-free cannon fodder and a vehicle for bad writing. 2 words - colonization era The clash of cultures on various technological development level.. anyone remembers the story of Spanish meeting Aztecs? or how Australia got colonized? What about far east cultures of that time? Orcs can be your Aztec culture for example or others. It's perfectly viable for fantasy setting that you can have various development of tech among cultures, because "magic" and "active deities", hence you can get even nomadic tribes or even literally cavemen... It is a colonization and exploration era in Eora, right? And the setting is still wide open for tweaks and additions, right? So we have yet another reprecentation of the orcs as bloodthirsty, low tech at odds with the humans. No thanks. I would love an Aztec inspired civilization, but no orcs. There is nothing inherently interesting with orcs,elves,dwarves. Every interesting thing you can do with them, you could do just as well( in fact better since there would be no expectations) with another, original race. Who said that they have to be at odds? If I recall history right, it was the greedy Europeans wiping native american cultures on both continents. Heck, I could even take the idea of orcs from the latest Might & Magic series by Ubisoft (HoM&M5 / 6 and M&M X)

Really? That's your argument? I'm pretty sure the main demographic for video games is central europe, north-america and australia. I don't know of any culture there where prearranged marriages or honour killings are part of. Also, what's up with the assumption that every party member should be single in the first place? If you want your realism in a medieval world and not just some 20th century with swords and magic, given the life expectancy, most people are probably married by the time they join your party, especially if they are usually not a full time adventurer. I argue that in most settings it's probably more logical and realistic if your party members are married, so romance makes no sense. Feel free to bring some counterarguments. Speaking as a young married man, I have to say that the inability to cast yourself as a married person(even if your spouse is never depicted in the game and remains abstract) is a little unfortunate. Or as a widow/widower if that's more convenient and economical from a writing standpoint. I don't think this would be applicable because Romance is optional, so I'm battling understand why you would want to be married in a RPG but never meet your wife or have no interaction with her? If this is a reason to not Romance then the solution should be to just not follow any Romance options? As Namutree said, I was envisioning a biographical option more than anything else. I find it a little odd that of all the possible relationship statuses(or lack thereof) you have to choose from in games, married is never one. I'd imagine that a large(decent?) portion of the people playing the game are married, so it's an easy thing to relate to. The letter idea is actually a good one if anybody cared to flesh it out to that point. Anybody who's read letters between spouses knows that they can easily be very touching, and it's economical from a resource standpoint. It's much harder to depict two people FALLING in love(and one would necessarily question why you would even try unless that was the central part of the story you're telling) rather than in a constant state. I don't like romances in games(or literature, for that matter) because I don't think they're well written. That isn't to say that the people who have to write them aren't good writers, but that it's really, really hard to do it well in any medium other than film or non-fiction writing. The only romance I've seen in any game that was worth paying attention to was Jaheira in Baldur's Gate 2 and Throne of Bhaal. It was straight faced enough to be pretty believeable. You make some good points around the whole marriage option in a RPG. Its worth considering, the only criticism I would have is Romance in a RPG is normally about interaction with a party member that is part of your adventure and you can see. This makes the Romance person more believable and whole RP experience more real as there is some kind of emotional connection. So why don't we combine the best of both worlds, we have Romance options but also the option to get married? Or is that taking it too far ? Not sure if I am misreading the previous poster or you are :D But, my impression was not his desire to get married (good luck to any marriage taken after a month of relationship with 30 sentences said between the couple), but he was asking, why are we not STARTING out as a married person (a background) and try to maintain that relationship or even better, it is even visibly affecting our choices and consequences of various choices. - letters, visits, perhaps even some grander decisions (wealth flows, security, moving out, power grab, etc.). That could be even interesting... but probably also not something that Bangers are looking for, as this would limit their freedom whom they can sex virtually. I stand by my stance that the Biowarish romances are nothing more than cheap sex bots for people who can't get the courage or have chances of getting interesting partners in real life, because "reasons"... the example of ME and The Normandy Love boat is the most glaring one. By that standards I could say that Bond movies also have romances in them...

This is equally true - I would argue more true - of elves and dwarves. But Obsidian is including those, and we trust them to do a good job. There rest of your post doesn't make sense to me. You seem to praise Obsidian for doing new, creative things with the races they've chosen to include, but assume that if Obsidian were to include orcs they would not be able to do similar creative things. There's nothing inherent to orcs and goblins that would suddenly make Obsidian incapable of creativity. You're arguing from a double standard. I've never seen anyone do anything interesting with Orcs or Goblins(the ONLY exception for Goblins is, funny as it sounds, Harry Potter) , but I HAVE seen them do interesting things with elves and dwarves, repeatedly. The Witcher is a good example. The fact that it pulls from a deep cultural wealth of Polish/Baltic mythology that is LOADED with elves and dwarves is what gives it substance, whereas Orcs and Goblins as we think of them effectively date from, as others have said, Tolkien's works. The PoE world is being built in a renaissance period. The powerhouses of the time in reality were states like the Dutch Republic, The Hanseatic League, the Italian states, France and the wealthier parts of the H.R.E. The nomadic steppe peoples had been pushed out of the Russias and their time was O-V-E-R. The arab world was FAR past it's prime(it's widely held to have peaked around 1100-1300. This isn't to say that everything in the PoE world must derive from the Earth at that time, but rather that it's not the eternal middle ages seen in pretty much every other fantasy setting. If you cast Orcs as any of those types of civilizations, they'll just be what they always are: low-tech, low-rent tribal militarists with some goofy priest-driven theocratic structure bolted to their seat of gov't. Want to cast them as the monolithic empire with a higher level of development but retaining the same silly themes? Maybe ripping off the Ottomans/Fatimid Egypt and some far eastern culture? Congratulations, you just made the Qunari! Tolkien's Orcs are no better than demons. They're animals. They're inspired by a version of the nomadic steppe peoples that never existed except in the imaginations of historical revisionists of the romantic period who saw those events not as the mass, gradual migrations that they were but rather wholesale demonic invasions by monster people. They are not fertile material for creating an interesting, intelligent, high-performing, thought-provoking race of people. They're always going to be a fantasy re-fit of the Arab, the Hun, the Mongol, the Turk, or the Oriental. Make me a well-written nation of Orcs based on 1600's Holland/Venice and I'll accept that they might be useful for something other than providing guilt-free cannon fodder and a vehicle for bad writing. 2 words - colonization era The clash of cultures on various technological development level.. anyone remembers the story of Spanish meeting Aztecs? or how Australia got colonized? What about far east cultures of that time? Orcs can be your Aztec culture for example or others. It's perfectly viable for fantasy setting that you can have various development of tech among cultures, because "magic" and "active deities", hence you can get even nomadic tribes or even literally cavemen... It is a colonization and exploration era in Eora, right? And the setting is still wide open for tweaks and additions, right?

I guess I fail to see the appeal of going to a video game brothel to have video game sex. A romance is at least a RPing thing. the only difference i see is that in so called romance you hit 3 lines of text while in brothel you hit 1 line of text with payment. result is exactly the same, i.e. virtual banging scene... and that's what people are after, if believing the romance direction bioware went for (oh, you must be sure that in brothels you can bang freaks to make it more appealing)

To be honest, I feel like there is a place for Orcs, for example a culture based on Aztec (more stationary) or Hun (nomadic) type. Not just mere brutes, but still warlike. Their labor based on slaves, more rural and religious types than art and science, but still with some own architecture that is not looking like primitive huts unless they are true nomads.

Went through the whole BG saga recently, now I am playing XCOM Long War mod... super good stuff. If you want to see some high quality vids of that game with the mod, I recommend this guy - Beaglerush and his series of videos Live and Impossible: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLXctaw5JGF4Inwdinw7ijDafjKlVC2oDo

Probably will hit resolve and int or might.

I believe that persistent until map change / reload would be fine

in short, no one is forced upon you. You can just create own party or go solo if you wish, the starting companions are just that, starting companions for the first few maps, but even then we know that you can be solo as soon as 10min into the game (leave the merchant behind and say to the soldier female that you want to rest badly)