Jump to content

Katrar

Members
  • Posts

    74
  • Joined

  • Last visited

Posts posted by Katrar

  1. From DarkHorse's upcoming releases

     

    Pillars of Eternity Guidebook Volume One HC

    Obsidian Entertainment (W)

    On sale Mar 11

    FC, 120 pages

    $19.99

    HC, 8 1/2" x 11"

     

    Packed with never-before-seen art and in-depth lore, this is the definitive exploration of the acclaimed new video game from Obsidian Entertainment!

    Having broken records with its hugely successful Kickstarter campaign, Pillars of Eternity mixes modern technology with the beloved traditions of role-playing games, introducing a breathtaking new fantasy world. Every monster, every faction, every deity, and everything in between is covered within the pages of this tome, all accompanied by luscious illustrations.

    • Pillars of Eternity raised over 4 million dollars through crowdsourcing!

    • Tons of art and lore from the acclaimed game!

    • The godfathers of the RPG create their masterpiece!

     

    I'll come right out and say whoever wrote this terrible copy should find a new job. This is the equivalent of an unedited self-published novel on Amazon.

  2. Is it too late? Really, after a long fought battle it would be nice to have an option to slap my companion on the fantasy buttocks and grunt, "You da man." I imagine the ensuing return text would be suitably bromantic...

     

    If this is not possible for PE at release, perhaps some (free?) bromance DLC. Or at least serious consideration for PE2.

     

    Anyone else hoping for this?

    • Like 2
  3. The earlier poster that mentioned managed expectations as the key to enjoying this game is exactly right. I'm expecting a decent game in the spirit of the BG series, that plays at least similarly to it. I'm expecting the content to be well thought out, creative and nicely implemented. I'm NOT expecting 80-100 hours ala BG2. Fact is, they raised a lot of money but they didn't raise a LOT of money, ya know?

  4. Just have to say that this thread is filled with a lot of awesome ideas, love following it, and dreaming of what surprises PE will bring us :)

     

    To be honest, if OE follows all the advice in this thread, there won't be much of a game...

     

    "Ok guys, we need a boss for this dungeon level."

     

    "No bosses, the community thinks they are cliche'd."

     

    "No bosses? Ok... How about... hmmm... what kind of game are we making again?"

     

    "We don't know."

     

    The End.

    • Like 1
  5. There was this rpg I played years ago, I don't remember much about the PC except I was yellow, kind of round (a bit fat maybe) and had a large mouth. There were these ghosts chasing me, and I ran around this maze-like location trying to avoid them. The real hook though, the thing that made this quest different and memorable were these strange pills you'd find in out of the way corners. Eating one of these pills transformed you into some kind of ghost eater, and for a moment the tables were turned. I think it must have taken place in a mad scientist's laboratory.

    • Like 1
  6. Just a quote from the latest interview with Sawyer that briefly touches this very subject and might give some fuel to the discussion.

    An answer which I found both interesting and pleasing, especially the last section.

     

    It actually came out of some thoughts I had about the physical and metaphysical underpinnings of our own world. When worldbuilding, I think a lot of designers want to explain everything up front. There's obvious value in defining how the world works because it helps everyone wrap their heads around what the setting is about. Over the years, I've felt that breaking down the supernatural into easy-to-comprehend chunks drains the magic from it.

     

    Compare this to our own observation and understanding of the physical world. Public reaction to the discovery of the Higgs boson particle was very telling. Despite the scientific community's general requests to stop calling it the "God particle", the public and media couldn't help themselves. A discovery that potentially explains, if not the "why", at least the "how" of existence is appealing.

     

    Project Eternity's world has a similar level of flawed understanding. They can perceive souls, they can detect and record some data about them, they can verify their findings to a certain extent, but they still don't really "get" how it all works. Arguably of greater importance, they don't understand why souls work (and don't work) the way that they do. Individuals also don't agree on the role the gods play in the cycle. Last week, our art director, Rob Nesler, came in and asked me, "Are the gods actually gods or just beings of immense power?" While there aren't many people in the world of Project Eternity who deny the existence of gods, that question is one that people in the setting have debated for millennia.

     

    This quote reaffirms every reason I chose to participate in OE's Kickstarter.

    • Like 1
  7. I think that in a game with unlimited random encounters, it can be OK to have characters earned their own XP. It's simply a matter of "taking them out for a spin" to close some of that gap.

     

    However, in games where most of your battles are set piece encounters, and you have a more or less finite number of XP you are able to gain during a course of play, it makes - imo - more sense to have some sort of peripheral xp gain for unpartied characters. Full or partial can be argued in many directions, but it helps keep unpartied characters from quickly becoming permanently crippled.

  8. In update 28 they talk about how they are making a spreadsheet on the break down of the funding and where all the money is planned to go. 1. as a backer i think we should get to see this breakdown. and 2. more importantly i just think it would be interesting to see where 4.1 million goes into making a game as epic as this. Its an insight that most consumers dont get to see. Kind of an inside look on things

     

    What do you guys think

     

    I totally get your question. And I agree, it would be an interesting look behind the scenes at a part of the game making process we rarely get to see.

     

    But no. Please, no.

  9. So posting feedback is bad and Obsidian should work in a bubble, isolated from any and all outside input? Amusing.

     

    Even more amusing is your claim about a "wandering band of Internet protesters." There is no great feminist conspiracy manifesting in rogue bands of protesters plaguing the boards. People are simply growing tired of the male gaze dominant in most games and voice their concerns. Hell, J.E. Sawyer, the Project Leader, voiced his displeasure with the boob plate, rendering your point moot.

     

    Obsidian is known for subverting RPG mechanics and cliches. Sometimes they need to be reminded of it, particularly in cases of boobplate-with-tit-tips.

     

    Posting feedback? Good. Not liking boobplate? Fine. Barfing all over these forums with accusations of sexism, male chauvenism, and male privilege, demanding PE women be "covered up", lamenting the horrors of all fantasy artwork and literature since before the 1970s, equating the aesthetics of console action games somehow with the CRPG genre, man... seriously?

     

    You know what gets me. At the end of the day your "side" or whatever it is never acknowledges the fundamental plea to let OE design their own game. That's really what it boils down to. Let them design their own game, without getting all up in their grills with the angst and the anger and the hate and the sound and fury of your righteous crusade against cleavage in a fantasy setting.

    • Like 1
  10. Attractive might not have been the right word, I was responding to an earlier post. However, it should be a bit more stylized to show off that its female/male, way more than the current picture shows.

     

    Awesome, all they they have to do then is colour the armour pink and you'll be happy :)

     

    Those of us who have seen this exact groups <insert some point of view who disagrees> show up on every other board on every website shoving the same PC crap in everything for months. It gets a bit tiresome.

     

    Indeed.

     

    Doesn't change that the original Cadegun armour was butt ugly in a suspension of disbelief hurting kind of way. If it had been ceremonial armour, then maybe, but as work clothes it was ridiculous. And yes, that from a testosterone oozing male who loves chainmail bikinis (in fact, having invested a lot of money on large Boris Vallejo posters over the decades).

     

    If that particular armour is your entire basis for arguing why women should be "sexier" in video games to make you happy, then you need to learn how to pick better fights. Yes, it *was* that ugly in it's first presented form.

     

    +1 for Boris Vallejo. Proof that there really is no such thing as oversexualization in the fantasy genre, simply a divide between the amateur and the professional. Anyone who looks at Vallejo's work and sees nothing but oversexualization really has no business looking at fantasy artwork to begin with. =P

  11. Most of this thread puts me in mind of that cartoon that goes something like: "Someone on the internet is WRONG and I must fix it!" :biggrin:

     

    I'd generally agree with you, the difference here is that we've seen inklings that the game's aesthetic decision making process may have already been affected by this small band of what are effectively wandering internet protesters. Badmojo makes what I think is the fundamental point: LET OE DESIGN THEIR OWN GAME. This project may have been community funded but it should not be community designed, and that's what this particular crowd seems to be doing: demanding that OE conform its design decisions to their real world political needs. Now, perhaps OE would have done this naturally, and great. But what if they have been second guessing their art department because of this? Or second guessing their aesthetic/artistic options in general? Would a real gamer want this? Someone here solely for political activism might, but a gamer would - in my opinion - respect the creative process that is just now being set in motion without trying hard as they might to restrict or redirect it.

    • Like 2
  12. I hope they lean heavily on the tried and true (the familiarity of the D&D monster manual types of monsters), empowered by the quality writing we all expect, and add their own flourish, their own personality with some key monsters of their own design.

     

    Here's the thing... budget. I don't know how many of you have ever actually tried to come up with a proper monster ecology, IE a writeup-breakdown, in depth description, history, etc of a monster. It's a long road to walk down to do properly. And I hope you are all of like mind that a proper monster is not just a nicely drawn picture. Passing up decades of entrenched fantasy monster ecologies would be idiotic, in my opinion. Better to take something good and make it special with your own (speaking of OE) contribution. Then you have a solid foundation, and you have that little bit extra that makes it unique.

  13. The term tree hugger isn't an unbalanced view on nature, it's a phrase that was given to over 300 Bishnoi Hindus that were slaughtered protecting the trees within their village in the late 1700s. They clung around trees, holding hands, as their bodies were sawed through. Most of the village's adults were massacred in order to built a new palace for a local prince. This real world example is what I view as the epitome - the cornerstone - of the fantasy druid. Someone who is willing to die in an effort to preserve the natural balance, or some aspect of it. Hippie dippie aspects don't really come into it. Unless, of course, the druids (wisely) enjoy granola.

  14. I don't think there is anything at all inherently wrong with "tree hugger" druids. I think the problem has been lazy writing in the crpg genre that has failed to take advantage of all the possibilities.

     

    Do we really want to reject every trope of fantasy literature, just because some people took the easy road? Arboreal druids are no more inherently boring than rock loving dwarves, magic loving elves, violent orcs, or ancient treasure hoarding dragons. Boring writing is boring writing. You could give a talented writer any one of these and end up with an awesome story.

     

    So long as the writing is interesting, there's no reason whatsoever to simply say... druids + trees = OFF LIMITS. No reason at all.

    • Like 3
×
×
  • Create New...