Shoeless Joe Jackson

I think we'll get past 3,5 mil. easily, you can quote me on that Beginning to believe this myself also. The last 4 or 5 days have really set us up very well for the final push. Not counting any chickens mind you.

Started out at $65 + $15 international shipping as I wanted the boxed version. Moved up to $140 + $20 international shipping as for some reason I decided I wanted the collectors box edition, although I think subconsciously I just wanted to support the game more. Final move was to $250 + $30 international shipping + $8 Obsidian Order = $288 total. Moved after the update announcing Wasteland 2 and the expansion. I decided that I still wanted the collectors box so moving to the digital only tier of $165 wasn't an option. $288 is absolutely as much money as I can justify, so this will be it for me.

They need to do something to really whip up a frenzy in the last couple of days. There has been a couple of noticeable spikes after updates, notably the update offering Wasteland 2 at the higher tiers and the update with the screenshot and lore information. They'll get a big spike in pledges for the last couple of days anyway but to really finish strongly I think they need to pull something else out of the hat. I know they've said there will be no more stretch goals but I actually think there's (an outside) chance we could have a huge last couple of days and end up a fair bit over $3.5m. Another stretch goal at $3.6m or $3.7m would be cool. You never know. I'd like to see a few more companions. Either way, the mega dungeon is going to end up very deep indeed. :D

Fell asleep at some point after he managed to kill Phaen in the house rather than getting butchered over and over again at the Palisade. :D It was a great watch though, particularly as he didn't just destroy his way through it like a real expert with a bunch of munchkin paladins with ludicrous saving throws and what not. Just went at his own pace and had fun with the people watching. Voices were hilarious too. Not sure how he could really have more time to throw at it but I would definitely watch a bit more if he kept at it.

I'd really rather not have ! quest markers. I want to play the game for exploration, not to be told exactly where to go and who to talk to every single time. If the quest-giver supplies reasonable information and the journal keeps a good record of this, then so long as the game is well made then you should find what you need to do or who you need to talk to anyway. But at least it made you find it yourself! I wouldn't be adverse to the locations of major inns/taverns/shops etc being marked on your main overhead map, but, only when you've been there at least once. The first time you explore anywhere, you should have little to no information on it and the the fog of war should be back too!

Great post, totally agreed. When they started rolling out the black talon elite and the chill you knew it was game on. Would love to see Obsidian do something similar.

I guess my only concern re the two big cities would be if 80% of the content or something ended up being based in those 2 places. I'm all for the second city, but I really want there to be loads of fairly random wilderness areas to explore a la BG1 and I wouldn't want these to disappear as a result of promising the second huge settlement.

Upped my pledge so threw in the extra 8 dollars. Knew I'd end up joining this eventually Anyway, can I please be; Shoeless Joe Jackson, Barefoot Fanatic of the Obsidian Order

Awesome update. Screenshot looks incredible and I really think Obsidian have managed this kickstarter campaign brilliantly. I'm not sure we can get to $3.5m but you just never know! I'm up to $288 but that's absolutely as much as I can afford!

At this stage, Obsidian have covered most things I wanted to see in the game. The only things I'd like to see added now are more companions and a bigger world. There's what, 8 companions as it stands? How about a stretch goal thrown in at $3.2m for double the companions! They wouldn't all have to be absolutely core companions. with huge back stories and whatever, but still fleshed out to a certain extent. Like the more marginal characters in BG1 and 2 really.

There is a lot of respect and trust involved in Project Eternity and it flows both ways. Whatever the personal motivation of each individual who has pledged to the Kickstarter or through Paypal, we are all ultimately trusting Obsidian to make a game that we will enjoy playing. I also think a significant proportion of the people backing this project enjoyed the old games, but also have been turned off by the way gaming companies treat the fans/consumers now, particularly things like Day 1 DLC, stripping out chunks of the game purely to sell as DLC and other underhand tactics. This is where the respect must flow both ways. If Obsidian were to pull a stunt like the above, making a very short game with day 1 DLC and obvious chunks pulled out purely to sell to us again, then the respect has not been given back to the fans and I think they'd have a very hard sell if they went for another Kickstarter. I for one would not pledge again, that's for absolutely sure. But they won't do anything like that, I'm certain. They seem like terrific people and apart from anything else, they simply have far too damn much riding on this project to give the fans the shaft like that. As for a commitment from Obsidian to the world beyond this game, I think that's pretty certain also. It is Project Eternity after all. Every interview I've seen with the guys has them talking about the long term ownership of the IP and the way they can develop the world over time. I actually think that's what they're most excited about. So long as the game doesn't bomb, we will see a sequel.

This update is definitely having an affect. $5k pledged in the last hour and a lot more likes on Facebook. Could be another couple of levels being added to the Endless Paths soon :D

Edit, I should really read the update properly before posting Hmm, $250. Can I afford that?

I'd be surprised if it doesn't get to $3m. PE is a big kickstarter and there is always a big upsurge in the last 3 or 4 days so I think $3m will be reached but probably not a lot more. Depends how much is actually contributed through Paypal too. I think the best thing Obsidian could do (if they want to maximise pledges) would be to throw out a major stretch goal at $3.5m as soon as possible, by tomorrow at the latest anyway. $3.5m is the farthest away goal that I can see being reached as I can't see 4m being possible from here. A big, popular, but also achievable goal that's over a million away with a week or so to go could be the catalyst that leads to a late flurry of pledges. Of course, what that major stretch goal at $3.5m should be is hard to say. Personally, I want more and more content. I think we have enough races now but more fully fleshed out companions would definitely make me consider pledging more. More cities, more towns and more wilderness areas. Maybe a goal that says the game will be as big as BG1. Regardless, I think 3.5m is the number to shoot for.

Baldur's Gate 1 definitely. One of the things that Baldur's Gate 1 did brilliantly was it didn't put a lot of pressure on you to do anything in particular. The world wasn't required to be saved immediately. You had next to no knowledge about where to go, what to do, or why you were doing it. That fit absolutely perfectly with the zone system, effectively allowing you to explore the entire Sword Coast and stumble across the actual plot eventually. I would love for PE to go for something similar to that, offering loads of extra areas, not central to the plot, that could be explored in the same way as BG1's map.

The Origins feature was very well done. I don't really hold it against them that the backstories didn't matter an absolute ton after the initial period of the game as it's just simply not realistic to have that much differing content if it's all going to be fully voiced and acted out. Anyway, DAO got off to a terrific start but lost momentum somewhere in the midgame and never really got it back. Personally, I felt like Ostagar happened way too fast. There should have been a bit more content before the big battle and Duncan should have been fleshed out more to make the subsequent events a bit more meaningful. But my big gripe with DAO was that the second half of the game just becomes a massive, massive grind. Every 10 steps there's a fight with multiple enemies that takes a couple of minutes to take care of. Another 10 steps up the road and you fight a very similar fight against the same set of enemies. It gradually fatigued me to the extent that I stopped enjoying the game. I did manage to get through to the end and finish the game but that was purely for completion purposes. I have never felt like firing the game up again since. I do feel that there's a rule for rpg's now that they have to be "epic". And apparently, the definition of epic includes being at least 50 hours long. So to flesh the game out, they add in a zillion fights to get the hours up. But that only works if the combat is fun! DAO's combat was not much fun and since you restored health and spells after the fights (this may not be 100% true as I don't remember it that well) it meant that there was very little riding on the fights, once you could beat the set of enemies in a given area, there was no reason to fight them another 100 times but the game made you do it anyway until you became mentally tired of the whole experience. If Obsidian can learn one thing from DAO it's to not obsess about how long the game is. Concentrate on making the content good (and replayable if possible) and the combat enjoyable and they'll be 90% of the way there imo.

Hell yeah. Have always loved the paper dolls inventory screen. Seeing your character wearing the new armour you've just pillaged from a corpse has always helped immersion in my opinion.

28 and Baldur's Gate 1.

As much as possible about the world and the game mechanics. Some minor details on the characters. Next to nothing on the story.

Personally, I'd like to see stat rolling in the character creation. If you're planning on playing through multiple times with different characters, it's fun to be able to roll characters on a scale of being completely gimped to being demi-gods from the off. Maybe you could even set it so point buying system was in place for the first playthrough and the option to roll was unlocked after you'd finished the game with your original balanced character.

Dublin, Republic of Ireland.