rjshae

A summonable creature could perhaps fill the same role, if Wizards can use it to scout or indirectly cast spells. Otherwise, familiars mostly seem like decoration.

How are racial abilities any different? They are proabably more beneficial to certain classes as well. I don't think they are bad design so much as a necessary evil. My preference is for racial bonuses that apply to secondary abilities based on those attributes. I.e. saving throws, skill modifiers, special abilities, and so forth. But either way it encourages min-maxing.

I'd love to have BG3 continue the god-child story. I'd make it canon that the protagonist chose to fill the throne of Bhaal and would continue the story on a more epic level, among the divines and gods themselves. One way to continue the story would be to role-play an Avatar for the new deity. Your character starts off ordinarily enough, but through a progression of adventures discovers an affinity with the newly-elevated deity, be it good or evil. From then on your role will be to act as the champion for the cause, whether by recruiting followers, battling adversaries, or just fulfilling a duty. The deity can intervene in your favor, depending on your choices or the nature of the situation. But otherwise you would be left to develop your own prowess and select your methods. Your decisions can be subtly interlaced with the nature of the deity, so that his or her actual nature can be further revealed and refined based on the path you choose. (I.e. your character is actually acting as a mirror for the continuing growth of the new deity.)

Well there's Orlan tossing... Stuffing Orlans in a small barrel and rolling them down a hill... Trolling for Trolls with Orlan pinatas... Bobbing for Orlans... Orlan juggling...

I don't know why they wouldn't have robes; it's a common enough piece of garb and there likely to be some NPCs wearing them. They've already got cloaks.

I had a thought that semi-randomized companion attributes set at the beginning of the game would make them a little less predictable. For example, give them a set of minimal base stats then add in a fixed amount of additional points spread randomly amongst the attributes. Give them a pool of starting talents then randomly choose among them. Vary some of their starting equipment a little and change up some of their initial spells. Setting these parameters at the start of the game would make it difficult to select for by restarting.

No, what's done with is using the five Chinese elements for the sole purpose of not using the occidental four elements. I mean, seriously, the concept of the four classical elements arose at least about 4000 years ago. When did it get old, last year? "Oh man, 'earth, water, fire and air' ... that's soooo 2000 BC!" There's a lot of jaded players in these forums. But there's always new blood coming up for whom concepts such as Hermeticism are not old and worn.

Ref-ing football matches always seems a bit like herding cats to me. The good ones manage it with a deft touch, and that sometimes means letting some of the rough stuff get by. It's a contact sport.

Thank goodness it didn't go to PKs....

Nobody is making you buy it. If there is a 10% chance that you are utterly wrong, then you'll get a game you enjoy. If you are right, then that will show up in the reviews and feedback, allowing you to avoid wasting your money. You have little to lose by encouraging the development of more games like the BG series, regardless of the name. If you want to criticize a release, it is more productive to do so once it is out and you can rationally assess it.

Because positive name recognition still works well on most people as a marketing tool. It might not in some cases such as you, but individually you're not going to make or break the game sales. As for whether or not it will disappoint, well that would be true regardless of the title. All the title would do is get the foot in the gamer's door, so to speak.

Corrected for you. I want to have that capability; you don't have to use it.

A smart AI could take care of switching to the optimal weapon under most circumstances, if you have the required weaponry in your inventory slots.

Honestly, I feel as though a lot of the things they could've done very different, where they could have chosen to do some weird and very non-standard stuff, but didn't, they did because of their initial campaign and their backers. Many of these conservative decisions were probably made because many backers wanted a more standard fantasy game. A game with these elementals, kobolds, and mindflayers. But can you imagine the **** Obsidian would get if they went full on weird? I mean, they've been getting **** for as small things as including guns in the game and not having a super-macho, bulky, beefy male warrior companion. Yes, the reasoning goes something like this: We want to fund you to create a game that's just like the old school IE series. We want to fund you to create a game that is completely unlike anything else. Why can't you be original, creative, derivative, and grant us our total nostalgia fix, Obsidian?

Books are immersive because you surrender your disbelief and absorb yourself in the story and let it lead you through it. However, in a RPG, you assume the role of a character. It is your thoughts are decisions that are influencing the story. Yet your entire involvement in the outcome boils down to a handful of menu picks. When I only have a few cookie-cutter choices for how I respond, and none of them fit my concept for the character, then it is can be completely immersion-breaking, regardless of the quality and maturity of the writing. The result is that I have no emotional involvement, no concern about the characters, and little interest in the outcome. This is the inherent flaw in the current generation of menu-driven CRPGs, and no amount of panning of that argument is going to improve the experience for me. Can you prove to me that this problem can be fixed? If not, then it is hardly spurious. This is also why I want something completely different from the run of the mill romances, because it adds a deep level of the unexpected to my choices and engages my interest.

Another update: Snow White - An Adventure for Pathfinder RPG and D&D 3.5 -- A hardback edition of our fantastic, five-star adventure Snow White, a faithful rendition compatible with Pathfinder RPG and D&D 3.5. $9,990 with 28 days to go. Necromancer Games: Back for 5th Edition! -- 5th Edition Rules: 1st Edition Feel! Monsters, Adventures, and Spells for 5th Edition! Succeeding at $28,657 with 55 days to go. d6xd6 CORE Role-Playing Game -- Quick-and-easy 5-minute character creation. Tactical combat rules. Three dozen professional settings so far. Succeeding at $3,200 with 23 days to go. Fragged Empire, Tabletop RPG -- Betrayed by your creators, you are a genetically engineered remnant emerging from the ruin of genocidal war. Succeeding at $52,995 with 22 days to go Ponyfinder: Griffons of Everglow Pathfinder Expansion -- Expanding on the Ponyfinder Campaign Setting, Griffons of Everglow takes a closer look at how these majestic people work in Everglow. Succeeding at $15,684 with 23 hours to go. Rhune: Dawn of Twilight (Expanded Primer & Adventures) -- Bringing Stormpunk to the Pathfinder RPG! Inspired by Planescape, the Iron Kingdoms, Tesla, & Norse Myth. Are you ready for Ragnarök? Succeeding at $9,822 with 20 days to go. Chronicles of Ramlar RPG, Pathfinder Edition -- Chronicles of Ramlar RPG comes to Pathfinder! Explore the exciting world of Eranon with innovative game mechanics like One-Roll Combat! $1,173 with 32 days to go. Fear The Living RPG -- The world you knew is gone, consumed by the hungry dead. This is the story of what happens next. $1,972 with 22 days to go. The Lost Territories -- Tabletop RPG with a unique character system, strange powers, and a gorgeous setting. Flintlocks and fireballs, together at last. $2,602 with 21 days to go.

Correction: people like good games. Using this logic, not trying to be completely asinine, but Doublefine would be making millions on Broken Age. True, people like to play good games. Tastes vary, of course. But I do think that many of us suspected there remained a latent market for old-school CRPGs. The people who didn't seem to know it were many of the corporate suits in charge of deciding what games get funded. D:OS and others will hopefully demonstrate that there is at least a niche market that may be worth some funding. At least until they saturate it with a pipeline full of fodderall.

Mundane romances in CRPGs just feel contrived to me. If there is any romance at all, I think I'd prefer to see it have some surprising novelty. How about a romance with a soul trapped inside a strange creature, or even an inert object? To interact personally, you'd need to travel to a spirit realm where physical substance has less influence. Or you could have a romantic interaction with a person from another time period (through magical means), then try to track down the current form of the person and have to deal with the consequences of their current condition.

It looks like the physical copy of the 'Making of' DVD doesn't even kick in until the $140 level. For contributing that much, I think they are entitled to some special treatment.

We all have ideas. It's implementing them in an enjoyable way that's the hard part.

Heh, funny how all the 'crap' and 'overrated' teams made it to the elimination rounds. People must have especially rosy memories of past WC tourneys.

My understanding is that the contract signed with TSR made certain contractual allowances for the use of the name 'Baldur's Gate'. Thus it could have legal ramifications that may make it more financially feasible to create a Baldur's Gate 3 than, say, a Waterdeep 1. It wouldn't necessarily need to be connected to the original, in the sense that Icewind Dale 2 told a whole new tale. Or it could have some loose connections. *shrug*

They'd go like all Brazil on us...

I wonder if, in retrospect, Bioware may have been better served in regards to the Knights of the Old Republic 'brand' if they had avoided making it into an MMO and instead just kept making engrossing story-centered single player games. As I recall, the announcement there would be no KOTOR 3 and instead we would get an MMO was met with much the same contempt that's being heaped on the concept here. I think its become very common for people in general, not just the RPG geeks gathered here, to react to the announcement of a new MMO set in their favorite franchise with a groan rather than any enthusiasm. Whether it's fair or not, I now associate a company's decision to make an MMO with the kind of myopic stupidity you'd expect from a senior EA executive or some other such figure who doesn't understand games beyond the potential they have for milking customers dry. I expect that Obsidian is smarter than that. Remember, there was a time when WoW was going gangbusters and it looked like a good model for game production. You'd have to assess the state of the market at the time the decision was made to determine whether it was a sensible choice. The market for MMORPG will undoubtedly follow the hype cycle and at some point stabilize. In the meantime, hopefully gaming companies will better recognize the unique story-telling strengths of single-player and co-op CRPGS.

Nice work! It's good to see original creatures like these. The animated form of the Rain Blight seems too stable given its watery nature, but perhaps that's because it is stationary. Otherwise they look good. A digitally downloadable copy of the documentary is fine with me. Thank you for the update.