jarpie

The same reason movie studios do it? Because they are looking at the bottom line, and the bottom line for them is big budget movies make bigger box office? Same with games? I don't agree with the reasoning, but that's what it is. If you read my post you would know that film studios also makes films with average budgets which potentially won't sell that much alone but when you combine their profits they make as much as one huge film and that's where game publishers are doing wrong; They are only concentrating on huge AAA+++ titles and not doing what film studios do. Part from my post:

If you don't like those things in games, there's nothing wrong in opposing it. I'm not sure where you see me saying it was wrong for anyone to oppose it. The post you were quoting was showing a rough division of "two opposing forces", which itself was a very over-simplistic look at the dynamics of a customer, or worse fan, base. How do they satisfy the extremes of their "base?" By not catering to either side overtly, doing what they were going to do anyway, and depend on the end product being good enough, and enough of what enough of their base will enjoy, that not directly engaging with the extreme sides won't matter. Unfortunately, like a politician. As much as I might dislike certain aspects of more "modern" games (I want turn-based (not real time with pause), six party member parties that the player creates, and I want graphics to be like the year 2000 never happened (cursed NWN and other games moving into "3D")) I accept that mediums change over time. Tastes and trends change. Game design doesn't happen in a vacuum... companies are trying to cater to their audience. Do they misread trends and tastes, see the wrong things in market research and polls? Often, sure, but they try - and when things don't sell, they change their tactics. The sad truth is that FPS and Madden will always outsell cRPGs. Always. And that, for about a decade, MMORPGs were the best selling PC games. You don't have to like this (I don't) but you kind of have to adjust. You can sit on your mountaintop and remain pure, crusty and upset at the world... or you can try and enjoy the best of what exists out there, encouraging the games closer to what you want. I'm sure THIS is what you all believe your are doing, and are trying to do. Or most of you. Benefit of the doubt? But a small subset is exactly who your are. What's the Codex's membership levels? Hundreds? Maybe a few thousand? Games have to sell (even for indie titles) tens to hundreds of thousands, if not millions. A few hundred die-hards who wish it was still 1980 (and, again, I'm here - I want that, too, for video game design philosophy) can't be a target audience. Be glad that Obsidian is full of people who at least want to bring back a bunch of lost design mechanics from the early 2000's. Not just MCA, but their KS pitch. From BG - exploration and companions. From IWD - tactical combat and dungeon delving. From PS:T - themes and story. Just, you know, I don't think for most who LOVE PS:T a removal of Vancian magic, the addition of cooldowns, or even adding more overt romance to the companions, would have significantly "lessened" their love for the game. Replied to you in here not to derail the topic.

I decided to reply for Merin in separate topic not to derail the romance-topic: If you don't like those things in games, there's nothing wrong in opposing it. I'm not sure where you see me saying it was wrong for anyone to oppose it. The post you were quoting was showing a rough division of "two opposing forces", which itself was a very over-simplistic look at the dynamics of a customer, or worse fan, base. How do they satisfy the extremes of their "base?" By not catering to either side overtly, doing what they were going to do anyway, and depend on the end product being good enough, and enough of what enough of their base will enjoy, that not directly engaging with the extreme sides won't matter. Unfortunately, like a politician. As much as I might dislike certain aspects of more "modern" games (I want turn-based (not real time with pause), six party member parties that the player creates, and I want graphics to be like the year 2000 never happened (cursed NWN and other games moving into "3D")) I accept that mediums change over time. Tastes and trends change. Game design doesn't happen in a vacuum... companies are trying to cater to their audience. Do they misread trends and tastes, see the wrong things in market research and polls? Often, sure, but they try - and when things don't sell, they change their tactics. The sad truth is that FPS and Madden will always outsell cRPGs. Always. And that, for about a decade, MMORPGs were the best selling PC games. You don't have to like this (I don't) but you kind of have to adjust. You can sit on your mountaintop and remain pure, crusty and upset at the world... or you can try and enjoy the best of what exists out there, encouraging the games closer to what you want. I'm sure THIS is what you all believe your are doing, and are trying to do. Or most of you. Benefit of the doubt? But a small subset is exactly who your are. What's the Codex's membership levels? Hundreds? Maybe a few thousand? Games have to sell (even for indie titles) tens to hundreds of thousands, if not millions. A few hundred die-hards who wish it was still 1980 (and, again, I'm here - I want that, too, for video game design philosophy) can't be a target audience. Be glad that Obsidian is full of people who at least want to bring back a bunch of lost design mechanics from the early 2000's. Not just MCA, but their KS pitch. From BG - exploration and companions. From IWD - tactical combat and dungeon delving. From PS:T - themes and story. Just, you know, I don't think for most who LOVE PS:T a removal of Vancian magic, the addition of cooldowns, or even adding more overt romance to the companions, would have significantly "lessened" their love for the game. See, that's the difference between you and me; you are willing to take inferior and dilluted game but fortunately for me and other Codexers there are devs who do not want to make games for mass audiences and compromise - without people like in RPGCodex (who are not limited to RPGCodex) Fargo might not have known that there is audience for Wasteland 2 - same with the devs who are making game called Chaos Chronicles which is turn-based fantasy rpg using OGL 3,5 ruleset and partly because Wasteland 2 was so succesful they got financing for doing turn-based rpg. If everyone would've just moved on and wouldn't challenge the "modernization" of RPGs, those games might not have never been gone into production. I have been following game business since 1986, there have been genres which have gone away but has since come back such as 2D platformers which mostly disappeared when 3D appeared but has since come back because people glamour after those games. Should've they also just moved on stop demanding 2D platformers because they went out of fashion for almost ten years? As well you know Obsidian launched Kickstarter campaign to get us finance the proper RPG which would not be compromised by what mass audiences want without modernizations such as partylimit of 3 or dilluting mature and serious themes which publishers are afraid of. The audience for "old-fashioned" RPGs never went anywhere - 61290 backers for Wasteland 2 shows that, but the publishers has made the mistake of completely removing games which are made with small or average budget and they are aiming for AAA+++ titles with big budgets which are aimed to very much for big audiences. Even though I disliked Dragon Age: Origins it was still a fair bit like games such as Baldur's Gate, and it sold about 3-4 million copies, and what EA does? They go "Hey, let's make DA2 to be over-the-shoulder action rpg to bring in the Call of Duty audiences!" and what happens? Call of Duty audiences wont buy it and EA drives away almost 2/3 of the DA:O fans because they dilluted the game. If Bioware would've made DA 2 in the vein of DA:O they would've probably kept the DA:O fans and get new players to buy DA2 bringing at least somewhat larger sales but they screwed it up. Let's take films for example, even though films like Transformers brings in gazillions of dollars in boxoffice, film studios are still doing films with budgets of 10-50 million for smaller audiences, and why? Because there's still audience for them and they make reasonable profit against their budgets. And why film studios just doesn't do huge films? Because if they make five films with 200 million budgets, they take big risks with them even though they might bring lot of profit but if three of those five flops miserably it might bring down the studio, but if the film studio makes 20 films with budgets ranging from 10-60 million, they all make reasonable profit, and some of them might be surprise hits, and will probably bring as much profit altogether as those five huge films would. That's what game publishers are doing wrong - they only go for games with big budgets bringing lot of profit but they are not taking into fact that if they would make maybe fewer big budget games and would make several average budget games which all would be different types (rpg, adventure, action, sport etc) then they would most probably bring as much profit as those big AAA titles but would widen their audience segments and some of them might be surprise hits. Game with the budget of 5 million would have to bring in sales about 500 000 to get 10 million profit if they get 30 dollars profit per sold game, and now with digital distribution that shouldn't be too hard to get. Me and codexers doesnt want back 1980, we want back the golden years from about mid-90s to early 2000s, and 61290 backers for Wasteland 2 disagrees with you. Everyone had been saying that games like Dungeon Master are dead and buried and then small finnish team makes a game called Legend of Grimrock which is very much of Dungeon Master-clone and the game makes back the expenses in a week, that's right, in a week and spent quite a bit of time in the top sellers of Steam, not bad for old-fashioned game from the late 80s/early 90s with very few modernizations? Now, tell me after that there are no audiences for traditional RPG, and it's not worth to stick to your guns? And remember to go to tell Fargo that it's no point of doing Wasteland 2 because there are no audiences for turn- and party-based rpg, oh and dont forget to stop by Almost Human offices too, they dont know that there's only very few people who wants to buy Dungeon Master-clone.

It's not like you'll be able to see it with perspective the game will be using. Unless the character sheet or talking figure is a picture that just really puts you off. Some of them in Arcanum did that to me. That said, this is something that should be stupidly easy for the community to change, or even an individual. Which ones? as far as I remember Arcanum had just heads as portraits.

What value would 3D add in isometric game which has 2D backgrounds with fixed perspective?

Not sure if trolling... They want to do PC (and mac) only game without publisher, so why would they waste any money doing expensive console port is beyond me. Without publisher they would have to pay the licensing fees which are high so why would they pay them by themselves since there's a very good chance that the game wont sell on consoles? The publishers would demand changes and at least part of the IP so why would they work with publisher since they specifically stated that they want to work without publisher so that they can keep the IP completely by themselves?

When I think of mature, I don't think sex, violence or harsh language. When I think of mature it's that the fiction in subject whether it being film, book or game tackles on different kind of deeper/higher issues such as MCA said in the recent interview: When I think of mature film, I think of film like Blade Runner which tackles on with the issues "If we give conciousness and emotions to androids, are they still just androids?" even though that is somewhat under the surface but it's still there. That's not to say I don't enjoy violent films such as Evil Dead 1 and 2 but I don't consider them as very mature even though they are great films.

I'm really interested on how you came up with the "week to write romance", especially if you want it to be substansial. Most of what goes into writing characters is actually the dialogue and since romance is what? I think it's dialogue and there can only be so much dialogue per character it's bound to limit on how much other kind dialogue there will be. How have you exactly calculated that it's going to take a week? Can I see the formula? and how do you know who pledged and what they want? Also they wont get the full 4 million since Kickstarter, Amazon and Paypal will take their cut so the budget will be 3 - 3,5 million at most, depending on whether they pay the rewards from the pledges or from their own pockets, if they pay the rewards from the pledges, it'll cost them probably about 500k, possibly more (it cost about 700k for DFA to manufacture and send the rewards). I remember one pro-romance (not necessarely you) arguing that mature fiction has romances, which I countered with examples of mature fiction which doesnt have romances and that's why I asked why should all fiction have romances and why should this game specifically. Still no proper counter-argument since it clearly doesn't fit every fiction and game. And explain to me also how would romances make this game perfect? Would it be less perfect if it doesn't have romances and romances wouldn't fit it? Care to explain how romances make characters more deeper than say..."Brothers in Arms"-camaraderie? Would characters actually be any deeper if one of them would have romance instead of friendship or rivalry? What makes having romance for companion more special than say... friendly competition between friends (you and companion)? This comes to my first point in this reply (and several postings before this one), the writers basicly have to devote any given companion to one route; be it friendship, rivalry, romance etc and if they do several routes which player can choose from, they can spend less time writing all given routes and they all will be dilluted. Would you rather have companion which is shallow with many different possibilities or deeply done in one? If devs write romance for one character, they have to also write another route or the players who doesnt want to have romance have no reason to interact with the said companion/NPC. Lot of players can enjoy the friendship-route but those who just enjoy romances are much fewer. So you wouldn't mind forum being swalloved with endless threads and arguments which companion is hotter? Case-in-point, check what happened to the BSN romance-subforum. My problem is with those who comes in and writes messages presuming that romances are in by-default even though devs haven't stated in one way or another. Anyway, MCA clearly implied that game probably wont have romances so I don't see point in arguing. MCA:

Which equally means there is no reason to demand that there should be no romance at all in the game. See, it works both ways. As far as I know, no one from the pro-romance team here made any ultimate demands. We are voicing our preferences as we were asked to do by the developers themselves, no less. Really? What was with all those lists in the last thread then? Pro-romancers were asking for many options. One said he wanted possible romances with npcs you helped widow or raped. And another one straight up said that he wanted minigames. To ask and to demand are two different things. Elementary! You don't demand, in the way you separate it from asking, because you are not in a position to demand. But that doesn't change the fact that you have things that you want to be in a game and are very aggressive about it. All you do is cry when we present evidence against you. When we give valid arguments all you do is dismiss us as naysayers and other bull****. And yes all you want is minigames in order to indulge yours -and others'- romantic fantasies. You arguements are based on making x number of npcs romance-able, y styles of npcs romance-able and z number of possible sexual preference npcs to be romance-able. What you don't get is that romance, as well as other things, have to have some place in the plot. They are not filler, they can't be filler. Romantic love is an emotion, it must be used to advance the characters involved and through that affect the plot in some way not to give options for different sexual orientations, stimulations etc. And you can't freaking tell us that you want PST or MotB romances, when romances there were weaved into the narrative and plot and they weren't there to indulge into anyone's fantasy. Then you support and defend bioware and their writers, when they have never done that. I'd really enjoy a posting history of you, jarpie, Jasede, evdk and Living One, for example Posted up against qloher, Kymriana, me and a few others who want romances open as a possibility. We'll compare who results to ad hominem first, the most and who actually posts constructive, intelligent, well thought out, legitimate posts that don't reek of self importance. I already know who's going to sound more reasonable and mature out of that pile. Also, stop telling me, and others what we do and do not want. I understand perfectly what I want, as an adult. I want a deep, complex interaction with characters based on romance, (not Bioware, not Japanese dating sim) if it doesn't fit, alright. If it isn't there because a bunch of people such as yourself yell loudly for no reason (acting a million times more entitled than us, by the way) then that isn't alright. Did you go through my posts yet?

Which equally means there is no reason to demand that there should be no romance at all in the game. See, it works both ways. As far as I know, no one from the pro-romance team here made any ultimate demands. We are voicing our preferences as we were asked to do by the developers themselves, no less. Really? What was with all those lists in the last thread then? Pro-romancers were asking for many options. One said he wanted possible romances with npcs you helped widow or raped. And another one straight up said that he wanted minigames. To ask and to demand are two different things. Elementary! You don't demand, in the way you separate it from asking, because you are not in a position to demand. But that doesn't change the fact that you have things that you want to be in a game and are very aggressive about it. All you do is cry when we present evidence against you. When we give valid arguments all you do is dismiss us as naysayers and other bull****. And yes all you want is minigames in order to indulge yours -and others'- romantic fantasies. You arguements are based on making x number of npcs romance-able, y styles of npcs romance-able and z number of possible sexual preference npcs to be romance-able. What you don't get is that romance, as well as other things, have to have some place in the plot. They are not filler, they can't be filler. Romantic love is an emotion, it must be used to advance the characters involved and through that affect the plot in some way not to give options for different sexual orientations, stimulations etc. And you can't freaking tell us that you want PST or MotB romances, when romances there were weaved into the narrative and plot and they weren't there to indulge into anyone's fantasy. Then you support and defend bioware and their writers, when they have never done that. I'd really enjoy a posting history of you, jarpie, Jasede, evdk and Living One, for example Posted up against qloher, Kymriana, me and a few others who want romances open as a possibility. We'll compare who results to ad hominem first, the most and who actually posts constructive, intelligent, well thought out, legitimate posts that don't reek of self importance. I already know who's going to sound more reasonable and mature out of that pile. Also, stop telling me, and others what we do and do not want. I understand perfectly what I want, as an adult. I want a deep, complex interaction with characters based on romance, (not Bioware, not Japanese dating sim) if it doesn't fit, alright. If it isn't there because a bunch of people such as yourself yell loudly for no reason (acting a million times more entitled than us, by the way) then that isn't alright. How about this, with romances you pretty much always have to choose the right responses or the romance cuts off but with friendships it doesnt. In BG2 you have praised for doing good romances you always have to choose the right response or romance is off. The problem is that isn't how real romances work, you don't say one wrong thing and then they always end. Friendships are the exact same way. If you say something stupid enough you could end either in a single sentence, that doesn't mean it's how it should -always- work. That's how romances WORK IN GAMES like in the Baldur's Gate 2 which romances you have praised so you made my point for me, thank you!

Which equally means there is no reason to demand that there should be no romance at all in the game. See, it works both ways. As far as I know, no one from the pro-romance team here made any ultimate demands. We are voicing our preferences as we were asked to do by the developers themselves, no less. Really? What was with all those lists in the last thread then? Pro-romancers were asking for many options. One said he wanted possible romances with npcs you helped widow or raped. And another one straight up said that he wanted minigames. To ask and to demand are two different things. Elementary! You don't demand, in the way you separate it from asking, because you are not in a position to demand. But that doesn't change the fact that you have things that you want to be in a game and are very aggressive about it. All you do is cry when we present evidence against you. When we give valid arguments all you do is dismiss us as naysayers and other bull****. And yes all you want is minigames in order to indulge yours -and others'- romantic fantasies. You arguements are based on making x number of npcs romance-able, y styles of npcs romance-able and z number of possible sexual preference npcs to be romance-able. What you don't get is that romance, as well as other things, have to have some place in the plot. They are not filler, they can't be filler. Romantic love is an emotion, it must be used to advance the characters involved and through that affect the plot in some way not to give options for different sexual orientations, stimulations etc. And you can't freaking tell us that you want PST or MotB romances, when romances there were weaved into the narrative and plot and they weren't there to indulge into anyone's fantasy. Then you support and defend bioware and their writers, when they have never done that. I'd really enjoy a posting history of you, jarpie, Jasede, evdk and Living One, for example Posted up against qloher, Kymriana, me and a few others who want romances open as a possibility. We'll compare who results to ad hominem first, the most and who actually posts constructive, intelligent, well thought out, legitimate posts that don't reek of self importance. I already know who's going to sound more reasonable and mature out of that pile. Also, stop telling me, and others what we do and do not want. I understand perfectly what I want, as an adult. I want a deep, complex interaction with characters based on romance, (not Bioware, not Japanese dating sim) if it doesn't fit, alright. If it isn't there because a bunch of people such as yourself yell loudly for no reason (acting a million times more entitled than us, by the way) then that isn't alright. I tried to provide you with the link from the forum's search engine for my posts but apparently it's not possible. Let me summarise what I've been saying and arguing: I have been arguing with the time on how long it takes them write companions and how long development time they have, I have argued with the budget which is very limited, I have argued with the "Not all fiction must have romances" (which they still don't) and have asked why this specific game should, and haven't gotten any other arguments than "because we want it" or "it makes them deeper!", I have argued with the type of the crowd it brings here (which haven't been countered). I have time and time again have said that if they do romances and they are done like in PS:T for example, I could live with that but I still would prefer not to have them. When some of us have criticized Bioware writers, you run in for their defense so what we should think of that when you first say you dont want the romances they do and then defend them?

Which equally means there is no reason to demand that there should be no romance at all in the game. See, it works both ways. As far as I know, no one from the pro-romance team here made any ultimate demands. We are voicing our preferences as we were asked to do by the developers themselves, no less. Really? What was with all those lists in the last thread then? Pro-romancers were asking for many options. One said he wanted possible romances with npcs you helped widow or raped. And another one straight up said that he wanted minigames. To ask and to demand are two different things. Elementary! You don't demand, in the way you separate it from asking, because you are not in a position to demand. But that doesn't change the fact that you have things that you want to be in a game and are very aggressive about it. All you do is cry when we present evidence against you. When we give valid arguments all you do is dismiss us as naysayers and other bull****. And yes all you want is minigames in order to indulge yours -and others'- romantic fantasies. You arguements are based on making x number of npcs romance-able, y styles of npcs romance-able and z number of possible sexual preference npcs to be romance-able. What you don't get is that romance, as well as other things, have to have some place in the plot. They are not filler, they can't be filler. Romantic love is an emotion, it must be used to advance the characters involved and through that affect the plot in some way not to give options for different sexual orientations, stimulations etc. And you can't freaking tell us that you want PST or MotB romances, when romances there were weaved into the narrative and plot and they weren't there to indulge into anyone's fantasy. Then you support and defend bioware and their writers, when they have never done that. I'd really enjoy a posting history of you, jarpie, Jasede, evdk and Living One, for example Posted up against qloher, Kymriana, me and a few others who want romances open as a possibility. We'll compare who results to ad hominem first, the most and who actually posts constructive, intelligent, well thought out, legitimate posts that don't reek of self importance. I already know who's going to sound more reasonable and mature out of that pile. Also, stop telling me, and others what we do and do not want. I understand perfectly what I want, as an adult. I want a deep, complex interaction with characters based on romance, (not Bioware, not Japanese dating sim) if it doesn't fit, alright. If it isn't there because a bunch of people such as yourself yell loudly for no reason (acting a million times more entitled than us, by the way) then that isn't alright. How about this, with romances you pretty much always have to choose the right responses or the romance cuts off but with friendships it doesnt. In BG2 you have praised for doing good romances you always have to choose the right response or romance is off.

What could they possibly say? Obsidian has gotten some of it's staunchest support over the years from die-hard old schoolers (like RPG Codex people) who are, in general, hostile to many "modernizations" of RPGs. It would be bad form (and bad for their brand) to directly say anything that would upset these people - and romance is clearly a bad thing to bring up. I mean, I'm betting Sawyer is at least mildly regretful of being too upfront about not doing Vancian verbatim. And Obsidian has gotten a big boost of new forum goers thanks to PE. And, clearly, a swath of them are clamoring for romance with the companions (NOTE - again, for those making assumptions without checking, I'm not one of them) so to blatantly say "no, we aren't including that" would upset a great number of forum goers and cause either a defection or a potential storm of negativity. Rock. Hard place. Best play? Stay non-committal, do what you were planning on doing from the start, and let the chips fall where they may after people get to play the game. Will some people still be upset? Sure. But some people will always be upset - let them be upset for the GAME, not for the concepts behind a game not even really started in development yet. Why is it so bad opposing "modernizations", like quest compass and arrows above NPCs head "I HAVE A QUEST!" or opposing magic map markers like in Skyrim? Or what's so bad opposing small party sizes, opposing cooldowns like in MMOs. When they revealed how exactly the cooldown will work, the complaints quieted down because it wasn't idiotc MMO cooldown. We from the RPGCodex have seen basicly entire genre been abducted, beaten, tortured, shot back to the head, dissected, pissed and shat on and then finally cremated in the last decade mostly because of so-called "modernizations" and appealing for lowest common denominator - we now have a chance of getting a grand rpg from one of the best RPG developers of all time without publishers meddling. We are (sometimes) abrasive because we are passionate about our precious genre and we dont want the game compromised because small subset wants it to be like those other modern rpgs with melodramatic relationship dramas - and what I read from the MCA's interview, the game wont be like that, none of the Obsidian's games have been melodramatic but we still dont want to see the forums filled with people who demands that kind of romances and romances for every possiblity. That being said I do trust Obsidian to make the best game they can and make it how they want it, and according to MCA's interview it'll be more like PS:T than BG1 and BG2 from the story point-of-view.

No. Yes. No.

Chris Avellone in interview: Interview in here: http://www.gamesindustry.biz/articles/2012-10-19-project-eternity-how-chris-avellone-blew-by-4-million-on-kickstarter

The irony being that wanting to alter the premise of the story to prevent people from make demands that alter the premise of the story is still people making demands that alter the premise of the story. That's less a reason to not talk about the feature and more a reason to not having certain attitudes about the feature. We dont even know what is the premise of the story, we just know that the main character witnesses something big and crucial which sets up the story in motion so like Jasede said, why people are then demanding that romance is shoe-hoerned into the game and wont let the devs do their job writing the game. We dont even know what it is about and what kind of story it'll be. Unless you have mind reading powers or crystall ball.

There's a pretty strong difference between real people in real scenarios doing what's actually practical and a videogame developer using it as an excuse to put a female character into lacey underpants. There is absolutely no practical reason for those underpants to be lacey frilly sexualized things, and they're trying to treat this character like she's entirely practical. It's dumb. With the Twi'lek twin bounty hunters you got the idea that their character matched the fact that they were walking around showing massive cleavage, with the dancer outfit you have the usual Hutt slobbishness. With the Handmaiden Undies there really is no good reason for them to look the way they do and there are a couple good reasons for them to NOT look like that. You do know that Star Wars is full of those, even before KOTOR 2? I wouldn't be surprised if they are demanded in contract :D

Casablanca had romance, and is considered one of the best films ever made. Every film should have romance! The Godfather is another film considered the best ever made. Every film should have gangsters! Battlefield Earth is considered one of the worst films ever made. No film should have aliens! It doesn't really work as a good argument to hold up one (game/book/movie) and say that everything afterward should follow it. It's one example, not definitive. .... and I liked the spaceship and lasers in Ultima. In any event, Ultima IV isn't a model for this game. Baldur's Gate, Icewind Dale and Planescape: Torment are the models for this game. Romance or no is not the focus of this game, nor is "virtues" nor "lack of a big bad." It's focus is - "the central hero, memorable companions and the epic exploration of Baldur’s Gate ... the fun, intense combat and dungeon diving of Icewind Dale ... the emotional writing and mature thematic exploration of Planescape: Torment ... tactical real-time with pause system ... world map is dotted with unique locations and wilderness ripe for exploration and questing .... create your own character and collect companions along the way ... engage in dialogues that are deep, and offer many choices to determine the fate of you and your party … experience a story that explores mature themes and presents you with complex, difficult choices to shape how your story plays out." A major hang-up in these discussions is what is meant by mature themes? Any subject can be handled in a juvenile way. Mature themes, I believe, means they will treat subject matters with a more thoughtful, realistic and logical approach. Romance CAN be a mature theme.... and that can happen without using another meaning of the word "mature" which tends to indicate "intended only for adult eyes - viewer discretion is advised." I would argue that romance being dealt with in a mature manner is one of Obsidian's strong suits - Mask of the Betrayer a pointed example of this. --- That aside, I'll mildly remind you (or tell you in case you missed it) that I'm not someone who's been saying that "romances make games deeper." Others have made that argument, I've not personally addressed it one way or the other - pretty sure I've not even quoted someone saying it before now. So why do you then demand/want romances into this game? This is what I wrote earlier: As I have said before I wouldn't have problem with romances done like in previous Obsidian games or PS:T, I'd prefer game not to have romances at all but if Obsidian decides to put some in, I trust them to do them well and not the Bioware-style, but my problem is with the people who demands/wants romances in even if they wouldn't fit the story and/or characters. Adding romances in game just for the sake of it shouldn't be done, as with anything. I also wouldn't want romances in because it tends to bring that certain type of people into the forums and start demanding that all companions should be romanceable, and every possible gender-combination put in, and certain style of romances.

I quite clearly remember the Handmaiden stripping down to her frilly lace underpants and using the usual "clothing is a cultural construct" excuse. So no nudists ever existed? Or is it "That character is attractive, so it MUST be shameless fanservice!"? The simple fact of the matter was that she was arguing from a practical movement perspective, and yet her undergarments emulated a very "form over function" style of Victoria's Secret bull****. The player character's underwear looked like this. Handmaiden's underwear looked like this. There is an obvious difference between what is considered "practical" for a male and what is considered "practical" for females under the same "Echani fighting ritual" cultural excuse. Yes. They didn't wear lacey Victoria's Secret underpants. And they didn't even wear that much. Oh teh horror!

But aren't "bad" and "good" ultimately subjective? Which is the problem with arguing absolutes with writing - again to me. Don't let me change your posting style with my comments, certainly not my intent. What is subjective about good writing? Apparently some people like James Joyce's ULYSSES. I kid. Well kind of. There's a technical aspect to writing and a creative aspect. The technical aspect is I'd agree objective to a large degree (and yet writers can subvert it to effect as well, so it's not always clear cut); the creative aspect is, however entirely subjective. At least that's how I see it. That's because SHEPPARDS DEATH with respect to the plot is an element of the story, not necessarily the point of the story. That said it is an element of character since being brought back by CEREBUS effects the character interactions that Sheppard has. To me a romance could serve as a good element of defining character between PC/NPC or NPC/NPC but only if it fits the context of the story and fits the characters involved and fits the developers vision for the game in general. It just moves the time forward! And it isn't an element of sheppard's character, because he doesn't care about it, nor does anyone else. You don't just ****ing kill the protagonist, only to bring him back to life minutes later. Sheppard is a brick. We don't see what he experienced, if anything, while dead. We don't see that traumatizing, hell lethal, experience. progress him as a character. And it doesn't matter to the plot either, the time jump was not needed, sheppard's death was not needed. Same with "romance" minigames; they don't serve anything. 'Anything' is extreme. They don't serve the main narrative. Neither do side missions or the mega-dungeon. How do you know? Do you have somekind of magical crystal ball? They will probably tie in sub-quests and mega-dungeon into the main narrative. Even if so, tying something into the main narrative doesn't necessarily add to the narrative -- it uses the narrative to add interest to the side mission. Or maybe you are mindreader! GET OUT OF MY HEAD!

But aren't "bad" and "good" ultimately subjective? Which is the problem with arguing absolutes with writing - again to me. Don't let me change your posting style with my comments, certainly not my intent. What is subjective about good writing? Apparently some people like James Joyce's ULYSSES. I kid. Well kind of. There's a technical aspect to writing and a creative aspect. The technical aspect is I'd agree objective to a large degree (and yet writers can subvert it to effect as well, so it's not always clear cut); the creative aspect is, however entirely subjective. At least that's how I see it. That's because SHEPPARDS DEATH with respect to the plot is an element of the story, not necessarily the point of the story. That said it is an element of character since being brought back by CEREBUS effects the character interactions that Sheppard has. To me a romance could serve as a good element of defining character between PC/NPC or NPC/NPC but only if it fits the context of the story and fits the characters involved and fits the developers vision for the game in general. It just moves the time forward! And it isn't an element of sheppard's character, because he doesn't care about it, nor does anyone else. You don't just ****ing kill the protagonist, only to bring him back to life minutes later. Sheppard is a brick. We don't see what he experienced, if anything, while dead. We don't see that traumatizing, hell lethal, experience. progress him as a character. And it doesn't matter to the plot either, the time jump was not needed, sheppard's death was not needed. Same with "romance" minigames; they don't serve anything. 'Anything' is extreme. They don't serve the main narrative. Neither do side missions or the mega-dungeon. How do you know? Do you have somekind of magical crystal ball? They will probably tie in sub-quests and mega-dungeon into the main narrative.

I don't know how convenient it was... but here goes some of my cRPG nerd cred. Ultima's weren't my games. I've barely touched most Ultimas, and have only played a bit of IV and VI. I accept that Ultima IV was a paragon (pun intended) of cRPGs for the day. The Utlima's just never grabbed me - laser pistols and Lord British notwithstanding. Also, I'd never played Might & Magic until like a year ago. Another big hole in my library of cRPG experience. But you know what cRPG's from back then had romance? Gold Box SSI games. In the background, like the Dragonlance games... or with the PC and companion, in Treasures of the Savage Frontier. Ultimas didn't have laser pistols after maybe first two or three parts. The point I was making is that one of The Most mature and serious RPGs ever made didn't have any romances, and I have been asking "Why should Project Eternity be one of the games to have romances." and only reply I've been getting is with the buzzwords "Becooz it makes dem deeper!", and I've been saying this since beginning: With very limited timetable and budget they can only do so much (or little) so they should keep the game as focused as possible.

You are missing the point. RPGs are not only about a story, they are also about role-playing, that is about doing what you want to do, behaving the way you want to behave, having priorities you have chosen to have. More like you don't understand that it's a designer to decide what options to role-play you get because a game will obviously have limitations since it has to be finished and then released. And since games are always limited obvious that some content will get in and some other won't. Now,how do we decide wich gets in and wich doesn't? Player demand for fanservice or artistic considerations? It really isn't so hard to understand. Also lol,to quote myself(and from this same page too!!!): The point you were trying to bring up has already been criticized several times in this and others threads,yet you brought it up regardless without bothering to bring up additional arguments to support your stance. Nice try but, again,you'll have to wait to try again.Maybe 5-6 pages should do it. Has anyone here ever worked on an elaborate, narrative-driven RPG? The notion that romances absorb excessive time and effort from the developers is speculative at best. If it takes Avellone to write one companion two-three months at least, I'd say it's pretty damn excessive time and effort. Have YOU ever worked on writing elaborate, narrative-driven RPG? An elaborate, narrative-driven RPG? No. That's why I said "has anyone" (including) and "speculative" -- if I knew for certain, I would just tell you, instead of asking a rhetorical question. As for the other question: does "writing a companion takes two-three months at least," even make sense in a game where dialogue and narrative blend together with an open persistent world that is being worked on until the last second? Is Avellone writing those companions concurrently with other stretches of the game? If two-three months were spent on writing companions to the exclusion of all else, then based on the number of projected companions, Avellone wouldn't be able to write anything else for any other part of the game before it is released. Feargus has said that it takes him at least 2-3 months to write a single companion. I would bet that he writes the story, plot and companions all concurrently but they still have to calculate and budget on how many fricking hours he can spend on writing any given thing and how much of what he is writing.

Indeed it is, I ended up changing the a to an e because people short-forming my name were writing "Jouka" and I thought it looked awkward, whereas "Jouke" phonetically resembles a RL nickname. And what is swedish doing with the name from finnish national epic? ;D