lordgizka

I think the reason Shaker isn't getting pledges is not because the target audience is out of money, but because nowhere there is a simple reference to what the game is supposed to be a successor of (or a "clone", whatever). It's certainly not "like" Anachronox from a gameplay perspective, Hall's only actual RPG game. As I understand it, it's going to be Betrayal at Krondor/Might and Magic clone? If so, why not detail the gameplay and drop such names?

I'm making a stupid male dwarf and using Notch's custom portrait, which I assume will exist. The character is going to also be aggressively Evil. And a barbarian, I suppose.

Well if the game has traits, and one of them is Bloody Mess, I'm taking it. They certainly promised perks though, maybe one of those.

I think a better example for 8 companions being a good number of party members is probably Dragon Age: Origins. It basically had those same 8 companions (and Dog, Dog is pointless anyway), and they were fleshed out well enough. And no voiced dialogue would constrain PE developers too. Edit: forgot the "secret companion" and temporary ones. Number's still comparable, though.

If he does play it, he might not know of the existence of terra-arcanum's patch. We should be vocal about it when the announcement comes.

This argument always gets made, but I don't understand it, really. If the player recognizes for himself what the concepts of good/evil are, he is capable of judging ANY character according to those values. "Grey" characters are therefore either neutral and don't do extreme things that would make them either good or evil, or possess both evil and good traits, such as a terrorist that would attempt to, say, save his oppressed people by slaughtering the oppressors. Is the latter case what people want?

Seeing that the add-on is basically already announced, it's most likely that the ending will be a simple cliffhanger, hopefully with a lot of variables concerning the party and the world.

Tactics Ogre. No, seriously.

I honestly don't know which RPGs are you using to make this statement. All Bioware ones did, yes, bust most certainly not an overwhelming amount of others.

This concept of fantasy worlds ideally being completely separate from the real world is true and has been true since Tolkien, but some players and developers just refuse to get it. There can literally be anything in this game (yes, even romances) if in the developers' minds it makes sense to happen in their world with their characters. Again, ideally regardless of anything else, especially real world society and culture.

I think 9 out of 10 fantasy books I read last had romance arcs in them. It is one of the surest staples of fantasy literature. That argument was just weird.

They're not boozing, lame.

Didn't inXile people lament not having a party near the end of their kickstarter? Well if this is a legitimate mistake and an example, where is Obsidian's party video stream?

I'm actually surprised there is no streaming video of Obsidian folks drinking themselves into oblivion with a huge countdown clock in the background. Easily 100000$+ extra in pledges

There is likely a difference in the eyes of developers (and part of the fanbase) between PC romances (as in, in which the PC takes part) and NPC romances. MotB has love as one of it's central themes, but it would lose nothing of Safiya wasn't a romanceable character. This argument doesn't apply to Torment as well, but meh. Also, as Avellone wrote in one of his interviews, romance (and friendship) exist apparently to "ego-stroke" the player, which actually implies a lot of things about the mindsets of people playing RPGs, which I would like to think are simply not true. What is this supposed "ego-stroking" anyway? Attempting to instill the player with the feeling of self-worth because NPCs like him/her? The PC, mind you, not the actual player. I'm afraid your mistaken. Video games are intrinsically ego-stroking for the player, especially RPGs. The whole idea is to identify with a character who does great things. Is this really that absolute? Roleplaying doesn't intrinsically mean that people roleplay themselves. They roleplay a character with a distinct personality which isn't their own. Where exactly is identifying yourself with the character comes in?

There is likely a difference in the eyes of developers (and part of the fanbase) between PC romances (as in, in which the PC takes part) and NPC romances. MotB has love as one of it's central themes, but it would lose nothing of Safiya wasn't a romanceable character. This argument doesn't apply to Torment as well, but meh. Also, as Avellone wrote in one of his interviews, romance (and friendship) exist apparently to "ego-stroke" the player, which actually implies a lot of things about the mindsets of people playing RPGs, which I would like to think are simply not true. What is this supposed "ego-stroking" anyway? Attempting to instill the player with the feeling of self-worth because NPCs like him/her? The PC, mind you, not the actual player.

Well, first of all, all the early beta keys are going to essentially make us (well, not me, I'm not going to play the beta, what a silly thing to do) Obsidian's QA department, so that's basically free. And second, there is probably not going to be any "extra" money, by virtue of kickstarter/amazon fees (which are already easily 315000$ + whatever the failed transactions are going to be) and the costs of producing all the physical stuff everyone wants so much.

Wish from BG2 (ToB?) was loads of fun. Low WIS results especially,

About that bit where Beamdog can't change existing content: what exactly does that mean? Not actually changing the existing story is not fatal for an enhanced version; what I don't get is whether or not they can, say, write new content for existing characters. Because if they can't, BG2EE is going to be pathetic, just because of banters.

This thread has a weird premise to me. This project doesn't seem to pander to the new Bioware crowd at all (except for maybe ability cooldowns, but if they really steal it all from 4th ed, it won't be that bad). The more evident conflict is probably between people who want another Icewind Dale and people who want another Torment. The first group appears to be in the minority though (Storm of Zehyr did sell poorly), but they are quite vocal, and recent stretch goals do seem to cater to them specifically (party creator, giant dungeon etc.).

I'm interested in this game not being basically a topical show talking about negative things in our culture (well, western culture). Fantasy worlds are supposed to be imagined from the ground up with inspiration from certain elements from our world, not mirrored from them directly. If you look at DnD worlds, they still have all the "mature themes" they like, but they don't hammer things in like "our elves are slaves now, look how it relates to what folks on the news talk about".

Why exactly does every company insists on shooting themselves in the foot by starting a Kickstarter campaign while providing close to no information about the game itself? This is not only insulting to the other projects on the service who might have great working demos but not enough developers' renown, but also makes people hesitate.

it goes hand in hand with the whole perceived sexism thing... it's pretty barf inducing to be honest. Video games are notorious for this in recent years (*obligatory BioWare reference!*). My biggest fear is that in Obsidian's writers' minds these things might be synonymous with the concept of "mature themes". Which is always most likely either a grimdark setting or a bunch of Evil People Who Fight for Good (or vice versa).

Well, in regards to OP's point, according to Avellone's update he's going to do story structure similarly to P:T and MotB (even though it seems a little too formulaic - I mean, for every companion having a direct connection to the main plot is a little too convenient - and we now KNOW it's going to be this way in the game). The rest of the updates is pandering to Icewind Dale crowd simply because Obsidian can't pander to us anymore than saying "It'll have a story like Torment".

One question: translate will be in kickstarter-version of game or only in local distributors version in Russia and Poland? The normal route is always to sell the license to another company and let them do the work. Russia is relatively unadapted to digital distribution, so Obsidian is likely to lose money otherwise.