ohmygodsquad

This was one thing I thought Arcanum did extremely well. There were so many different avenues through which quests were found: Newspapers, items, notes, rumors, stumbling upon locations in the map while randomly exploring, talking to people, reading books. Stuff like the ancient gods quest where all you had to guide you was a cryptic book given to you by a researcher. It was up to you to puzzle out the meaning of the symbols and find the various alters. He didn't give you a detailed description of what to do because it was a mystery even to him. Planescape did it nicely as well. Stuff like tinkering with the toy Modron and snatching the frozen piece of the river Styx from the art museum.

I honestly wouldn't want a "go-to" style. Make all the styles viable for different reasons. What's important is balance. The reason so many people used dual wielding in BG2 is because it was just better most of the time. If the other styles were on par it wouldn't be a problem.

Exactly. We backed the kickstarter so Obsidian could make a game without publishers demands. Don't become the publishers and start forcing features down their throats.

Did you never tell them to go back to the tavern?

Just because they said they're separating combat or non-combat skill points doesn't preclude the option of creating a character that focuses on one or the other. All you need is a toggle at character creation that lets you choose a focus (War, Peace, or Balanced). That'll determine how even/uneven your point spread is between the two skill sets.

We have different definitions of "boring" - slaughtering people does't entertain me. It's all in how you do it. I enjoy noncombat means as much as combat depending on circumstances but I really see nothing else to do with a cult unless I could persuade them to worship me and investigating it seems redundant....they're a cult....what do you expect they're into, baking cookies? I dunno, you could prove to them their deity is actually a manipulative mage using illusions and tricks to gain their adoration? Not every cult is an evil, baby killing cult. It could apply to any religion outside the norm. Besides, its not like we have to investigate a cult, that was just an example. There could be a series of murders, or a crooked merchant, or a thieves guild, or a gang. It could be anything. I don't see why anyone wouldn't like being a detective to break up the monotony of monster slaying.

Couldn't disagree more. The investigation/trial quests in BG2, KOTOR, The Witcher, NWN2, were some of the best quests in their respective games. I always love a good mystery. And you're acting like the main quest is the only quest in the game, nothing wrong with side quests.

One thing I'd love to see return is the [Lie] options used to see in Torment and other games. Generally it involved you saying exactly what a good person would say. It was such a simple thing that rarely effected gameplay much but let you roleplay a more manipulative evil.

I loved a lot of the little touches in PS:T that didn't actually effect gameplay, like all of the descriptions you got for trying the different drinks and candies sold around Sigil and the little trinkets in the curiosity shop. I'd like to see more stuff like that to add flavor to the world. As far as actual magic weapons and accessories, the less generic the better. I'd personally rather not see plain old enchanted swords or swords +1 around. I feel like any magical item should have some sort of background or special name to it at least. Even something as simple as a flaming sword could be made unique with a little flair and history in the description. I'd want this even if it means I have to wait a bit to upgrade my steel sword to something more magical without having the whole +1 +2 upgrade in between to water everything down.

NWN was built from the ground up to be a client for running other adventures, not to mention it had a much bigger budget. I'd rather them focus on giving us a great single player adventure, which NWN didn't really provide, and possibly bring mod tools out later.

I thought AP did romances well. Everything about it was pretty casual, almost to the point that calling it a romance might be too strong of a word, which is what I think you'd expect if you were trying to date some kind of secret agent. That said, janky gameplay aside, I loved the game for its choose your own adventure sort of feel.

As long as its done as tastefully as torment I don't mind romances, honestly. If they're anything like Bioware I'd rather not see them at all. And don't see why you guys got so up and up on the bromance or whatever. Having a loyal comrade as opposed to a lover or a partner can be pretty powerful as well.

I just don't see the appeal of the romances, or at least romances as they've developed in modern RPGs. It honestly annoys me if I'm just trying to find out a characters story and all of a sudden there's a big wall that comes up because I have to bone them to unlock their next chapter. Look at Jack in ME2, if you're playing as a female there's a point where she pretty much just stops having anything to say and you only get the rest of her story if you romance her as a male. I'm not mad that I couldn't romance her as a female, I honestly wasn't looking to. It was just abrupt and I'd like another option to continue it. Then there's the other extreme which is the DA2 method of going here's 2 dudes and 2 girls and they want you regardless of gender, race, or morality. I'd rather have characters with a set sexual preference and standards that fit with their background. If you don't meet them, tough luck, no romance. But that shouldn't stop you from gaining their trust and learning their story. Throw on top of that the whole idea that romances culminate in sex and it all seems like a lot of adolescent pandering. If you're going to do romances give me something akin to Annah or Fall from Grace in Planescape, subtle and bittersweet. Also, I doubt that anyone bought ME3 because of Chobot, that was just a travesty.

I kind of like the way Alpha Protocol handled endings. Essentially it was always the same, the only things that changed were who got to the end with you and how much of the truth you knew about them and the situation.

I hear you there. I hate having to track down a quest give because he felt like going to the store to grab some milk.