anek

...because setting up an Excel spreadsheet and making accounting estimates requires one to have the 3rd edition D&D ruleset perfectly memorized?

As I usually do when logical argumentation is required - in fact, that's more or less what I get taught at uni. I sure hope it's not an economics degree though, 'cause your logic in these matters is seriously flawed.

I agree. She looks much better in the armor they ended up giving her in the kickstarter concept art, compared to the earlier revision with the boob plate. And it is more realistic and less stereotyped. Win - win.

Yeah, Feargus clarified this a bit more 3 hours ago (on the KS comments): "I am going to talk to Rob in the morning. He needed a good solid couple days to recover, from being under the gun on the art and from the vodka. -Feargus"

In logarithmic intervals please.

There is no reason to expect that the physique of the average highly trained adventurer/warrior should be the same as the physique of the average American civilian.

Based on designs given, including comparrisons to IWD(2?) dungeons, levels and other data on BIS/OE dungeons, yeah, 7 sounds about right. The 'design given' is a cartoonish concept drawing based on which no conclusion can be made regarding how long each level will take to complete. The pre-existing dungeons you mention also differ greatly in real-time length based on physical size, level design, and quests. Each level of the Mega Dungeon could just take 20min to complete, as far as we know. As mentioned, it was just another city besides Athkatla, so the comparrison isn't entirely valid. Secondly, it was the main quest, not an optional sidequest, with all the plotforwarding that would hold. The dungeon? No plot forwarding. It's not just another city, it is a very hostile environment. But, that's the thing - even in such a hostile environment (a part of the Underdark controlled by evil Drow!), the game creators managed to use good writing and level design to provide ways (in this case, subterfuge) for the player to restock/recuperate/etc while finding their way through it... But even then, it never loses the flavor of being 'trapped' in a dangerous place with no way of quickly teleporting in or out, having to work your way to the next level... The fact that the design happens to include a "city" of sorts is a red herring in this discussing. There are many possible ways to give players the opportunity to do varied side-quests (i.e. not just endless combat) and to restock/recuperate during a long dungeon-like adventure, and I'm sure Obsidian would be able to find some that fit in with their concept of the Mega Dungeon. And btw., the only "plot forwarding" regarding the main plot that happened during this whole long Underdark journey in BG2, was that you learned 'Yes, Irenicus traveled through here, and he may have collaborated with the Drow in some way, but he's gone now'. The actual sub-stories that guide you through this journey could just as well exist as an optional part of the game far away from the main plot. You cease to require easily accessible supply tunnels/portals.

How about "Nature's Cuteness", modeled after ToB's "Nature's Beauty".

YES! Like BG's "Insect Plague" and "Creeping Doom", except with cats instead of insects!

I said no such thing. I gave BG2's underdark journey as a positive example for implementing a many, many hours long adventure in a hostile environment during which you won't be able to teleport to your 'home base' - to counter the apparently widespread attitude that long all-in-one-go adventures must necessarily be boring, overly difficult, or in some other way suck. In no way did the invocation of that example imply that any particular design element of it would need to be copied 1:1 into the Mega Dungeon. Of course it would be adapted to a 'castle ruins/dungeon' setting rather than an 'Underdark' setting. Of course it would not include an underground Drow city, but instead maybe a big underground crypt inhabited by undead (which can be just as interesting, and have just as many non-combat side-quests, as a Drow city). The point is that long all-in-one-go adventures can be lots of fun and are nothing to be afraid of, as long as the game designers do their job well. Or maybe you need to learn what an example is.

Uhm... what?

No, but that didn't make it any less embarrassing. Also, I'm afraid that such incidents will make the devs less motivated to continue to engage with us (the community) now that the kickstarter is over.

Yeah, Obsidian handled it really well, and especially Alvin seemed to have lots of fun reading the live comment stream and giving witty answers even to potentially offensive comments. But a bunch of comments - which the Obsidian devs thankfully ignored - were really crossing the line and made me embarrassed for being part of the same fan community. I don't think they deserve replication here, but let's just say some of the sexual advances were more than crude.

What makes you think each level is as big as in Diablo? Obsidian can make their 14 level dungeon as small or big as they want, by trading horizontal expansion for vertical expansion. Have some faith in them, they know how to construct a cool dungeon.

And I have to ask, why do you play games at all when you could get rid of all constraints by playing out your own adventure in your head, where all and any options will be available whenever you want? Is it just for the pretty pictures? It is the very purpose of games (and especially RPGs) to provide artificially designed scenarios with constrained options, within which the player will have to make smart choices and find solutions. When playing an RPG, I want to be able to immerse myself into the game world and really play as the protagonist, making intelligent and realistic choices using all the options available from the protagonist's point of view. If I can do this and get an experience that is interesting, varied, at times thought-provoking, and most of all challenging, then it is a great RPG. I do *not* want to be forced into meta-gaming and constantly having to think "Hm, so, what additional rules do I have to set for myself now in order to construct myself a game-within-the-game that will actually be challenging and fun?" That would totally ruin the immersion. It is the job of the game designers, not the player, to set the rules and constraints in such a way. So no, saying "It's optional!" does not justify bad game design.

Who says it will last 7 times as long? The number of levels tells us nothing about the size of each level, or the amount of time one would spend there. And even if it will be 7 times as long, who says it can't still be designed in a fun and interesting way? That loot can't be balanced in such a way that you'll find enough arrows etc. along the way to not have to go back to town to restock? That the area design cannot be varied and the story well-written so that it feels like one long, awesome adventure? I really don't understand why people are so strongly against longer parts of an RPG that are "linear" in that you have to fight through all of it in order to get to the end of it. It provides a completely different immersive experience than being 'stationed' in one town and coming back there after each single quests. A truly epic RPG should provide both types of experiences. For example, consider BG2: Athkatla and surrounding villages/wilderness (chapters 2 and 6) provided the type of RPG experience where you would take individual quests and come back to town to sell loot / restock / recuperate after each one. After escaping from the Asylum, the long journey home in chapter 5 - Brynnlaw -> ship -> sunken city -> Underdark areas -> Underdark exit - was a part of the game that had to be completed in that order before being able to go back to Amn. And it took many, many hours of player time to complete that journey (especially if you made good-aligned choices in the Underdark and were thorough). And it did not become boring at all, it was really cool. The ability to teleport in and out between Amn and various waypoints in the Underdark would have totally ruined it. What makes you think that PE's Mega Dungeon (and the side-story associated with it) can not be designed in an equally fun and interesting way, that will make you enjoy spending many consecutive hours of gaming time to complete it from start to finish?

Thanks. This post from that thread (by the game developer) clears a few things up I think: So, it seems scripting - if available - will be independent of how the game engine itself is built, and hence modders will very likely not be using the Unity IDE, but instead be writing scripts in LUA (or whatever scripting language the developers make available) using whatever editor they like. So the pertinent questions are: Will the developers actually choose to provide such a scripting system? How much of the core game content will be implemented using said scripting system rather than directly using Boo/C#/Javascript in the Unity IDE? (Compare to the Infinity Engine games, where pretty much all area/entity/abilities behavior was implemented in the form of overridable LUA scripts)

True, each time I got "Hit points gained: 1" (and I got it a lot) it felt really dissatisfying... Another thing I don't like about PE's announced high-difficulty modes, is that apparently they'll hide numerical info of what is going on (dice rolls, ...) which would otherwise be available. I want challenging tactical combat, and at the same time enough fine-grained information to be able to really effectively optimize my party and tactics. This will be especially bad for the first playthrough, when you're not familiar with the combat system yet. If it will be possible to specifically exclude those two aspects, I'll probably activate all difficulty modes except for permadeath on the first playthrough, and see how far I get. (Hm, actually, permadeath on the first playthrough could be pretty fun... we'll see.)

Haha, while of course rhetorical hyperbole, there may actually be some truth to that... Too bad the other participants in that discussion seem to have not understood the comparison at all, and just interpreted "Maoist" as a generic insult. Guess it shows how little basic knowledge people have about political philosophy nowadays...

With video content it's much less important than with static images, as you can't focus on details anyways. Also, I think large-screen TV's nowadays have specialized hardware technology that performs much better upscaling than a software implementation running on a PC could handle. Anyhow, I don't consider this issue very important for PE. Yes, the Infinity Engine games look either small or a very slightly blurry on the hardware commonly used a decade later, but they're still perfectly playable. If the same will hold true for PE a decade after its release, I'll be happy. Edit: If they keep their graphics assets around and not loose them like a certain other company, they can always make an updated re-release a decade later. No need to spend any kickstarter money on it now.

Just speculation at this point. It hasn't even been confirmed that the game will be scriptable at all. They're really not very different from one another, at least not for the most common stuff. If you can handle one, you can handle them all - provided that you have access to Google, and an editor that gives you syntax highlighting (and ideally also syntax completion). The bulk of the learning curve of game scripting is not accounted for by the programming language that happens to be used, but by the API that the game engine developers designed for that particular game (i.e. names of functions & what parameters they expect & what they do, names of global variables & how the game uses them, ...)

Yes, the EULA may specify lots of restrictions for what you may or may not do with the software. But that's still a long way from installing technical measures (a.k.a. DRM) on the user's PC that will enforce those restrictions at the will of the publisher. For one thing, it bypasses the arbitration provided by the legal system - if the publisher thinks you've violated their terms, they can't just sue you (which in most cases they would shy away from), they can actually enforce their "sentence" on you at will by revoking your ability to play the game (or at least, to install it on a new computer in the future). And good luck trying to challenge that decision or getting your money back once that happens to you. For another thing, in most non-US countries, the law gives only limited power to EULA's. In some countries they don't count as legally binding at all (since they're not mutually agreed upon contracts before sale of the product). In others, they count only in a limited fashion, i.e. some of the sensible standard clauses that most EULA's have are indeed legally binding, while many of the more extreme and arbitrary restrictions that game publishers like to invent are legally void in those countries even if explicitly specified in the EULA. So no, you can't equate DRM-infested software with DRM-free software that merely comes with a license agreement.

But they also have some strengths compared to BG/BG2/PS:T imo. For example, I think the progression of encounters was done really well in IWD2. Which tactics and spells would help you the most continually changed as you progressed, so you had to adapt constantly which made it pretty interesting and challenging right through to the end.

Or rather, scale up the background so it fits the BG2 character size. I don't think you're not supposed to see the whole background at once.

Having a gold dragon companion is also preposterous. It's fantasy, not a historical representation of medieval Europe.