Pipyui

Ah, that ties up some threads (double entendre! (sorta)). Kidding. Happy birthday, Lephys. @Clean&Clear I know that the animations are supposed to be exagerated, but if I'm gonna go into super-unnecessarily-nitpicky mode for a second, the druid-cat ones felt a little too "muscle-running" to me. I'd prefer the upper body movements to feel more precise and controlled, a little more static perhaps.

Ah, I got ya. I had (perhaps incorrectly) presumed that the overhead camera view in the video was representative of the angle used in the game.

As a regular member of this forum, I contest that it is my job to overanalyse anything and everything! No, I understand that it isn't finished and didn't mean to imply that it was. We will however get to see the gul's hips as it's walking (as illustrated in the video), so they will, need to be animated eventually.

I too noticed this. I supose they just hadn't finished the walk animation for the gul yet. It otherwise seems silly to have such a loose and gangly critter walk so stiff like a machine. Yes.

I think it's quite too early to be pining for another IE reboot yet. PoE and Torment:Tides haven't even released yet; there's no reason to flood the market all at once with more cRPG reboots. Let Obsidian show that they can produce a quality IE throwback in PoE before we start expecting them to produce another. It's good business sense and good PR (or rather, another kickstarter for IWD before PoE has been released would be bad PR), presuming the market for cRPGs doesn't fall out.

As Ffordesoon said, this business feels too out of scope to me; but besides that, I find it hard to imagine that any enemy would allow their biases to so affect combat tactics unless they were particularly confident in their own capability, or otherwise really, really hung up on something (like super-crazy-misogyny). I'd prefer to see more generalized combat AI archetypes or personalities such as Jarmo addressed: Monsters can and probably should be fairly tactics-locked in this context, but human enemies could each be granted one of several AI script sets so that you might see aggressive, elusive, runs_when_alone, opportunisitc type enemies. And of course bosses would display unique tactical behaviors, but I don't feel that these need tie to the more particular facets of their personalities, just the overtones.

Do we know that Obsidian is actually going for infinite camera distance though? I'm not sure exactly what I was thinking here, to be honest. I had figured that parallax scrolling would be limited to copy/paste resources (like trees) that - I presume - wouldn't be baked into the environment. Otherwise layers would be needed, and that would, I suspect, make maps rediculously huge in file size. Alternatively, now that I reflect on it, image layers could be replaced by polygons drawn in 3D space upon the 2D plane. That might be more feasible, but the whole business sounds messy. I guess I was trying to imagine that, if parallax scrolling were impractical, they could use the existing map data elements (normal maps, occlusion info, height maps (I imagine this is how they managed dynamic water effects), etc), to kind of fudge up something similar to parallax mapping. Parallax mapping works by measuring the angle of view between a camera and a texture, and appropriately showing texture bits. I thought that, if camera wasn't at infinite distance, an angle could be measured between any point on screen and the camera, and a map of that point would define the look of the texture there? Heck, I didn't think dynamic water should be possible in a 2D imagine, but they done it, and I still don't know how exactly they managed to map a 2D image so that it reflects light as a 3D space instead of as the flat surface with bumps that it is (I suspect depth data is also stored in image, to abstract the 3D data of it). What I'm trying to say is, Obsidian has confounded my conceptions of 2D before, it shouldn't surprise me that they could manage to fudge parallax, though it seems perhaps impossible to me now. I could live with that.

Well, that all depends on the effective distance of the camera. At infinite distance (I know that's hard to imagine zoomed in so close), there would be no parallax effect. This is how I suspect PoE will look. On the other hand, if the camera is closer, though the camera never changes angle, the angle from the camera to any given point changes with panning, and would thus exhibit parallax. I (personally) feel like my eyes would explode if I had to play an isometric game with DoF.

I think if it was subtle it would look good for trees and the like, which aren't "baked" into the environment anyway (I don't think) because they're animated. They shouldn't look too pixely in this day and age of antialiasing, I imagine. Scratch that, even as an environment overlay piece, because it doesn't exist in 3D geometry, there should be no need for anti-aliasing regardless.

Does anybody know if we can expect a sort of parallax effect for the environments of Pillars of Eternity to illustrate depth when panning? Something to the effect of parallax scrolling, but with a technology perhaps more like parallax mapping? We've seen some pretty neat tricks that Obsidian employed with dynamic lighting and even water depth effects using normal mapping to immitate 3D space in a 2D image. Do you think it'd be possible that they could (or already have) also imitate parallax effects using the same (or similar) tech? I suspect that the constraits of a fixed camera angle might make this possible, but have no experience with graphic design from which to draw any real insight. Anybody with a knowledged or insightful thought on the matter?

I think I can answer hyperthreads. Your OS recognizes each as an extra CPU core, but they are not cores as such. Instead, each core is given an extra set of addressable and non-addressable registers, so that two processes can be loaded into CPU memory at once. This has the benefit of being able to switch between the two processes on the single core really really quickly, instead of reloading the process CPU state from RAM on each context switch. In effect, you have an additional "core" to work with, and it will be treated as such by your system (which is why applications and such show the number of cores you have as your hyperthread count). In actuality, it is not truely an additional core because it does not support parallel (simultaneous) processing. Basically, a 2 core - 2 hyperthread computer (I think they just count this as 4 hyperthreads) can hold 4 processes in CPU memory at once, but can only run 2 simultaneously. It can, however, switch between running any 2 of these 4 at once with incredible speed.

I never liked that D&D had such a separation between combat-capable and non-combat classes. Roleplaying is only so much fun when you can't roll to kill a goblin or two. I like when classes serve disparate combat roles, I just don't like when they can be divided so easily into combat and non-combat roles.

Huzzah! I will now no longer need worry about choosing between single-platform-only and DRM through Steam! Great news!

^ Or the people who you thought had cared for you. I'm not bitter. You're not alone, SqueekyCat. Since that last incident with a paintbrush, I am legally restrained from handling instruments of creation. I'm just lucky they left me with a keyboard. And my fingers. I'm slowly on my way to making them regret that.

We've been hearing a lot that scenery design is very complicated and may be difficult for modders. Could you define "difficult?" Is it a case where the software you use is not freely available, or is the procedure itself just very convoluted? Have you guys decided on a linux distributor yet? Thanks for the time and transparency!

I can understand that some would prefer to have a quest-marker toggle option, sometimes after a long day or on "down" hours you just want to power through the experience of a video game. I can understand it, however I can't say that I condone the idea; I don't think that it fits the PoE vision ("IE feels"), even as an option. Sometimes I just want to power through a gaming session too, but pin-point quest markers exist solely to let me turn off my brain and autopilot through story. Maybe sometimes that's what I want, but I don't feel that the game should cater to this at expense of its own vision. Of course, this is worse for some situations than others - I suppose I wouldn't mind much for quest-markers that point me to explicit and known locations (the blacksmith in Townharbor, perhaps), but situations such as Hassat addresses above me would go straight past infuriating and into the realm of numbing dissapointment. That being said, since PoE isn't going to have quest markers (unless the devs pulled a 180 on this), I'd be pleased to see location information or directions appear automatically in my journal. I have to presume that if I'm told to meet Cascades, whose home may be found in Balmora on whatever side of the river, that I'd posses the foresight to write this info down rather than look back at my journal and say "To Cascades! Who the **** is Cascades?" So long as I have a reasonably concise description of somebody/thing's whereabouts recorded, I should be okay to find the bloke/whatever myself when I need to. Not perfectly relevant to the topic at hand, but since I'm here I would also address the other end of this spectrum - Deus Ex: Human Revolution. A game with (perceivably) great depth, but that I couldn't get far into due to lack of a real journal (that I could find). From one weekend to the next I would have no idea what it was I was supposed to be doing, would just follow one marker to the next, hoping to be reminded once I arrived at my destinations. I see the "vision" here, but quest-markers without the benefit of a quest journal is completely unacceptable. Magic GPS or no, I certainly hope PoE doesn't follow this example. Edit: I hope never to have to use the word "vision" again. So abstract. So inconcise.

I do feel that it is important for companion characters to distinquish themselves in combat through one quirk/ability or another. Because there are so many classes available to us, and fewer companions than this to boot, I'm not too worried myself about companions "bleeding" together in terms of combat role in PoE though. The problem we address in DA:O comes about because there were only three real classes available - warrior, mage, rogue - and so many more companions. Though these companions are designed to each serve a unique combat function, any two of the same class can effectively become the other with little hassle. I'd like to see this as less viable or practical in PoE. As far as evolving in combat through the narrative, I recall that DA:O tried this also by granting slight buffs or abilities to companions your PC was friendly with. This makes sense - I imagine I'd fight better with a close and personal friend than even a long-term aquaintance - but the execution didn't really ring any chords in me. They didn't in any way shape a character's role in or out of combat, they were, IIRC, just slight passive buffs. I guess the best analogy would be to say "Hey! I'm glad we're close friends and that you're willing to help me resolve the ghosts of my past. Here's a dollar." "Um ... okay. Thanks." The slight reward didn't really mean anything. Certainly not more than the mere experience of aiding a familiar companion. As I say, it wasn't exactly bad, it just felt superfluous and pointless. If I was to see something similar in PoE - and I'd like to - I'd rather see it aproached a little differently. Passive stat buffs mean nothing to me, it'd be much neater to see companions evolve to gain a unique ability or two. As AfroJari says, something distinquished, but not too envelope-pushing. Furthermore - and if anything is to be taken from my post, I'd hope it be this - I'd prefer to see my companions evolve both in character and in combat based on the choices my PC makes. I think it'd be cool to see my companions grow in a way that, at least slightly, reflects the flow of the narrative. For instance, at one of those defining points at the end of a companion's personal quest-thing, said companion could learn one of two or three unique abilities based on the manner by which the story arc concludes. If she kills her own mother to save a score of strangers, Shialla gets one new ability, and if she elects instead to spare her at the cost of their lives, she gets another; and presumably your PC's influence will help determine the path. This need not be restricted to companion quests of course, but could apply to any major, or even minor, branch in story. tl;dr: Companions have distinquished abilities/roles, and evolve as a function of player choice, not because I talk to them between every mission.

We know that rigging animations and model skeletons is expensive, and that PoE is already inevitably going to be reusing them between creatures (as the devs have said) to add variety without too much expense. I can't see why some animated rigs created by inXile or Obs can't be shared between the two games where appropriate. A gangly man-rat in Eternity could translate to some twisted gollum-thing in Numenera - if shared, the devs would have more animated rigs to choose from and spread around in both teams to create more diversity of critter in each.

But uninformed outrage is so much easier than understanding. Obsidian will show us a little more when they've made a few more leaps and bounds forward of the last video, but I wouldn't anticipate another before a full, polished gameplay video come late this year in earnest. It'd be neat to get a short little demo of some of the active abilities and modals (like the warrior's ability to hold combatants), but I'd really like to see a brief UI demonstration.

They're already sharing tech, procedure, etc, which is great. I see little reason to share art resources (doors, maybe? wooden furniture?) without causing weird parallels through both games. Unless it's some odd secret that both share the same world, with bordering and melding dimensions, I'd prefer that the games keep their art assets separate. As far as modding and moddability are concerned, yeah, they can share all the tech they please.

To be honest, despite the time I've had to connect with it, I actually prefer Project Eternity and its acronym PE, to Pillars of Eternity (PoE). It may just be the name by which I first associated this game, but it's the one that resonates better with me. The word "pillars" just seems to passive to me, like "Lawnchairs of Eternity" or "Fenceposts of Eternity." But, as nikolocolus so aptly put, in the universe of things that matter [to me] ... this is not one of those things.

@Lephys You're much better at portraying my ideas than I am. Honestly, in reflection, I'm not even entirely clear on what it is exactly I'm arguing for anymore, so I'm just gonna go slither away until things are more concrete in my noggin.

^Except that traditionally your responses tend to be treated like this, either by a moral guage or by the world: You are the evils! (-2 goodness, everyone hates you) [brutish] You are still the evils (though the zombie may not realize it)! (-2 goodness, everyone hates you) [Misleading] You are the goods! (-2 badness, you are Neo Jesus) [Friendly] Neutral. (-0, meh) The archetyping is still there (usually), projected either through these moral guages or NPC responses. Despite my snarkiness, I'm not suggesting that this is inherently bad per se, I just like having as many options as are appropriate to the dialogue (and being snarky). In the example of the above post, you must make a direct response (an action, in effect) to dialogue, and so there are only so many reasonable responses available to you, as was addressed. Often times a response may not directly translate to an action (or interogation), however, and these are the times when I wish to see greater range of dialogue option than {good, bad, neutral}.

This is mostly the kind of thing I'm trying to address. I really want to roleplay Rorschach now, or maybe a Saren type from Mass Effect.

'nuff said how can there even be a debate about this? I understand where you two are coming from, but I can't say I completely agree with this logic. Saying responses should be tailored for good writing is like saying that a building should be designed using good plans. It's not wrong, it's just incomplete and far too abstract. Of course I want responses to be tailored well for their respective conversations, but these response options must differentiate themselves or else be redundant, and this is done by tailoring them to fit the number of reasonable actions or answers available for the PC to choose from, and to variations of the PC's character. It's not like I need to see these archetypes each getting a say in every response node ever, I'd just like to see different character types generally addressed overall.