Dream

This **** sounds awful. The need for torches would imply the environments would be too dark to see in without them. Can you imagine scrolling around the map to see if you missed anything when everything except a tiny circle around your character is pitch black?

God I hope not.

Oh no doubt, running through Cloakwood vs running through whatever that forest was called in Origins it's like night and day with how open the game feels. However, Origins still seems more open when compared to DA2 (at least to me).

If it's so much easier to design levels with only a fixed camera in mind than why did Origins feel like such a larger game with more varied levels (there were few, if any, complaints of repetetive design in regards the Origins, certainly less than for DA2). Saying that the tactical camera was cut to facilitate a bigger game is a bit disengenuous when what DA2 really suffered from was Bioware feeling they needed to reinvent a winning formula. Had DA2 been an actual sequel to Origins and not a brand new game with a few similar elements then it wouldn't have suffered from the issues that plagued it. People expect sequels to be larger than the originals despite shorter release schedules because they know the groundwork has already been laid out (BG2 came out just two years after BG1 but it felt like a larger game in pretty much every sense of the word). This is beside the point though since you wanted an example of an optional feature that made the game more fun for certain players, and I gave it to you. Perhaps you're right and a tactical camera isn't a simple switch, but there are certainly options that are. Hardcore mode in Diablo involved disabling respawns and adding some shiny graphics to represent dead characters. Additionally, Blizzard themselves said that they did not balance the game with hardcore in mind (this is evident by several enemy straight up one shotting people with attacks that you'd have to know about beforehand to counter). Were certain players frustrated when they died to something cheap on hardcore? Sure, but it was their choice to play that mode. Finally, I know several people personally who bought the game specifically because of hardcore despite knowing it wouldn't be balanced (in fact they prefered it that way since it made it more of a challange). There are plenty of optional feature in games (visible/invisible crosshair, subtitles, save tokens vs save anywhere, etc.), and while many of them may not be deal breakers they can certainly serve to color peoples' opinions of the game with regards to buying sequels/xpacs/dlc. On top of that adding options is a good way of generating good will and publicity by saying **** like "we care about the players."

i didn't say i LOVED the ending. Merely that I thought it was fine and liked what they might have been trying to do with it. If they were trying to do with it what I think they were, I thought that it was well-done. To me, it seemed that there are things in life that are inevitable and Bioware was trying to show that through the ending. Sooner or later Shepard's gonna die. What happens next is probably more important than him. Yes, I agree that they were sloppy by reusing exactly the same cinematics for all three endings, but ultimately, perhaps the point was that somethings are worth the sacrifice. I like games that make you feel an emotion, no matter how crappy that emotion can be (in ME3's case, the emotion is loss) as it makes for a better interactive medium. And I think that ME3 was trying to do this because they had intended other parts of the game to be thought-provoking as well. But yeah, I didn't LOVE the ending. I just appreciated it for what it was. Now PE on the other-hand, I know they're going to do a btter job than Bioware. Right? Bioware is a huge developer backed by a mega-publisher, not some indie startup. You don't get credit for "trying" when you're supposed to be the best. It's the same reason I never accepted any of the "well swtor is competed with an MMO that's been out for 7 years!" bull****; if you want to be big time, don't complain when people call you out for half assing ****. Personally, though, I hated the endings not because of the sacrifice (although that certainly didn't help), but because they made zero ****ing sense (it was almost as if whoever wrote them didn't even play the first game of the trilogy) and because of how blatantly Bioware lied about them in the leadup to ME3 being released (below image always said it best I feel).

While I agree with you I feel your assessment of the DA games is a bit off. Playing on nightmare sitting there and taking it was just not an option and I often found myself pausing almost every second to individually control each character whether it was to CC or set up a combo on a big enemy, hitting a group of smaller enemies with aoe, kiting straglers/pulling ranged enemies around corners with line of sight, getting my rogue to go after the squishy in the back, etc. (often I had to do all of these at once while at the same time trying to dodge the cluster**** of enemy abilities being thrown at me). In fact I actually found myself using tactics a lot more often in DA games than I did in BG where even by the middle of the game I could pretty much just cast haste and send my PC in to instagib **** (even the tougher enemies required pretty basic tactics like open door, cloudkill/horrid wilting, close door and wait). The dragons were pretty much the only enemies that required a brain.

It's still idealized talk. What are these options that take little effort but "vastly improve the enjoyment for some sect of players?" That you can logically deduce that an option would be desirable and therefore cause people to purchase a game doesn't make it so. Especially given that games are the sum of their parts. Off the top of my head; Dragon Age: Origins' camera. For the console you had a more action-y camera but on the PC you could zoom all the way out for a BG style perspective. Being able to see so much of the battlefield definitely made the game easier (which might be why I found DA:O such an easy game compared to other recent Bioware RPGs), but I still prefered having that camera, and if that camera wasn't present I would have been far less likely to preorder DA:A and DA2. To go along with that, DA2 did not have this feature and it (among other issues) definitely hampered my enjoyment of the game.

That's pretty much what I've been going for; I hardly expect them (or even want them) to balance every single metagame option they add, and big disclaimers saying it'd throw game balance out of whack would be good. As for gameplay stopping people from playing; I know wouldn't play the game if it had checkpoints (even if that was how it was "intended"). I can deal with that in Halo or Bayonetta, but not in RPGs. It's not about throwing balance out the window; it's about making it balanced in one mode (the "intended" one) and then allowing people to play it in several others (permadeath, no ff, etc.), but not worrying about balancing those extra modes. I posit it's better to have other modes and have them be unbalanced than to not have them at all; the game proper will be balanced regardless.

Mac Walt... I can't say that with a straight face. Seriously though, the dude(ette) who wrote Bayonetta (dunno if it was Hideki Kamiya or if he only directed).

I was merely using you as an example of a person who would skip a story driven given over gameplay mechanics (since the guy I quoted posited such people didn't exist); whether you're pro or against metagame options was irrelevant to the point, but my bad if it came across as me distorting your views. This is an idealized logical deduction that doesn't occur in reality. The costs associated with options is often non-trivial. It's important to note that even if a task is easy and won't take much time to do, doesn't mean you should do it. In game development, there's is never a shortage of ideas. Stuff is always cut. Given that games are made with a finite amount of resources, this means that one task that only takes a day to complete means some other task is not going to be done instead. Exactly, so adding an option that takes little effort but will vastly improve the enjoyment for some sect of players (who while they may not buy/skip the game because of this option will most certainly be influenced in buying any xpacs or sequels) seems like a no brainer.

To be fair someone else gave me the heads up, I only capitalized on the information.

Not everything has to be a conga line of suffering to emphasize the fragility of life and how we are all doomed to a harsh and sad life followed by a tragic and miserable death (or something like that) either. Having said that, since PS:T and BG had a good bit of humor in them, and P:E is supposed to be their spiritual successor, lets go with that. Well there is a disconnect here. A great many influential authors; Kafka, Dostoevsky, Tolstoy, Philip K. D!ck, Cormac McCarthy to name a few all wrote very seriously they didn't throw a few yucks into War and Peace so people could "have fun". Even author's like Joseph Heller, Camus, Beckett(debatably) or Kurt Vonnegut who wrote satire always did it in order to prove a make a point, often a dark one, it wasn't just goofy puns thrown in so people could go "Hurr durr I understand that reference!" Mature narrative doesn't need to be humorless you can use humor to tell a point but what the OP is talking about is dumb jokes thrown in without purpose to make him chuckle. Humor of that kind is immature by nature and best left to comedies. Comedies are fine but its not what I want this game to be. OP might, but I don't. I sure as **** don't want War and Peace the Game. Video games are a different medium than books and the same "rules" (if you can even consider them that) don't apply. This very game is the spiritual successor of a series that had gold, silver, and bronze pantaloons that formed a big metal unit. If you don't like "immature" humor that's fine, but a lot of people do, and as BG and PS:T showed you can have both a serious narrative and a good deal of dumb old fun at the same time. If you want a more modern example look no further than Borderlands 2 which possessed some rather dark and sombre elements but at the same time had some of the most off the wall ridiculous jokes I've ever heard.

Not everything has to be a conga line of suffering to emphasize the fragility of life and how we are all doomed to a harsh and sad life followed by a tragic and miserable death (or something like that) either. Having said that, since PS:T and BG had a good bit of humor in them, and P:E is supposed to be their spiritual successor, lets go with that.

Bro, what?

No I don't. Pitchforks aren't good weapons anyway. They're what 1D4 or something? That's hardly the way to foster good will.

Innovate away, but don't leave out options because they'd be a pain to balance when the players that want said options would enjoy the game more with the option turned on even if it wasn't balanced (especially since this is a story driven single player game).

Because this game is art, damnit!

While we cannot doubt that gameplay options take time to implement and balance, we can very well doubt that more options will make the game appeal to "a broader audience". Will any RPG fans skip over this game because you can't turn off friendly fire, if it has a gripping story and solid mechanics? I'd say no. Apparently they would. Two things: 1) This is true to some extent for BG2, because combat mechanics never was its strong point. From what we've heard about the classes, PE will offer more tactical depth than BG2 (ToEE was cited as an influence), and that makes balancing more important. Of course flawed balance often only becomes noticeable until you've experimented a bit with the game (not even necessarily replaying), but that's hardly an excuse for bad balancing. 2.) There's no reason to copy the flaws of its spiritual antecessors, but there is every reason to try and improve on them. 1) "Obsidian Entertainment and our legendary game designers Chris Avellone, Tim Cain, and Josh Sawyer are excited to bring you a new role-playing game for the PC. Project Eternity (working title) pays homage to the great Infinity Engine games of years past: Baldur’s Gate, Icewind Dale, and Planescape: Torment." 2) It's not about copying the flaws of those games; it's about realizing that perfect balance is not really that important to the core audience so making sure that every option you add is balanced is a waste of resources. Design the game to be played one way and then add a bunch of options for the people that want no FF, permadeath, limited saves, etc. If those options make the game really hard/easy then whatever; it's the player's choice to play that way, let them.

You CAN make a difference believe it or not, albeit not as big of a difference than Obsidian can make. But you can contribute by offering suggestions to curb piracy of this game. I came up with a few that I listed, maybe others have other ideas too. Going on pirate bay could actually help as well, I'd suggest Obsidian puts some form of pay what you want on their pirate bay torrent pages. You could leave nice comments on the torrent page too, being rude won't get anyone to donate. However, being nice, and suggesting that the devs deserve at least a little bit for their work could net some donations at the least. All those things are pretty much what I meant when I said do something that would actually help Obsidian. The OP wants us to grab pitchforks and storm the Pirate ship in an attempt to tear it down which simply a) wont work and b) be a massive waste of time and energy. Putting out good will and talking up P:E, on the other hand, will have an actual effect.

Why though? "Save scumming" has been around forever on the PC and it's pretty much how people play. The only reason games even exist without "save anywhere" is because on consoles there are limited buttons and developers created checkpoints/lives to make it easier to play without having to open menus to save/load (same reason quicksaving and loading was invented on the PC, where there aren't limited buttons). Edit: The other reason lives were created, I suppose, is to charge people quarters; so maybe P:E should do that. Every save costs a dime and every load costs a quarter. Why reinvent the wheel? Because YOU think it's not the "proper" way to play games?

I don't think I've ever had that issue (especially not in BG or PST). If anything I was always annoyed by how much more deadly my PC was compared to every other companion I had. Really the only characters to even come close were Sarevok and maybe Vhailor.

Of course not, silly. But I would prefer that the devs focus their resources on in-game options rather than metagame options, even if that means the metagame features do some things contrary to my personal preferences. And if it turned out that the devs' vision was drastically different from my expectations, then yeah, I'd rather not play the game at all. How about you? Would you prefer a game with a metric fluckton of toggles in the "Options" screen, but with wildly out-of-balance gameplay, with some classes either grossly overpowered or borderline unplayable, depending on how you set those toggles? What indeed. Because even if it does take away time and money from other things the added sales gained from making a game that appeals to a broader audience will, in the end, outweigh the cost. Beside that, "wildly out of balance gameplay" isn't exactly the kiss of death for a single player story driven game. Baldur's Gate had some ****ed up balance with certain classes, and kits especially, being okay at best and others being straight up broken. Hell, PS:T was even worse with one of the three classes being borderline worthless (thief), another making the game stupid easy combat wise (fighter), and the last providing the only reasonable access to half of the story/dialogue content (mage). If they were multiplayer games then those would have been serious issues, but they weren't so it was hardly worth even mentioning (and most people didn't even notice the issues, if they ever did, until they'd replayed the games multiple times).

What exactly do you want people to do here? Go on Pirate Bay's forums and spam them calling them ****? Put up fake torrents labeled Project: Eternity with viruses on them? Not to mention how the **** are you going to "see someone pirate the game?" There is literally nothing you can do that would deter piracy; so focus your efforts on something else that would actually HELP Obsidian. Hell, in the time you wasted writing and defending this thread you could have probably made half a dozen threads about P:E on random obscure forums across the internet and convinced at least a few people who didn't know about the game to back it. You might have even been able to do that on the Pirate Bay's forums. More like a pro-don't-give-a-****-about-****-you-can't-change faction and a stress-the-****-out-about-and-waste-resources-fighting-against-the-inevitable faction.

Of course not. I would simply not play that game. For example, I didn't finish Arcanum, Gothic 3, or Oblivion, and didn't even buy Skyrim for that precise reason. I didn't care for what they were trying to do. Nor does it offend me the least bit that lots and lots of people do like them. I certainly don't. However, I do care about my single-player experience. When I crack open a new game and look at the settings, I have no clue how they may affect the game balance. If I can throw the entire class system out of whack by unchecking a single checkbox -- "friendly fire," say -- then, in my opinion, the devs have screwed up. So you would rather not play a game, or force other people to play the game in a way they don't enjoy, than have options available because you can't resist opening the ****ing options menu and going "oooooooh, shiny, MUST CHECK ALL THE BOXES!" What?

Then why didn't you? The place was added for people who like big ass dungeons with lots of puzzles and combat.