Brannart

The reason I liked PS:T is it did not hold your hand at all really plotwise. You had to pay attention, gather the clues and solve the mystery. And even after many playthroughs I was still finding more things, heck it was probably 2007 that I found the Blind Archer in the Morgue. And that experience, for example, sort of leaves you wondering what was the deal with the Blind Archer and why did he follow TNO and you realize you will never know. And this was a guy who never actually appeared in the game really. So I guess it is a plot that really makes you think to puzzle it out, which gets you thinking of its implications and a desire to get to know and understand how that relates to the characters. Characters who have real darkness, melancholy, idealism, or righteousness, or whatever makes them decide to tag along with you that goes deeper than the 'daddy/mommy didn't love me' melodrama you run into alot. In this game we seem to have something significant that haunts the main character and perhaps that will tie you to a bunch of places and characters and ideas that will be that sort of compelling. The kind of plot that makes you want to play the game again so you can appreciate it on a whole other level. Another thing I enjoy are real choices that dramatically fork the game though I know some do not care so much for that. I know that most choices in cRPGs are just the illusion of choice or cosmetic choices and that is probably necessary and most of the choices in any game are going to be that. But I loved how in MOTB you would reach certain choke points where you had really big choices to be made that would have a big impact on the next part of the game. I would love a repeat of that but even more so. To the point that the plot, the places you go and the way the characters develope is significantly impacted by say a big choice you make at the end of chapter 1 or whatever. To where you want to go back and see what happens if you chose differently. And of course these choices would compound on top of each other at each choke point so there would not be many of them. So basically look to PS:T and MOTB for inspiration is what I say.

Wizardry: Proving Grounds of the Mad Overlord Ok seriously...it is probably not an original opinion but I guess PS:T because it is a game I can play years from now and still enjoy like I presently can still fire it up every once in a while.

Alright. This thing is going to make Durlag's tower look like Durlag's outhouse.

Man this is going to be great.

Wow what a horrible thing to say. Seriously dude that is messed up. I guess I thought those women were just adults having some fun not...what you are implying. It was not even like they did anything inappropriate or dirty they just did the party pose thing.

This. A thousand times this. I want Dorn's Deep on steroids.

A game within a game? I like it!

Heh. Oh heck no. I will probably have a hard enough time on 'normal' during my first play through.

NO I want 14 levels of monsters, traps, puzzles, shifty characters, legends, exotic and weird locations, and treasures and the whole thing. I only wish once you go in there is no way out Legend of Grimrock style. But that is probably too much to hope for.

Really? It wasn't that bad. Most of the comments were harmless. Like 'Say hi to Sweden' or whatever.

Huh I thought you were going to suggest the stronghold be in the city...but actuallly be a city? Wow consider my mind blown. How would that work? I don't know I guess I would rather the stronghold be more varied on things like race and class.

I would like for factions to have a huge impact on the game world but I do not think joining them is necessary.

I want the romances from PS:T and KOTOR2 to serve as models for Obsidian in this case. A more subtle and complicated kind of romance.

This is very odd, because you seem to go on to restate peoples concerns with romances right after you said that you did not understand those concerns.

I didn't mind him. For one he was a force of Priestly destruction. But I didn't really get why his romance was that much worse than the others in that game. Women seem to not like him though, eh I liked the neurotic dude. They had a similar reaction to Carth IIRC. But Bioware learned something because they loved Alistair.

I don't think BG or FO has romances though, at least as we currently understand them. I am just saying do not underestimate how all consuming and destructive romances can be from a storytelling perspecitive. I don't mind if they are there and will enjoy them if they are but they need to be small optional content not become this huge consuming thing like with the Bioware games. But generally I like how Obsidian has handled these things in the past so I probably should not be worried.

I agree but the problem becomes that everybody will want at least one option. That requires a ME type situation which I do not think Obsidian should be using time doing. But I guess if we have one male and one female character who were go for anybody that might work....maybe.

I don't need any updates so long as they drop in here and answer questions from time to time. But if they are going to do them we just need one once a quarter or so. Just to get the basic gist of where we are going.

I loved the ending of Arcanum. They should make Tim responsible for the ending. Do something like that.

Obsidian has needed to turn around projects very quickly for years. I hope this game is a chance for them to take the time they need and do it right. Granted they probably have to worry about going too long with just a 4 milllion dollar budget.

Is our sample size really that big here? I can think of knight in shining armor characters that are not straight but we are limiting ourselves exclusively to romancable characters in cRPGs published by BW and Obsidian?

I'm assuming this was directed at me but my goodness there's no need to be so rude Of course the developers are not saying "this is how all bisexuals behave". And a few aggressively flirtatious bi characters in a few games would not be a big deal, but the thing is this is pretty much how all bi characters are being shown in games today, which isn't great. Even if you personally don't object to the content (which is fine and I do understand that it's not a big deal for most hetereosexual people), from a strictly narrative/writing perspective, that character archetype being reused repeatedly is just plain boring. It just makes it a bit different because these characters are also playing into stereotypes in the real world that do exist and are harmful to some people. If me wanting to see more LGBT people portrayed in a realistic/positive light makes me "sensitive" then yes I am a giant sensitive child and I see no problems there I guess I disagree that Zevran was this horrible character who advanced any stereotypes that had any social or political harm. But if romances are this social-poltical thing that cause real world harm well that might be another reason why perhaps Obsidian should consider limiting their impact on the game.

That's why I was strongly against Adventurer's Hall. Adv Hall in the game about deep rpg elements (basically NPCs, their motives, reactions, story, etc.) is just... Wrong. So people got an OPTION to avoid some content. And now, after they recieved this OPTION they try to reduce our OPTIONS using this Adv Hall as argument??? Great. You greatly greatly dissapointed me. I'll go to my small hamster's house and I'm gonna eat a lot of carrots, just to cheer up. I will probably never use the Adv Hall just FYI unless I decide for some reason my character has a twin or is adventuring with his/her spouse or whatever. I was just stating romances are showing this tendency to dominate games and especially when somebody might have no NPCs they should be treated carefully.

Well I couldn't help but notice practically the only meaningful choice you got in DA and ME was who you romanced. If doing them right means stripping away the variety and replayability from other elements I would just assume do without them. It is not that I do not enjoy romances, I do, but they seem to have become this massive monster that dominates modern RPGs and I want to see them tamed a bit.

Ok Bioware is not doing this game. But I think this is a good example of what worries me a bit about Romances. A few in there as a fun little mini game is alright (heck I even enjoyed the Anomen thing but I am a dude so my female character was just along for the ride. It was so melodramatically cheesy I thought it was fun. But it was also short and did not distract much from the main game). But you are right that if you are going to do sexuality like this then everybody wants an equal option. And trying to provide a romance for everybody and do them right and involve them in the plot or whatever becomes a huge task. Particularly since this is a game where some people will be taking zero NPC companions b/c of the adventurer's hall thing. Utlimately it is up to Obsidian but if they decide to do without the Romances I will not blame them. I think having seen the monster grow in BW games I can do without them, but if they are there I will enjoy them for what they are. Just, you know, don't let them dominate the game.