Fionavar

Thanks, Bartimaeus. Same browser/platform? If so, which one and did you change IP address for any reason?

Pillars of Eternity II: Deadfire is a computer/classic roleplaying game (CRPG), which explores the topics of personal freedom and responsibility, religion, and colonialism. The story takes place in the (fictional, but it is obvious) Deadfire archipelago, where several local and foreign factions stand in uneasy peace, while the protagonist follows a reborn god (who destroyed their very nice castle during his rebirth) to save their soul. The game was unique in many aspects, most importantly, in supporting the player's agency and acknowledging their choices, and some admirable design decisions, such as not rewarding murdering random non-playable characters without an in-character reason (quest) and the critical path (the main story) being of reasonable length. Then, in one of the last updates, the Blackwood Hull, required for it, was moved from the shipyard at the capital, broken into 5 pieces, and these pieces scattered at random places, thus, successfully decreasing the immersion and securing another sale on GOG, which allowed to rollback the update almost painlessly (installing and uninstalling GOG Galaxy while downloading the game twice was not the most positive experience, but it worked). Keeping the 51GB around was less painless, but absolutely worth it. Usually in video games, the final part where the player and/or the party are proficient with the technical aspects of the gameplay systems and have completed most of the story, thus, being invested in both, consists of several hours of story-free battles, which, on one hand, allow to utilise the most powerful equipment and skills the player has. On the other, these long battle sequences are predictable, boring, and do not exactly serve the narrative. In terms of the in-game lore, Ukaizo was the lost birthplace of the local people, the Huana, which also was the final destination of Eothas, whom the player's party was pursuing throughout the story, and the target of the factions vying for the control over the Deadfire archipelago and its resources. Therefore, it would be expected for the island to be mechanically similar to the end-game locations from other CPRGs, including the first Pillars of Eternity (fortunately, as far as I remember, Obsidian did not go overboard there either). The level and narrative design of Ukaizo was impressive in general and in the context of CPRGs - while it featured one avoidable (blessed be the Bounding Boots) token boss battle with a unique foe that had little to no bearing on the story (the Guardian did provide some lore), the encounter with Eothas was never meant to be combat, due to him inhabiting a giant adra (soul-sucking-rock) statue from the practical point of view (granted, a few well-shot explosives could have solved it), and because I wanted to see him taking down the creatures that were much worse than he was, which made travelling to Ukaizo in the first place rather out of character, but the quest journal pointed there and, as a player, I wanted to know the outcomes of my actions. It also was very convenient to replay, considering the number of expansions, with all of them taking place in the story before visiting Ukaizo. Another boss battle at Ukaizo was against a leader (I think there were several for each option) of a non-chosen faction. For some reason, despite me not compromising my moral high ground for any of them, it usually was the Royal Deadfire Company of the Kingdom of Rauatai, with Hazanui Karū as the boss. Possibly, it was because of Atsura, who was definitely not a spy, giving me the opportunity to decrease the number of their employees without negative consequences. The point being is that the presence of this battle highlighted another essential aspect of the story - the relationships with the factions, where each of them was reasonable enough not to be killed on sight, unlike, for example, the Legion in Fallout: New Vegas or the Systems Alliance in Mass Effect (not an Obsidian game, and the damn faction was impossible to leave, while the game itself was extremely pro-military). And, most importantly, there were dialogues with the companions on the way to Eothas, reflecting the bonds built with the party. It also was great that the romantic interest did not lessen or overshadow the friendships with the other party members, while the fact that all of the possible romances were bisexual successfully avoided cis-heteronormativity and made the story more immersive and engaging for the LGBTQ+ gamers. Thus, Ukaizo defied the combat-first (not an unjustified approach, since providing a satisfying and interactive combat system, while still challenging, is significantly easier than satisfying and interactive dialogues) aspect of many CPRGs where the last location is a long mind-numbing gauntlet of battles and the boss, whom you have come to kill anyway, monologuing for an hour - the dialogues with both bosses and Eothas were skippable and/or possible to minimise. I also loved how in PoE1 it was possible to kill Thaos without listening to him, since the information you needed was much more satisfying to take from his corpse. I see Obsidian as one of the best RPG developers whose games I have played. I think it is important to explore the conventions and subvert the expectations of the genre in order to make more unique and memorable art, while supporting it being sustainable (system requirements and development costs), accessible (fully rebindable controls and saving at will), inclusive, and DRM-free, because video games are both art and a product and it is crucial to acknowledge and support both of these aspects.

Thanks, Gorth. I've read through your blog multiple times and find many parallels between your experiences and my own. Your generous sharing prompts me to realise how many titles from OBS, including those under the existing banner and previous iterations like Black Isle, I've replayed. I've lost count of how many times I've played through NWN, FO 1&2, and now, ToW! I often return to KotoR, not just for the gameplay but also for what it heralded for the future, which you've captured so well, especially regarding the ending. As 'The Acolyte' is set to release, I can't help but remain geekily hopeful that OBS might get another opportunity with the franchise. Thank you for taking the time to share your experiences and reflections, and for being the first contributor to the Community Blog. Your post sets a welcome model, and I'm excited to see the variety in future contributions. You've started us off in a good way—thank you!

Great stuff! Will follow-up in DM

The June 7th blog is primed and ready. Feel free to read (perhaps again) @Gorth musing from last month: As well, currently looking for someone to contribute to the August 7th edition. Please DM me if you have an inkling to create something.

Went for a run, removed some ticks from the hound, vacuuming, and some MYSTARY gaming ... so far a nice way to slide into a Canadian long weekend

Look, our very own @Gorth is famous

Oh, well that's exciting ... I look forward to that conversation as time permits, BruceVC

You were pretty good at keeping us out of the loop for sometime

Heya Guard Dog, Low tech retirement - nicely done! Life sounds as though it has been full, perhaps not always easy since you were here last, but the national parks adventure has (I assume) revealed lots of surprises and beauty of life's up and down unfolding. Look forward to hearing more about your journeys to and from as time permits on the world of the analogue

Joyfully began the new Obsidian Community Blog feature ... 20 years people! https://forums.obsidian.net/profile/666-gorth/

Thanks, Pidesco! Happy reading, my friend

Just fixed them - good now, @Pidesco?

@Gorth has provided the first Obsidian Community Blog! He not only gets a shiny new badge, but we get to learn from a long-time member what life as a gamer can look like ...

Our first OBS Community Blog by @Gorth is now live: June and July are also written. Please DM if you have a musing in mind ...

Since this is a "history" post, I'll start with the oldest stuff first and work my way towards the current time, here and now on the Obsidian boards I often deny having owned a gaming console and that is technically correct. But... long unrelated story, I grew up with relatives who were "junkies" (heroin addicts) and they would often rob stores and homes for things to sell for mere pittances at times to finance their addiction. One day, the oldest showed up at my parents place (my mother, for reasons, had become their legal guardian) with a Pong gaming console they had stolen somewhere and no fence would take it off their hands. The original Pong console was among my first video gaming experience in the mid 70's. It was my parents though, not mine. (I would have loved to put an image of the console here, but I honestly do not remember what it looked like 50 years ago) Other sources of video gaming at the time was the arcade machines a various convenience stores and grill bars. Some were electronic, some were part mechanical, part electronic. I particularly remember a "Duck Hunt" game, where several layers of glass were used to create the sense of depth and a single glass plate was used to reflect a flying duck from a TV screen hidden out of sight. The shotgun was mounted to a stick that was effectively a big joystick. No fancy electronics at all. Other places had more modern games like Galaxy Invaders... I spent a fortune in coins on those machines. Jump forwards almost a decade, 1983 I was convinced I was going to end up studying biology after high school... until my dad came home with three page advertising pamphlet for the Commodore 64. It was so colourful and impressive looking. It used an elephant to symbolize the humongous memory it had (even though only 38k turned out to be available to the user in the end). I managed to raise the money for my machine of dreams as well as the associated tape recorder and two games. A game on tape called "Beach Head" and a cartridge called "International Soccer". First two games I ever bought with my own money. Never mind that programming the C64 got me hooked on software development and an impromptu career change, the games changed my life too, spending much of my free time playing games on the old "Bread Box" (Danish nick name for the C64). US Gold was a major publisher int he 80's and the football game? It took almost 10 years before a better game of its kind came out. Another decade later I raised the money for a Commodore Amiga 4000 and a hard drive. Gaming now became almost an art form. Bear in mind, in the early 90's, the Amiga completely outperformed contemporary desktop PC's, with the latters CGA graphics and built in tweeter for sound. Never mind the operating system, where MS only caught up with Windows 8 or thereabouts. But the games... sooo many, soo good. On the C64, I developed a love for strategy games and role playing games. SSI gold games, the Ultimas etc. were not just nostalgia, they were state of the art as each individual title came out. So many strategy games too, it was like paradise for a gamer like me. The Amiga added better graphics and real music to many titles. And they just kept coming for the next decade. This is where I almost get to the point... (skipping a list featuring literally a decade and hundreds of Amiga games here) Some of the newer PC games in the late 1990’s looked interesting and I could run them on a PC Emulator. One title in particular stunned with its atmosphere (because I'm a child of the Cold War and the end of the worlds was always present), the demo for a game called "Fallout" had me completely hooked. I bought the full game and... it didn't want to run on my PC emulator (even though the official demo did). Life as a PC gamer Building myself a PC, my first gaming experiences on it was Interplay’s Fallout. More games followed and Fallout together with the first Tomb Raider were my standout memories from the late 90's. Then I ran into a game from the now established Black Isle Studio called Baldurs Gate 2 (yes, I missed the first one) and I spent the next 12 months, day and night playing the heck out of that game, to the detriment of the rest of my life pretty much. Fallout 2 happened, I ended up buying Baldurs Gate 1 too, completing it a few times, nothing like the time I invested in BG2 though. Still, I took note of the name Bioware as well as Black Isle. That thing called Obsidian I was active on the internet too at the time, but I had little interest in this thing called "Forums" (some newfangled sofware that was probably going to die out in a year or two, so why bother?). Usenet was where things happened and many discussion groups (especially the alt groups like alt.games.interplay) were completely unmoderated. Calling it the wild west is being nice to it. Usenet died the slow death of entropy and forums stayed. By the time I had convinced myself to join the Interplay forums, Interplay de facto folded. At least, it ceased to exist as the Interplay I knew. That's when I heard about this "successor company" called Obsidian Entertainment which had plans for opening up a forum. Still not the fastest tool in the shed, it took me a fortnight to sign up. Despite being somewhat of a troll at times and getting into fistfights at times, I ended up as a moderator. Much to my own surprise honestly. I suppose the thinking at the time was something along the lines of using a troll to catch a troll. The discussion subject at the time was "Project Delaware", resulting on all sorts of crazy speculations and wishful thinking (and doom saying). Knights of the Old Republic 2 arrived and... good game with awful ending is the best way I can summarize it. An understatement of course, as the ending was completely missing for various reason... Neverwinter Nights 2 followed and was slightly less buggy the Kotor2 had been, but not flawless. The DLC's however... Mask of the Betrayer in particular brings back fond memories of a game I might not otherwise remember. The Sequel Maker Obsidian was developing a reputation of making buggy sequels to Bioware games that were all 132% perfect... at least if you were to believe the most critical voices. Of course, there is a lot more to how such thing happen, but gamers are a weird bunch, often prone to tunnel vision and confirmation bias, congregating towards echo chambers. Especially when it comes to likes and dislikes of games. Fallout New Vegas managed the impossible, convince a lot of people that Obsidian could actually make great games, that weren't necessarily direct sequels to existing games. It is probably also the only Obsidian game I feel like coming back to again and again, despite it's age. I know Outer Worlds offers a lot corporate humour and a feeling of living in dystopia, but something about the post nuclear setting just strikes a nerve because of my age (growing up during the cold war, expecting the end of the world every day). Playing through scenarios where humanity survives said war feels good I suppose? Still here Obsidian is no longer known in the business as the "buggy sequel" maker, but as a world builder, story creator and the maker of interesting characters. Like Obsidian, I’m still here. Still enjoying video games 40+ years later, still having a preference for crpg's and turn based strategy games. There are many more Obsidian games I could mention (take a look at the forum!) and would have loved to spend time on, but those are the ones that stuck out for me... -Gorth

Teaser: First Community blog goes live tomorrow Life as a Gamer ...

Only until they are published

Hello trolls, friends, and denizens! I am fairly excited to share that our first three community blogs are in process and the first will be pushed on May 7th, and then the others will be published of each following month. I look forward to sharing such wisdom and insight that is courageously offered by our community members. If you have a musing you are considering, please PM me, as it is great to have a queue of posts lined up!

Admin has been working in the inner machination of the machine, so hopefully this is some of what you have noted @LadyCrimson

Thanks, LadyCrimson. I will pass this on @The Guildmaster via @SChin

Yes - that was indeed noted. Over 500+ new members to the community last week!

That would be more than fine! It is always great if it is connected with OBS but the reality is as OBS work broadens it will attract different experiences, so happy to find that balance. DM if you want to explore further

Hey y'all, Things should be back to normal: please let us know if you notice any sprats causing issues!

Hello everyone - there were some issues on the backend that may have affected the theme. I have let Admin know and will follow-up as soon as I hear back details.