mcmanusaur

Ahh. So it's just tilting it that would screw it up? I'm no graphics expert, but that's what I would assume. Tilting is definitely out of the question for isometric projection, and rotation is more of a question of the reference grid (the orientation of which is generally fixed to reduce the necessary number of sprites).

Right, but the second you rotate a camera, you've lost that very specific form of projection, correct? So, would the fixed nature of the camera not be a property of isometric projection? I'm sincerely asking. Rotating the camera doesn't inherently preclude isometric projection as far as I know; it disrupts the use of a grid to map objects (a fixed grid can only be viewed isometrically from four directions).

What about "Distillers of Nocturnity"? "Spillers of Discernity?". Oww... I think I just strained some ligaments with that reach. I'm fairly certain those aren't even words. Distillers... that's a good one; I'm slightly ashamed I didn't think of it.

Somehow I forgot this thread existed or something. As another possible answer to the OP's question, it might amount to little more than an RTS with narrative and in a fantasy setting. Anyway, At least you're not as bad at conveying ideas (you're actually not at all) as I am at replying to posts in a timely manner... a thread is one possibility, though in reality there are already a lot of threads where this issue is discussed (even if it's not the OP's intended topic, usually thanks to me). It depends on what you consider direction; I personally find plenty of potential direction and sufficient motivations to do things simply operating under the basis of my own psychology and within the world that the game presents. To me (at least on a hypothetical level, outside of which my point isn't all that relevant) what separates linear and non-linear games is not that one gives the player motivation and direction and the other doesn't; what separates them is that one does so in a metagame fashion (and that includes when there is an in-game reason as a post-hoc justification for a metagame-enforced linearity) and the other does so otherwise. I don't have any particular reason to feel that your metaphor is a straw-man argument, so it would be interesting to see you expound upon it (maybe then I would decide that you are doing so). I have a hard time envisioning a world where no stimulus exists; that's like there might as well be no world existing at all, which isn't what nonlinear games are about in my experience. In addition, I don't define quality (i.e., logical, rational) roleplaying as "linear"; I guess at the end of the day we're just using completely different definitions of the word, and there's little to it beyond that. For me, complete nonlinearity isn't about 100% agency (in fact I would hate that, which is sort of a funny notion I suppose); it's about setting the game's system loose to create its own emergent narrative without outside (i.e. metagame) interference.

BS. Strategy games without a fixed view are a pain in the ass. The same applies in RPGs. If i'm spending more time fighting the camera than the enemies something isn't right. For strategy games perhaps, but we're not talking about strategy games here, and the very fact that someone's argument (with which many people apparently agree) would hinge on the assumption "because it applies to strategy games, it also applies to RPGs" makes me all the more dejected about the genre's future (but it's not worth getting into that can of worms)...

Because isometric view just isn't a particularly good option over first-person perspective for action RPGs (TES), and a free-moving third-person camera for "tactical" party-based RPGs (NWN, KOTOR), if you can afford either of those. Sorry, but that's the simple truth. (not that I won't enjoy PE having an isometric view)

"Killers of Modernity" sounds like a hipster band. Could be, but I was thinking punk.

I think we all can probably agree that "Pillars of Eternity" is preferable to "Millers of Paternity", "Thrillers of Maternity", "Grillers of Fraternity", and "Killers of Modernity", so I think on the whole Obsidian is doing a good job with the name, all things considered.

Not bad, I can certainly envision "Pillars of Eternity" as a marketable franchise name for a series. At the very least, I like it more than the names of any of the games that inspired PE...

All this mention of "souls" just has me thinking about soul music, and I'm not sure if that mental image is very conducive to my roleplaying...

@Pipster If a plot "without direction" isn't a plot, why is it called one? Consider the most prototypical and ubiquitous plot of all: life. Unless you're religious (I tend to assume that most people on this forum aren't), there's no magic hand moving everything around "because story". Even so, the various "systems" that comprise the life experience interact dynamically to produce the plot development that other storytelling sources can only imitate. No, video games are never going to possess systems as rich as those that make up life experience, but I think the point still stands; nonlinear "emergent narrative" is no less compelling than predetermined linear narrative, simply by virtue of being nonlinear. Also, I think you make a mistake in equating stimulus with impetus, and in assuming that a hypothetically 100% nonlinear game wouldn't present any sort of stimulus. The difference here is that nonlinear media is brave enough to let the content speak for itself, knowing that the audience will become invested in it in some personally unique way, rather than doing what is essentially beginning with "assuming X applies to you and your experience (if not, you're out of luck), it follows that Y". Presenting a player with potential reasons for investing themselves in a story doesn't make it linear; failing to include players who have different reasons does. There is an obvious question of resource cost and practicality with this line of thinking, but my point is simply that theoretically nonlinearity storytelling is not inferior to linear narrative in any way.

Maybe this is true for most video games up to this point, but I like to think we will eventually get to a point when we will embrace the true potential of the medium as something beyond films with token interactive elements and carefully-allocated challenges. Narrative nonlinearity is a natural progression of precisely what separates video games from other media. No doubt the counter-argument will be something along the lines of "there is a sweet spot for the amount of interactivity/linearity", but I reject that. There is no such thing as too much nonlinearity; there is only poorly executed nonlinearity, just as there is poorly executed linearity. That said, Project Eternity in particular is unlikely to push that boundary, which is 100% okay given its intended purpose.

This reminds me of that thread that got locked...

Since when was character progression (i.e. XP) necessarily tied to player skill level in RPG's? If you're "better at the game", that's its own advantage and you don't need XP bonuses on top of that... It's true that the non-combat aspects of Project Eternity probably won't be as complex as the combat system (and for me that's too bad), but that's no reason to further devalue them.

Project Eternity MMO confirmed.

I agree, and there's always the possibility of simply having less loot (that doesn't equal less objects in-game, just less combat/magical equipment). I've personally never bothered making multiple loot-hauling trips, but I'm disadvantaging myself by not doing that (or so I hear). There wasn't anything witty to that part; I was just clarifying what I believe my suggestion would achieve while continuing with the tongue-in-cheek style.

I think that however you look at it, there were some features of IE games that incentivized "degenerate play" or whatever you want to call it, and- not to imply that what Gifted1 mentions is necessarily among those- it's good that Obsidian is acknowledging that. I do think that many of the aforementioned design decisions are quite on the side of minutiae (something which old-school RPG players seem quite inclined to obsess over), however. Fixed! I don't really get your point. It would serve the purpose of rewarding the player. Giving the player XP every time he opens a door would also serve the purpose of rewarding the player; that's obviously not sufficient justification in and of itself.

If only the solution was as simple as limiting inventory space but having a "salvage" mechanic so that players could decompose extra loot into near-weightless crafting components (but not the terribly generic MMO kind, mind you)... If only there existed such a way we could restrict players from carrying around tons of weapons and armor without incentivizing them to make multiple trips for all the loot. Fixed!

Fixed that for you.

Not sure if trolling or just incredibly derpy.

Well, if you successfully sneak past an enemy and get experience for that, you probably shouldn't be able to go back and kill them for more experience, and "objective" experience solves that issue pretty nicely.

I would fear some kind of hyper-asymmetric design where NPC's treat mage characters like gods and other characters like peasants. And a world map that looks something like this:

While I do agree with the general gist that most RPGs' design unfortunately seems to assume that the player is more concerned with exploiting game mechanics rather than with role-playing (or otherwise exercising any form of self-control), I don't see how some of the examples you listed have anything to do with this phenomenon. If my understanding is correct, the "no kill XP" thing is more about ensuring that different play-styles are equally rewarded than it is about preventing people from grinding up their level. I would also think that unlimited inventory constitutes the opposite: relying on players to exhibit self-control and to not "game the system" more than necessary.

The Extra Credits Youtube show has recently done a series of videos on this topic, worth watching even though they're pretty basic. When it comes to limitations, I heavily prefer non-arbitrary restrictions in which you are free to experience the negative consequences of any relevant course of action rather than being prevented from taking that course in the first place. For instance, in Europa Universalis' current state it's impossible to conquer more than a couple provinces from a single war, regardless of how one-sided the war is; instead, the game should model the reasons why you might not want to take on so much land so quickly (and to some extent it already does, making this arbitrary limit all the more baffling). You could likewise argue that the player should be able to experience the consequences of committing evil acts rather than being prohibited from performing such acts, but I think you can make the case that certain things are irrelevant enough that they don't need to be simulated. As a general point, I think that too many designers focus exclusively on "rewarding" the player, and- while that's definitely important- it's a big mistake to ignore the behavioral conditioning value of "punishments"; without punishments it's very difficult to dissuade players from undesired behaviors, and they'll just be left wondering "what could have been". The "punishments" don't even have to be that punishing to achieve this most of the time, just as extrinsic "rewards" need not be so rewarding if the core experience is fun. The most important thing is giving interesting and meaningful feedback that motivates the player to align his or her goals with those accommodated by the game's design, and many RPG's seem to suffer from assuming that those goals are aligned from the start. However, the problem with this approach is of course that with every system of consequences you program, you are widening the scope of the game's simulation, which drains development resources. In my experience though, even the simplest feedback can be sufficient (such as a single perhaps-humorous line to describe an irrelevant object that the player attempts to interact with), as long as it provides an in-world explanation (i.e. more so than Skyrim's "you cannot go this way"). I myself love "wide" games, but it does seem that there are a lot of people who enjoy more "narrow" (not necessarily deeper in my opinion) games.

Honestly, I think that blimp-to-blimp combat is something that far too many cRPG's overlook.