Endrosz

I get that, and yes, probably a perfect version of Anachronox would be one with good combat. But it had enough "stuff" outside of combat (which you can't say about a lot of RPGs!) that if they were out of dev time and had to ship the game and couldn't rework/improve combat, then they should've at least reduced its frequency. Know your strengths and all that. I have played Anachronox only once for the exact same reason Humanoid explained. The mere thought of trudging through dozens of hours (not kidding) of bad combat...

Nonek, you just explained my main motto as a creator. It's from French writer Antoine de Saint-Exupéry, writer of the Little Prince. "Il semble que la perfection soit atteinte non quand il n'y a plus rien à ajouter, mais quand il n'y a plus rien à retrancher." (Ch. III: L'Avion, p. 60) "Perfection is finally attained not when there is no longer anything to add, but when there is no longer anything to take away." Streamlining isn't a blasphemous word for me. It can improve a game immensely, or it can ruin it. I consider going from Master of Orion 1 to 2 an example of the former, and going from MoO 2 to 3 an example of the latter. Anachronox is a game where I constantly wished there was a "skip combat" button. The world, characters, the so-called world skills like Yammer and Throw Coin, the stories, the visuals, the humor, everything was great except the combat which was easy (even on the hardest difficulty) and boring and sloooow because of needlessly flashy and long animations. And it had a lot of combat.

I realize that few people on this board would care about this now, but an interesting sandbox/PvP MMO called Crowfall is in the final 24 hour of their Kickstarter campaign. I just found about it yesterday. They've made their goal of 850k, currently at 1.4M.

It's for raising awareness about the game, boosting initial sales, and helping people who are on the fence about buying it decide.

If you're apprehensive about the coming storm, best thing you can do is PUT YOUR SHADES ON.

Companions' stats reflect the narrative team's vision for that character. Aloth, as previewed during the PAX East stream, is a know-it-all, see-it-all type guy, which maps to high Perception and Intelligence. I have no idea why people expect companions to be min-maxed combat gods.

Hero Edition #1 seller on GOG Royal Edition #7 seller, higher than Champion Edition which is #10

When you ""buy"" a game, you buy a single license to use it. It's in the EULA that takes about 2 seconds to click in the box and then "Next" and you never read it. (Some EULAs only allow clicking Next if you scrolled to the bottom. They care so much! ) http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_detailpage&v=sglZGSwK6ow#t=43 From the standpoint of the seller, just because it's 'your girl' who wants to play it, she still needs a separate license if she want to play concurrently. If a company wants to run 10 copies of a software on different machines, they need to buy 10 licenses, usually in the form of a (heavily) discounted group license. Theoretically, those 10 copies could be used by the same person who is a superhuman and exists in multiple places at the same time, the license seller still won't care. If the license allows a single user to install copies on multiple devices (like a smartphone version and a desktop version), then that's specified in the license. It's not the norm. Using a single GOG license on two different devices isn't legal, GOG simply doesn't care about the breach. They care more about customer satisfaction, and if that includes some illegal convenience copies, whether for archivation or family members or even friends, then so be it. They see more business value in satisfiying the customer than using DRM to force the customer to buy another copy. It's a different business strategy, not a different legal status. Oh-so-many people are under the illusion that when you buy a game software license from GOG, you own the game. NO, YOU DON'T. Not any more than a Steam version, anyway. Here's an excerpt from the Deus Ex EULA from GOG, emphasis added by me: And again, if you want to own your games, play freeware, open source, CC licensed games. Here's one of my favorites as a physics teacher, Rigs of Rods, an open source vehicle (crash) simulator.

Pointless, just because some number is too small or a mechanic not relevant enough? That's a very narrow view of rating such a complex part of a RPG as a race. The game is totally playable even without racial traits present. Godlike have unique lore, unique looks, unique portraits (and some of those really cool!) and probably some reactivity in the world. So what if their racial traits suck? Try to enjoy the remaining 99.98% of the game, mate. Or -- gasp! -- try to play a race/culture/class for reasons other than a bonus to something. You might find it fun. It seems that people are misled by the label "godlike", expecting superhumans. The label implies that they have the "imprint" of a certain god in their existence, most visible in their looks, not that they are superhuman. That's a subtle change from DnD 3ed planetouched, who are superhuman, and have an appropriate level adjustment (ECL +1 for tiefling and aasimar) for those bonuses.

Recently, a team of modders released the 1.00 version of System Shock Infinite, improving and expanding the already amazing System Shock 2 in various ways. It's like the content mods for Kotor 2, Vampire: TM, and various other games. Here's the feature list: ALSO, there is a Cyberpunk Sale on Steam until March 20th, which has System Shock 2 off 75%, for a measly 2.5 dollars. Now is a really good time to either get into or revisit one the best games of all time. If you prefer DRM-free, GOG has it, though not on sale currently. If you don't like the additional stuff from the mod (some of the changes are quite radical), just grab a hi-res/wide-screen support mod. (I skimmed through the user reviews, and I was very pleased that no small number of people who played BioShock first went back and played the precursor SS2, and now they say it's better and their new favorite. That's right, son, learn to respect your elder games.)

I'm neutral about a respec, but I can offer a proper ingame explanation for those who want it: Soul Modifier/Eraser animancy device, ancient Engwithan gizmo. It's located in one of the most difficult areas, is introduced by a side quest, all well and done.

I second the idea of Talents for armor. That way you can "dress up" the base numbers more without changing them, and support certain playstyle+armor type combos. There should be about 2-3 Talents per armor type, supporting different playstyles/character concepts. You wouldn't take all of those, just the one that fits best.

True that. Yay, it's like in the Infinity Engine games! The difference is that if you used heavy armor-capable characters in a ranged role (archer fighter, caster priest), you would still put them in plate in the IE, because there was no drawback in doing so.

You'll be surprised then, I reckon. This is their system, no license holder's lash present, and Sawyer is more than willing to shake things up if he sees a good reason. He will simply continue to do what he did during the beta. There is now a launch hiatus in balancing/reworking, after that, it's back to business.

Why wasn't there any official heads-up for this AMA?... Cool stuff otherwise.

I won an invite to the Skyforge Closed Beta some time back. Obsidian is doing the English localization and also involved in narrative design, so there's that extra curiosity. If you want to know what really saved Obsidian'ass after the PoE KS, look no further than the my.com client: Those two contracts. (I don't anything about World of Speed, other than the title rips off TWO popular franchises at the same time. The balls!) I don't want to write about Skyforge, it's an MMO, 'nuff said. But here's an imgur album capturing a few hours of playtime. Start browsing at the end, because the order was reversed when I put them into the album. PS: Before the CBT rolled in, I played Master of Orion 2, and now that I'm finished with Skyforge, Sid Meier's Alpha Centauri is next. I was really in need of some 4X turn-based goodness, action games worn me out lately. I've never played with the Alien Crossfire expansion, I just realized after installing, so I have cool new factions and gameplay to look forward to.

"Dwarves in Seven Dragon Saga = Volourn has pledged 200", hm? This is the most geeky KS pitch I've ever seen. They start right away by showing a pure class basement dweller now in his 40s talking about RPGs the second the video starts, and then continue in the same trend. They scored bonus points with me with an original Guild Wars box on premier display in Klein's shots. As a long-time GB fan (see my signature for a Let's Play), I have no choice, I must pledge to these guys. I remember enjoying the intro/menu music in Pool of Radiance so much that most of the team member names burned into my mind by repeated watching of the team credit screen. It was very strange when I first saw David Shelley on Matt Chat. My teen heroes actually have faces and can talk?

It's interesting how adept Feargus is at saying "**** publishers for screwing us over and then downrating us for the layoffs caused like it's our fault" euphemistically. He's buzzing around it like a moth around a lamplight, but never actually getting there. Obsidian still needs good relationships with publishers, they managed to stay mid-sized after the 2012 layoffs, so it's noticeable how carefully he words his opinions -- contrast this with how Brian Fargo does it, who forwent** the traditional funding model, and openly badmouths publishers. On a related note, I'm curious if Fargo'll ever regret doing so; burning bridges in business is a real thing. I kind of understand why Feargus's the CEO among the owner-founders of Obsidian, he's charismatic and diplomatic and fast-thinking and business-savy. Great guy, it's clear that the employees like and respect him. You can't say that about a lot of companies... ** This is the first I've seen or used this word. I checked in Merriam-Webster whether forgo's simple past form is what I think it is. You learn something new every day!

The damage is so high on the stronger mobs it makes DT a pointless investment. If the average damage I receive is 10, then it's worth to don an armor which gives a DT of 4. If the average damage I receive is 30, then wearing that DT 4 armor is rather pointless, you should just go for full offense by not reducing your action speed via armor, and try to CC the enemy instead of relying on armor. Per-hit damage is too high, that goes both for character damage incl. spells and monster damage.

There is a guaranteed 20% damage that DT cannot reduce. The system is fine, it can deliver the different outcomes that people expect from combat, it just needs tweaking. I agree that general per-hit damage is high and combat is over too fast and that makes defense not so great except on tanky characters. It is known.

This is even better than I expected. The documentary is the only extra I bought beyond the KS pledge, so I'm glad it's money well spent.

There's the issue of "going gold". The version they're putting on the discs in the game boxes is already locked down by my guess. In this final stretch, it's nothing but bug fixing and polishing for the Day 1 patch. It would be an insane risk to do a major version middleware upgrade at this point -- probably leading to another "Bugsidian!" round in the gaming press, and with justification.

Icy has a new gameplay video out showcasing survival mechanics; they're 200% funded. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KoIbvP8v8EM

This week in science+video game news, a project of University of Pittsburgh/DARPA: A paralyzed woman flew an F-35 fighter jet in a simulator — using only her mind

I'm going to poll beta-veteran people about what the weakest classes, weapons, talents, whatever are, and beat the game in Path of the Damned with those. Then after I'm finished, and new balance patches are out, do the same with Ironman added.