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Quetzalcoatl

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Everything posted by Quetzalcoatl

  1. Quetzalcoatl
    This has been explained already, but writing a separate romance path, and making that romance fit in with that character's other interactions and expressions, would cost a lot more resources. It's not simply a matter of adding a dialogue option to pursue a romance. PS:T didn't really have romances, at least not the way it's usually done in RPG's (repeatedly choosing dialogue options to build up 'romance points' to romance someone and ending up in a relationship with them, usually in the ending). The 'romance' with Annah was more about her plight as an orphaned and discriminated tiefling. So that leaves BG 2. Which undermines your point, since the romanceable characters in that game had far more content than the non-romanceable ones. And the pitch for this game was always to take various elements of all the Infinity Engine games as inspiration at Obsidian's own discretion.
  2. Quetzalcoatl
    I don't think it's a question of budget, at least not in Bioware's case. For reference, here are the writing guidelines for Baldur's Gate 2, which show a similar mindset: (http://www.gamasutra.com/view/feature/131493/baldurs_gate_ii_the_anatomy_of_a_.php?page=2): Of course, an RPG doesn't need to have well-designed dialogues to be a good RPG, and often less is more. But it is something Bioware obviously puts a lot of effort in, and I don't think they've ever done a particularly good job of it.
  3. Quetzalcoatl
    It's amazing how incompetent Bioware is at writing dialogue, despite being one of the longest lived RPG studio's. Why are they trying to pigeonhole everything into categories (Noble/Clever/Direct), and arbitrary categories at that? Why must there be three response options, and always three? There can be situations that call upon only two dialogue options, or maybe half a dozen. The fact that they had to add explanatory tooltips to dialogue choices is rather telling.
  4. Quetzalcoatl
    You're comparing an open-world RPG where the possibilities are endless (a non-hostile NPC could be a villain for instance) to Bioware's linear railroaded RPG. Besides, I would argue that Dragon Age 2 is much worse in that regard, despite the restrictions on player freedom. You spend most of the game killing mobs of random people around every streetcorner, being a mage doesn't prevent you from romancing a character who wants to kill all mages, etc. Gay characters = good. Characters whose sexuality fluctuates to always be attracted to the player = horrible.
  5. Quetzalcoatl
    Obsidian is not 'getting it only half right'. They simply have a different approach to characters than Bioware. You seem to prefer Bioware's approach, which is perfectly fine. Although your praise for the Dragon Age 2 companions being independent and not subservient to the player is pretty amusing considering most of them can be bedded regardless of the player character's gender or sexuality. And you can fill their romance meter by giving them gifts.
  6. Quetzalcoatl
    Of course, this is the first time they worked on a game where they didn't write the story.
  7. Quetzalcoatl
    How in the world does one conclude that since there's no romances then that means there will be less group interaction? That doesn't even qualify as pessimism. It's just a flat out complete red herring. Romances in video games usually do the complete opposite. they tend to LIMIT group interation, not add to it, since by definition, a romance is a series of personal interactions between TWO people, while Group Interaction thrives when there's more than 2 interacting. You're wrong. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xTw8hnPG2Kg
  8. Quetzalcoatl
    The funny thing is that Chris Avellone wrote Planescape: Torment, which was released in 1999 (i.e. a year before Baldur's Gate 2) and was perhaps the first cRPG that featured plenty of romance that was central to the plot. I'd argue that simplifying his comments on video game romance as 'immature and condescending' is pretty immature and condescending of you. I said comments on Love and Romance, I did not say video game romance. If you're gonna reply to someone then reply to what they actually said. His comments on 'love and romance' were obviously about video game romance.
  9. Quetzalcoatl
    The Dragon Age franchise has some of the worst video game armor design I've seen. It manages to look both completely generic and completely impractical and exaggerated. Take that helmet for example. Not only does it look terrible, but it opens up in sharp pointed ends that would cut into your neck.
  10. Quetzalcoatl
    That post was in reply to your post demanding that Obsidian use their own money to expand the scope of a niche game. That is a big risk, yes. All the major Kickstarter projects bank heavily on nostalgia and it still remains to be seen if they're commercially viable enough.
  11. Quetzalcoatl
    The funny thing is that Chris Avellone wrote Planescape: Torment, which was released in 1999 (i.e. a year before Baldur's Gate 2) and was perhaps the first cRPG that featured plenty of romance that was central to the plot. I'd argue that simplifying his comments on videogame romance as 'immature and condescending' is pretty immature and condescending of you.
  12. Quetzalcoatl
    They'll probably make the floor patterns more distinct when they do the 2d touchups. And I'm sure the cat form will look better in motion.
  13. Quetzalcoatl
    Are you by any chance the same guy who did the Tali sweat analysis?
  14. Quetzalcoatl
    Since the Kotor vs Kotor 2 comparison seems inevitable, I'll just leave this here:
  15. Quetzalcoatl
    I think Pillars of Eternity has a much higher chance of success than any of the other Kickstarted projects, and the steady stream of informative updates only confirms that. Sawyer, Cain and Avellone have been the leads of over half a dozen 2d isometric RPG's. Obsidian is also a sizable company with plenty of know-how and expertise, in contrast to the other Kickstarter devs, who are either indies that are just starting out or companies that develop games for iPhones (Harebrained Schemes, InXile, etc.).
  16. Quetzalcoatl
    I much prefer three-dimensional comic relief characters whose funniness stems naturally from their character (i.e. Nordom's identity crisis, Morte's guilt). I found Minsc to be painfully unfunny.
  17. Quetzalcoatl
    I hate to break it to you, but the Creation engine is just a slightly tweaked version of Gamebryo.
  18. Quetzalcoatl
    Playing evil tends to feel bat**** crazy because RPG's often railroad you into playing a good character who will save the world (BG 2, NWN2, DA:O, etc.). We know this won't be the case for PoE, where the main quest will be a more personal one. It's also a matter of writing quality obviously.
  19. Quetzalcoatl
    Why are you guys so hung up on Baldur's Gate? The Icewind Dale games and especially Torment (i.e. the games designed by people who went on to form Obsidian) had much better voice acting. And Obsidian has a track record of handling voice acting well.
  20. Quetzalcoatl
    If they offered romanceable waifu's at certain high prices, they'd stand to make a killing.
  21. Quetzalcoatl
    Papers, Please deserved to win in that category, I thought. The high praise for 'Gone Home' struck me as less to do with it being a good game and more to do with game journalists wanting to feel validated and being able to point to a game and say 'hey look, this game is tackling a mature subject, gaming has finally grown up!'. Not that these awards should be taken seriously in the first place.
  22. Quetzalcoatl
    Luckily the black crystal minerals mined from that island were preserved. I believe they're called 'obsidian'?
  23. Quetzalcoatl
    It wouldn't necessarily be tomorrow - they already deviated from the update schedule. It could even be... ...today.
  24. Quetzalcoatl
    Choke points aren't necessarily bad if what the player character is pursuing is a selfish and personal goal. From the information released so far, it sounds like Project Eternity will handle that better than DA:O and BG2 did: As for the origins, I think you misunderstood my point. I'm not arguing against dialogue responses or quests tailored for specific races/classes. The origins were opening segments that lasted for an hour or two and that attempted to give your character a fixed history. DA:O had like, what, 6 of these? These origins by their nature impose limitations. You couldn't start out as a human bum, you could only pick human noble or human mage.
  25. Quetzalcoatl
    I thought the observations the Stanley Parable made were incredibly banal, and painfully hamfisted to boot. Everybody who plays a game is aware they're playing in a limited simulation, that's hardly some shocking revelation. That doesn't mean there's no value in trying to give the player as much freedom as humanly possible while providing valid justifications for the unavoidable limitations. Errant Signal is a very shallow reviewer, I've found. He focuses mostly on AAA mainstream stuff under the pretense that it's the cutting edge of video game innovation (hint: it's not) and ignores everything outside of that sphere. The points he makes are not very cogent and don't delve particularly deep (like in this video ignoring that games are an abstraction out of necessity or not even questioning the existence and popularity of achievements and what they represent).
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