Harry Easter

Thanks for your hard work! I took a look at it and it seems solid so far. I hope I will find people to play with .

Divinity: Original Sin 2. I hoped that it will be my new favorite game and now it is my new favorite game.

ELEX. Gothic with Sci-Fi and northern mythology. It's awesome!

Played through it. I thought that it would be my new favorite game and I was right. True, the third act was short, but the writing and story was still strong, so at least the third act didn't fall apart like in D:OS1. There are still some bugs tho' and I hope they can detect and fix them. Now I will rest, because those were 138 hours in one sitting on hard. I need a rest. And sleep :D. My hopes for the future of the game: - More quests in the third act, so it is at least as fleshed out as Fort Joy. - They could rebalance the last fight a bit. On paper it is better than the one in D:OS1, but it is so hard, I feel itcan't be done alone and

Didn't really get why they decided to nerf the Bone Spider. It costs 3 AP to cast and the thing has no magical armour. The incarnate is actually more useful. Also, the bone spider only lasts 4 turns, not enough time to do much of anything. Hmm, I found it quite useful. It does make a decent amount of damage and it can take it. I'm now in the last fourth of the game and the spider is still valuable companion against stronger voidvoken.

One sister started to play the game and is now fixed. The other installed it already. I'm gonna get them all for the big MP. It's fun, but it seems more stable at MP-Servers? Weird.

I've had it freeze for up to thirty seconds or so when reading crafting manuals- mouse was still responsive but no input worked. The 30s case was a manual with 26 recipes (!), so quite an extreme case. Otherwise there hasn't been any noticeable slowdown at all and no proper bugs, only journal ones. Good to know. I thought maybe it was my Notebook, but this is kind of a relief. Well, they are patching fast, so maybe we already get something next week.

@algorth So, you would have turned the story more into an investigative mystery, than a fight for power and they would never leave Kyros' services? Good read, but wouldn't that make the outcome of the story very linear? Ist that the point? @injurai So it would be again less than more on the story part? I also wasn't very fond of the player as a descendant of heaven and hell. It kind of robbed the games of the idea, that humans CAN overcome the demons, just by pure will, but at a high cost. It fitted the depressing atmosphere of the games better. Smaller post on this one: Drakensang: The River of Time This continuation of Drakensang did everything better. Better quests, livelier companions and it was way more lore-heavy than the first ... which was also it's problem in the end. If you didn't know anything about the world of Dere, you couldn't understand what the actual point of the big conspiracy was and the final fight felt really lacking. The story is otherwise a joyful adventureyarn so I would only rewrite the ending and the motivations of the bad guys. How? Turn the conspirators into cultists: The continent Aventuria has one iconic bad guy: the nameless god. His servants try to destroy order and overthrow the authorities. The mage Coldstone helps the Baron of Nadoret to garther an army and overthrow the ruler of the palinate of Kosh and secretly worships the nameless god. He wants to turn the campaign into a crusade of the nameless and kill and sacrifice as many people as he can, while weakening the middlerealm, where the game takes place. In thwarting this plan, the players would really acomplished something and it would fit, since we also explore a ruin, which was destroyed by other servants of the nameless god. Coldstone would also have a plan b, which is: Freeing the water dragon out of the temple of the river god: In a name called Drakensang, there should be a dragon to slay. Luckily it does, but the creature is more of an sidequest, as does the temple of the river god, which is build up as something at the beginning of the game, but then ... isn't. This is sad, because the atmosphere in this building is great and connecting this part of the game stronger with the mainquest, would pay of the build up better AND give us a better reason to fight a dragon, besides greed (we kill him fo the trophy and the treasure). In this case, the water dragon could his soul to the nameless god and his presence would curse the river for a long long time, so it has to be stopped (and a big dragon running amok can't be good for business). So yeah, my thoughts on River of time. Smaller and better game, but you could have raised the stakes just a little bit more . I really think it could also helped the game to seel more units.

Haha, have a nice time playing I wish everyone the same ... and I know what you meam @Gorgon. I always think "just a little" and then I played four hous again :D.

"Heavy risk, but the priiiiiiiize~" Honestly, that was a symptom of not having a black writer on staff. I kinda understood what Bioware was trying to do. They were trying to make kind of a Fabio style non-serious romance with Jacob, but it backfired and came off creepy and vaguely racist (the hypersexual big buff black man and his Mandingo BBC). Me and like three other people are probably the few that romanced Jacob as a serious relationship. There's actually a moment where fem!Shepard says something really sexual to Jacob (in like, their 2nd conversation ever) and he (and me) are like "whoa Shepard, keep it in your pants." And to make matters even worst, he cheats on Shepard and knocks up another woman in ME3. Again, had there been a black writer in the Bioware writer's room they would have told them that there's a harmful stereotype about black men and infidelity as well as black men supposedly cause a lot of unwanted pregnancies. Bioware -most likely- inadvertently enforced those harmful stereotypes due to their cultural ignorance. AKA I don't trust Bioware with black people anymore. That's interesting. Everytime I talked about Jacob with people, the words we used were "boring", but the stereotypes you describe are relatively unknown here in germany. Funny story though: we (my sisters and me) thought that Jacob good interesting after the break-up with Shepard and his family, because he finally had a life, besides being the counterpart to Mirandas(s) not so femme-fatalish ways.

Divinity: Original Sin 2, of course!

It's better. Way better. The best game they ever did. Trust me. Still, I would also like another Dragon Knight - Saga.

Okay, now I have the time to write about this one: Torment: Tides of Numenera Warning: I will spoiler this one and I assume that you played at least the first act. I don't think that Numenera is a bad game. It's an unfinished one and that's what it brokes it neck. You can really see where the budget was cut and my approach for the story to fit: - Cut out the sequence with the tombs and let the player crashland into the Bloom: The Bloom is the one weird region of Numenera, a big blob who can open portals to other world at random. The portals are a nice way to introduce weird locations and the game wouldn't really lose something, if we would go directly to the Bloom and learn to survive there. The Airship from Act 1 crashlanding there, would also be less contrived than a portal suddenly opening and getting us to the Bloom, so the story still works. The City of the first act and the Bloom are tightly connected, so why do unnecessary busy-work? - Make the eternal battle a vital part of the story: If you speak with NPC's a lot of them metion the ternal battle, the fight between the forces of the changing god and his cast-off children. It seems to be a very cool conflict, so why don't fight for one of the sides in the Bloom? The Blooom would also be fitting, since it is also a hungry blob, that feeds on the suffering and flesh of the people. Both leaders even count on soldiers losing their life. Why? - The Bloom is the basis of the economy: Like I said, it can open portals to other worlds, so troops could plunder other locations and since it is a big blob of flesh, I could imagine that the Bloom could be modelled as a big meat factory to feed millions of people of the tiers. It's bones are turned into fundaments for houses, it's skin good for clothes and it suffers. That's why it called the Sorrow. - The Sorrow is not the guardian of the tiers: It's an alien creature, that lives to ease the suffering of creatures and that's why the Bloom called us. It wants to destroy every trace of the changing god and their children so the Bloom will find rest. This focus on the Bloom would also rewrite the story from "What is one life worth" (which never fit, I think) to "does suffering for a greater good exist?“ or something like "Are you ready to make people suffer for ypur survival?" - The Changing God tries to help us: One of the better plot twists of the game was, that the main antagonist isn't the Changing God but a A.I. that THINKS that it is the Changing God. It corrupted the crusade of it's masters and just tries to become flesh and bone. Perfect flesh and bone. But what if the Changing God exists as a dead vegetable and wants to help him, so he may finally finde piece for himself? Not original yes, but it could help to deliver more informations about the true nature of the Specter and help to build up the twist better. It could also be a good setup for the old motive „creation that tries to surpass it's creator“ and mirror the Specter and the Last Castoff as beings, who both want to live, only that their methods are completely different. Maybe.

Huh, never thought about it like that, but yeah you're right. It was part of the game (also the mechanics) and a more organic decision, since you maybe have to live with her for the rest of your life. When I think about romances, I think about Aerie from BG2. She still works for me, because she isn't always fun. In fact, she is exhausting, since she is sad and depressed and depressed people are not always fun. But those quirks turn her into her own character and make the romance a bit more complex, than other BW-Romances, where there isn't much conflict anymore (besides telling Morrigan that she should stop looking at me so creepy, brrr). Personally I would like to play an RPG where the lovestory is the heart of it. Maybe an RPG, where both characters also depend mechanically on each other (not only that she uses the sword and he the bow, but maybe he can make healthy food and she makes wonderful mana cocgnac). It could work if the relationship would be ... work. There is more to romance than lust, flowers and fun.

Perk: Mocking - The sharp tongue of the socialte was always a double-edged sword. With Mocking she can attract the attention of her enemies, so they may attack her and not her companions. Hopefully her sword didn't get rusty. Okay now ... where is the Kickstartermoney for this :D?

This is good idea, also because you could make this playable. Different characters could be useful in every time period. For example: the weapons of the soldier are powerful in the middle ages, but she has to save her ammunition and to be protected by the more meele-savy Samurai. Maybe somebody could add a mechanic, were some characters get back home, but then you lose them forever? Your characters are useful, but if you love them, you let them go back and they never return. Pyre did this in an interesting way. The Aliens could also use different kind of technology, so there is enough varriety in combat. This is fun. I want this^^.

@Guard Dog Exactly! SoU did so much better, it's sad that it never got the recognition it deserved (at least I only hear that the story didn't feel "epic" enough for some people). And you are right, it is weird that Faeruns best and brightest get killed by a bunch of goblins ... although I never questioned that, when I was younger. It was something that just happened ... but you'e right. Hmm^^. @KaineParker Good points too! Myself I would change three details: - Turn Ellesime in the mainntagonist: She really hasn't a real role in the game, besides being part of Irenicus background, but on a closer look she would fit more in the themes of the series. She's immortal and technically a god, so why not make the tree ill and now she tries to safe it and her own immortality? We could show how a once benevolent ruler turns into a real beast, who doesn't want to lose her power and is willing to sacrifice hundred of others (mainly darkspawn) to achieve this goal. - Irenicus would still be her lover and the mainscientist behind the "Essence-stealing-project", but now he wants the power of Bhaal to stop her, because what she's doing is an affront against the gods and maybe he can safe his soul (and the other elves) when he brings her down. In the end he gives up, because his feelings for her are stronger than all the duty he ever felt. You don't even need to rewrite the stuff with him allying with the drow and other stuff. He's just that desperate. - Bodhi would have been one of the Ellesime clones (maybe even the first), who turned into a vampire and would thematically serve as a dark reflection of what Ellesime has become. Irenicus keeps her around, because he can't live in a world without Ellesime (yes, he's that obsessive and you can't tell me that it doesn't fit the character). And Throne of Bhaal would have been changed as follow: - Bhaal takes over: Thought long about it, but as predictable as it would've been, Bhaal should have been the last boss of the series. The games were about his plans and I don't know why he just didn't take over of Amelyssan. - Keep Balthasar, Yaga-Shura and the first Lady in, but replace Sendai and Abizigal with a fourth Bhaalspawn, who is presented as this uber-Spawn, that Yaga-Shura (who is just an ordinary Fire Giant) is serving. Could be a good decoy antagonist and a display of how powerful a Bhaalspawn can be in the end. @SonicMagic I'm sure you're just joking, but I like the idea of side-quests giving me informations about my maingoal. Could be working and a revengestory in a cruel wasteland is always a good motive.

Since we have now a few "What game would you like to see?" - topics I thought we could start this topic: There is a lot of talk about stories gamers don't like (biggest offender: "i was bored!"), but where there also any stories you would've liked to rewrite, just because they didn't live up to their full potential? If yes, why and how? Rules for this thread: - Name the game. - Write what problems the story had. - Write your suggestions. - Hopefully have fun writing them. - Profit. I will start with Dragon Age: Origins (and hope you've played this one). While not a bad game, the first Dragon Age bores me to death. The main reason is that the story gets really uninteresting after the origins, because I didn't played my origins character but a Grey Warden from that point on. Thing is: I never got a real idea what a Warden supposed to be. Sure, we got to know Duncan and Alistair, but the infos we got out of them were minimal at best (and let's be honest, Alistair isn't a credit to his order). So the connection to our order was mostly nonexisting and Ferelden really didn't live up to it's potential as a "barbaric" nation. So what could they have changed? Answer: Put the game in the northern nation of Andersfels. Why? - It's the homecountry of the Grey Wardens and their HQ could have been a nice hub. - The nation is very poor and it's king has only power in it's capital, which could have been a good explanation why the farmers depend on the Grey Wardens, with whom the King has some political tensions. - It's close to Tevinter and the Qunari, so the game could have introduced us to these nations, without stretching the plausability of the setting (I mean the mages came down to the south of Ferelden, just for a few slaves. You could have those cheaper, buddies^^). - Killing the king of Anderfels wouldn't have changed as much, as crowning the new King of Orzamar, because Anderfels is a very desolate country. - I could have an explanation why everyone is a Grey Warden and why they are immune to the poisonous blood of the Darkspawn, which was a thing ... at the beginning of the game. Okay, that's for the setting, how about the structure of the story? I would keep the "one adventure per location" - structure of the original, but would have burned down the smaller City after the halfpoint of the game, to raise the stakes. The players should feel a connection to the people living there, before I kill everyone. The role of the main-antagonist should also be divided between - The King of Anderfels (doesn't want to lose his crown and values the independence of his people) - The Grandmaster of the Grey Wardens (wants tighter controls on everything and turn the Grey Wardens in some kind of private army of the chantry and kill pagain traditions that might have survived the centuries). So I wouldn't change as much, just details to tighten up everything a bit and give the player more room to identify which the organisation he's supposed to be part of.

Simplicissimus by Grimmelshausen (Thirty-year war). It has it all: magic, War, surviving in a cruel world, philosophy, adventure, love, hate, strange creatures and a protagonist who always start at zero. Can't imagine a better book, that would be suited for a non-linear experience like video games.

Awesome. With Pillars we have kind of a historic setting, so I would like to see how Obsidian would far with Sci-Fi or Steampunk. Or Vampires, combined with Sci-Fi maybe .

Double Post, sorry.

Leap of Fate. This is fun and the short story segments are very well written.

Hurray. BTW: I remembered that the lead developer was the head of Nirval Interactive, which developed Heroes of Might and Magic V. That was a good game, so I',m more positive that this could be a good game.

2 was incredible. I've heard 3 is less so. It's still good and we can finally play it in MP.

But well written and it really makes clear how he writes, although I had to think about Kotor 2 and grin, when I read the part about "respecting the franchise" (although I think that Chris was hateful, he just looked at it from a different angle).