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Mercer

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Everything posted by Mercer

  1. I have to reply to this one before I get started cause this is like a list of reasons not to ever let crpg designers touch DnD materials disguised as reasons too. I couldn't let the irony pass me by. Well I'm very happy to see that most of the issues that I wanted to bring up were brought up. I've really enjoyed reading everyone's opinions, so a big THANK YOU to all! Sorry if this disappoints anyone, but after spending about 40 minutes writing what I thought and citing support for my point of view, I ended up with something that read like "101 reasons why most of the games that most of the obsidian team has made are crap." Needless to say, I did not feel this was an appropriate place for a slam session on designing with DnD. Thanks so much guys for hosting these forums! You really have done some great work and I look forward to seeing what you do next. "Free your minds" of the creativity trap that is DnD! Give your GM a copy of the late 70's edition of the Champions HERO system, and feast on a rational that can truly help you make better games. You can do anything!! Make something great! *Is dragged away like a revolutionary calling his government to greater heights*
  2. I promised I'd start it even though I don't have time to write about it right now. I'll be back to elaborate soon if you guys don't get started without me.
  3. Thanks for the good advice everyone! Maybe I can find a QA job someday worth taking. Hard to convice people who don't know you that you can help them make thier game so much better that it would be a great deal for them to pay you 50 a year though. Time to dust off the old WC3 maps and see if I can turn them into something really spectacular I guess. I'd rather chew glass than work within the confines of DnD,and NW is a really clunky, dirty editor anyway. I think putting a few 100 more hours into the NW editor would have saved map devs millions of hours around the world. I thought it was really cool until I played with the WC3 FT one, and I just asked myself "were they tring to make it as diffucult as possible?" But then I also haven't updated it in over a year so...*rambles on for a while and then goes and makes a cool mod*
  4. I'd like to ask if any of you guys have some advice for those of us who are already in the professional world, have a family, and are trying to break into the industry. I think I would be one of the best there is at QA (and have done quite a bit informally), but I have yet to hear of a QA job that I can afford to take, and even if I could feed my family on it, it seems like getting a job in QA is all about who you know. I already have a degree in Int Business (and I'm not going back to get another one, and besides I can't think of a degree that demands more ficticous technical writing...uh, I mean technical AND ficticous writing). I took a job in Japan to polish my Japanese and hopefully be able to break into the industry through localization. But what I'm really good at, and what I really enjoy, is QA, design and production management, so why do I want to waste my time translating right? I feel kind of like a nuisance asking you guys for advice on my specific position, but if any of you gurus can spare a couple minutes for my question I would be most grateful and maybe it can help some others in simular situations. Is localization still my best bet, or will it not get me any closer to the designer
  5. I think this neigh unto schizophrenic opinion (though I think an intelligent and well thought out one), is almost poetic in illustrating the difficulty if finding the sweet spot for an rpg. As you say Schazzwozzer, that sweet spot is dependent on the game's focus, but I think in general we are discussing rpgs (though what exactly that is in video games today is certainly a subject of debate). And what I am saying to community is what you also feel: "I certainly wouldn't mind giving up some freedom in order to have a dialogue that is enjoyable and rich." The only change I would make is changing "freedom" to "illusionary freedom." I think we can cut a lot of fake freedom and improve the game without making much impact on real freedoms that the character has, and improve the depth and color of the story quite a bit.
  6. In response to ~Di: If VO doesn't add quality, why do cash strapped developers pay for it? and why do so many gamers want it? I also find it ironic that you take a cost vs. utility approach to try and say it doesn't necessarily when you figure in the cost, when you don't even know how much it costs in comparison to other inputs! When I read your refute of my argument (or more precisely a premise to my argument), all I see is a bunch of business no-brainers that don't even begin to support an argument that I am wrong to assume that (and let's be reasonable about this) generally speaking, VO adds quality to a game. MGS is Metal Gear Solid (my bad for assuming everyone knew, sorry). If you want to be a designer or even just want to be able to talk about design in an informed way, educate yourself on what you are missing man. Console games are the majority of quality games on the market. Go to any website or magazine that covers all platforms and you will see that the number of 4 star (or whatever they use) games for consoles games outnumber pc ones vastly. You sound like a true connoisseur of the beautiful art that is videogames. If so, you are missing out bigtime by not playing any console games!! Go buy yourself a PS2 and look up on gamespot for all the 8.5 and above games that interest you for the PS and PS2, and go play some. The older ones are dirt cheap and you will never have to buy an expansion, or download a patch, or wonder why your graphics card doesn't like a game. And don't forget to pick up a copy of Final Fantasy Tactics and Castlevania, Symphony of the Night. They are over ten years old, but I still pull them out sometimes. And by the way, this is the "Developer's Corner." We are here to throw around ideas on how to make games better and how to better make games. What good does it do us to throw our hands up to the invisible hand and take polls on what people want in our games? We are artists. If we were simple slaves to the dollar, and only cared about what upper management and market strategists say, Obsidian would not exist.
  7. no no no!!! You guys have it all wrong!! Story story story!!! Relationships, actions, reactions!! Throw away this inane system before it ruins every idea you ever come up with!!! DnD is.... actually I should make a new topic for this. Check for it soon. DnD and Videogames.
  8. Well Atreides, in theory I think it would be fun. In practice....write me a story, no, even just three connected scenes and make them that way, with a flow chart for alignment parameters. I'll bet my left hand that you will not be able to write something that is interesting and engaging and still generic enough to work with all those archetypes. You'll find that it will be painfully lackluster, and the longer the story gets the more it will scream for depth and the more you will be unable to give it to it.
  9. I think the most destructive thing is the culture that a religious institution creates within itself.
  10. I agree, and I think it is something to work towards, but I think it is a mistake to look at it in terms of alignment. I think that Looking at it in these terms, instead of what the character has actually done or said to specific people in a specific world, and categorizing characters this way, the DnD way, is largely the reason why we have what I see as failures in the system, and a lack of character in the execution. When we actually play DnD (or, heaven forbid, a different rpg) do we think of each other as generic alignments? or as complex characters with personal motivations?
  11. I know it looks long, but it really is worth reading. Trust me.
  12. It's not the reading that gets me; It's the...well, just read Aaron's post again. I really enjoy a good fantasy novel. It's simply that reading a PC RPG today has none of the same joys. To me, the interface is the biggest problem with "voice" in PC RPGs today, not whether or not there is VO work. And even if there was no VO in the Kain games they would still have a much better story than any PC RPG today. I think you would still hear the voices in your mind cause the lines are full of color and character. Character development is what makes a story interesting and engaging. And when the character/s are generic, the story is inescapably so. Great VO makes a story better, but it doesn
  13. All I can say is that I hope to personally prove you wrong someday, and I hope you don't miss it cause you were listening to mp3s .
  14. your "unless"es were actually an intregral part of my opinion. Glad to know you don't actually disagree with me By the way, your avatar rocks! I rest my case about how good it would be if NA talent wrote it. Trust me man, most of those converstations are actually very important from a Japanese perspective. Study Japanese for a while and even when you play games in English that are from Japan, they will make more sense. Stuff that still doesn't make sense, mark up to translation, lots of things just don't translate well. Most Japanese game writers are very very talented men...and yes, they are only men.
  15. Thanks for all the responses guys! and especially to Frank for taking the time to talk with us. Let me respond to some of the ideas that piqued my interest the most. from Aaron: Aaron, you sooo know my pain. This single thing keeps me from being able to enjoy NWN, ever playing it again, or from buying any expansions for it. And as much as I enjoy the game mechanics of the infinity engine, I can
  16. I'd like to start a discussion about "voice" in all it's literal and metaphorical meanings in videogames. What is the best form for characters to interact with the player and for the player to interact with them? What should we hear? What should we read? What should we choose? What should we just sit back and watch? Personally, I get sick of reading dull, directed at generic good/evil hero, character dialogue text. And I enjoy the generic good/evil "choice" of what I "say" even less. I prefer to have a choice over direction and decisions in general, and not have to read 3 boring lines for responses to everyone I have the misfortune to have to "talk" to. I find in my playing that story and dialogue, the joy of role-playing, are often swallowed up in a desire to let the player play whatever he or she wants. Playing whatever you want is great for a game, but when the game tries to be a great story too, as all rpgs should be, the story and interactions all loose their flare because the main character has no personality. Yes, let me play the main character, let me decide what he/she is, let me decide how he/she fights, but please, for the sake of the story; you decide WHO he/she is, and what their personality is, and let the dialogue be rich and fun and ALL voiced over. Let me look forward to talking to other characters by rewarding me with something entertaining, not punishing me with something tedious and making me dread it. What does everyone else out there think? I'm sure many see my point of view as too cinematic or not even an rpg at all, and I take it from the BG games that most of the Obsidian team does not agree with me. If that is the case, why? And what do you think the perfect way is?
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