Gromnir

can you linky the nix'd top-down remark as we see no mention at the bio site... or elsewheres. HA! Good Fun!

Just to be fair, the one saying that was the same guy who talked about Xbox360 being the lead platform, something Bioware's developers have denied on their boards. So, take it with a grain of salt. our trust in bio is limited, but am not gonna believe that top-down view is being removed unless we sees some biowarian confirmation. doing so would alienate a significant % o' pc gamers. da2 seems to be excessive streamlined, perhaps in an attempt to meet an aggressive release deadline, but we still cannot accept that the da2 developers would sacrifice the overhead perspective. HA! Good Fun!

the game were successful, but were the origins. bg were a successful game, but the biowarians changed many things 'cause o' overwhelming complaints and perceived feedback. we never saw no payoff for the extravagance o' the origins, but we does also like the more ambiguous bhallspawn and grey warden protagonists. developers not gotta add origins to keep a protagonist vague. however, we didn't see much complaint 'bout the origins. sure, there were some folks who, having played multiple times, observed that origins had little impact and changed very little in the da:o gameplay experience. nevertheless, we never observed any kinda fan fallout regarding origins. regardless, bio ain't doing origins in da2. why? whim? doubtful. the obvious reasons we can come up with for abandoning origins so soon after da:o is cost and player preference. if bio data gathering showed clear that folks much preferred ReavnSheps to origins (in spite o' what we were seeing on their boards,) then the origins abandonment would make sense particularly if such origins were prohibitive expensive to implement... more zots. am not seeing a "The Origins as an Experiment" kinda thing from bio. is too expensive to experiment that way, and even if it were a one-shot feature, why would bioware abandon if it were successful? am recalling that biowarians were mildly surprised by the overwhelming approval regarding the bg2 romances. Gromnir loathed such stuff, but the fans liked and bioware is noting if not reactive. romances quickly became a staple o' the bio crpg experience. HA! Good Fun!

... am not thinking that you meant what you said. how the heck can a "narrative shift" have an "always"? perhaps you suggest that the narrative focus were always directed 'pon the protagonist/pc... but that ain't what the quoted material is saying. *shrug* bio, sadly, appears to be returning to the Revan/Shep kinda protagonist... a far more defined protagonist than were available to players in da:o or the bg games. am kinda sad that we were correct 'bout the waste and impotence o' the origins. if origins had been more successful, and more capable o' producing differentiated storytelling, then perhaps bio would not have abandoned so quick. 'course the "narrative shift" stuff could all be more bio bs. this game gots a relative short development cycle, and the move towards full vo no doubt necessitated some changes. writing dialogue for Hawke, a human protagonist with defined qualities, makes the writer's task much less onerous... and by utilizing the dialog wheel, bio can save significant vo resources as well. this Hawke stuff may simply be a time/resource saving measure that is getting sold as a boon to the player. HA! Good Fun!

So tell me Vol, where exactly were you when I was playing Dragon Age? Because in those three cases the first time I played I almost lost my party (and did totally in the fourth case) and I don't remember you being there. But thanks for the compliment on my gaming skills (even if you overestimate them)! there were a number o' threads on bio's da boards that observed the relative difficulty o' attempting redcliff as a first option post lothering. vol is being vol. the deep roads were probable the toughest challenge for a beginning player, but redcliff weren't far behind on the frustration-meter as expressed by posters at bio. the battles in redcliff tended to be loooooooong, and given the fact that many players had only morrigan (and probable little or no lyrium potions) as a non-healing spellcaster, there were far less margin for error than the elf or mage portions o' the game... you were not able to inch towards daylight. also, am wondering what kinda sick joke were the flaming oil. the undead would run through the fire quickly, being burned for minimal damage, but apparently our defenders liked to camp out and enjoy the flames. HA! Good Fun! ps the dialogue wheel... sucks. have 5 v. 3 emotes not make much difference when you still only gots 2 genuine vo responses. is developer sleight-o'-hand.

vol should takes a quick quiz: is a statement more or less credible if the author includes "LOL" four or more times in one line o' text? vol played the watered-down console version... and we suspect he played on a less difficult level than Gromnir. consoleized version sends smaller version o' mobs, and redcliff difficulty is linked to extreme long mob-laden battles, potentially with the aid o' only 1 mage who may (or may not) have access to a single healing spell... and possibly 0 lyrium potions. 'course vol is just repeating the same tired nonsense at this point, and we ain't particularly feeling likes following his lead. 'course, with respec, or as a mage pc, then the situation is considerably different... and am also assuming that the player ain't a nutter. HA! Good Fun!

gets a little more clear-cut (morally) if you played a dwarf noble origin. as for redcliff, the game developers sends you some pretty strong signals that redcliff is your best starting point following lothering. al make a couple comments 'bout how you should start in redcliff that would seem to be the typical crpg blunt force trauma method for guiding a character to the optimal destination. the only reason Gromnir went to the mage tower first is 'cause previous to playing the game we had read at the bio site that wynne were a spirit healer, and we assumed she would be available at the mage tower. ... having played the game multiple times, we wonders why a developer would want a player to attempt redcliff first. am given to understand that the redcliff battles is watered-down on the console, but am still dubious 'bout the choice o' redcliff being first even for the console folks. HA! Good Fun!

Identity confirmed? I'm with Thorton_AP here, she looks like someone out of Conan or Red Sonja. she vague reminds Gromnir o' mellisan (sp?) from tob, but if those inexplicable armoured boots gots high heels as in the concept art... HA! Good Fun!

I've often wondered why huge areas are created but only bits of them fleshed out, rather than a smaller area but with a higher degree of depth. EPIC rare happens entirely in the village of Hob or the town o' Swert. you need scope for epic, so regardless o' whether you use all spots on a map, you need a map that can support an epic clash o' persons and armies... 'specially if you envision multiple sequels. no doubt it is better to ere on the side o' caution and does too much map rather than too little... can always open up the "Here There Be Dragons" edges o' the map later. HA! Good Fun!

am telling you folks, custody battles often makes everybody involved looks crazy. you couldn't pay us enough money to do domestic/family law... and we weren't kidding when we said that the lawyers most likely to be keeping a gun in their desk drawer is the folks dealing with custody crap. assume that everybody is lying and you probable is much closer to the truth. lie, cheat, steal, assault, kill... the laundry list o' evil and loathsome deeds committed ostensibly in the name o' "love" for one's children is extensive and horrifying. to watch such stuff is the sorta thing to makes you lose your faith in humanity. the real victim is the child. HA! Good Fun!

While talking we are talking about Mel's weird antics followed by a discussion as to why actor's behave kooky. Now you bring to the board that most of the actors you know were a little damaged, so whether you meant it or not you are associating your view on actors as damaged with the cause for all this Hollywood nonsense. regardless o' how you see it, the actual statements made are not stereotyping... not in the least. there were no generalizing of a whole based on experience with a few. walsh and Gromnir simply imparted our experiences with a few. Gromnir, for one, never hypothesized the "why" actors is kookie as you suggest. disagree with us if you will, but there is no need to mischaracterize our statements to fit your assumptions and conclusions. HA! Good Fun!

the knee-jerk demand by publishers for multiplayer and rt hobbled many a good game. 'course, am also gonna concede that given the length o' some fo:t missions, to remain in tb mode for the entire game would force players to endure an excess o' the "soul numbing" quality o' fo tb combat. fergie is the guy who once observed that even the best tb combats could become soul numbing, particularly as such combats dragged on interminably. toee actually made some very nice improvements to traditional squad-based tb combat. is too bad so many other aspects o' that game and its development were busted... coulda' possibly helped resurrect tb combat in crpgs. HA! Good Fun!

how do you know that he hasn't exploited underage girls following his flight from justice? as has been noted already, a very large % o' pedophiles were abused as children and suffer from serious and enduring traumas that does not disappear with prison time. the incidence o' recidivism is extreme high for pedophiles, even for those who voluntarily seek help. polanski, on the other hand, has shown little remorse since his flight from justice. the best we can say is that it is unlikely that polanski has abused any underage Californians since his escape. as for the civil case, am not seeing the relevance. sadly, victims o' sexual abuse commonly and desire anonymity. 'course it ain't victims who bring criminal charges... is the State. HA! Good Fun!

to be fair, much o' the broken mechanics were due to the fact that the developers were relative faithful to special. many broken aspects o' fo:t were more easily exploited in rt as 'posed to tb, but such issues could be avoided simply by avoiding rt. HA! Good Fun!

Good point. I lived in a house with actors and actresses many years ago, and they were ALL wankers. the actors and actresses we has met is, without exception... difficult. we has actual been friends with a few actors/actresses, but am gonna note that we thought they was all damaged or nutty to a lesser or greater degree. not wankers (some were very nice people) but all was kookie. HA! Good Fun! You are correct, of course. Damaged is a better description. But many of them hurt others by their damage. Like a backpack with a broken pole. You both are stereotyping a group of people because of the interests they share. There are other things to consider here, difference on generation, individual factors, not all actors can be "damaged" you and krez is misreading. Gromnir and walsh is not stereotyping a group o' people 'cause o' shared interest. Gromnir and walsh specific mentions the actors and actresses we personally met, without necessarily making judgment on all actors actresses. is maybe some misunderstanding regarding the meaning o' stereotype? perhaps you is assuming that we stereotype actresses and actors as a whole based on the board comments made, but you clear not have any evidence to support such a position. HA! Good Fun!

yes HA! Good Fun!

ausir, and fo fans, keep missing a very important point: strict adherence ain't necessarily a good thing. maintain spirit w/o crippling creativity is often a more meaningful approach/goal. the twisted fo fans, who react with over-the-top vulgarity and a nutty preoccupation with their personal notions o' canon is, wacked. we referenced the nutter who complained 'bout the basalisk war droid on the kotor boards? the nutter were Right from a canon pov... the war droid obsidian chose did not match previous depictions. obsidian made a Better version, and lucas approved. unfortunately for the makers o' fo:t, they found out too late that success would only have come with slavish devotion to the dogma o' cain. fo:t were actual a pretty good game (first 2/3rds at least) but fo fans helped kill in spite o' the fact that taylor, the original fo lead, didn't have no real problems with the changes... not til after the game were released and the fo fans did what fo fans is expected to do. *chuckle* but bethesda shows up and the caininites learn that a developer trying to make a fo game with mass appeal can ignore the fo bible and the original fo fans and still be ridiculous successful. actuall, we mispoke. the fo fans didn't learn nothing from the fo3 experience. HA! Good Fun!

I'm not saying he was limited to tech on FO, but I'm saying that his role on FOT was limited (just like the role of Bethesda's producers is on FNV - they have input, but they're not directly working on the game). I'm far from dismissing is work on FO1. I'm not saying that he has diminished capacity to speak on the spirit of Fallout, far from it. I'm saying that he was not responsible for the departures from the said spirit in FOT as much as you imply, since he was not directly involved in the creation of the game in most of its aspects, and his role was mostly supervisory. ... a supervisory role is pretty darn significant.... just ask folks who has had to work on lucasarts games. also, as already noted, taylor's pre-release comments (some of which is still archived at nma) did not suggest a tangential or limited role... and he clear never expressed any serious concerns 'bout the direction o' the game. heck, his immediate post release comments were in defense o' the game. *shrug* and personally, we kinda liked the look o' the updated power armour. the entire robot section o' the game sucked, but the armour were hardly worth flaming. HA! Good Fun!

fair enough regarding josh post chrisA departure. nevertheless, such an observation does not diminish the initial point that you implied that taylor's knowledge and opinions were more easily dismissed 'cause he were limited to tech on fo. taylor carried same job description on fo as did josh regarding vb... post chrisA departure, and regardless, the notion that you would even suggest that a developer o' the original fo games would have diminished capacity to speak to the spirit o' fo is unfortunate and misguided. btw, we saw comments from taylor (multiple places... including nma.) he sure didn't sound as dismissive or unrelated as you would paint him. gonna try and blame publisher arm twisting or something similar. perhaps thorton has a point, but am not certain that a sorta internet napoleon complex is enough to explain. HA! Good Fun!

heck no. sw fans is wacky... but we were referencing games specific. "the hardcore fo community is, in our experience, one-o'-a-kind. no fans o' a game franchise is more inexplicably proprietary... no game fans we know has a similar sense o' entitlement. " there has been far more bad sw games than good, but sw fans not react to games with near the nuttiness and vitriol as does fo fans. is also worth noting the sheer number o' sw fans compared to fo fans. the existence o' sw crazies is expected given the reality that hardcore sw fans probable number in the millions. thus, the fact that fo produces a greater number o' game zealots than does sw is... odd. HA! Good Fun!

oh come now, Gromnir has witnessed game developments involving both star wars and star trek. is nowhere near the frenzy we seen from fo fans. is maybe one or two freaks showing up on the kotor and kotor 2 boards (some guy offended by obsidian implementation o' the basilisk war droid were amusing) but such folks were nowhere near as vulgar and irate as were fo fans regarding mere announcement o' fo:bos and fo3. and your comments 'bout taylor is sorta silly. taylor were lead designer on fo and had significant input on fo:t. you thinks the average fan had more understanding o' the Spirit o' fallout than did a developer who worked on the project? josh, if our recollection were accurate, were pretty much limited to technical aspects o' combat mechanics for VB. no doubt josh input regarding VB is easily dismissed and surely less enlightened and educated than feedback from the nma and codexian hive mind. HA! Good Fun!

Dear god.../hug/ hahaha! Well I knew the job was dangerous when I volunteered for it. But my that was...a very different weekend. Still didn't really justify some of the stuff people did IMO - angry over the announcement or not. It did answer the age old question of how quickly users could post animated gifs of FOBOS producer Chuck Cuevas having horrible things happen to him, though. the hardcore fo community is, in our experience, one-o'-a-kind. no fans o' a game franchise is more inexplicably proprietary... no game fans we know has a similar sense o' entitlement. bg fans were disappointed by the announcement o' dark alliance. dark alliance ii announcement may have been received even more poorly, but the reactions weren't anything likes fo fan reactions to fobos. how many horrible d&d games has been made? didn't see the d&d fans (who has been 'round much longer and in greater numbers than fo fans) rise up en masse to complain every time a new d&d fighting game were announced. am also remembering how the fo fans reacted to the Violation of the Fallout Setting that were fallout: tactics. the fact that Chris Taylor, the lead designer o' the original fo were the guy violating the setting didn't blunt the attack by the faithful one bit. heck, am recalling the horrible trolling that went on by the Faithful when bethesda first opened up their fo3 boards. is... odd. HA! Good Fun!

vol, as is his norm, misunderstands. we do not thinks your opinion that the console version o' da is superior makes you unique. there is numbers o' folks who believe as does vol... just not for the same reasons. da:o on the xbox 360 (but less so on the ps) is more stable and less likely to suffer some o' the endemic performance issues claimed by many pc players. it is odd that you not mention the most common and most reasonable justification given for da console superiority. as for your actual reasonings... "I did'nt claim it was commercially successfull, and critics did love it." doesn't matter... unless you is suggesting that critical appeal w/o commercial success could/did resurrect the genre. not even the critics who loved fo ever equated their approval with the resurrection o' the genre... 'less you count the guys at nma and codex as critics o' note. HA! Good Fun!

*Nods* Never saw the acronym before. And VB? Wow, you dug deeply there. Was still just a lurker over there back then. My definition of grindy is just... lots of combat, plain and simple - but it's certainly not helped if they're repetitive aswell. I do well remember gathering money by sleeping in the area around... the city after Candlekeep. And selling the equipment. I think I just felt the DA: O grinding due to the fact that it was more recent and I had "already" started to get bored with combat. didn't have to dig deep. we has link saved 'cause we gots so tired o' having to correct fo fans regarding their estimations o' the commercial success o' their fave game. bri were a black isle developer, so folks were more likely to believe him than Gromnir. and is not that fo were unsuccessful, but there is a very good reason why black isle and interplay kept trying to squeeze more blood out of the iwd franchise as 'posed to developing fo3. iwd were a better seller and a far less costly game to develop and publish than were the fo games. fo were loved, but it didn't resurrect anything. and vol... well, vol is being vol. inventory, camera, resolution and controller issues aside... *shrug* am having a hard time believing vol played da on the pc, but if he did, it is showing just how... unique is vol. HA! Good Fun!