Gromnir

seems much harder to pull off, but it sounds great to Gromnir. am all for being able to choose an appropriate faction as part of gameplay and story development choice. little bit harder for Gromnir to envision writing appropriate compelling dialogues in josh's suggestion as you still seems to have a more fluid and dynamic story resolution process goings on, but benefits to gameplay might outweigh problems for story development. *shrug* regardless, change focus of development from trying to make a vague and indefinite protagonist more compelling, to creating multiple possible villains/factions seems like a good direction in which to be heading. protagonists is 0 sum, 'cause the more you develop, the more freedom you takes away from player. HA! Good Fun!

its only needing to be a real secret for the first 20 minutes of gameplay... after a player chooses an antagonist through his actions, then there ain't no need for keeping faceless... unless you want a sauron thing. if josh is thinking of a single villain that changes as the player changes, then so be it... but that seems far more difficult to achieve than what Gromnir suggests. run into that same vagueness problem you gets with a mutable protagonist... which is exactly what Gromnir is trying to correct. pope seems to be getting the idea. HA! Good Fun!

"The other problem is that with several villains, all content in the beginning and middle of the story will have to be independant of the general story or "clean slates" to make it possible to fit it with the end of the game." untrue. see above. much of a crpg story is not happening along the main story arc anyway. got loads of sub-quests, right? but regardless, you still not need four or five completely different story arcs. stop the horde. 1) go to goblin fortress and discover try to discover plans 2) now that you has learned plans and possibly killed lieutenant, you gotta accomplish 2 of 5 goals to slowdown/ prevent (or for evil folks: subvert horde to your will) invasion a) block ice fang pass b) subvert the alliance 'tween the red dog clan and the howler tribe c) etc. is typical crpg stuff, no? if a Sauron evil guy is behind the invasion then you is gonna learn something slightly different at the goblin fortress than you would with a Noble villain. the lieutenant at the goblin fortress in sauron situation would talk 'bout a new age of darkness and his dark master's plans... yadda yadda. on the other hand, the lieutenant of the Noble villain would express regret at having to elimintae such a worthy adversary as yourself. add more differences as you progress through game, but the choke points is gonna be in same places. drop in some villain specific journals... add a few timed encounters tied directly to one choice of villain or another... at a few key points you can has some change made to game. am not envisioning a game that completely diverges from point A into 4 unique games. is not feasible. however, you can has a macbeth and a sauron and other villains, each with very different motivations and dialogues w/o substantially changing 90% of a game. HA! Good Fun!

why would there need be a shift? no clear antagonist is set until player interacts with environment for a brief time, then antagonist is solidified for remainder of game. sure, if you wanna does a 180 personality switch after the first 20 minutes o' gameplay then you is gonna be maybe stuck combating a Noble villain rather than a Sinister one, but so what? is still gonna be a viable antagonist, maybe not ideally appropriate, but compared to the single UBG option how is that any different? if developers wanna keep simple and resource

for Gromnir, playing evil is... lame. tried to play evil in kotor2 and other games, but what we ended up being were a bully and a murderer rather than any sorta evil character that Gromnir might be willing to consider. push somebody down just 'cause you can? is evil? probably, but it is a petty kinda evil. find some way to plays an honorable and evil or sneaky evil might be worth trying, but so far all the evil options we has encountered has just been kinda lame.

? not see how you get to "exponential" growth from our suggestion. obviously you simply cannot have limitless or even dozens o' potential UBG (Ultimate Bad Guy) possibilties, but 3 or 4? most of his/her minions can be left unchanged, but change the UBG can make big difference to story and game as a whole. HA! Good Fun!

what the heck is dragonbait? is it some kinda fr monstrous pr0n? that letch who keeps making elminster books/crap finally lost all self control and made the old wizard into toril

weren't our idea, but we wish it were. as is so

it had to happen eventually. drink miller light. product placement in movies and games is ubiquitous. drink miller light. the only thing we gots working in our favor here at obsidian is that we gots so little traffic that nobody would ever waste such effort on this kinda nonsense. drink miller light. you think that some marketing morons would actually pay an established obsidian boardie to push their product in such a gross and demeaning fashion. drink miller light. seems mighty unlikely. HA! Good Fun!

conan > belgarion if you want a tangential Chosen One, and Good v. Evil and that kinda stuff then we is okie dokie with that, but do different. if you need a Chosen One in story/world then maybe make so that the player's actions decide the fate or nature of the Chosen One. *shrug* maybe Gromnir gots too much Nietzsche than is healthy, but in stories we prefers that the Gods or Fates or whatever would just back the hell off and let men decide man's future. HA! Good Fun!

"Well-written fantasy can be realistic, logical, and entertaining." actually no, fantasy cannot be realistic. is pretty much the definition of fantasy. if the stuff happening in a fantasy story is all realistic stuff then you not got fantasy. however, fantasy can be rational and internally logical

what about the out of work pr0n stars? who is gonna think 'bout them? dozens of second and third tier starlets of the scandalous screen depended on e3 yearly for some much needed cash... no doubt to pay for extension classes at the local university. why does developers gotta be so selfish. want e3 to be 'bout them and their games? sure, that is understandable, but ain't there 'nuff love to go 'round at e3 for the tramps and trollops working their arses off to earn a living? why does josh gotta be so cold? bah. our midwestern values run far too deep for us to complain 'bout change at e3. there is still gonna be attractive babes at e3 for those of you who wants to ogle and gape and drool, but they is gonna now be dressed in clothes/costumes that no longer can be fitting into an aspirin bottle. good. no more booth babes trying to distract us from recognizing that a publisher/developer's game sucks? great. for chrissakes. e3 is in LA during may. go down to the friggin' beach or one of the 2000 local health clubs and gawk at the beautiful & scantily clad women at those locales. HA! Good Fun!

1) Gromnir has an adversarial posting style 2) josh thinks that Gromnir is full of hokum put these two factors together and we suspect that any constructive criticism we might have to offer would be falling on understandably deaf ears. ... y'know, most of the folks who read josh's item descriptions liked 'em... all 12 of us. attention to detail and somewhat staid style is not crippling josh as a potential writer... just gotta find the right characters and situations to make use of his particular style. get a martin luther character into a game and we thinks josh could write him up wonderfully... or maybe has a series of short essays incorporated into game (is any number of reasons for doing so,) and we thinks that josh would do a bang up job. if Gromnir were in charge of writing for obsidian, we would find some way to make use of josh

has been a number of "what the hell..." kinda moments we were having over the years. probably has already been mentioned, but most recent unfortunate example were the mentionings of the droid factory in kotor2 and how/why obsidian left'em in the game. ... laugh if you will, but Gromnir retraced every possible inch o' accesible geography in kotor2 looking for the droid factory we musta' missed. oh sure, they 'members to take out the factory, but they forgets to take out a couple lines of dialogue from hk-47? HA! Good Fun!

observation: we recently watched as a woman friend of ours played kotor2, a realtively linear and simple game. having never really played video games of any kind previously she were unfamiliar with many conventions of such games. kotor2 became frustrating for her at a number of points... simply 'cause she were thinking like a real and rational person as 'posed to thinking like a gamer. *shrug* a handful of timed quests that is tangential and optional is fine with Gromnir, but we thinks that gamers forget just how frustrating these games can sometimes be for normal folks who has not been perverted by game logic. HA! Good Fun!

sounds like he weren't particularly happy trying to find that medium. if josh don't want to write, and he not have to write to stay involved in game development, then we not see any reason why he should keep banging head 'gainst wall trying to write stuff that you or Gromnir will like. josh has been in game development for a long time now, and he has developed his craft to a point where he enjoys a certain 'mount of recognition and respect from peers and fans. he understands his current limitations and he has, with eyes wide open, decided that his writing (whether good or bad,) is not popular. is not a knee-jerk reaction. is not like he ain't tried to write in past games. we can respect the choice of josh precisely 'cause it has taken him some time to come to the realization that he don't wanna write... which ain't the same as saying he cannot write. btw, this is josh we is talking

"As far as the story goes, you weren't "supposed" to feel anything specifically about the twins. They weren't written as bad guys or good guys, but as antagonists. I knew that some people would feel sympathetic for them and some people would think they were buttheads and I thought that was a good goal. " why you think that were a good goal? regardless, you leap past ambivalence and went straight to apathy. with iwd2 you not got no nameless one or exile for the player to get emotionally attached to. you gots a Party of up to six adventurers with necessarily ambiguous backgrounds and motivations as your protagonist... which is just fine if you manage to fill the void left by absence of an identifiable and memorable hero. do that by making us care 'bout npcs... 'specially the villains. yeah, these is crpgs and in a perfect world the player should be able to be the hero of his own story/stories... woulda', shoulda' coulda'. lots of gameplay choices ain't 'nuff. gotta give the fans some reason to care 'bout your game/story beyond simply the next opportunity to level... and as far as we can tell, you can't write great dialogue for a generic good or evil party... at least we ain't seen anything that makes us think otherwise. in absence of a identifiable protagonist, iwd2 shoulda' made the villains more compelling... not less. btw, writing compelling dialogue is necessarily an exercise in ego. you gotta take risks to makes good dialogues. if your main concern is trying to avoid sounding hokie or clich

am not going to abuse the obsidian folks with our content complaints further... they has suffered enough, even if they deserved to suffer. however, we recently attempted to replay (well, not actually "replay" as we never finished it before,) and the damned thing has such terrible slowdowns even on a relatively fast machine that we just couldn't endure a second attempt at a game we thought were mighty under whelming. and yes, all our drivers is updated. am simply disappointed at how clunky the game is. HA! Good Fun!

indeed...I think that aging and forced retirement (mind you, Pirates! has you retiring at about age 35 IIRC, which is pretty realistic) is THE solution to the open-ended problem. now, if you like Morrowind just the way it is then I'm not talking to you. but if you think open-ended games need some sort of mechanism to complete the experience (WOW, I retired as a governor this time!), then there is nothing better IMO than aging and forced retirement. It is the best way to introduce opportunity costs in an otherwise unlimited playground. if you don't like unlimited playgrounds without some sort of opportunity cost and balancing mechanism but refuse to play a game with aging, then linear RPGs are for you, not open-ended ones. <{POST_SNAPBACK}> the same ends can be reached w/o forced retirement. forced retirement is hardly the best mechanism for preventing 10075 and exp farming in a crpg. random encounters and respawns is how folks get uber powerful in games... going beyond reasonable and rational limits envisioned by developers. heck, even the bumfuzzled d&d developers considered this problem and largely put it to rest in 3e. kill kobolds as a 1st level party and you get valuable exp. kill kobolds as a 20th level party and get... nothing. so, we got a problem? nope. 1) cap random freaking encounters so that they is rational. & 2) get diminishing/0 exp for killing easy hostiles. no meeting up with demi-gods in the woods simply 'cause you is uber level, and make sure that after you kills your 50th wolf or cliff racer or kobold or whatever that ain't getting any experience for doing so. if you wants aging in a game, then add it... but play a 40 hour game and be forced to end up enfeebled is just ridiculous... and unnecessary. now, as to have voluntary aging with some benefits and handicaps... we think that such is a good idea... but forced retirement and quicksilver geriatrics is a horrible way to enforce balance.... like time limits and level caps. is options for those developers w/o

Wow. I think you are the first person to admit watching and liking this "film". Ever. It is known as one of the worst movies ever made. <{POST_SNAPBACK}> and yet it were better than the new underworld movie. don't get Gromnir wrong, seeing kate neeked were all well and good, but that should not be the only positive recollection one takes away from a movie. ok, there were one other positive. went to see underworld at suggestion of, and in company of a woman... call it a date if you will. the absolute horribleness of the movie had our companion apologizing to us over and over. she owes us. *shrug* HA! Good Fun!

am building a budget/mid-range gaming desktop. decided on the msi k8n neo4 sli mb, now that msi seems to have worked all the kinks out of it. seemed like a good board for Gromnir as we only got limited overclocking interest. however, we got absolutely 0 experience with msi boards, and we is trying to decide what heat sink to be putting on an amd athlon x2 3800+ cpu... preferably a quiet heat sink. usually we uses zallman, but the one msi socket 939 board zallman not seem to have any recommended heat sinks for is the one i am using. have stuck zalman's on non-reccomended asus mbs in the past w/o difficulty, but as this is our first msi board we don't wanna take the risk. any thoughts? HA! Good Fun!

obviously Gromnir communicated something badly. need not be (and rarely is,) simply a matter of gameplay v. story... one or the other. oh well. HA! Good Fun!

Its a game, Mr Khan. I don't want to care, I want to play. Not that they have to be mutually exclusive to be sure, but given limited time to spend on implementing all of a game's features, I'll take gameplay over characters anyday. Give me some plastic cut outs, but just let me have fun with them. If I want to care about some characters, either fictional or non-fictional,I'll read a book. <{POST_SNAPBACK}> perfectly understandable. pong were a great example of a game with addictive gameplay and 0 story. you not need story to play game. *shrug* unfortunately, pong and madden football and so many other games gets awful dull awful fast if you is simply playing v. the computer. play larry, curly or moe and maybe you adds the element o' competition, but otherwise the experience of pitting yourself v. the computer gets old fast... which is why so many adventure and crpg games throw in story elements... 'specially since these games is made so that 12 yr olds can beat 'em w/o too much difficulty. is not like you is really being challenged in any way as far as gameplay goes. nevertheless, if you is content simply to play game to watch your character acquire more points in strength or to be getting more valuable 10075, then more power to you. is a perfectly acceptable approach and gaming developers would love it if everybody were just like you. oh, and books ain't really the same is they... 'cause you is simply an observer when you is reading a book. crpgs is making you an active participant in the story... so the book option ain't really analogous... not at all. HA! Good Fun!

"Oblivion intends to create a realistic fantasy world" oxymoronic, no? oblivion is gonna have to pass the larry, curly and moe test before Gromnir purchases... gonna need for three of our friends to be buying and recommending 'fore we even consider purchase, 'cause as of right now it still seems like the folks at bethesda just don't understand how important character development is in a crpg. all those nifty features is just so much fancy make-up on the oblivion sow w/o a dedication and understanding of morrowind's fatal flaw: no heart. it were so damned difficult to care 'bout what were happening in morrowind 'cause the character's dialogues were as flat as their faces. after morrowind we asked for heart, and instead we is getting pork soda? unsolicited advice: suppress your urge to buy oblivion until your own larry, curly and moe is giving positive feedback.

we know a couple of folks who might be able to help eldar out... seriously. will see if they can email or pm him with info. ... heck, did you think of pming josh? he seems to get pretty elaborate with his halloween costumes. maybe he got some "ins" someplace. HA! Good Fun!