Gromnir

having seen articles in magazines, and having read lots of posts from developers, we is getting feeling that kotor2 is gonna be much like kotor. combat is staying relatively same, and engine is pretty much same, and sounds like skills, feats and powers and all other gameplay mechanics issues is going to be pretty much same... with some cosmetic improvements. call Gromnir greedy, but we cannot help but feel that if relatively little effort is going into engine and gameplay improvements, obsidian should be having that much more time to be devoting to content. ... what we is trying to say is that if we ain't getting lots of new features, we is going to be wanting content to make up for the shortfall

over the years Gromnir has occasionally been mighty critical o' bis and fergie... but we has always been impressed and vocally supportive of the art in bis games. whether it were portraits or the painted tilesets, 2d bis artwork has always been beyond reproach. no matter how many talented artists leave, fergie always seems to be able to reload more than adequately. is good to see that obsidian is keeping up one of the good bis traditions. HA! Good Fun!

the less kotor2 relies on known star wars elements, the better. bio set kotor 4000 years in past... and they still had to contend with fans and lucas being all slavish to canon. heck, Gromnir thought EU stood for European Union 'fore we seen the bio star wars boards. HA! Good Fun!

I think what I'm saying is that PS:T was indeed a failure, but that it shouldn't discourage developers from making games that are meaningful and deep, so to speak. The fact that PS:T had a interesting story and well-written characters is not the reason it failed, and successful games need not be fun only in the most superficially gratifying sense of the word. But I think the devs of Obsidian are already well aware of that. agreed. for years we has been suggesting that the conventional wisdom concerning ps:t failure was wrong... and truth to tell is that it was all just Gromnir opinion. didn't have no extensive research or market surveys to back up our suggestion that ps:t did not fail 'cause folks was too simple and uncultured to appreciate the quality of writing in ps:t. was always disappointed that developer thought ps:t failed primarily 'cause of too much text or excessive reliance on slowly developing characters. kotor seems to dispel many misconceptions 'bout what can and cannot succeed in crpgs. meanwhile, we will sit back and let krazy prove our point for us... is doing a pretty good job when he responds exactly as we claims he will, no? HA! Good Fun!

adding "lol" to start to virtually every reply to us not give your posts anymore merit than does your single-minded reliance on conclusory and unsupported statements.. statements that is rejected by the mass number of critics, fans and developers who not only thought kotor was best crpg last year, but best game of year, and one of the bestest crpgs evar. no doubt gotta assume that those folks is all fanboys

LOL, and you keep denying that SW is KotOR's greatest draw. You not known for much common sense ever since you became a fanboy in exchange for a cameo. ah, that tired old reply from krazy... always comes out when the quiver is empty... expected it sooner. again, if star wars is such a powerful draw that it can elevate a simply "ok game" like kotor to blockbuster status, then why has so many other star wars games failed so miserably? why did jedi academy not sell better. clearly it too was at least an "ok game.". nevertheless, kotor far out sold jedi academy. kotor far out sold any star wars game we can think of... so no doubt, kotor did something that other star wars games did not. sorry, but krazy ain't making sense, and the lame arguments you is now resorting to just makes that fact more obvious. "So in terms of success, I think that PS:T was in fact successful - not in the commercial sense, but in garnering a very dedicated fanbase for whom it has been virtually deified." there is a small group of folks who also think that arcanum is the bestest fantasy crpg evar. am not sure what you was trying to say above, but we feel compelled to note that you can always redefine success to make any game a success if you try hard 'nuff... try hard 'nuff to ignore the obvious that is. bis made ps:t to be popular with some minimum number of crpg fans who would buy the game in the first two quarters following release... and it failed. ps:t was immediately embraced by critics. that has never changed. unfortunately, the folks ps:t was built for, the crpg fans, did not think that ps:t was fun. you can keep redefining "fun" all you want, but it not change the fact that ps:t was built to be fun for crpg fans, and crpg fans largely rejected or ignored ps:t. the fact that you notes other games which you thinks was good and fun and popular should be making apparent the fatal flaw of ps:t... but that ain't happening, and we admit to being baffled as to how to proceed. HA! Good Fun!

and you just keep repeating self w/o saying anything. "KotOR sold primarily because it is star wars." keep saying over and over won't make it true... no matter how many times you try. HA! Good Fun!

"All in all, it's a combat game with mediocre combat and not much of a story. What does it really have other than SW? All you people making this silly claim that it is a great game on its own merits haven't pointed anything out that makes it a great game without SW. " sure they/we has... "Ok, first I should warn you: when people like me praise Torment, we aren't praising it's combat system or whatever, 'cause Gromnir is right about that; it isn't very good. In fact, it sucks; since you're immortal (long story, but suffice it to say when you get killed you come right back to life just a short distance away), you can essentially kill a Demigod with a rusty fork if you're patient enough. We're mostly praising it's storyline, it's characters, it's setting, etc. " is same thing folks is saying 'bout kotor. repost: kotor is an honest reviewer

nobel and pulitzer is judging two different things. in theory, it should be easier to identify a great author, at the end or late in his career, as 'posed to identifying a single good book that a group of folks can agree 'pon as the best in a given year. for most yearly awards for a best work, Gromnir generally looks at nominees as 'posed to winners, to see how spot on the judges was. is tough to get any bunch o' folks to agree on much concerning lit, so fact that out of a group of books, so-called experts choose the wrong book as best is unsurprising. is easy to see why nabokov might get passed over for lolita and pale fire and other works. lolita was published same year as faulkner's "fable" and was 'bout an old man in love with a young girl. pale fire was a book that mocks literary criticism. etc. nabokov often seemed to go out of his way to write books that critics would have to be brave to publicly support. GREAT books is often controversial, and it is hard to select controversial works as bestest. now, lifetime achievement awards is a little different. stinebeck not get nobel soon after writing "The Grapes of Wrath,"... a book that polarized academics and the public alike. even today, many scholars question the greatness of "The Grapes of Wrath" as a novel... but having the benefit of hindsight, and looking back on stinebeck's entire body of work, it would be hard to imagine that stinebeck would not have eventually been recognized as a Great author, even if folks still disagree 'bout his individual works. the old adage, "hindsight is 20/20," has great merit... and nobel is an award that in theory should be judging with the benefit of hindsight. have always thought that it would be great to see a major award given to the best book from 10 years or even 20 years ago... get academics and critics to agree on best book of 1994 as 'posed to 2004 would probably be much easier... would be less likely to inspire cowardice in panelists too. in theory, that is what the nobel does... is giving the award to a person for recognition of his/her body of work... looking back over time. "Masterpieces of gaming are not some kind of "high art" that can only be appreciated from a impersonal, distantly objective perspective. They too can be loved, cherished, and appreciated for being "fun."" but if they is only appreciated by some very small segment of folks, how can you say that they is successful... 'especially since the reason why they ain't successful is the fact that they is patently un-fun to so many other folks. as you said, a game ain't "high art." ain't writing a game for posterity... to be appreciated years down the road by folks who finally understand the genius of a work and recognize that it gives people a new, if painful, perspective on the human condition. masterpieces of literature and sculpture and paintings and poetry often ain't made to be enjoyed by folks who experience them... (though some small segment of folks will invariably "get it," before their peers,) and that is ok. but a game that ain't fun for the majority of folks who play it? we is talking 'bout crpgs. the fact that a developer is making a crpg means that he is already tailoring to be popular for a relatively small group o' gamers... and if you can't reach a majority of that small sub-set of people... if you can't make game fun for a majority of those people, and make it popular now, today, then not only will you be out o' business (e.g. black isle,) but you will have failed to make a game that is fun. ask fergie whether he would rather have had more or less people enjoy ps:t. the goal was obviously not to be making a cult classic

we suspect that at this point, even krazy knows that his initial "KotOR sold primarily because it is star wars." statement is silly... not worth debating. heck, even krazy can come up with better arguments most times. HA! Good Fun!

again, all those fans not help battle grounds or yoda tales or any of the multitude of other sw stinkers over the years. and again, we never denied that sw was popular... but you has hardly shown that kotor was undeserving of acclaim... krazy opinion not seem to count much 'gainst weight of so many respected critics and developers. if there is so many delusional sw fans out there, then why does so many sw games tank? HA! Good Fun!

"But did Harry Potter?" did harry potter what? sell well? sure. what does that have to do with "one hundred years of solitude," or any number of updike best sellers? popularity does not preclude quality. "It's not so much that the market analysts have the wrong ideas, but that they have the right ones and can exactly pinpoint what people want, and in the process, defeats the very drive for originality underlying true masterpieces." for chrissakes... you does realize that we is talking 'bout games, right? just say the word, "Games." does we even have to acknowledge that a "game" should be fun? creating a masterpiece or a work of art has to be a secondary or tertiary concern at best. if a majority of folks not find a game to be fun, then we suspect that there is something wrong with it, don't you agree? "To judge a book by its reception by these people simply defeats the whole purpose of writing literature, so in a way good literature *has* to be exclusive, *has* to be elitist, because otherwise the best literature would be something like Stephen King's horror novels (not his "greats", but his "horrors"), and American society would become truly shallow, indeed." ridiculous. the notion that literature must be elitist to be good is ridiculous. if a work of literature must be dismissed just 'cause it is popular, then we think you might be surprised by just how many Great Works of lit actually was very popular when released. should popularity be the only measure for lit? no, of course not, but popularity not preclude quality neither. even so, these comments 'bout quality of lit continues to ignore the fact that games is a different beast. is more like architecture we s'pose. building a cathedral or monument or office building is an expensive undertaking that requires the labor of many peoples, and inherent in the design is gonna be practical concerns... will have to be functional. heck, buildings is even less needing to bend to practical concerns than does games. a game lasts for how long... gots how much of a shelf life? some millionaire/billionaire might invest in a building as a way to gain immortality, but what kinda person is gonna do something similar with a computer game that will be largely forgotten w/i a few years? "Nope, its sufficiant to note that KotOR and other SW games have sold better than they should have otherwise. " hogwash. http://www.bioware.com/games/knights_old_republic/awards/ large numbers (if not a majority,) of fans, critics and other developers seems to agree that kotor was a good or even great game... but krazy thinks it sold better than it should have. am not convinced. HA! Good Fun!

most folks thought jedi academy was a good game... aside from the fact that it was a star wars game. galactic battle grounds, on the other hand, despite fact that it had great pedigree of engine AND star wars label did not sell... http://www.gamespot.com/company/lucasarts.html looks like a 50/50 proposition that a star wars game will pan out for lucas... interplay did better than that and they has not fared well. might be a better example to point to crappy games that sold well... could then attribute success to star wars label. am not suggesting that star wars label was a non-factor in kotor success, but to simply state, "KotOR sold primarily because it is star wars." seems naive at best. HA! Good Fun!

fact is that most star wars games in recent years has not been particularly great sellers. HA! Good Fun!

"I am sure Salvatore novels and Dragonlance crap and Fabio and whatnot sell a lot more than Nobel-prize writers. Does that tell us anything about the quality of writing? Admit it, Grommy. " admit what? dragonlance does not sell more than gabriel garcia marquez books. try to find out how many copies of "one hundred years of solitude," has been sold over the years. recognized good lit does not mean it is poor selling. if john updike wants to take 4 years to write a novel, more power to him... but how much does it cost to develop a game and how many folks is employed in such an endeavor? how much of a shelf life does a game got in reality? a novelist can do whatever the hell they want with their time... they can live off of top ramen and jolt for four years while they write the Great American Novel. the novelist with integrity can does a james joyce and refuse to cave to publisher wishes... refuse to make changes to "dubliners." wait an additional bunch of years finding a publisher who will share vision. heck, a novelist in these days can self-publish if they wants... true self-publishing. games is different. is a reality of the business that computer games has got to be popular or folks is out of money... and they can't be developed with notion that maybe 5 or 10 years from now they might be popular. publishers ain't gonna make a game as a prestige piece just to garner good will from industry. can name the independent developers that can afford to self-publish on one hand

Like, say, Bioware's writing ?!? Frankly, i'll take Torment's over-floressant prose over that. must always come back to fact that kotor sold... and ps:t did not. we can go back and forth with blame games and excuses, but try to recall what we has heard from bis/obsidian developers in past when they talks 'bout amount of character development/interaction and text we will be seeing from them in torn, jefferson, iwd2, and fo3. "there won't be as much as you saw in ps:t." the above comment we seen over and over was not meant as a criticism of their own projects, but rather as a way to reassure potential fans. bis developers clearly was under the impression that one of the things that hurt ps:t was the 'mount of text. bioware, following bg1, came to conclusion that crpg fans did not mind dialogue, but that long segments o' dialogue was tending to result in folks just trying to scan quickly through such dialogues, or not reading at all. so, why write stuff that most folks ain't gonna read? bio instituted a guideline whereby they tried to keep individual dialogue options to no more than 3-lines. was obviously not a hard rule, but seems to have served them well. and

must admit that we is mildly surprised that lucas would let us create characters more powerful than yoda or the emperor. HA! Good Fun!

you is preaching to the choir 'bout hk-47. http://swforums.bioware.com/viewtopic.html...346860&forum=76 nevertheless, the awards heaped at hk-47's metallic feat is substantial, including awards from peers. http://archive.gamespy.com/gdc2004/awards/ "for better or worse," hk-47 was VERY popular with fans, critics and fellow developers. "so yes, it was basic stuff....but really, it fits well with the mood of Planescape in general, and sets the game apart from 'here's the bad guys, KILL 'EM!', as is practiced in god only knows how many RPGS......KOTOR included. " funny, but we thoughts that kotor was 'bout redemption... much like ps:t. "For me, it was the defining moment of the game....especially since I finally got to see the ol' Practical incarnation get what was coming to him for so long." *gasp* sorta a "KILL 'EM!" attitude, no? nevertheless, is obvious that reasonable minds may differ. is not so clear-cut an issue as some might have suggested. HA! Good Fun!

This is sort of a half-answer, so bear with me. In KotOR some skills may have felt neglected by the end of the game. In our game we try to make each skill get more "air time", if you will. Ideally speaking if you have bought any particular skill by the end of the game you should feel like you got some good mileage off of it. There will probably be some skills that are more desirable than others (which is almost always inevitable), but all skills should have their moments to shine and be relevant. -Ferret seems like you is saying that instead of just one opportunity to get some use out of the repair skill (i.e. upgrading hk-47,) you may get three or four opportunities to use repair. seems like what you is doing is similar to jedi powers... nothing really different, just more of same. *shrug* people liked kotor, so we ain't surprised at the approach being taken... just seemed like despite fact that kotor was fun for lots of folks, there was still much room for improvement too. was hoping for more than a long expansion. oh well. HA! Good Fun! p.s. asking if experience awards is gonna be implemented more along the lines of what j.e. sawyer suggested was plan for jefferson now seems ridiculous to even be mentioning.

"And Jolee is the one KOTOR who could stack up against any one of the solid PS:T characters. I was impressed with Jolee, but his associates are 'Waahh! The Sith killed my family!' Carth and 'Waaah! The Jedi took me from my daddy!' Bastila." and for better or worse, hk-47 has made just 'bout every magazine's best npc award. bastilla coulda' been better. she never really whinned 'bout her daddy as you suggest, but she was decidedly unlikable. even so, we would take canderous over vaihlor, and if not for sheena easton doing annah's voice, we wouldn't put her much before the god awful writing and character development we seen from fall from grace. yeah, we all get that ffg is the "mystery that is woman" character, but that ain't no excuse for failing to develop at all. taken as a whole, the joinable npcs in kotor stacks up pretty darn well 'gainst ps:t. and we wasn't comparing korriban to just a few lame ps:t parts... was pretty much everything after you leave sigil... and a few things from before. *shrug* ps:t, much like fo, benefits much from a cult following that sees things through the foggy lens o' nostalgia. example: "Technically, KOTOR didn't have the room to be as good in writing as PS: T, because KOTOR didn't have the descriptions of the latter game. The only writing was dialogue or direction for a quest. " most of ps:ts descriptions came via dialogue options... was not great sections of narration for most part. and using more words rarely equates as being better writing. hemingway's "a clean, well-lighted place" is only a few pages long, and he cut out any extraneous descriptive language. was a true minimalist 'fore the movement became popular. am not thinking that ps:t or kotor is in same class as hemingway's story of something like 1,500 words. kotor was not quite as self-indulgent as ps:t... was not forced to listen to cliff's notes for dummies versions of basic philosophical concepts like those spouted by coaxmetal and the transcendent one. ps:t was at its best when it skipped the florid prose and remedial philosophy and when it told simple human stories. ask eldar what he likes best from ps:t. he likes the tiefling storyteller from the brothel, and her simple stories... delivered as dialogue. and what did Gromnir likes best? morte after you encounter the pillar of skulls and the mebbeth/ei-vene/marta/ravel encounter once you return from curst is examples of when ps:t was very, very good... 'cause chris a and the other writers was taking completely unbelievable characters and making 'em more human than any crpg characters we ever met. sure as hell weren

repost: now that the devs is answering questions, Gromnir is wondering if the obsidian folks is taking an "if it ain't broken..." approach to skills as they is to combat. will skills be treated largely as they was in kotor? if changes to skills is made will they be superficial or substantial? will there be more quests that is limited to folks whose primary character has a requisite skill level? will game play be different for folks depending on what skills they takes? will the skills be better balanced than they was in kotor? etc. whatever thoughts developers wish to share concerning kotor2 skills would be much appreciated... honest. end repost possibly gets a little more attention in this thread... or not. HA! Good Fun!

"The writing in Torment was much better than the writing in KOTOR, the characters much more three dimensional, and the general feel much more mature." ask 100 folks who the best character in ps:t was. will see morte and annah and tno and the transcendent one get mentioned... you will even see votes for fall from grace, and she is one of those unfinished and half-baked characters that we was mighty disappointed with. far down the list you may see ravel mentioned. even so, ravel is the one ps:t character we would stack up 'gainst jolee. korriban were also better developed and better written than a number of areas in ps:t. in fact, ps:t really was, for Gromnir at least, more of a sigil+ game. the fortress of regrets, in particular, was kinda lame. heck, baator was so underutilized as to be a bit of a joke. after you leaves sigil, the game, save for one important encounter upon return to sigil, was anti-climactic for Gromnir. furthermore, as much as chris a was clearly the lead writer and soul of ps:t, he didn't write ps:t all by his lonesome. hell, many of the really good ideas for ps:t was characters, place and situations lifted from underused planescape supplements. collin mccomb never did get his due from fans... and for those of you who liked the brothel, well, that was dave m doing the writing. the number of people who mistakenly thinks that the pillar of skulls was chris a's idea, raise your hand. similarly, david g did not write kotor. dave did hk-47, carth and jolee, and got a planet, and he helped on some other stuff, but ain't like his stamp is everywhere on game. oh, and keeps in mind that kotor also very cleverly disguised the fact that it was recreating the entire star wars story arc alongs with characters and themes lifted from the first three movies. that alone, while seemingly a minor thing, is getting big points from Gromnir. was only an intuitive approach from hindsight, but it was perfect for what kotor was trying to accomplish. is also also something that we rarely seen professional or amateur critics of kotor mentions when talking 'bout strengths and weakness of kotor. seems to us that many folks missed the mostest important aspect of kotor story writing. how many folks on these boards has mentioned that they not like the lightside ending of kotor? not seen one of those self appointed pundits note that the lightside ending was almost a forgone conclusion considering how faithful bioware was to the source material... was an ending exactly like from the original star wars movies. the ending, like the rest of the game, was an homage to the first three movies. no matter what, you was gonna end up with an ending that took most of its elements from star wars or return of the jedi. why folks would expect a different kinda ending considering how closely the game followed the story arc of the first three movies is beyond Gromnir. any other kinda ending woulda been maybe more fun for players, but from a writing standpoint it woulda' been a glaring incongruity... an incongruity that almost none mentions. *shrug* Gromnir liked ps:t better than kotor, but we also recognize that kotor did many story things better... and am not seeing why you find a comparison of chris a and david g so meaningful or even clear-cut. HA! Good Fun!

"You want reassurance? Most of the guys at Obsidian are former Black Isle developers. Heard of Black Isle? Made Planescape: Torment, and the Fallout games? The top 3 PC RPGs of all time? Reassurance given. " top 3 rpgs? really? not based on anything objective like sales figures, that is for sure. heck black isle's IWD sold better than any of the games you mentioned. and fallout is probably the mostest overrated game we ever played. average writing and poor balance is just a couple of the oft overlooked flaws of fallout... adolescent males seemed to be liking the Mad Max style setting and bloodshed and mature content as kinda a reactionary response to other fantasy crpgs. even so, Gromnir liked fallout, am just not sure that a top 3 consideration is warranted. best we can say is that you named some games we like very much despite their mediocre sales. furthermore, how many obsidian guys actually worked on fallout? is probably more guys at obsidian who worked on Heart of Winter, Torn and IWD2 if only 'cause they was much more recent projects from bis. so, does those titles inspire confidence in folks? a former bis developer sarcastically noted that the bio ceos had mentioned that fergie and bis had never produced a AAA game.

"No, but as it stands they have the worst." reason it is worst is 'cause it is relatively underpowered compared to guardian and consular. "They do actually, force regeneration for example is not present at all in Star Wars d20 and as I am at it weapons CAN be customized in Star Wars d20. " and there is special lightsabres in d20 too... am not seeing the dif... and we not see what your point is 'bout force regeneration. that again is an issue dealing with force powers and how they is implemented much different than the d20 skills based powers, no? also, armour in star wars gives dr... is no ac bonus. but lightsabres ignore dr. makes the lightsabre even more powerful in d20 star wars than in kotor. you not seem to be talking 'bout the same skills Gromnir is. we is talking jedi skills in d20, right? jedi skills must overcome dc checks just like all other skills. is not like how if you got level 20 and a 30 in spellcraft you can add epic spells to your level nine pool of spells. example: if we recall correct, force grip not check skill level to see if he can cast... got 1 skill level in any jedi skill and you can use that power. skill level checks sets the dc for the opposing will save. if you gots lots of skill levels, the will save for an opponent becomes more difficult (the dc is also modified by the dark jedi's int score... and not all dark side jedi skills is modified by int. can be wis or con or charisma or other stuff too.) force grip cots 4 vitality points to cast... which is akin to hps. no spell levels, and the skill checks works much different too. loose vitality points for casting. sure... mechanics is exactly the same. HA! Good Fun!