Amentep

There's a difference, though, between inspired by Medieval Europe and being Medieval Europe. The advantage in a situation like Project Eternity (over, say D&D) is that they can build the monk class history into the setting from the beginning and thus show how / why it developed organically in the campaign setting (which isn't Europe).

While I don't disagree with your excellent points about Europe and medieval Europe and the transformative effect of two cultures when introduced to one another, the big sticking point for many people is that Project Eternity isn't set in Europe.

To be totally fair, I imagine that people do the "I played this for 100 hours and hated it. Then I took an arrow to the knee" bit because far too often conversations go like this: Player 1: "I played Skyrim for 3 hours, but couldn't get into it and ultimately felt without any narrative that hooked me or other interest that I shouldn't continue..." Player 2: "Oh only 3 hours, you need at least 5 to see all the good bits. You should play it more and you'll see why its great..." etc. And of course that leads to the silliest argument of all, that you can't dislike a game until you've done everything in it (including beating it) and only then (after 60+ hours) can you say you didn't like it... ...at which point people begin to wonder why you put 60+ hours into something you hate. Its a viscous cycle, I tells ya!

FORTON: "I used to be an adventurer...until I took an arrow to my nipple".

What can I say, I'm biased and only care about the health of women's sternums. "Hey baby...I want you to have...a healthy sternum" *slap* Okay maybe that isn't working out so well. This type of attitude breaks my immersion and verisimilitude. It bent my wookie too. I'm for the inhuman woman if she's sexy. Peep! Your intimidation tactics, slinging your schlong in the face of nay-sayers, won't work on me. No really, it won't work, don't try it. Whose indeed.

Surely in a fantasy world, familiar structures are pointless constructs? Whether a "landsknecht" would make sense in a "martial arts" or "samurai" RPG would really depend on the kind of world and history being created and presented wouldn't it? Provided the setting supports and motivates the existance of someone who'd be a "landskenecht" (or fantasy equivalent) in the "samurai" world, then surely there is no internal inconsistency in the fantasy setting and the problem only lies in an external inconsistancy (namely that the "real world" doesn't support the real world "class" in the real world equivalent of the setting) perceived by the player and applied to the fantasy world?

I've enjoyed most of the SMT games that I've played and related series (that said I never finished SMT: Devil Survivor).

I'm pretty sure most of the factions in Morrowind were joinable without exclusion (I seem to recall being the head of both the Mage's and Fighter's Guild). There were exclusivity in the Houses as i recall (never did the Vampire stuff, but I seem to recall hearing they were exclusive). Since Oblivion moved location, it seems the majority of the organizations that carried over weren't exclusive in Morrowind - if my memory is correct.

What can I say, I'm biased and only care about the health of women's sternums. "Hey baby...I want you to have...a healthy sternum" *slap* Okay maybe that isn't working out so well.

I'd think (and could be wrong) that most people who are heavily conservative secessionists see the federal government as something granted its powers by consent of the state; their patriotism therefore should be stronger for their state than for the nation as a whole, which they see as an outgrowth of their state agreeing to cede part of its state power to a national government to encourage inter-state cooperation and management. Ergo, the state is more important than the nation.

If I thought romances would hinder game quality, I'd not argue for them. But I'm pro-romance in that I think there's value in developing relationships of all types with the NPC and PC. But I certainly can't dismiss those who think that such effort will negatively impact the game because to my mind the implementation of it isn't trivial - not saying you are saying they are, but that that has been an argument on these threads.

To be honest, I've never seen much difference between Morrowind, Oblivion or Skyrim. Except Oblivion introduced the character creation feature of "exploded faces" that never looked quite right. The only difference really is cutting down the "busywork" in building skills (I jumped from tall building and didn't die - skill level up!). I never felt any real interest from any of the NPCs in any of the games or any of the quests. The guilds are a joke with one being able to join most (if not all) of them without issue (whether it makes sense or not). The fun in the games was roving around the landscape doing whatever you felt like doing, not in engaging characters or plots. Although Morrowind is unbearably ugly without mods, IMO. Any how, which is better - "I saw a mudcrab today...horrible creature" or "I used to be an adventurer like you...then I took an arrow to the knee"?

I remember the only time I ever renamed all the NPCs in a game, I then spent the game having a dickens of a time trying to remember who was who because I couldn't remember what I'd named them. So no real interest from me.

Of a single minor quest. Describing the romance as minor is precisely the reason why some people argue that people who want romance in games just want a sex minigame. Because it doesn't seem like there's any import to them if they're "minor". So minigame. I'd also argue that the proper way to do a romance is that it can't be a singular "extra" quest, because then the Player is going to feel the character is pointless unless they want to romance them. To make sure that the character holds up in responsiveness for all players, the Romance should be an alternate path and there should be dialog content for the player who chooses not to romance the NPC that still gives the NPC character depth. Which would mean, realistically, that adding a romance is at least creating double the amount of work. YMMV, of course. To be honest, downplaying the implementation of romances (as some people have claimed a fully formed, completely responsive, non-trivial romance could be created in hours) isn't helpful either. What we know is that the developers have said that it takes 2-3 months to write a companion. For a romance to work (IMO) it cannot be tacked onto the character as an afterthought, it has to be part of the 2-3 months. It should - as I mentioned above - not lock out the player who doesn't choose the romance from having and interesting companion. Which means developing parallel relationships (romance-friendship or romance-rivalry or romance-unrequited love or whatever) Now you also need to make the romance recognizable by the game world (since the player is going to want feedback on their choices). So now the other companions need to have comments, maybe non-joinable NPCs; maybe the villain. And now their are other choices - should a group going to an Inn with a couple in a relationship be charged more for a specific room for themselves? Should there be shops that sell items that you can give to your SO (for RP purposes not for a +1 on the relationship meter)? Are their quests where knowing that the characters are in a relationship is important (storyline bits where the heroes may end up captured and being interrogated I think you'd want the game to acknowledge trying to get to the PC through the NPC SO). Etc. So to my mind this stuff isn't minor and isn't trivial.

I watched Skyfall over the weekend (enjoyed it, has more similarity to Casino Royale than Quantum of Solace) and the Star Trek reboot (which I liked again).

Mebbe it should be treated like romance then. A pop up message that says "You happen to have some bread in your backpack. It looks delicious. Your stomach growls when you look at it, though you do not know why. You feel strangely compelled to sink your teeth into it. Give in to this seduction y/n" Completely optional. Now we're back on the winning track with pop-a-bread gameplay and romance pies!

*Knock, knock* "Who's there?" "Forton" "Forton Who?" "Forton is a lot of weight!" ... Maybe you had to be there.

I never argued romance was required, though, only one "tool in the toolbox" for developers to use if/when it made sense (to them, not to us) On the flip side, really don't want to see a non-toggle-able food mechanic because I find them a bore in games and a lot harder to ignore than optional dialogue. Can't argue that it isn't, but ultimately that's what most of these things boil down to from our (the game players) perspective

1. Few things would be more important than food. 2. There can be choices about food - do you actively kill monsters/ animals and eat them, do you use a character's skill (like setting snares) to simulate hunting, or do you fight humanoid enemies to buy food with their gold? 1. In real life, yeah. In a game? Not to me because that's not what interest me - the story & characters are. If I wanted to play a sim game, I'd play the Sims and be forced to feed my Sim and guide them to the bathroom to poop and all that. 2. Again making complex systems to handle what is essentially a money/time sink button press element ("Press 'Y' to not starve to death") isn't interesting to me. I won't hate it if a food mechanic is in, but its not something I have an interest in.

I can't understand this arbitrarity. If you allow for the fact that your character has enough experience in his world to take care of his physical needs, why don't you just guess that he also knows how to satisfy his emotional needs? Because the choices should be mine - not choices on what to eat and when, but what to do in the "important" stuff that develops who the character is or how the story unfolds. Who I pick as my ally is defining, not eating a sandwich. Without the choices that count being mine, I'd just be watching a movie. Which is fine activity but not really what I want for a game. I'll admit that I'm a bit idiosyncratic in this regard, but to me food requirements are pointless busywork; you have a meter that goes down and is replenished by pressing a button. The button only works if you have a resource in your inventory. So essentially all that has been added is a button I'm required to push and a money sink that I have to spend money on. I'd actually rather pay an upkeep fee for things like this and not worry about pressing the button. I also confess that back in the C64 era I played a RPG that had a food mechanic and got stuck in a situation where I needed money to buy food but didn't have any but starved to death every time I tried to go to the outerlands to find a monster to kill for gold. Arguably realistic but for me not a fun experience at age 13 or 14. Absolutely. If I could romance a pie [and eat it], we'd all be happy and I'd buy 10 copies of this game. I think we have Obsidian's next Kickstarter here. EDIT: rereading this, I was struck by my previous idea that to me RPGs are more story with a character I control working through the definition of the character and story established/allowed by the game. Its entirely possible that I'm more in favor with game elements that concentrate on the aspects I like (which is story & character) vs those that I don't like that don't add value to story and character (heavy sim aspects, like eating). This may explain why I don't see a logical disconnect between being pro-romance and anti-button-press-eating while others do.

I'd like to assume that my character knows when they're hungry and how to plan to have food available to them when traveling. I don't like to assume my character knows how I want them to interact with other people. A character doesn't have to be in a romance to live; they do have to eat* to live. I'd like to assume dialog with other characters can lead to unexpected outcomes. If I eat bread, I should eat bread. Not roll for initiative and try to hit with my teeth. The only way these two situations - in my opinion - could be remotely relatable is if I have to have dialog options with my food to successfully eat or something. Which is just weird enough concept to be worth it. *or some eating equivalent if we're talking plant people or something

Yes--and then you can go after people who make a similar-enough product using a similar-enough symbol. The breadth or narrowness of a given trademark depends a lot on how many lawyers you can afford. You're have to be fairly close though for the lawsuit to be anything other than a nuisance suit; I'd think (and I'm not a lawyer) that unless you had three snakes eating one another Bethesda wouldn't be able to prevail in a suit. Just having an ouroboros wouldn't be enough - even in the same competing field. Not that it matters since Project Eternity's logo isn't using the ouroboros anymore...

Except Monte Carlo is anti-romance and was forced to remove a cartoon of a lady in a chainmail bikini from his sig! As I mentioned before, I think its far to easy to classify the "sides" in a derogatory manner. For example pro-romancers have been accused of being people who think sex is icky in real life and therefore look to games as their sexual fetish outlet. And now you've essentially asserted the same of the other camp. The problem is assuming that someone's pro / con romance feeling has any connection to how they feel about sex and relationships in real life, which ultimately doesn't logically follow. Er...I'm on your side and that's the argument I've been making for like a month now. Color me befuddled.

See I'd disagree (possibly because of semantics, but reading a novel is an experience, its just not the same experience as playing a role-playing game). To me a role-playing game is a participatory story; I take a character in the story and develop that character through the story based on what the story gives me. This is why they can be so flexible as to carry very heavy plot and character driven epics and simple "jump in a tunnel and fight monsters" type tales. The experience is in the playing, sure, but that's not what they are. Actually given a limited budget, I'd argue to expense (money, developer resources) is a good reason to be very frugal in character development to ensure that the player gets the most "bang for their buck" (dodgy innuendo not intended, oo-er). But for my purposes I could see a story in which a group of people share a friendship and journey for that reason or a group forced together in a fellowship developing a camaraderie along the way without having there be a need for a romantic relationship to develop. Could it? Sure. Must it? No. I'm a big believer in the idea that romances need to work within the context of both the PC and the NPC and if the group gathered doesn't make sense to have a romance there's no reason to include such a thing. A character can be well drawn and realized in the game without being romanceable (and I think the reverse is true, although I know many who debate this).

* sigh * Yes, having no bananas is exactly like having no moral choices, because it takes away from the experience. Re-read your post, forensically, and try to tease out a few micrograms of sense. No? Me neither. ... If you like dating sims then come out and say it, don't dress it up in terms of moral choices and immersion. Feh. Yes, writing stupid thing, while saying that you opponent makes no sense, is exactly like having an argument. Because I suppose this kind of behaviour comes with a gratifying feeling of false superiority. As for the dating sims, I have already explained the difference. If you paid attention to what I was saying instead of trying to look witty and well-worded, you would have known it too. To be fair, reductive arguments in storytelling doesn't work; the idea that "Story A" is diminished by not having "element B" assumes "element B" was considered for the story in the first place. Which it may not have. While I agree that romance is one "tool in the toolshed" for developers building stories and characters, its by no means the only tool in the toolshed, and they can build a perfectly fine game without it (alternatively for the haters, they could build a perfectly fine game *with* it too). The idea that characters become robots when romanceability is removed automatically assumes that the only character traits the character had was to be romanceable.