Wasteland 2 Kickstarter

[alanschu]

Eh, I don't know if it's gotten better (I assume it has, as the game is less conceptual at this point), but I haven't been to the official forum in quite some time as in general I found it unpleasant (a lot of Fallout vs. Wasteland type stuff).

[mkreku]

Okay, so, now that the first bit of gameplay footage has been released and my interest in this has grown, I've got a question for any "Wasteland experts" in here:

 

What is there in the core of Wasteland franchise that differentiates it from Fallout, the old Black Isle style Fallouts to be exact? Of course there's a somewhat different setting and you control a party instead of one character, but what else? (yes yes, spiritual sequels and whatnot, but there must be something noticeably different)

 

Is there anything in the first Wasteland that would make "Okay, so this WL2 is like a newer classic Fallout game" the wrong mindset to have while playing this game?

 

Fallout is set in an alternate world that was abrupted in the 1950's, with all the culture and technology (almost) intact.

 

Wasteland was set in an alternate world where the apocalypse took place in the 1980's.

 

What I really loved about Wasteland was that it used real life weapons and equipment. I knew that a M16 is better than an AK-47 because that's how it is in real life. I knew what kind of ammo fit which weapon because it's the same in real life.

 

Wasteland also used a learning-by-doing skill system, but one that actually worked. I never felt the need to grind skills, like I can feel in the Bethesda games. I am not sure why this is though.

 

Wasteland had a real world map, where Fallout had that quick travel map.

 

Other than that, it was much the same. Same humour, same diverse quests, same variety in locations. I felt that Wasteland had a more serious tone than Fallout and more difficult puzzles to solve, but that's just my opinion.

[Humanoid]

It sort of parallels how superior DXHR's dialogue system was compared to Mass Effect's superficial similarity. In the latter, you just had to hope that Shepard would say something approximately equivalent to the thing you just selected, in the former, highlighting a given option revealed in full the first sentence of Jensen's dialogue before allowing you to confirm. It made a huge difference in how much control I felt I had of my character.

[BruceVC]

Eh, I don't know if it's gotten better (I assume it has, as the game is less conceptual at this point), but I haven't been to the official forum in quite some time as in general I found it unpleasant (a lot of Fallout vs. Wasteland type stuff).

 

 

Alan if you  are nervous I'll come with you to the W2 forum while we visit for a shot while , safely in numbers. I have no problem with this so don't see it as you will be inconveniencing me in the slightest

 

[alanschu]

Minor nitpick: Jensen's full line wasn't always shown.  If it was a longer line, it would omit sentences from time to time.  Still, in general it's a minor quibble and it certainly helped for those that wanted more clarity on what Jensen would specifically say.

[alanschu]

 

Alan if you  are nervous I'll come with you to the W2 forum while we visit for a shot while , safely in numbers. I have no problem with this so don't see it as you will be inconveniencing me in the slightest

 

 

 

It's all good. I don't feel any sort of pressing need to go there and discuss the game.  I'm content with how it's shaping up and look forward to it being released.

[Humanoid]

I did specify "first sentence", but yeah, not sure if that's always the case. But yeah, the point is that there was never a point in which I'd be (internally) screaming to myself "no, why the hell did you say that?!?", such as the "I'm not working for Cerberus" response.

[BruceVC]

 

Alan if you  are nervous I'll come with you to the W2 forum while we visit for a shot while , safely in numbers. I have no problem with this so don't see it as you will be inconveniencing me in the slightest

 

 

 

It's all good. I don't feel any sort of pressing need to go there and discuss the game.  I'm content with how it's shaping up and look forward to it being released.

 

 

Okay,let me know if you change your mind. For those interested in the update that discusses the latest information to W2  here is the link

 

http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/inxile/wasteland-2/posts/412225

[SunBroSolaire]

Makes me want to see what Obsidian is doing with P:E's dialogue. I have really high hopes given Alpha Protocol and New Vegas, but it looks like they'll have some healthy competition this time.

[Keyrock]

/holds hand over thread

 

[Altered Beast] Rise from your grave! [/Altered Beast]

 

Here's a quick video showing off what the inventory screen is going to look like:

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wHN7QTcuqI4

 

I have to say that I'm very impressed.  The way it's set up seems extremely logical, functional, and efficient.  I particularly like the 'favorites' feature and the way you can sort by a bunch of different paramaters.  Bravo, inXile.

Edited May 31, 2013 by Keyrock

[BruceVC]

/holds hand over thread

 

[Altered Beast] Rise from your grave! [/Altered Beast]

 

Here's a quick video showing off what the inventory screen is going to look like:

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wHN7QTcuqI4

 

I have to say that I'm very impressed.  The way it's set up seems extremely logical, functional, and efficient.  I particularly like the 'favorites' feature and the way you can sort by a bunch of different paramaters.  Bravo, inXile.

 

 

Sweeeeeet, nice one.

 

It may seem like an obvious feature but I like the table for the inventory so you can easily see the weight and other attributes of items. This is something I always find a little laborious in other RPG when I just want to see specifications of my items

[Labadal]

I like the fact that you can mark items as favorites for different characters. I'm sure the inventory will work, but I'm not a big fan of what was shown in the video.

[Drowsy Emperor]

Why does everyone hate grid based inventories now that we have three times larger screens than before. 

[Keyrock]

Why does everyone hate grid based inventories now that we have three times larger screens than before. 

While I don't hate grid based inventories, list based just seems intuitively easier to sort and categorize.  If the grid based system can be set up so that I can easily arrange the items by a number of different parameters with the click of a button then I'm all for it, this just seems easier to achieve with a list based view.  In the end, I'm mostly concerned with efficiency, flexibility, and functionality.

Edited May 31, 2013 by Keyrock

[Humanoid]

I don't like grid inventories because to me it feels like oversimulation. Sure, it's a neat system for visually depicting the bulk of an item, but my feeling is, why should I care about the bulk of an item? What does it add to the gameplay?

[Drowsy Emperor]

It can be one item one space. Lists are irritating when they're long which is what always happens when the inventory is full of junk.

 

Frankly I'm still not seeing anything in this game that second rate Fallout clones haven't done before. Its just not impressive so far, visually or otherwise.

Edited May 31, 2013 by Drowsy Emperor

[rjshae]

I like it; the interface is functional and stylish. The favorites option is a particularly nice touch.

[Azdeus]

I like inventories that are limited by both weight and size, having to make those pain in the arse loadouts do add a certain something to games I think.

 

Loved that part about Jagged Alliance 2 1.13 - the loadbearing equipment and such.

[Keyrock]

Fargo Talks Reactivity 

 

 

Wasteland 2 isn’t coming out when we thought it was coming out. That’s probably the greatest tragedy of modern times, maybe of recorded human history. But the reasoning behind it is actually far more interesting than inXile’s original blog post let on. Yes, yes, polishing up the rusted over cessparadise is a big part of the developer’s reasoning, but even once it’s feature complete, creative effort will continue right up to the last second on one key portion of the game: choice and reactivity. Think less Mass Effect, more Witcher 2 with a hint of Deus Ex. And maybe even more than that.

 

 

“We’re really hanging our hat on reactivity,” inXile CEO Brian Fargo told RPS during a recent studio visit. “Reactivity and choice. The scope and scale of the game, and the reactivity part is an absolute part of [the delay]. The levels are all fundamentally in, and all we’re doing is sitting around all day saying, ‘What about this? What about this? What about that?’ We watch people playing the game, and they come up with a clever way to do something, we want to accommodate that. That’s why with role-playing games, we can do difficult puzzles. It’s not like an adventure game where you hit a stop and you’re just done. I can level up and get around something. Brute force it. Blow it up. Find another route.”

 

About half the game, most people will never see.

“We want to make those changes all the way to the last second. Some of that requires dialogue. I think that’s why you’ve seen some role-playing games become more cinematic. They’ve got to lock and load the audio five or six months before it’s done. So you can’t make changes like that. For us, we’ll be making those changes until the last second.”

 

But just how far-reaching can differences between different playthroughs be? Well, you know how Witcher 2 received 427 Nobel Peace Prizes for its billion-headed hydra of a second act? Think that, but in many, many, many more locations.

 

 

 

“We aren’t shy about shutting off entire levels of gameplay,” said project lead Chris Keenan. “We really wanted to make that happen.”

 

“We have so many sequences,” added inXile president Matt Findley. “About half the game, most people will never see. We’re not afraid at all to create content that’s off the critical path or can be closed off permanently.”

 

Quite the contrary, actually. Fargo and co are embracing their newfound ability to create with one hand and destroy with the other. Unlike many developers who want to wrestle control away from your hands so they can [Aladdin music] show you the world, the entire point of Wasteland 2 is that you’re in the driver’s seat.

 

“On the biggest level,” Fargo continued, “there will be areas that will be completely different. Gone, destroyed. There’s not one just like it to make up for it. It’s just gone.”

 

“And we show the reactivity,” Keenan said. “If you go to one area, you start to hear radio calls from the other. They’re getting taken over, and if you try to veer back, you see the destruction from that, and they’re in a completely different state. For instance, if you’re too late to a call, maybe robots took it out. If you go there, you’re gonna see carnage. Piles of dead bodies. No robots left to kill because they’ve moved on.”

 

 

 

The fact that Kickstarter chipped in nearly three times the game’s original budget hasn’t hurt, either. In fact, it’s enabled Fargo and co’s “risky” behaviors in multiple ways, allowing for a rather massive boost in scope and ensuring that the game’s already paid for. Sales are just an (admittedly very nice) bonus.

 

“We over-funded,” Fargo boasted, beaming. “I don’t make any money from this. Me, I want to make a game that people talk about the way they do Fallout and Wasteland, 10 or 20 years from now. I’m only focused on that and what I have to do to make sure it hits all the points I know work for the game.”

 

He then fast-balled further examples. What if, for instance, you disobey Ranger orders to the point of becoming a liability? You become a pariah. Your own organization turns on you, hunts you. The entire game changes. And then, of course, there’s the extra-colossal, radiation-mutated elephant in the room: you can kill anyone, anytime. And sometimes – for example, if a party member won’t stop selling your stuff for booze money – you might have to.

 

“Remember: you can shoot or kill anybody in the whole game,” Fargo interjected. “That in itself [is huge]. If someone joins your party, you can kick them out, kill them, whatever you want. There’s whole sequences you’re not gonna see later because you offed the guy. We just deal with it. There’s no replacement – no NPC that joins you and acts just like him functionally. He’s out. You’re just not gonna see it.”

 

 

 

It’s an approach that’s definitely ambitious, to say the least. One that could even outstrip the games it’s most indebted to – the Fallouts and Wastelands of yore – in some ways. Of course, it’s all just talk until we have proof in our starving claws, but inXile’s message is clear: no illusions. Just a world that’s crumbling, and you can either duct-tape it back together or help knock it down. Or you can just do your own thing and leave no one happy. At the end of the day, it’s your call.

 

“It’s not real reactivity unless we do that stuff. Otherwise it’s just a magician’s trick. You’re getting the same thing. It’s not that. It’s a virtual impossibility for two people to have the exact same experience of the game.”

 

“I’ve felt the pressure of this since the beginning and I’ve just pulled out all the stops to make sure that it’s hit every single point that anybody’s going to want to see in these classic games. But not to let myself get locked in the past. I’m not trying to re-create what it’s like to be in the late ‘80s or early ‘90s.”

 

I recently got the chance to see oodles (and even a few kaboodles) of Wasteland 2, so look forward to hearing more about it all week. Expect impressions tomorrow, and a smattering of other details and interviews in the days to come. Also maybe a little Torment, and a Very Important Discussion of spiders in games.

I love the fact that you can kill absolutely anyone in the game and if that person was critical to furthering the story, oh well, deal with the consequences, find a different way to proceed.  I've always felt that was a better way to proceed than invulnerable characters or essentially a clone taking their spot.  

 

Anyway, this all sound really fantastic and it sounds like Fargo & Co. are swinging for the fences.  3 thoughts:

 

1) I hope this doesn't go the way of Broken Age, I hope Fargo has done a better job of managing the funding and staying within what they can actually accomplish with the money, because this sounds really ambitious

 

2) This sounds great, but will they actually follow through with this or is it just boasting?

 

3) I'm usually in favor of releasing a game that's as bug free as possible, but if they're going to keep pushing more reactivity into the game until the last second that will undoubtedly mean unforeseen breakage at launch, and I'm actually fine with that.  I can deal with bugs and breakage for a few weeks/months if it means a more lifelike breathing world. 

Edited July 31, 2013 by Keyrock

[alanschu]

 

 

I love the fact that you can kill absolutely anyone in the game and if that person was critical to furthering the story, oh well, deal with the consequences, find a different way to proceed.  I've always felt that was a better way to proceed than invulnerable characters or essentially a clone taking their spot.

 

I think almost everyone would agree that, for the game player, this is ideal.  The problem often comes with cost, as well as with what the goals of the project itself are.  I know just from my own experiences with the NWN toolset that the combinatorial explosion of having divergent paths gets pretty daunting.

 

I hope he delivers, because I think that that will be fantastic.  Although I actually am finding myself intrinsically hardwiring myself to not expect too much in this regard, because if I let myself expect what *I* consider to be ideal, I still think it's a particularly lofty and borderline impossible to achieve goal.

 

 

Hopefully he recognizes that, while he saves on having to do any voice work or cinematics with last minute changes, there's still the localization costs (unless he plans on only localizing after content is officially locked down, which may cause issues with scheduling in and of itself - depends on how much text is actually in the game).

 

 

 

 

3) I'm usually in favor of releasing a game that's as bug free as possible, but if they're going to keep pushing more reactivity into the game until the last second that will undoubtedly mean unforeseen breakage at launch, and I'm actually fine with that.  I can deal with bugs and breakage for a few weeks/months if it means a more lifelike breathing world.

 

Rest assured, when the game goes live we'll immediately put more time into the game than the whole development team could even dream of.  I expect there to be issues simply due to the extreme reactivity he is promising, let alone the willingness to keep open for last minute changes.  It all depends on how severe the bugs are, in the end.

[Spider]

Edit: Nevermind, read it wrong

 

The game does sound fantastic though, if he delivers it'll be an awesome experience.

Edited July 31, 2013 by Spider

[BruceVC]

Fargo Talks Reactivity 

 

 

Wasteland 2 isn’t coming out when we thought it was coming out. That’s probably the greatest tragedy of modern times, maybe of recorded human history. But the reasoning behind it is actually far more interesting than inXile’s original blog post let on. Yes, yes, polishing up the rusted over cessparadise is a big part of the developer’s reasoning, but even once it’s feature complete, creative effort will continue right up to the last second on one key portion of the game: choice and reactivity. Think less Mass Effect, more Witcher 2 with a hint of Deus Ex. And maybe even more than that.

 

 

“We’re really hanging our hat on reactivity,” inXile CEO Brian Fargo told RPS during a recent studio visit. “Reactivity and choice. The scope and scale of the game, and the reactivity part is an absolute part of [the delay]. The levels are all fundamentally in, and all we’re doing is sitting around all day saying, ‘What about this? What about this? What about that?’ We watch people playing the game, and they come up with a clever way to do something, we want to accommodate that. That’s why with role-playing games, we can do difficult puzzles. It’s not like an adventure game where you hit a stop and you’re just done. I can level up and get around something. Brute force it. Blow it up. Find another route.”

 

About half the game, most people will never see.

“We want to make those changes all the way to the last second. Some of that requires dialogue. I think that’s why you’ve seen some role-playing games become more cinematic. They’ve got to lock and load the audio five or six months before it’s done. So you can’t make changes like that. For us, we’ll be making those changes until the last second.”

 

But just how far-reaching can differences between different playthroughs be? Well, you know how Witcher 2 received 427 Nobel Peace Prizes for its billion-headed hydra of a second act? Think that, but in many, many, many more locations.

 

 

 

“We aren’t shy about shutting off entire levels of gameplay,” said project lead Chris Keenan. “We really wanted to make that happen.”

 

“We have so many sequences,” added inXile president Matt Findley. “About half the game, most people will never see. We’re not afraid at all to create content that’s off the critical path or can be closed off permanently.”

 

Quite the contrary, actually. Fargo and co are embracing their newfound ability to create with one hand and destroy with the other. Unlike many developers who want to wrestle control away from your hands so they can [Aladdin music] show you the world, the entire point of Wasteland 2 is that you’re in the driver’s seat.

 

“On the biggest level,” Fargo continued, “there will be areas that will be completely different. Gone, destroyed. There’s not one just like it to make up for it. It’s just gone.”

 

“And we show the reactivity,” Keenan said. “If you go to one area, you start to hear radio calls from the other. They’re getting taken over, and if you try to veer back, you see the destruction from that, and they’re in a completely different state. For instance, if you’re too late to a call, maybe robots took it out. If you go there, you’re gonna see carnage. Piles of dead bodies. No robots left to kill because they’ve moved on.”

 

 

 

The fact that Kickstarter chipped in nearly three times the game’s original budget hasn’t hurt, either. In fact, it’s enabled Fargo and co’s “risky” behaviors in multiple ways, allowing for a rather massive boost in scope and ensuring that the game’s already paid for. Sales are just an (admittedly very nice) bonus.

 

“We over-funded,” Fargo boasted, beaming. “I don’t make any money from this. Me, I want to make a game that people talk about the way they do Fallout and Wasteland, 10 or 20 years from now. I’m only focused on that and what I have to do to make sure it hits all the points I know work for the game.”

 

He then fast-balled further examples. What if, for instance, you disobey Ranger orders to the point of becoming a liability? You become a pariah. Your own organization turns on you, hunts you. The entire game changes. And then, of course, there’s the extra-colossal, radiation-mutated elephant in the room: you can kill anyone, anytime. And sometimes – for example, if a party member won’t stop selling your stuff for booze money – you might have to.

 

“Remember: you can shoot or kill anybody in the whole game,” Fargo interjected. “That in itself [is huge]. If someone joins your party, you can kick them out, kill them, whatever you want. There’s whole sequences you’re not gonna see later because you offed the guy. We just deal with it. There’s no replacement – no NPC that joins you and acts just like him functionally. He’s out. You’re just not gonna see it.”

 

 

 

It’s an approach that’s definitely ambitious, to say the least. One that could even outstrip the games it’s most indebted to – the Fallouts and Wastelands of yore – in some ways. Of course, it’s all just talk until we have proof in our starving claws, but inXile’s message is clear: no illusions. Just a world that’s crumbling, and you can either duct-tape it back together or help knock it down. Or you can just do your own thing and leave no one happy. At the end of the day, it’s your call.

 

“It’s not real reactivity unless we do that stuff. Otherwise it’s just a magician’s trick. You’re getting the same thing. It’s not that. It’s a virtual impossibility for two people to have the exact same experience of the game.”

 

“I’ve felt the pressure of this since the beginning and I’ve just pulled out all the stops to make sure that it’s hit every single point that anybody’s going to want to see in these classic games. But not to let myself get locked in the past. I’m not trying to re-create what it’s like to be in the late ‘80s or early ‘90s.”

 

I recently got the chance to see oodles (and even a few kaboodles) of Wasteland 2, so look forward to hearing more about it all week. Expect impressions tomorrow, and a smattering of other details and interviews in the days to come. Also maybe a little Torment, and a Very Important Discussion of spiders in games.

I love the fact that you can kill absolutely anyone in the game and if that person was critical to furthering the story, oh well, deal with the consequences, find a different way to proceed.  I've always felt that was a better way to proceed than invulnerable characters or essentially a clone taking their spot.  

 

Anyway, this all sound really fantastic and it sounds like Fargo & Co. are swinging for the fences.  3 thoughts:

 

1) I hope this doesn't go the way of Broken Age, I hope Fargo has done a better job of managing the funding and staying within what they can actually accomplish with the money, because this sounds really ambitious

 

2) This sounds great, but will they actually follow through with this or is it just boasting?

 

3) I'm usually in favor of releasing a game that's as bug free as possible, but if they're going to keep pushing more reactivity into the game until the last second that will undoubtedly mean unforeseen breakage at launch, and I'm actually fine with that.  I can deal with bugs and breakage for a few weeks/months if it means a more lifelike breathing world. 

 

Wow, that interview around W2 sounds amazing. It sounds like RPG heaven, I've never played an RPG that will allow you such freedom and of course consequences. I like the concept of your Rangers turning against you. Guys I'm suuuuuper excited about this game

[Keyrock]

I just hope that it's not all smoke & mirrors and they actually deliver.  It sounds like they're implementing what I am hoping PE would do (though it's unlikely because the IE games didn't do it and I think Obsidian is going for a more focused narrative), have time elapse during the game, either all the time, or when traveling across the wasteland, and have events happen at certain times whether you are there to affect the outcome or not.  

[alanschu]

Hmmm, I don't know if I'd factor in time elapse at all.

 

I did quickly read over the article before I went in to get my braces tightened, but did they say that they expect the game to react to time use?

 

Reactivity doesn't mean that the game world is no longer 100% dependent on the player doing things in order for it to occur.

 

 

 

I am a bit curious how things play out, because I remember (like a year ago now, so it's been some time) Fargo getting excited about a quest idea that showed player reactivity, which was a quest about resolving a dispute between two people.

 

With great enthusiasm he described how you could side with one person or the other, or continue on, find more information, and get a superior outcome as a result.  I remember him being a bit surprised when people were actually not superbly thrilled with the idea.  A lot of good suggestions came up (including from yours truly ^_^) and Brian was certainly receptive to feedback, but it was somewhat surprising that what I considered a fairly typical scenario in RPGs was cause for such enthusiasm.

 

Which leads me to believe that Brian may be the type of guy that gets enthusiastic about a lot of things he's working on

[Keyrock]

Well, what makes me think that time will elapse on its own in the game is that it did in the Fallout games.  When he mentions getting a call about something happening over the radio then having a choice to ignore it, or try to do something about it, then you may or may not make it there in time, makes me think that time will elapse during the game on its own.

 

 

“We aren’t shy about shutting off entire levels of gameplay,” said project lead Chris Keenan. “We really wanted to make that happen.”

 

“We have so many sequences,” added inXile president Matt Findley. “About half the game, most people will never see. We’re not afraid at all to create content that’s off the critical path or can be closed off permanently.”

 

Quite the contrary, actually. Fargo and co are embracing their newfound ability to create with one hand and destroy with the other. Unlike many developers who want to wrestle control away from your hands so they can [Aladdin music] show you the world, the entire point of Wasteland 2 is that you’re in the driver’s seat.

 

“On the biggest level,” Fargo continued, “there will be areas that will be completely different. Gone, destroyed. There’s not one just like it to make up for it. It’s just gone.”

 

“And we show the reactivity,” Keenan said. “If you go to one area, you start to hear radio calls from the other. They’re getting taken over, and if you try to veer back, you see the destruction from that, and they’re in a completely different state. For instance, if you’re too late to a call, maybe robots took it out. If you go there, you’re gonna see carnage. Piles of dead bodies. No robots left to kill because they’ve moved on.”

 

I'm hoping some events like this will trigger on their own in the game and not when the player reaches a certain area or talks to a certain person or performs a certain action.  If you happen to be nearby when the event triggers you can choose to intervene or hightail it out of there and let it play out on its own.  If you're far away you may try to get there but not reach it in time.  Heck, maybe things will happen that you may not even ever find out about if you never go back to that area.  That's what I'm hoping he meant by that.