In-Game Tutorial

[GrinningReaper659]

No tutorial or, at most, an optional tutorial available through the game menu.

[Jarmo]

Quick and easy tutorial for me.

 

I can easily spend 200 hours reading 1000 pages of text from a game forum, but I almost certainly can't make myself read a 20 page manual. But then I can spend another 10 hours asking & answering questions and reading tips from the same forums. Still won't read the manual. Cant remember the last game manual I actually read. Though I have an occasion searched an answer to a particular problem,

 

I used to read them when I was less crazy and senile.

[Juneau]

The game starts with a "traumatic event" that throws you into the story... But why/how are we to care about what happens if we have no back story?

 

Ie. We witness our village/parents been slaughtered by X. Yet we have no reason to care about them..

 

So why not give us a prologue which is skip-able (Like NWN2) - based several years before the event or even as a child that introduces us to the story and how to do the basics.

 

Such as - say you roll a Mage, you start as an 8year old you. and your aunt is visiting, she's a student of the arts etc.. and she can see you have the gift... she teaches you to cast a light spell to illuminate the room and maybe lift something with telekensis - then it goes to your 15th birthday and she teaches you a fireball spell or something.

 

Or - Say you roll a warrior, your dad teaches you about honour and shows you his armour and maybe provides you with a woodern sword and you play fight with your dad....

 

Or - your a rogue and your uncle shows you a puzzle box which you have to open - it's a lot more complex then picking a lock and you have to solve the puzzle to open it (obviously this isn't going to happen every time you pick a lock) but it introduces you to your class, gives you a bit of back story.

 

Maybe the tutorial allows you to roam around your town as a child - watching the blacksmith work away and he tells you about the different mats he would need to make you a blunt sword to improve your training. etc.. etc..

 

edit - This way you have several different variations of the introduction to suit each class. Giving you a bit more reason to play it each time.

Edited November 19, 2012 by Juneau

[Radwulf]

What they could do is have a class related faction/place which you could start in if you want to do the tutorial which is asked after character creation. This would teach the generic principles and a short overview of how certain things like spells are cast even if you aren't a mage, perhaps in RP terms to defend yourself from them. Then it would go into detail about how to effectively use your particular class.

 

In addition to this new characters could have some slight in-character tutorials when they join your party ('how are you useful?')

 

In order to minimise development time these different training areas and characters could be included in the main game. This would mean in BG2 terms that that a rogue would be trained by the shadow thieves or the warrior in the De'Arnise Keep for the tutorial. Furthermore this added background could lead to class and background specific quests.

[xSigma]

No tutorial during a major game set piece. Think of how ME3 failed in their intro with the tutorial.

[Radwulf]

What they could do is have a class related faction/place which you could start in if you want to do the tutorial which is asked after character creation. This would teach the generic principles and a short overview of how certain things like spells are cast even if you aren't a mage, perhaps in RP terms to defend yourself from them. Then it would go into detail about how to effectively use your particular class.

 

In addition to this new characters could have some slight in-character tutorials when they join your party ('how are you useful?')

 

In order to minimise development time these different training areas and characters could be included in the main game. This would mean in BG2 terms that that a rogue would be trained by the shadow thieves or the warrior in the De'Arnise Keep for the tutorial. Furthermore this added background could lead to class and background specific quests.

 

Just to clarify on this, I'm arguing for a separate optional tutorial at the start but the characters and location could be visit-able later in the main game.