A Matter of Mood...

[IndiraLightfoot]

First of all, when I say Mood I'm not talking about the clothes designer Mecca on Manhattan.

 

No, I mean the mood of the game, of the world. And obviously that mood is not one mood necessarily, but several. However, here I'd like to discuss the general mood of it, the feel that permeates its very fabric.

 

With writers like Chris Avellone and George Ziets onboard, I trust that it will be a wonderful mood, but still there is the small matter of what kind of mood. How often do we want comic relief? In NWN2 vanilla there was a lot of jokey bits and pieces. Less so in the great MotB. I'd prefer if the giggly stuff isn't pervading the game. Nor do I want a tonne of nods to other games (at least not in any obvious way).

 

To me, CRPG-wise, Planescape and MotB are among the best as far as mood goes. And given that this is a source of inspiration for the team, I'm very excited and I do hope for a similar mood. However, the setting is slightly different this time: Perhaps it's some War of the Roses, or that Umberto Eco-book about the detective monk that we should picture? Even if the cultural refences won't be all that Western/European throughout, it is clearly som pre-Renaissance world in the making here? Is that good? Do you guys want feudal conflict and religious fanaticism/inquistition?

 

As far as pen-n-paper go, I would love it if the team borrowed some of the more nice moods from Ravenloft and Call of Chtulhu, obviously first freeing itself from the neo-gothics in the first and Lovecraft's modern occultism in the second.

 

What do you guys want to see?

[Cantousent]

I think humor in PnP should be part of the give and take of a group of friends getting together. There are a lot of inside jokes, slapstick, and guy humor. In a CRPG, I think the humor should be more subtle. Comic relief should be a way to relieve dramatic tension. Morte was peftect in that regard. I want to see t he whole breadth in this game. I want suspense, drama, comedy, horror, and even inspiration.

 

EDIT: a little free and loose with my spelling and grammar right now.

Edited October 10, 2012 by Cantousent

[IndiraLightfoot]

Cantousent, well put! Subtle humour is precisely what I was after. And sure comedy has its place too. But to me, I'm after some kind of suppressed epic fantasy, if you know what I mean? Sometimes it can be down and dirty, but more often it is a bload-soaked tapestry woven with strands and layers of history, intrigue and, best of all, NPCs that have great stories to tell (or at least they lure you into them). The fabric should be as important as the fighting and the encounters.

[Cantousent]

I'm seriously going to have to revisit this thread in the morning, which will come in about six hours, but I agree entirely. I think comedy should be used to relief tension so that the design team can set the player up for the more dramatic elements. Morte was perfect in that regard in PS:T in that he could be humorous, particularly in the beginning when he was scoping out the undead chics, but then he was also a tool for character development and dramatic expression. I'm sure I'm not making sense right now, but the words are right on the tip of my tongue. lol Seriously, though, I think I'm right with you on the whole idea of trying to convey the idea of someone haunted by this terrible event he's witnessed while still giving enough room for the player to breath a little between the overpowering dramatic elements. If the game is bereft of humor, it would not be good, though. There has to be something there to give the player some space so that the dramatic hammer can strike with even more force.

[Pangur]

To me, CRPG-wise, Planescape and MotB are among the best as far as mood goes.

 

*Agrees wholeheartedly.*

[LordCrash]

+ 1 for feudal conflicts (nobility vs. clerics, nobility vs. bourgeoisie, organisations (orders, guilds, ) vs. dominion, social uprisings, civil war...)

+ 1 for religious conflicts (inquisition, crusades, religious wars, modernization vs. restoration, struggles between gods....)

+ 1 for ethnical conflicts (discrimination, racism, pogroms, even genocid,....)

+ 1 for social/civilizing conflicts (magic vs. technology, social situation of women,....)

+ 1 for global conflicts (wars, crusades, extended diplomacy, espionage, rising and falling empires and races,....)

+ 1 for general problems of medieval times (epidemics, bad health, extended poverty of the peasantry,....)

 

 

Please give us a dark, murky, realistic medieval fantasy worlds where no mature problem of the time is excluded. Don't get me wrong, it shouldn't be all bad but in dark medieval times happiness and satisfaction lie in the personal goals and situation of single individuals and not in the whole society. There may be "relative peace" in small communites or even realms but they never last long and conflicts always smolder under the suface waiting to break out. In fact, medieval times were brutal, merciless and full of dangers. There is a reason why most people died in young years in these times.....

[jethro]

I value humor a lot. Frankly it wouldn't disturb me not a bit if the game changed to a satire or to South Park in the middle ages. But that probably would go to far for a lot of people. So I vote for dark and sublte humor through side quests, side quests NPCs and companions. Think about it, companions have the advantage that you can select whether you want to have the humor magnet with you or not. And lets not forget that Minsk and Morte are the best remembered and most-cited companions in the whole canon of IE games.

 

So as an example you could add as a possible companion for the more in-your-face humor Hermann the Brute Squad, former village idiot, now your front line fighter, just don't let him decide policy. Not only would he be comic relief, but if the player chooses to create a low-int PC, imagine the wonderful discussions ensuing between those two.

 

Another companion could be the source of more subtle humor (Ephentos, the failed former radical who tries to convince everyone of strange ideas like democracy (where you vote which son of the king should get on the throne and when). The rest of the companions would be straight and earnest, brooding and philosophical so that humor-averse players have the simple means to avoid unnecessary humor in their dark fantasy.

[Karranthain]

I'd love to see some horror themes weaved in from time to time; not too often, as it cheapens the experience - but the right dose really can work brilliantly.

 

Wouldn't mind black humour either

[Review or Die]

KOTOR2's humor felt the most right to me, tonally. It never went goofy, but there was always something about it that could get you grinning and sometimes just laughing out loud, despite the fact that in all likelihood the universe was going to be consumed of every living entity and you being some sort of abomination unto the Force that could very easily be the most dangerous person in the universe.

 

I never was a fan of things that took themselves so seriously that they forgot that human beings are naturally inclined to try to relieve tension by joking, and that people are... well, they're a little ridiculous. They've got their quirks, their foibles, their things that have them saying "And what's so WRONG about [my stuffed purple giraffe]?" By ignoring humor, you're ignoring a fundamental part of the way people interact with each other and human nature as a whole. And if everything's serious, then the game can't get serious. It's a matter of contrast that makes a scene more impactful. I don't need a jester companion who tells knock knock jokes, but some humorously witty dialogue is a must for me.