How "retro" should the mechanics of PE be?

[Karkarov]

It costs less than the NWN2 engine because NWN2's engine isn't strictly isometric in nature.

Uh yeah.... Unity is completely capable of doing 3d graphics. The isometric view is at Obsidians discretion, not a limitation of the engine. Also do you have any idea how many games get released with little to no print media or tv coverage these days? Hundreds. The internet is by far the standard means of advertising video games these days and it costs less than you might think. Especially when you are dealing with a niche title that will already have appeal and be looked at by it's core fans without having to do more than exist. In fact I dare say word of mouth is the most common and strongest advertising most niche titles get in modern gaming and it costs 0.

 

You need to also factor in that when this game gets to market it will be VERY closely examined by the gaming press. As of right now is it the highest funded kickstarter ever, it is made by a known company that has made a game that is actually critically acclaimed in the last few years (Fallout New Vegas), it will definitely be the benchmark for whether or not kickstarter funding will be viable for developers looking to avoid publishers long term or something that will only work for small projects. There will be people who couldn't even care less about the game itself who will cover it for no other reason.

 

The game represents a lot more than a BG 3.

Edited November 12, 2012 by Karkarov

[Metabot]

Your poll is wrong WRONG!!!!! You are asking how the game should appear graphically, which has already been decided and Obsidian has already told us what they are doing. "Mechanics" of a game has little to do with it's graphical presentation. Example, the "mechanics" driving NWN 2 and Baldurs Gate 2 are actually pretty darn similar, but visually the games look totally different.

 

That said I was thinking about how funny it is going to look watching a bunch of fully 3d character models running around on a flat 2d image. I hope Obsidian finds a way to make the game maps considerably more "alive" than they were in PS:T, BG, and IWD.

 

I am beginning to think they expected to get less budget than they did. There are many fully 3d RPG's in the style of the Infinity Engine games out there that actually had smaller budgets than what PE got from just Kickstarter. Some of them even have full voice work to boot which adds a hefty sum on any games dev costs.

 

Have you played ToEE at all? 3d characters on top of 2d background looks fine. Playstation era Final Fantasies were the same I believe.

[Karkarov]

Have you played ToEE at all? 3d characters on top of 2d background looks fine. Playstation era Final Fantasies were the same I believe.

Little bit different. These days they can make a 3d model that actually looks real.

[teknoman2]

Have you played ToEE at all? 3d characters on top of 2d background looks fine. Playstation era Final Fantasies were the same I believe.

Little bit different. These days they can make a 3d model that actually looks real.

and how exactly will the higher quality of the 3D model prevent it from fitting in with the 2D background?

[Aldereth]

Personally, I think going "retro" does not work well for presentation of computer games in general. What dev. should shoot for if they want to go "retro" is to go for some design theme and game mechanic and present it with at least the industry average in the area of presentation. Dated graphics and sound just doesn't stand up well like painting or music. So a cRPG that goes retro may want to have more detail stats and less streamline mechanic like Diablo or Mass Effect 2&3 but using 16 bits graphic is well not really advisable.

[BetrayTheWorld]

Actually, I'm sure with marketing and licensing costs, the budget for NWN2 was much higher than 6m. Even if it is, that's 2006. According to you, 1999 is OLD. 2006 was 6 years ago, 1999 was 7 years before that. You're saying that 6 years isn't a long time? That 6m is a reasonable figure for a NWN2-esque title being developed? Get some consistent belief system here - is 13 years a long time? But 6 years is not a long time? That's half the distance of a 'long time' - 6 million won't cut it. Costs have risen dramatically.

 

Technologically, 13 years is a long time. Fiscally, 6 years is not. You're talking about two completely different things with regard to time. My cost comparison was using fewer technological resources than it would have taken 6 years ago to make nwn2, while adjusting for inflation. If they're making a game that is to be lighter in the graphics department than AAA titles of today, I was making the comparison that they could have easily created the game in the newer, yet still dated nwn2 3D style, and likely been the better for it, in my opinion. But that's just it, it's my opinion. I'm entitled to it, as you are yours. My entire point was that they had started this project only needing 1m. They got 4m, and will likely end up with 6m before completion. In expanding the budget by 6 times, it's possible to enhance the manner in which the entire game is presented. One of those possibilities(financially) was to go from isometric to 3D. All I was doing was gauging the public opinion on the matter, while weighing in with my own preferences.

 

As for the rest of your post, all those issues have been asked and answered. I'm not going to rehash the entire thread for you. I put too much time into my posts to have to make them over and over again.

Edited November 12, 2012 by BetrayTheWorld

[teknoman2]

Personally, I think going "retro" does not work well for presentation of computer games in general. What dev. should shoot for if they want to go "retro" is to go for some design theme and game mechanic and present it with at least the industry average in the area of presentation. Dated graphics and sound just doesn't stand up well like painting or music. So a cRPG that goes retro may want to have more detail stats and less streamline mechanic like Diablo or Mass Effect 2&3 but using 16 bits graphic is well not really advisable.

just to make it clear, because you seem really confused about it... they wont use a 12 year old 8-16bit graphics engine, they will use a modern graphic engine to make a game using the same visual design as some 12 year old games.

to make it simpler: they make a plane that looks and works similar to WW2 planes, but instead of steel wires for the controls, iron-alluminum body and analog instruments, they will use nano fiber alloys for the body, hydraulics for the controls and the latest electronic tech for the instruments.

so don't confuse the tech used with the visual style they want to present... they are unrelated, just as half life 2, flat out and dota 2 are unrelated, while they all use the source engine

[Karkarov]

and how exactly will the higher quality of the 3D model prevent it from fitting in with the 2D background?

Because the higher quality the character models the easier it is to draw disparity between them and the "dead" flat 2d image with no movement, active shading, or depth.

[Metabot]

Have you played ToEE at all? 3d characters on top of 2d background looks fine. Playstation era Final Fantasies were the same I believe.

Little bit different. These days they can make a 3d model that actually looks real.

 

mhmm and have you seen the screenshot for PE?

[Pshaw]

and how exactly will the higher quality of the 3D model prevent it from fitting in with the 2D background?

Because the higher quality the character models the easier it is to draw disparity between them and the "dead" flat 2d image with no movement, active shading, or depth.

 

Well it depends how it's handled. While I know this game has no where near the budget of Diablo III all the objects that weren't a part of the background blended in perfectly. They were just skinned in such a way that was totally consistent artistically with the background. It's hard to notice some of the more subtle stuff when you're out hacking hordes of monsters to bits but if you run on out the fields of misery in act 1 you can find plenty of areas where there is tall grass that sways and moves as you run through it. They'll also to the same for explosions and attacks that happen on the grass. Also in act 1 at any point where you're in the monastery run up to where the long draping tapestries are hanging on the wall and attack. They flap around and move while you attack near them and if you don't do that you'd probably just assume they're static since they blend in so well. This of course doesn't take into account any of the various destructible objects throughout the game as well.

 

So my point is that it's entirely possible to place high quality 3D objects on top of painted backgrounds without having an obvious separation. It just requires a bit of a hand touch in the skinning and lighting of the objects to make them seamless. This is also a million times easier to do in a game with a fixed perspective which is why Diablo III steadfastly refused to change this aspect of the game.

[PK htiw klaw eriF]

 

If Obsidian is telling the truth, it will use all $4M to make this game.

 

 

What? I don't recall them stating that the only funds for PE will come from crowd-sourcing. There is no reason to believe that PE will not be funded in some part by Obsidian.

[teknoman2]

If Obsidian is telling the truth, it will use all $4M to make this game.

 

 

What? I don't recall them stating that the only funds for PE will come from crowd-sourcing. There is no reason to believe that PE will not be funded in some part by Obsidian.

indeed... it's not like they are broke, they just dont have the budget to make a whole game without aditional funding. and since pubblishers were not interested in providing the funding they turned to the pubblic.

[Alexjh]

If Obsidian is telling the truth, it will use all $4M to make this game.

 

 

What? I don't recall them stating that the only funds for PE will come from crowd-sourcing. There is no reason to believe that PE will not be funded in some part by Obsidian.

indeed... it's not like they are broke, they just dont have the budget to make a whole game without aditional funding. and since pubblishers were not interested in providing the funding they turned to the pubblic.

 

I'm sure a little of Obsidian's own money will make it in here or there but from my understanding of things, Obsidian/most developers don't necessarily have that much "free" money at a time. What will happen is that somehow the process of makign a game might get underway, either shopping their own idea to a publisher or a publisher getting them to work on a certain property, the publisher then gives them some money to do this (the equivalent money to the money we've given them through kickstarter) and then they make the game. Most of the profits them go back to the publisher as they are the ones who paid for production in the first place. So, in Obsidians case, while they might have a big lump of money in their bank account, that is specifically money for Project Eternity given to them by us, or money specifically for South Park: stick of truth, given to them by THQ and any "free money" would be more limited.

 

I might be wrong in that, but that's my understanding of the matter.

[Karkarov]

Well it depends how it's handled. While I know this game has no where near the budget of Diablo III all the objects that weren't a part of the background blended in perfectly.

I seriously hope they have better graphics than Diablo 3. That game cost so much because blizzard is an incompetent developer that needs three times the staff and three times the well... time, to do what other teams can do. They also have the forced online BS, multiplayer, and the ever popular real money auction house which i suspect saw more effort than most things in the game did. You are right though, the pretty par character models by today's standards did look okay on the background images.

[teknoman2]

Well it depends how it's handled. While I know this game has no where near the budget of Diablo III all the objects that weren't a part of the background blended in perfectly.

I seriously hope they have better graphics than Diablo 3. That game cost so much because blizzard is an incompetent developer that needs three times the staff and three times the well... time, to do what other teams can do. They also have the forced online BS, multiplayer, and the ever popular real money auction house which i suspect saw more effort than most things in the game did. You are right though, the pretty par character models by today's standards did look okay on the background images.

that was not even a game... that was a promotional feature of the real money sucking black hole: the auction house

[anubite]

Personally, I think going "retro" does not work well for presentation of computer games in general. What dev. should shoot for if they want to go "retro" is to go for some design theme and game mechanic and present it with at least the industry average in the area of presentation. Dated graphics and sound just doesn't stand up well like painting or music. So a cRPG that goes retro may want to have more detail stats and less streamline mechanic like Diablo or Mass Effect 2&3 but using 16 bits graphic is well not really advisable.

 

Old games don't usually age well, but in the case of isometric games, I think they actually age very well. Look at Starcraft, Age of Empires II, or any RTS from before 2000. They still look very beautiful today.

[jivex5k]

It's sad to see Blizzard has fallen so far, but it was foretold by the lack of LAN support in starcraft 2.

[Alexjh]

It's sad to see Blizzard has fallen so far, but it was foretold by the lack of LAN support in starcraft 2.

 

I do think the Blizzard bashing is a bit melodramatic, Diablo 3 isn't a bad game really tho it certainly has it faults, it just can't live up to it's hype. IT was fun enough that I don't regret the £20ish I spent on it and didn't buy anything in the real world auction house, and indeed sold a few bits and bobs so the game cost me even less.

 

The biggest problem with it in my eyes is I get the impression they actually obsessively polished it too much removing so much of the "clunk" the overall experience ended up feeling more insubstantial than was actually true. The final result is certainly a disappointing game (particularly for the obsessive hardcore players) but I don't think you can fairly call it a "bad game" persay. If it had been made by someone else and called something else it would get a lot less flack.

Edited November 13, 2012 by Alexjh

[LadyCrimson]

I seriously hope they have better graphics than Diablo 3.

Path of Exile has more detailed graphics - or at least gives an illusion of such or something - in some respects, than D3. Aren't those both more "3d" than P.E. is likely to be, tho? I'm not always sure about these things...

 

At any rate, D3 is kinda weird for me visually, because Act1 looks so terrible but later stuff often looked a lot better.

[HansKrSG]

Basically #1 with updated graphics. As in higher resolution 2d backgrounds and avatars, not 3d or anything like that.

Edited November 14, 2012 by HansKrSG