Small suggestions. Easily implemented ideas, quickfire thoughts.

[rjshae]

^^^ Aye, well it didn't seem like that thread was for combat (weapon/armor) items.

[rjshae]

Legend holds that a colorful fish, familiarly known as the ancestor fish, may sometimes be seen by an individual who has recently lost somebody precious to them. The story goes that when a solitary mourner is seated beside a calm body of water, the fish may poke its head above the surface and begin to speak with the voice of the one who was lost, attempting to comfort the person or confront them with an uncomfortable truth. Once the exchange has been completed, the fish then sinks under the water and vanishes from sight.

 

Whether this legend is true, or if it is simply a tall tale, remains in question. Some scholars argue that the spirits of those who have suffered a horrific end may linger nearby for some time afterward. The fish is then provided by a deity as a means for the spirit to communicate with the living, in order to ease the spirit into its next cycle of existence. Regardless, the desperate mournful may sometimes seek solace along the calm shores of a calm pool, hoping for a kind word from the ancestor fish. Pools of water where said fish are claimed to put in an appearance may take on an elevated status in the local community.

[JFSOCC]

I hope that the developers put a ****load of content in the world that isn't linked to quests. Any quest idea they had which doesn't make it, use the bare bones and just leave it in the game without the quest. It will give us the impression of a much much larger world where a lot of stuff is going on, even things you can't get involved with.

 

So you might stumble upon a group of 12 wizards locked in a ritual circle busy summoning a demon. And you can wait and fight the them all including a demon, or you can kill them and ruin the ritual, or you can abuse that they're busy summoning and rob them blind, or you can ignore them. but nothing what you do will tell you who they are, why they are there, what their motives are or any of that. Or you come across a ruined temple which you can loot.

 

these sections are about visual narrative more than anything else. You can see what happened if you pay attention to your surroundings. You don;t have to hit the player over the head with it either.

 

These days I notice way too many games only include things which have a purpose, mostly quest oriented. So you're fairly sure that when you speak to someone with dialogue besides the standard greetings, that they're involved in a quest or questline.

And that's sort of immersion breaking, because it encourages meta-game thinking. By having unexplained but atmospheric content richly mixed in between the quests, you create the illusion of a much much bigger world.

Edited March 6, 2013 by JFSOCC

[JFSOCC]

"Yes, I know what the DEATH screen looks like, I'm in LOVE with the DEATH SCREEN"-A very sarcastic Chris Avellone after dying for the umpteenth time.

 

So, yeah, different death screens. In Quest for Glory, there would be an amusing epitaph based on the way you died. A little poem. I loved those.

Maybe something like that.

(I suggest you mute the lowe quality sound.)

[rjshae]

^^^^ Different death screens based upon the path you've taken through the game might be interesting.

[Chippy]

I'm not normally one to buy into the nostalgia stuff, but would request a low level magic missile type spell (with the pink colouring from IE games and Warlocks blast from NWN2).  There was just something about that colouring that spoke to me.

[Lephys]

I hope that the developers put a ****load of content in the world that isn't linked to quests. Any quest idea they had which doesn't make it, use the bare bones and just leave it in the game without the quest. It will give us the impression of a much much larger world where a lot of stuff is going on, even things you can't get involved with.

 

So you might stumble upon a group of 12 wizards locked in a ritual circle busy summoning a demon. And you can wait and fight the them all including a demon, or you can kill them and ruin the ritual, or you can abuse that they're busy summoning and rob them blind, or you can ignore them. but nothing what you do will tell you who they are, why they are there, what their motives are or any of that. Or you come across a ruined temple which you can loot.

 

these sections are about visual narrative more than anything else. You can see what happened if you pay attention to your surroundings. You don;t have to hit the player over the head with it either.

 

These days I notice way too many games only include things which have a purpose, mostly quest oriented. So you're fairly sure that when you speak to someone with dialogue besides the standard greetings, that they're involved in a quest or questline.

And that's sort of immersion breaking, because it encourages meta-game thinking. By having unexplained but atmospheric content richly mixed in between the quests, you create the illusion of a much much bigger world.

If you wanna boil that down, stuff can have any number of purposes without the game even telling the player, up front, what all those purposes are. I think the standards on the nature of quests have been kinda... ehh, simplified and arbitrarily restricted? "A quest is something that you agree to do while knowing what it's all about before hand, and what kind of reward there is, with MAYBE a handful of varying factors along the way." The world shouldn't be made out of quests. Quests should be made out of the world.

 

Like you said... Want to figure out what's going on with those linked, chanting mages in that ritual? Now you're on a quest to find that out. You'll even get some type of reward for it, really. But no one ASKED you to do it. The game didn't TELL you to go do that. Want to help them summon the demon and take control of it? Go for it, connect FOUR! Want to kill them all because you don't like what they're trying to do? Go for it. Want to find out exactly what it is they're doing before you decide? Maybe you don't have enough skill/reputation/knowledge, or you simply don't say the right things, and they refuse to explain anything to you. You still have to decide what to do about it. Maybe if you leave them be, you come back to find them all gone, and they show up later on in some situation or another, with their demon. Maybe they've disguised their demon as a monarch, and no one knows. Maybe they've got some other goals in mind.

 

The possibilities are endless. The whole point is, the quests are all there, depending on your perspective and goals. They simply aren't in a convenient cafeteria line, with labels out in front on the glass. It's up to you to discover them. Games are starting to lack discovery, like it's annoying or something. "Just tell me who gives me the best armor if I kill them, and that's who I'm gonna kill. I shouldn't have to look this up online! JEESH!"

Edited March 7, 2013 by Lephys

[JFSOCC]

No, what I mean is, if everything is linked to something for the player to do, you get the sense that the entire game-world is made for you. that's incredibly immersion breaking. If everything has a purpose, you know automatically when you see something "Oh, I guess I should find out what's going on, otherwise I might miss something useful"

 

By adding content which is completely superfluous but still very stylishly done, it gives the player the idea they're in a much larger world where everything does not revolve around them.

[JFSOCC]

A fully animated capture of this man's dance:

 

resulting in the setting ablaze of all the terrain around him. A powerful fire spell.

[TSBasilisk]

An NPC chanter who wants to chronicle your adventures, and takes up residence at your stronghold. After large quests you can tell him your story. If you choose to lie to cover up aspects you don't want known, your reputation will improve marginally. If you tell the whole truth, it will improve slightly more, but your standing with any aggrieved parties will worsen.

 

The chanter also acts as your main method of learning how you are viewed as a person - generous, greedy, mercenary, etc.

[Sacred_Path]

An NPC chanter who wants to chronicle your adventures, and takes up residence at your stronghold. After large quests you can tell him your story.

said chanter should also be an homage to another, allegedly fictional, "chanter".

[Giantevilhead]

When your party becomes famous or infamous, I want people to start naming things after your characters, streets, schools, villages, etc. It would be fun to go to an inn and see a beer named after your PC. Or if you're playing a really evil character, people could refer to cleaning the vomit off the floor as "mopping up the 'PC name.'"

Edited March 12, 2013 by Giantevilhead

[forfs]

It's probably neither easy to implement nor small, but I'd love to see combo fields much like in Guild Wars 2 MMO. Short description:

If say wizard casts wall of fire, and then archer shoots an arrow trough it, the arrow catches fire. Same with acid, etc. 

[Lephys]

It's probably neither easy to implement nor small, but I'd love to see combo fields much like in Guild Wars 2 MMO. Short description:

If say wizard casts wall of fire, and then archer shoots an arrow trough it, the arrow catches fire. Same with acid, etc. 

 

I similarly love the combo effects in Mass Effect 3. But, yeah, I like a lot of the ideas Guild Wars 2 implemented, regarding abilities and combat.

[Chippy]

If there's any gathering of stuff for crafting, it would be great to hire flunkies to do it.  Although it would be equally cool if player skill could determine the quality of gathered stuff - like spot/search/crafting to extract ore in a better manner for that special weapon.  So being able to choose would be great.

[pipboy2000]

In short: Some little consequences for successful thievery/pick pocketing:

 

I wrote this in another thread a long time ago, but it also seems to fit in here:

(I will qoute it here because I really would love to see something like that in the game and hope it might get more attention, if I mention it over and over again! )

 

I really would love to see some (little) consequences even for successful thievery! For example:

- If you stole a purse from a maidservant she could start complaining that she will face punishment at her employers house, because she had not been careful enough.

- A merchant could turn on his no good bodyguards for not preventing a theft.

- If you stole from a farmer, he could become desperate, now that he would not be able to buy the two cows he had been saving his money for 2 years.

- If you stole from somebody who would give a quest to you later on, he could say something like: "I would have offered you 50 gold pieces, but since some bastard stole my purse, I can't."

- If you stole from a beggar kid he could start to cry, now that he and his little sister would have to starve...

Even if it would only be "role play" consequences, I think such little events would make you think twice before doing the "steal-harvest" on a map, before moving on...

 

All those things can easily be accomplished with a little text over the head of those you stole from. Nothing fancy and no voice acting needed. (Of course I am aware, that it would break the immersion, if you would use the same text over and over and over again, because, you see, I used to be an adventurer like you, but then...)

 

 

( http://forums.obsidian.net/topic/60453-thievery-should-be-m )

[mcmanusaur]

Am I the only one who notices that half of these suggestions could be construed as forms of PC/player ego stroking? Though I suppose after all that's precisely what many people play RPG's for.

Edited March 20, 2013 by mcmanusaur

[JFSOCC]

most aren't.

[Oner]

Could we please have some bearable companions please? Obsidian does great writing but companions are usually either annyoing people, or hate everyone around them.

KotOR2: Kreia: arrogant hag, looks down on everyone. Atton: Punk, looks down on everyone (except maybe Bao-Dur), etc.

NWN2: Quara: ungh.. Sand: Funny but a smartass. The gnome bard: village idiot, etc.

AP: Everyone in the Graybox who isn't Mina (and maybe Westridge. I liked him, but I can see why others would be annoyed by his demeanor).

 

I'm not saying Obs should make flawless characters, but how about some positive personalities (and I don't mean obvious comic relief) and a sense of camaraderie? It's a party afterall, let those people bond, please?

[JFSOCC]

Yes! And not every adventuring party has members at odds with eachother, usually there is some form of team spirit. The whole notion that you need to choose between party members and you can't keep them all happy... I'll kick out the troublemaker who ruins the unit cohesion, not the person I disagree with most.

 

Six people, a real team.

[Chippy]

Was just thinking that one of the few things I liked about Skyrim was the Stormcloak missions (where you helped them raid a crypt or assault a castle, etc) it would be great if the crafting skill was taken into account and I had the option to equip those guys with better stuff - in true RPG fashion though, so maybe it would advance my reputation with the faction, or even within that scouting party if their leader was corrupt.  Getting a bit detailed now.

 

Maybe even just give them some gold to upgrade their gear - likely the sort of thing a cleric, monk paladin would do.

[smithereen]

Am I the only one who notices that half of these suggestions could be construed as forms of PC/player ego stroking? Though I suppose after all that's precisely what many people play RPG's for.

 

More reactivity is not ego-stroking..

[JFSOCC]

Maybe it's too much to ask, but I wouldn't mind a few points in the game where you can respec some of your level-up choices, since you can't always tell in advance how they'll work out and whether or not they suit your play. It'd be a shame if you're forced to stick with all your mistakes or roll a new character or go back to a previous save way back.

[rjshae]

Social events at your stronghold where the behavior of the guests is modified by the wealth of the furnishings and the impressiveness of your displayed trophies.

Edited March 21, 2013 by rjshae

[Lephys]

Companions who actually don't ALWAYS steal all the cool stuff you gave them when they decide to leave you. (Maybe they do if they happen to be arses).

 

"I'm afraid I cannot travel with you any longer. I must politely take my leave... AND all this awesome equipment you outfitted me with, u_u..."