Obsidian: Where is the announcement for spiritual successor of Arcanum?

[Malekith]

 

IWD 3 in P:E engine (I think Obsidian owns the IP)

 

Icewind Dale is part of Forgotten Realms IP which is under D&D IP, which owner is Wizards of the Coast, who is owned by Hasbro.

I was talking about the IWD brand which i think belongs to Obsidian. However, yes if they want to use it they must license D&D by hasbro

[Elerond]

 

 

IWD 3 in P:E engine (I think Obsidian owns the IP)

 

Icewind Dale is part of Forgotten Realms IP which is under D&D IP, which owner is Wizards of the Coast, who is owned by Hasbro.

I was talking about the IWD brand which i think belongs to Obsidian. However, yes if they want to use it they must license D&D by hasbro

Only ones that I could find belogn WotC

http://www.trademarkia.com/icewind-dale-85043957.html

and Atari, which is abadoned

http://www.trademarkia.com/icewind-dale-77380064.html

Edited April 10, 2013 by Elerond

[Lephys]

Meh, I should've worded what I said better. Just for the record, what I meant was, Fallout 3 didn't achieve a net gain by going 1st-person/3D. It gained some things, but it also lost a lot that was Fallout 1 and 2 (and even Brotherhood of Steel... even though it was a bit lacking for other reasons).

 

I don't hate Fallout 3 or anything. Although, I liked NV a LOT better. But, yeah, I just don't think taking an RPG story from isometric 2D to 1st-person 3D is a quantifiable improvement or anything. There is no new era of RPG design that makes the old-school STYLE of gameplay/perspective/interface obsolete (as can easily be seen by the glorious, glorious P:E demo posted last night).

[Malekith]

 

 

 

IWD 3 in P:E engine (I think Obsidian owns the IP)

 

Icewind Dale is part of Forgotten Realms IP which is under D&D IP, which owner is Wizards of the Coast, who is owned by Hasbro.

I was talking about the IWD brand which i think belongs to Obsidian. However, yes if they want to use it they must license D&D by hasbro

Only ones that I could find belogn WotC

http://www.trademarkia.com/icewind-dale-85043957.html

and Atari, which is abadoned

http://www.trademarkia.com/icewind-dale-77380064.html

Ok, maybe i was wrong. I swear that i read somewhere that Feargus had the rights

[Barothmuk]

Although I've loved everything I've heard about Project Eternity and am pretty confident I'm going to be invested in this franchise for quite a while I hope they'll take a break after PE + its expansion and try and create another cRPG IP.

 

Some of the ideas they've mentioned in interivews have been quite interesting.

[Amentep]

 

 

 

 

IWD 3 in P:E engine (I think Obsidian owns the IP)

 

Icewind Dale is part of Forgotten Realms IP which is under D&D IP, which owner is Wizards of the Coast, who is owned by Hasbro.

I was talking about the IWD brand which i think belongs to Obsidian. However, yes if they want to use it they must license D&D by hasbro

Only ones that I could find belogn WotC

http://www.trademarkia.com/icewind-dale-85043957.html

and Atari, which is abadoned

http://www.trademarkia.com/icewind-dale-77380064.html

Ok, maybe i was wrong. I swear that i read somewhere that Feargus had the rights

 

My memory is   that Obsidian bought the assets used for IWD/IWD2 - like the art and portraits - from Interplay.

[Archmage Silver]

I heard MCA will be a stretch goal for Arcanum: The Spiritiual Sequel™.

[Grape_You_In_The_Mouth]

Arcanum had an awesome story although it loosely centered around a typical high fantasy plot, and I support all efforts to bring back any elements from that game.  When I first heard about the intro to P:E, I thought "they're remaking Arcanum....my life has peaked."

[Domigorgon]

I want a new Vampire: the Masquerade game.

[Malekith]

I want a new Vampire: the Masquerade game.

I want a WoD or Ravenloft 2D isometric game.

[Darth Trethon]

I sincerely hope they follow in the steps of inXile and have another kickstarter planned for after PE goes into full production but I think they need to do two things first: launch a pledge fulfillment site for PE and have a gameplay video to show for PE. The video inXile had for wasteland 2 was a killer, didn't just hit the ball out of the stadium but into space. I think these two bits are important: it gives pledgers the sense of safety that obsidian is tracking and cares about fulfilling their pledges while the gameplay video shows raw awesomeness and displays the kind of awesomeness that can be expected from the end product. If they do decide to make this I sure hope a spiritual successor to Arcanum would be next but I would back them in any future endeavor they choose to make through crowd-funding.

[Jaesun]

Activision owns the IP and trademark to Arcanum. Making a new Arcanum would be pointless.

[Grape_You_In_The_Mouth]

They could call it Arkanum and let you think it's pointless the whole way through.

[Darth Trethon]

Activision owns the IP and trademark to Arcanum. Making a new Arcanum would be pointless.

Look at what inXile did with Torment. They don't have the IP rights to the Planescape franchise nor is the game in any way related to the PS:T setting or characters so they created a new IP.

 

Now Arkanum is too close, the change of only one letter could be hit for copyright infringement but they can use other alterations like Arcane for example as part of a title. Again it would be a whole new world and all new character and an unrelated story but can live up to the feeling of the classic CRPG.

[Ffordesoon]

It's worth noting that I'd love a Kickstarted Arcanum spiritual sequel for the same reason I would like one for Alpha Protocol: because it would be a chance to get it right. Both of them are games which are beloved for a few things they get really, astonishingly right, and both of them are games most people would bounce right off of for, let's face it, the larger amount of things they do poorly.

 

And I say that as someone who likes AP much more than Mass Effect 1, its obvious antecedent that is absolutely the more polished and consistent game.

 

I actually wish Arcanum had a sequel slightly more than I wish AP had one, to be honest, because I can at least play and enjoy AP, for all its faults. Whereas Arcanum... Well, I love everything about it except actually playing the thing, which I've never been able to do for more than an hour. And I'm a tremendously patient and forgiving gamer who is more than willing to spot any game the benefit of a thousand doubts. If Arcanum doesn't work for me...

[Alc Cides]

 

Activision owns the IP and trademark to Arcanum. Making a new Arcanum would be pointless.

Look at what inXile did with Torment. They don't have the IP rights to the Planescape franchise nor is the game in any way related to the PS:T setting or characters so they created a new IP.

 

Now Arkanum is too close, the change of only one letter could be hit for copyright infringement but they can use other alterations like Arcane for example as part of a title. Again it would be a whole new world and all new character and an unrelated story but can live up to the feeling of the classic CRPG.

That's exactly my feeling the main components are the steam-punk vs fantasy, the dialogue, the open world, the very different options for each race so It's perfectly possible to do it.

[Alc Cides]

It's worth noting that I'd love a Kickstarted Arcanum spiritual sequel for the same reason I would like one for Alpha Protocol: because it would be a chance to get it right. Both of them are games which are beloved for a few things they get really, astonishingly right, and both of them are games most people would bounce right off of for, let's face it, the larger amount of things they do poorly.

 

And I say that as someone who likes AP much more than Mass Effect 1, its obvious antecedent that is absolutely the more polished and consistent game.

 

I actually wish Arcanum had a sequel slightly more than I wish AP had one, to be honest, because I can at least play and enjoy AP, for all its faults. Whereas Arcanum... Well, I love everything about it except actually playing the thing, which I've never been able to do for more than an hour. And I'm a tremendously patient and forgiving gamer who is more than willing to spot any game the benefit of a thousand doubts. If Arcanum doesn't work for me...

That's is right I've managed to travel 3 times the hard land of Arcanum, the main feeling is: Why? Why they didn't do it right? So an spiritual successor could be a perfect opportunity. I didn't play alpha protocol so maybe I've to start looking for it.

[Ffordesoon]

Oh, I can tell you why they weren't able to do it right. A few reasons, actually:

 

• The publisher forced them to insert a real-time combat option into the game a few months before release, which basically meant that neither mode was polished in time.

 

• It was a tremendously ambitious and innovative game on a schedule and budget which weren't at all conducive to ambition and innovation.

 

• It was a tremendously ambitious and innovative game. As much as we all like to hate on Big Evil Publishers, from a pure financial point of view, they're right to be wary of investing in projects that are innovative or ambitious, and doubly right to be wary of investing in both. Because innovative things tend to be a bit busted the first time around, and ambition only multiplies the amount of things that might end up busted.

 

See also: Peter Molyneux's whole career, pretty much.

 

EDIT: And you should totally play Alpha Protocol, because it's a great game wrapped in a mediocre one. If you can squint hard enough to see past the numerous flaws (and if you've played Arcanum three times, I think you probably can), it's a gem.

Edited April 14, 2013 by Ffordesoon

[Rivfader]

no time for Arcanum cuz after the expansion of PE we get PE 2 WOOT

[lolo]

 

 

 

 

IWD 3 in P:E engine (I think Obsidian owns the IP)

 

Icewind Dale is part of Forgotten Realms IP which is under D&D IP, which owner is Wizards of the Coast, who is owned by Hasbro.

I was talking about the IWD brand which i think belongs to Obsidian. However, yes if they want to use it they must license D&D by hasbro

Only ones that I could find belogn WotC

http://www.trademarkia.com/icewind-dale-85043957.html

and Atari, which is abadoned

http://www.trademarkia.com/icewind-dale-77380064.html

Ok, maybe i was wrong. I swear that i read somewhere that Feargus had the rights

http://www.gamebanshee.com/interviews/109792-project-eternity-interview/page-3.html

 

--------------------------------------------------

Buck: I know that Obsidian Entertainment owns the Icewind Dale franchise assets and that you've approached publishers in the past about the prospect of pursuing Icewind Dale III. Given the success of your Project Eternity Kickstarter, what are the odds that we may yet see an ID3 in the near future, crowd-funded or not? Hypothetically, what direction would you take a third entry in the series?

 

Feargus: You are correct, we approached Atari a number of times about doing Icewind Dale 3. We hope that with the success of Project Eternity that it might be possible to talk to Hasbro / Wizards of the Coast about those games again. However, our focus right now is Project Eternity. We would not want to start working on something like IWD3 soon, since we don’t want anything to compromise Project Eternity at all. If we were to do IWD3, I think we would continue the focus of what the IWD series was all about – a great dungeon crawling counterpoint to Baldur’s Gate and Torment.

------------------------------------------------

I remember the news from gamebanshee

[PrimeJunta]

Arcanum.

 

I have finally, finally, FINALLY managed to get into it. I now get it, and absolutely bleeping love it. 

 

It's also unbelievably broken in so many ways it NEEDS a spiritual sequel that does it right. Seriously.

 

My Arcanum history in brief.

 

I played many, many characters up to level 15 or so, which then fizzled. The first ones I rolled were a bit like MCA's -- disastrously underpowered; constant dying was not fun. My very first character concept was a technological gunslinger. I did not know how to build one. It was not fun.

 

Then I figured out the most egregious loopholes in the game: how XP is awarded, and, um, Harm. So I rolled up a nearly pure diplomat, and watched as my minions steamrollered everything in their path. The game essentially became a "Win!" button, which got really boring.

 

So I ditched my diplomat and made a (nearly) pure mage instead. Once my arcane affinity hit near 100% and I got a couple of staffs with 40-50 mana, it was "Win!" button again. I only needed relatively limited spells to mow through the game, so I easily maxed out Persuasion again. So... boring again. 

 

And finally I'm back to my original concept, and this is fun. It feels like a constant balancing act, constant hunt for stuff to use, constant drive to find creative ways to overcome challenges. Of course I did cheat a bit at the very beginning: I had the difficulty set to Easy until I managed to get to the point where I had my gunslinging abilities up to the point where I wasn't getting mauled by wolves every time.
 

The tragic flaw of Arcanum is that to have this much fun, I have to intentionally gimp myself: to forgo the most efficient ways of playing the game. If magic and diplomacy were balanced the same way as technology, it would be a much, much better game. Specifically --

 

(1) Nerf Charisma. Maxing out Cha makes your party four times more powerful than average Cha. No other ability has this level of impact on your power. It's tantamount to an instant-win button.

(2) Add resource costs to magic. The most fun part of playing a technomancer is having to hunt for schematics, components, and materials. In fact the crafting mechanics in the game are the best I've seen anywhere. Mages would be way more fun to play if you could find or buy spells the same way you find or buy schematics, if you could craft magic items the same way you craft tech items, and if  the more powerful spells required material components you would need to find, buy, or craft. With the cheap and plentiful stamina potions, you can just spam Disintegrate to mow through anything. If every Disintegrate used up a diamond (crafted from Rough Diamond, magically crafted from Coal?), you'd have to think more strategically about it. 

(2b) Nerf Harm. It should not scale with level and magical affinity as much as it does. You shouldn't be able to waste, say, Granite Rats or Ore Golems without taking a scratch and with your stamina barely depleting just by going clickclickclickclick.

 

But yeah, now I get why this is a classic. It's been totes worth the trouble to work around its flaws.

[Malekith]

Arcanum.

 

I have finally, finally, FINALLY managed to get into it. I now get it, and absolutely bleeping love it. 

 

It's also unbelievably broken in so many ways it NEEDS a spiritual sequel that does it right. Seriously.

 

My Arcanum history in brief.

 

I played many, many characters up to level 15 or so, which then fizzled. The first ones I rolled were a bit like MCA's -- disastrously underpowered; constant dying was not fun. My very first character concept was a technological gunslinger. I did not know how to build one. It was not fun.

 

Then I figured out the most egregious loopholes in the game: how XP is awarded, and, um, Harm. So I rolled up a nearly pure diplomat, and watched as my minions steamrollered everything in their path. The game essentially became a "Win!" button, which got really boring.

 

So I ditched my diplomat and made a (nearly) pure mage instead. Once my arcane affinity hit near 100% and I got a couple of staffs with 40-50 mana, it was "Win!" button again. I only needed relatively limited spells to mow through the game, so I easily maxed out Persuasion again. So... boring again. 

 

And finally I'm back to my original concept, and this is fun. It feels like a constant balancing act, constant hunt for stuff to use, constant drive to find creative ways to overcome challenges. Of course I did cheat a bit at the very beginning: I had the difficulty set to Easy until I managed to get to the point where I had my gunslinging abilities up to the point where I wasn't getting mauled by wolves every time.

 

The tragic flaw of Arcanum is that to have this much fun, I have to intentionally gimp myself: to forgo the most efficient ways of playing the game. If magic and diplomacy were balanced the same way as technology, it would be a much, much better game. Specifically --

 

(1) Nerf Charisma. Maxing out Cha makes your party four times more powerful than average Cha. No other ability has this level of impact on your power. It's tantamount to an instant-win button.

(2) Add resource costs to magic. The most fun part of playing a technomancer is having to hunt for schematics, components, and materials. In fact the crafting mechanics in the game are the best I've seen anywhere. Mages would be way more fun to play if you could find or buy spells the same way you find or buy schematics, if you could craft magic items the same way you craft tech items, and if  the more powerful spells required material components you would need to find, buy, or craft. With the cheap and plentiful stamina potions, you can just spam Disintegrate to mow through anything. If every Disintegrate used up a diamond (crafted from Rough Diamond, magically crafted from Coal?), you'd have to think more strategically about it. 

(2b) Nerf Harm. It should not scale with level and magical affinity as much as it does. You shouldn't be able to waste, say, Granite Rats or Ore Golems without taking a scratch and with your stamina barely depleting just by going clickclickclickclick.

 

But yeah, now I get why this is a classic. It's been totes worth the trouble to work around its flaws.

Finally, you see the light!

But yes, Arcanum is a mess. I tried 3 times to get into it and got bored. Only the constand praise of the game by people who i trust that liked the same games as i did made me willing to TRY again. And when it "clicked" to me i absolutely loved it. But it is a problem that for you to like the game you must try hard to like it at the begining until it clicks to you. That hurts the game.

[Diggfinger!]

Ok. We've the spiritual succesor of Icewind Dale, Baldur Gates on PE.   The postnuclear saga from Wasteland, Fallout 1 and 2 continues on Wasteland 2. 

Torment, oh Torment has now they own spiritual sucesor on Torment: Tides of Numenera 

So, just one is missing: Arcanum: Of Steamworks and Magick Obscura. 

We need a new steampunk , isometric RPG on this revival. 

I think is Obsidian turn to make it 

 

 

Ok. We've the spiritual succesor of Icewind Dale, Baldur Gates on PE.   The postnuclear saga from Wasteland, Fallout 1 and 2 continues on Wasteland 2. 

Torment, oh Torment has now they own spiritual sucesor on Torment: Tides of Numenera 

So, just one is missing: Arcanum: Of Steamworks and Magick Obscura. 

We need a new steampunk , isometric RPG on this revival. 

I think is Obsidian turn to make it 

Definitely..but let them finish PE first! 

[Zitchiock]

From what I deduce, it seems PE is going to pay most tribute to Baldur's Gate & Icewind Dale.

 

A sequel however (PE2), could perhaps introduce more industrialism into its setting, and not only continue the story from the original, but also evolve the world story (and pay tribute to Arcanum). In doing so, the list of games in current development (the current top-down/isometric cRPG) could look something like this:

 

Links are to the Kickstarter projects, many of them are finished and all of them have reached their funding goals.

 

High-Fantasy (& possibly Steampunk-ish?):

- Project: Eternity = Baldur's Gate, Icewind Dale & Darklands Tribute (0 Seconds to Go)

(- Project: Eternity 2 = Tribute to Arcanum whilst keeping the above)*

- Divinity: Original Sin = Divine & Beyond Divinity Tribute (16 Days to Go)

- Shroud of the Avatar = Ultima** (0 Seconds to Go)

 

Science & Spiritual & Metaphysical:

- Tides of Numenera = Planescape: Torment Tribute (0 Seconds to Go)

 

Futuristic:

- Shadowrun Returns = Shadowrun (SNES) Tribute & Sequel (0 Seconds to Go)

- Wasteland 2 = Wasteland Tribute & Sequel (& old-school Fallout Tribute***?) (0 Seconds to Go)

 

* Just a "wish" & vision & possibility

Like swatting 3 flies with 1 hit: 

1. PE sequel

2. Arcanum tribute

3.  progression of the Eternity world

 

** Does not look like it's going to be top-down (more like 3rd Person) but I felt like including it into the list~

 

*** Honestly, I haven't followed the development progress of Wasteland 2 but what I can say is that I hope Fallout 4 (or the next one in the Fallout franchise) has options to move the camera into a top-down perspective with a Free Camera mode and a point+click system. A hybrid system, hopefully, something that allows both First Person and Top-Down (Something I feel that both New Vegas and Fallout 3 would have done nothing but benefit from doing). Dragon Age: Origins benefitted a ton by allowing you to have the "over the shoulder" perspective and allowing the player to zoom out (PC version).

 

^That paragraph has nothing to do with what I wanted to say: Wasteland 2 doesn't strike me as a Fallout-esque game from what I've seen on the pictures and the little I've read. It really looks like its own IP and that it has nothing to do with Fallout except that both are post-apocalyptic settings. That is intended as a compliment btw, Wasteland 2 looks awesome on its own. In my opinion: Wasteland is Wasteland. Fallout is Fallout.

 

TL;DR: Ramblings. The point I wished to convey is that PE2 could introduce more steampunk & industrial elements based on time progression between PE1 and PE2.

 

PE1 = Represents late 1500's (High or Late Middle Ages (Eternity Wikia); Technology in P:E)

PE2 = Could represent the more Arcanum represented Era: 1760-1850's (Industrial Revolution (Wikipedia))

 

Thanks for this post! I had no idea a new Divinity game was in development. That is great news. I really enjoyed the original games. Shroud of Avatar looks interesting too, as I missed the Ultima boat entirely. 

[GrumpyOldschooler]

I'm all for spiritual sequel of Arcanum, since it is one of my favourite RPGs along with old Fallouts and Torment. I also approve the idea of making it a sequel to P:E, but the problem is that one thing that made Arcanum unique was it's "magic vs. technology" theme. It's already pretty clear that in P:E world magic and technology don't interfere with each other, so pure spiritual successor would be impossible with P:E world. Also it would mean that industrial revolution of P:E world will lead to crazy and uncanny world of so called magitech (probably most people don't want anything to do with that), unless weakening of magic is used as a plot point. Then again if done in right way, magitech might be interesting (since there isn't really anything that has done it right as of now, though Dwemer of Morrowind come close) even if bizarre and certainly not spiritual successor to Arcanum.