We need a bunch of non-backers buying this

[Valmy]

Okay, so what are people actually planning to do to make others buy this game?

 

Remember to write metacritic reviews. Write Steam reviews. Talk about the game on forums and recommend it to people.

 

It is only through us that games like this continue to be made, also remember that the sales of this game will decide Obsidian's future prospects of making more games like this. What happens now is at least as important as the Kickstarter campaign.

 

Yep. Please do this once you get your hands on the actual game.

[kozzy]

Been harping on my steam friends to get this game

[Sluggy7]

I pre-ordered the game through Steam over the weekend. I'm a non-backer. I've been looking forward to this game for quite a while. I'm fine with the price point and have cleared my schedule for the weekend (except for a funeral that I can't get out of. Not my own.) because I deserve this. Go me.

[ComplyOrDie]

Great to see its up there on twitch. Itmejp ex Starcraft caster with over 3k views. I'd watch but I don't want to spoil .

[Katarack21]

 

So, to sum it up, your comment about "miss only one of those elements and it's not an RPG anymore" is only valid for games you like it to be valid for? Talk about double-standards.

 

Indeed, talk about "No true Scotsman...", I think we can safely say that Katarack's definition of "What is an RPG" is pretty much specific to Katarack and no-one else. It's certainly not broadly accepted, because RPG is a very wide and all-embracing term in computer games, rather than a very narrow and specific one. Every CRPG I can think of that's actually good at anything sacrifices one area that he highlights in order to succeed in another. What I think is particularly funny, looking at things historically, is this insistence that the ME games are merely "shooters with RPG elements", when pretty much every RPG on the market is some genre of game "with RPG elements" (including the IE series - RTS with RPG elements, Fallout - Turn-based tactical game with RPG elements, then later "shooter with RPG elements", and so on and so forth).

 

Back on topic, if we want non-backers to buy this, and importantly, to go on and buy the expansion and/or sequels, the main things needed are:

 

1) For the game to be good fun for people who aren't hardcore Infinity Engine-series fans. Some of them will be people who played the original IE games, and have fond memories of them, but were never "serious" players. Others will never have played them, and just like RPGs in general, whether it's Skyrim or ME or whatever that was their actual entry point.

 

2) Publicity. Twitch streaming will help, a lot, but word-of-mouth is going to be the killer. If the game is good enough, and accessible enough (which isn't necessarily super-accessible, but accessible enough), then we can happily go around recommending it to every even slight RPG fan we know, which is a hell of a lot more people than backed it or even seem to have heard of it.

 

I mean, most of my closer friends at least like RPGs - many have played or still play P&P RPGs, for example. Most of them seem to have heard of the new Torment game, but almost none of them seem to be aware of Pillars of Eternity, outright confusing it with Torment, and not knowing anything about it. If the game I get on the 26th is good enough and accessible enough that they'll like it, that's going to change, real soon! If it isn't, though, I will wait until it is - it might be that I have to wait until the party member AI goes in before recommending it to some people, for example. Better that they wait and have a good experience, than get it on release and be pissed off.

 

Focuses on one or the other, they don't completely get rid of it. Genres are a thing, man, and while the borders of genre's by nature blur--thus hybrid game styles like Mass Effect and System Shock--that doesn't mean that an RPG isn't very clear when you see one, or that an RPG and an FPS aren't the same thing. That's the very reason that Pillars of Eternity is being made--because modern AAA "RPG's" are hybrid genre messes. Notice I didn't call System Shock 2 an RPG either, even though it's one of my favorite games of all time.

 

To say every rpg just has "RPG elements" is ridiculous, as is your claim that the IE games are RTS with RPG elements. Those games do exist--Dawn of War and Warcraft 3 are shining examples, and clearly very distinct games from Baldur's Gate 2. The IE-style games aren't even tactical RPG's, really, at least not in the sense that most people who use the term mean. They're really RTwP games, which are their own particular style of gameplay which can be applied to many genres and which emphasizes tactical combat as an addition to the normal features of whatever genre the game might be.

Edited March 23, 2015 by Katarack21

[AgentZeus]

I have already been nagging people to buy it and I'm a non backer!

 

Picked up a copy via greenman...... and have just given in and preordered that lovely looking hardback prima guide from amazon

[Kiya]

So has anyone else noticed that Pillars of Eternity has crept up into Steams top ten list?  It is sitting at number 4 for me in the UK between Arma 3 and CS:GO.

 

Rock, Paper, Shotgun did a really great article on the game today .

[Katarack21]

I'm looking at it #4 in my list, as well. #1 in the RPG top sellers. :-D

[Hassat Hunter]

I don't know about the game being bug-free. I'm afriad it will repeat the mistakes of SW:TOR - at the release every single bit of end-game content was bugged because public tests never allowed people to get into these stages of a game. PoE does something similar - allowing people to access only tiny bit of a game more to test the gameplay and generic mechanics than testing... you know... the game itself. It obviously got a huge disadvantages, such as that we don't have any sagnificant spoilers, but it also can cause tons of problems with bugs in the storyline and quests.

Wow... it's a good thing, a *very* good thing developers don't simply trust on their players for bughunting and fixing. QA exists for that. If players are left to that task, trust me, it would be the worst thing ever. The worst.

 

Something about many cooks also applies here aswell.

 

Also, you're giving a bit of a conundrum; content is bugged because not many players played it, but if you want players to find bugs for you they need to play content that's heavily bugged (not to mention most of them wouldn't go through one area 300 times before moving on and stuff). It's a 20-20 of failure, but fortunatelly nobody needs to make such horribly wrong decisions since QA exists...

[Sky_walker]

Rock, Paper, Shotgun did a really great article on the game today .

Finally!

 

OK ladies and gentleman - get out there and write some positive comments!

 

Seriously though - it seems like they really like it, so that's a good start

 

 

 

I don't know about the game being bug-free. I'm afriad it will repeat the mistakes of SW:TOR - at the release every single bit of end-game content was bugged because public tests never allowed people to get into these stages of a game. PoE does something similar - allowing people to access only tiny bit of a game more to test the gameplay and generic mechanics than testing... you know... the game itself. It obviously got a huge disadvantages, such as that we don't have any sagnificant spoilers, but it also can cause tons of problems with bugs in the storyline and quests.

Wow... it's a good thing, a *very* good thing developers don't simply trust on their players for bughunting and fixing. QA exists for that. If players are left to that task, trust me, it would be the worst thing ever. The worst.

 

Something about many cooks also applies here aswell.

 

Also, you're giving a bit of a conundrum; content is bugged because not many players played it, but if you want players to find bugs for you they need to play content that's heavily bugged (not to mention most of them wouldn't go through one area 300 times before moving on and stuff). It's a 20-20 of failure, but fortunatelly nobody needs to make such horribly wrong decisions since QA exists...

 

We'll see after the release just how great that QA is. So far I haven't seen a game that would have components tested by QA team less bugged than components tested by general public - hence my post.

[Hassat Hunter]

That's because you never played a game tested by the general public... ???

(as far as I know, none such game exist, not even Early Access titles)

Edited March 24, 2015 by Hassat Hunter

[Sky_walker]

That's because you never played a game tested by the general public... ???

(as far as I know, none such game exist, not even Early Access titles)

General public in a meaning of not a dedicated QA team. Not a general public as in random people taken from the street. And that means pretty much every Early Access game, crowdfunded game, open beta tested game or closed beta tested game with open recruitment.

[Hassat Hunter]

Those still have QA teams, and feedback filters through them, not from players directly to devs.

 

So I say again, no, such games don't exist... and there's a good reason for that.

[Sky_walker]

Those still have QA teams, and feedback filters through them, not from players directly to devs.

 

So I say again, no, such games don't exist... and there's a good reason for that.

What are you even talking about?

Read this: http://forums.obsidian.net/topic/71190-we-need-a-bunch-of-non-backers-buying-this/page-5?do=findComment&comment=1591947 then come back to me. If you still don't get it - read it again.

I never discussed games with absolutely no dedicated QA teams.

[edit] Maybe in my previous post I should have said "components tested by general public on top of the regular tests" to avoid this silly nitpicking game. Though the context should be more than clear if you'd bother to read my post before that one (as linked above).

Edited March 24, 2015 by Sky_walker