And I'd argue that creating a whole game system (DnD was being developed over the years and had feedback of thousands of players before the BG was even in the plans) with all the mechanics is a process which takes a lot of effort and can't be rushed. I believe that for the time of development and the size of the team, PoE mechanics are very solid and should simply be improved upon. 

 

And yet Sawyer says in regards to crpg rule sets: pretty much all games get it wrong IMO. And there was a lot of feedback from players in the beta which was ignored because of ~feels~.

 

This is the nature of science. Did Newton have gravity wrong? Yes. Yes he did. Does this mean Einstein could completely ignore Newton? No. No he couldn't.

 

There is always room for further improvement, but the smartest thing is to start with the current status quo and innovate from there.

This game makes rooky mistakes in rules design ... D100 being the most obvious one. It's uselessly fine grained with the only real benefit being "it's not D20". You might think it makes the math more intuitive, but you would be wrong because most people don't have a feel for absolute vs. relative percentages to begin with. D100 is one of those things naive designers think will have a benefit, because they don't truly understand the downsides of flat RNGs ... D100 only feels like it would solve any of them, but all it can do is make the numbers bigger.

 

There is a lot of NIH syndrome as well (or simply a complete lack of knowledge of RPG rulesets). Things like bonus type names (there are still bonus types, but it's completely obtuse to the player) and the concepts of tumble&ACP (people in light armour should be mobile) should just have been copied.

Haven't read all 17 pages. But going off of general topic. Probably unfair to compare BG1/BG2 to PoE. BG1/BG2 were still AAA titles and PoE is not. Huge budget differences.

 

BG1 at the time was considered to have brought the cRPG game back to life. Even though Fallout 1 came out the previous year. Then BG2 was a monster of a game. Pound for Pound Undisputed Champion of all cRPG's. Yes I know someone is going to say Planescape but honestly BG2 combat a million times better.

 

And anything going up against D&D being created from scratch is a challenge. D&D has been out for what 40 years? Look at what inXile is doing for Torment: Tides of Numenera. They went with a P&P ruleset instead of creating one from scratch.

 

I would say it would be fair to compare PoE to Wasteland 2 and Divinity Original Sin though. I take PoE over them 2. 1 playthrough of W2 and 3 playthroughs of D:OS.

 

PoE will have for it what Bg1 had going for it. PoE 2 could therefore be legendary.

I don't think the Budget differences were all that great.

 

PoE cost just over $4 million to make. How much did BG1 cost to make?

I don't think the Budget differences were all that great.

 

PoE cost just over $4 million to make. How much did BG1 cost to make?

I believe I have heard BG1 cost $5 million, but that was in 1998.  Taking inflation into account that would be $7.2 million.  I believe BG2 cost $20 million in 2000, not counting inflation.

Edited May 7, 201511 yr by FlintlockJazz

That's a pretty huge difference just for BG1. And that's without the need to create a new setting from scratch.

I hate saying this, but playing PoE has gotten me into starting another playthrough of the BG 'trilogy'

 

 

Let's see: Sawyer was lead designer on Icewind Dale 2 and Fallout New Vegas. His bitter critics here don't appear to have designed much of anything, and the stuff that they are so angry about ranges from 'don't care' to 'flatly disagree' to 'perhaps, but fixable' in my book. I'll give the guy behind Door#1 the benefit of the doubt.

 

This would make sense if the game wasn't released to the public, but...

 

It is.

 

Surely, given a released product one can reasonably pass judgement on it -- understanding, of course, that others might disagree.  If X has released products A, B, and C to widespread acclaim (and possibly to your own acclaim), and has now released product D that doesn't receive widespread acclaim (and/or your personal evaluation is that it is inferior), then it is flatly absurd to argue (as you seem to be arguing here) that "D must be as good as A, B, and C: the defect is in your perception of the product."

 

I don't like the PoE mechanics for various reasons (far beyond "That's not the way it was in the Infinity Engine games"):  those perceptions are valid regardless of whether or not Sawyer (or anyone else, for that matter) agrees with me.  If enough people agree with me, then Sawyer will have to take these ideas into account or risk the financial success of his future products -- if more people agree with Sawyer than myself, then he will best receive success by ignoring my criticisms. 

 

"Past performance is not an indicator of future results", basically.

 

 

 

You should rate a game on how good it is, agreed.  I was reacting purely to the personal (ad hominum) attacks on Sawyer, to the effect that everything he does is crap, that several people in this thread have repeatedly made.  Whenever I see basically anonymous internet people making personal attacks like that it just makes me discount whatever they're saying.  It's the old lawyer joke:  "When the facts are on your side, pound the facts.  When they aren't, pound the table." 

 

I am interested in games with engaging environments, interesting character development, and game play challenges / puzzles that make me think.  A game that captures those ingredients from the old IE games is a good one in my book, regardless of rule system.  In general I'm a lot more interested in a new system (like PoE) than in a rehash of old systems, largely because there is so *&()) much baggage with the old games - people will flip out if you make the most trivial changes in the formula.  It can actually be better to just hit "reset" on mechanics and focus on capturing the spirit of fun - which frequently has nothing to do with the particular things that veteran players obsess about.

That's a pretty huge difference just for BG1. And that's without the need to create a new setting from scratch.

Not really. They did have to create a new engine from scratch. And the software tools were much more expensive and far less efficient back then. Plus they had to pay all the licensing fees for the rights to use both the Forgotten Realms setting and the AD&D ruleset.

 

Oh, and contrary to the ridiculous Hyperbole, BG2 did not cost $20 Million to make.

Edited May 7, 201511 yr by Stun

Let's see: Sawyer was lead designer on Icewind Dale 2 and Fallout New Vegas. 

 

And IWD2 was the weakest part of BG-IWD era. NWN2OC must be one of buggiest, most boring games in the whole genre. 

 

Actually, PoE is probably the best Sawyer game for me. Pleasant graphics, nice music, serviceable story and combat, reasonable number of bugs. 

 

 

Let's see: Sawyer was lead designer on Icewind Dale 2 and Fallout New Vegas. His bitter critics here don't appear to have designed much of anything, and the stuff that they are so angry about ranges from 'don't care' to 'flatly disagree' to 'perhaps, but fixable' in my book. I'll give the guy behind Door#1 the benefit of the doubt.

 

This would make sense if the game wasn't released to the public, but...

 

It is.

 

Surely, given a released product one can reasonably pass judgement on it -- understanding, of course, that others might disagree.  If X has released products A, B, and C to widespread acclaim (and possibly to your own acclaim), and has now released product D that doesn't receive widespread acclaim (and/or your personal evaluation is that it is inferior), then it is flatly absurd to argue (as you seem to be arguing here) that "D must be as good as A, B, and C: the defect is in your perception of the product."

 

I don't like the PoE mechanics for various reasons (far beyond "That's not the way it was in the Infinity Engine games"):  those perceptions are valid regardless of whether or not Sawyer (or anyone else, for that matter) agrees with me.  If enough people agree with me, then Sawyer will have to take these ideas into account or risk the financial success of his future products -- if more people agree with Sawyer than myself, then he will best receive success by ignoring my criticisms. 

 

"Past performance is not an indicator of future results", basically.

 

 

 

You should rate a game on how good it is, agreed.  I was reacting purely to the personal (ad hominum) attacks on Sawyer, to the effect that everything he does is crap, that several people in this thread have repeatedly made.  Whenever I see basically anonymous internet people making personal attacks like that it just makes me discount whatever they're saying.  It's the old lawyer joke:  "When the facts are on your side, pound the facts.  When they aren't, pound the table." 

 

I am interested in games with engaging environments, interesting character development, and game play challenges / puzzles that make me think.  A game that captures those ingredients from the old IE games is a good one in my book, regardless of rule system.  In general I'm a lot more interested in a new system (like PoE) than in a rehash of old systems, largely because there is so *&()) much baggage with the old games - people will flip out if you make the most trivial changes in the formula.  It can actually be better to just hit "reset" on mechanics and focus on capturing the spirit of fun - which frequently has nothing to do with the particular things that veteran players obsess about.

 

 

I assume you were refering to me, as I'm the first one that brought up Sawyer's name in this thread.

 

What I posted is nothing but the objective truth:

 

http://forums.obsidian.net/topic/39401-armor-abstractions-in-fallouts-special-game-system/?do=findComment&comment=526647 ("...I really disliked most of the CNPCs, I really disliked being forced to go find Imoen, I really disliked the style of dialogue, and I really disliked being flooded with a million quests by every shmoe on the streets of Athkatla. Basically, there wasn't a whole lot I did like about it.")  Note that this predates the PoE Kickstarter by several years.

http://new.spring.me/#!/JESawyer/q/449392305086952316 Saywer's response, posted when the first message was dug up ( after the Kickstarter).

 

All I stated was the objective truth about Saywer's opinions on BG2 and pointed out that, as a result, having the project team play BG1EE / BG2EE probably wouldn't have made a significant difference in the development of PoE (in fact, I rather expect that they did play them, at least BG1 / BG2, along with the other Infinity Engine games -- it was just in the context of "OK, don't make this mistake in PoE", rather than "This is exactly how PoE should feel").

 

What's the ad hominum fallacy here?

 

Let's see: Sawyer was lead designer on Icewind Dale 2 and Fallout New Vegas. 

 

And IWD2 was the weakest part of BG-IWD era. NWN2OC must be one of buggiest, most boring games in the whole genre. 

 

Actually, PoE is probably the best Sawyer game for me. Pleasant graphics, nice music, serviceable story and combat, reasonable number of bugs. 

 

 

Don't know why people keep saying NWN2 OC was a sawyer game, because it was not.  He only took over to finish it up after the original head of the project went to bioware.

It was a Sawyer game. He was the lead. That's a FACT.

It was a Sawyer game. He was the lead. That's a FACT.

 

It's not he's game.  He had to salvage what Ferret Baudoin lefted over.  That's a FACT.

 

Not like it matters who game it is.  I love NWN2.  <3

Edited May 7, 201511 yr by bonarbill

I thought it was solid too. Still doesn't change the fact that it was, in the end, Sawyer's game. He was the LEAD.

I don't know if you can really credit or blame Sawyer for NWN2. He was the design lead. But Chris Avellone was the creative director. Wouldn't that mean that all design decisions would have to be approved by Avellone? Which position holds more power? If it was Avellone's then you would have to say he had the bigger hand in how NWN2 turned out.

Avellone is also an Obsidian OWNER so justifiably he and his co owners are 100% responsible for everything Obsidian does.

Ok, i finished PoE today, man what a great story and a pleasent ending. Thumbs up Obsidian!

 

Now its even more unfair to compare PoE with BG1 :

 

Charakters, Story/Plot, Writing, c&c, reactivity... all is soo much better then in BG1, a comparsion is ridiculous.

 

Combat is still the weak point of PoE (because of the terrible encounter design, the mechanics itself are ok imo), but its not realy badder then the combat in BG1 (without TOTSC).

Edited May 9, 201511 yr by Ramireza

 

Combat is still the weak point of PoE (because of the terrible encounter design, the mechanics itself are ok imo), but its not realy badder then the combat in BG1 (without TOTSC).

 

Yeah, it is. Not that it takes away too much from the overall experience, but the AI and foremost the pathfinding isn't top notch.

 

On a side note, since there has been some talk about NWNII, which I haven't played for quite some time. Does that elven wizard you can recruit in the capital remind anyone else of Aloth? I mean, right down to the voice.

"Combat is still the weak point of PoE (because of the terrible encounter design, the mechanics itself are ok imo), but its not realy badder then the combat in BG1 (without TOTSC)."
 

Despite weaknesses, combat is PE's strrngth. Its' combat is vastly superior to its story.

That's a pretty huge difference just for BG1. And that's without the need to create a new setting from scratch.

 

exactly.

 

to me one of the main differences is that PoE rules and mechanics are not as good as AD&D was in BG. but it took years to AD&D to reach that level.

hopefully , with time, PoE rules will match it.

 

and anyway, PoE is already a good game. and it will improve.