Comparing PoE to BG is unfair

[Yellow Rabbit]

Not just that. Some of them have explicitly claimed to harken back to IE games.

It's just matter of telling usual marketing crap from genuine attempt to recreate an atmosphere of IE games.

[Captain Shrek]

Ohtheirony.jpeg

[BPM]

Objectively it is possible to compare Poe with BG?
Poe gameplay, in my opinion, is completely different from BG.
The same can be said of skill, stats, etc.
I thought that to be fair, Poe should be judged on its merits.

[Amentep]

I like this spirit of discussion. But I must disagree. It has nothing to do with being the first game of a series. Being so does not put constraints on quality. In that regard (being first of a series) claims about scope and breadth are admissible but not the quality of content.

It can put a constraint on the scope of the game though.  BG2, for example, has the benefit of an engine, systems and assets made for it (through the production of BG1) that BG1 didn't.  Therefore time that was eaten by working on the engine or working on assets isn't a factor for BG2 like it was for BG1, that development time can be spent elsewhere.

 

PoE did have Obs working on a new engine and having to create all their assets and develop their systems. 

 

Now I'm not saying PoE and BG2 aren't a fair comparison (IMO its all fair game), all I'm saying is that I can buy an argument that if you want to look at what's potential with development time, a first game might make more sense compared to another first game.

[Godless]

How can you say that BG is a terrible game? It had everything I wanted as a kid: A badass villain with well realized intentions and some more or less realistic cronies, such as Tazok, a story that had quite a bit to it if you actually read all the correspondence between the Iron Throne and its subordinates, and the ability to make a customized character and choose from a decent selection of companions all with their own biographies and voiced dialogue. I recently replayed BG 1 and 2 when the Extended Editions came out, and had a fantastic time doing it. These are games that I played through as an 11 year old and got my ass kicked. However, with a slower and more calculated playthrough, I was able to absorb a relatively coherent story with engrossing gameplay that kept me wanting to side with a certain faction or spite certain villains, which is enough for me to have an enjoyable RPing experience.

[Captain Shrek]

 

I like this spirit of discussion. But I must disagree. It has nothing to do with being the first game of a series. Being so does not put constraints on quality. In that regard (being first of a series) claims about scope and breadth are admissible but not the quality of content.

It can put a constraint on the scope of the game though. 

 

 

Which is what I said.

 

BG2, for example, has the benefit of an engine, systems and assets made for it (through the production of BG1) that BG1 didn't.  Therefore time that was eaten by working on the engine or working on assets isn't a factor for BG2 like it was for BG1, that development time can be spent elsewhere.

 

PoE did have Obs working on a new engine and having to create all their assets and develop their systems. 

 

Now I'm not saying PoE and BG2 aren't a fair comparison (IMO its all fair game), all I'm saying is that I can buy an argument that if you want to look at what's potential with development time, a first game might make more sense compared to another first game.

BG2, for example, has the benefit of an engine, systems and assets made for it (through the production of BG1) that BG1 didn't.  Therefore time that was eaten by working on the engine or working on assets isn't a factor for BG2 like it was for BG1, that development time can be spent elsewhere.

 

PoE did have Obs working on a new engine and having to create all their assets and develop their systems. 

 

Now I'm not saying PoE and BG2 aren't a fair comparison (IMO its all fair game), all I'm saying is that I can buy an argument that if you want to look at what's potential with development time, a first game might make more sense compared to another first game.

 

The engine is not made by obsidian. In fact, this particular engine (unity) is well known for assets that come with it. 

 

 

How can you say that BG is a terrible game? It had everything I wanted as a kid: A badass villain with well realized intentions and some more or less realistic cronies, such as Tazok, a story that had quite a bit to it if you actually read all the correspondence between the Iron Throne and its subordinates, and the ability to make a customized character and choose from a decent selection of companions all with their own biographies and voiced dialogue. I recently replayed BG 1 and 2 when the Extended Editions came out, and had a fantastic time doing it. These are games that I played through as an 11 year old and got my ass kicked. However, with a slower and more calculated playthrough, I was able to absorb a relatively coherent story with engrossing gameplay that kept me wanting to side with a certain faction or spite certain villains, which is enough for me to have an enjoyable RPing experience.

 

I played BG/2 quite late (when I was 20's. So I had none of this nostalgia clouding my judgment . 

Edited April 27, 2015 by Captain Shrek

[MReed]

 

I like this spirit of discussion. But I must disagree. It has nothing to do with being the first game of a series. Being so does not put constraints on quality. In that regard (being first of a series) claims about scope and breadth are admissible but not the quality of content.

It can put a constraint on the scope of the game though.  BG2, for example, has the benefit of an engine, systems and assets made for it (through the production of BG1) that BG1 didn't.  Therefore time that was eaten by working on the engine or working on assets isn't a factor for BG2 like it was for BG1, that development time can be spent elsewhere.

 

PoE did have Obs working on a new engine and having to create all their assets and develop their systems. 

 

Now I'm not saying PoE and BG2 aren't a fair comparison (IMO its all fair game), all I'm saying is that I can buy an argument that if you want to look at what's potential with development time, a first game might make more sense compared to another first game.

 

 

To be a bit more explicit -- BG2 benefited from (saved time) in comparison to BG1 in the following ways:

 

* The engine and UI was already written

   * The developer team was very, very familiar with the engine, as they had written it (and, speaking as a developer, this makes a big difference)

   * They had the benefits of feedback from the consumer's on what parts of the interface needed to be tweaked, versus working in a void.

* Many, many creatures / items / spell effects had already been built and could be reused (or tweaked, if they thought it was appropriate)

* The pipelines for building resources (everything other than code, basically) had been tested under fire, and everyone was familiar with those processes (what needs to be delivered to whom in order to avoid bottlenecks, for example)

 

And, ontop of all of the above, the success of BG1 meant that the budget for BG2 was significantly higher.  So, they had less "behind the scenes" work (stuff that is absolutely critical to any program, but isn't going to be noticed by the end users unless it is missing) to do but more funds to do it with -- not surprisingly, the result was a much more robust game.

 

To address the OP:

 

There are two totally different questions being asked in this thread:

 

"Should I buy the game?" -- this should be judged based on comparison to recent titles, such as DAO / DA2 / DAI / Witcher 2 and the like.  If the infinity engine games enter this discussion at all it would be in the context of "You can buy BG1 for $10 vs $40 for this game, and in my opinion you would be better off..."

 

"Did the game meet its Kickstarter objectives" -- since it was explicitly meant to be inspired by / recreate the Infinity Engine experience but with modern sensibilities, then comparing it with BG1 is the only fair comparison that can be made.  Whether or not it is a "good game" / "worth the money" is irrelevant:  the only thing that matters is "Does playing this feel like playing BG1, but better?"

[Amentep]

The engine is not made by obsidian. In fact, this particular engine (unity) is well known for assets that come with it.

Sure, but it is their first game using it. And they had to create the systems and mechanics (stats, how they're used). That's all stuff a BG2 would have benefited from that a PoE can't.

 

Heck even IWD and PST had the benefit of BG already existing even though they were BIS's first shot at the IE engine.

[Isi1dur]

BG is sh!t compared to PoE, BG2 however trumps both.

[majestic]

The engine is not made by obsidian. In fact, this particular engine (unity) is well known for assets that come with it. 

 

 

I don't think that was his point. Yes, Obsidian used an existing engine (one that many indie-devs use due to the licensing system among other things) but you really don't think that any of the character and monster models, animations, spell effects, items & co are stock assets, do you? Also, seeing how Obsidian allowed inXile to use a bunch of in-house tech developed for PoE there also was most likely some time spent to engineer useful addons.

 

Assuming a potential sequel uses the same tech they can create a lot more actual game content in the same time. Devs already have experience handling the scripting and the engine and know how to deal with the peculiarities of the tech involved. Basic models and animations can be reused.

 

Back when Black Isle made Icewind Dale 2 they used the Infinity Engine to stomp out a complete game in more or less six months in an attempt to stop Interplay from going belly-up (which kind of worked for a short time). Reusing assets allowed them to even change the ruleset to 3E and almost stay within the given project time limit.

Edited April 27, 2015 by majestic

[MReed]

Just to pile on -- this is also the first isometric (2d backgrounds with 3d objects on-top) that has been written for Unity, so obviously tons of tons of functionality had to be added on, and lots of "out of the box" functionality had to be ignored, discarded, or rewritten to make sense in this environment.

 

It is also worth pointing out that Unity really shouldn't be called an "engine" in my book -- otherwise, you would have to label DirectX the same way, and since Unity uses DirectX (in Windows, anyway)...   It certainly isn't an engine in the same sense that the "Infinity Engine" is an engine.

[Gromnir]

To be fair, when you advertise your game as the spiritual successor to BG (and IWD and PST) then comparisons to BG would seem to be natural.

 

And even if comparisons directly between a modern game and an 15 year old game weren't "reasonable" (something I don't agree with) you could still make comparisons to how they are relative to their respective contexts of time.

 

am very disappointed in you.

 

did we not thoroughly and complete exorcise this demon during the past couple years?  the ie games, ALL the ie games, were listed as inspirations for poe... along with other unnamed crpgs from the increasing distant past.  no "spiritual successor" nonsense from obsidian.  evar.

 

and truth-to-tell, even if we did try and shoehorn poe into a "spiritual successor" straightjacket, we don't even know what that means.  get a dozen folks to tell you what were best in the ie games, or most integral to ie game appreciation, and you is gonna see as much variation as you see same.   the ie games used the same engine, but they were, in many ways, fundamentally different.  obsidian never claimed to be making the ultimate evolution, the final distillation, o' the ie experience.  

 

Gromnir liked the ie games.  the developers (many o' them) liked the ie games.  thousands o fans still like the ie games.  obsidian were creating a game that would share many common elements with the ie games.  but spiritual successor?  nope.  never said that... and thank goodness, 'cause it don't mean anything... or rather it might mean anything.

 

we do agree that a bg2 comparison would be even more perilous than the spiritual successor hobgoblin. obsidian, or at least josh (as an aside, people who have names that is also verbs is always difficult for Gromnir.  technically we is esl) mentioned more than once that poe would not manage bg2 levels o' scope and would almost certainly have less encounter complexity. bg2 were an enormous undertaking and obsidian didn't have the resources to match.  nor would they have the benefit o' multiple previous releases from which to build 'pon and refine.  bg2 were specific identified as more o' a future goal for the potential poe franchise rather than any kinda reasonable expectation for poe itself.

 

HA! Good Fun!

[ShadowStorm]

BG was awful. BG2 was better.

BG2 was awful. BG was better.

[Amentep]

 

To be fair, when you advertise your game as the spiritual successor to BG (and IWD and PST) then comparisons to BG would seem to be natural.

 

And even if comparisons directly between a modern game and an 15 year old game weren't "reasonable" (something I don't agree with) you could still make comparisons to how they are relative to their respective contexts of time.

 

am very disappointed in you.

 

did we not thoroughly and complete exorcise this demon during the past couple years?  the ie games, ALL the ie games, were listed as inspirations for poe... along with other unnamed crpgs from the increasing distant past.  no "spiritual successor" nonsense from obsidian.  evar.

 

Would you rather I say "homage" - like Obsidian did in their Kickstarter pitch ("Project Eternity (working title) pays homage to the great Infinity Engine games of years past: Baldur’s Gate, Icewind Dale, and Planescape: Torment.") than "Spiritual Successor"?

 

I'm not sure such a semantic split is necessary, but I suppose that depends on what you see a Spiritual Successor means...

[Gromnir]

 

 

To be fair, when you advertise your game as the spiritual successor to BG (and IWD and PST) then comparisons to BG would seem to be natural.

 

And even if comparisons directly between a modern game and an 15 year old game weren't "reasonable" (something I don't agree with) you could still make comparisons to how they are relative to their respective contexts of time.

 

am very disappointed in you.

 

did we not thoroughly and complete exorcise this demon during the past couple years?  the ie games, ALL the ie games, were listed as inspirations for poe... along with other unnamed crpgs from the increasing distant past.  no "spiritual successor" nonsense from obsidian.  evar.

 

Would you rather I say "homage" - like Obsidian did in their Kickstarter pitch ("Project Eternity (working title) pays homage to the great Infinity Engine games of years past: Baldur’s Gate, Icewind Dale, and Planescape: Torment.") than "Spiritual Successor"?

 

I'm not sure such a semantic split is necessary, but I suppose that depends on what you see a Spiritual Successor means...

 

thats the problem, isn't it?  as we noted, folks believe they know what a ie spiritual successor is... and everybody is believing different.  an homage is not the same.  some novel or movie includes a brief nod to previous luminaries and that is considered a freaking homage.  

 

a little honesty.

 

HA! Good Fun!

 

ps we saw a funny bit where it were noted how many marvel movies had folks get their hands cut off... homage to empire strikes back.  homage is nothing.

Edited April 27, 2015 by Gromnir

[Amentep]

Fair enough, I'll agree that "Spiritual Successor" can be nebulous; that said I'll argue that PoE touting an attempt to craft an homage to the Infinity Engine games would mean more than a brief nod.

[b0rsuk]

as BG was a horrible game as such. What was great about BG was its amazing art + spell FX. The rest was cringeworthy: Story, Chars and combat were horrible in general. BG2 at least improved upon quest density. 

 

Also, BG was~15 years ago. If a game made today is NOT better than BG then what's the point of making it?

 

What made this thread possible? The continuous claims that POE > BG and somehow that being a metric of good games. 

Discuss your opinions!

 

Visuals can get old. Good design doesn't get old. By your logic, basketball is a bad game because it's old. Surely there must be something better by now. Or Discworld is trash because it's old.

[Volourn]

"as BG was a horrible game as such. What was great about BG was its amazing art + spell FX. The rest was cringeworthy: Story, Chars and combat were horrible in general. BG2 at least improved upon quest density."

 

Whatevs.

 

 

". I can expect this kind of behaviour on Bioware boards, I expected this community to be more restrained, or dare I say, mature."

 

L0L The Obsidian forums are one of the least mature forums I've ever seen. That's why I like 'em.

 

 

 

"It's driven by a group of posters claiming that PoE, a game that most of us really like, is terrible.  The backlash against BG is inspired by the fact that a lot of the people trashing PoE  happen to worship BG.  So it's just retaliation in kind."

 

So.. you like b/c you are butthurt b/c someone said mean things about a game you like? WAAA They hate a game I like so I will bash a game I like just because I know they like it. That's the ultimate definition of butthurt *and* trolling.

Edited April 27, 2015 by Volourn

[Ohioastro]

Explaining something that other people are doing is not the same thing as feeling it yourself.

 

Good God, does every form of disagreement somehow translate to being butthurt for people old enough to drink?

[majestic]

Explaining something that other people are doing is not the same thing as feeling it yourself.

 

Good God, does every form of disagreement somehow translate to being butthurt for people old enough to drink?

 

Try discussing religion and/or politics on a message board. The petty squabbles here will appear to be nothing but minutiae compared to that.

[Gromnir]

Fair enough, I'll agree that "Spiritual Successor" can be nebulous; that said I'll argue that PoE touting an attempt to craft an homage to the Infinity Engine games would mean more than a brief nod.

and that's fine, but an homage can be complete different than the original.  folks who is fans o' the artist or work being paid tribute to can see the connections, but the new work is not typical considered a successor, spiritual or otherwise.  in fact, you make what amounts to the "spiritual successor" to a novel and chances are you got many folks complaining that you were simple stealing or copying the original.  in virtual any other medium, we would expect an homage to be genuine original, otherwise, what would be the point o' creating such a thing?  if you like the original so much, just go and read the gosh darn original, no?  

 

why is poe different?  'cause folks wanted a spiritual successor and not an homage?

 

HA! Good Fun!

 

ps please note the second quote in our signature.  miller's crossing were an homage to 1940s gangster flicks. it took bit and pieces from any number o' such films, but it did different.... and in color too.  

Edited April 27, 2015 by Gromnir

[Cronstintein]

 

BG was awful. BG2 was better.

BG2 was awful. BG was better.

 

 

Troll!!  Where are my fire arrows... oh wait.. I don't need those anymore 

[RadonGOG]

 

 

BG was awful. BG2 was better.

 

Which is part of the point. Why aim for something that is clearly inferior and then celebrate when you beat that mark? 

 

They were clearly talking about Baldurs Gate Trillogy, course near to EVERYBODY always talks about Baldurs Gate Trillogy when they say Baldurs Gate. If they don´t, they write Baldurs Gate I... 

[Namutree]

as BG was a horrible game as such. What was great about BG was its amazing art + spell FX. The rest was cringeworthy: Story, Chars and combat were horrible in general. 

Wrong!

 

Story was mediocre, but well presented.

 

Characters were entertaining and memorable. Far better than most RPG's where companions express themselves through exposition exclusively.

 

Combat was fine.

 

Awesome character creation that holds up fine to this very day, vast areas to explore (and are worth exploring), and an epic/atmospheric soundtrack.

 

BG1 is better than the overwhelming majority of rpg's made since. Only a few rpg's in existence are better.

[GrinningReaper659]

For what it's worth, as I avoided bringing it up, I happen to enjoy BG1 quite a bit, I just don't think whether or not I like it personally is very relevant to the point put forward by the OP. If he's saying that comparing it to BG1 is unfair because he sees BG1 as a crap game and it shines too favorable a light on PoE, then he's essentially just whining that some people are pointing out some of PoE's strengths and trying to force some absurd argument about how they can't possibly be compared to put a stop to it.