Chris Avellone says Pillars of Eternity was too linear and that he had little impact on the story

[Magnificate]

Sagani is someone I would want to travel with, since she seems to be the most dependable of all the companions. This is especially evident after seeing the ending slide with the player failing her sidequest.

[why]

I can't imagine I'll play without Aloth and Eder.  I guess probably because I feel somewhat responsible for Aloth and I think of Eder and Aloth as a team.  Eder is clearly the most sympathetic and meant to be the most sympathetic NPC.  I enjoy Durance, but his syle of 2 parts nasty combined with 1 part wild eyed crazy can be offputting.  Frankly, the only NPCs whose quests I haven't finished are Hirvias, the trashy (literally) monk, and whoever is in the White March 2.  I'll be doing those quests next.

 

As aside, nice transition from gossip column stuff to NPCs!

 

P.S.  I saw Hark mention the ending slide for Eder, and I thought that was brilliantly done also.  Sagani's, on my second run at least, was depressing as hell.

Edited February 8, 2016 by why

[house2fly]

- Grieving Mother is characterized as regretful, traumatized, caring, and evasive, and she doesn't break that. Her plot is very interesting, but it needs actual representation in the game. It makes no sense whatsoever that you find her after you've seen all the Wichts in the game or that you don't you know see her village. Her transformation is interesting and plausible, but only reflected in the ending slides. Thematically I can't quite place her. Maybe misguided authority, or the harm of ignorance. The only time she impacts the game (Dyrford) she does so flawlessly.

Her theme is all about the harm done by hiding a painful truth, which ties in with what the villain of the main plot is doing. She lied to a whole village which led to devastation when the lies couldn't be sustained; after revealing this she asks you to do the same to her, and if you make her live with the painful truth then eventually she gets better.

 

Regarding Durance, you hit the nail on the head there- he puts people through trials to change them and tries to do so with you, but it's you who ends up transforming him. I think Aloth is the worst character because he has two stories that are basically entirely separate, but the second one that follows you to the endgame is all about rejecting or accepting authority and fits well with the main plot, which saves him imo.

[FlintlockJazz]

Regarding Aloth, the short story helps tie them together more.  Trying not to spoil it for those who haven't read it, it basically shows how one essentially lead to the other.

[JBrown247]

Isn't this the guy who is supposed to be making novels for multiple games? I guess he should be writing on those instead of tweeting.

[JBrown247]

You can not only pick your stories, but you can literally just kill virtually anyone in PoE and the Elder Scrolls. In TES, if you kill someone essential to the primary storyline, the game allows it to happen but simply prints an on-screen warning, "you just killed someone essential to advancing the main plot"

 

Also, did you say that Fallout New Vegas is an example of non-linear story? cause...

 

 

Repetitive combat + copy-pasted rubble + no significant story = boring waste of time.

 

The exploration in New Vegas feels very repetitive and boring.

 

The game does have a main plot, just that it's a bit slow to get going. The main driving force is finding your dad and fixing the water supply. As for everything being copy and paste, that's just the wonders of the gamebryo engine.

 

http://forums.steampowered.com/forums/archive/index.php/t-2209561.html

Only people who played FONV once or played multiple characters making the same decision would think that FONV is linear.

[Valsuelm]

 

He's not "at Larian", just doing part-time work there same as he does for everybody else.

Basically, he could be working on some quests and characters for PoE2 in future as part-time.

 

Not going to happen.

[mychal26]

I'm going to disagree with those tweets. Playing through the game (in prep for the release next week), and I'm finding that it's very enjoyable (quite a bit better than W2, and the closest CRPG to BG that I've played). I've found no issues with 'linearity' and I think the companions and their back stories so far have been good. Also, I liked what happened to the first companions - it was unexpected. Not only are the tweets unprofessional, it sounds like the guy is whining; guess it's a reason to not back a game if his name is on it.

[anameforobsidian]

When asked about being a stretchgoal Avellone tweeted "Hell no."