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I finished playing Trails of Cold Steel awhile back and the game takes place in a fantasy world that's in the middle of an industrial revolution (sound familiar?). The primary conflicts are mostly about the politics of a imperial society whose culture is becoming increasingly technologically and economically irrelevant and those who fight against or in favor of the change. (Pretty deep stuff considering--no offense--that its a jrpg.)

 

Considering POE 1 & 2 largely have to do with souls and the gods I think it would be interesting if in one of the expansions or the sequel they shift some of the focus on the sociopolitical issues brought up in a world on the cusp of an industrial revolution. There was some of that in POE1 with animancy, but I'd like to see more of that in the future.

 

Anyone else's thoughts?

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- I finished Trails of Cold Steel 1+2 recently and the games are great. You should play the other Trails games too.

But why do those japanese devs always think that its a good idea to fight tanks, gian robots and soldiers with automatic guns with swords?

Don´t try this at home.

 

- Considering what type of game PoE2 is, Arcanum might be a better example for industrial revolution in a magic world.

There are dwarfes and elves, we have a conflict between magic and technology and much open world exploration. There were several ways to finish the main quest, tons of side quests and lots of things to discover. People react on your gender, race, stats and skills. Playing an orc with low int was super funny, especially with the dumb dialogue.

Ok, combat, leveling up and balancing were terrible, but I enjoyed the game a lot. Great setting, story and reactivity.

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Doesn't the Hand Occult prevent/sabotage stuff like letterpress printing and other stuff that would potentially lead to a industrial revolution?

 

sure but a group can only do so much, as a priest of ondra might say "You can fight against the tide but inevitably it will...it will...I forgot"

Edited by nightcobra
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Considering POE 1 & 2 largely have to do with souls and the gods I think it would be interesting if in one of the expansions or the sequel they shift some of the focus on the sociopolitical issues brought up in a world on the cusp of an industrial revolution. There was some of that in POE1 with animancy, but I'd like to see more of that in the future.

 

Anyone else's thoughts?

 

I think it would be interesting to examine, but I have my doubts it will from a business perspective. PoE is Obsidian own fantasy IP, designed to cater to a rpg traditionalist customer segment. Even if they wanted, Obsidian might be reluctend to do so, in fear of alienating fans.

 

Also, I wouldn't say that a vaugly-early modern analogous society is "on the cusp of an industrial revolution" (even if I dispense with my dislike for hard historical inevitability) - but that might be a quibble depening on whether you think 150 - 300 years is a short time.

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- I finished Trails of Cold Steel 1+2 recently and the games are great. You should play the other Trails games too.

But why do those japanese devs always think that its a good idea to fight tanks, gian robots and soldiers with automatic guns with swords?

Don´t try this at home.

 

- Considering what type of game PoE2 is, Arcanum might be a better example for industrial revolution in a magic world.

There are dwarfes and elves, we have a conflict between magic and technology and much open world exploration. There were several ways to finish the main quest, tons of side quests and lots of things to discover. People react on your gender, race, stats and skills. Playing an orc with low int was super funny, especially with the dumb dialogue.

Ok, combat, leveling up and balancing were terrible, but I enjoyed the game a lot. Great setting, story and reactivity.

 

 

To be fair, I thought fighting mechs with swords was pretty hilarious. :D But, yeah, Arcanum is a much better example of what I'm thinking.

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Doesn't the Hand Occult prevent/sabotage stuff like letterpress printing and other stuff that would potentially lead to a industrial revolution?

^This.  Also let's not forget what happened to the Engwithans.  The gods literally wiped them out for no other reason than "their tech is getting too advanced". 

 

I don't think there is much chance of Eora ever getting to a real industrial revolution as a result.  Well unless there was some kind of major shake up first, which could happen who knows.

 

Also Dog_Days, you need to play jrpg's.  Yes, there is all sorts of traditional dosh, but there are also games based on the writings of Nietzsche, games that seriously explore politics, and others with truly wacked out premises like the entire world is just a video game and your characters find out their world is literally about to be deleted.  In fact many JRPG's get way more experimental than any western RPG when it comes to story.

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In short: We're not quite there yet. Eora is a mid to late 17th century-ish early modern era setting. We're going to be seeing some of the dark side of what precisely that means in Deadfire, with colonialism in the archipelago. The industrial revolution is still a ways out.

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I finished playing Trails of Cold Steel awhile back and the game takes place in a fantasy world that's in the middle of an industrial revolution (sound familiar?). The primary conflicts are mostly about the politics of a imperial society whose culture is becoming increasingly technologically and economically irrelevant and those who fight against or in favor of the change. (Pretty deep stuff considering--no offense--that its a jrpg.)

 

Considering POE 1 & 2 largely have to do with souls and the gods I think it would be interesting if in one of the expansions or the sequel they shift some of the focus on the sociopolitical issues brought up in a world on the cusp of an industrial revolution. There was some of that in POE1 with animancy, but I'd like to see more of that in the future.

 

Anyone else's thoughts?

 

I agree that an Industrial revolution in PoE would make for an interesting setting! However, it would be better to have a PoE 3 with an Enlightenment first and THEN have a new RPG series and story set in the same world that happens a century later that is in an industrialized Eora.

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I'm not really sure Eora would go through an outright enlightenment. They already have less  restrictions on heresy and there is already a pretty significant number of scholars that seem to use a tangible scientific method (though it is a tad... flawed, so was a lot of the early scientific revolution).

 

Frankly I think they're just a working internal combustion engine away from an industrialization. However, that could take anywhere from 50 to 500 years depending on what amounts to luck.

 

Anyway, in a fantasy universe, a culture doesn't really *have* follow the normal cultural changes which happened in reality. Say, instead of an enlightenment, a culture could turn into some sort of theocracy which declared machines holy instruments of the divine and only allowed priests to learn about and operate them. Likewise, steps in the real technological development could in theory be bypassed (electricity discovered and utilized before internal combustion engines by some sort of soul-powered technology).

Edited by Yenkaz
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It's hard to really say whether Eora is on the brink of an Industrial Revolution or not. Outside of things like the Hand Occult and proverbial Gods actively sabotaging technological advances the world does seem very much at that tipping point of reach a new era but there are certainly other factors at play deciding that.

 

I think one of the biggest is the fact that Magic, Gods and more importantly Soul manipulation exists. A great deal of the worlds intellectual capital is being spent in these fields because they are readily tangible rather than those subject areas our great thinkers spent their time on in large part because God and the rest were so intangible. Whether magic and soul manipulation can act as equal substitutes for our worlds Biology, Chemistry, advanced Mathematics, etc is up in the air though. 

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I think it'd be neat of the Pillars universe diverged from our own history of progress and found some alternative to the industrial revolution. I think part of the charm of fantasy worlds like Pillars is that people can find meaning and purpose from a diverse set of trade skills which are have a lower bar of entry.

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I think it'd be neat of the Pillars universe diverged from our own history of progress and found some alternative to the industrial revolution. I think part of the charm of fantasy worlds like Pillars is that people can find meaning and purpose from a diverse set of trade skills which are have a lower bar of entry.

 

I agree, soul power can ride (I don't know  if it's the right verb) through copper just like electricity (but with a memory?), maybe in the future they'll use latent souls in the air to power up things.

Edited by Daled
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I think it'd be neat of the Pillars universe diverged from our own history of progress and found some alternative to the industrial revolution. I think part of the charm of fantasy worlds like Pillars is that people can find meaning and purpose from a diverse set of trade skills which are have a lower bar of entry.

I agree, soul power can ride (I don't know if it's the right verb) through copper just like electricity (but with memory), maybe in the future they'll use latent souls in the air to power up things.

we know that wizards in order to cast spells they use soul fragments (soul plancton for who remembers the stream) in the air to gather power for the spells. wouldn't surprise me to see one with copper wired container that is designed to fill up with souls fragments, maybe a adra container lined with copper. it'd kinda be like a soul battery

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I'm not really sure Eora would go through an outright enlightenment. They already have less  restrictions on heresy and there is already a pretty significant number of scholars that seem to use a tangible scientific method (though it is a tad... flawed, so was a lot of the early scientific revolution).

 

Frankly I think they're just a working internal combustion engine away from an industrialization. However, that could take anywhere from 50 to 500 years depending on what amounts to luck.

 

Anyway, in a fantasy universe, a culture doesn't really *have* follow the normal cultural changes which happened in reality. Say, instead of an enlightenment, a culture could turn into some sort of theocracy which declared machines holy instruments of the divine and only allowed priests to learn about and operate them. Likewise, steps in the real technological development could in theory be bypassed (electricity discovered and utilized before internal combustion engines by some sort of soul-powered technology).

 

Pillars of Eternity is already about Enlightenment/Post-Enlightenment thought and philosophy, delivered through heavy use of fantasy metaphor.

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One of my favorite things about the Pillars series is that it has much emphasis on religion but I'd love to see this idea as well.

Just what do you think you're doing?! You dare to come between me and my prey? Is it a habit of yours to scurry about, getting in the way and causing bother?

 

What are you still bothering me for? I'm a Knight. I'm not interested in your childish games. I need my rest.

 

Begone! Lest I draw my nail...

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