Deadfire DLCs Revealed

[CottonWolf]

He's... chill.

[Skazz]

He's... chill.

 

And so, the last piece of the puzzle falls into place!

[Boeroer]

You mean Rymrganddude grinds stuff to dust just via chillaxing?

 

 

Edited April 29, 2018 by Boeroer

[Skazz]

You mean Rymrgand dude grinds stuff to dust just via chillaxing?

 

Grindrgand

Edited April 29, 2018 by Skazz

[Alot]

 

You mean Rymrgand dude grinds stuff to dust just via chillaxing?

Grindrgand

But can we romance him?

[anameforobsidian]

I really don't get the reason behind releasing these small chunks of some mid-game content over the next half a year instead of releasing one aggregated expansion at the end of it. What is this release schedule trying to achieve?

• Do they expect people to replay the whole game every time an additional island is added? Is this then meant to keep people playing almost exactly the same content over and over again for months, because I really don't see that happening, no matter how good the game is.
• If "forcing" multiple replays is not the purpose, then is this rapid schedule supposed to provide people with additional content while they play? In that case, are there really so many people, that take more than half a year to finish a game (I'd imagine, one would already have forgotten half of the plot details after that long) to warrant basing DLC schedules and size on them?

I just don't get it and it makes me worried. I hope, that these DLCs will together form a coherent addition with depth greater than its individual parts, but it does not seem like they will.

 

I like longer expansions.  Frequently they actually provide a better game than the base game because devs understand the tools better, and they are cause to improve the base game.  However, business wise they seem to be an artifact of the past.  Devs repeatedly say it would just be better to release a sequel than a long expansion.  This isn't just Obsidian; HBS saw a lot more sales when they released Dragonfall standalone. 

 

I don't think it's cause to worry either.  Some expansions to older games would have worked just fine split into DLC: Tales of the Sword Coast is really designed like 3 pieces of DLC put together.  Watcher's Keep could have existed without the rest of ToB.  Also, there are many good stories that you can tell in shorter DLCs, and you can get iteratively better at telling stories in a game.  Old World Blues was fantastic, among NWNII:MotB and BGII:ToB in terms of quality.  I much prefer its existence to a potentially more extensive Dead Money campaign.

 

Of these three DLC though, only the 3rd sounds interesting to me.  Rymrgand is not a terribly interesting god to me.  I'd like to see a greater role for Wael, and some reactivity if you scattered the souls.  Also it seems like a massive waste to heavily involve Rymrgand and not even let the player be a priest of Rymyrgand.

 

One question.  Is there any news on the teams involved?  It seems like having different creative designers for each expansion could be a good way to test who should lead post-Josh Pillars franchise.

[The Sharmat]

A Rymrgand centered expansion may well be the cure to Rymrgand not being terribly interesting to you. He needs screentime if he's ever going to get fleshed out.

[TimeParadox]

I hope new dlc to be in new part of World. At the moment Lore is so small. The must be expansion. New races, monsters, culture, country's and etc.

[AndreaColombo]

I’m all for new monsters, but the lore doesn’t really feel small in this game to me.

Edited April 29, 2018 by AndreaColombo

[The Sharmat]

Well we don't exactly have anything like the Pocket Guide to the Empire from Daggerfall. Which is just as well since everything post-Morrowind ignores it entirely, so it really accomplished nothing but to taunt us with a far more interesting fantasy world than we ever got. Lorebooks and Codexes usually end up that way.

[algroth]

 

 

You mean Rymrgand dude grinds stuff to dust just via chillaxing?

Grindrgand

But can we romance him?

 

I bet his cult practices death by snu-snu.

[Amaror]

 

I really don't get the reason behind releasing these small chunks of some mid-game content over the next half a year instead of releasing one aggregated expansion at the end of it. What is this release schedule trying to achieve?

• Do they expect people to replay the whole game every time an additional island is added? Is this then meant to keep people playing almost exactly the same content over and over again for months, because I really don't see that happening, no matter how good the game is.
• If "forcing" multiple replays is not the purpose, then is this rapid schedule supposed to provide people with additional content while they play? In that case, are there really so many people, that take more than half a year to finish a game (I'd imagine, one would already have forgotten half of the plot details after that long) to warrant basing DLC schedules and size on them?

I just don't get it and it makes me worried. I hope, that these DLCs will together form a coherent addition with depth greater than its individual parts, but it does not seem like they will.

 

I like longer expansions.  Frequently they actually provide a better game than the base game because devs understand the tools better, and they are cause to improve the base game.  However, business wise they seem to be an artifact of the past.  Devs repeatedly say it would just be better to release a sequel than a long expansion.  This isn't just Obsidian; HBS saw a lot more sales when they released Dragonfall standalone. 

 

I don't really think so. Both Witcher 3 Expansions did fantastically. 

White March didn't do very well, but it also had barely any marketing. I pay attention a lot to games news exspecially concerned with Rpgs and I only noticed its release when it suddenly popped up on steam one day. 

It also was a big shot in the foot to split the dlc into two parts. Not many people want to get back into such a big, complex, story-heavy dlc when they know they will have to stop half way through and wait for the second part. That stuff is just bearable in telltale style games with 1-2 hour episodes max, which can be summed up in half a minute of flash back. It doesn't really work for a big rpg expansion.

[Skazz]

 

 

 

You mean Rymrgand dude grinds stuff to dust just via chillaxing?

Grindrgand

But can we romance him?

 

I bet his cult practices death by snu-snu.

 

 

And big gaping Frost-Hewn Breaches.

[The Sharmat]

 

 

I really don't get the reason behind releasing these small chunks of some mid-game content over the next half a year instead of releasing one aggregated expansion at the end of it. What is this release schedule trying to achieve?

• Do they expect people to replay the whole game every time an additional island is added? Is this then meant to keep people playing almost exactly the same content over and over again for months, because I really don't see that happening, no matter how good the game is.
• If "forcing" multiple replays is not the purpose, then is this rapid schedule supposed to provide people with additional content while they play? In that case, are there really so many people, that take more than half a year to finish a game (I'd imagine, one would already have forgotten half of the plot details after that long) to warrant basing DLC schedules and size on them?

I just don't get it and it makes me worried. I hope, that these DLCs will together form a coherent addition with depth greater than its individual parts, but it does not seem like they will.

 

I like longer expansions.  Frequently they actually provide a better game than the base game because devs understand the tools better, and they are cause to improve the base game.  However, business wise they seem to be an artifact of the past.  Devs repeatedly say it would just be better to release a sequel than a long expansion.  This isn't just Obsidian; HBS saw a lot more sales when they released Dragonfall standalone. 

 

I don't really think so. Both Witcher 3 Expansions did fantastically.

Witcher 3 led up to them with a chain of bite seized free DLC to keep up market hype. And Hearts of Stone was fairly short. Which is ironic since I actually liked it much better than Blood and Wine and I normally prefer larger expansions.

[PatrioticChief]

They are look interesting at the very least! 

[Voss]

 

My guess is that Obsidian will not be doing a full size expansion after doing this round of DLC.  Even if Deadfire's sales are phenomenal, the time that would be spent on a large expansion could instead be used on: (1) getting a sequel out faster, (2) a same engine spin-off in the spirit of Icewind Dale, and/or (3) porting Pillars 1 to the Deadfire engine.  And that is assuming Obsidian does not need to use members from the Deadfire team for Tim Cain's unannounced project or some other project.  

 

Honest question: why do you assume that they would port PoE 1 to PoE 2's engine? What would be the point of that? I can't help but think it'd be a considerable waste of time with zero return.

 

 

Because that's what developers do these days.  Skyrim, for example, had its... 5th? iteration for... reasons, recently.  All those FF re-masters and Enhanced Editions.  The game industry is taking cues from the film industry and just wholesale stuffing old content into new boxes.