Fluff

I don't understand honestly. There's already 4 different casting classes with different mechanics and you want them to spend more time and money to shoehorn in a 5th that plays essentially just like one of the ones we already have..only...not with a book? This is just how the lore of this world has been written and how the classes within it operate.

... It rolled high on its Stealth check? *shrug* Please never stop being a Punsmith. You add so much color to these forums.

Very much so. A lot of the credit can of course go to things like Steam. But also the simple fact that certain genres just can't work on anything other than a PC. A calculator can handle a platformer, but cRPGs are a good example.. I wouldn't envy console users at all if they got ports of them. Have fun playing something that complex with a controller.

Or it's just a product that publishers weren't willing to invest in and we all know that publishers rarely get it right. Unfortunately, they do actually. If you've got 12 minutes this video explains it a lot better in more depth. But, long story short. Games like Battlefield and games with 5th and 6th installments are what sells the best. When risks are taken, they rarely pay off for the people putting money into them, and even when they do only marginally compared to these "blockbuster games". Only to become a cult classic 20 years later. Even classic franchises like Mario aren't safe from this, Galaxy, Sunshine, and Yoshi's Island despite being regarded as practically masterpieces now are 3 of the worst selling Mario games in history, while New Super Mario Bros.. an unoriginal rehash is one of the best selling ever. Basically, taking outside of the box risks in the video game industry just isn't a smart idea unless you've got the money to back up that risk.. and RPGs (of any genre) are no exception to this.

I couldn't agree more. 'Pillars of Eternity' is our chance to show the RPG gaming industry they are headed the wrong way, or at least that more games addressed to mature audiences are released. There should be more titles like Baldur's Gate I&II, Fallout I&II, Planescape: Torment and I really hope 'Pillars of Eternity' imminent huge success is going to send a loud message to producers. As much as I, and probably every single person here wants that. I honestly highly doubt it will go far past a mild success or carving its own niche. A large part of the gaming audience is still young people, and I don't mean young adult, but children and teenagers. PoE is not the kind of game they want, even many people around my age (younger 20s) have absolutely no interest in these old format of RPGs. Your general audience finds them needlessly hard and complicated, and many just plain don't like the isometric style. Almost every single one of my gamer friends love Fallout 3 and NV for example, but thinks FI&II are awful crap and glad it's first person now. I understand that Fluff, all I'm saying is that despite that fact, old-school cRPG style based heavily on narrative, triggering imagination rather than graphic visuals and tactical combat need not disappear from the market, especially when the fans of such games can amass 5 MIL USD for the production of such a game. Even more so when the majority of the people bought a digital copy of the game for 25$, like I did, yet still such a grand amount of cash was raised. Such games can easily be released at full retail price. The community exists and is more than willing to buy such games. It hasn't disappeared from the market. It's just a much much much smaller part of the market, there's been a decent amount of games over recent years attempting to "revive" or hearken back to the old days though, it's far from dead. What it has made from the Kickstarer though, sadly means almost nothing to the actual market.. as can be seen by a large majority of other successful Kickstarters. I don't say this to be negative, just to be realistic as while a revival of the genre on a grand scale is of course possible, I also think it's overly optimistic. Many niche things get amazing funding from Kickstarter to go on and do...nothing really, they may receive mild success but that's about the extent of it. There have been exceptions, but not that many. Do I want to see it become a great retail seller and the next BG? Of course. Do I think it will happen though? Honestly, no. I just don't think it's what your average consumer wants, we are a small community with an unpopular choice/opinion in game. I don't mean to mislead though, this isn't what I want to happen though. I hope when the game sees a release I can eat these words.

I couldn't agree more. 'Pillars of Eternity' is our chance to show the RPG gaming industry they are headed the wrong way, or at least that more games addressed to mature audiences are released. There should be more titles like Baldur's Gate I&II, Fallout I&II, Planescape: Torment and I really hope 'Pillars of Eternity' imminent huge success is going to send a loud message to producers. As much as I, and probably every single person here wants that. I honestly highly doubt it will go far past a mild success or carving its own niche. A large part of the gaming audience is still young people, and I don't mean young adult, but children and teenagers. PoE is not the kind of game they want, even many people around my age (younger 20s) have absolutely no interest in these old format of RPGs. Your general audience finds them needlessly hard and complicated, and many just plain don't like the isometric style. Almost every single one of my gamer friends love Fallout 3 and NV for example, but thinks FI&II are awful crap and glad it's first person now.

I'm glad of that. Really. And, to be clear, it is not at all my intention to berate you. I just hate to see people dread something that they think is all but hopeless, for a pretty good duration, only to ultimately be surprised by quality and enjoyment that they didn't even really think was a possibility at all. It may be weird of me, but I try to present those potentialities and provide some amount of encouragement to hold them in consideration (where you might not have, before, for very valid, human reasons), just so that you don't spend the time period between now and getting your hands on the game thinking "crap, I probably blew $125 on something I can not, at all, be excited about." Because, I know that feeling sucks. Ideally, we can all have some amount of hope for something beyond a worst-case scenario, rather than a "I'm just probably going to not-enjoy this much" mindset the whole time. I just try to share the hope, haha. Oh it's okay, I completely understand where you are coming from. It's why I try to find somewhat of a middle ground, I'm not going to lie and pretend I'm happy about some of the choices they've made with the game.. but like you said, there's no point in just spending months bummed over something that as you said may end up being better than expected, or even amazing. Ultimately as long as the story, characters, and lore is as good as they are hyping it to be (7 novellas with the game is kind of insane) I'll be satisfied "enough" in all honesty, because that's a very large portion of why I chose to support it. Id' just like the game play that matches that story to just well..not suck if possible.

You do make some good points, and you're right it's not really fair of me to blame the entire system because of the way a single genre typically uses it. It's just a twitch reaction I suppose, after pouring what has probably been thousands of hours into an endless number of JRPGs over my life it's the first thing to pop into my mind when you say "Turn based". I'm also still just a little bitter over that being one less new RTwP game that I get to play, it's my own fault of course but I just kind of assumed that's what it would be. I'm still interested in the game, maybe just not limited edition collector's edition interested like I initially was. I'll still definitely play it, and hopefully enjoy it though. Because as a fairly poor early twenties kid (who really needs to stop throwing hundreds of dollars at games that aren't even out yet) I can't afford to not play it after backing it. Despite my personal negativity towards the choice, I hope I'm wrong though. I want to enjoy the game.

I enjoyed Isle of Bxnes on my tablet, so I know they are capable of making a game that is at least decent. I only wish there was more in the way of physical rewards. The book is cool and all, but I'd like a physical copy of the game itself. I will admit that their explanation of the hows and whys made me less sad that I thew so much money at them, but I'm still skeptical. It's not so much that I hate turn based combat as it is that I'm simply sick of it, before I got a bit older and learned about the other forms of rpgs I played jrpgs to death, and back to life, and then death again.

Shut up.. You're making me sad. :/ I backed it, and when they later decided to release a poll for RTwP or TB and TB won.. well, yeah.. I mean. I'm still going to play it, I feel like I have to play a game I backed for $125. I just don't really expect to like it as much now. I will admit that like many others, I was pretty much suckered in with the "Torment" name.

Fogs been confirmed, but I'm not sure about wind. That would definitely be cool even if it is minor.

There will be both in the game. You can see weather in the official trailer actually. and they showed a day and night cycle at some other point. Edit : Trailer -https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HKoDTzea79Y Water/Trees/Day & Night -https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AUleDEFkUtE

My internet hippie remark was just a joke really. It wouldn't be a wrong label, but I don't go around touting that I'm an internet hippie.. in part because it'd probably sound really ridiculous. But yes, the general defense for DRM by most people as is simple as you put it. "What I'm doing might technically be illegal, but you probably wont get caught.. so who cares?" or in some cases, basically a badge of honor. I can't argue with the first one on a theoretical level.. because it is pretty much true.. you probably wont. However, I personally like to not break laws if possible even if I don't like them.

I personally just think people grumble about Steam DRM due to inertia. There's a lot of us though who won't buy a game that has DRM period though. Which is why I end up not owning many modern PC games that aren't indie. If I can't feel like I genuinely own what I purchase I don't want it, and I can't feel that way with DRM. If they sell the game through Steam with DRM, I don't care.. but if that was the only way to get it? I'd request my money back. I used to think we could own software too and was concerned about DRM, and then I went to law school... Seriously though, the whole DRM v. no-DRM fight was lost decades ago when it was decided that the best way to sell software was through licensing. The software liscense you agree to when installing pretty much any program is at its core managing your "digital" rights. There are more restictive ones and less restrictive ones, but all of them limit your rights in the way you use the software. Dunno what nation you live in, or what law school you went to, but if it's in the U.S. you were misinformed if you think it's that black and white on the side of the you never own your software licensing folks. Different nations have different laws but in the U.S. the first sale doctrine still applies, and Sony v Universal is still precedent, though there are multiple lawsuits going through the pipes to try and circumvent it as well as to try and protect it, largely due to the DMCA (an abomination of a law and horribly misinformed on a number of levels, not just this issue). The 9th circuit has been fairly anti first sale doctrine and pro silicon valley/Seattle on this (no wonder really) but not entirely, while the other circuits are more mixed. Regardless, there are some folks who buy into it the idea you don't own the software you buy, and some folks who absolutely won't. Unless it's open source you will never truly own your software the way you own most of your physical goods. Trying to claim anything else is just ignorant, but it's effective because most people never question it or don't care. If I buy a chair, I can paint it, modify it, smash it into little pieces, give it to/sell it to someone else if I feel like it, attempt to recreate it.. whatever I want. Because I bought it. If I buy software, I can do exactly what they tell me I can do with it and absolutely nothing else (legally) and usually many steps are taken to help make sure you can't do anything they don't want you doing, or at least make it difficult.. I don't really call that owning something, it's closer to renting. So I'd have to disagree with you, and say it is that black and white.

I didn't mean to make it sound like I'm the only one, I just know that..especially from the Pillars of Eternity side of things there's a pretty even split of younger people (Teens-20s) and slightly older to middle aged people.