Torment Torment: Tides of Numenera Thread

[Jenkem]

Thank you Roguey!

 

[VIDOMINA]

Played it for about an hour and never again. It's not a bad RPG, not by a long shot but considering the legacy, it's kind of disappointing. Still, can't hate on InXile. I enjoyed Wasteland 2 and waiting for Wasteland 3.

 

[Iznaliu]

Played it for about an hour and never again. It's not a bad RPG, not by a long shot but considering the legacy, it's kind of disappointing. Still, can't hate on InXile. I enjoyed Wasteland 2 and waiting for Wasteland 3.

Is this InXile's way of doing stealth PR? Are they trying to salvage their reputation?

 

[Morality Games]

I think part of the problem with T:ToN is that the dev team though they were making the best thing ether and didn't do enough introspection as a result.

Problem with Torment is that it is a panel of experts assembling a bunch of motifs to meet the entertainment industry standard version of great narrative instead of a talented writer weaving a story out of his interests, passions, and beliefs.

It's like watching PS:T transformed into a Marvel movie where every story element is there to meet some kind of benchmark.

 

[RuySan]

Problem with Torment is that it is a panel of experts assembling a bunch of motifs to meet the entertainment industry standard version of great narrative instead of a talented writer weaving a story out of his interests, passions, and beliefs.

It's like watching PS:T transformed into a Marvel movie where every story element is there to meet some kind of benchmark.

This is a problem with most high profile kickstarters. You could apply the same description to broken age or pillars of eternity. Or even wasteland 2 even though I liked it a lot.

 

[Lurker King]

This is a problem with most high profile kickstarters. You could apply the same description to broken age or pillars of eternity. Or even wasteland 2 even though I liked it a lot.

This is what a former employee said about InXile in the Glassdoor reviews

Management treats software development like manufacturing. Constantly valuing hours worked over quality of output. And will pursue feature because they fit in the schedule without any consideration if they will be worth the time or effort.

The problem with these kickstarter games is that they are treated like products manufactured by checklist design. I posted this about Obsidian in another thread:

Taylorism design. Obsidians at work. "Everyone has a function. They are very efficient!"

What allows them to make complex cRPGs really fast is the same checklist design that makes their games suck in the first place. They could be called “Taylorism Entertainment”, because their games are created on assembly lines. The producer, artists, programmers, level designers, writers, which working furiously in their particular roles to ensure a bland and massive disjointed game. That’s why you shouldn’t lose any sleep expecting any progress in the encounter design, because the worker who did this job, just made what he was told, i.e., place a bunch of enemies on this area to fill the map. The real decline is no the absence of cRPGs of yore due to lack of funding, but the belief that a superficial checklist design made by people with such disdain for traditional cRPGs can be a substitute for the real article.

The same thing can be said about InXile. The only way to deliver a cRPG without thought is by checklist manufacturing design approach. You deliver a shell of a game with some features in it, and expect that the suckers will never notice the difference. This is what taylorist checklist design looks like:

 

[RuySan]

Don't know if anyone mentioned yet but one of the best gaming websites has published a Numenera review:

http://www.hardcoregaming101.net/torment/numenera.htm

 

[Iznaliu]

What allows them to make complex cRPGs really fast is the same checklist design that makes their games suck in the first place

T:ToN was not made "really fast".

 

[Lurker King]

T:ToN was not made "really fast".

A poorly administered assemble line is still an assemble line. The process is the same.

 

[FeelTheRads]

Hilarious how butthurt Prime Junta is about the fact that PoE is a generic piece of shit, indeed created on an assembly line directed by a failed html monkey.
Guise those are not vampires, they're fampyrs. Totally original, please don't steal.

Even worse butthurt than Infinitron, looks like... now that's a lot.

 

[Mynon]

Hilarious how butthurt Prime Junta is about the fact that PoE is a generic piece of shit, indeed created on an assembly line directed by a failed html monkey.
Guise those are not vampires, they're fampyrs. Totally original, please don't steal.

Even worse butthurt than Infinitron, looks like... now that's a lot.

I rate this post "Creative"...

 

[Quillon]

T:ToN was not made "really fast".

A poorly administered assemble line is still an assemble line. The process is the same.

You contradicted your own point with this. The problem isn't the assembly line, its the quality of the assembly line i.e. tech-tools/pipelines. Designers can make bad designs but also their imaginations are limited by what is feasible in that assembly line. They don't have the luxury of limitless resources/time, not everyone is Blizzard/Rockstar and its unreasonable to ask them to do what Tim & Co did back in the day(working on a game to their limit with no social life) and with these team sizes it would mean chaos anyway, plus not everyone on a team is necessarily excited about the project they are on/making their favorite type of/dream games(its probably someone's job to motivate them in that assembly line ). And making reasonably state of the art games became harder/more complex over the years. So these "big" developers can't work without the assembly line atm. You are expecting wrong things from wrong developers. You should look for smaller teams, go more indie.

And my statements aren't based on experience. I could be wrong about all of this :D

 

[Iznaliu]

It could be more like a cargo-cult assembly line; mindlessly copying stuff from better devs without understanding its purpose.

 

[Lurker King]

You contradicted your own point with this. The problem isn't the assembly line, its the quality of the assembly line i.e. tech-tools/pipelines. Designers can make bad designs but also their imaginations are limited by what is feasible in that assembly line. They don't have the luxury of limitless resources/time, not everyone is Blizzard/Rockstar and its unreasonable to ask them to do what Tim & Co did back in the day(working on a game to their limit with no social life) and with these team sizes it would mean chaos anyway, plus not everyone on a team is necessarily excited about the project they are on/making their favorite type of/dream games(its probably someone's job to motivate them in that assembly line ). And making reasonably state of the art games became harder/more complex over the years. So these "big" developers can't work without the assembly line atm. You are expecting wrong things from wrong developers. You should look for smaller teams, go more indie.
And my statements aren't based on experience. I could be wrong about all of this :D

1. cRPGs are intellectually complex projects where every single element counts, from the art direction and itemization, to the combat system and the story. If they have no strong creative person on the lead, holding these elements together in a harmoniously manner, giving them a personality, the end product will be underwhelming and generic. So that is point 1. You need to keep everyone of the team on the same page and the same page requires a strong vision. If you read the Glassdoor review I mentioned, you will see that each “cook” was left to himself for weeks. That’s no way of running a tight ship.

2. Cash grab games are motivated by nostalgia. Therefore, they can’t have the strong vision behind the project that I mentioned above, since they are made to please other people's tastes. Nothing really fun can come out of this. W2 was miles ahead of T:ToN because the developers enjoy working on their game. But then again the game was rushed, etc.

3. The third factor is efficiency in how you handle time. It’s obvious that PoE, W2 and T:ToN were rushed, but PoE looks good, W2 looks like shit and T:ToN took too long considering the end product and how many people worked on the game. It is obvious by now that InXile is much more incompetent than Obsidian. Sorry.

4. Complex cRPGs take time, iteration and tweaking of the systems. They shouldn’t be rushed because they are delicate complex machines. It is obvious that most studios only think about delivering a teenager power-fantasy product that check the right boxes. What matter to them is payroll, deadlines, their mortgages, etc., you know, the other stuff that is really important. I think these cynical people must look to developers like Styg and Vault Dweller with spite. But here is the catch: If you adopt this disdain for your own creation, the result will be generic, disjointed and uninspiring games that no one will remember. Or well, maybe no one that is worthy will remember, because lucky for them, they have plenty of bootlickers that have no taste and are too eager to promote their “products”. The point 4 is the most important factor in the assembly line mentality.

 

[Quillon]

1. Yeah.

2. Sure.

3. I agree.

4. Like I said above they don't have the luxury of loooong iteration when they are working on a tight budget and struggling with their assembly line. We'll see what Obs will accomplish with Deadfire; now they are relatively comfortable on both ends.

 

[Iznaliu]

If you read the Glassdoor review I mentioned, you will see that each “cook” was left to himself for weeks. That’s no way of running a tight ship.

That is hardly the "assembly line" you describe. I get the impression working at InXile is more like waiting for meat to marinate.

 

[IHaveHugeNick]

Eh, ultimately TTON is bad because troubled development ended up with half of the game being gutted. Even if you didn't know about the cuts, it takes 2 hours with the game to see that it's more of a collection of random scraps quickly put together, rather than a coherent product developed according to some overarching vision.

It's telling that not just other Kickstarter RPGs, but even WL2 is a much more consistent, thoughtfully designed game, and they went into that one completely unprepared and couldn't enjoy the benefits of long pre-production.

I think it will always be a mystery what really went wrong, because it's not just that the game sucks, it's that it sucks exactly in ways it wasn't supposed to suck. My worst case scenario was something along the lines of "buggy with shit writing" , but they managed to make a game which had mostly trouble-free launch, has lots of excellent writing, and somehow still sucks donkeys ass.

 

[Quillon]

If you read the Glassdoor review I mentioned, you will see that each “cook” was left to himself for weeks. That’s no way of running a tight ship.

That is hardly the "assembly line" you describe. I get the impression working at InXile is more like waiting for meat to marinate.

Hah. I completely forgot about that. Designers/writers were in different cities and shit and they were making 2-3 games at a time. In some vids their offices didn't particularly look like it had structure for separating teams nor space for many devs. Have they told how many worked on TToN?

OMG omg omg assembly lines's existence in question!

 

[Iznaliu]

Have they told how many worked on TToN?

They probably can't since they don't have a definite number.

 

[Lurker King]

Hah. I completely forgot about that. Designers/writers were in different cities and shit and they were making 2-3 games at a time. In some vids their offices didn't particularly look like it had structure for separating teams nor space for many devs. Have they told how many worked on TToN? OMG omg omg assembly lines's existence in question!

No, it isn't. Some things have their parts built in different countries.

 

[Iznaliu]

No, it isn't. Some things have their parts built in different countries.

But there is usually a defined process - something InXile seems to lack.

 

[Mynon]

Recent user reviews are now at 77% positive, quite a few positive reviews on the front page too...

 

[Iznaliu]

Recent user reviews are now at 77% positive, quite a few positive reviews on the front page too...

Do something about it.

 

[Mynon]

Recent user reviews are now at 86% positive...

 

[Fedora Master]

Looking at the recent positive reviews, seems like it's mostly normies who aren't used to reading a lot and are easily impressed by big words.