Question for the long time cRPG'ers

[oldschool]

NEWSFLASH: The poster above is an idiot.

Heh. Must be a slow news day.

"You click on your enemy and then go get a cup of coffee while the little people do the dance of death. No tactics. No options."

IE games fit this description a lot more than most Aurora games.Then again, you probably think SOZ is awesome.

o rly?

When you went into the Twisted Rune in BG2, you just clicked on an enemy and went and got a cup of coffee did you?

Didn't spend any time sizing up the enemy and trying to figure out how to avoid getting your ass handed to you?

Anyway(s), I'm guessing you just reloaded and didn't go back in there.

R00fles!

R00fles indeed.

 

[oldschool]

There are no tactical decisions to be made in an Aurora game. You click on your enemy and then go get a cup of coffee while the little people do the dance of death. No tactics. No options. Just filler combat until you get trapped in the next dialogue box or cutscene.

Just to point out, Storm of Zehir has several encounters that prove you're full of shit here.

The problem with Aurora games is not the engine. It's that most of the time the encounter design is ass.

And it would be fair to point out that any IE combat that didn't involve mages/dragons/liches/Kangaxx (all warmly remembered) was a lot of times just the thing you described there.

Nah. Just proves I haven't played SOZ.

If they actually gave you tactical control over your party, then that is a vast improvement indeed. Haven't really kept up with the news, but it sounds like they actually tried to insert some gameplay into it.

Having struggled mightily with the NWN toolset to create tactical and challenging combat, I would counter that the problem with encounter design is the Aurora engine.

IE had many flaws, and definitely isn't my favorite game engine, but it's miles ahead of Aurora in the gameplay department. Qualified by the fact that I dropped out of Aurora games when NWN2 came out. If they've improved it since then, then great.

Now if someone would take the TOEE model and make a new game that actually utilizes that engine to its maximum potential, then I would be a happy idiot indeed.

 

[Volourn]

"When you went into the Twisted Rune in BG2, you just clicked on an enemy and went and got a cup of coffee did you?"

Exception that proves the rule.


"Didn't spend any time sizing up the enemy and trying to figure out how to avoid getting your ass handed to you?"

Nothing to size up. Most encounters in BG2, like ALL games, aren't that difficult. But, at least, it's not as SOZZY as SOZ. Then again, the argument was about the game engines NOT the games. I thoguht we already agreed that BG2 is a better game than the NWN OC?


"Anyway(s), I'm guessing you just reloaded and didn't go back in there."

Only pussies do that. Are you a pussy?

 

[Disconnected]

- Intuitive, clean interface

- Context-sensitive mouse cursors with default actions you could override (IE games). I liked the exploding pie radial in ToEE since it gave you all options available within 2-3 nests. NWN2 right-click menu also does the same thing but doesn't look as cool.

I'm all for WYSIWYG-editable GUIs, but...

A UI is the portal between the user and the software. Ideally, it should read the users wishes and make them happen, but the technology for that doesn't exist. Still, the point is that less is more when it comes to user interfaces.

That doesn't mean "less GUI on screen" it means "less shit the user has to defeat to accomplish whatever he's trying to do". Less shit on the screen is obviously good, but if it's a choice between easy translation of the players wishes into action, and displaying more of teh purdys for the sake of it, ease of use is always more important.

Radial menus, and to a progressively lesser degree, context and drop-down menus, are bad. Why bad? Because they require the user to interface with the interface. That's not what the user is trying to do.

Radial- and context- menus are worse still, because they aren't fixed. Consequently they're not as quick to navigate. Radial menus compounds the problem further, by not being readily readable. The fail to conform to the top-left to bottom-right format most people are used to.
Moreover, both radial- and context- menus generally contain nested functions. Each layer of nested functions requires more interfacing-with-the-interface from the user. And again it's made worse by the lack of a fixed location, and in the case of radial menus, the format.

ToEE, and to a lesser degree, NWN and PS:T are great examples of needless complication. None of those games had more functions than could reasonably be integrated in the on-screen GUI. ToEE is extreme both for taking the Right-Click Wheel of User Hostility to extreme lengths, and for being silly enough to make it text based.

 

[mountain hare]

" Nothing to size up. Most encounters in BG2, like ALL games, aren't that difficult. But, at least, it's not as SOZZY as SOZ. Then again, the argument was about the game engines NOT the games. I thoguht we already agreed that BG2 is a better game than the NWN OC?

Perhaps you should try Weimer's tactics mod, if you haven't already. It certainly makes the encounters harder. Although to be honest, I don't agree with the method by which Weimer increased the difficulty, where enemies were grossly overpowered instead of having their AI tweaked.

Shoddy AI was probably the only real downfall of BG2, given that it made what should have been awesome battles far too easy (Dragons hanging around in a Cloudkill, humanoids being unable to open doors, Beholders continuing to shoot rays despite the target having a Shield of Balduran equipped). On the other hand, players don't have to exploit AI deficiencies if they don't want to.

 

[DemonKing]

Seems to me that the whole point of the industry is to entertain, and that games like BG2 or FO3 are more successful at entertainment (not better games, just more popular) than games like planescape, AoD when it's complete, and FO.

No - they just offer a kind of entertainment that more people can embrace.

Personally I don't usually get much enjoyment from romantic comedies but it seems tons more people are willing to pay to see them than the kind of depressing arthouse movies I tend to watch.

A lot of people don't want deep, interactive entertainment - they just want to sit down for a bit, shut off their brains, and relax. It's not that PST is inaccessible as such but simply that only a few people out of any sample would be prepared to put in the effort to appreciate the kind of entertainment it offers.

 

[M_I_C_K_E_Y_M_O_U_S_E]

Improved Anvil > Weimer by a ton.

IA doesn't give the retarded AI nuclear devices, he gives them really good scripts, good items, which can be used, sold or be used to craft other items with the right components, randomizes items and changes far too many rules and the way certain things work to list on a page or two.

 

[oldschool]

Then again, the argument was about the game engines NOT the games.

Sorry, bud. Got off track. I believe you were explaining to me how an engine without tactical control of your party was superior to an engine with tactical control. I think there were facts involved.

Also:

Only pussies do that. Are you a pussy?

Maybe.

Anyway(s), bored with this. Carry on. You win.

 

[poocolator]

Why can't we all just get along?

... and have some nice cyber-orgies with Volourn being the pièce de résistance?

 

[DraQ]

Why can't we all just get along?

... and have some nice cyber-orgies with Volourn being the pièce de résistance?

He's more of a pièce de merde.

*probably fails his French-emulation roll*

 

[Lonely Vazdru]

He's more of a pièce de merde.

*probably fails his French-emulation roll*

Actually no. That was pretty funny even, something a real french probably wouldn't come up with, but understands just fine. A bit rough on Volourn, but hey, this is the codex. You even got the "è" right, both of you, which is better than what many a french youngster would do nowadays.

 

[poocolator]

I live in Canada and only nowadays appreciate the French taught to us during grade school+. I definitely plan to take French courses during my university life.

 

[DraQ]

I have never ever used, heard, read or learned French, it's terra incognita to me, hence the emulation part.

 

[Longshanks]

Then again, the argument was about the game engines NOT the games.

Sorry, bud. Got off track. I believe you were explaining to me how an engine without tactical control of your party was superior to an engine with tactical control. I think there were facts involved.

This is not an engine limitation.

NWN2 actually has direct control of your party does it not? Assuming this is what you mean by "tactical control".

The difficulty of combat is also unrelated to the engine.
Eg. PST also used the IE, and it's combat required as little pre-planning as that in NWN2. Mages and Liches providing some difficulty at times in BG, and requiring some thought as to how to approach them, is not engine dependent.

Other than some reduced difficulty (mostly involving magic users) and the camera view, NWN2's combat does not differ significantly from the BG's.

Maybe stick to discussing the games that used the IE and Aurora engines, rather than the engines themselves, as very little being discussed is a product of the engine.

 

[felicity]

No point comparing BG2 and NWN... they have different focus. BG2 solely on singleplayer, OC; NWN on custom module, MP, the OC is crap. In OC BG2 squad tactical depth beats NWN hands down, NWN is no compete. NWN is not designed with one player controling whole squad. MP is where NWN shines, you work with other real players, communicate and plan the execution, this is nothing like BG2; it is a different level of fun, two can't compare. If I have my buddies and a good run module then I'd prefer NWN than BG2. BG2 if I just want to relax and entertain myself. NWN can't pause in MP so can feel pressed for action sometimes.

 

[Relayer71]

There are too many shitty games sold as hits (you heard about Oblivion, no ?), codexers dont like those.

That's a retarted statement.
They are not SOLD as HITS.
They sell well and thus become HITS.

As for hardcore and mainstream games, there are bad and good games to be found in both.

Like in music - I'm a fan of 70s progressive rock, jazz fusion and modern "post-rock", music with complex rhythms, unusual dissonant sounds, varying time signatures. Songs that sometimes reach 20 minutes or more in duration.

I also love Guided By Voices which play very simple, short, catchy, melodic rock/pop tunes.

But short, catchy, simple, melodic usually also applies to most of what I consider crap that plays on radio and is popular with the kids these days. Just like not all progressive rock is good.

Same thing applies to games. It's like the stupid console vs. PC RPG arguments. I've played some good console/Japanese RPGs and I've played some terrible PC RPGs.

There should be room for it all though. Choice is good.

You can't expect everyone to have the same taste. As much as I hated Oblivion I can see why it appeals to the audience it does. So it's not really a full fledged RPG but more action/adventure. So it's not exactly even good as an action/adventure game but still has some of the RPG flavor.

How many vast-world, go where you want to, do whatever quest you feel like, play any type of class combination, easy to pick up, first person games are there to choose from?

Exactly, not many - and so like it or not Oblivion fills a void.

As for BG II - I don't get the hate. I loved it when I first played it. Not much by way of C & C and was linear but it was fun and pretty epic as far as length and the amount of locales you ended up treking through. Writing and story were no PS:T, not even close but it wasn't terrible either. And it was a bit on the difficult side at times so there was some challenge involved. It also had great art design and music.