Wow, the gaming media really ignores the little guy...

[DalekFlay]

I was surfing the Larian Studios forum recently for news about the new Divinity 2 expansion and found this post by the owner of Larian, "Lar_q":

Thank you for the nice words - you're right that we underinvested in PR, but to be honest, we're having a lot of trouble grabbing the attention of the larger media outlets as we're not supported by a major publisher.

I once flew to the US from Europe to do five presentations at 5 of the very large outlets - two of them had the decency to listen to my story but didn't publish anything, another one put me in front of an intern who wrote a piece which was so badly written and had nothing to do with what I showed him that it hurt, another shortened the meeting to 15 minutes after he figured out it wasn't a major publisher behind it and yet another cancelled just like that. If memory serves me right, out of that entire trip came the badly written preview, and nothing else whereas clearly certain games get plenty of coverage just to mention who the voice actors are going to be

That's depressing. I mean, it's common sense that the gaming media would have more interest in "AAA" games, but actively ignoring and disrespecting developers? Not just indie developers, but indies that have had some decent success before? Ugh.

 

[Freelance Henchman]

How is this game?

 

[Awor Szurkrarz]

Fucking alien scum

 

[Phelot]

Their game isn't that good, but it certainly is better then a lot of the shit that makes Top 10 lists, so yeah I'm sure there is some bias which is shocking since the game is about as polished or more so then most of the new shit.

 

[SimpleComplexity]

Who? Never heard of the guy.

 

[DalekFlay]

How is this game?

I liked Divinity 2. It's no Gothic 2 or Morrowind, certainly, but it was a good RPG. The bulk of complaints against it were that it was too hard because you could go into areas way above your level, if that tells you anything.

 

[Freelance Henchman]

Hah, I see.

 

[Raapys]

How is this game?

I liked Divinity 2. It's no Gothic 2 or Morrowind, certainly, but it was a good RPG. The bulk of complaints against it were that it was too hard because you could go into areas way above your level, if that tells you anything.

Strictly speaking, most of the complaints were directed towards the crappy dragon-form part of the game and the ridiculous level scaling which artificially made you do less damage vs higher lvl enemies while also receiving more damage.

 

[Excommunicator]

Disgusting treatment. But we cannot expect more from scum that actually thinks it deserves to hold the sway it does and even believe it wields it with integrity, no less.

These people actually think they are contributing to the gaming industry as news agencies. It is mind boggling

 

[Overweight Manatee]

TL;DR the job of the media isn't to show off games, it's to sell advertising.

 

[Luzur]

this is why you should just carry on doing it yourself.

 

[DalekFlay]

Strictly speaking, most of the complaints were directed towards the crappy dragon-form part of the game and the ridiculous level scaling which artificially made you do less damage vs higher lvl enemies while also receiving more damage.

The dragon form was wonky, yes. The expansion supposedly fixes a lot of that though, but I haven't played it yet.

 

[Mastermind]

Their game isn't that good, but it certainly is better then a lot of the shit that makes Top 10 lists, so yeah I'm sure there is some bias which is shocking since the game is about as polished or more so then most of the new shit.

I beat it twice and will probably go for a third as an archer sometime this week. "polished" is not a word I would use to describe it. Especially since they just released another version of the game that's supposed to be optimized well like the original should've been. Divinity 2 is Dungeon Lords 1.2

 

[DraQ]

I'd class it as a H'n'S++, rather than proper RPG. It has a lot of proper RPG elements, but somehow doesn't click. Nevertheless I had tons of fun with this game and will buy DKS at the earliest opportunity.

ridiculous level scaling which artificially made you do less damage vs higher lvl enemies while also receiving more damage.

facepalm.jpg

It's the exact opposite of level scaling.
Learn the meaning of the buzzwords you use, moran.

 

[bonescraper]

How is this game?

It's good. I'd pick it over Ass Effect and Dragon Turd anyday. It's not your epic Baldur's Gate kind of game, but it's fun. It has really nice graphics (for a Gamebryo engine), decent story and writing, good voice acting and some pretty interesting features like mind reading or your own undead frankenstein kind of pet. The combat feels like it's some kind of hack 'n' slash and mmo hybrid. So, if you don't mind a well crafted, fun ARPG with plenty of content, this game is for you.

 

[Raapys]

It's the exact opposite of level scaling.
Learn the meaning of the buzzwords you use, moran.

O rly? Your damage and damage you receive scale with the difference in level between you and your enemy. Thus, level-scaling. Moran.

 

[bonescraper]

Oh, and the music is fucking awesome.

 

[DalekFlay]

It's the exact opposite of level scaling.
Learn the meaning of the buzzwords you use, moran.

O rly? Your damage and damage you receive scale with the difference in level between you and your enemy. Thus, level-scaling. Moran.

The term level-scaling is typically used for when a game picks what monsters you fight and what level they are based on your level. If you go into Dungeon X at level 1 you fight goblins with daggers, but if you go in at level 20 you fight Ogres with axes, etc. etc..

Divinity 2 does NOT do that, which is a good thing.

 

[Raapys]

The term level-scaling is typically used for when a game picks what monsters you fight and what level they are based on your level.

Typically. And there are different types of level-scaling, and I specifically said which type this game has. So...?

 

[made]

Codex isn't any different. Just look at the number of NV threads we get compared to low profile games like Div2.

 

[Sisay]

The leveling system is designed like a single player MMO. Just doesn't work for this type of game, they should've copied Gothic in this aspect as well. Overall it's not a really bad game but not particularly great either. I enjoyed the original game more, to be honest, even with the silly title and terrible voice acting.

 

[Awor Szurkrarz]

It's the exact opposite of level scaling.
Learn the meaning of the buzzwords you use, moran.

O rly? Your damage and damage you receive scale with the difference in level between you and your enemy. Thus, level-scaling. Moran.

Still, it's logical. More experienced/better trained fighters are better at minimising damage when hit and better at delivering damaging hits at opponents. Unless higher level also have much more HP which would make the whole mechanic retarded and redundant.

 

[Volrath]

Fucking combatfags.

 

[Raapys]

Still, it's logical. More experienced/better trained fighters are better at minimising damage when hit and better at delivering damaging hits at opponents. Unless higher level also have much more HP which would make the whole mechanic retarded and redundant.

That's sort of the problem though. At equal level with the player, higher level enemies have more hitpoints and do more damage than an equal lower-level enemy. So the level-scaled damage is really just a way of artificially ensuring players are of a certain level before venturing into a certain area. MMORPGs use this all the time.

A system like that, if needed at all, should obviously be based on the character's fighting skills, not level. It's not quite as bad as putting up a locked door marked 'Level20+ only', but it's close.

 

[Zomg]

TL;DR the job of the media isn't to show off games, it's to sell advertising.

It's actually to be advertising.