Obsidian's Pillars of Eternity [BETA RELEASED, GO TO THE NEW THREAD]

You may be right in that I'm overestimating post-development sales. We'll just have to wait and see.

The future is rather bleak anyway. In another twenty years, many of these industry veterans will be retired, and most others will have permanently moved on to different careers. They're an aging bunch, and developing computer games is a very demanding profession. By 2030, the era of old-school cRPGs will have drawn to a permanent close. I suspect much of the player base will have moved on along with the developers.

In my opinion, 2011-2020 will be the last hurrah for developers like them and for players like us. We've got this round of projects (Wasteland 2, PE, Star Citizen, etc.) to look forward to, then perhaps another round or two to come, and after that our little hobby will seem as old-fashioned and outdated to the gaming industry as crooners seem to Generation X.

I wish it could last forever. When games like IWD, Torment, Fallout, Wizardry, adventure games, space sims (remember Radio Shacks filled with computer joysticks?) and so on were still big sellers, I was in Heaven and I thought I'd be playing games like that for decades to come. But we lost almost a whole decade.

 

I dunno, my brother. Grimrock, which was way more niche than PE, and only really advertised through word of mouth, sold 17k copies on GoG alone - that's at least 50k with Steam included, which is a very modest estimate. BG2 sold like 3 million altogether. I don't think it's unrealistic to expect PE to sell in the ballpark of 500k; as an estimate, for 20$ per copy and Valve taking its 30% Steam Jew-toll, that's 7 million of profit, easily enough to fund a sequel.

I understand it's better to be pessimistic about these things, but these kinds of sales numbers aren't unheard of. Frictional Games are still selling over 10k copies of Amnesia every month. As long as Obsidian actually release a good game without tons of bugs (the biggest danger here, imo), they should be absolutely fine.

 

ME2 might have been (alright was) a worse RPG but it was a far more entertaining game that DA2 could ever hope to be.

Apart from that I too am afraid that PE will crush and burn when released.

 

I wouldn't say to much about this so far. Truth is that they had a very good press coverage this far and will continue to have. Sure they will miss the big ads and TV commercials, but I still think it is very possible they can sell a few 100k. And since they have no publisher that money will go almost straight to their pocket. I remember when Paradox was asked how much more they will make on selling their games directly, the answer was "Many times as much".

 

PE will not be a loss. That much is captain obvious.

Whether it will make a serious profit to warrant another such game without kickstarter, I don't know. BUt in the world of digital distribution probably you are right. Let's see.

 

I think there are some younger developers who like oldschool games and even trying to make new ones. Take Underrail, for example. With a bit of luck, guys like Underrail's developer will become more influential in the future and they will make games that we might enjoy playing.

 

P. much sums up what's wrong with gaming today.

EDIT: admitedly if his RPG experience consists of Fag Age and Ass Effect he does have a point about their gameplay being shit.

 

With further sabotaging good gameplay right here, what do you expect?

 

I mean FFS at least if the writing was any good I would understand, but most games have, shit stories, shit characters spouting shit lines, what the fuck is there to like about them? Hell, most of them are worse than the worst summer block buster C movie or any dime-in-a-dozen-wrote-on-command-based-off-of-an-already-existing-franchise fantasy novel. This is 5th grade level (at most) writing we are talking about here.

 

It's like POV porn, imo. Fucking retarded, but some people need to be immersed, I guess.

 

There really aren't many RPGs with actually good gameplay. I can't name many at all off the top of my head. Most people who play RPGs are those who enjoy them exclusively for the cinematic experience, C&C romance etc. because there really isn't much for the gameplay crowd.

(This could be an interesting thread to open here, RPGs you play for gameplay).

 

I tried to search but couldn't find...does anyone know how many pledges failed for DFA and Wasteland 2?

 

BTW

 

Gonna try to argue probably one last time with that biodrone in romance thread but arguing with them is like this:

 

I seriously doubt that kickstarter contributors are even 1/4 of people would buy this game if it was for sale right now. There are plenty of people who are wary of kickstarter, who won't buy a game until it's out, who never even heard of the kickstarter, etc.

Is there any particular reason that people will not want to make games like cRPGs in the future? For the ~10 years, the reason was that you couldn't make money doing it. If we can make sure there is a profitable market where developers can sell their wares, I'm sure there are younger developers right now who would like to make games like Fallout, Arcanum, etc

 

I voted story

I'd rather play PS:T than KotC.

 

In PS:T, the "story" was the gameplay. Choices and consequences, plus stats thrown into the mix. Fucking Codexers don't even know what they should know.

 

Only people who've made a great game can make another one? Where did those original good games come from?

With most entertainment someone makes just one really good thing and then the rest of their career is decline, and so far games don't seem to be a big exception.

 

CYOA gameplay pretty much sucks even if there is stat checks.

I like PS:T because the writing is good not because it has stat checks.

 

The emphasis was on the choice and consequences part, douche.

 

I still wouldn't care without the good story. Therefore story is what I want.

 

Then go read a book trololo