Interview Fall dialogue at RPGDot

[Saint_Proverbius]

Tags: Fall: Last Days of Gaia; Silver Style

<a href="http://www.rpgdot.com">RPGDot</a>, hot on the heels of the announcement of <a href="http://www.the-fall.com/">The Fall</a>, have done up <A href="http://www.rpgdot.com/index.php?hsaction=10053&ID=750">an interview</a> with <A href="http://www.silver-style.com">Silver Style</a>'s <b>Carsten Strehs</b>. Here's a bit on the combat:
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<blockquote><b>RPGDot: Is it more action- or story-orientated?
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Carsten Strehse:</b> The Fall is a story- and no action-RPG. But we break new ground for combat. Frankly, the combat system in current 3D RPGs is not really their strong side. That's why we decided to make combat in The Fall more tactical. The player has by far more influences on his up to 6 member party, if he wants to. If not, he can let the AI handle the combat.</blockquote>
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<i>Less twitch, more tactics</i> is fine by me. Though, the part about the AI running combat kind of makes me wonder how tactical it will be.
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Thanks, <b>Garrett</b>!

 

[Diogo Ribeiro]

RPGDot: How does level up work? Do you get XPs for killing monsters and/or solving riddles, quests? And if so, how can you use the XPs?

Carsten Strehse: Yes, you get XPs. Both for killed enemies and for quests. For level up you need a certain amount of XPs…quite traditional. If a character gains a level, he can distribute a certain amount of points on skills and attributes. By this level up however, not only the effect of the skill is increased, but he also gains new, special ways to use the raised skill.

Interesting. But wouldn't it be better to have skills have multiple possibilites from the get go? For instance, if im given lockpicking, it makes sense that i could use it to lock and unlock things from the get go; but this suggests that i'd have to advance to level X before i could do something simple, (or as obvious when taking the skill into consideration) as that. Will this also happen with pickpocket? Will i only be able to plant evidence in someone's pockets after i reach a certain level?

Knowing this is RPGcodex, im willing to bet Carsten Strehse will quickly post an answer here :wink:

 

[axel]

recognize anything? hehe

Does it say if it's TB?

/edit:

RPGDot: Is there magic or something similar like psi forces? If so, what different spells are there? How does the spell system work? Based on reagents, only mana/force or totally different?

Carsten Strehse: No, The Fall has no magic. That would not become a realistic scenario.


RPGDot: What weapons are there, just the classic guns and rifles or also medieval weapons like swords or bows?

Carsten Strehse: Overall there are more than 50 weapons and more than another 300 unique items. Weapons are foremost shooting weapons, but there are also knives, baseball bats and crossbows. There are no swords however.


RPGDot: What races and classes are there in The Fall? And which of them can you play actually?

Carsten Strehse: The Fall does not differ between races and classes. The player can form his characters through 6 attributes and 14 skills according to his ideas.

I found that uproarishly funny for some odd reason.
Pure-Sex-Movies Wrestling Dildo Spanish Tricked Pale Voyeur Creampie Masturbating Busty-Teen Big-Ass Slim Twins Latina College Plumper Cum-Eating Twink Interracial Rough-Sex Soccer Fingering Buttfucking 3some Leather Ass-to-Mouth Jizz Sleeping Shemale Sunbathing Close-up Latex Granny Whore Public Wife Brunettes Uniform Dick Mistress

 

[HanoverF]

I found some of these questions on the cutting room floor...

RPGDot: What kind of wands can you expect to find?
RPGDot: Will there be Beholders, Drow, or Dragons?
RPGDot: How many Magical Weapons will there be?
RPGDot: Can we Expect a Romance with our Demi-God spawned Half-Sister?

 

[Shevek]

The AI bit doesnt sit too well with me either but Im willing to keep an open mind. So long as there is some kind of difficulty slider or something that allows the player to play at a level where greater control over combat is necessitated then Im sure all will be well.

Role-Player brings up an interesting point about skill use. Having greater skill open up more "abilities" does seem kinda wierd. Why wouldnt you just allow the player to use those abilities at the start albiet with a lower chance of success? Using RP's pickpocket example, why not let the player plant evidence but with a high chance of failure at lower skill levels as opposed to only opening up the ability later on? Of course,you can look at this in another way: this is hardly different from FO where you would get your small guns skill up to a certain amount then pick up the sniper perk. In the case of the Fall, however, the special ability is simply given to the player as a product of his skill investment as opposed to being chosen.

 

[Diogo Ribeiro]

Exactly. Of course they could be considering a system like Diablo, or Arcanum's spell schools/technological disciplines, but that should work only with abilities, not skills. Well etymologically there isn't much of a difference between the two, but i was refering to abilities as in a branching skill system. Skills tend to be multiuse from the beginning.

 

[axel]

Role-Player brings up an interesting point about skill use. Having greater skill open up more "abilities" does seem kinda wierd. Why wouldnt you just allow the player to use those abilities at the start albiet with a lower chance of success? Using RP's pickpocket example, why not let the player plant evidence but with a high chance of failure at lower skill levels as opposed to only opening up the ability later on? Of course,you can look at this in another way: this is hardly different from FO where you would get your small guns skill up to a certain amount then pick up the sniper perk. In the case of the Fall, however, the special ability is simply given to the player as a product of his skill investment as opposed to being chosen.

In the case of pick pocket it doesn't seem to make much sense, like how Role-Player stated about the only being able to plant when you've reached a certain level and things like that. In that respect, yeah, it doesn't make much sense. However, if it were a skill like marksmenship, then it might make sense, that only a skilled marksman can make called shots to the eyes, or shoot from the hip, etc.

So it does have me a bit leary, but still, I'd need more information on it's implementation to make any type of judgement.

 

[Gorath]

The Fall uses real time combat with "stop triggers". You can select 0-15 of them to control when the game pauses and waits for commands.

Which "stop-triggers" are planned?
after...
1. ... enemy contact
2. ... enemy assault
3. ... own assault
4. ... got hit
5. ... enemy got hit
6. a char has less than 50% HP
7. dto., 50% HP
8. character dead
9. ammo clip empty
10. one ammo clip left for current weapon
11. dto., out of ammo
12. no secondary weapon
13. after an explosion
14. end of assault turn (party + enemies)
15. character without task


Which "behaviour-sets" can be assigned to the party members?
1. attack on enemy contact
2. defend when attacked (but don´t attack first)
3. attack weakest opponent first
4. dto., strongest op.
5. dto., nearest op.
6. always kneel down during combat
7. dto., lie down ...
8. force secondary weapon attack
9. try head shot
10. flee on enemy contact
11. flee when out of ammo
12. auto reload
13. flee when HP <= 50%
14. dto., 25%
15. remain completely passive (char AI disabled)



Based upon infos from an unofficial German FAQ in the Silver Style forums.

 

[axel]

The Fall uses real time combat with "stop triggers". You can select 0-15 of them to control when the game pauses and waits for commands....<snip>

Jumping juniper trees... I having fallout tactics nightmares again

*runs screaming into the night*]

Well there goes that idea. Oh well...

 

[Saint_Proverbius]

Sounds more like Baldur's Gate to me. And Germans seem to have a fascination with the year 2083. Restricted Area and The Fall both take place in 2083.

 

[Grifman]

Number 14 under stop triggers seems pretty close to turn based.

FYI, this actually is very close to the UFO: Aftermath scheme of control. In BG you can pause and issue orders, but I don't think you can specify when that happens. In UFO: Atermath, you can tell the game under what circumstances to stop - see an alien, come under fire, etc. This seems pretty close to that.

Grifman

 

[Astromarine]

Erm, BG also had an end of turn trigger. Does that make it turn based? Stop triggers are just places where the game autopauses to allow you to give orders. Turn based is NOT that.

 

[Psilon]

BG also had stop triggers for out-of-ammo conditions, criticals, hits, injuries, and deaths. See Gameplay::Auto-Pause options.

Astro's right; there's a big difference between pausing when the action queue is empty and turn-based combat.