Woah, the Codex has original content? Amazing.
"Compared to Lovecraft, Stephen King is like your grandma reading a scary bedtime story."
King is like that anyways, except my grandma actually gave her stories an end.
"A starting character will have a Sanity score of somewhere between 50 – 100. As conceived right this minute... (continued)"
It may not be this way, and I trust the guys who are associated with AOD, but this sanity seems like an annoyance... similar to the good old classic poison. The fact that it can cause you to lose physical control of your character without any (apparently) interesting drawbacks, is something I would not enjoy experiencing.
"There will be no special quests for insane characters..."
HUGE mistake. There is so much potential here for true chaotic neutral. This incredibly interesting path is hardly ever explored. The Corrupted state sounds like a generic RPG gimmick. Actually, it sounds like Heretic Kingdom's dream world but with a forced vampire-type path.
"I’ve already had some good suggestions, like a constantly diminishing Sanity resulting from lack of proper sleep, which would lead to hallucinations."
Go with this. We always get to send apparations at the monsters. It would be interesting to be on the receiving end. I can imagine walking up to a character and entering conversation, only to have an NPC walk up and engage me, asking why I was talking to myself.
"Introducing what I call the S.E.D.I.W.P. system – the base stats are: Strength, Endurance, Dexterity, Intelligence, Will, Perception. There are nine available Skills (Mechanics, Mind, Deceit, Medicine, Arcanum, Physique, Clubs, Blades, Guns). Skills will range in value... blah blah blah"
I thought all the skill acronyms were a Codex joke on Bethesda's bastardized SPECIAL system. Anyways, I mostly glossed over this while reading. Spreadsheet RPGs usually drive
my sanity meter down.
"With a prerequisite of 50 in Deceit, you can purchase Forgery. If the player has access to a writing desk and writing materials, he can forge signatures and other documents to forward his agenda. With a prerequisite of 50 in Mind, you can purchase Mesmerism. Mesmerism allows the player once a day to assist an NPC to recover lost Sanity, as well as opening up dialogue options in applicable situations."
Now you're just outright stealing from Bethesda. The Oblivion perks, the once-a-day birthsigns? How about instead of the player trying to run out there and farm exp (however this is handled) to get the extra couple of points so they can gain the arbitrary level required to forge signatures, allowing them to use forgery through the entire course of the game, gradually becoming better and better? What about the most powerful people having the hardest signatures to forge, and thus require a higher level? Instead of having the player say, "I'd forge through this quest, but my level isn't high enough," have him say, "I'll attempt a forge. If I'm unsuccessful, I might be able to flatter my way through this guard to let me off the hook."
"I think readers will also be interested in my conception of optional Character Backgrounds."
Backgrounds are always good. "You are an unknown hero... with an unknown past..." is bullshit, unless your character has severe amnesia. Also bullshit is the make up your own background cop-out.
"I’m going to approximate the Fallout model of NPC followers: limited inventory control (no packmules), some AI options but not direct control over actions, no more than three followers. These people won’t follow you everywhere you go, either."
Goddamnit Ian! Quit shooting me in the back!
Anyways, I like the idea of them not following you everywhere. Arcanum would have been a whole lot more immersive if Sogg left your party and went to a pub in every city, and you had to go retrieve him. A good trade-off I think for his exceptional power and loose morals.
"Typical opponents will be other human beings."
Just don't make them all suicidal.
"There will be no “fighting” major Mythos entities."
Conversation is good, but some players want that epic battle climax.
"Fisticuffs"
I love that word.
"The deadliness of the fight, and your opponent’s willingness to spare your life depends on the situation. If you resist arrest barehanded, the police will beat you down with a club but not kill you. Other times, it might benefit your opponents to capture you. Reaching zero Life in Cyclopean means unconsciousness, so there is also a chance, depending on your opponent’s appetite, that you may regain consciousness later and manage to crawl to a hospital, or be discovered by some good Samaritan.
There are also certain dialogues where you may be challenged to an entirely non-lethal fistfight.
To the question, Can I play through the entire game without combat? my answer is “I don’t know.” The main quest lines will all have non-combat solutions. For all other quests, I let the story drive the possible solutions and pick sensible ones, rather than automatically assigning 6 or 8 different solutions for every quest."
I don't have much to say here except for "Totally Awesome".
"I dislike role-playing systems that rely on conversation stats, like Diplomacy, Gather Information, etc. In Cyclopean, I want the player to read and think about what’s being said, instead of clicking the highlighted line that indicates a Diplomacy check because he has a high Diplomacy."
I'm on the fence with this. On the outset, it sounds good, but sometimes the player just doesn't know what the character knows. I think these diplomacy and charisma checks, when implemented the right way (as in, not how Bioware does it), determine how successful you are. You say Deceit will determine how successful the player is at lying, but how about flattery or even telling the truth to someone who's incredibly skeptical?
"Also, there are no elves."
Might as well put a "Not Intended For JarlFrank" sticker on the box. :D
Overall, great review. Much better than most of the crap that is posted here and taken from other sites. Of course, I also guess that has to do with the person being interviewed, but the questions were very good.
