Review Absolutely idiotic Gothic 3 review

[Data4]

somebody set us up the bomb

 

[The Public Enemy]

There is only one solution.

 

[galsiah]

How could I give you actual numbers? Do I have PB's books?

I don't mean actual figures (though clearly that'd be ideal). I mean well thought out estimates.

Its common sense. Why have budgets for games gone from next to nothing to millions/10's of millions? It has nothing to do with salaries.

It might be common sense overall, but we're talking about 1 company and 1 game here. PB are in specific circumstances with a specific codebase, a specific staff, a specific publisher...
They could change these things, but it'd take significant time and effort (i.e. money) to do it.

If we're talking about general industry trends, it makes sense to generalize, and might be necessary to fall back on common sense. Since we're talking about one specific company, it makes sense to look at the specific info we have on them.

In any case, much of the increase in modern budgets is due to salaries - since there are now usually many more artists on projects than in the past. To cut down on this you'd need to reduce the variety of game artwork significantly (then sack/not hire some people ).
Perhaps it'd be doable to cut down on art quality rather than variety, by getting artists to stick to low detail stuff (I'm not really sure on this - it'd depend how long it takes to make models/textures of high vs low quality). However, you need to consider whether you're going to get talented artists to stick with you if you're constantly forcing them to go for speed over quality. I'm not an artist, but I guess this isn't how most artists like to work.

I don't know for sure, but I don't think spending less time on the graphics engine would translate into great budget cuts unless artwork (and thus artists) was significantly scaled back.
If you're suggesting less variety/quality in artwork, as well as less shininess, that's fine. I'm not sure it'd make much sense from PB's perspective though.

And you are mixing up development resource allocation with computer prcessing somehow.

Aha - you're right there. My mistake. I wondered what you were on about.
I agree that gameplay ought to be more of a focus than graphics. Not having played Gothic3, I'm not really in a position to make any judgement on this, but it'd surprise me if there were actually more focus on graphics than gameplay. Too much focus on graphics perhaps, but that's not the same thing.

Now lets say they had the same size team, but there artists created more art instead of super graphic awesomest graphics

Possible, but again I guess that most talented artists would want to work where they can go for quality rather than quantity.
Perhaps I'm wrong in this - perhaps a lot of artists really enjoy doing the best they can with limited resources. I'd guess not though. Any artists care to enlighten me?

and they had less artists employed but more quest designers and content designers, and faction designers, and dialogue writers. Now combat only takes up 50 or 60% of the game. Lets say they put just 10% less into art and graphics and added those resources into designing and implementing the best combat system they could. How would that have impacted the game.

Perhaps it might have been a better game in most codex views. I'm not sure it would have sold better or got publisher approval though.

If they reused all the graphics, engine, and content from g1 and 2, they could have made the same game with at least 1/4th the budget.

Possibly true. They'd need to sack half their staff though, leaving them pretty much screwed for their next project. They'd also have been crucified in pretty much every review.

You're basically talking about doing another (huge) Gothic2 expansion. Using the same engine, content etc. (with all the same art) for a "new" game would be financial suicide. Making a huge expansion probably wouldn't have made sense - I'm not sure.

I'll stand by that number without even knowing the numbers, because every designer that talks about the costs of games always says the cost of graphics have skyrocketed.

Sure - because you need to pay all the artists.
However, sacking your art team after every other project is hardly a good business plan. It would be wonderful if a game studio could simply take X amount of funds and allocate them exactly as desired at any given moment. That's not practical though. To run a reasonable business, PB need a stable (as far as possible) art team.

If they hired a load more artists for Gothic3, then perhaps you have a point. Perhaps they could have stuck with what they had and put money elsewhere.

If you look at it as a pie...

Sure. However, it's not a pie.
It's a business with employees, a publisher (possibly with the IP rights to Gothic??), an existing code base etc.

With that situation, your pie shrinking might become:
Sack most of the art staff.
Probably devastate team moral in the process - but fuck it: we need a smaller pie.
Convince everyone else you want to keep to stay. You really value them as people etc. etc., even though you just sacked their friends on a whim.
Leave publisher, since they won't get behind the Bold New Vision.
Conclude that Gothic3 is now not possible, since PB can't make it without JoWooD [at least not for now].
Hire new people who know little about the way you work. Spend time training them.
Realize that your entire plan rests on reusing all the content from Gothic2.
Find that JoWooD's lawyers have their own views on that issue.
Engage in protacted legal battle with JoWooD.
Become frustrated as deals with new publishers become impossible.
Watch the rest of your staff leave.
Quit.
Conclude that a bigger pie has its advantages.
Kill yourself.

That might all be garbage. It clearly rests heavily on the idea that JoWooD wouldn't support such a move from PB. Perhaps your comments were aimed at the publisher too.

Whatever the case, you can't just throw a few equations around and halve the budget of an existing company without regard to its particular circumstances.
It makes more sense to make suggestions about the general direction of the industry than about a specific company - unless you take into account all the relevant factors. It'd also make more sense to blame a company which self-publishes for bad decisions, since at least in that case you can be sure it was their decision.

 

[Ladonna]

Come now, there are plenty of games that are doing just fine without having graphics as good as G3's.

I already mentioned NWN2. There are plenty of others. And the Gothics are huge in Europe, something I think many are forgetting. Roqua has made a decent point. They could have made a really polished game and had it looking almost as good. Throw in climbing and the ability to swin underwater like the old Gothics (and the various quests that could have needed these features) it would have sold quite well.

The main problem many people had with the earlier Gothics were the UI and the combat. I can understand to some degree why they didn't like the UI. I loved the combat.

If they had given it a modest graphical update (while keeping their art and design at its usual brilliant level) and cleaned up the User Interface, possibly making combat easier in execution (NOT difficulty, its now been made too easy), they would have had a polished winner. And the reviewers would still have been reviewing it. This game has had mammoth amounts of fan hype, all over the internet. It was on every radar.

 

[Roqua]

Lets look at another example, to hopefully clarify this. Troika had a picth for ToEE. They went to Atari with the pitch. Atari, in order to fund the game (debt), gave them some terms (total debt, milestones, and development time of 18 months). Troika didn't have to accept, they can also try and negotiate. Obviously, Bio's negotiations with them went alot better.

But Troika accepted. In order to make the game, in in 18 months, they had to reuse the Arcanum engine. So even if they wanted to make a 3d game they couldn't. Even if they wanted to make their own engine they couldn't. Even if they wanted to have ultra fancy graphics they couldn't. They had to alocate resources as best as possible to make the game they could make with the resources avialable.

Salaries has nothing to do with it, salaries is part of resource allocation. As human's are a resource. If you want an extra texturer or whatever some artist name is, and you are stretching your budget, maybe you move the QA guy to level design, and push the level designer to that has experience texturing to texturing, but again it doesn't matter.

What you are saying about salries is like the size of the art team has to be fixed. No, that isn't true.

And you are using the word Quality in relation to art as if only super fancy graphic rpgs have quality art. Which is also not true at all. The quality of the art is independant of how many pixel shaders and vrotex discombobulers are present. ToEE had quality art. World of Warcraft has quality art, and noeither of those game pushed any graphic boundaries.

There was a development post I wish I saved the link to that talked about the full process of turning a drawing into an in game, fully animated model for the top games today. The process is very lengthy, time consuming, and expensive. You can have quality art and graphics with skipping most of the "gloss" steps and save a bundle in time and expense.

I hate to say it, but you have absolutley no idea what your talking about at all. I have no idea what I'm talking about when it comes to the actual development of games, besides what I've read about it, but I've never been in the actual game creation process, but I understand how projects and project management goes (and no, I've never managed a budget or a project).

My core points are simple and obvious. Look at AoD and the changes that has went through over graphics. How many extra people had to be hired or contracted when the game switched from 2d to 3d? How much extra time did adding lighting or whatever they're doing now add to the development of the game? What has all, or at least the lion's share, of the money spent so far go towards? Art and graphics.

Now lets say VD won the lotto. He is happy with the graphics so far, but wants to put the 5 million he won into the game. So he hires 10 more people to add non-graphic content, such as quests, new systems, new dialogue, new scripts, optmize the engine, squish bugs, increase functionality of existing resources, etc. The game would have much more value without putting anything more into the fancyness of the graphics.

Now, would the game have a return that would justify putting the 5 million into it? Probably not. Without fancy graphics it probably will never be a huge seller. ANd to tell the truth, the game probably is too complex for the mainstream to want to give it a try. But this articulates resource allocation. With the 5 million he could have scrapted his engine and graphics, hire all new art people, leased a super fancy engine, and spent all the money on just moving the game over to a new package that just fancied up the graphical presntation of the game, without actually adding anything at all to the gameplay value of the game.

If anything, the gameplay might suffer, because he wants to see a return on his incvestment of 5 mill and time into thegame, so he switches from TB combat to twitch, streamlines and shortens dialogues and quests, and makes the game more mainstream friendly so it sells to a broader demographic. Now do you understand what I'm saying about valueing graphics over gameplay?

What Gothic did was instead of trying to make the best game they could have for their existing fans, is sicrifice the quality of the game and gameplay for the ultra fancification of the graphics of the game, to the point where a lot of their fans can't even play the game on their outdated PCs, just to chase after Oblivion fame and capture that demographic. But they failed, the graphics weren't good enough, the bugs to prominent, the gam too unpolished, and the core gameplay (besides combat) wasn't dumb enough, so they get a lot of retarded reviews and didn't achieve their goals.

I will never be mad at a company for trying to make money. I will get mad at a company trying to make money in what I belive to be the wrong way, such as short term gains over long ter gains, not catering towards their customers, etc. This situation could go both ways, as broadening your customer base is good long term business practice. But failing to execute properly and not reaching that goal is poor practice, especially when the fans who got you where you are are left dissapointed. And I think the biggest fans of G1 and G2 are not overjoyed with G3.

 

[Vault Dweller]

Troika didn't have to accept, they can also try and negotiate.

It's very easy to give generic advices. To negotiate successfully, Roqua, you always need some leverage. When you have none, you take what people give and kiss their hands. When you have a lot, you force other people to kiss your hands. That is how it works.

Obviously, Bio's negotiations with them went alot better.

What negotiations? NWN? A game that was sponsored by Interplay for years and then was taken to Atari in an almost ready state, being already overhyped and anticipated? There is a HUGE fucking difference between that and asking to sponsor a game from scratch.

 

[Kraszu]

I would be very surprise if g3 would not be financial success if they would use g2 engine, they should add new models, armors [...]. They don't have to sell as much copies as bigger developer to make profit obviously, and they fan base is big, that is one of the most popular games in big part of Europe. Paradox games made what 6 games whit the same engine: EU, EU2, Diplomacy, HoI, HoI, Crusader Kings (any more?).

 

[Roqua]

Troika didn't have to accept, they can also try and negotiate.

It's very easy to give generic advices. To negotiate successfully, Roqua, you always need some leverage. When you have none, you take what people give and kiss their hands. When you have a lot, you force other people to kiss your hands. That is how it works.

Obviously, Bio's negotiations with them went alot better.

What negotiations? NWN? A game that was sponsored by Interplay for years and then was taken to Atari in an almost ready state, being already overhyped and anticipated? There is a HUGE fucking difference between that and asking to sponsor a game from scratch.

Troika was an example of a game that didn't poor a lot of resources into graphics, reused existing assets, and still came out with a brilliant game in 18 months. I'm 100% positive that if they were able to, they would have liked to have had more time and a bigger budget with ToEE. But they took what they could get and made the best of it, and the best of it was better than 99% better of what other devs do with much larger budgets and much longer development cycle. The properly allocated resources and valued what they should have. Sure, there was room for improvement, just not time. ANd the graphics were great without pushing any next gen boundaries. They wouldn't have been able to make the game if they decided to emphasize graphcis over gameplay.

And the fact, and I stress fact, that Bio is better able to negotiate just doesn't stand with Atari. It stands across the board when comparing Troika with Bio. Troika was in business to make great rpgs, Bio is in business to make games that sell well. Of course the company trying to maximize returns is going to get better terms. If Bio went to a publisher with the same pitch for a post apoc game that troika did, they would have been able to acquire the capital to make it.

There's no reason to get mad at anything because you love a game that values graphics over gameplay and could have been a lot better if they properly allocated resources to stress the important factors of the game, instead of the superficial. People like what they like. The same could be said for Bloodlines, and I won't appologize for loving that action game. I admit to liking World of Warcraft, I'm just not blind to its faults, or uncritical of any game I love.

VD, you have to at least admit that G3 would have been a far better game if they alloacted resources away from fancy graphics and put those resources into the meat of the game.

 

[Vault Dweller]

And the fact, and I stress fact, that Bio is better able to negotiate just doesn't stand with Atari. It stands across the board when comparing Troika with Bio.

Bio's fate was determined by Baldur's Gate - an RTS game turned into an RPG. Troika's fate was determined by Arcanum and Sierra's decision to wait 6 months while the game was massively pirated. That was the beginning of the end. Had Sierra released the game immediately, things could have been very different, and Troika would still be in business, and we would be playing Arcanum 2 now.

If Bio went to a publisher with the same pitch for a post apoc game that troika did, they would have been able to acquire the capital to make it.

When? Now when Bio is a big and established name or back when Bio was making shooters?

VD, you have to at least admit that G3 would have been a far better game if they alloacted resources away from fancy graphics and put those resources into the meat of the game.

Fancy graphics is what sells today, especially for a FP/TP game. An isometric game can get away with ok graphics, but a game where world visuals are in your face can't.

 

[Ladonna]

I agree that graphics are big for what you describe, but Roqua is right. If PB had made a modest update in graphics, and more towards gameplay and polish, the game would have been better...not to mention FINISHED. Without all the bogus reviews and horde of kids having the game crash on them (Yes, I had the dreaded save bug as well until 1.09) the game would have sold better than it has.

I love the game too, but they needed more time on this puppy.

 

[Roqua]

I agree that graphics are big for what you describe, but Roqua is right. If PB had made a modest update in graphics, and more towards gameplay and polish, the game would have been better...not to mention FINISHED. Without all the bogus reviews and horde of kids having the game crash on them (Yes, I had the dreaded save bug as well until 1.09) the game would have sold better than it has.

I love the game too, but they needed more time on this puppy.

Just one adendum, I never said the game would have sold better without the super graphics. I just said it would be a better game.

Fancy graphics is what sells today, especially for a FP/TP game. An isometric game can get away with ok graphics, but a game where world visuals are in your face can't.

So you are saying super fancy graphics and an emphasis on graphics is a necissity for a game to be good? And a 1st/3td person perspective 3d game can't get away with quality, but not next-gen graphics to be a good game?

What about G1 and G2? What about Arx Fatalis and Wiz 8? What about a million other examples that say you are wrong?

Now if we start talking about games maximizing sales and being super-duper Oblivion popular, then i guess pooring all your resources into grahics is a must. But that doesn't mean my point is wrong. graphics don't make a game. In in the case og G3, a franchise with established fans, that pooring all their resources into graphics has maximized returns. It would have been an instant classic if it just built on the established gameplay of 1 and 2, with new art and existing art resources re-used. It would have sold well and needed a fraction of the cost and time to make.

Graphics sell is a sad fact, but it doesn't mean its necessary or needed, or a game shouldn't be harshly criotized when it values graphics over gameplay.

You can jump on the next-gen bandwagon, but I sure as fuck ain't. G3 needs to be harshly critized for valueing graphics over gameplay, and having a much worse game because of it. Maybe the game is super fantastic, as Bloodlines is in my opinion, and had the same values. But being a blind bandwagoner, excuse making graphic whore doesn't get anyone anywhere. PB fucked up and managed this project and the resources at their disposal that they had control of poorly. You manage projects in real life, how can this not be blatantly obviuos to you?

Super graphics hurt G3, screwed its fan base, and the game is worse off because of it. I'm not saying it is a bad game by any means, just that it isn't nearly as good as it could have been, and isn't what the true, faithful, and vocal fans of G1 and G2 hoped it was going to be.

p.s. The only way what you are saying could be aplied in this case would be if G1 G2 fan thought this exact thought, "Gee Wilickers, I really like these games. But I hope the next one has much better graphics and much worse combat and can only play on high end systems and isn't as polished as G1 and G2. I also hope they take out climbing and all that stupid shit."

Arena, Daggerfall, then Morrowind. G1, G2, then G3. I remember having htis same argument when morrwind came out. I'm pretty sure G4 will be comparable to Oblivion, as these two series are beginning to mirrow each other. I'm sure there will also be a correlation between FO1, FO2, FO3, and the gothic series. But thats what happens when devs spit in the eyes of their fans and value graphics, mainstream streamlining, and superficial bullshit over all else.

 

[Vault Dweller]

So you are saying super fancy graphics and an emphasis on graphics is a necissity for a game to be good? And a 1st/3td person perspective 3d game can't get away with quality, but not next-gen graphics to be a good game?

I said "what sells", not "what's good", Roqua.

AoD development has taught me a lot of things. The most surprising thing of all was the simple fact that gamers don't want to play shitty looking games and will not buy shitty looking games, and that any developer naive enough to make shitty looking games won't stay in business for a long time (Jeff Vogel is an exception because he's tapping into the starved Mac market and he makes dungeon crawlers, basically. Zero-Sum is a far better example of my "theory"). People were bitching and studying AoD graphics under a fucking microscope from day one, comparing and complaining about the game not looking as good as Fallout, which was kinda ridiculous. I could bitch about the unfair ways of the world or accept the situation and do my best to improve the graphics to [slightly] more acceptable levels. I chose the latter.

What about G1 and G2? What about Arx Fatalis and Wiz 8? What about a million other examples that say you are wrong?

Arx Fatalis -> Dark Messiah; Wiz 8 -> dead. What else you've got?

Graphics sell is a sad fact, but it doesn't mean its necessary or needed, or a game shouldn't be harshly criotized when it values graphics over gameplay.

Is that a fact?

G3 needs to be harshly critized for valueing graphics over gameplay, and having a much worse game because of it. Maybe the game is super fantastic, as Bloodlines is in my opinion, and had the same values.

Have you played the game? Have you read my review? Where does it say "the gameplay is shit, but the graphics are super awesome!"?

PB fucked up and managed this project and the resources at their disposal that they had control of poorly. You manage projects in real life, how can this not be blatantly obviuos to you?

I disagree that they've mismanaged their resources. Play the game, then we will talk.

Super graphics hurt G3, screwed its fan base, and the game is worse off because of it.

Great. Now prove it.

I'm not saying it is a bad game by any means, just that it isn't nearly as good as it could have been, and isn't what the true, faithful, and vocal fans of G1 and G2 hoped it was going to be.

What does "not nearly as good as it could have been" mean? Don't be shy, be specific. Also, who are the "true, faithful, and vocal fans" and who aren't? What are their issues?

 

[galsiah]

@Ladonna
I've agreed that perhaps they could have made a less graphics focused game.
My disagreement was with Roqua's notion that they could necessarily halve (or thereabouts) the budget just by cutting back on graphics.

Lets look at another example, to hopefully clarify this. Troika had a picth for ToEE....They had to alocate resources as best as possible to make the game they could make with the resources avialable.

So they were powerless to make decisions beyond those forced upon them?
Who is to say that PB weren't in the same situation, but forced to use a new engine with new graphics etc.?

Perhaps this isn't the case. Again, feel free to throw some facts at me - that's all I'm asking for. Perhaps you are right.

Salaries has nothing to do with it, salaries is part of resource allocation.

So that's kind of a contradiction isn't it??

As human's are a resource. If you want an extra texturer or whatever some artist name is, and you are stretching your budget, maybe you move the QA guy to level design, and push the level designer to that has experience texturing to texturing, but again it doesn't matter.

If you have a team where it's always possible to switch people around without losing any efficiency, or losing any staff, that's great. In the real world that usually isn't possible.
The types of changes you were talking about wouldn't happen simply by moving a few guys around - even assuming most of the team were multi-talented.

What you are saying about salries is like the size of the art team has to be fixed. No, that isn't true.

Not fixed, but pretty much stable over a few projects. It's not an absolute in either sense: it's just better with small changes.

And you are using the word Quality in relation to art as if only super fancy graphic rpgs have quality art. Which is also not true at all. The quality of the art is independant of how many pixel shaders and vrotex discombobulers are present.

No I'm not. I'm saying that high quality art takes longer to produce than low quality art. I'm talking about the number of artists and their salaries - not about the graphics engine.

You are right in a way that artistic quality is independent of pixel shaders etc. However, it's far from obvious that having all the graphical bells and whistles means that art takes longer to produce. For example, if an engine has great support for realistic real time lighting, the artist can (presumably) pretty much forget about lighting, use suitable materials, and know that it'll all look good. If the engine doesn't have great lighting support, the artist can't rely on that, and will have to do everything themselves.

Again, I'm no artist, so anyone who has experience of these issues can feel free to set me straight. However, applying similar reasoning to programming - i.e. that higher level, fully features programming languages, APIs etc. make development take longer - would be laughable.

ToEE had quality art. World of Warcraft has quality art, and noeither of those game pushed any graphic boundaries.

Yet something tells me that WoW didn't exactly have a small art budget. How about ToEE? How big was the art team there? I'm guessing it wasn't heavily reduced.

There was a development post I wish I saved the link to that talked about the full process of turning a drawing into an in game, fully animated model for the top games today. The process is very lengthy, time consuming, and expensive. You can have quality art and graphics with skipping most of the "gloss" steps and save a bundle in time and expense.

Perhaps that's true. I'd like an artist's opinion though. Would an artists in such a situation find their work really rewarding, or would they feel stifled? Perhaps they would be fine with this if they were really enthusiastic about the game (not merely the art).

I hate to say it, but you have absolutley no idea what your talking about at all.

You're right there when it comes to art. I'm just guessing. So are you however. That's why I'd appreciate a few facts.

...but I understand how projects and project management goes (and no, I've never managed a budget or a project).

So forgive me, but how do you maintain you know this? Are you also assuming that managing a specific, small software project is necessarily the same as other project management? That'd be a pretty groundless assumption.

My core points are simple and obvious. Look at AoD and the changes that has went through over graphics.

If you are talking about general industry trends, it might make sense in a "simple and obvious" way. You're talking about one specific company though.

Comparing IT to PB is hardly a useful comparison. IT is a new setup, which migrated from 2d to 3d. PB is an established studio already entirely set up for 3d production. IT is an indie studio that can make its own decisions on quality in every area. PB is not. IT is using a new (to them) 3rd party engine for the first time (unless Flashback used it before??). PB is using an in house engine they're largely familiar with before the project.

Now lets say VD won the lotto....So he hires 10 more people to add non-graphic content, such as quests, new systems, new dialogue, new scripts, optmize the engine, squish bugs, increase functionality of existing resources, etc.

10 people who still need to be made familiar with the way AoD is coded, the design ideas, the writing etc. Who need to be able to integrate all their work with existing content well for it not to seem like a load of out of place quantity-over-quality tosh. Who need to understand the engine before they can squash bugs, etc. etc.

Starting the project with 10 more people would be a different matter, but throwing 10 more developers in now might do more harm than good.

The game would have much more value without putting anything more into the fancyness of the graphics.

Clearly that's true for AoD, since the graphics were never a selling point - the aim has always been to get them to be passable, not exceptional. Again PB are in a very different situation.

But this articulates resource allocation.

What about it exactly?
You've basically said "If AoD changed things like this, the results would clearly be...". That demonstrates nothing.

Find an existing professional company which restructured, and give some data from that. Then you'll have a useful example. At the moment you're not much further forward than "Take a pie...", with just as much "It's clear that..." when it isn't.

With the 5 million he could have scrapted his engine and graphics, hire all new art people, leased a super fancy engine, and spent all the money on just moving the game over to a new package that just fancied up the graphical presntation of the game, without actually adding anything at all to the gameplay value of the game.

What has this to do with PB's situation?
Did they hire new people? (I guess so, but how many?)
They didn't licence a fancy new engine.
They didn't change the way their team was organized to any huge degree (I think).

If anything, the gameplay might suffer, because...

Again, what has this to do with PB?

Now do you understand what I'm saying about valueing graphics over gameplay?

In general terms I both understand and agree with you.
There's a big difference between general terms and the specific case of one small developer. Pulling a halving of budget out of thin air because it-stands-to-reason..., is just nonsense.

What Gothic did was instead of trying to make the best game they could have for their existing fans, is sicrifice the quality of the game and gameplay for the ultra fancification of the graphics of the game...

Evidence?
"...the best game they could have..." needs to take financial necessity into account.

While neither I, not Twinfalls (presumably) can demonstrate that such a graphics focus was a financial necessity, you're some distance from demonstrating that it wasn't. "It's obvious..." just isn't too convincing an argument.

...just to chase after Oblivion fame and capture that demographic.

So you're saying that the development of Gothic3 was based around the success and fame of a game which came out just months before Gothic3? For all PB knew for the vast majority of development time, Oblivion might have failed (commercially ). No game is certain of success.

But they failed, the graphics weren't good enough...

That's not the impression I get from reading reviews.

the bugs to prominent, the gam too unpolished

That sounds to be true, but wouldn't it make more sense to blame the publisher there? Even if they'd taken a different, less graphics focused approach, the publisher would probably have pushed for earlier release.
I'd be interested to know of any evidence to the effect that games with moderate graphics end up more polished on the bugs front. I'd guess that the reverse is true.

I will never be mad at a company for trying to make money. I will get mad at a company trying to make money in what I belive to be the wrong way, such as short term gains over long ter gains, not catering towards their customers, etc.

Agreed. However, you simply don't have enough information to start arguing about what PB should have done differently. I can agree that it would probably have been better if they'd put more emphasis on gameplay over graphics. I'm in no position to know if that was a viable option.

But failing to execute properly and not reaching that goal is poor practice

Not really - it's just poor execution. Calling it poor practice implies that it'd have been possible to predictably get things right from the outset.

Again, if you look at the industry, and find that say 70% of projects fail horribly, you can be fairly sure there is poor project management going on. Looking at one individual project which goes less than perfectly tells you next to nothing. Game development is risky. Perhaps it was poor management. Perhaps it was bad luck. Without a load more specific information that we don't have, it's impossible to say.

...especially when the fans who got you where you are are left dissapointed.

Personally I'm not a big fan of the idea of "catering to the fans". I'd rather developers took a lead than followed fan requests and focus groups (at least unthinkingly).

It's also not clear to me why PB owe anything to their fans. They've provided a load of gamers with entertaining experiences in return for some money. Why should that tie them in to providing similar games for similar players in the future? Surely it's reasonable for game developers to want to try different approaches.

Also, people are forever throwing around the idea of "loyal" fans. Almost exclusively, fans are "loyal" so long as everything is how they want it. They probably buy the one game that changes things significantly, complain about it (perhaps reasonably), then don't buy the next game. I don't exactly see the loyalty there.
[e.g. Daggerfall -> Morrowind -> Oblivion]

I don't think Bethesda should change the way they do things for the benefit of Daggerfall fans. I think they should change the way they do things because they're crap (objectively, mind you ).

So long as PB steer clear of such crap, I won't hold changes of direction against them. Sure it'd be nice if more developers made games to my taste. What annoys me is shit design - not changes in design, or lack of "loyalty".

 

[galsiah]

I agree that graphics are big for what you describe, but Roqua is right. If PB had made a modest update in graphics, and more towards gameplay and polish, the game would have been better...not to mention FINISHED.
I love the game too, but they needed more time on this puppy.

Again, I'd be interested to know of any examples where publishers have said:
"We gave less funding on graphics, so let's allocate more time to fix bugs etc."
rather than
"The graphics are only just ok - let's push this out as soon as possible before they look too dated."

 

[Roqua]

I agree that graphics are big for what you describe, but Roqua is right. If PB had made a modest update in graphics, and more towards gameplay and polish, the game would have been better...not to mention FINISHED.
I love the game too, but they needed more time on this puppy.

Again, I'd be interested to know of any examples where publishers have said:
"We gave less funding on graphics, so let's allocate more time to fix bugs etc."
rather than
"The graphics are only just ok - let's push this out as soon as possible before they look too dated."

ToEE, Arcanum, The RoA series, Fallouts, PS:T, G1 and G2, and 8 billion other examples of games that didn't try to push the graphic envelope, but instead pushed great gameplay. Games that all were far behind leading the way graphic wise in there day, but had their values right. Galsiah, you really seem to be missing easy, key points. I can't, ethically and morally, keep argueing this with you in a civil way.

I could bitch about the unfair ways of the world or accept the situation and do my best to improve the graphics to [slightly] more acceptable levels. I chose the latter.

Did G3 improve the graphics slightly and focus on gameplay? Did they, honestly answer this?

They made a huge push to improve graphics, to the detriment of gameplay, and the game suffered because of it.

You want proof. Combat is the number 1 proof. It went from needing a huge amount of player skill and forethought, getting the timing just right, and having very tough battles that required a twitch strategy, to being a clickfest where a low lvl can beat any humanoid with stun locks.

What happened to some of the staple gameplay functions in G1 and 2 like climbing? They got cut didn't they? Why? Poor allocation of resources with a heavy emphasis into pooring resources into graphics.

Look at the fans that have posted so far in this thread, or any other thread, here or at rpgwatch. The people that truly loved G1 and G2 are disapointed, and a large portion of them don't have systems capable of playing the game.

G1 and G2 had quality graphics when they were released, but not super duty fancy graphics. Also, answer this, can you honestly say that the development strategy was the same for G1/G2 and G3? Was resource allocation the same? Did they emphasis the same things? Did the game get a grpahics rehaul and dumbed down gameplay to appeal to a wider audience?

You are argueing against every point you made. You are siding with and justifying Bethesda and what the did to the ES series, and will do to the FO series. You are siding with the Drakensang devs, and every other dev you critizied in the past. You are saying its okay to value graphics over gameplay, and okay for gameplay to suffer for it. Its okay to cut content and dumb down gameplay to have more resources for graphics and appeal to a broader audience of mindless mainstream retards who destroyed the rpg genre.

You, good sir, have sided with evil, and have taken a stand against everything you once stood for. Before this you where a bright, shining beacon of light and sanity in an rpg world gone mad, but your lack of even acknowledging these glaring faults in a game that could have been so much better and faithful to the fans who have made the series so popular, and your staunch defense and justification of pandering to mainstream graphic whore retarded bitches is to much for me to take.

I love you and will buy your game, but this slap in the face and stab in the back by an ally and mentor is just too much for me to take. On thanksgiving no less. I'm actually crying. I'm now so confused and alone. I need to be held. the world is now all topsy turvy. The drama! It actually pains me.

 

[Roqua]

"Necessity is the plea for every infringement of human freedom. It is the argument of tyrants; it is the creed of slaves." --William Pitt (Earl of Chatham), speech in the House of Lords, November 18, 1783

This is a fiting quote. Just replace "human freedom" with "gameplay devaluation and an emphasis on the awesomest graphics".

Mr. Vince D. Hines II

 

[JrK]

ToEE, Arcanum, The RoA series, Fallouts, PS:T, G1 and G2...

That was a few years ago. Times have changed old timer.

 

[Vault Dweller]

Did G3 improve the graphics slightly and focus on gameplay? Did they, honestly answer this?

Both the graphics and gameplay have been improved. Both the graphics and gameplay have certain issues that could have been polished and tweaked. I can't honestly say that the gameplay has been dumbed down or abandoned in favor of graphics.

You want proof. Combat is the number 1 proof. It went from needing a huge amount of player skill and forethought, getting the timing just right, and having very tough battles that required a twitch strategy, to being a clickfest where a low lvl can beat any humanoid with stun locks.

That's an animation-related mistake, I believe, not a design decision. Any other creature is tough and requires what you described. Fighting skeletons click-fest style is a suicide mission.

What happened to some of the stable gameplay functions in G1 and 2 like climbing? They got cut didn't they? Why? Poor allocation of resources with a heavy emphasis into pooring resources into graphics.

One feature. Not enough to condemn the game and its developers.

Look at the fans that have posted so far in this thread, or any other thread, here or at rpgwatch. The people that truly loved G1 and G2 are disapointed...

Post some links. Come on, Roque, you are not a noob. You know that generic statements like "people are disappointed" have 0 value. You are trying to make a point? Prove it.

Did the game get a grpahics rehaul and dumbed down gameplay to appeal to a wider audience?

Absolutely fucking not.

You are siding with and justifying Bethesda and what the did to the ES series, and will do to the FO series. You are siding with the Drakensang devs, and every other dev you critizied in the past.

Huh?

You are saying its okay to value graphics over gameplay, and okay for gameplay to suffer for it.

Where? I described the game in my review without wasting any words on graphics. Did you like the description of G3 gameplay? If yes, what are we arguing about now? If not, what exactly you didn't like?

Its okay to cut content and dumb down gameplay to have more resources for graphics and appeal to a broader audience of mindless mainstream retards who destroyed the rpg genre.

Roqua, my dear crusader pal, I share many of your sentiments and I believe that you are a smart fella, but you are making a very big mistake. You haven't played the game and your attacks based on some random forum posts that led you to believe that G3 was dumbed down. It wasn't. Some mistakes were made, and the game lacks polish, but overall it's a fantastic and rare game, and I will encourage anyone who liked it to support PB with your money.

You, good sir, have sided with evil, and have taken a stand against everything you once stood for.

And you have turned into Volourn, posting whatever amuses you at the moment without bothering to back anything up.

I love you and will buy your game, but this slap in the face and stab in the back by an ally and mentor is just too much for me to take.

Give the game a try, and I'll be more than happy to discuss its shortcomings with you.

 

[galsiah]

ToEE, Arcanum, The RoA series, Fallouts, PS:T, G1 and G2

I didn't say give me examples of great games without great graphics. I said examples of polished games with fixed bugs.

I'm all for games with great gameplay over graphics, but both you and Ladonna have played the "There'd be time to fix all the bugs" card. I'm just saying that that's rarely the case in practice.
I haven't played all the games you mentioned, but I gather ToEE was hardly polished. Fallout certainly wasn't. AFAIK there were significant issues with G1 and G2 too.

I'll give you PS:T post-patches (didn't play it at the time). That's a good example, but is probably helped in no small part by the linearity of the game.

In any case, you'd need to show not just a few examples to make your case (i.e. that a lesser emphasis on graphics would actually lead to fewer bugs etc.), but statistical evidence.

I'm not necessarily saying that bug-freeness is something to aim for - pushing the envelope with gameplay is probably more important. I am saying that your assumption that lesser graphics would lead to fewer bugs bears little relation to reality - whether or not it's "obvious" in principle. Generally speaking, the more you interesting stuff you do with gameplay, the harder it'll be to lose the bugs.

Galsiah, you really seem to be missing easy, key points. I can't, ethically and morally, keep argueing this with you in a civil way.

But you're missing the point that I'm not disagreeing with everything you say.
I'm not saying games wouldn't be better with a gameplay focus.
I'm not saying there aren't great games without great graphics.
I'm not saying that you're wrong about industry trends as a whole.

I am saying that there are important realities in any given particular situation which can't just be conveniently ignored. I'm also saying that "it's obvious" is not a good argument without some real world examples to back things up.
In particular, without knowing something about the specific developer-publisher details of this situation, it's not reasonable to assume that PB could simply do things in whichever way seemed right to them.

 

[Roqua]

VD, you should give Oblivion another swing and rethink your critisisms of it. Turncoat.

And why should I link to this thread, you know how to get here. As for other links, I'll give you directions on how to get there, namely your review of the game here and at rpgwatch. In both those threads, which you have posted in so i have full faith you can navigate back to them, the fans of the series, bigger fans of G1 and 2 than you were, say they like the game but have valid critisisms of it.

Why would I buy G3? Bloodlines was the exeption twitch-game wise for me. I like rpgs. I do not want to support companies that value graphics over game play with my money. I do not want to support companies that spit in the eye of their fans. I will save my cash for indie rpg developers who value what i do and don't stick their dicks up their fans ass as with oblivion, dues Ex 2, Morrowind, Gothic 3, FallOut 3, etc.

You can call me volourn, and I'd rather be him than a fan of the coprorate machina that has destroyed the rpg genre by thinking, supporting, and believing graphics are the most important aspect of a game, and are an absolute necessity for a game to sell, even though G1 and G2 proved otherwise.

Galsiah,

Ssshhhh. You are confusing and odd, and keep talking about things other than what you should.

 

[Vault Dweller]

And why should I link to this thread, you know how to get here. As for other links, I'll give you directions on how to get there, namely your review of the game here and at rpgwatch. In both those threads, which you have posted in so i have full faith you can navigate back to them, the fans of the series, bigger fans of G1 and 2 than you were, say they like the game but have valid critisisms of it.

Would you be so kind to post a few quotes? For old times' (when I wasn't a turncoat) sakes.

Why would I buy G3? Bloodlines was the exeption twitch-game wise for me. I like rpgs.

Then you will like G3, because unlike the previous games, this one IS A FUCKING RPG. If you can't trust me, Roque, whom can you trust?

 

[Roqua]

In all rpgs characters become the masterswordman independent of player skill. This is not the case in Gothic 1 2 or 3, so they aren't rpgs. They are action games with rpg elements. So, I guess I can only trust myself. I can't trust Benedict Arnolds.

 

[Volourn]

"because unlike the previous games, this one IS A FUCKING RPG"

Bullshit. It's an Action RPG. Like Roqua said, player skill with the mouse and keyboard is the number one influence on whether or not one succeeds in combat. Character stats ar every minimal. It's no different than either JE or BL. So, stop fuckin' lying.

G3 - good or bad - is an Action RPG - heavy on the action.

Period.

 

[Vault Dweller]

The choices make it an RPG.

 

[Volourn]

That's why it's an Action RPG. Just like BL and JE which both have choices that effect the game, quests, and outcome. But, like G3, combat is influenced by player phsyical skill and not really by character stats. Action RPG. It's not neccessarily a negative. Just a fact.