KickStarter Dead State Pre-Release Discussion [GAME RELEASED, GO TO NEW THREAD]

[VioletShadow]

It was said millions times before, but I have to say it: ROGUEY IS A CREEPY INTERNETZ STALKER!!!

Just because of it, never try to ban him! No matter how often he is quoting Sawyer

Looks to me like Roguey's stalking ability would come in handy. Wonder if he/she has managed to uncover any dirty secrets about our favorite devs...like if MCA prefers boxer briefs or tighty whities.

 

[eric__s]

I only got to play the game for about 10 minutes, the last 10 minutes of PAX, so I didn't really get to see that much and most of that time was spent fumbling around and getting used to the controls (which are pretty much the same as Age of Decadence). Something that didn't really come across in the twitch stream was that the game rewards exploration. In the map where you're raiding that hardware store, there's at least one other building that isn't part of your objective you can search for supplies. I didn't get to check out every inch of the map, but the exploration felt very real and satisfying.

But also, everyone I spoke to was incredibly cool and it was really gracious of them to let me play as PAX was shutting down. We didn't get much time to check out the other booths because we were all working the whole time and I'm sure they were super tired, so I really appreciate that they took the time to show me the game. I probably came off like a big nerd so I'm glad they tolerated me!

So yeah, I'm pumped for the game and completely confident it will provide.

 

[Azrael the cat]

Why do I get the feeling that Roguey's already compiled a list of the real names, addresses, employment history, family and photographs of everyone who posts at the Codex, but just considers it to be too mundane to be worth posting as evidence of her stalking ability?

Actually....that gives me an idea for a GD topic - I'll get right on to it.

 

[Vault Dweller]

So Mazin is the t-rex guy.

No.

 

[Roguey]

Huh I guess GUI/Concept/Models doesn't cover portraits.

 

[Cosmic Misogynerd]

Huh I guess GUI/Concept/Models doesn't cover portraits.

Isn't the T-Rex girl artist Maiandros? a.k.a. the pretentious fuck?

 

[Vault Dweller]

Huh I guess GUI/Concept/Models doesn't cover portraits.

Brain had another person to do portraits and early concept art. Mazin did our portraits, the new GUI, and many other things, and we introduced him to Brian.

 

[Grunker]

Anything would be an improvement over Fallout's mechanics.

"This game looks like shit, though at least it looks better than the alltime Codex favourite."

ok

 

[Morkar Left]

Liked what I saw. The only thing that bothers me is that there aren't enough zombies shuffling around for a zombie apocalypse in a town. I miss the tension of outstealthing zombie groups. And looking at dead corpses lying around not knowing if one of them may rise as a zombie or if they are gone for good. The environment looks pretty empty because of that.

 

[Roguey]

The only thing that bothers me is that there aren't enough zombies shuffling around for a zombie apocalypse in a town. I miss the tension of outstealthing zombie groups. And looking at dead corpses lying around not knowing if one of them may rise as a zombie or if they are gone for good. The environment looks pretty empty because of that.

It's the very first area you enter, filling it with zombies would be a bad thing. It's an abstraction of a small town. The high-risk, high-reward City Area they promised through a stretch goal is probably going to be packed with zombies.

 

[Morkar Left]

I already had in mind that they take it on the easy side at the first days but there should have been a lot of chaos going on when the virus/desease or whatever happened.

For visuals I'm thinking (obviously) at the Walking Dead start or Romeros movies or the Stand. A lot of corpses lying around, some broken barricades etc. Just signs of panic that happened.

Gameplaywise I guess I would miss zombies when the areas are that empty. The horror atmosphere in a zombie game stems mostly from the danger that could lurk everywhere. If it's just your noise level spawning zombies outside or even next to you out of thin air I see no chance to achieve the right tension.

I hope there are at least some explanations for the empty areas. Why are the shops empty? Did people try to barricade that area? Maybe fences keeping zombies outside as long as nobody tried to enter? Maybe that's why they choose this store to loot in the first place? Was it sunday and the shop closed when ITZ happened? Was everybody trying to leave the towns and zombies roaming mostly in the countryside for food? (doubtly because they are slow zombies without a chance to catch some wildlife).

 

[Vault Dweller]

The horror atmosphere in a zombie game stems mostly from the danger that could lurk everywhere.

The zombie movies (at least the early ones that started the genre) were never about the horror but about survivors.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Night_of_the_Living_Dead

The movie is about people stuck with each other in the cellar. The focus is on them, not on zombies that lurk outside.

 

[Morkar Left]

The horror atmosphere in a zombie game stems mostly from the danger that could lurk everywhere.

The zombie movies (at least the early ones that started the genre) were never about the horror but about survivors.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Night_of_the_Living_Dead

The movie is about people stuck with each other in the cellar. The focus is on them, not on zombies that lurk outside.

But the question is why they are hiding in a cellar when getting attacked by (supernatural) zombies isn't horrifying for them in the first place.
Plus they can hope of intervention from the outside because the government and everything is still running (and has everything under control as shown later).

It was later zombie movies which invented the zombie apocalypse theme. It's basically a post nuclear / environmental catastrophe crossed with a horror. The zombies become a natural threat to the survivors in the same vein primitive tribes in ancient times had to fight against beasts to gather their ressources needed for survival.

And on top of this comes the infighting in the group and fights against other survivors (or "tribes"). Which is great to have for me and I'm really looking forward to have an actual "zombie survival" game instead of a gore and splatter (tactical) shooter.

But my point is that you should feel the threat the survivors are facing when going outside to gather ressources. The zombies should be a constant danger you have to carefully avoid everytime you are moving on the map andkeep out of sight. Ideally you can use terrain to your advantage like closing a fence to give you just enough time to plunder a shop/house before it gets overrun. Or use one group to make a distraction to lure zombies away while the other is searching for the things that are needed. Things like that.

 

[Castanova]

The horror atmosphere in a zombie game stems mostly from the danger that could lurk everywhere.

The zombie movies (at least the early ones that started the genre) were never about the horror but about survivors.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Night_of_the_Living_Dead

The movie is about people stuck with each other in the cellar. The focus is on them, not on zombies that lurk outside.

That's some revisionist shit right there. NOTLD was most certainly a horror movie. Just because it did a good job versus newer movies that replace horror with "CGI monsters hiding in the shadows while a creepy soundtrack plays" doesn't change that. The fact of the matter is, all the human drama is meaningless if there's no threat. If some character is a problem and the outside world is nearly empty of any kind of "horror" then you could just say "gtfo loser" with a clear conscience. It undermines the entire concept of being stuck in a base and making do.... there shouldn't be another choice.

 

[Sensuki]

The horror atmosphere in a zombie game stems mostly from the danger that could lurk everywhere.

The zombie movies (at least the early ones that started the genre) were never about the horror but about survivors.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Night_of_the_Living_Dead

The movie is about people stuck with each other in the cellar. The focus is on them, not on zombies that lurk outside.

Same with Alien 1 (1979) as well.

 

[Vault Dweller]

The horror atmosphere in a zombie game stems mostly from the danger that could lurk everywhere.

The zombie movies (at least the early ones that started the genre) were never about the horror but about survivors.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Night_of_the_Living_Dead

The movie is about people stuck with each other in the cellar. The focus is on them, not on zombies that lurk outside.

That's some revisionist shit right there. NOTLD was most certainly a horror movie. Just because it did a good job versus newer movies that replace horror with "CGI monsters hiding in the shadows while a creepy soundtrack plays" doesn't change that. The fact of the matter is, all the human drama is meaningless if there's no threat. If some character is a problem and the outside world is nearly empty of any kind of "horror" then you could just say "gtfo loser" with a clear conscience. It undermines the entire concept of being stuck in a base and making do.... there shouldn't be another choice.

Romero: "I thought I Am Legend was about revolution. I said if you're going to do something about revolution, you should start at the beginning. I mean, Richard starts his book with one man left; everybody in the world has become a vampire. I said we got to start at the beginning and tweak it up a little bit. I couldn't use vampires because he did, so I wanted something that would be an earth-shaking change. Something that was forever, something that was really at the heart of it. I said, so what if the dead stop staying dead? ... And the stories are about how people respond or fail to respond to this. That's really all [the zombies] ever represented to me. In Richard's book, in the original I Am Legend, that's what I thought that book was about. There's this global change and there's one guy holding out saying, wait a minute, I'm still a human. He's wrong. Go ahead. Join them. You'll live forever! In a certain sense he's wrong but on the other hand, you've got to respect him for taking that position."

 

[EG]

And, without those zombies, we no longer have a story about how people respond or fail to respond to zombies, do we?

 

[Ninjerk]

The only thing in NoTLD zombies thats particularly significant is that they're cannibals. It's the response that's implied by such a situation: eating each other.

 

[Castanova]

The horror atmosphere in a zombie game stems mostly from the danger that could lurk everywhere.

The zombie movies (at least the early ones that started the genre) were never about the horror but about survivors.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Night_of_the_Living_Dead

The movie is about people stuck with each other in the cellar. The focus is on them, not on zombies that lurk outside.

That's some revisionist shit right there. NOTLD was most certainly a horror movie. Just because it did a good job versus newer movies that replace horror with "CGI monsters hiding in the shadows while a creepy soundtrack plays" doesn't change that. The fact of the matter is, all the human drama is meaningless if there's no threat. If some character is a problem and the outside world is nearly empty of any kind of "horror" then you could just say "gtfo loser" with a clear conscience. It undermines the entire concept of being stuck in a base and making do.... there shouldn't be another choice.

Romero: "I thought I Am Legend was about revolution. I said if you're going to do something about revolution, you should start at the beginning. I mean, Richard starts his book with one man left; everybody in the world has become a vampire. I said we got to start at the beginning and tweak it up a little bit. I couldn't use vampires because he did, so I wanted something that would be an earth-shaking change. Something that was forever, something that was really at the heart of it. I said, so what if the dead stop staying dead? ... And the stories are about how people respond or fail to respond to this. That's really all [the zombies] ever represented to me. In Richard's book, in the original I Am Legend, that's what I thought that book was about. There's this global change and there's one guy holding out saying, wait a minute, I'm still a human. He's wrong. Go ahead. Join them. You'll live forever! In a certain sense he's wrong but on the other hand, you've got to respect him for taking that position."

Just like there's no point of choice without consequences, there's point of human drama in a secluded outpost without a reason preventing them from leaving. So when you leave the outpost in Dead State, you better damn well be in serious fucking danger (i.e., HORROR) or the game will be shit by default.

 

[Trash]

Anything would be an improvement over Fallout's mechanics.

"This game looks like shit, though at least it looks better than the alltime Codex favourite."

ok

Yeah, because when a game is a fav you're suddenly supposed to never again mention its negatives. Gimme a break.

 

[Grunker]

Anything would be an improvement over Fallout's mechanics.

"This game looks like shit, though at least it looks better than the alltime Codex favourite."

ok

Yeah, because when a game is a fav you're suddenly supposed to never again mention its negatives. Gimme a break.

lol, yeah, that's exactly what people are saying. People are extremely negative about the new Wasteland 2 info, to the point where people are saying they've lost faith in the project. That's not "omg I'm just mentioning negatives".

Funny thing is, I obviously agree completely that Wasteland 2 combat looks to be a massive improvement of Fallout's simplistic, tiresome and shallow combat mechanics, but I'm not the one FO as best game ever.

I know that if someone made something like my favourite game, which I would describe as "an improvement over its mechanics", I'd be shitting my pants in excitement, even if it lacked some improvements I'd like. Obviously I'd be sad that the improvements I'd like weren't there, but to the point of negativity towards the project? Hell no.

Hence my comment. You said "Wasteland 2 looks like shit", someone pointed out that the mechanics looked better, and you said "well, anything is an improvement of this." Makes no sense to be fundamentally critical of something that is, in your own words, an improvement over one of your favourite things.

 

[Roguey]

lol, yeah, that's exactly what people are saying. People are extremely negative about the new Wasteland 2 info, to the point where people are saying they've lost faith in the project. That's not "omg I'm just mentioning negatives".

Funny thing is, I obviously agree completely that Wasteland 2 combat looks to be a massive improvement of Fallout's simplistic, tiresome and shallow combat mechanics, but I'm not the one FO as best game ever.

I know that if someone made something like my favourite game, which I would describe as "an improvement over its mechanics", I'd be shitting my pants in excitement, even if it lacked some improvements I'd like. Obviously I'd be sad that the improvements I'd like weren't there, but to the point of negativity towards the project? Hell no.

Hence my comment. You said "Wasteland 2 looks like shit", someone pointed out that the mechanics looked better, and you said "well, anything is an improvement of this." Makes no sense to be fundamentally critical of something that is, in your own words, an improvement over one of your favourite things.

I'm guessing it's because the quality of combat wouldn't necessarily be all that important to a Fallout fan. The problems with Wasteland 2 were with nearly everything else.

 

[Grunker]

lol, yeah, that's exactly what people are saying. People are extremely negative about the new Wasteland 2 info, to the point where people are saying they've lost faith in the project. That's not "omg I'm just mentioning negatives".

Funny thing is, I obviously agree completely that Wasteland 2 combat looks to be a massive improvement of Fallout's simplistic, tiresome and shallow combat mechanics, but I'm not the one FO as best game ever.

I know that if someone made something like my favourite game, which I would describe as "an improvement over its mechanics", I'd be shitting my pants in excitement, even if it lacked some improvements I'd like. Obviously I'd be sad that the improvements I'd like weren't there, but to the point of negativity towards the project? Hell no.

Hence my comment. You said "Wasteland 2 looks like shit", someone pointed out that the mechanics looked better, and you said "well, anything is an improvement of this." Makes no sense to be fundamentally critical of something that is, in your own words, an improvement over one of your favourite things.

I'm guessing it's because the quality of combat wouldn't necessarily be all that important to a Fallout fan. The problems with Wasteland 2 were with nearly everything else.

I wasn't making a blanket statemnt about the entire game, but about combat.

(I also don't perceive Wasteland 2 as having major design flaws compared to Fallout, and we've known since the very beginning that the game would be silly-silly).

We'll see.

 

[Elhoim]

Well, people were losing guys in the first area even if there are around just 8-9 zombies in the area (not counting the ones that could spawn due to noise).

 

[tuluse]

I wasn't making a blanket statemnt about the entire game, but about combat.

(I also don't perceive Wasteland 2 as having major design flaws compared to Fallout, and we've known since the very beginning that the game would be silly-silly).

We'll see.

At this point in time, it may be wise to admit you don't understand why people like Fallout.

In the demo shown: the quest design sucked, skill usage was boring, and the map seemed like a Bioware corridor. Now, some of that could be because of the nature of a linear demo, but it doesn't look promising.