Decline Designers grabbing you by the hand and leading you isn't very fun

[rusty_shackleford]

How to identify and repair a broken vent in Fallout 2:

https://streamable.com/1xa6c1
Rattling points your eye towards the object. Examine object, read examination, think about a solution -- repair seems like a good choice. Manually use the Repair skill on the object.

How to ... do whatever the designer wants you to do ... in 1 click in wotr:

there's a hovering icon tells you the exact DC of the check and the skill used. You click the icon. Yay.

 

[Butter]

I blame this:

 

[rusty_shackleford]

I blame this:

This is just another side of the same coin.

 

[octavius]

there's a hovering icon tells you the exact DC of the check and the skill used. You click the icon. Yay.

It's like "play a game" has become "play a story".

 

[Ryzer]

I blame this:

Ah yes, Oblivion with guns 2.0 supposedly incline

 

[Arulan]

Natural discovery is a great feeling, and even more so when it's the result of a logical conclusion on your part. By presenting the player with all available options you become more of a passive actor, one that merely picks their path, rather than discovering their own. Unfortunately the mainstream audience by-in-large appears to be one without any patience. They're interested in getting through the content, even if it means becoming that passive actor. The moment they do not know what to do to proceed they get frustrated, and many designers believe they should remove those frustrations.

Funny enough rusty_shackleford , Morrowind is an excellent example of this, and arguably the core reason why it towers over the later entries. Quests in Morrowind were enjoyable, even the simple ones, because you reasoned through them yourself. Maybe you shouldn't be so anti-mushroom. :D

Kingdom Come: Deliverance does this as well, even though it has quest markers by default (though I believe it was confirmed they were added after-the-fact, which would explain a lot). In several quests you can take optional paths and approach other NPCs about said quests that are never implicitly mentioned, but make logical sense that you should be able to.

 

[Dr1f7]

*repair check: failed*
sorry looks like your character can't open vents, try again next game

 

[rusty_shackleford]

*repair check: failed*
sorry looks like your character can't open vents, try again next game

And? It's an RPG, not an adventure game.

 

[purupuru]

There are more than a handful obscure quest/puzzles in Wotr, the hidden bracer in Areelu's Lab for example, people thought it wasn't implemented or was bugged and the solution was first found by looking into the scripts.
As for the skill checks in the environment, having the DC on display is essential since many of the times you face severe consequences should you fail them, and you will want to use things like "touch of good" and "bit of luck" for the non-trivial checks.
And obviously those are D20 checks, in a crpg a D20 check without DC info is pretty retarded since you will never know why you failed the check.

And to Rusty: Did you play the game? Did you finish it? I respected you more when you actually play the games you talk about, even the ones with bad reps on codex like Fallout 76 or ME:Andromeda.

 

[Butter]

You'd think the Pathfinder audience would be hardcore enough to not want to be led around by the nose, but then you'd also think the Pathfinder audience wouldn't ragequit and review-bomb the game because of an insect swarm. Owlcat clearly took no chances the second time around, and their Steam reviews are better for it. I wonder if these people would freak out during a tabletop session if their DM didn't tell them about an available skill check.

 

[Dr1f7]

*repair check: failed*
sorry looks like your character can't open vents, try again next game

And? It's an RPG, not an adventure game.

repair doesn't even make sense in that situation. you're not repairing anything, you literally just pulled something out of the vent. if anything it should be perception check.

 

[rusty_shackleford]

*repair check: failed*
sorry looks like your character can't open vents, try again next game

And? It's an RPG, not an adventure game.

repair doesn't even make sense in that situation. you're not repairing anything, you literally just pulled something out of the vent. if anything it should be perception check.

How do you dislodge something using your eye?
Use an intelligence check on your next post.

 

[Dr1f7]

*repair check: failed*
sorry looks like your character can't open vents, try again next game

And? It's an RPG, not an adventure game.

repair doesn't even make sense in that situation. you're not repairing anything, you literally just pulled something out of the vent. if anything it should be perception check.

How do you dislodge something using your eye?
Use an intelligence check on your next post.

perception check to notice the rattling u dense cunt lmao

 

[agris]

I blame this:

No no butter, you're mistaken. This is the highly immersive Fallout: New Vegas. This image is a great encapsulation of how immersive the UI is, how it's structure and presentation engrosses you in the milieu of playing a Gamebryo game. The gameplay choices enabled by clicking 1 or 2 are sincere examples of Reactive Quest Design(TM) and in no way detract from the experience through the dry, rote presentation of meta knowledge such as skill thresholds.

If you find this unconvincing, please report to the Obsidian discussion thread for immediate reeducation.

 

[Jenkem]

isnt there a puzzle in the first dungeon where the answer is just pasted on a wall somewhere?

 

[perfectslumbers]

Yeah, WOTR has terrible "puzzles," and very little interesting interaction with the environment. The only moment in the game (that I can think off of the top of my head,) where you can be creative is to bypass the checks against Shamira.

I need to say it again, the puzzles are fucking terrible. Generally completely unintuitive, often with a near totally unuseable ui.

isnt there a puzzle in the first dungeon where the answer is just pasted on a wall somewhere?

This one is a good example of how bad they are. The puzzle has 4 coloured buttons. The answer is a bunch of coloured paintings in a random room in the dungeon, you simply copy the order of the colours in the painting. There's no puzzle solving there, it's just seeing the random paintings in a random room and making the connection. And that's probably the best puzzle in the game.

 

[KateMicucci]

I really like when rpgs have puzzles so that there's a break between combats that isn't storyfaggotry. Even if the puzzle is just platforming sequences.

Have any of you guys ever watched a normie try to play an RPG? Like even the super easy hacking puzzles in NV or dragon claws in skyrim?

Puzzles are a lot harder to make than marginal additional combats or throwaway dialogs and I doubt the average consoomer appreciates them.

 

[agris]

isnt there a puzzle in the first dungeon where the answer is just pasted on a wall somewhere?

This one is a good example of how bad they are. The puzzle has 4 coloured buttons. The answer is a bunch of coloured paintings in a random room in the dungeon, you simply copy the order of the colours in the painting. There's no puzzle solving there, it's just seeing the random paintings in a random room and making the connection. And that's probably the best puzzle in the game.

The exact same thing happens in that Larian-inspired miserable atrophied-appendage of an RPG, Encased. You need to turn 4 valves in the correct order to turn off steam blocking access to a room. Each valve is a unique color, and there is a wall chart with the 4 colors in the correct order conveniently in the room blocked by the steam. Another "puzzle" of the exact same design occurs later, involving a neo-70s laserdisc player.

 

[Dr1f7]

isnt there a puzzle in the first dungeon where the answer is just pasted on a wall somewhere?

This one is a good example of how bad they are. The puzzle has 4 coloured buttons. The answer is a bunch of coloured paintings in a random room in the dungeon, you simply copy the order of the colours in the painting. There's no puzzle solving there, it's just seeing the random paintings in a random room and making the connection. And that's probably the best puzzle in the game.

oh man that part sucks ass

 

[Denim Destroyer]

Modern games have a higher graphic fidelity so quickly ascertaining what is interactable will be a lot harder than in older games. Compare Fallout 2 to Wrath of the Righteous. Wrath is littered with decorative objects, particle effects, and poor contrast. All of that makes it harder to direct the player's eyes towards any one direction unless the camera automatically moves there or some big icon hovers over it. Additionally Wrath has a fully rotatable camera so you cannot guarantee what direction the player is even looking in. Fallout 2 doesn't have these problems as that games simply graphics make it easier for the player to notice each individual item. This is simply a case of visual clarity and graphics advancement ruining game design.

 

[Nifft Batuff]

Interaction with the environment is one of the aspects I consider the classic Fallouts vastly superior than the IE games and their recent clones.

 

[d1nolore]

That’s because old rpg games were made by nerds with a high IQ generally, so they would assume a certain level of intelligence.

 

[wishbonetail]

*repair check: failed*
sorry looks like your character can't open vents, try again next game

And? It's an RPG, not an adventure game.

And it's a shame there aren't no adventures in Fallout engine. Here we can effortlessly interact with any object ingame with any skill or item from inventory and devs barely scratched the surface of possibilities in original Fallouts.

 

[Lord_Potato]

*repair check: failed*
sorry looks like your character can't open vents, try again next game

And? It's an RPG, not an adventure game.

And it's a shame there aren't no adventures in Fallout engine. Here we can effortlessly interact with any object ingame with any skill or item from inventory and devs barely scratched the surface of possibilities in original Fallouts.

Dude, there are numerous total conversions of Fallout 2, with whole new campaigns. Especially Fallout of Nevada and Olympus 2207 are similar to adventure games in their use of items in quests. Fallout: Resurrection is less reliant on item-based puzzles. Not sure about Fallout: Sonora.

 

[wishbonetail]

*repair check: failed*
sorry looks like your character can't open vents, try again next game

And? It's an RPG, not an adventure game.

And it's a shame there aren't no adventures in Fallout engine. Here we can effortlessly interact with any object ingame with any skill or item from inventory and devs barely scratched the surface of possibilities in original Fallouts.

Dude, there are numerous total conversions of Fallout 2, with whole new campaigns. Especially Fallout of Nevada and Olympus 2207 are similar to adventure games in their use of items in quests. Fallout: Resurrection is less reliant on item-based puzzles. Not sure about Fallout: Sonora.

Yeah, I know the main stuff. Nevada and Olympus were super buggy several years back, so it kinda smudged the impression. Resurrection is legid good but it is more akin to originals. I've yet to try Sonora. Still I would love to play something like Quest for Glory hybrid in Fallout's engine.