Incline Disco Elysium - The Final Cut - a hardboiled cop show isometric RPG

[the mole]

A game in virtual form is the improvisation of an idea made into graphics, that same idea can be in both table top games and video games

Except that in tabletop, the creation happens as you play. With a computer game, everything has to be designed and created beforehand. The player can never step outside those bounds.

If the underlying system is the same you're playing the same thing a dm could create in tabletop, one of them has graphics and sound design though

Say we just crawled out of Irenicus's dungeon. In a tabletop game, our party could decide just to say fuck Imoen, never liked her anyway, let's sneak on the first ship to Chult, then throw the captain overboard and be pirates. Can't do that in BG2.

A player can't step outside the bounds of what the dm in tabletop wants either, everything is according to him as he's in control of the game

 

[Prime Junta]

A player can't step outside the bounds of what the dm in tabletop wants either, everything is according to him as he'said in control of the game

Except that the whole point of being a DM is to adapt to what the players are doing. A DM that blocks actions that ought to be reasonable in-world is a shit DM. You just don't say "nuh-uh, can't get on a ship now, you have to get 20k gold to save Imoen and you need to stay in Athkatla to do it" is a shit DM, not running the game as it's intended to be run.

Spoiler

Of course it can be fucking frustrating for a DM if you've spent weeks working out the factions and politics in a town, and then the party decides to go adventure with the steppe raiders instead, but that's the nature of the beast -- and a good DM will always find a way to put that background work to use later.

I mean, there are canned modules that the DM can run for the party, and beginning DMs often do, but I don't know anyone who's stuck with the hobby more than a few months who hasn't graduated past that PDQ. And of course sometimes the DM and the players can just agree beforehand that cool, we're gonna stick to the bounds of this module for these sessions. But these are side dishes, not the main event.

 

[the mole]

A player can't step outside the bounds of what the dm in tabletop wants either, everything is according to him as he'said in control of the game

Except that the whole point of being a DM is to adapt to what the players are doing. A DM that blocks actions that ought to be reasonable in-world is a shit DM. You just don't say "nuh-uh, can't get on a ship now, you have to get 20k gold to save Imoen and you need to stay in Athkatla to do it" is a shit DM, not running the game as it's intended to be run.

Spoiler

Of course it can be fucking frustrating for a DM if you've spent weeks working out the factions and politics in a town, and then the party decides to go adventure with the steppe raiders instead, but that's the nature of the beast -- and a good DM will always find a way to put that background work to use later.

I mean, there are canned modules that the DM can run for the party, and beginning DMs often do, but I don't know anyone who's stuck with the hobby more than a few months who hasn't graduated past that PDQ. And of course sometimes the DM and the players can just agree beforehand that cool, we're gonna stick to the bounds of this module for these sessions. But these are side dishes, not the main event.

I agree dms should allow more freedom in games, they have years to work on it, it shouldn't be that hard

 

[Prime Junta]

I agree dms should allow more freedom in games, they have years to work on it, it shouldn't be that hard

Are you a big Skyrim fan by any chance?

 

[Haba]

Neways, game complete. Steam says 37 hours for doing everything possible like a good little autist with OCD should. Minus 5 hours for the one re-rolled start and a couple hours for various interruptions. And I didn't even read everything possible (books, board game, phasmid lore).

I was highly sceptical about the game, especially since its biggest proponents have(had?) a natural propensity for being tragically wrong about what is a good game.

I'll gladly eat crow now. It is good. One of the best role-playing games out of the 300+ cRPGs I've played. Not a fucking easy feat to pull off.

Is it perfect? Fuck no. I could nitpick about a dozen things that could've been improved upon. It isn't something that I'll be replaying seven times.

But it does things that a no game before has done. And it is not a game that I will forget.

 

[Skdursh]

I've been reading through this thread a bit and I don't really have anything to say as I haven't played the game yet personally, despite buying it near release, but holy shit,

REEEEEEEE

you are one seriously retarded piece of shit. I genuinely hate you. Like, the only reason I even logged in is because I just had to tell you.

 

[the mole]

I've been reading through this thread a bit and I don't really have anything to say as I haven't played the game yet personally, despite buying it near release, but holy shit,

REEEEEEEE

you are one seriously retarded piece of shit. I genuinely hate you. Like, the only reason I even logged in is because I just had to tell you.

Hate means nothing what are you going to do about it champ

 

[TwinkieGorilla]

Prime Junta with all due respect, I admire your patience, but the only important distinction that REALLY needs to be made here is that if you have no experience with tabletop RPGs, your opinion on a game that has explicitly set out to mimic the feel and experience of a tabletop game is going to be crippled. You can comment on the game all you like but the one thing you can't do, if you don't have that experience, is speak to how closely Disco came to that experience. Or how much the devs succeeded in their goal of making their cRPG feel like a tabletop experience.


All else about the differences is just static, honestly. Just put the dumbfuck on ignore. I've ignored all of three people since 2007. Two of them have come in the last two days and both from this thread. Make of that what you will.

 

[the mole]

I agree dms should allow more freedom in games, they have years to work on it, it shouldn't be that hard

Are you a big Skyrim fan by any chance?

No its a piece of shit, I thought we agreed game dms should incorporate more choice into games

Rather than saying game dms can't incorporate more choice you should say yes I should be able to do that quest in an obvious way in bg2

 

[Prime Junta]

I have a peaceful easy feeling today, gotta find some way to get rid of it

Rather than saying game dms can't incorporate more choice you should say yes I should be able to do that quest in an obvious way in bg2

But there's the rub -- you can't, and if you program that in, then the players are going to think of something else they're not able to do. Hey, how about setting up an interplanar trading company in the interplanar sphere?

That's the crucial difference between cRPGs and tabletop RPGs right there. Tabletop RPGs are really not about the rules at all, the rules are there just so all the fun stuff can happen. Computer RPGs are largely about the ruleset because computers are really good at rules but can't improvise for shit; the content is necessarily limited to whatever the designers were able to design and implement, and players cannot step outside those bounds -- there is nothing there.

But anyhoo, I'm starting to think the comrades are right and I had better let this drop; you can lead a horse to water and all that.

 

[Skdursh]

I've been reading through this thread a bit and I don't really have anything to say as I haven't played the game yet personally, despite buying it near release, but holy shit,

REEEEEEEE

you are one seriously retarded piece of shit. I genuinely hate you. Like, the only reason I even logged in is because I just had to tell you.

Hate means nothing what are you going to do about it champ

Obviously, I'm going to call you a retard, retard.

 

[the mole]

Prime Junta with all due respect, I admire your patience, but the only important distinction that REALLY needs to be made here is that if you have no experience with tabletop RPGs, your opinion on a game that has explicitly set out to mimic the feel and experience of a tabletop game is going to be crippled. You can comment on the game all you like but the one thing you can't do, if you don't have that experience, is speak to how closely Disco came to that experience. Or how much the devs succeeded in their goal of making their cRPG feel like a tabletop experience.


All else about the differences is just static, honestly. Just put the dumbfuck on ignore. I've ignored all of three people since 2007. Two of them have come in the last two days and both from this thread. Make of that what you will.

All I said is that a game and a tabletop can offer a similar experience, I'm actually agreeing with you, I wasn't here for water convoy you had with fantastic, I'm just saying an ambitious dev can create something with choices like you think disco does, we actually agree

 

[the mole]

I've been reading through this thread a bit and I don't really have anything to say as I haven't played the game yet personally, despite buying it near release, but holy shit,

REEEEEEEE

you are one seriously retarded piece of shit. I genuinely hate you. Like, the only reason I even logged in is because I just had to tell you.

Hate means nothing what are you going to do about it champ

Obviously, I'm going to call you a retard, retard.

But you can't do anything to me, you physique psyche motorics and intelligence scores are too low

 

[IHaveHugeNick]

Oh for christ sake, this guy makes Roqua seem reasonable.

 

[Prime Junta]

Oh for christ sake, this guy makes Roqua seem reasonable.

Roqua is also really funny. At times.

 

[the mole]

Facts aren't meant to be funny

 

[JarlFrank]

Just ignore it and it'll go away. There's no way I'm going to let this cretin make me abandon my convictions.

Asshurt, the dm is the lead dev of a game, in a tabletop you have to pretend something visual happens, yet in a virtual game the dm can actually show you something visually, the same experience can be made in both settings

Nigger do you even have a brain?

This is some of the most retarded shit I've read on the Codex in decades, and trust me, plenty of abysmally mornic shit has been said on these forums.

 

[the mole]

Just ignore it and it'll go away. There's no way I'm going to let this cretin make me abandon my convictions.

Asshurt, the dm is the lead dev of a game, in a tabletop you have to pretend something visual happens, yet in a virtual game the dm can actually show you something visually, the same experience can be made in both settings

Nigger do you even have a brain?

This is some of the most retarded shit I've read on the Codex in decades, and trust me, plenty of abysmally mornic shit has been said on these forums.

A game dev and a dm can set up a fight with goblins or let you sneak around, what's the difference, what can a game dev not do that a dm can, they both setup encounters and you play them

 

[Darkwind]

Anyone dealt with dude who is so rich light bends around his face? What's the deal with that?

That is an inside joke (one of many) that I guess few people got. One thing I like about this game is that for the factoid inclined there are LOTS of inside jokes / references etc. I picked out half a dozen through my playthrough.

The rich guy is a very obvious allusion to Steve Jobs. It was said that Jobs had a 'reality distortion field' that would emanate from him and get people to buy his 'visionary' ideas about tech and how to make gobs of money. This was largely true as angel investors were just handing the guy millions of dollars on nothing more than his slick talking. Given the way that whole dialog went about the guy always looking for amazing business opportunities, etc. it was fairly obvious who that was referring to. You can google this and will get a dozen articles talking about this phenomenon w/ Jobs.

 

[JarlFrank]

A game dev and a dm can set up a fight with goblins or let you sneak around, what's the difference, what can a game dev not do that a dm can, they both setup encounters and you play them

A DM can improvise on the fly.

Game devs have a budget and have to put more effort into creating levels than a DM has to.

You want a player in a PC game to be able to enter every house in a city with 200 houses? That's 200 interiors for the level designers to build.

You want there to be NPCs in those houses that have quests for you?

Great, let's say 20% of these houses have a side quest in them, that's already a shitload of quests for the writers to come up with.

A DM can just quickly improvise and say "Yeah ok you can go in this house." Describes the interior of the house in two sentences. Describes the NPCs sitting inside.

Boom, it's that easy. Content created on the fly in the DM's head with zero budget.

You can't do that in a PC game.

 

[Prime Junta]

A game dev and a dm can set up a fight with goblins or let you sneak around, what's the difference, what can a game dev not do that a dm can, they both setup encounters and you play them

Your head seems to be running on loop. Have you considered giving it a sharp rap with a hammer? Might get it unstuck. Works with my fridge when the compressor starts making that annoying RRRRRRR noise.

 

[the mole]

A game dev and a dm can set up a fight with goblins or let you sneak around, what's the difference, what can a game dev not do that a dm can, they both setup encounters and you play them

A DM can improvise on the fly.

Game devs have a budget and have to put more effort into creating levels than a DM has to.

You want a player in a PC game to be able to enter every house in a city with 200 houses? That's 200 interiors for the level designers to build.

You want there to be NPCs in those houses that have quests for you?

Great, let's say 20% of these houses have a side quest in them, that's already a shitload of quests for the writers to come up with.

A DM can just quickly improvise and say "Yeah ok you can go in this house." Describes the interior of the house in two sentences. Describes the NPCs sitting inside.

Boom, it's that easy. Content created on the fly in the DM's head with zero budget.

You can't do that in a PC game.

Your dm probably won't let you waste his night by going into 500 houses in a mega city and finding nothing, you have goals and tasks

Really a game dev could put in more work but when they can lie and say the story is 90 hours when it's 30 why would they

 

[GewuerzKahn]

Took me 30 hours to finish this great game.
I hope this games inspires more developers to do different and more mature settings in a RPG. Not just fantasy or save the world shit.

Investatigating the "paranormal" stuff was the best.

 

[Prime Junta]

Your dm probably won't let you waste his night by going into 500 houses in a mega city and finding nothing, you have goals and tasks

The party could invent a task that requires it to break into 500 houses. A tabletop campaign isn't about the DM handing out quests and the party completing them, it's about the DM and the party riffing off each other. It's really common for the players just to come up with their own objectives, and they always come up with ways of attacking them that the DM hadn't thought of beforehand.

"Okay, so Imoen's been taken off by that mage council thingy. Let's go see what we can dig up on them, maybe there's someone there who's up to something nefarious, we can find out what it is, and put the screws on him." A good DM will adapt to that, let the players get to it, keep them occupied, and come up with something. A DM that says "No you can't do that, I haven't prepared files on all the members of the council" is a shit DM. It could turn into a terrific sequence of sessions. (Or not, it doesn't always work.)

 

[ScrotumBroth]

If we all ignore Josh/Feargus alts, we'll be better for it.