Divinity: Original Sin Pre-Release Thread

[Jaesun]

Click on hivers name, then click Ignore, and you will be fine.

 

[Zed]

there are advantages of randomizations, but not any of them apply to anyone aspiring to make the best possible SP TB RPG.

Well, if you find the one formula for that, don't forget to let the right people know.

I think it can help with replayability, at least if loot/equipment is supposed to be a source for long-term motivation.
Otherwise it quickly degenerates into a simple list to work off when you replay it - get the boots of ass-kicking by helping the mayor in the 1st town - check, get the vorpal fire-blade from the bandit hide out - check.
And so on.

The other extreme, completely randomized drops from anywhere addmitedly would be worse, but it doesn't sound as if they will do this.

I guess, I'm fine with either if it's done well. Some amount of randomization is not a no-go for me, at least.

A good RPG shouldn't need loot as a motivator or incentive to play the game. But then again I don't think Larian is capable of making a really good RPG to warrant avoiding arbitrary ARPG shit so maybe randomized loot and item quality-systems is right for this game.

 

[Jaesun]

A good RPG shouldn't need loot as a motivator or incentive to play the game.

Can you name some of these good cRPG's?

 

[evdk]

A good RPG shouldn't need loot as a motivator or incentive to play the game.

Can you name some of these good cRPG's?

PS:T.

 

[imweasel]

A good RPG shouldn't need good writing as a motivator or incentive to play the game.

 

[Zed]

A good RPG shouldn't need loot as a motivator or incentive to play the game.

Can you name some of these good cRPG's?

pretty much any good RPG.
items should be part of the game, definitely. a weapon could define your characters attack, or make challenging encounters more forgiving. but items shouldn't be what motivates you to play the game (unless it's Diablo or something?)

 

[Admiral jimbob]

A good RPG shouldn't need loot as a motivator or incentive to play the game.

Can you name some of these good cRPG's?

You spend most of the game with the same equipment in Wizardry 6-7

 

[Mortmal]

Fallout 1 and 2 wasnt really loot centric either, oh it helped to get good gear, but you were not playing for the loot . Ultima werent, i think there was a magic sword , glass sword and the talking demon sword and that was about all about the things you were looking forward, no major upgrade on anything. In good pen and paper rpgs sytems(chaosium for ex), skills and story telling are far more important than loot, the genre has evolved since the original D&D, corridor, door, monster , treasure schema .If you've played pathfinder societies (the true 4th edition D&D) recently , you will notice they drastically tuned down the selection of items compared to an usual D&D 3.5 game .

 

[hiver]

Gotcha. My post count is low enough where I am not immune from being retardedly insulted and yet not high enough to being able to defend myself. I get it.
I backed, I'll bow out now.

Oh for christ sake not another innocent victim. That was not an insult and you know it. Faggot.
It was to the point, focused answer to your stupid "theories", and crap resulting from them we have been fed for years. Both in literature and gaming.
I aint going to explain the preference and need for plausibility and coherence in fantasy regardless of how high it is to anyone who cannot understand that - or in fact, to anyone who intentionally doesnt want to accept anything else but satisfaction of his own little stupid selfish desires.

- zap!

 

[Gord]

I'd still argue that even in games that aren't loot-centric, loot can be an important part of the motivation.
The rpgs you play only to advance the (hopefully) great story are pretty rare. Usually it's a mixture of different things:
Story, character advancement, overcoming obstacles (combat, quests, riddles, etc.), with different weight put on each depending on sub-genre.
And in almost all rpgs loot is part of the character advancement, which is true even for low-magic, non loot-centric settings.
I was hoping for some good loot when rummaging through the Glow in Fallout, and neither in Torment was it completely irrelevant.
There's just something to that feeling when finding some cool new equipment hidden away deep in an old ruin or taking the weapon from the bandit boss you just defeated.

Of course, finding some new sword which improves poison damage by 1% from +23% to +24% every 5 minutes because every other rat drops some magic weapon is inflation and will hurt the motivation behind it, but again, I don't think Larian is making a Diablo clone here (I hope).

But maybe ForkTong can add a few words to that.

 

[Haba]

There is loot.

And then there is the magic of discovering new things.

Rarely do the two go hand in hand.

 

[Kem0sabe]

Can you name some of these good cRPG's?

I would have to say that Fallout 1 and 2 were not loot centric in any way, also PS:T, talking about "AAA" crpg's, if you go down the indie path, the games from spiderweb are not very dependent on loot depending on your build.

Probably more, but those are the ones that come to mind.

 

[SCO]

Sorry, but PST was absolutely 'loot centric'. Loot just came in the form of stats upgrades and delicious item-lore (but often it did come as loot; eg: punch daggers, the entropy blade, the tattoos etc).

My suggestion for location randomization that Zed shat on, was predicated on being a easy way to add a bit of variety to a replay while still not using levelled lists. OF COURSE I'D ALSO WANT LORE FOR THE 'RANDOM' LOCATIONS. They'd not really be 'random' as 'can appear everywhere on the map' but random as 'XXX item can be on lore appropriate place A or B, and with a different (but plausible) path for it being there.
Now if you're the kind of OCD-sufferer that can't stand the idea of the power armor not being in navarro... well, get help.

 

[Kem0sabe]

Sorry, but PST was absolutely 'loot centric'. Loot just came in the form of stats upgrades and delicious item-lore (but often it did come as loot; eg: punch daggers, the entropy blade, the tattoos etc).

My suggestion for location randomization that Zed shat on, was predicated on being a easy way to add a bit of variety to a replay while still not using levelled lists. OF COURSE I'D ALSO WANT LORE FOR THE 'RANDOM' LOCATIONS. They'd not really be 'random' as 'can appear everywhere on the map' but random as 'XXX item can be on lore appropriate place A or B, and with a different (but plausible) path for it being there.
Now if you're the kind of OCD-sufferer that can't stand the idea of the power armor not being in navarro... well, get help.

My view on what is or what isn't a "loot centric crpg" is a game where the character absolutely needs constant gear upgrades to progress.

Take Fallout or Planescape for example, i imagine that you could easily finish the game with your starting equipment (haven't tried it), Baldurs Gate 2 on the other hand, not so much.

 

[Commissar Draco]

Yes with maxed up diplomacy but you would have to skip all the combat quests.

 

[MicoSelva]

Random loot is inferior in any way, except maybe for replay value.

I however would never replay an RPG just to find new random loot. We have hack'n'slash games for that. The game must draw me in some other way to be replayed, either through c&c or trying out a different build (to solve quests in different ways) or somethinglike that.

 

[Humanity has risen!]

The Watch is still beating us.

I disable my referer in my browser, so I went out of my way to browse this site with another one, and click on a link to the kickstarter so it would register as coming from rpg codex.

 

[Ulminati]

Ships with editor? Turn based combat? Sign me up. You can have the jewgold I didn't give the RTwP race traitors at Obsidian.

 

[Admiral jimbob]

Ships with editor? Turn based combat? Sign me up. You can have the jewgold I didn't give the RTwP race traitors at Obsidian.

First Kickstarter I've backed since Wasteland

 

[Darth Roxor]

First Kickstarter I've backed since Wasteland

Fairly sure I'll do the same once I get off my ass and transfer cash to muh paypal for the Codex fund (altho that boxed potato version... ). This seriously looks way, WAY too good not to back, I might even dare say it's the best kickstarter prospect so far because it's got a truckload of available info and stuff to show. It's essentially an almost already-done game that you can put under deep scrutiny and analyse a great deal of its assets, as opposed to 'lol bros i had this cool idea plz fund'. Not to mention I don't think I've heard a single bad thing about it so far.

 

[Jaesun]

http://www.ign.com/articles/2013/04/02/larian-studios-risking-it-all-for-jetpack-dragons

Article from IGN.

 

[JarlFrank]

They're fighting the good fight and don't afraid of anything.

 

[ERYFKRAD]

And cue those reservations about jetpacked dragons.

 

[Jaesun]

http://www.gry-online.pl/S022.asp?ID=8894

New article in POTATO.

http://www.gamekult.com/actu/zoom-divinity-original-sin-A107886.html

New article in French.

 

[MicoSelva]

Fuck these corporate firewalls which block my insight into the INCLINE.