Community Ensure the Warriors of Diversity will live on in Eternity

[Deleted member 7219]

Still, I think if there was to be a donation drive from the Codex at all, it should have been more generous in its wording. We should be happy that they're still wanting to make RPGs.

Why? The project is already funded and even if it weren't, I see no reason to suck up to game developers just because they're begging. If we raise the cash because, despite what I think, Codexers really want to fund it, then it'll get funded. But if we can't raise enough for the target, then we put in whatever gets raised and go for what we can get. Now, most of the money for the Wasteland 2 statue was because we had a clear goal and something to aim for in the form of an awesome image of a statue. We didn't even know what we were donating for in Eternity until today, and even then, people have specifically said they're not going to donate because they don't want to see 6 Codexers in the game (and we have no real fucking idea what it is we're putting in the game, once again).

There was also about a month's delay between Fargo announcing that "we're thinking about a Wasteland 2 KickStarter" and it actually happening for Wasteland 2. They didn't say "Something AWESOME will happen! Trust us!" and then act all secret like. You're raising money here, you can't afford to be secretive. I mean, a title of the game at least would be nice. Mind you this is also the third KickStarter we've fund-raised for in as many months, with all the forum "no no no I want a giant banana and three magic rings and our location should have a great big cherry on top" whining to go along with it, so maybe I'm a bit jaded.

Could one of the other staffers like Crooked Bee have written the front page article instead, then? You could have written all this as a response, to get your own view across.

 

[InspectorRumpole]

I thought about donating, but DU's posts sum up just about how i feel about PE.

 

[TeknoBM]

as long as theres gonna be a tranny with pole proficiency in there ill donate

 

[DarkUnderlord]

Could one of the other staffers like Crooked Bee have written the front page article instead, then? You could have written all this as a response, to get your own view across.

Did you really just propose that the Codex should choose which news poster should post news, based on ensuring that only optimistic viewpoints are conveyed in an official capacity, so as not to upset someone who might think a particular game is awesome?

You sir, should be ashamed of yourself.

 

[Infinitron]

Could one of the other staffers like Crooked Bee have written the front page article instead, then? You could have written all this as a response, to get your own view across.

Did you really just propose that the Codex should choose which news poster should post news, based on ensuring that only optimistic viewpoints are conveyed in an official capacity, so as not to upset someone who might think a particular game is awesome?

You sir, should be ashamed of yourself.

Neutral, not optimistic.

 

[VentilatorOfDoom]

The Codex is the site that makes developers shiver. Every now and then I want to see a glimpse of fear in their eyes.

 

[Infinitron]

This isn't a fucking game review, it's an attempt to get something done.

 

[Brother None]

Well, if I may angle this discussion slightly, I don't think anyone should be telling Codex newsposters not to be haters, because hello this is the Codex, but DU, I might suggest your timing is a bit off. I mean, slamming it while asking people to put money up for it feels a bit half-assed.

I agree with the criticism of it being IE-inspired though. That really fails to excites, those games were all really boring, except PS:T, which overcame rather than was helped by its engine (other than graphically). The development cycle is interesting. Vince hammered hard on this for WL2 but not for Eternity that I've seen. 17 and 18 months. Of course, Obsidian does have and will (as far as I know) use Onyx, perhaps an edited version but basically Onyx. Even then...Obsidian aren't exactly known as heroes of planning and budgeting either, but it's interesting that two different experienced companies land on roughly the same development schedule.

 

[Surf Solar]

Of course, Obsidian does have and will (as far as I know) use Onyx, perhaps an edited version but basically Onyx.

Somewhere on the Obsidian boards Avellone ( I think it was him?) said they won't be using Onyx for PE. Damn if I could find the link. :/

 

[EG]

Are we taking the bitterly-humorous and often sarcastic opines of DarkUnderlord seriously then?

You guys are insane.

Why the hate for IE, though?

 

[Brother None]

Somewhere on the Obsidian boards Avellone ( I think it was him?) said they won't be using Onyx for PE. Damn if I could find the link. :/

Interesting. He may have just meant they needed to gut the infrastructure. Note I don't have what I was told prior to KS launching saved anywhere, so I'm worked off memory and may just misremember. Would be very interesting if they don't go Onyx but go Unity as well. Wonder what Vince would think of that.

 

[Mother Russia]

RTwP is inferior to Turn Based, but it is much better than real time. The IE games were awesome. Still, I would have loved turn based...however, Obsidian has shown how they can fuck that up as well when it comes to the game around the turn based engine (aka ToEE). And yeah, it was Obsidian to blame for that, not publisher pressure. I am not talking about bugs, I am talking about the horrendously boring module they decided to use. And seriously, why use modules at all? Especially WOTC/TSR modules? They suck ass. All of them. Only i6: Ravenloft was any good.

Obsidian work best when they come up with story shit themselves, such as on KOTOR II, and even then they have issues wherein they go off the deep end and try to make the story really 'mature' and 'deep', which in the end just becomes ridiculous and weird, and completely at odds with the decades old established lore of the beloved franchise ( like the whole 'wound in the Force', which is retarded because the Force as established is impossible to 'wound')

Still, KOTOR II was awesome, and another game with a story made by the same ppl would be great.

I just hope that they have a class based system, not skill based (or at least a combo of the two). And the magic system must be awesome.

Why is the Force impossible to wound? Because Lucas said so? The best stuff in the Star Wars universe was the stuff not written by him. TIE Fighter, the Thrawn books, KOTOR 2 being three examples. They all bring elements of originality to what was originally just a fairy tale set in space.

But even going by the Lucas canon approach, there were hints of Force wounds in A New Hope. Obi-Wan's shock and pain at the destruction of Alderaan, for instance. And in the EU there are references to the remnants of the second Death Star above Endor being pretty much a no-go area, and that was established before KOTOR 2.

We're getting sidetracked here, but KOTOR 2 fanboy as I am I can't let statements like that go unchallenged. You can dislike the concept if you want but calling it retarded is a step too far. To drag this back to topic, Obsidian aren't the betrayers of lore than some make them out to be. I personally find that many of the people on the internet who despise Obsidian (you obviously not being one of them) are fans of KOTOR 1 and Fallout 3. Maybe Obsidian's sequels to are at odds with the established lore (actually, I think New Vegas was very loyal to F1, F2 and the Van Buren project), but only in terms of how simple and undeveloped the stories were in those games.

Yes, because Lucas said so. It is HIS property, not yours, not Obsidians, not anyone elses. Yes I know that sounds trite, and I admit it is, and I most certainly agree that people can cause a property to evolve into something better than it originally was, but that doesn't change the fact that whoever came up with and owns the property, IS the owner.

Anyhow, sadly the EU and Obsidian did NOT improve the property. The movies are still the best. TIE fighter was a fun simulation game, that is it. No way was it better than the movies. The destruction of Aldreaan was not a wound in the Force. What Obi Wan felt, and actually stated he felt, was the death and anguish of millions of people that resounded briefly in the Force. The Force itself was not wounded in anyway, in fact the Force as conceptualized in the movies is impossible to would. I mean, you cannot even see it or affect it in anyway, how the fuck could you wound it? Stupid concept is stupid, admit it.

Also, I never said KOTOR II sucked. It did not. In fact, it was a great game, and one of the best SW games of all time. I loved the fact that it had a dark tone. Just that the whole wound in the Force thing was retarded. And also the whole last of the Jedi thing was silly...didn't we already have that in the OT? How about something fresh? And Kreia was a shit villain. Nihilus was far better, but unfortunately wayyy underdeveloped. Sion was just silly.

 

[Vault Dweller]

DU's position is very reasonable. We know nothing about both games. Both games, regardless of who did it first, could be considered a cash grab or an honest attempt to make a good RPG (or both). Both KS were extremely vague, telling you nothing but implying that "its gonna be awsum!"

It's easier to relate to WL2 because the name tells you what to expect. At least this part is sort of clear, but even that doesn't bring much clarity, as sequels, especially the ones separated by decades, can be nothing alike. Fargo's silence is troubling. We know more about Obsidian's new game after the last two updates (less than a week) than we know about WL2 after 6 months.

Thus, in the end it comes to faith - a naive and pure belief that the universe owes you a good RPG. I have more faith in Obsidian than in inXile (for reasons I've explained in other threads). DU is the opposite. You can't fault him for being low on faith and not being all excited that Obsidian decided to make a RTwP fantasy game with elves and shit.

 

[Brother None]

We know more about Obsidian's new game after the last two updates (less than a week) than we know about WL2 after 6 months.

That's bullshit. We don't even know what engine Eternity is on. We barely have one piece of concept art for Eternity while we've seen WL2 run (albeit as a static display situation). The fuck, dude.

 

[DarkUnderlord]

Well, if I may angle this discussion slightly, I don't think anyone should be telling Codex newsposters not to be haters, because hello this is the Codex, but DU, I might suggest your timing is a bit off. I mean, slamming it while asking people to put money up for it feels a bit half-assed.

I like people to know what they're getting. A half-assed encounter in a half-assed game.

it's interesting that two different experienced companies land on roughly the same development schedule.

That one's easy, game developers are all overly-optimistic idiots.

This isn't a fucking game review, it's an attempt to get something done.

Get what done? The project's already funded and we haven't sorted out exactly what we want in this encounter, with a split between "lulz" and "sirius" or "named Codexers" vs "generic Codexian traits". I've seen a lot of people saying they're not going to donate because they don't know what they're donating for. We only have a vague notion of our party - and that's assuming we raise the $5k. The recent Dead State fundraiser failed to raise it's target. What happens if we only raise $1k, $2k? What do we do then?

The way I see it, you either want in or you don't. If you're looking at this and judging it and saying "well I want the Codex in, but not if it's a giant lulz statue" - or "Well DU's not really enthusiastic about this game, so I won't donate", then you're not really in it in the first place. Those who want in, will donate knowing that we'll sort that shit out and whatever we sort out, will be appropriately Codexian regardless of my own, or anyone else's personal feelings towards the game.

If you're looking at this and even contemplating "well so and so said it would suck" or "I'll only donate if we have a potato reference" then you've really missed the entire point of KickStarter. The only question you need to ask yourself is: Do you want a Codexian reference in an Infinity Engine inspired RTwP game being created by Obsidian? If no, don't donate. If yes, the link is in the news post. You're a grown adult, I don't need to sell it any more than that.

 

[skuphundaku]

Somewhere on the Obsidian boards Avellone ( I think it was him?) said they won't be using Onyx for PE. Damn if I could find the link. :/

Interesting. He may have just meant they needed to gut the infrastructure. Note I don't have what I was told prior to KS launching saved anywhere, so I'm worked off memory and may just misremember. Would be very interesting if they don't go Onyx but go Unity as well. Wonder what Vince would think of that.

They may be thinking of Onyx as their engine plus all the middleware, such as Scaleform and all the rest. In order to use the middleware in a project, they need to pay licensing fees or royalties, and they're not willing to do that for a Kickstarter project, so I suppose that one alternative may be to use the engine without all the middleware add-ons and use a different codename for that. Another alternative may very well be Unity, especially now, with Unity's upcoming Linux support and PE's Linux stretch goal.

 

[Infinitron]

Get what done? The project's already funded and we haven't sorted out exactly what we want in this encounter, with a split between "lulz" and "sirius" or "named Codexers" vs "generic Codexian traits". I've seen a lot of people saying they're not going to donate because they don't know what they're donating for.

Sorry but this a bullshit argument. We know what we're getting, a party of adventurers. Just like we knew what we were getting for Wasteland 2, a shrine. What we don't know is the details. Those can be reached through voting and consensus.

We only have a vague notion of our party - and that's assuming we raise the $5k. The recent Dead State fundraiser failed to raise it's target. What happens if we only raise $1k, $2k? What do we do then?

We'll make it because MCA.

The way I see it, you either want in or you don't. If you're looking at this and judging it and saying "well I want the Codex in, but not if it's a giant lulz statue" - or "Well DU's not really enthusiastic about this game, so I won't donate", then you're not really in it in the first place. Those who want in, will donate knowing that we'll sort that shit out and whatever we sort out, will be appropriately Codexian regardless of my own, or anyone else's personal feelings towards the game.

If you're looking at this and even contemplating "well so and so said it would suck" or "I'll only donate if we have a potato reference" then you've really missed the entire point of KickStarter. The only question you need to ask yourself is: Do you want a Codexian reference in an Infinity Engine inspired RTwP game being created by Obsidian? If no, don't donate. If yes, the link is in the news post. You're a grown adult, I don't need to sell it any more than that.

That's a naive way of looking at things. You're telling people to donate money - do it properly. Nobody's forcing you to do this. Or are we?

 

[Vault Dweller]

Somewhere on the Obsidian boards Avellone ( I think it was him?) said they won't be using Onyx for PE. Damn if I could find the link. :/

Interesting. He may have just meant they needed to gut the infrastructure. Note I don't have what I was told prior to KS launching saved anywhere, so I'm worked off memory and may just misremember. Would be very interesting if they don't go Onyx but go Unity as well. Wonder what Vince would think of that.

Vince is wondering what happened to that sweet Steam engine that looked so appealing in ToEE and handled so much in Arcanum. Vince is also curious what happened to Troika’s "super fantastic extra cool ultimate 3d RPG engine". Since Tim Cain is there now, it's easy to assume that both engines, with all the bells and whistles, are there as well.

Perhaps, that's why they don't need to use Onyx after all. If, however, they were to announce that they are going with Unity, my faith in the project will drop significantly.

 

[skuphundaku]

We only have a vague notion of our party - and that's assuming we raise the $5k. The recent Dead State fundraiser failed to raise it's target. What happens if we only raise $1k, $2k? What do we do then?

That's easy: server upgrade

 

[skuphundaku]

The only question you need to ask yourself is: Do you want a Codexian reference in an Infinity Engine inspired RTwP game being created by Obsidian?

Even more reason to have a party of marauding shitposters. A degenerate team in a degenerate game.

 

[Jashiin]

"You encounter what appears to be the remains of a small gang of warriors. Amongst the broken monocles and buzzing flies you spot a satchel containing some gold and what appears to be some sort of codex. The pages are stained with blood and what is untouched seems like the writings of an angry madman. It does however mention some sort of purpose, a raising of funds of some sorts to combat an oft mentioned but unexplained "decline". It seems different opinions on how to allocate these funds to combat this decline led to an argument and ultimately the gang had turned on itself leaving none left standing."

 

[Vault Dweller]

The development cycle is interesting. Vince hammered hard on this for WL2 but not for Eternity that I've seen.

I'm under a convenient assumption that it's not a brand new engine. If it is, I'll have exactly the same concerns.

... but it's interesting that two different experienced companies land on roughly the same development schedule.

I don't think it's that interesting at all. It has to do with sales. It has to be within your reach, not 2-3 years down the road. Thus 18 months is the max stretch, if you want to do well on KS.

 

[majestik12]

Nice job, DU. No Codex-designed party for the Obsidian hacks. Extra kudos for pissing on local RTwP heretics instead of just telling them to fuck off with their stupid fundraiser, and keeping the renegade admins from managing the fundraiser in a way that might make it work.

 

[DarkUnderlord]

Get what done? The project's already funded and we haven't sorted out exactly what we want in this encounter, with a split between "lulz" and "sirius" or "named Codexers" vs "generic Codexian traits". I've seen a lot of people saying they're not going to donate because they don't know what they're donating for.

Sorry but this a bullshit argument.

However we do it we should decide ASAP so that people can know what they're donating for. Personally I'm not interested in donating very much if it's just to put some "famous" forum posters into the game.

FYI, Spectacle is the one who reserved the $5k pledge position in the first place. I believe there were a few others who said similar things as well but with the five or so threads on this, I can't find them at the moment.

We know what we're getting, a party of adventurers. Just like we knew what we were getting for Wasteland 2, a shrine. What we don't know is the details. Those can be reached through voting and consensus.

I believe donations to the Wasteland 2 drive only reached over $10k because we had an awesome piece of concept art which clearly defined the statue. Incidentally, I doubt donations for P:E will reach $5k without a clearer idea on what we're going for. Plus it has to be inspiring to the Codex - the Dead State KickStarter failed to interest a lot of people.

That's a naive way of looking at things. You're telling people to donate money - do it properly. Nobody's forcing you to do this. Or are we?

Well, technically...

 

[Vault Dweller]

That's bullshit. We don't even know what engine Eternity is on. We barely have one piece of concept art for Eternity while we've seen WL2 run (albeit as a static display situation). The fuck, dude.

First, engine doesn't tell you much about the game (only about the tech side and the game's chances to be completed in 18 months) and the fact that Fargo is going with Unity and Obsidian with a mystery engine doesn't tell us anything at all.

Second, that static display is nothing but modeling art. It's not "seeing the game in action", it's seeing animated models on a small map. It wasn't a proper battle that shows you different mechanics. It's the most basic of steps, familiar to anyone who's ever placed Warcraft or Starcraft assets on a map and looked at them with in wonder.

Third, my point was that Obsidian told us more than Fargo did to-date. If you disagree, kindly sum up what we know about the world and mechanics. Maybe I missed something.