Game News Expect to get spoiled

[Talby]

This is not a true RPG because there is no option to rape Cassius at the abandoned house. Where's my evil option?

Seriously though, this is shaping up to be very good. Should be worth the wait.

 

[MetalCraze]

There is a difference between "trust us, it will be cool!" and tons of detailed examples, no?

Well Beth actually even showed videos of stuff that in the end never was there.

 

[FeelTheRads]

If you really cared about the quest you would have done it before you decided to step out of the gates.

Excuse me... what the fuck?

Ah, good, I see we're still making up excuses for failed game mechanics.

I guess it will be good for what it is, though.

 

[Dark_Paladin_Anti_Hero]

If you really cared about the quest you would have done it before you decided to step out of the gates.

Excuse me... what the fuck?

Ah, good, I see we're still making up excuses for failed game mechanics.

I guess it will be good for what it is, though.

Excuse me... what the fuck?

If you read the rest of what I wrote you would see I criticized a bunch of stuff. That was one sentence tacked onto the end about the ludicrousness of what a bunch of people seem to be focusing on. It wasn't an excuse for a failed game mechanic. I'm not an Iron Tower apologist. Most of the good quests seem like huge things that you wouldn't ignore unless you genuinely did not care about them. The little quests like killing rats and escorting old ladies are pointless and can easily be forgotten unless you really need to gold, in which case you would do them. Feng wanted the guy killed and the meeting was happening soon. He wouldn't have waited two months for you to travel all over Ancient Roman Fantasy Land, and neither would have the meeting. This game seems to be using a realistic scale and everything isn't within ten paces of every other place - so you cannot just leave everything and come back and expect it to have stayed the same. This is a good thing.

Imagine you were in high school (before you obviously dropped out) and your mother (before she died of a heroine overdose) asked you to get some eggs for tonight's dinner (I'm sure you remember the uncomfortable nights when the pimp came over for a visit and she cooked). You could visit your friend's house on the way to the store and everything would be fine as long as you were back in time. If you drove to the airport and bought a round trip ticket to Ottawa, by the time you came back she would have already bought the eggs, cooked dinner, and the big black man with the purple hat would just be leaving after a week's long fucking. She wouldn't be standing around saying, "Where are my eggs?"

 

[Fat Dragon]

The auto-complete sounds like a really cool idea. You're basically just a simple vagabond trying to get by however the hell you can. Turn a job down, no big deal somebody else will be around to get shit done. Your guy in the game isn't really all that special and shit goes on with or without you which I assume is what Vince and crew were going for. It's a post-apoc world after all, most people in a place like that wouldn't really give a shit if you disappeared (probably assume you robbed and dead) and would just find some other merc to do their work.

 

[POOPERSCOOPER]

What I don't like about those lets play things is that its filled with posts from people I don't give a shit about. VD can you maybe have like separate threads where you post progress and only your allowed to post in it.

 

[Elhoim]

My question: 800x600? Please tell me that 1024x768 is an option.

Yes, and higher too.

 

[Lumpy]

I guess there isn't all that much to do in a town, that you'd spend weeks in one. Maybe one week at most. Feng might be willing to wait that long.
The moment you've travelled to another city, several weeks pass. Feng is obviously not going to wait for you to come back.

 

[Vault Dweller]

The auto-complete sounds like a really cool idea. You're basically just a simple vagabond trying to get by however the hell you can. Turn a job down, no big deal somebody else will be around to get shit done. Your guy in the game isn't really all that special and shit goes on with or without you which I assume is what Vince and crew were going for.

Exactly. Shit gets done with or without you, but if it's done with you, you can affect the outcome (and even fuck everything up).

You are given a pitifully low amount of dialog options. I am certainly glad that there's no dialog 'fishing' (exhausting all options until you get all the information in the NPC's database), I can't help but think the game would be greatly enhanced by providing a little flavor to your responses, and varying them. You cannot say anything to these NPCs besides Yes, No and Continue. It's like a Windows' prompt.

I don't think the game suffers from low amount of dialogue options, but maybe I'm mistaken. Anyway, judge for yourself:
http://www.rpgwatch.com/show/article?ar ... ref=0&id=2
http://www.rpgwatch.com/show/article?ar ... ref=0&id=2
http://www.rpgwatch.com/show/article?ar ... ref=0&id=2

http://www.irontowerstudio.com/forum/in ... opic=610.0
http://www.irontowerstudio.com/forum/in ... opic=564.0
http://www.irontowerstudio.com/forum/in ... opic=363.0

If Feng is helping you to gain an audience with Antidas...

He isn't. He explained why. If you tell Dellar that Feng sent you, he'll tell you to fuck off.

... why does your character ask him how grateful he would be for killing Cassius?

You can ask for more money.

The whole issue with you getting a meaty paragraph whenever you meet a new character is very fourth wall breaking...

Risk we're willing to take.

Quest line A: The character plays an idiot when he admits to the head guard that he is an opportunistic bastard, and that he was hired for an assassination.

Assassinations are a legitimate business in AoD. Opportunistic bastards are respected because they tend to get shit done.

The guard is all, "Well, that's all right kid. Let's go see the boss." What's worse, is that you cannot say anything else! You act like an assassin as soon as you walk up and meet him. There are a ton of possible situations here. You could conspire with Cassius against the man that tried to kill him, for instance.

Why would he need to conspire? The lord of the town invited him personally. Feng is dead the moment Lord Antidas hears that he tried to have his guest killed. Well, he isn't dead, he manages to leave town, but you get my point.

My question: 800x600? Please tell me that 1024x768 is an option.

It is.

What I don't like about those lets play things is that its filled with posts from people I don't give a shit about. VD can you maybe have like separate threads where you post progress and only your allowed to post in it.

See the rpgwatch links above (in this post).

 

[Fat Dragon]

So what kind of consequences do we get for NOT doing a quest? Say you agreed to do something important for one of the high ranked faction guys or something but pussed out. Would he send some of his guys to hunt you down as punishent for lying or something like that? I can't imagine him just saying "eh, fuck it" and letting it go, especially if his job for you was really important.

 

[Vault Dweller]

If you really cared about the quest you would have done it before you decided to step out of the gates.

Excuse me... what the fuck?

Ah, good, I see we're still making up excuses for failed game mechanics.

I guess it will be good for what it is, though.

The "ur mechanics r failed" judgment has already been passed? I thought we were going to talk about it?

There is a difference between "trust us, it will be cool!" and tons of detailed examples, no?

Well Beth actually even showed videos of stuff that in the end never was there.

What videos? The AI and dynamic shadows? It's different. Easy to fake, hard to implement, easy to explain why they had to be turned off because the game can contain only so much awesomeness. Dialogues and choices are pretty much the opposite, especially for games that actually have demos.

Sense of urgency? Quests that don't revolve around killing 10 wolves?

Got that and it's all fine. Still, I don't like the way it's handled.

Life is full of disappointments?

It seems really heavy-handed: you don't want to punish the players too hard by having time limits on the quests but you also have all uncompleted ones auto-complete at the same time.

We don't have side quests that can wait. Each town has a "theme" - events that involve all factions. For example, Teron's events revolve around the Imperial Guards attempting to take over. So, one of the assassins quest is killing the IG commander, which would prevent the takeover. It can't wait. If you playing for the guards, you'll be doing your best to help them to take the town over. Can't wait. They will attempt the takeover with or without you, just like other factions involved will respond with or without you. If you leave and come back a few months later, you'll find that things have changed and some factions are no longer there.

Part of it, it is. And you have to admit it sound pretty much like the way NWN1 handled unfinished quests in a location.

No. NWN simply removed unfinished quests. AoD auto completes them, choosing the default outcome, which will affect gameplay.

VD, a question about the auto-completion. What about quests you haven't started yet?
Say, you meet an NPC, accept a sidequest, go away for too long and the quest completes itself.
Now, if you don't meet the NPC at all, will the quest still auto-complete?

Yes. Let's say you didn't talk to Feng at all. He doesn't exist for you, but he exists in the gameworld and his problem - Cassius - exists in the gameworld too. He has no choice but to do something about it.

And will there be new sidequests available when you re-enter the place later?

Yes.

It would be interesting if some side-quests were only available at certain "chapters" of the game.

Something like this. Certain events will trigger them.

 

[Dark_Paladin_Anti_Hero]

At least 1024x768 is all I need. Higher resolutions are a luxury. I have a widescreen display at 1680x1050 and 800x600 is incredibly restrained. It makes me want to play in windowed mode - but then the window is too small.

I don't think the game suffers from low amount of dialogue options, but maybe I'm mistaken. Anyway, judge for yourself:
http://www.rpgwatch.com/show/article?ar ... ref=0&id=2
http://www.rpgwatch.com/show/article?ar ... ref=0&id=2
http://www.rpgwatch.com/show/article?ar ... ref=0&id=2

http://www.irontowerstudio.com/forum/in ... opic=610.0
http://www.irontowerstudio.com/forum/in ... opic=564.0
http://www.irontowerstudio.com/forum/in ... opic=363.0

I still stand by my initial statement. I could go through them all but it probably wouldn't matter. The game seems to provide a lot of freedom, so I guess overall it isn't a big issue.

If Feng is helping you to gain an audience with Antidas...
He isn't. He explained why. If you tell Dellar that Feng sent you, he'll tell you to fuck off.

... why does your character ask him how grateful he would be for killing Cassius?
You can ask for more money.

I haven't read the LP, so maybe this is just a case of me not having enough information, as all I'm going off of is the thread that was linked to in this news posting. In fact, towards the end, he gives you a ring which will help you to gain an audience with Antidas. Dellar gets one paragraph in the first Feng case (that's all you posted), and that's like me doing this:

If Feng is helping you to gain an audience with Antidas...

fuck off.

... and then launching into a tirade against you saying how you are such a horrible person and all that. That's obviously incorrect as that is only part of what you said, which was in a totally different context, and doesn't given an accurate representation of your argument.

Knowing "how grateful" means more money would entail that the entirety of the situation - Feng not being able to get you an audience, apparently (? see previous about ring), and him offering you money in the first place. If he didn't initially offer money, which seems to be the case in the screenshot, this of course begs the question as to what an assassin doing without first asking how much he would be paid for said assassination. Like I said, I haven't followed the LP, so I don't know all the details. I'm sure it works out great.

Quest line A: The character plays an idiot when he admits to the head guard that he is an opportunistic bastard, and that he was hired for an assassination.
Assassinations are a legitimate business in AoD. Opportunistic bastards are respected because they tend to get shit done.

The guard is all, "Well, that's all right kid. Let's go see the boss." What's worse, is that you cannot say anything else! You act like an assassin as soon as you walk up and meet him. There are a ton of possible situations here. You could conspire with Cassius against the man that tried to kill him, for instance.
Why would he need to conspire? The lord of the town invited him personally. Feng is dead the moment Lord Antidas hears that he tried to have his guest killed. Well, he isn't dead, he manages to leave town, but you get my point.

Well, I didn't know that. It makes the situation seem a whole lot less odd now that I do. I have issues with the fact that that's all you can say... but it's related to my dialog option thingy.

I worded the "conspire" part wrong. What I meant was that you just walk up to Cassius and tell him to pay you or die. You could try to befriend him and mention that another loremaster could have issues with his presence. Then you could work towards getting what you want from both men, eventually getting to meet Antidas by being a respected friend of his guest (saving him from Feng), a heroic soul that tried to save the life of his guest (killing Cassius for Feng's reward, then framing Feng with hidden evidence and blackmailing him), or some other option. Maybe that's too much, but maybe it would be nice if you could handle the situation a bit differently, where you are not threatening Cassius but informing him of what's going on instead.

 

[Occasionally Fatal]

Random Question: VD, are there going to be combat fatalities like in Fallout? I only ask because of this: http://www.irontowerstudio.com/images/indexscreen7.jpg Also, any idea how much gore we can expect in a real fight?

Also, lookin' good.

 

[Fat Dragon]

I still stand by my initial statement. I could go through them all but it probably wouldn't matter. The game seems to provide a lot of freedom, so I guess overall it isn't a big issue.

What you're noticing is that the game has no pointless fluff dialog choices (like what you see in Bioware games, Fallout 2, etc). You instead just go quickly to the part where you make the dialog choices that actually matter.

 

[sqeecoo]

AoD is looking better and better. It's hard to be patient, but I am doing my best.
Anyway, the only non-silly complaint here is the lack of dialogue choices, which as Fat Dragon has just explained is a conscious, reasonable decision on the part of the developers.

 

[Dark_Paladin_Anti_Hero]

Fat Dragon -
They're only pointless fluff in most games because the designer's don't bother to flesh them out. I said in my first post in this thread how I hate huge list of dialog options that you're supposed to exhaust for information - that also extends to dialog loops and the 'two questions - same response' scenario. Extra options don't have to be huge things or bust. They could slightly change the experience to how characters perceive you and add up to your overall reputation in the world. I'm sure Antidas and Cassius would appreciate you more (in a non-LARPer way, of course) if you weren't an assassin and just someone looking out for the benefit of the local Lord and curious for information from his loremaster. I'm just talking here though because it's an interesting subject. The game is obviously not going to suck unless it's riddled with bugs, regardless of how many dialog options there are.

 

[Vault Dweller]

Random Question: VD, are there going to be combat fatalities like in Fallout? I only ask because of this: http://www.irontowerstudio.com/images/indexscreen7.jpg Also, any idea how much gore we can expect in a real fight?

We're working on it. Translation: at the moment very little, but we would like to improve it and there is a chance that we'll overcome the engine's limitations and succeed.

Also, some critical animations:
http://www.irontowerstudio.com/forum/in ... opic=883.0

So what kind of consequences do we get for NOT doing a quest? Say you agreed to do something important for one of the high ranked faction guys or something but pussed out. Would he send some of his guys to hunt you down as punishent for lying or something like that? I can't imagine him just saying "eh, fuck it" and letting it go, especially if his job for you was really important.

You'll lose a bit of reputation for being an unreliable douchebag. The actual effect depends on your reputation with a faction. Your mistake can be overlooked, or you can be thrown out of the faction, or put on a shit list and attacked on sight.

In fact, towards the end, he gives you a ring which will help you to gain an audience with Antidas.

No. Here is the exact quote:

"When you finally meet Lord Antidas - I suppose I could take you to see him, but it would be too suspicious, you'll offer the ring as a tribute without asking for anything in return."

Dellar gets one paragraph in the first Feng case ...

The entire conversation was posted in the LP thread (see the RPG Watch links).

Knowing "how grateful" means more money would entail that the entirety of the situation - Feng not being able to get you an audience, apparently (? see previous about ring), and him offering you money in the first place. If he didn't initially offer money, which seems to be the case in the screenshot, this of course begs the question as to what an assassin doing without first asking how much he would be paid for said assassination. Like I said, I haven't followed the LP, so I don't know all the details. I'm sure it works out great.

Like I said, take a look at the RPG Watch links if you're interested. These screens were posted on the forums to entertain those who follow the game and are familiar with the events. I didn't think that other sites would post it as news otherwise I would have explained the situation better and posted the missing screens.

 

[DarkUnderlord]

HELP! I cannot do the quest. Where is Cassius' house? I cannot find it. Fuck this gaem is stupid where is the quest compass? Why do they make it so hard to find someone?

Someone tell me where Cassius house is plz kthx.

 

[Secretninja]

If you really cared about the quest you would have done it before you decided to step out of the gates.

Excuse me... what the fuck?

Ah, good, I see we're still making up excuses for failed game mechanics.

I guess it will be good for what it is, though.

HELP! I cannot do the quest. Where is Cassius' house? I cannot find it. Fuck this gaem is stupid where is the quest compass? Why do they make it so hard to find someone?

Someone tell me where Cassius house is plz kthx.

Two different styles of troll. The first here is pretending to be serious, and bitching about a completely logical system to deal with a major flaw in rpgs. The second is making fun of rpglites, and dumbshits in general. Discus: Which brought about more lulz.

My vote is for Darkunderlord, since he appears to not be retarded, as the other does

 

[Dark_Paladin_Anti_Hero]

No. Here is the exact quote:

"When you finally meet Lord Antidas - I suppose I could take you to see him, but it would be too suspicious, you'll offer the ring as a tribute without asking for anything in return."

Dellar gets one paragraph in the first Feng case ...

The entire conversation was posted in the LP thread (see the RPG Watch links).

...

Like I said, take a look at the RPG Watch links if you're interested. These screens were posted on the forums to entertain those who follow the game and are familiar with the events. I didn't think that other sites would post it as news otherwise I would have explained the situation better and posted the missing screens.

I read it and things mostly make sense now. For some reason whenever I click on the images in the second article it brings me to random images from the first, so unfortunately I missed that entire thing.

 

[Satori (original)]

Damn, can it be Thursday already?

This. Are you in alpha testing yet VD?

No offence, but the writing seems a bit pedestrian. It's a common thing with indie (and some AAA) games. Style is as important as substance.

Maybe it's because I'm knackered and 'in the zone' but I felt a great deal of immersion when reading the dialogue so I'm happy, it gives off a great Medieval vibe.

 

[Gnidrologist]

People who are bitching about quest mechanics here are beyond clueless or just don't know what they don't know and that's how little they know.
This is like an upgraded (!) version of BiS/Troyka style quests and yet it's still wrong? Then how must this Divine non-linear questing actually work?

 

[FeelTheRads]

I thought we were going to talk about it?

You didn't seem to want to explain how it really works, so I assumed the worst.

AoD auto completes them, choosing the default outcome, which will affect gameplay.

See... that's really good. I assume there will be minor quests too? Can you find out in anyway the outcome of those?

And the fact that new quests will appear is good. And that some will be triggered by others.

However this:

We don't have side quests that can wait. Each town has a "theme" - events that involve all factions. For example, Teron's events revolve around the Imperial Guards attempting to take over. So, one of the assassins quest is killing the IG commander, which would prevent the takeover. It can't wait. If you playing for the guards, you'll be doing your best to help them to take the town over. Can't wait. They will attempt the takeover with or without you, just like other factions involved will respond with or without you. If you leave and come back a few months later, you'll find that things have changed and some factions are no longer there.

You keep talking about the urgency and that quests can't wait, but as long as you stay there they CAN wait it seems. That's my biggest problem, and excuses like "this game doesn't makes it all about you" do not cut it.

and bitching about a completely logical system to deal with a major flaw in rpgs

I think I've shown in doesn't really deal with it, it more like tackles it and after VD's last clarifications it seems a better than before.

 

[Andhaira]

So you can't do this quest WITHOUT killing? You are forced to kill to advance?

Why can't we have a peaceful diplomatic solution, or simple bribery?

 

[Compcat]

Wheres the bloom and marilyn manson music? This game is gonna blow.