Investing in stores in Oblivion

[bryce777]

I'd like to highlight the point made a few posts above: the fallacy of arguing for popularity is arguing that because something is popular, it is *praiseworthy* (either factually or ethically or artistically -- by some objective measure). Because "good" can mean "ethically praiseworthy," it's true that you can say that it's fallacious to argue that because something is popular it is good -- but only in that sense.
]

no

 

[Proweler]

These guys just don't know what the fuck they are doing, plain and simple.

Gee, that must be why they are selling so good.

the reason they sold was because they had the daggerfall name to sucker a lot of people like myself on the pc side and on the xbox side they had no competition.

You seem to be the minority now.

Could all dumbfucks who trot this out in future please refer to section8's comments about Hitler, and popularity being no defence? Maybe that should be stickied or something.

They are now a good selling game compangy, obviously they do know what they are doing. Otherwise they wouldn't be a good selling game compangy.

This is not a statement about qaulity, you can sell junk to people and they'll enjoy it.

 

[WouldBeCreator]

The structure of the fallacy is that because people believe A, A is true. That is, "People believe A is just, therefore A is just." That only matters for objective truth statements.

To make an appeal to expertise . . . .

http://www.fallacyfiles.org/bandwagn.html

Form:
Idea I is popular.
Therefore, I is correct.

http://www.nizkor.org/features/fallacie ... arity.html

The Appeal to Popularity has the following form:

Most people approve of X (have favorable emotions towards X).
Therefore X is true.

http://www.intrepidsoftware.com/fallacy/pop.php

Definition:

A proposition is held to be true because it is widely held to be true or is held to be true by some (usually upper crust) sector of the population.

http://www.logicalfallacies.info/bandwagon.html

The bandwagon fallacy is committed by arguments that appeal to the growing popularity of an idea as a reason for accepting it as true.

 

[ANDS!]

If attacking with a mace opened a dialogue window half the time, then the combat would be "broken".

That would be broken - because the program has a bug in it. An undeveloped merchant system is hardly broken. Its SIMPLE - but not "broken".

With the economy, it is broken in the following ways:
It is an unstable world economy - money flows in and not out in an uncontrolled manner.
Yet merchants are static - how much you trade with them makes no difference. ["investing" aside]
The player can easily get almost unlimited cash.
The method of stopping this is to bore the player until he stops waiting for money to respawn magically.
It is totally unconvincing.

What youre describing isnt a broken system - its simply an "economy" that is secondary to the point of the game. If one of the "perks" of playing the game was being a merchant, and this is the type of economy they had - then sure. . .the system would be pretty undeveloped and simple.

This made me think there might be a real economy.

I dont know how you can make that kind of leap. Radiant AI was always touted as improving NPC behavior, not affecting the world in such a dynamic manner. Bethesda chose to focus on more important aspects of their game instead of investing hundreds of hours scripting together a program that created an evolving economy. If THAT really is a game-breaker for people, then really - they need to reeval how they critique games.

All I did was skim,a nd all I can say is - you are a goddamned idiot.

Well of course - nevermind that you couldnt string together a sentence to "explain yourself", and that the BEST retort you have is "you're a goddamned idiot" - kudos sir.

The big advantage Fallout has over Morrowind and Oblivion, is the fact that it doesn't utilise methods of delivering narrative that conflict with the open-ended nature of the world.

How does MW's narrative (you cant lump OB in there because you havent played it yet) conflict with the open ended nature of the world - especially considering that once the main storyline is completed, you can STILL play the game -

A solid economy is pretty essential, otherwise money, and all gameplay elements that revolve around it are pretty pointless.

Certainly, but this game isnt primarily focused around the world-economy. It's just not. Again - they could have broken down and came up with a more dynamic economy system, but that wasnt the thrust of the game. They had a choice between making a simple ecnomy system that didnt feel entirely cheap, or creating a more complex system that restricted the user. They chose the former. If the game primarily revolved around "the economy" like EVE Online - then sure fault them for a lackluster system. But you can hardly say that a simple economy system COMPLETELY rips you out of the game; unless of course for every quest you do, or every dungeon you raid youre thinking "Oh whats the point, the games economy is broke - screw it. . ."

Making a big world might give the player more to do than your average game, but it's not really a sandbox if it's noticeably finite.

What game has done this? Unless they utilized random scripts that generated random, never-ending quests - no game is going to be able to achieve this (this gen). The only reason we know theres a finite number of quests, is because the devs have said so. I'd imagine if one played it - theyd never get "everything" on their own. . .

As for content that updates with player action - that happened in MW and I'm sure itll happen in OB in some fashion.

not the player's reflexes.

The SPEECHCRAFT interface is not a "game". Its simply a dial at the top of the screen that displays a characters reaction depending on certain choices. As they said, its merely a visual cue to aid in gleaning information for those who wish to use it, or are good at SC.

'd say the persuasion minigame is also poorly integrated.

How can it be integrated but through an interface of "If I chose this action, whats the possible reaction". Stealth is easy because its a part of action and has no interface needed. Really, calling it a "mini-game" is a misnomer.

Why should the player limit themselves?

Because they chose to play a character a certain way. If someone creates a Night Elf pure-mage, and roleplay as such - what sense does it make then to pump all their time into being good with blunt weapons or sneaking?

The Crazy Frog was insanely popular too.

Was it a CRITICAL success as well? The folks who applauded MW for what it accomplished, are they hacks? And if so, are they still hacks for heaping praise on FALLOUT as well?

Yep. What's not to love about being able to give people money as a gift just so they will be richer in the future?

You're not giving them a gift. You're 'investing' into the shop to increase a merchants bargaining power.

That would have been the simplest goddam thing in the world to do, and a hell of an improvement on the bizarre daftness they've gone with instead.

So, one broken system in place of another. Hey - instead of increasing the buying power of a shop and having some control over your investment - well just roll the dice off screen and determine randomly how much people bought from you that month. Real immersive. You're in game design arent you?

The 200 gold could become 200 BAJILLION by the time you've finished with the game.

Shocking isnt it - you invest money into an organization, and they have a greater capicity to hire more people, increase production/stock, they make more money, and thus have more cash with which to buy further products from you. Completely unrealistic system. I agree.

What is the difference between "investing" in a merchant and going into the CS and editing the amount of gold he spawns with? Nothing, as far as I can tell.

One involves you using the tools of the game as they are envisioned by the developers. The other has you change the game code to suit your whim.

Daggerfall had investment. You put money into a bank account. You received interest on it.

How the hell does that in anyway translate to merchants, which is the point of this thread. Its like talking about Peanut Butter and Jelly, when I asked for a Ham sandwhich.

I give up. Too much stupidity to deal with today.

Well thats what happens when you use a pointless straw-man argument. Comparing Hitler to MW is like comparing apples and oranges - beyond being FRUIT, they are absolutely different situations. Even if you think the base argument is apt, it doesnt make the entire thing a SOUND argument.

 

[bryce777]

I don't know enough about the XBox market to comment intelligently. You're right that the XBox had few RPGs, and I suppose if someone who loved RPGs so much that he was willing to play ones that he knew sucked yet nevertheless bought an XBox, he would probably go ahead and buy Morrowind, too.

Maybe Morrowind sold because it was pretty. The graphics were good for an RPG. But the people I know who played it and liked it seemed to enjoy it because it basically let them powerplay a la MMORPGs in a single player environment. The graphics never struck me as their primary interesting -- rather, they seemed to really enjoy how they developed their characters and how they were able to overcome obstacles creatively (like flying up to a pillar and shooting some monster to death (apparently it wouldn't walk away)).

As I said, I didn't like Morrowind and I'm not trying to defend its merits. But I do think this whole, "It only sold because people are stupid and like games that they don't enjoy because they look pretty!!!!" strikes me as a silly position to stake out (not as silly as claiming that Morrowind was a bait-and-switch for Daggerfall, of course). Morrowind could never have sold three million PC copies on its graphics alone -- they were good, but they weren't mindblowing. It wasn't a tech demo the way Myst or Unreal Tournament or Half-Life II was where people would want to show it off or just see how good it looked.

There are lots of games -- from soccer to Galactic Civilizations II to Beirut -- that millions of people like but I hate. In some cases -- like Beirut -- I think the games suck and that people who like them are stupid. But I don't think that people are *tricked* into liking them and they really aren't enjoying themselves.

Is scream a better movie than the seventh seal?

There have been plenty of crap movies or mediocre movies (which is where this applies) with huge marketing that did well commercially, and plenty of great movies that most people have never even heard of....

 

[Rendelius]

I have to admit I'm looking forward to VD's review and the shitstorm that will follow. It's going to be NWN all over again.

Agh, so you already know what VD's review will be like? Interesting.

Me too

"Dumbed down game, where your actions have no consequences. Game economy is way too simple, and good graphics can't make up for that. A step behind Morrowind, and a shame to the TES legacy"

 

[bryce777]

These guys just don't know what the fuck they are doing, plain and simple.

Gee, that must be why they are selling so good.

the reason they sold was because they had the daggerfall name to sucker a lot of people like myself on the pc side and on the xbox side they had no competition.

You seem to be the minority now.

Could all dumbfucks who trot this out in future please refer to section8's comments about Hitler, and popularity being no defence? Maybe that should be stickied or something.

They are now a good selling game compangy, obviously they do know what they are doing. Otherwise they wouldn't be a good selling game compangy.

This is not a statement about qaulity.

Or they just know how to market, or they were just first to market.

 

[Rendelius]

Is scream a better movie than the seventh seal?

There have been plenty of crap movies or mediocre movies (which is where this applies) with huge marketing that did well commercially, and plenty of great movies that most people have never even heard of....

But like you can't say: successful is good, you can't say successful is bad. There are a lot of crap movies that didn't sell well, and a lot of excellent movies that did.

 

[Proweler]

Or they just know how to market, or they were just first to market.

Or the only to Market.

But like you can't say: successful is good, you can't say successful is bad. There are a lot of crap movies that didn't sell well, and a lot of excellent movies that did.

But you can say that the creators of Scream are more effective movie makers. They manage to turn something medicore idea into a succes with on comming profit. When it comes to getting bread on the plate that's a far bigger succes then making a good movie.

edit:

IIRC Bethesda's competence was the original point. Not their ability to make qaulity games, wich is imo a rather subjective matter.

 

[Rendelius]

But like you can't say: successful is good, you can't say successful is bad. There are a lot of crap movies that didn't sell well, and a lot of excellent movies that did.

But you can say that the creators of Scream are more effective movie makers. They manage to turn something medicore idea into a succes with on comming profit. When it comes to getting bread on the plate that's a far bigger succes then making a good movie.

Agreed.

 

[galsiah]

Cross posting in the hope that this might be understood here. Or not.

It's extremely simplistic, but no more simplistic than a number for HP simulating physical wounds.

As I said at our own dear codex, this isn't "simplistic", it is nonsense.

It is totally insane for a 50000 item to sell for 1000 when the merchant can buy 50 items worth 1000. Should the 50000 item sell for 50000? Probably not. So make it sell for less. The selling price as a proportion of the actual price could diminish the higher the value of the item. Mercantile skill could reduce this rate of decrease. The rate of decrease could also depend on the mechant in question.

Here's a reasonable system:
Give each item a cost: objectCost
Give each merchant a funding level: merchantFunding
Use player and merchant mercantile skills: playerSkill, merchantSkill

merchantPrice = (objectCost * merchantFunding) / ( objectCost + merchantFunding )
merchantWouldPay = merchantPrice * ( 200 / (200 + merchantSkill))
playerReceives = (merchantWouldPay ^ ( 1.01 - 1/playerSkill))


This gives the following sale prices:
First keeping player skill and merchant skill at 50:

ObjectCost____MerchantFunding______PlayerReceives
20________________1000______________15
200_______________1000______________126
2000______________1000______________500
20________________5000______________15
200_______________5000______________146
2000______________5000______________1065
20________________20000_____________15
200_______________20000_____________150
2000______________20000_____________1352

When the price is low, the merchant's funding level makes little difference. High funding levels allow the merchant to give a reasonable price for valuable items. The player can sell a valuable item anywhere, but he'll get a better price at a well funded merchant - for a given player and merchant skill.

Now fix the object cost at 200 and the merchant's funding at 1000, to see the effect of player / mechant skill:
MerchantSkill____PlayerSkill______PlayerReceives
100______________20______________92
90_______________30______________102
80_______________40______________110
70_______________50______________117
60_______________60______________124
50_______________70______________130
40_______________80______________137
30_______________90______________144
20_______________100_____________151

The object cost is one fifth of the the merchant's funding level so this still has some effect. Player / merchant skill has a larger effect here though.


This kind of system would make reasonable sense, but be a simplification. "Investing" could for example increase the merchant's funding level, as well as giving the player a small percentage of profits from then on. This would give the impression that the merchant were now able to shift items of higher value more easily - resulting in a higher selling price. There would be no idiotic cutoff point though.

If desired, Merchant funding could be reduced as the player sells items to him, and slowly replenish as he "sells" them. This way, selling 50 items priced at 1000 would be possible, but the player would receive less and less money as he sold each one - since the merchant would be assuming a higher risk.


A system like the above takes hours (at most) to think up, and next to no time to implement: it only requires variables that are already present, and one moderately complex formula.

Sticking with the stupidly simple system they've got just seems a bit silly. A feature like this could be improved beyond recognition in one day. It's not even that complex - it can all be understood on an intuitive level.

Perhaps the system I outlined has problems (I don't think it does - constant tweaking aside). It makes a lot more sense than what we're stuck with though.

 

[Vault Dweller]

I have to admit I'm looking forward to VD's review and the shitstorm that will follow. It's going to be NWN all over again.

Agh, so you already know what VD's review will be like? Interesting.

Me too

"Dumbed down game, where your actions have no consequences. Game economy is way too simple, and good graphics can't make up for that. A step behind Morrowind, and a shame to the TES legacy"

It does describe what we know of the game well though.:wink: Anyway, let's hope that there is some depth somewhere in the game and I'll do my best to find it.

 

[Perishiko]

I have to admit I'm looking forward to VD's review and the shitstorm that will follow. It's going to be NWN all over again.

Agh, so you already know what VD's review will be like? Interesting.

Me too

"Dumbed down game, where your actions have no consequences. Game economy is way too simple, and good graphics can't make up for that. A step behind Morrowind, and a shame to the TES legacy"

It does describe what we know of the game well though.:wink: Anyway, let's hope that there is some depth somewhere in the game and I'll do my best to find it.

We can only hope... So, how long after release do you plan on being able to review it?

I know I've enjoyed quite a few too many of your reviews after being subject to the codex ways.

 

[Lumpy]

Galsiah, there's something wrong about the NPCs' mercantile skills having an effect on the player. Mercantile skills are forms of persuasion. You can't use persuasion on the player. A better merchant is supposed to sell more than a worse merchant, but if prices are affected by the skill, he will actually sell less. So the skill should only affect the amount of money the NPC has.

 

[Vault Dweller]

We can only hope... So, how long after release do you plan on being able to review it?

I know I've enjoyed quite a few too many of your reviews after being subject to the codex ways.

From another post: Let's wait a week, and while it would take me at least a month of playtime to write a review, you'll have my first impressions, summarizing basic elements and overall gameplay, in a week or less.

 

[WouldBeCreator]

Is scream a better movie than the seventh seal?

There have been plenty of crap movies or mediocre movies (which is where this applies) with huge marketing that did well commercially, and plenty of great movies that most people have never even heard of....

A few points.

(1) This is the perfect example of an appeal to authority or an appeal to popularity. I am highly, highly skeptical that you would've picked The Seventh Seal as your gold standard if not for the fact that it's so widely considered a "great movie." In fact, if I asked you what made it so good, I doubt you'd be able to come up with anything that wasn't either vague and meaningless or lifted from pages you'd Google up in response.

(2) Second, I'm not sure why you're comparing a non-American art movie from 1957 with a mass-market American movie from 1996 as evidence that the sales don't equate to quality. The the available audience for Scream was many orders of magnitude larger than the the audience available for The Seventh Seal.

(3) What do you mean by "better movie"? I certainly enjoyed Scream a lot more, especially the first sequence, which I think stands out as maybe the best horror sequence ever. (And yes, I've watched Pscyho, which is laughable now. And yes, I like other Hitchcook movies, although many are also laughable now. And yes, I know that he created much of the film idiom. So what? We're talking better, not more original.) And I think the average movie-goer would enjoy Scream a lot more. In many regards, I think a movie that is able to bring pleasure to more people is a better movie than one that brings pleasure to fewer. But, again, it all depends what we mean by "better." If I were trying to impress people with how intellectual I was, Scream would not be a "better" choice than The Seventh Seal.

(4) Regardless, no one argued that Morrowind is better because it sold well. Here is the exact exchange: Bryce, "These guys just don't know what the fuck they are doing, plain and simple." Proweler, "Gee, that must be why they are selling so good." Bryce, "the reason they sold was because they had the daggerfall name to sucker a lot of people like myself on the pc side and on the xbox side they had no competition." Twinfalls, "Could all dumbfucks who trot this out in future please refer to section8's comments about Hitler, and popularity being no defence?"

The fact that Morrowind sold four million copies is proof positive that Bethesda's execs "know what they're doing." You can get a lot of sales by marketing, but you can't hit four million. No game in my meory was more hyped than Black & White (Daikatan's hype was different), and that sold relatively few copies. And if the underlying game sucks, expansions don't sell well. It's obvious that Bethesda is making games that people enjoy playing. Period. Maybe those people are stupid. Maybe they have bad taste. But Bethesda is not in business to make games that Bryce likes. They're in business to make games that sell well. And they are doing so.

[EDIT:

Also, the investing system sounds mindblowingly stupid and illogical and I can think of lots of easier ways to do things. But that's neither here nor there.]

 

[galsiah]

Galsiah, there's something wrong about the NPCs' mercantile skills having an effect on the player. Mercantile skills are forms of persuasion. You can't use persuasion on the player. A better merchant is supposed to sell more than a worse merchant, but if prices are affected by the skill, he will actually sell less. So the skill should only affect the amount of money the NPC has.

He'll sell less to the player, but that's only a small amount of his sales.

I think it's a little silly to suggest that "NPC Mercantile skill == NPC funding". Why can't a bad merchant be rich, or a good one poor? Some street traders can easily be more savvy than some big investors - they just haven't got the connections or backing to make it big.

I see your point though. The trouble is that NPC mercantile skill doesn't really have a correct place in cost equations. It should really be an effect on player confidence / optimism, as well as a knowledge of what the player will be willing to pay.

Perhaps NPC mercantile skill could be used in other ways. E.g. have items described vaguely or inaccurately, with highly skilled merchants having items described accurately - since they know their trade. That way highly skilled mercants could charge more due to higher player confidence that he would get what he payed for.

Buying from lower skilled merchants might be more hit-and-miss - perhaps you'd occasionally get a good item very cheap, since the merchant didn't realise its true value. More often you'd get shoddy items - though still cheap. The low price would help to encourage players to take a risk.

I'm not sure how this would work with selling.

I guess there's nothing to say that higher NPC mercantile skill should necessarily make things harder for the player. It should make a reasonable difference though, or it might as well be scrapped. I don't think it should mean the same thing as funding / wealth of the merchant.

 

[Blahblah Talks]

What is the difference between "investing" in a merchant and going into the CS and editing the amount of gold he spawns with? Nothing, as far as I can tell.

One involves you using the tools of the game as they are envisioned by the developers. The other has you change the game code to suit your whim.

So? The end result is the same. People who use the CS to edit merchant gold are not solving the economy problems of MW, they are finding the simplest way to get rid of ridiculously over valued items. Providing the exact same "solution" in-game is a cop-out. Actually, it is worse, since it accelerates the speed at which gold is added to the economy.

Hopefully they have made other substantial changes to the economic system. If this is all they did, that's pretty pathetic. As someone said earlier, it's not like it takes 100 man-hours to come up with some reasonable fixes.

[EDIT:

Also, the investing system sounds mindblowingly stupid and illogical and I can think of lots of easier ways to do things. But that's neither here nor there.]

Yeah, that belongs in a thread about whether or not Bethesda has competent management.

 

[bryce777]

The structure of the fallacy is that because people believe A, A is true. That is, "People believe A is just, therefore A is just." That only matters for objective truth statements.

To make an appeal to expertise . . . .

http://www.fallacyfiles.org/bandwagn.html

Form:
Idea I is popular.
Therefore, I is correct.

http://www.nizkor.org/features/fallacie ... arity.html

The Appeal to Popularity has the following form:

Most people approve of X (have favorable emotions towards X).
Therefore X is true.

http://www.intrepidsoftware.com/fallacy/pop.php

Definition:

A proposition is held to be true because it is widely held to be true or is held to be true by some (usually upper crust) sector of the population.

http://www.logicalfallacies.info/bandwagon.html

The bandwagon fallacy is committed by arguments that appeal to the growing popularity of an idea as a reason for accepting it as true.

None of this supports what you say in the least. Hitler is just an example. People believed the earth was flat, and were wrong, yet that was not an idiological statement. It is an idea, though...everything is an idea - such as the idea/belief that bethesda is a good developer. Put down the crack pipe.

 

[Cimmerian Nights]

OK I'm not Alan Greenspan or anything but this isn't investing at all, you're just increasing the shopowner's petty cash. Is the shopowner now supposed to be going to a wholesaler every night so that the petty cash is replenished? I fail to see how this is not a more munchkinish way to deal with the 'sleep and come back tomorrow' way of other games. It's basically 'you don't need to sleep and come back as often as you did before'.

 

[Drain]

Buying from lower skilled merchants might be more hit-and-miss - perhaps you'd occasionally get a good item very cheap, since the merchant didn't realise its true value. More often you'd get shoddy items - though still cheap. The low price would help to encourage players to take a risk.

I like this idea, but hit-and-miss would be often accompanied by reload.

 

[WouldBeCreator]

@ Bryce

Hey, dumbass -- no one is saying, "Lots of people think Bethesda is a good developer, therefore Bethesda is a good developer." What people are saying is, "Lots of people buy Bethesda's games, therefore Bethesda is a good developer." That may be fallacious -- if, for example, the measure of a good developer is something other than selling games -- but it's not an appeal to popularity.

Hitler is just an example. People believed the earth was flat, and were wrong, yet that was not an idiological statement.

Aside from the delicious "idiological" statement, I don't even begin to get what you're trying to say. I assume it's because you don't speak English very well -- reasonable, since it's not your first language.

Under you theory, it would be a logical fallacy to say, "Britney Spears CDs sell well, because lots of people buy them." After all, "selling well" is just an "idea" and my proof of that idea is what lots of people do.



Hint: Here's the moment to quickly rush in with some intellectual credential, like, "why should i even talk to u, u think scream is good and don't like seven seal. lollerz! maybe u should watch casablanca before u try to talk about beth!!!1!!!"

 

[bryce777]

Is scream a better movie than the seventh seal?

There have been plenty of crap movies or mediocre movies (which is where this applies) with huge marketing that did well commercially, and plenty of great movies that most people have never even heard of....

A few points.

(1) This is the perfect example of an appeal to authority or an appeal to popularity. I am highly, highly skeptical that you would've picked The Seventh Seal as your gold standard if not for the fact that it's so widely considered a "great movie." In fact, if I asked you what made it so good, I doubt you'd be able to come up with anything that wasn't either vague and meaningless or lifted from pages you'd Google up in response.

(2) Second, I'm not sure why you're comparing a non-American art movie from 1957 with a mass-market American movie from 1996 as evidence that the sales don't equate to quality. The the available audience for Scream was many orders of magnitude larger than the the audience available for The Seventh Seal.

(3) What do you mean by "better movie"? I certainly enjoyed Scream a lot more, especially the first sequence, which I think stands out as maybe the best horror sequence ever. (And yes, I've watched Pscyho, which is laughable now. And yes, I like other Hitchcook movies, although many are also laughable now. And yes, I know that he created much of the film idiom. So what? We're talking better, not more original.) And I think the average movie-goer would enjoy Scream a lot more. In many regards, I think a movie that is able to bring pleasure to more people is a better movie than one that brings pleasure to fewer. But, again, it all depends what we mean by "better." If I were trying to impress people with how intellectual I was, Scream would not be a "better" choice than The Seventh Seal.

(4) Regardless, no one argued that Morrowind is better because it sold well. Here is the exact exchange: Bryce, "These guys just don't know what the fuck they are doing, plain and simple." Proweler, "Gee, that must be why they are selling so good." Bryce, "the reason they sold was because they had the daggerfall name to sucker a lot of people like myself on the pc side and on the xbox side they had no competition." Twinfalls, "Could all dumbfucks who trot this out in future please refer to section8's comments about Hitler, and popularity being no defence?"

The fact that Morrowind sold four million copies is proof positive that Bethesda's execs "know what they're doing." You can get a lot of sales by marketing, but you can't hit four million. No game in my meory was more hyped than Black & White (Daikatan's hype was different), and that sold relatively few copies. And if the underlying game sucks, expansions don't sell well. It's obvious that Bethesda is making games that people enjoy playing. Period. Maybe those people are stupid. Maybe they have bad taste. But Bethesda is not in business to make games that Bryce likes. They're in business to make games that sell well. And they are doing so.

[EDIT:

Also, the investing system sounds mindblowingly stupid and illogical and I can think of lots of easier ways to do things. But that's neither here nor there.]

Well obviously when I say they do not know what they are doing, in that context I am referring to when making a game. So, any response would logically be addressing that, and if not then it is an absolutely pointless response.

Why should I give a fuck if the businessmen behind the scenes are geniuses who are making tons of money or at least making a lot of sales. I have actually heard that the sales were not spectacular compared to the expenses. The reason they are in business at all is due to being bought out. So, even by that measure I am not so sure they are so great.


As for what is a better game, I do not make an appeal to authority whatsoever. I do not say that the seventh seal is considered a masterpiece by joe segal or someone. I simply ask the question. An appeal to authority is also not a logical fallacy used in that context, anyhow - you are wrong on all counts thus far and need to restudy philosphy before you go around trying to apply it like this. It is only a fallacy when you make an appeal that makes no sense. Such as - "Oh, yeah? The guys at NASA fucking LOVE scream, dickhead!". If I had pointed out that the seventh seal is one of the most critically acclaimed movies of all time in the context of making a case that it is a better movie than scream, then that is perfectly valid. When it comes to acting, art direction, camerawork, direction...and basically every element that makes up a movie, seventh seal is widely regarded as one of the best movies ever made, whereas scream does not come close. You could argue scream is a better summer blockbuster, just like you could argue that morrowind is better as simulating LARPing than most any game out there, but that does not make scream a great movie and it does not make morrowind a great movie.

 

[WouldBeCreator]

When it comes to acting, art direction, camerawork, direction...and basically every element that makes up a movie, seventh seal is widely regarded as one of the best movies ever made, whereas scream does not come close.

Definition: A proposition is held to be true because it is widely held to be true or is held to be true by some (usually upper crust) sector of the population.

Snicker.

 

[galsiah]

I like this idea, but hit-and-miss would be often accompanied by reload.

That's a danger, it's true, but it doesn't always happen.

There are situations in Morrowind where I'd reload if something went badly (even if I hadn't died...), but equally there were many situations where I wouldn't. I think the fact that there is an option in this case, makes reloading less likely. If you want to be sure of your purchase, you can go to a better merchant. If you want to take a chance with a lesser guy, you can. The player is more likely to accept getting a randomly bad item if he chose to take that chance.

Some players would reload I guess, but some people will reload at anything. I think the fact that the player would be unlikely to have lost out much, combined with it being his choice to take the risk, would lessen the reload syndrome.

Most of the time I was thinking you'd be getting e.g. a slightly imbalanced longsword, rather than a quality one, or a cuirass that was thin in places and gave slightly less protection than most of that type. Hopefully a player would accept this as a consequence of going to a cheaper dealer. He'd usually get an item that did the job - just sometimes not quite as well as he might have expected.

Good merchants could have shoddy items too, of course - but they'd be accurately described. A player could get an imbalanced longsword from a good merchant more cheaply than a "longsword" from a bad merchant.