Game News inXile reveal Wasteland 3's party system

[Roguey]

You can solo Wasteland 2.

That sounds like it'd be an incredible slog given that enemies are balanced for parties, and there's no way to stealth critical path encounters.

The final battle would be a massive chore even with the benefit of combat shooting.

 

[himmy]

Holy shit, this thread proves my long-lasting suspicion that most of the people here have some sort of fantasy/role-play abusive relationship with RPG devs going on in their head at all times. Fucking hell, some people take every design decisions as a personal betrayal of what they hold most dear and purposefully act dramatic about it, rather than seeing it as a regular fucking design decision.

 

[imweasel]

^

Yep. You should have seen the major spergfest from people like FeelMuhRetardation (who is probably the biggest whiney faggot on the codex BTW, got a 2x4 stuck up his ass) when Inxile announced that Wasteland 2 would have a square grid and not a hex grid. It was glorious.

 

[CyberWhale]

Holy shit, this thread proves my long-lasting suspicion that most of the people here have some sort of fantasy/role-play abusive relationship with RPG devs going on in their head at all times. Fucking hell, some people take every design decisions as a personal betrayal of what they hold most dear and purposefully act dramatic about it, rather than seeing it as a regular fucking design decision.

 

[FeelTheRads]

Yep. You should have seen the major spergfest from people like @FeelMuhRetardation (who is probably the biggest whiney faggot on the codex BTW, got a 2x4 stuck up his ass) when Inxile announced that Wasteland 2 would have a square grid and not a hex grid. It was glorious.

Ah, and you were the one sperging about how a square grid is rounder than a hex grid, no?

By the way, some extreme butthurt here. I'm expecting you to go through all my posts to rate them, only then will the butthurt cease.

 

[imweasel]

Are you triggered? Come on, fight me!

 

[CryptRat]

Holy shit, this thread proves my long-lasting suspicion that most of the people here have some sort of fantasy/role-play abusive relationship with RPG devs going on in their head at all times. Fucking hell, some people take every design decisions as a personal betrayal of what they hold most dear and purposefully act dramatic about it, rather than seeing it as a regular fucking design decision.

Not the only one, but lack of party creation is one of the reasons why I hate so many modern cRPGs. I never said it was anything else than a design decision, and I also generally ignore games I simply have no interest it, but I am vaguely interested about this one (I enjoyed Wasteland 2) and complaining about the lack of party creation in a Wasteland game aka Bard's Tale with guns seems legit to me.

 

[felipepepe]

In more story-focused games well-crafted, well-written companions are nigh-indispensable.

But is Wasteland story focused?

That's my issue with this - it's the standardization of RPGs. Now every RPG has to have BioWare-like companions, be open-world-ish, focus on story, offer morality choices, etc... Even a franchise that was brought back from the dead to deliver "old-school" gameplay is abandoning part of what made it unique to go to the default "modern RPG design sheet".

Where does this stop? Until someone Kickstarts Wizardry 9? Or that too will have UNIQUE and charismatic personal ego-masturbators following you around and sharing their sad childhood stories, because creating your own party is for losers? "Fight alongside (and romance) Werdyna, the goth teenage daughter of Werdna, who seeks to learn the truth about her father..."

And how the hell do you even make "iconic" companions that are customizeable? Either you'll be severely limited, or it will be utterly ridiculous - "Yo, I'mma play KOTOR now and want an all-Jedi party, so I'll just re-spec HK-47 and Ordo as Jedis." or maybe "Edwin and Aeris should both be barbarians for this playthrought!". Sounds really solid and well-thought out.

 

[Kev Inkline]

Are you triggered? Come on, fight me!

That's the personification of the awesome button.

 

[Roguey]

RPGs are defined by being a checklist of features found in other RPGs so it's appropriate for revivals to get with the program.

 

[Bubbles]

Update 2: inXile developer Thomas Beekers has also made a statement in response to a fan question:

And if that single character dies but one or more of the party created later do not, does the game end?

You can still continue playing if that character dies.

Now we've almost come full circle, but who knows what tomorrow may bring? Remember to update your ratings on the OP!

 

[DramaticPopcorn]

All those "decline" rating on the OP imply that inxile held any actual merit at some time in the past which is BLATANTLY UNTRUE. I hereby demand you people change your ratings to meh


EDIT:

Update 2: inXile developer Thomas Beekers has also made a statement in response to a fan question:

And if that single character dies but one or more of the party created later do not, does the game end?

You can still continue playing if that character dies.

Now we've almost come full circle, but who knows what tomorrow may bring? Remember to update your ratings on the OP!

So, what is the point of even sticking to the 1-character intro? Are we gonna see party roster expand as the game goes on or do we play a solo intro for a bit and then design a full fledged party?

 

[Bubbles]

Maybe it's similar to Morrowind: when your main character dies, you'll get a message like "the course of destiny has been perverted", but you can continue playing normally until the big bad guy demands to duel the Chosen One.

 

[DramaticPopcorn]

You know, this vague, out of nowhere dramatic change to one of the founding aspects of an established franchise is either miscommunication, misunderstanding or the devs testing waters for feedback and how much can they get away with, without running into a ton of refunds or pledge withdrawal.

 

[Prime Junta]

In more story-focused games well-crafted, well-written companions are nigh-indispensable.

But is Wasteland story focused?

Dunno. Is Fallout 2? It wouldn't have been the same without Myron or Sulik.

That's my issue with this - it's the standardization of RPGs. Now every RPG has to have BioWare-like companions, be open-world-ish, focus on story, offer morality choices, etc... Even a franchise that was brought back from the dead to deliver "old-school" gameplay is abandoning part of what made it unique to go to the default "modern RPG design sheet".

Now that there is a valid objection. I'm all for different styles of games. Kinda hoping Obsidian will do an IWD-like dungeon crawl with the Eternity engine at some point, as a little side project. Fully party creation would fit that well.

And how the hell do you even make "iconic" companions that are customizeable? Either you'll be severely limited, or it will be utterly ridiculous - "Yo, I'mma play KOTOR now and want an all-Jedi party, so I'll just re-spec HK-47 and Ordo as Jedis." or maybe "Edwin and Aeris should both be barbarians for this playthrought!". Sounds really solid and well-thought out.

You don't?

Instead, you add enough of them to give you enough flexibility for party building, or complement them with hirelings you can spec as you like.

 

[Roguey]

So, what is the point of even sticking to the 1-character intro?

Question was answered in the OP

Keenan agrees, and the team have been watching Twitch streams to see how the players actually enjoyed the game. “It seemed like there was a group of people who were used to that old-school character creation right off the bat, with lots of stats and numbers, who you could tell just immediately loved,” he says, but there were other people who were more apprehensive to that creation system, and Keenan offers a solution. “What if we give the player a little bit of a sense of the world so they can start to feel it out and then building that stuff up afterwards so they can really make it count?”

 

[GloomFrost]

In more story-focused games well-crafted, well-written companions are nigh-indispensable.

But is Wasteland story focused?

That's my issue with this - it's the standardization of RPGs. Now every RPG has to have BioWare-like companions, be open-world-ish, focus on story, offer morality choices, etc... Even a franchise that was brought back from the dead to deliver "old-school" gameplay is abandoning part of what made it unique to go to the default "modern RPG design sheet".

Where does this stop? Until someone Kickstarts Wizardry 9? Or that too will have UNIQUE and charismatic personal ego-masturbators following you around and sharing their sad childhood stories, because creating your own party is for losers? "Fight alongside (and romance) Werdyna, the goth teenage daughter of Werdna, who seeks to learn the truth about her father..."

And how the hell do you even make "iconic" companions that are customizeable? Either you'll be severely limited, or it will be utterly ridiculous - "Yo, I'mma play KOTOR now and want an all-Jedi party, so I'll just re-spec HK-47 and Ordo as Jedis." or maybe "Edwin and Aeris should both be barbarians for this playthrought!". Sounds really solid and well-thought out.

There are still plenty of games where you can make a party. You could "create" your companions in POE. Also Serpent in the Stagland, Legend of Grimrock and Lord of Xulima. Its just most people prefer well written companions to silent dummies just accept that.

 

[FeelTheRads]

Its just most people prefer well written companions to silent dummies just accept that.

Right, right.. and is that a good thing or what? Also, why should you "accept" it? Accepting it means that you should be OK if every game did that because after all "most people" like that way so why do anything else, right?

 

[l3loodAngel]

You can solo Wasteland 2.

That sounds like it'd be an incredible slog given that enemies are balanced for parties, and there's no way to stealth critical path encounters.

You know that's the first time I agree with you. WL2 did not have stealth, it was a slog, no story driven exploration that made FO1-2 great. But sure let's focus on the important stuff like retarded party creation that can be moded into the game by 13 year old. Just FUCK YOU ALL!!!

(Because I can't find troll singing decline)

 

[Zdzisiu]

Its just most people prefer well written companions to silent dummies just accept that.

Because most people are stupid emotional wankers that need their ego validated in everything they do, even by such meaningless concept as npc in a computer game. If people want well written characters they should read some fucking books.

When I play a game and create my party, I can give them all of the character and personality I want. I usually don't go beyond the basic roles they will play. There will be somebody who leads the party, various forms of soldiers, a wise mage to cast some spells and somebody who can heal my party. Its a game, if the mechanics are interesting then they don't need stupid backstories. Do you give names to your pawns in chess?

But from all of the games that had a strong focus on companions, their characters, backstories and romances, I learned that it is used to hide the fact that the game is shallow and boring when it comes to mechanics so the developers drown you in the incessant character drama.

Fuck, I get more attached to my dudes in turn based strategy games than in modern cRPGs.

 

[Bubbles]

Do you give names to your pawns in chess?

I have zero doubt that there's a version of chess with companion romances out there.

 

[felipepepe]

There are still plenty of games where you can make a party. You could "create" your companions in POE. Also Serpent in the Stagland, Legend of Grimrock and Lord of Xulima. Its just most people prefer well written companions to silent dummies just accept that.

Have you noticed that, besides Grimrock, all these games were Kickstarter projects?

The whole point of kickstarting old-school RPGs was to get things that are not being done anymore, that wouldn't get funding from publishers. "I'll revive a old-school RPG from 1988, with isometric graphics, full party creation, exclusive for PC." - That's something no publisher would back in 2012, and was aimed at a niche.

The current pitch of W3 - with an established IP, CINEMATIC dialogs, aweshum graphics, BioWarian companions, multiplatform release, "let's please the Twitch guys", etc - seems very mainstream and publisher-friendly to me. And by this point it has been clearly established that "evil publishers forcing me to go to consoles & compromise" was 120% bullshit - Fargo happily does that himself.

So really, at this point kickstarting InXile is like pre-ordering a game 2-3 years before release just because it is more profitable for Fargo than a publisher deal or bank loan.

 

[CyberWhale]

So really, at this point kickstarting InXile is like pre-ordering a game 2-3 years before release just because it is more profitable for Fargo than a publisher deal or bank loan.

And less risky by a fucking mile.

 

[Fairfax]

So really, at this point kickstarting InXile is like pre-ordering a game 2-3 years before release just because it is more profitable for Fargo than a publisher deal or bank loan.

Specially with his family's bank in such deep shit.

But yeah, it's very publisher friendly because he wants one to pick it up as well. Fargo wants to make a fortune playing with the big boys on consoles, and InXile can't afford it on their own.
Even on PC alone it's easier to share the risks with a publisher. It's why Obsidian gave up on Figstarting Tyranny.

 

[Excidium II]

It's why Obsidian gave up on Figstarting Tyranny.

Tyranny is a Paradox title you fool. Obsidian is merely the developer.

I think paradox only picked it up to publish later, considering it started in 2014.