KickStarter Kingdom Come: Deliverance - Dan Vavra's medieval chad simulator

[SlamDunk]

 

[Parsimonious cook]

A board game about burning down Catholic monasteries during the Hussite Wars? Sounds fun!

Notice the dude with the two-handed flail (iconing Hussite weapon) to the left of the monk´s head - nice attention to detail.

 

[Smejki]

We had natural transitions from any state to dialog in one of the earlier alphas. Unfortunately for it to work under any circumstance it meant there's a new transition state between minding-my-own-business and actually-ready-to-do-talking and this transition took way too much time way too often. It also meant we couldn't place the player in better position for dialog camera. The dialog had to happen wherever player was when the NPC reached the state actually-ready-to-do-talking (and if player was still close). It was wonky and grew annoying quickly.

All that because you wanted KCD dialogues to be dynamic, like mini-movies with "acting" and different angle cuts, ála Witcher 3? The Skyrim solution ("in-game" dialogues with no special fade-outs, camera angles, gesticulation etc.) was never in the cards?

Funny that you mention Witcher 3 beause their dialogs are super static. W3's approach to dialogs is that they are actually mini in-engine branching cutscenes. They are predetermined to happen at a certain place with manually setup cameras, with predefined starting point for every animation involving movement, and with environment complementing the available animation set. This means:

• Dialog actors or "side shot actors" (as in one camera shot during the dialog shows a bartender watching you, because ZOMFG cinematix!!) must be nailed to the spot (or a tiny area so that their teleports won't feel dissonant) where the dialog will be triggered. Or they don't exist and will be spawned in mid-dialog.
• You cannot disrupt these situations by any interaction so there are no interactions with civilians. You can't attack them, steal from them, and they cannot react in any way to your actions. The biggest reaction you'll ever see from a bystander is cowering/raising hands, turning and shouting, barking. That's it.

i.e. the civilian NPC world in Witcher 3 is almost as interactive as the skybox.
Our NPCs can be anywhere, can react to anything and you can attack them, kill them, steal from them. Whatever. Making W3-like dialogs in KCD is impossible due to this interactivity.
(BTW we could do W3-like dialogs. CryEngine has a tech call TrackView which is very similar to what they use but we use it for pure cutscenes. All we'd have to do is run the dialog system in parallel and allow different dialog sequences to jump around the cutscene checkpoints and play the correct cameras, show proper lighting etc.. The result would be almost the same.

Despite all of that they do have a backup dynamic dialog system in place. I've seen it in action with Crach an Craite where the dude just started walking to some other location while a dialog option with him remained valid.
The system is apparently very barebones. The NPC turns to you violently, clothes failing everywhere, cameras are off, framing is all wrong. It's similar to what we have but really terrible.

Anyway, to answer your question finally.
Skyrim style was never on the table. It looks quite bad in many situations.

 

[cvv]

[
i.e. the civilian NPC world in Witcher 3 is almost as interactive as the skybox.

Absolutely, we've been banging that drum for years ITT and elsewhere. The system of AI routines and independent acting is by far the most underrated aspect of KCD.

But the dialogue system does look similar in KCD and TW3, meaning whenever you click on an NPC there's a fade-out and "cutscene" plays out with you and the NPC making faces and gestures in various camera angles. The "Skyrim solution" was much simpler - you click on an NPC, they just freeze, a dialogue window pops-out and you can click dialogue options. Without any fade-outs or "acting". I just wondered if that was ever considered for KCD since it seems way more simple and less demanding to implement.

 

[Quillon]

Skyrim style was never on the table. It looks quite bad in many situations.

Apart from their limited dialogue options etc. it worked fine in Fallout 4 imo, first person to cinematic and back on the fly. Lighting was hit or miss tho.

 

[Wesp5]

The "Skyrim solution" was much simpler - you click on an NPC, they just freeze, a dialogue window pops-out and you can click dialogue options. Without any fade-outs or "acting". I just wondered if that was ever considered for KCD since it seems way more simple and less demanding to implement.

A middle ground like in Bloodlines would have been nice! Like you can talk to NPCs while they are moving and the rest of the world keeps going too, but you stay in first person view with NPC gestures and limited camera angles possible.

 

[Smejki]

[
i.e. the civilian NPC world in Witcher 3 is almost as interactive as the skybox.

Absolutely, we've been banging that drum for years ITT and elsewhere. The system of AI routines and independent acting is by far the most underrated aspect of KCD.

But the dialogue system does look similar in KCD and TW3, meaning whenever you click on an NPC there's a fade-out and "cutscene" plays out with you and the NPC making faces and gestures in various camera angles. The "Skyrim solution" was much simpler - you click on an NPC, they just freeze, a dialogue window pops-out and you can click dialogue options. Without any fade-outs or "acting". I just wondered if that was ever considered for KCD since it seems way more simple and less demanding to implement.

Since the very inception it was always meant to be as competent as possible in cinematographic terms, without needing to resort to having to manually setup and/or embellish each dialog scenario like Witcher 3 does.
However the start and end faders were not part of the equation initially. We just realized we couldn't do it without them if we wanted the transition into dialog to be safe, quick (relatively) and if we wanted reliably good results.

 

[cepheiden]

And that way of thinking is why your game will never be good Smejki.
You think you need to focus on NPC faces during conversations. You think need to have lip sync etc.

But what you really need is actual gameplay and not that doll house bullshit. People would still buy the game without it. Other games sell just as well with just a text box for dialogues.

The reall issue is, that the actual gameplay of kingdom come sucks.
The combat is clunky and requires no skill. It's just skyrim combat with pointless directions added. Take a note from Mount&Blade if you want to know what good combat is like.
The world is huge but empty. Even if there was something to find, it wouldn't matter, because the pacing is so horrible, that winning a single encounter will solve all economic challenges for the player for the rest of the game. You expect people to play through your boring, borderline cinematic experience 100 hour story that has at best 10 hours worth of actual gameplay? What a joke.
The dialogues a cringy. Your guys tried too hard to make everyone sound as mad and uncivilized as possible.
The story completely ignores the character progression. There is ludonarrative dissonance at every step. Heck, you literally have a respawn system in a "realistic" game.

 

[Lord_Potato]

And that way of thinking is why your game will never be good Smejki.
You think you need to focus on NPC faces during conversations. You think need to have lip sync etc.

But what you really need is actual gameplay and not that doll house bullshit. People would still buy the game without it. Other games sell just as well with just a text box for dialogues.

The reall issue is, that the actual gameplay of kingdom come sucks.
The combat is clunky and requires no skill. It's just skyrim combat with pointless directions added. Take a note from Mount&Blade if you want to know what good combat is like.
The world is huge but empty. Even if there was something to find, it wouldn't matter, because the pacing is so horrible, that winning a single encounter will solve all economic challenges for the player for the rest of the game. You expect people to play through your boring, borderline cinematic experience 100 hour story that has at best 10 hours worth of actual gameplay? What a joke.
The dialogues a cringy. Your guys tried too hard to make everyone sound as mad and uncivilized as possible.
The story completely ignores the character progression. There is ludonarrative dissonance at every step. Heck, you literally have a respawn system in a "realistic" game.

 

[cvv]

And that way of thinking is why your game will never be good Smejki.
You think you need to focus on NPC faces during conversations. You think need to have lip sync etc.

But what you really need is actual gameplay and not that doll house bullshit. People would still buy the game without it. Other games sell just as well with just a text box for dialogues.

The reall issue is, that the actual gameplay of kingdom come sucks.
The combat is clunky and requires no skill. It's just skyrim combat with pointless directions added. Take a note from Mount&Blade if you want to know what good combat is like.
The world is huge but empty. Even if there was something to find, it wouldn't matter, because the pacing is so horrible, that winning a single encounter will solve all economic challenges for the player for the rest of the game. You expect people to play through your boring, borderline cinematic experience 100 hour story that has at best 10 hours worth of actual gameplay? What a joke.
The dialogues a cringy. Your guys tried too hard to make everyone sound as mad and uncivilized as possible.
The story completely ignores the character progression. There is ludonarrative dissonance at every step. Heck, you literally have a respawn system in a "realistic" game.

36 posts in 10 years on Codex.

One would think if your level cap is only 3 posts per year you'd make the most rounded, eloquent, value-rich posts on the site instead of the "game is bad because gameplay is bad" kind of shitposting.

 

[Smejki]

And that way of thinking is why your game will never be good Smejki.
You think you need to focus on NPC faces during conversations. You think need to have lip sync etc.

But what you really need is actual gameplay and not that doll house bullshit. People would still buy the game without it. Other games sell just as well with just a text box for dialogues.

The reall issue is, that the actual gameplay of kingdom come sucks.
The combat is clunky and requires no skill. It's just skyrim combat with pointless directions added. Take a note from Mount&Blade if you want to know what good combat is like.
The world is huge but empty. Even if there was something to find, it wouldn't matter, because the pacing is so horrible, that winning a single encounter will solve all economic challenges for the player for the rest of the game. You expect people to play through your boring, borderline cinematic experience 100 hour story that has at best 10 hours worth of actual gameplay? What a joke.
The dialogues a cringy. Your guys tried too hard to make everyone sound as mad and uncivilized as possible.
The story completely ignores the character progression. There is ludonarrative dissonance at every step. Heck, you literally have a respawn system in a "realistic" game.

Spoiler

 

[GhostCow]

Take a note from Mount&Blade if you want to know what good combat is like.

Honestly though this is true. There are a lot of things to love about Kingdom Come but the combat isn't one of them and it's sad how I've never seen another game copy and maybe even improve on Mount and Blade's combat, which probably has the best combat of any game ever made.

 

[cvv]

Take a note from Mount&Blade if you want to know what good combat is like.

Honestly though this is true. There are a lot of things to love about Kingdom Come but the combat isn't one of them and it's sad how I've never seen another game copy and maybe even improve on Mount and Blade's combat, which probably has the best combat of any game ever made.

It's super immersive but mechanically looks like a simple hack'n'slash.

I don't love KCD combat either. But they clearly wanted to go beyond a simple R1 mash fest, do something sophisticated and close to realistic HEMA. M&B combat just wouldn't do here.

Problem is Vavra insisted the game had to be in first person and you simply can't make a fantastic, sophisticated first person melee combat. Maybe in VR, ten years from now. But not now and not with standard peripherals.

 

[Beowulf]

M&B combat was functional, but very simplistic at the same time. And it doesn't look like it would work that well in FPP.
I really liked KCD combat, what made it crap was the forced lock-on in 1 vs many fights. But for 1v1 it was really good. And Henry's character performed different animations the more moves you unlocked, and that kind of progress is always a nice feature.

 

[Gerrard]

Combat in KCD is shit because, unlike with the block->counter->block->counter exchange, you can't do anything to defend against ripostes, so the only logical thing to do is never attack first. It's literally the same issue For Honor had.

 

[GhostCow]

It never ceases to amaze me how many people think melee in first person sucks. I would never play Mount and Blade in third person even though I'm pretty sure most people do. I think people just don't want to git gud at FPP

 

[Alienman]

Combat in KCD is shit because, unlike with the block->counter->block->counter exchange, you can't do anything to defend against ripostes, so the only logical thing to do is never attack first. It's literally the same issue For Honor had.

Don't forget master strike.

 

[Krivol]

I actually love KCD combat - it's probably the best duel, FPS, aRPG combat ever seen (I didn't play too many new games TBH so maybe there are better ones). It's messy when you have more than 1 opponent but it should be - fighting with numerous enemies should be hard (compare it to - say - wither 3 - where it does not matter if you fight 2 or 10 enemies, it just takes longer to kill'em'all). I enjoyed every single fight on the arena. That's true that 99% of moves are waiting for an enemy attack and countering him, but master strike gives so much satisfaction when you finally do it properly.

Also - I am not in some knight brotherhood or something, but all duels I've seen in my life (not on movies but on fairs and reconstructions) were 'smash opponent until he dies from exhaustion type (where attacking could have made a costly mistake) or 'attack, defense, counterattack, defense' etc.

Oh and remember kids - only hardcore mode is approved mode in KCD. The rest of the settings is for popamolers, so if you don't like fights and played it with big green marker saying when to block - kill yourself, and don't waste air.

 

[Beowulf]

Combat in KCD is shit because, unlike with the block->counter->block->counter exchange, you can't do anything to defend against ripostes, so the only logical thing to do is never attack first. It's literally the same issue For Honor had.

Don't forget master strike.

Right, forgot about that, the master strike was OP and made the combat trivial once you've learnt it.

 

[Beowulf]

It never ceases to amaze me how many people think melee in first person sucks. I would never play Mount and Blade in third person even though I'm pretty sure most people do. I think people just don't want to git gud at FPP

For FPP slashers Chiv and Mordhau are better alternatives. M&B's strength is definitely not in it's simple combat model, but with the grandiose battles.

And that one playthrough where you decide to just fuck it and play horse archers faction.

 

[IHaveHugeNick]

I thought the combat was quite okay, as long as you can resist the temptation to always use the most exploitable moves.

 

[Valdetiosi]

At first I didn't see the problem with combat, but then I played it with Better Combat and Immersion Compilation mod and the holes opened up. Vanilla master strikes are too easy to do and opponents never let you do combos because they counter with said master strikes.
The mod fixed it trivially by having you to mirror enemy's stance to do master strike, vice versa to them, and made combos as meat to do damage.

 

[PorkyThePaladin]

All of you guys complaining about problems with KCD combat, please read my modding guide thread for it, with those mods, it becomes the proper HEMA combat it was always meant to be. No more master strikes, a lot more flow between attacks and parries, combos are harder to land and necessary for winning, etc.

 

[deuxhero]

KCD combat is screwed by how counters work, making the same mistake all the BAMHAM games and their ilk do. Counters are essentially risk free (I recall but can't say for sure they outright made you immune to other enemies while something awesome happened) but normal attacks are risk heavy because enemies can also awesome button counter you.

 

[PorkyThePaladin]

You are not reading what I am saying bre. Master strikes (what you call counters) are removed by the mods described in the modding guide mentioned above, removed altogether, from you and the NPCs. NPCs also perfect block (parry) a lot more often, causing you to defend more on their ripostes.