Editorial Leon Boyarsky - Thoughts on RPG development

[Section8]

There's been some great points raised by the newcomers in the above posts. Welcome guys, it's good to see some intelligent discussion on the internet for once.

One thing that was mentioned, and soemthing I think Fallout derives great strength from is the fact that it doesn't have a pulp storyline. Rather than being like a cheap paperback from a supermarket shelf, it bears more resemblance to the books that are compulsory reading for english and/or literature studies. There's depth beyond the surface. There are themes both implied and presented in more obvious manners, and most of them are worthy of discussion, interpretation or even just musing upon.

It's intellectual, and that scares a lot of people. Not everyone wants anything past the face of the story in their literature or movies, and computer games are no different. On the flipside, its perfectly understandable that the generally held opinion of video games among non-gamers is not a high one. The games that get mass media attention usually only get it due to controversy, and most of the time it's purely shock value. Games like Carmageddon, BMX XXX, GTA3 don't have much depth, some of them are fun, but they definitely aren't going to capture the imagination of anyone looking for an intellectual gaming experience.

 

[Rosh]

RE: Piracy: There's an interesting thing I found with... something from Macromedia I think? Whatever it was, it was a little art program that let you make fancy word effects. I'd nicked it off the net (I'm a lousy warezer when it comes to some things) and installed it. Went to "Help --> About" to put in the registration code and found that there was some machine code there. Basically, when I installed it, some number seemed to be generated that was based on my machine stats. That number determined my registration code.

So, in other words, the only way to get the registration code was to send off my machine code to the company with my money, and get the registration code in return. In the end I gave up on the program and found a free one that let me do what I wanted. But it's something that I think could work. I mean, unless someone cracks the code and figures out what registration code is generated depending on your machine, then you're basically home free.

Of course it means you'll have to handle a whole lot of e-mails with people registering which has other issues... I'm also curious as to what would happen if I registered and bought a new computer, then tried to install the program. I wondered if I'd need to pay for another registration code because my machine code was different, or whether they'd just send me another one for free, cause I've already paid. That raises issues with me installing it on a friends computer and getting the code for free for him too... But anyway, it's an idea I've seen.

Ever hear of a keygen? Cracking an algorithm isn't that hard.

Usually, when you have an order, it will take your customer number and their mailing client will take it, strip out the register number, and then give you the register key back in e-mail. Your copy of the program takes the reg number and the register key and compares the two through some algorithm or encryption key. Some can be time-based (good if used withim a month), or a number of other things. The fact is, they all can be cracked sooner or later. Zero Sum is doing good by having a different key needed per patch.

Also, for updates on other computers, it's not hard to track requests for keys by usr/account. You can even add another layer to this registration by requiring someone to use a customer number (since a new computer would require a new reg number to be created).

It's fine in theory, but a bit dated, and still easy to crack. Just need a bit of time and some patience.

 

[Saint_Proverbius]

Later, however, I heard that you could only half the races would have female characters. This sort of sexism in a game offends me, and I don't buy the lame excuses usually offered.

As I understand it, that was an art issue. Too much art made was making the game too big (file size way) so they stopped that. An interesting point to note is that they made a male version for every race, even the ones without females, but didn't have a female only race... IE: They chose males over females.

You understand poorly then. The races that don't have females in Arcanum have lore reasons for them not having females. In fact, this is actually explained in the manual.

• Half Ogre females are never seen because it's believed that Ogre clans kill them at birth, or tuck them away for breeding purposes. Meanwhile, they allow the male offsprings to roam freely.
  
  Gnome females are highly revered and often tended to by their spouse. They don't become adventures are are rarely seen outside their houses without bodyguards because they're so cherished by their spouse.
  
  Dwarf females are believed to be cloistered to their mines as part of their culture. It's also believed it takes them 10 years to produce an offspring once pregnant.

It's not sexism, it's part of the setting and the cultures within the setting. Now, some of the cultures may be sexist within the game, but that's part of the history of the setting.

And remember, we're talking about fantasy with Victorian themes, here. Women's Sufferage just isn't part of those themes, though Half Elf, Human, Elf, and Halfling women are afforded more opportunites than the above mentioned races in the game.


And honestly, Moontyger, your arguments are self defeating. You seem to go out of your way to look for what you consider sexist without actually checking your facts first, or even giving any thought to your arguments. So, you decide not to buy a game. Well, that's one less point in the marketting statistics for you, regardless of whether or not your opinion of the game being sexist is true or not. End result, marketting people think women are largely interested in such and such type of game, so they don't bother with your gender when it comes to marketting the game the next time.

 

[DarkUnderlord]

You understand poorly then. The races that don't have females in Arcanum have lore reasons for them not having females. In fact, this is actually explained in the manual.

Oh no, I know about the Lore reasons. The Lore was made after the decision to not include them due to art reasons though. Otherwise, it seems kinda odd to include things like this in the files for the game:

// Dwarf female (no such thing)
{30}{} // critically hit
{31}{} // dying
{32}{} // dying_gruesome
{33}{} // fidgeting
{34}{} // attacking
{35}{} // alerted
{36}{} // agitated

// Half Ogre female (no such thing)
{150}{} // critically hit
{151}{} // dying
{152}{} // dying_gruesome
{153}{} // fidgeting
{154}{} // attacking
{155}{} // alerted
{156}{} // agitated

As I understand (I tried digging up the IRC log where, IIRC, Troika explained that in one of the dev chats, but I don't seem to have it), Troika were originally planning on allowing the player to play females of these and Gnomes, except they decided not to due to the art requirements. Then they made the Lore excuse. Otherwise, how would they have explained the lack of female dwarves in the game? They needed the Lore to do that.

It's not sexism, it's part of the setting and the cultures within the setting. Now, some of the cultures may be sexist within the game, but that's part of the history of the setting.

And remember, we're talking about fantasy with Victorian themes, here. Women's Sufferage just isn't part of those themes, though Half Elf, Human, Elf, and Halfling women are afforded more opportunites than the above mentioned races in the game.

A setting where an entire race, Orcs, are treated poorly. True, you're not allowed to play a full-blooded Orc, only a Half-Orc, but surely Troika could have worked this into the game for women? If they work in lower reactions for every race and dialogue reactions dependant on your race, a vein of a fighting woman couldn't have been that hard to do. Most of the dialogue where this occurs is auto, meaning it's chosen depending on the code behind the game. Things like people's greetings depend on your race etc...

I don't think the reason they left it out had much to do with the Victorian setting, considering that you could play a female human with only the very rare instance of this nature popping up, especially in instances like the Gentleman's Club in Tarant. It's not as if every bloke you talked to treated you like the dainty Victorian woman of the era, unlike people's reactions to races.

However, I think Moontyger's main point was that the developers went "Buggerit, no need for women" and left out the art for 3 or 4 races. As I said, it's interesting to note that they didn't leave out any male art, they only made excuses for the females. Also her other point was that the sterotypical "whore yourself for results" options get old and boring, especially when they're the only real alternative that seems to be offered.

 

[Sharpei_Diem]

This is a foolish argument. People pirate because it's easy to do, and they're basically freeloaders.. However, they still want to play games, or they wouldn't spend all that money on their PCs to do so. After all, you still have to spend $200 to $400 on a 3D card that can push those games.

Hell, I know a few people who warez a lot. It's hard to be on the internet and NOT know one or two. However, one of those guys always has a decked out system. He's always investing in his machine.

Given cases like that, which I'd say are pretty common, it's hard to make the claim that if they didn't warez, they wouldn't have PCs. Like I said, the reason they do it is because it's easy, and they're freeloaders.

Please don't dismiss my opinion as foolish so easily. Plenty of people that originally pirated material buy it later on. Yes, there are some that are freeloaders and will always pirate, even when there's no real reason for them to. If piracy was impossible on the pc platform, do you honestly think these people would then go out and buy games? I think they'd just move to a platform where piracy was possible. If piracy was impossilbe on every platform, I wonder how many would be gamers/would have gotten into gaming in the first place.

More central to the point i was trying to make though, if one of these guys has a warez copy of a game, the industry thinks this represents a sale lost: i think this person would never have bought the game, and so can't represent a sale lost.

If the industry wants to lessen the impact of piracy, one solution might be to loosen up return policies. Everyone hates buying a crap product, and if merchants were willing and able to accept a return on an inferior product it might go a long way to easing pirate mentality. There's few industries where one has to buy a product without getting an opportunity to test it/look at it in any form and then has no recourse if the product is faulty/doesn't meet their expectations.

 

[Sharpei_Diem]

on sexism

It's an interesting argument (though i've never really been concerned with it) but i have a question for those for are concerned in it:

Would you prefer a game that allowed you to play as a female but otherwise didn't distinquish between men and women(men and women being equal - including stat maxs and playing options), or one that did distinquish between the two (in stat maxs and as in fallout's prostitution options) but allowed more creative role playing?

One of the things torment did so well was to take consideration of stats in the dialogue choices, and even though it may be considered sexist, i'd rather see more of a similar consideration of sex in other games...I noticed Icewind Dale II did this on occasion(I noticed because the party leader was female) and though it stopped short of offering alternate solutions, it made for a better game.

 

[Saint_Proverbius]

Please don't dismiss my opinion as foolish so easily. Plenty of people that originally pirated material buy it later on.

I've never met any that do. The only games they buy are the ones they're forced to buy because of CD Keys.

Really, though, isn't this why developers release playable demos, also? Most games have playable demos that allow players to test out games before they buy them, so the need to warez the game to test it out isn't that much of a point, is it?

Yes, there are some that are freeloaders and will always pirate, even when there's no real reason for them to. If piracy was impossible on the pc platform, do you honestly think these people would then go out and buy games?

I think this is obviously the case. Look at the sales figures for games that have internet protection schemes, they've all sold well.

I think they'd just move to a platform where piracy was possible. If piracy was impossilbe on every platform, I wonder how many would be gamers/would have gotten into gaming in the first place.

Umm.. What? Piracy doesn't get people in to gaming, all it does it remove the profit from making games.

More central to the point i was trying to make though, if one of these guys has a warez copy of a game, the industry thinks this represents a sale lost: i think this person would never have bought the game, and so can't represent a sale lost.

Which is a bullshit argument because there's gobs of evidence to the contrary. NWN, Quake 3, and so on, games that have a good CD Key scheme with internet verification. These are the games that the people who typically warez their games actually buy. Why? Because they're FORCED IN TO IT.

Now, given those circumstances, I think it's rather hard to justify your position there that people wouldn't play games because they don't buy them.

If the industry wants to lessen the impact of piracy, one solution might be to loosen up return policies.

This is a Catch-22, because a lot of people just burn the game and return it. That won't help against piracy, because a lot of people out there do that. That's why retailers don't typically do returns any more. They lose money on it because of piracy as well.

Would you prefer a game that allowed you to play as a female but otherwise didn't distinquish between men and women(men and women being equal - including stat maxs and playing options), or one that did distinquish between the two (in stat maxs and as in fallout's prostitution options) but allowed more creative role playing?

Morrowind does this, basically. There are character starting differences between male and female per race, but beyond that, I didn't see any difference between male and female characters.

I'd much, much rather see some differences, frankly. It adds to replayability of the game. If the game has fundamental differences based on your character's gender and abilities, then that's a good thing because it adapts to who your character is.

Of course, this is largely a moot point if the game is a dungeon crawl, though, since it's more of a role playing type thing and dungeon crawlers are pretty light on the role playing thing.

One of the things torment did so well was to take consideration of stats in the dialogue choices, and even though it may be considered sexist, i'd rather see more of a similar consideration of sex in other games...I noticed Icewind Dale II did this on occasion(I noticed because the party leader was female) and though it stopped short of offering alternate solutions, it made for a better game.

I'm not sure Planescape: Torment is sexist just because the Nameless One is a male. That's rather silly, the story is about a man. So what? Is Tomb Raider sexist just because Lara Croft is female? What about Darkenned Skye? How about Bloodrayne?

Sure, you can argue that the women in these games are well endowed, but then again, so are the men in these games. There's very few games where the men don't fit some Greek ideal of how men should be, large chested, muscular, and so on. It's hard to claim sexism in this care where the protagonist lead persons are typically the ideal case regardless of gender.

 

[LeonX]

Okay here's the deal with the women in Arcanum:

There were never going to be dwarven women or Half Ogre women as playable races in the game. The decision for no Half Ogre women was story driven (you find out why there are no half ogre women in the game during one of the quests) and the no dwarven women was our not very humorous attempt at mocking the discussion of dwarven women amongst gamers (do they have beards? Where are all the dwarven women?). If you ask a dwarf in the game about dwarven women, they get upset with you. The only two female races that were originally planned and were then cut (for art space reasons) were gnome women and halfling women. Our data files might have listed women dwarves, for instance, but that was simply because a programmer cut and pasted a male list and changed it to a female list without thinking about it.

As far as no table of contents in the manual, we were as shocked as everyone else.

leonX

 

[Chadeo]

re: Piracy

I think that looking at the sales figures for a game with a "working" copy protection method vrs ones without one is not a true comparison. The only way you could claim that would be if you compared two identical games, one with "working" copy protection, and one without, that were released in two controlled environments. This is never going to happen though, so we do not know if the games you mentioned sold well because people liked the games, or if more pirates bought real copies.

In any case, I have 0 problems with anyone copy protecting their games as long as it does not impact the end user (I.E. break the game because the copy protection method has bugs in it).

If I was a publisher I would try to artificially release a game into the pirate channels with some kind of watermark in it, about four weeks before the official "gold" date. The final part of the game would be missing, or there would be some deliberate functionality missing from it. Then I would track it and get some real numbers. If they were small (like 1k or so) I would just ignore all copy protection and take the possible hit in sales. If the number were huge (100k) I would make real sure I had a very strong copy protection, but also release a demo.

I guess it is just me, but I find it very hard to think that a large percentage of people have access to high speed internet access, and the knowledge of the pirate ftp sites. I can see numbers in the thousands, but if you project 400k sales, then a few thousand is just advertising.

Also publishers should sell games for direct download at a 10$ or so discount. The download should be made available as soon as the "gold" date is hit. I suspect this is not done though because publishers have some kind of deal with the retail outlets. Still, this would cut out middlemen, and cater to the "must have it this second, so I will pirate it and buy it later...I promise" crowd.

Oh and full game released as a download is just as secure as a full game released on cd. I have yet to see any kind of "cd-copy protection" that does not have a quick and easy work around. All those things do is piss off legit buyers, who go and download the "no cd" patch.

Of course all of this has nothing to do with RPG’s in general ;P Though if some publishers actually did get hard numbers for how many pirated games were downloaded it would be interesting to see which types of games were pirated the most.

 

[Mistress]

If the industry wants to lessen the impact of piracy, one solution might be to loosen up return policies. Everyone hates buying a crap product, and if merchants were willing and able to accept a return on an inferior product it might go a long way to easing pirate mentality. There's few industries where one has to buy a product without getting an opportunity to test it/look at it in any form and then has no recourse if the product is faulty/doesn't meet their expectations.

There was an article in PCFormat here last year about return policies in stores and the fact that you could treat them as a games library service. I think HMV had the best one - a 30day no questions asked returns policy! SUPERB IDEA THERE! The lowest was Electronics Boutique with 10 days.

 

[Chadeo]

While I love it when a game reacts to me in a different way depending on what kind of character I play, each new option you add means a large amount of effort on the game programmers.

I have heard that one of the biggest problems with making a game that has many different paths in it, and many different responses, is that most people who play the game only see one path. I consider myself a fairly hard-core rpg player, but still I doubt I have seen each line of dialog in fallout or torment or arcanum.

I bet the argument goes something like this:

Designer "It will take us x days/months to add in this really cool evil female magic using elf only quest"

Publisher/Manager "What about the evil female human fighter quest?"

Designer "X days/months. plus x days/months of extra qa/test cases"

Publisher/Manager "Why not just spend that time adding this cool feature that I can add as a bullet on the back on the box instead?"

Designer "But I feel that the evil female magic quest would really add to the replay value of the game, not to mention the human-polymorphed-into-a-dwarf quests I have been thinking about..."

Publisher/Manager "Replay is good, but wouldn't it be better to spend time on something that will sell more copies, rather than just make our rabid fans even more rabid?

Designer "but.."

I think a good example of this would be the rouge like games, most (like nethack) have insane amounts of replay value. Still each time a new version comes out, I bet the same X people are the ones who play it. The number of new people attracted to the game just due to its replay value is very low.

Its probably a very hard balance to strike.

 

[Sharpei_Diem]

I've never met any that do. The only games they buy are the ones they're forced to buy because of CD Keys.

You've NEVER met anyone that originally used to pirate but the progressed into a purchaser? I'm not talking about getting a warez of a game and then buying the same game to play multiplayer (I think i would agree with you on that point: I doubt few people pirate and then buy the same game, excepting the need to for CD-keys, as you noted), but I'm talking of a longer-term trend where people begin to realize the advantages of purchasing.

Really, though, isn't this why developers release playable demos, also? Most games have playable demos that allow players to test out games before they buy them, so the need to warez the game to test it out isn't that much of a point, is it?

Many, but not all. And many demos are only available to those with high-speed connections - something not everyone has or has access to. Demos also frequently come out long after a game has been released (Warcraft 3).

Umm.. What? Piracy doesn't get people in to gaming, all it does it remove the profit from making games.

I disagree. I got my first system because a friend of mine could get me games. I couldnt afford it and begged my parents for a system, knowing i could get all the games i needed off of him.

People don't go out and buy a system for nothing: they have a reason. If they don't know a pirate, or how to get hooked up, they won't pirate. Have you tried going on to yahoo and searching for warez games? It's not an easy road...

Which is a bullshit argument because there's gobs of evidence to the contrary. NWN, Quake 3, and so on, games that have a good CD Key scheme with internet verification. These are the games that the people who typically warez their games actually buy. Why? Because they're FORCED IN TO IT.

You've also named some top games there. Maybe people buy them because they're good. If you have gobs of evidence, please post the links, because i've found it difficult to get good hard data on piracy (especially on one site). Actually any stats on video game/console sales would be good too

Now, given those circumstances, I think it's rather hard to justify your position there that people wouldn't play games because they don't buy them.

In the example i mentioned, i suggested that the industry automatically assumes that a person who has a pirated copy of a game would have bought that game if piracy was not possible: I don't think this is true. My general position is that the industry overstates the impacts of piracy, often blaming rampant piracy for lacklustre sales when the culprit is often a poor game, poor marketing, poor support or some other issue.

This is a Catch-22, because a lot of people just burn the game and return it. That won't help against piracy, because a lot of people out there do that. That's why retailers don't typically do returns any more. They lose money on it because of piracy as well.

That's true, but i think can be dealt with by requiring ID for returns. I bought Simgolf the other day and returned it (it gave me headaches whenever i tried to play it). EB took it back no problem, but wanted my info and i gave it. I think the threat of leaving a paper trail might be a good deterant.

Do you know if retailers buy their games (like stock), or is it more akin to magazines(where they return unused copies)? I'm not familiar with retail gaming.

I'd much, much rather see some differences, frankly. It adds to replayability of the game. If the game has fundamental differences based on your character's gender and abilities, then that's a good thing because it adapts to who your character is.

totally agree.

I'm not sure Planescape: Torment is sexist just because the Nameless One is a male. That's rather silly, the story is about a man. So what? Is Tomb Raider sexist just because Lara Croft is female? What about Darkenned Skye? How about Bloodrayne?

No, sorry, never meant to imply Torment was sexist. What I was trying to say is that Torment made extensive use of stats(including dex, str, int, chr and wis) to determine dialogue choices and it would be better if more developers used sex like torment used stats: to determine dialogue choices. Icewind Dale II did this..

Sure, you can argue that the women in these games are well endowed, but then again, so are the men in these games. There's very few games where the men don't fit some Greek ideal of how men should be, large chested, muscular, and so on. It's hard to claim sexism in this care where the protagonist lead persons are typically the ideal case regardless of gender.

But most of the men aren't in loincloths I don't find the skimpy attire given women to be sexist, only immature, and especially in an rpg setting, inaccurate (now, where's that +2 plate that exposes my cleavage and bikini line?) :wink:

 

[Sharpei_Diem]

Re: re: Piracy

If I was a publisher I would try to artificially release a game into the pirate channels with some kind of watermark in it, about four weeks before the official "gold" date. The final part of the game would be missing, or there would be some deliberate functionality missing from it. Then I would track it and get some real numbers. If they were small (like 1k or so) I would just ignore all copy protection and take the possible hit in sales. If the number were huge (100k) I would make real sure I had a very strong copy protection, but also release a demo.

I've thought of this too, and wondered why no ones' done it. I've also wondered how games get leaked in the first place, and why more isn't done to stop that kind of thing. When a game is readily available before it hits shelves, it's got to be someone in publishing or developing, right?

I guess it is just me, but I find it very hard to think that a large percentage of people have access to high speed internet access, and the knowledge of the pirate ftp sites. I can see numbers in the thousands, but if you project 400k sales, then a few thousand is just advertising.

Also publishers should sell games for direct download at a 10$ or so discount. The download should be made available as soon as the "gold" date is hit. I suspect this is not done though because publishers have some kind of deal with the retail outlets. Still, this would cut out middlemen, and cater to the "must have it this second, so I will pirate it and buy it later...I promise" crowd.

Good points. But your first point about access to high-speed access cuts into the second one. I have high-speed dsl, but i wouldn't be too thrilled about dling a 1 Gb game...

 

[Sharpei_Diem]

There was an article in PCFormat here last year about return policies in stores and the fact that you could treat them as a games library service. I think HMV had the best one - a 30day no questions asked returns policy! SUPERB IDEA THERE! The lowest was Electronics Boutique with 10 days.

I think 30 days would be begging for abuse, but i think 10 or 15 is reasonable. Not sure if you're being sarcastic with "superb idea there"... :D

 

[Spazmo]

I don't find the skimpy attire given women to be sexist, only immature, and especially in an rpg setting, inaccurate (now, where's that +2 plate that exposes my cleavage and bikini line?) :wink:

*Cough*NeverwinterNights*Cough*

 

[Sharpei_Diem]

Designer "It will take us x days/months to add in this really cool evil female magic using elf only quest"

I think that kind of thing is excessive. I find class specific quests to be kind of annoying. Icewind Dale II had a couple of them(one with a transmuter and one with a cleric of ilmater). I thought these were ok though mainly because it seemed more of a bonus than an actual quest.

What I think would be cool is something along the lines of

if player chr>14

if male

{if npc is female: positive response}
{if npc is low chr male, negative-response}

if wis <12
{if npc is high chr female: player smitten tree}

if female

{if npc is male: positive-response}
{if npc is low chr female, negative-response}
{if npc is high chr female, aggresive-esponse}

etc....

Actually, the thing i'm really dying for in an rpg is more dynamic, realistic environments. One of the bad aspects about most of the games using the infinity engine is their total detachment from what is happening(ie what the pc is doing). The pcs can go to the kobold lair a dozen times and every time they come back it's just how they left it. The dead guards aren't replaced, new traps aren't set, the king doesn't seem to be aware he's the last one remaining.

What would be cool is to have a tree of responses available depending on what the pcs did:

Guards dead, pcs leave the area: replace guards
10% of lair dead, pcs leave: survivors call for reinforcements(if lawful) or raid nearby town(if chaotic)
50% of lair dead, pcs leave: survivors build traps
75% of lair dead, pcs leave: monsters leave, pcs get quest completion notice when they return (but no treasure and no additional xp apart from completing the quest)
pcs come at night: most of lair sleeping(unless nocturnal)

 

[Chadeo]

Good points. But your first point about access to high-speed access cuts into the second one. I have high-speed dsl, but i wouldn't be too thrilled about dling a 1 Gb game...

Right, but if a publisher still did the normal best buy release, it would not matter if the online sales sucked.

Basically you get a higher profit margin on the online sales even if you only sell a few hundred that way.

See its funny, publishers say that piracy hurts their bottom line a lot, yet will probably also claim that no one would want to download their latest 20gig game. It can not be both ways ;P

I suspect that a company loses far more sales from a true pirate, someone who downloads the game, burns in on cds, and sells it for 10$. I just do not buy the idea of 100k l33t d00ds waiting 5 hours in an irc room to get on the temporary ftp server to download the 200 10 meg zip files (without sound and possible viruses).

Music artists might actually have 100k download their songs, but I just do not see it for anything larger than 10 megs (with current download technology).

Still I think the developer (not publisher) has every right to be pissed that even one person is such a big jerk that they want to play the game, but not pay the people who made it.

 

[Chadeo]

I think that kind of thing is excessive.

For a real unique response you need real, new, interesting dialog. Just changing a adjective, or a facial expression because the player meets some set criteria is not what I am talking about.

A real unique quest would need NPC's with custom dialog, possibly extra art and extra items, and yet another path that the QA team would need to test.

Again I am talking about doing it right.

I am still amazed at the amount of dialog in Planescape that you would never see if you played the game with a 9 int and 9 wis. Or if you never bothered to talk with your NPC's once they joined you. Or if you never went back to places after you gained the ability to speak with the dead. Or if you never joined X Faction. ETC

But yes I did exagerate in my example, still it is a balanacing game, and I am sure it is one that those who care only about sales (read Interplay Marketing Drones who do not know the first thing about games) see one way, and the developers making the game see another.

 

[Saint_Proverbius]

I think a good example of this would be the rouge like games, most (like nethack) have insane amounts of replay value. Still each time a new version comes out, I bet the same X people are the ones who play it. The number of new people attracted to the game just due to its replay value is very low.

That's one reason why I post Rogue-like news on this site, to draw more people in to what can can be done in terms of elaborate design work in dungeon crawlers.

You've NEVER met anyone that originally used to pirate but the progressed into a purchaser? I'm not talking about getting a warez of a game and then buying the same game to play multiplayer (I think i would agree with you on that point: I doubt few people pirate and then buy the same game, excepting the need to for CD-keys, as you noted), but I'm talking of a longer-term trend where people begin to realize the advantages of purchasing.

Do you mean like teenagers who warez, then eventually get jobs and start buying games because they have money? Yeah, I know a few like that. However, most of the people I know who warez are over 18, have jobs, and so on.

Like I said, they do it because it's easy and they don't feel like paying for something when they can just get it for free.

As for the argument about download speeds, I know a few people who warez games off 56k modems, as well.

Many, but not all. And many demos are only available to those with high-speed connections - something not everyone has or has access to. Demos also frequently come out long after a game has been released (Warcraft 3).

Right, like IWD2 doesn't have a demo for it. However, most do.

And honestly, the argument that people warez because demos are too large to download doesn't make sense. Most demos are 100MB or so, whereas ISOs can be three to four times that size, and there can be multiple CDs per game.

People don't go out and buy a system for nothing: they have a reason. If they don't know a pirate, or how to get hooked up, they won't pirate. Have you tried going on to yahoo and searching for warez games? It's not an easy road...

It doesn't take much searching to find warez FTPs, or a warez IRC channel.

You've also named some top games there. Maybe people buy them because they're good. If you have gobs of evidence, please post the links, because i've found it difficult to get good hard data on piracy (especially on one site). Actually any stats on video game/console sales would be good too

How about countries that sell bootleg CDs? Russia, Eastern Europe, Asian countries, and so on, it's common there.

With a CD Key, you can't just buy the bootleg and play online.

No, sorry, never meant to imply Torment was sexist. What I was trying to say is that Torment made extensive use of stats(including dex, str, int, chr and wis) to determine dialogue choices and it would be better if more developers used sex like torment used stats: to determine dialogue choices. Icewind Dale II did this..

It's been brought up before, your post just gave me a sequeway for that.

But most of the men aren't in loincloths I don't find the skimpy attire given women to be sexist, only immature, and especially in an rpg setting, inaccurate (now, where's that +2 plate that exposes my cleavage and bikini line?)

Nameless One was pretty naked. In Arcanum, there were skimpy clothes that fit both male and females.

However, if you're talking about games like NWN, where all the women's clothing was open in front, down to their belly buttons, than yeah.. I agree. That is silly.

 

[DarkUnderlord]

The only two female races that were originally planned and were then cut (for art space reasons) were gnome women and halfling women. Our data files might have listed women dwarves, for instance, but that was simply because a programmer cut and pasted a male list and changed it to a female list without thinking about it.

As far as no table of contents in the manual, we were as shocked as everyone else.

Ahhh... That makes sense then. Thanks for all of that LeonX. I hereby absolve Troika of all blame for the lack of contents page.

I hope you hunt down and shoot the people responsible though.

Good points. But your first point about access to high-speed access cuts into the second one. I have high-speed dsl, but i wouldn't be too thrilled about dling a 1 Gb game...

Then to solve piracy, make games bigger! Think about it, DVD sized games. 18 Gigs of game. No one in their right mind would download that. Even if they did, they'd have to back it all up. Of course, making an 18 gig game is another matter entirely...

For a real unique response you need real, new, interesting dialog. Just changing a adjective, or a facial expression because the player meets some set criteria is not what I am talking about.

A real unique quest would need NPC's with custom dialog, possibly extra art and extra items, and yet another path that the QA team would need to test.

Again I am talking about doing it right.

It's interesting to note that games like Arcanum (approx 3 years) and NWN (5 years) take a considerable time to make because they're making the engine/graphics and art at the same time. Now that games like Arcanum and NWN are made and the mod-tools exist for them, I'd love to see a team of 10 people spend 3 years working full time with the existing graphics and engines to make a really in-depth game. I often wonder what could be done when you don't need to spend time making the engine and graphics.

 

[Sharpei_Diem]

Basically you get a higher profit margin on the online sales even if you only sell a few hundred that way.

True, but they'd still have to pay for the bandwidth, and many can't even maintain the bandwidth for small 2-5 mb downloads.

I suspect that a company loses far more sales from a true pirate, someone who downloads the game, burns in on cds, and sells it for 10$. I just do not buy the idea of 100k l33t d00ds waiting 5 hours in an irc room to get on the temporary ftp server to download the 200 10 meg zip files (without sound and possible viruses).

Not to mention foreign countries where bootlegging isn't so much as given a second glance. Hong Kong comes to mind here, but i'm sure there's lots of places. I think cd sharing might be pretty large factor too...

 

[Sharpei_Diem]

I am still amazed at the amount of dialog in Planescape that you would never see if you played the game with a 9 int and 9 wis. Or if you never bothered to talk with your NPC's once they joined you. Or if you never went back to places after you gained the ability to speak with the dead. Or if you never joined X Faction. ETC

I know what you mean. I missed talking with the dead the first time round, and when i found out you could(through a forum), I just had to do it again....and I played it one final time to see if i missed anything else, but now just thinking about it, I never did get to read Fall from Grace's diary...

 

[Saint_Proverbius]

It's interesting to note that games like Arcanum (approx 3 years) and NWN (5 years) take a considerable time to make because they're making the engine/graphics and art at the same time. Now that games like Arcanum and NWN are made and the mod-tools exist for them, I'd love to see a team of 10 people spend 3 years working full time with the existing graphics and engines to make a really in-depth game. I often wonder what could be done when you don't need to spend time making the engine and graphics.

The Aurora engine that NWN uses was also used in MDK2, which was published back in May, 2000.

 

[Sharpei_Diem]

As for the argument about download speeds, I know a few people who warez games off 56k modems, as well.

lol....perhaps those people suffer enough for it :D

It doesn't take much searching to find warez FTPs, or a warez IRC channel.

But if you knew nothing of it? They might not even know enough to call it warez. And think of all the virus's they'll download before they even get the first file..

Nameless One was pretty naked.

Yeah, but he had skin like hardened leather...

 

[Spazmo]

The average guy who pops an AOL 8.0 disk into his brand new Dell "with super powerful Intel Pentium 4 processor" isn't going to start warezing, but if you're really interested, it isn't that hard to figure it out.