KickStarter Mechajammer (formerly Copper Dreams) - cyberpunk RPG from Whalenought Studios

[Grampy_Bone]

So your main reason you dislike them and probably won't give them another chance is because the end of their first major game was shit? How many games - let alone RPGs - have you finished that have good endings?

I've said this before, this is a specious argument. The lack of quality in other games doesn't excuse the lack of quality in any specific game. The existence of even one "good ending" invalidates the argument, which is why this always turns into a shitfest of disqualifying each other's examples. Since the answer is definitely more than zero, how many non-shit endings do I have to name to satisfy this metric? 10? 100? Just looking for a ballpark.

I don't think my standards are very high. I don't expect every game to have a brilliant story. I'm actually fine with little to no story at all. But SitS's was such an infuriating, hectoring, smarmy torrent of garbage; why should I give them my limited gaming time ever again, when there's so many other choices out there? I don't enjoy paying money for a game to tell me what a horrible person I am just for daring to play it; it's a pretty odd way to build a commercial entertainment product. It's the same problem I had with Spec Ops: The line.

I agree it's unfair to judge a game for what it's not trying to be. SitS wasn't trying to be a big budget AAA title so I won't fault it for say, not having voice acting. But it most definitely was trying to be a player-driven story-based roleplaying game with clear attempts to emulate the tabletop PnP experience, and on those grounds I think it's a disaster. If I ran a D&D campaign like Whalenought apparently does, I'd lose every one of my players forever.

 

[Lyre Mors]

I've said this before, this is a specious argument. The lack of quality in other games doesn't excuse the lack of quality in any specific game. The existence of even one "good ending" invalidates the argument, which is why this always turns into a shitfest of disqualifying each other's examples. Since the answer is definitely more than zero, how many non-shit endings do I have to name to satisfy this metric? 10? 100? Just looking for a ballpark.

I don't think my standards are very high. I don't expect every game to have a brilliant story. I'm actually fine with little to no story at all. But SitS's was such an infuriating, hectoring, smarmy torrent of garbage; why should I give them my limited gaming time ever again, when there's so many other choices out there? I don't enjoy paying money for a game to tell me what a horrible person I am just for daring to play it; it's a pretty odd way to build a commercial entertainment product. It's the same problem I had with Spec Ops: The line.

I agree it's unfair to judge a game for what it's not trying to be. SitS wasn't trying to be a big budget AAA title so I won't fault it for say, not having voice acting. But it most definitely was trying to be a player-driven story-based roleplaying game with clear attempts to emulate the tabletop PnP experience, and on those grounds I think it's a disaster. If I ran a D&D campaign like Whalenought apparently does, I'd lose every one of my players forever.

This is all fine and you are of course completely entitled to spend your time as you please. I just found it ridiculous to say you would never give a developer another chance because you were unsatisfied with the ending of their first game, which is what the initial post implied. Developers improve and develop their skills as they continue working on games, just as others decline.

 

[ArchAngel]

So your main reason you dislike them and probably won't give them another chance is because the end of their first major game was shit? How many games - let alone RPGs - have you finished that have good endings?

I've said this before, this is a specious argument. The lack of quality in other games doesn't excuse the lack of quality in any specific game. The existence of even one "good ending" invalidates the argument, which is why this always turns into a shitfest of disqualifying each other's examples. Since the answer is definitely more than zero, how many non-shit endings do I have to name to satisfy this metric? 10? 100? Just looking for a ballpark.

I don't think my standards are very high. I don't expect every game to have a brilliant story. I'm actually fine with little to no story at all. But SitS's was such an infuriating, hectoring, smarmy torrent of garbage; why should I give them my limited gaming time ever again, when there's so many other choices out there? I don't enjoy paying money for a game to tell me what a horrible person I am just for daring to play it; it's a pretty odd way to build a commercial entertainment product. It's the same problem I had with Spec Ops: The line.

I agree it's unfair to judge a game for what it's not trying to be. SitS wasn't trying to be a big budget AAA title so I won't fault it for say, not having voice acting. But it most definitely was trying to be a player-driven story-based roleplaying game with clear attempts to emulate the tabletop PnP experience, and on those grounds I think it's a disaster. If I ran a D&D campaign like Whalenought apparently does, I'd lose every one of my players forever.

If you compare SitS to a terrible PnP game, please don't ever try Age of Decadence. You will probably kill yourself.

 

[Grampy_Bone]

I just found it ridiculous to say you would never give a developer another chance because you were unsatisfied with the ending of their first game,

Why not? How else should I judge a developer other than by their past products? Past behavior is the best predictor of future behavior.

 

[Kyl Von Kull]

So your main reason you dislike them and probably won't give them another chance is because the end of their first major game was shit? How many games - let alone RPGs - have you finished that have good endings?

I've said this before, this is a specious argument. The lack of quality in other games doesn't excuse the lack of quality in any specific game. The existence of even one "good ending" invalidates the argument, which is why this always turns into a shitfest of disqualifying each other's examples. Since the answer is definitely more than zero, how many non-shit endings do I have to name to satisfy this metric? 10? 100? Just looking for a ballpark.

I don't think my standards are very high. I don't expect every game to have a brilliant story. I'm actually fine with little to no story at all. But SitS's was such an infuriating, hectoring, smarmy torrent of garbage; why should I give them my limited gaming time ever again, when there's so many other choices out there? I don't enjoy paying money for a game to tell me what a horrible person I am just for daring to play it; it's a pretty odd way to build a commercial entertainment product. It's the same problem I had with Spec Ops: The line.

I agree it's unfair to judge a game for what it's not trying to be. SitS wasn't trying to be a big budget AAA title so I won't fault it for say, not having voice acting. But it most definitely was trying to be a player-driven story-based roleplaying game with clear attempts to emulate the tabletop PnP experience, and on those grounds I think it's a disaster. If I ran a D&D campaign like Whalenought apparently does, I'd lose every one of my players forever.

You're missing the point. The ending is a small part of ANY game; therefore hating the ending (because it made you feel like they were judging you?) is a dumb reason to hate the whole game. Elex has a shit ending, I still very much enjoyed it. In fact, I would say that the vast majority of RPGs, even the vast majority of good RPGs, experience a major drop off in quality at the end. But twenty bad minutes at the end doesn't ruin the dozen of hours running up to it.

The ending =/= the game. It's not as silly as saying you hate a game for its inventory system, but saying you hate the ending is not at all equivalent to saying that you disliked the game in its totality.

For example, I haven't finished SitS, but so far I like it a lot. Even if the ending is terrible, I doubt that would ruin it for me. But maybe I'm just not an ending-fag.

 

[Lyre Mors]

Why not? How else should I judge a developer other than by their past products? Past behavior is the best predictor of future behavior.

Well...

You're missing the point. The ending is a small part of ANY game; therefore hating the ending (because it made you feel like they were judging you?) is a dumb reason to hate the whole game. Elex has a shit ending, I still very much enjoyed it. In fact, I would say that the vast majority of RPGs, even the vast majority of good RPGs, experience a major drop off in quality at the end. But twenty bad minutes at the end doesn't ruin the dozen of hours running up to it.

The ending =/= the game. It's not as silly as saying you hate a game for its inventory system, but saying you hate the ending is not at all equivalent to saying that you disliked the game in its totality.

For example, I haven't finished SitS, but so far I like it a lot. Even if the ending is terrible, I doubt that would ruin it for me. But maybe I'm just not an ending-fag.

This was along the lines of how I would have responded, but Kyl was in before like a champ.

 

[Kyl Von Kull]

This was along the lines of how I would have responded, but Kyl was in before like a champ.

 

[Zombra]

Pig pile on Grampy_Bone, I'm here to join the underdog.

What's really important about a game is what you remember about it. As an example, Vampire: Bloodlines had a crappy ending, yet it's not thought of as a bad game because that's not what we reminisce about when we think of it. If the first thing Grampy_Bone remembers is the horrible ending, and it poisons any fun he may have had along the way, he's perfectly justified in slagging the whole game for it. An ending may be a tiny part of a game, novel, movie, etc., but it's the final impression the author chooses to leave us with, and it does reflect strongly on their ability to tell a good story in the future.

That said, it does seem like this would be very easy for Whalenought to do differently with their second outing. "Never again Whaelnogut!!!! " is pretty extreme. Why not look at reviews, or even ask someone who's played it if they like the writing, before deciding whether to give Copper Dreams a try?

 

[ArchAngel]

Pig pile on Grampy_Bone, I'm here to join the underdog.

What's really important about a game is what you remember about it. As an example, Vampire: Bloodlines had a crappy ending, yet it's not thought of as a bad game because that's not what we reminisce about when we think of it. If the first thing Grampy_Bone remembers is the horrible ending, and it poisons any fun he may have had along the way, he's perfectly justified in slagging the whole game for it. An ending may be a tiny part of a game, novel, movie, etc., but it's the final impression the author chooses to leave us with, and it does reflect strongly on their ability to tell a good story in the future.

That said, it does seem like this would be very easy for Whalenought to do differently with their second outing. "Never again Whaelnogut!!!! " is pretty extreme. Why not look at reviews, or even ask someone who's played it if they like the writing, before deciding whether to give Copper Dreams a try?

I object to that. I loved Jack and Not Cain having a last laugh over the Prince blowing up into bits.

 

[Grampy_Bone]

If you compare SitS to a terrible PnP game, please don't ever try Age of Decadence. You will probably kill yourself.

Yeah well, here's what D&D has that SitS doesn't: Stealth, diplomacy, bribery, and player agency.

You're missing the point. The ending is a small part of ANY game; therefore hating the ending (because it made you feel like they were judging you?) is a dumb reason to hate the whole game.

I disagree. It would be one thing if the ending was just kind of bad or lackluster like ELEX, but SitS goes way beyond that. It invents a new kind of bad, one that passes the bad story event horizon and makes you unable to see any good in it ever again. For another example of this, see Mass Effect 3. I'd never be able to enjoy the parts of that game that are good again because I know what's waiting at the end.

To quote myself, "You can add a drop of wine to a barrel of sewage and its still sewage, but if you add a drop of sewage to a barrel of wine it all becomes sewage." SitS ending was a buttload of sewage vomited into the wine. I won't drink from the cask again.

I haven't finished SitS

Interesting. What's the over/under on him changing his tune once he finishes it? Anyone want to give me odds?

 

[Infinitron]

Why not? How else should I judge a developer other than by their past products? Past behavior is the best predictor of future behavior.

It isn't when the developer's past product was also the first full-scale RPG they ever made, and when their next one's fundamental design attributes seem to be different in every way. You're either trolling or are a strange person

Go read some Kickstarter updates, educate yourself.

 

[Ninjerk]

Why not? How else should I judge a developer other than by their past products? Past behavior is the best predictor of future behavior.

It isn't when their past product was also the first full-scale RPG the developer ever made, and when their next one's fundamental design attributes seem to be different in every way. You're either trolling or are a strange person

Well, he IS a Fallout 2 fan.

 

[Lyre Mors]

What's really important about a game is what you remember about it. As an example, Vampire: Bloodlines had a crappy ending, yet it's not thought of as a bad game because that's not what we reminisce about when we think of it. If the first thing Grampy_Bone remembers is the horrible ending, and it poisons any fun he may have had along the way, he's perfectly justified in slagging the whole game for it. An ending may be a tiny part of a game, novel, movie, etc., but it's the final impression the author chooses to leave us with, and it does reflect strongly on their ability to tell a good story in the future.

I cannot remember a single game I've completed where I enjoyed the ending or thought it was well done. It's almost always anti-climatic and pales in comparison to the rest of the game, and I've never thought a game was overall bad and irredeemable because of this. This is the main point I was making. Not sure I'd call it pig-piling.

 

[ArchAngel]

You're missing the point. The ending is a small part of ANY game; therefore hating the ending (because it made you feel like they were judging you?) is a dumb reason to hate the whole game.

I disagree. It would be one thing if the ending was just kind of bad or lackluster like ELEX, but SitS goes way beyond that. It invents a new kind of bad, one that passes the bad story event horizon and makes you unable to see any good in it ever again. For another example of this, see Mass Effect 3. I'd never be able to enjoy the parts of that game that are good again because I know what's waiting at the end.

You are just to obsessed with shitty details. Worst part of ME3 was all of it, the ending was just icing on top of a shit cake. The terrible corridor combat, senseless story, stupid NPCs and lack of almost any RPG elements from ME1 was what was bad with ME3.

 

[Grampy_Bone]

Why not? How else should I judge a developer other than by their past products? Past behavior is the best predictor of future behavior.

It isn't when the developer's past product was also the first full-scale RPG they ever made, and when their next one's fundamental design attributes seem to be different in every way. You're either trolling or are a strange person

Go read some Kickstarter updates, educate yourself.

Whalenought's response to the whole SitS ending fiasco was to say, "You're not playing your own character, you're playing a pre-determined god with his own motivations." Which is a pretty odd thing to say in a game that starts by specifically letting you choose your character's personality and motivations.

I also refuse to excuse this as an amateur mistake coming from a developer who introduces themselves in this fashion:

As your GM for this experience, we wanted to let you know what to expect and prepare for. Serpent in the Staglands is an adaptation of a pen & paper roleplaying experience for the computer, and is a module campaign within the world of Vol we've created.

So which is it, is this a game with player agency or not? They make it seem like it is, but it's not. "Dear players, your character's aren't yours, and we reserve the right to make (idiotic) decisions for them whenever we feel like it." I've made zero cRPGs but as a DM I've never made this kind of error. Shit, my tabletop players would quit before ever rolling ability scores.

 

[CyberWhale]

Whalenought_Joe why are the graphics becoming uglier with every further update? Did the clean high-res textures/low-poly models style we saw in the Kickstarter pitch video cause too many optimization problems? Or did it require to many man-hours to produce desirable results?

P.S. the color palette also seems to have changed a lot from the starting one (which was reminiscent of PSX titles like MGS and Vagrant Story) to something more flashy, cell-shaded and filled with neon lights.

EDIT: Or maybe I'm just wrongly perceiving things because those animated GIFS are low quality and/or show unfinished parts of the game.

Either way, I would like to hear an explanation.

 

[Zombra]

So which is it, is this a game with player agency or not? They make it seem like it is, but it's not. "Dear players, your character's aren't yours, and we reserve the right to make (idiotic) decisions for them whenever we feel like it." I've made zero cRPGs but as a DM I've never made this kind of error. Shit, my tabletop players would quit before ever rolling ability scores.

Disagree here. It's perfectly fine for the GM/dev to imbue the protagonist with as little or as much predetermined personality as they wish. "You are the murderer - you can be a jokester or a grimwad, but you're still the murderer. Make your character within those guidelines." When you play the game you accept these guidelines, complaining about them is dumb.

 

[Sensuki]

In other news, apparently the next internal build will be 'next week'. Been 9-10 months since the last one. Looks like lots of things have changed!

 

[gaussgunner]

lol at Grampy_Bone bitching about the ending of SitS. I never made it past the RTWP combat in the demo.

It seems like most devs never surpass their first or second game. Joe and Hannah definitely learned from their mistakes with SitS. On the other hand I fear they got too ambitious with Copper Dreams and may never finish fiddling with it. That's too easy when you're your own boss.

 

[Jrpgfan]

Hopefully this will release before The New World.

 

[ERYFKRAD]

As an example, Vampire: Bloodlines had a crappy ending, yet it's not thought of as a bad game because that's not what we reminisce about when we think of it. If the first thing

Bad endgame or bad ending?

 

[Black Angel]

I cannot remember a single game I've completed where I enjoyed the ending or thought it was well done.

Fallout 1.

 

[Grampy_Bone]

So which is it, is this a game with player agency or not? They make it seem like it is, but it's not. "Dear players, your character's aren't yours, and we reserve the right to make (idiotic) decisions for them whenever we feel like it." I've made zero cRPGs but as a DM I've never made this kind of error. Shit, my tabletop players would quit before ever rolling ability scores.

Disagree here. It's perfectly fine for the GM/dev to imbue the protagonist with as little or as much predetermined personality as they wish. "You are the murderer - you can be a jokester or a grimwad, but you're still the murderer. Make your character within those guidelines." When you play the game you accept these guidelines, complaining about them is dumb.

SitS doesn't tell you Necholai is a separate person with his own desires and motivations, it tells you he's a character you can shape and mold to your will with your decisions. The problem is the game's interpretation of your decisions is preposterous.

If I told players to make their characters fit into a certain setting or theme, that's one thing. Its quite another if I actively overrode their decisions and played their characters for them. Like they say, "I want to check the door for traps" and I say, "Oh your character wouldn't do that. You've been playing carelessly until now, so you have no right to decide to be cautious in this instance. You open the door without checking it and get hit by the trap." Running a game like that would elicit howls of protest from the entire table and get cans of Mountain Dew lobbed at me, but that's pretty much what SitS does at the end.

Here's a more spoiler-ish description:

Spoiler

It's one thing to say "your character has a bad past, play him accordingly." It's quite another to say, "Even though you've been a good guy this whole time, you're actually evil because you killed people once. Now you have to murder all your friends and side with the bad guy." It makes no distinction between aggressive violence and defensive violence. It just considers all killing the same. Somehow, Necholai is the only person in the entire Staglands with moral agency because he has "privilege," even though you're outnumbered in almost every fight and can be killed by a fox. All the thugs and murderers who hunt you down are actually poor helpless victims of society, even though they plunder the weak and helpless and they'll kill you without a second thought.

It's like saying Luke Skywalker is not only evil because he killed Imperials when he blew up the death star, but he also has to side with the Emperor and murder all his closest friends because one thoughtless act means he's on Team Evil forever. It really is that moronic.

On top of this, the game gives you no tools for actually avoiding fights; no stealth, no diplomacy, not even bribes. In fact the whole game is pretty much non-stop hack-n-slash until the end, when it suddenly calls you a monster for playing it how it's designed. Like you're actually just supposed to run from all the fights non-stop? Who does this? It boggles the mind.

Honestly I think the excuse "You don't control Necholai" is a post-hoc cop-out by the devs since pretty much all the documentation, ad copy, and general game design says the opposite.

 

[ERYFKRAD]

I cannot remember a single game I've completed where I enjoyed the ending or thought it was well done.

Fallout 1.

Bloody Mess player detected.

 

[Lyre Mors]

Bloody Mess player detected.

I should have said there are a minuscule amount of games that I've completed where I enjoyed the ending or thought were well done. Fallout 1's was one of the best, but still hardly the shining part of the game for me.