Obsidian's Pillars of Eternity [BETA RELEASED, GO TO THE NEW THREAD]

[Xor]

So, what ever happened to the additional stretch goals? Last I heard they put up a poll and then seemed to forget about it.

 

[Shadowfang]

Usually soloying an archer means you are either shooting or running away, and its specially the former in RT.
The animal companion is an easy fix. Your ranger doesn't have to run away, since his beefy companion is tanking for him.
I expect we are going to see dire wolves and bears and such as the most common options and the days of the trusty raven resting on your shoulder may be long gone.

 

[Infinitron]

So, what ever happened to the additional stretch goals? Last I heard they put up a poll and then seemed to forget about it.

My guess is they'll put the game on Early Access and then use the money from that for those stretch goals. I don't think there's much point in trying to launch a publicity campaign to start gathering money for those goals now when it'll be so much easier to gather it on Steam in N months time.

 

[Dorateen]

The quoted post responding to Monte Carlo got me thinking. How come there were more AD&D computer role-playing games produced than 3/3.5 edition? And 4th edition... what a joke of failure that was, not even a single one. ("Neverwinter" Online does not count.)

 

[Ravel myluv]

So we won't be able to level up past level 12 on this game?

 

[Infinitron]

The quoted post responding to Monte Carlo got me thinking. How come there were more AD&D computer role-playing games produced than 3/3.5 edition? And 4th edition... what a joke of failure that was, not even a single one. ("Neverwinter" Online does not count.)

Because the Decline of RPGs and PC Gaming coincided with 3E's heyday

 

[Gord]

The quoted post responding to Monte Carlo got me thinking. How come there were more AD&D computer role-playing games produced than 3/3.5 edition? And 4th edition... what a joke of failure that was, not even a single one. ("Neverwinter" Online does not count.)

I don't really know much about the issue, but I would guess it's a mixture of things:
1) computer games at the time of AD&D where probably faster and cheaper to produce
2) at the time of 3/3.5, the rpgs had some sort of renaissance, which however didn't last very long
3) licensing issues - I think there was some rather long legal battle between WotC and Atari?

 

[tuluse]

The quoted post responding to Monte Carlo got me thinking. How come there were more AD&D computer role-playing games produced than 3/3.5 edition? And 4th edition... what a joke of failure that was, not even a single one. ("Neverwinter" Online does not count.)

Sometime after NWN2 was made, the DnD video game license went into lawyer hell. Atari owned some right, Hasbro owned others. They couldn't come to an agreement to produce a game with both their names on it.

Even NWN2 has problems being sold online. I think it's currently not on Steam even though it was in the past.

 

[Dorateen]

The quoted post responding to Monte Carlo got me thinking. How come there were more AD&D computer role-playing games produced than 3/3.5 edition? And 4th edition... what a joke of failure that was, not even a single one. ("Neverwinter" Online does not count.)

Because the Decline of RPGs and PC Gaming coincided with 3E's heyday

Legal issues, which tuluse pointed out, aside, this is more what I was getting at. One might view the coincidence as a bit of an indictment against the latter editions.

 

[Infinitron]

The quoted post responding to Monte Carlo got me thinking. How come there were more AD&D computer role-playing games produced than 3/3.5 edition? And 4th edition... what a joke of failure that was, not even a single one. ("Neverwinter" Online does not count.)

Sometime after NWN2 was made, the DnD video game license went into lawyer hell. Atari owned some right, Hasbro owned others. They couldn't come to an agreement to produce a game with both their names on it.

Even NWN2 has problems being sold online. I think it's currently not on Steam even though it was in the past.

That doesn't explain why there were no D&D games between NWN1:HotU and NWN2, though.

I blame the decline of RPGs and also the fact that WotC's management are a bunch of incompetents like so many other PnP license holders.

 

[tuluse]

What's the full list of 3/3.5E games?

IWD2, NWN, ToEE and NWN2 are what I know of.

That is similar to PS:T, BG, BG2, IWD. The big difference is that 2E also had the goldbox era and the two Dark Sun games. 2E basically had two "eras" of games while 3E had one.

 

[Gord]

That doesn't explain why there were no D&D games between NWN1:HotU and NWN2, though.

I blame the decline of RPGs and also the fact that WotC's management are a bunch of incompetents like so many other PnP license holders.

There have been premium modules, though.
And I guess that Atari didn't want to share the licence...

 

[Infinitron]

That is similar to PS:T, BG, BG2, IWD. The big difference is that 2E also had the goldbox era and the two Dark Sun games. 2E basically had two "eras" of games while 3E had one.

It's not just that, though. That first group of games all came out in the space of a mere three years! And don't forget that they had expansions too, so don't count MotB, etc, as separate games to inflate 3E's count.

EDIT: To be fair, there is a certain 3E game that you forgot to mention.

 

[Dorateen]

Pool of Radiance: Ruins of Myth Drannnor.

But on the AD&D side, there are also the Eye of the Beholder trilogy and the Ravenloft games. That brings up another point. AD&D gave us multiple and varied campaign settings. With 3E, it was all Forgotten Realms! More adventures like the one Greyhawk exception would have been welcome.

 

[deuxhero]

What's the full list of 3/3.5E games?

IWD2, NWN, ToEE and NWN2 are what I know of.

That is similar to PS:T, BG, BG2, IWD. The big difference is that 2E also had the goldbox era and the two Dark Sun games. 2E basically had two "eras" of games while 3E had one.

Dungeons and Dragons Tactics for the PSP. It's OK. REALLY short though and very much feels half-finished all the way around (No multiclassing, weird ass menu controls, among other issues). It actually includes Psions and Psionic Warriors among the playable class, which is nice. Runs fine on PPSSPP if you want to try it.
Dungeons and Dragons: Eye of the Beholder for the GBA. It's a weird 3.0 blobber tactics (I think. The one battle I got into no one moved and I couldn't figure out how to use the move command. Could just be pure blobber) hybrid with only 4 classes. Haven't played much of it, so can't tell you much about it. Apparently it is a remake of PC blobber by the same name.

 

[tuluse]

Dungeons and Dragons Tactics for the PSP. It's OK. REALLY short though and very much feels half-finished all the way around. No multiclassing among other issues). It actually includes Psions and Psionic Warriors among the playable class, which is nice. Runs fine on PPSSPP if you want to try it.
Dungeons and Dragons: Eye of the Beholder for the GBA. It's a weird 3.0 blobber tactics (I think. The one battle I got into no one moved and I couldn't figure out how to use the move command. Could just be pure blobber) hybrid with only 4 classes. Haven't played much of it, so can't tell you much about it. Apparently it is a remake of PC blobber by the same name.

That's how goldbox games were. Exploration in first person, combat in tactical 3rd person.

 

[deuxhero]

Weird is more in reference to the 3.0 rules and their implmentation (it's the only adapation I've played that actually included "intuit direction" as a skill, which everyone seems to have acknowledged was a stupidly narrow skill that could easily fit into some of the other, very broad, skills.). I think its the only modern cRPG that requires rolling for stats and doesn't even give the option for point buy.

 

[Infinitron]

You might as well mention D&D Online.

I think what may have happened is that WOTC allowed four traditional 3E D&D PC games to be commissioned and among them only NWN was close to being a real financial success and two were bugfests. I guess that dampened their enthusiasm for finding a more competent publisher than Atari to produce more such games. They eventually tried again with Obsidian and that wasn't such a big hit either by the standards of the time.

Obsidian may have fucked up the chances of a mid-2000s D&D revival by messing up that game. Such a shame.

Dungeons and Dragons Tactics for the PSP. It's OK. REALLY short though and very much feels half-finished all the way around. No multiclassing among other issues). It actually includes Psions and Psionic Warriors among the playable class, which is nice. Runs fine on PPSSPP if you want to try it.
Dungeons and Dragons: Eye of the Beholder for the GBA. It's a weird 3.0 blobber tactics (I think. The one battle I got into no one moved and I couldn't figure out how to use the move command. Could just be pure blobber) hybrid with only 4 classes. Haven't played much of it, so can't tell you much about it. Apparently it is a remake of PC blobber by the same name.

That's how goldbox games were. Exploration in first person, combat in tactical 3rd person.

More on the GBA EoB here: http://www.hardcoregaming101.net/eyeofthebeholder/eyeofthebeholder2.htm

The originals were pure blobbers with no tactical combat.

 

[tuluse]

IDW2 and ToEE were pretty cheap, I imagine they were happy enough with the results. While NWN2 got two expansions funded, so it couldn't have been too poor a showing.

 

[Roguey]

So we won't be able to level up past level 12 on this game?

That's not a bad thing. The more levels there are, the harder it is to balance. More importantly, that's already a massive amount of work when it comes to designing abilities and talents for all 11 classes.

Since XP rewards are scripted and not systematic it shouldn't be too difficult for them to balance those rewards so that getting all the XP you possibly can won't put you too much above level 12.

 

[Infinitron]

While NWN2 got two expansions funded, so it couldn't have been too poor a showing.

Not too poor, no, but I got the impression the expansions were more of a "let's recoup our investment from the people who already bought the original game" thing then a "let's sell even more copies of this hugely popular game!" thing.

 

[deuxhero]

I'm pretty in favor of a cap you reach without trying TOO hard in games with limited experience. It prevents "degenerate behavior" of trying to squeeze every bit of blood you can from the XP good.

 

[Ravel myluv]

So we won't be able to level up past level 12 on this game?

That's not a bad thing. The more levels there are, the harder it is to balance. More importantly, that's already a massive amount of work when it comes to designing abilities and talents for all 11 classes.

Since XP rewards are scripted and not systematic it shouldn't be too difficult for them to balance those rewards so that getting all the XP you possibly can won't put you too much above level 12.

Good point about balance, but leveling up is such a feel-good moment in RPGs that I feel a bit sad we'll only get it 11 times in what promises to be an around 50 hour RPG.

 

[Roguey]

Good point about balance, but leveling up is such a feel-good moment in RPGs that I feel a bit sad we'll only get it 11 times in what promises to be an around 50 hour RPG.

The level cap in BG was even lower and I understand it was pretty easy to hit fairly early if you tried to be a completionist.

 

[Arkeus]

Good point about balance, but leveling up is such a feel-good moment in RPGs that I feel a bit sad we'll only get it 11 times in what promises to be an around 50 hour RPG.

For levelling, more is less. There is a reason that BG/BG2 are still favorites, and that's partly because they are both 50+ hours games where you gain around 9 levels each.

Gaining a new level should be a great moment, not a "i got one a hour ago" thing.