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

[Jasede]

In the last 5 minutes Feargus has simultaneously hedged his bets RE: the stamina/health system and the no XP for kills idea. Seems he isn't totally behind either.

Where? Source?

 

[General Maxson]

I just hope they put an achievable stretch goal, and not 4 million $. Something realistic, like 3 750 000 $.

 

[Arkeus]

Feargus has always seemed a bit more "traditional" than the other guys there, yeah (or at least his KS comments look like that).

 

[Stabwound]

It is odd that they didn't have something planned for 3.5m being reached. They're squandering some precious golds by leaving the last few hours without any feedback or anything.

 

[Aeschylus]

In the last 5 minutes Feargus has simultaneously hedged his bets RE: the stamina/health system and the no XP for kills idea. Seems he isn't totally behind either.

Where? Source?

KS comments...

Creator Obsidian Entertainment 8 minutes ago
@DeDawg I was on the fence about the Stamina / Health thing as well. My thought on it right now is that it is worth implementing (not a ton of work) and then we can see how it feels. If it doesn't feel good, then we will change or pull it.

Creator Obsidian Entertainment 12 minutes ago
@Adric The XP for kills thing is still an ongoing discussion here. Our goal is to make this a game that is reminiscent of the IE games and in my mind that does mean XP for kills. We just need to balance with other systems.

 

[Mrowak]

In the last 5 minutes Feargus has simultaneously hedged his bets RE: the stamina/health system and the no XP for kills idea. Seems he isn't totally behind either.

Where? Source?

KS comments...

Creator Obsidian Entertainment 8 minutes ago
@DeDawg I was on the fence about the Stamina / Health thing as well. My thought on it right now is that it is worth implementing (not a ton of work) and then we can see how it feels. If it doesn't feel good, then we will change or pull it.

Creator Obsidian Entertainment 12 minutes ago
@Adric The XP for kills thing is still an ongoing discussion here. Our goal is to make this a game that is reminiscent of the IE games and in my mind that does mean XP for kills. We just need to balance with other systems.

Oh Fergus. First you let your developers run amock throwing ideas left and right, and now you are going to pull them back. Clearly asking for a vision document was too unreasonable.

 

[Raygun_elf]

Feargus has always seemed a bit more "traditional" than the other guys there, yeah (or at least his KS comments look like that).

He's used to dealing with contracts as a CEO, probably why everything is "IE games" this and "IE games" that. They pitched a modern emulation of an IE game and feel obligated to deliver on that to the letter, so nobody is slighted by the end result. Or so I think.

 

[Jasede]

It was probably a spur of the moment thing for them. "Hey, wouldn't it be cool if..."
That said that's a bit of a damper for me.

 

[Jaesun]

The combat and systems are going to go through a number of iterations, until they land on something they feel is good for the game.

Just like every game ever made.

 

[Captain Shrek]

The combat and systems are going to go through a number of iterations, until they land on something they feel is good for the game.

Just like every game ever made.

By Obsidian. In 18 months. With a 11 level dungeon and 2 big cities. Sounds about right.

 

[l3loodAngel]

I am :declining:

It is a new project that still being built. If something won't work they will have to axe it. I thought that was clear?

 

[Mrowak]

It was probably a spur of the moment thing for them. "Hey, wouldn't it be cool if..."
That said that's a bit of a damper for me.

Bro, you asked me earlier why I asked for a plan? There you have it! So that

1) They cannot backpeddal on their promises.
2) They know what they are trying to make - because at this point from Fergus's comments alone it is evident they don't yet have clue what they are making.

 

[Esquilax]

I just hope they put an achievable stretch goal, and not 4 million $. Something realistic, like 3 750 000 $.

Personally, I'd rather they just spend any money earned after this stretch goal to polish the game up. Really, even with the roughly ~$3.7 million that this campaign will probably finish with, a lot of fees are going to eat into the funding. Kickstarter + Amazon take a 10% cut right off the bat, and those physical rewards are also going to cut into the budget as well. The net total after all that should be around $3 million.

Infinitron, IIRC, you posted the total amount that the Double Fine Kickstarter had remaining after it was finished. If it was you, could you post it again? I can't seem to find it here.

 

[Infinitron]

1) They cannot backpeddal on their promises.

Is that necessarily a good thing? What if their promises suck?

Infinitron, IIRC, you posted the total amount that the Double Fine Kickstarter had remaining after it was finished. If it was you, could you post it again? I can't seem to find it here.

Wasn't me.

 

[Captain Shrek]

1) They cannot backpeddal on their promises.

Is that necessarily a good thing? What if their promises suck?

Then it's betrayal of trust. But I am biased. And I can live with a CERTAIN amount of backpedaling I personally deem useful.

 

[Mrowak]

1) They cannot backpeddal on their promises.

Is that necessarily a good thing? What if their promises suck?

If they thought them through and put it in a proper plan they wouldn't suck.

You see, here is the problem: you think that they can make every promise in the world and then axe it when they feel like it or transform it into something which wouldn't consume so much resources (e.g. 11 level dungeon of boring or DA2-like "tactical "combat consisting of mobs swarming at you).

I say that before making the promise they should have an idea how it is going to work in their game, how they will connect it with other game elements and how to make them *fun*.

Naturally in my approach, it's all concept works and there's bound to be playtesting and tinkering and *changing* (as opposed to removing) ideas to ensure that they are fun. As it is it's wild west.

One of the profound problems of Obsidian and Bioware games is that they are full of features that do not go well together. Why I think this is the case? My hypothesis (indeed, I may be wrong) it that someone came up with the ideas first, did all the work, consumed resources, and then - after all the effort and money wasted - discovered that with all those ideas implemented separately there's now way for them to integrate them together to form *fun* experience.

This is a very touchy subject form me I will explore in detail in the upcoming article for the 'Dex.

 

[IDtenT]

The pledging have pretty much stalled.

 

[Jasede]

What are you talking about? It made almost 30K in the 80 minutes. That's a lot, especially if it keeps up like that.

 

[Infinitron]

The pledging have pretty much stalled.

 

[IDtenT]

What are you talking about? It made almost 30K in the last hour or so.

There could be more with a proper target.

 

[Haba]

Well, what do you expect? It is at about 3,6 million DORRAHS and there are no new stretch goals.

 

[Jasede]

Sometimes I just have to wonder with you guys.

 

[IDtenT]

The pledging have pretty much stalled.

YOUR STATISTICS LIE.

 

[LeStryfe79]

The pledging have pretty much stalled.

 

[Haba]

I love the fact that obsidian KS account had no projects backed when they started and now they are at 17...