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

[canakin]

For fucks sake people are asking for that cunt Felicia Day.

She was fine in NV

What do you want? For the game to be a complete sausage fest?

Yeah, I would take that over an annoying lesbian bitch rambling about dresses and shit any day.

 

[skuphundaku]

Really I don't get you guys. Now you're complaining that there's only 5 companions? For fuck's sake mates, it really sounds like you expected Project X to be Wasteland 2 redux - an old school tactical TB RPG.

It isn't. It's a BIS/Obsidian/Troika game. Which means, first and foremost:
- Focus on storyfaggotry, which will be pretty sweet, and not on combat, which is liable to end up a steaming turd (really, think about it, this never had anything to do with publisher intervention - Obsidian and Troika suck at combat systems, with the notable exception of TOEE)

- Companions as central pieces of the story, developed a whole lot more than any other NPC, with probably 20% of all dialogues being with one of the party members. That's really so fundamental I don't even. Given that, would you srsly expect there to be 20 available party members to fill 4 slots? Really?

Now if you're cool with these things, then great, you'll probably enjoy the game. If you don't like them, then you're not really an Obsidian/BIS fan anyway, so why the heck are you reading this thread in the first place? Did you also spam the Double Fine thread about how you hate point&click adventures?

I was hoping that it wasn't going to be a fantasy game. We're up to the gills in fantasy games, so just another fantasy game, with a AD&D-like system most likely, isn't going to knock anyone out of their socks... unless it's something really PS:T-like, which I doubt it will be. I was hoping for a non-fantasy setting with a classless system (of which there are enough of royalty-free ones to choose from), but I guess I was being too optimistic.

 

[Commissar Draco]

See a few warning signs will donate after they're cleared:

1) Using Steaming pile of shit as platform and hence Copy Protection... this one can be fixed by Corsair Harbor Modders.

2) RTWP... Pity but as someones said earlier Obsidian combat always sucks and their game appeal was story faggotry... which brings greatest obstacle:

3) Gay High fantasy Celtic/Tolkien Setting and what Some pointed that Game will be New Biowhoren like PC.... which would be fun if I could just never pick trannies/furries and have cool squadmates like HK-47 Handmaiden, Cass and Boon instead.... but with only 5 choices it can be difficult. BTW I wander if putting all females in burkah will be inclusive and tolerant for some.

 

[made]

Uh, MCA didn't draw the jewgold troll himself? Meh.

 

[TalesfromtheCrypt]

Really I don't get you guys. Now you're complaining that there's only 5 companions? For fuck's sake mates, it really sounds like you expected Project X to be Wasteland 2 redux - an old school tactical TB RPG.

It isn't. It's a BIS/Obsidian/Troika game. Which means, first and foremost:
- Focus on storyfaggotry, which will be pretty sweet, and not on combat, which is liable to end up a steaming turd (really, think about it, this never had anything to do with publisher intervention - Obsidian and Troika suck at combat systems, with the notable exception of TOEE)

- Companions as central pieces of the story, developed a whole lot more than any other NPC, with probably 20% of all dialogues being with one of the party members. That's really so fundamental I don't even. Given that, would you srsly expect there to be 20 available party members to fill 4 slots? Really?

Now if you're cool with these things, then great, you'll probably enjoy the game. If you don't like them, then you're not really an Obsidian/BIS fan anyway, so why the heck are you reading this thread in the first place? Did you also spam the Double Fine thread about how you hate point&click adventures?

Well, Lumpy nailed it. Mask of the Betrayer had 5 companions and it was great. Planescape had 6 companions. It just menas that the companions will be well developed and propably be central pieces of the story. Just like in almost any other Obsidian/BIS rpg.

 

[Roguey]

The low number of companions and classes makes me happy because it means they're exercising scope control. I don't want another Arcanum. Saying "game sucks, only has X number of Ys" is ridiculous when you have no idea how in-depth the Ys are.

Also Dullsville: Eterntiy is gonna need some proper tags. I'm thinking "gender done right, incredibly mediocre, neckbeard land, rape trigger warning, shoo straight folks, whitey needs not apply, women positive"

People who say that 'any tb, even arcanum's' would be better than any RTWP are out of their fucking minds, period.

I agree with this with the caveat that good tb>good rtwp always.

 

[DraQ]

I haven't read this thread (tl;dr) and I don't care what retards at SA think. What I want to know is an answer to the question I always ask when a new game looms on the horizon - "why should I care?".

Ok, game being developed by BIs/Troika/Obsidian crew with complete creative control (and not being South Park or popamole attempt at spy thriller) is a partial answer to that question, but I want something of more substance - what makes this game different from all those similar games I've played, what's special about it, why should I care about its fantasy world, characters or story, why good people at Obsidian chose to make this game in particular and so on.

I know I can reasonably expect the game to be awesome, at least in the aspect of story and atmosphere, but I still have no clue regarding *what* it's going to be - terms like isometric merely describe interface details, and fantasy can range between Mieville's Bas-Lag cycle and Oblivion's turdlet polished by repeated cycle of swallowing and regurgitation.

I still don't know what fucking game is Obsidian making!

I agree with this with the caveat that good tb>good rtwp always.

If( Homeworld || Myth ) return false;

 

[evdk]

I am pretty sure you will not get any sort of answer to that because they are trying to cast a wide net and any specifics might scare off potential marks supporters.

 

[Roguey]

Like it or not, but there is a reason why a game like Baldur's Gate 2 in its time was considered a HIT and Arcanum a miss and it's not piracy. In fact, none of Troïka's games succeeded in the market, for various reasons, with each games flaws unrelated to the other apart from the common thread of releasing rather buggy games, with their last being the worst in the bug dept. (And holy mother of god, how dog slow it was to boot. VTMB on the average computer of its time was one of the worst pain in the ass I ever had every time I loaded a new area. Fuck.)

In that recent Codex interview Tim Cain said all their games made a profit, even Bloodlines. Just not enough of one, and I'm sure not fast enough either.

I thought what killed Arcanum was the fact that it was really a bad game with an atrocious gameplay.

Yeah, it's always funny to me when people say "This game would have succeeded if the publisher had successfully tricked a bunch of people into buying their bad product sight unseen!" Market forces, bitches.

 

[kaizoku]

You guys are taking the "stretch goals" way too literally. The game doesn't have a design yet. It's not like they have a solid plan and they're modifying it based on how much money they get. It's just a way to keep that money counter rising.

Yeah. I mean One More Companion. Okay... uh... so how many are there initially?
These stretch goals don't really tell me much unless I know what's there already.

That said, more funding = more stuff. More stuff is positive, regardless.

Only watched the video have you

1.1 million, Base Goal – Achieved!
Base game includes three races, five classes, and five companions. We have ideas for these, but we want to hear your opinions on what you'd like to see. Stay tuned to Kickstarter, our website, and our forums to join in on the conversation.

Maybe female and male will have at least some attributes differences, like males having more strength and constitution, and women having more charisma, for instance, that would make more sense.

I'd like to see something similar to this as well.
I never understood why no game has ever implemented this positive discrimination.
It just make character and party composition more interesting.

1) Only 5 companions. That means you need to take them all with you if you have a 6 person party. Worked in PS:T but that was a RPG unlike any other.

BG1 had 25 companions
BG2 had 17 companions
Can anyone tell me the budget for these games?

Anyway, my guess is that that maybe this will be a RPG unlike any other as well.
They're probably going for detailed characterization of each NPC and don't want to make then unbalanced.
Having 6-10 detailed NPCs and a poll of low characterized "mercenaries" would please both player factions.

The party size is a very pertinent question.
I'd love for a party of 6 characters... but I can manage with a party size of *teeth cringe* 3 if I have to.

2) Only 5 classes. Unless there are 'kits' like BG this limits the diversity of the party and NPCs. Best option is like Diablo with skill paths to differentiate the players. Oh joy.

Classes are an illusion in most cases. Mostly a LARPer thing. How many of class proponents then ask about multi-classing?
You can do as well with skills and perks, without having the artificial constraints classes impose you.
I'm surprised they even went with classes.
http://www.rpgcodex.net/forums/index.php?threads/class-based-vs-skill-based-character-syetems.32803/

3) They are not even man enough to call it a stronghold. They call it a house. Maybe we can have tea parties there.

Depends on how they implement it. BG2 pocket plane was pretty cool IMO.

4) They say companions can stay relax at said house. This implies a crappy 'camp' mechanic, small party sizes and shitty everyone gets XP even if they are not in the active party.

And do you think relaxing and decorating the house will be the focus of the game?
They are just selling their fish at the bigger audience, that likes that type of thing.

5) The whole soul crap is gong to be incredible gay (no offense Jaeson). Without knowing anything about it besides it having something to do with the magic system I can tell it's going to be a forced construct.
6) The magic system is going to be stupid. You see it involves souls!

The whole soul thing is kind of cheesy, kind of reminiscent of my little pony. But if you think about magic as your life force, where each time you use it you'll get older or the like, is not that silly at all.

We simply need more information on character mechanics at this point.

My stance on this project is basically this. They have the best people in the RPG game industry. I believe they can pull a really great game. So I'm going to put my chips on it.
If this ends up in a miserable game... I'll never buy another RPG again.

Bitching on the codex won't do much (yeah I know, this was what the codex was invented for). But it might be more productive to make intelligent posts on Obsidian's forums and the project's comment page on KS, and educating other people while at it.

 

[evdk]

Fuck, the Obsidian servers are like rollercoaster ride. Did they set them up themselves or what?

"This game would have succeeded if the publisher had successfully tricked a bunch of people into buying their bad product sight unseen!" Market forces, bitches.

But that is all that the publishers are doing nowadays and quite successfully too.

 

[Dexter]

Yeah, I don't exactly get the companion thing either, Icewind 1+2 didn't have any companions but just a pregenerated party and that was pretty good, although it wasn't exactly a storyfag game.

 

[DraQ]

I am pretty sure you will not get any sort of answer to that because they are trying to cast a wide net and any specifics might scare off potential marks supporters.

Lack of specifics can also make potential marks supporters fairly apathetics towards their goal.

Apathetic people don't shout excitedly to shout up and take their money.

 

[evdk]

DraQ
I guess they are banking on the "OMG BAULDERS GAET" sentiment and prefer the people to build up their own ideal project in their minds and then sell them this dream without ruining it too much with specifics. You should notice people are already bitching about the companions issue.

 

[Lumpy]

Maybe female and male will have at least some attributes differences, like males having more strength and constitution, and women having more charisma, for instance, that would make more sense.

I'd like to see something similar to this as well.
I never understood why no game has ever implemented this positive discrimination.
It just make character and party composition more interesting.

Uh, because if you have a pool of extra attribute points you can assign anyway, it makes no difference what the initial values were.

It would've made sense in a system like NWN2's, I guess, where the farther you increased an attribute from the base value the more points it cost. But then, it would have simply meant that a male fighter would be stronger than a female one, and a female sorcerer better than a male one. Which would've been rather pointless ultimately.

Given that attribute points are limited for the sake of game balance only, I don't really see anything wrong with a player character female being as strong as a male, so long as this isn't typically the case in the game world. Like AoD does it, that is.

 

[skuphundaku]

I am pretty sure you will not get any sort of answer to that because they are trying to cast a wide net and any specifics might scare off potential marks supporters.

You also have to take into account that if they don't come to their senses with their shit stretch-goals, DRM and general lack of information, the people that flocked to Project Infinity during the first day may start withdrawing pledges. It's been more than half a day since they hit the initial goal and they received only, roughly, $150k in pledges... after over $1M the previous 24h. That's a big fucking drop.

 

[Infinitron]

It's been more than half a day since they hit the initial goal and they received only, roughly, $150k in pledges... after over $1M the previous 24h. That's a big fucking drop.

A big fucking drop which has happened after the beginning rush of EVERY KICKSTARTER EVER.

And EVERY time, people still say it's because "the developers fucked up".

 

[Freelance Henchman]

Wow, what the fuck happened to SA. o_O

 

[Oesophagus]

Funny how the Biodrones think that pledging on kickstarter gives them some sort of right to dictate what the game has to be like.

 

[made]

Funny how the Biodrones think that pledging on kickstarter gives them some sort of right to dictate what the game has to be like.

Unlike the Codex, you mean?

 

[evdk]

Wow, what the fuck happened to SA. o_O

Goons happened.

 

[skuphundaku]

It's been more than half a day since they hit the initial goal and they received only, roughly, $150k in pledges... after over $1M the previous 24h. That's a big fucking drop.

A big fucking drop which has happened after the beginning rush of EVERY KICKSTARTER EVER.

And every time, people still say it's because the developers fucked up.

So you don't agree with the statement that that drop is because of the shit stretch-goals and the lack of an official statement saying that there is going to be a DRM-free version?

 

[Don Peste]

- Focus on storyfaggotry, which will be pretty sweet, and not on combat, which is liable to end up a steaming turd (really, think about it, this never had anything to do with publisher intervention - Obsidian and Troika suck at combat systems, with the notable exception of TOEE)

Majestic exception of TOEE.

Bah, give the game to Tim! You read the interview, he would do just fine!
Or let him make an old-fashioned expansion!

 

[Curious_Tongue]

Yeah, it's always funny to me when people say "This game would have succeeded if the publisher had successfully tricked a bunch of people into buying their bad product sight unseen!" Market forces, bitches.

I remember New Vegas marketing. They went to lengths to hide the fact the game wasn't a derped piece of shit.

First time I've been happy to be fooled by marketing.

 

[Infinitron]

So you don't agree with the statement that that drop is because of the shit stretch-goals and the lack of an official statement saying that there is going to be a DRM-free version?

There would have been a huge fucking drop no matter what they did.

Maybe it would be slightly less huge with better stretch goals. Maybe not.