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

[Blaine]

Yes, Your Grace. Let's see, four pages arguing over some concept art, and... where were we? Right, Sawyerism and people with learning disabilities.

Ultimately, I visualize this issue as a spectrum:

At one extreme, there are people like me who've been playing tabletop RPGs for decades, who've been playing cRPGs for decades, who'll read the game manual for fun, and who will probably be able to master the game even in absence of a manual or "disguised tutorials" of any kind, without relying on crutches such as save scumming.

At the other extreme, you have the impatient, oblivious, Johnny-come-lately casual gamers who won't read the manual, may not fully absorb the tutorials (however they're implemented), and will get buttravaged if their party of gnome priests can't beat a dragon by virtue of mashing buttons.

It's a conflict of interest, really. There's no way to completely please both groups. I will say that there should be a well written and extensive manual, that the game itself should be tightly designed, and that a few tutorials of some kind may not be out of order. I'll even go so far as to condone a "retard toggle" for those closer to the casual end of the spectrum who need compasses, quest markers, dialog tags, easier difficulty and so on. They have to get their funding from somewhere.

In this way, 2/3-3/4 of players should be fairly satisfied, and the other 1/4 will have the retard toggle if needed. I still wish P:E would go full-on Realms of Arkania tier, though.

 

[Hormalakh]

^ I can live with that.

 

[TwinkieGorilla]

But i guess Twinklie must get any ego boost he can.

Bro, you're ignoring me, remember?

 

[tuluse]

I thought the point of kickstarter was that they didn't have to appeal to Joe 6-pack.

Edit: though with modern UIs, I see no reason for traditional manuals. I did just fine with Baldur's Gate and Fallout without ever looking at a manual. All you need are tool tips, and a civilopedia-esque help system where you can look up information about anything in the game.

 

[Blaine]

I see you haven't skimmed a wide sampling of the Kickstarter backer comments, tuluse.

Neither have I, because I know exactly what's there and I don't want to see any of it.

 

[tuluse]

I sort of thought that these old school developers wouldn't either, and would just make games with the same design principals as they used to use before appealing to the lowest common denominator was the only way to get publisher money.

 

[bminorkey]

There's no way to completely please both groups.

Trying to please any kind of majority is a mistake, and excessive pandering will quickly turn the game into a retconned mess. This is exactly why publishers suck. They got the funding to make a game with certain features, and within these confines they should work only to please themselves. You know these guys are perfectly capable of making a good game, and really they know more and have thought more about gaming than any of us. More importantly, they have access to the design documents and know the effects of a given feature on the rest of the game. We don't. If they're given the reins and the end-result sucks, it'll be because the team itself sucks, and no amount of pandering will fix that.

 

[Hormalakh]

Some of the things I've read Josh say has had me worried that he will appeal to Joe 6-pack. Sometimes I think he sees a lot of gamers as Joe 6-pack and feels sorry for them. I could be wrong though, and I sincerely hope that I am misunderstanding him.

 

[Infinitron]

There are different levels of "Joe 6-pack". There's the RPG playing "Joe 6-pack" and there's the general population "Joe 6-pack" who is even dumber. AAA publishers try to appeal to the second type.

 

[SwiftCrack]

free joe 6-pack

 

[TwinkieGorilla]

This thread is now about Joe 6-pack.

*discuss*

 

[Roguey]

ITT a bunch of people think a bunch of other people who bought/played/enjoyed the Infinity Engine games didn't unnecessarily struggle with them at times.

Quick example: Adam fucking Brennecke.

 

[Hormalakh]

I think that some struggling is necessary. But at the same, reducing the unnecessary (who is to say what this is) by intuitive design can be better.

 

[Lord Andre]

A bunch of people are intellectually inferior to another bunch of people. I'd rather play a game that makes me feel stupid than play a game that makes me feel smart.

 

[Roguey]

Fortunately this thing will have an expert mode with separate toggles for each feature, three difficulty modes that change enemy composition, and a path of the damned toggle that loads all three difficulty mode enemies at once.

 

[Hormalakh]

It's not always about "modes." If the high-level design philosophy of Sawyer is that people shouldn't struggle, where does it end? It will affect mechanics. There can't possibly be toggles for every single thing out there. "We'll have toggles for buffs and mechanics that actually interact with one another."

This whole idea that mechanics should be completely separate from one another is just another symptom of the of complexity. These things should take brain cells to figure out.

Toggles has become the new go-to. It's ridiculous. Instead of working on so many toggles, let's make more content for those of us who can RTFM. And then let's teach the rest of the people how to play. I have no problems with teaching the novice player. But let's not just "toggle" it off for them. It's like they're babies and can't figure it out for themselves. Frankly, if I was a novice in these games, I'd be offended.

 

[Arkeus]

It's not always about "modes." If the high-level design philosophy of Sawyer is that people shouldn't struggle, where does it end? It will affect mechanics. There can't possibly be toggles for every single thing out there. "We'll have toggles for buffs and mechanics that actually interact with one another."

Except Sawyer's philosophy isn't that people shouldn't struggle, it's that the struggle shouldn't be made in such a way that it forces a majority of players to hate the game. E.G, have ways for the person who made very big mistake in the early game because he was a noob (but got better in the next twenty hours) to not have to ragequit when he realizes he messed up something Important TM.

You'd have to really squint at things and TRY to read it as something different to read it as "They shouldn't struggle".

 

[GarfunkeL]

Struggle is good. Challenge is good. If they really have all those difficulty options, then I won't complain. Yet.

 

[Hormalakh]

It's not always about "modes." If the high-level design philosophy of Sawyer is that people shouldn't struggle, where does it end? It will affect mechanics. There can't possibly be toggles for every single thing out there. "We'll have toggles for buffs and mechanics that actually interact with one another."

Except Sawyer's philosophy isn't that people shouldn't struggle, it's that the struggle shouldn't be made in such a way that it forces a majority of players to hate the game. E.G, have ways for the person who made very big mistake in the early game because he was a noob (but got better in the next twenty hours) to not have to ragequit when he realizes he messed up something Important TM.

You'd have to really squint at things and TRY to read it as something different to read it as "They shouldn't struggle".

Since when is not making mistakes an issue? People have been rage-quitting for the lamest of reasons since the invention of popamole. As long as the "something important TM" isn't game-breaking, people should learn to live with their mistakes. If they want to rage-quit because their character isn't "just right" that takes away from the other players who don't want a "dumbed-down game."

This is the problem with games today: we as gamers expect to have certain emotions triggered by video games. Those warm fuzzy (and sometimes lustful) emotions are all that gamers enjoy. Who said that frustration and coping with loss aren't important feelings that we shouldn't have, even in a game? Devs should allow us to feel a dynamic range of emotional feelings and these include frustration, anger, helplessness.

We should make those mistakes, live with them, and if the game is good enough, play again keeping those mistakes in mind. We shouldn't give players a "there there little fella" card everytime they (even a majority of them) start to feel "owwies."

This is especially true for a game like P:E where money isn't the main issue: it's a work of love. Pumping gamers with dopamine-induced ego-stroking is understandable when you're trying to sell games to the Doritos-crowd. But a game that is meant to invoke "mature" thoughts and emotions shouldn't shy away from making its gamers feel more than one emotion.

 

[Zed]

People should be ridiculed for playing on easy modes.

Easy should be called Pussy-ass faggot mode. To turn it on, you'd have to go into Options and select it and answer a series of questions like "are you sure? playing on pussy-ass faggot mode makes you a pussy-ass faggot", "are you sure you even want to play this game? perhaps you should make your wife a sandwich instead", etc. In-game, monster will be renamed. Instead of "Goblin", you'd get "Mongoloid Goblin". Instead of "Highwaymen" there would be "Incompetent buffoons", etc. The gameworld should reflect how much of a bad player you are, and how dumbed-down the game is to accommodate this fact.

The default should be the core rules, as Sawyer himself would play it, with Hardcore mode being optional.

 

[Hormalakh]

Thank you Zed. That's actually exactly how I feel. Why should "normal" be easy? Easy should be easy.

Edit: Frankly I'm tired of the difficulty creep that's been going on in games. The hardcore gamers should feel comfortable, and the easy-gamer crowd should feel the discomfort. Make your games for the hardcores first, then put in an "easy mode" for the casuals. Don't do it the other way. Don't start easy and make "hard" an afterthought.

Don't put in a fucking quest compass and then base your quests off of that. Put in your quests without the compass, then fucking give the :baby: a fucking compass. And make sure he knows that nap-nap is at 10 AM.

 

[procrastinator]

 

[Hormalakh]

^ God my blood is boiling whenever I think about this ... This shit really pisses me off.

In the ONE PLACE where making mistakes should be OK - FUCKING VIDEO GAMES - where SHIT DOESNT AFFECT YOUR LIFE, we don't even want to allow it there. You should be fucking learning some fucking thing from your fucking game. Anything. God damn it.

So tired of these motherfucking popamoles and these wanna-be hardcore popamoles...

 

[Sam Ecorners]

No fist is Bro enough for that comic strip.

 

[hiver]

can you newfags turn the experience a bit down?
there are people around here who are trying to think, you know...