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

[coffeetable]

I think we'll get two big cities, but a) one will be much larger than the other and b) neither will be on par with Athkatla (which was ridiculously huge, content-wise)

 

[Grunker]

I don't recall them promising an Athkatla. That made up half of a huge game. By big city, I always thought they meant something like Baldur's Gate. But that + wilderness areas is already quite the mouthful.

 

[coffeetable]

I don't recall them promising an Athkatla. That made up half of a huge game. By big city, I always thought they meant something like Baldur's Gate. But that + wilderness areas is already quite the mouthful.

They didn't promise it, it's just Athkatla is the first thing to mind when someone says "big city in an RPG".

Looking at this table-breakin' map, which one d'you guys think the second city will be? We know the game stays in the Dyrwood & Eir Glanfath, so no Vailian cities are on the cards. My guess is The Court of Bowing Ashes, with elven and Orlan tribes living in an ancient ruin of a city, because that's the starkest contrast to Defiance Bay you could hope for.

 

[weresheeple]

Baldur's Gate and Athkatla are big cities. Spanning multiple large maps with a ton of interiors, characters and quests, big cities are a lot of fun. Like strongholds, they also take a lot of work to do well. We're going to have one big city in Project Eternity. Would you like two? If you take us on an exciting adventure to $3.5 Million, we will take you on an exciting adventure to another big city.

Taken from the Kickstarter project page. Sure, they don't explicitly say "our cities will be as big and content dense as Athkatla" but they shouldn't be that much smaller.

 

[tuluse]

I'm glad they promised 2 big cities.

1 huge city in an expansive area that should clearly have more always feels unnatural. Like Arcanum with every city feeling unfinished compared to Tarant.

 

[Grunker]

I don't recall them promising an Athkatla. That made up half of a huge game. By big city, I always thought they meant something like Baldur's Gate. But that + wilderness areas is already quite the mouthful.

They didn't promise it, it's just Athkatla is the first thing to mind when someone says "big city in an RPG".

For you, maybe. I think of Baldur's Gate. Athkatla is its own beast entirely.

Baldur's Gate and Athkatla are big cities. Spanning multiple large maps with a ton of interiors, characters and quests, big cities are a lot of fun. Like strongholds, they also take a lot of work to do well. We're going to have one big city in Project Eternity. Would you like two? If you take us on an exciting adventure to $3.5 Million, we will take you on an exciting adventure to another big city.

Taken from the Kickstarter project page. Sure, they don't explicitly say "our cities will be as big and content dense as Athkatla" but they shouldn't be that much smaller.

What an odd statement. Then I suppose they're only taking about the number of screens. Baldur's Gate and Athkatla are pretty comparable there.

 

[Grunker]

I'm glad they promised 2 big cities.

1 huge city in an expansive area that should clearly have more always feels unnatural. Like Arcanum with every city feeling unfinished compared to Tarant.

I think Baldur's Gate's Baldur's Gate + settlements did a pretty good job of this balance. Two major hubs + a bunch of wilderness seems... well, I hope they make it.

 

[weresheeple]

Let's just hope that Obsidian are aware that if they half-ass their cities and other content but actually go all out with that mega dungeon, most of their backers would probably agree that it would have been better to put that effort into the rest of the game instead, even if it would just mean that the two cities would have gotten 15 extra dungeon levels below their different districts. Just to make those places seem more complete. I certainly don't want this game to go Storm of Zehir on us with lots of cities and dungeons that are all just one room and one quest giver/encounter.

 

[GarfunkeL]

Agreed, that was my main gripe with SoZ - cities and dungeons being so tiny.

 

[Roguey]

Since Josh loves Darklands so much it'd be funny to me if they took its abstracted menu approach to cities/towns/villages.

 

[coffeetable]

Agreed, that was my main gripe with SoZ - cities and dungeons being so tiny.

Will these do?

Also, Kaz did three concepts for areas in Defiance Bay, so I'm guessing it has three areas.

 

[GarfunkeL]

Yeah, those will do.

 

[imweasel]

Tis Antville or Anthausen. How lovely.

 

[Ninjerk]

Ant...werp

 

[Space Satan]

Well, josh specificly said that BG and Athkatla were extremely disbalanced in terms of content and they intend to prevent stuffing big cities with the majority of content in the game.

 

[Jedi Exile]

So 'two big cities' will be something like Nashkel and Beregost lol.

 

[Sensuki]

I think we'll get two cities with multiple large sized areas with moderate amounts of content. The two big cities will cut into the amount of world map content we get though.

 

[Infinitron]

Well, josh specificly said that BG and Athkatla were extremely disbalanced in terms of content and they intend to prevent stuffing big cities with the majority of content in the game.

I think he says that just about Athkatla, not Baldur's Gate.

 

[Rake]

Well, josh specificly said that BG and Athkatla were extremely disbalanced in terms of content and they intend to prevent stuffing big cities with the majority of content in the game.

I think he says that just about Athkatla, not Baldur's Gate.

That. He said that the pacing in BG2 was off, with Chapter 2 being half of the game itself. Athkatla has too much content compaired to the rest of the game. So my guess is something along the lines of Athkatla with less content(Baldur's Gate) and that missing content will be relocated in other areas, maybe at different chapters of the game.

 

[Sensuki]

The PC is not from the Dyrwood or Eir Glanfath. My assumption is that you will probably 'arrive' at Defiance Bay first (perhaps by boat lol? IWD2?), though I hope I am wrong because I do like starting out in a village or whatever first because then arriving at a city is more spectacular because of the difference in physical and content size.

 

[Mantic]

The PC could discover he is related to some long-gone Dyrwood nobility, and has inherited the "Stronghold" (which is now a long-abandoned ruin) by a letter, tempting him to travel to this land.

 

[Space Satan]

The PC could discover he is related to some long-gone Dyrwood nobility, and has inherited the "Stronghold" (which is now a long-abandoned ruin) by a letter, tempting him to travel to this land.

And if he is a furry or other nonhuman freak of nature? In PE races cannot interbreed so I guess you'll earn stronghold one way or another.

 

[Mantic]

The PC could discover he is related to some long-gone Dyrwood nobility, and has inherited the "Stronghold" (which is now a long-abandoned ruin) by a letter, tempting him to travel to this land.

And if he is a furry or other nonhuman freak of nature? In PE races cannot interbreed so I guess you'll earn stronghold one way or another.

Good point

 

[Sensuki]

I actually thought you were joking Mantic, lol.

 

[Sensuki]

Did P:E have some Private backers? I only heard rumors, wasn't aware if it was true.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_most_successful_crowdfunding_projects

Fantasy role-playing video game. Succeeded Double Fine Adventure as the highest funded Kickstarter video game. Was succeeded by Torment: Tides of Numenera in April 2013. Including private backers, the project raised over $4.5M.