Interview Project Eternity Interview @ Irontower

[felipepepe]

Yeah, I always remenber how my brother used to gloat on how he beated Kangaxx using one mage and 5 enraged orcs...

 

[Jasede]

Also why did you play Dragon's Age? You are the decline. =/

It's a very good game, you should play it. If you have any interest in P:E, you'd likely enjoy it. P:E is shaping up to be somewhat of a combination between the IE games and DA in my opinion.

I can't tell if this is a joke.
If it is, it's very tasteless.
If it's not I pray your opinion is completely wrong.

(My point is that if the game were anything like Dragon's Age it's going to be terrible; the incarnation of everything I can't stand.)

 

[felipepepe]

Aren't you mistaking DA1 with DA2 Jasede?

 

[Grunker]

Also why did you play Dragon's Age? You are the decline. =/

It's a very good game, you should play it. If you have any interest in P:E, you'd likely enjoy it. P:E is shaping up to be somewhat of a combination between the IE games and DA in my opinion.

I can't tell if this is a joke.
If it is, it's very tasteless.
If it's not I pray your opinion is completely wrong.

(My point is that if the game were anything like Dragon's Age it's going to be terrible; the incarnation of everything I can't stand.)

If DA is the incarnation of everything you can't stand and you perceive the IE games as masterful, you should get your priorities straight in my opinion

That said, I was edging for a response with the way I formulated my post, but I do maintain that DA is a good game and the P:E is going not going to be a pure IE-game, but a game that seems to utilize certain aspect of Dragon Age's mechanics (though in the case of the HP-system, they might utilize a surperior version of those, which I certainly wouldn't be against).

You are right that DA did some things differently compared to the IE-games and it ended up being a worse game for it on most fronts where it introduced modern mechanics, though. That doesn't make it horrid however. In my opinion the IE games were masterful, and a game that is worse is not necessarily shit.

 

[Jasede]

Correct me if I'm wrong but DA 1 is supposed to be an actiony RPG with poor encounter design and Bioware-style writing, right? (Which explains why I've never tried it.)
Having any of these elements in PE would ruin it for me.

I don't know what the difference between 1 and 2 are, only that 2 is reviled even by fans of 1.

 

[Grunker]

Correct me if I'm wrong but DA 1 is supposed to be an actiony RPG with poor encounter design and Bioware-style writing, right?

The combat is no more action-y than the IE games.

The encounter design is not as good as the IE games, but it is better than the Codex gives it credit for. The enemy diversity is, however, very lacking in comparison to BG2. But BG2 might be one of the best games ever in terms of enemy diversity. Ignore allegations of trash combat - I don't know what that is about. Avoid this game on account of trash combat only if you disliked the amount of combat in BG2 and Wizardry 8. It has less trashfights than both these games.

In terms of writing, it tries to accomplish much, much more than Baldur's Gate did, and that's the only reason it fails. The writer simply didn't have the skill to pull of the level of seriousness he wanted to. In a way it is more fulfilling than BG because, well, BG didn't really attempt to do a lot and was very honest about what it was, but in the end the writing is not nearly sufficient for the scope it has. However, there are also small parts that are really, really good. The Dwarf culture is excellent, perhaps one of the best takes on dwarves ever. I can recommend starting with one of the Dwarf-origins. Ultimately though, I care little about the writing. If it's good, it adds much to the game for me. If it is bad, I dismiss it as a nuisance, unless the game is completely centered around it. DA is kind of a mediocre middle-way.

In the end, DA is not so different from BG/BG2, it is just worse in many areas, and better in very few. General diversity is lower, exploration is horrible, but the key part, combat, is very enjoyable, and it has decent character customization.

If Baldur's Gate and Baldur's Gate 2 are great games, DA is a good or quite OK game, depending on how you look at it. Have you read Vince's review? I don't agree completely with it, but it should give you an idea of what the game is about and how it plays.

 

[felipepepe]

DA1 is better than NWN, that's for sure...

 

[suejak]

Some players may simply not want to fight certain enemies or they might want to peacefully resolve a conflict.

"Some players might just, you know, want to." I.e. some players might want to LARP.

Look at this guy. He doesn't even know what he himself means by this word. JE is saying the game will give you feedback for peacefully resolving a conflict, etc. You're still calling this LARPing because you assume combat will give you more shit. You are directly contradicting yourself across threads. You are such a confused little man, and you suck at my language. Jesus Christ.

 

[Grunker]

DA1 is better than NWN, that's for sure...

That doesn't say much at all though

suejak: You're not even worthy of a reply at this point.

 

[felipepepe]

DA1 is better than NWN, that's for sure...

That doesn't say much at all though

The default codexian reaction is NWN=meh ; DA=OMG, ABOMINATION, KILL IT WITH FIRE!

The "Made by BioWare" defintly weights a lot more on how people judge the later...

 

[Alex]

Eh, at least NWN had a lot of fun options to try out. Sure, they didn't mean a thing in the end, and all that those prestige class brought to the table is thousands of fiddly options that didn't make a difference. But all DA supposedly had going for it was a little bit of C&C to its story, but what use is that when you can't bring yourself to care for the story in first place?

About the XP issue. I still think having handling out only quest XP makes the game more linear and boring. Similar to allowing the PCs to regenerate between fights so you don't have rest issues. I would much rather have resting and XP harvesting have different consequences in the game than to normalize everything so players can't break the game. Sure, this can allow for even more exploitation. But in the end, I feel it makes for a more complete, interesting game. Besides, I think people are more likely to play along as they should if the game suggests therright consequences, even if a few border cases allow for exploitation, than when the game avoids it all with abstract, straightforward but boring systems.

 

[Jasede]

I may give it a shot in the future then. I mean, I gave Jade Empire a fair shake despite our biases and got a fair bit of enjoyment out of it. (Finished it, even.)

And NWN is pretty great for the engine; it gave us many great P&P-like Persistent Worlds. Not many other games can say that. Though the campaigns were terrible, of course. And the combat is lackluster and boring at best.

 

[Grunker]

Yeah I was speaking about the OC. The Hex Coda was a mod that made the purchase worth it for me, plus I toyed a little bit with my own (very shitty) mods which was enjoyable enough.

 

[felipepepe]

Besides, I think people are more likely to play along as they should if the game suggests therright consequences, even if a few border cases allow for exploitation, than when the game avoids it all with abstract, straightforward but boring systems.

This is very relevant; if Sawyer wants player to have the non-combat skills so badly, just make them feel relevant, ffs! Fallout is a great example in this, even before starting the game you knew it might be a good idea to have some points in those non-combat stuff...

Good cRPGs tend to have great replay value, if they make a 100% combat focused party, but percieve they are missing many non-combat oportunities through the game, they will be inclined towards trying to mix a bit next time (or even start the game again). The "give them all the tools" is almost what AAA+ developers is saying with "we want every player to experience everything on their first playthrough"...

 

[roshan]

After trying SCS2, I get what Josh is trying to say about combat and DND mages. It's integral for combat to be able to be resolved in multiple ways, combat should be something that engages one creatively, not where you need to memorize what spells counter which ones and then cast those spells in rote order whenever you end up in combat with a wizard. Make fights challenging, but let people figure out their OWN way to win the battle, that's much more fun and rewarding.

 

[Anac'raxus]

About the rewarding combat vs. rewarding diplomacy. Why couldn't they just keep track of the loot/experience value of the mooks/bosses, and give out a reward for diplomatic solutions that's equal to the value of the experience/loot you'd get if you were to slaughter everything? They'd need to think of ways to prevent players from backtracking and slaughtering everything after they got the diplomatic reward, or give them a hit to their reputation, of course, but I don't think it would be that hard if they actually develop the game with balance in mind from the start of the project.

Also, I wouldn't make it impossible to steal quest rewards, but I would make that hurt your relations with factions in a way that can't be fixed easily, if anyone sees you using the stolen item. Balance through consequence, not through restricting choice. It would imply more scripting and more bugs to squash, but that's a necessary trade-off for deep RPGs.

We haven't discussed conversation skills as much as reputation mechanics. To me, conversation is one of the primary means players have of defining the type of person they are playing in the world. Instead of a heavy emphasis on conversation skills, I would rather allow players to behave in a variety of ways and develop robust reputation systems to react to those choices throughout the game. I think it's more interesting to allow a person to select diplomatic responses and develop a reputation for being a diplomat than to level up a Diplomacy skill and pick the Diplomacy option when it's unlocked for you.

Like DA2?

I do want to try a Sawyerist game that's not burdened by D&D rules simulation or publisher demands, but I wouldn't want the entire genre to be defined by one.

 

[Grunker]

Why couldn't they just keep track of the loot/experience value of the mooks/bosses, and give out a reward for diplomatic solutions that's equal to the value of the experience/loot you'd get if you were to slaughter everything?

They could, but they're not ackknowledging that they will.

Mr. Sawyer said:

We haven't discussed conversation skills as much as reputation mechanics. To me, conversation is one of the primary means players have of defining the type of person they are playing in the world. Instead of a heavy emphasis on conversation skills, I would rather allow players to behave in a variety of ways and develop robust reputation systems to react to those choices throughout the game. I think it's more interesting to allow a person to select diplomatic responses and develop a reputation for being a diplomat than to level up a Diplomacy skill and pick the Diplomacy option when it's unlocked for you.​

Like DA2?

Indeed, that's what it sounds like. This was pretty much exactly how DA2 and similar diplomacy-systems (like TW2) was marketed).

 

[Jasede]

Really not on-board with the no-dialogue skills idea. Dialogue skills can work well, just look at the trial in NWN 2. The simple key to it is that the dialogue skill option shouldn't be the auto-win option but instead just be that: another option which may have different outcomes from the other ones, some better, some worse. (Though generally slightly better, of course.)

 

[Infinitron]

DA2 did not track reputation. It tracked your character's personality.

 

[Grunker]

just look at the trial in NWN 2.

You mean the one where your successes and failures have no consequence but comes down to just another battle?

 

[tuluse]

I've seen both "RPGs must have dwarves" and "RPGs must not have firearms" on the OE forums during the Kickstarter drive, so it's not fake at least.

(Yes, I'm excluding Volo)

Especially with stuff Sawyer likes to talk about, you need to really see the nitty gritty to be able to tell for sure. E.g. his answers to #4 and #6 at this stage can't really tell us anything.

Yeah I remember the no guns crowd, they seemed fucking stupid to me.

Sawyer is a kind of gamist extremist, basically. And that's interesting - I'm not necessarily against it. I'd like to see where that approach can take us.

What I fear may be true however, is that the only reason his design approach does not end up creating utterly soulless games is because it is buttressed by Obsidian's excellent writing talent.

My problem with Sawyer is his insistence that all skills be equally useful and equally useful throughout the game. I think that leads to homogenous design that feels very bland. Like in Fallout: NV, too many doors were openable by lock picking or hacking. It made them feel like the same skill. The fact that all weapons skills were equally viable also made choosing one type feel like a cosmetic choice rather than a gameplay choice, and killed a sense of character progression.

I'd like to marginalize the speech skills into the dust bin, personally.

Going to agree with you on this Roguey. Dialog in cRPGs needs to be overhauled completely.

 

[FeelTheRads]

DA2 did not track reputation. It tracked your character's personality.

Did it have any meaning at all?

Having a skill and making of use of it is RPG. Choosing dialog options and getting some useless values to increase or decrease is.. I don't know... LARPing?

I think that leads to homogenous design that feels very bland.

BUT THE AGONY OF CHOIEC!!!!!! WHAT TO CHOOSE BASH HEADS IN OR SET THEM ON FIER! THE CHOICES ARE MINDBLOWING!!!!!!

 

[Jasede]

I can sort of understand what FTR means here. There's nothing more RPGy than making a speech or social skill check. Not having them is... strange.

But, I'm sure what he means is that they want to go the Torment route and have dialogue puzzles. Actually, I'm not sure...

 

[Alex]

Really not on-board with the no-dialogue skills idea. Dialogue skills can work well, just look at the trial in NWN 2. The simple key to it is that the dialogue skill option shouldn't be the auto-win option but instead just be that: another option which may have different outcomes from the other ones, some better, some worse. (Though generally slightly better, of course.)

Also, I think dialogue skills must be worked on as something challenging, instead of simply a skill option in dialog. For example, suppose you have the intimidate skill. Most games have the equivalent of, in a table top game, saying "I intimidate him". Having the ability of intimidation doesn't mean that you just use it, like if it was a mmorpg skill with a cooldown and a mana cost. ou need to figure how you intimidate a person. What is he afraid off? What does he value most? What kind of setting do you use to make your threat? Are you overt? Do you imply more than you actually say? Do you show your strength in your threats?Depending on who you are intimidating, who you are, and what consequences you are willing to stomach, the answer should be different.

In this way, dialog skills can become an actual part of the gameplay. You would need to find more about an NPC before you cna really threaten him. And if you don't know enough about him, you might end up in an undesired situation. Push someone's buttons too far, and they may surprise you. Make a covert threat to someone dull, and they may ignore you, while a very overt threat to a weak noble may leave him a useless pile of nerves. People frequently suggest some abstract combat like gameplay for conversations, but I find this can be really bad, as having fleshed out conversations is usually where you flesh out characters and convey the mood of the setting. Instead, I think an adventure like gameplay, where you have to explore, use your skills and try to get into the character's heads to understand how they think would fit very well here.

 

[Infinitron]

DA2 did not track reputation. It tracked your character's personality.

Did it have any meaning at all?

There were one or two quests where it could alter the outcome. Mostly it was just flavor, though.

You could tell that VA was the one thing Bioware didn't go cheap with in that game. Probably because they had plenty of talent already available and on their payroll from TOR.