sawyer wants rpg to evolve

[Infinitron]

Josh seems like a numbers guy. I have a hard time believing he'd strip out character customization and builds. I think when he says rpg's can be more 'fluid' he is saying the underlying stats can be present but shoved under the hood.

I don't think he personally wants those things. I think this panel, if anything, was early PR for Tim Cain and Leonard Boyarsky's AAA RPG, which will do those things.

In recent interviews, when asked about the games he'd like to make, Josh has always said 1) Turn-based historical RPG and sometimes 2) Turn-based tactical Pillars of Eternity spinoff.

When he's talked about making a Skryim-like game, it's been when saying "Feargus really wants to make a first person open world Pillars RPG" - almost always taking care to mention Feargus, I've noticed.

Folks are drawing too many conclusions from this one shitty summary of a panel they haven't watched, as if Sawyer ripped off the mask and suddenly revealed himself to be a stat-hating Bethestard the entire time

 

[Kyl Von Kull]

Man who considered Wizardry-likes to have been RPGs only by the "definitions of their time" has now moved on to considering Fallout-likes to have been RPGs only by the definitions of their time, as predicted by myself and many others.

Where does he say that Fallout and its clones are not RPGs by today’s standards? You need to drop a lot of acid to arrive at that interpretation.

Saying RPG designers should be more radical is not the same as saying that old school, conservatively designed games are not part of the genre.

What’s wrong with making interactive storytelling the foundation of the genre? Reasonable people can differ on what can change the nature of a game, but if you had to pick one thing that defines an RPG, interactive storytelling would be a legitimate answer.

I want to say two things:
1. This explains why PoE was so bad. Its main designer wanted to actually make Skyrim instead... good thing I swore to not give any more money to these quacks.
2. So this is a topic Infinitron decided to hide in instead of posting news about a true Incline game - Disco Elysium. Shame Infinitron! Shame!

Maybe Josh gets all his gaming news from Codex front page, hence why he doesn’t seem to know about No Truce with the Disco: Elysium Furies.

 

[Egosphere]

Stalker is a slow-burning shooter with horror elements. It does have some c&c and reactivity, but its not nearly as open as old school crpgs. Can I kill Sidorovich? No.

 

[Iskramor]

Cites Skyrim, does not cite Divinity: Original Sin 2, Age of Decadence, Tides of Numenera, Disco Pretentious

Dont you dare insult disco elysium.

 

[Egosphere]

this thread is an excellent place to show his most played games on steam

It's encouraging that he's spent four times as long testing Deadfire than New Vegas

4 times more balance

 

[ArchAngel]

I want to say two things:
1. This explains why PoE was so bad. Its main designer wanted to actually make Skyrim instead... good thing I swore to not give any more money to these quacks.

You've cracked the case. Josh Sawyer wanted to make Skyrim instead of Pillars Of Eternity. That's why Pillars Of Eternity is so much like Skyrim.

No but it was already in decline.. which is now explained by him praising terrible terrible games.

 

[AwesomeButton]

I agree with Infinitron, this article is manipulatively hacked together for clickbait purposes.

No self-respecting game developer would link Skyrim with the direction in which RPGs need to evolve, while speaking in 2018. In the eyes of the mainstream, Skyrim itself has ripened enough to be counted among the "old school" nowadays.

Those have to be interpretations of illiterate journos.

The current cutting edge of mainstream RPG design is epitomized by Witcher 3, and in the mainstream world, this position is determined by the most objective of all factors - sales figures. The next best thing to Witcher 3, which still passes as RPG is D:OS2.

Fallout 4? If you recall, it got a somewhat begrudging reception due to reusing the old engine yet again. It took mainstream reviewers about a decade to notice, but in the end they did.

 

[ArchAngel]

I agree with Infinitron, this article is manipulatively hacked together for clickbait purposes.

No self-respecting game developer would link Skyrim with the direction in which RPGs need to evolve, while speaking in 2018. In the eyes of the mainstream, Skyrim itself has ripened enough to be counted among the "old school" nowadays.

Those have to be interpretations of illiterate journos.

How often do you offer your ass to Sawyer? I hope you two use a lubricant.

 

[AwesomeButton]

I agree with Infinitron, this article is manipulatively hacked together for clickbait purposes.

No self-respecting game developer would link Skyrim with the direction in which RPGs need to evolve, while speaking in 2018. In the eyes of the mainstream, Skyrim itself has ripened enough to be counted among the "old school" nowadays.

Those have to be interpretations of illiterate journos.

How often do you offer your ass to Sawyer? I hope you two use a lubricant.

I'm one of the most consistently and vocally critical of Sawyer people on this forum, shitstain.

 

[Kyl Von Kull]

I agree with Infinitron, this article is manipulatively hacked together for clickbait purposes.

No self-respecting game developer would link Skyrim with the direction in which RPGs need to evolve, while speaking in 2018. In the eyes of the mainstream, Skyrim itself has ripened enough to be counted among the "old school" nowadays.

Those have to be interpretations of illiterate journos.

Indeed, the article is silly and this thread is like the inside of a schizophrenic’s mind: full of fuzzy logic, loose associations and lots of hastily formed conclusions that don’t pass the sanity test.

 

[AwesomeButton]

Indeed, the article is silly and this thread is like the inside of a schizophrenic’s mind: full of fuzzy logic, loose associations and lots of hastily formed conclusions that don’t pass the sanity test.

People believe what they want to believe, as an obscure game character once said.

 

[FeelTheRads]

So, granularity defines RPGs, now?

How the fuck is that granularity?
It significantly changes the system and how you play it.

Saying RPG designers should be more radical is not the same as saying that old school, conservatively designed games are not part of the genre.

And yet that's exactly what he said about Wizardry. By that logic Fallout or any other RPG can also be stripped of their genre because Average Dumbfuck suddenly starts to think Halo is an RPG.

But getting back to Wiz and how it's not an RPG anymore, makes you wonder... Japan still calls their Wiz-clones RPGs, right? In that case are these both RPGs and not RPGs at the same time? Or what happens if they are imported into Sawyer-land? They stop being RPGs?

 

[Parabalus]

Stalker is a slow-burning shooter with horror elements. It does have some c&c and reactivity, but its not nearly as open as old school crpgs. Can I kill Sidorovich? No.

We were talking about the third installment, Call of Pripyat, which has a lot more RPG elements.

By your "can I kill the main questgivers" RPG purity test, stuff like Bg2 (Aran), ToB (Solar) , all the nu-Beth games, Bioware, Witchers, etc. aren't RPGs.

 

[Egosphere]

Stalker is a slow-burning shooter with horror elements. It does have some c&c and reactivity, but its not nearly as open as old school crpgs. Can I kill Sidorovich? No.

all the nu-Beth games, Bioware, Witchers, etc. aren't RPGs.

Never said they were

 

[fantadomat]

almost 400 hours put into DF is a pretty good sign regardless. unless he left it on while away on vacation

More concerning is how much time he put in skyrim and fallout 4,games that he played for fun and not because he is doing bug/narrative testing.

I agree with Infinitron, this article is manipulatively hacked together for clickbait purposes.

No self-respecting game developer would link Skyrim with the direction in which RPGs need to evolve, while speaking in 2018. In the eyes of the mainstream, Skyrim itself has ripened enough to be counted among the "old school" nowadays.

Those have to be interpretations of illiterate journos.

The current cutting edge of mainstream RPG design is epitomized by Witcher 3, and in the mainstream world, this position is determined by the most objective of all factors - sales figures. The next best thing to Witcher 3, which still passes as RPG is D:OS2.

Fallout 4? If you recall, it got a somewhat begrudging reception due to reusing the old engine yet again. It took mainstream reviewers about a decade to notice, but in the end they did.

I agree with you that it is a clickbait publication. Still it doesn't change the fact that the guy likes Bethesda games. It is pretty obvious that he would like to make a AAA action rpg with not that much of stats. Having more play time on skyrim and fallout 4 is clear indicator for this. Even i couldn't put more than 30 hours in fallout 4,and i have pretty low standard for playing(doesn't mean that i like them) games.

Also the Witcher 3 is great incline when it comes to writing,narrative presentation,level design and atmosphere.

 

[Silva]

Stalker is a slow-burning shooter with horror elements. It does have some c&c and reactivity, but its not nearly as open as old school crpgs. Can I kill Sidorovich? No.

all the nu-Beth games, Bioware, Witchers, etc. aren't RPGs.

Never said they were

So, only good RPGs are RPGs? That's No True Scotsman fallacy.

 

[fantadomat]

Stalker is a slow-burning shooter with horror elements. It does have some c&c and reactivity, but its not nearly as open as old school crpgs. Can I kill Sidorovich? No.

all the nu-Beth games, Bioware, Witchers, etc. aren't RPGs.

Never said they were

So, only good RPGs are RPGs? That's No True Scotsman fallacy.

This one is rpg too.

 

[Kyl Von Kull]

So, granularity defines RPGs, now?

How the fuck is that granularity?
It significantly changes the system and how you play it.

Saying RPG designers should be more radical is not the same as saying that old school, conservatively designed games are not part of the genre.

And yet that's exactly what he said about Wizardry. By that logic Fallout or any other RPG can also be stripped of their genre because Average Dumbfuck suddenly starts to think Halo is an RPG.

But getting back to Wiz and how it's not an RPG anymore, makes you wonder... Japan still calls their Wiz-clones RPGs, right? In that case are these both RPGs and not RPGs at the same time? Or what happens if they are imported into Sawyer-land? They stop being RPGs?

If Wizardry 1 came out today, I’m not sure I’d consider it a CRPG either. First person exploration with party based combat? Mutant Year Zero will have that and nobody’s calling that an RPG. From the very beginning you had pen and paper people bitching that Wizardry wasn’t a real role playing game precisely because it lacked interactive storytelling. Josh’s argument didn’t just come out of nowhere. You can say that’s absurd because Wizardry created the genre, but I’d counter that CRPGs were always trying to mimic pen and paper. In 1980 computers just didn’t have the horsepower to copy much more than character building and rudimentary p&p style combat.

As for Japanese dungeon crawlers, we call them JRPGs to distinguish them from the superior WRPG or CRPG genre. I have no problem calling Wizardry 1 a proto JRPG made by Americans.

 

[Parabalus]

Stalker is a slow-burning shooter with horror elements. It does have some c&c and reactivity, but its not nearly as open as old school crpgs. Can I kill Sidorovich? No.

all the nu-Beth games, Bioware, Witchers, etc. aren't RPGs.

Never said they were

Nice selective quoting. To Bg2 I'll add PoE (Webb), Bloodlines (Elysium areas), Arcanum (Nasrudin) , NWN1&2 (everything), almost all blobbers.
Really, you should apply your purity test to the Codex top 70, I bet less than 10% would pass.

 

[Silva]

CRPGs were always trying to mimic pen and paper.

Sorry to get this out of context, but do you think that's the accepted definition of the label by most people? I would say it's styx wash (again, STALKER is a better RPG than most RPGs) but I can see the reasoning behind that.

Well, that would explain Blakemoreland Hybrid Boss anal obsession with THAC0.

 

[FeelTheRads]

What? No, JRPGs are FF and other similar shit.

Also what fucking interactive storytelling? A game can't be an RPG with a linear story or what is interactive supposed to mean in this case? I control the characters, I decide what to do, that's fucking interactive.

 

[Silva]

Also, a game can't be an RPG with a linear story

Really?

Spoiler

 

[FeelTheRads]

again, STALKER is a better RPG than most RPGs

Yes, if you think RPGs are what they are actually not.

Did you know Championship Manager is a much better FIFA game than most FIFA games???

 

[FeelTheRads]

Also, a game can't be an RPG with a linear story

Really?

Spoiler

Are you retarded or what is that supposed to mean?
The question was rhetoric... meaning I don't actually believe a game with a linear story can't be an RPG.
Or are you showing me BG...as proof of a linear game not being RPG?

 

[Blakemoreland Hybrid Boss]

If Wizardry 1 came out today, I’m not sure I’d consider it a CRPG either.

again, STALKER is a better RPG than most RPGs