KickStarter Shroud of the Avatar - Lord British's Not-Ultima Online 2

[Stabwound]

Well, it's just that it seems like he's trying to straddle the line and appease fans of both types of games. It's not really an MMORPG in that you apparently only play with/see people you know, either by adding your various social media accounts or via friends list. He's adding a lot of LARPing shit, though: he talked about opening/running shops, performing operas that people pay to watch, etc. I have no idea how he's going to implement things like that into what seems like a rather basic game, but we'll see. It seems more like Neverwinter Nights than UO.

At this point Divinity: Original Sin seems much more like a spiritual successor than this thing.

And yeah, weirdly enough LB apparently disliked the open PVP of early UO. This game is going to only feature PVP in situations which you do something "evil" like steal an item, where you then get marked for PVP vulnerability. I guess it's a decent tradeoff from freely open PVP (which is best) and shitty PVP which is opt-in only.

I'd still rather just have a U7 sequel though.

 

[Rostere]

Don't be part of the decline. It's because people give money to these kinds of projects we're drowning in shit games.

Would you back a hack'n'slash Fallout MMO?

 

[Scruffy]

oh this will crash and burn so badly

$147,693
pledged of $1,000,000 goal

oh, that's not what i meant...

 

[Xavier0889]

There's a Barbie game shown among the resumé of that "team of experts" that's helping RG to build his new larping wet dream.

 

[Nope]

Looks like Garriott at least has an inkling of what people are actually interested in even though he's making a semi-MMO: http://www.gamesindustry.biz/articles/2013-03-08-garriotts-new-rpg-is-the-antithesis-of-mmos

"The player base was saying, we really just want a solo player game. It's fine to play multiplayer, but we really were hoping you'd go build a game with a deep story in it that we couldn't get in the best of MMOs," Garriott said. "I'm itching to do that too, but their motivation is from another angle. It's good to know their angle, because that really changes some of the detail as to how I'll both pitch it and how I'll execute on some of it."

The game will have many of the classic Garriott touches, including a character system without classes, a virtue system and consequences that follow from player actions.

 

[Jaesun]

It's not even fucking Rocket Science. What kinds of games get HUGE funding on KS? SOLO Old School cRPG's, sold with nostalgia.

And he can't even figure this out.

 

[JarlFrank]

It appears that he's too obsessed with MMOs ARE THE FUTURE to see that they're actually crap and good single-player experiences (maybe with some optional multiplayer mode, but not MMO) is where it's at.

 

[Xavier0889]

Well, there's a lot of nostalgia for UO. It's as strong as the original Ultimas, I'd say.
But you're right. The Ultima we all know and love was the single player adventure.

 

[Stabwound]

Well, the thing is that he's been working on this for a long time. A lot of this comes across like it's a project he WANTS to make, rather than just some money-making scheme. There's definitely some of that in there, though.

I believe this KS was more for the publicity blitz than anything else. It was going to come out regardless.

 

[Xavier0889]

Well, the thing is that he's been working on this for a long time. A lot of this comes across like it's a project he WANTS to make, rather than just some money-making scheme. There's definitely some of that in there, though.

I believe this KS was more for the publicity blitz than anything else. It was going to come out regardless.

My guess is that he wanted to get it on KS for an ego thing, so he can sey "hey, this is the true Ultima that players gave their money for", against EA's Ultima Forever, which will be perceived as a blantant cash grabber and even further lore raper by EA.

 

[Stabwound]

Haha, true. At the very least this looks infinitely better than that Ultima Forever abomination.

 

[Jaesun]

Haha, true. At the very least this looks infinitely better than that Ultima Forever abomination.

THAT I can agree with. And I played Ultima Forever.

 

[Delterius]

Haha, true. At the very least this looks infinitely better than that Ultima Forever abomination.

THAT I can agree with. And I played Ultima Forever*.

*Not really a pre-requisite.

Just to clarify.

 

[Jaesun]

So it's almost been 6 hours and: $237,195 and Torment made $900,000+ in this same time. Methinks thou might be a bit out of touche with thy fans M'lord.

 

[Zed]

It's been 6 hours?
Fuck. I've done nothing today.

 

[buzz]

A lot of this comes across like it's a project he WANTS to make, rather than just some money-making scheme.

Go ahead and cut my throat but I think I respect that kind of attitude a bit more (same with Sawyer's game design ideas). I mean, I understand the fact that we first need to re-establish the norms and revive the cRPG scene before moving on to something else but I can't really hate someone just because he tries to do something else (even if that might turn to be a failure). Afterall, the Ultima games (and its spin-offs) were as ever-changing, revolutionary and influencing as possible for the genre. You only tangentially hate LB now because his crazy antics don't seem as fun and interesting as they did back in the day.
Not that I trust his project anyway. I'm just saying: stop being so wary to newness.

 

[taxalot]

To Richard's Credit, Ultima was already a dead horse when the original Planescape came out. Of course Torment gets more funds, only the more hardcore RPG fans even know who the guy is in the first place.

As for what this is going to be, yes, I took a leap of faith. Life is not fun when it's all cynicism and realism. I want to believe in the odd he can do something good and was ready to lose 25$ in that illusion.

I am not sure he wants to go against Ultima Forever, but the concept sounds very similar : UF is at its core a single player game where everyone is in the same lobby and can join your party. Garriot's concept is still a bit vague, but what I understand of it is... well that.

 

[Hugstari]

Well at least you've got to give him props for delivering a prototype\ingame footage for the launch of the kickstarter. Obsidian and Inexile didn't even give us screenshots. But still not my kind of game.

 

[Brzęczyszczykiewicz]

So it's almost been 6 hours and: $237,195 and Torment made $900,000+ in this same time. Methinks thou might be a bit out of touche with thy fans M'lord.

More like 4 hours, but yeah it is not outrunning Torment especially considering it is already slowing down.

 

[Alex]

To Richard's Credit, Ultima was already a dead horse when the original Planescape came out. Of course Torment gets more funds, only the more hardcore RPG fans even know who the guy is in the first place.

As for what this is going to be, yes, I took a leap of faith. Life is not fun when it's all cynicism and realism. I want to believe in the odd he can do something good and was ready to lose 25$ in that illusion.

I am not sure he wants to go against Ultima Forever, but the concept sounds very similar : UF is at its core a single player game where everyone is in the same lobby and can join your party. Garriot's concept is still a bit vague, but what I understand of it is... well that.

I think, going from his kickstarter and his article he wrote a while back talking about the future of RPGs, that he wants to create means for players to interact without needing to be online at the same time. At the time, it looked he was talking about shit like farmville or whatever it is people play on facebook. Still,the idea isn't all bad by itself (like, say, a dwarf fortress like game where players get to play on the dungeon you make or that kind of thing), and if he is smart with that, he could make some stuff that don't really go anywhere in single player games (that just amount to larping) actually important. Like creating your own in game shop, or hiding your stuff so people won't steal it. Those things only would really matter in MMO games, and then, because of how MMO games work, they don't usually matter much anyway.

 

[taxalot]

Well, I'll be sure to break any NDA to tell you how it is when I get to the alpha

The game is done with good intents. On paper, it sounds good and I liked the (easy) blurb about NPCs with exclamation marks on their head and just needing to follow the quest markers on the compass.

 

[evdk]

As for what this is going to be, yes, I took a leap of faith. Life is not fun when it's all cynicism and realism. I want to believe in the odd he can do something good and was ready to lose 25$ in that illusion.

There's a difference between not being a totally hardened cynic and taking an all expenses paid vacation in the rainbow lala land.

 

[Jaesun]

There is some more info here: http://sota.ultimacodex.com/interview-with-richard-garriott/

 

[Alex]

(...snip)

The game is done with good intents. On paper, it sounds good and I liked the (easy) blurb about NPCs with exclamation marks on their head and just needing to follow the quest markers on the compass.

What are you talking about? Is it something in the video (I hadn't had the chance to watch it yet)?

 

[Jaesun]

(...snip)

The game is done with good intents. On paper, it sounds good and I liked the (easy) blurb about NPCs with exclamation marks on their head and just needing to follow the quest markers on the compass.

What are you talking about? Is it something in the video (I hadn't had the chance to watch it yet)?

Yes that's in the video. Give it a watch.