The Outer Worlds Pre-Release Thread [GO TO NEW THREAD]

[BlackAdderBG]

Bit of an insight into Leonard's design philosophy. Passing a dialogue skill check MUST benefit the player. You invested points into the skill so you deserve a reward.

No exceptions? Why bother reading then? Just pick the shiny Awesome-Dialogue-Option.

What's the point of stats/skills then? It's retarded when checks are used just for lore or larping.

 

[Infinitron]

"Beneficial" is a relative term. Even if lying objectively provides with you a material short-term benefit, it could still not be the way you preferred to solve a quest.

For example, if you can bypass a fight by lying to somebody then that's "beneficial", but then you don't get to kill them (what if they're really evil?) and take their loot.

 

[Terenty]

Its painfully obvious now they have inadequate budget to realise their vision, nowhere near AAA as someone here tried to assure me, cut half of the game out and dont even have features that became standard nowadays( npc schedule, etc).

Now the question is what's so special about this game now?

Nothing comes to mind.

Art style by Boyarsky? Nope, ugly ass game.

Never heard before c&c ? Nope, everything sounds rather mundane.

Super puper dialogue? Nope. A step back from Arcanum

Unique companions with complex interactions? Nope, just some comments from them here and there.

What is there to be excited about again?

 

[BlackAdderBG]

What is there to be excited about again?

Darth Roxor's review?

 

[Abu Antar]

Codex butthurt.

 

[rusty_shackleford]

Cutting content is part of the game development process. Designers have to be reined in or they would never finish the game.

 

[Duraframe300]

BTW: Tim Cains idea for Fallouts ending was balloons and a cake. Though I dont know if that was known.

 

[Terenty]

Even fucking Numenera sounded more unique before release

 

[sullynathan]

The game will be fine

 

[rusty_shackleford]

Can't wait for the steam screenshot of every person in this thread complaining playing it at the same time.

 

[Jarpie]

But no NPC schedules. They don't go to sleep at night.

This feature has never existed in a Cain/Boyarsky game so it's not that surprising.

Arcanum had NPC schedules.

 

[Space Nugget]

Can't wait for the steam screenshot of every person in this thread complaining playing it at the same time.

inb4 Epic Store Exclusive

 

[rusty_shackleford]

Can't wait for the steam screenshot of every person in this thread complaining playing it at the same time.

inb4 Epic Store Exclusive

It's a Microsoft product, they have no incentive to make it an Epic exclusive when Microsoft owns a direct competitor.

 

[Black Angel]

Hmph. On one side of the gaming industry, we have this:

Bit of an insight into Leonard's design philosophy. Passing a dialogue skill check MUST benefit the player. You invested points into the skill so you deserve a reward.

Typically lying to an NPC requires you to pass a skill check. Tim wanted there to be a Flaw where if you lied to people too many times, you'd have the option to take a Flaw that would force you to ALWAYS lie to people. But Leonard said, if lying is always beneficial then how is that a flaw?

On the other side, is this:

Spoiler

Option 2 (the proposed system):

The biggest conceptual change is that the tagged lines would now represent an attempt without any guarantees of success. It’s up to the player to read people based on the available info and consider what would work best. You can have two different streetwise lines, for example, one would result in a positive reaction, the other in a negative.

That brings us to the second biggest change. Most lines would no longer lead to success or failures but result in positive and negative reactions, represented numerically. Your skill level would act as modifiers, magnifying positive reactions and reducing the effect of blunders. The final check would tally up the reactions, which will determine whether you’ve succeeded or failed.

Let’s say your Persuasion is 3. You’re offered 3 arguments. The NPC will respond very favorably (+2) to argument #1, favorably to argument #2 (+1) and very negatively to argument #3 (-2). Your skill will modify these reactions to 4, 2, and 0. Let’s say the final check’s value would be 10, so assuming the conversation has 3 nodes with tagged lines, you’ll need to score at least 2 very favorable reactions and 1 favorable (or 3 very favorable ones) to pass the check. In longer dialogues you’d be able to fail a few times and still recover.

This system will maintain the importance of skills and encourage further investment but it will shift the focus to figuring out which lines would work best. Obviously, it might increase meta-gaming but that’s your choice and thus not our concern. Every time the player is offered to make a choice with different outcomes, 8 out of 10 people would want to know the outcomes in advance and the exact way to get to the outcome they want.

NPC text:

1. [skill 1] Dialogue option A
a. NPC very favorable reaction: +2
2. [skill 1] Dialogue option B
a. NPC negative reaction: -1
3. [skill 2] Dialogue option C
a. NPC favorable reaction: +1

Yes, it's unfair to compare a brief explanation of what someone has in mind to elaborate paragraphs showing a system that's yet to be tested, but still... Also, I don't see how 'beneficial' being a relative term when Boyarsky specifically mentioned that the benefit is a MUST. Does that [Barter] check with Dean Domino in any way beneficial to the player? I guess you can say so, relative to the fact that players gain XP for passing that check, so if they pulled that off in this game I'll give a standing applause for them.

 

[SpaceWizardz]

Can't wait for the steam screenshot of every person in this thread complaining playing it at the same time.

inb4 Epic Store Exclusive

It's a Microsoft product, they have no incentive to make it an Epic exclusive when Microsoft owns a direct competitor.

inb4 Windows Store Exclusive

 

[FreeKaner]

Character designers striving to make "realistic-looking" women and bimbo-beauty modders are two sides of the same perverted coin.

Where the white women at

 

[Roguey]

BTW: Tim Cains idea for Fallouts ending was balloons and a cake. Though I dont know if that was known.

Needed a goofy song to go along with it to make it complete.

 

[Terenty]

Imagine how much more content they could put into the game if they went isometric with beautiful art style ala Disco Elysium instead of the trash they have

 

[Sigourn]

Most people like looking at beautiful characters. It's called escapism.

Clearly not those who decide to make ugly looking characters. "Most people" don't make videogames, they are just the consumers.

 

[Infinitron]

I assume the unspoken assumption was that somebody who chose to take that Flaw would typically have his skill topped up.

 

[Sailor Woedica]

What is there to be excited about again?

 

[Duraframe300]

I really feel like this is not the last time they'll cut stuff and try to bullshit us to believe it's by design, not because they bit off more than they could chew.

Yes, in a video where they openly talk about multiple things they didn't do or had to cut back on because of time and budget the one thing they lied about in that regard was a random flaw.

Makes perfect sense!

 

[Prime Junta]

What is there to be excited about again?

Precisely my thoughts for the past several pages. Other than the potential for some Cainarsky humour I got nothing.

I mean quest markers ffs

 

[IHaveHugeNick]

That one-hour podcast from Game Informer is a must watch. They are truly classy lads, honest and transparent answers, no bullshit and you really get to see what makes Tim&Leo's partnership tick.

 

[Grunker]

What is there to be excited about again?

Precisely my thoughts for the past several pages. Other than the potential for some Cainarsky humour I got nothing.

I mean quest markers ffs

I literally haven't followed the game at all but NV has quest markers so since when has that been automatic damnation