Torment Torment: Tides of Numenera Thread

[Iznaliu]

So is this game good yet, or even worth playing? Or is it still juggling 20 numanuma's in your inventory and deciding which ones to use in the 5 combats in the entire game

I don't think there have been any major changes to the game's mechanics, if that is what you mean; there also hasn't been any major changes to the story, other than the addition of a new companion. This will likely not change, due to the game's dismal sales.

 

[Luckmann]

So is this game good yet, or even worth playing? Or is it still juggling 20 numanuma's in your inventory and deciding which ones to use in the 5 combats in the entire game

No, jesus, no! These questions need to stop being posed. The game is terrible! It's a disgraceful piece of shit!

Stay clear of it! It'll never be good unless it's basically redone from scratch.

 

[Iznaliu]

No, jesus, no! These questions need to stop being posed. The game is terrible! It's a disgraceful piece of shit!

I think a potential reason why these questions might be posed is because these people were backers and don't want to feel as if they wasted their money.

 

[Luckmann]

No, jesus, no! These questions need to stop being posed. The game is terrible! It's a disgraceful piece of shit!

I think a potential reason why these questions might be posed is because these people were backers and don't want to feel as if they wasted their money.

Well they did.

 

[FeelTheRads]

There was this one one guy in some thread or other asking why didn't somebody mod it yet.

It was a good laugh.

 

[circ]

Torment writers' GDC 2017 panel is now on Youtube:

In this 2017 GDC session, game writers George Ziets, Leanne Taylor-Giles, Chris Avellone, Colin McComb, and Gavin Jurgens-Fyhrie share their experiences working on everything from AAA to indie and tabletop, discuss their strategies for remaining creative on varying budgets, and define common terms that may just result in you not needing to set everything on fire after all.

Didn't bother finishing because why would you, none of these games have writing that complements gameplay, and so isn't in any way interesting. See in the movies when a writer writes an elaborate story, a producer checks it over and says, no we don't have the budget for three giant dildoes, we can afford one, please rewrite. And so on. In games that doesn't happen. The writers are given free reign and can't write around gameplay elements or know what a programmer is capable of or if there's time for it. That leads to completely useless exposition, at the expense of the player. Movies have a saying, I think it's originally from the movies - show don't tell. I might have that backwards and completely wrong. But this should apply to every visual medium that incorporates writing, and games can be a very visual medium.

Look at some of the strongest writing, and it's strangely not in RPG's. Homeworld. Dawn of War? Those games rely on writing lore with some gaps and then let the player flesh it out. Not everything is explained or told. They know that telling a story about how Captain Bob flipping Inquisitor Ed the finger is inconsequential. Writers should know their field and know what it's capable of and go from there. No one cares how much you write, they care about gameplay, and writing is there to enhance it that's all. BioWare gets a lot of shit for its recycled characters, but they understood atleast that characters should be basic archetypes, not dictionaries, although they did forget about that concept because their critics didn't actually understand what they were critiquing.

 

[Iznaliu]

Well they did.

My point is that many people will do anything to avoid admitting that they made a mistake somewhere along the line and evade responsibility; see inXile's comments about T:ToN.

 

[LESS T_T]

inXile environment artist Paul Fish (also ex-Obsidian who worked on NV, PoE, and Tyranny) on the process of making isometric environment art: https://80.lv/articles/how-isometric-environments-are-made/

 

[Anomander Rake]

Today I wanted to try the gog version updated to the latest version. I did this because I had a little faith that maybe the writing could entice me.

But none of you mentioned an issue that is plaguing many users and they didn't fix: the hugest technical issue such a game could have.

BLURRY TEXT

What the fuck? Were they serious?

Seems like a solution is in this page: https://steamcommunity.com/app/272270/discussions/1/133258092256946326/?ctp=5 (post #73, a solution endorsed by developers but they couldn't even integrate it).

I hope that Inxile fails hard. I won't hope for them to become beggars because luckily the copy wasn't mine. Game deleted, had just to reach the main menu to face the issue of blurry text.

Blurry vs 'normal':
http://i.imgur.com/OsT5pIN.jpg

 

[aweigh]

maybe they stealth-added AAA graphics features like Motion Blur to T:ToN in order to boost sales.

some chromatic aberration and depth of field really makes those textdumps pop !

 

[Luckmann]

inXile environment artist Paul Fish (also ex-Obsidian who worked on NV, PoE, and Tyranny) on the process of making isometric environment art: https://80.lv/articles/how-isometric-environments-are-made/

Neat.

I can shit on Tides of Numenera endlessly, but the craftsmanship of the environments are solid as fuck.

 

[Popiel]

I can shit on Tides of Numenera endlessly, but the craftsmanship of the environments are solid as fuck.

They look like fucking shit except the Bloom.

 

[Cross]

inXile environment artist Paul Fish (also ex-Obsidian who worked on NV, PoE, and Tyranny) on the process of making isometric environment art: https://80.lv/articles/how-isometric-environments-are-made/

Neat.

I can shit on Tides of Numenera endlessly, but the craftsmanship of the environments are solid as fuck.

If anything highlights InXile's incompetence, it's the environment art. Despite having a significantly higher budget and fewer areas than other comparable isometric games, T:ToN's environments often look quite bad, a mess of inconsistent, cheap-looking art assets that don't look like they were placed on a map so much as they were thrown around randomly.

Compare this crystalline environment in T:ToN

Spoiler

to this crystalline environment from another game running on the same engine.

Spoiler

Notice how muddy, dull and unconvincing the crystal surfaces in the first screenshot look compared to the second.

 

[FeelTheRads]

Except the engine, Unity, has pretty much nothing to do with how the crystals are rendered.

And also that thing from PoE, whatever it is, doesn't really look like crystal either. More like painted ceramic.

 

[Luckmann]

Those look like they're meant to be completely different kind of surfaces.

Which they are. The PoE image of the carved Arda isn't even crystalline, it's meant to be smoothed arda, which is a jade-like coral-type thing, and if anything, I think it looks way too glossy or even wet, whereas the Numanuma is clearly meant to be more of a mute and cool crystalline rock type thing.

They should look vastly different and I think that the Numenuma-picture looks great, except for one thing which does indeed highlight the incompetence at play, and that's the copy-pasted crystal formations on the ground.

Edit: That said, some environments in Numanuma does look like ass, but that's not so much an issue of the craftsmanship as it has to do with the subject matter. It's not the artist's fault they ended up polishing the turd of Monty Cuck.

 

[Lagole Gon]

Except the engine, Unity, has pretty much nothing to do with how the crystals are rendered.

And also that thing from PoE, whatever it is, doesn't really look like crystal either.

It also doesn't look like shit pasted from the Unity Preset Library.

Spoiler

 

[fantadomat]

Except the engine, Unity, has pretty much nothing to do with how the crystals are rendered.

And also that thing from PoE, whatever it is, doesn't really look like crystal either.

It also doesn't look like shit pasted from the Unity Preset Library.

Spoiler

That area is filled with some retarded random shit. It made absolutely no sense and had not theme. I can't imagine what kind of autistic idiot was the level designer.

 

[Lagole Gon]

Maybe it wasn't their fault. Maybe the Prosper Face cursed the project.

 

[fantadomat]

Maybe it wasn't their fault. Maybe the Prosper Face cursed the project.

Yup

 

[Deleted Member 16721]

There was just too little to do between all the reading.

Same exact thing can be said about Planescape.

I played PS:T a few months back and completed it, it's fresh in my mind. The games are incredibly similar. Most of the combat in PS:T was pointless. Hive Thugs jumping you every screen transition. Tides just cut that out and made the actual combat encounters meaningful, i.e. a Crisis. And the combat that is in Tides is damn good. I played 20 hours and finally had my first combat encounter, and then thought, damn, that was dope! I want more! But the game is still a blast to play for the same reasons Planescape was, combat or not.

Overall it's an amazing game. I wish it were successful because it's more interesting than 99.9% of other RPGs on the market right now and you all damn well know it.

 

[Iznaliu]

And the combat that is in Tides is damn good. I played 20 hours and finally had my first combat encounter, and then thought, damn, that was dope! I want more!

That's probably because you've missed out on combat for 20 hours rather than being a testament to the quality of anything.

 

[Deleted Member 16721]

And the combat that is in Tides is damn good. I played 20 hours and finally had my first combat encounter, and then thought, damn, that was dope! I want more!

That's probably because you've missed out on combat for 20 hours rather than being a testament to the quality of anything.

You would think that, but no, I don't think that's it. I was fine to continue playing the game as it was, but when I saw the various systems in the combat, I thought it had great potential.

The Effort system. Cyphers. Flanked statuses and tons of buffs/debuffs. The various abilities and damage types. I loved it. And this specific encounter did not even involve environmental aspects, which apparently can play a big role in other Crises, along with various character skills (speechcraft in combat, essentially.) When you add all those factors in, it gives way for great creativity in the system.

Also, not only combat-related but the Effort system is awesome. I wish there was more of a risk/reward aspect in the game when it came to resting to refill your Effort. There is

Spoiler

the murder quest. A character got murdered because I slept the night and didn't take care of finding the murderer right away

, and more of that would be very welcomed. Then you'd have to manage your Effort more. Consumable items would gain much higher importance and so on.

So yes, I do think more combat in general would have grabbed people more. I'm fine without it (surprisingly, I love gameplay and combat in RPGs), but for the mainstream fan it would help I feel.

Otherwise, it's a hell of an RPG and a unique experience. I'm having a blast with it.

 

[aweigh]

i can't imagine having to wade through 20 hours of mediocre sci-fi writing before getting to a combat. seriously. it literally sounds like torture to me, like if there was an RPG lover's circle of hell, it would be that.

 

[Deleted Member 16721]

i can't imagine having to wade through 20 hours of mediocre sci-fi writing before getting to a combat. seriously. it literally sounds like torture to me, like if there was an RPG lover's circle of hell, it would be that.

Funny, because many would say the same about 20 hours of Elminage Gothic. :D

I don't look at it as 20 hours of fiction, though. The game does keep you on your toes that combat *could* happen and have consequences, so you should be ready in case it does happens.

But I take it you aren't a fan of PS:T, aweigh? It's good stuff, just for different reasons than combat gameplay (with yes, tons of reading.)

 

[aweigh]

love PS:T, great game, good writing with no textdumps and proper interpretation of adventure game elements and RPG elements, a true adventure game hybrid. Numenara is like a bad adventure game with underutilized RPG mechanics.

my main problem with Numenara is not that it's barely an RPG (i like adventure games) it's that the writing is sterile, boring and unimaginative.

Discussing Torment will always bring up story vs combat vs what is an RPG and I'm too tired to explain it all again as this has already been discussed to death.

TLDR version is that some folks consider story in an RPG secondary to game play, and others consider reading textdumps to be the gameplay.

This is further complicated when the textdumps themselves are not good!