Tyranny Pre-Release Thread

[Fry]

Please stop.

 

[Roguey]

Why care about anything other than maximum damage and crowd control in a system with cooldowns and no friendly fire? Might as well read a fucking book oh my god.

 

[veevoir]

And why exactly are here reposts of people talking on twitter?

People read dex, some people dislike dex, water is wet

 

[Roguey]

And why exactly are here reposts of people talking on twitter?

People read dex, some people dislike dex, water is wet

It's always interesting when game developers react to the Codex.

 

[Infinitron]

Maybe we need a Lindsey Laney Tribute Thread.

 

[Neanderthal]

Pity about art, I mean I really liked Poes design, you know that verisimilitude thing. If you're going stylised though fucking commit, don't do this weak arsed shit, I mean look at Apotheon an all inspiration they coulda used an made someat really distinctive an striking. The compromise just looks a bit mediocre an samish.

 

[veevoir]

And why exactly are here reposts of people talking on twitter?

People read dex, some people dislike dex, water is wet

It's always interesting when game developers react to the Codex.

No, not really. Especially if it is in some bland way full of masterfully stiff jokes.
Thruth to be told I'm offended by that uninspiring, non-offensive reaction and need to retreat to my safe space.

 

[Sensuki]

If this game also has a Stronghold and a "Megadungeon", it sounds like they've heavily copy-pasted the Pillars production schedule, lol.

 

[Anthedon]

Seems like D:OS 2 and Torment starved Tyranny of all the RPG attention. Nice going, Failadox.

They sure do treat it like a step-child. The official Tyranny forum over at the Paradox site is completely dead.

 

[Infinitron]

Wasn't there supposed to be a bi-weekly dev diary update yesterday? I guess that got postponed because of Gamescom.

 

[Bubbles]

Seems like D:OS 2 and Torment starved Tyranny of all the RPG attention. Nice going, Failadox.

They sure do treat it like a step-child. The official Tyranny forum over at the Paradox site is completely dead.

As long as the Codex cares, everything will be alright.

 

[Jimmious]

By the way does the game still have an arbitrary "2016" release date? The information I quickly googled are not..clear

 

[Bubbles]

Yes, Coming 2016.

 

[Infinitron]

Judging by the amount of information they've said they still want to reveal in dev diary updates, we think it won't be before Q4.

 

[LESS T_T]

RPS Preview: https://www.rockpapershotgun.com/2016/08/25/tyranny-rpg-preview/

I’ve seen Tyranny [official site] several times before and I even played it out at E3, but it was only after a hands-on session at Gamescom that I felt ready to write about Obsidian’s next RPG. It’s a tricky one to preview, seeing as so much of the pitch relates to a world that changes to reflect the Big Choices you make. In a game that’s so keen to gesture toward the bigger picture, it can be difficult to get a sense of how well the smaller moments work toward that end.

At Gamescom, I played a new section of the game, crafted some spells, and decided that even if I can’t know how well the bigger picture will come together, there’s enough here to understand at least some of what Obsidian are building. It’s strong stuff.

At one point, I thought I’d landed on the perfect summary sentence: “Tyranny is the Icewind Dale to Pillars of Eternity’s Baldur’s Gate”. Problem with that perfect summary is that it’s probably based on a false premise. What I’ve played of Tyranny focuses on combat and more traditional RPG dungeons and quests, with plenty of traps to disarm and roving gangs of enemies to stumble across, but that’s most likely because those are the parts of the game easiest to demonstrate in half an hour or less.

Start digging into the turning points in the narrative during those short sessions and you’re likely to run into problems. If I can pick a side in a localised conflict, which will then have an impact on the wider world, I’m not going to see that impact half an hour later. Give me some spells, skills, legendary weapons and a tricky dungeon layout to play with, and I can see exactly how the whole thing works.

The combat system in Tyranny is excellent. I’ve always preferred a full-on turn-based combat system to Infinity Engine style pauses for thought, but the four-person parties here are manageable and specialised. Every character has something to offer and it’s easy to see the impact of skills that aggro enemies, directing their attention toward a tough-as-nails bastard who can take the damage, as well as those that chip away at armour or create vulnerabilities.

Armour is very important. Unleashing your strongest attacks won’t achieve a great deal if an opponent is protected, so the order in which you direct your attacks can be as important as their targets. In the portion I played at Gamescom, ethereal horrors were spawning and spilling out of the walls. Some were vulnerable to ice, some were vulnerable to fire or electricity. The tougher, boss variants were slightly vulnerable to just about everything but didn’t have any one specific weakness to exploit.

If you’re anything like me, those kind of encounters lead to lots of pausing and hovering over spells and skills to find just the right one for the occasion. Then you hover over the enemies to make sure you’re definitely delivering the fireball to the creature that, like every Brit right now, complains as soon as the world around them ceases to qualify as ‘dank’. There are combos to consider, both in the form of skills that actually require two characters to commit to them and sequences of attacks that work well together one after the other. For me, that kind of tactical play mostly involved using a rogue to knock somebody over and then having everyone else pile on top. And I’m playing the good guys.

At least I think I am. Tyranny’s pitch is easy to misunderstand; it’s not necessarily a game about playing the villain, rather it’s a game where the bad guys won. A sequel to a game you’ve never played, in which the heroic band of adventurers failed and evil triumphed. In your position of privilege in the new world order, you have an enormous amount of responsibility – you’re carrying out big tasks for The Man and The Man is a Bad Man – but you’re not being used as a tool to terrorise the factions and individuals you meet along the way. You’re part of the post-conflict plan, switching between warrior, peacekeeper and diplomat as the situation dictates. The great promise of Tyranny’s story is that it’ll tell the high fantasy version of post-occupation blues, and in what I’ve seen there are some tricky decisions to be made about asserting control of populations and cultures in a power vacuum or the aftermath of brutality.

Quite how that sits alongside the much more traditional dungeon crawling of this most recent demo, I’m not entirely sure. Down in the ruins of the world, in this case part of an enormous wall that has fallen into neglect and nightmare, it appears to be RPG business as usual.

That’s no bad thing, and the addition of a spellcrafting system and flavoursome legendary weapons is very attractive indeed. The spellcrafting works around collecting sigils (either from characters or in the world) and combining them to create new abilities, utilising a base element, form of expression (cone, AOE strike, bolt, beam, touch) and additional, optional modifiers. Based on what I’ve seen, which is very little, the spells you can create aren’t as weird or exciting as those on Divinity Original Sin 2’s vast cocktail menu, but even if they’re all iterations or variations on the usual D&D arsenal, the ability to modify and name them makes them feel more personal to the characters they’re attached to.

The same is true of legendary weapons. They have spiffy names and provide a brand spanking new skill to whoever wields them, but they’re not game-changers so much as embellishments on the world and your characters. As the lore goes, they’re named, unique items within the world, and there’s a lovely touch in that the more you use them, the more famous they become. Although they’ve already made a mark on history, you’re adding to the list of their legendary deeds, and that makes them more powerful still.

I might not be clear on how attractive the bigger picture will be but a lot of Tyranny’s smaller details are adding up into something substantial and evocative. At this point, I want to see more of the world and I want to see how I can change it, but – importantly – I also want to spend time playing with the combat system and exploring dungeons. Having a levelling system based entirely around skillsets rather than classes means I can change that wizardy fellow into a flame-spewing tank if that seems like a good idea, and I can have a speedy rogue-like who packs a real punch.

The grand schemes of this oppressed world might be unclear until we actually get to sit down and play the whole thing from start to finish once or twice, but I’m becoming comfortably excited about that prospect.

Tyranny will be out later this year.

 

[Infinitron]

http://www.obsidian.net/news/72-tyranny/920-tyranny-best-rpg-at-gamescom-by-mmorpgcom

Tyranny Named Best RPG at Gamescom by MMORPG.com!

The crew over at MMORPG.com have named Tyranny as their Best RPG of Gamescom! Contratulations to the Tyranny team!

Come on, really? Well I guess it is the most MMORPG-like of them.

 

[Excidium II]

Joke makes itself.

 

[Duraframe300]

http://www.obsidian.net/news/72-tyranny/920-tyranny-best-rpg-at-gamescom-by-mmorpgcom

Tyranny Named Best RPG at Gamescom by MMORPG.com!

The crew over at MMORPG.com have named Tyranny as their Best RPG of Gamescom! Contratulations to the Tyranny team!

Come on, really? Well I guess it is the most MMORPG-like of them.

MMORPG.com has given awards to several single player games. IIRC.

Despite the name they do not really focus solely on mmos.

Previews and reviews by them popped up as well in the past so I'm a bit surprised you're surprised

 

[Duraframe300]

In fact last year POE: The White March won best indie.

 

[Infinitron]

http://www.obsidian.net/news/72-tyranny/920-tyranny-best-rpg-at-gamescom-by-mmorpgcom

Tyranny Named Best RPG at Gamescom by MMORPG.com!

The crew over at MMORPG.com have named Tyranny as their Best RPG of Gamescom! Contratulations to the Tyranny team!

Come on, really? Well I guess it is the most MMORPG-like of them.

MMORPG.com has given awards to several single player games. IIRC.

Despite the name they do not really focus solely on mmos.

Previews and reviews by them popped up as well in the past so I'm a bit surprised you're surprised

I know that, silly. That's not what surprised me.

 

[Infinitron]

Low energy preview: http://www.gameinformer.com/games/t...demo-shows-off-spell-creation-and-combat.aspx

Tyranny
Gamescom Demo Shows Off Spell Creation And Combat

In Tyranny, the world has turned upside down. Evil has conquered good, and you're one of the baddies. During Gamescom, we got a better look at one of Tyranny's dungeons, and its spell creation system.

Tyranny is an isometric RPG from Obsidian, similar to the likes of Baldur's Gate and Pillars of Eternity. Set in a magical land following a devastating war, you play as an officer to the evil overlord Kyros. While evil reigns in Tyranny, certain story choices you make affect the world around you. You can either continue to be merciless, or try to make this land a better place.

In the demo, we chase after another character, leading us into a dungeon beyond the Old Walls, which are large structures believed to have been built by an ancient civilization.

Before diving into combat, I saw the new spell creation system. Around Tyranny's world, you come across magic sigils, and these give you basic formulas for spells. These consist of core elements such as fire, ice, healing, or lightning. By mixing and matching different components, you then add accents, where you can change the area of effect or range. Each spell can be given its own custom name and has a runic symbol that changes shape depending on its accents and customizations. Finally, you assign a spell to a corresponding party member who has a high enough lore level to conjure it.

Your party includes up to four members, making it a small group that is easier to manage. Mine consisted of a healer, tank, mage, and ranged character, but unlike Obsidian's previous game Pillars of Eternity, you don't pick standard classes in Tyranny. Instead, you customize your characters into your own unique mold.

Tyranny features play-and-pause combat, meaning you can pause the real-time fighting at any moment and assign moves or attacks for your party members to use. When you're not controlling a party member, they are automatically directed commands by the A.I. Your characters have a single health bar, rather than both health and endurance like in Pillars of Eternity. They can hold their own well, but it's best to issue commands and take charge of their maneuvers to aid your group towards victory.

Combat is a flashy spectacle of ice spikes and fireballs, making fights entertaining to watch. All enemies have weaknesses and strengths, and you can view them any time during battle to help you deduce which damage type is most effective against them. One dynamic part of these fights is that your party members can perform team attacks, such as a character throwing your archer upwards, resulting in a shower of arrows raining down on the enemy. Another addition is artifact weapons, which are special tools that increase in power and effectiveness the more you use them.

I was impressed by Tyranny's deep customization and spell creation, leaving me excited to see more of what this CRPG has in store. Tyranny releases this year on PC. For more on the game, head here.

 

[Neanderthal]

One dynamic part of these fights is that your party members can perform team attacks, such as a character throwing your archer upwards, resulting in an embarassed silence and enemy looking at you like you're a right twat. They will then quit combat walk away an call you a bunch o pansy cheerleaders. Shortly afterwards your party members will begin to commit suicide as they can't live with the shame of being such collossal manginas.

FTFY.

 

[Sannom]

You know, I don't think people bother reading a quote if they can't understand the answer.

 

[Infinitron]

Some more low energy Gamescom previews: http://www.polygon.com/2016/8/26/12...anny-will-let-you-build-your-own-magic-spells

Obsidian's new RPG Tyranny will let you build your own magic spells

Obsidian Entertainment's upcoming role-playing game, Tyranny, has a heavy classic vibeto it. Its isometric view, band of mages, rogues and warriors, and dungeon-diving fantasy gameplay will feel instantly familiar to anyone who's played games like Baldur's Gate orIcewind Dale — with some exception. The game will include a creation system for players to build their own magic spells.

At Gamescom 2016, Polygon got the chance to test out spell creation and its results in battle. There are a few key components: First, a player must pick the core of their spell. This is essentially its element — frost, fire lighting and so on. Once selected, you can set the expression of the spell, or how it will appear in battle. A bolt will offer a solid long-range choice, for example, while a cone adds more damage to enemies in a wider space.

Once created, players can buff their abilities with accents, which add attributes that can increase damage, add additional range, buff stun times or more. As you pile on accents, however, the lore cost for each item will increase; if your character lacks the lore to match, they'll be unable to use it.

Spell creation is a fairly simple process that adds a sense of personalization in battle. By choosing the shape of my spell — a bolt, for example, or an area-based cone —I was dictating how I wanted to play. Do I want to hang back and shoot off well-timed bolts? Probably not. I'm a little too sloppy for that; the more area I can hit, the better. Each enemy has different sets of resistance, which makes tailoring your spells to your party and play style important to success.

Tyranny launches for Linux, Mac and Windows PC later this year.

http://www.mmorpg.com/gamelist.cfm/game/1425/feature/11116/Its-Good-to-Be-Bad-Gamescom-Hands-On.html

Previews: It's Good to Be Bad - Gamescom Hands On

Deep in the dim reaches of the far past, so around September 2012, Obsidian Entertainmentneeded to switch things up. Obsidian is no stranger to making games. Since its inception in 2003 they've worked on all sorts of different styles of games. However four years ago they were facing a problem and made a saving throw.

The dice were clearly in their favor as we ended up with Pillars of Eternity.

Tyranny follows in the same vein as the critically acclaimed Pillars of Eternity. You'll control a party, you have the real time combat with the option to pause at a button push and of course the isometric view of the world.

That's the basic similarities. Tyranny puts you in new shoes though. You aren't the hero setting out to slay a great evil. You aren't a hero at all.

Evil won, and you are on the winning side.

It's Good To Be Bad

Running through a demo at a convention combines equal parts excitement and exasperation. Tyranny has a beautiful magic system and most of the early part of the presentation was given over to it. However when a dev strongly suggests you craft a particular type of spell, that's not them being helpful, that's making sure that random idiots like myself go through the rest of the demo with approximately the right tools to use against things.

That said, let’s talk about the magic system.

Spells are created for your characters using Core Sigils, Expressions and Accents. The Gamescom demo had access to the core sigils of Fire, Lightning, Ice and Life. Every spell you make will first start with a core sigil and there are more to discover in the game. Think of them like schools of magic. After you pick your core, you have to pick how it is expressed.

Each spell symbol changes depending on what expressions and accents you use which I found to be a lovely addition that probably could have been skipped in design but I am glad that it wasn't. It's a little addition to the system that makes it feel thought out. Anyway after your core sigil you choose how it is expressed. Once again for the demo options were limited, you could create a touch spell, a bolt or a cone. Naturally in the game there will be others to play with. Finally you can add an accent, increasing aspects of the spell like range, damage or duration.

After you've put the spell together you will have a generated name for it, but every spell can be renamed if you want. The spell will also have a lore cost. Characters can only have so many spells on them and cannot use spells whose lore cost exceeds their own lore ability. I can already see myself having fun building some of my party up into lore wielding magic blasting monsters.

The exasperation aspect is only a tiny one and left to the weird world of media demos. If someone insists that you really need to make an ice spell, you can be sure that some of the mobs you meet will be 100% weak to ice. It was completely outweighed by the excitement of crafting what I wanted in terms of spells to use later on.

Pick A Path

Naturally there's more to the game than mere spell systems and the view point. In Tyranny we start out in a world where evil has won and you are a Fatebinder. Fatebinders are the judges of the world whose word is law and naturally carry out the sentences themselves. The demo I got to run through only teases at some of the world elements. I got my hands on an artifact which had its own added spell. In what I think is a great twist, every artifact has a reputation and can become even more renowned through use, which in turn will boost its added spell power. It won't just be my party that is the talk of the world, it can be the very weapons we carry and use.

Tyranny’s world looks great on the map and I can't wait to get my hands on more of it. The demo however kept me in a fun little dungeon full of traps, imps and a small quest to solve. What I played through, I can say I thoroughly enjoyed. Obsidian clearly don't need to be told how to run their business on the back of Pillars of Eternity. This shines through in Tyranny and left me with a fun experience crawling the dungeon. There's plenty of flavor in the world apparent even in the demo, partially coming through the NPC companions. I'm not entirely sure what my roguish companion was threatening to tear out via people’s asses, but she certainly was willing to try.

What will sell the game at the end of the day isn't the fun and varied magic system. It isn't the pedigree of the studio, rich though that is. It isn't even the polished RPG experience. It's the question and the thrust of the story.

In a world where evil has won, where you are no hero and no angel. In a world where you are one of the strong right hands of the big bad, what will you go on to be? What do you want to be? Will you make amends and bring back hope to a world beaten down and crushed underfoot? Or will you keep that foot on the necks of the common people while you show Kyros the true meaning of tyranny?

Tyranny will be available in 2016. What little of 2016 remains, of course. From my limited experience? I definitely recommend picking it up if you want a rich new world to make your mark in.

 

[Sannom]

Why bother to do it now, Infinitron? As you say, "low effort". Might as well package it with the dev diary that should hit in two hours!