VD's Gothic 3 impressions

[sabishii]

LONG Q&A with PB, from http://forum.worldofplayers.de/forum/sh ... ost2601994

[PB]Mike 27.10.2006, 17:35

First off:

I tried addressing all questions regarding GAMEPLAY - except a few which made no sense.
In the following posts I'm going to answer questions regarding story, the future of Gothic and general questions.

1 - Is it intentional, that many blows don't have any effect since the enemies step back (jump back) very often?

For the wildlife this is intended (as in G1 and G2). When fighting humanoids, this is happening too often and should be improved imho. This is not yet going to happen in patch 2, though.

2 - Is it intended, that many spells are missing their target, since the opponents are easily evading?

In the game I played, it was possible to fire off a fireball in a straight line with a short click. A long click makes it a "homing missile". This is intended.

3 - Why the astronomical prices for weapons and equipment?

Since one gets that much gold within the game world, which has to reflect back to the pricing.

4 - Why is one often given incomplete and inaccurate quest directions, making it a frustrating search?

Some directions are stupid.

5 - Did you take into account, that especially for RPG newbies, the lacking thread and sparse information regarding "what to do next" might be a problem?

It is intended, that the presence of monsters capable of killing the hero is a problem.
It is intended as well, that the player has to seek out goals for himself (more yet, than in the previous Gothic games).
Personally, I think that we're distancing ourselves for a good part from what many people perceive as "main stream" (in a negative sense) this way.

6 - Why is the spawn rate so high, why do mobs appear out of nowhere when I started a fight with two or three animals only? This way, I get ambushed by an entire horde and my allies have no chance of surviving.

a) Many NPCs are (currently) too weak against monsters.
b) One should be careful about where to get into fights.
c) The monster population was thinned out a bit with patch 2.

7 - Are Nordmar and Vengard Orcs so evil, that they're attacking even the most prominent of Orc mercenaries?

Yes. That's intentional. Just like human bandits.

12 - Why are there no real professions (like in G2)?

That's also intentional. We made the entire profession thing a bit more abstract, but we also did expand it (e. g. making it possible to use whetstones etc.).

13 - Why is the combat system designed in a way that makes it possible to unintentionally hit your own allies in combat without even targeting them?

"Your allies" are probably neutral NPCs (yet). When getting involved in a fight between two neutral NPCs, one is indeed facing the problem of often hitting the wrong guy with "normal" attacks. By keeping the right mouse button pressed it's possible to take one opponent into "focus lock" and specifically attack him with left mouse button clicks afterwards though.

14 - Where's the good old quest log?

Making a "dialog log" was planned from the start. Imho the desired result is simply lacking in some places because not all relevant dialogs appear in the log. It's possible to resolve that in a future patch.

16 - Why is there nothing to do in the cities after the revolutions?

"Farming off" cities (there are more of them, in exchange) and using cities as mere "trading outposts" afterwards was intended.

17 - Why is the combat balancing so half-baked (in particular when fighting against wildlife), or was that intended?

Missing animation data. The boars e. g. had no "strike out" animation, which was the reason for their "power attacks" to be as quick as normal attacks (but twice as strong) and the strike out pauses were missing. Fixed in patch 2. Yet these beasts still aren't easy to beat though.
It was intended, that there are a few "most feared" opponents, forcing the player to e. g. use a bow or learn hunting perks.

18 - Why is there no sense of loyalism or sense of community within any of the factions?

Again: Usually, one does not return to previously visited locations, except for trading (maybe sleeping, learning). This impression is also a result of the changed concept / the size of the game world.

19 - Are the bugs that are the cause for quests failing going to be wiped out with the next patch (-> do you need help from the WoG community in regards to a bug compendium?)

Yes, it should happen that way. Regarding the second part of the question: There is a very good bug tracker already.

20 - Why are there so few dialogs? (-> most NPCs get rid of you with the same lines over and over again)

Because we were of the opinion, that it wouldn't really be worth implementing dialogs with ambient characters. Most players talked to two or three farmers or miners at the beginning of G1 or G2 and ignored them afterwards. Personally, I also don't consider ambient character dialogs to be important. Some main characters probably should have had a few more lines to tell (especially for the fans), but I dealt with that in my previous post already.

21 - Why are there relatively few items, weapons, scrolls and armor?

I didn't get that impression. For the weapons the problem was, that the distribution system was bugged, resulting in no better weapons appearing in chests. This should be fixed with patch 2. However, the system starts working from the time the first chest is opened, therefore you will find less great weapons unless you restart the game.

22 - Why do some skills have close to no effect to fighting (good / master swordsman)?

The effects are:

a) the strength of hits (opponents will tumble more often, also depends on the difficulty setting)
b) the patch adds a good chunk of additional damage

23 - Why are "trainers" so rare in Myrtana, Nordmar and Varant?

I don't think so.

24 - Why is the hero paralyzed for a short time after getting hit (like in G1, at the start)?

The player is supposed to take better care not to get hit.

30 - Why does the old learning system from G2 no longer exist? (10 -> 100%)

Since there were basically only 3 different levels there as well. The new system was supposed to be reduced to the essentials.

31 - Why are the contents of chests random and so ... boring?

The world is meant to be possible to be completed in any order, after all. Therefore we made a few important design decisions, which were not perceived as improvements by all players. After it's possible to find "great items" with the patch, the problem is solved - provided that you accept the design.
In the smaller addon world we will probably revert back to the old concept.

32 - Why do the hero's deeds have so few effects on the game world (-> king killed, nobody cares)

This was impossible to realize, taking the size of the world into account. Probably it would've been possible to add some dialogs in some places, however, it would've been absolutely impossible to achieve full coverage of certain topics all over the gaming world.
Was it possible to tell anybody of Gomez' death in Gothic 1? If so, it was merely one or two characters for certain. This is pretty much the same point as the prementioned shortfall in regards to adding more dialogue for the main characters (one of the two main points of criticism, me included)

33 - Why are there so few and only small maps (world map)? Why are there no town maps?

The towns are sufficiently clearly arranged imho. I, for one, do not miss these maps.

34 - Why is it not possible to get an own house / hat?

This is possible in Montera. It has been realized by scripting, not by system (as previously) - it was never intended to realize something like that as a major gameplay element, since it (and I repeat myself) does no longer belong to the concept to keep returning to previously visited places in Gothic 3.

36 - Is it that essential that important NPCs are mortal?

No. But it was part of our goal to give as much freedom to the player as possible. Unfortunately, NPCs are too weak compared to monsters. This will be fixed in another patch.

38 - Why is it always the same "I understand" over and over again?

Because the hero's voice actor (Christian Wewerka) complained that he had to read out "I understand" and "Show me your wares" over and over again for a thousand times for the previous parts of the Gothic series. Therefore, he requested that we "solve this some different way, it has to be possible after all...".
It was.

39 - Is it possible to play with the old combat controls? (-> as it was possible in G2)

It would be, however, I'd prefer to improve the new controls.

40 - Is the fast leveling intended?
41 - Why are there no longer additional health points granted when gaining a level?

What am I supposed to say in regards to these two questions? Leveling is faster, there are more learning points which can be used for "buying" health points. More freedom for the player to decide for himself, how offensive he wants his character to evolve while spending learning points. You can simulate the old system by simply investing in health points every 4th level.

42 - Why are there no weapon sheaths?

There never were and never will be. The realization effort is disproportionate in regards to the improvements it would make to the game.

43 - Why are there no / close to none alternate paths for quests?

There barely were any in the predecessors either. In exchange, in G3 you can transform into a meat bug to get past guards or commit an unnoticed theft right in front of the eyes of an NPC using telekinesis.

That's it for now. Patch 2 is online now and does not improve everything, but much. Party members and humans per se are a tad stronger against monsters, but still not strong enough - this will be fixed together with the combat system in the next (and hopefully last) patch.

 

[Admiral Rimjob POOBUM]

Uh... the boars were fixed in the 1.08 patch. The still pack a punch, but they're no insta-death killing machines anymore - which is a good thing.

Yeah. I can almost imagine how it would go...

Hero: None can vanquish me! I am all Might- HOLY CRAP A BOAR!!! RUN!!!!!!!

Quite sadly, that's almost word-for-word how it went after I liberated Montera.

 

[suleo]

Erm, no mention of the HORRIBLE SAVEGAME CORRUPTION BUG in this Q&A. I really, sincerely, definately hope they fix that bug and all other memory-related crashes in the next patch. They should have taken care of those in patch 2 but they didn't...

 

[Needle]

21 - Why are there relatively few items, weapons, scrolls and armor?

I didn't get that impression. For the weapons the problem was, that the distribution system was bugged, resulting in no better weapons appearing in chests. This should be fixed with patch 2. However, the system starts working from the time the first chest is opened, therefore you will find less great weapons unless you restart the game.

This really sucks. So everyone who bought the game on release day and doesn't want to start all over again will be stuck with rusty swords and scrolls of light for the rest of the game? Way to punish your most loyal customers, PB. Making a workaround for this can't be that hard.

 

[Vault Dweller]

Some of the questions are really, really stupid.

 

[Jasede]

This is less stupid:

First, we don't chose the "we want fast money and kid the fans"-way.
That G3 wasn't finished at the release was crap. That guys complain about that is legitimate. We knew that there will not be no bugs but we underrated the amount of problems we were confronted working at the goldmaster.
We thought that we will deliever a finished game with a few bugs at the announced release and wanted to remove them with one patch.

Sadly we are working on a 2nd patch now but although we will fix the most known bugs many fans will be disappointed.

We tried to get a big target group for Gothic III. So we made a few changes which fans see as worsening:
- No membership -> free gameplay
- Great, free, non-linear world, which towns you can "play" in every order instead of returning to the visited town with pemanently new quests.
- Quest are "given by the world" and not by NPC's.
- New combat system instead of only new animations (more details later).
- AI-reaction at town level instead of NPC-level (like murdering, theft)

This changes maybe would had been accepted by the community if there - beside the technical problems (which we have mostly fixed now) - were not 2 big mistakes:

1. Tuning (NPC, items, combat)
2. Bad presentation of important chars.

The tuning will be fixed with the 2nd patch. For example there was no way to use the crossbow advantageous. But to patch the combat system we will need more time.

The story is not more or less than "There are dragons, find their master! (Gothic 2). The problem in Gothic 3 is the density. We chosed a lower one but but give important chars less lines to compensate that (this sentance makes imho no sense in German ). To solve this problem we had not enough time at the ending.

In the future we will not try again to overstrain us with a big world like this.

That it's, I will answer further questions now.

Zitat:
Zitat von premus2
There's more from PB in the german thread "Antworten der Piranhas". Could you translate it all please?
Ok, but not word by word - I habe not enought time:

1) Why you can't dive?

There were more importent things we are working on so that it was at the ending of the feature list. Than we thought abaout how usefull dive would be and how many time we would need to add it.

pro:
- It was in G1/G2 and give you the feeling of freedom.

con:
- It was never really added. So you can't pick up items.
- We didn't thought about underwater quests.
- We would had to create a whole under water world.
- We would had to create a new movment which would be very difficult particulary because of the physik engine we use.

2) Why is there no climbing anymore?

There are several reasons. We didn't liked that the hero can climb at each thing (for example Innos statue) and you can't enter locations which the AI can't.

So we wanted two add two different ways of "climbing". First an automatic jump at some placed and second a way to move with your back at a wall. First wasn't possible because of we would had to flag every stone and the 2nd rask would be oversized for our one animator.

Additional we would had getting troubles with the animation system.

3) Did you used a LOD system?

(In short) Sure, where it was usefull.

4) Is there a documentation of supported features (engine)?

(in Short) No, but it would be interesting because of

a) there are a few things which make the engine "unique":
- seamingless world feature
- All meshes are "arbitrary complex". That means we use meshes with any complexity instead of "heightfields" or "convexe meshsoups".

b) it support many features which we didn't use like:
- Physik: ropes, chains, fluids, classic rigidbodies (rolling barrels, detroyable objects)
- Rendering: Ultra High Detail meshes with LOD
- Materialsystem: tons of shader combinations
- Eventsystems, Mover,
- etc..

I hope we will add a list to the mod-kit.

Btw the genome Engine consists of 1.5 Mio lines code written by 3-6 guys in 3 1/2 years.

5) Will there be no shut downs anymore?

- (short) I guss yes. We fixed all what we can.
- We still try optimize the engine.
- A patch will support the Agea PhysiX card.

6) Do you look at the bugtracker?

- Yes. Respect to the creators.

7) Is is right that you needed 4 GB Ram during the development.

(short) No, we don't have PC which supported 4 GB so it was impossible.

8) Why the decision to work with the gamebryo engine?

At the beginning of the development it looked good because of the good documentation and modular structure. But later wo noticed that it is difficult to add things like seamingless worl, arbitrary meshes and our physik so that we decieded to make an own engine. And it is usefull to own an own engine.

by Eshme:

Q. "Was there a deficiency of Money or Time ,to complete more Rendervideos?"

A. We have very early agreed to make the Rendervideos ourselves. That was more of a Creative Decision than a money one, because we wanted to exercise more Control over them.
In the End it was missing Time to complete more of them, since only at the end of Production we started to produce them. (Because the Material then finished)

Q. "Why do Womens play no Role?"

That was discussed in my Thread at
http://forum.worldofplayers.de/forum...d.php?t=153707
and i have tried to explain it thorougly, here an excerpt:

The Answer is probably as banal as it is simple, and its embarrasing to post. We simply had no time to make them game-relevant.
We completed 6 Models with textures. But there was technical Problems, like the design of the Hairs or Clothes, that we havent been able to complete satisfactory in time. And that means the Models have arrived at the Story Guys very late (Who placed the Characters)
Because of that, the Voice recording had been done mostly. (many Areas had a Time limit the text had to be finished, to be done in time)
And the Ladies stood speechless, and what would that be saying about the Game in the end?
As we could finally put them into the World, we barely had Speechsamples that contained Quest Information, since the Guys in the Storydepartment had been forced to work around that Problem when we werent finished.

I bow to all female Gothic Fans. We havent forget you or are a Band of female hating Gamedesigners.
In fact its the Opposite, we would have liked more Womans in the Game, but it wouldnt be true this time. Gothic 3 has been a tricky technical Production (not that anybody has missed that)

Q. "Do Fullbody Armors always have to be a Part of Gothic?"

In the Moment yes, since that is the System we build the Animations on ,as well as the "Head and Texture Switches".
But there should be more possible with that System in the future.

Q. "What happened with the Tail of the Avatar

As you may have noticed, none of the Models has real long Hair.
It has caused Problems with Transitions (Transparencies?) and looked bad by trying to Animate it with Bones. And as the "FRAGEN ZUM ARTBUCH" Thread explains, we're missing it (the hairs) as well.
I cant say yet, if we implement them in the Future.

Q. "Why are most of the Characters so identical, or sloppy designed?" (same Haircuts, Body characteristics are often the same)
Q. "Why do some Humans have little heads"
Q. "Who has so much deformed the Heads of the old Friends?"

That is also explained in the "FRAGEN ZUM ARTBUCH" Tread.
I save you from copy and paste explanations, and want to tell those who want to know to read that Thread (its not that long and hopefully answers all of your Questions)

Q. "Why are in some Areas so few Animals, and in some bare Areas (Nordmar) are full of Creature hordes?"

The Phase in which the World has been filled with monsters has been very hectic, and sadly only been able to do near the end of the Project. At first the Middlelands has been filled with Monsters, and then the other 2 at the same Time.
The Goal was to make Nordmar the hardest to play Territory. Because with our gameplay you can run past most Monster, we compensated with that much more Monsters. Soso, the result was a bit irritating, and we're tuning that abit right now.
On the other Hand are the mostly empty Areas. The Process of adding Monsters is basically to systematically fly over the World and place Monsters both logically and interestingly. If possibly one tries to put them also tactically or optically interesting, depending on the Landscape.
With that it still happened that one simply missed one Place. Those arent even recognized in the Testing phase, since the Testers know where the Story is played at. And theyre mostly where the Story is at.
But there is the Fact, that sometimes it is a desired Effect, as in the Desert, where there is nothing at all in huge distances. And that has been really well done in my Opinion, and helps the Atmosphere.

Q. "Why are the old Temples so monotonous, and very small inside..compared to their impressive size.

As the Temples have been on Schedule some months back, ive made the decision to design the inners of a Temple so linear and small as possible. To build Temples always is fun for us, and in "Night of the Raven" we really could exercise.
The Halls have been good modelled and textured, but they took alot of working hours.
The Temples in Gothic3 arent places ,the Player should be at for long. The Priority lays in the Landscape, the Towns which there are plenty.
So what to do? Make the Lands of Myrtana sparse, but spend 4 weeks in Temples the player quickly forgets?
Or to spend more time in the Landscape ,the player is at 90% of the time?
Ive decided for the latter, and made the Temples as they are now. Yes i know it could have been more beautifully, but we have created 3 radically different Landscapes with their Towns, which set a new standard in our Genre.
So our work was a matter of priorities.

Q. "Why is there so few Diversion in the World? Where are the Dungeons or the many secret Places?

Indeed there are just a limited amount of that in Gothic3. That is sad for sure, but we still tried to put in some Highlights here and there.
In Myrtana for example are 2-3 bigger caves and ca. 30 smaller ones ,who all have gotten an individual Object (Only counting the middlelands). Then theres the passes to Nordmar, the Ruins in the Desert, the Library and the Ore-melter in Nordmar. In the End we had to decide, which to put more Value in.

Would one ,for example, take the Ruins away, to place more hidden ,invididual modelled places in the World?
Or would one like to exchange the individual Houses in the Desert-towns (Ishtar, BeliarTemple, Mora Sul Fortress) against more nice dungeons, and make the Deserttowns less unique as the ones in Middlelands are?
However you twist it, there are many Possibilities, to put your time into many beautiful locations. We just have decided on that big World, with many different and big Landmarks. Sadly for the Cost of detailled Levelwork, which means Minilocations and Dungeons.
That does change in the Future thou, since we/myself arent confident of that principle. The middleway is always the best Way.
If you dont have big and remarkable landmarks in the World, it doesnt have much profile. If its missing little interesting locations, the world is missing density instead.

Q. "Are Objects ,like the Tunnel to Nordmar, or the Ending portal made very low quality ,or not made at all, because of time or money pressure?"

Oh yes, the Tunnel.. The Tunnel should have been blocked with Rocks.. Its isnt actually the Pass to Nordmar.. The bridge in Faring should be leading towards a Lake, which hasnt been done.. the real Pass to Nordmar is the serpentines on the right side..
I have told that a collegue, to shut the tunnel, but it was quickly forgotten. And i havent looked back again..and as i read a review in a english online mag, i realized the tunnel was still passable... and Gothic 3 was "Gold" at that time..
Oh yes, a big World..many things that we wanted to do we forgot, because there was so many things to do at once.
And also the ending Portal, which doesnt seemed that nice.. but i was confident ,that a portal to the Unknown Lands should look like as the Nature is defending itself to be passed by you. So, my idea was the rocks, that had to look as you could move them apart..
Sadly the Portal didnt make it that impressive into the Game as i would have thought. And then it was to late to make big changes in the landscape.

Edit: I will change it into a link if it is too long. Just complain.

 

[Whipporowill]

That's old - it's in some other thread already, so don't bother.

 

[Elwro]

After losing hundreds of hours to G1, G2 and NotR and beying a PB fanboi, I still say that the reasons for excluding climbing and females are pathetic.

"Sorry, we're making the RPG of 2006, yeah, we really aim high, but what do you expect us to do with only one animator?"
Hint: Hire more animators, you're no longer an indie ffs.

 

[Stauff]

After losing hundreds of hours to G1, G2 and NotR and beying a PB fanboi, I still say that the reasons for excluding climbing and females are pathetic.

I still can't get my hands to play the game - so can you please comment on females question - according to QA log it is not clearly understandable - are there any females at all in the game world. If not is there at least a smartass explanation (in the game itself) on why they aren't?

 

[Vault Dweller]

Yes, there are some female slaves.

 

[Elwro]

You see, I haven't played the game myself. I'm just being negative in the true Codex way, without first-hand knowledge.

 

[Vault Dweller]

Well, if you liked the first two games, you abso-fucking-lutely will like G3.

 

[Elwro]

Thanks. That's the kind of info I wanted.

 

[suleo]

Besides the generic female slaves, there are in fact TWO (2) NAMED female slaves, somewhere in the desert. You can even intiate "normal" dialog with them!

 

[Drakron]

Well G1 had what? a couple of females?

G2 had far more but none played a key role, G3 does have a issue because they dont use much of the female slaves and female rebel models so its ends up looking that about 80% of the population is male.

Of course its no TES in the sence there is a static wold population, when you "liberate" a city in G3 you get NPCs that just "pop up" in the game world, the rebel bases NPCs are not used to populate the liberated towns.

 

[Stauff]

G2 had far more but none played a key role

G2 had brothel and it was quite a lively place

 

[fizzelopeguss]

G2 had far more but none played a key role,

I think the leader of the thieves guild under khorinis was an old woman.

 

[Elwro]

Not so old, even, iirc.

 

[Micmu]

Don't forget Sagita The Herb Witch.

 

[Elwro]

And Sekob's wife with the quest around her and the help she could give you.

 

[Drakron]

By key role I mean main quest progression, I remember quests in Gothic 2 that were given by female NPCs and the city having many female NPCs walking around.

 

[Elwro]

... and the bartender from Onar's Farm who would give you some valuable extra rewards for certain deeds.

Although yeah, no females in the main quest. I always thought that the main quest was the worst thing about G2 and the game's beauty was in the responsive world and "smaller" sidequests, though...

 

[Needle]

Besides the generic female slaves, there are in fact TWO (2) NAMED female slaves, somewhere in the desert. You can even intiate "normal" dialog with them!

There are also two or three female warriors in Nordmar. Strangely though, they spout the same lines as the female slaves.

 

[Littlefizz]

Well G1 had what? a couple of females?

The good thing about no-females in g1 was that it actually made sense, it was a male prison, they traded ore for bitches.

Actually, I didn't care that much about the lack of women in g3 until I read that, I was too busy freeing slaves and all, anyway, if they are not important gameplay-wise I don't care if there are no women, children, men, orcs, elves...

However, I need to ask those of you that have already played many hours, are female orcs in?

 

[Needle]

No. The manual mentions something about the orcish families waiting in the grlaciers of the far north for their men to return with teh phat loot or something like that.

 

[Littlefizz]

No. The manual mentions something about the orcish families waiting in the grlaciers of the far north for their men to return with teh phat loot or something like that.

There goes my hope for a female orc porn cutscene, another chance g3 missed to offer something original