Preview Worthplaying previews Oblivion

[GhanBuriGhan]

I guess this one will have less of those Morrowind NPCs. You know, the ones in random spots all over the wilderness doing nothing but waiting for you to approach, before murderously scrambling for your x/y coordinate with cooking utensils raised. So hopefully cities won't be so barren.

Yes, Morrowind had a lot of murderous campers! Some of the screens and video scenes show cities that look reasonable for a sunday morning, although I have seen none with Saturday afternoon bustle - exept maybe that Anvil port shot.

 

[Micmu]

Yes, Morrowind had a lot of murderous campers!

They were more like suicidal campers. Game quickly became boring and unchallenging in combat after you reached level 10.
Hearing that hostile NPCs/creatures are now leveled is a good decision (if true).

 

[GhanBuriGhan]

Yes, Morrowind had a lot of murderous campers!

They were more like suicidal campers. Game quickly became boring and unchallenging in combat after you reached level 10.
Hearing that hostile NPCs/creatures are now leveled is a good decision (if true).

Levelled creatures (levelled lists) were in before, so it more depends on how well the lists are balanced. Levelling NPC could be interesting. BTW, what you say is true for fighters, but not for mages in MW - that stays challenging up to level 30 in my experience.

 

[Twinfalls]

It'd be even better if wandering campers with nothing more than a loincloth and rusty fork would actually take note of your freaking Deadric Tuxedo, and decide not to want to start a rumble.

I'd find it dumb if country folk are still murderous, but happen to be massively tough and sporting the best armour on the continent just because you have reached level 20 or whatever.

Micmu - so both the minigames are optional. That's a good thing.

 

[GhanBuriGhan]

Yes, it would be nice if they evaluate your "threat level". I think something along those lines was mentioned once in the forums, but I cant swear to it.

I think MicMu was kidding - but of course you don't have to use persuasion or you can just use it like MW's and allways go for one "pure" option...

 

[Micmu]

Levelled creatures (levelled lists) were in before, so it more depends on how well the lists are balanced.

As far as I remember, creatures were leveled up to level 20, but you reached that level very quickly (too quickly) without any powergaming.
I know I had to play it with a mod that reduced leveling rate by three times (and doubled creature hitpoints). If you wanted to play a fighter at +100 difficulty!
Only real threat were dremora lords equipped with daedric warhammer, dai-katana or battle axe - they were able to kill you with 2 blows. But their AI was utterly dumb - they continuously kept casting fireballs (even if you resisted each attempt) so you could chop them down like little rabbits.

Levelling NPC could be interesting. BTW, what you say is true for fighters, but not for mages in MW - that stays challenging up to level 30 in my experience.

As soon as you made your spell (fireball-o-death) mage was the easiest character to play with. I remember playing with a breton and atronach birthsign - piece of cake, much easier than with a fighter.

 

[GhanBuriGhan]

As soon as you made your spell (fireball-o-death) mage was the easiest character to play with. I remember playing with a breton and atronach birthsign - peace of cake, much easier than with a fighter.

Not with all those cretures with 90% (or whatever) reflect. I toasted myself more often than I can count. I actually had to resort to H2H for those - which was ok for my mage / monk hybrid, but for a pure mage it would be annoying.

 

[Twinfalls]

They've just released the Oblivion main title music. I think it's dreadful - a reworked Morrowind theme which sounds even more overwrought, hackneyed, and kind of ...cheap!

check it:

http://www.bethsoft.com/downloads/music/tes4title.mp3

 

[Vault Dweller]

A new tidbit - this from a new interview with Gavin:

For characters, we have worked our system of facial animation into the Speechcraft skill. Whereas in Morrowind persuasion was simply an invisible die roll against your skill, we’ve created a persuasion system where you look carefully at an NPC’s expression to determine how they’ll react to certain forms of persuasion.

CoolZ0r. Role playing now means face-analysis.

http://www.elitebastards.com/page.php?pageid=12316

Twinfalls, it is so cool and hip to criticize everything that is Oblivion, isn't it?

Well, it's not as cool as giving developers complimentary blowjobs and pretending that Oblivion is the bestest game evar, but it has its charms.

In fact that seems to be the way to acceptance on this board.

That is so true. We ban everyone who is suspected of being a TES fan. Just ask Tintin, GhanBuriGhan, crpgnut, yipsl, and all the other people who are looking forward to Oblivion.

Because for anyone who is cool and hip in a rpgcodex cool and hip kind of way, there is obviously not a single redeemable feature in Oblivion.

More like, for anyone who likes RPGs (don't confuse with games with adjustable stats), Oblivion doesn't have a lot to offer.

Oh, wait, I forgot. According to your canons this is NOT a criticism because it contains no evidence or reasoning. Just a one-liner. And that is NOT allowed.

Actually, it does. You missed it due to your cluelessness. Here is an explanation:

The new way relies on player's skills instead of character's skills. What else needs to be explained? Why player's skills are bad and character's skills are good? That's been covered many times. What's that? You don't mind using your own skills? Good for you, dear. You probably don't care whether it's an RPG or an FPS or an adventure game, as long as you having fun, that's a great game. We are very happy for you, but this is an RPG site, and we judge games by their RPG qualities. Any more questions?

 

[MrSmileyFaceDude]

Actually, it relies on both, VD -- both of the minigames are noticeable easier if your character's skills are higher, and noticeably more difficult if your character's skills are lower. So player skills are still important -- but character skills still play a huge role.

 

[pseudo intellectual]

Well, look at you, tracking down my posts on the Oblivion Forum!

I think that behind and beneath the endless taunting and withering criticism of all that is Oblivion, MSFD realizes that there are knowledable and experienced rpgers here -- and he respects you, your opinions, and your influence. Therefore he wants you to like Oblivion, and is willing to overlook the adolescent profanity and ridicule. Also, he sees all the conversation that is generated everytime an Oblivion news story goes up -- and he realizes the publicity capital. Which is another way of saying that yes, I think he is trying to preach to the unconverted.

Wrong. MSFD is one of the primary programmers on Oblivion. You think he has time to "preach to the unconverted" on this site in the middle of crunch time on the biggest title in the company's history? This is utterly illogical.

He's here for only one reason, to tone down the vitriol in order to minimize fallout (sic) going into GM.

Actually, he has been a regular poster here for quite some time -- long before crunch time. So nothing illogical there.

MSFD showed up here right after bethsoft acquired the Fallout license and this site expressed it's doubts about their competence to stay true to the franchise. So he was doing damage control back then.

Whether or not MSFD has contracted Stockholm syndrome in the intervening months can only be answered by him, but I find it fairly amusing that he has to come here in order to learn about what makes an RPG.

This is the problem with the industry now, you get people designing and making games that aren't expert in their implementation. I know he's a programmer, not a designer, but still this implies a disconnect.

Add to this the industry-wide practice of hiring designers/world builders on their scripting ability (in bethsoft's case, their proficiency with the TES toolset) rather than their design knowledge, writing talent, etc.

This is a very bad system. You should take writers and teach them how to use the toolsets rather than taking some uncreative person who knows the toolset and expecting them to write compelling stories and lifelike characters. It's just not going to happen.

Is it any wonder that games are no longer fun and game play has taken a back seat to graphics?

Add to this rampant neoptism and cronyism. Not only does the industry promote non-writers and designers into these creative positions, producers largely limit the selection to their extended and friends further exacerbating the problem.

 

[Twinfalls]

Actually, it relies on both, VD -- both of the minigames are noticeable easier if your character's skills are higher, and noticeably more difficult if your character's skills are lower. So player skills are still important -- but character skills still play a huge role.

Choosing individually written responses and having to determine for oneself what the outcome might be, without being told 'this one is flattery, this one is insulting', would also be a good way for player skill to come into it... the player's reading and social skills that is.

This could be in addition to the current mini-game.

 

[Twinfalls]

This is the problem with the industry now, you get people designing and making games that aren't expert in their implementation. I know he's a programmer, not a designer, but still this implies a disconnect.

MSFD is a bad example of what you are arguing, which you badly fudge over with that sentence. He's a programmer, doing the combat system. Why should he be an RPG writer or even designer? And he's stated that he plays RPGs, even PnP.

 

[pseudo intellectual]

This is the problem with the industry now, you get people designing and making games that aren't expert in their implementation. I know he's a programmer, not a designer, but still this implies a disconnect.

MSFD is a bad example of what you are arguing, which you badly fudge over with that sentence. He's a programmer, doing the combat system. Why should he be an RPG writer or even designer? And he's stated that he plays RPGs, even PnP.

http://rpgcodex.com/phpBB/viewtopic.php ... ht=#151691

He's stating his ignorance of RPGs here. I think that's fairly definitive.

You are a proven moron with a propensity for getting into nit picking arguments with VD and other so i'd rather not get into it with you, but even someone of your laughable intellect should be able to discern the importance of the combat system programmer being highly knowledgable about RPG combat mechanics in multiple systems.

 

[MrSmileyFaceDude]

Blow it out your ear, pseudo intellectual. As much as you'd like your pet theory to be true, there's no ulterior motive in my being here. And while it's certainly your prerogative to be a cynic, you have no knowledge of how Bethesda is structured or of the qualifications of its personnel, so you're commenting out of complete ignorance.

I'm a programmer. I've been programming for over 26 years. I worked a variety of non game development jobs for 13 years after college, and then worked in ZeniMax's R&D department for a couple years before transferring over to Bethesda in 2001, midway through Morrowind's development. So I have about 4 years experience programming games in particular, and more than 3 times that professional, paid programming experience. That's not counting the hobby programming I did throughout high school.

So when it comes to designing software, I damn well know what I'm doing.

But when it comes to RPGs, I'm a -relative- newbie. And so I came here to learn more. Yes, I'm working on Oblivion, and I'll post about that when I think it's appropriate to do so. But I'm not here for PR or damage control. So, please, get off your X-Files conspiracy theory kick.

 

[Twinfalls]

Well done Pseudo, you've just become a proven dick-head.

 

[pseudo intellectual]

Blow it out your ear, pseudo intellectual. As much as you'd like your pet theory to be true, there's no ulterior motive in my being here. And while it's certainly your prerogative to be a cynic, you have no knowledge of how Bethesda is structured or of the qualifications of its personnel, so you're commenting out of complete ignorance.

I'm a programmer. I've been programming for over 26 years. I worked a variety of non game development jobs for 13 years after college, and then worked in ZeniMax's R&D department for a couple years before transferring over to Bethesda in 2001, midway through Morrowind's development. So I have about 4 years experience programming games in particular, and more than 3 times that professional, paid programming experience. That's not counting the hobby programming I did throughout high school.

So when it comes to designing software, I damn well know what I'm doing.

But when it comes to RPGs, I'm a -relative- newbie. And so I came here to learn more. Yes, I'm working on Oblivion, and I'll post about that when I think it's appropriate to do so. But I'm not here for PR or damage control. So, please, get off your X-Files conspiracy theory kick.

If this were true then why the developer icon, why not just post as a citizen, and why are the bulk of your posts either defending or explaining Oblivion?

I never called into question your programming skills. I'm sure you're good at that. Morrowind did not fall down in the programming area.

 

[bryce777]

Patrick Stewart isn't popular over in Russia? Well, that means your average IQ is higher than here, especially among the nerd/geek groups. Congratulations.

Fuck Startrek. Fuck Stewart. He's a B-grade actor. The only reason he's popular is because he's the least suckiest among a cast of people that were hired off the street. He's really not that famous at all.

They should have gotten Sean Connery to do the emperor if they wanted someone famous (and HEY! Sean is actually famous!). At least he's been in a medieval fantasy movie before. But nooo, they get a fucking space captain from the future.

Oh well, maybe the assassins will end the emperor's life before I do. Die Stewart.

Patrick Stewart is a classically trained theatre actor, and he is about 200 times better than sean connery ffs.

I don't really care too much for watching a movie when I want to play a game, but it is ridiculous to call him a bad actor when he is an excellent actor.

 

[Twinfalls]

This is the problem with the industry now, you get people designing and making games that aren't expert in their implementation. I know he's a programmer...

I never called into question your programming skills.

You are not only stupid, but a liar.

 

[Vault Dweller]

Actually, it relies on both, VD -- both of the minigames are noticeable easier if your character's skills are higher, and noticeably more difficult if your character's skills are lower.

I'm aware of that, I just dislike that mechanism, just like I dislike the "always hit" combat. You know why.

So player skills are still important -- but character skills still play a huge role.

Respectfully disagree on the "huge role" thingy though.

 

[pseudo intellectual]

This is the problem with the industry now, you get people designing and making games that aren't expert in their implementation.

I never called into question your programming skills. I'm sure you're good at that. Morrowind did not fall down in the programming area.

You are not only stupid, but a liar.

dumbfuck: programming ability has nothing to do with knowledgability about RPGs, and in this case combat systems.

 

[Twinfalls]

dumbfuck: programming ability has nothing to do with knowledgability about RPGs, and in this case combat systems.

Yes that's right pseud, keep telling yourself that.

 

[Micmu]

Morrowind did not fall down in the programming area.

*cough* application has executed an illegal instruction and will be terminated *cough*

 

[Vault Dweller]

If this were true then why the developer icon, why not just post as a citizen, and why are the bulk of your posts either defending or explaining Oblivion?

You do realize that admins are the ones who assign custom tags to people? MSFD is posting here as a "citizen", not as a PR rep, so give him a break. Criticism should be justified. MSFD was always open and upfront about many things, never pretended that he knows better because he's "teh programmar", and even if he believes in something that you don't, that's his opinion.

 

[Twinfalls]

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