Do you think it is possible to produce a RPG that combines Baldur's Gate...

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Aristillius

Maybe doable with enough time and resources? If you have those clear-cut goals I mean?

Eudaemonium

I'm really not sure. Planescape, for example, benefitted immensely from its tight storyline and narrow selection of characters. Even within them, some of its cast seem far more fleshed out than others (I would, for example, say that Morte and Dak'kon are far more fully-realised characters than Nordom).

Baldur's Gate, by contrast, has far larger customisation options (from class, race, gender, proficiency options to a wide selection of party characters), but a more (IMO) shallow plot experience. BG's strength is in its gameplay and its customisation.

Coming from BG to Torment to BG2, I was initially horribly disappointed in BG2, which I considered to be a massive step back from Torment's deeper characterisation, plot and setting. At the same time, I remember starting Torment and being horrified that my character was stuck as this scarred-up muscly guy, who could not be any kind of cleric, druid or multi-class character.

The issue really comes down to one of funding and resources. Sure it *might* be possible to combine the best elements in theory, but in practice this is unlikely to occur due to the fact that any dev team will have to focus on certain elements and discard others.

Xavioria

The plotline of Planescape was so refreshingly different than anything else I have ever played. It's like working your way backwards. I personally prefer Torment's alignment system, dialogue system, and LOVED how you could pick a faction and represent them! BG had a great storyline too though (BG2 was a bit lacking, but was still good in its own right) but had the deep customization that I HAVE to have in a game I love, and also brought higher levels, more NPCs and a better battles than Torment had.

I think it would have been amazing to combine the two with their best features. The only problem, would be: Who decides which are the best features. Making EVERY stat count would be better for a main PC because to be a good leader AS WELL AS whatever class they chose, they'd need everything.

As I stated, Heavy personalization in a game is a must for me, even before storyline (I figured that out about myself with FFTA2...) but what about those who need story line more, or options more, or whathave you?

My last answer is yes. I think it would make a masterpiece of a game. The only real issue though, is that you need one HELL of a storyplot, and I think that's the most difficult to build.

ajwz

Yeah, I think it's possible. However, western games have tended to drift away from story telling and more towards gameplay, and that's where I think the long term trend is headed.

Personally, I'm a big fan of visual novel style games, but I think they'll remain relatively niche.

Gallowglass

Interesting question, @Bhaaldog.

As a theoretical possibility, yes, sure. However, it'd be very difficult to be certain (until you actually did it) whether what you got at the end would be the best-of-both or a dog's-breakfast. Quite a gamble.

In practice, each aspect of a game which a dev team focuses on maximising adds significantly to the development cost. Only the very biggest game companies would have the resources even to attempt an every-aspect-maxed project, and even then their finance director would likely stop it by having the creative director taken away by the men-in-white-coats as "obviously insane" for risking the whole company (and all of their jobs) on a single project. So I don't think the "perfect RPG" is economically feasible.

For my taste, games like BG and Torment are (in their different ways) as close to the ideal as we're likely to get. We're VERY LUCKY that Overhaul has taken on the Enhanced Edition projects! This is probably the only business model by which a commercial enterprise might be able to improve on such already-great games without dooming itself to bankruptcy. Building something this good from scratch would be just too risky an investment, without the already-proven success of the original versions to bank on. Even so, it's obvious from the way that BGee was released with so many obvious major bugs (thankfully many of which have now been patched, although some features like the Journal are still a dreadful mess) that Overhaul was forced to release before the product was ready, presumably because their budget was running dry.

We know that the original developers had more planned in BG1 and BG2 than actually made it into the final versions. That wasn't because they were vandals who wanted to short-change players! Perhaps some of the Unfinished Business was cancelled because it was judged to be poor-quality story material, but I'm certain a lot of it was cut simply because good-quality development costs a fortune and they couldn't afford to complete everything they'd hoped to be able to do. It's better to reach the market with 90% of what you wanted to achieve than hold out for 100% and go bust before you deliver!

Astafas

I'm hoping for Project Eternity: http://eternity.obsidian.net/

Lord_Tansheron

Project Eternity looks promising indeed, and with Kickstarter funding we can finally overcome the single greatest barrier to seeing another game like BG - money.

Let's face it, the more complex and in-depth a game is, the less likely Average Joe is to buy it. They want fast-pased, action-laden consumer experiences that they can jump in and out of at their leisure, preferably in a way that compares their e-peen against that of other Average Joes on the internet.

An involved, complex, time-consuming single player experience has an incredibly narrow market at the moment, and consequently no company will want to invest into creating new IP in that category.

That left us with low-budget indie titles and remakes of old successes (oh hi there Overhaul!); with Kickstarter, we can hopefully get a new quality project out that hopefully provides us with something similar to what BG offered and is still offering.

Mattysek

Try Original War. It combines strategy with rpg and has great storyline and really unique gameplay. Intro to american campaign: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LaWKiPiDIec

DJKajuru

What I miss the most from Torment and Fallout is how your attributes influence the game - intelligence, charisma , wisdom...

A baldur's gate like game with this kind of care when it comes to dialogue and roleplaying options would be amazing!

mlnevese

This is a feature I'd really like to see in the BG:Next game. Reactions based in your attributes and race. It would be interesting to see people reacting with fear or hatred to your drow paladin, for instance. And then you'd have to slowly build trust in people until you're known as a true hero.

Even your companions could show distrust or disagreement according to your race/attributes.

DJKajuru

@Xavioria , you mentioned the words "heavy personalization" . Although I understand what you mean, it scares me the fact that developers don't always do it in a subtle way . I hate to see this:

"You're a nice girl, Aerie"
*Charname has just TWO social points with Aerie."

OR

"Nalia: You'll be the lord of the hold"
Charname won a stronghold - click here to access DLC for the Keep"


When RPG games try to customize stuff like that - romance by social points , decorate your stronhold , replay that dungeon for more experience... - it ends up lacking real immersion, which for me is the most important thing in an crpg : to make you feel you are living the life of that character , with its advantages and limitations.

Xavioria

@DJKarjuru I... think you seemed to perceive what I was saying incorrectly, because I was talking about creating a character with different stats, race class, proficiencies, alignment yada yada, with the ability to choose good or evil.

Granted Baldur's Gate power gaming leans more towards good, I digress...

So, I don't think you actually DO know what I meant by that, I honestly don't know which game you're talking about that does this "point" system you seem to be referring to (I don't own any consoles so maybe that has something to do with it) But that is not at all, in any way, what I meant, and I'm even more confused as to how this point system counts as customization, at all.

When she mentioned Torment, Torment lacks alot of the customization that BG has (granted it has some) and I think with the heavy plot details and dialogue heavy immersion within Torment mixed with the customization of BG, would be a great game.

Nonnahswriter

mlnevese said:

This is a feature I'd really like to see in the BG:Next game. Reactions based in your attributes and race. It would be interesting to see people reacting with fear or hatred to your drow paladin, for instance. And then you'd have to slowly build trust in people until you're known as a true hero.

Even your companions could show distrust or disagreement according to your race/attributes.

I remember Icewindale did this in a few, little instances of gameplay. I can't remember the specifics, but I know that if you have a low intelligence or play a certain class you get certain dialogue options when talking to certain characters that your other party members wouldn't have. Now if a new Baldur's Gate game took these little touches and made them more detailed, and mixed in with your suggestion of character reactions, that would be a sight to see.

karnor00

DJKajuru said:

@Xavioria , you mentioned the words "heavy personalization" . Although I understand what you mean, it scares me the fact that developers don't always do it in a subtle way . I hate to see this:

"You're a nice girl, Aerie"
*Charname has just TWO social points with Aerie."

OR

"Nalia: You'll be the lord of the hold"
Charname won a stronghold - click here to access DLC for the Keep"


When RPG games try to customize stuff like that - romance by social points , decorate your stronhold , replay that dungeon for more experience... - it ends up lacking real immersion, which for me is the most important thing in an crpg : to make you feel you are living the life of that character , with its advantages and limitations.

I remember I once made the mistake of installing a mod for PST which told me how many law/chaos/good/evil points I was accruing for each action. It took so much away from the immersion of the game as I realised I was choosing options based on how many points I got rather than just picking what I wanted.

My first playthrough I had no idea how many points I was accruing, but just selected options based on what I thought my nameless one should be doing. I enjoyed the game much more and ended up as chaotic good - which felt right because I'd generally been doing the right things, but not caring whether this broke the law or not.

Playing Dragon Age 2 in particular I was almost forced to select certain options based on which party I had chosen. If I didn't then I could end up missing a lot of the game, and this wasn't much fun.

State_Lemming

ajwz said:

Yeah, I think it's possible. However, western games have tended to drift away from story telling and more towards gameplay, and that's where I think the long term trend is headed.

Personally, I'm a big fan of visual novel style games, but I think they'll remain relatively niche.

Interesting, what games are you referring to? When I look at Mass Effect and Dragon Age I see a larger emphasis on storytelling, but then those are both Bioware games.