Once they hit $2.5M they'll have the same number of companions as the original PS:T, which will be nice. Hopefully they add another at $3M, for eight. Of course, more companions is always good, but I think 8 sounds like a decent figure. After that it might be best to increase content with those 8 rather than create new ones.
Really, really, looking forward to this. Will definitely be following the development.
As long as all companions have as much content as the ones in PS:T had, I don't really mind. I suppose it would be difficult to get to that point with much more than seven or eight of them running around.
I have started playing Planescape: Torment for the first time a few days ago. Now I am in a kind of dead end gameplay-wise.
Spoiler: I am in the valley/street with the two Dabus, one of them already dead (murdered by the valley itself, it's called "Gasse der heulenden Seufzer" in German). I should reverse two changes the Dabus made, but since I am a mage already, I have no chance to use the hammer to do so. I got Morte and Annah with me, both of them not able to use the hammer as well. How can I continue..? Does anyone have an idea?
Thanks a lot. I also figured I need another item to get things working. I already had to play it again, because I "forgot" the hammer the first time and the door would not open again.. This seems like a real dead end.
I have only played PnP D&D once, and I think it was 3rdE, so i actually have no idea about this whole kerfluffle, but from the way this book gets talked about it seems to be the poster boy for why raging fanboys should not write the rules for the things they're raging fanboys about. Especially at the young age of 22.
I still have my copy of the Complete Book of Elves. My dislike of it was more based on the general lore for elves in 2nd edition, but then, I was pretty young at the time and didn't have an appreciation for mechanical balance (and it took a long slog through 3rd edition to bring home the fact that roleplaying disadvantages don't balance mechanical advantages).
On the subject of the Kickstarter, I'm looking forward to more people than Colin McComb talking. I'd like to get excited for this, but his rhetorical style just isn't doing it for me.
I'd expect there to be a lot of work involved with each character: plotting, writing, drawing, rendering, coding, compiling, figuring out how they fit in the game, coming up with as much depth and complication as each of them had in PS:T, and so forth. I see no reason why all these things would not take a lot of money: they do in most modern AAA games too, and in those games writing tends to be kind of crap in the end anyway.
Also, contrary to what most people think, graphics don't actually take that much money, even in a full-3D high-resolution eye candy like we see today. It's surprisingly cheap.
Notice that as they get more money they're hiring more writers to work on different plot modules; unless they've got outside backing, they need to have enough money to pay those writers for the duration of the design cycle, including the inevitable delays. This, if I remember correctly, is why the Hero-U Kickstarter is going to take so long to produce a game; they didn't raise enough money to pay everyone to work full time, so the project crew is working on it part time while they do other projects for money.
"Outside of the choice of gender, which will change the game in certain ways, you'll not be able to make your own, personal character. “We’re not going to customize the looks. This is primarily an internal journey. It’s not dress-up,” McComb said."
If it's an internal journey, why does it matter if the player customizes the looks? Maybe we can get a $3.3 mil stretch goal to be able to change the skin tone. Also a completely dodge on the question of whether or not there's going to be same-gender relationship options. I know they don't want to do a classic "select the right dialog options to get sex" style romance, but you know, homosexual people have relationships that are about interpersonal intimacy as well; they're not all sex-crazed maniacs. [/sarcasm]
Personally it never did matter to me at all, both on the case of personal appearance customization and on same-gender relationships. Certainly neither of them should ever be the first priority to think about in the game.
Personally it never did matter to me at all, both on the case of personal appearance customization and on same-gender relationships. Certainly neither of them should ever be the first priority to think about in the game.
Perhaps not, but if you're approaching it from the standpoint of priorities, you're implying that everything in the budget is more important than letting a player customize their appearance or same gender relationships. So increasing the number of legacies is more important than letting a player customize appearance to match the character they want to play, hiring Monte Cook to write a novella is more important than including characters who aren't heterosexual, and a new special dungeon is more important than either of them, and so on.
Perhaps not, but if you're approaching it from the standpoint of priorities, you're implying that everything in the budget is more important than letting a player customize their appearance or same gender relationships. So increasing the number of legacies is more important than letting a player customize appearance to match the character they want to play, hiring Monte Cook to write a novella is more important than including characters who aren't heterosexual, and a new special dungeon is more important than either of them, and so on.
I wasn't implying anything: all I said was that neither of them were the first priority: nowhere did I mean that absolutely everything should be above them. Although, yes, all the things you did mention are more important than appearance customization.
You could not customize how you looked in Planescape Torment either. Did the game suffer terribly from this?
You could not customize how you looked in Planescape Torment either. Did the game suffer terribly from this?
Does Baldur's gate suffer from letting you use custom portraits and alter your coloration? How many resources do you think this diverted away from more "important" things? Things which don't actually pertain to the game at all?
@tilly It's definitely more common than it used to be (though it's usually easy to avoid if you don't care for it). Honestly, if they just came out and said "all relationships in the game are going to be strictly platonic; we don't want to touch those icky fuzzy feelings," then I'd be fine with it. It's this wishy-washy "we don't want make it about sex, but there is going to be intimacy--look! Ball of goo!" that annoys me.
How many resources do you think this diverted away from more "important" things?
Probably more than you'd think. Even allowing you to change color like in Baldur's Gate would take quite a bunch of coding and compiling that we would not know of - let alone drawing a whole lot of incredibly beautiful portraits for you to use, or going all the way and allowing you to change every single scar and wrinkle and eye color and nose shape like in most modern games.
Look, all their emphasis on choice and legacy and all that is sending the message that they want the player to take ownership of the PC, to define who they are. Having a static appearance says the opposite: That they decide who the PC is, and you just get to drive them around. Appearance customization allows for greater player buy-in. It doesn't have to be a complex, fully featured system that lets you alter every last detail. A few alternate portraits and some ability to change skin and hair color would go a long way.
It seems like there is a big pendulum shift away from 'corporate game making' to 'artistic game making'. What I mean is that there appear to be many small teams that are making games as a labor of love and are finding out that the public wants those.
When did RPG's start playing more like Medal of Honor? It came down to corporate decisions, I'd wager. At least there are some who are bucking the trend a bit.
It seems like there is a big pendulum shift away from 'corporate game making' to 'artistic game making'. What I mean is that there appear to be many small teams that are making games as a labor of love and are finding out that the public wants those.
When did RPG's start playing more like Medal of Honor? It came down to corporate decisions, I'd wager. At least there are some who are bucking the trend a bit.
I think it's less a "pendulum shift" and more "filling the gaps." Corporate game making is still alive and well and not going anywhere, but it's becoming easier for smaller developers to exist alongside that system and cater to smaller audiences who favor a specific niche genre.
Look, all their emphasis on choice and legacy and all that is sending the message that they want the player to take ownership of the PC, to define who they are. Having a static appearance says the opposite: That they decide who the PC is, and you just get to drive them around. Appearance customization allows for greater player buy-in. It doesn't have to be a complex, fully featured system that lets you alter every last detail. A few alternate portraits and some ability to change skin and hair color would go a long way.
But again, Planescape Torment allowed all that, and made you really feel like you were this guy making the decisions. The fact that he looked the exact same every time did not deter from that at all.
Comments
Really, really, looking forward to this. Will definitely be following the development.
Spoiler:
I am in the valley/street with the two Dabus, one of them already dead (murdered by the valley itself, it's called "Gasse der heulenden Seufzer" in German). I should reverse two changes the Dabus made, but since I am a mage already, I have no chance to use the hammer to do so. I got Morte and Annah with me, both of them not able to use the hammer as well. How can I continue..? Does anyone have an idea?
And here's a short vid with Monte Cook on the world of Numenera.
Next up is the 3.0m mark with 24/23 days left.
On the subject of the Kickstarter, I'm looking forward to more people than Colin McComb talking. I'd like to get excited for this, but his rhetorical style just isn't doing it for me.
Also, contrary to what most people think, graphics don't actually take that much money, even in a full-3D high-resolution eye candy like we see today. It's surprisingly cheap.
I had no idea that the world setting is a future Earth.
Next up, $3.0m with only 16 more days to go!
"Outside of the choice of gender, which will change the game in certain ways, you'll not be able to make your own, personal character. “We’re not going to customize the looks. This is primarily an internal journey. It’s not dress-up,” McComb said."
If it's an internal journey, why does it matter if the player customizes the looks? Maybe we can get a $3.3 mil stretch goal to be able to change the skin tone. Also a completely dodge on the question of whether or not there's going to be same-gender relationship options. I know they don't want to do a classic "select the right dialog options to get sex" style romance, but you know, homosexual people have relationships that are about interpersonal intimacy as well; they're not all sex-crazed maniacs. [/sarcasm]
You could not customize how you looked in Planescape Torment either. Did the game suffer terribly from this?
@tilly It's definitely more common than it used to be (though it's usually easy to avoid if you don't care for it). Honestly, if they just came out and said "all relationships in the game are going to be strictly platonic; we don't want to touch those icky fuzzy feelings," then I'd be fine with it. It's this wishy-washy "we don't want make it about sex, but there is going to be intimacy--look! Ball of goo!" that annoys me.
When did RPG's start playing more like Medal of Honor? It came down to corporate decisions, I'd wager. At least there are some who are bucking the trend a bit.