Will SoD be a expansion like ToTSC or a separate area like Throne of Bhaal?
Thalamond
Member Posts: 127
What the title says :
Will SoD be a expansion like ToTSC or a separate area like Throne of Bhaal?
:-)
I personally hope for the former. It is far more immersive to add to the existing world and continue the BG story than feel the shallow attempt at "continuation" through an export screen and separate world disguised as the same BG world. Any info exists on this?
Will SoD be a expansion like ToTSC or a separate area like Throne of Bhaal?
:-)
I personally hope for the former. It is far more immersive to add to the existing world and continue the BG story than feel the shallow attempt at "continuation" through an export screen and separate world disguised as the same BG world. Any info exists on this?
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Also see: http://forums.beamdog.com/discussion/42311/new-areas
During the live stream last week they also said there are many side quest available, so I don't think the game will be as linear as you fear. That being said, it does have a defined beginning (end of BG1) and end (start of BG2) so they have to make sure the story matches those two up. This will limit how non-liner it can be.
For me, BG1 is one of the (if not THE) defining RPG games. Therefore I naturally want its expansions to be like it and add to it directly. So please allow me to share my opinion even if its futile.
SoD is story driven, not an additional wilderness area of random encounters.
If I read a classic fantasy book like LoTR I expect an interesting linear story which leads from place to place toward the linear conclusion. This works well for a book.
Now a video game in the RPG-subgenre of Baldur's Gate is an entirely different thing. Here the players are themselves actors in the unfolding plot and they can decide to act in many different ways and react to encounters in many different ways. And while the main story will force the player towards a certain end result the path to that end result will be arbitrarily decided by the player. If a game in this genre is dynamically done it will give the impression of a living world. If not it will be a book unfolding with the graphical sides of the game taking the place of imagination from bookreading. Or perhaps the movie is a better comparison: I will make sure to watch a playthrough of SoD on Youtube when it is released because that will probably be enjoyable (No sarcasm, I really want to watch such a playthrough with enjoyment).
Why is your argument a straw man?
Because being free to do whatever you like isn't the same as being free to do whatever you like WITH CONSEQUENCES. This is the problem with Bethesda games as the player can break immersion completely by jumping off a mountain or teleporting away when the game's npcs are making a speech about the uncoming threat from evil or whatever. You can even choose to fire an arrow into the face of the emperor without more than a slight penalty for "assault" being put on your head. I could go on about the flaws of this RPG-free roam type, but my point is rather that your flawed argument branding me as some impatient, immature casual player is totally wrong.
Baldur's Gate 1 has in my opinion a, albeit flawed, very good system for immersion. It is a system of freedom with consequences. For instance, when we run off to the wilderness in BG, we risk being ambushed and we cannot simply teleport away. When we commit lots of frowned upon acts there are consequences in the form of Flaming Fist patrols and hired assassins.
Bottom line is ToB didn't have this freedom. It was a Highlander movie epic turned Forgotten Realms world with Roleplaying as an afterthought. IWD and BG2 were not much better in this regard (freedom).
A SoD with freedom with consequences and choices & consequences would be the perfect addition in my eyes and you beg to differ. This is fine, I did say that I hope people will have fun with SoD. You don't have to used flawed argument cheap tricks to slander me just because you disagree with my opinion. I'd rather have a real discussion.
To be fair, the only thing the devs have said about SoD being like ToB is that there will be a new world map and you will not have access to the previous areas from BG1. They never said the game play and/or story telling style and/or pacing of the story would be like ToB. These are things we will all have to wait for release to see.
Also in case you have not see it, here is a transcription of the Q&A from last week: http://forums.beamdog.com/discussion/42230/recap-of-sod-presentation-and-q-a-session/p1
Choices are good, if they make sense.
"Help us Bhaalspawn, you are our only hope. The Shining Legion is besieging Dragonspear Castle and threatening to unleash the hordes of hell across the land. What ever shall we do?"
"I don't know about you, but I thought I would take a hiking holiday. There is a lighthouse south of Candlekeep that I always wanted a closer look at."
But I agree that the choices in the main quest are lacking. This will hopefully be fixed with mods like the Eve of War. However, it is simply of less importance because it is only the frame story. The day to day interaction with the world, quests, and party members are what makes the roleplay experience for me.
For me the beauty of BG1 is that I hardly ever feel that I am being railroaded by the plot. I feel that I can make choices and play it the way I want. It feels like a world not a scenario. I feel that less in BG2 and by the time you get to ToB it is completely absent.
This is my opinion exactly. And because we know BG1's world so well by now, expanding on it by adding areas to the already existing ones instead of creating isolated new areas is preferable to me - in short: making the world bigger instead of creating a new world.
I think something that was encouraging is in the reveal stream they did stress the game would have more exploration like BG1 and that they were fill it with nooks and crannies to explore and find stuff in. So for what it's worth, it looks like it IS going to have more BG1-like exploration aspects. That said, I expect it to tell a mostly linear story like all other Baldur's Gate content out there.