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The journal is deeply unfair, as it was in BG:EE (but isn't in BG2:EE)

xzar_montyxzar_monty Member Posts: 631
in Baldur's Gate: Siege of Dragonspear
I just started SoD. I am rather disappointed by the fact that the journal keeps omitting vital information, just like it did in BG:EE but never did in BG2 or BG2:EE. The first example: Corwin tells me of my former companions and their current whereabouts. She lists the names of my companions and their locations to the best of her knowledge. Very good. I get a journal entry about this. I check the journal entry. It contains ONLY THE LOCATIONS where my former companions may be found, but nothing about WHICH ONE OF THEM IS WHERE or WHO THEY EVEN WERE.

These omissions are incredibly annoying. Why do that? Seriously, why do that? Am I meant to write things down on paper?

Comments

  • EscarcheEscarche Member Posts: 61
    I didn't really focus too much on journal, because you can always ask Corwin where everyone is supposed to be (and she tells you who is in location you came to anyways), but you have a valid point. This should be fixed.
  • PurudayaPurudaya Member Posts: 816
    I remember there being a couple of quests where the journal didn't provide enough information on who to talk to or where things were (Neera's potion components, for example – does the journal actually list them?)

    I've also been getting repetitive journal pop-ups (which I otherwise like) and entries that don't seem to fully resolve/update (talking to Glint's cousin in the Coalition camp). I'm still not sure why the journal needs to be floating/moveable (and therefore unnecessarily compact) when the rest of the menus are static, either. Visually, it doesn't feel consistent with the rest of the UI.

  • xzar_montyxzar_monty Member Posts: 631
    I played for a bit more and noticed that there are more of these omissions. I'm quite surprised: I thought anything done these days would avoid the problems of the original BG journal, especially because the journal in BG2 was already very good.

    It's just not ok to receive (an imaginary example) a quest where "you must absolutely find a red thing and a blue thing" and then see a journal entry saying "Apparently, and surprisingly, this problem can be solved by the use of colors." Upon looking at that entry, you go: right, that was the thing, and I was also given much more specific information, but why isn't it in the journal?
  • bob_vengbob_veng Member Posts: 2,308
    unfair journal = awesome!
  • WaterRabbitWaterRabbit Member Posts: 11
    Yes, the journal is complete trash now. There is very little useful information in it at all. The structure is also poorly laid out.
  • TrudeauIsSantaTrudeauIsSanta Member Posts: 161
    Yeah in 2016 the Journal should act like a modern quest log, which I think was their intent, but somehow it's worse than BG1 at times.
  • LoreLore Member Posts: 114
    Its an old school RPG, in BG1 it was always like this and to some extent in BG2 as well. Do you want a shining arrow pointing your way as well ?
  • FardragonFardragon Member Posts: 4,511
    Well, I hear a lot of complaints about modern games doing too much hand-holding.

    It's hard to see a way you could make everyone happy, unless you had alternative journal entries for different difficulty settings.
  • rapsam2003rapsam2003 Member Posts: 1,636
    xzar_monty said:

    It contains ONLY THE LOCATIONS where my former companions may be found, but nothing about WHICH ONE OF THEM IS WHERE or WHO THEY EVEN WERE.

    Ok, but why should the game spoon-feed you this information?...
  • Sids1188Sids1188 Member Posts: 166
    edited April 2016
    rapsam2003 said:

    xzar_monty said:

    It contains ONLY THE LOCATIONS where my former companions may be found, but nothing about WHICH ONE OF THEM IS WHERE or WHO THEY EVEN WERE.

    Ok, but why should the game spoon-feed you this information?...
    The game does. The journal doesn't. I think that's the issue. This is information that the character knows. It has already been spelled out to them, it just isn't getting recorded. It's rather different than marking it on the map, which is an extrapolation beyond what the character is told. If you skimmed over that dialogue, or have just been away from the game for a few weeks, there could be no way to get the quest information back (though that's not the case for the NPC locations).
  • rapsam2003rapsam2003 Member Posts: 1,636
    edited April 2016
    Sids1188 said:

    The game does. The journal doesn't. I think that's the issue. This is information that the character knows. It has already been spelled out to them, it just isn't getting recorded. It's rather different than marking it on the map, which is an extrapolation beyond what the character is told. If you skimmed over that dialogue, or have just been away from the game for a few weeks, there could be no way to get the quest information back (though that's not the case for the NPC locations).

    And what's the issue? If you can't remember this stuff, then why can't you use the journal to take notes? You always could use the journal to write player-created notes, even back in 1998. Besides, at this point, there's already guides and/or walkthroughs for SoD.

  • Sids1188Sids1188 Member Posts: 166
    edited April 2016
    rapsam2003 said:

    Sids1188 said:

    The game does. The journal doesn't. I think that's the issue. This is information that the character knows. It has already been spelled out to them, it just isn't getting recorded. It's rather different than marking it on the map, which is an extrapolation beyond what the character is told. If you skimmed over that dialogue, or have just been away from the game for a few weeks, there could be no way to get the quest information back (though that's not the case for the NPC locations).

    And what's the issue? If you can't remember this stuff, then why can't you use the journal to take notes? You always could use the journal to write player-created notes, even back in 1998. Besides, at this point, there's already guides and/or walkthroughs for SoD.

    While that is true, if the journal's quest log isn't recording quest details then it isn't actually doing it's job. If we are supposed to record all information ourselves, it might as well be replaced by a blank text editor (ie, have only the user section and nothing else). It's debatable whether the quest log is good for the game and all that, but if it is there (which it currently is), it should be performing it's function.
  • rapsam2003rapsam2003 Member Posts: 1,636
    The journal is performing its function just fine. The object of the journal is not to record every minor detail for you. Rather, it's your job to remember those minor details.
  • Mikey205Mikey205 Member Posts: 307
    I like the old chronological journal better.
  • GrammarsaladGrammarsalad Member Posts: 2,582
    Every one of these omissions, with spoiler warnings, should be reported.
    :)
  • WaterRabbitWaterRabbit Member Posts: 11
    rapsam2003 said:

    The journal is performing its function just fine. The object of the journal is not to record every minor detail for you. Rather, it's your job to remember those minor details.

    No, the job of a journal is to record the pertinent information for you at the stage of the quest you are on. Otherwise, there is zero value in it. The current version of the journal is annoying and worse than the original for the information it present. It isn't even useful to jog your memory.

    I particularly disagree with you about the player having to remember those minor details -- that is precisely the job of the journal.

    In Neera's quest, it was particular awful. All the journal need to tell you were you need x items and the you have found y of them. It didn't even succeed at that. A shopping list with a checkmark would have been 100 times better than the current journal.

    There was never a single instance in the game in which the journal was of any value.
  • jasteyjastey Member Posts: 2,785
    @WaterRabbit I second this view on what a good journal should be for.

    Just one thing because it took me several hours of gameplay with SoD before I realized it: The journal has actually three stages of indeptness. There is the overall title, if you click on the arrow, you get a short summary, and if you click on that arrow, too, you get a quite detailed description. Until I found that I was very disappointed about the non-usefulness of the journal entries, myself...

    -The time it took me to find this deeper level of detail, maybe there are other people out there, who aren't aware of this, yet...
  • AvariAvari Member Posts: 38
    I am playing through BG2:EE at the moment and a lot of journal entries pop up on the screen, but when I check my journal for them nothing appears. Dunno if it's just buggy, but it's rather annoying.
  • jasteyjastey Member Posts: 2,785
    I had the impression that happened in SoD for me, too. I couldn't track it down well enough to phrase a bug report, though.
  • xzar_montyxzar_monty Member Posts: 631
    edited April 2016
    @rapsam2003: You are missing the point entirely.

    This, in a nutshell, is why the journal doesn't work:

    1) Within the game, in a discussion with someone, you are given a piece information, like "Bob lives next door to Jim in the Docks District".
    2) You get a journal entry about this piece of information. When you check the journal, it reads: "I should find Bob."

    The problem is glaringly obvious. The journal should record important and relevant information, but the information that is actually recorded in the journal is meaningless. Of course I know I should find Bob, and I was actually given the information, but the journal holds no record of it.

    A perfect example of this is Neera's potion quest: the ingredients for the potion are listed *only when Neera talks about them for the first time*. After that, there is no way to get that information again from within the game. The journal only says that the ingredients should be found. And to make things look even more silly, once you find an ingredient, such as the feather from a planetar, the journal duly notes that "I have now found a planetar's feather", although it was nowhere noted that you should look for one.

    As for your other points: I am not interested in walkthroughs. I am interested in finding stuff out for myself. And as far as taking notes is concerned: well, yes, that's a strategy - but the journal should actually do that. As for remembering: that's a fair enough point, but I don't have much time to play the game, and when there are other, much more important things in life, it's not always easy to keep this stuff in mind as well. If it was about remembering, it would be much, much better the remove the journal entirely. That way you would know that it's your job to remember.

    When it comes to recording relevant information in regards to the things you are supposed to accomplish, nobody in their right mind would make notes as stupid as the current journal does. THAT is the problem.

    In BG1, the journal was quite crude. In BG2, it was excellent. In SoD, it's worse than in BG1. This shouldn't happen.
  • rapsam2003rapsam2003 Member Posts: 1,636
    xzar_monty said:

    @rapsam2003: You are missing the point entirely.

    This, in a nutshell, is why the journal doesn't work:

    1) Within the game, in a discussion with someone, you are given a piece information, like "Bob lives next door to Jim in the Docks District".
    2) You get a journal entry about this piece of information. When you check the journal, it reads: "I should find Bob."

    And then, when you click on the arrows further, it expands the journal to give you those finer details. It's not all that hard.
  • megamike15megamike15 Member Posts: 2,666
    was i the only person that understood the old journal was under that arrow? i hate bringing this up everytime someone complains but i need to. they said during all those streams that the old journal was still there.

    it goes like this; you get a journal pop up [ can be turned off]. you look in the journal. you click the quest. you get a summary. then you click the dang thing again and you get the original baldurs gate journal.

    it's not that hard.

    I like the new journal it's more organized imo...besides with mod quests but that will be fixed in time.
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