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The NWN Spirit Mechanic was very interesting on paper, but you eventually dying didn't actually add anything, it only took away from the game. I don't understand why they didn't just say "you'll get *this* weak, and be limited to *these* spells/skills at the lowest point." So you could still rely on your team to get you to the next place where you could rebuild/buff your character to normal levels. Anyone who thinks otherwise is a  who plays old, overly complicated strategy war games or someone who thinks Dark Souls would be more engaging and fun if it deleted your savegame each time after you died.edit: 
Drifter fucked around with this message at 16:30 on May 20, 2013 |
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May 20, 2013 16:25
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Raygereio posted:Giving the player some sence of urgency isn't a bad idea in and of itself. (Which destroys the narrative sense of "looming" anything.)
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May 20, 2013 17:14
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Mordaedil posted:Huh? The time limit in Fallout 1 was pretty generous and you could essentially "trade time" between the first half and second half, albeit the trade-off wasn't big exactly equal, it was probably the best timed quest in video game history. If you know where you are going there is no problem, but because of the wsy the game works, it is very easy to lose the game simply for going in the wrong direction
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May 20, 2013 17:25
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Drifter posted:Anyone who thinks otherwise is a The first time I heard of Demon's Souls it was through a lovely writeup that made it sound like a roguelike. To this day I'm sad this was never created because that would be fantastic. That said I understand the point you're making, in as much as an urgency provider doesn't have to be a hard loss state.
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May 20, 2013 17:40
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It probably won't be a time limit, or at least not one single hard-capped time limit. As Colin said on the Codex: We're not talking about a timer. A timer on certain quests might be appropriate (with some great examples above), but right now our thought is that using that as our primary pressure for the overall game is a bad idea. Which is to say: though the word "time" does appear in that answer, we're looking at a broader implementation with a variety of mechanics, and using a timer is just way one to do it. A timed main quest seems like exactly the kind of thing that would get us into the frustrating, over-tense experience I said we were looking to avoid. Rather than risk a polite email, let me just say that our direction points toward primary use of other tools. (if I sound cryptic, it's because I'm exhausted and I'm trying not to give anything away)
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May 21, 2013 06:05
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Thanks for the clarification, Brother None. One of the disconnects that come from the whole Take Your Time trope, is when the sidequests expire or enter a less-than-ideal state (like you can only partially succeed) if you advance the plot too fast. People naturally want to see all the content, and ideally solve it in "the best" manner (I know Torment is aiming at subverting this "the best" idea, but as a rule...). So players become very cautious about advancing the main plot until they have cleared out all the sidequests. If they could avoid that link, I should think even putting some pressure on the main plot wouldn't be a bad thing. Essentially you can keep the sense of urgency and allow the player to, at least to a certain extent, space out their sidequests along the way, rather than putting the main plot on hold for days as they tick off the currently open sidequests. And really, why should a sidequest always fail based on the main plot advancing? They are sidequests with a life of their own for a reason. If they are connected, they would be part of the main plot. Exceptions could occur of course, but then the sidequest itself should have some time limit or condition inbuilt, that the main plot inadvertently messes up (f.inst. the main plot requires you to go past a Portal of No Return). GhostBoy fucked around with this message at 09:21 on May 21, 2013 |
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May 21, 2013 09:13
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Yeah as long as you don't do that bullshit at the end of Mass Effect 2 where a storyline mission would set a flag that causes your ship's crew to get abducted in an absurdly contrived plot event exactly one mission later, and you have to immediately begin the endgame if you don't want them to die. That was incredibly obnoxious because there was absolutely no indication that this was going to happen and it made everybody super paranoid playing through ME3, and the ME3 characters almost break through the fourth wall saying "OK Shepard once you do <thing> there is no turning back beep boop endgame begins here alert" so even Bioware probably realises they messed that one up. (I know Mass Effect is this thread's favourite whipping boy but I had a lot of fun with it, and for the most part it pulled off the whole space opera thing really well, legendarily bad ending notwithstanding)
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May 21, 2013 12:18
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I dislike the idea of a timed main quest, but Fallout's time limit was so generous as to be non-existent. Especially post patch. One game that did time well was Avernum 3. You'd never actually lose, but towns would be overrun and the landscape would be transformed as mysterious monster invasion progressed.
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May 21, 2013 13:59
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Brother None: I've always been more of a fan of time-related bonuses as opposed to time-related penalties. I know that it's certainly more realistic to punish a player for not meeting certain in-game deadlines but it definitely feels less fun.
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May 21, 2013 14:44
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I suppose one way you could create a backwards push, without hidden plot flags tripping or setting an arbitrary time limit, beyond which you die/lose, would to utilize the Angel of Entropy as a recurring villain. As you faff about more and more you see signs that your pursuer is drawing near. Eventually, it will catch you, at which point you can fight it into retreat. That would buy you a bit more time to faff about, at which point it finds you again, and this time is stronger (being not stupid, it will realise that it shouldn't attack until it has gained more power somehow). Repeat until you overreach and get killed, or you realize that you only just made it the last time, so perhaps you should get a move on and get out of sight for a bit again. GhostBoy fucked around with this message at 15:54 on May 21, 2013 |
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May 21, 2013 15:51
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GhostBoy posted:I suppose one way you could create a backwards push, without hidden plot flags tripping or setting an arbitrary time limit, beyond which you die/lose, would to utilize the Angel of Entropy as a recurring villain. As you faff about more and more you see signs that your pursuer is drawing near. Eventually, it will catch you, at which point you can fight it into retreat. Hmm. That kind of interferes with the whole "don't show the shark" visual storytelling impetus though. Without going all giant space flea from nowhere as the definitely final boss, fighting the big bad throughout up to and including the last fight would be kind of anticlimactic. I guess you could use escalating lackeys though.
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May 21, 2013 16:06
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Depends on how it's done, there's the Nemesis from RE, and then those huge hooded guys from that one ultima. The angel isn't necessarily the final boss, or if it is it could be all the sweeter to finally collect the foozle and put the thing thats been hassling you all game down for good
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May 21, 2013 21:31
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Seeing as the mind is being played up a lot in this game, I think a sanity mechanic could be put into it. Your sanity erodes over time and the crazier you are the more weird poo poo shows up that tries to kill you. You get sanity by reinforcing your character and persona in the game world. This can be done with quests that support your alignment or defeating various manifestations of your psyche. Major story milestones could increase your resistance to erotion and your maximum sanity which will be what's pushing you towards it. Difficulty levels could be used to determine how powerful the worst manifestation is, thus forcing the player onward.
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May 21, 2013 21:43
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Zilkin posted:Has there ever been a game where something like that has actually been fun?
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May 21, 2013 22:48
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The proper answer is FTL - real urgency, because they (The enemy armada) chase you, but it doesn't mean "Auto-Game over when they catch you". Yes, things get much harder when every space jump is now populated by the enemy armada, but you can still make it out alive. Offtopic: FTL is a great, great game, if you haven't played it, give it a chance, even this old and bad RPG player enjoys it.
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May 22, 2013 00:01
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coyo7e posted:Left 4 Dead? Left 4 Dead is the videogame version of a sketch comedy show stretched out over a season with a string of lightly-related skits. It's not the same.
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May 22, 2013 01:33
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Nilbop posted:Left 4 Dead is the videogame version of a sketch comedy show stretched out over a season with a string of lightly-related skits. It's not the same.
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May 22, 2013 03:45
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Nilbop posted:Left 4 Dead is the videogame version of a sketch comedy show stretched out over a season with a string of lightly-related skits. It's not the same. I think he's referring more to the AI director than the overall tone of the game. The AI director does a great job of presenting the player(s) with a steady stream of enemies with variable difficulty in order to push them through each campaign. Another factor is that L4D is primarily designed for action over environmental interaction, adding to this is the extremely linear setup for both the level design and Climax events. (Climax events are pre-scripted events where zombie hordes are guaranteed to appear). I can see something similar to the Shadow lords from Ultima V working pretty well. But that may also feel too random to players and create situations where you are returning to a previous region to finish a side-quest only to find the Angel of Entropy sitting in the town square. So the objective is to create a system where the player is aware that they are operating on borrowed time but give them enough freedom to experience the game world organically. I can think of a few questions regarding the Angel of Entropy's pursuit of the player:
I'm going to go ahead and re-post this list in the developers website later this week if anyone would be interested in pursuing this line of thought. Brought To You By fucked around with this message at 04:09 on May 22, 2013 |
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May 22, 2013 03:59
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Please do, it's good food for thought. As developers/writers you constantly have to question yourself on why and how things happen to create a plausible game world/experience. Though I'll have to say we don't really talk about plot details as a rule, and that makes specific questions on things like the AoE hard to answer beyond a vague answer on mechanics.
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May 22, 2013 11:59
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Demiurge4 posted:Seeing as the mind is being played up a lot in this game, I think a sanity mechanic could be put into it. Your sanity erodes over time and the crazier you are the more weird poo poo shows up that tries to kill you. You get sanity by reinforcing your character and persona in the game world. This can be done with quests that support your alignment or defeating various manifestations of your psyche. Major story milestones could increase your resistance to erotion and your maximum sanity which will be what's pushing you towards it. That's a cool idea. But doesn't Nintendo own the patent for sanity based mechanics in games or something like that? I swear it was a hold over from the Eternal Darkness days.
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May 22, 2013 19:27
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FTL's pressure was good. I also thought Pikmin 1's was fine.
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May 22, 2013 19:34
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Zilkin posted:Has there ever been a game where something like that has actually been fun? The implementations I've seen have ranged from passable in Fallout 1, mainly because the timer was so easy to beat, to pretty horrible like the hunger timer in MotB. Full interview here. If you don't like Dead Rising, you don't like fun
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May 22, 2013 19:40
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CottonWolf posted:That's a cool idea. But doesn't Nintendo own the patent for sanity based mechanics in games or something like that? I swear it was a hold over from the Eternal Darkness days. I do believe Amnesia had a sanity meter. And the table-top version of Call of Cthulhu.
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May 22, 2013 20:08
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Cicero posted:FTL's pressure was good. I also thought Pikmin 1's was fine. I've never played Pikmin, but I do agree that FTL has a great pressure mechanic. It gives you enough time to do most of what you want to do in a given sector, as long as you plan well, and there's enough of a penalty to letting the Rebels catch up that you want to hurry while still being able to fight off the Rebels if you have to (depending on ship loadout and luck, naturally). It gives the game a great sense of urgency and constant motion forward without being overly harsh if you screw up. It does help that FTL is roguelike in its design, though; you're expected to die fairly frequently. I don't know that it'd translate perfectly well to an RPG where you're expected to continue through the entire game on the same character. It's still worth looking at though. Zurai fucked around with this message at 21:19 on May 22, 2013 |
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May 22, 2013 21:17
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Pomp posted:If you don't like Dead Rising, you don't like fun I couldn't stand Dead Rising due to the stupid timer. I wanted to gently caress around and couldn't because I felt pressured by the timer. Guess that's more my issue than the game's. But I never finished it because of it.
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May 23, 2013 16:59
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Mordaedil posted:And the table-top version of Call of Cthulhu. I always love that in that game. No matter how well you played, after so many campaigns your character would have to eventually become insane. I love that concept.
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May 23, 2013 19:56
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Norns posted:I couldn't stand Dead Rising due to the stupid timer. I wanted to gently caress around and couldn't because I felt pressured by the timer. Guess that's more my issue than the game's. But I never finished it because of it. For real, the time limit ruined Dead Rising.
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May 23, 2013 21:50
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havenwaters posted:You will probably have to start over. I ran into this problem, this fixed it for me: http://www.shsforums.net/topic/37824-please-report-crashes-here/page-9#entry534474 Obviously, don't forget to back up your executable in case you gently caress it up.
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May 23, 2013 22:06
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Drifter posted:The NWN Spirit Mechanic was very interesting on paper, but you eventually dying didn't actually add anything, it only took away from the game. I don't understand why they didn't just say "you'll get *this* weak, and be limited to *these* spells/skills at the lowest point." So you could still rely on your team to get you to the next place where you could rebuild/buff your character to normal levels. Eh, I found that it made playing evil incredibly tedious/terrible while being good was easy as pie. Since the evil ending was one of the best in any game I've ever played I'd say that it really discouraged people from exploring the game to its fullest potential.
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May 23, 2013 22:08
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Cicero posted:FTL's pressure was good. I also thought Pikmin 1's was fine. FTL is not a story-based RPG. You're not expected to play through it in one go and experience most of the content.
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May 23, 2013 22:15
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Megazver posted:FTL is not a story-based RPG. You're not expected to play through it in one go and experience most of the content. I agree with you. So what is the point of 'videogame pressure' in a game like this? Why can't you just create a narrative that allows for exploring everything instead of trying to have you zoom through, or skip, parts of the game?
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May 23, 2013 22:54
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Drifter posted:I agree with you.
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May 23, 2013 22:58
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Drifter posted:So what is the point of 'videogame pressure' in a game like this? Why can't you just create a narrative that allows for exploring everything instead of trying to have you zoom through, or skip, parts of the game? We don't know what sort of mechanic inXile is planing, but I'm fairly sure it's possible to have a mechanic that impresses on the players that they're being chased without resorting to silly crap like a timer that kills you when it reaches zero.
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May 23, 2013 23:06
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Drifter posted:I agree with you. I don't know. I think they're loving this up a little right here. I've played a bunch of adventure games lately and I've been thinking about what makes an adventure game and an RPG and I think one thing that most people seem to overlook about RPGs is that when they're doing it right, they allow you to set your own pacing and tackle the content on your own terms. Depending on what you feel like doing, you can go do a few combat-heavy dungeons or you can run around and do some silly fetch quests or you can do an investigation quest or you can play a few in-game CCG tournaments or you can do the next mission in the main quest and so on. And when I've made my way through most of the content and as the field of opportunity shrinks, I always struggle with a sense of loss, as control over the game's structure is taken out of my hands and I have to experience the story on the developers' terms. So yeah, I think they should just let the players go through the game as they loving want to go through the game. If they wanted to control the pacing, they should have Kickstartered an adventure game.
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May 24, 2013 00:20
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They should just have the Angel be like Nemesis or Pyramid Head, scripted encounters that you need to finds way to escape from or drive off. Nemesis and PH both worked real well as pursuers without making their games unwinnable when you run into them or making them pathetically easy. Time limits just really don't work well in RPGs, especially in a game that's supposed to have a big focus on exploration, atmosphere, story, and characters like Torment is going to be.
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May 24, 2013 00:45
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Accordion Man posted:They should just have the Angel be like Nemesis or Pyramid Head, scripted encounters that you need to finds way to escape from or drive off. Nemesis and PH both worked real well as pursuers without making their games unwinnable when you run into them or making them pathetically easy. Time limits just really don't work well in RPGs, especially in a game that's supposed to have a big focus on exploration, atmosphere, story, and characters like Torment is going to be. Or like, y'know, The Transcendent One.
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May 24, 2013 00:47
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Megazver posted:Or like, y'know, The Transcendent One. Even though they explicitly listed TTO as an example of how they don't want to do it?
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May 24, 2013 00:54
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I hate time limits but I don't mind it here because I know someone will mod it out sooner or later 
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May 24, 2013 01:02
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I do kind of like the idea of some kind of time pressure, though a soft deadline is much better than a hard one. In Fallout 2 I spent nearly two in-game years exploring the world and yukking about while my village died of thirst. Even once I found the GECK I just put it in the trunk of my car and continued to yuk about, because there were no consequences for putting it off. If I wanted, I could have rushed to get the GECK, taken it back and then spent two years yukking about while my fellow villagers stood about doing nothing in an Enclave prison. Of course, if there had been a time limit then I would have had less of a chance to yuk about, which would have made the game less fun. Still, I can see it encouraging repeated playthroughs: you don't get an optimal result the first time but you get better the next time you play, and the time after that. If the game's good enoug that even that first playthrough is still satisfying,I can see that being a great way to encourage a replay.
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May 24, 2013 01:19
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I feel like the big thing emphasized in the Kickstarter was reactivity of the world. It's a safe bet that in a single playthrough you won't be able to experience anywhere near all the content because each decision will deeply affect what questlines open/close, what NPCs are there or even want to speak to you, what your legacy is and so on. Something lightly pressing you onward (even if unnecessarily harsh which, let's be real, won't be the case) doesn't necessarily prevent you from doing all the content you'd be able to see with that particular character. Even if the angel becomes too dangerous for you to stay in the area before finishing every last little side quest that's no biggie. Now you have something fresh in the inevitable second playthrough.
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May 24, 2013 01:44
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