Don't "niche" yourself out of business

[God Emperor Charles]

Friends,

I'm sorry. Would someone please explain the significance of "red boots". This is haunting me right now.

CKB

[Gabriel77Dan]

Friends,

I'm sorry. Would someone please explain the significance of "red boots". This is haunting me right now.

CKB

IIRC in one of the publisher meetings the person they sent to talk to Fargo wanted to talk about Red Boots most of the time.

[Pachterballs]

game's already funded. No problems here whatever it is they decided to do. Pretty sure BF+co will shape this the right way

[Vryheid]

Ya'll do realize that this game is going to continue to be sold after this Kickstarter campaign ends, right? And that a significant portion of the money the developers make is going to come from said sales? Our money is going to be used to help them fund development of the game, but for Inxile to actually make a profit they need to appeal to a wide variety of consumers. That means not deliberately crippling the game to appease a few veteran CRPG holdouts who have the mistaken belief that doing so will appease their feeling of nostalgia.

The insanity of some of these "old school" suggestions makes me wonder if there are a lot of gamers who are secretly masochistic. I mean, really- "No quest logs"? Did these people step out of a time machine from the 80s, or do they seriously enjoy copying down every irrelevant NPC quote in a goddamn notebook instead of playing the actual game? Did they ever once think that taking out the quest log isn't going to make the game more challenging, because people will just look up all the quests on an online walkthrough instead? Somehow I doubt much thinking at all was involved in the process. Other suggestions like forcing the player to mash the space bar to heal are equally ridiculous.

Starcraft II is a great example of a game that kept old-school sensibilities and mixed it with modern design improvements. Gone are sprite based graphics, the severely limited custom map software, and the mediocre unit control. In are the ability to select an unlimited amount of units at once, fully rendered 3D graphics, and a custom map software that has virtually unlimited scripting opportunities. The core gameplay concepts of the original that actually worked were translated over pretty dang well. I hope something similar happens with Wasteland 2.

[yugoloth]

I wouldn't want dialogue with typing keywords either

I agree

is the only thing old school that does not really want to see

[Infinitron]

I mean, really- "No quest logs"? Did these people step out of a time machine from the 80s, or do they seriously enjoy copying down every irrelevant NPC quote in a goddamn notebook instead of playing the actual game? Did they ever once think that taking out the quest log isn't going to make the game more challenging, because people will just look up all the quests on an online walkthrough instead?

Yes, really. Why are you so shocked by this? There was no journaling system whatsoever in Ultima V: Lazarus, and it was glorious. Very immersive.

That said, since even Fallout had a (minimalistic) quest log, I wouldn't worry too much about this.

[Kide]

This is certanly not something that will try very hard to please people that don't already want this style of game, old rpg game. Mostly because there has not been any games for a long time that have put other than gaining money in the first priority in creating the game. And that's what I am more than happy to change. Of course there should be some thing's made better, but even if this for some reason would end up to be a very old style game, even older style than fallout 1, I would not really mind too mutch. I still rather have that kind of game even though I have not gotten used to them in my youth, than a game that would try and please the masses.... And I am sure there will be more people that will buy the game after it is completed, in the way they will create it.

Certanly a quest log similiar to Arcanum is something I would prefer, as I liked that system pretty mutch, but certanly on the other hand there are some thing I in no way do not wish to see, for example the quest arrow. I am just glad to see this style of old gaming being revived, as I have been so unsatisfied of the modern games for a long time.

[timobkg]

I really hope you aren't suggesting that a sequel to Wasteland must ignore 24 years of gaming innovations

Can you name some of those innovations?

For me, one of those innovations is player characters with backgrounds and personalities, that you can converse with in the game, and that will impact your game experience by being included in your party beyond just what skills they may have.

[CoderlyWriter]

I really hope you aren't suggesting that a sequel to Wasteland must ignore 24 years of gaming innovations

Can you name some of those innovations?

For me, one of those innovations is player characters with backgrounds and personalities, that you can converse with in the game, and that will impact your game experience by being included in your party beyond just what skills they may have.

This seems to be a rather hot-button issue around here, actually. I agree with you, though. Wasteland may have had a good party system, where all characters were created by the player, but I'm not sure I'm ready to roleplay as an amorphous aggregate of individuals. I have, after all, only one brain. And this is, whatever you want to call it, an RPG. And I'm of the opinion, as a writer, that fleshed-out, detailed characters can only add to a game.

Fortunately for those purists here...there haven't really been that many innovations in the cRPG genre, largely because it's been in hibernation for a decade or so. But I don't immediately dismiss all advancements in games because they're different from the games I played when I was younger.

I was a big fan of Homeworld when it came out. Heck, before it came out. And I was a little disappointed with the decision in HW2 to group fighters into squadrons instead of giving me individual control. But I think Relic was on to something here, actually, and as much as I hate to say it, I like the squad-based system better than the individual control system. Now that I think of it...a hybrid may be even better. Dunno. Having to group fighters into their own squadrons would be micromanagement-heavy... Eh, something to think about.

Another much-maligned innovation I've noticed is auto-regenerating health in FPSs. The med-pack has all but died off! But when I play a game that does it right, and for the right reasons, I have more fun, even when compared to older, but similar titles. And the modern cover mechanic has taken off for a reason. It works, and makes gameplay more intense.

Not every innovation is a bad thing, people.

[Jasede]

Good grief, your opinions sicken me. I've never had the misfortune in my life to find someone who actually liked modern cover mechanics or the lack of med packs. It's clear we can never ever agree or hope to understand one another but I will tell you flat out that if Wasteland 2 comes with so-called "modern innovations" the old-school fans that donated to this wonderful cause are going to flip out like ninjas and burn down Fargo's house, mark my words.

He promised us an old-school game. We don't want your "innovations". Innovations, frankly, can go die in a fire.

[Infinitron]

Here's the thing, CoderlyWriter.
This argument isn't really about "innovations". It's about focus. The RPG genre used to be a certain way, and then some character drama elements were added to it - as a gimmick, the cherry on top of the ice cream. They weren't meant to be something you were supposed to think about much, to expect or to take for granted.

10 years later, that gimmick has bloated like a cancerous growth, and so many people can barely see the original template which it grew from. Some don't even know the original template was there in the first place.

So yes, maybe the character-driven elements introduced in games like Baldur's Gate 2 were an "innovation" of sorts, and thus they aren't to be completely disregarded. But some of us just don't want to see them discussed much - certainly not as the most popular threads on the forum - because frankly, they just aren't that important.

[CoderlyWriter]

Jasede,

I'm going to try, however hard it might be, not to take that personally. Even though it was clearly meant to be. You should try it sometime, since you seem to have taken my post quite personally.

Different people.
Have.
Different tastes.

It's very difficult to say that one thing is objectively worse than another thing. I hate this. It means I can't really disparage, for instance, Twilight. I can say that I think it's a campy romance novel with a hackneyed story that makes little to no sense. I actually don't know, since I haven't read it, and don't plan to.

You don't like modern cover systems. That's fine! I certainly don't like some of them(good god, Dark Void...), so hey, we have the dislike of those specific systems in common. It's been done poorly, certainly. Does that make them objectively bad? No. Does that even make the ones we both dislike objectively bad? No. Maybe if we polled every gamer on the planet and found a list of certain games that they disliked, or even hated, then we could say that those are objectively bad. But I'd bet you anything that the list would be very, very short. At least, we could say that those are objectively bad within a very small margin for error.

But let's face it. Millions upon millions of people play games that utilize modern cover systems. Many of them, I believe, actually like those systems. That's a *lot* of people.

And millions and millions apparently enjoy Twilight.

Just like you can't understand why people could enjoy cover system mechanics, I can't understand how people could enjoy Twilight.

It's not even about the intelligence of the people in question. That's a scary thought, but I have a feeling there's some literary professor out there who absolutely adores Twilight, hopefully in secret, and is still well-respected in the field. Whatever you may imagine, I'm no intellectual slouch myself, and I enjoy modern gameplay innovations.

Oh, and for the record, I'm no console-junkie. The only four games I've played that had a cover system were:
Alpha Protocol(implemented poorly)
Dark Void(Implemented VERY poorly)
Deus Ex:Human Revolution(implemented decently)
Mass Effect 2(Best of the four)

But in the last two, I felt that the action sequences played better -- and believe me, I'm still trying to analyze why -- than their predecessors'. It's largely, I think, a simple matter of the fact that even a keyboard is a poor substitute for the human nervous system when it comes down to controlling movements. Prior to the development of cover systems, movement didn't seem as natural or fluid as it does now. This, in turn, is probably because the focus has shifted from controlling the character to directing the character. Telling them "Go over there and shoot that guy" instead of "Move forward three meters, then turn 12 degrees, crouch down, bring up the scope, fire."

Oh, and I hope you didn't actually think I was suggesting a cover mechanic be introduced into an isometric, 2D cRPG? The only way cover should be included in this game is if there is a thick, sturdy wall between the characters and whatever's trying to kill them.

So yeah. Agree to disagree?


Infinitron,

I concede the point. Perhaps a blank-slate party system is better for Wasteland.

What I'd LIKE would be procedurally generated interesting characters. Yeah. Not so much of a compromise as just both systems. And I know enough to know that that's not the kind of thing you even attempt on a small budget. I'll take procedurally generated dull characters instead, I guess, if I have to.

Maybe I'll just come up with party backgrounds ahead of time. I should probably get cracking on that. In fact... I already have one character that I think I'll use. She's been looking for a project, after all.

[TheEmissary]

Good grief, your opinions sicken me. I've never had the misfortune in my life to find someone who actually liked modern cover mechanics or the lack of med packs. It's clear we can never ever agree or hope to understand one another but I will tell you flat out that if Wasteland 2 comes with so-called "modern innovations" the old-school fans that donated to this wonderful cause are going to flip out like ninjas and burn down Fargo's house, mark my words.

He promised us an old-school game. We don't want your "innovations". Innovations, frankly, can go die in a fire.

If by "modern innovations" you mean the streamlining of games to work on a console/casual audience then I agree its best to avoid doing that. I can't agree with you If you also meant technical innovations made in the last 25 years in terms of Graphics, Sound, and AI. Not every new idea is without merit. It is certainly possible to build a old school RPG and still feel modern. I am willing to bet that Brian Fargo is probably wanting to have the freedom to experiment with the old concepts.

[talkingcrows]

UM,didn't they niche themselves into this corner?I kinda like the view from this corner.Business is booming apparently.

[Jasede]

Good grief, your opinions sicken me. I've never had the misfortune in my life to find someone who actually liked modern cover mechanics or the lack of med packs. It's clear we can never ever agree or hope to understand one another but I will tell you flat out that if Wasteland 2 comes with so-called "modern innovations" the old-school fans that donated to this wonderful cause are going to flip out like ninjas and burn down Fargo's house, mark my words.

He promised us an old-school game. We don't want your "innovations". Innovations, frankly, can go die in a fire.

If by "modern innovations" you mean the streamlining of games to work on a console/casual audience then I agree its best to avoid doing that. I can't agree with you If you also meant technical innovations made in the last 25 years in terms of Graphics, Sound, and AI. Not every new idea is without merit. It is certainly possible to build a old school RPG and still feel modern. I am willing to bet that Brian Fargo is probably wanting to have the freedom to experiment with the old concepts.

Not disagreeing with you there. It's fine to have a good interface or appropriate AI, graphics and sound. It's a good thing. But I hope - and from what Mr. Fargo said in interviews I am optimistic - that no matter what some younger people might say, he won't budge one inch to make the game appealing to the broad masses that play Mass Effect and Dragon's Age. This is our game. Us who played Wizardry and Might and Magic and Bard's Tale and Wasteland and Buck Rogers and all that.

[tootboot]

Agree, I wouldn't mind something with similar gameplay to Fallout 1/2 or Baldur's Gate 2 with an improved interface. Fighting with the interface doesn't confer depth.

[MDF_MadDogFargo]

I really hope you aren't suggesting that a sequel to Wasteland must ignore 24 years of gaming innovations

Can you name some of those innovations?

Gay characters and gay sex. Unkillable NPCs and party characters. Instant health regen. 5 minutes long cutscenes every 5 meters. Half of genres being indistinguishable from shooters. Quest compasses telling you where exactly what is with a pixel precision. +10 to dmg of assault rifles that all behave the same after killing 100 enemies instead of dozens of skills.

Do you still think there weren't enough innovations?

LOL. The innovations that have been made have been superficial - literally, 'on the face.' The interfaces look prettier, but the *games* have been dumbed down.

The 24 years of gaming innovations may have improved the details of the computer interface, but they have not improved the role-playing.

The party system is essential. The original CRPG games were made to play like tabletop pen and paper games, which were a party affair. Sometimes we even played them like that, with a couple of people making choices for different characters. Role-playing.

If we want to, we can create an RPG that is closer to a tabletop game than a computer game. More oldschool than oldschool. The real RPG is in your head, and the computer is your pen and paper.

I am old enough and played enough computer games that I have many times asked myself what am I really doing with my time sitting at the computer, what is the result of my effort? If you don't know that answer then you are wasting your time!

My answer is that these games are stories. The stories sometimes put me in a tactical situation, sometimes ask me to solve puzzles, sometimes ask me to make friends with pretend people - sorry, characters.

And when you get right down to it, dressing up our characters, playing war games with them, solving puzzles with them, isn't so different from playing with dolls. Er, action figures.

Maybe if we take a step back away from the computer, we might find that some of the computer game genres we think are so different - RPG, text adventure, strategy, sim, visual novel- aren't really, because they are all about sitting at the computer and making believe. Some of them just hold our attention longer than others.

[Gabriel77Dan]

This seems to be a rather hot-button issue around here, actually. I agree with you, though. Wasteland may have had a good party system, where all characters were created by the player, but I'm not sure I'm ready to roleplay as an amorphous aggregate of individuals. I have, after all, only one brain. And this is, whatever you want to call it, an RPG. And I'm of the opinion, as a writer, that fleshed-out, detailed characters can only add to a game.

Maybe we should be able to create a "main" character (More like a party leader, it's about the whole group but until the "main" dies then it's he who calls the shots.) and then pick 3 out of 20 possible pre-made NPC's?

The pre-made characters would have their own strengths, weaknesses, morals and personalities, sometimes their views might clash with your decisions and sometimes they might even take the incentive to do stuff on their own because of their design.

Just something I'm throwing out there.

[almondblight]

Did these people step out of a time machine from the 80s, or do they seriously enjoy copying down every irrelevant NPC quote in a goddamn notebook instead of playing the actual game?

That's the thing. You think the problem is quest logs. Some of us think the problem is irrelevant NPC dialogues and quests. I don't remember ever looking at the quest log in Fallout. You know why? I always knew what I was doing. That was good design. I recently played through PST, and though it's a good game, the middle part I had to constantly go back to my quest logs because there were 20 different errand boy quests ("I lost my earrings, can you find them for me?" "I need a cup, can you get one for me?" "I need a handkerchief, can you pick one up?"). The reason you think games need quest logs is because they've been poorly designed.

It's very difficult to say that one thing is objectively worse than another thing. I hate this. It means I can't really disparage, for instance, Twilight.

True. But would you be pissed off if Prometheus or The Dark Knight Rises turned out to be like Twilight? Especially if you had given money because you wanted a prequel to Alien/sequel to The Dark Knight?

We paid money to get a sequel to Wasteland, and so some people hear want a sequel to Wasteland. If you want a sequel to Baldur's Gate 2 or something, that's fine, but that's not what this project is, and you shouldn't be surprised that it's not what most of us here want.

[paultakeda]

Maybe we should be able to create a "main" character (More like a party leader, it's about the whole group but until the "main" dies then it's he who calls the shots.) and then pick 3 out of 20 possible pre-made NPC's?

Look. Play the original Wasteland. No, wait. Just turn it on and start. Notice your party? It's already filled up, isn't it?

You don't have to create ANYBODY. You do so if you WANT to. You already have what you want in the original 1988 game.

The guy who calls the shots is the guy in slot 1. That's a basic paradigm for classic CRPG players, you always put your favorite in slot 1; and you role play it that way.

Again I point to the Let's Play on YouTube. Notice how he's narrating this. This is fantastic in that it represents exactly how most people played this sort of game in their heads.

I felt like this was what Brian was talking about when he was standing in the middle of the desert reminiscing about the golden era of computer games when creativity was king; to me he wasn't just talking about game developer creativity but player creativity as well.