Isometric POV & Turn Based Battles

[ZeroToHero]

First of all, I apologize if this isn't in the right section. I thought about putting it in the What to Include/Avoid sections, but I'm afraid that wouldn't exactly convey how I feel (and hopefully, other people feel) about the game's gameplay.

Not to mention it might have been brought up before. I'm not sure. Anyway, I personally don't think that an isometric/top-down POV is the best way to go about Wasteland 2. I understand that the first two Fallout games - and Wasteland itself - were like this, but I believe it was more due to the era where computers just weren't quite yet capable of rendering big worlds with many characters. Jurassic Park Trespasser ran very poorly on computers due to its huge world.

However, this is a different era, and I don't think such a POV is essential for Wasteland 2. I love top-down games like DOTA or Alien Swarm, but I don't think that, unless it's extremely well pulled off, this is such a wonderful idea. I think the game would be much more memorable as a whole if the POV was more of a third person, shoulder based camera. Unity is an engine that allows for particularly good graphics, and to make it isometric is to waste a big part of the engine.

I get that the idea is to make a spiritual successor to the first Fallout installments, but I feel split about it.
If the developers were to go with a third person view, the game would not only be a lot more immersive, but also be open to more detail, and make full use of the engine. If you intend on keeping FO1/2 styled battles (and truth be told, I would love something more classic, with menus and the likes, although I figure this isn't at all what the target audience for W2 wants), this could easily be fixed by having two different views of the game world: Third person for the overworld, and isometric for combat.

At this point in development, however, everything I've said is probably too late to be changed, nor would it be a very welcome change. Oh well.

I'd like to know what other people think of it.

[Lucius]

A top down or isometric view allows for a more tactical view. You can see the entire battlefield and where all the enemies/allies are in the field. I like being able to zoom to a 3rd person perspective for LOS reasons, but I don't think thats how the game should be primarily played. And graphics can be just as good in a top down view as more up close perspective, though graphics should be a secondary consideration than gameplay.

[Elandryl]

It isn't exactly the same amount of work requested to design a world seen from an eagle view than to design it in a view where you could go and check every single detail.

No, InXile won't be making a Skyrim with à 3M$ budget. And no, that's wouldn't even be a good idea if they could. As Lucius said before me, we need a tactical view, were you can have an eye on every member of your team at every moment. This isn't Fallout 3. Thank God it isn't.

As long as a 3rd person perspective doesn't offer a single gameplay value better than "hey, this would look cool for 10 times the budget!", I don't see the point

[Color Blotch]

If the developers were to go with a third person view, the game would not only be a lot more immersive, but also be open to more detail, and make full use of the engine.

It would also provide unforgettable experience of struggling with stupid camera. Thank you but no thank you.

[ButchinMelancholy]

I feel quite sad to note how some people consider isometric/top-down perspective as an archaic model that isn't able to offer as much as a full 3D world perspective. This is different, and it offers a singular experience that has its own value.

Aside from the budget problematic, which totally excludes this eventuality, I would just not like a third person RPG like an isometric one, and that's why my love for those old masterpieces has not fade away a bit. It gives you a really different feel of the universe, more distant and subjective, and that is where its unique magic operates because your own imagination has way more room to draw things, as you're not constantly caught by the overwhelming graphical environment and thus you are immersed in a more inner contemplative experience. And this doesn't mean less graphics for more imagination space, but more evocative ones for more personal perception. Moreover, the artistic style is necessarily different, and you can't offer some of the isometric-typed frescoes in any other perspective, this is unique.
Then, as it has been said before, in terms of gameplay you naturally can't have the same possibilities and beyond the obviously more tactical dimension that it offers, I feel like it fits the turn-based system well while I wouldn't find it as credible in a third or first person perspective. Just take that VATS b*llshit Bethesda had the false good idea to implement. In the first Fallout games, every action was based on your AP potential, so you had to thoroughly plan and anticipate each one of your actions and movements because all this was linked together, including that targeting option that had, thus, a real impact on your choices. In addition, the isometric perspective with turn-based system gave a really precise combat gameplay, notably space-wise. But how an artificial aiming system can have any meaning in a first person perspective? Seriously. And based on nothing but a purely sunken additional bonus AP system that is related to nothing, and which have as much tactical depth as COD's regenerating health... And as you were able to freely move around because it was overall real-time otherwise, there wasn't any of the depth and precision of the original gameplay.
Do you see how different this is, and how you can't replace this design choice by another one just for the sake of more polygons?

That's pretty much the main idea for me, I think.

[Hiver]

Horrible idea. Not going to happen. Leave Fallouts alone. Go and make mods for that spinoff bugthesda made.

Those would be my thoughts on the matter, in short. With some heavy censoring over the top.

[ZeroToHero]

Horrible idea. Not going to happen. Leave Fallouts alone. Go and make mods for that spinoff bugthesda made.

Those would be my thoughts on the matter, in short. With some heavy censoring over the top.

What a wonderful argument. I completely see your point. You seem to have spelled Bethesda wrong? Very strange. Thank you.

[Hiver]

No, i actually spelled it right.
Didnt mean to be upsetting. Its just all im thinking about idea such as yours in the OP.

[BlackGauntlet]

If WL2 is anything but top-down or isometric, it'd be like a kick to the nuts to all backers.

[Woolfe]

First,

This is a Party based game. How do you reconsile the 3rd person view with having multiple party members that you directly control?

Second,

Immersion is subjective. I get plenty immersed in games like Civilisation etc, and yet they have no 3rd person view.
Your opinion is that 3rd person is more immersive. I disagree.

Third,

The kickstarter for this game was a comment on the fact that not all that is old is bad, and that not all that is new is good. They are specifically using old school design ideas with new school technology, to show that it can be done and (hopefully) done well.

Finally

I don't want it

[Lucius]

First,

This is a Party based game. How do you reconsile the 3rd person view with having multiple party members that you directly control?

See Dragon Age: Origins. Some would salute that game as a successful RPG with party mechanics, in 3rd person. I played it on console and that experience was far from being a tactical experience. It was down right unenjoyable when it was required of me to switch between party members. Relying on the party AI system was unreliable at best. All in all, I never felt it provided that tactical gameplay of party games from the past with turn-based combat and top down perspective.

[Woolfe]

First,

This is a Party based game. How do you reconsile the 3rd person view with having multiple party members that you directly control?

See Dragon Age: Origins. Some would salute that game as a successful RPG with party mechanics, in 3rd person. I played it on console and that experience was far from being a tactical experience. It was down right unenjoyable when it was required of me to switch between party members. Relying on the party AI system was unreliable at best. All in all, I never felt it provided that tactical gameplay of party games from the past with turn-based combat and top down perspective.

I wasn't a fan of DA: O, I tried to play it twice on PC, and got annoyed by it. So It has been banished to a day when I don't have something better to play. I'm glad I only payed a couple of dollars for it in a steam sale.

I honestly can't recall the gameplay that well. Which is probably indicitive of how lacklustre it was. From what I recall, it sufficed, but I think you are right. The tactical gameplay was not very good. I do remember telling all my "party" members to go sit in a room, whilst I dealt with some bad guys on my own, thats not a good indication of the gameplay.

[suz]

Forum login with just 2 posts in this thread, created 20 mins before first post, posting obviously controversial opinion... "shoulder cam" is a dead giveaway, seriously... Don't feed it.

[Seytan]

DA-O was awful. I liked Baldurs gate etc more then that. It languished on my Steam game list. Frankly I thought the party system and the combat was awful and im bieng polite. Even NWN nights was a better game. And I actually spent the time to learn scripting so I could create my own little world with it. DA-O? lol...no LOL.

[JerryLove]

I think the game would be much more memorable as a whole if the POV was more of a third person, shoulder based camera.

Those are generally implemented with a single-protagonist. Wasteland is squad-based.

Unity is an engine that allows for particularly good graphics, and to make it isometric is to waste a big part of the engine.

What part of the engine, exactly, is wasted if the camera is moved to some position other than "over the shoulder"?

[Zombra]

Actually, I wouldn't say no to multiple camera angles.

Anyone ever play the Incubation series? (Really great TB tactical, and the gameplay holds up beautifully, if not the graphics. Try it if you can get it cheap.) The default camera mode is isometric, but you can change on the fly to a true top-down "chessboard" style, or go the other way to a pannable first-person perspective. Switching between characters is no problem and the gameplay actually doesn't change at all between modes; the controls are exactly the same.

Of course, you don't get the necessary tactical overview from first-person at all, but it's there if you want it. Actually pretty cool to really get down into your soldiers' perspective sometimes.

[Equidistant]

Well, Kickstarter update #16 seems to suggest that the devs will be sticking to an eagle view approach. I find the reasoning pretty persuasive; Wasteland doesn't have the budget to compete on high-res close-in graphics, but can look gorgeous from a sky cam while expending far fewer resources.

[Woolfe]

Well, Kickstarter update #16 seems to suggest that the devs will be sticking to an eagle view approach. I find the reasoning pretty persuasive; Wasteland doesn't have the budget to compete on high-res close-in graphics, but can look gorgeous from a sky cam while expending far fewer resources.

they have actually stated that previously.

Topdown overland map that zooms into a Isometric point of view when entering combat or locations such as cities etc.

How far away that point of view is yet to be determined. However Brian did say that it would be further than Fallout, so that the entire team was included.

I hope there is a degree of Zoom allowed, so that you can come in a bit closer if you want, or further back if you want.

[Valka]

Forum login with just 2 posts in this thread, created 20 mins before first post, posting obviously controversial opinion... "shoulder cam" is a dead giveaway, seriously... Don't feed it.

And yet they keep coming lol.

[ButchinMelancholy]

I hope there is a degree of Zoom allowed, so that you can come in a bit closer if you want, or further back if you want.

Yes, that's the only option I would like to see added at this level. Otherwise, I love the rigid isometric point of view.