Continuity Concerns

[e_wraith]

I say absolutely continue with the original continuity. This is Wasteland 2, after all, and not Wasteland Re-imagined, or whatever else. To me it shouldn't be hard to refer to the plot and history from the first game in a manner that newcomers could adjust to. We can assume some characters would have started out well educated (in a post apocalyptic sense) in the pre-war history that remains and some would have been born in communities who have no idea what happened even a few years ago. Some communities might hold the Rangers from the first game as heroes... Some might see them as terrible villains. And maybe most never heard of them or their adventures at all. Given that a character in the game could theoretically come from so many diverse backgrounds, it seems to me that different player PoVs aren't a problem at all. Through a good story new players can find out what happened in the past if they care. And if they don't, well, it's all just background noise they don't have to pay attention to as they get on with their current concerns.

As someone else said as well, the old military bases were some of my favorites to explore in Wasteland. The Sleeper Base, Darwin, Cochise... Ah. If they could capture the feeling of stumbling upon them and just the inkling of what civilization used to be and the incredible forces and powers they wielded...

[ankou]

If the continuity is retconned, if the nukes fell in a war with China, if the pc's are Canadian Mounties and not Desert Rangers, in what sense is this Wasteland 2? Continuity is what makes this Wasteland instead of Fountain of Dreams 2 (which, I'll be honest, would rock so hard. FoD is my dark secret love. So terrible... so fun.)

I absolutely love the idea of retrofuturistic 80's with kind of a harsh, dirty punk vibe. That just says "Wasteland" to me.

Edit: I also think that there should definitely be references to the first game, but only if it's natural to do so. A forced reference only serves to confuse players new to the franchise and embarrass veterans. A well done nod should make us old players smile and new players want to play the first game.

[Cruxador]

This seems not to be an unusual opinion, but I say don't worry about the continuity too much. Make a good game. If some of the old setting details could be better, make them better even if it's not compatible with the old game.These are separate stand alone games. There were a lot of good ideas in the first Wasteland game and they should be brought over, but don't stick to anything just because it's old.

I also don't think it should be retrofuturistic. Update stuff whenever it doesn't mean we'd lose something interesting.

[Akira28]

Oh god, I need the chance to field the original team. I loved my Snake Vargas - Hell Razor - Angela Deth - Thrasher team combo. I'd love to come up against a Scorpotron mk.IV. I'd like a proton axe, and sure, an upgrade to neutrons, fine.

I'd like a 20 year later continuity of the same story, with a greatly expanded world.

[Pneumonica]

I have one thing to say:

Snake squeezins. There must be snake squeezins.

Okay, I have more to say than that. It doesn't plainly matter to me whether the nuclear war was started by the now-nonexistent U.S.S.R. or perhaps by a dissident faction within Russia that took on the old Soviet banner and believed they were fighting for a "new mother Russia". It really doesn't matter to me if India and Pakistan added to the fallout, or if China and North Korea did as well. The original nuclear war wasn't really given a lot of detail - we really didn't need it. You can always "fit in" the details later.

I do want it to carry the consistency of more-or-less how it got there. Nuclear war happened, and the Desert Rangers operate out of a prison in Nevada having kicked the prisoners out into the desert. Personally, I'm more interested in knowing more about the Rangers themselves. The only thing we saw of Ranger Station was the walls (one of my gripes with the original was that Ranger Station wouldn't provide supplies, not even for a price, and wouldn't provide medical services, not even for a price). I'd like to know more about the Desert Rangers as they are in the "today" of Wasteland.

[Layle Baker]

I think wasteland 2 should become retrofuturistic with 1980s/1990s retro style . This is the only way the original Wasteland backstory/lore, with a nuclear war between the US and USSR in 1998, could remain canon without a major lore rape / backstory retcon .

I wholeheartedly support this. Esp. the retro-futuristic in the 80s/90s style.

[chrisboote]

Part of what made WL/FO and FO2 so great was the shared backstory
I was very concerned that this would be somewhat lost in FO3, but it was even better
Please keep the fifties retrofuture - it doesn't matter WHY it refers to a late 90s nuclear war (although I can think of half a hundred ways to accommodate that) it just DOES
And yes please, ladle in as many references to games gone by as possible!
As well as lots of other throwaway lines (e.g. the bridgekeeper & the tardis in FO2) - maybe you should plough in some Discworld, Neil Gaiman, Jack Vance, Larry Niven, Firefly, Dr Who etc. references too

[Ausir]

Part of what made WL/FO and FO2 so great was the shared backstory
I was very concerned that this would be somewhat lost in FO3, but it was even better
Please keep the fifties retrofuture - it doesn't matter WHY it refers to a late 90s nuclear war (although I can think of half a hundred ways to accommodate that) it just DOES
And yes please, ladle in as many references to games gone by as possible!
As well as lots of other throwaway lines (e.g. the bridgekeeper & the tardis in FO2) - maybe you should plough in some Discworld, Neil Gaiman, Jack Vance, Larry Niven, Firefly, Dr Who etc. references too

Wasteland is not Fallout. It was never a 50s retrofuture. It was a cyberpunkish vision of the future grounded in 1980s science fiction. And I think they should keep the original timeline, making it a retrofuture based on the 1980s (not 50s like in Fallout).

[RangerWasp]

From a story and gameplay standpoint, I think an important thing here is to stick as close as possible to what Wasteland 2 would have been as envisioned at the time. I'm ok with updates to technology and graphics but the essence of it should be very much like WL1. I mean, that's the point, right? We are looking to resurrect the greatness of what WL was, we aren't trying to resurrect Van Buren or any other. I want the game that I dearly missed when they couldn't make it then - with toaster repair.

I'm ok with moving geographically to a new area and think the main plot should be a new story in the WL universe. No retconning to war with China or making it the 50s like Fallout, making it two hundred years later, or anything like that.

Ideally, I'd like the chance to know what happened to the areas explored in the first game - did the Rangers open up a base in the Sleeper Base? Did the Guardians regroup? But in recognition of those new to Wasteland, I wouldn't make that stuff core to the game, just nice bonus information for those of us who remember it from long ago. Much like how New Vegas used things like Marcus - you didn't need to know who he was but it was cool if you did.

And yes, I'd like to be able to import my party, I admit it. I know this is an unrealistic desire and actually I'm not so sure I *have* a party lying around any more, but I'd play WL again and make a new one!

[Quarex]

Part of what made WL/FO and FO2 so great was the shared backstory
I was very concerned that this would be somewhat lost in FO3, but it was even better
Please keep the fifties retrofuture - it doesn't matter WHY it refers to a late 90s nuclear war (although I can think of half a hundred ways to accommodate that) it just DOES
And yes please, ladle in as many references to games gone by as possible!
As well as lots of other throwaway lines (e.g. the bridgekeeper & the tardis in FO2) - maybe you should plough in some Discworld, Neil Gaiman, Jack Vance, Larry Niven, Firefly, Dr Who etc. references too

I hope people coming here to make intentionally sarcastic entirely inappropriate posts start getting banned.

[derekticon]

I think wasteland 2 should become retrofuturistic with 1980s/1990s retro style . This is the only way the original Wasteland backstory/lore, with a nuclear war between the US and USSR in 1998, could remain canon without a major lore rape / backstory retcon .

Yeah. Love that idea. It should retain narrative continuity and be an extension of the same universe.

Riff the 80s/90s retro-futurist/cyberpunk/new wave style and tribute to 80s/early 90 sci-fi and geek culture

[LateWhiteRabbit]

Riff the 80s/90s retro-futurist/cyberpunk/new wave style and tribute to 80s/early 90 sci-fi and geek culture

I love the idea. The 1980s are one of my favorite decades (that I've lived through). The hot neon colors, mismatched bright colors, New Wave fashion, sprayed-hair, rainbow colored Ray Bans, plastic bracelets, etc. I think Wasteland 2 should be every bit as steeped and overflowing with 1980s fashion, design, and nostalgia as the Fallout series is with 1940s and 1950s design. Clothing like Punky Brewster's with her mismatched shoes, socks, patched vest, torn pants and bandana's tied around knees already look like a scavenged post-apocalyptic outfit!

And the joke has got to be made in the game somewhere about how everyone in the 1980s used "rad" to mean "awesome" when a "rad" is also a measurement of how much radiation exposure you have received.

[Wild_Bill_711]

Agree with most of this... hoping that Wasteland 2 is a 'continuation' of the Desert Ranger story with the same look/feel as the original.

Haven't seen any mention of Combat Shooting skill or the famous Red Ryder Air Rifles...
Would hope there'd be 2 Red Ryder rifles (like the original Proton Ax) at far different locations, later in the game.
Possibly 'link' the Combat Shooting 'skill level' to the lowest range-weapon skill level a particular character has (no penalty for NOT having any particular weapon skill)... thinking that a Combat shooting skill level of 1-2 might increase 'damage inflicted' by 3%; a skill level of 3-4 might increase 'damage inflicted' by 6%;; a skill level of 5-6 might 'inflict damage' by 9%; and finally a skill level of 7 might increase 'damage inflicted' by 10% !

Even IF there's no "Super-Loot Bag" 'bug' ('random pointer error'???) in the game, players will be looking to "secure" any 'extra items' they can... LOL !

[Tagaziel]

Personally, I'd much prefer an alternate history approach to Wasteland, rather than making it deliberately retrofuturistic. It's easy to go overboard, with retrofuturism obscuring logic, consistency and setting plausibility (vide Fallout 3). An alternate future that resulted from a few historic variables being changed (think Turning Point, except good) that has some recognizable motifs from the 80s/90s sounds better to me.

A big problem here is the timeframe. In Wasteland, nearly ninety years passed since the nuclear war. In Fallout, eighty-four. Societies in both world were evolutions of human clusters that avoided destruction in the nuclear holocaust. What I'm getting at? If Wasteland 2 is set nearly a century after the War, then it should represent a plausible evolution of society in that timeframe, rather than have overt references and elements of the 80s/90s just for the sake of retrofuturism.

[CHAR-BROIL]

If the continuity is retconned, if the nukes fell in a war with China, if the pc's are Canadian Mounties and not Desert Rangers, in what sense is this Wasteland 2? Continuity is what makes this Wasteland instead of Fountain of Dreams 2 (which, I'll be honest, would rock so hard. FoD is my dark secret love. So terrible... so fun.)

I absolutely love the idea of retrofuturistic 80's with kind of a harsh, dirty punk vibe. That just says "Wasteland" to me.

Edit: I also think that there should definitely be references to the first game, but only if it's natural to do so. A forced reference only serves to confuse players new to the franchise and embarrass veterans. A well done nod should make us old players smile and new players want to play the first game.

This. Perfect.

Scorpitron!

[wormspeaker]

I guess I need to be the n'th "me too" on this one. A 1980s retrofuture would be "the bomb," literally and figuratively.

I also wouldn't really mind if WL2 was exactly the same plot as WL1 with updated graphics and game systems. I still played WL1 up to a few years ago because it is that good. (Though it is a bear to get to work with DOS Box, which is the only reason I haven't gone back to it in a while.)

I want to see the return of the Ronald Regan APC, nuclear bomb worshiping blood cultists, and the maximum security prison repurposed into the Ranger's HQ.

Of course, there's a limit of how close you can skirt to the WL1 game since EA owns it. You can't copyright a plot, but if you do an nearly-exact remake I'm sure EAs lawyers will try their best to convince a judge that you can. That doesn't mean that the devs can't heavily use plot elements from the first one. Especially since inXile owns the trademark.

[Wild_Bill_711]

As for 'continuity'... wonder what the original developers might have had in mind in 1988-1989...
and how has it evolved in their minds over the past 20 years ???...

personally WOULD have liked to see the original 4 'Rangers' return, with their initial skills & attributes; NOW wonder if it would be possible (and legal) to have a choice between those 4 Rangers OR 4 completely new Rangers with all new traits ???

A new 'adventure' in the Wasteland... a survivalist world... mostly new locations to visit.

Possibly Las Vegas would still be there... new adventures... though probably on a larger map, at "Scorpy's" intersection, a shallow crater with some reference to the 'charred remains of a destroyed robot'... at Brygo's hideout, maybe "skeletal remains in the main doorway" and an open passage to the other area where another "skeleton sits at an old computer with Wasteland still displayed on the screen".

Just some random thoughts !

[Wild_Bill_711]

How about a 'dummy' Store somewhere... all sorts of exotic armor & weapons... Redhawk is the owner/manager... he'll NEVER 'sell' you anything ! ... just excuses, 'your money looks counterfeit', you'd have to pay now, but wait till the check clears, and best of all... we don't take VISA cards !

[Wild_Bill_711]

Would the Desert Map include the "destroyed" Base Cochise location ???

[Drool]

Hm. If it's in the same geographic location (or nearby) and set after the first, I think it would be pretty neat to be able to explore the ruins of Cochise. It'd be like a mini-Easter egg.