Larian Studios Forums Divinity - Original Sin Divinity - Original Sin - General 20 points to make a great game even better

It's funny that you on the one side completely object the idea of a quest item tab but on the other side even claim that all craftable items or ingredients should have an own tab...

You know, that's a contradiction in itself. And an inventory tab which includes all ingredients for crafting (weapons, armour and everything inlcuded) would be approx contain 80% of your inventory items anyway, only with the difference that it's against the old-school hardcore attitude to not make the life of the game any easier but to keep the exprience as clunky as possible...(a bit ironic, sry).

I wasn't replying to your original post, sorry it's not readily apparent on this board's layout.

Artemis#### was complaining about old school games being terrible and I was offended by that comment.

As for my modding comment, there was a request for an in game note pad sort of thing and someone wrote how hard can that be.

Horrorscope saying "just categorize it" as if renormalizing a database and changing all the corresponding methods in the implementation layer is just a couple seconds of effort, reminds me of the pointy haired boss in Dilbert

As for your suggestions I feel neutral. Some points are nice, but since I don't know how the engine is built, I don't know how feasible they are to implement. They would be nice for sure if the devs can get to it. Others I disagree with but since this is your wish list, I have no urge to rain on your parade.

@artemis42

Thanks for your thoughtful response. That's what I created this thread for (besided giving Larian direct feedback). I agree with most of what you've written (not with every detail) and I think your passage about general game design is a very important one in this whole discussion. The first and foremost question in game development should always be whether the game and its mechanics are fun and entertaining or not and because of which reasons and not if you fit into a certain overal thinking pattern or genre. Of course you can't always cater to everyone's taste but at least you try to make a "round" experience. That's what we are all talking about. How to make the experience even rounder and more "homogenic". I agree that this whole hardcore/old-sohool vs modern/casual doesn't help much in the discussion and even does the discussion a dissservice by leading to more dogmatic conflicts instead of talking about certain game mechnics with a more open-minded attitude. It's perfectly valid to criticise a lacking map or the exact opposite but that should always happen in respect to the whole game design and of course based on personal tastes instead of dogmatic category thinking (ala this has to be that way because it's a game of genre X).

@Songbird
Ok.

Didnt i already mention strawman arguments and other assorted fallacies?

Trying to blame the other side for these falacies while you are using them directly to do so - is a strawman argument.

And ad hominem fallacy of sorts.


First strawman argument:

Who exactly has done this and how do you know thats what that someone was thinking? The answer is - nobody. It never happened.

As for me, i did in fact objectively look at the suggestions and analyzed them in that way, which was replied to with nonsensical screaming about self entitlement and "opinions". Which prompted several other exchanges of opinions.


Is that a fact now? In what alternate reality?

I would rather say that you dont understand the difference between term "hand holding" and the game giving the player character internally consistent and coherent information.

The difference between a mass market game leading players somewhere by the hand, directly - without ever bothering to provide any real valuable internally coherent information that could serve to alow player to find anything himself.
Various quest compasses, shining lights over characters, and other such brainless, mindless customers features - including designing the whole game in a way that prevents any possibility of player somehow not knowing where to go and what to do.

Such as various bethesda, blizzard and bioware games, are full of, for example.

BBB... hmm..

Anyway, making declaratory statements that you cannot explain or support with anything isnt a real argument, buddy.


None whatsoever. Read the above again.

Second direct straawman argument:

Nobody actually made that argument so... you are putting something you invented into others people mouths.

Double strawman since nobody thinks the old games were perfect.

Which does not mean that your mass market stremlining and hand holding should replace some of the old design values.




That actually doesnt have anything to do with anything....

And it doesnt even make sense.

Juggling floppy disks does not increase the length of a gameplay since thats completely external to internal game play-through length.

In addition of having nothing to do with what we are discussing here at all.

You just found something archaic to use as another cheap, laughable strawman fallacy.




This is a very thin and cheap ad hominem, while taken altogether its just another distorted logical failure based on a fallacy... about an ancient feature directly related to hardware issues of the earliest computers and gaming consoles.

Which has nothing to do with subjects and suggestions discussed here.

Therefore i will conclude that you are a cheap moron, who is not actually capable of creating any real argument but instead relies on strawmans and ad hominems.

btw, calling you this is not an ad hominem because it is true.

You should atleast understand that ad hominems fallacies are based on intentional distortion of facts and usage of personal insults that have nothing to do with reality to distort the discussion in attempt to win it through other means then real facts.

Of course, if you were able to understand this then you wouldnt have written that opening constructed only of strawman arguments, ad hominems and incoherent logical fallacies.

Weve been over this notion of yours several times over the last few days and you were repeatedly told that what you think is fun and entertainment is worthless as any kind of realistic measure.
(not only you, but that kind of value system is inherently worthless and literally impossible to use)

Not to mention that you think mass defect 3 is a "great Rpg"...

Which says all about your personal taste worth.




Decline in a nutshell.

I would love to make your face more homogenic.
So that everyone can think its pretty.



That was me and that comment was written with a lot of tongue in cheek feel.

With a question mark at the end, which should have told you it is a question, a hopeful question - not a declaration or a statement.

Oh thanks Hiver for explaining that.

But yeah that seems like the attitude of some people here,

@Hiver
Why do you still address me? I don't read your posts anymore, you are on my ignore list. You could spare yourself the time and effort.

Good thread, I agree with those points.

Because your false mass market propaganda must be exposed for what it is and your fallacies dismantled with facts, logic and truth.

As well as lies, strawmans and ad hominems of others supporting your ideas while refusing to think objectively.

Im not really talking to you.



Yeah... tends to happen in places like this a lot. Arguments from ignorance and wishing well dont mix nicely.

But its also relative, in a sense that we all understand it isnt exactly "easy" but that devs are capable of doing it - if they really wanted to. The question is can they, do they have time and money and most importantly - what any specific feature would do to the game.



Then you have two basic groups or lines of thought.


For mass market drones the biggest importance is their own selfish sense of entitlement to "fun and entertainment" regardless of what that actually means. That tops everything else and is one of the main reasons for ages of decline of RPGs.


And the other that is actually trying to look from the angle of "what is best for the game" from internal gameplay, setting, gameworld point of view.

These are some really great ideas for an already great game.

They would only help to improve and make things even more fun and replayable. Id really like to see most of these become a reality, because Id like to think that this game is something Id still want to be playing long into the days to come.

I wish people realize that the studio have finite resources to do something. Some of the people here don't seem to? We know they are working on more companions, companion AI, engine updates for modding, etc.

Those are all big ticket items.

I don't think they can get to much of any other stuff other than bug fixes until the next patch is released.

It's exactly as you say on the schools of thought.

"I would like the game to do this and discuss the merits of the suggestion." That's an actual discussion thread. Versus

"Omg my favourite [game name] does this, why isn't it like that here, the devs need to fix this now!" This isn't a constructive post and there are too many of those

If you're not talking to him don't address him. Seems silly that you would do so. And if you do quote him (which is essentially addressing him) then a response is usually expected, particularly if he disagrees.

Also, there was nothing wrong with his thoughts on improving the game. Many of his thoughts have been supported by many posters in this thread. And many of his thoughts don't detract from the overall experience of the game, within the context of story, gameworld, etc.

Case in point is the identify all option he would like implemented. The process of identifying items is simply clicking them and selecting the identify option. There is nothing particularly immersing about it. There is no mini game or special lore for each item. It's essentially a stat roll. There are also effectively no limits on how many items you can ID, other than your Lore stat. There are no scrolls or resources to manage. Consolidating all the clicking and inventory transfers into one simple option is just a time saver.

If you would still like to have a "loremaster" character who you transfer all items to and have him/her ID them, there is nothing preventing you from doing so with this idea. You can still keep your immersion in the game within the context of story, gameworld, etc. I don't find many of his suggestions to detract from the immersion since the concepts he's discussing aren't particularly immersing to begin with.

Which only makes it the more hilarious that you are using them over and over again.



Simple: "hand-holding" has consistently been used in this thread as a disparaging term to help build an argument (a fallacy in and of itself).



The term hand-holding is commonly used to describe almost any game feature which isn't absurdly hardcore, and doesn't always relate to giving directions in a game. Quest text too descriptive? Hand-holding. Maps? Hand-holding. Free respawns? Hand-holding. The truth is, what one person deems to be hand-holding might seem hardcore to someone else.

Oh, and by your rationale, a spell that pointed a player to the next quest (I believe there is such a spell in Skyrim), is internally coherent and thus ceases to be hand-holding.



I never said anyone made that argument, so take your own advice and stop putting words in my mouth. It is a very common argument which I was stopping in its tracks.

I also never said that anyone claimed that old games were perfect. I said that the common argument which I alluded to would only make sense IF old games were perfect.

My god, man...



Oh my...

Let's say that a publisher deems 5 floppy disks to be the absolute maximum that they are willing to sell due to pricing, etc.. Assume that for game foobar, 2 hours worth of content fits in those 5 floppy disks. What did they do in those days? Make the game insanely difficult to make the game take much longer to complete it. Get it?




Not an ad hominem as I did not use it against any of your arguments. Ancient feature related to hardware issues? There are games being made today which feature no maps or have an option to disable said map (look up Legend of Grimrock).



Thinking something is true and it being actually true are two wholly different things. You provided no proof for your claim that I'm a "cheap moron".



Right back at you.

Please keep going. This is totally not going to end badly for you.

Here we go again people...
I'm not going to quote the huge blocks of text or this post will be even larger, just put http://www.larian.com/forums/ubbthreads.php?ubb=showflat&Number=515602#Post515602 next to it...

1. Again; which quest actually doesn't give enough info in the log. I find none. As said; short, to the point. That's how a journal should be.

Planting the entire convo in it doesn't quite solve that. Also, storing all convo's will quickly reduce it to an unordered gigantic pile to search for what you want. You think the 'all' inventory is bad, it will be thousand times worse.

3. I wouldn't mind making it harder, like for example taking those gear bonusses away you mentioned.

4. I would say no need for "de-linking" the sneaking character just moves on it's own linked or unlinked. Manually having to relink constantly is annoying.

5. So why do we need shared gold then if the PCs just keep the gold between themselves? It's not that hard to do, right?

6. I scroll, click done... and seeing Steam say 80 hours (+like 7 or so at Larian) I meet your criteria!

7. Aside from knifes not appearing on ingredients, what major other items are there where cross-tab needs to be done (so all). Keys + soap? Keys don't even APPEAR on all. So which combo's need it that critically that all is super-organised rather than having access to all you need in the tabs?
The objection is that your solution simply ignores the already convient sub-tabs, so why should we ignore those again and organise our entire inventory in "all"?

9. Let's see... "Hey, reveal scroll for evil villain lair"... "Yeah, that's useless, let's drop it"
That... is NOT Intelligence. Only people with bugs can actually complain there, not people who were too stupid to simply discard it.
Also, if you read my post history or just look aroud you see I help many people who have questions... so I'm not sure what the rants aimed at.

12. I do hate "Epic" nowadays with the overuse of the term regarding modern RPG's. And AFAIK bosses do drop a lot of stuff, usually higher quality. How does lowering other drops and raising boss drops help. Answer; not at all. So yes, I don't support it.

13. It doesn't force players to do anything. If however players have an utmost desire to waste their time reloading 100 times, it doesn't punish them either. I don't exactly see bad gameplay with that. As long as it doesn't *force* you upon degenerate gameplay it's good...

15. Then you seem one of the few, since Silverglenn you visit pretty much instantly after Cyseal as far as I noticed. And it's all Black Rock Tenebrium and Rot what NPC's tell you.

16. I am not being hostile. I just said that was a bugfix, not a suggestion, so there was nothing for me to say about it. Seriously. If you view that as critism I have no idea *what* to tell you...

17. Not really. Also the BG2 journal was all plumped together, making finding quests you did pick up rather hard. It didn't have the fine split per quests this game has. Making it far easier to navigate. So no, BG2 didn't have a better more convient journal.
Well, aside from the technical issues that has now (translations) it's exactly what I said before... it makes people expect the game to tell them stuff rather than explore themselves. And thus they wont learn. It's better to have that explained already in Cyseal than that they find out when a skeleton bashes their skull in, cause I can guarantee you that more "new" people would then cry out here in the forums since it was so unexpected with all the handholding before that.

19. Everyone complaining that they get beaten into a bloody pulp by enemies far above their level as soon as they leave Cyseal disagree with you. I do agree having some powerful beings early that you just had to return too would be great. But with the complains off hard-corism already probably too early. Hopefully around the time of Pillars of Eternity.
So yeah, I would agree with you there, but it's just the question if it was in how many more people would get totally bonkers than they already do...

@Stabbey
Hey mate, you're still alive? Divinity's biggest fan has become really silent since release...

@JoeBart
I ignore him because he is a rude and aggressive person who likes to insult other persons and can't dicuss in a civilized manner, respecting other persons and stay on topic. I don't care whether he has some good points or not, I'm just not interested in talking with him at all. And I only wrote my post addressing him because I saw another posters post responding to one of his own posts. I fact, I don't read any posts of him anymore.

No. I don't. You do, and that's an opinion. A wrong one, but still...




No. Some things are clunky in their current form. I was just agreeing.

Now that I've wiped your E-spit from my face, let us continue!





Well it does run on nostalgia, Ultima VII, Divinities of olde, and so on.

Why would I scream at you? You're adorable.




Threat? To you? For what? I don't even know you. LOL.

The point I was trying to make was that people acting tough on the internet are almost always weaklings in real life or/and have mental and/or health problems.

Anonimity makes people asses.

Guess how I pictured you after your "lard-ass" -comment.






Now you are metagaming. You're hilarious.




Oh look, it responded in a way that a twelve year old would in angst.

See what I did there?




Nope. Got plenty. Want more?

Oh, and I love people who spread the word "retard" around the web. It makes them seem really intelligent.





Clever boy. -Yawn!-

Here, have a cookie.




"Mommy! Ben dropped a bucket!"




Yup. You are boring me to bits. I think you are less clever than you think you are.




I don't think it means what you think it means.

And now, I'm off. You bore me to bits with your ignorant rants. You are a dime in a dozen. Nothing special, just vocal. Using terms like "straw man" over and over and over again (like you had just read the term from wikipedia, and not QUITE gotten what it means) does not make you seem any less intellectually impotent.


As for the game, it's good as it is. It could be even better, with small fixes and that is why we are talking here.

Trolling rant masters can do as they please.

@Hiver

Prove them wrong or shut up. It seems you're just a damn troll. Those improvements they're talking about are REAL and it's a fact. Like I said, prove them wrong or get out.

Sorry, subjective things are never facts.

But do go on.

I did prove them wrong already. Several times over.
And you either failing to understand that or intentionally claiming i somehow didnt is meaningless in any way except showing what limited cognitive abilities you have. Actually.



How am i using them over and over again? What strawman i ever made exactly?
Are you capable of supporting a single of your statements with anything at all?




... look, its obvious youre not really intelligent enough to lead this kind of argument so im going to simplify the matter even bit more so you understand what i am asking you - specifically.

In the sentence above you directly claim that "some people" assumed hand holding and stream-lining are necessarily bad instead of objectively analyzing the issues.

Those are your own words.
Thats a statement you made and then built the rest of your post over it.

I asked you to prove that was actually the case, with anything real.

Therefore you should quote who said that and prove that nobody analyzed the issues objectively.
Instead of just claiming it is so.

Answering that question with:

Doesnt mean anything.
Thats not the answer to that question but another empty declarative statement that is not really logically connected to the first strawman statement you made.

How disparingly the term is used - rightly so - has nothing to do with your statements that some specific people assumed hand holding and streamlining are bad and never objectively analyzed the suggestions.

Because the suggestions have been objectively analyzed several times over. And several of them were found to be unfitting for the game. While several people said that several are ok.

Me included. Because those suggestions are nothing special and just ordinary things anyone would expect. Basically.




err... can you actually prove that with anything at all, instead of just claiming it is so?



No, thats not what hand-holding means and this is the first time i ever hear or see anyone claiming that quest text that is "too descriptive" is considered hand-holding - by some unknown entities.


Same goes for maps.

Feel free to point me to a single evidence that anyone ever said that a map in a game that should have a map is hand-holding.

But i have to admit i dont really get the term of "free respawns" in relation to our discussion or OS.

Are there respawns that are not free? wut?


How is that a "truth"?

Any evidence to support that claim or is it just a stray thought that just fired off?



No, thats not internally coherent feature because you see... it is not enough just to throw something inside the game to make it internally coherent. You thinking and saying that is somehow my rationally is a strawman argument.

You never asked me for explanation about that. You claim that as if it sa fact you somehow know.

To be internally coherent a feature must make sense in the setting as it is, in the story and the overall game world and its lore or everyday life and reality.

In Skyrim, if you really want to mention that particular game, there were several hand-holding features for the brainless masses.

And masses hated it. Atleast a lot of players did.

The compass that was showing absolutely everything, every place, every location, every cave, hut and place of interest and WITHOUT which you could not find any of the locations various quests told you to go to or find or discover - was one of the biggest such features.

Hated even by regular fans and players of the game, let alone any old-school players who chanced upon that game or tried it.

One of the first mods that came out on Nexus, removing various functions from it was one of the most downloaded mods, probably still is.

Of course it was impossible to remove it completely because NO OTHER WAY to find anything in the game existed. So most people would just disable it showing various places of interest - so they could atleast keep some sense of discovery for themselves.

While engaged quest would still need to be shown, otherwise you would never find them.

Some people played without it completely but those were just the usual masochists.


The spell you mentioned only points out the direction to selected quest and it is basically just another, secondary quest compass, only superficially in the form of a spell. That does not make it internally coherent or consistent because no one else uses that in that whole world.

Its a player only hand-holding gimmick. It exists only for the players benefit. Doesnt affect anything else at all and its not connected to anything else in the setting-game world-lore-everyday life or anything else.







...


You never said anyone made that argument?

And you say that in reply to a quote of yours where you claim that someone did exactly that?



And you say you never said that?




.....



Right, at this point i will stop.
Because bashing intellectually challenged people isnt really cool thing to do.

And there is nothing else we need to discuss any further.


....


A way better way to spend time is doing some co-op with Source Hunters soloing the game without Lone Wolf and other such cheap mass market talents.


You go and think about things.

NM