Larian Studios Forums Divinity - Original Sin Divinity - Original Sin - General Gamescom 2012

Hi everyone,

I heard that Larian will be at the Gamescom this year presenting dragon commander and original sin. Will you also be on the public stand of focus home interactive? Will that be possible to meet people from the studio to have news about divinity original sin and autographs?

Larian is self-publishing their upcoming games, so I don't think they would be doing anything with Focus.
According to the Gamescom site, Larian is in the business hall, which may not be open to the general public (I don't know how strict they are, but the 'For trade visitors' section of the site says they "reserve the right to check trade visitor credentials when entering the trade fair").

They present there new games in the Focus Home's stand so I think that they might also organize things at the public stand. I confirm that the access to the business hall is only reserved to the trade (understand professionnal and press) visitors. I would like to know if there is something for fans

In that case, hopefully they will have something at Focus' public stand.

Unfortunately, Larian is just going to be at their own booth in the business hall.

Sad. I always wanted to meet them.

Say whaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaat:

http://kotaku.com/5935076/pc-dev-offering-5000-reward-to-anyone-who-finds-their-stolen-game

PC developer Larian is not having a great time at the Gamescom trade show in Germany this week.

The dev sent us a note to share that two PCs were stolen from their booth at the show. On those PCs were early copies of their upcoming games Dragon Commander and Divinity: Original Sin. Not good!

So they're offering a $5,000 reward to anyone who can help track the stolen goods down. Here's the full message:

I bet it's crackers or something.

Okay, let's all band together, track them down and kick their asses, then we'll go out for a beer after, like nerdy RPG heroes or something.

That's really screwed up. I hope the very best for Larian. I remember when someone took a copy of Half-Life 2 from Valve. People can be so crappy at times.

Me and two friends of mine will visit gamescom too, so if anyone is interested in talking to a DD fan look for the guy clothed like Alex from Clockwork Orange :

http://www.francobrain.com/literae/droogs.jpg

[Maybe I´ll sneak up to the business area to get my old DD copy signed by the devs :D]

I'd be careful of where you sneak. Gamescom security is apparently lacking, so Larian may have added a few spider mines...

These builds will probably be uploaded to torrent sites, unless thieves were interested only in computers.

The 5K bounty is a good start. The moment the stolen games surfaces on the net, there will be a horde of users hungry to get their hands on that money.

I hope the repercussions of the theft to the development of the game are not as grave as what's zipping through my head right now.

Not only this, but they might also be the thieves !

I once knew someone who knew someone ... And I had once read about another incident in the local press, too ...

Larian should investigate the Security People, too. Because if no-one had access - they had !


Apart from that I'll be there, too. Today. unfortuntely not in the business area.

I am very sorry for Larian's guys this is a shame to steal developper's computer. I hope that things will get any better soon for them.
And I hope that I could meet some of Larian's guy at the gamescom

Makes me wonder how they managed to steal two machines without anyone noticing. I imagine the booth is staffed by Larian during the day & the building would be locked up at night with security staff around. They must have cctv at the site surely not?

Hopefully the games won't make it to torrent sites but if they do then I don't know how bad that will be for game sales.

BTW a google search for "dragon commander torrent" brings up some results but the sites have been flagged as potentially malicious by my antivirus software so I'm a bit reluctant to see what they are.

Well.. look on the bright side. It could actually help gain more recognition for Larian and, if played correctly, could actually help with the marketing. Or at least it could help Larian become more know among (not so honest) players.

Yeah, I'm curious too - how did he/they manage to steal the whole PC (ie PC case with the internal parts)? I'm just having hard time to image it. Do all the devs left their stand/room and it was open all this time? Lar.net is still silent.



Because thief is still at Gamescom, he haven't got a chance to return home and check his new "loot" and sort things out.

I hope the "early builds of the 2 games" are containing a well hidden script that blow up or error when the thieves try to make more copies of both early builds !

Or even better: automatically the pc makes a photo/video of the thief when the thief start up the stolen pc and connecting the stolen pc with the world wide internet the photo automatically will be sended to a e-mail only know by the Larians.

Could it be ?

Good luck to all of you searching for the 2 pc's !!

Bad news, damn! I hope Larian can get the thief and sue him like there's no tomorrow!

Thieves! I come for you!


Where are Larian's computers?!!


I will find those computers at any cost!

======

I kinda think we have another problem on our hands now...

AND WHAT EXACTLY DOES THE POPE WANT WITH THE COMPUTERS???

Mayhap he will try to publish the games as his own!

Good job stealing your own pc's and setting up a reward, makes very good advertisement! Very clever!

Seriously now, I sincerely hope for all members of Larian that this will not result in a catastrophy.
Next time make sure such riscs can never occur again (like having essential dll files on stick instead of hard drive, suggestion...).

One other thing, has anyone read this yet?

See Lar's post here about a possible console version of DC.

I had forgotten about that post. Doesn't matter, I love pc gaming anyway.

I was at Gamescom yesterday as a normal visitor and I didn't see a Larian stand for the public ... Really wanted to meet 'em! Atleast I got to play the Xcom demo for a while.

/edit: just noticed it has been 7 years since my last post. Yikes! ...

Welcome back.

They were in the Business Area, which mortals cannot enter.

Guessed as much. They should've made an exception for people who've been a loyal member since 2003, right Alrik? ...

Gamescom presentation:

At 6:35! They used the DD soundtrack!

*nerdgasms*

I really love what I've seen in that presentation. Really liking that engine...sooo much potential!

Engine looks very smooth indeed. Everything [camera work,character animations and spell effects] looks flawless.

I just hope that conversation UI will be changed, because right now it takes the whole screen.

And the soundtrack at 6:35

I smell a HIT.

Hmmm....

The artstyle seems different.

It doesn't look realistic but it doesn't look too cartoony anymore. Also when they went near the light-house the lighting changed and everything looked gloomy (as a result of the place being haunted) which shows that any horrific areas will actually look like they're supposed to.

Really thank you for this video! I'm waiting this game! Hoping a collector!!

And any news about the robbery?
I really hope it will not be detrimental to Larian

Thank you VERY MUCH Estrogen for your video, it show me what I could not see at the Gamexcom. I agree with you hoping that the conversation interface will be changed. The awnser content is neither understandable nor really attractive. I am still waiting too for a collector edition

Yeah the answers a player gets to choose were rather limited weren't they?

*sigh* now I'm even more pumped..I was annoying the **** out of my boyfriend because I kept pausing and saying every minute, look what they do here, see how funny, haha what a line, yes the teleporter stones,ooh a voodoo doll,... ^^

luckilly gw2 is coming oiut in a few days so I have something to do while this game is being made AWESOME!!! and ready for us ^^



+ 1.00000000


small comments:
I have a feeling they changed the colour sheme a bit more yes? Less cartoony -> me like a lot
but is it just me or are all the trees in the vid fushia?is it supposed to be like that?it's very..erm..funky

and the dialogue options..what's up with that?Is it going to stay just a couple of words sometimes?I think not but just wondering..

I generally like the style they're going for. Really vibrant colours which make for a wonderful scenery.

Some of the enemies/monsters may look a bit too cartoonish for my taste but eh, who knows how many genuine scary looking things are in this game further on...

http://www.jeuxvideo.com/dossiers/0...de-role-divinity-original-sin-pc-016.htm

Divinity : Original Sin, best rpg for the biggest french game website

It is awesome we can read it, isn't?

The conversation topics are reminiscent of the Morrowind keyword style. I suppose that's not terrible, but it does lack some of the character of the traditional Divinity options.

That's what I noticed but it seems that when there's a choice to be made, you get a choice in actual dialogue.

Okay, I've got a chance to watch the video now and I must say I agree about the art-style. While it didn't really/actually changed much, they seems to be tweaked overall color palette and it looks rather appealing. But I was more pleased by how accurate the textured and design is. Lovely.

What disappointed me a lot is these redundant dialogs like this:


I know, these won't appear often, only in some cases with simple/primitive quests, bu still... it really ruins immersion for me. Oh well.

I have the same view as you Kein.

And for me the same ... the dialogs aren't supposed to be like this, I hope ?

How to read it properly without starting to have a hangover or headache ?
Brrr, nasty !

Every interface you see throughout the entire game/presentations is work in progress, no worries

Toppie !

I approve of this preview.

Still like the graphics, and the moment you go to the Lighthouse shows how much light changes perspective on how cartoony the graphics are. I think graphics didnt really change, just toned down the bloom etc. and a bit more zoomed out in contrast to some screenshots.

Love the fact you use the entire screen for dialog, to me it's a major plus in contrast to the older RPG's where only the bottom is used for that. Kinda waste of screen estate when you are only speaking.

Really liking how you can choose the different main topics in that same dialog screenshot, like "Phantom", "Murderer", "Undead" , "Sinking" and "Leave". Ultima stylish

I've just watched the new video about the impression after Gamescom: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ssjpa-jcSnw

And I saw an poster "Divinity Anthology - October 2012"!
But nothing about this now, on my habitual e-shops... except on Amazon...

Can someone tell me more about this anthology edition please? It seems to be an collector with very good items (art/story book, soundtracks). I would like to preorder as quickly as possible to be sure I can get one! :p

Thank you!

I have to agree, I don't like the one-word responses from the main characters. It's really missing the Divinity flavour where you can choose your own (usually snarky) responses.

A neat idea I'd like to see is several dialogue options, and if you mouse over them, you see a portrait of your main character having a different expression, so you can get a sense of what his or her attitude will be if you choose that line. Done well, it could even be used with two or more identical lines, but the expression gives a completely different context for each of them, and can provoke a different response.

Lar has mentioned the book they are putting together a couple times (see his latest blog post, for example), but nobody has announced anything about the anthology in the forum.

Very nice idea Stabbey !!! That will be awesome, really !

I know Lar mentioned a few things he found while searching trough old boxes, and there may be (guess its confirmed) plans for something special. But nothing official yet. But I see you paid attention to the video :D, good eyes.

Yes, 10! YEARS, ye olde farts.

Possible bonus release of LMK?

LMK ? They would have to take out every TDE thing from that, because they have no license for it.

And perhaps LMK is still copyrighted by the successor of Attic (yes, that exists !). http://www.attic.de/

Yeah, thanks, I remember this mentioned book but I do not know if this is the book included in this Anthology edition... for this reason that I ask some information about it :p I'm very curious!

Well, I just hope that final game will have more classic dialoges, not those TES-like ones.

Everything else is just awesome. Kinda felt some retro flavour.

That part where you use the teleporter stone and end up in a room with a woman taking a bath - does the gender of the person taking the teleporter change the gender of who you find in the tub? And if not, does the dialogue change if it was the female player who barged in instead of the male one?

Say NO to jerseys !

Screenshots from Gamescom: http://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.519918621367808.136956.468955009797503&type=1

I have to agree with Kein I like the colour palette and the art style, it looks better than the earlier garish colours.

Most of the screenshots come from the video presentation, but they show the good artistic work of Larian Studio, I am looking forward to test the conception toolset^^

Stunning screens, everything looks handcrafted.

Just look at this mysterious cave Im sure it's full of powerful loot

Keep up the good work LARIAN!

"I loot, therefore I play a role" ? Is this the credo of the new, Blizzard-infused gaming generation ?

For some reason this image reminds me of Curse of Monkey Island!

But I agree that the scenes and art-style look stunning, I haven't been this excited about an upcoming game for so long.

Home decoration [with loot] is the new form of roleplaying, you didn't know?

Loot is still an important part in any RPG.

I always hate how in some games you get to these epic enchanted items right of the bat...Where they barely let you work for such equipment.

Yes, but "loot" wasn't called "loot" in the RPGs before Blizzard - or at least not with the meaning Blizzard kind of invented : Collecting loot was just not there. Blizzard invented it. Before that, loot was just a means to survival - and for getting money for buying better things.
Blizzard changed "loot" into an collectible.

Arguing over pure semantics is captious and infantile.

It's not just semantics. Loot was (before) the means to an end (survival). Starting with WoW, loot has become the end.

I don't quite understand why you keep bringing up "blizzard games" and "WoW". I don't play massive multiplayer games due to their brittle nature and time deficiency, but for me loot means exactly the same as it did 10 or 15 years ago ["pro-customization" & "anti-unification" factor]. So please don't project your "modern gaming" phobias on me, because I have nothing to do with blizzard's perception of itemization. If I would know that those four letters will cause such unbelievable nerd-rage, then I would use the word "treasure" instead.

Starting with WoW doesn't mean its only Blizzard....

It's pretty much every single MMORPG out (you raid to stuff for the next raid in which you stuff for the next raid) and many single RPGs too now.


Every game has higher quality equipment, but before getting the best equipment wasn't the point of the game (or wasn't necesserally needed to finish the game).

Estrogen
You sound bitter. Are you okay?

You do. Implicitely. Becaue Blizzard influenced the whole RPG genre to a great deal.

Don't you think that others would like to copy the success Blizzard ? - That would lead to RPGs trying to copy at least parts of what Blizzard's success has constituted of. Which would be

- fast-paced killing of monsters
- item collecting
- item crafting
- item upgrading
- different tiers of "rarity" of items. Programmed in, not just "random" anymore
- items having not only 1 , but quite a lot of stats influiencing the item's use and the stats/abilities o the item-bearing character him- or herself.

Another element is the reduction of social interaction. But there was never much, anyway. OS:T is the only notable exception there.

nother point is that at one point gaming magazines began to compare ANY role-playing game for the PC with either Blizzard's offline or online role-playing games. Comparisons are made in sentences like "this is like in ..." "this is unlike in ..." . This is further cementing Blizzard's games as some kinds of "industry standards".

And the term of "industry standard" implies - as far as I understand it - both the acceptance and the implementation of something developers of things regard as "a success" or as "a good mechanic", or both. And this further leads into influence.

In my opinion, Blizzard chnged the whole RPG genre in an irretrievable way. Developers of now just cannot develop games anymore without being influenced by something that ince Blizzard (re-)invented and since then have influenced myriads of similar games. Before Blizzard, the fast-paced mass combat against SO many monsters was unknown - at that scale. BG didn't have such a large scale of monsters to bttle against, and it was either RTWP or real-time anyway. But it was never that fast.
Since then, this fast-paced "metzeln", as it is called with German-language gamers, has spread into so many games that actual slow-paced combat just isn't favourable anymore. Even in Dragon Age the combat was not slow, and not at ll turn-based.
Turn-based combat lies imho totally diametral to the fast-paced combat mechanics Blizzard invented. And guess how many turn-based RPGs exist nowadays ? Because no-one blieves the would sell nowadays, of course. Everyone is expecting fast-paced combat, or there would be many more RPGs with turn-based combat nowadays. Especially by the "big names". The bigger publishers usually shed away from failure; they want financial success; and success has been kin of "defined" by Blizzard's way of implementing combat into RPGs. almost every turn-based RPG released since then didn't have a success like Blizzard had.

And success is likel tried to be copied.
And copying something i like influnce . Allowing it to influence the own work.

What? Estrogen just sees an image of a cave, and wonders, hmm, there must be some chests having some nice equipment and/or other valuables.
Then some people comments how blizzard destroyed RPG gaming.

And then Estrogen is the one that is bitter? Don't get it.

Indeed Merendrious !

Who is who ?

We're all friendly people giving our opinion or speaking out our hope looking at the many beautiful screenshots that are already on the Original Sin site !

I even can't resist to use one of the nice screenshots as a wallpaper for my pc so I can't forget this rpg is coming ...
If I ever can't forget any game of Larian Studios ...

They're marked in my mind ...
To the end I see the light !

My only hope is that I can have big big fun playing Original Sin !
But in some way
I can only play,
In Divine's Name,
A Larian Game !

(and for you the same ?)

I thought it was preety natural.

Mysterious sea-cave used by the pirates [and ghosts] to hide their stolen treasures.

Yes, it's vastly overplayed and maybe even infantile concept, but very characteristic to many fantasy IP's.


And then the BLIZZARD DESTROYED EVERYTHING started


So I thought I'll let this one go , I'm not nerdy enough, I'll let them perorate.


And I was right, Alrik delivered

I honestly don't care about the subject of discussion, because it is hardly applies to DOS since Larian always had their own vision on many thing and that's why they earned my infinite respect and support so far.

Point is that I find Arik's position and arguments more reasonable and sane, with some basis behind them, while Estrogen seems to be on some kind of rant with subtle insults and his own entitled opinions. Not sure this will end well.

Well he insulted Alrik but that was it. I don't why he did that, perhaps the two have some feud going on between each other that I have missed from another topic. TBH I don't really care.

I think the only thing Diablo made popular was loot-collecting, killing monsters and fast-paced action combat. It didn't heavily influence the RPG genre. Ultima did that (Alrik, you're supposed to be a master RPG geek, I thought you would have known this?) with it's top-down perceptive, dialogue choices and freedom of choice.

Loot-RPG's are said to be influenced by Diablo and some of these games are often referred to as "Diablo clones" but games like Baldur's Gate, Planescape, Icewind Dale, Fallout and Neverwinter Nights were influenced by table-top RPG's and Ultima (along with other classic RPG's). First Person RPG's such as TES and Arx Fatalis were influenced by Ultima Underworld (with Arx actually being intended as a spiritual successor). It is said that First Person Shooter RPG's were influenced by Deus Ex which in turn was influenced by System Shock which in turn has influenced games such as Bioshock and Dishonored (Deus Ex also influenced the later one).

So I wouldn't say Blizzard have really been that influential in the RPG genre. In the RPG-loot genre, yes (they popularized it) but everywhere else, no. Most RPG's nowadays cite Ultima, Baldur's Gate, Fallout or Planescape as inspiration whereas shooter RPG's cite Deus Ex or System Shock as inspirations.

I wouldn't say "destroy", but it changed so many things ... In my opinion not always to the better ... Did I mention the guy who ranted about Drakensang being really bad an far too easy etc. ? I assume nowadays that he played Drakensang like an Action-RPG of Blizzard' invention.

My fear is that the newer gaming generations are so much USED to this tyle of gameplay ... THat they consider "Dark Souls" as being "brutal" and "difficult". Now, in Dungeon Mster one get health points substracted for colliding with a wall ... Dark Souls imho just isn't that difficult - it is this younger generations not used to this kind of gameplay, because they are only used to fast "zerging"-like running-through game play.
Imho.



Yes, but unfortunately that was before I came to gaming.

And when I played my first games, I was unaware of the whole RPG genre.
I'm still and adventure games player at heart.

There is so much I don't know about RPGs because I'm a younger genration, too.

My writing about Blizzard was rathr directed at a newer generation of games & their players. Nowadays, everything fast and speedy seems to be king, and bloody, too. Violence [as a means to solve prolems] is glorified. There just is not a single FPS game having anything other that killing people included asmeans to solve "conflicts". Diplomacy is for wussies, to put it quite cynically.

One trend of the Games Com this year was the overall total dominance of anything militaristic, shooters, killing, an again militaristic. There weren't even that much "cute" games for consoles shown. Shooters had the biggest booths and the biggest queues. People like to play killing, obviously.

And this s my biggest gripe : The loss of anything in terms of gameplay that is not about killing others. Everything is there just to provide better killing. Better loot -> better killing, better loot -> better defense -> longer time frame of being able to kill, better loot -> better halth potions, better magic potions, better magical artifacts ... In the recent times other dialog options have been completely eradicated. And for Blizzard, other dialog options weren't worthy to implement anyway. And success gets copied ...




Cite, yes, but nothing more.

There are no more RPGs wich are like them !

PS:T : Great, but who would buy it ? Most certainly not the newer generations of players trained towards fast-paced gameplay. Dialogs are sooo00 boring !


Edit : I must admit that I've grown quite bitter over the last years. Today's gaming just isn't my" gaming anymore, thus influencing my view.

I'm of the younger generation and yet I know of Ultima and with the re-releases on GoG I'm sure RPG fanatics of this generation brought them just like I've played many games from the eighties despite not being around in that decade. I've only played Baldur's Gate recently just as I did with Divine Divinity (last year) and have only discovered the greatness of these classic RPG's.

Oh and "citing as inspiration" is kinda of saying that certain features are inspired by those games. In fact isn't the combat system in Original Sin supposed to be rather influenced by the action points system of Fallout? Meanwhile ALL Elder Scrolls games and the 2002 Arx Fatalis game (and pretty much everything else Arkane has done afterwards) have been influenced by Ultima Underworld which was one of the first First Person RPG's with non-linear exploration and gameplay.

Baldur's Gate has influenced tons of games. There was an RPG that came out earlier this year (Confrontation - developed by Cyanide) that was clearly influenced by Baldur's Gate. Most reviews even noted the similarities, however Confrontation was panned for it's terrible gameplay, camera, story and tons of bugs which wasn't surprising considering Cyanide (developers of The Game of Thrones game that released) are known for rushing games. Hell, I think they've actually released 4 RPG's this year along!!

Not just you. Ask me what RPGs I played in 2011-2012? I have no answer. Because I didn't. Honestly, I can't say I really played more than 12 games within these 2 years, eeh.

I never played Dungeon Master, so I cant say if that wall colliding was implemented good. But harder is not necessarily better. You got the good, challenging hard, but there are so many frustrating hard, because of bad game design for example.



Those are just games for the masses. Zynga games like farmville is(was) also popular, and it just involves clicking in specific intervals.
But I also find questing and diplomacy lacking in RPG's these days. Most of "RPG's" dont even have quests where you can make real choices. You just either do the quest or don't. Divinity games are still one of the best in the last years. Before that Troika games were King in it with gems like Arcanum (wow, that game is from 2001 already )

But Blizzard don't make RPG's. Diablo is an action game and WoW is a grind game.



Isnt that already the case for years, the typical shooters and sport games get majority of the attention.



Imho you cant just blame blizzard for that. Yes, they are successful, and successes get copied. But other developers can (and should) do their own thing. It's just the amount of people who jump on every gaming hype and want to make a quick buck. I mean, FIFA games sell well every year, but that doesnt mean every developer should make football games.



There still are games like that, not many, and you have to look for them in the most obscure places. And it are small developers, so they dont have the attention or money that the big ones get. But Age of Decadence is one example of that.

Blizzard and other big players are kinda like the Hollywood of gaming. If it's not your cup of tea, it looks like there are only those type of games. But then you need to search for alternative places to find what grinds your gears. I do that the last years more and more, most fun I get are out of developers with 2 people or so, and their games cost 10-15 bucks at most. And I get more fun out of them then out of the typical AAA game.



I also think you overestimate the amount of deep and slow paced games that came out in the "early years".
But then again gaming is still relative young, and is still changing a lot and it is still going to.
And nostalgia used to be better back in the days ;-)