Larian Studios Forums Divinity: Original Sin 2 Divinity - Original Sin 2 - General Please get rid of isometric view for D:OS 2

That is true. But there is an overwhelming support there - and on the old Bioware forums, in which I participated - for a more cinematic experience.

Ah, so the rules for what constitutes a fact or an opinion are different depending on the medium, eh? Good to know.


THANK you.

Any reason you are trying really hard to be unpleasant? With a high degree of success I admit. Without proving me wrong, to boot.

I don't think another perspective would work for the kind of game, that D:OS. It didn't even work for DA:O when the fights started, because they were boring, as they were more cinematic but not as deep in D:OS.

Howerver 3rd - Person worked for Divinity 2, but this was also another kind of game. D:OS is about control a more distanced view is welcomed, Divinity 2 was about exploring a world alone, so you needed a closer view of your character.

I think there's some misunderstanding here. My suggestion (which Vandal Hearts demonstrates) is that the game should remain isometric. That is, there are parts of the battle where you're scanning the battlefield and choosing what you want to do. This should remain isometric.

However, every time you decide to complete an action, you then have to watch your character complete the animation for that action. This is a good opportunity to get more cinematic. This is what XCOM 2 does.

Some games can get away with being locked in a permanent isometric perspective. I'm not too worried about that though. XCOM is more action-focused and D:OS is more story-focused. That's why I'm more worried about the storytelling. Diablo 3 is another action-focused game (with a good story), and it sticks to a strict isometric perspective even in dialogue. Watch these players paying close attention to the Diablo 3 story.

Baldur's Gate was also strictly isometric, of course, due to limitations at the time and is reputed to have a good story: yadda, yadda, yadda.

Everyone's favourite example, the cinematics of Witcher 3 leave absolutely no room for less than your undivided attention. Can you imagine any scene from the Witcher being presented in an isometric format? Of course not. Because he actually has facial expressions. This is the ideal.

Or we could look at Vandal Hearts again. It's 100% isometric, but they make an effort to zoom in when you're performing an action and stage the dialogue to be as cinematic as possible.

Hmm, fair, although I don't know if we really need such cinematics or if it gets more rewarding, since we mostly SHOOT in X-Com, while we do way more things in D:OS.

Although I have to say, that I liked the handdrawn sequences we got after collecting the bloodstones. Something like that feels rewarding and fits the mood. We could some of those more.

Correct. I marry this position 100%.

Actually, in games like Baldur's Gate or in Pen&Paper games it's the player's imagination that takes centre stage, based on words and - in the first case - on the game world and how you interact with it, not 'cinematic' techniques of visualization. Therefore making a game more 'cinematic' doesn't just mean adding something (to make it 'better'), it would change the reception and the kind and degree of participation. 'Cinematics' tends to be more directive and restrictive to your imagination and for certain purposes, of course, it's the right choice. For me personally a 'cinematic' dialog between Esmeralda and Septimus could never be done so well that it would achieve what one can imagine when she says 'Oh, catch me, for I might faint!' and her voice raises theatrically (Classic Version) and one can 'see' her tiptoeing and slowly bend her back until she falls... and Septimus fly's to her side to catch her - it was never visualized, not even visually suggested that this happened right now. It's an imagination that is implied by her words and the outstanding voice acting. The facets of her character are so well presentated this way that a more concrete visualization of this scene would destroy what your individual imagination creates about this scene. Of course: this requires something different from the player than a cinematic scene or more visualized dialog (face animations, camera, etc.), but it offers you more, depending on your ability to imagine and on the quality of writing which is - to state that here - much better than others claim, since it's able to characterize NPCs, to give them a personality and to allow you to imagine scenes like the one I just described. That's something no other rpg of the last years - skyrim, risen, witcher... - could achieve. Risen and Skyrim failed by the triviality of their characters (and writing), and Witcher 3 by it's cinematization (since there's not much to imagine any more).

So if Larian tried to transform a Pen&Paper game experience into a cinematic experience they would tendencially - depends on the degree of cinematization and where it is done - transform actively imagining players into more passive spectators. And I'm not sure if we really need more games of this type, or at least D:OS 2 to be such a game...


And this would even force the problem of combat being a bit too slow at some points. Accelerating some animations would fit better, in my opinion, than to extend this to a 'cinematic' enactment of combat actions and to implement a dynamic combat camera that intermits tactical view every time your characters perform an action (even if it's just in case of attacks).

I dunno, I guess if I wanted to make my imagination fill in the gaps, I'd rather read a book: and I do feel a bit short-changed when I see someone else's interpretation of a favourite book either conflict with or fall short of what my imagination conjured up (Jackson's version of LotR is a particularly egregious example for me: they're good films, but they don't mesh at all with how I'd visualised the books, be it characters, pacing or even scenery).

In the case of video games, I'd still rather stick with options as there's scope to do that, within development budgets and timescales of course: all things being equal, if there's the ability to let the player choose, why not go with that?

I'm somewhere in the middle when it comes to things like cinematics: I didn't quite get the same sort of thing as with the Esmerelda example (and in its case a lot of it comes down to the personality that the voice actor conveys: that in itself is a contentious issue and I've seen people use exactly the same arguments for unvoiced, text-only dialogue, especially in the interminable Morrowind vs. Oblivion stand off. For the record, I like both) but I do get the point with The Witcher 3 which is that it was very choreographed and carefully directed. The latter is a rare example where I'm happy playing as someone else's character who has very little input from me, but usually I don't like playing a sort of interactive film. So somewhere in between for me, really. Which I guess D:OS did with its hand-drawn cut-scenes.

Anyway, I do wish 3rd person was an option just for when I felt like using it, but we've been told we're not getting it along with an explanation of why we can't have it!

Didn't somebody just write, that it is about money and the lack thereof?

Yeah, Nord, a few posts back. Basically too much effort and time to redo everything from another perspective, which I can't really argue with as much as I'd like it!

It's not implied at all. She's describing exactly what she's doing.

Hang on a moment, I just need to grab a coffee.

Mmmm. Great coffee. Anyway...


There is actually a great point to make here. Pick up your favourite book and read it again. Pay attention to how much time is spent describing things and people doing things. When it comes to imagination -- they're telling you exactly what to imagine.

Larian could possibly try to get away with having a 100% fixed perspective (like Baldur's Gate) but all writers -- whether for novels or cinema -- are told to follow the rule of "show, don't tell". Zixzax even mentions this (shortly before telling everything that's happening). The easiest and cheapest option would be simply to add some in-game description so that we know what to imagine. Some of the best parts of Baldur's Gate were the narrations that could have been literally lifted directly from a novel.

Game developers generally recognise that video games are a visual medium and so they should take more influence from cinema than from novels. But either method is acceptable.


You don't need to drag out the animations at all. It's very easy to cut to a close up just for 1-2 seconds. It also doesn't have to be for every action, but if you're doing something awesome (finishing someone off, or using a special attack), then you'll probably enjoy a chance to soak it in a little.

Last point is correct: you don't need to REDO animations, you simply need to create a dynamic camera.

All she says is 'Oh, catch me, for I might faint!' It's undertermined to a high degree or contains a lot of 'gaps', as Vometia called it. No words on her mimics, on her gestures, no words on what this scene shows about her character. So most of this situation must be 'completed' by imagination or interpretation, based on the information the game offers and the recipients personal knowledge etc. And that can be a joy or boring.

Depends on the book you read and the author's effort to describe and add 'realistic details' (but 'describing' doesn't mean 'telling', at least they are distincted in most definitions and should be distincted; you can't 'show' an action in literature - outside of dialog - without a more or less detailed description; in general, I'm not so happy about this narratological distinction, especially when it comes to different media). Some genres would describe everything that isn't described of Esmeralda and Donovan, just 'implied' as I said: the mimics, the gestures, probably what one or both figures think, what they feel, what they intend, what their characteristics are. Most things about both figures are already 'shown' in D:OS, not 'told', just with other means (less 'cinematic' ones, in a certain sense): PoE uses a lot of text to tell you what happens. D:OS uses interactions between characters (dialog and animated actions), items, book text and environment to 'show' characteristics, intentions, feelings, actions. Showing must not be identified with (or too much reduced to) cinematic techniques of visualization. Otherwise books could never 'show' (and that's not what is meant by 'showing', related to this medium). So I think we are more speaking of different means and meanings of 'showing' than of 'showing' vs. 'telling'. I'm not for telling things that can be shown or, at least, a dominating mode of telling.

I would like that, too. I refered more to examples from Witcher 3 and XCOM 2. They would not fit a game like D:OS, in my opinion. What Witcher 3 does is amazing. But the price (from another perspective) is that it restricts the individual act of imagination very much and is quite much like a film (by intention); it's a very different experience.


Yes.

Perhaps I explained this poorly. This does a much better job

You can try to cheat this rule by having people constantly say exactly what's happening. Like somehow it's not awkward to have characters talking about obvious things things like, "Hello, my 21-year-old sister named Vivian. How are you enjoying being unmarried and beautiful?"

This article actually makes a great point. You use your imagination either way. Showing flips this on its head. Instead of Zixzax always telling you how excited he is and imagining his facial expressions, you would get to see his facial expressions and make your own inference.

"Show, don't tell" is one of the golden rules of writing (though oversold a little). The problem with D:OS is that very little is shown to us at all. In fact, one pet peeve of mine is that no matter how much time I spent talking to Arhu, I never really properly understood that he actually looks like this, even though it's easy to see. Honestly, I just heard his voice, made my own mental picture and this just overruled his actual appearance. There's really no reason for me to be looking at his tiny portrait or his tiny 3D model. These things are only peripheral, and most of the 3D models look very different from their portraits. I want to see him up close when I'm talking to him. I don't even care if his mouth moves.



Calling this an interaction is pretty generous. The only contribution made by the player character is, "Tell me X". Then, after asking him to tell you about how he survived a shipwreck, he suddenly segueways so he can interject:

You seriously can't get any more telling than that. This is the problem with the current storytelling style.

How could you do it differently? Well, you could have him ask the player about Maxine (it doesn't really matter if you've never met her, because that leads to a natural segueway). As it is, he's far more interested in talking about his own backstory than he is in talking about Maxine. And he's far more interested in telling you about his history with Maxine than he is about trying to find a solution. His problem is that he doesn't know what to do next, so the obvious question for him to ask would be, "What should I do?" As it is, he never asks you anything, and he never asks for your help. Your only contribution is to encourage more monologue. This happens too much.

Witcher 3 gets it right again. Of course, it's easier when you can see their faces, but that's not the only issue. (Trying to emote with a cat would also be a fun challenge.)

So it should be structured like a fetch quest, rather than present a situation that you can choose to look into, if you are so inclined?

How is the Witcher 3 quest guy's long monologue any different than Zixzax, besides the camera moving around and changing perspective (sometimes annoyingly, IMNSHO)? The player has an occasional 'continue' question, with a fake choice a couple times that gives a short diversion before getting back to the where you can 'continue', and at the end there are some questions that can provide a little more detail.

I was referring to NPC-NPC interactions.


But what does evoking an imagination by visuals (animated 3D model) make more preferable to other techniques of showing (that seem to work and even overrule his visual appearance, as you said)? Yes, they are peripheral and my own picture of Arhu is also very different from his model or his portrait. My point was that your own imagination would be quite determined if such techniques would be used (to a higher extend). As you said in one post above: they would catch your attention, and direct it to Arhu's 3D model, to his animations, and be more restrictive to what picture your imagination will create - or at least it's a very different way to make the player imagine the character (since writing can be very directive too, but actually not determine the imagined visual appearance of a character as much as those pictures can). It's a matter of taste here, of course.


Yes, I can see the point, although I have no problems with this style. But you don't necessarily have to use more cinematics to change that, and in your example you also didn't - and I liked that.

I could arrange with a different presentation of dialogs, although - in my opinion - a more 'binding' and close visual picture shown in game wouldn't add anything to the character what a freer imagination couldn't also achieve or maybe even better for it's relatively freedom. But switching camera in combat as XCOM 2 does, finishing moves like Witcher 3 or Risen 3 or Skyrim or similar things would be very unpleasant for players who don't want their attention to be directed like this and liked the style of D:OS. It would also mean adding more 'action' and 'effect' to the game. Appealing for certain types of players, but another step away from original D:OS.

Disagree. It enriches without betraying the original one.

Well, let's just note that it makes a notable difference (otherwise no one would care). One might consider it enriching, another might value that negatively. But some parts of this discussion were more than just stating opinions. And that's the interesting and discussible part (in my opinion).

Well, facts have been provided, as well as opinions. I was ecstatic with Skyrim kill cams, as I found them a great addition to immersion.