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I'd say anyone who takes the time to actually read what was written before here, and take the time to be civil to another poster here, is helping already. We actually need people who can use this discourse not for the showoff, but for a common cause we all share - we'd like to see a great game made and are ready to contribute some thought to that.

@Sharp
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If you made a game to appeal to experts, it would not be played by the general public, because the learning curve would be too steep and the game would likely be very unforgiving. I am not saying it would be a bad thing to make a game for experts, but if you do so, you do so knowing that you are severely limiting the pool of people for which the game is appealing to.


Maybe it's just me, but I'd say BG 1 and 2 actually were good enough to instill the desire in the player. To become experts, to understand "how it all works".

I think it worked because back then, there were not so many game mechanic systems around. And people's capability to learn new stuff wasn't overstressed.

While right now we have so gaming mechanics around, all these editions, versions, half-cooked patchwork (sometimes, no doubt, hitting the vein).

So right now I'm just waiting for the poll system to get implemented on this forum, and would really glad for a coherent, thoroughly thought out set of questions to the auditory.

First of all, we need to set apart what can be modded (Larian would count on us making the specific mod to everyone's tastes, as they (S. Vincke) say);

And prepare the set of questions for what actually can be changed at this time in the development of the game (they probably wouldn't be happy getting new voiced dialogs/quests rewritten/whathaveyou).
Would be nice to concentrate the efforts knowing they won't be wasted. And it works both ways - for the developers and the players here.

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Originally Posted by Sharp

But do you have expertise though? There is a big difference between studying a topic and being an enthusiast of it. You could play BG 3 for 1,000 hours and never think much about it, you could also play it for 10 hours with a notepad and pen and write down lots of minutiae, noticing things 99.99% of players don't and be an expert on it. My point being, usually if someone is an "expert" on something, they have some body of work they can show which proves their expertise. Do you have a body of work to show this expertise to me?

Well, you are being a little disingenuous here, aren't you?
If what you want is a list of games I've worked on, no I can't show that "body of work" to you.
If what you want is proof that I have intimate familiarity with most of the mechanics and features I'm discussing, well, I've 20+ years of forum dwelling across dozen of communities,. With especial focus on this very genre, too.
Do you want to start some extensive stalking to get the pulse of my credential, though?
Well, creepiness of that thought aside, you could start with my post history on this very forum. Point me posts where I make unreasonable suggestions without an eye to their feasibility or arguments about why they would be for the better and we can talk about something specific, rather than this vague "Can you leverage the Appeal at authority fallacy in some way?".

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And this was something I also said. "What matters far more is whether a piece of feedback is good or not, rather than who said it." If a casual player comes here and provides some good piece of feedback, does it matter that they are a casual player? No, what matters is that there feedback is good.

But that's precisely the point where this whole digression started, isn't it?
If someone gains familiarity with the genre, thinks about the mechanics in depth and then "comes to this forum to give feedback" then that someone is implicitly moving out of the "casual audience" category, isn't he? Which doesn't make him automatically an "expert" yet, but let's put this aside.

Wasn't the attempted argument precisely that people who post opinions on forum don't matter, because they are just a niche and the casual audience doesn't give a shit?
These two takes seem to be at odd with each other.


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Originally Posted by Abits
Originally Posted by kanisatha
@Abits, based on your own post, it is also the case that the things you would like to see changed or "fixed" in the game are also things that don't have a consensus around them. So then perhaps the best course for Larian is to indeed ignore all the criticisms and feedback and keep things as is. For anyone (not singling you out here) to say "my feedback is meaningful and should be addressed, but other people's feedback which I disagree with should be ignored" would be disingenuous.

Yeah but I never said my issues are more important. Moreover, I explained in my big "Larian's biggest oversight" post that I think it's not issues per se, but a design philosophy I strongly disagree with, but perhaps there are people who find appealing (and if you read the comments. All I can do is give my feedback and hope Larian will consider it. And like I said, again, from here on out it's a matter of how much Larian is willing to do things differently. But I don't think it is a matter of completely ignoring me because they don't find my comment valuable.

I did say not you personally, didn't I? smile

My point simply is that there really isn't any criticism that can be labeled a consensus. And furthermore, even when there is something in the game about which there is a lot of criticism, people in this forum are very often in sharp disagreement with each other about how that issue should be resolved or fixed. And then on top of all that, as much as this forum is very animated right now, the number of individual regular posters here is a very tiny and non-representative fraction of the total number of people playing the EA or who are interested in this game. So my expectation is that Larian is taking all of these factors into consideration, meaning they are hearing all of this criticism but are: (a) not sure which ones they should respond to versus which ones they should stick with their current vision, and (b) of the ones they accept as needing to be changed/fixed, not sure which direction to take that change from among multiple options.

Things are very different for them with this game relative to the D:OS games. In the D:OS games, they were dealing with games that were entirely their own games/IP, games that were not part of a very beloved and cherished franchise, and also games not based on a PnP game very familiar to and loved by many people. So making changes and fixes to those games during EA based on player feedback was a much easier and very straightforward exercise. If a majority of EA feedback said X, do X. But that's not how you want to handle a game like BG3. With this game, Larian has to take into account how PnP D&D fans may react, how fans of the original BG games may react, how their own D:OS games fans may react, and even how WotC may react. They are significantly more constrained in how they can do things compared with their own D:OS games.

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Originally Posted by Tuco
Originally Posted by Sharp

But do you have expertise though? There is a big difference between studying a topic and being an enthusiast of it. You could play BG 3 for 1,000 hours and never think much about it, you could also play it for 10 hours with a notepad and pen and write down lots of minutiae, noticing things 99.99% of players don't and be an expert on it. My point being, usually if someone is an "expert" on something, they have some body of work they can show which proves their expertise. Do you have a body of work to show this expertise to me?

Well, you are being a little disingenuous here, aren't you?
If what you want is a list of games I've worked on, no I can't show that "body of work" to you.
If what you want is proof that I have intimate familiarity with most of the mechanics and features I'm discussing, well, I've 20+ years of forum dwelling across dozen of communities,. With especial focus on this very genre, too.
Do you want to start some extensive stalking to get the pulse of my credential, though?
Well, creepiness of that thought aside, you could start with my post history on this very forum. Point me posts where I make unreasonable suggestions without an eye to their feasibility or arguments about why they would be for the better and we can talk about something specific, rather than this vague "Can you leverage the Appeal at authority fallacy in some way?".

My point was and it more or less seems you agree, despite initially trying to argue otherwise, being an "expert," does not automatically make you right and that constructive discussion is what matters more. I am not actually at all interested in your personal life, my point was only that, your knowledge of games is likely no more specialized than many of the posters here, which means that if you are going to appeal to your, "expertise," then why shouldn't those other posters do the same? Or is it that maybe, just maybe, its not who says something, but the quality of what they are saying that is important.
Originally Posted by Tuco

Wasn't the attempted argument precisely that people who post opinions on forum don't matter, because they are just a niche and the casual audience doesn't give a shit?
These two takes seem to be at odd with each other.

At no point have I said that niche opinions should be ignored, at no point at all. I said that if a particular piece of feedback goes against the core design pillars the developers have for the game, it will probably be ignored. The hardcore fans of the game, the "experts," are still a very important part of the community and its vital that you keep them playing, because if you lose these people, you lose everyone else. But unless you are trying to make a very niche game (which Larian is not trying to do), you cannot make a game which only appeals to these people. This means that in some cases, you need to deviate from what those core fans want. There is the saying, you can please a few people, all of the time, some of the people, most of the time and all of the people, only some of the time. If you are choosing to appeal to a wider group, that means that most people are going to be dissatisfied with something about the game.

Originally Posted by Ellenhard
I'd say anyone who takes the time to actually read what was written before here, and take the time to be civil to another poster here, is helping already. We actually need people who can use this discourse not for the showoff, but for a common cause we all share - we'd like to see a great game made and are ready to contribute some thought to that.


I agree here.
Originally Posted by Ellenhard

Maybe it's just me, but I'd say BG 1 and 2 actually were good enough to instill the desire in the player. To become experts, to understand "how it all works".

I think it worked because back then, there were not so many game mechanic systems around. And people's capability to learn new stuff wasn't overstressed.

While right now we have so gaming mechanics around, all these editions, versions, half-cooked patchwork (sometimes, no doubt, hitting the vein).

So right now I'm just waiting for the poll system to get implemented on this forum, and would really glad for a coherent, thoroughly thought out set of questions to the auditory.

First of all, we need to set apart what can be modded (Larian would count on us making the specific mod to everyone's tastes, as they (S. Vincke) say);

And prepare the set of questions for what actually can be changed at this time in the development of the game (they probably wouldn't be happy getting new voiced dialogs/quests rewritten/whathaveyou).
Would be nice to concentrate the efforts knowing they won't be wasted. And it works both ways - for the developers and the players here.

I would argue that it had more to do with the time, than it had to do with the games themselves. At the time, for the most part, the only people playing video games were the hardcore enthusiasts. Gaming was not mainstream yet and was nowhere near the 4th largest entertainment market in the world. As a result of this, the audience was very different. Player expectations were different as well, players would not expect every character to be voice acted (I personally would rather only have important dialogue voice acted) and were fine with reading longer dialogues. Fans were also more accommodating to mechanics which today would cause a lot of mainstream disapproval. I am sure if Pathfinder: Kingmaker was released back then for example, people wouldn't have complained nearly as much about timers, but time has marched on and expectations have changed.

But yes, the most important thing to learn right now is what they will not budge on.

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Originally Posted by Sharp

My point was and it more or less seems you agree, despite initially trying to argue otherwise, being an "expert," does not automatically make you righ

which means that if you are going to appeal to your, "expertise," then why shouldn't those other posters do the same

Well, and my point was that factual "expertise" (as "intimate familiarity with this type of games and a degree of understanding of how their systems work") DOES tend to make a difference in the quality of your arguments; it was never that presenting yourself as an "expert" upfront should give you a headstart or a free pass to argue complete bullshit.


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A good point is a good point. Does not matter who or what the source is. Titles are irrelevant. They don't make things more or less true. Just like numbers of people or popularity don't make things more true. Seems to me that you all are more concerned about the "source" rather than what actually works. Usually this is solved by simply doing (conducting experiments in real time with all concerned bodies present) rather than arguing but that's not an option. Truth is you can argue till your ego's go blue in the face, but projecting results in a vaccum without accounting all variables is pointless. The most you can do is provide a point and hope Larian rolls for insight.

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Originally Posted by Aishaddai
A good point is a good point. Does not matter who or what the source is. Titles are irrelevant. They don't make things more or less true. Just like numbers of people or popularity don't make things more true. Seems to me that you all are more concerned about the "source" rather than what actually works.

Who's this "you" you're referring to?
Because I have no idea.


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Originally Posted by Tuco
Originally Posted by Aishaddai
A good point is a good point. Does not matter who or what the source is. Titles are irrelevant. They don't make things more or less true. Just like numbers of people or popularity don't make things more true. Seems to me that you all are more concerned about the "source" rather than what actually works.

Who's this "you" you're referring to?
Because I have no idea.


The "you all" was referring to the individuals arguing about validity of "experts" and how to credit or discredit any given point.

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Yeah, but your assumption that "we all" value the source above the content seems to be completely baseless.
That's the issue.


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Originally Posted by Aishaddai
A good point is a good point. Does not matter who or what the source is. Titles are irrelevant. They don't make things more or less true. Just like numbers of people or popularity don't make things more true. Seems to me that you all are more concerned about the "source" rather than what actually works. Usually this is solved by simply doing (conducting experiments in real time with all concerned bodies present) rather than arguing but that's not an option. Truth is you can argue till your ego's go blue in the face, but projecting results in a vaccum without accounting all variables is pointless. The most you can do is provide a point and hope Larian rolls for insight.


You realize a 'good point' is a point that's been qualified right? Which means it's inherently tied to a context which includes the source. While it doesn't necessarily subtract away from the truthiness of a thing, it does mean it may fit less into your context to which you're trying to apply the 'good point' to.

And the truth is that we do have in place formal rules of logic and other systems that make arguing/debating/discussing these things meaningful/fruitful and depending on the subject matter doesn't necessarily require you to run an experiment (usually because it's already been validated by the processes outlined previously.

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Originally Posted by Tuco
Yeah, but your assumption that "we all" value the source above the content seems to be completely baseless.
That's the issue.


Umm how exactly is it baseless? My statement was quite general and your response that's baseless comes from what? Are you saying my statement is false? Or are you saying you personally have not shifted the value of any given feedback statement for one reason or another that excludes the functionality of said statement in the closed vaccum of the game itself? Which would then make you not applicable to my original statement. Is that what you are saying?

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Originally Posted by Limz
Originally Posted by Aishaddai
A good point is a good point. Does not matter who or what the source is. Titles are irrelevant. They don't make things more or less true. Just like numbers of people or popularity don't make things more true. Seems to me that you all are more concerned about the "source" rather than what actually works. Usually this is solved by simply doing (conducting experiments in real time with all concerned bodies present) rather than arguing but that's not an option. Truth is you can argue till your ego's go blue in the face, but projecting results in a vaccum without accounting all variables is pointless. The most you can do is provide a point and hope Larian rolls for insight.


You realize a 'good point' is a point that's been qualified right? Which means it's inherently tied to a context which includes the source. While it doesn't necessarily subtract away from the truthiness of a thing, it does mean it may fit less into your context to which you're trying to apply the 'good point' to.

And the truth is that we do have in place formal rules of logic and other systems that make arguing/debating/discussing these things meaningful/fruitful and depending on the subject matter doesn't necessarily require you to run an experiment (usually because it's already been validated by the processes outlined previously.


Hmm I should define "good" to be consistant? That's fair. My definition of good is a hypothesis that based on a contextual setting with the malleable point"can it work" can be tested. It's loose. You are correct on this. I promote real time testing because of this in fact. The meaning comes from the testing in real time not the past results. In order to develop a creative break through you have to do things yourself. Using templates is fine, but they never define what you do. To discover something you must be open to the fact that nothing is concrete. You cannot do that if the data is thrown out before at least the screening phase of testing because the source is something you don't like or worse something that is beneath you. Which is exactly what most ego's demand. I prefer a more humble hands on approach to prevent loss of creativity and stop lazy "he said she said" arguments that always pop up when reliance on old data takes precedence over live data testing. Things are easier now so it's easy to swing past little things, but those little things could be what makes the difference. This of course is strictly for the discussion of Baldurs gate 3.

So as you already know this cannot happen which by default means the limit is post your point. Its all Larian after that.

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Tuco is right, Sharp and few others have basically tripped themselves into arguing about a strawman they imagined - about Tucos "expertise" - because it seems like an easy hanging fruit to pick.
All the while they claim that strawmaned interpretation of "Tucos expertise" is not important and each suggestion and idea should be considered on their own merit - which they fail to do and instead argue about a strawmaned importance of "expertise".

Which Tuco repeatedly explained isnt the case at all, as he was only referring to familiarity, experience with and general knowledge about this kind of systems and games. But the imagined low hanging fruit of criticizing "expertise" in a vacuum - twisted into a strawman argument - is just too satisfying to let go.


Also, the general consensus on anything here does not matter at all. Its not a requirement or a threshold that guarantees the studio will implement anything. False self victimization and "crying on forums" and throwing "hissy fits" is a much surer bet. Development of DoS2 is a glaring proof of that. Remains to be seen if the studio will fall for that again and how much.

The notion of consensus on its own is meaningless, since you can theoretically get some kind of consensus the game should be turned into a fist person shooter. You just need enough of bot accounts, or similar nonsensical "online mob" petitions.

What the devs should do is consider what is better for the game and leverage that against realistic business possibilities.

The End.

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Originally Posted by Aishaddai


Hmm I should define "good" to be consistant? That's fair. My definition of good is a hypothesis that based on a contextual setting with the malleable point"can it work" can be tested. It's loose. You are correct on this. I promote real time testing because of this in fact. The meaning comes from the testing in real time not the past results. In order to develop a creative break through you have to do things yourself. Using templates is fine, but they never define what you do. To discover something you must be open to the fact that nothing is concrete. You cannot do that if the data is thrown out before at least the screening phase of testing because the source is something you don't like or worse something that is beneath you. Which is exactly what most ego's demand. I prefer a more humble hands on approach to prevent loss of creativity and stop lazy "he said she said" arguments that always pop up when reliance on old data takes precedence over live data testing. Things are easier now so it's easy to swing past little things, but those little things could be what makes the difference. This of course is strictly for the discussion of Baldurs gate 3.

So as you already know this cannot happen which by default means the limit is post your point. Its all Larian after that.


No, I mean that the definition of a 'good point' is tied to the context from which it was created from. For example, if we agree that Larian's surfaces are too much and say it is a good point then it should be understood that we, of a certain demographic, hold this as a truth. But if you were to apply that point to someone else who enjoys surfaces then it would be blatantly false.

Also, I mean to say that testing can be done in a myriad of ways including hypotheticals, synthetics, real-time, thought experiments or whatever else but the conclusions you derive from that need to be carefully measured if you want actual applicable results.

That being said though, the things that are available to this forum can easily chop down most arguments without Larian because while they're related to BG3 they are first and foremost going to be butchered down by logic before even reaching the point where you need to 'test' with Larian's data set or context.

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Unfortunately, I won't have time for a longer reply for until later but @Tuco this might help in your conversation with @Sharp smile

Sharp is a smart guy and is pretty good at rhetoric. I'd guess he's even had classes on rhetoric -- he is alternating between an appeal to the people and an appeal to authority. The trap he is laying -- and one you seem to believe I walked into -- is get you to declared an expert and then be tarred with unpleasant aspects of expertise. Snobbishness, elitist attitudes and the like.

Google snob appeal / mob appeal / Ad Populum

His larger point is that the forum is a type of irrelevant expertise and that game developers have the relevant expertise. So to argue for expertise an abstract sense actually bolsters his point -- for him we are like patients and the devs the doctors. Our feedback is valuable when we are describing our symptoms but not when we are offering solutions.

The flaw in the argument is inherent denigration of the opinions of the forum: that if devs listened to our proposed solutions then we would produce a game that only appealed to a small niche. In this vision we become the Homer Simpson who tells the car maker how to make something that only Homer would want to drive. (if anyone remembers that ancient episode)

But the argument is counterfactual -- BG was a D&D nerds game. It adhered to 2nd ed ruleset closer than any other video game. In BG2 they dove even deeper into the rules implementing optional rules like class "kits" (always hated that term). So BG2 was actually a Homer car that was wildly successful.

And @Elenhard nailed it --
Quote

Maybe it's just me, but I'd say BG 1 and 2 actually were good enough to instill the desire in the player. To become experts, to understand "how it all works".


Exactly. I really think BG3 will become a better a game if our solutions are listened to -- the forums have the relevant expertise and the devs can and should learn from us. As Bioware did when it was good company.

@Sharp, thanks for the detailed reply -- more later

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Originally Posted by Surface R



Also, the general consensus on anything here does not matter at all. Its not a requirement or a threshold that guarantees the studio will implement anything. False self victimization and "crying on forums" and throwing "hissy fits" is a much surer bet. Development of DoS2 is a glaring proof of that. Remains to be seen if the studio will fall for that again and how much.

The notion of consensus on its own is meaningless, since you can theoretically get some kind of consensus the game should be turned into a fist person shooter. You just need enough of bot accounts, or similar nonsensical "online mob" petitions.

What the devs should do is consider what is better for the game and leverage that against realistic business possibilities.

The End.


Well now, should I get a bucket so I can harvest Isaac's tears for all his hard work and list making?

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Originally Posted by KillerRabbit


Exactly. I really think BG3 will become a better a game if our solutions are listened to -- the forums have the relevant expertise and the devs can and should learn from us. As Bioware did when it was good company.

@Sharp, thanks for the detailed reply -- more later



Better for who? That's the multi-million dollar question.

Expertise is only relevant if it can be applied to the correct context; none of you so far have ever figured out what the audience of BG3 is for and how to navigate that. I haven't seen one person actually break down the possibilities then list out what compromises can and cannot be made. Yet, you are all claiming that your expertise can fit the bill without further qualification.

It's really surprising because these questions are basic interview questions you would get when you apply for a technical position.

Do any of you really have the relevant expertise and have any of you actually gone through the rigors to show that you have that expertise? Doubt it.

They can certainly learn from us, but it's not really all that much because very few people here have empathy let alone a good grasp of logic.

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@limz

Please tell me that you are not saying that a consensus has any and I do mean any hold on determining truth. Are you trying to say the opposite because then that would support my original statement. Clarify please.

Your last paragraph in your response to me is wrong. Fan vs Fan is still meaningless. You are trying to give yourself an unspoken title to screen out other people to "protec larian". Don't know if you did that on purpose or subconsciously. People are too easily swayed by loud noises and "white knights". Not saying you are one though but your "logic" sounds a lot like a hivemind and that is never going to lead to a better game.

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Originally Posted by Aishaddai
@limz

Please tell me that you are not saying that a consensus has any and I do mean any hold on determining truth. Are you trying to say the opposite because then that would support my original statement. Clarify please.

Your last paragraph is wrong. Fan vs Fan is still meaningless. You are trying to give yourself an unspoken title to screen out other people to "protec larian". Don't know if you did that on purpose or subconsciously. People are too easily swayed by loud noises and "white knights". Not saying you are one though but your "logic" sounds a lot like a hivemind and that is never going to lead to a better game.


It's not that hard to understand what I wrote, a truth about an aggregate applies to the aggregate not to the individual hence context. How fucking hard is that for you to understand? There is no such thing as a good point in a vacuum because it is inherently tied to a context due to having made a value judgment / qualifying it.

In short, your original statement is wrong as is your understanding of what I wrote.

Fan vs Fan isn't meaningless unless you're trying to take the conclusions of that and apply it to something that doesn't mesh. How hard is that for you to understand?

And you're pretty dense if you think that my logic is that of a hivemind, it's literally what every architect has to consider when given a project or any product owner, which is a criticism to both supporters and opponents of the current implementation.

So, please, tell me how my logic supports a 'hivemind' when I am telling you that almost no one has qualified and quantified in any serious manner?

I mean is it really this hard for you to read the interviews and figure out their constraints and do an analysis? Or is doing that analysis in depth considered a hivemind activity?

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+1 to what Tuco and kanisatha said (more eloquently than I could).

I also think we are, to an extent, arguing over definitions. We're talking "experts" (I used "veterans" to avoid it, but it's still a bad term), but I'd say most of the time we mean (more or less) "players who have certain experience in the genre as well as are thoughtful and willing to analyse certain aspects of the game in a systematic, thorough manner". I think no one here is saying "so you've only played 10 games in your life? not an expert, GTFO of these forums, your opinion is irrelevant". It's, as other people here mentioned, about how well any given individual can construct an argument; how insightful the feedback is; how reasonable and well thought out the suggestions. The "expertise" will manifest itself through this. It's also not about making a game "for experts" that is only enjoyable by "experts"; I'm not sure how this was taken from anyone's post.

Moreover, I feel like at times we descend into thinking about this as a democracy. Or something someone can "win". Which it's not. What we're doing here is presenting Larian with our feedback and suggestions. Our feelings, thoughts and ideas on the game. It's up to Larian what to do about it. Of course, we can make our cases stronger either by making compelling arguments or by sheer numbers (reinforcing problem points), but we're not debating councilmen. Our only power is in persuasion attempts. Not that I consider debating useless, quite the opposite.

Originally Posted by Sharp
I don't think it is bad if a game is made and advertised entirely towards a hardcore audience. There are some niche games like this and its perfectly fine for them to do so and I am sure the developers of those games are aware that their games have a much smaller appeal as a result of this, but so long as both them (and their audience) is happy with what they are getting, everything is going just fine. Roguelikes are an easy example of this. BG 3 has not marketed itself as being that game though, its trying to have broad market appeal.


If we go by what type of game BG3 appears, yes, it has broad appeal and could be compared to modern BioWare (say Inquisition). Clearly there is an attempt at "mass market appeal" - a succesful one, from what I understand.

However, the game IS being marketed toward "niche" or very specific audience: it is a "main entry Baldur's Gate game" and a "D&D 5e game". They were pretty clear in marketing it as such, and therefore, in my opinion, it is fair to hold the game to being appealing not just to any RPG player, but specifically to these groups. And yes, Larian have made it quite difficult for themselves...

Originally Posted by Ellenhard
@Sharp
Quote
If you made a game to appeal to experts, it would not be played by the general public, because the learning curve would be too steep and the game would likely be very unforgiving. I am not saying it would be a bad thing to make a game for experts, but if you do so, you do so knowing that you are severely limiting the pool of people for which the game is appealing to.


Maybe it's just me, but I'd say BG 1 and 2 actually were good enough to instill the desire in the player. To become experts, to understand "how it all works".


The thing about BG1&2 is... you don't need to understand the systems to enjoy the games. I don't consider myself a hardcore player. To this day my understanding of all the 2AD&D systems is... incomplete at best. Yet it never stopped me from enjoying the games, and not because I had nothing else to play.

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