22 réponses à ce sujet

[Tooneyman]

I actually thought this to be very interesting in the sequel. I actually thought it had more potential then it lead on to be. The pack was fun for treasure hunting, but I think being able to create your companions gave this xpansion more depth when it came to customization of a story. Thoughts?

[Shaun the Crazy One]

I'd actually feel quite the opposite. Allowing custom companions has it's benefits. It lets you design a custom party built toward specific tactics, plus the ability to essentially play through the game with multiple characters at a time. But what it adds in game play it takes away in story. Because the game allows for a fully customize party it's impossible to characterize each character uniquely like you would with pre-made characters. A characters responses differ only based on class, alignment (and occasionally race), and even then only rarely. Also allowing any member of the party to respond in dialog may allow for better use of skill sets, but the responses are the same for most characters, and it ultimately narrows the character's individuality down to their skill set.



The way I see it SoZ, may have improved game play, but it was a setback when it came to story and plot.

[Tooneyman]

Shaun the Crazy One wrote...

I'd actually feel quite the opposite. Allowing custom companions has it's benefits. It lets you design a custom party built toward specific tactics, plus the ability to essentially play through the game with multiple characters at a time. But what it adds in game play it takes away in story. Because the game allows for a fully customize party it's impossible to characterize each character uniquely like you would with pre-made characters. A characters responses differ only based on class, alignment (and occasionally race), and even then only rarely. Also allowing any member of the party to respond in dialog may allow for better use of skill sets, but the responses are the same for most characters, and it ultimately narrows the character's individuality down to their skill set.

The way I see it SoZ, may have improved game play, but it was a setback when it came to story and plot.

It has some serious protential though. The game play was very fun. What I think they should have done was have 10 custome characters with personalities to choose from. These would be fully Voiced AI. What this would do woudl give each character a personality trait to your liking and they could comment on your story and play through. Basically it would be like ME companions only you get to customize there abilities anyway you wanted.

[Leinadi]

I'm a fan of it myself. The expansion isn't nearly as story-driven which I find to be pretty refreshing in today's world of voiceovers and cinematics. But I'm of the opinion that story sometimes (quite often) smothers the gameplay in player input in RPGs.



I think the true step forward however was the conversation system if we're talking about party creation games. Other games have allowed you to select your speaker (ToEE, IWD for example) but SoZ really streamlined it. I think they were stretched rather thin though when it came to implementing the reactivity to skill checks and all that but as a concept, I think it's absolutely superb.

[Dorateen]

I have to disagree with the notion that including joinable NPCs magically makes an RPG have a better story and plot. And conversely, that leaving out developer created companions somehow must mean the plot and story is weak.

Baldur's Gate had a good plot and story, yes?

Yet I did not take any of the NPCs, and played with a full custom party. Was the plot and story any more diminished? Not at all. In fact, contrary to the modern day concept of forced companions, none of the BG characters were required to have along. They were, if the player chose it as such, completely irrelevant to the story.

Harumph!

Modifié par Dorateen, 14 juillet 2010 - 03:27 .

[Quixal]

In playtesting Legacy of White Plume Mountain I am seeing what the gameplay options SOZ introduced can really do. I fear SOZ development time was spread a little too thin and the gameplay options shouldered the blame. Perhaps unfairly.

[MokahTGS]

IMO, SoZ was a "Builders Expansion" just as MotB was a "Players Expansion."

The amount of new toys that came with SoZ is really incredible when you see what the Community is doing with it right now. Sure, MotB gave use new classes, feats, epicness, yada yada yada, but it's main focus was on deep story. SoZ gave us a game light on story, but the ability to do things we couldn't before as builders.

Plus...Dinosaurs..so it's got that going for it...which is good.

Modifié par MokahTGS, 15 juillet 2010 - 03:17 .

[Remmirath]

Dorateen wrote...

I have to disagree with the notion that including joinable NPCs magically makes an RPG have a better story and plot. And conversely, that leaving out developer created companions somehow must mean the plot and story is weak.

Baldur's Gate had a good plot and story, yes?

Yet I did not take any of the NPCs, and played with a full custom party. Was the plot and story any more diminished? Not at all. In fact, contrary to the modern day concept of forced companions, none of the BG characters were required to have along. They were, if the player chose it as such, completely irrelevant to the story.

Harumph!

I completely agree. I've never once taken the NPCs along in Baldur's Gate, and I've played through the series many times. I tried with the NPCs, once. It wasn't as fun that way.

At least to me, it also increases replayability a good deal if you can have a completely different party each time. It always feels odd to me somehow if all my characters are travelling with the same people. Of course, some people don't want to roleplay more than one character, but if you've also got optional companions than it's good for everybody.

I think that was the best thing about Storm of Zehir, that you could do that.

[dethia]

I liked the system it's right up my alley as are stale companions. I happen to like both systems equally well and very much so it's always a win win for me. I wish others could enjoy them the same way.

[Quixal]

dethia wrote...

I liked the system it's right up my alley as are stale companions. I happen to like both systems equally well and very much so it's always a win win for me. I wish others could enjoy them the same way.

This.

Variety is good. Even in those areas where I have strong preferences I don't want all games to perfectly conform to them. I would much rather see variation than feel I am playing the same game over and over again.

[Dorateen]

Another thing I was so grateful for with Storm of Zehir was that there was no background forced upon a "Main" PC. For years we've been saddled with this baggage of being the Bhaalspawn, the Shardbearer, the Spirit Eater, etc. This really goes against the nature of PnP, when you played with a group of friends and were amongst equals.

One of the things that Obsidian did well by reintroducing the party-creation game mechanic.

Harumph!

[PJ156]

I think a bit of both would be good, but then I am greedy. A well implemented companion adds an enormous amount of depth to a story, and allows me, the player to imerse myself in the main character me

I remember running through Baldurs gate and wanting custom companions and running through Icewind dale and wanting writen ones, if only for the diversity in dailogue. In the end a bit of both would be great.

For me BG is not BG without Imoen but the rest I could take or leave.

PJ

[Kaldor Silverwand]

I've always appreciated the ability to create your own party members. Pre-written companions can be entertaining at times. But I think the choice of who to have in your party is a personal decision that should be left to the player to decide. Also removing the requirement that pre-written companions be in the party allows the death system to be closer to PnP rules.



Choice is good.



Regards

[Khajiin]

Sadly the best time i had with SoZ was creating my own group and their background.

Not to say SoZ is bad, i just prefered the story aspect i could only find in my groups background. ^^

[Dorateen]

I like how the the motto you create for your adventuring party appears on the banners outside the Merchant Headquarters at Crossroad Keep.

It was unexpected, and an amusing surprise.

Harumph!

[Thorne_underfoot]

Shaun the Crazy One wrote...

I'd actually feel quite the opposite. Allowing custom companions has it's benefits. It lets you design a custom party built toward specific tactics, plus the ability to essentially play through the game with multiple characters at a time. But what it adds in game play it takes away in story. Because the game allows for a fully customize party it's impossible to characterize each character uniquely like you would with pre-made characters. A characters responses differ only based on class, alignment (and occasionally race), and even then only rarely. Also allowing any member of the party to respond in dialog may allow for better use of skill sets, but the responses are the same for most characters, and it ultimately narrows the character's individuality down to their skill set.

The way I see it SoZ, may have improved game play, but it was a setback when it came to story and plot.

I kinda disagree with you.  For me, and I have played games like this all my life, I have different characters with their own personalities and mind sets.  With the conversation addition, I pick through the choices and decide who "Might" say what.  And in my mind, choices that aren't given are spoken amongst the party.  Althought it takes creativity and a mind that can handle multiple personalities like that, I think you get just as much or more without being force-fed personalities by someone else.  Just my two cents.

[unclejoe1917]

Tooneyman wrote...

Shaun the Crazy One wrote...

I'd actually feel quite the opposite. Allowing custom companions has it's benefits. It lets you design a custom party built toward specific tactics, plus the ability to essentially play through the game with multiple characters at a time. But what it adds in game play it takes away in story. Because the game allows for a fully customize party it's impossible to characterize each character uniquely like you would with pre-made characters. A characters responses differ only based on class, alignment (and occasionally race), and even then only rarely. Also allowing any member of the party to respond in dialog may allow for better use of skill sets, but the responses are the same for most characters, and it ultimately narrows the character's individuality down to their skill set.

The way I see it SoZ, may have improved game play, but it was a setback when it came to story and plot.

It has some serious protential though. The game play was very fun. What I think they should have done was have 10 custome characters with personalities to choose from. These would be fully Voiced AI. What this would do woudl give each character a personality trait to your liking and they could comment on your story and play through. Basically it would be like ME companions only you get to customize there abilities anyway you wanted.

That is actually a great idea and I would have never thought of that.  I wouldn't even stop at ten.  How about 30 or 40?  Not only that, you could make it possible to select the same person and give them different names and they would have interaction programmed to account for that also.  For instance if you wanted to lead a party of three clerics who at first are a essentially the same person except for their names, you could do that.  It would be like they came from the same church so to speak (or thieves guild, wizard school, clan, monestary, etc.) for role playing purposes. 

[Wolfehunter]

My only issue is how come Kelgar and others don't recognize my character from core game. I've carried my player character over and for some reason they don't know who I am? Did I miss something or did he drink 12 tankards again?

Kinda lame since they're waiting for my return.. Not even the Greycloaks know my face?... very odd...

I think the dev's messed up the story for those who use the same player character and not assume we all made new ones.

Modifié par Wolfehunter, 31 août 2010 - 05:24 .

[Haplose]

They don't recognize your character because he is supposed to be in a far away land fighting an ancient curse (MotB) during the events in SoZ.



Btw. have fun enjoying the adventure designed for level 4 characters with yolur level 20 or 30 (depending if you played MotB) Knight Captain.

[The Fred]

Wolfehunter wrote...
I think the dev's messed up the story for those who use the same player character and not assume we all made new ones.

You're supposed to make new ones, or it doesn't make sense story-wise. While MotB is a sequel to NWN2, SoZ is not a direct sequal (that is, it comes afterwards, so could be considered one, but doesn't use the same main char) to either of them (like how HotU follows SoU but SoU doesn't follow NWN1, for example).

[Hellfire_RWS]

Also, not everyone likes to keep using the same character over and over.

I prefer SOZ to the other two, more my kinda game.

Modifié par Hellfire_RWS, 01 septembre 2010 - 12:41 .

[BigfootNZ]

Seeings as i recently got myself SoZ (yeah 2 yearsish late) ive kinda changed my views (which i expressed in another thread about this topic) on the idea of create your own companions (party).

While i still think specifically created NPC companions are far superior to story telling since they can be tied directly into the events more deeply than any premade, ive found myself getting attached to my mottly band of self created characters... I think SoZ missed the mark a little though in incorporating the party chat somewhat. While it gives some decent options in responces for you to spread between your various custom characters to give them some semblence of personality I dont think it was restrictivly diverse enough in just who got what to say (if two have the right heal skill they both have the option to say the same thing... they should have at least given all skill interjections some alignment difference in wording, ie Evil heal check responce, Good heal check responce. Along with more than just... you have this skill trained heres a responce for it regardless of your actual skill level).

But overall id give it a point more than what id given it before. And it fits well into the more open ended SoZ given your a party of established adventurers not a lone would be hero finding outside help for a momumental quest from companions who might or might not have some direct link to your goal.

Kinda miss the cinematic dialogues though... wonder if the two GUI's could be spliced togather (rubs his chin while hmmmming)