65 réponses à ce sujet

[In Exile]

You wouldn't say it, but you would be partially mistaken, at least. Original Sin has been successful: Source

It's not sales volume. It's profit per unit. We don't know how much OS cost to develop. If they needed 550k sold to break even + fund the development of their next game (remember that developers fund the cost of their future release from the revenue of their last) then the profit is measly.

EA is a publicly traded company. They need a certain growth and return to prevent capital flight of shareholders. Lots of factors then count that wouldn't for a company like obsidian or larian.

[In Exile]

Yeah, but the OP's specifically asking for a low-budget game, so that's covered.

The conceptual problem isn't whether the game would make money. I'm not even sure EA'd mind Bio playing in the B-game space with a couple of projects. I'm just not sure there's any instituitional appetite at Bio for abandoning cinematic design, which they'd have to do for a low-budget project.

The problem is opportunity cost. Any time Patrick Weekes, Mary Kirby and DG spent writing a 500k selling game is time they're not spending on DA4. Even if you say they'd spend a lot less time - which would be mistaken because it's not like BG2 wasn't an insane amount of work - there is still the issue of whether their time might not be more profitably spent on an AAA title.

[Akka le Vil]

If those things were an improvement ... I don't think it is, if the actual game makes no use of those non-combat skills. And not alibi-uses like the pick-pocket-skill.

 

But maybe some people are too focused on numbers that make up their char? For me at least, I make the char up in my mind, make him/her as strong as I see fit, and without the needs for numbers for that...

 

So you answer to a plead about making non-combat skill relevant by "it's no use if they are not relevant".

Wow, missing the point much ?

 

And it's nice you can play make-believe in your head about how your character is. But I thought the very point of a computer RPG was precisely to be able to give life to such character. If their supposed abilities are in no way reflected in the game, then all your imaginary session is completely pointless.

 

I wouldn't say those games were successful. We don't know if they were more succesful than ToEE and IWD which is what they mimic, not BG2 or PS:T which they have 0 in common with actually.

 

Wasteland 2 has little to do with ToEE and IWD, and a lot to do with Fallout. Pillar of Eternity looks much closer to PS:T than ToEE or IWD too (though we'll have to wait until it's released, but I'm rather pretty certain about it).

Also, consider the difference in budget and marketing : they are all under 5 millions bucks. That's order of magnitude below what an AAA cost, and they don't have to content a greedy publisher. I'd say that, relatively speaking, they are probably actually MORE successful than lots of AAA games - they certainly are more than DA2, to say the least.

[AlanC9]

The problem is opportunity cost. Any time Patrick Weekes, Mary Kirby and DG spent writing a 500k selling game is time they're not spending on DA4. Even if you say they'd spend a lot less time - which would be mistaken because it's not like BG2 wasn't an insane amount of work - there is still the issue of whether their time might not be more profitably spent on an AAA title.

Well, I was assuming they'd go full SoZ, so they'd be cutting wordcount as well as cinematics. But yeah, still not a great use of those resources.

[Ascendra]

People forget Arcanum when they talk about old rpgs. I daresay it was on par with PST and Fallout in terms of complexity and stat usage. Good old days. 

Would have been great to see it remade in a new engine.

[metatheurgist]

It's garbage design when you don't know ahead of time a very useful sounding skill is trash. That's what DAO was like - it was trash roulette the first time you played through figuring out which abilities didn't suck.

The good design part is only putting in skills that will be useful, if you're putting filler skills in your game then it's time to go back to the drawing board. I didn't think DA:O was that bad, the entire skill benefits were pretty much laid out in the progression display.

[In Exile]

The good design part is only putting in skills that will be useful, if you're putting filler skills in your game then it's time to go back to the drawing board. I didn't think DA:O was that bad, the entire skill benefits were pretty much laid out in the progression display.

DAO had skills that were underwhelming and spells so OP they turned the game into a cakewalk. Direct damage was far better than CCC even on nightmare and spells like mana clash broke the whole game.

[Paul E Dangerously]

As often as Bioware totally changes the nature of Dragon Age (read: every game) to follow whatever is popular, all you need to do is have some RPG hit it big so they can jump onto that bandwagon next. Hopefully the next DA will actually expand on RPG mechanics and not take a hatchet to what's left of the quivering remains of DAO (and even DA2), but I'm not holding my breath.

 

Bioware basically sacrificed everything for gear and Inquisition perks - and both are underwhelming. At least regular found or bought gear. Crafted gear, is as predicted, laughably overpowered. It's like they didn't even try avoiding the pitfalls of every game with a crafting system ever.

[metatheurgist]

DAO had skills that were underwhelming and spells so OP they turned the game into a cakewalk. Direct damage was far better than CCC even on nightmare and spells like mana clash broke the whole game.

OK. When I refer to skills I was talking about actual old school skills like "Diplomacy" and "Basket Weaving". Not spells, the overpowered nature of mages is a completely different discussion.

[CronoDragoon]

Bioware basically sacrificed everything for gear and Inquisition perks - and both are underwhelming. At least regular found or bought gear. Crafted gear, is as predicted, laughably overpowered. It's like they didn't even try avoiding the pitfalls of every game with a crafting system ever.

Every game does that because crafted gear should be more powerful. Especially when as much thought was put into the crafting system as Inquisition's.

 

I have no desire for what the OP suggests. There are far more companies making what OP wants right now (plenty of examples listed in this thread) than doing what BioWare is doing. In order for this "project" to not delay Dragon Age 4, it'd need a different team. And if it needs a different team, then it's not exactly a BioWare game anymore.

[katzenkrimis]

I understand why. you're moving with the times and the market.

I believe the proper term is 'selling your soul'.

It's just money, and greed. They are willing to sacrifice quality for a chance at the elusive console jackpot.

If they really cared about making a great PC game, they could do it. And make money. But dollar signs keep tempting developers into a different direction. Hopefully with the success of lower budget games like Divinity, developers will realize that consoles don't mean squat when it comes to making money.

You don't need 250 million to make a great game. 4 million and some anti-console talent will do.

Can't wait to see what Larian Studios comes up with next.

Already know what Dragon Age 4 will look like.

[AlanC9]

Hmm... so EA's so greedy that they're ignoring the huge profit margin that would come from ignoring AAA console games and focusing on lower-budget PC games instead? Interesting kind of greed, that.

[In Exile]

OK. When I refer to skills I was talking about actual old school skills like "Diplomacy" and "Basket Weaving". Not spells, the overpowered nature of mages is a completely different discussion.

My apologies. I misunderstood.

Those skills were also not very useful in DAO but that was poor design of a different sort. Making skills actually have an effect is not difficult; and certainly with skills RP reasons for gimping are more sensible.

[In Exile]

Hmm... so EA's so greedy that they're ignoring the huge profit margin that would come from ignoring AAA console games and focusing on lower-budget PC games instead? Interesting kind of greed, that.

The other thing is that everything that lets Larian get away with making Divinity on the cheap would be inexcusable for an AAA company like EA. For example, the bad writing. And I don't mean plot. I mean the actual English language written dialogue is grammatically awkward or outright incorrect.

[Reymoose]

The other thing is that everything that lets Larian get away with making Divinity on the cheap would be inexcusable for an AAA company like EA. For example, the bad writing. And I don't mean plot. I mean the actual English language written dialogue is grammatically awkward or outright incorrect.

 

You know, I played D:OS and it has a lot of flaws, but the story/lore was fine, and had good humor in it. I personally encountered none of that, because the game has been patched to fix many issues, so if you could give examples rather that simply come out and say 'bad writing' that wouldn't come off as so biased.

 

You know what is also inexcusable for a AAA company like EA, character's feet and hands clipping/floating through the world. Or pretty much all of Qunari animation, or characters zipping through the world during conversations, which I can give examples of all through DA:I. 

[Paul E Dangerously]

Every game does that because crafted gear should be more powerful. Especially when as much thought was put into the crafting system as Inquisition's.

 

I have no desire for what the OP suggests. There are far more companies making what OP wants right now (plenty of examples listed in this thread) than doing what BioWare is doing. In order for this "project" to not delay Dragon Age 4, it'd need a different team. And if it needs a different team, then it's not exactly a BioWare game anymore.

 

No, it shouldn't. Especially in terms of rewards. I should not slog through a temple for two hours only to find out the thing at the end is worse than any of the ho-hum gear I've had dropped by this point, even in the same place - especially when the description puts over how great it's supposed to be. At least with Origins I was generally assured of finding something useful in the various areas of the game. Even DA2 handles it better than this. And DA2 didn't make sense with it's loot placement, either!

 

It's like finding Excalibur and tossing it back into the lake because the sword you got from the village blacksmith is actually superior. Or if Aragorn had Narsil reforged into Anduril and tossed it because he found a few chunks of iron on the side of the road and made his own.

 

And the funniest thing is that Bioware didn't put a lick of thought into it whatsoever. Not a single damned one. It didn't even bother avoiding the same pitfalls every game with a crafting system makes. The crafting actually should be more broken than it is, for Maker's sake - if Bioware hadn't abandoned any pretense of sense while making the damn thing.

 

• Item strength is locked to schematics, which makes a whole boatload of sense. The Masterwork Superior Vanguard Armor of Beige Flaps is way better than the Regular Vanguard Armor of Beige Flaps which is visually identical because it says so. Even if you're using the same materials. Why?
• Nobody actually knows how to make their own crap except for the Orlesians, which also makes a whole lot of sense. You can actually - oddly enough - find Orlesian Army Schematics in Val Royeaux. The Inquisition (!), Templars, Mages, Wardens, Dalish, and damn near every other faction in the game do not possess the schematics for their own equipment. Even if you ally with them. Instead, it's in totally random places across the map, and those faction troops just somehow pull new armor and weapons out of their backsides.

The only game I've seen that's ever handled crafting properly is a series that's designed entirely around it - there are no default weapons, just schematics. Which might actually be a better way to handle it, because it'd be better to find a (properly scaled) Legendary Weapon Schematic rather than "I guess I'll sell this for a pittance" like with most of the junk in DAI.