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Giant Bomb #8 | It's a Hit!

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Myggen said:
Young Dan Ryckert:

BtSDUIjCYAA171q.jpg
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Nice dress, Dan.
 
Jesus - Dan and I are about the same age, so when he started posting some of his journal entries, even I started to get all nostalgic. His handwriting is eerily similar to mine (read: terrible).

As for the "dress" shirt - if you were a preteen/teen in the 90's, all of your shirts were huge and your shorts were small - so every t-shirt turned into a dress.
 
bemusedchunk said:
Jesus - Dan and I are about the same age, so when he started posting some of his journal entries, even I started to get all nostalgic. His handwriting is eerily similar to mine (read: terrible).
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Dan's Diary is basically the Gone Home sequel we don't deserve, but the one we need right now.
 
So pillars of Eternity has auto health regen that kicks in after like 4 seconds. Not sure how I feel about that.

edit - just after I post this, they explain the health system. It's not what I thought based on the UI. I stand corrected.
 
I didn't realize Pillars of Eternity is so close to completion. For some reason i thought it was on the same schedule as the new Torment game and would be out next year. This is really exciting, i love Obsidian games and Chris Avellone's writing is always amazing.

Edit: Only 5 minutes in but i'm 100% sold. This looks like Baldur's Gate which is all i need to know. Having Rorie in this is really nice. He's the perfect person to ask questions about a game like this due to all his experience.
 
Antiwhippy said:
Man, looking at pillars of eternity makes me appreciate just how good divinity looks.
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Divinity looks good, but i think they were going for a pre-rendered background style in this much like the classic games had. I think they nailed it. I do think the characters don't look very sharp, but they might look awkward in the environment if they were too hd.
 
TharpDaddy said:
Divinity looks good, but i think they were going for a pre-rendered background style in this much like the classic games had. I think they nailed it. I do think the characters don't look very sharp, but they might look awkward in the environment if they were too hd.
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I think they nailed making it look like those games, sure. But I never thought the aesthetic of those games was what made them good. It's not awful or anything, but I agree with the previous poster that D:OS is a much better-looking game.
 
Antiwhippy said:
Man, looking at pillars of eternity makes me appreciate just how good divinity looks.
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At least the animations in Eternity look really good and the character portraits are delicious. The character models themselves are a bit lackluster though, I'd agree... but those backgrounds are beautiful.
 
Huh, Chris Avellone is only writing some companions for this game and is not a lead writer (unless i misinterpreted what was said). I wonder what he's working on, then. Certainly not that Tank MMO.
 
TharpDaddy said:
Huh, Chris Avellone is only writing some companions for this game and is not a lead writer (unless i misinterpreted what was said). I wonder what he's working on, then. Certainly not that Tank MMO.
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He was a stretch goal for like a billion different Kickstarted RPGs. I wonder if he finished up his work on those.
 
TharpDaddy said:
IIRC he's not a lead writer on Torment and will be mostly providing some input and writing a companion. I want to believe that he's working on Obsidian's next Fallout game.
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I choose to believe he's working on Obsidian's Archer game.

That little story-bit Josh talked about with the God possessing a dude and starting a holy-war is so fucking Forgotten Realms it hurts. And I love it.
 
After looking at the stretch goals for Torment it says he joined the design team (as did Pat Rothfuss who is a fucking amazing author) so he probably has his hands full between that and whatever Obsidian's next big game is.
 
stump sock said:
I was there. I think my shirts were about a size smaller and the shorts a size longer, however.
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Guess you weren't one of us cool kids then.
Did you sit up front on the bus?
Because only us cool kids sit in the back.

The rows right before the very last rows to be exact. Cool Zone.
 
Zaph said:
Dan's Diary is basically the Gone Home sequel we don't deserve, but the one we need right now.
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I would play a Gone Home type game that took place in Dan's childhood home, complete with finding items like a pan with egg shells in it, various diary notes strewn about the house, and old WWF VHS tapes.
 
As someone who does not know any better (but is happy to learn), why would I buy something like Pillars over something like Divinity?

I know Divinity would be much harder to get into, but I feel it looks like a much better made game in a similar genre.

I ask, as I will probably get into one before the end of the year, and Divinity seems to be heads and shoulders the right choice to make to me
 
Keyser Soze said:
As someone who does not know any better (but is happy to learn), why would I buy something like Pillars over something like Divinity?

I know Divinity would be much harder to get into, but I feel it looks like a much better made game in a similar genre.

I ask, as I will probably get into one before the end of the year, and Divinity seems to be heads and shoulders the right choice to make to me
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How much do you care about story and characters? If you care a lot I would wait, cause those are easily the weakest parts of Divinity. If you don't care and for some reason feel like Pillars looks like a worse game I'd start with Divinity cause you can already play it.

I finished Divinity and it is my game of the year so far (I'm going on record here: There won't be 10 better games than Divinity this year) but I'm so psyched for Eternity.
 
Keyser Soze said:
As someone who does not know any better (but is happy to learn), why would I buy something like Pillars over something like Divinity?

I know Divinity would be much harder to get into, but I feel it looks like a much better made game in a similar genre.

I ask, as I will probably get into one before the end of the year, and Divinity seems to be heads and shoulders the right choice to make to me
Click to expand...

I think they're trying to accomplish different things.

Pillars is basically designed to be the spiritual successor to Baldur's Gate 2 and the Infinity Engine games. So you have the whole real-time thing going, strong narrative drive, varied companions, among other things.

Divinity, which I haven't yet gotten around to playing, is much more reaching back to an earlier time, I believe. Hence the wider sense of openness and the fact that it's turn-based.

But I suspect, and I could be totally wrong, that the major narrative and character development is less than that of Pillars.

As a massive fan of Black Isle and the IE, Pillars still appeals to me much more than Divinity. I can see why Divinity would appeal more to other people, however.
 
Keyser Soze said:
As someone who does not know any better (but is happy to learn), why would I buy something like Pillars over something like Divinity?

I know Divinity would be much harder to get into, but I feel it looks like a much better made game in a similar genre.

I ask, as I will probably get into one before the end of the year, and Divinity seems to be heads and shoulders the right choice to make to me
Click to expand...

Divinity and Eternity are two VERY different types of CRPG.

Divinity is focused more on interactions between in game elements. There are specific rules and you are free to play in the sandbox with those rules. You can fuck up everything by playing it in a certain way but for the most part you will still be able to progress through the game. The story takes a back-seat to the freedom you have to solve problems... whether it's combat problems or quest problems or gear problems. The environment is dynamic and so you can spring traps with barrels or even inventory items. In these ways it's much more similar to Ultima 7 than Baldur's Gate II. If you want to get into crazy scenarios and shenanigans only to survive them through ingenuity and creativity, then play Divinity.

Eternity is focused more on the story and the characters that are interacting with it. It's text heavy and decision heavy and will probably be much more serious and emotional. The combat will be just as difficult but I'm guessing it will be much less strategic than Divinity will. The items will likely have less interactions and the environment will DEFINITELY be less dynamic. But, again, the focus in Eternity is the story. If you're looking for an epic adventure that pulls you along because you want know what happens next, play Eternity.
 
Thanks for the replies everyone.

I dont mean to be reductionist, but just looking in from the outside, Divinity seems to be a great reinvention of old ideas, and a game that could only have been made in its current form in the last few years. Contrast this with Pillars, which (to me) looks more like old ideas just tidied up to appeal to people who loved those games in the past. I feel like I could have played the game that Pillars is 10-15 years ago, whereas Divinity looks a bit more fresh to me.
 
Keyser Soze said:
Thanks for the replies everyone.

I dont mean to be reductionist, but just looking in from the outside, Divinity seems to be a great reinvention of old ideas, and a game that could only have been made in its current form in the last few years. Contrast this with Pillars, which (to me) looks more like old ideas just tidied up to appeal to people who loved those games in the past. I feel like I could have played the game that Pillars is 10-15 years ago, whereas Divinity looks a bit more fresh to me.
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I think you're close to the truth.

But the fact remains that people loved the IE games and they just stopped making them or anything like them. People such as myself want to play a new game that's like them but maybe just a smidge more advanced, so PoE works perfectly for that.

If they had attempted to make major changes in the name of progress, they would have defeated the whole purpose of what the game is supposed to be.
 
Patryn said:
I think you're close to the truth.

But the fact remains that people loved the IE games and they just stopped making them or anything like them. People such as myself want to play a new game that's like them but maybe just a smidge more advanced, so PoE works perfectly for that.

If they had attempted to make major changes in the name of progress, they would have defeated the whole purpose of what the game is supposed to be.
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I don't know much about each game, but I sure like me some infinity engine games.
(especially Madden '13)

To me, it seems like Pillars is more like Super Mario World, whereas Divinity is more Super Mario 64.
One is more or less following in the footsteps, whereas the other is more like a new spin on old favorite.
 
The Pillars of Eternity quick look look kind of blurry, especially the text for everyone else? All of the content coming out of San Francisco has looked like shit lately, but the giantbomb NY stuff looks fine.

Just want to make sure my monitor isn't being weird or my eyes acting up(had lasik last week). Will say Josh Sawyer didn't sound like I expected at all.
 
Keyser Soze said:
Thanks for the replies everyone.

I dont mean to be reductionist, but just looking in from the outside, Divinity seems to be a great reinvention of old ideas, and a game that could only have been made in its current form in the last few years. Contrast this with Pillars, which (to me) looks more like old ideas just tidied up to appeal to people who loved those games in the past. I feel like I could have played the game that Pillars is 10-15 years ago, whereas Divinity looks a bit more fresh to me.
Click to expand...

Really Divinity is a very specific callback to the Ultima series, especially Ultima 7. It's much prettier, obviously, but most of the philosophies are old rather than new. There is, of course, the awesome environmental interactions in Divinity that were impossible in older games like Ultima 7 but I expect we'll get the same kind of innovations from Pillars of Eternity in a different aspect.

The previews of Eternity have already shown a level of storytelling complexity that was impossible in the older Infinity Engine games. Innovations is clearly present, but not in the most immediately visible ways.
 
KingKong said:
nope, completely missed out on those. I tried BG2 a few months ago and couldnt get into it.

I'm loving Divinity Original Sin though
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That's what I figured. I'm guessing for those of us who loved those games, the gameplay looked great.

It looked like exactly what I wanted when I pledged my money.

I can also already see the narrative forming from those who don't have that history with the IE games about how PoE isn't great because it isn't like Divinity.
 
that's kind of the beauty of the whole kickstarter thing though is that they get to heavily pander to the nostalgia crowd without worrying about pleasing a wide audience.

reading that sentence, it sounds kind of negative but I don't mean it that way at all. it's neat.
 
Patryn said:
That's what I figured. I'm guessing for those of us who loved those games, the gameplay looked great.

It looked like exactly what I wanted when I pledged my money.

I can also already see the narrative forming from those who don't have that history with the IE games about how PoE isn't great because it isn't like Divinity.
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The same dividing lines were drawn up between Ultima games and Gold Box games back in the day. I'm actually giddy that we're having these conversations again.
 
Kerned said:
"Mom, we caught a really weird shaped cat!"

Funny coincidence that he would post this photo now. I actually just confirmed yesterday that a groundhog has ben eating my kale and brussels sprouts (caught him red handed) so I need to go get one of these traps today. Maybe I can borrow Dan's.
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Brussel sprouts? That rodent was doing you a favor, man.
 
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