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Pillars of Eternity by Obsidian Entertainment (Kickstarter) [Up: Teaser]

C

Chance Hale

Member
Are the assets in this 3D? Would there be an improvement in detail by running at 4K compared to 1080P? Screenshots are gorgeous but there's a bit of blur in some of them.
 
I

injurai

Banned
ricochetguro said:
Are the assets in this 3D? Would there be an improvement in detail by running at 4K compared to 1080P? Screenshots are gorgeous but there's a bit of blur in some of them.
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Characters and Enemies are 3D, everything else is 2D. They use down scaling to achieve your resolution, so I believe that 4k will look just as good as 1080p. If you have some odd resolution things make look a bit off, but the common resolutions they will have covered.

because the environments are bigger than your screen resolution, they will also zoom out more for 4k monitors allowing for more on screen,
 
L

Labadal

Member
I've been teeling you guys that they have said development is going well.the pessimistic part of meI thought that the beta would come in September, but August means they get enough time to get user feedback if the game releases in November/December. Hell, I no longer care if they delay the release to January/February as long as I have the beta to mess around with.
 
Z

zkylon

zkylewd
unfortunately i don't have beta backing and i heard today here in argieland customs is being very shitty about imports so i'm very scared of not being able to actually receive my boxed copy (and my obs shirt T_T)

that'd be fucking tragic
 
B

Bluth54

Member
Good to see the beta is so close (hopefully the full game will follow in a few months). I backed the game but I'll wait for the full version to play it.
 
L

Labadal

Member
Haven't done this in a while:

Customization and talents:
The ultimate amount of customization will depend heavily on how many Talents we are able to implement. This is the last character-oriented gameplay content we are implementing and almost all of it will be developed in reaction to how the core classes wind up being used by QA and backers. If we wind up with a lot of good, solid Talents, there will be more flexibility in how core class abilities are received/selected/modified. The Talent system is fully implemented and we have a lot of flexibility in how the class structure allocates things as characters level, but we still need to finalize the content.
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Enchantment? Enchantment!
You can add an enchantment of any damage type to any weapon. This can be the traditional flaming sword or adding crush damage to a stiletto if you really wanted to.
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Souls of monsters and animals:
Don't monsters and wolves or w.e. have souls? Where do their souls go when they die? Why don't the powers at be just have an infinite amount of zombie monsters at their disposal, and how do you kill something that's already dead? Why not bring people back as animals or reincarnate into a giant, or something cool?
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In short, it's due to a combination of ignorance and the current limitations of science (animancy, specifically).

1. Yes. Druids are animists and educated people have known for many generations that animals (and some plants, and some stones) have souls. Animancers believe those souls have many similarities to the souls of kith ("civilized" folk) but are not identical and not interchangeable. Some souls occasionally reincarnate in animals, plants, or living rocks, but it is uncommon and the process isn't understood.

2. No one knows exactly where souls go when the bodies associated with them die. Popular belief among Aedyran/Dyrwoodan cultures is that they go to Hel, a vaguely-defined underworld, where the gods hold them and later release them back into the living world. Short of reincarnation and Awakening, these are one-way trips. Even Awakened souls have no memory of their afterlife.

3. Animation of unliving material and re-animation of once-living material is difficult, time-consuming, expensive, and fraught with complications. Centuries ago, the intentional creation of what could best be called corporeal undead (broadly termed "vessels" in Eora) was one of the events that heralded a backlash against animancy in most nations. Vessels can be killed by severely damaging their physical forms. Souls that are present in the physical world need something physical to anchor to. The exception are spirits, which never left the physical world and are anchored in it through the sheer will to be physically manifested.

4. Some animancers try to do these things. Ancient Engwithans did it in a limited fashion and created animats, multiple warrior souls bound into a suit of bronze armor. However, there are almost always side effects assuming the process works at all. Both the general public and many powerful people view animancy as reckless and likely to invoke the displeasure of the gods. It's seen as tampering with a natural or divine cycle. So while many animancers are interested in this research for a variety of reasons, it's not always easy to find patrons.
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No character customization in E3 demo:
We didn't show character creation for two reasons: time and polish. Our demo slots were only 30 minutes long, 20 minutes of which were taken up by the demo itself, leaving 10 minutes for questions and general coming/going. I think Gromnir is right that character creation is very important in a game like this. At the time of E3, character creation was functional but it had a lot of bugs and the interface was really rough. Most of Roby's time recently has been spent polishing CC. It tends to be one of the most complicated and easily-busted interfaces in the RPGs I've worked on.
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Ciphers:
Powerful ciphers can do a lot of things with souls, but I don't think what they do is, conceptually, tremendously out of line with what wizards and other powerful characters can do. What's stopping any powerful character from laying waste to things at will is other powerful characters who oppose them.

Ciphers can't rip souls out of bodies, but they can manipulate and use them as power sources for other effects. Detonate and Disintegration are the high-level cipher powers most obviously associated with direct single-target damage.
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Ciphers do have some combat charm/dominate powers (in fact, one is actually called Puppet Master), but they are relatively short duration and do not change the fundamental nature/soul of the target. Some animancers do attempt to change the nature of souls/implant fragments of other souls/transplant souls, etc. -- usually with limited or no success.
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More about animancy:
The places most tolerant of animancy are the Dyrwood and Vailian Republics. Animancy was explicitly outlawed in Aedyr and Grand Vailia (the old world). The new colonial nations, once they gained independence, were slow to deal with issues related to animancy and research has flourished as a result (with some hiccups along the way). Aedyr and many of the "old world" cultures still think animancy is extremely dangerous for both immediate (you will get physically messed up) and global (the gods will get mad) reasons.

Detailed (correct) knowledge of animancy is not particularly widespread. The research texts tend to be held by a small number of people in part because texts are all still copied by hand. Common folk have a lot of ideas and opinions about what animancy is, but it's not well-informed. Even within the Dyrwood, where a lot of animancy research occurs, there is a strong division between the opinions of rural Dyrwoodans/Glanfathans and people who live in Defiance Bay, much closer to where the research is actually happening.
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The common folk are imagining that the gods themselves will punish/annihilate entire nations for the activities of a few. Many also believe that animancers are inherently malicious and that their practices are intentionally undertaken to swindle/cause harm. They associate animancy with gods-forsaken evil instead of ethically-questionable but maybe well-intentioned haphazard experimentation.
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We've focused in the past on how animancy has been used in the past to create undead, but I'm positive we've also discussed that a great deal of animancy research goes toward understanding and attempting to correct personality defects/mental illness and other beneficial things. Enough powerful people in Defiance Bay see the potential for good (at least, their own good) in animancy to keep the mobs at bay.
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Weapon sets in combat:
You can switch between weapon sets in combat, but weapons have to be in sets when combat starts. You can't move items around while in a combat state.
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I can't pretend to be a cowboy:
You can only wield one ranged weapon of any kind at a time. You could alternate between a pistol and bare (monk) fists, though.
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O.DOGG

O.DOGG

Member
I'm kind of split on this beta thing. I don't want it to spoil any part of the game when it's released in its complete state. Yet I do want to get a taste of what they've been making for the past ~2 years.
 
A

Andiie

Unconfirmed Member
So do we know how access is worked out? I'm pretty sure I added enough for beta access on top of my $20 pledge but they never sent out a survey to confirm what the extra money was for. I paid $65 for the $20 pledge.
Hopefully we'll hear about it soon.
 
L

Labadal

Member
Andiie said:
So do we know how access is worked out? I'm pretty sure I added enough for beta access on top of my $20 pledge but they never sent out a survey to confirm what the extra money was for. I paid $65 for the $20 pledge.
Hopefully we'll hear about it soon.
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Have you managed your pledges!
http://eternity.obsidian.net

If that doesn't help, I think one of the devs said that this is something they will fix in the future.
 
I

injurai

Banned
O.DOGG said:
I'm kind of split on this beta thing. I don't want it to spoil any part of the game when it's released in its complete state. Yet I do want to get a taste of what they've been making for the past ~2 years.
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I think people that have a vested interest in 'beta testing', that is trying to break that game and expose bugs should play it.

Otherwise go in with fresh eyes. My backing was not contingent on the promise of beta testing, and I will not be spoiling that first time full experience for myself.
 
L

Labadal

Member
I'll just go ahead and bold it all.
For people who are concerned about spoilers, the Backer Beta will feature a number of areas near the middle of the game that do not have strong connections (if any) to the critical path. In addition to the characters you create, we are also likely to feature a roster of pre-made characters who are not companions. We don't have any interest in using the Backer Beta to give out story info. We'd much rather have people play it and throttle the mechanics, UI, etc. so we can make fixes and adjustments.
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L

Levyne

Banned
I think I'm just going to stick with my game-only pledge and the just regret it when the beta rolls around
3AQmK.gif
 
I

inm8num2

Member
Crazy to think it's been nearly 2 years since the crowdfunding began. I've really enjoyed following this game's development so far and can't wait to read what people think of the beta.
 
Z

zkylon

zkylewd
cool stuff

animations and models look improved from what i remember seeing in the gameplay trailer. i might be remembering wrong but these guys seem to have more personality and color to them

i was hoping they'd cut the creepy ass spider people but fantasy games having spiders is inevitable
 
Z

Zeliard

Member
It's too bad they're not going to be able to get a Blu-Ray copy of the documentary out, but I can't wait to check out the digital version nonetheless. Should be very interesting to see the sort of discussions and iteration that went on these past couple years. I would have killed for something like this during Planescape: Torment's development.
 
L

Labadal

Member
Courtesy of rpgcodex.

You will not be locked into Steam because of the Backer Beta. We're using a separate SKU/product for the Backer Beta for a number of reasons.
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Option to purchase Backer Beta Access will be removed before the Beta releases.

Demo (Beta) will be playable at Gamescom.

Brandon Adler and Josh Sawyer big fans of tactics games like Final Fantasy Tactics and Front Mission. I take this as confirmation that they are working on Final Fantasy Tactics 2 and Front Mission 6. No, the dream will never die.

They're showing off the character creation process to the press now.

The campaign almanac's written from the perspective of an in-game cult, Hand of the Occult.

More:
y8RJ5lr.png
 
L

Labadal

Member
About the backer Beta (BB):
The two most salient are 1) separating the BB from the actual product means it's easier to separate the product platforms when the full game is released 2) the BB is a beta, so it will be full of bugs, possibly crashy, and generally not fully polished. It may also have wild balance issues, exploits, and GUI issues that will (one hopes) not be present in the final game. However, anecdotal data strongly suggests that people playing betas do not evaluate them as betas, but as final products. Accordingly, they trash the product's ratings and give scathing reviews. If the beta product is later "upgraded" to the final product, all of the hooting and hollering done about the beta remains part of the final game. So separating the beta product from the final product appropriately segregates comments and ratings for each one.
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As a forewarning, there will not be a lot of Talents in the Backer Beta, so class advancement will feel fairly static in that regard. Feedback on core class abilities will help us revise them, re-organize them, and flesh out Talents accordingly.
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Familiars:
The likelihood is very small for the initial release, but we did do work on it and it could be supported in an expansion.
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Coverage: Posted by Matt Rorie at GB, formerly worked at Obsidian.
Quick Look EX of Pillas of Opportunity on Giant Bomb this Thursday.
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G

Gattsu25

Banned
Labadal said:
2657891-poe.jpg


Giant Bomb QL EX in 2,5 hours.

Gamespot will also have something to show, maybe an article.
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Glad that it's an EX. Listening to the QL and podcast discussion on Divinity Original Sin was really weird because they (outside of Rorie, IIRC) kept comparing the game to Diablo and not any of the old CRPGs.
 
F

FACE

Banned
Someone in the Obsidian forums asked Josh Sawyer whad he'd have liked to change in PoE:

I think 4-5 characters is much more manageable for RTwP. If we're just speaking about "Hey what kind of game would you make?" I'd develop something turn-based.

E: Even if it were some sort of Darklands spiritual successor, I'd still go with turn-based.
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Get rekt Durante.
 
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