My biggest concern with the game

It isn't the awkward combat, the balance, the grind, the bugs, the (lack of) PvP, the over-emphasis on housing, the UI, the economy, the (low) performance, the graphics... no no no! While those are obviously aspects of the game that needs work, I'm more-or-less confident that these issues can and will get resolved.

What I'm concerned about is the dialogue. It's horrible! It isn't necessarily the writing nor is it an issue with how it's presented in the chat window. The problem is the system that drives it.

It's pretty unreasonable at this point to expect the NPCs to understand what you're typing. Fair enough, it a system that runs on keywords. You don't know the keywords, you can't progress. Simple. It's pretty obvious how limited the system is but the game does try to help you out by highlighting the keywords.

Keywords alone, though, is a problem in itself because the NPC response won't necessarily give you the information you need from the keywords alone. More times than not, the response has nothing to do with the keyword.


Sometimes NPC will ask questions like "who are you?" but don't respond to your own name.

And sometimes they'll have keywords like "No" highlighted because, somehow, somewhere in the conversation, "No" is a choice you can make. So if the NPC uses that word in ANY sentence in its repertoire of things to say, you can basically break the entire flow of the conversation and skip to the part where you were asked "will you help us?" even if you don't even know what you've just replied to.

Like I mentioned earlier, using keywords alone won't give you all of the information. There is some information that the NPCs won't divulge unless certain keywords follow other keywords. For example, if a keyword is Bob, the NPC will share his/her feelings towards Bob. If that NPC asks you to talk to Bob, the keyword "Bob" won't be enough to tell you where to go to find Bob. So "where is bob?" is something you have to do to wrestle the information out of the NPC.

Then there are edge-cases where, say, a Spirit-talker will talk about his "low rates" if you decide to hire him. Typing "rates" somehow hires him... You have got to be kidding me.

You either have NPCs constantly respond to you saying "I don't understand" or you awkwardly jump/skip/loop the flow conversation. The thing is, you need BOTH methods to progress but neither show reliability. Either way, you're struggling to get the information you need each time you talk to an NPC.

It's a gamble every time and this is a game that judges you for your choices; not a good combo. It's certainly not a good feeling to have in an RPG; a genre where some would argue that dialogue is one of the most important part of the game.

I've tested this in the "polished" areas or Soltown and Ardoris. While I understand that "polish" is a relative term, there is no hint what-so-ever that suggests the dialogue system to be remotely capable of doing what Portalarium is trying to pull off.

You can classify this as a bug all you want; the entire system is a bug. You have too many edge-cases and you can't possibly account for all of them; remove it. No amount of Q&A will fix this as it is a perpetual problem.

On a related note, Portalarium wrote in in a recent newsletter that:

Thank you for assuming I knew exactly where that stuff was... and the sad part is that I have the impression the writer felt like he/she was doing me a favour by adding more detail in the parentheses. You're building a giant world. A simple slip of the name "Ardoris" would've narrowed it down considerably. I mean, I don't care about the emote but I bring this up because this is the kind of oversight that I'm constantly seeing throughout the game and it worries me profoundly.

Portalarium, this will be your biggest downfall: designing things for people who already know wtf you're talking about. We're not idiots but we're not clairvoyant either.

 

I agree with many points, especially highlighting 'no' when it's an improper response.

Overall I like the keyword style; but, the writing text could use some clarification.

I also agree that many posts (by both users and the developers) assume the readers know more than they do. At this point onward there are many new and returning players. Posts, information posted, and responses to questions should be phrased in ways that will help new players - not leave them confused.

I for one, would change both the font, font size, and text weight in the dialog box. It's too small and a struggle to read at times.

I'll have to check the options next time I'm on to see if this is possible; but, the current default setting/window design needs some TLC.

Seems like a little thing; but, a pile of dirt in the corner of a otherwise clean room makes the whole room seem dirty.

If the developers tidy it up and clean up the little bits - it will help with the overall perception.

BTW - I went from Ardoris and scoured Brittany looking for the jugglebottles emote due to the first ambiguous post about it. At least I found the Fire Lotus Tavern on my circuitous and eventually successful quest which end back in Ardoris.

 

I was in Ardoris, entering a shop when the shopkeeper said something about a widow being thrown out of her house or something like that. I then initiated dialogue and asked him about this but he didn't know what I was talking about.
This was very disappointing and destroyed the - wait for the evil word - immersion.
It's simply not fun when NPCs drop such hints you can overhear, thinking that this might lead to a quest but then no one knows about this or what you are talking about. This doesn't encourge players to want to really talk to the NPCs as it gives the impression that they won't ever know what you talk about.

 

I think it is a bug for Shogun Siranto and Lady Khasi that both ask for your name in their greeting, but aren't prepared for a response. I'll submit a bug report for that.

Sometimes in the middle of the conversation they'll throw out a rumor or another greeting randomly. If I could re-produce it consistently, I'd open a bug for it. I think that is what you saw with Johann above.

 

Why cant we have chat and quests from NPCs like in any other game? So much easier to have a selection of responses where we pick from one

 

I think one aspect which bothers me is the repetition. I see oracle underlined in a conversation with every guard, and every guard says "you can find the oracle at x location". The problem is, some npc's will actually have a response to the oracle that is important information, but you can't tell who will or won't. And each guard does seem to have some remarkably unique story to them, which is wonderful, but I have to thread through the same exact dialogue about everything in the town to get there, and that's sad. I think it would be more efficient if you had a guide npc. He would be at the main entrance to the town, or perhaps scattered about, and if you asked him about the oracle, he'd give you the directions, while the same dialogue can be removed from the guards to tighten them up so they all don't say the same thing.

I can give you an example. Love. 99% of the guards say "Love is all you need". Great fun poke at the song, of course, but I think that they should either re-direct you to a few characters that actually have dialogue about love "go talk to person x located y they like to talk about love" or not have it in their dialogue at all, rather than repeat the same tired old line that it's all we need. Speaking with every single character seems very important in order to discover the content, but I don't want to do it, if they all have the same copy/paste dialogue. To avoid the copy/paste instead use redirection to a character that actually has the dialogue. Sure, the redirection itself is a copy/paste but it CAN be written in so many different ways. The lack of creative re-wording of each line is disheartening from a game that's supposed to be heavy on content. I'm sure anyone could find a Bartlett's Quotes out there and find more than enough lines to paraphrase what love is so that every single npc doesn't have to say the exact same line. You know what would be really fun? a randomized table of responses. Put all the possible responsive comments about love into a large pool and have the npc's grab one at random. That sort of thing would really freshen it up a lot.

 

Well good luck in getting this fixed... I would certainly hope they fix the other stuff first ^^

 

On that quest line specifically: The guards at Lady Khasi's gates refused to open the gate because I had already visited Siranto; asking for a password and stating that only those with special gifts will know the password. I'm the AVATAR! I'm practically immortal! If that's not a gift, I don't know what is. Anyways, I end up getting a password a few hours later only to have that same guard tell me "you don't need a password to enter".

... also, if you rely on the keywords, you won't know that you actually need to ask them to "open the gates" in order to proceed... as the option will never be listed.

Yep :\

That's a step in the right direction, for sure. While structuring how the information gets distributed will go a long way of making the experience consistent and fun, I personally think the entire structure of the system need to be revised... like... how keywords in general work.

I think Morrowind's dialogue system would work well here. Dialogue on one side of the window and a list of all available keywords (hide the ones the player don't know yet) on the other.

Here's another one: I was a Kingsport talking to some random NPC on the docks. That NPC tells me that he was worried about his child that may have been kidnapped by pirates and that he's desperately hoping to hear news on the issue. It turns out that the entire dialogue (which is well written) was just meant as "gossip" and not a real quest (confirmed by Lum).

What a waste of my time.

 

Yet another reason the design team needs more folks. The shear amount of data entry for conversations is way more than should be expected to be done by Lum, Fire Lotus, the occasional dev, and a handful of vetted community members.

 

I think this is a big part of it, no more broken branches. If we have rumors or information about something, it should actually lead somewhere and be a quest, not a waste of our time. Background lore and info is fun, but not when it outnumbers the actual content, which it does at this time. I spent 4-5 hours running around asking every npc I could about missing brothers, or East Perennial Trail because of the notes we find in that scene, and I'm sort of insulted that nothing came from it. This is a simple rule in any story-writing. Do not waste the reader's time with any information that is irrelevant to the plot(s) of the story. I think Portalarium needs to remember that core rule, and either expand the intriguing stories they have available only as frustrating time-wasters, or remove them completely as non-essential to the world.

 

LOL Wow, nice - just basically dis the entire game. I'll be honest, I'm real sick of reading posts like this. I enjoy the combat, the balance, the grind, the bugs(I enjoy being part of the process), the ( framework for) PvP, I enjoy very very much the housing, the UI, the economy, the performance is good for me, the graphics are excellent(I just watched a beautiful in-game sunset!). I feel insulted by your post - you insult a game I enjoy.

I had a conversation last evening with a friend about how much we both enjoyed the Questing Dialog and keyword system. I love it. Takes me back. It is so unique. Submit a bug report and be constructive for the problems with the NPC dialog.

The reason the Khasi NPC didn't understand your name is because your name is Gix, not gix.

People need to cut it out with getting on here and acting like the whole game is broke. Really, "profoundly worried"... really? Lots of us enjoy exploration and the rewards of in-game discovery and knowledge. Cut out the drama.

 

I agree completely and have been harping on this since R20 ish, The quests are hit / miss and some are just lucky yo get them right. People say have hints up

The quests and content are what needs to be worked not more pixel crack

 

Well if there was no personal money involved I would say you are right. People have put anywhere from 25$ to tens of thousands of $ in this game. I personally put 20k into it. After years of waiting and getting ignored from the devs and getting attacked by people on the forums for my ideas, I sold my metro, my duke, my baron 3 my lord and what ever else I had. I actually am much happier now that I do not have all that money hanging over my head and consider it a lesson learned. I am very UNfavorable of the combat. I am very upset about the direction of which the game has went. I will not stop though telling my side of the argument and pushing for less PC and more freedom. For me I have a really hard time using the reticle and trying to use the chat system. How the heck are you supposed to intuitively hit the words in the text if you have no cursor? What happens if you are getting attacked while trying to talk to an npc? It just all feels bad and wrong. So yes I am still here wanting a better game, and the "better game" is what we need to be debating. Do not get me wrong ender, I really like much of what you post. But we need to have unfiltered dissent on these forums to get the whole picture of the "community".

 

I usually just type "name" and then randomly click on all the highlighted words. Sometime later I'll Google "Shroud Quests" and go through all of them if I can't find anything better to do.

It took WoW ten years to get the quest dialog / interface in game good enough so that people weren't heavily dependent on external sites and / or add ons. I don't expect SotA to get it right any time soon.

While I'd love to see any and all possiblye improvements, I just accept the fact that I'm going to have to use external guides / wikis for all of the quests.

 

Wow, you completely missed my point. I'm saying that of all of these elements that people are concerned about, I'm only really concerned about the one thing.

Before you get insulted by anything, maybe you should take the time to read someone's post.

Devs don't really take bug reports as feedback. My feedback is that NPC dialogue isn't matching up with what they're trying to achieve and I've stated all of the reasons why. One of which being that there are too many edge-cases to file bug reports on.

Ultima 4's dialogue system worked a lot better than what we currently have. It was primitive, sure, and SotA's trying to elaborate on that but it was straight forward and consistent. There is nothing wrong with a keyword system... but the way it's currently implemented in SotA is not working.

Morrowind's dialogue system also worked great and it too was keyword-based.

SotA's only "unique" in the way that it doesn't really do a good job.

Except I'm supposed to have the ability to lie to NPCs, aren't I? In fact, nothing in the game suggests that text is case-sensitive. Guards in Owl's Head don't seem to mind. The reason why Khasi didn't understand my name is that the dialogue is written asking the question but the scripting behind it wasn't taking into account that I may answer the written question.

Yet here you are stating that you're insulted by my post. I'm here sharing my feedback/concerns with the game and here you are coming in and saying stuff like "Man, people need to stop! I'm insulted by your post because you said mean things about the game." and you contributed NOTHING to the conversation.

So yeah! Cut the drama out, will you?

The dialogue system as it stands is abysmal beyond compare. If we had to bug report for every shitty conversation we'd get from these NPCs, we wouldn't see the end of it. The devs are under-staffed and, therefore, need to find a better solution to creating content.

Again, there's nothing wrong with the writing, it's what's underneath the hood that I have a problem with.

If you actually read the quests in vanilla WoW, they were all cleverly written and possible to complete without external sources. I should know, that's how I progressed through the game. It wasn't until Wrath of the Lich King that the dev team got lazy and started doing a really poor job on their dialogue text. I should know, I've read most of the quest dialogue in WoW up to that point. They probably figured that no one read them anyways and that's when they started implementing quest helpers into their UI.

Guess what? I stopped playing WoW about that time too.

If Portalarium wants to get lazy, sure... why not. Just give me in-game tools to circumvent it all. I'm pretty sure they wouldn't do that because that'd defeat their own mission statement.

 

I find the dialogue system great as a story-building method. The more NPCs you talk to, the more immersive it gets. Alot of NPCs are still getting or awaiting dialogue passes. I've been in and out of the game alot over the development process so perhaps I can see the progress and where an npc has obviously not been fleshed out or is awaitng dialogue or a re-write vs a finished one.

I do agree that an npc should accept lower /title case (unless the game allows for 2 players to have the same name spelled with different case). I can understand that people experiencing them for the first time may find some dialogue like this unreliable, but does anyone understand the note when you logon that says the game is not finished? Nobody who does should be expecting the quests or dialogue on all NPCs to be finished at this point. However, if we discover a wonky dialogue, submitting it to the devs is the best and most constructive thing to do. Imagine how awesome the conversations could get if we are constantly providing feedback.

I do understand that releasing the game to early-access (vs keeping it to kickstarter-only players during the entire development) has brought an expectation to get a finished game upon purchase from everyone buying since. It's a tough place for portalarium. They need the big numbers to stress-test the systems, and they need the solid systems in place before the 'final wipe', and everyone feels the need to be all-in after final-wipe so they can play competitively. Now that all this has come to be, portalarium are finally free to invest more resources into the story and polish, yet everyone is playing and judging the product as though it is finished and the polish and story are their complaints.

At this point, all I do is continue to casually enjoy a game that fills a need for me. I try not to rush the quests that I know are awaiting polish, and stick to the more complete areas while I watch the final polish get applied - which it feels to me from experiencing the whole process - will be by the end of this year.

So if the story and dialogue are most important to you, and you have. not started playing , my recommendation to these players would be to wait for the end of the year before considering it a ready to play final product.

 

Don't read them?

 

The concern over dialogue system is legit. I have to disable the "zoom in" mode because it hits me with a horrible game performance during the conversation.

I don't know what would be the best solution at this point without the full revamp. I personally prefer to see the limited dialogue options just from the sake streamlining, but others may prefer different approach.

 

Please post specific dialogue bugs as you come across them.

 

@Gadfrey Zukes My issue isn't about NPCs with incomplete or missing dialogue, it's about how messed up what little we already have is.

I'm only looking at NPCs that received the rudimentary "polish" to foresee how painstakingly long the process is going to be to code for each edge-case scenario... because that's what they're heading towards; they're scripting themselves into a corner. Remember this? "Selene facepalms her head." Yeah "working as intended", they said... and that was just an emote! Sure, they ended up agreeing to fix the issue but that means that we have to go through this process for every NPC... and they still claim it's "working as intended".

No. It is not working. If the devs don't realize this, they're signing up for a LOT of work (most likely more than they've bargained for) and failure to do so will mean that overall NPCs are going to be inept at basic conversation.

You could write all the (awesome) dialogue in the world for each NPCs and it still won't work because every single one of them will technically be a bug or have a glitch.

The patchwork method this early in development scares me.

I'm telling you that, if they don't make any drastic changes to the system, you're not going to see much of an improvement by the end of the year. Content is not the issue, it's the structure of it and how you interact with the content that's the problem.

Think about it this way: Think of the current player housing feature. The houses and decorations look nice and they're planning to progressively add more. Now imagine that if each time they added a new decoration to the game, that they had to modify the code for each house one by one in order to allow that new decoration to be placed. Now imagine them having to do that per floor per house... and that one of the older decoration created a conflict with the new one, but only in a specific house... so on and so forth. Now, imagine having to rely on the community to write bug reports whenever the players would see a decoration not aligning properly in their particular houses because they live on a hill or next to a river or maybe because they had the door opened or something.

That'd be a shitty system. That's what's happening with the dialogue system. Yeah... please. Do submit a bug report. I'm calling it and, at this point, I'm not holding my breath.