I've Never Played Single-Player Offline Mode...

... because I don't see why I would want to before it is finished. Let me explain.

What made Ultima 7 so great was the fantastic story. Right?

What made Serpent Isle even better was that the story got even deeper. Yes?

Especially with Serpent Isle... nobody had to build a whole new game engine. They could just dive deeper into the story. The structure was already built... the story "hangs" on the game structure like drapery, or decorations. It's the last thing to come. Whenever "release" happens (assuming it happens)... those story elements must be held back until then.

How bad would this game flop if the entire story were "leaked" out ahead of time in pre-release?

So the reason I have not ever played Offline Mode is not because I don't want to, but because I don't expect anything from it at this point.

I don't see why I should. And I've read back through all the Release Notes going back to the beginning, and I've been unable to turn up any evidence to believe that I should expect anything satisfying from Offline Mode at any point until Episode 1 is released.

I do see some "big" promises that were made about Offline Mode. I'm not sure if they can pull it off. I hope so. But I don't see any evidence to suggest that these promises have been broken, since they were being made about a finished product, which is decidedly not what we have here.

I also don't see any reason to doubt that Richard Garriott is fully intending to create a game that he, himself, would enjoy. I don't know him personally, but I've played enough of his games to give him the benefit of the doubt.

*These thoughts brought to you by Patch Updates 486-488*

 

I understand your thoughts, BUT think of this...the single player offline also needs to be tested. Imagine if no one tested! I have made it a point to at least play a few hours on the offline side to look for issues. I do not want to get too far into the version as I do not want to "spoil" my adventure.
Go into it with zero expectations of a complete story, but with the idea of looking for smooth gameplay, companion interaction, economic playability etc. It will help everyone.

 

I pretty much am forced to play SPO because I'm playing with less than the recommended RAM. I can maintain Multiplayer mode for about 5 mins of gameplay before memory leaks destroy me.

I spend practically all my time on SotA underground on small maps. I think I'm beginning to turn into a kobold...

 

What if Portybabe never fixes those giant memory leaks...

 

While I agree that the story of Ultima 7 and Serpent Isle was one of the great points of those games, there is much more to a single player offline game.
The interactivity with the world and the objects was one of the great points of Ultima 7 and SI, too. Being able to move every item around to maybe find some hidden items made the world feel alive.
Every NPC had his home and purpose in the game, his unique backstory and was a part of the world. Every NPC also had a daily schedule. NPCs had atmospheric descriptions of what they were doing and what they were looking like which made them feel even more interesting and unique.
The games had a unique UI that made it look and feel like a single player RPG.
The games had an atmospheric and great dialogue screen - not a IRC chat window. There were no constant messages popping up in a chat window. NPCs didn't behave like robots who repeat the same sentences over and over.
We could sleep to advance time.
The world was more condensed which made questing interesting as we didn't have to search through gigantic empty towns and talk to NPCs who serve no purpose in the game.
There were no strangely decorated player houses ruining the atmosphere.
We had a great companion system in which the companions really played a part in the story. We could manage their skills, inventory and gear of the companions. They were more than just talking pets.
The games were not about grinding.
The games felt like true single player games and not like an offline MMORPG.

This is why we need to test the offline mode. Not to see the story early but to see if all of the features that make the offline mode a true single player offline game are there and are fun.

 

The game is effectively an MMO so a single player offline mode would be pretty insubstantial. It would be like Kingdoms of Amalur but much worse.

 

Which is not how it should be an which is not how SotA was announced.

 

I don't disagree. But this is what it is now.

 

The arc of the story seems to consist of three lines tied to the three primary virtues and one concluding segment after these are completed. (Never seen this laid out explicitly so if that's not right someone can correct me.)

The 3 virtue quests are in the game in various stages and the love quest is supposedly "polished". There is no "leak"; it's actually there! All but the final reveal may be in before release. So what you said is technically true, but some seem to think there is no story in the game right now and it will all be plopped in at the last moment. But story is not the last thing being added at all.

Brave, brave souls with 1,000,000+ points in courage are going through the story right now. It is the way it has to be. There is an important reason. It's the oft-cited small team - Port needs community testing. Some are foregoing the polished experience of the story to provide it and my hat is off to them. I've dipped my toe in, but the water was too cold for me. I may try again as we get closer to release.

In my opinion, what will make the game flop even more are very buggy quest lines after release. For those who experience it early, they generally know what they are getting into.

 

Correct, although there is

Spoiler

a backdoor as well

Also there is

Spoiler

no I mean it, you many not want to know this

Spoiler: are you sure?

as in

Spoiler: really really sure?

the octa-adversaries

Spoiler: huh I don't get it?

the villain(s) is a cabal of 8 adversaries, each representing one antithesis

Spoiler: what is that it? then why all the spoiler tags?

Because spoiler tags are fun fun fun.

 

Yes- I get that there are three main arcs which form the trunks... but there will be many branches, no? Side quests and sub quests and such... spending days trying to track down a magical item. Skill quests and such.

Right? Or do I have it wrong?

 

If the singleplayer lacks just as much real content as multiplayer does, so to specify you have to grind so much to be able to finish quests. Yeah no thanks

 

It looks to me like we are getting Ultima 7, we just got the Super Nintendo version.

 

Your basic premise is completely correct. With the caveat that the story in Offline and Online is the same one. So any twists will be the same regardless of whether you only play Offline or Online.

But yes. Anyone interested in 'only' a Single Player Offline game should wait for post-launch, sit back a while, smugly watch the online crowd do all the testing, and reap the rewards thereof.

But then again, if all the Offline gamers does that, then it is very likely that the parts that @Lord_Darkmoon is talking about above will be missed and/or untested, which would lead to less of an experience.

 

Well here's the thing about that. Perhaps I'm being super naive. Or maybe I'm in denial. But...

When I consider the hidden backstory to Ultima VII as well as the ensuing fallout between EA and Origin, not to mention the actual plot of Ultima VII (along with Serpent Isle and the Silver Seed) along with the depth of side-quest plots developed for each city in Britannia.... I find it extremely difficult to believe that RG is planning to throw a thin veneer of a story over the Shroud game engine, and then attempt to pass it off as the "spiritual successor" to Ultima VII.

For example, as @Lord_Darkmoon mentioned, the Companions were- of course- a huge part of what drove the story as each character had their own backstory, and they did not always see eye-to-eye with the Avatar, or each other. From what I've heard- Companions in Shroud are currently little more than pets.

But rather than conclude "that's it" and assume that Portalarium's plan is to attempt to pass "glorified pets" off as the Companions (like everybody is somehow not going to notice)... I am assuming that element is just very far from finished.

What I'm trying to say is that there seems to be a lot of animosity lurking in the background toward RG and Port that is based on the assumption that they are somehow planning to renege on their promise to deliver "rich storylines, deeply integrated into game play" and "an interactive world where their choices have consequences, ethical paradoxes give them pause, and they play a vital part in weaving their own story into the immersive world and lore surrounding them."

Some people are posting rants weekly, if not daily about it. People are quitting the game, and threatening to quit the game over this. We've got at least one grownass adult in Jaanaford behaving like a scorned little child over their "disappointment" that Portalarium is not living up to their expectations of how the game "should" be. The list goes on and on...

Here's what I am trying to say... after everything that went down with Origin and EA. After everything that went down with UO. After all of that plus another decade, and a kickstarter, and over $10M in capital raised. After all of this...

Some people think that Richard Garriott and Portalarium are "leading us on" with false promises that they never intend to keep? I don't understand.

Why so much anger and animosity? Why the hate sites? Why? What did Portalarium ever do to deserve the constant onslaught of rants against the game for failing to "live up to its promises"... when they haven't even released Episode 1 yet?

It's deeply prejudicial to attack this game for not living up to its promises when it hasn't even been "finished" enough to release Episode 1.




TL;DR After everything that's gone down in gaming in the last 30 years, through the "miracle" of crowdfunding we now get to learn that some of the so-called "fans" are actually much, much worse than Electronic Arts. EA... well they were just "doing business" according to the Machivellian "divide-and-conquer" economic ethos of the times. But I see a number of people around here who seem hell-bent on destroying this project out of pure spite. Nice. Great job, guys! You seem to have really picked up on the philosophy of love and compassion that Richard Garriott is attempting to communicate through his work.

 

Very good points all round. However, in the last release or two ago, after Port had proclaimed that the Love story line in this game was basically completed, and after reading some of the comments that contradicted that claim, I was compelled to go through that part of the story on the QA server. Glad I did. I found some issues that needed to be resolved, and now as you can see in the release notes, they are going back over those sections were I already found some issues in. As much as I hated to do this, and it may partially ruin it for me, I hope that this story will finally be up to par with what I would expect from an Ultima like game. The biggest disappointment for me would be to go through the story, after it is announced that it is completed, to only find parts of it bugged, disjointed, or so simplistic that I feel like I'm playing a 'dumb down' version of Ultima 4.

 

This very last statement is the very reason why I decided to run through the love quest from start to finish on the QA server. I truly hope that this helps in creating a better game when release.

 

Agreed on this point and I think that a good number of people in this community are already putting in 200+ % into this game, play testing and ensuring that this does end up being the best possible game out there.

 

Mostly reasonable, assuming that they are planning to fix those issues. But they have no plan to fix MAJOR single player features by episode 1. I find that unacceptable.

Many of the things that allowed U7's story to flourish have been deemed not important enough to be included upon release. Two of the most important are:

1) Interactive companions. When asked, they have said interactive companions are out of the scope for episode 1. U7 would have been a much more shallow game without companions who interjected their opinions, bantered and even argued. It was, for me, core to the experience. We're not getting that. It has been confirmed by Port.

2) Time advancement. Another integral part of U7 was how NPC schedules where included in story elements. Like following Mayor Patterson to confirm his extra-marital affair. Without time advancement, the ability to lay down my bed roll and wait until midnight, that quest would never have been worth my time. I can't fathom playing a single player game and just standing around waiting for daytime, because I can't rest or wait. But this feature has also been confirmed as not in the plan for episode 1.

I don't want the project destroyed. I want Port to realize that many features they've thrown by the wayside, are integral to the single player experience. I want them to understand that this game will be an unplayable mess for the single player experience without them.

Without time advancement at the very least, I don't even want to play this game I've invested so much in. Am I salty? Yes. But I truly feel that the single player game is not receiving the attention it deserves. And not in a "I want it now" kind of way. Just in a "this should absolutely be addressed by release" kind of way.