My comments on the game thus far (features & technical)

@Evil Superhero

I don't expect any sympathy, what a ludicrous notion.

If depth is the requirement of simply re-typing an underlined word on screen, then it is not depth, just a stupid waste of time.

From there, we have to move in two directions. One is to removed the underlined words and make it completely up to the player to understand and decide what to ask the NPC about.
And two, is to remove the re-typing part and just have the player click on discovered keywords the NPC can respond to.

These two are mutually exclusive and vastly different ways of interacting with the bots in game. We can never compromise on these, one will always be preferred over the other to every player. Which is why both should be in the game.

However, as is currently, it is in fact broken.

 

if a player wants to click without reading to just populate their lists and move the story forward then so be it, whats it to you?
I find this difficult as players still have to read to understand *who* to talk to and *where* and what to do afterwards.

I'll personally still be reading every word, I just dont want to move my hands and have to retype words to the NPC, Nor do I want to manually maintain a list of keywords.

You should be able to switch between that system and one with all keywords hidden and that require you to type them in. So we both get to enjoy it.

 

Damnit I have no desire whatsoever to type chats to bots. Woe is me indeed. On the other hand if I can just click the keywords i've discovered and the bot can reply to in order to move the story further, and maybe miss out on 5% of the lore I couldve gotten if I dressed up my verbs, then so be it, I don't care. This is not the real world nor will it replace mine.

I'm sure the handful of you who like to create written books to help you play a game, and want to have imaginary conversations with a bot who is programmed to mimic understanding will love this game.

 

Disingenuous post is disingenuous.

This is not just about how we interact with bots in a game. It is about exploration through conversation.

Whether the keywords are bolded or not in text doesn't make any difference to me. What does make a difference is what I posted about earlier. I do want to have to pay attention to what is said and take notes to help me remember later.

I don't want to have a keyword list pop up and remind me of a conversation bit that I had earlier. I want to do the work.

I don't care if you want a keyword list, exclamation marks over people's heads or whatnot. Just try to present your case in a more civil manner, instead of being insulting by calling someone else's style broken or stupid.

Also, the system seemed to work just fine(despite not having fully written dialog), so it works just fine. There is nothing broken here.

 

I *am* just talking about how we interact with bots in game. If you want to talk to me in this topic, stick to the topic I brought up.


One can have exploration in a game through conversation without having to remember and write everything down. I have no interest in writing *anything* down, and have a rather spotty memory when it comes to reading something 30+ game hours ago. The game should keep track for me so I can still enjoy the story, discover new conversation trees and progress. You want to do work and keep track of it, thats great for you, I have literally better things to do with my life so I want the game to do that menial crap for me. Both options should be in the game.

I never said I wanted exclamation marks above quest giver's heads. You are putting words in my mouth. And don't tell me my post was disingenuous; I meant every word I wrote.

My case is presented the way I wished to present it. If the manner displeases you, you are welcome to not take part. I do think that having to write your own walkthrough to a game you're playing is stupid, I think talking to a bot by typing responses is stupid too. I also I hate the automated message systems my cell phone carrier uses where I have to speak to a recording and hope that my exact keywords were programmed in. The system sucks. Either give me options or let me talk to humans. Same goes for this game. Let me pick from what I can talk about with the recorded bot. If others want to type prose, let them do that too, no skin off my back.



This whole argument is pointless. I am calling for two systems. Which is better is not relevant. You not liking me is not relevant either.

 

While postulo is spot-on, (the system is archaic), it is clearly one of the mechanics the vocal backers assumed would be core to the game and something we will all likely learn to work around - for now.

Much like the inventory system.

 

Not having exclamation marks above people's heads to tell you who gives quest and a minimap that tells you exactly where to go to fulfill said quest is archaic, too. Just because it is archaic, does not necessarily mean it is a bad system. The idea of having written laws is archaic, but we still use it, because it is a good system.

There is one big advantage of typing keywords over mousing them - no lost options. Every game I've ever played that had the click to choose answers has suffered from this. If you are in a conversation with an NPC, options often appear in your chat menu that have a limited lifespan. If you click on another option they sometimes disappear never to reappear. When the conversation is done, you've literally lost pieces of the conversation that you can't get back.

In a game with autosave, this is not that big a deal, but it is annoying. In an MMO, it would likely be much worse.

In a game with keywords, this will never happen, because the keyword will always be available to use.

Postulio also made one other huge mistake. Instead of saying something like, "I'm not really a big fan of the conversation system and would like to see an option to click on keywords or conversation options," he denigrated the system(mocking some people's preferred playstyle). Instead of an impassioned plea for an option, he started with, "This is stupid and broken." That sort of attitude doesn't engender thoughtful debate. It puts people on the defensive.

This is similar to what happens in the PvP forums at least once a week where someone starts a new thread with a statement similar to this: "PvP is the only real playstyle. Everyone who doesn't PvP is a giant loser that doesn't know how to play the game. Give me full loot open PvP with no barriers." Then they sit around and wonder why their obviously true statements aren't going over so well.

 

Have to agree with OP on the dialog. It is archaic. And I see it being a royal pain in the caboose. You do 8 or 9 quests in a town, then have to remember all the people and the different keywords, talk about sucking the fun right out of the game. This is one of the antiquities that is keeping the backer count so low. Yes, games today have gone too far in the hand holding department. On that I agree, but this is too far a swing the other direction.

 

To be completely balanced here, you have to admit that this is a massive assumption on your part?

As long as we're jumping to conclusions, I say the system will drive the casual player away from conversing with NPCs. So content is now being hidden which leads to a perception that the game is short of content whilst also being particularly frustrating.

"Well then, this game's not for them." is the typical response to this, to which I say "How is that a tenable proposition for any developer?"

Some things hang around because they work really well. Some things haven't been seen for some time because they were horrible. Typing keywords into a console to access content is, frankly, horrible. Packed full of wonderful memories, sure. Appeals to the anal-retentive quest collector, granted. Entertains the jobless who think nothing of blowing 4-5 hours a session, without a doubt. Entertaining to spend 20 minutes of your free hour trying to dig through bot responses in a console? Not so much.

I have to say the game itself is shaping up to be a great deal better than I imagined from the updates, but these 2 systems concern me because it means I *will* likely struggle to get my regular crew of social misfits to join in.

 

White noise...

 

Thing is I am not petitioning for the removal of the current system. I am merely asking the addition of these keywords being clickable hyperlinks of sorts. You can still type and chat with NPCs to your heart's content. It is just an option to players who don't necessarily want to get into conversations and just want to move on. Let players decide how involved they want to be.

You completely correct that my approach was wrong, and for that I apologize. I do not, and did not want to offend anyone who prefers to type chat with NPCs, even though I find it stupid, I did not want to make the inference that people who like it are stupid too. I like lots of stupid things too.

 

I believe they have specifically stated that there will be a journal that "remembers" things for you.

As for this being one of the things that is keeping the backer count low, I can't say yea or nay. The backer count could be "low" for any number of reasons. Project Eternity was about 6 months ahead of this, and Torment: Tides of Numenera debuted two days before. RG's last game was considered a "failure" by many, so that could be another reason.

It could be, or maybe not. I can't say.

 

I'm not saying that the conversation system can't or won't change, but I will point out that RG's idea of having this "very old school" system has been known since June 10th and was widely approved of even though some, myself included, did state that it may be considered burdensome by some people.

I don't mind the typing myself and am looking forward to having to find out what each NPC knows though an indepth "conversation" but I do understand the complaints from those that don't want to do that. I just hope that RG makes the game he wants to instead of changing his vision too far from what it originally was.

 

Thats why I said I listed it as "one" of the reasons and not "THE" reason. And I know for a fact it is one of the reasons as I heard it multiple times from friends past and present when I tried to recruit them for the game.

 

That's not really statistical evidence, but I would agree with you assertion that it may be one of the reasons. Some people dig it, some people don't.

The fact that the game got 2 million with what they are proposing to do is, in my mind, amazing.


Whether it will overcome those "limitations," I don't know.

 

Well, as a old geek as you put it....I'm glad for the ability to play the game like a normal rpg instead of ADD inflicted mess....

 

@Phredicon
I love the in depth conversation that is in the game. I just want to interact with it differently, ie clicking instead of keyboard. It would streamline the whole process (not to mention win more fans and enable those with typing issues have more fun). Not sure how clicking vs typing makes this an ADD mess but I am guessing @rune_74 is just being hyperbolic (something we can use a lot less of in these discussions).

Like I said, you could still dress up your speech and type whatever you wanted, but the keywords could be clicked on.

An in-game difficulty bar so to speak. Some players will breeze through scratching only the surface of the world yet still experiencing the story while others would delve deeper into the lore and find out much more from NPCs. Have players be the master of their own experience. We are all different after all, the only thing that brings us together is our love of Computer RPGs and wanting to play Richard Garriot's latest and [hopefully] greatest.

 

If keyword highlighting is an option I don't see why clicking the keywords could not be an option as well. If nothing else it could just put the word in the chat box and hit enter for you automatically.

 

This is basically the opposite of your attitude on the first post you made, I responded to what you wrote with in kind. I can agree with what you said here for clickable.

 

@rune_74
Fair enough. Opinions change and my ideas evolved. Glad you read through the entire thread now though.