What I feel is missing from the current conversation system

Looking at the current conversation system from the eyes of a SINGLE PLAYER RPG, not an MMO, it struck me during R4 what I felt was missing.

When speaking to an NPC, it would be fantastic if we could get an ultima-esque popup window with the chat onscreen, as opposed to seeing the chat in our little chat window. I realize you can see the text over their head, but that isn't the same.

I'm specifically referring to U7-style text, complete with a small picture of the face of the NPC you are speaking to.

Currently, the conversation and info feels too much like standard MMO chat info, very much like LOTRO... not Ultima.

 

Hmm possible counter proposal...
Since the current chat window can have tabs... A tab specifically for NPC's... It would also be very easy to include a box in this tab that displays a camera pointed at the currently selected NPC's face so you can see who it selected and thus who you are talking too. Perhaps with some additional information like their name, title, faction affiliation and relationship status with you to balance the resulting dead space in the interface.

 

I think my main reservation with the NPC/PC chat is that it's open. When ever anyone is chatting with an NPC it adds clutter to the rest of the chat. I am sure they can do a little more with the spacial chat and tighten the area that people can pick up your chat but in it's current state there is a lot of noise.

That is for the MMO side, the single player side, I don't see it as too hard to isolate input/output to a new window for one to one chat with a NPC. (probably can already with the chat tabs)

 

In NWN, NPC had different settings to determine whether just the greeting or entire conversation was public. So in most cases conversation would started with a greeting and then only be seen by the player. These would be merchants and flavor NPC. When the whole thing was public it was normally a group quest giver where you would expect more than one player to be playing attention.

I would like to see something similar in SOTA, but right now the filter on the tabs works great.

 

Lum has stated this wasn't supposed to be the case and will be resolved ASAP.

 

Yeah, I was chalking that up do pre-Alpha, just like combat is only auto attack.

 

There are currently two chat windows (tabs 1 & 2) on each tab is a menu that lets you filter each window so you can set NPC text to appear in one and all other text to appear in the other.

 

I agree that something needs to be done about the NPC chat so we can get a better feel for the character, perhaps the pop-up portrait would work? It could just be a zoom in on the NPCs 3D face, so the team wouldn't need to go and create new portrait images for each NPC...

just something so we feel know who we're talking to and what they look like. At the moment you don't get a good look at them.

 

I was going to suggest the same thing! There's no way they're going to draw portraits for every NPC at this point, but using the existing graphics might be feasible.

 

I have to agree with Bubonic. The conversation system with NPCs really needs it's own interface.
One of the problems is that the text is displayed twice. You see it in the text bubble above the head of the NPC and you see in the chat window. The whole text is displayed in the chat window, whereas it is slowly coming up in the bubble. In a normal conversation I look the person I am talking to in the eyes, which I cannot do in SotA as the chat distracts. So why have the text in the game twice?
But as SotA wants to be a SP RPG, too I think a MMO-chat window is not sufficient for conversations with NPCs. It needs ist own interface.

Here is something I crudely put together which would make the conversations more like conversations and less like an MMO-chat. The speech bubble remains but below it there is the text input field where you write what you want to say. So you always look at the speech bubble and to the NPC during a conversation:

 

Excuse me, but the 3D faces can in no way ever be as varied and impressive as those delightfully expressive faces and their quirks as seen in Ultima 7. Which I adored. I may not remember names so well, but I never forget a face. And darn right, when I play the game 15 or 20 years later, I actually -remember- ... "Oh this guy! Holy smokes, I remember this one, he has this and that secret below his house and a switch below a chair .."

I know it might mean work, but yes, I absolutely think we -must- have individual hand drawn faces for each and every NPC that we encounter. Give them some heartblood, not just a few lines of scripted text and an inventory.

 

I wouldn't hold my breath for that. That's a great deal of work. Right now, it sounds like just getting a window or zoom in on their current face doesn't fit with the convo system. Hand drawn faces seem like asking for the moon at this point.

 

Well, they need to do something, otherwise it will difficult to 'bond' with the NPCs. I'd love them to do hand drawn images for all the main NPCs but don't see this happening because of the massive work involved from an artistic point of view.

I think a good middle ground is to give some kind of a UI box with the characters 3D head and shoulders in it.

 

Totally agree, but I remember reading something from a dev (god know where) that it would be difficult to do and probably won't happen. I could just be insane though.

 

One of the "perks" at the Developer pledge level is the ability to design your own NPC. I agree with those that state each NPC involved in story lines should have their own unique face - at least in portrait, not necessarily 3D. Let those pledge level players that are artists draw up and submit as many facial drawings as needed to provide the unique NPC portraits if it's too much effort on the part of Portalarium. If we don't have enough players at that pledge level to do this then open up the ability for the next few pledge levels below Developer - at least down to Patron level. Let the community itself provide additional value to the game.

 

Besides, this can be outsourced too. I mean -- just look at commission prices for any decent artist on Deviantart, and you'll see that there are a whole lot of artists perfectly willing to do such a thing for reasonable amounts of money.
Heck, -speedpainters- could come even come up with fine portraits and easily finish a dozen or so withing a day if not more.

It's not that hard or expensive to get good portraits for your money. I know *I* could get mine for free, or, if I wanted to, commission an artist for 10$ - I'm talking a high detail one that would be way more than needed for a game like this. See my current avatar? This was a gift from a dear friend. If this was an Ultima game and I could play as one of the Leopard creatures from Underworld II, I would so go for that -- yes!

All the artist needs is a good description, someone to talk to, and - of course, the money, and the agreement that these may be used for commercial purposes.

If more funding was needed, despite all this, we could still go for some kind of NPC adoptables call, and every "adoption" pays for one portrait, and one for your very own character in single player at least.

 

I would really like them to do this, but I doubt it will happen. Up until recently I have been totally on board with everything the dev team has done, but as we get closer to release, the feeling that a great deal of classic single player rpg functionality is being sacrificed for the sake of the multi-player side is hard to ignore.

A great deal of this I simply took for granted based on the desire to emulate the deep story elements of the Ultima games. The map was one disappointment, but there are other things that many of us just assumed would be there that recent talks in the deep dives suggest aren't important to the dev team.

A close up of who you are talking to seemed like a no brainer. It was a shock to learn it wasn't really planned at all.

Dynamic companions who take part in the story didn't seem like something we would have to question, but they don't seem to be on the menu either.

I really hope the dev team takes a look at the design schedule and tries to see things from a single-player perspective, because as it stands it doesn't seem like we're getting the ultimate rpg with selective multi-player. It looks like we're getting a story-driven multi-player game with single player capability (it's a subtle difference, but it seriously changes the design priorities).

Please guys, PLEASE give the single player functions some serious thought. For many of us, it was the driving force behind our interest in the game. Don't let it flounder.

Thanks.

 

I miss the NPC portraits from ultima 7/underworld. Can't they at least get someone talented from the community to assist in making them? I think NPC portraits work much better than close-ups of the NPCs when there is no spoken dialogue.

 

I say to do away with the tabs completely, and do something much more innovative with the chat.
And add cool portraits like u7 and like countless other rpgs.

Its all just more time and money i suppose...
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docdoom, i agree with everything you just said.

every little bit of it.