Age of Decadence's Choices and Consequences

Morbus

Morbus

Sonny, I Watched the Vault Bein' Built!
Age of Decadence is an independent post-apocalyptic fantasy RPG made by Iron Tower Studio that promises... well, you know the deal. If you don't, go over to their site.

So what's new? The demo? Noup, but they're trying to keep our interest up by creating a thread to show the already known storyline of one of the first start game vignettes, with special attention to quest design and choices and consequences. Don't just read the first post though, because C&C doesn't stop there. In fact, judging from what was shown, there are choices every step of the way. There's also loads of screenshots to show how it works ingame.

Link: Choices & consequences @ Iron Tower Studio Forums
 
Don't want to get spoiled by reading/watching those. But been following closely this game, and it's incredible what they've achieved with such a small team. If you read the interviews of the project leader you'll see he is a motherfucking genius.

About time we get a next Fallout game after over ten years. (Just don't make it over fifteen years, please.)
 
While the C&C they describe is great, I take issue with lying to the player. Lie to the character, yes. Lying to the player is another matter entirely.
 
Trithne said:
While the C&C they describe is great, I take issue with lying to the player. Lie to the character, yes. Lying to the player is another matter entirely.
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I think the game should lie to the player sometimes, keeps you on your toes. I remember one of them was speaking on how people usually accept info in a non-realistic setting at face vallue.
 
That's nice, now hows about altering the unbelievably retarded single character turn based combat?
 
Trithne said:
While the C&C they describe is great, I take issue with lying to the player. Lie to the character, yes. Lying to the player is another matter entirely.
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It's good training for real life.
 
Eyenixon said:
That's nice, now hows about altering the unbelievably retarded single character turn based combat?
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I believe they will soon be releasing a demo with the specific purpose of collecting feedback on combat, so feel free to suggest improvements to the turn-based combat system.
 
Slaughter Manslaught said:
Trithne said:
While the C&C they describe is great, I take issue with lying to the player. Lie to the character, yes. Lying to the player is another matter entirely.
Click to expand...

I think the game should lie to the player sometimes, keeps you on your toes. I remember one of them was speaking on how people usually accept info in a non-realistic setting at face vallue.
Click to expand...

I have no clue how one want to make a believable setting for a RPG at least without characters that are lying to the player. I am not talking about the overdone seen-already-a-100-times NPCs friends/mates that betray the player in some key situatoin for what ever reasons. I mean simple lying as it happens many times in usual situations. I mean ... seriously now, what would one expect when asking for informations from a very questionable hooker? Thief, criminal or any other shady character would they be honest all the time only cause its the player? I am really missing such things in RPGs today. A realistic grown up scenerario for dialogues where as well would be finally a chance to put in "spech skills" into good use the better your skills the easier you see behind lies particularly when the liar has bad skills. I guess it would need a very well thought out plot at some point and pretty good skill in writting (so things dont look like fake and forced on the player).

Considering how much they care about the dialogues (or at least it seems to me so) and the time they took to make the game since the visuals are not the main focus of the game I am somewhat looking very much forward to that part of it.
 
Scorpius said:
Eyenixon said:
That's nice, now hows about altering the unbelievably retarded single character turn based combat?
Click to expand...
I believe they will soon be releasing a demo with the specific purpose of collecting feedback on combat, so feel free to suggest improvements to the turn-based combat system.
Click to expand...

The only way to fix it would be to add in party members, and that would take far too much effort on their part, so I really doubt anything is going to happen.
I'll just rest easy that this is going to be another one of those games where I slowly die from various diseases connected to severe fits of boredom as I struggle through tedious combat while waiting for the next NPC to give me some bits of C&C dialog.
 
Eyenixon said:
I'll just rest easy that this is going to be another one of those games where I slowly die from various diseases connected to severe fits of boredom as I struggle through tedious combat while waiting for the next NPC to give me some bits of C&C dialog.
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I suspect that the combat will be rare if you'd like to play that way (more so than Fallout). I'm hoping for more of an adventure-game experience than a traditional RPG.

But I agree that single-character TB combat is lame.
 
Eyenixon said:
The only way to fix it would be to add in party members, and that would take far too much effort on their part, so I really doubt anything is going to happen.
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Not really. We do have the "party members" system (you'll be able to get some temporary allies every now and then, but you'd never control them directly), so theoretically, it won't take too much to add permanent party members, but it's not that kind of game.

I'll just rest easy that this is going to be another one of those games where I slowly die from various diseases connected to severe fits of boredom as I struggle through tedious combat while waiting for the next NPC to give me some bits of C&C dialog.
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Well...

a) if you hate combat that much, you can play through the entire game without ever fighting anyone.

b) the combat is hard and challenging, without cheap tricks like 500 HP enemies or insta-kill attacks. In fact, not many people will be able to beat the demo, so maybe, just maybe, you won't die of boredom. If you think that you'll simply click on enemies until they die, you are mistaken and won't get very far.
 
Trithne said:
While the C&C they describe is great, I take issue with lying to the player. Lie to the character, yes. Lying to the player is another matter entirely.
Click to expand...
Yes and no, there are right and wrong ways to go about it. The impression I get is that they are against the idea of including mention of the fact that NPCs lie to the player and that the UI reflects those lies anywhere, even in the instruction manual and that is something I have a problem with. If you are going to deviate from standard practices in the industry then you need to take extra care to highlight the where you do so as to minimize needless frustration over the UI.
 
Well, there is a streetwise skill to avoid it, and it's not like Baldur's Gate etc haven't had cursed items and such before.

I'd say the best course of action is to let the player know if an item is "Iffy" until it has been identified to be either the fake or the real one.

It actually sounds like a cool idea but to not have a single hint that it's fake (since it apparently only affects very background calculations) is a bit much. I wonder if you also have the chance to pawn your super ring off on someone who is an even bigger rube than yourself for major profit.
 
Truth or Consequences

Truth or Consequences





{Voice on PA system ...}

VDweller said:
... If you think that you'll simply click on enemies until they die, you are mistaken ...
Click to expand...

{Curtain opens.}

{Lights: One spot center stage.}

{Baby 4too: (Enters stage right.) Stops. Thumb out of mouth.}

{Baby 4too: With blue satin edge security blank-e, advances to center spot.}

Baby 4too: "No click and die, but roll the die! I'm tellin' ... MOM!"

{Baby 4too: Thumb in of mouth.}

{Baby 4too: Thumb in mouth. Dramatically stomps to time out corner (stage left) covers head in blue satin edge blank-e, and heroically sulks.}

{Lights: center spot slowly out. Oblique lighting battery raises mixing levels on back screen to 256 shades of beige.}

{Baby 4too in self righteous - draped - silhouette as curtain closes.}








4too
 
As they were saying over there, if there's no indication in the manual or the UI that things are not as you were told, people are going to think there's a bug. Roguelikes have been lying to the player for donkey's years, but they let you know when you were duped.
 
VDweller said:
...
b) the combat is hard and challenging, without cheap tricks like 500 HP enemies or insta-kill attacks. In fact, not many people will be able to beat the demo, so maybe, just maybe, you won't die of boredom. If you think that you'll simply click on enemies until they die, you are mistaken and won't get very far.
Click to expand...
so combat will have more tactical choices then Fallout 1/2?

I am somewhat interested in which direction it goes. Comparable to Jagged Alliance 2 (which had a pretty good tourn based system even though it was at one point very easy to exploit if you knew how, but I guess thats possible with ANY system since the AI almost always can be outsmarted in some way)
 
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