Bethesda and PnP mechanics

[Mord_Sith]

Darky, you just compared PnP with larping, if you were right beside me I'd smack you right now.

As for perspective in PnP, I tend to stick to over shoulder / birds eye / iso views / side so that I can view both my character and their characters at the same time. It helps when you're fighting to be able to take stock of the locations and situation quickly as we don't bother to use a mat or miniatures for the game.

 

[ivpiter]

[SNIPED]

Indeed twas off-topic, glad we agree.

 

[xdarkyrex]

Hmm, well I have complained in other threads that the removal of text descriptions is a huge loss and I wish they would leave them in. I am currently arguing about first person vs third person, not about text descriptions. stay on topic, please.

 

[DarkCorp]

They decided to make a sequel to one of the best CRPG's in history, if Beth didn't what the burden of living up to that legacy that could have made a spin-off.

Apparently Beth isn't too smart in the rpg imagination, dialogue, mechanics department (all glaringly noticable in their previous games).

So instead some jackass at corporate was like, "We should buy the Fallout future apoc idea and just put it into a Morrowind engine. This way we already have a new game with minimal investment. Sure the liscence is expensive but it would be worth it when we reach into the pocketbooks of a whole new target audience with what pretty much is another Morrowind clone".

 

[Sorrow]

I am currently arguing about first person vs third person, not about text descriptions. stay on topic, please.

You really want to argue about taste?
Fuck off, then.

I played FPP RPGs and I played isometric RPGs. I dislike FPP ones and I definitely prefer isometric point and click ones with a good pathfainding.

 

[Brother None]

The proper nature of a ROLE PLAYING game seems to be in virtual reality, I am not speaking for all games

Good Frith.

No.

Read this.

 

[Tyshalle]

Funny thing is, I'm not against your tastes, and you'd enjoy the Fallout 3 I'd like to see. I'm not for removing anything. But for some reason you think it ok if what I like is removed? How mean.

I'm not the one calling Bethesda's design decisions stupid (and a whole lot worse), though. And yeah, if they left the game mechanics of Fallout alone for the sequel, then I'm sure I'd enjoy that too. But at the same time, it's not just that I'm okay with the concept of a first-person-perspective, real-time Fallout RPG, I'm looking forward to it. So yeah, I'm okay with "what you like" (that is, turn-based, third-person perspective) being removed. And it's not that I think you should like it too, but you're acting like Bethesda is a bunch of idiots for making these changes. You're acting like First Person Perspective, Real-Time gameplay is dumbed down compared to turn-based isometric. It just isn't so.

This is true except that not all mechanics are functionally identical, and you can't switch between mechanics thinking you'll get the same results.

I'm not suggesting you can. What I am suggesting is that the change from Fallout 1's mechanics to first-person, real-time combat isn't a weaker or stupider concept, and there's a whole lot of potential for a great role playing game here, not just a mindless Halo shoot'em up with post-apocalyptic graphics.

Who's saying that? I'm saying they're the core of Fallout and there's more to it. But the phrase "there's more to it" doesn't mean you can ignore the core.

And I'm saying that they're not the core of Fallout. They're just the core game mechanics, which you've blurred what should be a very defined line between. They're not even especially memorable by themselves, at least, not to me. The things that I remember from Fallout is the witty dialogue, the integrity of the way the story and the setting is handled, the ability to really have true freedom of choice in the game, the lack of good vs. evil bullshit you see with so many other lesser games. That to me is the core of what makes Fallout Fallout. The game mechanics aren't even secondary, they fall way, way down on the list, at least for me (but I imagine a lot of people feel the same way, though probably not too many around here).

I understand mechanic chances for just what they are: a sign of things to come. Why simplify mechanics towards real-time and first-person if you're not also going to simplify the storytelling?

The problem I'm having with this, is you're looking at this so-called "simplification" and giving it a terribly negative connotation. You're taking a design decision to make the game more immersive and more intuitive and saying that it's being dumbed down for idiots and the masses. And maybe it is being altered for the masses, but there shouldn't be an automatic negative connotation there. The fact of the matter is, the masses, unwashed as they may be, want their games to be less stat-heavy and more intuitive. They want it to feel more real than games of the Nintendo era were capable of. Just like storytelling in movies have gone away from lengthy dialogue and slow-paced and more and more are being tweaked to have that whole, you-are-here, run-and-gun documentary feel, games are, more than ever, trying to make you suspend disbelief and put you in the shoes of your character.

Now, you could say that the quality of movies and games, especially in storytelling quality, has gone down and down to the point that everything truly is just dumbed down for the American Idol watching culture of complete dipshits, who care more about flashy CG explosions than meaningful storytelling, and I'd be the first one to agree with you. But that has nothing to do with the mechanics of the storytelling itself, or in the case of games, whether it's first or third-person perspective, turn-based or real-time.

Worse, you're giving the name "immersion" a bad rep around here. You're making it sound like merely an excuse, a buzz-word used by PR suits to give dumbing down your precious game mechanics a positive connotation. But that's really not what it is. Immersion isn't necessary to a great game experience, Fallout 1 and 2 have proven that. But Bethesda is changing that, and intentionally trying to make it a more immersive experience. They're not doing this purely to dumb their game down. And it doesn't dumb their game down. At worst, it makes the game more accessible to dumb people who would refuse to give turn-based combat a chance, but are you any better for (at least seemingly) not being willing to give Fallout 3 a chance for the exact same (but opposite) reasons? Sure, you can call home turf here and say that Fallout started off as turn-based, so that gives you dibs on the right to bitch, but if you truly believe in that reason then you wouldn't feel the need to color your position with twists and exaggerations, by turning the word "immersion" into "something idiots say to defend their, obviously wrong, position," and you wouldn't be implying (or even outright saying) that real-time/FPP is "dumbed-down" compared to turn-based/ISO.

You call it a simplification, but if we're only going to use buzz words here, then we could just as easily turn your statement: "Why simplify mechanics towards real-time and first-person if you're not also going to simplify the storytelling?" into "Why make the game mechanics more immersive through real-time and first-person if you're not going to also make the storytelling more immersive?" In that light, which is what a lot of people who are pro-first-person/real-time for Fallout 3 feel like, it really doesn't look bad at all. And it makes a lot of sense. Further, it's a lot easier to look at First-Person perspective/real-time combat as a move towards more immersive gameplay than it is to look at it as dumbed-down. I'm not saying that there aren't a lot of dumbed-down First Person Perspective games, but there are probably just as many crappy turn-based/3rd person perspective games out there. Core-game mechanics (unless broken) don't define a game, at least not usually. Definitely not in the case of Fallout.

The audience that hates turn-based and isometric overlaps very conveniently with the audiences that hates "the tyranny of choices" and "confusing storylines." Instead we have retarded design rules like "immersion" and "NPCs may never betray the PC" to replace deep storytelling.

Whaaat? Maybe this is an "in your experience" sort of thing, or maybe you're just looking at all the game reviews calling Halo 3 the best game in the fucking universe ever made, or maybe you're looking at how linear games have become in recent years. And yeah, I agree, games have become more and more "cool factor" and less and less "meaningful, complex storyline" as of recent years. Hell, I'm not even saying that Fallout 3 won't wind up going that route. I am saying, though, that a lot of the core excuses you preach for why FO3 will suck are weak. "The game isn't turn-based and therefore this is evidence that the storyline will suck." "The game is First Person and therefore this is evidence that they're dumbing things down." "This East-Coast BoS guy doesn't fall directly in line in terms of mentality of the canon Brotherhood of Steel, and therefore it's obvious that Bethesda doesn't give a shit about Fallout and doesn't know Fallout from the toilets they shit in."

Now, I get that you're using this all as evidence built up over time, and you've probably given hundreds of in-depth reason as to why you feel the way that you feel, and now a days the bulk of the reasons you give are just the streamlined versions, but they do nothing for your integrity or NMA's integrity. Your arguments and Bethesda jabs only work for people who already agree with you. But these arguments are as stupid as the arguments given by unreasonable people on the other side of the fence. For well-reasoned people capable of thinking for themselves, you're not going to turn many of them to your side with arguments like this.

Maybe that doesn't matter to you, and maybe all you want to do is mudsling at Bethesda and have your fun saying how much they suck, but I don't understand the mentality of settling for stupidity and lazy arguments when you're accusing Bethesda of pretty much the same exact thing.

it's a simplified game. If you disagree with me you'll need to compare the evolution of Bethesda's own games.

Maybe. But I've only played Oblivion, and I enjoyed the crap out of it. I didn't find it to be mentally challenging in the least, and I recognize that it had a lot of flaws, especially in the storytelling area, but it was still a lot of fun.

One problem I do see, which you seem to have the same exact problem but don't voice it as being what it is as much as you do more exaggerated arguments, is that games these days, as a result of needing to put so much time and energy into their graphics, wind up putting less effort into other, more important areas, like story and pacing and linear progression vs. open-ended design, characterization, and other things that make games more clever than awe-inspiring.

And yeah, the enormous push for big-epic-graphics comes from the same idiots who demand big epic but completely stupid movies like Transformers and basically every comic book movie ever created (save a few). And yeah, the best way to really explore super-duper graphics is first-person perspective. So I get why you might associate FPP with dumbed-down gameplay. But they aren't necessarily connected, and there have been plenty of good games that have been real-time and first person.

I know I'm jumping the gun here and just provoking the inevitable "wait and see"s, but I "wait and see"d for new on mechanics too, assuming Bethesda wouldn't be stupid enough to just apply their own model on the franchise they bought. I was wrong then, I'm not really planning to be that naive again.

"Wait and see" isn't really my style. I've gone on many a diatribe talking about tons of MMO's that hadn't come out yet that I knew were going to suck, and they all did (it helps that basically all MMO's suck in general, so playing 100/0 odds is a relatively easy bet). With Fallout 3, I'm more just saying, "so far, not a lot has been presented. What little bit has been is either neutral to whether the game is going to suck or not (such as turn-based or First person perspective), or is highly exaggerated by this site (such as calling them idiots over the Brotherhood of Steel background thing, or the look of the Super Mutants). What little bit is worrisome (the excessive nuclear explosions in this game) is actually rather minor, and while it could be a sign of a larger problem, when 95% of the information that comes out about the game you trash as mercilessly and exaggeratedly as possible, you make the appearance that you're not even giving the game an honest, unbiased look. You look irrational, and while the irrational people who already agree with you might cheer you on, and while the irrational people who disagree with you are going to call you an idiot just as quickly as you call them an idiot, there's a whole bunch of rational people with more than a black-and-white view of things who might agree with a lot of your points but are going to be turned off by your ham-fisted approach at bashing on the game.

Which isn't to say that you need to be nice for appearances sake. It just means that, if you actually care about making a difference, as opposed to just getting your jollies off bitching about a game you're probably going to buy anyway, you might want to start being more reasonable and unbiased, and making the arguments you can actually win by virtue of the content of your arguments themselves, and not the sentence-by-sentence breakdown of your opponent's every argument so you can throw bile and sarcasm back at them.

Mind you, I don't really feel like you've been slapping me around personally, and I think you probably have the attitude that when somebody comes across as an irrational dipshit they deserve to have their ass spanked, and I get that philosophy, but it just seems to me like you'd want to have a bit more dignity about it, rather than coming down to the percieved level of your opponent's and fighting irrationalism with sarcasm and more irrationality.

Buzzkill. What is the "real core of what actually matters to Fallout" has been objectively established. Your opinion, just like mine, is just an opinion. You don't get to determine what the core of Fallout is any more than I do, Tyshalle, we only get to find out about it. Because we didn't make the game, and neither did Bethesda.

The problem here is, I don't personally give a rats ass about creator-intent. I mean, I do sometimes, but most of the time I care more about what I take from it than what the creator is trying to give me. It's the whole "is it what the teacher teaches or the student learns" thing.

And the interesting thing is, you actually agree with me, you just don't seem to realize it. Because, if we're going to go by developer's intention as being the supreme definition of what matters to the heart of the game, when we pretty much have to abide by the intention of Fallout 3's developers, which is Bethesda. Fallout 3 is a separate entity from the originals, that is obvious. Further, it's being developed by a highly successful, but completely different company. Expecting Bethesda to follow the same rules as Interplay simply because Interplay did it first is completely ridiculous. Moreso when they don't have anybody from the original game designing this one.

Fallout didn't even follow the same rules between 1 and 2, with as much low-brow comedy as they put in it. And while 1 and 2 are obviously going to be a great deal more similar than 1 and 3 (or 2 and 3), it's only natural that after a decade and a completely new developer, the game's going to get an overhaul.

But if we go by Developer's intention here, then that really should be okay with you, because Bethesda is developing this. And I really don't see any reason why they should be obligated to following exactly the same philosophy on every aspect of the game in order to be considered worthy of making the sequel.

the philosophy being applied to a franchise that's based on a different philosophy. If you differ in philosophy, why pick up the franchise?

I think that, ultimately, Bethesda took what they cared about from Fallout and abandoned the stuff they didn't care about, or the stuff they figured wouldn't make this a successful property. The design philosophy of turn-based combat with third-person, helicopter-viewpoint is really a developer's philosophy. It's a philosophy that might not be shared, or even understood by the players of Fallout 1 and 2 unless they've actually read articles or looked beyond the game itself. I think that what Bethesda took was the core of the story, and the themes of the game itself, like real freedom of choice, and the consequences of those choices (which I realize people think are being butchered by the possibility of no killable children). And yeah, it's just my opinion, but I think that saying turn-based combat is more important than those things is obscene.

Whoa did you miss the point.

The designer intention is more important than the highly subjective impressions of you or me. The game is the result of the design intentions, but you can't measure it "objectively" outside its design intentions. Duh friggin' gypsy.

Sure, and I can agree with that. But agreeing with that doesn't mean that I think Bethesda should be tied down and forced to apply every single aspect of designer intention of the original team/s simply because they bought the license. They're going along with the original themes of story and story elements, and they're abandoning game mechanics that, not only do they have little experience with, but more importantly, game mechanics that would probably hold Fallout 3 back from being as highly successful as it will be.

I mean, Bethesda bought Fallout for what? Like ten million dollars? That's not a small amount of money. And that's not the kind of money you spend to make a game unless it's going to earn itself back by a billion percent. Maybe that doesn't make it "right" by whatever moral standard you think you're judging it by, but it at least makes "sense."

 

[xdarkyrex]

I see your point, role-playing is far from a good definition of the genre.

I guess I'm just of the disposition that playing a character through a story is more fun when you get closer to simulation in a fictional world.

Touche, BN, touche.

*edit*

I do, infact, disagree with two key points.
1. Next-gen doesn't MEAN graphics over gameplay, it just seems to end up that way often (Next-Gen clearly has an alternate meaning though revolving around certain production philosophies)

2. Immersive, to me, is not a meaningless buzz word. To me, and based on the way I've seen it used, generally implies that it is trying to take steps towards playing like a simulation of a fictional setting.

Oh, and this made me lol:

Story-driven RPG – a game where story is actually important. In fact, it’s so important that anything else, including your freedom of choices, is secondary. When a game starts and you are quickly explained that you are a huge emo who will follow his father/brother/another emo anywhere, odds are you’re playing a story-driven game.

Good read

 

[Azrael-Arkangel]

Maybe you ought to stick to games without a screen, then. Books and pen and paper. Many of us video game fans enjoy it for the visual aspect. It is called a video game, not an imagination game.

The visual aspect does not removes the imagination part, IMO. Playing with the players imagination it's an important resource to make a good game. If you use people's imagination you can make them feel scared, lonely or whatever you want to make them feel.

 

[whirlingdervish]

man I wish I had time to write a whole page of strawman arguments and place words in other people's mouths, but sadly I only have this to say:

here we go...

FPP is not immersive, by definition, nor does it even have much to do with the concept of immersion.

I find the ambient music of Fallout to create more of an immersive effect than any amount of high poly FPP graphics ever used in any game.

Immersion does not mean better looking graphics to fool you into thinking you are LARPING.

It refers to the process of convincing the player that their player character is interacting with a living breathing world, no matter how shiny the graphics are that display that world, and no matter what angle they are viewed from. It isn't convincing you that you're in the monitor, because that would be stupid, and ineffectual on all but the most retarded of individuals.

This is where pnp rpgs and larping have very big differences, which imo, make pnp a much better medium for the act of role playing.

The ambient sounds, lighting effects, behavior of npcs and world objects and the ability to interact with these things in some meaningful way are all major aspects of immersion.

Having fully rendered 3 dimensional trees that still don't look like real trees is not immersive, it's just pretty.

Being able to look at that tree with your player character and having that action pop up a text window with an extended description of the things about that exact tree that you can't see by staring at one side of it from a distance is Immersive.

 

[Brother None]

I see your point, role-playing is far from a good definition of the genre.

I hate the way the term RPG gets thrown around. The truth - the one this article misses - is that it is an umbrella definition, which fits for games like Oblivion, games like Baldur's Gate and games like Fallout. But that doesn't mean Oblivion and Fallout are or should be the same game. The beauty is in their uniqueness, the kind of uniqueness Bethesda is currently turning into similarity.

I'm not the one calling Bethesda's design decisions stupid (and a whole lot worse), though.

Oh please. They're a public company making a public product. It's part of their job. Let's not start crying our eyes out here.

And yeah, if they left the game mechanics of Fallout alone for the sequel, then I'm sure I'd enjoy that too. But at the same time, it's not just that I'm okay with the concept of a first-person-perspective, real-time Fallout RPG, I'm looking forward to it. So yeah, I'm okay with "what you like" (that is, turn-based, third-person perspective) being removed.

That's a very egoistic point of view to take, but go for it.

And it's not that I think you should like it too, but you're acting like Bethesda is a bunch of idiots for making these changes. You're acting like First Person Perspective, Real-Time gameplay is dumbed down compared to turn-based isometric. It just isn't so.

Oh *HELL* no, you did not just go there.

I've been a bit addicted to Titan Quest the past few days. It's basically a dumbed down version of Diablo. Hear that? Diablo. Dumbed down. And I love it.

I'm not an elitist and I do not appreciate it when someone tries to shove me into a convenient little pre-conceived cliché box. I praised BioShock for what it accomplished (and ignored it for what it didn't).

There is no *inherent* inferiority or superiority in any mechanic.

But...mark this remark, because it's hella important to this argument...But that doesn't mean you should go changing mechanics that are an extension of the core philosophy of a franchise.

What I am suggesting is that the change from Fallout 1's mechanics to first-person, real-time combat isn't a weaker or stupider concept, and there's a whole lot of potential for a great role playing game here, not just a mindless Halo shoot'em up with post-apocalyptic graphics.

And I agree. There's just no room for the kind of RPG that Fallout was intended to be.

And I'm saying that they're not the core of Fallout.

You don't get to determine that.

The problem I'm having with this, is you're looking at this so-called "simplification" and giving it a terribly negative connotation.

I'm not giving it anything, I'm seeing what it already has. Or did you think Oblivion was "smarter" than Morrowind?

The fact of the matter is, the masses, unwashed as they may be, want their games to be less stat-heavy and more intuitive.

The fact of the matter is, the masses, unwashed as they may be, want less story and more action in their games, less confusing storylines, less deep plots.

I can't believe you can't see the slippery slope you're on. If you're going to give way to the masses on one point, who not on the other?

But that has nothing to do with the mechanics of the storytelling itself, or in the case of games, whether it's first or third-person perspective, turn-based or real-time.

Only in the most simplified sense.

Worse, you're giving the name "immersion" a bad rep around here. You're making it sound like merely an excuse, a buzz-word used by PR suits to give dumbing down your precious game mechanics a positive connotation.

My Frith? Are you new to this? Immersion is a meaningless term thrown about by PR people in the most idiotic fashion. I'm seriously scratching my head here, I'd have figured anyone who visits NMA would know that by now. The context we've seen it in, the times it's been used, the broad inapplicability of it...

...it's like next-gen or innovation. It is a buzzword, and it's meaningless. Honestly, I can only laugh if you're going to suggest it's not.

Immersion isn't necessary to a great game experience, Fallout 1 and 2 have proven that.

I was immersed in Fallout 1. And 2. Not in Oblivion. And I mean real "immersed", not the "omg pretty graphics" definition gaming media has given to the word.

They're not doing this purely to dumb their game down. And it doesn't dumb their game down.

Heh. Wanna bet?

make the storytelling more immersive?

That doesn't even mean anything.

Whaaat? Maybe this is an "in your experience" sort of thing, or maybe you're just looking at all the game reviews calling Halo 3 the best game in the fucking universe ever made, or maybe you're looking at how linear games have become in recent years.

Uhm, considering you just went "maybe you're just looking at reality".

So what more can I say than "yes. Yes I am"

Now, I get that you're using this all as evidence built up over time, and you've probably given hundreds of in-depth reason as to why you feel the way that you feel, and now a days the bulk of the reasons you give are just the streamlined versions, but they do nothing for your integrity or NMA's integrity. Your arguments and Bethesda jabs only work for people who already agree with you. But these arguments are as stupid as the arguments given by unreasonable people on the other side of the fence. For well-reasoned people capable of thinking for themselves, you're not going to turn many of them to your side with arguments like this.

"Well-reasoned people"? Call me when you see one. Have you seen the Bethesda forum lately?

Anyway, there are multiple well-reasoned articles spread over No Mutants Allowed and other sites that contain fuller histories of the franchise, Bethesda and our reasoning. If you're looking for reasoned arguments, look there. Pretending that a bunch of forum posts, the most meaningless form of interaction known to man, reflect on my "integrity" is laughable.

Inlè, it'd surprise me if you can claim with a straight face that you're here to honestly listen to my arguments. I appreciate that you're here, no mistake, I like reasoned critical voices on these forums, but you're not coming across as someone who has given the other side a chance. If I could show you half the interactions I've had with Bethesda and gaming media on the topic of Fallout 3, you'd understand fully how much of a chance I've given the game, and that you're just flying in at the tail-end of a 2-year reasoning progress to tell me I'm not being reasonable.

One problem I do see, which you seem to have the same exact problem but don't voice it as being what it is as much as you do more exaggerated arguments, is that games these days, as a result of needing to put so much time and energy into their graphics, wind up putting less effort into other, more important areas, like story and pacing and linear progression vs. open-ended design, characterization, and other things that make games more clever than awe-inspiring.

This is a more general thing. But yeah, it's the truth.

Still, considering Troika's games made a profit and Bethesda self-publishes, there never was anything to stop them from releasing a hugely popular spin-off series to Fallout while also working on a niche, for-the-fans-not-for-the-masses sequel to Fallout 3. Is that elitist? No it isn't, because all you're doing is making a sequel that makes sense, the fact that it ends up not for the masses is just consequence, not a part of the decision-making progress.

This choice was Bethesda's. It's always been Bethesda's. They've never been forced to anything and could've sold this idea to ZeniMax. But they're not those kind of fans. Either they are fans but consider their own views superior to those of Tim Cain's, an unbridled form of arrogance, or they're not fans at all.

What little bit is worrisome (the excessive nuclear explosions in this game) is actually rather minor, and while it could be a sign of a larger problem, when 95% of the information that comes out about the game you trash as mercilessly and exaggeratedly as possible, you make the appearance that you're not even giving the game an honest, unbiased look.

Unbiased? Where do you think you are, CNN? Of course we're frigging biased. We're fans of Fallout, that means our bias is "Fallout fan". We're holding up Fallout 3 to Fallout 1. The reason the media, meanwhile, is slobbering over the game is because they're fans of Oblivion, and they're holding Fallout 3 up to that. But I'm not seeing you whinge about their being irrational.

But bias is not the same as being irrational. How much of this site and these forums have you read? You're jumping to all kinds of wild, unjust conclusions.

Years ago, there was an enforced rule "don't jump to conclusions" before info was out. We'd vat most messages that talked shit on Fallout 3 based on nothing. I never see anyone talk about that, instead we're blamed for "never giving the game a chance."

We reacted positively to Ron Perlman being hired. We loved the news of Emil Pagiarulo being made head designer and still like the old bear generally. We've made many attempts to build some kind of working relationship with Bethesda. We liked the PIPBoy. Our preview praised the vault, the protectron and some other things.

But when we see something stupid, we call it stupid.

And now you're going to sit there with a straight face and pretend you know enough to judge us?

Does that really, honestly sound reasonable to you?

Mind you, I don't really feel like you've been slapping me around personally, and I think you probably have the attitude that when somebody comes across as an irrational dipshit they deserve to have their ass spanked, and I get that philosophy, but it just seems to me like you'd want to have a bit more dignity about it, rather than coming down to the percieved level of your opponent's and fighting irrationalism with sarcasm and more irrationality.

Yes, yes, I've heard that plenty of time. Now I'm an admin here, and people seem to like me for some odd reason no one can quite figure out. Do you think that means I have a little switch under my desk that determines when people will be nice or not? Some of these guys have been here with us for more than 5 years. In that time, we've seen Interplay treating the franchise as shit, Bethesda purposefully ignoring any attempts at serious contact and finally telling us to go fuck ourselves when we released a preview (widely well-received and praised, note) with more honest ivews of their game, and in the meantime trolls have been coming here on and off with the pre-conception that we're just a bunch of idiots and they can come here to get the lulz or talk down to us (kinda like you're talking down to us). Oh, did I mention when Something Awful decided to ban all our members, did a DOS attack on our site, tried to hack the computers of several of our staff and still run a smear campaign against this site.

Oh, and look, now you're here, telling us we should be nice.

I really, really think you haven't considered your stance very well. Either that or it's not very well-informed. Which is no problem, I don't really expect the internet at large or you individually to care enough to do a detailed study of NMA and its history. But in lieu of such a study, perhaps you shouldn't jump to conclusions? Maybe?

The problem here is, I don't personally give a rats ass about creator-intent.

And we've already indicated that is an irrelevant stance, to us. You can advocate it as much as you want, doesn't matter.

Fallout 3 is a separate entity from the originals, that is obvious.

Really? That's odd, because it's called Fallout 3. Perhaps it shouldn't pretend to be a sequel of it's a separate entity. Do you realise how many times we've seen Bethesda developers claim to be loyal to the series? Or what about Todd's first dev blog, where he selectively quoted from a Fallout 1 vision document to make it look like it agreed with his views, even though other bits directly contradicted what he said.

Hey, you're blaming the wrong guy here. I'm not the one claiming this is a sequel, they're doing that. And that is, well...an "untruth"

Expecting Bethesda to follow the same rules as Interplay simply because Interplay did it first is completely ridiculous.

No, the ridiculous part is buying a franchise with no intention to make a game that fits in the franchise. You're just judging it one step too late.

Moreso when they don't have anybody from the original game designing this one.

It's not like they had a choice in that.

Wait a second...they did! We know of at least one important original Fallout developer who directly applied for a job at Bethesda. But Bethesda turned him away (in a shameful manner, I should note, but I can't go into details).

Whoops?

I think that, ultimately, Bethesda took what they cared about from Fallout and abandoned the stuff they didn't care about, or the stuff they figured wouldn't make this a successful property.

Yes, that would be pretty much the problem, wouldn't it? Their priority is "our tastes" and "what sells" first, and "what's Fallout" somewhere down the line. Don't be surprised if they dump on bits of the setting for not being marketable. Changed supermutants, anyone?

They're going along with the original themes of story and story elements.

Really? You got the script or something? Because last time I checked, only about 1/5th of what Bethesda has released in info fitted directly in the original setting, the rest is their vision, BoS, new supermutants, supermutant endboss, mini nuke launcher, toilet water drinking, swearing Mr Handy, etc. etc. All minor, but it adds up.

Maybe that doesn't make it "right" by whatever moral standard you think you're judging it by, but it at least makes "sense."

Why should I care about "sense" over "right"?

I should just make this my sig or something. Don Miguel de Cervantes gets the last word on the issue, as he does on so many: “It is true folly to perceive life as it is, and not as it should be.”

 

[Kyuu]

You're acting like First Person Perspective, Real-Time gameplay is dumbed down compared to turn-based isometric. It just isn't so.

Yes, it is. That's not to say that there can't be FPP RPGs that aren't entirely simple. As far as real-time goes, well, that change necessarily requires an entirely different sort of mechanics than turn-based, and generally, you can't make the same sort of choices and decisions because you don't have time, and because the mechanics don't allow for them. It's like chess: can you really say that a real-time adaptation, with knights and soldiers running around hacking at each other, would involve anywhere near the same thought and strategy? You might find it more interesting, but people who enjoy playing chess will, quite understandably, probably not be impressed. They enjoyed playing chess, not a (poor) attempt at simulating "real-life battles" with superficial resemblances to their game.

Anyway, the real issue is that Bethesda's system IS, in fact, dumbed-down and simplified. There's no need to make an argument for this. If you played Morrowind and/or Oblivion and honestly believe these are good, intelligent combat systems in any sense, then we're not going to find any common ground. Adding a pause function linked to Action Points and a slo-mo head-gib camera is not, I don't think, going to make it suddenly terribly awesome or even add any amount of real strategy.

Also, quit trying to equate FPP with "immersion." Really. Just stop. Immersion (ignoring the fact that it's mostly a buzzword with no real meaning now) is not quantifiable, unless "immersiveness" simply means how closely it simulates reality. Even then, I don't see how an FPP perspective where I have no peripheral vision, I can't move my head, eyes, or appendages independently of my torso, my weapon is always sticking up in my vision in the exact same position, etc. and so on is really all that "immersive." Great music, great writing, great art (which, coincidently, the original Fallout had all three) all contribute much more to "immersing" me in the game world than the viewpoint. And, I never had a problem with the isometric camera breaking "immersion," myself. I can't say the same for Oblivion's crap writing, blah music, often terrible art direction, visiting the exact same cave/ruin 100 times for level-scaled loot and monsters, awful combat, and ridiculous skill system that rewards absurdity (jumping everywhere, summoning a scamp in the middle of town, casting fireballs at it, and repeating 1000 times, etc.).

If you enjoy the sort of LARPing that Bethesda is trying to cram down everyone's throats, fine. Not all RPGs need to be like that, and if there's any justice in the universe, they sure as hell won't be. I very much wish Fallout wouldn't be perversely twisted into one.

 

[Deleted member 53669]

xdarkyrex wrote:

You failed art history, didnt you?
Art nazis are fucking idiotic and completely miss the point of art.

Art is subjective, creators usually have an intent, but that does not rigidly confine the view of the viewers. Beauty is in the eye of the beholder, fool.

Did you even get the point I was trying to make, or did you just fly off the handle so you can try and be correct with a burn?

Fallout 3 will never be Fallout 3 because it has no ties to the first intentions of Tim Cain and Brian Fargo. I didn't say that the things you took from Fallout 1s art where subjective, but subjectivity and opinions do not constitute and make you an expert on what the fallout universe is about. The only way you can make a true Fallout 3 is by understanding and implementing the original intentions of art for Fallout 1. You can think whatever you wish about how the first game made you happy, but using that subjectivity to make a sequel of something taken from someone elses artwork makes you a complete assnut.

 

[Morbus]

Bah, will he ever reply?

 

[Tyshalle]

I've said it before and I'll say it again about this fucking 'immersion'.
There's nothing immersive about first person view. No-thing.

I suppose it'd be considered "trolling" for me to call you an idiot over this, but give me a fucking break.

Normally, all human beings have so called 'peripherical' sight, that allows you to see everything that happens to the left or right. So the perception field is MUCH bigger than can be depicted even on a widescreen. Thus any 3d person view (including iso) is much more immersive (fuck this word) as it allows you to be aware of what happens around you.

This is the most ham-fisted, retarded argument that just keeps coming up. Yes, computer monitors lack peripheral vision. But to say that being able to see the back of your character's head, or to be able to see from a birds-eye view of things in order to gain that "peripheral vision" is more immersive than being able to see out of your character's eyes themselves, even if you're suffering from a minor case of tunnel vision in the process... I mean, what a fucking crock of shit. To call your argument "reaching" would be an understatement giving you far more credit than you deserve.

This is the type of argument that passes right on by the label "intellectually dishonest" and lands somewhere around "intellectually dysfunctional."

And if I'm coming off hostile, it's only because that argument is so tangibly full of shit that I'm a little pissed off at ruining my pants trying to wade through it.

There's nothing 'immersive' about minimizing interface. UI is a part of the game atmosphere if done well. Just look at Fallout or Witcher. Their interfaces are pieces of art. They not only don't brake the immersion of player into game, but enhance it by creating the unique spirit.

Now yes, a good interface can be spectacularly useful and beautiful and not get at all in the way of immersion. But to say that there's "nothing immersive" about minimizing interface is illogical, and only proves that you don't even know what the fuck the word means, or what people mean when they say it.

That's moronic. So now, stats and turn-based combat are immersion-breaking just because he doesn't like them?

It's not moronic, and he even has a point. And yes, stats and turn-based combat are less immersive than real-time combat where the statistics are all invisible, behind the scenes. I'm not even going to elaborate, because the only way somebody can't understand that is if they're lying to themselves. Stupidity isn't even a factor there because I don't think it's possible to be that stupid.

To suggest that Oblivion is the at the top of the list for anything RPG related strikes me as obtuse ignorance at the least and mendacious toadying for money at worse.

I agree. Oblivion, while a game that I logged over 80 hours playing, and enjoyed a hell of a lot, I really don't consider it much of a role playing game so much as an adventure game slightly superior in quality with much better production values to say, STALKER (though, STALKER completely kicks its ass in terms of atmosphere).

As far as the spirit of Fallout being lost... lets see.. confirmed on the chopping block we have...


Totally gutted, intelligence WILL NOT affect dialogue (loss of an entire sub-branch of the game, the moron*)

And yeah, this bugs me a lot too. Though I don't have a problem with them getting rid of the cave-man dialogue. Playing the game like that, while interesting as a novelty, essentially doubles the dialogue work of Bethesda, and I think that as far as managing efficiency and prioritizing, getting rid of the cave-man dialogue is a good idea. Still though, there were a lot of areas in the original two where having a high intelligence would let you do things you couldn't otherwise, and could often make your life a lot easier. If they've really gotten rid of them completely, this is bad, bad, bad.

And ripped away is my beloved status-box which conveyed so much of the rich depth of character and humor that is Fallout, oh well, life's a pisser and then you die..

I agree here to some extent, but I do think that, if the art direction is good enough, and it's less concerned with just being epic and badass with their fucking bullet-time nonsense, the visuals might be able to replace the status box. If not completely, at least to a level that isn't unforgivable.

Well if you're a 'writer' you should bloody well know that it is impossible for a computer to take away all of your senses even in a 'picture perfect look' I've seen millions of photos, good, bad, and ugly, however none of them I got the impression that I could reach out and touch.

Maybe your imagination isn't as good as you were boasting, then.

If your imagination is so easily shirked and cast aside for bloom & doom so be it, however I still pity you for it.

And honestly, that's not even what I was saying. I still think that imagination is useful and necessary. But I think that when you leave the world of pure-text-based role playing and add graphics, you can't bitch when those graphics get better and better. I mean, you still saw those super-mutants in the first two games. They gave you some amount of direction to let your imagination take over. And I'm not dissing that, nor am I saying that Fallout 1 and 2 weren't effective. I'm simply not saying that improved graphics are going to hurt the situation.

Video games haven't always had shiny graphics, to many it is an upgrade from pure text, however to me the graphics will always be secondary to a good storyline.

And I'd agree. You do realize that I loved the original Fallout, don't you? In no way am I incapable of using my imagination, nor am I of the mind that superior graphics automatically make a superior game, or even that superior graphics are preferable to less great graphics at the expense of story.

And yeah, before text-based role playing existed, there was pure tabletop role playing, and when people started role playing on computers, the table-top purists refused to go either, refusing to consider text-based role playing as "true" role playing.

And before computers, there were books. And before there was the internet, people talked in person, or wrote letters that a mailman would have to come pick up.

Yeah, change is hard, and people constantly piss and moan when change occurs. But you're the whining old man sitting on his rocker yelling at the "youngsters" in this case. I'm not even saying that all this stuff is superior necessarily, but you are saying that is automatically inferior, which is why you are the irrational one in this argument.

I disagree, technology can be used to translate an idea accurately but it can further inhibit immersion. It's like the argument "The book was better than the movie." Does the author need to fill the book with illustration after illustration to get his point across? Of course not. Perhaps he needs to create an entire 3D world to get his point across because his readers lack the imagination to make their own world from their own point of view!

I think I should elaborate a bit more on what I meant when I said that eventually there comes a point where video/audio immersion becomes more effective than your own imagination.

Your imagination is extremely powerful. And there are a lot of instances where your imagination is actually superior to showing through images (or whatever). For instance, in horror. It's much, much better to only show hints, or maybe audio of the big bad monster, to let your audience decide individually, in their own imaginations, what the fuck it could be out there. They're going to come up with something much, much scarier to them than any puppets or CG demons you come up with will be.

However, in the world of clarity, otherwise known as effective communication, a clear image is much, much, MUCH more effective than your imagination.

For instance, if your best friend was dying of poison, and I told you that the only way to save his life was if you went off and found me a particular plant, a flower or something, which would you fucking prefer, with your friend's life on the line, me to describe it for you and let your imagination take over, or for me to hand you a fucking picture and let you go off on your own?

Great graphics and still leave a lot up to your imagination if they want to. Shitty graphics can only go so far with clarity, and words require your imagination to work in overdrive. This isn't necessarily inferior, but it's very limiting. More limiting than the other, in point of fact.

I'm not a diehard NMA Fallout nut (no offense) but I have to say that messing with stats is one of the most satifying parts of RPGs. It literally takers me hours to settle on the starting stats for a new character in fallout 2, or say NWN2. That's one of the things I didn't like about oblivion...if you don't read the manual you can't even tell what the starting stats for your race/gender are! And you don't even get to play with them! What a let down.

I can pretty much whole-heartedly agree with this. My personal take with the whole Fallout 3 thing and stats is, yeah, okay, I can see how making the statistics more transparant can be more immersive, but Fallout really had a great design down, where you could powergame your stats as little or as much as you wanted to, and that really allows a lot of people to do and get what they want out of the system. And I love spending a lot of time thinking up my character. Now a days 90% of the time spent on a character is tweaking the way he looks, and while that's fun (and it is), it's ultimately superficial and irrelevant. One of the best things about old-school RPG's is that you really get to design your character from the ground up. Oblivion you only got to make the broad strokes, and the game did everything else for you. I can see how that might be good for people who don't care about shit like that, but Fallout catered to both types of players.

Your a dumbass.

Good, but maybe insulting other people's intelligence might work better for you if you actually could differenciate between the words "your" and "you're."

However, this is actually educational, and I think I'm starting to see things from Brother None's perspective a bit more. I mean, similar to how you can tell based on marginal evidence from early released information what the entire quality of a game is going to be, I can tell, based on the quality of the very first word you wrote, that the rest of your post is going to be filled with nothing but stupidity and inane bullshit.

Fallout is not an educational software program. It is a work of digital art. Art is from the perspective of the creator, and your suppose to enjoy the creators perspective of the work in question, not pick and choose like a fucking moron from something like if hypothetically Mona Lisa was remade by Bethesda and given cock-sucking lips and a huge rack, and made holding a chainsaw. THE POINT IS THE ORIGINAL INTENTION OF THE ARTWORK, NOT YOUR OPINION ON WHAT IT SHOULD BE! SO SHUT THE HELL UP AND GO MAKE YOUR OWN DAMN GAME ASSHAT!

And what do you know!? Success.

But, point in fact, dipshit, art is utterly, and entirely in the eye of the beholder. People can argue about artist intentions all fucking day if they want, and some people have made entire careers, basing their entire lives around artist intentions, but the simple fact is, it's more important how art makes you feel than what the fucking artist was intending. Maybe what you feel and what the artist intended match up. Maybe not. There's no right or wrong here.

Any artist who disagrees is just an egotistical prick.

And that doesn't mean that artist intention isn't worth anything, or even that they shouldn't go out of their way to manipulate his audience, and try to make them feel certain things.

But like a badly fucking written sentence, like say "Your a dumbass," what you intend doesn't make an ounce of a difference to how your finished product ends up coming out. And when somebody gets something out of your product that you didn't intend for, bullshit excuses of "well that's not what I meant, you should think/feel/imagine this instead" are worthless.

Ever play any muds? Have you ever read a book? Well thats what text based adventures do for the player. Every character is cast right, every camera angle is perfect, every sound, sight EVERYTHING is perfect when you are given the ability to imagine it. Its customized to you, but when visuals and sounds are incorporated, abominations like the Ogre/Mutant are born

Sure, I run my own weekly text-based role playing game campaign. In fact, several years ago (back in like, 2002) I had ran my own massive text-based Fallout campaign, where I took the rules of the game and modified the to work in a text-based environment (I didn't know about the Fallout bibles and all that yet, so I wound up doing a lot of work unnecessarily myself), and I wound up having over 80 players in that game. I'm not new to how spectacular text-based RPG's are. I loathe MMO's because of how fucking retarded they (and 99% of their players) are. Despite how easily accessible MMO's are, I still choose to role play in text-based environments.

But I'm not a big enough asshole to assume that one way is inherently superior to another way. That's what you're doing here.

Basically everything he wrote.

And here I go posting before I've read the entire thread again. You pretty much have covered all the bases here, so I guess I'll be overlapping you a great deal, but yeah, I basically agree with most of what you wrote, and think you're far more well reasoned than you're being given credit for.

Changing every game genre into them only makes the gaming world less diverse. It's like turning all the food in the world into chocolate.

Yet when Fallout is made to be more diverse, you pitch a fit?

Oh please. They're a public company making a public product. It's part of their job. Let's not start crying our eyes out here.

Let's not take this out of context. You were telling me that it's "mean" for me to be disagree with your tastes, but it's okay for you to disagree with Bethesda (much more strongly and sarcastically) simply because they're a public company? You don't exactly run a private website here.

But that doesn't mean you should go changing mechanics that are an extension of the core philosophy of a franchise.

But again, core philosophy to who? I still say that most people who enjoyed Fallout without being a crazy-obsessed (and I mean that in the nice way, seriously) fan probably don't think of ISO/TB to be core to the philosophy of Fallout. And to be honest, I think that, if FO3 was turn-based/ISO and this specific subject hadn't been attacked for the past year straight, then I really doubt that everybody would be sticking to TB/ISO as a "core game mechanic to the philosophy" of Fallout. Because I bet that most people, even when they think about the game mechanics of Fallout, they still think of the choices the game gave you, and how those choices had real consequences, and then the story and yadda yadda I don't want to keep repeating myself.

The fact of the matter is, the masses, unwashed as they may be, want less story and more action in their games, less confusing storylines, less deep plots.

I can't believe you can't see the slippery slope you're on. If you're going to give way to the masses on one point, who not on the other?

Because in one instance (less stat-heavy, etc.) we're both in agreement that this isn't inherently bad. In the other (less story), we both seem to be in perfect agreement that the masses need to take a fucking hike, and jerk off to the concept of Halo 4 before they get to dumb-down the story or the way the story is told of Fallout 3. I think that, if you make a game that is more accessible to the masses, but is still smart and intelligent, the masses will still go for it.

Lots of people went for Mass Effect. I haven't really played much of it yet, but I know that there's a lot, a ridiculous amount of dialogue in that game. The game's also a bit more exciting than your traditional turn-based RPG or even the kind of thing KOTOR was, mostly due to the manual-aiming of the combat. I think that finds a good mix and balance of the two. Again, I haven't played Mass Effect, but I do know that it was very popular, and maybe the story wasn't great (maybe it was, I don't know yet), but I think it makes a case that the masses will go for a story-heavy game with a lot of downtime and dialogue. A lot of them might not go for a game more in the vein of Fallout 1, though.

Sucks? Maybe. But again, when you spend millions of dollars on a franchise, you do it to make that money back times a gajillion.

And if Fallout 3 does suck, and if it's pretty much that cut-and-dry, then what's your end goal here? Why spend so much of your time talking about it if there's no hope? It's not going to ruin Fallout 1 or 2 (anybody who says otherwise is a whiner). So what's the goal here?

My Frith? Are you new to this? Immersion is a meaningless term thrown about by PR people in the most idiotic fashion. I'm seriously scratching my head here, I'd have figured anyone who visits NMA would know that by now. The context we've seen it in, the times it's been used, the broad inapplicability of it...

...it's like next-gen or innovation. It is a buzzword, and it's meaningless. Honestly, I can only laugh if you're going to suggest it's not.

I am suggesting it's not. Or maybe it is and it isn't. Maybe it is a word being thrown around a lot by PR people, but that doesn't make it false or bad or eeevil or whatever. Immersion is still important to people, people still find FPP to be more immersive, et cetera.



Okay, really skimming now because I'm about to leave work here ....

"Well-reasoned people"? Call me when you see one. Have you seen the Bethesda forum lately?

Yeah, I left before you did, and I checked back once or twice since they seemed to kill all NMA people and I still can't get in there.

Believe me when I say that I agree with a lot of what you're saying. It's not like I'm on the opposite side of the fence here. I'm sitting on top of the fence, one leg over each side, looking around, seeing the good and the bad of both positions. But I ain't the only one.

Pretending that a bunch of forum posts, the most meaningless form of interaction known to man, reflect on my "integrity" is laughable.

Eh, I disagree. I think that most people come across like idiots on internet forums as a result of them being idiots. I don't disagree that forum-interaction is the most meaningless interaction known to man, but I really think that's more because it gives complete morons the ability to discuss issues with people who may or may not be complete morons, when normally complete morons would be ignored. The trouble with forums is that they're always moderated for "civility" sake, so the idiots can never be told their idiots out-right, and so a lot of hoops have to be jumped through to explain in great detail as to why they're idiots, yadda yadda yadda -- the point is, I tend to hang out in forums where I can bitchslap people who need to be bitchslapped, and where I can be bitchslapped when people think I need to be, and we can go at it to the death without risk of having a moderator coming by and breaking things up as long as they don't just decend into pure "you suck" "no you suck" stuff.




Okay, clearly the last 5 paragraphs or so of mine were rushed. I've been writing 10 times faster than I usually do so I can finish in time, and I didn't. So, uh... yeah. I'll be back tomorrow or possibly tonight.

 

[Azrael-Arkangel]

Bah, will he ever reply?

I think he was overwhelmed by the huge amount of reasoning and facts posted here...

By the way, thanks for your enligthening posts BN, there were a lot of things I didn't know about NMA's story.

EDIT: Maybe he wasn't overwhelmed.

But again, core philosophy to who? I still say that most people who enjoyed Fallout without being a crazy-obsessed (and I mean that in the nice way, seriously) fan probably don't think of ISO/TB to be core to the philosophy of Fallout. And to be honest, I think that, if FO3 was turn-based/ISO and this specific subject hadn't been attacked for the past year straight, then I really doubt that everybody would be sticking to TB/ISO as a "core game mechanic to the philosophy" of Fallout. Because I bet that most people, even when they think about the game mechanics of Fallout, they still think of the choices the game gave you, and how those choices had real consequences, and then the story and yadda yadda I don't want to keep repeating myself.

I'm not one of the Crazy-Obsessed Fans as you call them, in fact I think I belong more to the Looking Forward FO3 Fan, but one of the things that atracted me to the original fallout was the isometric view and the turn based. I remember seeing a magazine with some screens and some info about the turn based battle, and thinking "I want that".

 

[Black]

Where's Rosh?

 

[Morbus]

@ Black
Indeed

@ People
Hey! Who here was a RPG player back when Fallout came out and played it then? Ok, now, you, do you think turn based top down was part of the core philosophy?

Yes, because playing the game like two or more years after it comes out and following its development in expectation are two completely different things. I didn't follow, I don't know, Homeworld's development, and I love that game (played it two years ago). And I don't know squat about its philosophy, and seriously, if I had to write about it, I'd have to READ about it first. Which is something some people are forgetting about: they need to read about Fallout so that they can have a decent opinion about it.

Got it?

 

[Mord_Sith]

Well if you're a 'writer' you should bloody well know that it is impossible for a computer to take away all of your senses even in a 'picture perfect look' I've seen millions of photos, good, bad, and ugly, however none of them I got the impression that I could reach out and touch.

Maybe your imagination isn't as good as you were boasting, then.

Beg pardon? that doesn't make much sense dude, just because to me photos haven't been able to replace my imagination my imagination isn't as good as I have been boasting?

If your imagination is so easily shirked and cast aside for bloom & doom so be it, however I still pity you for it.

And honestly, that's not even what I was saying. I still think that imagination is useful and necessary. But I think that when you leave the world of pure-text-based role playing and add graphics, you can't bitch when those graphics get better and better. I mean, you still saw those super-mutants in the first two games. They gave you some amount of direction to let your imagination take over. And I'm not dissing that, nor am I saying that Fallout 1 and 2 weren't effective. I'm simply not saying that improved graphics are going to hurt the situation.

I am not bitching about good graphics in general, my perception of graphics is that they are directly proportional to the quality of storyline put into the game, the lesser the graphics the better the storyline as they aren't relying on the graphics to tell the story for them and vice versa. Besides, you're repeating what I was saying about graphics in my post back to me, doesn't make much sense duzzit?

Video games haven't always had shiny graphics, to many it is an upgrade from pure text, however to me the graphics will always be secondary to a good storyline.

And I'd agree. You do realize that I loved the original Fallout, don't you? In no way am I incapable of using my imagination, nor am I of the mind that superior graphics automatically make a superior game, or even that superior graphics are preferable to less great graphics at the expense of story.

Glad to see we've crossed this bridge once before...

And yeah, before text-based role playing existed, there was pure tabletop role playing, and when people started role playing on computers, the table-top purists refused to go either, refusing to consider text-based role playing as "true" role playing.

I play both actually, I play tabletop, and cRPGs on a regular basis, but on any day of the week I'd trade a cRPG for a good game of DnD 2nd ed or CP2020, and that's only got pictures in the books to help the setting a tad.

And before computers, there were books. And before there was the internet, people talked in person, or wrote letters that a mailman would have to come pick up.

Yeah, change is hard, and people constantly piss and moan when change occurs. But you're the whining old man sitting on his rocker yelling at the "youngsters" in this case. I'm not even saying that all this stuff is superior necessarily, but you are saying that is automatically inferior, which is why you are the irrational one in this argument.

I thank you for understanding, however my point was that games haven't always needed to rely on purdy piccies in order to be immersing, so you completely missed the mark on this one, try again robin hood, next time you might actually hit the apple, instead of maid Marian.

Your a dumbass.

Good, but maybe insulting other people's intelligence might work better for you if you actually could differenciate between the words "your" and "you're."

By the way, it isn't cool to pick on people about their grammar, you got the idea of what he was trying to say, yes it was a bit of an attack, but there are a lot of people on these forums that english is a second language, so I ask that you don't grammar-nazi us to death plzkthx.

 

[FeelTheRads]

I am suggesting it's not. Or maybe it is and it isn't. Maybe it is a word being thrown around a lot by PR people, but that doesn't make it false or bad or eeevil or whatever. Immersion is still important to people, people still find FPP to be more immersive, et cetera.

When immersion means only FPP and awesome graphics, as defined by the media and the PR, it really has absolutely no value whatsoever.
Drawing conclusions from this, any game that isn't first-person or doesn't have awesome graphics can't be immersive no matter what, right?

I won't even go and bother with the bullshit about mechanics not being important. I'll just say this: Leave alone Fallout for awhile and think about Fahrenheit.
And that's only a case from a myriad others.