Excuse me but I have a fairly silly question for post 1.0 (rambling included)

[eRe4s3r]

So... will there ever be some NPC Interactions and memorable unique NPC's ? ;p

You know, Interaction, as in, they do stuff (like saying something) when i hit "use" (which is the Inter in action ,p) ? As it is now while there is a great many monologues in the game there is not a single dialog in the sense that 2 people say something, 1 being me and choosing a reply or dialog opening. Particularly rescuing NPC's feels pretty lifeless and emotional detached than it should be from the sound of it. You don't even see the NPC in question really and he's just suddenly there in your settlement and alive and happy.. and exactly as blank as anyone else in that settlement.

My point being, right now I feel the game lacks this emotional touch that it should have. You know, the world has shattered we fight for survival of mankind, but it never feels that way really. Now it may appear that this is just a small thing but to me "chilling" in between the "shooting" is a very important aspect of a game, chilling meaning exploring characters, background stories or just random gossip. Right now the game is 100% shooting. (I don't count menu based crafting as anything but preparation to shoot more and harder).

Because I am rethreading old GC games I came across Tales of Symphonia and was reminded there what really misses here. That is, characters I care about.

The system of "switching" into other characters literally destroys the immersion for me. If all characters are just "respawns" then all I do when rescuing them is adding more respawns. I am not rescuing people with a story, but a gameplay bonus to be used. And I can't for some reason stop seeing it that way ever since that was introduced.

So what I am essentially rumbling about is whether there'll ever be some more to the game than just shooting, crafting and exploring endlessly? Characters to meet and talk to, do things for, get hugs and gifts or evil stares and poison in food etc.? Background stories, secrets (not talking about secret missions, but unique rare locations with unique rare events/characters in them ,p)

And what about the obligatory side-kick who comments my actions and failings and keeps track of my mess ;p ?

Essentially, right now the game is a very fine side-scrolling shooter but I am not feeling the story

Mhh, yeah, wasn't sure where to post this. So here it goes anyway

[keith.lamothe]

There actually used to be a big tree of npc interactions, they used to do the crafting for you, they used to have hope/goal/need hierarchies (need = quest, basically), at one point each had a sort of "memory thread" (since at the time all ones that shared a graphic were echoes of a specific persona) kind of like the mysteries thing that eventually did get done.  And for most of the game's history we planned to let the player use groups of NPCs in grid-based tactical battles.

Many, many features proved counterproductive before alpha, and many features since then have been ditched due to player feedback (largely about lack of cohesion).  AVWW's feature graveyard is enormous   Probably only about 30% of the time I've spent on this game is reflected in the current version.

[eRe4s3r]

Mhhh, so is that a yes a no or a maybe? ;p

Heh, i would really rather like to play the system you just described - well it would have to mean a "small" redo of the settlement mechanic but aside that.. whats the difference of a crafting shrine and a crafting priest? Apart from the fact I can talk to the one and only touch the other. Eh.. sounded wrong..... Though I wouldn't be a huge fan of grid battles either.

I am not entirely sure what exactly is missing apart from the general "story" connection. I just don't feel the story. Even though it is detailed and can be explored but it just doesn't have any hook that "pushes" you forward or that keeps you connected to the story. I am not talking about achievements and how they unlock stuff (that is a really cool idea by way ,p).

It's like, I am missing some "character" that is *always* there and that interlinks the "continent victories" so that there is an overarching progression to that with a goal beyond the singular overlords. Something that keeps tracks how often I failed, what I did, and didn't do. How many settlers i sacrificed and souls converted to spells.

Without that over-arching connection, after the first overlord I have essentially "beaten" the game (although maybe not seen everything ,p

Mhh, Ah, what is missing is the END GAME so to speak. The - after the first overlord, you discover something or whatever, and this is of vital important to the world (or a character we are introduced after the first overlord victory)

You know, something that "pushes" us on beyond the first overlord.

[x4000]

I really don't plan on adding heavy story elements -- I think it would get in the way of the mechanical elements.  I imagine we'll grow the story and such somewhat, but those sort of involved NPC systems are pretty much all scrapped for a reason: they weren't fun (to me at least).

Also, when it comes to trying to make procedurally-generated NPCs that you care about like you do about a hand-scripted character in an RPG... that's just not going to happen, I don't think.  We looked at doing that, but it's just not a technically feasible sort of thing in my opinion.

Basically, what you're describing are RPG elements, and we've made a conscious decision to shed all that sort of thing.  I really can't see us going back to that, to be honest, but you never know.  I love story games with memorable characters as much as it sounds like you do (my favorite games are these kinds), but I just don't feel like that sort of thing can be combined with the sort of gameplay we're going for here.  Someday I'll make a tight little non-procedural story-driven game with awesome characters, and that will be loads of fun, but this isn't that game.

I know it's not the news you were hoping for, but I figure there's no point in misleading you and saying "maybe maybe maybe."   

[eRe4s3r]

Thats ok As long as you make that next game for real and don't dawdle around with puzzle games (no offense, but I am no fan of these, even though Tidalis was HILARIOUS story wise / and I mean that in a good way / in the end it was a puzzle game.... although.. It does have a lot of re-playability so thats good... eh.. but Puzzle games.. well they aren't my thing ;p

I guess I am still hoping you push AI War more into a orderly overaching meta-campaign structure first.. hehe

[x4000]

All good.

In terms of AI War, it too is what it is, and there definitely won't ever be an over-arching campaign structure because that would be fundamentally redefining the game.  However, I think Fallen Spire was just the bee's knees and is something I'd like to see us do a lot more of.  So that way of "injecting campaigns into an otherwise procedural world" is something I really like and would like to see more of.

For that matter, post-1.0 I could easily see us doing something like that in AVWW, too.  There are all sorts of interesting possibilities with that, but I don't want to get your hopes up for something that is just speculative there.  With AI War we know that kind of campaign can work and be really, really interesting.  With AVWW we'd have to figure that out from the ground up, and personally I've not even begun to think in that particular direction yet.

I also don't plan on doing another puzzle game, probably ever.   But my wife thanks for you for the compliments on the story, she worked really hard on it.

In terms of the next game after AVWW, my hope is that we can just focus on more more more AI War and AVWW for the next three years or so.  I want both of these to get really big.  The bigger AVWW gets, the more likely I imagine it probably is that we'll want to inject some fallen-spire-type story-type stuff in there somewhere as an optional sub-component, to be honest.  All my favorite games are heavily story-based with memorable characters, and I wanted to be a novelist when I grew up, for crying out loud.  And Keith has even more leanings toward story in games, for that matter.

So who knows.  But you may also notice that there's not a lot of repetition in the types of games that we make.  So in another three years or whenever we are looking to do a fully new game, I really do want to do some sort of epic JRPG in the style of my favorite games ever (FF6 and Chrono Trigger).  And someday I want to tell a story that is as impactful and -- in some respects -- devastating as Silent Hill 2.  To The Moon kind of is that, actually.

That's a whole lot of waffling, perhaps, but it really just means that I don't know what the future holds.  I love story games, but I don't feel that overall AVWW is meant to be a story game (or AI War).  But having sub-elements that are optional and story-focused could be really cool.  It mostly depends on what wider player reaction is to the game, and what people are most interested in seeing us add post-1.0.

[eRe4s3r]

Hah a J-RPG from Arcengames would be awesome But then with proper art-style and all, combat system / travel system split, traveling through cities, arch nemesis, romance and drama, twists and death! Yes? ;P

Chrono Trigger (and that direction) is a great goal to aim for

And yes, please mention my praise for the story in Tidalis. It really made me laugh many times because everything was written so well and often drifted in the weird absurd but still took itself totally serious (which is great ,p) it's kinda funny the best "story" from Arcengames was where nobody expected a good story ;p

[KDR_11k]

I always thought that JRPGs tend to be so formulaic that you could write a random generator that builds a JRPG story out of tropes and have it pass the turing test.

[zebramatt]

I actually think it more likely that any and all JRPGs, procedurally generated or not, would fail a Turing test!

[Dizzard]

Yeah, I do feel like the npcs are lacking in the depth department. That's true.

They might as well be walking signposts for about 95% of gameplay (unless you glyph transfer them)

[eRe4s3r]

I always thought that JRPGs tend to be so formulaic that you could write a random generator that builds a JRPG story out of tropes and have it pass the turing test.

Tales of Symphonia, Grandia 2 and Chrono Trigger would disagree! Although one can always think of things that could be done better in those.

You have a point though.. "modern" JRPG are total.. well, disappointments. But hey, when was the last time you actually played a character driven RPG ? Where you liked the Characters? Western or JRPG ? (For me, Only Mass Effect / Dragon Age Origins comes to mind) - and of course older PC RPG's

I mean, did you look at "The last Story" ? Apparently that is an JRPG and we have such shining choices in dialog as "Accept this Quest Yes/No" or "Be a total idiot/be nice" .. I mean seriously? Just goes to show that Square Enix couldn't produce a proper RPG even if you hit them repeatable with Final Fantasy 7. Even that game has dozens of huge game design flaws (let me not even get started on the grind nature of that game)

On the other hand, The Last Story has some nifty game elements but again complete hilariously badly written characters.

Pickles from Tidalis has more depth than the entire cast of The Last Story combined!

[keith.lamothe]

Pickles from Tidalis has more depth than the entire cast of The Last Story combined!

It's

PIK.
TA.
RA.
MON.
The Terrible.

  (that really should be a purple smiley)