Torment External News Thread

[Brother None]

This thread is for all media/blog/youtube/other coverage not directly from inXile.
For all the latest check the Torment tumblr.

[Brother None]

Fan-run Italian Torment RPG blog has an interview with Kevin (Italian and English both)

I really love the idea behind “Crises”, but I’m curious to know how exactly are you guys planning to handle them? Mainly trough text - in choose-your-own-adventure fashion - or through “normal” gameplay? Will they incorporate puzzle-solving elements, instant death events and other challenges? What are the pros and the cons of Crises compared to a more “system-oriented” approach to non-lethal gameplay ( i.e. stealth/hacking in Deus Ex/Vampire: the Masquerade - Bloodlines)?

Crises occur in the framework of normal gameplay, but are separate from exploration or conversation gameplay, much like real-time exploration is separate from combat in some classic RPGs. For example, we expect for the interface and some of your options to change when you’re in a Crisis (e.g., we may find that different game camera options are best for Crisis gameplay than for when you’re exploring the world). They won’t be choose-your-own-adventure style; text will be a part of them, but in the same way as it is throughout the rest of the game, with you potentially engaging in (limited duration) conversations and examining items in the environment. I think it’s accurate to say that Crises will include puzzle-solving elements. We won’t blindside players with unpredictable instant death, but you’ll pay the consequences if you’re careless.

The main reasons we are looking at this approach (as compared to the approach in the examples you give) have to do with compartmentalizing these experiences, which provides benefits such as:

We can safely create the environments throughout all of the parts of the game that don’t have Crises even while we’re still iterating on Crisis design. So we can take the time necessary to flesh out our Crises and best understand what they require from their environments without putting the rest of environment creation on hold. This is especially important because we expect iteration on our 2D prerendered environments to be more challenging than for a 3D game.
We can consider more extreme abilities and reactivity (i.e., choice and consequences).
This approach allows us to handcraft the major encounters, simultaneously blending non-combat elements into them. We promised early that our encounters would be thoughtful and strategic, and Crises allow us to live up to that promise.
The primary potential disadvantage is that the Crises (and thus combat) will feel less seamless. This affects the pacing of the game in ways that could be either good or bad depending upon the specifics. But we do risk some loss of immersion.

[Brother None]

https://twitter.com/SaundersKevin/statu ... 2732961793
@adamheine Consistently great work on #torment. Would you accept promotion to Design Lead?

https://twitter.com/adamheine/status/403026958545461248
Re: Lead Designer for Torment. It's basically the same work as before, but now I can't blame failures on @SaundersKevin or @ColinMcComb.

Congrats to Adam! Great designer, awesome core team.

[veryalien]

Congrats to Adam.

What does that mean in terms of where Torment preproduction is?

[Brother None]

Really good, indepth questions and answers in this interview with Adam on the Italian Torment blog

Also, you can now ask Adam anything on his own blog

[Crosmando]

Good interview, Adam Heine sounds like a good cRPG designer who has the right ideas, also surprisingly that he seems traditionalist on RPG design - maybe because he has lived outside the US/West and thus hasn't been influenced by "modern game design" ideology?

Either way a good sign that he has a good attitude toward adapting tabletop mechanics, many designers nowadays would just dismiss entirely the idea that cRPGs are supposed to be based on P&P RPGs, but he embraces it.

But what about savescumming? What if the player saves/reloads until he succeeds at every task? Won’t he just breeze through the game?

Sort of. I mean, savescumming isn’t exactly a breeze; it’s still work, especially to get past tasks that you shouldn’t normally succeed at. I know. I’m a savescummer.

Generally, if someone wants to savescum their way through a game, I don’t think it’s the developer’s job to stop them (though we shouldn’t encourage it either). Some gamers prefer to see how well they can succeed at a game, and saving/reloading is a part of that. Others prefer to press through failures, to see if they can beat the game in spite of them. In both cases, players are playing the game the way they want to. Torment will implement a few things to encourage people to play through (e.g. “failure is interesting,” above), but we’re not going to go out of our way to stop people from playing the game the way they want. Even in a purely deterministic system, savescummers *points at self* are gonna savescum.

Absolutely perfect, right in the face of those who dis randomness/dice-rolls in RPGs.

[-Archangel-]

Well yes, unless their RNG generator is as broken as the one in WL2. When I tried to repair the comm tower, with 70% chance to succeed, I failed 3 times in row

[Crosmando]

You'd be surprised how many bright, educated people don't understand how probability works these days.

[Woolfe]

http://youtu.be/NbInZ5oJ0bc

Indeed

[Adam Heine]

Good interview, Adam Heine sounds like a good cRPG designer who has the right ideas, also surprisingly that he seems traditionalist on RPG design - maybe because he has lived outside the US/West and thus hasn't been influenced by "modern game design" ideology?

It's not entirely due to living outside the US, but yes, my influences skew older. I have on many occasions been surprised by the assumptions backers, or even my colleagues, have made about what this game is going to be like, only to discover that the assumption has been "the thing to do" for the last several years.

Although the comparisons to Mass Effect still baffle me. It's a totally fun game, but I think it's a stretch to call it a CRPG

[Arcanix]

But what about savescumming? What if the player saves/reloads until he succeeds at every task? Won’t he just breeze through the game?

Sort of. I mean, savescumming isn’t exactly a breeze; it’s still work, especially to get past tasks that you shouldn’t normally succeed at. I know. I’m a savescummer.

The reason this came to be is that in some games, back when, quest/plot specific uniques got lost in failures with or without the ability to save. Through time this has developed to a "perfect gaming experience" thing.

[SniperHF]

Avellone talking Torment on Matt Chat
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=06YvwO3V ... Qfe-wNS8oA

[Brother None]

Matt Chatt with MCA is quite good, he covers quite a lot on the setting and game's systems, though I don't think it has much new for people who follow us very closely.

Speaking of interviews: Adam Heine, Colin McComb, George Ziets and Jeremy Kopman all answer questions on RPG Codex.

[dorkboy]

fascinating interview.
any heads up on the "tech demo" that was being hinted at some time ago?

[Brother None]

Not entirely sure what you're referring to, what tech demo?

[dorkboy]

edit: it seems 'tech demo' was just my faulty memory confusing the PE tech licensing update with this statement by Mr. Fargo (via GamesBeat, february 19th.):
Update: Torment is still in heavy preproduction, inXile CEO Brian Fargo told GamesBeat. The team has generated about 800 pages of design documents and a prototype for one of the crisis areas. “We are working on some beautiful new screens, which we hope to show in the next 90 days or so,” he said. “We are thankful for the long design stage we were given thanks to crowdfunding.”

screens would be nice, though.

[Brother None]

Great interview with Kevin, Adam and Jeremy on Gry-Online

[dorkboy]

yep, indeed a good interview that seems to cover all the bases.
the only thing that slightly worries me, due to its vagueness, is this bit:

[...]With this focus, we’re hopeful that we can craft each situation to be as responsive and reactive to a player’s choices as possible. Since we can’t be quite as flexible as a human GM, we’re investigating UI elements and approaches to the environment art to help players understand what they can interact with and how, as well as knowing what to expect to happen when they do so. [...]

with the whole panic about possible player pixel hunting popping up like psilocybin mushrooms in cowpies lately, what are the odds of such a feature/set of features not eclipsing or clashing with the environment art?
will it be full Tactical Arnold-Vision (tm) whenever the game goes into Crisis mode?
will interactive objects stand out like sore thumbs backlit by green, glowy oozes of cheap outline?
is it being designed to be fool proof?

[shaigunjoe]

http://youtu.be/NbInZ5oJ0bc

Indeed

And this.

http://search.dilbert.com/comic/Random% ... 0Generator

[dorkboy]

RPGnuke interviews Colin McComb: http://www.rpgnuke.ru/articles/site/del ... b_eng.html