Yeah, interest -1,000 right there. That system makes it sound like it's basically just a shooter where the guns are randomized and you have to unlock key gameplay features (passive health regen, ammo supply) using skill points. Based on that almost entirely passive skill system there's not really a whole lot of 'RPG' to this FPS/RPG, and since the RPG was about 95% of my interest was on the skill planning and character designing side I think this most likely just became a bargain bin title for me. I'll wait for more detailed info, but that sounds like a pretty big buzzkill to me.
It's like an FPS, but instead of thinking "gee I wish I could survive more shots/ my shots did more damage/ I could point my gun more accurately/ I could just sneak past these guys", you can think that, allocate skill points, and actually do it. Think of it as an FPS that you can customise to your particular playstyle, along with tonnes of guns, Diablo loot, etc.
The question is whether the skill customization really changes your playstyle. Passively changing your firing rate, crit percentage, or damage will not change the way you play the game. Going medic will. The question is how many trees are like the medic and how many are just different types of damage/survivability boosters.
The skill information has made me more cautious about the game. Instead of getting it day one, I think I will wait for more detailed information about the trees or until people here have played it.
I think that the classes will have the differences that you're looking for, while the skills will be more like Diablo. In D2 if you're, say, a fire sorc, you play the same way as a lightning or ice sorc, just with different spell sprites and damage values. The core gameplay doesn't change. Same with barbarian, A whirwind barb plays about the same as a frenzy barb. What they're doing is basically giving you a few playstyles in the form of classes, and then the ability to specialise your role in that class the way you like.
Like other people are saying, it's an FPS first, but it's giving you a lot more options than most FPSs about how you play the game, and allowing customisation to make your character slightly different to other people's take on that style.
Also, passively changing your firing rate, crit percentage, or damage does change playstyle. You're going to play a lot differently if you always up your damage output compared to if you up your defense, for example.
Just read the thread that was linked earlier. Seems to me like you really can't label all the skills as passive in the traditional sense. There definitely will be skills that do +X% health/dmg/whatever but there's also skills that give an aoe heal on kill, party damage buff on headshot and stuff like that.
The skill system is less like the rpg/mmo "here's a hojillion active skills" and more like "hey we just made your melee/stealth/turret/bird even MORE badass".
And based on what I read skills will most definitely impact your role in the game.
Just read the thread that was linked earlier. Seems to me like you really can't label all the skills as passive in the traditional sense. There definitely will be skills that do +X% health/dmg/whatever but there's also skills that give an aoe heal on kill, party damage buff on headshot and stuff like that.
The skill system is less like the rpg/mmo "here's a hojillion active skills" and more like "hey we just made your melee/stealth/turret/bird even MORE badass".
And based on what I read skills will most definitely impact your role in the game.
I really like the sound of the aoe heal on kill, because healers are often weaker and need to sit back a bit, but this gives a strong advantage to creating a healer with serious damage ability. It's always good to see skills that reward more of a multipurpose character than specialisation in a thin field, useless in all others.
A total of 3(2 at a time) active abilities per class does not sound like nearly enough.
Here's an ability you can use, it's called point your fucking gun at someone and blow their goddamn head off. :P
edit: what I mean is, this is a goddamn first person shooter, not an RPG. It has a few RPG elements in it, but first and foremost it's a shooter in which you run and gun and blow shit up. I don't know why so many people keep thinking it's the next Diablo or something and get all butthurt when they discover it isn't.
I goddamn hadn't gone into goddamn depth with the game, poring over fucking goddamn every piece of info.
I thought the action might have been more in the vein of Hellgate, with a mixture of skill usage and shooting, and that probably would have pleased me more.
Yeah, I think a lot of people don't seem to realize this is first and foremost a FPS. From what I can tell it's hte polar opposite of Fallout 3. Fallout 3 was an RPG with FPS element, where Borderlands is a FPS with RPG elements.
Yeah, interest -1,000 right there. That system makes it sound like it's basically just a shooter where the guns are randomized and you have to unlock key gameplay features (passive health regen, ammo supply) using skill points. Based on that almost entirely passive skill system there's not really a whole lot of 'RPG' to this FPS/RPG, and since the RPG was about 95% of my interest was on the skill planning and character designing side I think this most likely just became a bargain bin title for me. I'll wait for more detailed info, but that sounds like a pretty big buzzkill to me.
It's like an FPS, but instead of thinking "gee I wish I could survive more shots/ my shots did more damage/ I could point my gun more accurately/ I could just sneak past these guys", you can think that, allocate skill points, and actually do it. Think of it as an FPS that you can customise to your particular playstyle, along with tonnes of guns, Diablo loot, etc.
The question is whether the skill customization really changes your playstyle. Passively changing your firing rate, crit percentage, or damage will not change the way you play the game. Going medic will. The question is how many trees are like the medic and how many are just different types of damage/survivability boosters.
The skill information has made me more cautious about the game. Instead of getting it day one, I think I will wait for more detailed information about the trees or until people here have played it.
This. Passive boosts, if they dominate, dictate whether it's actually any different in practice to play one class over the other, or one build over the other. From what I've seen of the game in the demonstrations, and based on the skill tree info, it sounds like you'll play the same game essentially the same way no matter which class or spec you choose. And if you play with friends (the main draw of the game) you get most or all of the benefits anyway (via the 'boost to party characteristic X' formula that keeps getting tossed out), potentially making the character building aspect of the game nearly meaningless.
Now, if they do it utterly and completely right in terms of balance such that you have to invest massively in specific skills to open up specific playstyles that differentiate classes and builds, it might still work. Maybe. I'm also not sure why it's suddenly impossible to activate real-time skills in games. It's not like you had to open a pause menu to switch your skills around in Diablo, after all. If you can hotkey to the face buttons you can switch out as needed and still have at least four skills active for 'run and gun' use at all times in combat if you do it right, and swapping them out doesn't have to pause the game for everyone. The medic tree is a good example - it looks like you activate some of your abilities (healing bullets) AND have some passives (area healing when you get the kill). If all the trees are a good mix like that, I can see it working.
Also, my interest level was at over 9000. So a 1000 unit hit, while susbtantial, does not mean that I now hate the game. Just that I'm going to be a lot more wary until I see more details of the other skill trees and can tell if I'll have to open a menu to tell my class or character from the guy next to me.
It was confirmed that there are 10-12 vehicles that you can pilot, although I didn’t come across any during my time with the game.
I know they've said the vehicles are customizable, though exactly how much customization is possible beyond color we don't fully know yet (weapons, armor, propulsion, etc)
@Iron Weasel: It hasn't been confirmed whether splitscreen + LAN will be an option, but certainly 4 consoles/PCs can be LANed together.
I think I read it costs something, probably in-game credits.
Which I'm totally fine with.
I'm not expecting respec'ing to be done at will, eliminating any thought requirements from selecting skills, I just don't want to be penalized by trying out something to see how I like it, and finding out it's crap. Sadly, my days of having hundreds and thousands of spare hours to muck around with Diablo 2 builds are long gone, so being able to sink dozens or hundreds of hours into a single character over months and years and not feeling like I'm only getting 1/3 of the experience is nice.
Forar on
First they came for the Muslims, and we said NOT TODAY, MOTHERFUCKER!
Fifteen New Borderlands Screenshots from GamesCom, has Berserker skill-tree:
Edit: IGN has bigger pictures. For below: Yah I think one of the preview-players at official forum said you could max 1 tree and like half another at max level (or go jack of all trades-route).
Edit2: Actually, you have 45 points at level 50. According to that picture you could get two (maxed) end-tree abilities (need only 5 points total at each step to move to next tier), and with 5 points to spare.
360 controller on the PC or not, they have to recognize that most pc gamers won't use a 360 controller.
If they're 360 shots, that's fine, but I dunno about anyone else but my 360 sure as hell doesn't output to 1920x1200 resolution. Not that that's stopped developers from putting out shots that are way higher res than the game actually runs at, making it look way better than it actually does (I'm looking squarely at you Halo 3. Seriously, why the fuck do the in-game screenshots players take still output at a significantly higher resolution than the game actually plays at?). It's still a lame thing to do.
That talent screen for Brick doesn't look too bad - tanking, big guns, and fisticuffs! I really, really want more detials about how the skills work though. It sounds like there's one big 'activation' skill and then effects, buffs, and procs which could combine for some good character building strategy. It also looks like you could conceivably build some very different Bricks - toe to toe smasher with huge DR, or all out heavy gunner, etc. That's promising.
Still hungry for more details on the skill tree, especially on the abilities in the tiers.
Ironically, one of the ways he heals is by shooting teammates.
One of the guys who was playing as a healer during the press event was complaining that people were cursing him out for being a prick when he was trying to heal them, and that he invariably ran out of ammo because they'd take all the loot while he was trying to heal them back up.
Posts
I think that the classes will have the differences that you're looking for, while the skills will be more like Diablo. In D2 if you're, say, a fire sorc, you play the same way as a lightning or ice sorc, just with different spell sprites and damage values. The core gameplay doesn't change. Same with barbarian, A whirwind barb plays about the same as a frenzy barb. What they're doing is basically giving you a few playstyles in the form of classes, and then the ability to specialise your role in that class the way you like.
Like other people are saying, it's an FPS first, but it's giving you a lot more options than most FPSs about how you play the game, and allowing customisation to make your character slightly different to other people's take on that style.
Also, passively changing your firing rate, crit percentage, or damage does change playstyle. You're going to play a lot differently if you always up your damage output compared to if you up your defense, for example.
The skill system is less like the rpg/mmo "here's a hojillion active skills" and more like "hey we just made your melee/stealth/turret/bird even MORE badass".
And based on what I read skills will most definitely impact your role in the game.
"Time to pull out Big Bertha and take out that tankbug!" "WHRRRRRRRRRRRRRDAKKADAKKADAKKADAKKA"
"Shit, that was Melinda."
So do we know yet, if I want to specialize in heavy weapons, do I have to use brick, or can the soldier guy do it as well/instead?
I really like the sound of the aoe heal on kill, because healers are often weaker and need to sit back a bit, but this gives a strong advantage to creating a healer with serious damage ability. It's always good to see skills that reward more of a multipurpose character than specialisation in a thin field, useless in all others.
http://gbxforums.gearboxsoftware.com/showthread.php?t=72757
I won't bother copy/pasting the info because it's still being updated.
I goddamn hadn't gone into goddamn depth with the game, poring over fucking goddamn every piece of info.
I thought the action might have been more in the vein of Hellgate, with a mixture of skill usage and shooting, and that probably would have pleased me more.
Now, if they do it utterly and completely right in terms of balance such that you have to invest massively in specific skills to open up specific playstyles that differentiate classes and builds, it might still work. Maybe. I'm also not sure why it's suddenly impossible to activate real-time skills in games. It's not like you had to open a pause menu to switch your skills around in Diablo, after all. If you can hotkey to the face buttons you can switch out as needed and still have at least four skills active for 'run and gun' use at all times in combat if you do it right, and swapping them out doesn't have to pause the game for everyone. The medic tree is a good example - it looks like you activate some of your abilities (healing bullets) AND have some passives (area healing when you get the kill). If all the trees are a good mix like that, I can see it working.
Also, my interest level was at over 9000. So a 1000 unit hit, while susbtantial, does not mean that I now hate the game. Just that I'm going to be a lot more wary until I see more details of the other skill trees and can tell if I'll have to open a menu to tell my class or character from the guy next to me.
So does that mean four people on a LAN, or do I need to go on Live! for the full Borderlands experience?
The Division, Warframe (XB1)
GT: Tanith 6227
From an interview last month:
http://www.videogamemedia.com/articles/previews/3012
I know they've said the vehicles are customizable, though exactly how much customization is possible beyond color we don't fully know yet (weapons, armor, propulsion, etc)
@Iron Weasel: It hasn't been confirmed whether splitscreen + LAN will be an option, but certainly 4 consoles/PCs can be LANed together.
You'd damned well better be able to!
*cue 7 page back and forth*
Heh, you can at the "New U" terminals.
I think I read it costs something, probably in-game credits.
Which I'm totally fine with.
I'm not expecting respec'ing to be done at will, eliminating any thought requirements from selecting skills, I just don't want to be penalized by trying out something to see how I like it, and finding out it's crap. Sadly, my days of having hundreds and thousands of spare hours to muck around with Diablo 2 builds are long gone, so being able to sink dozens or hundreds of hours into a single character over months and years and not feeling like I'm only getting 1/3 of the experience is nice.
Edit: IGN has bigger pictures. For below: Yah I think one of the preview-players at official forum said you could max 1 tree and like half another at max level (or go jack of all trades-route).
Edit2: Actually, you have 45 points at level 50. According to that picture you could get two (maxed) end-tree abilities (need only 5 points total at each step to move to next tier), and with 5 points to spare.
Origin: Galedrid - Nintendo: Galedrid/3222-6858-1045
Blizzard: Galedrid#1367 - FFXIV: Galedrid Kingshand
Edit: NVM, IGN has the high res version. Gotta find a version without the damn IGN logo on it though :P
Giant Purple Lobsters!
Well, someone had to get that out of the way.
Still cool though.
Looking at the high-res shots yeah, this'll be a PC buy, not a 360 buy, for me.
For sure.
EDIT: Wasn't it stated before that the lead dev said the PC version would be the version? Why do those shots have all the 360 controls on them.
I hate PC games that have all the menus referring to console controls.
Origin: Galedrid - Nintendo: Galedrid/3222-6858-1045
Blizzard: Galedrid#1367 - FFXIV: Galedrid Kingshand
Totp fff
playing on PCs with 360 controllers :P
Registered just for the Mass Effect threads | Steam: click ^^^ | Origin: curlyhairedboy
Who is terrible enough to do such a thing?
If they're 360 shots, that's fine, but I dunno about anyone else but my 360 sure as hell doesn't output to 1920x1200 resolution. Not that that's stopped developers from putting out shots that are way higher res than the game actually runs at, making it look way better than it actually does (I'm looking squarely at you Halo 3. Seriously, why the fuck do the in-game screenshots players take still output at a significantly higher resolution than the game actually plays at?). It's still a lame thing to do.
Origin: Galedrid - Nintendo: Galedrid/3222-6858-1045
Blizzard: Galedrid#1367 - FFXIV: Galedrid Kingshand
Take note kids. Drugs are bad.
EDIT: Oh god that means that the Siren...
Still hungry for more details on the skill tree, especially on the abilities in the tiers.
One of the guys who was playing as a healer during the press event was complaining that people were cursing him out for being a prick when he was trying to heal them, and that he invariably ran out of ammo because they'd take all the loot while he was trying to heal them back up.
Origin: Galedrid - Nintendo: Galedrid/3222-6858-1045
Blizzard: Galedrid#1367 - FFXIV: Galedrid Kingshand
That's one of his other trees, I think.