New Comic Thread, Wednesday, June 22 2011

godmode · June 2011

You know what Co-op bothers me? Dragon Age Legends. When dudes use my warrior, I want to get some experience from it, damnit! And the limit on using friends' characters once every few hours is silly.

Hunter · June 2011

TankHammer wrote: »

Who out there actually has anything positive to say about this kind of gimped co-op? What would possess a game designer to create a 2-player experience like this?

Diablo 2 had 8-player co-op with persistent characters eleven years ago.

What is their goddamn problem?

Some people just refuse to learn. It seems so obvious, but there are those that appear to be willfully ignorant of basic fundamentals in games.

I'm honestly baffled how this got through into the game build. Who the fuck plays a dungeon crawler in which playing it doesn't allow your character to obtain wealth, gear, or experience. That is the primary function of playing a dungeon crawler. How could that be overlooked or flat out ignored.

The Geek · June 2011

Sometimes I jump into other people's games in Fable 3 and just start murdering all the citizens I can find.

Because hey, my character is evil.

Jars · June 2011

lets take basic principles from the most successful co-op dungeon crawl ever by a large magnitude and not include them in our game.

Rolo · June 2011

the dungeon siege games were always filled with this kind of stupid bullshit when it comes to multiplayer

diablo 2's leveling mechanics and game structure were almost all based on playing it over battle.net, and then the single player aspects were fleshed out from that model

most other action RPGs seem to approach it the other way around, so you can get a competent single player but then things just fall apart when you want to play with friends, or lord help you, the general public

Druhim · June 2011

That's a good point. So many action RPGs have had pretty terrible multiplayer to be honest. While it isn't as bad as this, look at how clunky multiplayer is for Borderlands.

Artreus · June 2011

Druhim wrote: »

That's a good point. So many action RPGs have had pretty terrible multiplayer to be honest. While it isn't as bad as this, look at how clunky multiplayer is for Borderlands.

Yeah it is so clunky. If borderlands 2, assuming there will be one, fixes that, it would be fantastic. And I just won't play it on somebody elses console, because I don't want to play borderlands without getting all the cool weapons for myself.

Butters · June 2011

Lucascraft wrote: »

New Vegas was simply not as good as Fallout 3, despite some improvements to the game mechanics, and Obsidian failed to fix or improve on many of the game crippling bugs that were present in FO3. Oh and New Vegas had a whole slew of new bugs as well.

New Vegas improved a lot more than just game mechanics but yeah they really shit the bed in the bug department. At least Fallout 3 was playable on 360.

Gaslight · June 2011

Is...is this really a true fact about Dungeon Siege III? Well there goes any little shred of interest I had in that game.

LTM · June 2011

I was going to speculate about somehow power-leveling people using this mechanic, but I don't even think I want to try and rationalize...

Rolo · June 2011

yeah, the best I can think of in terms of having the right idea is Guild Wars, which straddled the line between Diablo 2 multiplay and MMO play

although they still managed to get as many things wrong with Guild Wars as they got right

Edcrab · June 2011

Lucascraft wrote: »

New Vegas was simply not as good as Fallout 3, despite some improvements to the game mechanics, and Obsidian failed to fix or improve on many of the game crippling bugs that were present in FO3. Oh and New Vegas had a whole slew of new bugs as well.

It wasn't perfect by any means but I enjoyed NV a hell of a lot more than Fallout 3. Despite the wall-to-wall bugs and weirdness it just... felt better, somehow. Look at me supplying an enlightening critique

But ruining co-op like this by removing your partner's advancement/loot? That's just baffling. On the plus side, I'm sure it's something that could be addressed with a patch if they got their act together

Even the first Dungeon Siege had fuller co-op functionality. Weird design choice

Gaslight · June 2011

For my money NV had nice gameplay revisions and overall better characters and writing, but FO3 had better story and atmosphere.

But there have been plenty of threads to have the Fo3/NV debate in.

Black_Heart · June 2011

Didn't Dungeon Siege 1 and 2 revolve around actual co-op with teams of your friends, fighting, leveling up, obtaining loot together? I specifically remember doing that with my friends in the previous 2 games.

So this is a step backwards. They actually took out a feature that was present in the previous two games? Who made that decision?

I played the demo and it seems like they just want to make an average single player RPG and call it Dungeon Siege.

Rolo · June 2011

Black_Heart wrote: »

Didn't Dungeon Siege 1 and 2 revolve around actual co-op with teams of your friends, fighting, leveling up, obtaining loot together? I specifically remember doing that with my friends in the previous 2 games.

So this is a step backwards. They actually took out a feature that was present in the previous two games? Who made that decision?

I played the demo and it seems like they just want to make an average single player RPG and call it Dungeon Siege.

I believe the first two games were created by Gas Powered Games, and were only for PC.

This latest one is done by Obsidian and it's multiplatform for consoles as well, so it's not as simple to make it multiplayer-friendly, and really from the design it sounds like the multiplay was just "bolted on" to the single player campaign.

Really, it doesn't have much to do with the first two games.

jwalk · June 2011

The Geek wrote: »

Sometimes I jump into other people's games in Fable 3 and just start murdering all the citizens I can find.

Because hey, my character is evil.

when I was a guide for Everquest people would try to use this rationale when they were caught greifing other players.. "but I'm evil.. see I'm role-playing.."

yeah, I would summon their character to the middle of the ocean where they would get eaten by sharks... "oh ok, me too".

The Geek · June 2011

jwalk wrote: »

The Geek wrote: »

Sometimes I jump into other people's games in Fable 3 and just start murdering all the citizens I can find.

Because hey, my character is evil.

when I was a guide for Everquest people would try to use this rationale when they were caught greifing other players.. "but I'm evil.. see I'm role-playing.."

yeah, I would summon their character to the middle of the ocean where they would get eaten by sharks... "oh ok, me too".

I think killing citizens in other people's games doesn't have any kind of real impact, though.

Darmak · June 2011

jwalk wrote: »

The Geek wrote: »

Sometimes I jump into other people's games in Fable 3 and just start murdering all the citizens I can find.

Because hey, my character is evil.

when I was a guide for Everquest people would try to use this rationale when they were caught greifing other players.. "but I'm evil.. see I'm role-playing.."

yeah, I would summon their character to the middle of the ocean where they would get eaten by sharks... "oh ok, me too".

That reminds me of Fansy the bard

Seg · June 2011

The Geek wrote: »

jwalk wrote: »

The Geek wrote: »

Sometimes I jump into other people's games in Fable 3 and just start murdering all the citizens I can find.

Because hey, my character is evil.

when I was a guide for Everquest people would try to use this rationale when they were caught greifing other players.. "but I'm evil.. see I'm role-playing.."

yeah, I would summon their character to the middle of the ocean where they would get eaten by sharks... "oh ok, me too".

I think killing citizens in other people's games doesn't have any kind of real impact, though.

Killing Citizens in your own game doesn't have much of an impact, except your next time through the people who spawned to replace the dead have a higher chance of running away from you.

MalReynolds · June 2011

rfilyaw wrote: »

I've been playing Secret of Mana again recently. 1993 had better co-op than 2011 does.

Except that it's kind of the exact same co-op that DSIII is running. You couldn't take your Secret of Mana character off the cart and take it back home with you, you could just jump in and help your buddies out.

It's essentially a cart-based co-op experience, but... online. Which is stupid.

If you have someone on a couch who can play the whole thing with you, the only thing they're really missing is cheevos, but outside of that, it's a very old school approach to the whole co-op thing. Reminds me a lot of Baldur's Gate: Dark Alliance/Champions of Norrath in that regard.

Not that it's not stupid.

Coldbrand · June 2011

The best multiplayer is Phantasy Star Online.

The Geek · June 2011

Man, I remember when 4 player games were a big deal on consoles. Very few games had them, and you had to get a special splitter to play. But it was always cool and fun. I'd play games I didn't even care for that much just to be able to play more than just two players. Like Madden 96.

ThatDudeOverThere · June 2011

newspost is up

A Dabble Of Thelonius · June 2011

I really enjoyed Dungeon Siege 2, up to the point where the loot leveling system got idiotic.

Oh hey a new staff for my wizard. Oh. Ok, I need 45 Strength to use it. Ok, let's see here. Only way to raise Strength is...Ok. Melee combat. Hmm.

Oh hey a new bow for my archer. Must have Intelligence 56? Hmmm.

Oh hey a new sword for my etc etc etc Uninstall.

LTM · June 2011

Darmak wrote: »

jwalk wrote: »

The Geek wrote: »

Sometimes I jump into other people's games in Fable 3 and just start murdering all the citizens I can find.

Because hey, my character is evil.

when I was a guide for Everquest people would try to use this rationale when they were caught greifing other players.. "but I'm evil.. see I'm role-playing.."

yeah, I would summon their character to the middle of the ocean where they would get eaten by sharks... "oh ok, me too".

That reminds me of Fansy the bard

The first thing I thought of was the guild in EQ that got raided during an in-game funeral, but all I can find is references to it happening in WoW...

Also, holy shit I remember #5 from this, ah EQ...

edit: I don't read anything I post, ever.

Caulk Bite 6 · June 2011

Woodroez wrote: »

Caulk Bite 6 wrote: »

well, I can only assume that it's a step up from (pretty sure) fable 2's co-op, where it didn't even let the second player use their character. everything else seems to fit though.

Yes, you can assume that.

You'd be wrong, though.

so dungeon siege 3 also doesn't let you use your own character as the second player?

jwalk · June 2011

yeah I quit before they opened the "no rules" PVP server (which then had to make rules because of Fansy...)

luckily I was guide on a non PVP server, but of course people still found ways to fuck with other players..

(aaand then they found themselves in the middle of the ocean surrounded by sharks 15 levels higher than them...)

Wren · June 2011

wait wait

is this a real thing? I mean.. they made 2 other games that didn't do this so where would they get the idea

Jars · June 2011

The Geek wrote: »

Man, I remember when 4 player games were a big deal on consoles. Very few games had them, and you had to get a special splitter to play. But it was always cool and fun. I'd play games I didn't even care for that much just to be able to play more than just two players. Like Madden 96.

I remember one... was it nightmare on elm street? I think that's what it was. too bad the game was pretty shitty.

that and the powerpad but those didn't take controllers

Caulk Bite 6 · June 2011

Jars wrote: »

The Geek wrote: »

Man, I remember when 4 player games were a big deal on consoles. Very few games had them, and you had to get a special splitter to play. But it was always cool and fun. I'd play games I didn't even care for that much just to be able to play more than just two players. Like Madden 96.

I remember one... was it nightmare on elm street? I think that's what it was. too bad the game was pretty shitty.

that and the powerpad but those didn't take controllers

I had the splitter for Super Bomerman. that was fun times.

Lord Dave · June 2011

Tycho quoted the new Weird Al album at the bottom of the newspost
What a nerd

Darmak · June 2011

Weird Al has a new album? What the shit, why didn't anyone tell me

Peccavi · June 2011

Wren wrote: »

wait wait

is this a real thing? I mean.. they made 2 other games that didn't do this so where would they get the idea

It's made by a different developer. And Obsidian sabotages every game because they're terrified of success.

Fiaryn · June 2011

Gaslight wrote: »

For my money NV had nice gameplay revisions and overall better characters and writing, but FO3 had better story and atmosphere.

But there have been plenty of threads to have the Fo3/NV debate in.

I literally cannot fathom the idea that FO3 had a better story.

It's almost identical to the plot of FO2 wrt to the Enclave but with a Brotherhood of Steel that acts nothing like the Brotherhood of Steel so people could have an obvious good guy to side with, and a Dad who you decide to help even if you're a ravenous monster who devours the flesh of the fallen. Shit at least in New Vegas you can side with the Legion if you're super negative karma and it'll make sense.

Oh and I like how the Super Mutant thing never got any resolution, like it was just out and out forgotten.

As for Dungeon Siege though, I imagine it's the same issue as Neverwinter Nights 2, the base campaign that is. It's a case of Obsidian trying to be something it's not.

Raiden333 · June 2011

Man

Tycho's newspost makes me REALLY fucking want a new Descent game.

easily my favorite shooter series ever.

The Geek · June 2011

Lord Dave wrote: »

Tycho quoted the new Weird Al album at the bottom of the newspost
What a nerd

I think he's done that for the last couple albums.

Darmak wrote: »

Weird Al has a new album? What the shit, why didn't anyone tell me

Umm..

Peccavi · June 2011

To be fair, no one had any reason to think that was a Weird Al thread without first knowing not only that a new album was coming, but also knowing what the album was called.

The Geek · June 2011

Peccavi wrote: »

To be fair, no one had any reason to think that was a Weird Al thread without first knowing not only that a new album was coming, but also knowing what the album was called.

It was named a few other things before that. Most people instantly figured it out when it was called "War. Pestilence. Famine. Polka."

Der Waffle Mous · June 2011

Well, at least this time it isn't a good series that obsidian is screwing up.

Lucascraft · June 2011

Yeah, Gas Powered already ruined their own franchise when they made Space Siege. HAH. Space Siege. What a bad game.

Penny Arcade

New Comic Thread, Wednesday, June 22 2011

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