2020 Miscellaneous Links: Untitled Moose Game

[NotMiki]

Rosa Parks persona incoming.

IT WOULD BE THE BEST THING

[AndrewRogue]

I really stand by want something like Fate/America

Saber: Jim Bowie
Lancer: Neil Armstrong
Archer: Billy the Kid
Caster: Nikola Tesla
Berserker: Ol' Yeller
Assassin: The Second Gunman on the Grassy Knoll
Rider: Rosa Parks

Entirely for having a bus Noble Phantasm.

[SnowFire]

Not enough gratuitous nonsensical gender swapping Andy, 0/10.  Needs more Theodora Roosevelt or whatever.

I'm not sure why there's any fear Persona's fanbase would whine about that, SMT has already used a bunch of historical / quasi-historical figures who became legends as summonable spirits a la Joan of Arc, Masakado, Guan Yu, etc., so Zorro or Captain Kidd make perfect sense.

[Anthony Edward Stark]

Fallout 4 has decided that having SPECIAL and skills be two things that are different is too complicated for its audience.  Apparently it "spread choices too thin" to have, you know, actual choices instead of an infinite levelling treadmill until you maximized everything.

[Grefter]

Let's take a series that is rooted on a GURPS style system, then let's get rid of skills.

That said I am sure it will still be an okay post apocalyptic not Fallout game.

[Anthony Edward Stark]

It will be Skyrim with guns, just like Fallout 3 was Oblivion with guns.

[Grefter]

Yeah and when I pretend it isn't trying to be Fallout, that was better than Oblivion was, so Skyrim with guns I might be more positive about than I was about Skyrim (which is a 2/10 game for me or an 8/10 game and I still don't fucking know).

But yes in terms of not getting the point, removing skills from the SPECIAL system rates pretty high up there.

[Fenrir]

i think the exact opposite:
- the old system was very dated and it was time for a change. Fallout 1 and 2 could be very intimidating like only old PC RPGs could be. Too many fucking skill points, need more discrete choices. Vampire Bloodlines had even more choice but it handled skill points more gracefully.
- that said all things point to Fallout 4 being super boring like every Bethesda game and I don't know how anyone who played New Vegas could go back to this. Also level scaling

[Sierra]

- that said all things point to Fallout 4 being super boring like every Bethesda game and I don't know how anyone who played New Vegas could go back to this. Also level scaling

I'm sure super high Metacritic and fan adoration is inevitable anyway and this response will be just as baffling to me as it was with FO3. Sometimes I just don't understand human behavior. Zero interest in the game personally just because the two Bethesda-developed games I've played left me with no respect for their skills at worldbuilding or storytelling.

I think replacing a skill system that actually requires you to make character choices with a leveling treadmill a la Skyrim is pretty lame, but that said, you could definitely max out all stats and skills in New Vegas too if you really wanted to and were willing to abuse an exploit.

[The Duck]

I think the question in VSM's topic about what you don't get could have easily have been Fallout 3. Save for the choice to blow up Megaton, there isn't much that is memorable there, and I sunk a lot of hours walking around trying and failing to find anything else interesting (there was a tower with ghouls and humans or something?). On the other hand, New Vegas is something I have to urge to go back to every few months.

The only thing I've seen in the promotional things for Fallout 4 that excites me is that there is a dog, but if the writing is perfunctory and the world is huge but empty and I won't care about it at all. Changing the setting to Boston doesn't provide very much interest and Skyrim with guns sounds really boring to me.

[Ranmilia]

Just go replay Bloodlines.

[The Duck]

Full disclosure: I never finished Bloodlines because I got to a point where the game kept crashing. I really liked it but should try another normal playthrough and then do Malkavian at some point. I'll pick it up on Steam when it's on sale.

[Grefter]

Fan patch is super solid, I just finished a play through, do recommend.

I am okay with changing the system in Fallout Fen.  It is just doing this is super embelematic of how Bethesda approach the license.  Oh here is a thing from Fallout, let's take it, completely change it to the point where it is no longer anything like the old thing (for good or bad!), but let's keep calling it the thing because the name is what makes it Fallout!

It treats branding like a label you just peal off and resticker on to something.  SPECIAL without skills is just a stock standard stat system (instead of a GURPS rip off with the name changed).  Super mutants on the opposite coast from where FEV was released in an isolated space are not really Supermutants as they stood in Fallout.  The Brotherhood of Steel that are actually Wasteland Paladins instead of isolationist tech hoarders are not really the Brotherhood of Steel.

It makes for a functional game and can be fun and good, but it is super shitty at actually being Fallout.

And the thing is, NV clearly shows you can do it in that engine.  Obsidian really brought Skills back to the forefront, but nah just raw stats will do the same job and we will get to/have to completely overhaul perks while we are at it.

Edit - oh yeah.  Of course Fallout 4 has a Dog in it.  Fallout 1 had Dogmeat.  Fallout 2 had K-9 and Dogmeat in a secret area to reference how Fallout is an homage to Mad Max.  So that means every Fallout game has to have Dogmeat because a dog called Dogmeat is Fallout tm.

[Anthony Edward Stark]

Speech and barter are really the only problems that not even FONV could find a way to make more than a pass/fail in dialog.  Skills that used to be pass/fail checks gating options like repair and science were tied into crafting in a meaningful way at last.  Outdoorsman was even fun.  SPECIAL + stats is like the difference between talent and proficiency and removing one kind of misses the point.  It was a real big problem with FO3 as well, where raising SPECIAL was really mundane and it was trivial to have 10s in everything at the end.

[Fenrir]

If you want a dog in your vidcons, may I suggest

https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/143870832/home-free-0

[Sierra]

Changing the setting to Boston doesn't provide very much interest and Skyrim with guns sounds really boring to me.

I didn't even know they were doing the east coast again. So copy all that stuff I wrote after playing FO3 about how dumb it was to lift all the established Fallout-y elements and move them throusands of miles away where they make zero sense outside their context of origin just for self-indulgent look our hometown is in this game reasons, and drop all that here.

[Grefter]

But Boston could be a pretty cool city for a post apocalyptic video game.  Especially if it is potentially one set some time after there has been potentially some revitalisation of the north east and there clearly being an established nation state up (at least on the east coast) of Canada in this setting (from FO3 rather than it being tied to any other parts of canon).

It has potential to be interesting.

[Anthony Edward Stark]

The only thing I liked about Fallout 3's setting was that people on the East Coast were still living in craters and scavenging for food out of grocery stores at the time the West Coast has developed multiple nation-state governments and has reliable industrial, communication and transportation infrastructures.  West Coast best coast.

[Grefter]

https://www.indiegogo.com/projects/indivisible-an-rpg-by-lab-zero-and-505-games#/

Lab Zero is proud to announce that we’re partnering with 505 Games to develop a new action/RPG, currently titled Indivisible.

Indivisible is inspired by classics like Valkyrie Profile and Super Metroid, but with the unique character, world, and gameplay depth Lab Zero is known for, and will feature a stunning soundtrack by legendary Japanese game music composer, Hiroki Kikuta.

Seemed like a thing that the DL would generally like?  I haven't backed for a couple of reasons, but mostly wanted to bring to people's attention.

[Fenrir]

http://www.ibtimes.com/florida-candidate-us-senate-augustus-sol-invictus-sacrificed-goat-drank-its-blood-2128507

K so one guy renamed himself AUGUSTUS SOL INVICTUS and he's running for senator.
Also he sacrificed a goat and drank its blood.


And source wikipedia:

Invictus has issued a call for "total insurrection", saying to his followers:

“I do not want you to vote, so much as I want you to wake up. I want you to drop out and tune in. I want you to take LSD and practice sorcery. I want you to listen to trap music and black metal, to learn the law and to break it deliberately, to find your own religion. I want you to learn the use of firearms and subject yourselves to rigorous physical training. I want you to treat your bodies as Holy Temples and to take your girlfriend to a strip club so you can seduce a dancer in the back room. I want you to worship Nature and dance naked in the moonlight ‘round the fire, screaming in ecstatic joy. I want you to revolt. Raise Hell. Break your limitations. Renounce your life and go into the Wilderness, that God may speak to you of things to come.”

[DjinnAndTonic]

Cool advertising tactic. Can't wait for his new album to hit shelves.

[Grefter]

Pretty sure this is the opening track.
Or maybe it was this.

[SnowFire]

http://www.usgamer.net/articles/a-voice-for-ivalice-the-localization-and-voice-acting-of-final-fantasy-xii

Alexander O. Smith is still the man.  Explains various tricks in the fantastic localization of FF12.  I especially liked this bit, my kind of change:

Another kind of localization was a little more subtle. Where Japanese games are often very comfortable breaking immersion to deliver in-game information, Western gamers tend to prefer more wholesale immersion. So in one place in Rabanastre where the player, as Vaan, encounters a chocobo vendor, the Japanese had the vendor explain to the player that the big yellow birds he saw behind him were chocobos, and that they could be ridden. If we're in character as Vaan, of course, this is very immersion-breaking, as a street-wise orphan would certainly know what a chocobo was. So, the English version has the vendor lamenting that some guy rode off on one of his chocobos the other day without paying. It's the same information as the Japanese provides (the birds are called chocobos, you can ride them, and you have to pay for the privilege), but couched very differently.

https://twitter.com/RoboRosewater/status/626827292929589249

RoboRosewater still exists as IRC reminded me recently.  I like this adorable art to one of the earliest cards the machine made.

[Hunter Sopko]

http://www.usgamer.net/articles/a-voice-for-ivalice-the-localization-and-voice-acting-of-final-fantasy-xii

Alexander O. Smith is still the man.  Explains various tricks in the fantastic localization of FF12.  I especially liked this bit, my kind of change:

Another kind of localization was a little more subtle. Where Japanese games are often very comfortable breaking immersion to deliver in-game information, Western gamers tend to prefer more wholesale immersion. So in one place in Rabanastre where the player, as Vaan, encounters a chocobo vendor, the Japanese had the vendor explain to the player that the big yellow birds he saw behind him were chocobos, and that they could be ridden. If we're in character as Vaan, of course, this is very immersion-breaking, as a street-wise orphan would certainly know what a chocobo was. So, the English version has the vendor lamenting that some guy rode off on one of his chocobos the other day without paying. It's the same information as the Japanese provides (the birds are called chocobos, you can ride them, and you have to pay for the privilege), but couched very differently.

FUCK YOU PERFECT DIRECT TRANSLATION OR NO TRANSLATION HUUUUUUURRRRRRRR

[Fenrir]

Woah nice. I wonder what part the translation had in making FF12's writing so much better than the other mainline FFs. Probably a pretty big part (despite Matsuno)