Shadowrun Shadowrun: Hong Kong Pre-Release Discussion [GO TO NEW THREAD]

[Durante]

What a fucking stupid stretch goal.

"Have a second really short campaign." WHY?????

Reasons I can think of:

• Unlike core gameplay goals or content expansions, it doesn't blow up the production schedule for the actual main game, which is something pretty much every single overfunded kickstarter project struggles (and generally fails) to avoid.
• It allows them to experiment with some really dense high-level content, which could be interesting compared to the existing campaign patterns.
• They can sell it as DLC to non-backers.

All of these sound like pretty good reasons to me.

 

[Transfiguring Roar]

Considering that they are only aiming for a 20 hr main campaign they don't have a leg to stand on trying to justify a separate 4-5 hrs module.

If their track record is anything to go by (DF-DC...) it'll be more than 20hrs. They have 700,000 from kickstarter for the main campaign so far, and whatever is in their bank - let's say 1 mil total for the main campaign. Again, 4-5hrs is prob a conservative estimate for the mini-campaign (based on their track record). A third of that seems fairly reasonable for the mini-campaign, considering it will be about a third the length of the main campaign and most likely have some new content and assets.

It should never have been separate, there should just have been one big campaign, never mind asking for half again of their original goal for a smaller product.

Why not separate? Why should there be one big campaign? I can think of a few reasons why this is a good idea for HBS and gamers. HBS can focus more on C&C and replayability with a shorter campaign. A shorter campaign allows them to focus on polish too. A shorter campaign is easier to manage for HBS without them blowing the budget... I'm not even trying here.

How is 300k half of 1 mil? Hell, it's not even half of 700k.

I trust their ability to tell a story and to make a game... but I certainly don't trust their business acumen, not if that's what they think makes good sense.

I do trust their business acumen, because they have obviously learned from their previous kickstarters. They're thinking about their future.

Now, SU, why don't you be a champ and answer these questions? Do you run your own game dev company? Have you successfully funded and delivered a game via kickstarter without blowing the budget or not delivering on all the promises? Have you done a full cost analysis for what it would cost HBS to deliver a 4-5 hour campaign? Have you done the same for stealth and astral plane implementation?

I'm not saying that I know if it's justifiable, or not. I'm highlighting the point that you don't, and therefore that your opinion that it's unjustifiable isn't reasonable.

 

[Sykar]

When will people learn that part of SRR has always been the UGC as well?

 

[Blackstaff]

• It allows them to experiment with some really dense high-level content, which could be interesting compared to the existing campaign patterns.

THIS is extremely interesting.
For a high level campaign, they need to create new abilities, new items, new spells, new weapons,... All for the sake of playing outside the ballpark of a 12-15hours campaign. Wich means that after the mini-campaign next year, they will have the ley-out for an extended campaign ( should be something like a 25-30 hours game) and all the sales from H-K and its DLC, so enough dough to fund a larger following campaign, with, in bonus, maybe another KS campaign early next year for high level goals like stealth or astral plane.

It's a step by step way of preparing a future larger game.

 

[cruelio]

We've gone over this before: HBS's play times are usually extremely conservative. They indicated a 12 hour play time for Dragonfall and that ended up taking about 30-40 hours to complete. It's likely that the "mini campaign" will last about 15 hours, which is about as long as The Banner Saga or Blackguards 2, and slightly longer than the SRR OC.

How the fuck did it take you that long to go through Dragonfall. I did every single misison, in the Director's Cut, and it was like 15.

Also, as shown by the absence of quality work shop campaigns, especially ones that last longer than one or two hours, making a good mini expansion by professionals could easily cost 300k+. HBS has also shown again and again that they deliver on what they promise in a very conservative manner and if they say it costs 300k to make a mini campaign I don't have any reason to believe otherwise. Not to mention this will be the first one to focus specifically on high karma characters, which they have not done yet and surely involves its own unique balancing and considerations.

 

[Transfiguring Roar]

THIS is extremely interesting.
For a high level campaign, they need to create new abilities, new items, new spells, new weapons,... All for the sake of playing outside the ballpark of a 12-15hours campaign. Wich means that after the mini-campaign next year, they will have the ley-out for an extended campaign ( should be something like a 25-30 hours game) and all the sales from H-K and its DLC, so enough dough to fund a larger following campaign, with, in bonus, maybe another KS campaign early next year for high level goals like stealth or astral plane.

It's a step by step way of preparing a future larger game.

Absolutely, and fucking spot on!

 

[GarfunkeL]

Yeah, Blackstaff hit the nail on the head. It would really weird if we get a high-level mini-campaign from HBS that then doesn't include any new abilities, spells, weapons and items.

Anyone can use the editor to make a run with dozens of enemies with bloated stats and then allow players to import a character after all.

 

[Damned Registrations]

I hope their long term goal is something really non linear and open world, instead of just a really long drawn out linear campaign. One of the things lacking in the current games is that awesome feeling of going back to some low level johnson or runners and feeling like a bigshot once your character has grown enough. The story and the runs you do just scale with you for the most part. I'd have loved the option to go back and fuck with that drug gang in the first mission after I had talked to Alice and was a god damned war machine.

 

[Transfiguring Roar]

They've had another good day: $26,747.

http://www.kicktraq.com/projects/webeharebrained/shadowrun-hong-kong/#chart-daily

 

[Jaesun]

I hope their long term goal is something really non linear and open world, instead of just a really long drawn out linear campaign.

I hope as well that is their next idea for a game. Though that would be very costly.

 

[PhantasmaNL]

It's pretty clear that they don't want to go crazy with Hong Kong. I find this new mini-campaign stretch goal pretty damn good. Making the base game even larger with all the extra funding it's a very dangerous enterprise. You can fuck a lot your schedule by doing this, and also the paicing or even endanger the storyline (also, it would mean a notorious delay of the game). They have this campaign very clearly outlined, so adding a new campaign, as short as it might be, with a new storyline, is a good way to put all this extra funding to good use.

I was expecting before this kickstarter started something more ambicious, with stealth, astral plane, and all the good stuff, but when they reveled the inicial goal, and after all what they said until now, it's obvious that they just want to do for now a Dragonfall Director's Cut 2.0, which means tons of polishing mechanics and very small new features (although very useful, like being able to toggle turn based mode outside combat), and a small augmented scope. They didn't want to go crazy and make another Shadowrun Returns like experience (basically, falling short), so they kept their progression a bit more focused and controled.

Not a bad thing if you ask me.

This and Blackstaffs post after that hit the nail on the head.

HBS have a plan in place and wont compromise for the sake of juicy stretchgoals and more dollars/publicity. I like this level of resource management and planning, it all but ensures delivery on time and target, pretty essential for a business and rare in the gaming industry. The stretch goal may indeed be part of the strategy to expand the game in small manageable steps, in this case high level gameplay, which can be challenging to get right. Excellent KS sofar.

 

[Ulminati]

Yeh, I have to admit I'm pretty impressed with how HBS have carried themselves since the first kickstarter. I had some misgivings about a mobile game dev doing PC RPGs. But they've been good at not biting off more than they can chew. And all their releases have been steadily improving. They're going to plateau (or pull a Oblivion) eventually, but it'll be interesting to see how far they can improve before that happens. Hopefully we still have a SR magnum opus the size of BG2 to look forward to. If that means we have to go through another 3-4 dragonfalls while they get the systems in place, I'll happily buy them :3

 

[Diablo169]

I wish people could get past equating the monetary values of stretch goals with what that money will be spent on. Those 50k stretchgoals that were achieved were not JUST paying for that content, and this 1 million dollar stretchgoal wont JUST be paying for that expansion DLC.

HBS are far from perfect, and neither are the games that they make. But they should be fucking applauded by how they have turned themselves around after Dead Mans Switch.

 

[SausageInYourFace]

I disagree with people saying SR should become an open world RPG in the long run. I fear that would ultimately only water down the whole experience. Focus instead of making every single run bigger, better and diverse, with different solutions and outcomes. Also, as I said elswhere, I would love to see some kind of planning/preparing mechanic, where you make a few decisions before the run even starts and based on them it would play out differently.

 

[Sykar]

I disagree with people saying SR should become an open world RPG in the long run. I fear that would ultimately only water down the whole experience. Focus instead of making every single run bigger, better and diverse, with different solutions and outcomes. Also, as I said elswhere, I would love to see some kind of planning/preparing mechanic, where you make a few decisions before the run even starts and based on them it would play out differently.

Shadowrun doesn't really work with current technology and patented theme park elements they so love to overuse. Especially on the side of HP bloat vs DPS.

 

[Transfiguring Roar]

I wish people could get past equating the monetary values of stretch goals with what that money will be spent on. Those 50k stretchgoals that were achieved were not JUST paying for that content, and this 1 million dollar stretchgoal wont JUST be paying for that expansion DLC.

HBS are far from perfect, and neither are the games that they make. But they should be fucking applauded by how they have turned themselves around after Dead Mans Switch.

I totally agree that they should be applauded, but just to clarify one thing... It's not the monetary value associated with stretch goals - it's the impression they create. The better the impression they create, the more pro HBS look.

 

[Jedi Master Radek]

If HBS started making strech goals outside the main campaign and it took some time to announce this new goal,(previous goals were announced pretty much from the start), then it's obvious HBS estimation before kickstarter was that they won't get much more than 700k. Especially if we consider the low 100k figure for funding. They are getting more money than they expected

 

[zero29]

I disagree with people saying SR should become an open world RPG in the long run. I fear that would ultimately only water down the whole experience. Focus instead of making every single run bigger, better and diverse, with different solutions and outcomes. Also, as I said elswhere, I would love to see some kind of planning/preparing mechanic, where you make a few decisions before the run even starts and based on them it would play out differently.

well, perhaps not a full blown open world, but i'd like to see HBS shifting their games a bit further to a pnp experience. imagine being thrown into the shark pond of a city hub like denver/FRFZ and spending the first half of the game just with surviving some minor runs, collecting enemies/partners on the way and then out of the blue getting hit by the main plot, like e.g. being caught in the middle of ghostwalkers attack on the aztlan sector. and instead of making something like this an "epic fight the dragon/big bad" story, let me and my team just take advantage of the situation and - by using the contacts i made through the game - escape the war zone being rich and (in)famous.

being able to manipulate runs beforehand by e.g. collecting hints or bribing guards would indeed be a nice addition. HBS could even use the revamped matrix for that by making it accessible from the city hub. and i want more situations like in the black lodge trial run, where you could say "fuck'em i'm outta this shit" and abort the run.

 

[Infinitron]

Folks need to consider that Harebrained Schemes might be perfectly happy with their niche as the developers of the "turn-based Mass Effect".

 

[FuriousGamer87]

Folks need to consider that Harebrained Schemes might be perfectly happy with their niche as the developers of the "turn-based Mass Effect".

But yet I can't do virtual rough sex with Eiger last I check.

 

[Sykar]

Folks need to consider that Harebrained Schemes might be perfectly happy with their niche as the developers of the "turn-based Mass Effect".

I consider SRR, even the original DMS, to be better than ME 1.

But yet I can't do virtual rough sex with Eiger last I check.

I wanted a threesome with Glory and Eiger, while Blitz and Dietrich going for a straight gay romance, old man Dietrich showing Blitz a proper MESSERKAMPF! fisting!

 

[Roguey]

To hell with "RPGs are a checklist of required features" imo.

 

[Sykar]

To hell with "RPGs are a checklist of required features" imo.

RPGs are overrated anyway. We need more cinematic romances and .

 

[imweasel]

So we get a DLC at 1 million dollars?

They are now obviously overbudgeted for SR:HK, such a shame that they refuse to increase the scope of the game. I guess it must be rather difficult and time consuming to increase the scope so far into production. Kind of sucks, but oh well.

I lowered my pledge from a rather high tier to 15 dollars, I really don't see any point in giving them more money if they don't need it and I couldn't care less about the rewards.

 

[Ulminati]

I'd rather have a polished game within scope on time than a trainwreck bloated with half-finished ideas that's out 6 months late. Probably not going to up my pledge unless they gief collector's edition. But I'm happy with what it looks like I'm getting.

Like others said: If they make a high-level campaign, it'll either give us high-level abilities or at least help them figure out what they need for them to work in their next release. :3