Torment Torment: Tides of Numenera Beta Thread [GAME RELEASED, GO TO NEW THREAD]

[Roguey]

Troll Quiz: What RPG had a famously awkward and railroaded opening sequence that told you what enemy was chasing you and what you had to do to defend yourself, and proceeded to almost win RPGOTY largely on the basis of its storyline?

If you're referring to kotor2, that had its share of detractors on release.

http://www.rpgcodex.net/content.php?id=125

When KOTOR 2 was announced, many people expected a game of the Planescape: Torment caliber, especially in the story, dialogue and NPCs departments. Sadly, it didn't happen. Can you tell us why?

CHRIS: Well, not a loaded question, but how did K2 fail compare to Torment in story, dialogue, and characters?

VINCE: There was no story (there was a backstory, but that's a different element), other than find 4 Jedi masters and either collect them all like pokemon or kill them all for a secret to be revealed.

Dialogues felt empty. Well written, but empty. Again, one of those hard to explain things.

As for the characters, there was no emotional attachment to or interest in the party members or characters. In PST Pharod, Ravel were giants loaded with personalities, depth, and flaws that made them so human and alive. It was different in K2. Not because I had higher expectations - I didn't, but ... something was missing.

In PST it was hard to decide on which party members to pick. It was even harder to sacrifice Morte or sell/kill one for The Grimoire of Pestilential Thought. I played the game 3 times over the years, but I could never do that simply because the characters were so alive. In K2 I could easily sell/kill most NPCs. Why? I don't know. That's how both games made me feel.

There were some similarities between TNO and the Exile, but in PST we were shown the consequences on a grand scale - of TNO's entire life and how his choices affected people. In K2, the Exile's past didn't play an important role. It didn't matter at all.

Again, needless to say, those are just opinions, so don't take it personally. I didn't mean to offend or anything like that. Sorry if I couldn't be more specific. I believe emotions can paint a better picture here than a dry analysis.
CHRIS: I take no offense to your honesty. But stay right where you are, a missile is arcing its way toward your home right now, and there is a lightsaber-wielding Jedi on top of it.

 

[Infinitron]

Not the game I had in mind, but I'm sure there are a few more that fit the description.

 

[Jedi Master Radek]

Troll Quiz: What RPG had a famously awkward and railroaded opening sequence that told you what enemy was chasing you and what you had to do to defend yourself, and proceeded to almost win RPGOTY largely on the basis of its storyline?

If you're referring to kotor2, that had its share of detractors on release.

http://www.rpgcodex.net/content.php?id=125

When KOTOR 2 was announced, many people expected a game of the Planescape: Torment caliber, especially in the story, dialogue and NPCs departments. Sadly, it didn't happen. Can you tell us why?

CHRIS: Well, not a loaded question, but how did K2 fail compare to Torment in story, dialogue, and characters?

VINCE: There was no story (there was a backstory, but that's a different element), other than find 4 Jedi masters and either collect them all like pokemon or kill them all for a secret to be revealed.

Dialogues felt empty. Well written, but empty. Again, one of those hard to explain things.

As for the characters, there was no emotional attachment to or interest in the party members or characters. In PST Pharod, Ravel were giants loaded with personalities, depth, and flaws that made them so human and alive. It was different in K2. Not because I had higher expectations - I didn't, but ... something was missing.

In PST it was hard to decide on which party members to pick. It was even harder to sacrifice Morte or sell/kill one for The Grimoire of Pestilential Thought. I played the game 3 times over the years, but I could never do that simply because the characters were so alive. In K2 I could easily sell/kill most NPCs. Why? I don't know. That's how both games made me feel.

There were some similarities between TNO and the Exile, but in PST we were shown the consequences on a grand scale - of TNO's entire life and how his choices affected people. In K2, the Exile's past didn't play an important role. It didn't matter at all.

Again, needless to say, those are just opinions, so don't take it personally. I didn't mean to offend or anything like that. Sorry if I couldn't be more specific. I believe emotions can paint a better picture here than a dry analysis.
CHRIS: I take no offense to your honesty. But stay right where you are, a missile is arcing its way toward your home right now, and there is a lightsaber-wielding Jedi on top of it.

CHRIS: The answers herein are solely my opinion, and do not necessarily reflect the attitudes of Obsidian Entertainment or its design and production staff. If anything here seems like it could be damaging, it's only fair to warn you that this interview was in fact answered by Chris Applehaus, who occasionally impersonates Chris Avellone, and Mr. Applehaus really has no business answering questions for Obsidian Entertainment or anything related to its games or design philosophy.

 

[Roguey]

Looking forward to the official unveiling of Applehaus Entertainment.

 

[Hobo Elf]

Troll Quiz: What RPG had a famously awkward and railroaded opening sequence that told you what enemy was chasing you and what you had to do to defend yourself, and proceeded to almost win RPGOTY largely on the basis of its storyline?

Man, that's an easy one. It's Arcanum.

 

[MRY]

Seriously, I just can't decide whether this is pathetic, hilarious or insulting.

It's a tutorial. MRY's posts in this thread take on a new light?

For goodness' sake, Inf, can't you abide by mesirah on Hanukkah? :D

Actually, I haven't played Torment since the intro got reworked. I haven't really had time, plus for vanity's sake, now that I don't get to bask in my own writing, what's the point?

The writing looks great if you have a fetish for figurative language. hhhng metaphors

"The air is humid and dank" (tm)(c)(r)

It's a typo. For setting reasons, it was meant to read "human and dark." :D

It's a tutorial.

You know what's a tutorial? Pop-up messages that can be toggled, and which are also present in the game.

That's right. Tworment has BOTH a pop-up tutorial that you can toggle AND an unskippable in-game tutorial that you can't toggle.



Game by idiots for idiots.

Alert: It's a criticism!

 

[Irenaeus]

They changed the intro and cut off your stuff?

I'm playing a bit more of the beta and having a good time so far.

 

[MRY]

They cut it from the intro and moved it later in the game. Totally the right call, except from the standpoint of personal vainglory.

 

[roll-a-die]

I find it hard to believe that this sort of game introduction is really new to you.

Oh come on.

Tutorial dungeons are as old the hills. They too can be done in different degrees of dumbness.

Take one that's pretty far towards the dumbfuck end of the scale -- the Mass Effect Eden Prime mission. It introduces you to all the mechanics and gameplay elements. The only way it differs from the "real" missions is in that it's shorter, even more linear, and it has tutorial pop-up messages you can disable. It gives you a glimpse of the main antagonist. It communicates that it's scary as fuck. And you get to play space Jesus or renegade in a few unimportant encounters.

Things it doesn't do:

- have an NPC explain to you who the Protheans are, what that artefact is, and why exactly it's so bloody important
- give you a clear look of the main antagonist and have an NPC explain to you that it's named 'Sovereign' and is a machine intelligence from a race of beings called 'Reapers' that wipes out all sentient life every 50,000 years
- have an NPC explain that Because Reasons you're extra-special and the only one who can save the galaxy from the threat of these 'Reapers'

The T:ToN intro does the equivalent of all that, and more. When I'm out of the dungeon, there is no mystery left. I know I'm a Castoff, who are born when an individual called the Changing God moves zir consciousness out of one body and into another, that there is a scary thing called The Sorrow who wants to destroy the Changing God and all castoffs, that it's invaded my mind palace, that I return to that mind palace when I 'die', that I'm really fucking hard to kill, but not impossible, that the key to defeating the Sorrow is to restore the Resonance Chamber, and that to do that my next steps should be contacting the Cult of the Changing God or the Aeon Priests (my choice).

It's all spelled out for me in excruciating detail, and it's listed that way in my journal in case I was so stoned that I didn't notice when the Spectre rubbed my eyeballs in it.

The thing that hooked me from the first instant in PS:T was the mystery: who, and what, is this floating skull, and why is he following me? Did I really tattoo instructions for myself in SCARY CAPS on my back? Who the fuck is Pharod and where do I find him? Where's my journal? How is it that all these people seem to know who I am, and I even left things for myself for later? Etcetera etcetera. It's just a mountain of questions and mysteries and just subtle hints on how I should go about unraveling them.

Also, the Mortuary was one hell of a tutorial dungeon. All they'd have needed to do to 'modernise' something like that would have been to add optional tooltips explaining mechanics where appropriate; how Effort works and so on.

Once more: this is Tumblr: Tides of Numenera, not Torment.

I wouldn't say it's Tumblr: Tides of Numenera. It's kind of hard to explain, PJ, but essentially, tumblr stuff is generally goofier. I haven't run into anything like Undertale, Homestuck, etc while playing ToN.

Just so you guys know, this fuckers not me.

Also prime junta. At the start of mass effect you aren't given information of what the protheans are. What the artefact is. Or have an NPC explain your history too you. Sure.

But let's examine your statements a bit deeper.
ME Tutorial
Establishes Saren as the enemy, and a backstabber. Remember information about Sovereign and the reapers, only becomes relvent in ME2, and doesn't really get explained beyond the fact that he's a reaper, some kind of genocidal fucker that eradicated the protheans.
T:ToN
Establishes the heartless/the sorrow as your main antagonist and gives you a reason to fight it. It doesn't(Haven't played the current incarnation, but I'm gonna do that now) explain what the sorrow is, beyond something too do with the tides and that fixing your tides, whatever those are will help with making you safe from the sorrow.
ME
Establishes that your goal is to follow the visions and chase Saren through the periphery to discover what it is he wants.
T:ToN
Establishes your initial goal is to repair a device that could potentially, maybe fix yourself. Keep in mind we only have one chapter basically.
ME
Before the game starts has people discussing why your such a badarse, and if you are an appropriate choice for the spectres.
T:ToN
Establishes that your character is a cast off, or is it?

Next up, your comments about the mystery, I agree that the mystery is a bit lax in the intro too Planescape Torment, however, a lot of that comes from the design philosophy of either setting. Planescape was based around how utterly insanely weird it was and how it was unexplainable. Numenera, is based around the unknown being there, but everything generally having an explanation rooted in 3 things, hyper tech, nanites, or past civilizations/people.

EDIT: ALso of note, I've sat my friends down and had them play PS:T, the mortuary in their words is, "The most bored I've ever felt playing a video game." "I didn't know what I was doing, where I was going, or if I was even making progress." "I went upstairs and died, so I figured I didn't need to do anything up there and it was something for later." "After I got out(Of the mortuary), I didn't know where to go, so I just went around talking too people, then someone attacked me for talking to them, and killed me in one hit. Even after I reloaded, I still couldn't figure out where to go. And the game failed too hold my attention." There were people who are around my age(anywhere from 22 too 33) and they basically said, it was the worst part of the game. The game doesn't do anything too contextualize it's mystery in the Mortuary, to make it relavent to the player. It relies on to many conventions from the older years of RPGs and modern audiences don't derive the same experience from these things. More than that, if they just bar for bar clones the mortuary, we'd be rolling all over them regardless because it either, "Didn't fit the setting" or it "Was just a rip off of PS:T"

 

[Prime Junta]

Planescape was based around how utterly insanely weird it was and how it was unexplainable. Numenera, is based around the unknown being there, but everything generally having an explanation rooted in 3 things, hyper tech, nanites, or past civilizations/people.

The exact opposite is true.

Everything in Planescape makes sense once you understand the basic logic of Law, Chaos, Good, Evil, and Neutrality, and that belief shapes reality. It's a really simple logic and every single thing in the game, from the Xaositects to Ravel, the Lady of Pain to the Blood War, Nordom to Fall-from-Grace, makes sense against that background.

Numenera OTOH is specifically, explicitly defined as a setting where explanations shall not be offered: the past Worlds shall never be revealed, it shall never be explained how, why, or by whom or what the Sun was refueled, and so on and so forth.

Both PS:T and T:ToN are centred around a personal mystery. PS:T at the start gives away nothing. T:ToN gives away everything.

Moreover, T:ToN even fails at creating that personal mystery.

When you're out of the Mortuary in PS:T, the burning question is "Who the hell was I?" It's strongly implied that that question is the core of revealing what's hunting you, what those shadows are, why Morte is following me, and so on and so forth. And once it starts to reveal itself, it'll gently morph into that famous "What can change the nature of a man?"

In T:ToN, whatever questions are left after the infodump aren't even related to you. They're related to other people, and they're not even really mysteries. Who is the Changing God? What is the Sorrow? Everybody knows about the Changing God so you'll start learning about that just by durrr talking to people. And you know the Changing God knows all about the Sorrow, so it follows that all my questions will be answered when I find the Changing God, or dig through his smartphone, or whatever. At this point in PS:T I didn't even know who the antagonist of the first half of the game was, and had no inkling whatsoever about TTO.

Okay sure it's possible there'll be a huge twist somewhere along the line and it'll turn out that the Sorrow is just a red herring and the real antagonist is something that's only been hinted at so far -- the Bloom? -- which would be nice. Even if it is though, the way the game rubs my face in everything, with NPC narration, giant QUEST RECEIVED notices, the Current Objective pane, and a journal which spells out my next steps in detail -- will rob me of the pleasure of discovering or figuring it out for myself.

I would also be (positively) surprised if the game left anything unexplained. PS:T had lots of little mysteries that were simply left hanging. There were hints about them, so we could guess and speculate. We never did get to read Grace's diary, and accidental or not, the game was much the better for it.

 

[roll-a-die]

Planescape was based around how utterly insanely weird it was and how it was unexplainable. Numenera, is based around the unknown being there, but everything generally having an explanation rooted in 3 things, hyper tech, nanites, or past civilizations/people.

The exact opposite is true.

Everything in Planescape makes sense once you understand the basic logic of Law, Chaos, Good, Evil, and Neutrality, and that belief shapes reality. It's a really simple logic and every single thing in the game, from the Xaositects to Ravel, the Lady of Pain to the Blood War, Nordom to Fall-from-Grace, makes sense against that background.

Numenera OTOH is specifically, explicitly defined as a setting where explanations shall not be offered: the past Worlds shall never be revealed, it shall never be explained how, why, or by whom or what the Sun was refueled, and so on and so forth.

Both PS:T and T:ToN are centred around a personal mystery. PS:T at the start gives away nothing. T:ToN gives away everything.

Moreover, T:ToN even fails at creating that personal mystery.

When you're out of the Mortuary in PS:T, the burning question is "Who the hell was I?" It's strongly implied that that question is the core of revealing what's hunting you, what those shadows are, why Morte is following me, and so on and so forth. And once it starts to reveal itself, it'll gently morph into that famous "What can change the nature of a man?"

In T:ToN, whatever questions are left after the infodump aren't even related to you. They're related to other people, and they're not even really mysteries. Who is the Changing God? What is the Sorrow? Everybody knows about the Changing God so you'll start learning about that just by durrr talking to people. And you know the Changing God knows all about the Sorrow, so it follows that all my questions will be answered when I find the Changing God, or dig through his smartphone, or whatever. At this point in PS:T I didn't even know who the antagonist of the first half of the game was, and had no inkling whatsoever about TTO.

Okay sure it's possible there'll be a huge twist somewhere along the line and it'll turn out that the Sorrow is just a red herring and the real antagonist is something that's only been hinted at so far -- the Bloom? -- which would be nice. Even if it is though, the way the game rubs my face in everything, with NPC narration, giant QUEST RECEIVED notices, the Current Objective pane, and a journal which spells out my next steps in detail -- will rob me of the pleasure of discovering or figuring it out for myself.

I would also be (positively) surprised if the game left anything unexplained. PS:T had lots of little mysteries that were simply left hanging. There were hints about them, so we could guess and speculate. We never did get to read Grace's diary, and accidental or not, the game was much the better for it.

Except in my experience, from the people I literally had play PS:T less than a year ago. Who had never played it before or been exposed to hype about it, around 3(of the 10 or so) felt that personal mystery. The rest, felt there wasn't enough set up. That there wasn't enough information trickling in for the first 3 hours of aimlessly wandering the mortuary and city streets to keep them interested. Times have changed, and complain you might, but this is the environment we live in. The majority doesn't care to wonder about a skull's motivations on first meeting, they only care that he is helping them. Because they haven't been presented with any information other than that he's a skull, and he's helping them. To contrast this, you have Callistege and Aligern, who in their banter provide a basis for speculation.

Planescape Torment doesn't have a story for the first 4 hours. It's only after the mortuary the meeting with Pharod, the bar, the first meeting with the hag, that it all starts to come together into something that those 3 formed attachment too, and it's only then that you start to get enough information to even start to find a plot beyond the question of who and where am I. The mortuary is downright boring if you lack the ability to be immersed in it, the words while well written, are plodding, and sparse and Morte for 4 of the people, became outright annoying to them. Because they got so stuck they wandered for an hour clicking on every zombie and trying to exhaust every choice, and Morte attempting to chat up the skeleton ladies was rather annoying the 17th time.

Not disputing Planescape was a VERY GOOD Game, and it's story is one of the best written, but here's the thing. Given the choice of rereading things between, let's see, Tolkien's LoTR and Jim Butcher's Dresden Files, 7 of 10 would choose to reread the Jim Butcher works. Because they make for an easier read. Regardless of the fact that Tolkien is of a higher quality, it's plodding pace drags that down. Acknowledging the weaknesses in the trinity of fuckery has been one of the hardest things for the codex to do. But they are very flawed gems. And often the people nowadays don't have the time, nor the patience to play with the flaws of yesteryear.

 

[Prime Junta]

Except in my experience, from the people I literally had play PS:T less than a year ago. Who had never played it before or been exposed to hype about it, around 3(of the 10 or so) felt that personal mystery. The rest, felt there wasn't enough set up. That there wasn't enough information trickling in for the first 3 hours of aimlessly wandering the mortuary and city streets to keep them interested. Times have changed, and complain you might, but this is the environment we live in.

Bro, you're making excuses for the here.

Everybody's making games for dumbfucks. It is not unreasonable to rage when it turns out that a game that was explictly kickstarted as not being like that, turns out to be exactly like that.

The majority doesn't care to wonder about a skull's motivations on first meeting, they only care that he is helping them. Because they haven't been presented with any information other than that he's a skull, and he's helping them.

Fuck the majority.

This was not supposed to be a game for the majority. It was supposed to be a game for the small niche of players who like reading and unraveling a personal mystery.

To contrast this, you have Callistege and Aligern, who in their banter provide a basis for speculation.

"Basis for speculation" my lily-white arse. They spell it out in excruciating detail, and answer all your questions too.

 

[roll-a-die]

Except in my experience, from the people I literally had play PS:T less than a year ago. Who had never played it before or been exposed to hype about it, around 3(of the 10 or so) felt that personal mystery. The rest, felt there wasn't enough set up. That there wasn't enough information trickling in for the first 3 hours of aimlessly wandering the mortuary and city streets to keep them interested. Times have changed, and complain you might, but this is the environment we live in.

Bro, you're making excuses for the here.

Everybody's making games for dumbfucks. It is not unreasonable to rage when it turns out that a game that was explictly kickstarted as not being like that, turns out to be exactly like that.

The majority doesn't care to wonder about a skull's motivations on first meeting, they only care that he is helping them. Because they haven't been presented with any information other than that he's a skull, and he's helping them.

Fuck the majority.

This was not supposed to be a game for the majority. It was supposed to be a game for the small niche of players who like reading and unraveling a personal mystery.

To contrast this, you have Callistege and Aligern, who in their banter provide a basis for speculation.

"Basis for speculation" my lily-white arse. They spell it out in excruciating detail, and answer all your questions too.

You mean too say, they answer your questions with speculation to the best of their own knowledge? They just do so in a wordier fashion? At no point has it been confirmed that everything Calistege or Aligern says is correct.

And it's not turned out exactly like "that," you are claiming it has. And you've yet to show sufficient proof beyond nostalgia filled ramblings that it is.

 

[Infinitron]

Made a thread about this on inXile forums: https://forums.inxile-entertainment.com/viewtopic.php?f=32&t=16945

 

[Darth Roxor]

Made a thread about this on inXile forums: https://forums.inxile-entertainment.com/viewtopic.php?f=32&t=16945

i expect a great deal of insight to appear there

 

[Prime Junta]

You mean too say, they answer your questions with speculation to the best of their own knowledge? They just do so in a wordier fashion? At no point has it been confirmed that everything Calistege or Aligern says is correct.

At no point has it turned out that they're incorrect either.

And it's not turned out exactly like "that," you are claiming it has. And you've yet to show sufficient proof beyond nostalgia filled ramblings that it is.

I'm going on by what's in the beta. And the sourcebook.

Of course it's possible that the instant after I'm out of Sagus Cliffs everything changes. Why do you think it will though?

 

[Darth Roxor]

Can anyone tell me what's the purpose of this tutorial pop-up when the "current objective" list is EVEN MORE tutorial-y???

 

[Bester]

I just got a flush of anger that I actually clicked "disable tutorials" twice on that screenshot.

 

[undecaf]

Can anyone tell me what's the purpose of this tutorial pop-up when the "current objective" list is EVEN MORE tutorial-y???

Target audience wouldn't understand with a single input.

 

[commie]

I just got a flush of anger that I actually clicked "disable tutorials" twice on that screenshot.

Clearly that shows that you are the kind of person these tutorials are meant for when you try to click on non-interactive parts expecting a result.

 

[Jedi Master Radek]

EDIT: ALso of note, I've sat my friends down and had them play PS:T, the mortuary in their words is, "The most bored I've ever felt playing a video game." "I didn't know what I was doing, where I was going, or if I was even making progress." "I went upstairs and died, so I figured I didn't need to do anything up there and it was something for later." "After I got out(Of the mortuary), I didn't know where to go, so I just went around talking too people, then someone attacked me for talking to them, and killed me in one hit. Even after I reloaded, I still couldn't figure out where to go. And the game failed too hold my attention." There were people who are around my age(anywhere from 22 too 33) and they basically said, it was the worst part of the game. The game doesn't do anything too contextualize it's mystery in the Mortuary, to make it relavent to the player. It relies on to many conventions from the older years of RPGs and modern audiences don't derive the same experience from these things. More than that, if they just bar for bar clones the mortuary, we'd be rolling all over them regardless because it either, "Didn't fit the setting" or it "Was just a rip off of PS:T"

jesus

 

[TalesfromtheCrypt]

"Retards didn't like the original oldschool experience so it must be changed" is a pretty strange point to make, on the Codex of all places

 

[FeelTheRads]

Yeah, exactly the kind of people I'd expect to not know the difference between "too" and "to".

But. really, this is very important:

"I didn't know what I was doing, where I was going, or if I was even making progress."

That right there is exactly the reason on-screen walkthroughs like that exist. I'm expecting that soon (if it didn't happen already?) games will also have a progress bar that will show how far in the story you are.

Instant gratification is the most important thing these days. For some reason you have to appeal to dumbfucks and people who don't actually like games. That's the mark of a good designer.

 

[veevoir]

Honestly I can understand "if I am making progress" remark. Games, in the end, are skinner boxes.

I mean, there are games like underrail that dont hold your hand but you feel sense of progress. Every area you stumble upon when wondering aimless is *something* that is interesting. Keeps the level of engagement high.

There are others in which seeking your path seems like a bore and hours spent exploring dont feel that rewarding.

PS:T is the second kind - it dumps you into Sigil and you can run in circles for years before getting that feeling. But it is something that falls very well with the plot - TNO is really fucking clueless. This falls into brilliant storytelling vs engaging gameplay spectrum. "Why not both" is the holy grail ere.

I guess thats why numanuma lies heavy with exposition and "giving purpose". They sacrifice the storytelling device for gameplay flow. Funny thing to do in a storyfag game..

 

[Prime Junta]

Games, in the end, are skinner boxes.

Lord have mercy on your soul.