Game News Age of Decadence Released on Steam Early Access

[Metro]

How many do you estimate you'll have to sell to 'establish' yourself as a studio? IE, everyone can switch to it as full time jobs?

 

[Western]

Hey VD, you should also consider stickying some of the guides from the Iron Tower forum into your Steam forum.

 

[Humanity has risen!]

VD, all the years you've spent working on this game were worth it for the (lulzy) comments/reviews alone.

... and the jewgold, should you amass enough of it.

If he makes any, the CRA will take everything.

 

[Vault Dweller]

How many do you estimate you'll have to sell to 'establish' yourself as a studio? IE, everyone can switch to it as full time jobs?

No idea yet. Ideally, 10-15k copies overall.

 

[Vault Dweller]

VD, all the years you've spent working on this game were worth it for the (lulzy) comments/reviews alone.

... and the jewgold, should you amass enough of it.

If he makes any, the CRA will take everything.

Fucking accounting, how does it work?

 

[Johannes]

Yeah, the difficulty is too high. I don't see how constant reloading and enforced metagaming somehow enhances the atmosphere of the gameworld. Creating dozens of characters destined to die against tough odds works in a roguelike where the game content is procedural and therefore always different and fresh, and mostly about combat and other dynamic gameplay systems.

But in a story-heavy game with a set in stone world, and most of the gameplay consisting of static skill checks, it simply doesn't work. People play this kind of game in order to explore the world, for the dialogue, to see how the branching paths work. Not to figure out what are the thresholds for whichever skill check by trial and failure. If the game was easier it would be more possible to rely mostly on your wits in order to survive. But as is absolutely everyone will be looking at a lot of reloads/restarts, and therefore accumulate tons of meta information that helps them get along.

The game would be helped tremendously by having more points during chargen, be it on a separate easier difficulty level or on the single default setting. At the very least include a cheat command people can use to add skill points.

Fallout and Arcanum were very easy games but that was ok, it didn't get in the way of people enjoying the good parts of the game. Whereas too high difficulty in AoD does get in the way. Prevent this and you're looking at countless more satisfied customers. On the other hand, do you imagine there to be any amount of people who would enjoy the game less if it involved an easier game mode outside of the Awesome character?

 

[Jim the Dinosaur]

Just replace the awesome button with 1 or 2 easy modes with extra skill points. If you want you can put a disclaimer next to it saying that you're a pussy for choosing them.

 

[Vault Dweller]

There are people who like the challenge, the puzzle-like combat design (each fight is a different challenge that seems impossible on the first try), the figuring out, the mastering, etc. The game is for them. There are people who don't. The game isn't for them. Simple as that.

 

[AstroZombie]

There are people who like the challenge, the puzzle-like combat design (each fight is a different challenge that seems impossible on the first try), the figuring out, the mastering, etc. The game is for them. There are people who don't. The game isn't for them. Simple as that.

 

[Jim the Dinosaur]

There are people who like the challenge, the puzzle-like combat design (each fight is a different challenge that seems impossible on the first try), the figuring out, the mastering, etc. The game is for them. There are people who don't. The game isn't for them. Simple as that.

But what do you lose by adding an option for people who aren't learning animals and quit in frustration despite wanting to continue playing your game? It'd be clear from the name "easy mode" that it's not the way the game's supposed to be played, so you wouldn't be muddying the message about what your game's about, right?

 

[Humanity has risen!]

The thing is that if more failures didn't mean guaranteed deaths, and yet still offered a way to find alternate solutions without reloading constantly, it would be less frustrating and less an harduous exercise in min-maxing, while keeping the thinking gamer aspect that VD was vying for.

 

[almondblight]

It just needs to be sold as a retro Dark Souls. Reviewers were told that they were supposed to die in Dark Souls, all the cool kids were having fun dying, then suddenly dying all the time became a plus.

 

[Zed]

There are people who like the challenge, the puzzle-like combat design (each fight is a different challenge that seems impossible on the first try), the figuring out, the mastering, etc. The game is for them. There are people who don't. The game isn't for them. Simple as that.

But what do you lose by adding an option for people who aren't learning animals and quit in frustration despite wanting to continue playing your game? It'd be clear from the name "easy mode" that it's not the way the game's supposed to be played, so you wouldn't be muddying the message about what your game's about, right?

he doesn't want the game to be anything else than what it's about.

imagine being a musician and making this awesome rock album. then some idiot takes one of your choruses and remixes it into some shitty dance song for the masses - and you fucking hate dance music AND the masses. how would that make you feel?

 

[Johannes]

There are people who like the challenge, the puzzle-like combat design (each fight is a different challenge that seems impossible on the first try), the figuring out, the mastering, etc. The game is for them. There are people who don't. The game isn't for them. Simple as that.

What is there to master in this game? The combat system, and that's about it. Beyond that it's not about learning how the game system works, but memorizing how the specific encounters in the game work. People who like figuring things out and mastering systems tend to play games with dynamic content, not storyfag RPGs.

There are people who like the challenge, the puzzle-like combat design (each fight is a different challenge that seems impossible on the first try), the figuring out, the mastering, etc. The game is for them. There are people who don't. The game isn't for them. Simple as that.

But what do you lose by adding an option for people who aren't learning animals and quit in frustration despite wanting to continue playing your game? It'd be clear from the name "easy mode" that it's not the way the game's supposed to be played, so you wouldn't be muddying the message about what your game's about, right?

he doesn't want the game to be anything else than what it's about.

imagine being a musician and making this awesome rock album. then some idiot takes one of your choruses and remixes it into some shitty dance song for the masses - and you fucking hate dance music AND the masses. how would that make you feel?

If you get royalties and some recognition for it, probably pretty good?

 

[UnknownBro]

*struggling with the game* Three misses in a row with a ~60% THC? *ragequit*

I'll be back to it when it's fixed.

 

[Zeriel]

*struggling with the game* Three misses in a row with a ~60% THC? *ragequit*

I'll be back when it's fixed.

Basically the equivelant of flipping a coin three times and getting tails each time. Oh no, must be bugged!

 

[Vault Dweller]

There are people who like the challenge, the puzzle-like combat design (each fight is a different challenge that seems impossible on the first try), the figuring out, the mastering, etc. The game is for them. There are people who don't. The game isn't for them. Simple as that.

But what do you lose by adding an option for people who aren't learning animals and quit in frustration despite wanting to continue playing your game? It'd be clear from the name "easy mode" that it's not the way the game's supposed to be played, so you wouldn't be muddying the message about what your game's about, right?

Where do you stop? Do I make it easier just for you? How about the guy who's a bit less experienced? For him too? Someone new to RPGs? Why not, eh? What about his mom and the old lady across the street? Surely they too deserve to know some happiness that comes from crushing your enemies and seeing them driven before you.

 

[Vault Dweller]

What is there to master in this game? The combat system, and that's about it.

Not enough?

Beyond that it's not about learning how the game system works, but memorizing how the specific encounters in the game work.

It sure seems that until you figure out the system you can memorize specific encounters all you want, but it won't get you any closer to beating them.

If you get royalties and some recognition for it, probably pretty good?

If I was in it for the money, I would have made a different kind of game. Or didn't quit my job.

 

[UnknownBro]

*struggling with the game* Three misses in a row with a ~60% THC? *ragequit*

I'll be back when it's fixed.

Basically the equivelant of flipping a coin three times and getting tails each time. Oh no, must be bugged!

It's like the fifth time something like that happens, and the enemies don't ever miss, try it for yourself. Sorry but in my opinion this is not a FUN GAME in it's current state.

The game has a good setting, excellent dialog so far, possibly a lot of c&c but horrible balance and 'quest' progression.

I'm out, best of luck.

Ps: and for the record I did tried the old demo back in the day and the combat was easier then.

 

[Zeriel]

Not really speaking to the particular difficulty of AoD, but people blaming the very nature of chance on a game's flaws or bugs always pisses me off. In XCOM, I've had back to back 95% shots miss, and more than once. The sort of chances you're talking about aren't even unusual, that's a fairly average failure. 60% is barely better odds than even. For every time that you notice "unfair" rolls, I guarantee the CPU had just as many bad outcomes itself. You just didn't notice them, or chalked them up to your own superior planning/skills.

Never understood people complaining about difficulty in AoD, either. I mean, there's not even an ironman mode toggled, so what's the big deal? You reload until you win. If reloading a saved game is a torturous trial to undergo for the modern gamer, I'm not sure what to say.

It's just part of the setting to me. The game is teaching you what it means to live in a brutal world, but there's never any real, everything-at-stake-difficulty. Now if the baseline experience made you restart the entire game from scratch everytime you died, we'd have something worth bitching about.

Ultimately, I think people should get more comfortable with saying "This game is not for me", instead of "change your game to match my expectations, right now". And I guess you did say that... so, good! We can now all move on.

 

[stony3k]

Hmm.. it shows up at the 71st top selling game on Steam to me, which is pretty good considering it's just early access. if you can market it like another Dark Souls, it might sell well enough.

 

[Johannes]

What is there to master in this game? The combat system, and that's about it.

Not enough?

Not enough for a non-combat character.

Beyond that it's not about learning how the game system works, but memorizing how the specific encounters in the game work.

It sure seems that until you figure out the system you can memorize specific encounters all you want, but it won't get you any closer to beating them.

I'm not talking about combat encounters which you can indeed get better at. But all the CYOA sequences which are handcrafted, there's no minigame to get better at there. Only way to improve is to learn by trial and error what thresholds different checks have. This is definitely not a good type of challenge to have as too harsh. Comparing it to a roguelike or Dark Souls is ridiculous. The games strengths are still squarely in the storyfag RPG field.

If you get royalties and some recognition for it, probably pretty good?

If I was in it for the money, I would have made a different kind of game. Or didn't quit my job.

Yeah, difficulty slider would destroy all your artistic integrity, void all the fun you've had during the creation process, totally not worth the extra sales and increased chances to stay in the business.

 

[Bubbles]

Congrats, all that bitching made me buy the game when I previously had no intention of doing so. All the specialized skill checks hiding precious bonus content, the uncomfortably lethal combat, and the constant temptation of save scumming strongly remind me of the Dark Eye CYOAs of my youth. If Bubbles, age 12 could find merit in those experiences, so can a bunch of supposed RPG connoisseurs.

 

[Midair]

It would be nice to have a few "filler" quests. These quests can give needed SP to otherwise nonviable builds and can be presented as unattractive chores so players will not do them unless they have to.

Difficulty is something that is always going to be messed up in a game with a flexible character system. With a diversity of character builds, some are going to be too good and others not good enough. Fallout deals with this problem by keeping skill requirements low, and AoD deals with it by expecting players to put up with some mindless trial and error. Neither solution is ideal.

Edit: But congratulations to the team for making it this far. I hope some reassessment of difficulty will be done for the next game if not this one.

 

[Bubbles]

and can be presented as unattractive chores so players will not do them unless they have to.

I commend you for never having played an MMO, but you should at least give The Guild or Darklands a whirl someday.