Incline Chris Avellone Appreciation Station

[Doktor Best]

Brazilian TV is full of glorification of black criminals by far-leftists (they aren't even Jews), so I refrain from watching these shows whenever possible. Not to mention how ugly and unpleasant they are. Brazilian black children in favelas walk with guns and, when in bands, are constantly attacking White women in the streets, like my grandmother, my aunt, my girlfriend, myself. No thanks. Get the fuck out and go back to Africa.

If Avellone likes The Wire, wants to make an RPG about it, good for him and may he have fun and success doing it. I just don't want it, and I'm explaining why. I really like his writing and I'm interested in all his projects, except when it's something personally repelling such as this.

You got pretty strange political views for a lesbian.

 

[Immortal]

Really..? Because NWN2 was probably Obsidians best game next to MOTB / SOZ.

I have a personal dislike of NWN2 but NWN2 isn't exactly seen favorably in general I think.

Not arguing that but lets not conflate the problem..

It has huge performance / control scheme issues but it's definitely a gem in the coal mine.
I haven't seen a good RPG with custom tools like that since.

All these NWN rip offs after are just popamole garbage.. the NWN2 toolset is so powerful and yet it never caught on.. I feel like in a different world or with a few tweaks.. it could have been revolutionary.

 

[Irenaeus II]

Brazilian TV is full of glorification of black criminals by far-leftists (they aren't even Jews), so I refrain from watching these shows whenever possible. Not to mention how ugly and unpleasant they are. Brazilian black children in favelas walk with guns and, when in bands, are constantly attacking White women in the streets, like my grandmother, my aunt, my girlfriend, myself. No thanks. Get the fuck out and go back to Africa.

If Avellone likes The Wire, wants to make an RPG about it, good for him and may he have fun and success doing it. I just don't want it, and I'm explaining why. I really like his writing and I'm interested in all his projects, except when it's something personally repelling such as this.

You got pretty strange political view for a lesbian.

Yeah, lol. I threw that "myself" later when I was remembering the violences my family had suffered in the hand of black children and juveniles. I'll even add that most of my friends, all White, suffered violence in the hands of black criminals, but there's a retarded far-leftist law against "racism" in this communist South American shithole. Imagine that!

Fortunately, White people are awakening. But that's a tale for another time.

 

[Fairfax]

NWN2's base game was Saywer at his worst. Like PoE, it had its moments and was not a bad game overall, but it really lacked soul and overstayed its welcome. What Kevin and Ziets did with MotB was remarkable, nothing short of amazing as far as expansions go, yet criminally underrated at the time by journalists (can't really complain about players since 99% probably never finished the game in the first place).

The toolset was fantastic indeed.

 

[ArchAngel]

SoZ was even better. First game to give me a feeling of kind of playing Bg1 again.

 

[Irenaeus II]

SoZ was amazing, but some of the story fell short. What did Avellone work on it, if anything?

 

[Fairfax]

NWN2 also suffered from bad timing. The same game today (but based on 5E), by the same people and with the same budget, would've been a lot more successful and would've had better gameplay. It was one of the lowest points in CRPG history. PnP history as well, as the expansions came out right after 4E was released. Come to think of it, a few years later and it would've been based on the 4E, which Sawyer actually likes. I guess it's good that it came out right before that, then. lol

As for SoZ, MCA is only listed as Chief Creative Officer, I think, while in MotB he was writer and designer. I guess he wasn't as heavily involved.
In his LinkedIn profile he doesn't include SoZ as one of his projects.

 

[Irenaeus II]

It's really a shame that NWN2 couldn't use the full potential of the 3.5 ed rules, but I imagine they are indeed complicated to implement. 5ed in this sense is easier.

If MCA didn't participate in designing and writing SoZ that explains some bad dungeons and the failings of the story and weakness of the NPCs.

 

[Fairfax]

That's probably because of Tony Evans, really. I mean...

Area Design, Writing, System Design and Cinematics: Dragon Age 2

speaks volumes.

 

[Duraframe300]

As for SoZ, MCA is only listed as Chief Creative Officer, I think, while in MotB he was writer and designer. I guess he wasn't as heavily involved.
In his LinkedIn profile he doesn't include SoZ as one of his projects.

MCA came in later due to KOTORII (and as such had no input in the intial design (Sawyer either who came even later) which was ferret's) And as such was basically assigned to write all the companions.

As such he was suddenly assigned to write like 9? companions. A massive amount of work. That was what broke him, he basically had to half-ass all of the charachters to get it finished in time.

During SOZ he was on Aliens and later Alpha Protocol.

 

[Duraframe300]

That's probably because of Tony Evans, really. I mean...

Area Design, Writing, System Design and Cinematics: Dragon Age 2

speaks volumes.

Not really. By the same standards you could point out that he also worked on KOTOR II and MOTB.

 

[Fairfax]

That's probably because of Tony Evans, really. I mean...

Area Design, Writing, System Design and Cinematics: Dragon Age 2

speaks volumes.

Not really. By the same standards you could point out that he also worked on KOTOR II and MOTB.

Might be a little unfair, but Area Design, Writing and System Design in DAII are so notoriously bad it's impossible to ignore that in his record. It's not like I'm bashing SoZ either, but it's no MotB.

 

[Irenaeus II]

I really liked SoZ, but I'd say there's some bad dungeons, failings in the story and a general weakness in NPCs. Tony Evans and others are probably to blame here.

 

[Xeon]

The only companion in NWN2OC I think I liked is the villain turned ally mage IIRC, I didn't like much about the game, combat was not fun, quests were not great, keep was very basic, don't remember much about the story so can't comment about it. Didn't finsh NWN2 OC, game bugged out at the last boss fight and didn't want to go thru with it again.

MotB was great, I played a Sorucerer for the first time and I kinda liked it, the evil path is so mind blowingly good, no jerk or bad boy choices but kinda of evil and betrayal type of choices, really satisfying ending. Companions also really good, kinda felt bad about them.

SoZ was pretty boring, not many locations and whatever location there was, the area was really small except for the last dungeon which was multiple floors but they gave you the option to sneak IIRC. Trading between cities, I did it a little bit but didn't think it was all that worth it, it was kinda more trouble than it worth it. I liked One of Many or something appearing in there, kicked my ass. I also liked the way companions used their skills and special dialogues, kinda like W2's.

 

[Irenaeus II]

I also liked the way companions used their skills and special dialogues, kinda like W2's.

This and the overworld map were the best gameplay designs imo

 

[Immortal]

I also liked the way companions used their skills and special dialogues, kinda like W2's.

This and the overworld map were the best gameplay designs imo

Choosing the character who uses a particular skill should be a mandatory feature in party-based RPG's.. It's kinda sad we didn't get it until SoZ.

 

[ArchAngel]

SoZ was amazing, but some of the story fell short. What did Avellone work on it, if anything?

I am not really a story guy. The free roaming mixed with use of skills on overland map, mixed with harder fights than NWN2 and MotB, mixed with limited resting mixed with new setting, mixed with whole setting up a trade network was a very cool mix.

All they missed was better and bigger dungeons and more of them. But game was done in very short time and not expensive so I can forgive them. I hope to see something similar from some other game in some future but bigger and better.

 

[ArchAngel]

That's probably because of Tony Evans, really. I mean...

Area Design, Writing, System Design and Cinematics: Dragon Age 2

speaks volumes.

Not really. By the same standards you could point out that he also worked on KOTOR II and MOTB.

Might be a little unfair, but Area Design, Writing and System Design in DAII are so notoriously bad it's impossible to ignore that in his record. It's not like I'm bashing SoZ either, but it's no MotB.

That is good. MotB was linear game with terrible and boring encounters. It was only good to storyfags.
I finished it once, tried to play it again but found it worse than PST in every way. Using bad engine like NWN2 was didn't help it. Same as with FNV. Both games might have been good if done in IE or Fallout engines.

 

[Irenaeus II]

Oh yeah, limited resting. That was a great improvement. Nice you mentioned.

 

[Lacrymas]

...keep was very basic,...

The keep in NWN2 is actually the best stronghold mechanic we've ever gotten, so I don't know what you compare it to to call it "basic".

I didn't know Chris wrote the entirety of NWN2OC (basically). The writing in the OC is so ...lame, I guess. It's not bad in the sense that it's nonsensical, although there were some iffy moments, like the Trial by Combat. It also got some basic D&D lore mixed up, like severing the silver chord of the King of Shadow, even though they can't exist outside of the Astral Plane. Some of the events also didn't have connection and villains like Ammon were doing stuff in cutscenes which breaks the cardinal rule of gaming/writing "the AI/villains shouldn't cheat or have contrived/unexplained powers". Actually scratch that, NWN2OC's writing is bad :p

 

[Infinitron]

He said he wrote the companions, not the entire game. Much of the writing was likely done by the area designers.

Act 1 Area Design John Lee
Act 2 Area Design Eric Fenstermaker, George Ziets, Jeff Husges
Act 3 Area Design Constant Gaw, Anthony Evans

Guess which Act is the best.

 

[Irenaeus II]

I liked the bitchy and arrogant hot blonde Sorceress and the gay elf (duh) city Wizard was also decent. Forgot their names. People also liked some evil assassin hombre called Bishop, but I don't think I ever used him.

 

[Lacrymas]

Only rabid fangirls liked Bishop and only because he was handsome.

Yeah, my bad, he wrote the companions, not the whole thing. The companions are a mixed bag, mostly shitty. Shandra had the most character development and the only one who had a character outside of their race/class/alignment. Khelgar is a dwarf, 'nuff said. Neeshka is a tiefling rogue... and the tiefling part doesn't go anywhere, if it's even mentioned past the first time (I don't remember). Sand... is basically Vaarsuvius from Order of the Stick, but less memorable. Qara had potential, but it didn't go anywhere because of cut content. Casavir is a paladin with everything that that entails. Bishop had the most content cut as far as I know, but he's one of two Token Evil Team Members (tm) in how he turned out. Grobnar is a gnome bard, as unfunny as it gets. The githzerai one (Zhjaeve?) was just there to tell you what McGuffin you need to fetch and to proclaim some important-sounding symbolic gibberish that means nothing in and out of context. She was trying to emulate the relationship between TNO and Dak'kon, but failed miserably because the PC and her didn't have any kind of connection. Ammon Jerro is either a hypocrite, a liar and a psychopath (which is good) OR just nonsensical, probably the latter since we see a pattern here. Amie and Bevil... lol.

So, yeah, shitty companions :p

 

[Irenaeus II]

Amie dying was worse than Aerith... And I had forgotten that Qara is red haired, not blonde.

 

[Jedi Exile]

Atris