KickStarter Kingdom Come: Deliverance Pre-Release Thread [RELEASED, GO TO NEW THREAD]

[SoupNazi]

"Lhota" made me lol.

 

[Suchy]

My personal preference is a large and realistic map, but designing quests in a way that backtracking is reduced to minimum. If you want to send the player to a place he already visited, make him take a different route. Limited fast travel options aren't bad either, as paid services for example.

 

[joeydohn]

New blog is out. http://warhorsestudios.cz/index.php?page=blog&entry=blog_011#disqus_thread I am curious what would be your answer for my questions in it

The identical to real life landscapes sounds cool from a technical standpoint but I'm not sure how that'd actually play, other than be the most extreme hiking simulator ever. I think most people would find a realistic map quite boring if they were expecting the usual kind of open world RPG , although Flight Simulators have quite a hardcore following, but they're quite complex from a control standpoint I believe.

In the end it seems you found that even compressed a bit that isn't good though, perhaps that's how some of these super compressed games you don't like started out but they soon realised it just wasn't going to work for them? I guess "a smaller map that looks realistic but is reasonably compressed" sounds like the best compromise, but I don't think it's inherently bad to have large, mostly empty areas (like a forest, not a desert because deserts suck) with a few interesting things spread out in them, perhaps an easter eggs as long as you can make your own fun somehow and it doesn't feel like a bunch of copy-pasted trees. A real forest doesn't have to be boring, I used to love exploring woods and commons near me but I don't think it's easy to translate that into a game. I'm not sure it'd be that entertaining if looking at trees and hiking is the only thing you could do. In a real forest you've got lots of different plants, animals, things people have left behind, makeshift camps and so on. I don't think I've really made my point but life gives you much more freedom to do things than can reasonably be programmed into a computer game which is why we get caves and monsters roaming about every few metres to entertain us.

 

[Johannes]

A big map with some kind of fast travel would be my choice. Better if the fast travel somehow has same results as going on in on the micro-scale map.
Maybe a switch to just make the simulation to go 2x, 4x, 6x faster? But the framerate might suffer so much that any visual pleasure from traveling around would be undone...

 

[joeydohn]

A big map with some kind of fast travel would be my choice. Better if the fast travel somehow has same results as going on in on the micro-scale map.
Maybe a switch to just make the simulation to go 2x, 4x, 6x faster? But the framerate might suffer so much that any visual pleasure from traveling around would be undone...

I've never really liked fast travel systems but used because it saved time I guess, I like the idea of events being able to happen while fast travelling though so it doesn't just feel like a loading screen. Is something like an airship (if setting appropriate of course) or a horse-drawn carriage that acts like a taxi such a bad idea? I was quite disappointed (among other things) that the horse-drawn cart in Skyrim that I thought was going to be a taxi was just another kind of fast travel that charged me money.

 

[GarfunkeL]

a realistic landscape in which you can wander for hours even if it is relatively empty

 

[Kitako]

SoZ overland map (plus that mod that reduced the insane amount of trash spawns) was pretty perfect way to move around large areas. Exploration, use of skills, treasure finding, it was not a "click-to-teleport" crappy way of fast travel.

 

[Gord]

How large are we talking here? What can we expect?
Edit: Aww, only 3x3km

The thing that eventually kills map design in a game like Oblivion is obviously plausibility. Compressing the whole province like that just is stupid, it destroys any sense of size and grandeur. Fallout 3 on the other hand feels much more plausible - it's still smaller than reality, but the sizes are believable (if you don't think too hard about whether several independent settlements would develop within that area).

So my opinion is, definitely don't go the Oblivion route. If you are going to compress, use a reasonable compression. And if in doubt better restrict the simulated area and make the one you do more plausible.

If you are going (almost) realistically big (and I guess I would like to see that), maybe use a mixture of a point of interest and random encounter system where the former become known to you from quests, conversations, books, etc, so that travelling there doesn't mean aimlessly combing through hundreds of square kilometers of wilderness and the latter just can happen anytime, anywhere so as to provide some content that doesn't have to be placed in advance.

The lanndscape itself can, for a large part also be created procedurally, imho, better to put more effort into the important locations.

 

[Fens]

Emperor Lojza, Archmage Lotrando

...expecting to read more about an emtionally gripping romance with princess Zubejda in the future

if the most important locations are on the edges of the map, the player must entirely unnecessarily and too often undertake the same boring route across the entire map every time he/she sets out for anywhere.

...quick travel !options! like ships or carriages come into mind... not just clicking to get there, having the option to walk/ride there yourself or go to the harbour or the carriage stop (with limited destinations and maybe a short cutscene to bridge the travel from a to b... also: moneysink) would decrease the tedium and still keep the world intact

a realistic landscape in which you can wander for hours even if it is relatively empty?

as an avid explorer of virtual worlds i'm all for this... just give me some landmarks, a ruin here and there, some fields with peasants on them, some (non suicidal) wildlife and i'm happy

 

[DwarvenFood]

Had me at Potato. Compressed potato. Compressed potato landscapes.

Interesting read, we have a thread on big in-game cities that could be somewhat relevant.

Anyway I prefer a large empty landscape, but it also kind of depends on the type of game.

 

[MetalCraze]

Give us wide open landscape.

This is 2012. You have nice PC hardware today to pull off truly epic landscapes. By which I mean huge mountains and valleys. As in HUGE, not Skyrim's miniscule crap where towns and mountain ranges are 5 minutes apart.

You are a czech, doing big landscapes is in czech blood. So do it now.

 

[DraQ]

the famous imperial city of Lhota, the capitol of the world and largest agglomeration in the known universe, whose fame touches the stars.
The city consists of precisely fifteen buildings (one of which is the imperial palace); the town is inhabited by 30 NPCs

Wait, it's called Tamriel, not Lhota.

DraQ you've probably thought more about this than I have

I generally like fully modelled worlds, but the stretches of space between locations must matter somehow. The antithesis of this would be Daggerfall, where there is precisely nothing to be found in the wilderness (except the extremely unlikely and prohibitively time consuming attempts at stumbling upon dungeons or covens). Not to say that the worldspace must be full of stuff, but it must play some role that can't be abstracted away - for example in Frontier planets were separated by huge volumes of completely empty vacuum, yet thanks to the physics system and seamlessness of the world it played vital role in the game.

OTOH Daggerfall models the role of time and distance pretty well, although it would do better if it involved supply mechanics of some sort.

Showing dot travelling on the map is generally good, because it helps game convey that you're in fact travelling great distances, rather than teleporting, even if its of no mechanical consequence.

 

[abnaxus]

Interesting blog link. Apparently the Sacred 2 gameworld is bigger than Oblivion (22 mi²).

 

[sgc_meltdown]

Daggerfall

I've always been a little leery of people who quote the whole 'if you don't use overland travel in daggerfall it will take you ten real days to walk from one end to the other'

yes, and and I suppose it will take me weeks to fly from planet to planet in freelancer if I don't use the space lanes too, technical size of map is no quality metric for the player and if you use it like that for fanboy circlejerking

Showing dot travelling on the map is generally good, because it helps game convey that you're in fact travelling great distances, rather than teleporting, even if its of no mechanical consequence.

Once again I must point out Castlevania : Lords of Shadow's majestic way of conveying cinematic travelling by having the line on map thing plus overlaid shots of the hero striding purposefully in slow motion through various related landscapes whilst gazing into the distance

and yes even if there aren't any random encounters I really do prefer the line moving with the date clicking past instead of instant teleportation, what's wrong jerks you can't preload the next area during that or what

Apparently the Sacred 2 gameworld is bigger than Oblivion (22 mi²).

I hate to say this but the Sacred 2 gameworld is more boring than Oblivion's, if quite a bit less infuriating

 

[mikaelis]

I would rather go for option 3, which means relatively small compression (compared to such games as Oblivion or Morrowind for example) and smaller map. Again I wouldn't mind fast travel option which fits well in the scenario and for which you need to pay. Morrowind comes to mind for one. Boiling Point: Road to Hell had it done also well (travelling from starting settlement on the west towards the second big settlement at the east part of the map took a lot even with the car, and I cannot imagine how much it would take on foot. Yet, you were able to buy a ticket and go there with the bus as a "fast travel" option).
As for being afraid of having vast emptiness, why won't you put some fictional encounters/settlements, small enough so they will not compromise the realistic setting you are aiming for. For example, things like a camp of some raubitters (even better if dynamic, so they move from place to place), travelling people (like peasants, tradesmen, nobles with the company) - some very small settlements (which would be burnt hundred times in the history - so nobody remembers them anymore), farms, an inn here and there with couple of buildings like barn, small house, etc.

 

[Untermensch]

I like that they are going for a smaller map. Smaller scale means that they can add more diversity to the places that we are going to explore.

Looking forward to this

 

[toro]

This is really a retarded question. I cannot wait for the next shit: "Do you prefer blue or pink cutscenes?", "How big should be the trees?" or "Do you prefer QTEs in your movies or not?".

If this game was the result of someone's vision, there would be no need for these question. But hey, we have some real AAA developers in the house ... so it makes sense to have no fucking vision and follow the most common denominator. Wait a minute, did the Codex sunk so low?

And my rage doubled on the spot when I saw *potato* in that thread. A Codex meme should remain on Codex, otherwise it sucks.

 

[DwarvenFood]

This is really a retarded question. I cannot wait for the next shit: "Do you prefer blue or pink cutscenes?", "How big should be the trees?" or "Do you prefer QTEs in your movies or not?".

If this game was the result of someone's vision, there would be no need for these question. But hey, we have some real AAA developers in the house ... so it makes sense to have no fucking vision and follow the most common denominator. Wait a minute, did the Codex sunk so low?

And my rage doubled on the spot when I saw *potato* in that thread. A Codex meme should remain on Codex, otherwise it sucks.

 

[MetalCraze]

I like that they are going for a smaller map. Smaller scale means that they can add more diversity to the places that we are going to explore.

Looking forward to this

Yes Theme Park where you have kids living on top of ork caves while the travel to your archnemesis' lair takes less time than going into general store to buy milk is totally not a shit design.

3x3km is not a PC king size it's a smorr konsore pinis

 

[mikaelis]

3x3km is not a PC king size it's a smorr konsore pinis

As far as I understand this is just one location. And there will be several of such maps within the game (not persistently connected). But instead of being 3x3 km standard crazy compressed video game aka Oblibian, it will be much more realistic in terms of distances (though still a bit compressed). Just taking roughly what was written 3x3 km map will probably correspond to roughly 12x12 km in real world (compression factor 4, not too much as he said the compression factor for OFP was 20. I don't know what is the compression factor in Oblivion but it must be in hundreds). I took the values from his statement that 2 locations that they want to include in the game are ca. 12 km apart in real world.

I don't know man, but having 5 or 6 locations, each of them close to the real size of the whole Oblivion world with close-to-real distances is not that bad IMHO.

 

[Sul]

Big open world all the way. Non-marked places (caves, camps, etc...), horses, the lack of compass and a good in-game lore that gives plenty of reasons to wander about (Morrowind did that well).
I don't see the issue with fast travel, just put some travel services around like carriages and boats that link the player to central hubs where he can sell his phat loot and explore the surrounding area.

 

[GarfunkeL]

Alternatively, allow player to select a destination on the map, then assume control of the character and increase time - like in flight sims, where you can use a combination of auto-pilot and fast-time to speed up the boring parts. If the character encounters something, revert back to normal speed and return control. This way the player can also keep watching, enjoying the pretty world you've created.

 

[Sul]

Alternatively, allow player to select a destination on the map, then assume control of the character and increase time - like in flight sims, where you can use a combination of auto-pilot and fast-time to speed up the boring parts. If the character encounters something, revert back to normal speed and return control. This way the player can also keep watching, enjoying the pretty world you've created.

Sounds silly. I just can't imagine a good way to put a fast forward button and then watch everything go fast. Also, weaker rigs will suffer.
A series of hubs covering several places around the map where you can fast travel and then explore the surrounding area is a much more pratical way (and inexpensive for the devs) to cover the whole map and still give the player a sense size regarding the world

I also liked the idea of several smaller 3x3 instanced maps but it kinda misses the point of open-world game.

 

[GarfunkeL]

Freespace, Tie Fighter, Falcon 3.0, Falcon 4, Il-2 Sturmovik, SEAL Team and many others beg otherwise.

 

[Sul]

Freespace, Tie Fighter, Falcon 3.0, Falcon 4, Il-2 Sturmovik, SEAL Team and many others beg otherwise.

Nigga please. With the exception of SEAL Team (really? you're comparing the maps from SEAL with the ones made for a CryEngine2012 game?) you are talking about games where you have both the horizontal and the vertical plane without any obstacles blocking your way, of course you can use a fast forward button there. The same can't be said about a game with modern level design set in some kind of medieval forest full of rocks, hills and rivers.