Review RPG Codex Review: Darth Roxor on Disappointment, thy name is Pillars of Eternity

[Florian Gheorghe]

I also think that PoE artistic direction is great. I think it compares to Temple of elemental evil and Commandos as level of detail.

 

[MapMan]

Wow. I remember exactly what the opinions and general consensus was when DAO was released. Fast forward a few years and people take it as some kind of discriminant, comparing PoE to it. You people...

 

[Cadmus]

Funny, this got me really thinking and I bet I could name more encounters, or at least picture them if you told me, from DAO than PoE. I should stop reading this thread or soon I'll start to hate PoE for all its shit flaws

 

[Jools]

At first I thought at genuine nub, then I realized it was all too convenient. Which one of you is trolling the Obsidian boards so?

 

[Grinning Reaper]

It turns out that Darth Roxor's review was so good that it broke the post count record on the OE forums and inspired this thread that claims it's not a review: http://forums.obsidian.net/topic/78620-the-truth-behind-words-in-rpg-codexs-1-review-for-poe/

This is one of the most retarded posts I've seen this week. I guess the amount of attention given to a subject on the Obsidian forums is a measure of how "good" it is. So, for the most awesome things ever rankings, we have Roxor's review coming in as a distant third behind some backer memorial drama in second and the greatest thing ever in first: romance in video games. Great point Sensuki.

 

[Zorba the Hutt]

This is one of the most retarded posts I've seen this week. I guess the amount of attention given to a subject on the Obsidian forums is a measure of how "good" it is.

Nah, I've seen worse. Just in this thread, for example, there are plenty of examples of people misinterpreting obviously tongue-in-cheek comments.

 

[Volrath]

One man's tongue-in-cheek is another man's trolling.

 

[Zorba the Hutt]

One man's tongue-in-cheek is another man's trolling.

True, Bubbles has surfed that line pretty well in this thread

 

[Roguey]

Haha so he shouldn't had played Pillars at all then,with Pulitzer level of dialog like : [worshiper of Eothas] Who's Eothas?

To paraphrase Josh, they can't catch everything. Ideally that line would have been rewritten to say something along the lines of "What's your take on Eothas?"

Was Gaider really responsible for all that shitty dialogue though? Was Gaider to BG2 like what MCA was for PS:T? Even MCA didn't write all the dialogue in PS:T. I remember reading some kind of retrospective or interview about the writing in BG2, but I don't remember any details. I didn't play BG2 for the writing. Almost every cRPG ever made had shit writing, which is what I find a bit strange about Sawyer's response to that question. If he restricts himself to cRPGs with decent writing he'll pretty much be left with only PS:T and MoTB. Most of my favorite cRPGs had just awful dialogue because most cRPG writers who aren't MCA or Ziets (or perhaps Vince if he ever releases his game) just aren't any good.

BG2 was largely written by Lukas Kristjanson and Gaider. Josh didn't have too many problems with BG's writing, which Lukas wrote almost entirely by himself, but loathed the stylistic changes brought on by Gaider in the sequel.

 

[Shadenuat]

Judging by his own writing, Sawyer just can't stand any characters that actually convey some emotion.

 

[Grinning Reaper]

This is one of the most retarded posts I've seen this week. I guess the amount of attention given to a subject on the Obsidian forums is a measure of how "good" it is.

Nah, I've seen worse. Just in this thread, for example, there are plenty of examples of people misinterpreting obviously tongue-in-cheek comments.

More deflection. His comment wasn't tongue-in-cheek, it was retarded circle-jerking that six people brofisted. I guess in your mind they were all doing so ironically and they don't actually see the amount of contention as a signifier of quality. But, in reality, they do. The point has been genuinely made multiple times that Roxor must have really written a really good review for it to cause so much butthurt, and Sensuki's comment is another of the same vein. The problem being that the argument is shit. Popularity and contention on the Obsidian Pillars forums is, as I pointed out, clearly not a signifier of quality; but I guess that as long as someone claims the argument to have been a joke after the fact, it's bulletproof.

Now you can go ahead and say that your intentionally ambiguous comment wasn't directed at mine specifically and that it, too, is therefore immune to criticism. However, bullshit deflection doesn't make your argument any less shit.

 

[Sensuki]

This is one of the most retarded posts I've seen this week. I guess the amount of attention given to a subject on the Obsidian forums is a measure of how "good" it is.

Nah, I've seen worse. Just in this thread, for example, there are plenty of examples of people misinterpreting obviously tongue-in-cheek comments.

HAHAHAA

 

[Irenaeus]

It turns out that Darth Roxor's review was so good that it broke the post count record on the OE forums and inspired this thread that claims it's not a review: http://forums.obsidian.net/topic/78620-the-truth-behind-words-in-rpg-codexs-1-review-for-poe/

They are correct, it's not a review, it's a deranged rant.

 

[Irenaeus]

Wow. I remember exactly what the opinions and general consensus was when DAO was released.

My opinion when DAO was released: it's shit.

PoE still a masterpiece 10/10.

 

[Marat Sar]

Someone sure does have an axe to grind with Pillars of Eternity. (And communism). Looking at the 1,872 responses - mine counted - he probably got what he wanted.

First real forum review I´ve read on the codex though. Pity really. I don´t think this was the opportune moment for sensationalism.

Look at me, I´m actually dissappointed in RPG Codex.

 

[Azrael the cat]

Seriously? The minute to minute writing is poor in both, though less important in Brisbane admittedly, but the tonal shifts in BG1 were terrible. And surely 'wild card jacks the destinies of the chosen one and the big bad for his personal vendetta' is better than BG1's chosen one shtick?

 

[AwesomeButton]

I like the review and I agree with all the points it makes, although the game's flaws which it treats will hardly be noticed by over 90% of players, hence Obsidian will most probably not address them for future games.

If I could add something to the conclusion: "PoE is a game kickstarted with 'grognards'' money, and then designed towards casuals and journos.". I share Darth Roxor 's disappointment.

Also, I'm noticing that "weak, generic and uninteresting to boot" is starting to become a trademark for Josh Sawyer's game design.

 

[Irenaeus]

I deslike the "review", it's in bad taste and makes no sense. Obsidian will learn nothing from reading this guy frothing from his mouth.

PoE was kickstarted with my money and I'm very happy with the result. If you think I'm casual, I challenge you to 1x1 in any RTS.

The game is "Strong, distinct and interesting to b00t" and it made me change my mind about Sawyer's game design.

 

[Hatred]

PoE was kickstarted with my money and I'm very happy with the result. If you think I'm casual, I challenge you to 1x1 in any RTS.

As I have already said Irenaeus. Man the fuck up and put out a 1v1 turn based challenge. I know you are a filthy casual simply because RTS is your chosen form of combat.

 

[Sensuki]

10/10 awesome stronghold and crafting system

challonge me at NFSU1 Drift or Super Maze Wars

 

[Irenaeus]

As my 15th thousand post, I'd like to say cheers to this unappreciated masterpiece and hope that Obsidian continues to fight the decline, which has sipped its way in even in this supposedly monocled gentleman's club.

Cheers.

 

[Azrael the cat]

Sawyer removed hard counters for silly reasons, hard counters were "overpowered" on Infinity Engine games because of shitty encounter design... hohoho... all those skeletons/gnolls/bandits trash mobs grouped together, just waiting to be webbed/horrified on BG 1 wilderness areas... now...place those black talon archers all spread out and on a tactical position and prepare to be buttraped by ice arrows. Spellcasters were dangerous but only shitty players didn't know what to expect from them, low level ones mostly used hold person and horror as crowd control and fireball/pillar of fire as AoE, they were dangerous but if you had a single cleric/druid on your group and kept people spread out and having some archers with quick bows to keep interrupting them was nice too... I had more fears from the rare and deadly really good enemy archers with four attacks a round with those ice/fire arrows aiming for my spellcasters.

You could alpha strike enemies with web and fireball but that was more of a choice than something required and if you weren't a casual rest spammer, really inpractical to do all the time. Anyway...when I look to PoE spell casters... man... first, PoE has some decent protections for a mage like hardned veil for a quick and urgent defense and the second and third level spells that can make the deflection on a mage become decent enough to stop mages from be cut to shreds by the first arquebus fire volley but the only defensive spell I saw mages cast was spirit shield, completely useless spell... when they casted protection spells at all. Couldn't Obsidian program mages to cast hardned veil as their top priority for giving them time to cast more protection shit?

Another thing... on Infinite Engine games... the ai wasn't exacly THE best but... while the holding person spell was a really useful weapon against mages, if said mage wasn't a person or really powerful to pull hard spell protections... it wouldn't do anything and you would waste a cast but on PoE, mind bending from the cipher can be cast pretty much non stop by higher level ciphers on all targets, all the time, especially if you have more than one but I didn't see a single instance where an enemy priest cast protection against paralysis, actually I only saw one instance of priests casting that globe of protection spell (he died anyway afterwards by concentrated arquebus fire but was more useful for his friends than 99% of the other priests). If priests, mages, druids and ciphers (didn't see a single instance of enemy ciphers using mind lance or using mind binding or using puppet master on your tank.) actually used the useful spells.

I saw mages casting web to just cast minolleta's useless missile afterwards, the ai casting chill fog upon you and their own guys and boy... with the engagement system and weak Ai that promotes enemies and your guys just making a ball on some point, I think the Ai spell casters would actually help you by bombing their own guys with the more powerful spells if they used them anyway. Ai spell casters are so vulnerable that Durance wasn't kidding when he said arquebuses made spellcasters useless. On any difficulty bellow Path of the Damned, they can be cut like dogs and on Path of Damned, you just need some debuffs and disables from your wizards/ciphers before cutting them like dogs.

I had Durance, Aloth, Grieving mother, Éder with Adra Bettle figurine for tougher battles, my character as a cipher with biting whip and rogue I created using arquebuses. Grieving mother cast mind binding on mage, PC and rogue fire, mage dead, Aloth cast Curse of the fetid Caress on other mage followed up with a pistol with marking, Durance with his +10 accuracy with Arquebuses fire while my PC and rogue reload, mage highly hurt. PC and rogue reload, mage dead. I wouldn't have a problem with this working so well at lower levels but I didn't expect this to work so well on the whole game. I used mostly the companions with their shitty stats but I can imagine the kinda of steamrolling you can do with a full player made group.

Is it the kind of engine where we can expect an improved AI mod? Because it sounds like that would improve the game massively.

 

[ZagorTeNej]

Almost everywhere? You must tell me where everywhere is because I haven't seen any particular attention to detail.

This is from the dungeon on the main path I just finished in my current on and off playthrough:

Detailed enough for you? I certainly prefer it to brown corridors.

It looks like JA2 with painted backgrounds, but atleast JA2 had consistency.

I always liked JA2 graphics and overall visual style. Not as good as Fallout which came few years before but I dig it.

Also, characters that don't look like mutants? How can you tell what PoE characters look like...

You can zoom in close enough, don't need to get up to their nostrils to get a sense of what they look like and also:

unless you mean the party character screen

This.

I guess if the only games you've played are NWN, NWN2 and PoE, PoE would impress visually.

The amount of time I spent on playing those games is absolutely miniscule compared to the overall time I spent on various 2d isometric games throughout the whole gaming history. You can accuse me of having a shit taste but I don't really lack a point of reference.

 

[Sensuki]

Cliaban Rilag has some of the best environment art in the game.

(WTF @ not using Karkarov Solid HUD man @_@)

 

[Irenaeus]

Damn, the art in this game is awesome. I hope they keep it consistent in the sequels in different regions of the setting.