The Smaller Touches

bigredpanda · Post by **bigredpanda** » Fri Sep 22, 2006 7:18 am

I'm not talking about voice acting done "badly" - I'm talking more about just having an irritating voice... like Jedi Academy, for example. Obviously it comes down to personal taste, but that was kind of my point: why bother whith voice acting when one of the key features of the game is be able to define your own character? I like the fact that, in the previous KOTOR games, they didn't try and predict what sort of voice you wanted. For some games, like Splinter Cell, where the chracter is pre-defined, there's obviously less of an argument.

DesR85 · Post by **DesR85** » Thu Sep 28, 2006 9:06 am

I was thinking, what about this idea where if you lack skill points in certain category like security for example, you will still be able to hack into the control panel but at a much slower pace? The higher the skill point, the faster the time it takes to hack into a control panel. I think it would be much better than not being able to access the security panel at all due to your skill points not meeting the skill requirement. The same can be applied for almost any other skill like demolitions, repairs and others.

bigredpanda · Post by **bigredpanda** » Fri Sep 29, 2006 4:50 am

Not sure about that. I know your views on replaying games, Des, but this sort of thing was what Oblivion was criticised alot for - being able to do everything just ith one character, regardless of allignment, type, etc. The element you're talking about here added a lot to the replayability of the games for me.

DesR85 · Post by **DesR85** » Fri Sep 29, 2006 9:53 am

bigredpanda wrote:Not sure about that. I know your views on replaying games, Des, but this sort of thing was what Oblivion was criticised alot for - being able to do everything just with one character, regardless of allignment, type, etc. The element you're talking about here added a lot to the replayability of the games for me.

Hmm. Good points you brought up there. Well, if the leveling system is still based on the the previous KOTORs, it would still maintain some form of challenge and you will have to rely heavily on team member(s) who specialises in skills that you lack proficiency in. Using Oblivion's leveling method will not only take away the challenge but also the purpose of a team-based game.

And about Oblivion, yes, I played it before and I know how it's leveling system work. More like you have to keep working on a certain skill until you become more proficient with it. I also agree that this method suits a solo-type game and not a team-based one.

Darth_Juro · Post by **Darth_Juro** » Fri Sep 29, 2006 4:56 pm

how about changing the way your face changes when your evil? darth sidieous got his face that way because of force storm, but when anakin fell the only thing that changed was his eye color....and in the later movies his face was only like that because he got burned and spent years under a mask without sunlight.....also it would be nice if they added a feature where you could read people's minds at will

bigredpanda · Post by **bigredpanda** » Mon Oct 02, 2006 2:44 am

Darth_Juro wrote:how about changing the way your face changes when your evil? darth sidieous got his face that way because of force storm, but when anakin fell the only thing that changed was his eye color....and in the later movies his face was only like that because he got burned and spent years under a mask without sunlight.....also it would be nice if they added a feature where you could read people's minds at will

Heh heh I actually thought that was a bit of a mistake on behalf of ol' George. All the way up to RotS we think that being DS gives you that skin complexion, and then it turns out that its actually done suddenly.

I'm not sure about the reading people's minds, but I tihnk there's defnitely room to do more with the Awareness skill. In the previous games, Awareness always led to an advantage in conversation. But what if there were a few things you became aware of, that asking the NPC about actually resulted in them geting offended and walking off?

DesR85 · Post by **DesR85** » Mon Oct 02, 2006 9:26 am

Darth_Juro wrote:how about changing the way your face changes when your evil? darth sidieous got his face that way because of force storm, but when anakin fell the only thing that changed was his eye color....and in the later movies his face was only like that because he got burned and spent years under a mask without sunlight...

Good idea. Though I would very much prefer a gradual change of your looks when you go either light or dark side. Like the more evil you become, your face would look more twisted and have a despicable look. As for becoming good, your face would take on a more saintly and haughty look (I might be exaggerating a little bit here). This idea is an excerpt from Fable excluding the heavenly look with the halo and butterflies flying around and the evil look with the horns and flies flying around.

REal953 · Post by **REal953** » Fri Oct 27, 2006 12:02 pm

i would like to see a little more blood and guts. whenever you shoot someone all that happens if a few sparks.

DesR85 · Post by **DesR85** » Fri Oct 27, 2006 8:01 pm

REal953 wrote:i would like to see a little more blood and guts. whenever you shoot someone all that happens if a few sparks.

I don't know if adding blood and guts is a good idea. Seeing that Lucasarts is a company that focuses on developing and publishing family-friendly games, I doubt it will be possible.

REal953 · Post by **REal953** » Fri Oct 27, 2006 8:31 pm

DesR85 wrote:I don't know if adding blood and guts is a good idea. Seeing that Lucasarts is a company that focuses on developing and publishing family-friendly games, I doubt it will be possible.

I'm sure that most of the people who buy kotor games are old enough to see some blood and guts. I don't think it would hurt there sales that bad.

bigredpanda · Post by **bigredpanda** » Tue Oct 31, 2006 10:56 am

REal953 wrote:I'm sure that most of the people who buy kotor games are old enough to see some blood and guts. I don't think it would hurt there sales that bad.

That's not the point, at least not for LucasArts. Remember in the films when children didn't die, "younglings" did? Think along those lines.

DesR85 · Post by **DesR85** » Tue Oct 31, 2006 8:06 pm

REal953 wrote:I'm sure that most of the people who buy kotor games are old enough to see some blood and guts. I don't think it would hurt there sales that bad.

Also, if you look at the list of titles Lucasarts published or developed, none of them are rated M. Most of them border around the E-T rating (I'm using the ESRB rating system here). They don't even contain any mature content like blood and gore, sexual themes and what not.

Kayos · Post by **Kayos** » Wed Nov 01, 2006 12:05 am

its true. although blood and guts and gore, probably would boost LA sales, they are a family friendly company and therefore wouldnt do gore. i mean its kida like the kiss scene with bastila in the 1st kotor you know?

so yea, even tho gore and guts would be good, i dont think it would be good at all for LA.

Leet · Post by **Leet** » Wed Nov 01, 2006 12:29 pm

is gore and guts even possible? lightsabers arent like swords wich cut ur skin, it like burns everything includin blood, isnt that why you dont see any blood in the movies?

Darth_Juro · Post by **Darth_Juro** » Wed Nov 01, 2006 4:30 pm

Leet wrote:is gore and guts even possible? lightsabers arent like swords wich cut ur skin, it like burns everything includin blood, isnt that why you dont see any blood in the movies?

Yes a Lightsaber is a beam of energy.....it burns the wound making blood unable to pour. But I'd like to see your companions with a line of thought that is equal to their alignment......oh how I hated having a fully evil crew that still made a big deal about me killing an innocent person

DesR85 · Post by **DesR85** » Wed Nov 01, 2006 10:01 pm

Darth_Juro wrote:...oh how I hated having a fully evil crew that still made a big deal about me killing an innocent person

Agreed. I've seen quite a number complaints about KOTOR 2 where you turn most of your crew into Siths and they still chastise you for committing an evil deed. Another idea I had been pondering, and I think someone mentioned this a while back, is that if you're DS, you should have DS-based characters and if you're LS, you should be accompanied with LS-based characters.

bigredpanda · Post by **bigredpanda** » Thu Nov 02, 2006 6:42 am

Darth_Juro wrote:oh how I hated having a fully evil crew that still made a big deal about me killing an innocent person

Yes and no. I can see just as many complaints if you enlisted someone like, say, the Disciple, who's committedly just and good etc., then after one simple conversation he has no problem with you killing everything.
I suppose it depends how the influence is implemented: if you reason with someone that what you've done is best for all of you (as you can do with some charcters... er, Visas, perhaps?), as opposed to just doing something that they comment on (like with HK).

Not too sure about the completely different crews idea... it might result in quite a linear game, like either your dark or your light, and there's no picking your own path in between. Sometimes I'll play a character who's committedly one or the other, but sometimes I'll hop between them, as befits what the character might do...

DesR85 · Post by **DesR85** » Thu Nov 02, 2006 7:59 am

bigredpanda wrote:
Not too sure about the completely different crews idea... it might result in quite a linear game, like either your dark or your light, and there's no picking your own path in between. Sometimes I'll play a character who's committedly one or the other, but sometimes I'll hop between them, as befits what the character might do...

Well, in a way, it may provide some incentive for those who want to stay at a certain alignment. I don't really liked the idea of flipping from one alignment over to another in any open-ended game. But then again, improving on that idea, what about if you have a set of characters in your party but if you commit too many evil deeds, they will leave you (LS team members, that is) at some point in the game. Same goes to the DS team members if you do good deeds. Yeah, it may sound linear but it does look logical, in my opinion.

bigredpanda · Post by **bigredpanda** » Thu Nov 02, 2006 11:26 am

The idea of NPCs leaving your party is ace...

Thinking about it, that would seem to solve a lot of the problems - so if you had a lot of influence with them and did something they didn't like, they would stick around disgruntled, but if your INF was low, they would just run away. Brilliant.

I think more incentive to stay on one allignment could be done with closer attention to the rewards/plot - for example, the first time I played, I was a DS character. Then I got to Onderon, and it was obvious I was meant to side with Vaklu - but why? He was shooting at me! That made no sense whatsoever, unless I was able to kill him later. Better, I thought, to maintain the structure of power in place with the Queen, and manipulate her political decisions - that seemed a much more DS thing to do.

Leet · Post by **Leet** » Thu Nov 02, 2006 3:08 pm

i like the idea about how if NPC's dont like you they leave but wat about ur NPC's like actually either dieing, ? and geting new ones as you travel or if they are injured severly you cant use them for a while until they recover?