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Old 03-28-2001, 10:17 PM   #101
Strahd Von Zarovich
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One day humans will grow an extra finger and an eye just to keep up with the games. Or perhaps neurological Link to the game like In Shadowrun (I wonder why they din't make a game on this passed the sega gen one)
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Old 03-29-2001, 01:23 PM   #102
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Old 03-29-2001, 09:30 PM   #103
Nex
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bump

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In my darkest hour you'd be well advised
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Old 03-30-2001, 02:27 AM   #104
WOLFGIR
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OK, this might alread have been written but now the expansion have it´s own website up, here it is!
http://www.interplay.com/bg2throne/

Enjoy fellas!

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WOLF WINS EVERY FIGHT BUT ONE, AND IN THAT ONE, HE DIES
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Old 03-30-2001, 02:29 AM   #105
slackerboy
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cool

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Old 03-30-2001, 05:19 AM   #106
Memnoch
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Today's info.


Throne of Bhaal
Dave Gaider (Senior Designer)
Play balance and quests: If only it were that simple.

I'm sure I don't need to tell anyone here that the skill level of people playing the game is wildly different. We're not just talking about who's good at combat, either...I mean, there are still folks who get stuck in the initial dungeon.

I'm not saying they're stupid, there's just a whole lotta people that don't want to think too much when they play...and it is extremely frustrating to be caught in the game and you can't figure something out.

Do we want to simplify things to the point that they're inane? No. But in a game that's played as much as BG2 is, we can't have hordes of people getting stuck, either. What you consider moderately challenging (and therefore fun) could be frustrating to the extreme for a lot of others.

Okay, okay, enough of that.

As far as the original question goes, we intentionally don't intend to have people running up and giving the player quests. The player is, for the most part, involved in one giant quest throughout the expansion (workin' on new area #88 right now...this is no small thing)...anything that could be considered a 'side' quest, per se, is something that leads the player further on their own quest or something that they've discovered on their own.

Hmm. Actually, now that I think of it, there are a couple of side-quests. But they are appropriate to your level. You are a BIG deal in the FR now and the NPCs treat you as such...there's no Mr. Schmoe running up to you and offering you a job. You're above that, obviously.

As far as the player being able to direct the response to situations, that sort of thing is limited for the same reasons that we didn't have multiple paths for every quest in BG2. To implement all these different routes makes the whole plot larger without increasing length (and in an expansion, space is at a premium on one CD). But I think I get the gist of what Justy was talking about. You as the player WILL feel much more in charge of your actions and not at the beck and call of others...even in situations where your course is pretty much laid out for you.

To the one who wanted us to include the ability to initiate dialogue with your NPCs, we did consider that. We like the idea...and has we considered the design advantages waaay back when BG2 was being designed initially, I'd hazard a guess to say we would have gone that way. It was really effective in PS:T. But it wasn't done in BG2 and BG2's style worked well enough. And while we could change it in the expansion, there are a LOT of people who wouldn't know about this feature simply because it didn't exist in BG2. An expansion seemed, to us, a poor place to have such a change of style. So while we like it, that's something we'd do in the future. For now, your NPCs still do the talkin'.

Romances: Anyway, before I say anything at all about the romances, I want you to think of something. In the space of the expansion (and this has to be the part that continues on after defeating Irenicus, since Watcher's Keep can occur in the space of BG2, itself), how much time really do you think there is, playing-wise?

Think of Heart of Winter, if you've played it. Throne of Bhaal will be longer, most likely, but not by leaps and bounds.

In that short space of time, even the romances that exist can't have a long and complicated conclusion to them. Now...if we were to try and fit an entire romance into that time span, would someone be at all satisfied with it?

I'm not going to say, yet, what we're planning with all the romance stuff (some of it still isn't finalized, after all), but I want you to think about this question honestly, especially considering for BG2 itself how many people who liked the romances so much said that they were too short, even despite the monumental amount of effort that was required to write them in the first place.

Think about it and let me know. I'd be interested to see the response.

(And, no, don't tell me how unfair it is that female PCs 'only' got Anomen. That has nothing to do with anything I'm talking about.)

While we can add a few things into BG2, itself, a romance cannot be one of them. There are just too many places that the romance has to come into play, and the scripting gets too complex...and therefore the chance of new bugs being introduced is too great.

QA has to test enough things in the expansion, itself, without going back and re-testing all the way through BG2 again. Just testing the bug fixes will be enough of a resource drain.

It's be nice to have another full romance in BG2, I agree with you, but it realistically can't be done. Any additions for romance plots will have to come into the space of the expansion.

As for the person who suggested a short 'fling' or two...well, that is an idea. But would it be appropriate? Or maybe a bit disappointing? I mean...if it's a fling, we'd have to script in the fact that it ends so quickly, whereas the player might have other ideas. I dunno...I'd be pissed. We could do it, though. Heh...Edwin or Korgan comes to mind.

Gorion: Hmmm...how can I put this carefully?

...OK, here goes:

Gorion does play a part in Throne of Bhaal. In fact, you learn quite a bit about him, as well as yourself.

Beyond that, I'm not sayin'.

Importing and holding items: Yes, 'store' items such as gem cases and bags of holding do import. Or, at least, I know they import from a save game, as I've seen that with my own eyes. Not as sure if you import from just a character, however...that I would have to ask someone.

As for those who die in the battle with Irenicus...they will be dead, as per normal. If they were chunked, there's no bringing them back. If their grey portrait is still in your party you can raise them as per normal.

Spell levels for contingency spells: True enough...I'm sure you can well imagine the problems that would be associated with Time Stop and other high-level spells being associated with Contingency and Chain Contingency.

Right now, we're planning on restricting spells that can be put into contingincies to those of 8th level and lower.

At the same time, we're trying to keep enemy mages from plucking off automatic Time Stops and such, as well (excepting only those with particular items, like the Robe of Vecna, or innate abilities that speed up their casting times...but that's pretty rare). They'll generally have to cast the big spells just like you do.
Mark Darrah (Lead Programmer)
Importing holding items: Actually here is how Bags work through importing.

Since they are essentially portable stores, they won't transfer correctly when you just import the character.

HOWEVER since you can import your ENTIRE game into TOB in this case the store WILL be imported.

Only a Protagonist Mage being able to summon familiars: Yes this restriction will remain.

Open GL 3D support: The 3D support in BG2 is done using OpenGL.

However if you understand how BG's 3D support relates to other 3D games it becomes a little clearer why we don't get the performance curves that a FPS does.

Allow me to explain. BG is a 2D game. When we enter 3D acceleration mode we DO take advantage of some of the hardware acceleration. Specifically ALPHA blending is used to accelerate the BLT effects of the spells. HOWEVER, what the code is ultimately doing is forcing the 3D hardware to render a 2D game. For example: Our animations are sprite not model based. As a result as the animation changes we still have to do processing in main memory and push the frame down the BUS to the video card.

The result of this difference is that BG's bottlenecks are in different places then most other games. It also means that our performance curve is much flatter. While we perform better on a low end machine then a FPS we also don't improve as dramatically on a high end system.

The bottleneck we usually hit on high end machines is bus speed.

As to Win 2K support, I do not believe we will be officially support it.

As a speed attempt, try turning the 3D acceleration on. It might help marginally.

Pausing while saving: Maybe I shouldn't admit this but: One of the reasons that the inventory screen pasuses in BG2 when it didn't in BG1 is for performance reasons.

The number of additional spell effects and item effects in BG2 causes detrimental performance on the inventory screen.

Races for Wild Mages: Races: All that can be mages (including gnomes but not half-orcs sorry)

No multi-class.

Dual classing is the same as dual classing from a specialist mage in BG2.



Yesterday's info - I forgot to post.


Baldur’s Gate II: Throne of Bhaal
Kevin Martens (Lead Designer)
New stronghold: The new Abyssal stronghold applies all of the lessons that we learnt from the Shadows of Amn strongholds.
1) It's very connected to the story.
2) Lots of things happen it.
3) There is a portal function so that you can visit is at your convenience.
4) All of the NPCs in the game can be left there so that you have access to them whenever you need them.

And so on.

Movement being shown while in map mode being added: Indeed. This function is in as an option that can be switched on or off according to the player's preference.

Potion bags: We have potion bags and they're quite handy. We also have more bags of holding and ammo belts in addition to the gem bags and scroll cases from Shadows of Amn.

Add-on and Add-in sections: To start - here's a brief explanation of the Add-On and Add-In sections.

The Add-In section is a massive dungeon complex called The Watcher's Keep. When you install Throne of Bhaal (TOB), the area is added to your existing Shadows of Amn (SOA) map. You can play it whenever you access to it although you should have an average party level of at least 10 to venture in. The Watcher's Keep makes up approximately half of the expansion and can be accessed from both Shadows of Amn and Throne of Bhaal. The area is on both maps.

The Add-On section continues the main story after the final confrontation in SOA. An Ill-wind sweeps across the Sword Coast and the party drives southward in an attempt to learn more about the Prophecy of Alaundo and to find his or her place (as a Child of Bhaal) in that prophecy. We give you an entire new WorldMap with tons of stuff to do. This new map is made up of Southern Tethyr and Northern Calimshan. Just like the transition from BG1 to BG2, everything is new.

One of the concerns mentioned was that some people are concerned about accessing the stuff that they've stored in their stronghold or elsewhere in the SOA areas. We have several solutions for this:
1) You can import from your final save in SOA. Like BG1, this is just before the end encounter. All of the equipment that you've loaded yourself out with for the final battle will be imported over into TOB. Alternately, you can do the final battle and the game will flow directly in TOB from the end movie of SOA.
2) We have tons of importation options. You can import from any other SOA save games. If you left something behind or have not yet finished SOA, you can still import into TOB. You can also import any of your created characters into the game. Any characters that are below 2 million XP will be bumped up and be given a bag of holding full of appropriately powerful goodies. We insure that you will be at an appropriate level to be able to face the new challenges in the Add-On section regardless of where you've imported from.
3) You can start a new game in TOB - you can go through the character creation just like in SOA, including new options like the Wild Mage (also available from the start of SOA). You will build a 2 million XP character who will also be given tons of spells and items appropriate to his or her class and/or level.
4) All of these import or new game options give you access, in your new stronghold, to all of the Shadows of Amn characters who are not dead. There is also a new joinable-NPC who you meet in your new stronghold.

In short, you have options. Approximately half of the expansion takes place in SOA (although it is also accessible in TOB). So, anyone who's worried about items or tying up loose ends, should take some time there and gather up everything you want to take with you before moving on. If you're not interested in this, we always make sure that you have enough good loot to make it through the game, regardless of what you have when you start the Add-On section.

Experience cap: Everyone caps out at 8 million XP and all of the individual 2DAs are filled out to 40th level. We had to choose somewhere to stop and 40th level was what we chose. 40th level is ludicrously high by any standards. What may not be understood is that we did this to essentially remove the XP cap. A normal run through of Shadows of Amn/Throne of Bhaal will leave you at approx 30th level or 5 million xp (level, of course, varies according to class). The extra 10 levels or 3 million XP is in place for those people who play the game several times via reimporting and other people who might reach the cap abnormally soon. The majority of players will not reach the cap but everything is filled out to 40th for those who do.

If there was no cap whatsoever, we would have to fill out 2DAs for all classes to any number that the player might be able to reach by reimporting over and over again. Our solution was to place a cap that just isn't attainable through normal play, hence, effectively removing the cap. Die hard players like solo players or people who import back into the game over and over again could reach the 40th level/8million XP cap.

I was the lead designer of BG1 (the original Infinity engine game), so I so have some knowledge of how we adapted the rules. Disagree with us if you want, but we felt that the classes were balanced by the XP that a character had, not the level that he was at.
James Ohlen (Director of Writing and Design)
Experience cap: The reason we use XP as a cap instead of level is for balance. In 2nd edition, a 10th level fighter is far more useful than a 10th level thief, but the fighter requires more XP to reach that level. If we used the level as a cap, then the classes that progressed the fastest would be at a disadvantage. These classes would cap out at a level significantly weaker than the classes that advanced at a slower pace.
Mark Darrah (Lead Programmer)
Mirror spell animations being like Icewind Dale: The mirror image group is now like IWD.

Ioun stones: The reason that IOUN stones go in the helmet slot is simply a file format limitation. There was no left over space for extra slots so the helmet slot was the closest appropriate one.

The creature/character file format has already been bent beyond all recognition. Unfortunately there are certain boundaries we can't cross without losing backwards compatibility.



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Memnoch - Custodian of the Order of the Holy Flame
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Old 03-30-2001, 02:05 PM   #107
Accord
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Old 03-30-2001, 09:59 PM   #108
Accord
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Old 03-31-2001, 03:03 PM   #109
Accord
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Com'on, is someone else gonna bump this?

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Old 03-31-2001, 07:35 PM   #110
Nex
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Join Date: March 29, 2001
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UMPBAY!!!!!! ONGLAY IVELAY IGLATINPAY!!!!!

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In my darkest hour you'd be well advised
not to plan my funeral 'fore my body dies
-Nex
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