Wasteland 2 - Gameplay Video

Yeah, I guess than this game is not for you. But I think the point is that this game is bringing back the "old" gameplay and not just the franchise and that was what they said. But you seem to wish for the opposite: Have a modern game with the old franchise.
This game is not for you. On the bright side for you, there are tons of games out there which you will like - which we don't because they are too "streamlined" or "dumbed down" for us. That's not meant as an offense. But you seem to be more of a Console gamer enjoying to be entertained from the couch. A lot of the gamers on RPG watch seem to be the opposite, liking to get "invested" into games, as I do as well.

I won't take it as an offense, but only if you are not offended if I tell you that maybe, just maybe, you are wrong about the dumbing down and that maybe you are generalizing about what is investing in games. I am not really a console player, but I would rather invest my time in NPC interaction than in combat tactics and equipment management. But you are right on your first assertion, I wasn't expecting this to be a game for me, though I had a vague hope that it would turn out to be a little more close to my taste. On the not so bright side (for me), there are not many games on the horizon that are quite what I like (how many Mass Effect or Fallout 3 games do you know about being made right now? Not many , I'm sure). On the other bright side (not for me), old school seems to be very fashionable this season.
 
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Seems like every game that gets released always gets the "You hate my beloved game you bastard now go away treatment". Nothing changes.

I mean it every game we have the same discussions. People either love or hate the game. There is no middle ground.

As for me I'll withhold judgement as I didn't back it and will judge the final project before I buy it.
 
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I won't take it as an offense, but only if you are not offended if I tell you that maybe, just maybe, you are wrong about the dumbing down and that maybe you are generalizing about what is investing in games. I am not really a console player, but I would rather invest my time in NPC interaction than in combat tactics and equipment management. But you are right on your first assertion, I wasn't expecting this to be a game for me, though I had a vague hope that it would turn out to be a little more close to my taste. On the not so bright side (for me), there are not many games on the horizon that are quite what I like (how many Mass Effect or Fallout 3 games do you know about being made right now? Not many , I'm sure). On the other bright side (not for me), old school seems to be very fashionable this season.

I don't take it as an offense, but and maybe "streamlined" would have been a better word for "dumbed down" here. I mean a game like "Heavy Rain" might be an interesting game and mabye even with an intelligent plot. But you don't spend hours in thinking about how you develop your character and what path to chose. This is what I meant with "invest" in the game. In a game which merely 20 hours to be completed, I don't need to think that hard about what I want to do as in a game which takes me 150h. Especially if it's not challenging.

About the games to expect:
Well, there was also Skyrim (dumbed down version of Daggerfall), Risen, Arcania, of Orcs and Men, Game of Thrones, Torchlight 2, Witcher 2 and probably also others released in the last year, in addition to a "streamlined" version of JA, called Back in Action which, and I quote "had realtime combat due to being a 3D game".

And I think that there are a lot of games being made which you will enjoy, a new Witcher game, Cyberpunk, a new Dragon Age (which will be more classic again though), and I have no idea about the console market, but I guess Ni No Kuni or Final Fantasy can also be put into this category of games.
 
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Seems like every game that gets released always gets the "You hate my beloved game you bastard now go away treatment". Nothing changes.

I mean it every game we have the same discussions. People either love or hate the game. There is no middle ground.

As for me I'll withhold judgement as I didn't back it and will judge the final project before I buy it.

Hmm...yeah, there are probably a lot of fanboys or haters which either agree on anything the developers do or disagree. But I think there are also very mixed opinions about each aspect of the game. Not necessarily about W2 but that it's because people who want to buy a sneakers want sneakers and misinterpreted the boots for sneakers. But the people who want to buy boots are very pleased with the result. Ok, may sound weird but I hope you got my point anyways. :p
Whether or not things like combat which look cool now, suck anyways is up to be deiceded at release of course.
 
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One thing I'd point out is that.. well.. there wasn't that much combat in the video.

You start out with a short little fight, largely to show the interface, followed by another one-off fight to show off flanking. Then they showed us how discussion works and how skills work. That was pretty much the whole video. Like I said initially, you really have to assume a lot to conclude that this is clearly a strategy game without role-playing.
 
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Oh, one last thing about the graphics discussion.

I'm not going to sit here and say that this looks revolutionary or cutting edge. Obviously, it doesn't. This is a game on a relatively small budget. Nonetheless, I don't think the mid-90's or even late 90's comparison is fair by virtually any metric, even when couched in a vague discussion of being "overhauled."

I think a closer comparison is much closer to the present. Namely, something like Neverwinter Nights 2 from Obsidian. Now, I do think WL2 definitely looks better than Neverwinter Nights 2. However, I think there's a valid comparison to make.

Mid-2000's, okay, reasonable. Mid-90's, trolling.
 
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I admit I like what I've seen.
 
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I don't take it as an offense, but and maybe "streamlined" would have been a better word for "dumbed down" here. I mean a game like "Heavy Rain" might be an interesting game and mabye even with an intelligent plot. But you don't spend hours in thinking about how you develop your character and what path to chose. This is what I meant with "invest" in the game. In a game which merely 20 hours to be completed, I don't need to think that hard about what I want to do as in a game which takes me 150h. Especially if it's not challenging.

Hmm, I see your point. I never played Heavy Rain, because I do not own a console, but I would love it to have a PC version. I will not say that one is my kind of game, but it's one of my kind of games. Agreed, that you invest more in longer games, but, as I stated before, I would rather invest my time otherwise than tactical planning - it can be combat, nothing against action here, but I would rather take my combat with less detailed tactical reasoning. To be in or out of cover, running or walking, crouching or prone, sneaking of all guns blazing is tactical enough for me.

About the games to expect:
Well, there was also Skyrim (dumbed down version of Daggerfall), Risen, Arcania, of Orcs and Men, Game of Thrones, Torchlight 2, Witcher 2 and probably also others released in the last year, in addition to a "streamlined" version of JA, called Back in Action which, and I quote "had realtime combat due to being a 3D game".

Yes, there were many games in 2010, 2011, much less in 2012. In 2013 I guess there will be even less of that kind of RPG (though I wouldn't put JA Back in Action in that list)

And I think that there are a lot of games being made which you will enjoy, a new Witcher game, Cyberpunk, a new Dragon Age (which will be more classic again though), and I have no idea about the console market, but I guess Ni No Kuni or Final Fantasy can also be put into this category of games.

I eagerly await Cyberpunk 2070, though I'm fearful that it will come out around 2070. As for the others, I'm expecting them also. The console market seems to be more populated with that category of games (maybe because they have jRPGs), but I'm just speculating here.
 
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One thing I'd point out is that.. well.. there wasn't that much combat in the video.

You start out with a short little fight, largely to show the interface, followed by another one-off fight to show off flanking. Then they showed us how discussion works and how skills work. That was pretty much the whole video. Like I said initially, you really have to assume a lot to conclude that this is clearly a strategy game without role-playing.

It does look like a strategy game, I wouldn't say without role-playing, but with not as much importance given to it as in, say Fallout 1/2. Also, the definition of role playing I have lived and played by for over 20 years does exclude this kind of detailed strategical/ tactical combat that is inferred (granted, it is only inferred) in the video. It is not the final version of the game and the video does not show a lot, but it's not just the combat, also the positioning of the characters in movement, and not showing much of a real difference between action scenes and dialogue scenes - even Fallout the First had that - that makes me think of a strategy game when I watch this video. But I may be wrong...
 
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This is a quote from the original Wasteland 2 Kickstarter campaign:

"We’re going back to the original and building from there. No first person shooter, we’re going top down so you get a tactical feel for the situation. And we’re not ditching the party play to turn it into some hack-and-slash bloodfest. It’s turn based, tactical, with a storyline that will be deeper and broader."

I.e. this was never going to be anything like Fallout 3/Mass Effect. I'm slightly amazed that anyone could think otherwise.
 
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This is a quote from the original Wasteland 2 Kickstarter campaign:

"We’re going back to the original and building from there. No first person shooter, we’re going top down so you get a tactical feel for the situation. And we’re not ditching the party play to turn it into some hack-and-slash bloodfest. It’s turn based, tactical, with a storyline that will be deeper and broader."

I.e. this was never going to be anything like Fallout 3/Mass Effect. I'm slightly amazed that anyone could think otherwise.

If this comment was induced by the previous discussion where I was involved, let me clarify that, although those games were mentioned, there was no reason to believe that I was expecting Wasteland 2 to be anything like those (I merely said that was a pity, because, in my opinion, as cRPGs are concerned, Mass Effect and Fallout 3 are, so far, the best examples of the genre). No, what I was expecting was something more like Fallout, also because Wasteland is supposed to be the spiritual father of the game where war, war never changes. Will Wasteland 2 be more like Fallout than what appears to be in this video? I don't know, but right now the video does not show great promise of that assumption to be present in the final version.
 
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It does look like a strategy game, I wouldn't say without role-playing, but with not as much importance given to it as in, say Fallout 1/2. Also, the definition of role playing I have lived and played by for over 20 years does exclude this kind of detailed strategical/ tactical combat that is inferred (granted, it is only inferred) in the video. It is not the final version of the game and the video does not show a lot, but it's not just the combat, also the positioning of the characters in movement, and not showing much of a real difference between action scenes and dialogue scenes - even Fallout the First had that - that makes me think of a strategy game when I watch this video. But I may be wrong…


Honestly, I'm not sure what you're talking about. The definition you've used? So, you don't count the Gold Box games? Or some of the Ultimas? They're not turn-based, but I'm not even sure how this was markedly more tactical than the Baldur's Gate or Dragon Age style games.

"I wouldn't say without role-playing, but with not as much importance given to it as in, say Fallout 1/2."
Based on what? Fallout 1 and 2 both had a turn-based strategy combat system. They also both emerged directly from the exploration map in a style pretty similar to Wasteland 2. The biggest difference is that Wasteland 2 has more party management (F1 had virtually none, the side characters were worthless passed the first few hours, and F2's party management was a bit less than ideal), but Wasteland 1 had a big party with Bard's Tale-style turn based combat.

Overall, Wasteland 2's combat seems about as close to a merger of WL1 and FO 1 and 2 as anyone could reasonably expect (with the possible exception of those looking for more of a Bard's Tale style system). I'm not sure what you're expecting. Something like Fallout 3?

In any case, you're also arguing that there is more of a focus on combat than role-playing. But how could you possibly reach that conclusion after watching a few minutes of footage? Again, I just don't see how you feel confident enough about this to actually complain about it and follow up your complaints with further thoughts. How much time was spent fighting in that video? A couple minutes? Maybe 3? Out of a 17 minute video?

Now matter how I see it, this line of complaint is made up of assumptions and a strong imagination. The combat system is almost identical to Fallout's but with party management more like WL1. The ratio of combat:non-combat is hugely in the latter's favor. In fact, I just checked myself, and they spend as much time in dialogue as they do in combat. On top of all of this, I'm still not sure what you think we should be expecting to see.
 
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If this comment was induced by the previous discussion where I was involved, let me clarify that, although those games were mentioned, there was no reason to believe that I was expecting Wasteland 2 to be anything like those (I merely said that was a pity, because, in my opinion, as cRPGs are concerned, Mass Effect and Fallout 3 are, so far, the best examples of the genre). No, what I was expecting was something more like Fallout, also because Wasteland is supposed to be the spiritual father of the game where war, war never changes. Will Wasteland 2 be more like Fallout than what appears to be in this video? I don't know, but right now the video does not show great promise of that assumption to be present in the final version.

I think I might know where you are coming from, is it the dialogue system that you find lacking? I.e. Using keywords instead of sentences/phrases? They did state in the prelude to the video that it's purpose was to show off the HUD, combat and skill use mechanisms. They didn't really show any dialogue stuff beyond "Tell me about Snake Vargas".
 
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I think I might know where you are coming from, is it the dialogue system that you find lacking? I.e. Using keywords instead of sentences/phrases? They did state in the prelude to the video that it's purpose was to show off the HUD, combat and skill use mechanisms. They didn't really show any dialogue stuff beyond "Tell me about Snake Vargas".

See, if the line of criticism is, "The dialogue system looks a little lacking here," I could see that. Compared to the animated characters and the full text choices of Fallout, the system here feels lightweight. However, I'm still not seeing a game that's overly tactical or combat-focused for the genre.
 
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