RPGWatch Feature - Divinity: Original Sin Preview

Originally Posted by xenocide
I know you can play it single player, but I am still not convinced the focus on co-op will not hurt the single player experience. Being turn based should help in that regard (no need to control multiple characters in real time). Name me the games that had multi-player as a main focus that had awesome single player experiences. I hope they pull it off.

The multiplayer seems similar to what was in Baldur's Gate or Nwn. The only difference is that the game have 2 protagonists, so both can interact in dialogs.

Hopefully that is the case!

Originally Posted by azarhal
The multiplayer seems similar to what was in Baldur's Gate or Nwn. The only difference is that the game have 2 protagonists, so both can interact in dialogs.

I know you are arguing against me but IMO you just proved my point.

Baldur's Gate was primarily designed as a single player game with co-op as an option and it had an awesome single player experience.

NWN was primarily designed as a multi-player game with a single player game as an option and it had a mediocre single player experience.

I will be extremely disappointed in Original Sin if its single player game is only as good as NWN. In fact I am looking forward to it being much better than that.

What leads you to believe that they're not focusing on the single-player experience?

Originally Posted by JDR13
What leads you to believe that they're not focusing on the single-player experience?

From Swen's blog:

"I always wanted to go back to Divine Divinity and finish the job. One of the things that bugged me about that game was that it was originally supposed to have a multiplayer mode………

Then with Beyond Divinity, multiplayer was back on the agenda, but the Divine Divinity code had evolved to the point that putting it in would’ve meant rewriting everything, and at that time, that was impossible.

And then, came Divinity II. That one too was supposed to have multiplayer ……

they were probably right about canceling the multiplayer, but that didn’t prevent me from feeling frustrated about the entire thing, because that was the third time.

So now that we’re finally publishing ourselves, it shouldn’t come as a surprise that multiplayer was one of the very first things on the list………..

this cooperative dialog system we’re hinting at in the video & previews. What’s being show really scratches but the surface of our ambitions. I actually don’t understand why nobody did this before – the moment you start thinking about making a real RPG with cooperative multiplayer in there, you can’t but end up with something like this. Anyways, if we’re the first & players like it, I guess that’ll be something cool."


If that's not a focus on multi-player I don't know what is.

Mod tools releasing with the game like NWN.

Basically everything I have read or seen about the game leads me to believe that multi-player is the main focus. That's not to say they are not focusing on the single player enough, but history is against them so I am unsure at this point.

Will the single player game suck? I have no idea and I actually do not think it will.

Will they spend enough time and attention on the single player side? I have no idea, I hope so.

I know I am coming off as the Negative Nancy in this thread, and I am interested in the game and I will follow it and as I said before I will prob. buy the game. I just am not jumping for joy and creaming my shorts like 1/2 the people are in their posts. I am just taking a wait and see attitude because of the reasons I have outlined.

That comment by Swen is what makes you think the "primary focus" is on multiplayer?

He's simply saying that it was something he wanted to include. There nothing there that indicates he's placing more importance on one mode than the other. Of course you're free to interpret it any way you want, but I don't see the purpose of jumping to conclusions at this point.

He's already addressed this, sorta. "Swen Vincke ‏@LarAtLarian @MysterD Yes, the game is very much intended to be played in single player, offline, but when you want up to 4 can play together" - from his twitter

I am guessing it'll work fine either way.

Yes I did bold the one comment, but look at everything I quoted. He goes on and on about multi-player missing from every game and how he wants to go back and fix that and how he can't wait to play co-op with his girlfriend and look how cool this 2 person dialog system is and oh lets hope the community can make more co-op games that I can play with my girlfriend and the 2 main characters is clearly a co-op thing as well.

That's fine, one of the things I love about Larian is they do what they want to do, they don't have to cater to my personal tastes. But to categorize multi-player like this "He's simply saying that it was something he wanted to include." Really? Just throwing it in. The entire game is designed around the idea of co-op play: 2 main characters, dual dialog system, dual views, one main character does one thing while the other does something else at the same time. And again, like I said before, they may be able to make it work great in single player as well. But in every RPG I have played that had a major focus on multi-player (even if you want to argue that multi-player is not the main focus, there can be no doubt that it is one of the major focuses) the single player has suffered as a result. For me as a single player gamer only it raises a flag, not a deal breaker by any means but a definite wait and see.

And I heard all these same things before NWN came out to not worry the single player will be great too. Well I know how that turned out. I will "wait and see" and I am sticking to it.

Originally Posted by JDR13
Of course you're free to interpret it any way you want, but I don't see the purpose of jumping to conclusions at this point.

I would say I am the one not jumping to conclusions. Everyone else is saying "don't worry it will be fine" while I say "wait and see". It may be fine and it may not.

Originally Posted by xenocide
I would say I am the one not jumping to conclusions. Everyone else is saying "don't worry it will be fine" while I say "wait and see". It may be fine and it may not.

Don't worry I share the same opinion as you. Co-op is fine but when a game is designed to play with co-op the single player is flawed. I brought the same opinion up in the earlier thread and got the same response you are.

Originally Posted by xenocide
It may be fine and it may not.

Of course it might! As with any game noone has actually played.

The argument is because you are presenting "Original Sin was designed with multiplayer as the main focus" as a fact, and that isn't clear at all. Throughout the pre-announcement blogs, the video, our preview…recapturing the vibe of Ultima VII is clearly stated by Lar as the main focus but you have decided different. That's fine - but expect people to disagree.

Second, you draw a comparison with NWN and draw the conclusion that all MP "focused" games have poor SP campaigns, whereas the truth is simply that BioWare wrote a crappy campaign. NWN2 has the same basic goal as NWN, right? And yet Mask of the Betrayer is one of the best RPGs you'll ever play.

Since he is quoted as saying multi-player "was one of the very first things on the list"

This is worrisome…

Originally Posted by xenocide
If that's not a focus on multi-player I don't know what is.

Mod tools releasing with the game like NWN.

Actually, modding tools have been requested for all the previous Divinity games, so having something finally made available doesn't necessarily indicate anything about a focus on multi-player.

With Divine Divinity and Beyond Divinity some of the tools they used were proprietary and couldn't be redistributed, and others just were not very user friendly. During development of Divinity 2 Larian said they would like to like to release modding tools, given enough time and resources to do so (between DKS, Dragon Commander, Original Sin and other projects that never happened).

Originally Posted by Thrasher
Since he is quoted as saying multi-player "was one of the very first things on the list"

This is worrisome…

Why? Does being near the top of the list mean it is more important than anything else on the list?
What if a strong single player experience was also one of the first things on the list?

Originally Posted by Raze
Why? Does being near the top of the list mean it is more important than anything else on the list?

Apparently it does to certain people.

"was one of the very first things on the list"

I wish I had not put that in bold. I did it because it represented the theme of everything I had seen and read. But it is not just that one line that I am looking at. Read the whole blog. Listen to the description of the gameplay. Watch the video. Is anyone really going to try and tell me that they do not believe that multi-player co-op is not one of the main development focuses? Major parts of the game are clearly designed around the idea of co-op gameplay.

Sure you can argue semantics and I may be wrong that multi-player is the main theme. But it is clearly one of the main themes. Ultima VII is another. Focusing on PC's is another. But if someone is going to try and tell me that multi-player is not at least one of the most important development focus points they must be linking to different things then I am.

Fact: the game is designed around the idea of being able to play it co-op. Not my opinion, fact. Tell me why I am wrong. Are you saying the game is not designed with co-op in mind? Are you saying that co-op considerations play no part in the development process? As someone who will not use the co-op features why I am out of line being a bit worried that co-op considerations may affect the single player experience yet still remaining "cautiously optimistic"?

I did not bring up NWN, someone else did but my experience with that game is one of the reasons I am cautiously optimistic and not ecstatic. Why was the campaign not well written in NWN? I would argue that one of the main reasonsis because the team was heavily focused on making sure the multi-player aspects and tools came out just right. And Mask of the Betrayer is not NWN, it is a separate game made using the NWN engine. And while you can play Mask co-op, lets be honest, it is a single player game with one main character and everyone else just tagging along.

And truth be told I do not think in the case of Larian releasing the mod tools will affect the gameplay at all.

But forget NWN, where are all the RPG's that have multi-player as one of the main focus points and a great single player game? The only ones I can think of are shallow ARPGs like Diablo that are more about loot collection.

And you know what? Based on the type of game Swen seems to want to make at this time he should have co-op as a focal point when designing the game. That insures the greatest chance of it being a kick ass co-op game. But I ask again; As someone who will not use the co-op features why I am out of line being a bit worried that co-op considerations may affect the single player experience yet still remaining "cautiously optimistic"?

Sure, multiplayer is a core part of the design. That doesn't equal "it's all about MP", though.

Larian was formed trying to make The Lady, The Mage and the Knight with Attic (Realms of Arkania) and I remember Lar referencing Ultima VI as an inspiration. Now, he often talks about U7. This is a company with deep RPG roots and an understanding of the genre (really, you don't get any more hardcore than Realms of Arkania). Sure, they've made mistakes but I'm 100% positive they will be trying to develop a deep campaign for RPG fans, even in SP.

In my mind there's a distinction between multiplayer where you have lots of people playing together, and co-op where you have only a few people playing together.

Dawn of War 2 is a game with co-op that works brilliantly as single player or co-op, so does Diablo 3, so does Trine.

I think having a party of two will also make this game work well either single or co-op, much more like BG or IWD.

It's not like multiplayer is a separate focus to single player, at the level of a few players it's the same focus with a few tweaks to enable it to work at the usual sticking points - conversations and combat for example. The final points of quest progression and leveling we've yet to hear about, but people have found solutions for them in the past so I'm sure Lars are clever enough too.

I'm kind of hoping that if you play single player, you can have the party members arguing with each over, that would be rather interesting! Party banter is generally a good thing.

Daniel.

Originally Posted by xenocide
Fact: the game is designed around the idea of being able to play it co-op. Not my opinion, fact. Tell me why I am wrong. Are you saying the game is not designed with co-op in mind? Are you saying that co-op considerations play no part in the development process? As someone who will not use the co-op features why I am out of line being a bit worried that co-op considerations may affect the single player experience yet still remaining "cautiously optimistic"?

Indeed, the game is designed in order to make co-op gaming possible. To me that does not imply that SP experience will be less per se:
I've always thought it to be strange that when having a party of for instance 4 people there's only one person who's making all the choices, the others just simpy go along (Well, sometimes they utter an objection, but nothing major changes). Rather boring really.

When reading that D:OS will be designed with co-op in mind, I thought: great, finally I will be able (as a single player) to influence other partymembers actions and reactions, finally I will be able to control their interactions! Finally I'll get a party that will act naturally, like in real life: they will have a unique effect (mine to decide) on other partymembers and NPCs, they will disagree amongst themselves - not because those disagreements were predetermined, but because I prefer them to disagree that way.
It's not just me controlling one character, no I'll be controlling two! That gives me a whole lot of more different outcomes in a situation. Apart from focussing on what's best giving a specific situaton, I could focus on people: I might favour one party member in one situation and the other person in a different situation.


And these words of Swen make me think my initial thought was not way off:

Swen Vincke in reply to Jack Dandy

@Jack Dandy: The idea is that the inclusion of the cooperative mode actually increases the quality of your single player experience. How that's going to work exactly I'll reserve for a future post, but rest assured that we're focussed on making single player as cool as we can.

Also, don’t underestimate what we can do with a system like this in single-player. If you make a storyline where you ensure that there’s always the opportunity for interactions between party-members to be potentially conflicting, you can make good use of that in single player too.

I like the sound of this.

Daniel.