Needs more Richard Kimble: How PoE (Almost) Completely Fails to Deliver on Narrative

Adding more story elements to the game is fine in my book. But please don't make it as obnoxious as in D3. Like someone else already posted, Diablo, Azmodan, Cydia etc. popping up all the time telling you that all you did was worthless, whilst you know that it was not because, hey, you killed scores of monsters and bad ass stuff that was the greatest and vilest and whatnot in Hell, is annoying.
I'm all for story. It's a nice bonus. It's just a story that is thrown onto you (like in D3) that I don't like.
More character dialogue (monologue) that shows their development is nice, but it should be so that it's not repetetive. In a game that you play over and over again, things get old quite fast.

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Mark_GGG wrote:

<...>Gruest<...>

Greust, goddamnit.


Proposition to change the name from Greust to Gruest, as even the devs call him Gruest.


-_-

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Edwin_GGG wrote:

Watch this space :-)

:-)

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Edwin_GGG wrote:

4.  Lore

Yes, we're instituting quite a few more story glyphs (like the Shavronne's Tome in Axiom Prison) to enable players to piece together the puzzle that is Wraeclast.  What happened to it and why?  And I only intend to include lore that will, in some way, contribute to your understanding of what happens WITHIN the game.  There will be no history purely for 'interest's' sake.

Really hope you take this concept and go somewhere with it. While stand-alone lore objects like Shavronne's Tome or the Exile Orders/Judgement (whatever its called) is kinda nice and all, It would be pretty awesome if they were incorporated with randomness and fused in to the gameplay itself :)

For instance having a certain number of lore objects that spawn very rarely and randomly only in certain locations. And placing certain triggers to unlock mini sidi-quests, whether those just unlock more lore or small mediocre rewards.

Could even create a treasure hunt kind of thing, where finding a lore object unlocks more lore objects only hinted within the lore itself. Creating a sort of Quest that isn't mentioned within the Quest tab itself. Maybe link it to the more reactive towns you're planning :)

Well, really hoping you go somewhere far with this anyways :P

Nice post OP. I for one find the narrative/storyline really important in a game. It makes a game into something more than grind to gain tickets in the lottery. I always enjoyed killing diablo, mephisto and ball in d2, not to mention that drop out barbarian in act 5. And I often watched the cinematics between quests. Especially the one with Tal Rasha..holy shit. Might just go watch it again.

D3 should naturally serve as an example of how not to do it. Tyrael was so awesome in d2, as was diablo, but when they flash on your screen every second they become less mythical and in effect pointless.

I would love to see and know more of Piety, the story of wraeclast and Dominus. I suspect theres a lot more to come (and I can wait). Maybe I didnt go into enough detail with story, but why Piety and her Blackguards are even in Wraeclast is something of a riddle to me?

To me, the first 3 acts seems like a way for the exile to establish himself and survive in this new world that is Wraeclast, but I dont really feel any satisfaction when killing Piety as I just dont know her well enough to really dislike her.

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Mikrotherion wrote:

Adding more story elements to the game is fine in my book. But please don't make it as obnoxious as in D3. Like someone else already posted, Diablo, Azmodan, Cydia etc. popping up all the time telling you that all you did was worthless, whilst you know that it was not because, hey, you killed scores of monsters and bad ass stuff that was the greatest and vilest and whatnot in Hell, is annoying.

Exactly, like when you kill the siege engines, or the portals in act 4 they keep telling you it doesnt matter..haha...wtf, why are we doing this then? (not to mention the voice acting is terrible generally in D3 imo)

Just out of curiosity, are there any cinematics planned at some point, maybe along with the final release?

Letting story modify the town and townspeople is a very efficient way to make the story matter in my opinion. And a very good way to make the player think about and value the story elements.

And, remember how you could upgrade the merchants in an ARPG released last year? That was fun. It didn't last long and it wasn't used to its full potential, but hell, on that first playthrough, when you clicked and saw the new art on the blacksmith's shop; fun. It was fun.

I'm not sure that would be the way to go with POE, but I think it illustrates what kind of meta-game is fun and I think it would be even more fun if it was part of the narrative. And even more fun if some of it was optional.

Make an optional quest in a non-used area like Dread Thicket. Say there's a 1% chance for a "Shady Dealer" to spawn at the end. Now if you pick him up, he comes to town and has a [Diablo 2 gambling]-shop. Make him a character, he's an exile like yourself who spent his time collecting items but got lost in the thicket after eating a bad mushroom (you might have to polish that).

Or just leave him there. You get one chance to gamble, he thanks you for helping him and then he's gone. Maybe increase the spawn to 10% then.

Whatever way you want to go, there are a lot of ways to implement story that I think adds A LOT to even the most loot-heavy, action packed, Hack-n-Slash RPG.

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AiSard wrote:

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Edwin_GGG wrote:

Watch this space :-)

:-)

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Edwin_GGG wrote:

4.  Lore

Yes, we're instituting quite a few more story glyphs (like the Shavronne's Tome in Axiom Prison) to enable players to piece together the puzzle that is Wraeclast.  What happened to it and why?  And I only intend to include lore that will, in some way, contribute to your understanding of what happens WITHIN the game.  There will be no history purely for 'interest's' sake.

Really hope you take this concept and go somewhere with it. While stand-alone lore objects like Shavronne's Tome or the Exile Orders/Judgement (whatever its called) is kinda nice and all, It would be pretty awesome if they were incorporated with randomness and fused in to the gameplay itself :)

For instance having a certain number of lore objects that spawn very rarely and randomly only in certain locations. And placing certain triggers to unlock mini sidi-quests, whether those just unlock more lore or small mediocre rewards.

Could even create a treasure hunt kind of thing, where finding a lore object unlocks more lore objects only hinted within the lore itself. Creating a sort of Quest that isn't mentioned within the Quest tab itself. Maybe link it to the more reactive towns you're planning :)

Well, really hoping you go somewhere far with this anyways :P

Which reminds me, the tomes in Diablo 2 were fun. Like the one where you picked up the quest to kill the countess in Black Marsh. Diablo 3 events were fun. More fun than the main storyline lol.

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Edwin_GGG wrote:

2.  Player Character as Protagonist

I'm taking the view that the PC is a Character, not an Avatar...something I explain more fully in this article...
http://thefictionengine.com/2013/05/should-a-player-character-speak/

For instance, the Witch isn't a simple embodiment of her player in Wraeclast, a mere husk to fill with player agency.  The Witch is a character that the player is 'helping' to survive and grow.  Therefore, she should have some thoughts and feelings about her time in Exile.  To this end, I intend to write narrations for each Player Character that will display their character development during the course of their time in Wraeclast.  Through these narrations you will hear how your Player Character struggles and grows as a person in this hostile environment.

Reading your article, I think you are making a false dichotomy logic error.

Avatar vs Character should not be a binary decision, but more like a slider bar. A great example of this is the protagonist of Bioshock -- he doesn't speak, he begins the game mostly as an avatar, but as the story progresses he begins to uncover secrets about himself and learn some things about himself (or at least his previous self). Pretty close to an Avatar, but not quite.

And that's how I think the Exile should be treated. Should we add enough to the Exile to give the narrative a theme and a mood? Absolutely; it will immerse the player more into the world of Wraeclast and get him thinking about big issues, and those thoughts and moods will follow the player into the eventual end-game grind. But there is a real danger at adding to much.

Edwin, before you add too much to the characters, take some time to read Charan's wall of text in this thread. Because the player is a blank-slate avatar, Charan was able to add a lot of personalization to his character's motivations. Even though these are a kind of personal creation, they are not a bad thing; it's good that players are able to project themselves into this blank space, and I think the game's narrative would suffer overall if too many details about the Exile were provided.

Should the Exile be silent? No. Terse? Yes. Very.

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Sneakypaw wrote:

For example: You turn off the sun -> the chick you saved in sins becomes the only merchant because she still trusts you because you saved her -> one of the other merchants leaves town - > this NPC becomes an random Rogue Exile that can appear 1 time while you are playing and after you kill him you get the same loot like the Rogue Exiles in the anarchy league.

You mean Greust leaves the encampment and you later have a fight to the death with him? Perhaps in the Waterfall Cave?

That idea is completely badass.

Scrotie, I watched some Extra credits-episodes, I just watched a couple and thought I would start from ep 1, which I found very relevant to this topic:

http://www.penny-arcade.com/patv/episode/bad-writing

(Please disregard title. It's the points made in the video that I think are relevant :) )

For those reading that don't want to watch it, it's about how narrative in video games cannot only be what is explicitly written. How the format demands the narrative to be told through multiple elements of the game since noone wants to read chunks of text or listen to endless dialogue.

Oh and thanks for linking that series, I'm looking forward to watching more of it!

Everyone's way too welcoming - It's Wraeclast.


NPCs react to different classes in different ways.


Not the long arm of justice, but the long arm of vengeance.


With all of that said even in this relatively early stage of the game I find quite a few characters interesting. Eramir, Grigor, Lady Dialla, Hargan, Clarissa. And the lore that NPCs talk about and which is otherwise found through out Wraeclast is also pretty interesting to me. So I'm sure this game will have pretty well established lore given enough time.

All in all this is a great thread, I've read all of the points you make and agree with most, if not all. And I'm amazed with the response from the dev team, it's really awesome to see such communication between developers and the community. It reinforces my belief in this already awesome game.

Also I'd like to add that while certainly, you never ever play an ARPG for the story (there are many other games for that), saying that the story/lore/narrative whatever is unimportant is simply not true.
Gameplay>Story, we all agree. But a good story is still a great bonus and frankly this game could be the first ARPG with a truly good story.

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TheDudeOfGaming wrote:

Not the long arm of justice, but the long arm of vengeance.

Spoiler

And I really like the idea of having someone from Oriath coming after you. You've already been sentenced, but perhaps it can be someone who you've wronged in the past or wronged their loved one in some way. Consumed with a desire for vengeance they freely choose to go to a desolate Island filled with exiles many of whom have committed terrible crimes (among other horrors) just so they can kill you.

+1. Like Javert, but better.

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TheDudeOfGaming wrote:

I'm amazed with the response from the dev team, it's really awesome to see such communication between developers and the community. It reinforces my belief in this already awesome game.

Quoted for truthery.