Abtacha
16.08.2008, 22:48
In einem Thread im BioWare Forum (http://dragonage.bioware.com/forums/viewtopic.html?topic=645979&forum=135) wurde kurz der Eindruck der auf der Gencon gezeigten Dragon Age Demo (ich schätze die selbe wie auf der E3) gepostet. Hier noch der Text, falls jemand nicht das Original lesen will. Im Grunde wird nicht viel neues gesagt, aber der Teil über die Unterhaltungen hört sich für mich recht gut an.
Quote: The demo was a guided demo, but run by the Bioware staff about 20 minutes long. Much of the first half of the demo was watching conversation/cutscenes. The second half of the demo was several combats. Character progression was not shown at all and inventory management was shown briefly. All of the demo existed inside one city, so I have no idea as to overall scale of the game. One of the primary writers on the game made it sound that the game would be 'massive' and on scale like the Baldur's Gate games.
Graphics/Environment: Gorgeous. They were running the game in 1920x1200 (I believe) and it ran fairly well (slight pauses at time), but I'm sure it was on some monster machine. The city was highly detailed and had the illusion of being persistent. For example, a priest was giving a sermon to a bunch of army troops as the character walked by. You could stop and listen to the whole thing, or ignore it entirely. Character models had a lot of detail and good facial expressions (reminded me of characters in Mass Effect, but far more detailed).
Conversations/Cinematics: The game did an excellent job of carrying on conversations while other things were going on. It wasn't always just characters lined up talking to each other. Often, the characters would be walking along while other things happened. They kept walking regardless of how fast conversation selections were picked (allowing for pauses in conversation if you let them keep going). Obviously they are following a script at this point, but this along with changing camera angles made the game seem a lot more cinematic than Bioware's previous offerings. As mentioned above, characters are lifelike in movements and facial expressions. Conversation trees were very typical Bioware, except with seemingly more choices than "Good/Neutral/Bad." Like KOTOR and NWN, there were choices involving actions rather than speech (for example: "[Kill him and take his key]") The Bioware guys claim that this game leaves their previous mold of having 'good and evil points', now going for shades of grey. They stressed many times in the demo that choices you make will shape the entire game experience.
Combat: Imagine Baldur's Gate, except in a 3d engine that works well and isn't clunky like the NWN games. Like BG, you can pause and give every individual order or let the AI decide things as you go along. The various abilities were reminiscent of NWN or even D&D 4th edition in the number of different attacks that are available (even for non-spell classes). Animations in combat were very detailed based on the attack. A shield bash looks just like you think it would, for example. Spells were the most jaw dropping portion both in visuals and how they worked. What was most impressive to me is how spells to interact. Cast grease on an area, and enemies slip. Cast fireball and the grease ignites. Cast a blizzard-type area spell and the fire goes out. It looked like all of the spells they were using in the demo had the capability of hurting your own party members if not setup/aimed correctly.
Overall UI/etc: 4 party members max, no coop multiplayer announced at this time (not ruling it out, according to these guys). The inventory UI I saw was clean and used a typical paper-doll system. Skills were on an assignable skill-bar along the bottom of the screen.
I left the demo very impressed and anxious for this game to come out. Sure, this is largely colored by the lack of good single player RPGs in recent years, but this game looks to be outstanding. If you guys have any specific questions on things I may have seen in the demo, fire away. I may sit in on the demo again to try to get more detail.
Quote: The demo was a guided demo, but run by the Bioware staff about 20 minutes long. Much of the first half of the demo was watching conversation/cutscenes. The second half of the demo was several combats. Character progression was not shown at all and inventory management was shown briefly. All of the demo existed inside one city, so I have no idea as to overall scale of the game. One of the primary writers on the game made it sound that the game would be 'massive' and on scale like the Baldur's Gate games.
Graphics/Environment: Gorgeous. They were running the game in 1920x1200 (I believe) and it ran fairly well (slight pauses at time), but I'm sure it was on some monster machine. The city was highly detailed and had the illusion of being persistent. For example, a priest was giving a sermon to a bunch of army troops as the character walked by. You could stop and listen to the whole thing, or ignore it entirely. Character models had a lot of detail and good facial expressions (reminded me of characters in Mass Effect, but far more detailed).
Conversations/Cinematics: The game did an excellent job of carrying on conversations while other things were going on. It wasn't always just characters lined up talking to each other. Often, the characters would be walking along while other things happened. They kept walking regardless of how fast conversation selections were picked (allowing for pauses in conversation if you let them keep going). Obviously they are following a script at this point, but this along with changing camera angles made the game seem a lot more cinematic than Bioware's previous offerings. As mentioned above, characters are lifelike in movements and facial expressions. Conversation trees were very typical Bioware, except with seemingly more choices than "Good/Neutral/Bad." Like KOTOR and NWN, there were choices involving actions rather than speech (for example: "[Kill him and take his key]") The Bioware guys claim that this game leaves their previous mold of having 'good and evil points', now going for shades of grey. They stressed many times in the demo that choices you make will shape the entire game experience.
Combat: Imagine Baldur's Gate, except in a 3d engine that works well and isn't clunky like the NWN games. Like BG, you can pause and give every individual order or let the AI decide things as you go along. The various abilities were reminiscent of NWN or even D&D 4th edition in the number of different attacks that are available (even for non-spell classes). Animations in combat were very detailed based on the attack. A shield bash looks just like you think it would, for example. Spells were the most jaw dropping portion both in visuals and how they worked. What was most impressive to me is how spells to interact. Cast grease on an area, and enemies slip. Cast fireball and the grease ignites. Cast a blizzard-type area spell and the fire goes out. It looked like all of the spells they were using in the demo had the capability of hurting your own party members if not setup/aimed correctly.
Overall UI/etc: 4 party members max, no coop multiplayer announced at this time (not ruling it out, according to these guys). The inventory UI I saw was clean and used a typical paper-doll system. Skills were on an assignable skill-bar along the bottom of the screen.
I left the demo very impressed and anxious for this game to come out. Sure, this is largely colored by the lack of good single player RPGs in recent years, but this game looks to be outstanding. If you guys have any specific questions on things I may have seen in the demo, fire away. I may sit in on the demo again to try to get more detail.