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Dumpshock Forums _ Shadowrun _ Shadowrun on Xbox 360 and PC!

Posted by: Silent Recoil May 10 2006, 06:08 PM

Found a little blurb from E3 about Shadowrun on both the PC and Xbox. Also note that it mentions Gates "demonstrated", implying its far enough completed to be played!

http://www.e3insider.com/news/?articleID=5U0GT1MEHF

Posted by: nezumi May 10 2006, 07:45 PM

There are a bunch of threads on this already, including one 7 pages long. You might want to follow up there.

Posted by: blakkie May 10 2006, 07:48 PM

At least that is an interesting story there. Well not the Shadowrun part so much. I was wondering when they'd finally get around to bridging it so you could play in Live games online from your PC. I wonder the architecture will work, and if you'll need some sort of Live! subscription for your PC.

Posted by: nezumi May 10 2006, 09:07 PM

Do you need a Live subscription to play on your xbox?

But you're right, I thought that was cool too. Somehow I forgot to bring it up between all the hating going on. Too bad you need Vista to run it, though. I wonder if pirated copies count.

Posted by: The ubbergeek May 10 2006, 09:18 PM

Crud, I'd would have so much played it on my 'Cube. But at least, there is a PC version.

I just hope that it will end up like Neverwinetr Nights and not some amateurish MMORPG.

Posted by: Mardegun May 10 2006, 09:31 PM

Anyone got an email adress of the head of the studio making the game or any of there the leads?

Posted by: bustedkarma May 10 2006, 09:37 PM

www.shadowrun.com is the best place to start.
Guy heading the Dev team is named Mitch.
He hates SR Fans.

Posted by: nezumi May 10 2006, 09:37 PM

Don't bother e-mailing them. My theory is a group of middle-management folks in M$ decided it would be good to make a Shadowrun based game, then they got a group of devs who are good at making games where people shoot at each other.

The problem isn't that Mitch & co. want to do Shadowrun harm, or aren't trying to make a good game. It's just that none of them *LIKE* shadowrun. They like FPS games, CS games, things like that. And they were put on this project (generally when you're put on a project, you don't get an awful lot of choice). So they're trying to make a game they think people will like which means a game THEY will like. It isn't that a single person is to blame for making a mess of things, but it's simply that no one along the line said 'boy, maybe we should fid people who actually have some interest in the content and put them on the production team.'

I guess it'd be kind of like if Adam paid us to make a Barbie game. It would have pink AKs, transvestites, street hookers and Ken would randomly burst into flames during game play (in other words, it'd be really fun), but it would be Barbie only in name.

Posted by: blakkie May 10 2006, 09:52 PM

QUOTE (nezumi)

It would seem almost a lock that you'd need Live of some sort to play multiplayer on the 360, but then isn't there a basic Live that comes with the 360? I've had no interest so i've not really looked into it that closely.

The PC? *shrug* Traditionally no, but then there has never been a game that a PC and an Xbox could play multiplayer on the same server. Going to be curious to see if Microsoft thinks they can pull off charging a PC player a monthly subscription to play online without providing a persistant world.

Posted by: Kagetenshi May 10 2006, 10:08 PM

QUOTE (nezumi @ May 10 2006, 04:37 PM)

My theory is a group of middle-management folks in M$ decided it would be good to make a Shadowrun based game, then they got a group of devs who are good at making games where people shoot at each other.

The problem isn't that Mitch & co. want to do Shadowrun harm, or aren't trying to make a good game. It's just that none of them *LIKE* shadowrun. They like FPS games, CS games, things like that. And they were put on this project (generally when you're put on a project, you don't get an awful lot of choice). So they're trying to make a game they think people will like which means a game THEY will like. It isn't that a single person is to blame for making a mess of things, but it's simply that no one along the line said 'boy, maybe we should fid people who actually have some interest in the content and put them on the production team.'

I guess it'd be kind of like if Adam paid us to make a Barbie game. It would have pink AKs, transvestites, street hookers and Ken would randomly burst into flames during game play (in other words, it'd be really fun), but it would be Barbie only in name.

That doesn't mean they aren't to blame, that just means there are more people to blame. That said, Mitch had a choice, and he chose to do this. There is no reason to give him any slack.

blakkie: there is a free version of Live (Silver), but it does not allow access to online play.

~J

Posted by: FanGirl May 10 2006, 10:10 PM

QUOTE (nezumi)

I guess it'd be kind of like if Adam paid us to make a Barbie game. It would have pink AKs, transvestites, street hookers and Ken would randomly burst into flames during game play (in other words, it'd be really fun), but it would be Barbie only in name.

"There's no emoticon for what I'm feeling!"

Oh wait, yes there is:

Posted by: eralston May 10 2006, 10:19 PM

That exact bit of logic that good game makers will make a good game of license X is exactly what makes license games suck so often.

Posted by: Bigity May 10 2006, 11:34 PM

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=46558386214838511&q=shadowrun

I feel physically ill.

Posted by: hyzmarca May 11 2006, 01:54 AM

QUOTE (Kagetenshi)

blakkie: there is a free version of Live (Silver), but it does not allow access to online play.

~J

There is an unofficial and completely free network called X-link Kai. It supports multiplayer games from both X-Box and 360, as well as Gamecube, PS2, and PSP by tricking the game into thinging that the online players are connecting over a LAN. It should work for this game.

Posted by: Kanada Ten May 11 2006, 02:25 AM

Microsoft is pushing Live Anywhere, which will support PC to XBoX to Cellphone gameplay.

Posted by: Mardegun May 11 2006, 03:35 AM

QUOTE (eralston)

That exact bit of logic that good game makers will make a good game of license X is exactly what makes license games suck so often.

Of course I don't agree with this statement. While most license games do suck, there are a lot more factors involved then the general public knows about. In many cases the developers have are so restricted by the license concepts or ridiculous time tables that is unreasonable to expect a good product. However from what I have read Fasa Studios has eliminated some of these issues. In short they have discarded the modern version of shadowrun to forge their own game. Of course as a hardcore SR fan I don’t agree with this move. I still think you can create a game which is true to the spirit of SR AND still appeal to the market.

Posted by: Wounded Ronin May 11 2006, 04:34 AM

QUOTE (nezumi)

The problem isn't that Mitch & co. want to do Shadowrun harm, or aren't trying to make a good game. It's just that none of them *LIKE* shadowrun. They like FPS games, CS games, things like that. And they were put on this project (generally when you're put on a project, you don't get an awful lot of choice). So they're trying to make a game they think people will like which means a game THEY will like. It isn't that a single person is to blame for making a mess of things, but it's simply that no one along the line said 'boy, maybe we should fid people who actually have some interest in the content and put them on the production team.'

I guess it'd be kind of like if Adam paid us to make a Barbie game. It would have pink AKs, transvestites, street hookers and Ken would randomly burst into flames during game play (in other words, it'd be really fun), but it would be Barbie only in name.

Personally, I love FPS games, although I prefer the realism-inspired ones more than the pure fantasy style ones. I prefer situations where it pays to crouch and aim to situations where bunny hopping is the true way of the jedi.

So, that being said, if they gave me a SR game that was in fact a FPS dealing with Barbie, transvestites, and pink AKs, I'd probably enjoy it in spite of myself.

I feel loved.

Posted by: eidolon May 11 2006, 05:01 AM

OMFG. Just watched the video.

If it wasn't SR, wasn't supposed to be SR, and was in no way, shape, or form touted as having anything to do with SR, I might have just thought "that looks kinda neat, but not like anything I'd be interested in playing".

Since it is supposed to be SR, I wish great physical harm on several people.

Posted by: mfb May 11 2006, 05:10 AM

http://shadowrun.com/shadowrununiverse/default.htm

Posted by: eidolon May 11 2006, 05:36 AM

Yeah. Effing pathetic.

Posted by: ShadowDragon8685 May 11 2006, 05:44 AM

Why are they calling this Shadowrun? This isen't even related to Shadowrun. There are no Shadowrunners. You've got a corporation and a city in open rebellion. There's no Shadowrunners. There's no shadows to run!

Posted by: mfb May 11 2006, 05:45 AM

you know, i have a question. one of many, admittedly, but this question is at the top of my list, right above the question "Jesus Fucking Christ!".

that question is: if the ancient ziggurat in Santos predates all known civilization, how in the hell does the Chancela family trace their lineage all the way back to the builders of the ziggurat?

Posted by: SL James May 11 2006, 05:53 AM

Immortal elves?

Which is just.... hahaha. That'd be the ultimate "fuck you" to most people on DS.

Posted by: hyzmarca May 11 2006, 06:33 AM

Yes, Immortal Elves.

FASA Interactive and, by extension, Microsoft has the videogame rights to all FASA properties, including Earthdawn. They can exploit, maim, and butcher SR/ED crossover material as much as they please without any problems.

Posted by: mintcar May 11 2006, 06:38 AM

SL James; the flaming ball of pure hatred, is a powerful but fickle runner to have on your team. He will often demonstrate his ferosiousness by beating up his team members and showing no mercy to pedestrians and passer bys, but in the face of a true enemy he will stand back to laugh at the other team members when they fight in vain against impossible odds.

Posted by: DV8 May 11 2006, 08:10 AM

QUOTE (Bigity)

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=46558386214838511&q=shadowrun

I feel physically ill.

Hey, it looks kind of interesting. It's just not Shadowrun.

Posted by: Kremlin KOA May 11 2006, 09:07 AM

Yeah Nobody gets treat spells twith that many successes

Posted by: Laser May 11 2006, 09:32 AM

Plus I thought I saw a teleport... which is blatantly against the very short list of things magic can't do in the books.

Posted by: mfb May 11 2006, 09:40 AM

yep. it actually mentions teleporting in the 'history'.

Posted by: Laser May 11 2006, 10:02 AM

Well, when you think about it... teleporting of various types is strongly established as something that magic can do in video games, heck even technology can often do it (translocator, anyone?). That doesn't mean that it's excusable (Off the top of my head, I can't think of many spells that would be difficult to impliment in the game world. The emotion-based ones, perhaps, stuff like mob mood or detect emotions, plus anything that dealt strictly with nonvisual nonaudio senses), there is no shortage of utility spells in the game that don't violate any of the rules of the game. I'm just saying I can see where they're coming from.

Posted by: mfb May 11 2006, 10:18 AM

they're coming from the land of people who crap on licenses in exchange for money. how i hate that land.

Posted by: mintcar May 11 2006, 12:23 PM

Yeah, that land sucks. It's a land of untalanted people who are also stupid. The land of people who make good stuff that respects licenses is a much better place, and they make more money too.

Posted by: athros May 11 2006, 03:30 PM

holy fuck. And here I thought someone just might be able to make a decent game off of the SR license. Remember the old Genesis SR? Truth be told, if they would just call it something else, I'd buy it.
And on a side note, I'm going to go download the SR ROM again.

Posted by: Kagetenshi May 11 2006, 03:33 PM

QUOTE (mintcar @ May 11 2006, 07:23 AM)

The land of people who make good stuff that respects licenses is a much better place, and they make more money too.

Really? I visited the place, and found a half-dozen abandoned shacks and a corpse.

Well, and Peter Jackson's palace. Though he lives on the far border, and at least part of his palace is outside of the land.

~J

Posted by: blakkie May 11 2006, 03:40 PM

QUOTE (athros)

Truth be told, if they would just call it something else, I'd buy it.

So you are inclined to think it might be a decent game. Just not a decent Shadowrun representation?

Posted by: KarmaInferno May 11 2006, 04:05 PM

Holy crap those graphics are terrible.

Maybe a few years ago that might have been acceptable in a video game cutscene, but today?

Plus, yes, it's not Shadowrun.

-karma

Posted by: Taran May 11 2006, 04:10 PM

QUOTE (Kagetenshi)

blakkie: there is a free version of Live (Silver), but it does not allow access to online play.

Wait, what? What would be the point of that?

Posted by: eralston May 11 2006, 04:22 PM

Blech...that video shatters my hopes and dreams

I think that's actually supposed to be a dropped invisibility spell, there is a walking path up to the platform. Still, I think they're convinced it will only sell to 14 year olds

UPDATE: A friend of mine showed the the in-game video and that DOES look like a teleport...sadness...

Posted by: SL James May 11 2006, 04:31 PM

QUOTE (mintcar)

Evil is a fickle thing.

Posted by: hobgoblin May 11 2006, 04:55 PM

hmm, while it was a interesting video, it was all CGI and therefor not representative of the game at all. and the CGI smelled more team fortress or counterstrike then it did a RPG of any kind.

the story is out there, the gameplay i fear will be out there, its dead on arrival. talk about abusing a golden oportunity, shame on you fasa and microsoft...

Posted by: SL James May 11 2006, 04:59 PM

Oh, and besides that - who said I was on the same team as anyone else here?

Posted by: Witness May 11 2006, 05:21 PM

Maybe we can pretend that it's not the Shadowrun world, but is a Matrix game within the Shadowrun world!

Posted by: Kagetenshi May 11 2006, 05:22 PM

I did. You will spend an eternity with them.

~Satan

Postscript: Witness, we can already do that with better games. Look, I'm playing the original Doom inside an emulator on the Matrix! Isn't this so much more fun?

Posted by: mintcar May 11 2006, 05:27 PM

Kagetenchi: Sam Raimi has a pretty nice shack over there too, I believe. And the folks at Bioware and a few more. There's not many of them, but in all cases were a product made off a license has been wildly successful AND criticly acclaimed, it's been a faithful and loving adaption. <edit> That is to say: Making shit is easy and can make you money. But you need to make something good to make a classic, and if you do you will obviously make even more money.

SL James: That was a bit of a stretch I had to include to make my analogy work.

Posted by: blakkie May 11 2006, 05:28 PM

@Kagetenshi

But are you going to be going up against someone named Karl Combatmage in Doom?

And there will be players in the game that are aware enough of SR to use that name. Once again i remind you that DSF is the extreme end of the spectrum of getting hung up on canon with an inability or unwillingness to set it aside to just go have fun.

Posted by: mintcar May 11 2006, 05:32 PM

QUOTE (blakkie)

@Kagetenshi

But are you going to be going up against someone named Karl Combatmage in Doom?

And there will be players in the game that are aware enough of SR to use that name. Once again i remind you that DSF is the extreme end of the spectrum of getting hung up on canon with an inability or unwillingness to set it aside to just go have fun.

Haha. That's the first prospect about this game that has intrigued me.

Posted by: blakkie May 11 2006, 05:35 PM

QUOTE (Taran @ May 11 2006, 10:10 AM)

QUOTE (Kagetenshi)

blakkie: there is a free version of Live (Silver), but it does not allow access to online play.

Wait, what? What would be the point of that?

Why to sell you stuff of course.

You can buy things from other people, and Microsoft too i think, in LiveBucks or whatever they call their currency. Even when you are buying stuff from a 3rd party Microsoft is making money on the seigniorage.

Plus they can use it as an advertising medium with a tightly focused market. People that own an XBox/Xbox360 and have an internet connection for it.

Posted by: athros May 11 2006, 05:39 PM

QUOTE (blakkie)

QUOTE (athros @ May 11 2006, 09:30 AM)

Truth be told, if they would just call it something else, I'd buy it.

So you are inclined to think it might be a decent game. Just not a decent Shadowrun representation?

I am inclined to believe that it will be a decent game, and it might be a spectacular game, however IMHO with the current information available for it, it won't be an accurate representation of SR at all.

Posted by: blakkie May 11 2006, 05:44 PM

...and for that sole reason you would not buy and play the game? Now -there- is an opinion that Microsoft/FASA might take heed of. It isn't going to change dick-squat in this game they end up shipping. But at least they might actually notice it.

Because really the license was long 'paid' for and any good will of note was likely written off by some accounting department somewhere. It is like a free license, and with no pesty licensor wanting to vette the game concept or details. But if they actually thought it was -costing- them sales, then they'd take notice. Right now the vast majority of the reactions i'm seeing is that it really isn't costing them anything at all to use the Shadowrun name on this game they were likely going to create in some form anyway.

Posted by: Kagetenshi May 11 2006, 05:55 PM

Maybe athros sees something in the game that I don't, or maybe I'm really just blinded with rage by what they're calling "Shadowrun", but you're right—using the Shadowrun name on a game as bad as it looks to me like this one will be is indeed not doing anything the game itself wouldn't have done.

Of course, the fact that I've got a strict (though broken exactly once) rule against buying Windows games and don't plan to ever own an XBox of any form means they'd already lost me. What I can do, though, is encourage other people not to buy the game.

~J

Posted by: athros May 11 2006, 06:02 PM

QUOTE (blakkie)

And yes, for that reason, I will not buy the game. If it did not have the Shadowrun name on it, I would likely buy it. As it stands, I'm not going to dirty my karma with it. If they made an SR game that represented SR, I would likely buy it.

Posted by: blakkie May 11 2006, 06:02 PM

@Kagetenshi

By shaking an angry fist and competing with paid shills on their forum? Nah, your cries of "where did you bury the body of SR, you murdering hacks!" are just going to get drowned out by the sweet, infectious rythms of the trailer soundtrack.

Posted by: Lindt May 11 2006, 06:10 PM

Which has some cool tuneage, but its other wise totally goat-fucking terrible. Yeah, that was a teleport, never mind what ever the hell that was at the end.

Posted by: athros May 11 2006, 06:13 PM

QUOTE (Kagetenshi)

It's not that I see something you don't, it's that it might be an awesome FPS. And I am just as pissed as you are about them attaching the SR name to it.

Posted by: Kagetenshi May 11 2006, 06:15 PM

QUOTE (blakkie @ May 11 2006, 01:02 PM)

@Kagetenshi

By shaking an angry fist and competing with paid shills on their forum?

Nope. I'm not signed up on their forum, and don't plan to be. Instead, I'm just going to get the word out to people I know who might now or at some point own either a 360 or Vista and poison the game in their minds.

Think globally, act locally. Viral marketing is where it's at these days, didn't you get the message?

Edit: athros, if you believe it might be awesome you're seeing something I'm not. There isn't a whole lot of gameplay information there, but little of it looks good from where I'm sitting.

~J

Posted by: blakkie May 11 2006, 06:22 PM

QUOTE (Kagetenshi @ May 11 2006, 12:15 PM)

Think globally, act locally. Viral marketing is where it's at these days, didn't you get the message?

Not really. I use to play FPSs, and nearly exclusively PVP, but these days I don't nearly as much as they are hard on my wrist. Otherwise at this point i'd certainly still give it a chance to show me what it can do, as just a game, in the final release. It looks like it has some interesting possibilities for game play in it.

Counterstrike with a twist of spells? Ya sure, i'd check it out.

Posted by: athros May 11 2006, 06:38 PM

QUOTE (Kagetenshi)

QUOTE (blakkie @ May 11 2006, 01:02 PM)

@Kagetenshi

By shaking an angry fist and competing with paid shills on their forum?

Ok, then let me rephrase. I think that because they are attaching the SR name to a game that does not accurately represent Shadowrun, it is going to suck absolute ass. It might be a good/awesome FPS, and I am inclined to give it the benefit of the doubt with the limited information and actual gameplay footage, but I will not buy something that disregards what SR is.

Posted by: mdynna May 11 2006, 07:02 PM

I would put Brian Singer in the "respect a license and make money" town (he directed the X-Men movies). I think they very well respected the "feel" that was presented in the X-Men comics.

Posted by: James McMurray May 11 2006, 07:11 PM

It would have been kinda hard to make an X-Men movie and not respect at least part of it's feel because of how many variations on the X-men have been made, and how many moods they've used.

Posted by: eralston May 11 2006, 07:17 PM

I suppose I should reserve judgement on Brian Singer until Superman comes out. If he can produce quality film on two franchises, he's like up for sainthood or something. Especially after turning around super man (which has been on and off for like 10 years, a real testament to Hollywood bureacracy).

I would also say that most of the shots from X3 are really doing it for me as far as a "finally, a comic movie with balls" standpoint, but again, I'll wait until the movie. X-men doesn't seem to have suffer the loss of Brian. If X3 is still good, perhaps it's the franchise and not the quality of directors (watching Fantastic Four, it occured to me that as cheesy as the movie was, it was probably as good as they could do).

Is there anyone in video games you would say is an analog to Brian Singer? Give them our much beloved Shadowrun

Posted by: mintcar May 11 2006, 07:36 PM

QUOTE (mdynna)

I would put Brian Singer in the "respect a license and make money" town (he directed the X-Men movies). I think they very well respected the "feel" that was presented in the X-Men comics.

Agreed. The fact that X-men and Spiderman has made for much more successful movies than that Daredevil sludge is a small testament to the very scarce but o so sweet existence of justice and good taste in this world.

Posted by: James McMurray May 11 2006, 07:39 PM

And the comparative popularity between DD, Spiderman, and the X-Men. The latter two had a huge audience differential from Daredevil, simply because of how long they've been around and how pervasive they are in the Marvel universe.

I personally liked the Daredevil movie.

Posted by: eralston May 11 2006, 07:48 PM

DD wasn't bad. It's probably the best DD movie they could have made still under the pressure to explain his origin. I enjoyed their chosen use of flashback.

The big flexibility with SR is that the elements available could be told through any set of characters. That cuts both ways, because some things could be really mishandled. For instance, in DD they kind of struggled to properly represent DD's anti-heroism, but in a movie full of anti-heroes (like any SR movie) writing the specifics of them would be really hard. Especially given the American believe that generic good guys are killing machines even when not anti-heroes (damn 80s screwed that up for us).

Posted by: Witness May 11 2006, 08:24 PM

QUOTE (Kagetenshi)

Postscript: Witness, we can already do that with better games. Look, I'm playing the original Doom inside an emulator on the Matrix! Isn't this so much more fun?

Was kind of joking mate.

Posted by: Laser May 11 2006, 09:07 PM

QUOTE (Lindt)

Which has some cool tuneage, but its other wise totally goat-fucking terrible. Yeah, that was a teleport, never mind what ever the hell that was at the end.

An overly dramatic conjuration of a spirit, or command to manifest an elemental is what it seems to me. Or were you talking about turning into smoke?

Something else that bugs me about this is that it's set in 2021, yet there are apparent elves in the tribal team. And so it came to pass... has UGE not starting until 2011 -- so they're 10?

Posted by: hobgoblin May 11 2006, 09:10 PM

they are immortal elfs

about the only thing left of the original shadowrun timeline is the idea of worlds and the cycle of magic...

Posted by: JongWK May 11 2006, 09:10 PM

Apparently, humans mutate into elves and dwarves.

Yes, I'm crying from my corner.

Posted by: SL James May 11 2006, 09:16 PM

Take it from someone who finally gave up complaining about SR4: Move on, and worry about something that matters. You're never going to change MS's position.

Posted by: mfb May 11 2006, 09:35 PM

i dunno, i'm having a great time bashing the hell out of the game on its own forums.

Posted by: SL James May 11 2006, 09:45 PM

Considering that it seems a massive, faceless megacorp is the Good Guy, I fail to see what MS would see as a benefit to making them what the megas really are like in SR.

Posted by: mdynna May 11 2006, 09:51 PM

The problem is this: the people who control the money and get to decide which games get made are uncreative or cowards or both. They are afraid to move out into new territory and try something different. They would rather take the "safe" path of at least moderate sales by banging on familiar cash cows: eg. the FPS genre. I'm fairly certain when they sat down to make the game the conversation started by with: "How can we make Shadowrun a shooter?" I suppose I keep getting my hopes up because games like NWN occasionally gets made.

Another classic example of the "we must make an FPS" mistake was the Wheel of Time game. What a great, rich, fantasy world just waiting for an epic RPG game. Instead, you ran around breaking open wooden crates and collecting Tir'Angreals. *heavy sigh*

Posted by: ronin3338 May 11 2006, 09:52 PM

Here's my double-edged sword...

If the game doesn't do well, they won't make another one. If they don't make another one, they can't make a better one. (or one that I like better)

If the game does well, they'll make another one. If they make another one, it'll be just as "un-SR" as this one.

Posted by: mfb May 11 2006, 09:54 PM

they would be retarded to let one failure keep them from making another game. SR was, pre-announcement, the most-anticipated XBox360 release on the list.

then again, look how badly they're pissing off SR fans and then decide for yourself, re: retardery on their part.

Posted by: hobgoblin May 11 2006, 09:56 PM

damned if one do, damned if one dont...

Posted by: Kagetenshi May 11 2006, 09:59 PM

If the game succeeds, the people behind it get rewarded. If the game fails, the people behind it don't.

I see no double edge on that sword. If Mitch Gitelman has a job, is still employable after this is said and done, we as a society will have failed.

~J

Posted by: SL James May 11 2006, 09:59 PM

QUOTE (MS shill on shadowrun.com)

Take off your blinders and see that this is a game that can introduce new fans to the legacy and enjoy it as much as you say you do.

Where have I read that before?

Posted by: eralston May 11 2006, 10:03 PM

High anticipation doesn't mean much.

Have I brought up Advent Rising in here yet?

Overall, there is one chance at a first impression and that goes double in the face of the inflating costs for next-gen development.

Uwe Boll is more capable of making a passable SR movie than these guys are at making a good SR game.

Posted by: SL James May 11 2006, 10:17 PM

Seriously, the parallels (including the vitriol) with the response following the third SR4 FAQ is just shockingly identical, which amuses the shit out of me considering who was on which sides last year.

Posted by: hobgoblin May 11 2006, 10:31 PM

but then SR4 carryed over the game world, but changed the mechanics of it. this trows out the game world as well as the mechanics...

therefor you will have a more uniform nay aimed at this FPS rip-off, while some just shrugged at the new mechanics as long as they could keep the world that had learned to love.

Posted by: L.D May 11 2006, 11:17 PM

If you want to compare to the change to SR4, then imagine that FanPro said that instead of playing in 2070 SR4 would take place in 2021 with no goblinization, no orks and people changing into elves, dwarfs and trolls in 2012 (and more shit like that).

Posted by: Witness May 11 2006, 11:23 PM

QUOTE (SL James)

Considering that it seems a massive, faceless megacorp is the Good Guy, I fail to see what MS would see as a benefit to making them what the megas really are like in SR.

QUOTE (mdynna)

Actually you know. Corporation as clear-cut Good Guy? In this day and age that really is daring and different!

I know there must be another case of a benevolent Corporation somewhere in fiction, but I just can't think of one! Anybody?

Posted by: Shadow May 12 2006, 12:00 AM

QUOTE (eralston)

Uwe Boll is more capable of making a passable SR movie than these guys are at making a good SR game.

I cringe at the thought of him getting near our beloved game. Ugh.

As for the Console game... what do you expect? Its a console game! Dumb down the interface, dumb down the story line, more blood this is the cry of console gamers. PC games are "too complicated" whatever. There are so few good games released on consoles I am not surprised it will suck. Heaven forbid they make a Shadowrun game about Shadowrun.

Posted by: blakkie May 12 2006, 12:28 AM

QUOTE (SL James @ May 11 2006, 04:17 PM)

I think this puts SR4 into perspective. It actually is the same game in very much the same world. With a similar tone.

Sure there are some storytelling backflips and a few MINOR adjustments, but all in all the biggest change has to do with removing huge hunking wads of tediousness (tediousness that many people apparently liked) and the patchwork created by the first two major revisions and a decade and a half of additions.

To start with there is the obvious effort that was put into doing so. FASA didn't even give "trying" lip service.

P.S. I really don't get the Corp is the clear-cut Good Guy out of what they have. What i see is the the Corp is NOT the ultimate picture of evil, but still they did manage to destroy 1/2 a city (causing uncounted deaths) through incompetence (hello Ares!) and are forcibily repressing the rest of the city. It doesn't take much scratching to get below the their PR slogan of "making the world a better place through commerce" to see the naked selfinterest below.

Nor are ancient protectors particularly altruistic. They come off somewhat above Winternight (which is obviously not a corp) and give the IE running that show a real dirty edge.

I think that i one thing of SR that they managed not to irradicate. No clear good guys.

Posted by: blakkie May 12 2006, 12:35 AM

QUOTE (Kagetenshi @ May 11 2006, 03:59 PM)

I see no double edge on that sword. If Mitch Gitelman has a job, is still employable after this is said and done, we as a society will have failed.

The Batman TV series. That was a ultra-camp, public broadcast sanitized bastardization of Batman. But it has become a somewhat successful and culturally accepted take on Batman. Not the only one, but one of them.

How many people are there these days calling for Adam West's head on a platter for his part in that?

Whether the game is in the end judged as a quality, fun video game in it's medium (squad PVP FPS) or not still remains to be seen.

Posted by: Kagetenshi May 12 2006, 12:39 AM

QUOTE (blakkie @ May 11 2006, 07:28 PM)

I think this puts SR4 into perspective. It actually is the same game in very much the same world. With a similar tone.

That's a complete and utter lie, and you know it. For all its flaws I don't want to compare SR4 to this monstrosity, but it is not remotely the same world, the same game, or a vaguely similar tone.

~J

Posted by: blakkie May 12 2006, 12:45 AM

How much have you actually played of it? Besides the decker nolonger stuck in the basement unless he wants to be, and the extra AR glitz, it's the same grimey, "you stupid=you eventually dead" world. The history is certainly intact (just a couple of bruises in regards to details about adepts).

Posted by: hobgoblin May 12 2006, 12:51 AM

some people dont like the apparent predictability of the new dice system...

Posted by: mfb May 12 2006, 12:52 AM

QUOTE (blakkie)

The history is certainly intact (just a couple of bruises in regards to details about adepts).

~~blakkie, for chrissake, http://shadowrun.com/shadowrununiverse/default.htm http://shadowrun.com/behindthescenes/teamblog/gitelman_5-8-06_blog.htm.~~

mfb, for chrissake, pay attention.

Posted by: James McMurray May 12 2006, 01:00 AM

Perhaps you should be paying attention? Blakkie's reference to the facts not changing is in regards to people trying to parallel this to SR3 and SR4. The SR4 history is intact when viewed against an SR3 backdrop, because nothing changed about the world prior to SR4's 2070.

Posted by: mfb May 12 2006, 01:07 AM

whoops. damn all uses of the word "it", it's too confusing.

Posted by: SL James May 12 2006, 01:56 AM

QUOTE (blakkie)

QUOTE (SL James @ May 11 2006, 04:17 PM)

I think this puts SR4 into perspective. It actually is the same game in very much the same world. With a similar tonee first two major revisions and a decade and a half of additions.

This has nothing to do with the game. I'm just discussing the tone of the discourse. As soon as I saw one of their shills use the word blinders and constantly condescend about how they know more, I swear I was reading a freelancer's or playtester's (or both) posts back in late spring and summer of last year, especially in light of re-reading all of RPGpundit the other day looking for his Kenson-bashing quotes.

And the critical posts are just as vicious (although, like the complaints here, hardly as ignorant as claimed by defenders) as they were last year.

The games themselves? Irrelevant to me.

Posted by: blakkie May 12 2006, 04:52 AM

Someone calling the German government of the late 1930's/early 1940's "facist" is a little different than them calling their dad a "facist" for booting their 29-year-old freeloading ass out of the basement and to the curb.

Posted by: SL James May 12 2006, 05:12 AM

So, SR4 is Nazis?

Posted by: blakkie May 12 2006, 05:47 AM

Yes, but the good news is that it doesn't give you cancer. It is also a bit more selective about which of it's own citizens it snuffs, at least compared to Joey "SR3" Stalin.

Posted by: hyzmarca May 12 2006, 06:09 AM

QUOTE (blakkie)

QUOTE (Kagetenshi @ May 11 2006, 03:59 PM)

I see no double edge on that sword. If Mitch Gitelman has a job, is still employable after this is said and done, we as a society will have failed.

But, you see, Adam West was excellent in the role. He pulled it off in a way that most other people couldn't (George Clooney, if I ever see you I will ask for my money back). Camp isn't easy to do well. Adam did it well.

Now, it isn't just that Shadowrun is bastardized. It is that what we have been shown doesn't look link anything but standard genre fare. If it has the quality and appeal of Adam West's Batman then mor epower to them. I havn't seen anything to suggest that it will. This looks more like the Batman and Robin of Shadowrun.

Posted by: mfb May 12 2006, 06:10 AM

i find http://forums.shadowrun.com/forums/thread/488.aspx to be absolutely hilarious. CrimsonDude's post is especially amusing, for unrelated reasons.

Posted by: The Jopp May 12 2006, 06:37 AM

QUOTE (L.D)

If they would do THAT then I would start collecting money from all DS’ers so that we could buy the rights for the Shadowrun RPG and make our own Shadowrun game – SR5 with a HUUGE disclaimer telling future gamers that SR4 never existed and that it was just a myth.

Posted by: Ranneko May 12 2006, 07:30 AM

QUOTE (blakkie)

@Kagetenshi

By shaking an angry fist and competing with paid shills on their forum?

Nah, your cries of "where did you bury the body of SR, you murdering hacks!" are just going to get drowned out by the sweet, infectious rythms of the trailer soundtrack.

Have you actually looked in the forum?

It is almost entirely filled by angy angy people.

Posted by: Dranem May 12 2006, 07:32 AM

I can't beleive Kanada Ten actually posted that he would play this game! Have you no shame in actually showing interest in this falacy?!

Posted by: hobgoblin May 12 2006, 07:37 AM

QUOTE (mfb)

whoops. damn all uses of the word "it", it's too confusing.

yep, badly labeld context switching is a bitch...

Posted by: L.D May 12 2006, 07:58 AM

QUOTE (The Jopp)

QUOTE (L.D @ May 11 2006, 11:17 PM)

But that's what M$ is doing with the computer game and that's why so many people (including me) are so upset.

Posted by: TimeKeeper May 12 2006, 08:17 AM

Sorry I've been gone for such a long time.

I watch the trailer and was confused by the resurrect spell, then died inside when I saw the teleport (my thought was... that's not possible... not even for magic).

Delving furthing into this.... there's no word to discribe what this is.

I have but one question....

When are we sending in the teams?

Posted by: The Jopp May 12 2006, 08:17 AM

QUOTE (L.D)

QUOTE (The Jopp @ May 12 2006, 08:37 AM)

QUOTE (L.D @ May 11 2006, 11:17 PM)

But that's what M$ is doing with the computer game and that's why so many people (including me) are so upset.

Exactly, so we should buy the license from MS and make a REAL SR RPG with aHUUGE disclaimer that the MS game never existed.

...

And you think I am NOT upset?

Posted by: L.D May 12 2006, 08:18 AM

LOL... yeah... that'll happen. Good idea though.

I didn't know if you had read about the new game.

Posted by: The Jopp May 12 2006, 08:43 AM

QUOTE (L.D)

LOL... yeah... that'll happen. Good idea though.

I didn't know if you had read about the new game.

Seen the ads, seen the forums, seen the gawdawful screenshots. Then I cried…

A shadowrun FPS for me would need essences from the following games:

Deus Ex 1 & 2 (Cyberpunk, nanites, hacking etc)
System Shock 2 (FPS Hacking, Evil AI’s, scary athmosphere)
F.E.A.R (Supernatural happenings and really, really scary things)

Posted by: Laser May 12 2006, 08:45 AM

So, since this game is significantly lacking in Shadowrun essence, can we call it a cyberzombie?

Posted by: L.D May 12 2006, 08:52 AM

I'd prefer to call it: "The Abomination"

Or perhaps "Shadowrun: Just kidding"

Posted by: The Jopp May 12 2006, 08:53 AM

QUOTE (Laser)

So, since this game is significantly lacking in Shadowrun essence, can we call it a cyberzombie?

Nope, since it is made and controlled by an evil force we should call it a Shedim - M$hedim

Posted by: L.D May 12 2006, 08:58 AM

ROFLMAO

Posted by: Laser May 12 2006, 09:01 AM

QUOTE (The Jopp @ May 12 2006, 03:53 AM)

QUOTE (Laser @ May 12 2006, 08:45 AM)

So, since this game is significantly lacking in Shadowrun essence, can we call it a cyberzombie?

Nope, since it is made and controlled by an evil force we should call it a Shedim - M$hedim

They've often been compared to the borg, which are sort of distant relatives of the cyberzombie...

Posted by: hobgoblin May 12 2006, 09:14 AM

hmm, over on slashdot they still use the bill gates of borg image to indicate microsoft-related news...

Posted by: blakkie May 12 2006, 12:19 PM

QUOTE (hyzmarca @ May 12 2006, 12:09 AM)

Maybe I've been out of the shooter scene too long, and i never played all the mods, but moving through normally solid walls, floors, and ceilings strikes me as very different. As do the res rules. "The rules of combat have changed" is at least a little bit more than an empty tagline.

Sure through the wall sensors have been done. And movement somewhat like what the glider does has been done, as has the purchase of equipment (the Essense cost might be a bit of a twist). But I think this game is actually taking a real risk with the teleport and res. I don't know if it will work, but it definately has the potential to differentiate itself in the market.

For better or for worse. So they still have room to pull off an Adam West....or, you know, not and fall flat on their face.

P.S. The teleport really changes the flow of the map for those that have it, and indirectly for those that don't. So one of the things i suspect that feature will do is create a higher "knowledge of the map" advantage, which i philosophically don't like. It will though create a real mental challenge to thinking about the map in that new way. I suspect it will be quite entertaining to sit in spectator mode and watch in action someone that is really skillful and knows the map well.

Posted by: Kanada Ten May 12 2006, 02:17 PM

QUOTE (Dranem @ May 12 2006, 02:32 AM)

I can't beleive Kanada Ten actually posted that he would play this game! Have you no shame in actually showing interest in this falacy?!

Sure, it sucks that this is their best effort, but, if I get an XBox, playing a Shadowrun squad based FPS with my step-daughter & co. while she's in California is better than having to play a Counter-Strike squad based FPS. It's all relative.

Posted by: mmu1 May 12 2006, 02:22 PM

QUOTE (L.D)

I'd prefer to call it: "The Abomination"

Or perhaps "Shadowrun: Just kidding"

I'm calling it ShadowStrike.

Posted by: Austere Emancipator May 12 2006, 03:42 PM

http://forums.shadowrun.com/forums/thread/1224.aspx

Posted by: MikeTrevin May 12 2006, 03:54 PM

I found this. It may be of interest.

http://www.dell.com/html/us/products/e3/index.html

Lower-right hand corner, the 'sneak peak'. I am unsure if this is different from other trailers posted elsewhere.
Warning: this post is probably fairly time-sensitive, and I have no idea how long the link will be relevant.

Posted by: Kagetenshi May 12 2006, 04:17 PM

QUOTE (Austere Emancipator)

http://forums.shadowrun.com/forums/thread/1224.aspx

Man, I was totally wrong about this game. It's going to rock! Whats ur gamertag/ nebis nebis nebis nebis nebis…

Posted by: James McMurray May 12 2006, 04:34 PM

To be fair, the guy bashing on the game is as much of a dork as the guy saying it'll be great.

Posted by: Kagetenshi May 12 2006, 04:38 PM

You expected something else from a plant? I'm not usually one to claim astroturfing, but if that's a genuine conversation I'm Arnold Palmer.

~J

Posted by: Maltaltin May 12 2006, 04:52 PM

Ok... I can say nothing other then how can anyone in their right mind would even think about considering that game even remotely related to SR other then name, is beyond me. I hope that someone with half a brain will eventually buy the rights from Microsoft for SR so we can all enjoy SR without having a bunch of our friends over to dirty up our houses

Posted by: Moon-Hawk May 12 2006, 04:52 PM

I don't know if it's real, I don't really care, and I know it's stupid and immature, but this made me laugh:

QUOTE

I know that you typed something just now, but all I can see is:

derggedddy duuurrrrrr, dep duppedy doo da whhhoooppaaahhhaaaa I'm 14 blah blah bum dum Shadowrun is cool derkydy derk!!!!

Posted by: Firestorm May 12 2006, 06:59 PM

QUOTE (TimeKeeper)

When are we sending in the teams?

Drop Bear team ?

That might not be enough, but it could shake them a bit.

Posted by: hyzmarca May 12 2006, 09:25 PM

QUOTE (blakkie)

P.S. The teleport really changes the flow of the map for those that have it, and indirectly for those that don't. So one of the things i suspect that feature will do is create a higher "knowledge of the map" advantage, which i philosophically don't like. It will though create a real mental challenge to thinking about the map in that new way. I suspect it will be quite entertaining to sit in spectator mode and watch in action someone that is really skillful and knows the map well.

Teleportation isn't new at all. Unreal Tournament 2003 did teleportation. Teleportiation isn't innovative at all. In fact, it is one of the easiest features to impliment in a FPS due to the very nature of video games. In games that neglect to disable the debug console teleportation is a rather common console cheat. Tele only problem with teleportation in an arena game is getting the co-ordinates right, which is why it is usually limited to preset pods, LOS, or a marked location. Without such limitation it would be possible for a player to teleport outside of the arena by accident or intent.

The Tree of Life spell, likewise, is just a healing station. Even the ressurect spell is just a modification of a genre trope. Medic characters are not uncommon in FPS games the difference is that in this case the medic can heal characters with 0HP and the charactrs will die if the medic dies.

Posted by: blakkie May 12 2006, 09:43 PM

Just plain teleportation isn't new. But that's all fixed point or pre-setting waypoint teleportation. In UT 2003 you have to toss the marker out to set the target, which makes going through walls and traveling straight vertically very difficult unless you can rebound the marker off something to get it there. Or you dropped the marker and then run away and use the teleporter to get back.

The tree isn't that big a deal. But the medic continuing to be linked with the ressurected patient (apparently indefinately), including the fact that this is limited by both the medic's implants and prior ressurections, is new AFAIK and that is an interesting difference. Even just bringing back the fallen where they dropped (unless they were gibbed it would seem) is fairly different.

Posted by: eralston May 12 2006, 09:49 PM

Woh, that guy on the Shadowrun thread defending the game cause it's graphics are good is a moron. Has he not seen the in-game videos? They look nothing like the trailer

This game does nothing new AND shits on our beloved Shadowrun. I wish to incite violence against it's distribution

PS The guys who would suck MS's balls for making SR minesweeper don't sound like SR players at all

Posted by: hobgoblin May 12 2006, 10:16 PM

i have seen the tree effect in some FPS mods i think.

and the heal where he fell was in wolfenstein: enemy territory or whatever the free game's name is. dont know about that link part but i have a feel it more like a limited number of heals then anything else...

and teleportation can be done in any FPS, its just that its not often done because its hard to balance as someone can in theory just bypass any chokepoint rather then fight.

you dont need the drop marker that they use in UT. what you need is to draw a line out from the person teleporting in the direction they are looking, and long that line look for a proper place to land, one that will not drop you out of the map or land you inside something.

Posted by: eralston May 12 2006, 10:19 PM

Nothing's sexier than coming into existence in the middle of an object. I almost cheated levitation into the SR short that way, but the collision detection would eventually kick in and just kill the character (then squeeze them out of the object, launching them into the air). It was hilarious.

Posted by: blakkie May 12 2006, 10:32 PM

@hobgoblin

I'm not suggesting it is particularly hard to program popping the characters around the map. The game draws objects, including players, at whatever coordinates they are set to and it is programically easy to just change those to some other arbitrary coordinates instead of the normal change that is occuring from running/walking/jumping movements.

It's just than nobody does adhoc teleport as part of the rule set (backdoor console commands don't count ). So if they do adhoc AND they make it work as a fun game then they have a differentiation in the market....besides being one of few team combat FPS on the 360 (and owned by a company that has control over the options available with a potential competitor, Halo).

P.S. I purposely avoided calling ressurection of a fallen body unique, it seems pretty obvious that someone would have tried that in a mod by now. I did check out the Wolfenstein: Enemy Territory and you are right that they have that. Nothing about a maintained link between the medic and the patient, though the rez uses up a resource item from their inventory that they have to resupply from a depot. Still rez of the body doesn't seem overly common. There have been games though where it works like prison tag. When you 'die' you get locked up till a teammate physically hits a trigger to release you.

Posted by: Kanada Ten May 12 2006, 10:42 PM

Guild Wars has a rez enchantment that ties the resurrected to the Monk's life (it's a powerful version of rez, with a powerful disadvantage). It also has a teleport, but not through walls, IIRC, just to the nearest unexploited dead body. Of course, Guild Wars isn't an FPS.

Posted by: blakkie May 12 2006, 10:47 PM

QUOTE (Kanada Ten @ May 12 2006, 04:42 PM)

It also has a teleport, but not through walls, IIRC, just to the nearest unexploited dead body.

.... useful if you like going around exploiting dead bodies?

That sounds so wrong.

"Looting corpses" sounds so less.....in need of professional help.

Posted by: Kanada Ten May 12 2006, 10:50 PM

Well, in Guild Wars, a main character class is the Necromancer with one of its primary skill sets requiring the exploitation of dead bodies (to make zombies called bone horrors, heal yourself or others, gain mana, or cause them to explode). As a primary class, the Necromancer gains mana every time a creature or spirit dies, as well.

Posted by: Austere Emancipator May 13 2006, 12:49 AM

The HL mod Natural Selection includes static healing services (and all sorts of other ways of dealing with near-death or death, although admittedly none of them ties the resurrectee to the resurrecter), gliding and flying critters, and blinking -- not through walls, but, at least when I last played it, could be used vertically or through characters and certain other objects.

Posted by: hobgoblin May 14 2006, 01:42 AM

ok, did someone just read the lastet blogs? there will be no directly offensive magics. no power bolts, not fireballs, nada. this is just insane, and sadly im starting to understand the use of jihad...

Posted by: eralston May 14 2006, 06:56 AM

Holy crap *facesmack* just when you thought it couldn't get any worse

Posted by: Typhon May 14 2006, 07:42 AM

QUOTE (blakkie @ May 11 2006, 07:35 PM )

The Batman TV series. That was a ultra-camp, public broadcast sanitized bastardization of Batman. But it has become a somewhat successful and culturally accepted take on Batman

Although Batman as a character still remained mostly intact, his past remained almost identical to the comic, and his virtues as a human being stayed the same, which is why no matter how "camp" he became he was still essentially Batman.

Now people over at the game's forums have been using an argument similar to this but in favor of the drastic changes to the Shadowrun universe, mainly the argument is that Superman has had his backstory changed many times and this has only helped his franchise. The following is a post I made there to explain the flaws in that argument

QUOTE (Typhon)

I was thinking it of a way to describe it best and in that I believe I have found the best argument on why the history and universe is important

Take Superman, everyone argues that his history has changed many times and that it hasn't hurt the comic, well that is because Superman the comic is about Superman the character, and as long as the character doesn't change the feel of Superman won't change. Now I don't mean evolve, that is what make people love a character, it's being able to watch his journey as a human and being able to sympathize with any problems he encounters.

In other words comparing Shadowrun to Superman is a bad comparison. if we want to make a comparison to a comic book we would need to pick a comic book that doesn't center around a character, but rather the world, because that is what Shadowrun is all about, so in this argument I believe a better comparison is Frank Miller's Sin City. Now the characters of Sin City change constantly, hardly ever the same one more then once, and several of them have been killed, only to show up in another story but the one thing that both links them all together and the one character that never changes is the city itself. For you see the city is the main character of the book. The comic isn't called Frank Miller's Dwight, Marv or even Hartigan, it's called Sin City because that is the one character that always remains a constant.

And this is what Shadowrun is. Shadowrun isn't Big D, Ares, magic, orks or cybertech, It's the gritty world in which Big D, Ares, magic, orks and cybertech all have their story played out.

But Typhon, you say, Big D and the rest are the history and you said the history is what is important. This is very true , I would say, this is why Sin City has Senator Roark, Old town, dark alleys, and large guns, because these are all the people and things that help Sin City be Sin City, and the history of Shadowrun is what helps Shadowrun stay Shadowrun. What I mean is Because it's a RPG the main characters will never be the same in one game to the next, but the supporting characters (ie the history) will be the same just as in Sin City the feel and history are the supporting characters that remain the constant.

So this is my belief why there is such an uproar from us fans about this game, you see, you have promised us a game about our favorite character, Shadowrun, and instead gave us a story about someone else entirely.

Posted by: hyzmarca May 14 2006, 08:20 AM

My response to the Superman thing is a simple question. When did Superman stop being an alien from the Planet Krypton who has superpowers due to Earth's yellow sun and realitivly low gravity?

Superman's backstory has never changed, with the small eception of the Superboy career which isn't exactly that important to Superman. The backstories of all his supporting characters have changed drasticly of course, but that really isn't the same.

What they are doing to Shadowrun is like changing Superman into some sort of energy being but DC would never consider doing that because they have too much taste. Right?

Posted by: eralston May 14 2006, 08:46 AM

I can definitely agree with the Sin City argument and at this point, would they say superman would still be Super if he couldn't fly?

In changing the genre they totally changed the game. What if they had made campy batman a variety show instead of cheesy melodrama with onimanapia fights? Could you still call it batman? That was also made in a time when they didn't have much of a choice about presenting something with ballz. With a gritty game like "Condemned" on the system, you'd think they wouldn't have had to compromise.

No, the real compromise is the 360 obsession with maintaining the FPS as the idealogically dominant game in the console market. As long as Sony is chasing Halo they won't settle for whipping M$'s ass with amazing games like God of War and Shadow of the Collossus.

Posted by: blakkie May 14 2006, 12:56 PM

QUOTE (Typhon @ May 14 2006, 01:42 AM)

QUOTE (blakkie @ May 11 2006, 07:35 PM )

The Batman TV series. That was a ultra-camp, public broadcast sanitized bastardization of Batman. But it has become a somewhat successful and culturally accepted take on Batman

I don't have the list of screwiness, i'm just not that kind of Batman fan. But the personality of a lot of the characters was seriously shifted with the camp.

I think that that very few people here are acknowledging, or even recognizing what they likely did get right.

- big corp with extraterritorality and contracts for wide scoped civil law & order management
- no obviously morally "right" party
- massive destruction of civilality
- cyberware (don't see any bioware, which would be "correct")
- multiple cycles of magic/no magic, the last one begining roughly the end of the Mayan Calendar (which both of them are off on by a few days)
- ancient big magic (in a little different form though)
- elfs, dwarves, and trolls (yes, i'm aware they are a good decade early for the "proper intro of adults", and the greyhaired one becomes even wierder, and no orcs to be seen in the game, but it is still a definate similarity)
- they did manage to plop it down in a time/place that isn't that well covered in the P&P (yet)

I personally feel they could have come closer to canon in some things and still carried out their vision for their game. Hell even the teleport could be closer if they made it like the ED, and as a bonus they'd have wards as a level design tool (the trailer actually kinda shows it like that, where it is leaving a trail, giving the impression that it isn't merely instantaneous travel but really fast immaterial travel). The part of the cycle this came back in would obviously be way, way off but at least it is magic that will eventually be available outside the very few immortals that are likely to have it now.

I some ways I think that SR fans are extremely sheltered. They are used to authors that put an extreme and frankly inordinate amount of effort in to continuity. Which is why you just don't see the Planet Krypton or yellow sun, which are there. The focus is on the things that have become so much accepted fact, but are in some ways are quite peripheral to the -tone-. Exact year an elf becomes a viable mature? In the big sceme of things not so important to the -tone-. Cripies, SR itself tossed in spike babies.

Welcome to the pain so many other rabid fanbois have felt. :/

Posted by: hobgoblin May 14 2006, 04:44 PM

self-healing elfs? magic-negating dwarfs? where are those in SR as we know it?

Posted by: James McMurray May 14 2006, 08:35 PM

QUOTE (hyzmarca)

What they are doing to Shadowrun is like changing Superman into some sort of energy being but DC would never consider doing that because they have too much taste. Right?

I seem to have vague recollections of them doing that at one point, didn't they? After he died maybe? It's also possible that those memories were clouded by LSD at some point and are totally fictitous.

Posted by: Grinder May 14 2006, 09:45 PM

Mhhh... LSD he said.

Posted by: hobgoblin May 14 2006, 10:24 PM

i think they did. but these days he is back in his red and blue...

Posted by: James McMurray May 14 2006, 10:49 PM

Does anyone know which of his runs that was in, and the issue numbers? I remember seeing them but never got a chance to read them.

Posted by: blakkie May 15 2006, 12:46 AM

QUOTE (hobgoblin @ May 14 2006, 10:44 AM)

self-healing elfs? magic-negating dwarfs? where are those in SR as we know it?

Magic resistant dwarves? Last I checked SR dwarves do tend to have a higher Willpower than the other races. So it certainly seems roughly in the neighborhood, though obviously no directly harmful magic (from POV of their game i get that) is going to bring that out in a mechnically different way. (i didn't read that particular part yet, i haven't read through all their blog entries).

The elf thing, they seem to have seriously gimped their Body beyond what SR normally would do and replaced it with some sort of mild regeneration/healing magic for an interesting game balance aspect. I'm still trying to figure out if any of the metas other than elfs can cast spells.

So the point still stands, there are basic similarities. It's just that it is the orginal SR as viewed through a very strong set of Beer Goggles™.

Posted by: mfb May 15 2006, 02:58 AM

there are basic similarities, woo-pah. this could just as easily be a game based on d20 Modern/Future.

Posted by: blakkie May 15 2006, 03:19 AM

QUOTE (mfb @ May 14 2006, 08:58 PM)

there are basic similarities, woo-pah. this could just as easily be a game based on d20 Modern/Future.

Ok, it is SR as viewed by nearly sentient primates wearing Beer Goggles™.

But even if they hadn't put the name "Shadowrun" on the site it still would have been blatantly obvious that they were cribbing from SR....using drunk monkeys. And hey every one loves monkeys!

Posted by: James McMurray May 15 2006, 03:22 AM

Especially the drunk ones, which I suppose is why foplks haven't burnt you at the stake yet.

For the record, I don't think blakkie is a drunk monkey, I just thought it sounded funny. Drunk monkeys everywhere would have me lynched if I actually tried to make that comparison.

Posted by: hobgoblin May 15 2006, 05:55 AM

QUOTE (blakkie)

QUOTE (hobgoblin @ May 14 2006, 10:44 AM)

self-healing elfs? magic-negating dwarfs? where are those in SR as we know it?

its not that they are themselfs more resistant to magical effects, but that they negate the use of magic in a area around them. or atleast thats how i understood it. its kinda like those animals in star wars that can negate the force.

QUOTE

The elf thing, they seem to have seriously gimped their Body beyond what SR normally would do and replaced it with some sort of mild regeneration/healing magic for an interesting game balance aspect. I'm still trying to figure out if any of the metas other than elfs can cast spells.

it seems that all can select magic, and all can select "cyberware". and cyberware seems to limit the pool of magical energy you have available. ok, so said pool can be seen as a more game friendly take on drain (kinda like all action versions of D&D for consoles gives you a mana pool rather then a number of slots per "day").

but in the end both magic and tech becomes a kind of equipment, so why not give them the posibility to use magic as a weapon? because it have potentialy unlimited ammo? you can park our ass in a corner and spam fireballs all day? i just dont get the argument for not allowing magic as a weapon when they allow it as a kind of equipment.

QUOTE

So the point still stands, there are basic similarities. It's just that it is the orginal SR as viewed through a very strong set of Beer Goggles™.

the same kind of googles that they supply the marketing people at microsoft?

Posted by: ShadowDragon8685 May 15 2006, 06:14 AM

But of course. Brand loyalty - and they make the brand.

Microsoft ™ eBeers Perception-alteration headset. It allows them to believe their marketing, research, development, and design people.

Posted by: hyzmarca May 15 2006, 06:57 AM

QUOTE (ShadowDragon8685 @ May 15 2006, 01:14 AM)

But of course. Brand loyalty - and they make the brand.

Microsoft ™ eBeers Perception-alteration headset. It allows them to believe their marketing, research, development, and design people.

Don't waste money on overpriced designer beer goggles, just make your own. All you need is two pairs of goggles, a can of beer, and some hot glue. Pour the beer into one pair of goggles until it is full then attach them to the other goggles. Seal the two pairs of goggles together with hot glue and wear them. The result is perfectly functional beer goggles for under 10

.

Not only did DC make Superman into an Energy being shortly after his rebirth (due to having his powers supplemented when some supervillian blacked out the sun or something like that) they split him in half. For a while, there were two energy-being supermen running around. We all know how that worked out. Not too good. There is a reason that Superman is back to his old self, and that reason is that almost every Superman fan knew that it was a fucktaculously stupid idea in the first place.

Which brings us back to this apparent abomination. I understand that they want to make a good game without being bound by what came before, but what came before is pretty much free automatic flavor. Really, a lot of what has to be done to make a good realstic game world has already been done for them. All they had to do was translate. Instead they choose to strip it off and, apparently, replace it with something frightfully half-assed. Hell, I may reserve judgement for its release but their work on the flavor, thebackstory, and the world in general seems almost quarter-assed.

Posted by: hobgoblin May 15 2006, 11:11 AM

QUOTE

and that reason is that almost every Superman fan knew that it was a fucktaculously stupid idea in the first place.

hmm, makes me think of the clone saga that hit spider-man at one time. thankfully i never got mixed up in trying to figure it out...

still, it ended up bringing back the green goblin from the dead...

its seems the reason given for the restart of the shadowrun history was that they burned themselfs when trying to make the battletech/mechwarrior based games fit inside the storys.

thing is tho that both people here and on the shadowrun.com forum have shown that you can create a FPS inside the existing shadowrun world with only minor work. personaly im partial for a "desert wars" kinda game. or maybe even "tundra wars", as i think there was talk in sota63 about starting up stuff in the siberian tundra...

Posted by: blakkie May 15 2006, 02:02 PM

QUOTE (hobgoblin @ May 15 2006, 05:11 AM)

thing is tho that both people here and on the shadowrun.com forum have shown that you can create a FPS inside the existing shadowrun world with only minor work.

There is some "minor work", mostly just learning the setting i think, that could go into the backstory or the setting. But i'll go out on a limb and say i find this idea a bit better than Desert Wars. Urban Brawl too would feel quite contrived, even more so than what they have.

But that still wouldn't help in regard to things like the lack of Combat spells.

The problem is to have a shot of making money they most certainly must be able to sell to a LOT more than just the SR RPG P&P customers. So you need to create a game that is fun to play on it's own, and also stands apart from other games outside of just "it is based on SR". I really don't see a canon SR rules computer game being that engaging on it's own, certainly not one built on a reasonable budget.

In implementing a computer program you have to be very aggresive in thwarting feature bloat. I completely agree that combat spells would be hard to differentiate from guns in funtionality of the game. So they would add little value to the game play. It's likely why Orcs didn't make the cut too.

That's also why teleport and rez came in. So they WOULDN'T be making just another copy cat FPS clone.

Posted by: hobgoblin May 15 2006, 03:07 PM

yet both are in a way copycat elements (outside of the teleport thru walls bit)...

combat magic would be diffrent from guns in that they take their "ammo" From the "essense pool" rather then from some clip. ok, so there is the fireball spam problem but the jerk doing will run out at some point. and with the right tech you could maybe get around it (i would guess a well placed flashbang would be nice).

its mostly the magic-negating dwarfs and the regenerating elfs thats irking me these days. the rest could in theory be renamed to conform more with the SR p&p with minimal effort (like say labeling that tree of life as a spirit of man with a healing spell. prerequisite, pick up a healing spell yourself).

i dont know, granting special powers to specific races irks me somhow. that and the statement that they needed to basicly redo the whole setting background

Posted by: blakkie May 15 2006, 04:21 PM

QUOTE (hobgoblin @ May 15 2006, 09:07 AM)

combat magic would be diffrent from guns in that they take their "ammo" From the "essense pool" rather then from some clip. ok, so there is the fireball spam problem but the jerk doing will run out at some point. and with the right tech you could maybe get around it (i would guess a well placed flashbang would be nice).

But by spending the coding effort for spells on things that guns don't do they expand the range of the game moreso.

QUOTE (hobgoblin @ May 15 2006, 09:07 AM)

yet both are in a way copycat elements (outside of the teleport thru walls bit)...

The rez is relatively rare, and nobody here has managed to come up with the ongoing link to the healer (effectively sustained spell). To clasify a how game as merely a copy cat because a variation of it's elements have been used in other games, and not even together, is a very unrealistic characterization. Damn, take a look around the SR's offical metaplots.

"The world would be a better place if people would just accept that there’s nothing new under the sun, and everything you can do with a person has probably been done long before you got there." - Hooper X, Chasing Amy

Posted by: Austere Emancipator May 15 2006, 05:12 PM

Linking a resurrectee to the resurrecter and teleporting through walls can be fun little tricks, but they are not revolutionary new features that make for "innovative gameplay" (as someone who apparently hadn't read anything about the game put it on the shadowrun.com forums) in an otherwise basic, conventional game of CTF. A few such tricks are necessary to make the game something other than Unreal Tournament with slightly different graphics, but "innovative gameplay" requires a lot more. Something on the order of http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Natural_Selection_%28computer_game%29.

Posted by: mfb May 15 2006, 06:27 PM

QUOTE (blakkie)

But by spending the coding effort for spells on things that guns don't do they expand the range of the game moreso.

and that's bad, in your world?

and, what AE said. linking the resurectee to the resurecter is an innovative detail--one, i might note, that has no place in SR. they can come up with all the neat, innovative crap in the world, and i still won't lay down money for it as long as they persist in calling it Shadowrun.

Posted by: James McMurray May 15 2006, 06:59 PM

Spells ending when their caster dies has always been a part of shadowrun. It's that whole "susteained spell" thing. Resurrection isn't an SR concept, but sustained spells certainly is.

Posted by: mfb May 15 2006, 07:10 PM

health spells tend to be permanent, though. once you finish casting them, you don't have to sustain them anymore. basically, FASA got something partially right--and then used it completely wrong.

Posted by: James McMurray May 15 2006, 07:38 PM

Think of it as a possession spell instead of a health spell if that helps any. They don't fix the body, they just recal the spirit to temporarily animate it.

Posted by: mfb May 15 2006, 07:45 PM

sorcery can't summon or banish spirits. moreover, no one in 2070 has managed to perform such a feat, even with conjuring, so making it commonplace in 2021 is pretty much insane.

Posted by: James McMurray May 15 2006, 07:50 PM

I didn't say it fit in the SR universe, just that it was a way of getting around the problems with thinking that healing spells have to be permanent. If that opens new problems... sorry.

Posted by: Shadow May 15 2006, 07:54 PM

QUOTE (hobgoblin)

its seems the reason given for the restart of the shadowrun history was that they burned themselfs when trying to make the battletech/mechwarrior based games fit inside the storys.

Thats because instead of building a game that fit into the existing story, they wanted to create a whole new type of game that had nothing to do with Battletech, but used the name.

Sound familiar?

So they re-wrote the game to match their craptacular idea, instead of using the greatness that was already their.

One word: EGO

Heaven forbid you expand on someone elses idea. No no, you have to crap all over it and make your own idea, but use their name so that you get the IP.

Posted by: mfb May 15 2006, 07:56 PM

my main issue with the "Shadowrun" FPS is that it doesn't fit--at all--with Shadowrun continuity. coming up with theories on how magic works in the "Shadowrun" FPS would be an interesting exercise, one that i would normally get behind... except that i tend to view the "Shadowrun" FPS as a direct insult to SR fans, so exploring it is pretty much the opposite of interesting to me.

in other news, i think i've figured out why this game is such a mockery of SR. it's Microsoft's revenge on Shadowrun for making William W. Gates III an otaku freak.

Posted by: James McMurray May 15 2006, 08:01 PM

QUOTE (mfb)

in other news, i think i've figured out why this game is such a mockery of SR. it's Microsoft's revenge on Shadowrun for making William W. Gates III an otaku freak.

Posted by: blakkie May 15 2006, 08:29 PM

QUOTE (mfb @ May 15 2006, 12:27 PM)

QUOTE (blakkie)

But by spending the coding effort for spells on things that guns don't do they expand the range of the game moreso.

and that's bad, in your world?

Diverting that same coding effort to Powerbolt instead is bad. In my world coding resources are limited.

QUOTE

Linking a resurrectee to the resurrecter and teleporting through walls can be fun little tricks, but they are not revolutionary new features that make for "innovative gameplay".

*shrug* Capturing spawnpoints to win a game is certainly old hat.

Natural Selection certainly wasn't the first FPS to have a team commander mode to gather intell reports from the team members, set waypoints for resource deployment, and give directions from an overhead map view. I don't recall any that made it a -requirement- to have that position filled, but that's just a fun little trick. Right? :^)

Posted by: mfb May 15 2006, 08:32 PM

QUOTE (blakkie)

Diverting that same coding effort to Powerbolt is.

i'm a fan of doing things right. to me, that means that if you have to extend the total time you spend creating the game in order to match the mechanics and world up with the source material, you do so. partly out of respect for the source material, and partly because, as McMurray pointed out, making a name for yourself as a company that treats IPs with respect is a good way to ensure long-term profit.

Posted by: James McMurray May 15 2006, 08:42 PM

Do we know how much time was put into this project versus what the projected revenue was? Keeping in mind that the marketing guys probably figured that every Shadowrun fan would buy the game no matter what it looked like?

If the line was already being skirted I'd rather lose Power Bolt in favor of Heal and Summoning. If not, then yeah, I'd like offensive magic too. It comes down to how much cake there is and how many people are trying to eat it. At some point resources stop being available.

And of course, if it did have offensive magic, people would instead be complaining that it doesn't have improved invisibility, or trid phantasm, or whatever other really cool SR spell didn't make the cut. A lack of offensive magic is definitely an odd place to draw the line, but I can see the reasoning behind it.

And on a side note, is the world about to end or something? I find myself in the unique position of alternating between agreeing with mfb and blakkie. WHAT'S GOING ON????

Posted by: mfb May 15 2006, 08:56 PM

*shrug* you're the one that was talking about the financial sense of creating good work as opposed to shoddy work.

Posted by: James McMurray May 15 2006, 09:13 PM

Yeah. I know that. thanks for pointing it out though.

Posted by: mfb May 15 2006, 09:19 PM

i see you're still under the impression that i disagreed with you on that point. regardless, you don't see the relationship between that statement and the time versus projected revunue statement you just made?

Posted by: James McMurray May 15 2006, 09:23 PM

I definitely see the relation. More time means more revenue but higher up front costs. Less time means more revenue but the risk of a shoddier product lowering sales. It's a balancing act between resources and results.

Why would you think I think you're disagreeing with me just because I told you that I knew what I already said?

Posted by: Austere Emancipator May 15 2006, 09:31 PM

QUOTE (blakkie)

Natural Selection certainly wasn't the first FPS to have a team commander mode to gather intell reports from the team members, set waypoints for resource deployment, and give directions from an overhead map view.

That's not nearly all the human team commander does in NS, nor does that even touch upon all the other things that NS does different from all the other popular multiplayer FPSs that were around when it came out. But, if you think that fantasy races and a few spells are as big a leap in gameplay from UT2k# and CS:S as NS is from CS, DoD, etc., then I doubt I can convince you otherwise.

Posted by: Shrike30 May 15 2006, 10:18 PM

NS was, as far as I know, the first game to give ONE SIDE a commander (and have the other side use an integrated HUD/"overmind notifications" system to compensate), and still manage to balance it. I've also not seen a game where the commander has the option to manipulate the automated parts of the environment (opening doors, cycling elevators, etc), handles research, dispenses equipment, and establishes structural objects for the other players to set up. Of course, my gaming experience isn't hugely diverse, either, but these were features new to me in an FPS.

Posted by: mfb May 15 2006, 10:58 PM

QUOTE (James McMurray)

Why would you think I think you're disagreeing with me just because I told you that I knew what I already said?

mainly because i'm dealing with a sarcastic ass. so when you thank me for agreeing with you, i tend to assume you think i disagreed at some point.

at any rate, like i said: i'm a fan of doing things right. if it can't be done right for a reasonable cost, the choice to me is between not doing it and doing it right at unreasonable cost. i understand there are other ways of going about projects; for those who use those other methods, i reserve the right to put $ in their company name.

Posted by: James McMurray May 15 2006, 11:17 PM

Understandable.

You might be gifting me with more finesse then I've actually got though. Sometimes a sentence is just a sentence.

Posted by: blakkie May 16 2006, 02:34 AM

QUOTE (Austere Emancipator @ May 15 2006, 03:31 PM)

QUOTE (blakkie)

Just using different metahuman names instead of different 'classes' of gear/armor on humans is no big deal at all. I certainly said no such thing. Or "a few spells" just for being spells. But how those specific spells, rez and the teleport, work in the game seem like they are going to matter (the vine block one does sound interesting but i doubt that is ground breaking). Does Natural Selection represent a larger "leap"? Since the size of the leap is really only important in the context of a given direction that is a rather esoteric question.

Is it enough different from other FPS squad vs.? Maybe, especially given the timing on the platform. The point is that it is does have a difference and it has the potential to bring about a game play different that is meaningful. I do think the single biggest thing that sets it appart right now though is playing together cross-platform.

But these cries of "make it original, not copy cat" is just a bullshit red herring anyway. How many people here have advocated, both before and after the E3 announcement, effectively making a "copy cat" of Deus Ex?

Just tried to hunt down a report on the actual E3 Shadowrun demo (not the CGI trailer). I'm not sure exactly which metric was being used for determining "most anticipated", but it wouldn't seem to line up with internet gaming press run.

Judging from the sparse comments made about the E3 demo they are either not using the UT 2007 engine, they are running with an outdated build of the UT 2007 engine, or they really, really suck at models, skins, and textures. Hard to tell myself from the crappy resolution video clips IGN has.

Another thought has occured to me. This game's real purpose [to MS] might be partially a technology demo of Live Anywhere. The Shadowrun license being used as more of a throw-away, which doesn't seem out of line with what i'd imagine it's worth to Microsoft was. Who knows, if sales really tank they might end up putting it into a bundle with the 360 console later on and/or bundling it with the PC Live Anywhere product (if they have one).

Posted by: James McMurray May 16 2006, 03:11 AM

If they count how long people have been wanting a Shadowrun game that could bump it up to "most anticipated" pretty easily. How many other games out there can say people have been asking for it for a decade?

Posted by: blakkie May 16 2006, 03:14 AM

Ten years times dick all is still startlingly close to dick all. In the face of 100's of thousands of Halo fanbois it seems even less.

Posted by: James McMurray May 16 2006, 03:29 AM

True, but you're saying that from the perspective of somebody not in FASA Studio's marketing staff.

Posted by: blakkie May 16 2006, 03:44 AM

The perspective of some hack spinning total, utter PR bullshit? Yes, I suppose I am not.

Posted by: mfb May 16 2006, 04:59 AM

re: anticipation of an SR video game, i present the following http://features.teamxbox.com/xbox/1464/Most-Wanted-Unannounced-Xbox-360-Games/p1/.

Posted by: blakkie May 16 2006, 05:09 AM

Ah, it's one of the six unannounced that are "all at the top of everyone’s “most wanted” list for the Xbox 360". Ya, everyone is special...which would mean noone is.

Posted by: mfb May 16 2006, 05:12 AM

you're making even less sense than usual.

Posted by: blakkie May 16 2006, 06:04 AM

Translation: Without sarcasm intended, i thank you for that link as that clears up a lot.

I come away from that article with the impression that the results of a survey, with a massive sample set consisting of "everyone", show that in a catagory consisting of somewhere around 6 games Shadowrun is definately right up there in the top 6 when ranked by “most wanted”.

Posted by: mfb May 16 2006, 06:08 AM

could be. it's certainly possible they picked 6 games they knew were in production and said "which of these six do you anticipate most?". but... eh. rigged poll or not, i can see SR being a hot property. FASA Interactive did a great job with Crimson Skies 2, after all, and the Mechwarrior series, while not a top seller, hasn't been a disappointment.

Posted by: blakkie May 16 2006, 06:17 AM

I suspect if they have considered making an RPG they probably just followed your criteria of "do it well or don't do it at all" and decided they couldn't make money on a well done SR RPG. I get the impression reading the "Screw All This SR Baggage" manifesto that they even considered it not feasible to "do it well" putting together a canon compliant FPS, so they didn't do that either.

Then they decided to do the next best thing (in their eyes) and take a shot at doing a SR [themed] FPS well. Just is their idea of doing it well focused almost entirely on enjoyment of the FPS game and any vaguely inconvinent SR canon details got tossed under the software development bus.

Posted by: mfb May 16 2006, 06:39 AM

what i really love is their reasoning for not using the established history. they didn't know who to please--the PnP fans, the novel fans, or the game fans. as if those are all seperate, squabbling fanbases.

Posted by: blakkie May 16 2006, 06:45 AM

Ya, it's just one single squabbling fanbase. Not picking any of them at that point, to me, just gave it the reek of empty rationalization for taking a "just screw it" approach.

Posted by: hobgoblin May 16 2006, 07:00 AM

given that the novels are close to the p&p in story (if not in "physics") and the console games are so old, i would have expected them to go with the P&P and forget about the rest.

strange thing is that you see all sorts of action and proper rpgs based on d&d and the diffrent worlds (mostly forgotten realms but now there is eberron with the d&d online), but you never see them feeling the need to call it forgotten realms while puting it into a whole diffrent world.

still i guess the reason for that is that they licence rather then own the IP rights for those worlds. fasa interactive dont have to care about followin a licence as they own the IP rights for a computer interpetation of the old fasa rpgs and other games.

Posted by: mfb May 16 2006, 07:08 AM

indeed. i believe it's laziness and/or selfishness. crafting a story that meshes with the existing world would take work and research. they want to tell stories involving magic and cyberpunk elements--their own stories--while retaining the SR brand recognition.

Posted by: blakkie May 16 2006, 08:01 AM

Comparing D&D to SR you have to keep a few things in mind.

The FR D&D stuff tends to just use FR names, and they don't bother put FR on the cover (the setting is quite popular, i'd hazard a guess their most popular setting line long running). FR is also set up as the kind of world where you can find a spot to wedge in pretty much -anything-, it's a pretty flexible setting that way. I don't know anything about the D&D MMO, i have had zero interest in that.

D&D itself tends to be a lot less constrained in some ways than SR in that a lot of what is thought of as "norm" for things like magic are heavily influenced by D&D itself, and the rules are built as general rules with multiple interpretations open. SR, with it's very tight rules/setting binding, does not have that to nearly the same degree.

Also keep in mind that that outside of the gold box AD&D games they had some pretty horrendous AD&D computer games before Balder's Gate. WotC seems to have been pretty good about selecting who they select for licenses, and they also have made a very conscience effort to make their rules computer friendly (i.e. 2 times out of 3 they know a revenue source when they see it). So it's something that goes both ways, and without the effort coming from the P&P it has a hell of a lot less chance of flying.

P.S. The line between fiscal prudence and "laziness" and/or "selfishness" is pretty blurry at times.

Posted by: mfb May 16 2006, 08:05 AM

i can't imagine how fiscal prudence might lead to completely rewriting a setting. that's the worst part--it's an FPS, the story is just fluff. slap in Aztechnology as the corporation and Amazonia as the hippies, and voila.

Posted by: Dranem May 16 2006, 09:19 AM

Another thing to remember about D&D is that WotC purchased ALL rights to everything D&D... meaning they have a say in how games are developped.

Fasa Studios does NOT need permission from FanPro or WizKids to produce a Shadowrun game. This difference is the primary reason that the upcoming game will suck, because there's no control between the computer game developpers and the RPG developpers.

Posted by: blakkie May 16 2006, 09:34 AM

It seems they changed the time to avoid some other issues like tech levels, or just trying to avoid the details of SR history altogether by picking what seems to be sort of a blank spot. So Amazonia doesn't exist. Not sure about Aztech. Though having one of the big 10 names would be a nice nod to P&P players, RNA as the big bad corp at this point on the timeline is no big thing (it's pre-crash, so pretty much anything could have happened to it including a name change or merger to become Aztech). There are other things though that were changed around like dropping orks, elfs/dwarfs goblinizing, and adding teleports and rezes...which the people making the decisions might have only been vaguely aware of as issues.

So there you are designing a game. You look to the left, you look to the right. There is nobody helping or even particularly caring deeply about the P&P canon, or even helping you to understand what conflict between the novels and the P&P (and those previous console games) there might be. Just a lot a people caring about making a fun computer game with likely some requirements from the mothership about a game on both Windows and Xbox 360 that is going to compell people to play crossplatform and so on. This is a serious pressure cooker situation, and the design docs are flowing red with cuts to try get the scope down to something that can be implemented within the total alloted budge and still have a playable, marketable game.

To make it worse those damn artsy graphic freaks have already eaten up 5% just twiddling around with concept art and early 3d models, and another 5% was spent on something labeled as a "focus group marketing retreat" which you suspect was actually the original management team sending themselves off on a weekend bender junket to Tijuana.

Without a champion to aid, remind, and occationally brow-beat guess how far down the list does canon slip? What we see is the natural outcome of a lack of representation.

Posted by: mfb May 16 2006, 06:13 PM

QUOTE (blakkie)

It seems they changed the time to avoid some other issues like tech levels, or just trying to avoid the details of SR history altogether by picking what seems to be sort of a blank spot.

the thing is, that's not what they're doing. their intention, as stated on the site by the lead developer, is to completely rebuild the entire history of SR.

as for job pressure causing canon to slip down the list, i have no sympathy for them because that is the job they chose. if they want a low-pressure job, there are plenty of fast-food joints looking for burger-flippers.

Posted by: blakkie May 16 2006, 08:08 PM

It's not a matter of being unable to handle the job pressure. It's the reality of making things work. Going into that job with a "everything or nothing" attitude that you are exponsing would ensure disaster. At some point you have to say "good enough" because there is always more scope that could added. Buckling into that creates feature creep which is deadly to a software project.

People that handle the pressure make the tough choices best the can with the info at hand and cut what has to be cut to make it work. People that don't handle the pressure buckle and doom their product to an innevitable shipdate slip or out and out canceling.

So it is lack of a resource supporting the license's canon. Normally that is the job of the person/company with the non-computer product. It isn't really the design guy's or even FASA Interactive's or Microsoft's job to be that voice AND listen to the voice.

Posted by: mfb May 16 2006, 08:40 PM

"good enough" doesn't mean there aren't standards that can be set. choosing to place canon on the list of thing that you can skip is dirty and cheap.

Posted by: blakkie May 16 2006, 09:01 PM

QUOTE (mfb @ May 16 2006, 02:40 PM)

"good enough" doesn't mean there aren't standards that can be set. choosing to place canon on the list of thing that you can skip is dirty and cheap.

It is entirely reasonable to cut back on it if you don't readily have the info and expertise to implement. In the end you can only make decisions on what you have in front of you. Sure you could go out and try track it down and research it yourself. But that's just something else that you don't have time for in your 80+ hour week. Going out and trying do someone else's while abondoning yours is a good way to not get your job done, and ultimately get yourself turfed.

EDIT: Of course they could have tried to hire someone on with a solid SR petigree and Microsoft could have assigned a priority to that. But to what end? Here we get back to what they are trying to sell, and what they think the biggest chunk of market is willing to pay for. SR with computer game flavour or a computer game with SR flavour. They think computer game with SR flavour. If they are right that isn't lazy, that is called listening. If they are wrong it is called fucking up.

It isn't personal.

Posted by: mfb May 16 2006, 09:03 PM

no, it's not. the whole point of using someone else's IP, from a creative standpoint, is to tell your stories in their world. it's not so you can rewrite everything from the ground up. if you want to do that, then don't slap the IP on the title of your project--you're not using the IP, just the brand recognition.

Posted by: blakkie May 16 2006, 09:13 PM

QUOTE (mfb @ May 16 2006, 03:03 PM)

They aren't using the whole of the IP, just what they see as the core themes/flavour that resonate with a wide audience of people. Brand recognition is part of it. But delivering what people like is what'll eventually seal the deal.

Believe it or not the minuteia of SR history doesn't have that broad of audience. SR itself isn't that huge to start with, and you would get a blank slackjawed stare if you heard what passes for SR history at most tables. Partialy because they don't have access to all the books, but mostly because they don't really care.

Posted by: mfb May 16 2006, 09:16 PM

they don't have to use the whole IP--just enough to make it recognizable to SR fans. it's not like these guys have never heard of SR before. at least one of the devs still plays it. given that fact, i find it hard to believe they couldn't shell out the five or six man-hours it'd have taken to come up with a background story that at least nominally fits the existing material.

Posted by: Demonseed Elite May 16 2006, 09:18 PM

QUOTE

They aren't using the whole of the IP, just what they see as the core themes/flavour that resonate with a wide audience of people.

Unfortunately, they aren't even doing that well.

Posted by: blakkie May 16 2006, 10:01 PM

QUOTE (mfb)

I've heard drunk monkey stuff like that from a Commando. Admittedly a Commando whose strength was in BT and just getting into SR. But he was GMing, damn it.

You need to get out of the house more and has some contact with the dirty, huddled masses....or not.

Posted by: mfb May 16 2006, 10:02 PM

yes. because only alcoholic primates recognize that the game they're creating is not SR.

Posted by: blakkie May 16 2006, 10:04 PM

QUOTE (mfb @ May 16 2006, 04:02 PM)

yes. because only alcoholic primates recognize that the game they're creating is not SR.

No, I mean "stuff" like the setting fluff over on the FASA Interactive site.

EDIT: Obviously i find it a hyperbole describing it as unrecongnizable as SR. I've gone through the list already once, it's around here somewhere. Stuff that people were even claiming is antithematic of SR is actually somewhat consistant with the spirit of the setting.

Posted by: mfb May 16 2006, 10:10 PM

ah. regardless, i disagree with your list. what you've listed could as easily describe a d20 Modern/Future game. the list of things they changed for no apparent reason outweighs your list by an order of magnitude. the game is not SR. i mean, for pete's sake, SRRPG.com posted a freakin' disclaimer for the game.

Posted by: blakkie May 16 2006, 10:21 PM

QUOTE (mfb @ May 16 2006, 04:10 PM)

i disagree with your list. what you've listed could as easily describe a d20 Modern/Future game.

Well in that sense Shadowrun proper could be a d20 Modern/Future game (well not Modern itself i think, but there is some extra suppliment that adds non-human races and magic). Such is the breadth of what a -generic- system can encompass.

But thousands of year magic cycles with one showing up at the end of the Mayan calander, some humans expressing as metahumans, and global corps with sweeping contracts for enforcing all of civil law and order (of a situation that screwed up to start with)? Come on, that's more than a stretch to try claim that isn't signature SR.

Posted by: mfb May 16 2006, 10:27 PM

except they changed all of it. they screwed up the date of the Awakening. they screwed up the expression of metahumanity. they screwed up the global corps. like i said, you don't build a game off an established IP and then change everything--especially when there's no reason to. five or six hours, tops, and this game could be worked into SR canon. the reason Shadowrun is not interchangeable with d20 Modern/Future is because of those details. SR has them, d20 Modern/Future doesn't, or has different ones.

Posted by: blakkie May 16 2006, 10:34 PM

QUOTE (mfb)

You are describing slight details that are off. 12 days off, in the same month of the same year??? Hell the SR date doesn't even match up to the end of the mayan calander exactly.

They screwed up the global corps how exactly? Oh, they didn't use a name of the top ten...who may or may not actually exist under that name at that point in the timeline.

And they really openned the floodgates with those damn spike babies, and for Dwarfs too.

Once again split hairs does not equate to "everything". :/

Posted by: mfb May 16 2006, 10:43 PM

orks are not slight details. the appearance of dragons is not slight details. the way magic works is not slight details.

moreover, details or not, there was no. reason. to. change. it.

Posted by: L.D May 16 2006, 10:56 PM

blakkie... have you read their timeline? Have you actually checked the difference?

There are no Orks. Humans are tougher than Dwarfs. Elves and Dwarfs weren't born in 2012 (the year of the awakening...) but adults changed into Elfs, Dwarfs and Troll (but again , no Orks) that same year. Elves regenerate and Dwarfs nullify magic. When Humans install cyber, it costs less essece (why? hell do I know...).

Renraku is alive and kicking 8 years before Aneki created the company... and Fuchi's got a great optical implant that lets you see through walls... remember that this is in 2021... Because we all know that cybereyes and tech that could see through walls are part of SR-canon in 2021.

There is no offensive magic (just gone...), but there is resurrection, teleportation and a "Tree of life"-spell.

The game itself revolves about a megacorporation (RNA) trying to take control of a Ziggarut (one of six) that controls magic in the world.

How is that even close to being Shadowrun?

Edit: Forgot about the dragons... there are no dragons.

Posted by: blakkie May 16 2006, 11:05 PM

QUOTE (mfb)

orks are not slight details. the appearance of dragons is not slight details. the way magic works is not slight details.

They hint at "other creatures" in carvings. I haven't noticed in the screen shots yet what exactly they are talking about.

QUOTE

moreover, details or not, there was no. reason. to. change. it.

Orks? Sure. They are all somewhere else on earth right now *cough*. I'd lay money on it that there indeed is a reason. Likely because that's an extra model to build and animate that didn't add enough value to game play. Cut.

Dragons? So Dunk is going to show up late for his little chat at the right time. (or, more likely, they'll not bother focus on him which i'm am not going to shed a tear over) They certainly have no place in the gameplay itself. Drakes might have because of their smaller size, but not dragons.

Another dozen dense pages of history? Not needed to play the game. Cut. You want that go buy the book(s).

How magic works? In which way? Not allowing Teleport and Rez?

Damn man, if you think you can just spend 5-6 hours to make it real canon and not mess around with the basic premise underlying the game AND not have it end up a jumble of ass-pulling wierdness that'll only serve to confuse the majority of the people playing the game (for reasons that just aren't apparent to them) then have at it and send it too them. Because you can explain those away in SR canon terms sort of (the people never die, the teleporters are pulling a Harley astral jaunt), but really just open up a bunch more questions for people reading it.

Posted by: blakkie May 16 2006, 11:07 PM

QUOTE (L.D @ May 16 2006, 04:56 PM)

blakkie... have you read their timeline? Have you actually checked the difference?

I've read. I've even noted a lot of the differences and discussed them at length.

Is it dead on no? Is it really close? No. But it's roughly in the neighborhood.

P.S. Hrmm, didn't cover the Ziggarut. Ziggurats? No. Setting aside that that name is usually associated with specific cultures. But SR has magical wierdness aplenty. SR does have the dragon lines and power sites where they cross. There are plenty of artifacts too, a lot that aren't really discussed in much detail. Because that is what they are, open background for you to paint your own game on.

Posted by: L.D May 16 2006, 11:08 PM

http://www.philiprichardson.org/blog/post.aspx?id=20

QUOTE

I'm usually not one to openly criticise my employer (Microsoft) on my blog. However the travesty which has befallen Shadowrun demands that I speak out. After FASA imploded many years ago Microsoft ended up with all the computer game rights to the FASA properties (Battletech, Shadowrun and even freaking Earthdawn). Now I understand that we must make some comprimise in the nature of a game when we transfer it from pen & paper to a computer. I'm a PM: I understand the business of tough comprimises. What happened here was not a comprimise: it was total freaking re-invention. I'm not talking the re-imagined Battlestar Galactica with human looking cylons: I'm talking about re-making Lord of the Rings in which Frodo drives to Morder in a Lamborghini Murciélago. If you work for FASA and you are reading this then I welcome you to take the shuttle over to my office and punch me the face. Seriously: I won't be offended since your damn game just kicked me the metaphoric balls.

Posted by: mfb May 16 2006, 11:11 PM

and 'roughly in the neighborhood' is not good enough for me--and a lot of othe people--to lay money down for. nor is it good enough that i'm going to stop accusing them of being lazy hacks, because it could have been 'really close' or even 'dead on'. you'd think maybe those 5-6 extra hours would be worth it, considering the number of people planning to boycott the game because they weren't spent.

Posted by: L.D May 16 2006, 11:12 PM

QUOTE (blakkie)

Is it dead on no? Is it really close? No. But it's roughly in the neighborhood.

Personally, I don't think it's roughly in the neighborhood. Hell, I don't even think it's on the same planet. So on that we're gonna have to agree to disagree.

But, and mfb has talked about this as well, naming this game Shadowrun was completely unnessecary.

Seriously, if you look at different forums (not only DSF) and at reviews of the game most people who have previous familiarity with Shadowrun think that this game is a really, really bad idea. And not because of gameplay, but because they feel the Shadowrun name is wastad on this game since they have practicallly nothing in common.

The ones who like the game are almost exclusively people who have never heard of Shadowrun before and on those people the name is totally wasted. You could have given the game practically any other name you could have thought of and they still would have liked it. So we're back to wasting the name on a game like this

Posted by: blakkie May 16 2006, 11:13 PM

QUOTE (mfb @ May 16 2006, 05:11 PM)

and 'roughly in the neighborhood' is not good enough for me--and a lot of othe people--to lay money down for.

Big freakin' surprise down here at Anal Retentive Central.

QUOTE

nor is it good enough that i'm going to stop accusing them of being lazy hacks, because it could have been 'really close' or even 'dead on'.

Then put your money where your mouth is flapping and spend the 6 hours writing it.

Posted by: blakkie May 16 2006, 11:16 PM

QUOTE (L.D @ May 16 2006, 05:12 PM)

Hell, I don't even think it's on the same planet.

See, that is the exact kind of bullshit hyperbole that i'm talking about.

EDIT: Ya, it might have been poor judgement to put the SR name on any game. But telling them they can't use something they bought because Anal Retentive Central would whine, bitch and moan about pretty much anything they could afford to roll? Microsoft's only real alternative was to just let it rot into oblivion, because realistically that's where it was going to go. Given that i fail to see outside of some elitist view how they going off and building a game you'll never play really does that much harm outside of finally deflating a few pipedreams about a high production quality, strongly canon SR RPG.

Posted by: mfb May 16 2006, 11:17 PM

how about six minutes? here we go: replace their mockery of SR history with a cut-down version of http://www.shadowrunrpg.com/resources/timeline.shtml. take out elves and dwarves, put in orks. change RNA Global to Aztechnology and change Lineage to a nascent Amazonia. link the whole thing to the massive regrowth of the Amazon rainforest. QED.

and you, blakkie, are the last person on the planet who can talk about being anal retentive.

Posted by: L.D May 16 2006, 11:19 PM

If you still want elves and dwarfs, then move it up a couple of years to... dunno... 2030 or something like that.

Edit: Oh, and I would be fine with some of the shit they've done if they' d have given some explanation as to why. For instance, I could take the resurrection and teleportation if the other shit was more canon and the explanation was that within... oh, a mile (or such) of the Ziggarut teleporation and resurrection is actually possible. And there you have another reason for the company wanting that artifact. Who wouldn't want to be able to resurrect people?

Edit2: I'm not exaggerating. I think that this game is a completely different game. To me the game they're selling isn't Shadowrun. And thus we're talking another planet. With my changes in the last edit, then we'd be in the same neighbourhood.

Posted by: blakkie May 16 2006, 11:35 PM

QUOTE (mfb @ May 16 2006, 05:17 PM)

So now you've taken out Elfs and Dwarfs?

Sorry, you just stripped out game play design. Try again. But wait, what about those darn spells?

What are you, LAZY?

QUOTE

and you, blakkie, are the last person on the planet who can talk about being anal retentive.

I might be low on the last, but last i think not.

QUOTE

Edit: Oh, and I would be fine with some of the shit they've done if they' d have given some explanation as to why. For instance, I could take the resurrection and teleportation if the other shit was more canon and the explanation was that within... oh, a mile (or such) of the Ziggarut teleporation and resurrection is actually possible. And there you have another reason for the company wanting that artifact. Who wouldn't want to be able to resurrect people?

Extra explaination that leads to extra questions. Why bother people with that extra stuff? You like that explaination? Then run with it. It is still wacked by canon so far since no-teleport is a canon constant. Sorry. Wrong planet.

Or just ignore it all and have fun playing the game ganking people for cash. Or just don't buy it because it's not the type of game you'd play anyway, because they aren't selling to you.

Posted by: mfb May 16 2006, 11:36 PM

they've got until January to fix the gameplay. those spells can be tossed out along with RNA.

Posted by: blakkie May 16 2006, 11:41 PM

QUOTE (mfb @ May 16 2006, 05:36 PM)

they've got until January to fix the gameplay. those spells can be tossed out along with RNA.

Yes, just have them call in the software fairies to come up with some other premise for gameplay, redesign the game from the bottom up, and then rebuild the maps and the coding and the graphic content....in about 5-6 months.

Posted by: mfb May 16 2006, 11:49 PM

that's their problem. if they'd spent the time when they first started, they wouldn't be in this position.

Posted by: blakkie May 17 2006, 12:45 AM

QUOTE (mfb @ May 16 2006, 05:49 PM)

that's their problem. if they'd spent the time when they first started, they wouldn't be in this position.

Still a little slow on the uptake i see. Once again they likely found the strict canon version of the rules basically got in the way of the game and/or the intricacies of it came of as overly obtuse and bloated when trying to formulate it into brief, concise fluff. So out the strict rules went, and in came the paraphrasing that isn't using the same language that SR P&P people are used to (like "power point" instead of "power site").

Posted by: mfb May 17 2006, 12:47 AM

QUOTE (blakkie)

They likely found the strict canon version of the rules basically got in the way of the game...

that, right there, is exactly why i'm not buying the game. they decided to make what they wanted to make, and slap the SR logo on it.

i'm done here. i'm repeating myself, and blakkie is reverting back to his basic nature. nothing good can come of continuing.

Posted by: blakkie May 17 2006, 12:55 AM

QUOTE (mfb @ May 16 2006, 06:47 PM)

....and blakkie is reverting back to his basic nature.

....of poking you right in your big, fat, pompus, illogical eye.

The one that has decided that people not holding in high esteem your lofty [unrealistic] ideals AND your personal tastes are just lazy or greedy.

Posted by: Wounded Ronin May 17 2006, 02:31 AM

So, is one of you going to make a high-quality, stable, features-jammed Deus Ex mod set in a Shadowrun setting yet? I mean, since we pretty much figured out that the MS game won't be worth buying, I figured I'd just download and enjoy your hyper cannon of drama mod work instead. That dosen't exist yet. But it should.

Posted by: Da9iel May 17 2006, 02:35 AM

(Lets see if I can still do this.) Yeah, but it's cool because a dev has a http://www.gametrailers.com/player_e3i.php?r=1&id=10741&type=wmv.

Posted by: Red May 17 2006, 03:02 AM

I will readily confess that I am a detail man. I love deep stuff. I like stuff that's got so many layers it gets local geologists excited. And then when it comes time to share that stuff with everybody else, I've got to tone it down about ten notches so they don't look at me like I'm speaking Latin. That part of me can't help but feel awful. That part of me feels like my favorite puppy was just drowned in a lake inside a garbage bag. As much as I like SR4, I still miss the demise of variable TNs.

That said, I don't know how I'd make an SR computer game if I was placed in the hot seat. As Einstein says, make things as simple as possible, but no simpler. The development team obviously took the knife to canon, but I think they probably cut a little too far. But how much of this perceived loss is real or imaginary is hard to determine. They've gone all the way back to 2012. We can't say with certainty whether future events will be invalidated, but there is a real fear that if they tinkered with such basic stuff as making magic absorbant dwarves... then what else we be lost? Call it estimated trajectory.

I think it is clear that somebody probably started with gameplay mechanics first, and the cut apart SR stuff to fit. Sort of like putting square shaped stickers on a circle. On one hand, sure, mechanically a circle peg is going to fit in the circle hole, and thus increase the odds for good gameplay. But I think that people feel it is an insult to their intelligence when you slap the square sticker on top. Example, allow an option like an edge to be magic resistant, but don't slap it on the dwarf metatype.

So, in the end, I'm just conflicted.

Posted by: hyzmarca May 17 2006, 03:26 AM

QUOTE (Wounded Ronin)

I was thinking more of Morrowind. Shadowrun style drain is rather easy to impliment in Morrorwind due to the ability to mix and match spel effects. It is simple to seet magica cost to 0 and put damage stamine self on every spell.

Of course, firearms and cyberware would present some problems due to the fact that the game was disigned to support a Roman Empire tech level but firearm mods have already been done with creative scripting.

Posted by: Dranem May 17 2006, 03:26 AM

According to the game details, not only are dwarves resistant to magic, they inhibit magic! Automatic counterspelling whether they're a mage or not? Come one people!

Posted by: Wounded Ronin May 17 2006, 03:29 AM

QUOTE (hyzmarca)

QUOTE (Wounded Ronin @ May 16 2006, 09:31 PM)

Yeah, well, I don't like Morrowind. See that one to VW instead.

Posted by: mfb May 17 2006, 03:57 AM

meh. mods aren't where my talents lie.

QUOTE (Red)

They've gone all the way back to 2012. We can't say with certainty whether future events will be invalidated, but there is a real fear that if they tinkered with such basic stuff as making magic absorbant dwarves... then what else we be lost? Call it estimated trajectory.

i agree. on some of the forums i visit, the reaction of some is that fans of SR should buy whatever video game is offered, as long as it has Shadowrun on the box. that way, it's more likely to see a sequel. my personal feeling is that if the game isn't SR, i don't want it, no matter what it says on the box--and that goes for sequels as well.

Posted by: blakkie May 17 2006, 04:42 AM

QUOTE (Wounded Ronin)

So, is one of you going to make a high-quality, stable, features-jammed Deus Ex mod set in a Shadowrun setting yet?

We'll see that sometime after drunken monkeys sprout wings, feathered, not the kite kind, and fly off to happy happy candyland. Afterall apparently mods aren't where the talents here lie, sniveling about how -other- people just so don't know how to build a computer game is.

@Da9iel: Hehe, i hadn't seen that one before. Dig the "monkey brain" comment, i'm really onto something i think.

Posted by: James McMurray May 17 2006, 04:52 AM

The funniest thing to me about this entire thing is that no matter what game they'd made, hardcore SR fans would bitch. They would still have left out Orks, because Trolls and Orks are too close to one another to bother coding both. They would have had to leave some canon stuff out, meaning cries of "damnit! I wanted my kid stealth legs!" They'd have had to drop some spells ("Waaah! Where's my Turn to Goo???").

It is impossible for any game to fully duplicate a PnP game that's been around for decades. And depending on what your time frame is, you'll probably have to even change some game mechanics around to make the coding simpler. Hell, even Neverwinter Nights and D&D Online have hordes of detracters and they're both really close to the actual rule sets.

Posted by: mfb May 17 2006, 04:55 AM

QUOTE (James McMurray)

The funniest thing to me about this entire thing is that no matter what game they'd made, hardcore SR fans would bitch.

oh, definitely. that's the fun part about being a hardcore fan of anything--bashing parts of it you don't like.

however, the main difference between fan reaction to this game and fan reaction to a game where the developers took the time to portray the SR world with a reasonable degree of accuracy is, i'd be buying that other game. and so would a lot of other SR fans.

Posted by: James McMurray May 17 2006, 05:02 AM

True. And Microsoft would be getting the $5,000 worth of profits because of it. But who's to say how much making this version will net them from non-SR fans. I certainly can't, but it might be more than the money they lose by alienating the comparatively small group of people that play FPS games and also play PnP SR.

Edit: The "true" is meant to refer to your second paragraph. I disagree witht eh first, and it doesn't really seem to mesh with my statements anyway, since I was talking about hardcore SR fans bashing a computer game, not SR itself.

Posted by: Kagetenshi May 17 2006, 05:06 AM

QUOTE (Wounded Ronin @ May 16 2006, 09:31 PM)

So, is one of you going to make a high-quality, stable, features-jammed Deus Ex mod set in a Shadowrun setting yet?

I'm not sure how much easier Deus Ex's preexisting RPG elements would make it to mod, but unless the answer is "a whole lot" it is, while an awesome game, just about the worst choice you could make for a base to mod on. The engine sucks and sucks badly, as anyone who has tried to use the eye-lights in the game knows. That said, I am working on something with a friend. More news if and when it gets off the ground in a serious way.

James: you're assuming that the qualities that make a game attractive to fans will innately be aversive, or at least uninteresting, to non-fans. If I really have to point out the flaws in that assumption, there's no point in trying to talk about it.

~J

Posted by: mfb May 17 2006, 05:10 AM

your estimate of the number of SR fans appears to be slightly lower than mine. certainly your estimate of the number of fans who won't be buying the "Shadowrun" FPS because of the, ah, changes made to the story line is. as for how much they'll get off non-SR fans, well, that goes back to the M$ thing.

i was being largely tongue-in-cheeck about bashing something being the best part about being a fan of that thing.

Posted by: James McMurray May 17 2006, 05:12 AM

I'm not assuming anything. Did you somehow take my use of "I certainly can't" and "might" to mean I had nailed down exactly what effects the changes have on the marketability of the game? I'd say that if that is the level of reading comprehension you have, there's no point in trying to talk about anything.

Posted by: mfb May 17 2006, 05:16 AM

your phrasing would lead one to believe that you made that assumption. you say "this version might not get SR fans, but it might get non-fans", which certainly implies that there is something about the version which attracts non-fans while repelling fans. or, at least, one can easily draw that implication from it.

Posted by: James McMurray May 17 2006, 05:16 AM

QUOTE (mfb)

So what's your estimate?

Where's your market research?

How much profit do you think they make from each copy of SR that they sell, given that we don't know how much it cost to make and how much it will sell for?

How many copies would be pirated by SR players because "that's what shadowrunners do," and therefor wouldn't be profit for them anyway?

Admittedly I picked a number out of my ass, but it has about as much chance of being right as any number you pick unless you have access to a lot more information, and answers to questions that don't actually have any way of being answered. And the basic premise is the same whether the number is $5,000 or $500,000, as we have no idea of what the effects of adding the non-SR magic tot he game will be on sales.

Posted by: mfb May 17 2006, 05:20 AM

my estimate? i don't have an estimate. i have no idea exactly how many SR fans are not going to buy the game due to the lack of respect with which it treats the IP. i do know of around 200+ who have vocally made clear their intentions to not buy it for that reason, but whether or not they'll follow through--and how many haven't spoken, but who will do the same--i don't know.

none of which has anything to do with my point, which remains that the honest thing for the developers to do would be to either create a game that treats the IP with respect, or not make a game at all. the fact that they're doing neither is what prompted the whole M$ thing. i don't care how many sales of this game there are, though it would suit my personal sense of justice if it flopped. but whether or not it will succeed has never been my point.

Posted by: James McMurray May 17 2006, 05:28 AM

And oddly enough, they don't care whether or not you care. Ain't it grand when life turns full circle.

Posted by: nick012000 May 17 2006, 05:29 AM

http://www.shadowrun-online.com/sronline/index.php

On the upside, it looks like there's a SR MMORPG coming out as well.

Posted by: mfb May 17 2006, 05:31 AM

no. but i'm willing to bet they'll care if there's a massive fan backlash against their game. and i'm hoping that calling them on their dishonesty on the official forums--along with several hundred other fans--will motivate them to mend their ways.

Posted by: James McMurray May 17 2006, 05:38 AM

I hope so too, but doubt it. If it makes money they'll make a sequel. If it doesn't make money they won't.

Posted by: mfb May 17 2006, 05:42 AM

at this point, i'd rather not see a sequel.

i think of it this way: i was unhappy when Greedo shot first, but at least it was Lucas who decided it.

Posted by: James McMurray May 17 2006, 05:46 AM

And of course, whether you or I want a sequel really doesn't matter.

Posted by: mfb May 17 2006, 05:51 AM

indeed.

it's worth pointing out, by the way, that http://forums.shadowrun.com/forums/thread/2558.aspx, at least not in this instance. there are a lot of unhappy fans out there.

Posted by: James McMurray May 17 2006, 05:53 AM

I don't think anyone is saying that there aren't unhappy fans out there. To say that you'd have to be pretty much blind.

Posted by: mfb May 17 2006, 05:55 AM

ARE YOU CALLING ME BLIND!?!!!?!?!!?!?!

/self-deprecating humor

Posted by: James McMurray May 17 2006, 06:38 AM

Not unless you're trying to say that there aren't any unhapy fans out there. Or of course if you're actually blind.

Posted by: ShadowDragon8685 May 17 2006, 08:59 AM

QUOTE ("Hot sehks and win")

[THE BIG ‘D’] Good evening.

[WORDSMYTH] Again? What is it this time?

[JUNGLE CAT] This vile trickery doesn’t become you.

>UMSONDO JOINS

[THE LAUGHING MAN] Is this related to the previous discussion, oh wily wyrm?

[HECATE] Fool me once.

>HECATE LEAVES

[LADY OF THE COURT] Melodramatic much? What is this about?

[THE BIG ‘D’] Sorry to inconvenience you once more, dear friends. But there is something we must discuss. It concerns the fate of the world.

[THE LAUGHING MAN] Doesn’t it always?

[WORDSMYTH] Such is always the nature of things.

[THE BIG ‘D’] Truth, but this is different. Will you hear me? I trust I did not disappoint with the revelations gleaned from our last similarly clandestine meeting.

[LADY OF THE COURT] Yes.

[WORDSMYTH] We will hear you.

[THE LAUGHING MAN] Count me in! I’m always up for a bit of enlightening.

[UMSONDO] I remain and will listen.

[JUNGLE CAT] Very well.

>>>>>CODE: FILE EXECUTE-SHADOWRUN-FPS [Shadowrun.com]
>>>>>BEGIN? [Y/N]> Y

[WORDSMYTH] So… they wish to delete us?

>JUNGLE CAT SEETHES

[THE LAUGHING MAN] Well, it was a good run!

[THE BIG ‘D’] I’m afraid it is all true. Your own sources can confirm what mine have. The creators wish to wipe us from the fabric of existence, and start anew.

[THE LAUGHING MAN] A veritable etch-a-sketch end o’ the world!

[LADY OF THE COURT] Why would they do this?

[WORDSMYTH] Public appeal. A broader vision?

[UMSONDO] I perceive neither.

[THE LAUGHING MAN] Isn’t this folly? Are they not cognizant of that?

[UMSONDO] The consistency of an imagined world is its very foundation. Remove this and everything falls.

[JUNGLE CAT] Treacherous ingrates. Our blood and sweat and toil have borne their world and the following it enjoys. It is in our existence and perpetuity that they find life!

[THE BIG ‘D’] Now that you’ve had first glance, I’m publicizing the document and opening the discussion. This concerns more than just us.

>>>>>CODE: PROPAGATE*.LTG SHADOWRUN-FPS [Shadowrun.com]
>>>>>BEGIN? [Y/N]> Y

>HECATE JOINS

[HECATE] What?! They aren’t serious, are they?

[THE LAUGHING MAN] No riggers, no deckers, no orks, and a complete eradication of history as we know it. Hilarious!

[UMSONDO] With the annulment of our collective histories, they hope to provide our universe with a rebirth. I will watch, but it is not for me to judge.

[The Big ‘D’] You will not be able to judge from oblivion, my friend. In their vision, we no longer matter. The rich tapestry we have woven over the past few decades will unravel into nothingness in short order. The stories, the journeys, the glorious adventures of the 6th World are undone. They do not remember that it is not how a rock falls, or a bullet wounds, or a how a spell is cast, but rather the effects of these things in a lasting and rich world. With a tunnel-vision view on the “How”, they have ultimately neglected the “Why”, and excised us from this new realm. They have forgotten us. They have forgotten what we have added to the reality of running in the shadows. That in our characters and stories we have added a sense of permanence- that we have added lasting purpose.

[WORDSMYTH] And depth.

[THE LAUGHING MAN] And laughter.

[CAPTAIN CHAOS] And joy.

[CHROMEACNT] And respite.

[DEUS] And fear.

[ATZCAP] And challenge.

[LADY OF THE COURT] And allure.

[FASTJACK] And tragedy.

[LOFWYR] And intrigue.

[H COYOTE] And mystery.

[JUNGLE CAT] And glory.

[HECATE] And redemption.

[UNIBRO-4-LIFE] And immersion.

[The Big ‘D’] But take Heart. It might not be that bad. And perhaps someday in the near future, we’ll get to come out and play. Perhaps the experience will be engaging and entertaining, and will bring whoever dares to pick up the controller or mouse truly into our world, if only for awhile. Until then.

>SHADOWRUN LEAVES

Whomever wrote that should get a medal.

In other news... FASA dropped the ball. They didn't just drop the ball, they dropped the ball that set off the rube goldberg machine of fury and rage. Hopefully, it's going to fly around and kick them in the ass.

What has this game got going for it, ignoring all I.P., and treating it as a straight-up first person shooter? Things that few if any FPS's have ever done?

It has:

Multiple races. (Arguably. While other FPSs may or may not have races, they tend to have weight classes.)
Magic (Which is non-offensive, and relegates players to the support role. We all know how open-play guys LOVE to be the support role, right?)

What it has flying against it:

Windows Vista. The computer gaming crowd is not going to want to upgrade their O.S. just to play this game, especially as XP has several years worth of life left in it yet.

No singleplayer support.

It's a game that will be moving in direct competition with Counter-Strike: Source, which costs a whole lot less, whichever Unreal Tournament is currently "in", and America's Army, which is FREE.

The guys who coulden't care about Shadowrun and only want an FPS will wind up being unimpressed by it and go back to playing Counter-Strike: Source.

Worse, the few that DO like it and find out there's a PnP RPG (if they ever do, because M$ is certainly not going to mention it, as it dosen't get them any money) are going to buy SR4, and be all "omfg wtf is thiz hax? This isen't Shadowrun!" And then the Shadowrun guys they talk to will say "Sorry to say this mate, but that is Shadowrun. That shit Microsoft put out? They only got to use the Shadowrun name because of some legal name-pirating. Go ahead and try SR4 though, you'll find it's a lot better than the game. If you have any patience, that is."

"Patience? WTF is that shit? NM I GB2CS".

Worse is that making this a Shadowrun game would NOT HAVE BEEN ALL THAT HARD. Not at all.

You wanna know how? Here's how.

The game started development before SR4. So you set it in 2060, before the YotC and all the SotAs. This is to limit the PnP material you have to browse through.

You go through the guns and equipment and cyber lists and magic lists of the SR3 core book, pull out the useful stuff. You might have to drop riggers because of the "OMFG that drone just eradicated the whole team" factor - then again, you might not have to. Depends on your implementation - if you only use the small and light drones that can be destroyed with firearms, then you can keep riggers. Alternatively, do like BF2, and make anti-vehicle weapons common, and you can keep tank-truck/heavy drone riggers.

Come up with a good reason for this to be a CTF game. How about, I dunno, a scaled-up version of Urban Brawl? Urban Brawl Championship will be the In-Character reason for it, with anyone and everyone who wants to try to participate allowed to do so.

Bam. Story, not even all that implausable.

How to implement magic? Simple - a Stun and a Health bar. Each one imposes penalties, of course, making your aim more wobbly and slowing you down until you recover. This also gives people a reason to carry nonlethal weaponry - if someone is fast with healing spells on the enemy team, you can use the stun to put people out of action since they can't heal stun. Then when everybody's out of action, you can geek them. Or leave 'em to rot/kill themselves (thus losing points) to respawn.

Implementing decking? Easiest thing in the world. Just create an extra "zone" to the map that's outside the "physical world" zone. When someone jacks in, their meat body stays in the physical world, vunerable and undefended unless someone is defending it, and they can fly around in the extra world. What does it do? Make it so using the Matrix right is either VITAL to success, or Very Helpful - things like hacking the enemy base's turrets would be good. A short hack would simply put them offline until someone reset them in the Matrix, a long hack would change them to target the team they were supposed to protect. Or simply require the door to the flag room to be hacked open. You can simply forget all the IC and stuff, and make the only form of Matrix defense to be an opposing player in the Matrix - not inappropriate for a closed-system Urban Brawl match.

The Astral plane? Same deal, except you don't need a jack-in point to project. Projecting into the astral plane is simple - you occupy a new characture of yourself and fly around in what is essentially noclip mode. Some things (the ground, the boundaries of the arena, the skybox) are impassable, ICly you can say these places (as well as some other places, like the enemy spawns) have been warded against astral movement. Give the astral player moving a lot of speed, give him a speed toggle so he can either move super-fast as is Astral-norm, or move carefully. Let him see ordinary objects blurrily and indistinctly, thus making landmarks a little hard to follow, and make people out there in the meat world visible. Make Watcher Spirits on the astral out so that they show the mage a picture-in-picture view of what they're seeing from the astral in the top of his screen - not really canon, but it's a good fascimile. Other sorts of spirits, of course, you can order around with a simple but option-rich (not an oxymoron) map-view command system. "Go Astral. Go here. Manifest. Kill everything. Go Astral. Go here. Manifest. Kill everything. Go Astral. Go here. Manifest. Kill everything. Go back to step 1." for example. Bam, you just set up a three-point patrol. And this of course, introduces the reason for having the astral - spirits are difficult to combat in the world without AV weapons, but in astral combat a mage percieving is about equal to them, and a mage projecting has a really good chance of punking them down.

Bam. Shadowrun, the FPS. Instead, they chose to do some wierd shit.

Posted by: Kagetenshi May 17 2006, 12:48 PM

QUOTE (ShadowDragon8685)

What has this game got going for it, ignoring all I.P., and treating it as a straight-up first person shooter? Things that few if any FPS's have ever done?

It has:

Multiple races. (Arguably. While other FPSs may or may not have races, they tend to have weight classes.)

Not even arguably. The first, but not the only, example of this to come to mind is UT2k4, though it's an optional setting.

QUOTE

Magic (Which is non-offensive, and relegates players to the support role. We all know how open-play guys LOVE to be the support role, right?)

Maldavria (Q3 mod) and Clive Barker's Undying (commercial game) both have magic.

~J

Posted by: blakkie May 17 2006, 03:22 PM

QUOTE (nick012000)

http://www.shadowrun-online.com/sronline/index.php

On the upside, it looks like there's a SR MMORPG coming out as well.

Just to clear up the delusions, we'll see SR5 before we see a strict canon RPG. Fan made or otherwise.

That site was just someone trying to lobby Microsoft to build a SR RPG or MMO. Microsoft is currently right out of the MMO business. The cut it some time back, but for some odd reason had picked up Brad McQuaid's gang Vangard...which they just offically dumped distribution of earlier this month.

So there isn't going to be a SR as you know it RPG, and sure as hell no MMO.

P.S. As far as I can tell from the datestamps on the news, when that site openned up FASA was already nearly a year into development of this current game.

Posted by: hobgoblin May 17 2006, 04:31 PM

QUOTE

Maldavria (Q3 mod) and Clive Barker's Undying (commercial game) both have magic.

to bad the mod nosedived and the commersial game was a pure one player game.

hell, after reading some of the stuff linked from the forum-thread that mfb linked to, its clear that its a cheap CS clone made to attract people to the "live anywhere" service. way to butcher the IP property microsoft.

by the looks of it, they could not handle the richness of the background, so they had to boil it down to gun and magic to get the basic idea thru to the execs. and at that point the execs said: FPS! end of story

Posted by: James McMurray May 17 2006, 05:46 PM

QUOTE

Magic (Which is non-offensive, and relegates players to the support role. We all know how open-play guys LOVE to be the support role, right?)

Can mages not carry guns?

Posted by: blakkie May 17 2006, 05:57 PM

QUOTE (James McMurray @ May 17 2006, 11:46 AM)

QUOTE

Magic (Which is non-offensive, and relegates players to the support role. We all know how open-play guys LOVE to be the support role, right?)

Can mages not carry guns?

Of course they can. Magic is in a supporting role at a personal level. It is a tool. Even rezing someone, though obviously a "support role" at the team level, appears to be a really well paying (in ingame currency) sideline for the caster.

Posted by: James McMurray May 17 2006, 05:59 PM

Cool. The poster made it sound like all you could do is support.

Posted by: ShadowDragon8685 May 17 2006, 06:31 PM

No, my point is that nobody is going to support, because rezzing somebody will give you penalties. If you've ever played an Open game of CS or BF2 or something, you know what I mean, especially BF2. How many people play a support class? About none of them. Those who do never actually do the supporting they're supposed to, they just play it because they like the weapons available and the fact that they can support themselves.

They never support the team.

Posted by: nezumi May 17 2006, 06:50 PM

QUOTE (mfb)

it's worth pointing out, by the way, that http://forums.shadowrun.com/forums/thread/2558.aspx, at least not in this instance. there are a lot of unhappy fans out there.

Well, not in this case anyway.

(I'm sorry!!! I'm really being mean today, but they're just too easy!!)

Posted by: blakkie May 17 2006, 07:04 PM

QUOTE (ShadowDragon8685 @ May 17 2006, 12:31 PM)

I've played open server TF and Tribes/T2. I haven't played BF2. If people aren't playing the classes at all I would say then that it was a poorly designed game in that regard. It wasn't a fun to play option, so of course people aren't going to want to play it. Sounds like it is a class that should have been cut.

On the otherhand in Tribes 2 there were lots of jobs to fit different tasks. Pickup games were still relatively unorganized, but you could work effectively in teams of 2 or 3 people too even if the whole of the team was disorganized.

As for the specifics of rezzing currently the the caster gets a 50% take of what the player he rezzed makes from that point on. Given that cash is what you use to buy more spells and gear i'd say that's a pretty strong incentive to overcome tying up about a 1/3 of your casting reserves.

Rez two people and then go find a hidie-hole to crawl into.

Posted by: ShadowDragon8685 May 17 2006, 07:35 PM

You're assuming he's going to make anything. Which means you'll have people out to ressurect the top players, the top players console-killing themselves to get out of debt, and the newbies on their own anyway.

Yeah, real equitable there.

Posted by: blakkie May 17 2006, 08:08 PM

QUOTE (ShadowDragon8685 @ May 17 2006, 01:35 PM)

I'm not sure what you are talking about with console-killing themselves? You mean if someone rezzes them they'll just kill themselves and not earn any cash at all vs. earning 1/2 cash?

Rezzing the truely feeble isn't so much a problem as they'll soon free your Essense up again, and a player that is really good might leave you with a long wait and a dangerous situation before you can rez him.

You rez someone and your team is strengthened and you stand to gain some unknown amount of cash out of it. *shrug* The actual percentage cut the caster gets is likely something that tweaking would help on to find the right psychological sweet spot. But all in all a game that has well designed avatar options will have them all used in some reasonable extent.....which gets us back to it being helpful in building a good game to avoid being a slave to the literal rules of a game in an entirely different medium, and being willing to cut "features" that get in the way or doesn't add to the gameplay.

EDIT: One obvious area where a problem could develop is surrounding TKing. But without a stringent background anti-TK script running or an human admin present public servers tend to turn off team damage anyway.

Posted by: James McMurray May 17 2006, 09:19 PM

People play support classes in WoW all the time. Why would this game be any different (assuming the support class is fun to play).

Posted by: mfb May 17 2006, 09:22 PM

haha! woo. MMO players are a whole other breed from FPS players. guys who play both MMOs and FPSs act completely different from one game type to the other.

Posted by: Kagetenshi May 17 2006, 09:27 PM

QUOTE (James McMurray)

People play support classes in WoW all the time. Why would this game be any different (assuming the support class is fun to play).

People play average schmoes in Silent Hill all the time. Why would this game be any different (assuming the average schmoe is fun to play)?

~J

Posted by: Shrike30 May 17 2006, 09:53 PM

Show me a Silent Hill game where you're up against other players, and I might get more out of this...

Posted by: Kagetenshi May 17 2006, 09:56 PM

But that's exactly the point—they're different kinds of games. It happens that WoW and CounterRun have more in common with each other than with SH*, but they are still different games.

You dismiss my SH comparison, I dismiss the WoW comparison, both times for valid reasons.

~J

Posted by: blakkie May 17 2006, 10:02 PM

QUOTE (James McMurray @ May 17 2006, 03:19 PM)

People play support classes in WoW all the time. Why would this game be any different (assuming the support class is fun to play).

You don't have to go outside the team PVP set of games to find people on public servers playing all the various roles. Can't say what the specific issue with BF2 is, but TF and T2 had lots of people with engineering and medics loadouts/character types and a mix of offense/defense. I believe that at one point some TF servers did start putting caps on the number of players that could choose a given type. But that problem had to do more with teams running all snipers i believe, which resulted in the other side pretty much needing to run all snipers. It would then devolve into a sniper vs. sniper war.

The biggest problem in T2 was the learning curve on piloting where some noob would jump into the pilot seat on a transport or bomber and then proceed to run into something and flip it over or fly it at missle-bait altitude (anti-missle flares being a limited load out) getting everyone killed.

Which is another design boo-boo to watch out for to make the game public server friendly. Senarios where a single player can easily cripple a team through poor play to the point where it would better if the team was down a couple people rather than him being on the team. That's why the option is normally included to turn off friendly fire or at least have an anti-FF script running.

Posted by: James McMurray May 17 2006, 10:23 PM

So there's a couple people saying that FPS players don't do support classes and some saying they do. Does anyone have any backup for their claims? If not I'm going to assume that some people will want to play a mage, even if some of their magic is supportive, because there are people out there that like to be the one that others rely on. And if you get paid for helping people all the better.

Posted by: blakkie May 17 2006, 10:27 PM

QUOTE (James McMurray @ May 17 2006, 04:23 PM)

So there's a couple people saying that FPS players don't do support classes and some saying they do. Does anyone have any backup for their claims?

I'm still trying to figure out WTF Kagetenshi is talking about with SH (but then i don't play that particular game, so whatever he thinks he's saying is going to need to be a bit more explicit), mfb i'm assuming is going off his extensive FPS team PVP experience, and ShadowDragon8685 appears to be going off the fact that he is sparking up a fat one.

Posted by: Kagetenshi May 17 2006, 10:30 PM

QUOTE

I'm still trying to figure out WTF Kagetenshi is talking about with SH

Then let me try to distill the concept down to a core essence that perhaps even your feeble mind will be able to understand:

They are different game types. They play differently, and people play them differently.

Now, can we spot two other games in recent discussion that are of different game types?

~J

Posted by: Austere Emancipator May 17 2006, 10:34 PM

People playing support roles just to be a valuable contributor to the team are few and far between in team FPSs, in my personal experience (but then I only got in on FPS goodness in CS b3.1, so I'm still a bit of a n00b), but when such action is rewarded there will be people doing it. As an example, in America's Army, on servers where scores aren't being tracked and it's all about frags, you can bleed to death right in front of the team medic and he won't even blink. On some tracked servers, where being an active medic is a great way to score big time, you see medics queuing up to give first aid.

Posted by: blakkie May 17 2006, 10:39 PM

QUOTE (Kagetenshi @ May 17 2006, 04:30 PM)

QUOTE

I'm still trying to figure out WTF Kagetenshi is talking about with SH

Then let me try to distill the concept down to a core essence that perhaps even your puny mind will be able to understand:

They are different games. They play differently, and people play them differently.

~J

But why would that make this invalid?

QUOTE

People play average schmoes in Silent Hill all the time. Why would this game be any different (assuming the average schmoe is fun to play)?

Basically it comes down to if it is supported in the game and it's fun for people to play with it then people will tend to play with it. If it sucks to play it then they won't.

For some reason apparently BF2 was built in such a way that one or more of the avatar types suck (player has little personal reward to play). It doesn't match up with any siginficant personality group that plays the game and so it doesn't get used. That it is a "support role" avatar is largely incidental.

Posted by: Kagetenshi May 17 2006, 11:01 PM

Self-imposed cooldown time, I'll try to remember to address that tomorrow.

~J

Posted by: blakkie May 17 2006, 11:07 PM

QUOTE (Kagetenshi)

Self-imposed cooldown time, I'll try to remember to address that tomorrow.

~J

After cooling down you might want to spend a little thinking time addressing it first. It should save you a post.

Posted by: mfb May 17 2006, 11:25 PM

i wouldn't worry about it, Kage. blakkie's not here to hash out anything conclusive, or even just to debate. he's here to be an asshole and piss people off. when he gets like this, it's generally not worth replying to him at all.

Posted by: blakkie May 17 2006, 11:46 PM

QUOTE (mfb @ May 17 2006, 05:25 PM)

You are just a no worries kind of guy, hey? You certainly don't worry about backing up your mouth. Oh ya, only 5 or 6 hours tops to write the backstory in total canon for a great playable computer game. Nothing but Bull and Shit....and Bull just left town. Your solution being just copy and past the P&P game and it'll all play great.

Posted by: Shrike30 May 17 2006, 11:47 PM

*sigh*

Posted by: hyzmarca May 17 2006, 11:51 PM

The more I read about this game the more I think its sort of like Will Smith's I Robot without the robots.

Posted by: blakkie May 18 2006, 12:41 AM

QUOTE (Shrike30 @ May 17 2006, 05:47 PM)

*sigh*

That's what happens to snipers that sit and squat too long. Someone comes along and drops a grenade in their nest. To top it off he tries to pretend he is all mr. hash out and constructive when really all he's showing up to do is what he specializes in. Bitch, whine, and moan.

Posted by: mfb May 18 2006, 02:45 AM

QUOTE (hyzmarca)

The more I read about this game the more I think its sort of like Will Smith's I Robot without the robots.

haha, nah. Will Smith's I Robot had a single-player campaign (c'mon, i can't be the only one who though "boss fight!" during the tunnel scene).