The Hedge Knight
Member
I saw that a lot of suggestions were being repeated, so here is a list of all things already confirmed and denied by devs. Green is confirmed, red is denied, yellow is maybe, white is other. If you find anything I missed or if anything new comes up, please PM me.
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Multiplayer:
Sex:
Elderly Characters:
Child Characters:
Respawning NPC's:
DRM:
Alpha:
Multiple Worlds:
Pausing:
Liquid Physics:
Vibrant Colors:
Large Worlds:
Stealth:
Healing Potions:
Dismemberment:
Object Destruction:
Rigid Quest / Reward Mechanics:
NPC Relationships:
Persistent Multiplayer:
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Multiplayer:
Initially we will have multiplayer LAN. This will not be an MMO like UO, it's just not really possible (we adored UO btw). If and when we introduce online play will be more along the lines of battle.net but hopefully with some additional nice features.
Killing Everyone:Either way this is ultimately irrelevant at this point, it's merely speculation. Right now we don't have the resources to even consider online play as a reality. For the forseeable future we can limit ourselves to the single player / LAN aspects of this game.
We're certainly not planning to introduce any of these things. My comment on the rating was basically a joke and the point was that we're not targeting any specific rating. We're definitely not trying to push any censorship boundaries. Inevitably it will feature relatively graphic violence and being able to kill anyone is just part of the game unless you break the whole physics and realism aspect of it.
Sex:
Heh, the only "rating" we're going for is not banned!
Personally I can't imagine sex being anything but silly in the context of this game.
Elderly Characters:
Elderly people is something that we hope to have. Our physique system allows using any number of morph targets to be used for a body shape and we could also play with the physics here.
Child Characters:
Our discussions on this topic have always ended in "no children". Consider also that we intend to have a believable reputation system (someone must witness or discover what you did and also recognise you for plausible reasons). It's sad to have no children but we also don't want to make a game where you can abuse them.
Such moral issues inevitably come up when making a realistic simulated world. We wouldn't want our game to be preachy but I do think it would cool if it was possible convey the pain and suffering that cruel actions can cause. In practice I don't think that would be easy to do but we don't intend to reward the player for being cruel. Killing people shouldn't just be funny or inconsequential.
Respawning NPC's:
That's totally core to our philosophy and part of what all the dynamic story stuff supports. No unkillable NPCs, no respawning NPCs, nothing like that. It's much more than just annoying, it very much hurts immersion and the whole idea that what you do matters.
DRM:
Any copy of the game you get from us will be DRM free. We will give you a product key that will allow you to download the latest version of the game directly from us at any time as well patches, free DLC etc.
We don't use any 3rd party technology at all for physics, I built the physics engine from scratch. This goes for everything else too.
Alpha:
Technically an alpha version of the game would be one that provides the complete gameplay experience but lacks polish and still has many placeholder elements. We'll release something as soon as we think it's in a decent playable state even if content wise we still have quite some way to go. I think Tony's estimate is reasonable but hopefully we can get it to you a little sooner and if we can we will.
Multiple Worlds:
The idea is that you create a world instance and a character and yes, you can create new world instances and drop an existing character in. Difficulty scaling is something we're still not entirely sure about but it might take you a few play throughs before you can deal with some really hard fights. It's partly up to you how difficult the game is.
Pausing:
We'll allow pausing when in single player but you won't be able to do anything at all within the game while paused. Doing anything with your inventory or talking to people etc. will certainly not pause the game or prevent normal controls from working.
Liquid Physics:
We initially went for something more like that but without the blood actually sticking to things but just dissapearing it looked silly. We plan on adding decals but doing it properly takes some work, we couldn't get that done in time for the update.
Vibrant Colors:
Games often use under saturated or over saturated colours. This is a stylistic choice but can also be an excellent way of masking poorly made graphics. Even photography rarely has natural colours these days.
We have a strong background in photo-realistic architecture (cultural heritage) and luxury goods and the aim is always high fidelity. Colours don't have to look good, they have to be _exact_. This is always how we work, as much as possible we try to create something indistinguishable from the real thing and colour is often more important than anything else. Also if you give someone who works in fashion or luxury cars the wrong colours they will crucify you.
With the notable exceptions of flowers and modern chemistry and manufacturing, vivid colours are quite rare but when they are appropriate we won't shy from using them.
Large Worlds:
The "world" is going to be relatively small in scale but we'll try to make it as varied as possible as long as it doesn't compromise realism.
When we say relatively small we mean relatively. The word "world" seems quite deceptive in this context, we're definitely not making a planet with continents. Probably it will end up being similar in scale to the recent Elder Scrolls games. The tricky thing is that we likely want to add a fair amount of content after release and we definitely don't want any invisible barriers, just natural ones.
Stealth:
I loved the original Thief games. Awesome gameplay. I really hope we can capture some of that in SG. Hiding in shadows, being careful not to make loud noises, hiding bodies etc. These are definitely things we'd like to have in the game. I personally find stealth skills in RPGs quite silly but the stealth gameplay of the Thief games was great.
Healing Potions:
"Healing potions" beyond perhaps something that might slightly improve your natural gradual recovery definitely have no place in this game. Also remember this is essentially a low fantasy setting...
Dismemberment:
As for dismemberment our idea is that while it might not kill instantly it would still kill pretty quickly. Not something you can recover from.
Object Destruction:
Breaking stuff is definitely something we'd like to do, it's fun and adds realism. I have some ideas on how to break things that goes beyond just exploding them into pieces. We're unlikely to use a fully procedural system however so every object that can be broken would require more work. How many things you'll be able to break really depends, it's priority but not an essential feature.
Rigid Quest / Reward Mechanics:
This game will not feature rigid quest / reward mechanics. Someone might promise to reward you for completing a task but that's only worth as much as their promise until they deliver. Basically you're free to do anything with the information you're given, you're not necessarily rewarded for doing things. You should set your own goals and decide on the best way to achieve them, hoarding money isn't necessarily of any interest to you.
NPC Relationships:
Take the witch example. There is the assumption that you are in fact able to kill the witch, or that the authorities are able to capture her. If she's a thaumaturge she's unlikely to just let either one happen, she will most likely fight for her life or attempt to flee. It's possible that someone might decide to follow you but you'd need to make quite an impression or provide them with a serious incentive for them to abandon their current life to join you. They will then constantly reevaluate whether there isn't something better they could be doing. If they are killed in battle, that's it, they're dead.
Either way, everything here would be very circumstantial, you can't reduce any one event or behaviour down to some mechanic. There are many factors influencing every decision an NPC makes.
Persistent Multiplayer:
The idea is that you and your friends drop your characters in a (persistent) world instance and just do whatever you want. Whether you cooperate or duel or whatever else is entirely up to you.
If and when we introduce online elements we plan to to allow forming smaller parties for online play and introduce some more global elements such as PvP arenas with spectating players.