Dungeon Siege 3... from Obsidian?

If they made Dungeon Siege more like Icewind Dale, that would rock all kinds of socks off!

When I heard that they were making a Diablo 3, I was filled with a nervous excitement like a dog being chased by a swarm of angry bees. But this... this... I'm just not excited for in the slightest. They're going to have to work hard to dispel the horrible images that GPG has left the series with.

Podunk wrote:

Don't forget that Black Isle made the Icewind Dale games, which were not quite Diablo-style action RPGs, but were pretty damn close, and pretty damn awesome. I don't know how many dudes at Obsidian are Icewind Dale vets, but Josh Sawyer (lead designer of IWD2) has been at Obsidian for around 5 years now.

And they made KOTOR 2 that had no ending. And they made NWN 2, which was all right but not up to par with IWD. And they tried to make an RPG based on Aliens, but that vanished. And they made Alpha Protocol. It's hard for me to get excited for either Dungeon Siege 3 or Fallout: New Vegas now.

KOTOR 2 was awesome for 75% of the game. NWN 2 was fantastic once you hit chapter 2 onwards, the NWN2 expansions (especially MOTB) are really really good, Alpha Protocol was great... I'm all for more Obsidian.

A note on KOTOR 2. They had a mid year 2005 release date set when they started working on it, in summer of 04 Lucasarts had a big management shift, layed off a bunch of staff and decided that KOTOR 2 was now going to be a Christmas 04 release, it took an 18 month dev time down to 12 and gave Obsidian 3 months to finish the game. That was not their fault in the slightest. The lack of polish on their other titles certainly is on their head, but not KOTOR.

fangblackbone wrote:

Nice ideas, so-so implementation, nonexistent challenge scaling (hour 5 is the same as hour 25), crappy network code, ineffective post release support.

Hmm. Disagree, somewhat. Once you get through the campaign once and into medium difficulty, using special abilities and babysitting your party gets a lot more important. Also, there are a few interesting space and movement puzzles outside of the main quest.

The hotfix mods look like they make some interesting changes to the game, including opening up six character parties much earlier.

Anyway, despite the game's many flaws, I've always had a soft spot for this series. Watching the constant battle pyrotechnics is just a blast.

I'm glad to hear that there's a new game coming in the series, but I really wonder how a party-based Diablo-style hack and slash is going to work on the consoles. I'm worried that the core gameplay elements that I enjoyed from previous games won't be there. GSG's direction on Space Siege really doesn't fill me with much confidence and Obsidian has a pretty shaky record.

Sinatar wrote:

KOTOR 2 was awesome for 75% of the game. NWN 2 was fantastic once you hit chapter 2 onwards, the NWN2 expansions (especially MOTB) are really really good, Alpha Protocol was great... I'm all for more Obsidian.

Sorry, still not buying it. They have great concepts, but 9 time out of 10 they fail because of piss poor execution. If Alpha Protocol had executed on all cylinders, it would have been far and and away a much better game than either Mass Effect. As it stands, it's a bad console port and maybe there's a good reason why their Alien game was axed before it saw the light of day. The only thing Obsidian's earned over the last several years is a healthy dose of skepticism.

Icewind Dale and especially Icewind Dale II were all kinds of awesome, though. Please let this be a continuation of some of that.

When I saw the post of shack I let out an Oh no. I could point to other devs I'd rather see do it, but like above, I'll take Obsidian over GCP.

This is the excuse I've been waiting for to throw DS back on the pile. I tried it when it first came out, but it was too frustrating for my PC gamer newbself. First and last game I traded in. The Gamestop I bought it from gave me less than half of full price. Took me too long to stop supporting Gamestop, though my frequency was rare. Long live digital distribution!

First three screenshots
Random (screenshot #162)
IMAGE(http://blogfile.paran.com/BLOG_205498/201007/1280246251_screen_shot162.jpg)
Skeleton King
IMAGE(http://blogfile.paran.com/BLOG_205498/201007/1280246251_SkeletonKing.jpg)
Vodyanoi Cavern
IMAGE(http://blogfile.paran.com/BLOG_205498/201007/1280246251_VodyanoiCavern.jpg)

Project Director Q&A and CG teaser

IGN: Obsidian's always been known for doing a great job of embedding interesting stories into its game worlds, so can you talk about the story surrounding Dungeon Siege III and how much of an integral part of the experience it is?

Rich Taylor: We can't go into story details at this time. We can say that story is every bit as important in Dungeon Siege III as other titles we have developed at Obsidian such as Neverwinter Nights 2 and Knights of the Old Republic 2. The player will be an integral part of the story that unfolds as they progress through the adventure. There will be decisions the player has to make. These choices can impact how your party feels about you or affect the way other characters in the game respond to you. There are times when the player has to make a decision that will make one group or another unhappy, and this will have a long term effect on aspects of the story.

One of the refinements we are making to this system for Dungeon Siege III is that we are having each of these decisions have a short term, mid-term and long term affect on the game. So, you'll see the effects of your decisions constantly as you play through to the end.

It looks like i'll be getting this rather than Diablo 3... so i hope it's good!

I really enjoyed the first one but two did nothing for me.

They are going to have to pull of something truly amazing for me to get over the bad taste Demigod left in my mouth.

Tamren wrote:

They are going to have to pull of something truly amazing for me to get over the bad taste Demigod left in my mouth.

Obsidian didn't make DemiGod.... Gas Powered Games did and they're not making this game... It even says in the title!

Lolz! The entire time I was reading this thread I completely missed that. All that was going through my head was this running commentary about how much I hated GPG. Which should give you some idea of how much I dislike GPG for turning Demigod into abandonware.

So yeah, Obsidian. I'm kind of burned out on this genre in general. I never finished Torchlight, even though I thought the game itself was fantastic. So hopefully Obsidian can do something fun with the formula.

I totally forgot about Dungeon Siege 3 when replying in this thread. Anything that can help me resist buying a Blizzard product (in this case, Diablo 3) is welcomed. I'll be cautiously optimistic for DS3.

Blizzard have to actually release D3, who knows what timescale they're on. I'd guess DS3 is next year sometime.

There's also LOTR: War in the North which while not exactly the same kind of thing, has some strong similarities. So if fantasy action rpg is your thing, you may have a lot on your plate before long.

That is awful pretty.

Man. Those images are just filled with WoW Certis is awesomeness.

Just another way to pop my widescreen monitor cherry. Thanks, dowon! [size=6]and Obsidian[/size]

Ah, Skeleton soldiers, there's not a fantasy game without them.

Scratched wrote:

Ah, Skeleton soldiers, there's not a fantasy game without them.

Just to prove you wrong, i'm now going to design and make a fantasy game without them!!

>:)

Gameplay trailer

"The slo-mo was just an effect for the trailer, it's not actually used in game ever." said the game's lead designer.

Damn these eyes and their troublesome lens flare!

That looks incredibly akin to Diablo 2/3 with the special moves/skills..... This might be very interesting after the snoozefest that was DS2

The slo-mo definitely did the game a disservice. The game looked akin to an early 360 game with major aliasing. All told I think that trailer was bad. I didn't enjoy the pacing, cuts, slo-mo, or the terribly generic music.

I played the original Dungeon Siege but got annoyed by the "stats go up as you use them" mechanic. I kept having to get rid of cool gear because I knew by the time I got another five points of strength, it would be too late. Maybe I need to give it another try...

From http://store.steampowered.com/app/39...

System Requirements

o OS: Windows Vista or 7 (64-bit OS preferred, but not required)
o Processor: Modern CPU (Core i7, etc.)
o Memory: - 4GB of RAM minimum, 6GB or more if available
o Graphics: NVIDIA GeForce 280 or ATI Radeon 5800 series or better
o DirectX®: DirectX® 9.0c
o Sound: standard audio

What the hell are they doing with this title?

Scratched wrote:

From http://store.steampowered.com/app/39...

System Requirements

o OS: Windows Vista or 7 (64-bit OS preferred, but not required)
o Processor: Modern CPU (Core i7, etc.)
o Memory: - 4GB of RAM minimum, 6GB or more if available
o Graphics: NVIDIA GeForce 280 or ATI Radeon 5800 series or better
o DirectX®: DirectX® 9.0c
o Sound: standard audio

What the hell are they doing with this title?

Holy crap... I guess thats what happens when Obsidian is left to their own devices and make their own tech.

Whoah. I couldn't even boot that up, much less play it. Sounds like sky high ambition for a tiny market meeting lacking programming.