lol


Here's the rest:

Question: Day and night cycle sounds cool, but what kind of effects have you planned for it to have? (since day/night quests are not a design pillar) Will we see spells that work differently under the sun/moon, effects on accuracy, etc? Do we dare hope for NPC schedules a la Ultima 7? :)
Feargus: Our plan is to start with getting it to feel like day and night and then grow it from there. As the system works, we will pile more functionality on it. That would mean different day/night schedules and things like that. However, that stuff is secondary to making sure the core of the game is fun and solid. Torment was awesome and it used only very core CRPG systems.

Question: I hope you guys would consider maybe including a physical soundtrack cd at least at the 250+ tiers, possibly even at 140+. All the proper collector's editions I have ever gotten included a full soundtrack CD :). Just a humble request.
Feargus: Gotcha. I'll get that on the list. I thought it was at some point. Maybe something that slipped through the cracks.

Question: Regarding the Kickstarter, is it generally accepted to keep sweetening the higher tiers as the final date approaches to entice people to pick up the last available slots, or should the most customization occur in the mid-range to low slots?
Feargus: Ya know, we are really learning it as we go. What we are trying to do is to add things in that we would want to get ourselves and then after that make sure all the other tiers feel good. People comment about the $140 tier needing some love (added the mouse pad today) and the $500 tier not being that much more compelling than the $250 - so we talk about it and try to see what might help them.

Question: What's the percentage of retails sales for PC games anyway? I know the Gamestops around here don't even stock PC games any more and they're on the backshelves at the Best Buys.
Feargus: Retail PC sales are pretty low now, but larger in Europe.

Question: another thought for the 500 tier, maybe add in the obsidian shirt as well? if you add in the concept art (which i don't think would be too many, but might be a problem. don't know) that would give two decent incentives. if the art was signed, that would definitely do it considering that signatures are a pretty large part of that tier anyway.
Feargus: Thanks for the ideas. We are going to talk more about it tomorrow.

Question: Asking this for a friend who just loved KOTOR II but was very disappointed by the ending - were you rushed by producers to provide the current ending or was it your decision to end it the way you did? Just interested to hear some behind the scenes decisions because it's a great example about those.
Feargus: That's something that is tough to talk about. We have talked publicly about it a bit, but I try not to go into too much detail. I don't mean to pull that out here, however after the press has copied what I have said from the comments here, I try to be careful when talking about other projects, people and publishers.

Question: will it be possible to upgrade your tier in the same way if you used paypal in the first place?
you might want to ask brian about what they did with that, because it seems to be a pretty effecient way of doing it as far as i can tell.
Feargus: I don't know if that will work - but we can talk about it. We would have to compare PayPal vs. Kickstarter accounts when they might use different names and things like that. Hmmm.....

Question: that's why i'd say talk to brian fargo about it. he basically made a site where you could sign in and associate the e-mail address used for the kickstarter/paypal under one account, thereby making it easier to see who had done what and make it so they could be adjusted as needed/desired. it works well, i've already adjusted my pledge over there once using paypal and i was a kickstarter backer originally. they used the creditcard option of paypal, and have the option of using a paypal account there if you have one. hope that helps a little bit.
Feargus: Thanks! I'll forward that over to Darren, so he can read your explanation.

Just lowered my pledge from $35 to $25, and if the 20 bucks tier were still available, I'd go for it. With every new update, the Kickstarter is getting more cynical and stupid. I still have absolute confidence in Obsidian's writing staff, but a lot of this stuff leaves a sour taste in my mouth.

EDIT: Yay, someone else withdrew from the $20 tier. So that's where I am now.

I'm seriously contemplating going from $110 to $25. But it is Obsidian, my favourite dev in the industry and I really want to support them. But this game just reeks of genericness.

I'm surprised, by I agree with you guys...

What, you too? That settles it - I'm going to back this project!

You can half-count me :P I don't pledge, I'm just waiting for these games to be released or not :P

It's a BG homage, not sure what else you could expect from it than generic fantasy.

Generic fantasy was announced from the very start. I wasn't thrilled about that, but if that's what they want to do, fine.

But:
1) gamifying the Kickstarter to a ridiculous degree (stretch goals! endless dungeon! pledge more and we'll give you a fucking in-game pet – how very old-school!)
2) increasingly crazy amounts of tchotchkes to blow good money on
3) the phrase "honest to God expansion pack"
4) sucking up to the stupid sugar daddies in the audience who're old enough to know better but who're getting too much of a nostalgia hard-on for this pretty young blonde to use their common sense

…that's just off.

+1

Most of that is standard kickstarter salemanship, I hold no grudges over it. And yes real expansion packs are rare now, I see no problem with making a distinction (and I like DLC).

I thought you were a fan of stretch goals. Even if one of the strech goals is making another game.

Coming from Obsidian who made four very good to excellent DLC packs for New Vegas, this really sounds far too manipulative for my tastes.

In the olden days, perhaps these four would be packed together into one and sold as a huge expansion pack, mostly for logistics reasons. But that makes hardly any difference.

But it seems to be working for them. Look at kicktraq. They have been consistently getting $30k to $40k each day. Even Wasteland 2 and Double Fine didn't get such consistent numbers. I don't like it either, but I suspect the unwashed masses do... :(

Well, yeah. Ask any politician: the manipulative and cynical approach works every time because people are just dumb.

Also, did GOG do something to the forum software again? It seems to remove all new lines from posts when I click on reply, which is kind of annoying.

Dude, no politician would say that! They would never get re-elected! :)