Why this game gone TELLTALE? WHY???

[v00d00m4n]

Just because Walking Dead 1 was such hit a while ago? But season 2 already jumped the shark...
Well that was separate game it had none of previous games, not established fanbase, so it worked.

By Dreamfall chapaters not a new titile, its a 3rd game in a series! You had fans of TLJ who was Dissapointed by dramatic change of gameplay and narrative desgin in Dreamfall, and now you have both TLJ and Dreamfall fans who dissapointed by dramatci change comparing to both games.

I bet there are many fans who feels frustrated about fact that this game does not play neither as TLJ nor as Dreamfall and not even as mis of BOTH, instead it playes like Walking Dead by telltalle, which was already a dumbed down experience comparing to previous Telltalle games.

While Dreamfall TLJ controls was different ot TLJ core of gameplay was same, there was strong focus on dialogs and puzzles, and there was some really brainmelting puzzles, and yet STORY WAS NOT INTERACTIVE, i was linear and this was good, it worked well like a book, which is not interactive.

Now you strip us from puzzles, and shfiting to dialogs, well its not ok already, because people want to solve problems, not just talk in game, but thats not worst part, wors thing that game is no so modern and so interactive SO YO U SIMPLY SKIPPING PART OF GAME, SKIPPING PART OF STORY!

You never know know if this dialog will end sequence and you will never find out answers to so many questions you have, or if you will still have option to ask something else! You wlll never know if you still can talk with this character and visit this place or if this one single dialog choice will end it all.

What was good abour previous games - you was able to trigger all dialogs and i saw everything that game has to offer, none parats of story was missing "thanks" to your choice.
And what is horribly bad abou Chapters - you missing a lot! And you have to replace and and make choices you dont want to make (especially if you want to play normal in next episode and because THERE ARE NONE OF EXTRA SAVE SLOTS, Once you start game over again it will override your previous chocies!) just to squize some more details of story!


THis worked well in Walking Dead, but this does not work in TLJ universe, and you know why?

BECAUSE TLJ \ DREAMFALL IS STORY RICH AND DEEP AND WIDE, AND WALKING DEAD IS JUST FLAT ON GROUND AND VERY NARROW STORY.

Whole story of Walking deas i chracters survives, fight with zombies and other people, eat, sleep, arguing and making choices of who they will kill or will feed or something like this, very basic choice, very prime choice.
Whole Wlking Dead is about primitive instincts and affects, there is no freakin intrigue, its just a game about casual ocassions, thata why you dont give much o care about what would happen if tou will make another choice, who will survive and who will die,who will be angry at at you who will love you, you just make choices as your instincts tells you.
And lack of actual gameplay was rather dissapointing ever there, but at least if was compesated by adrenaline rush sequences and emotions.

In dreamfall story is about global cospiricies, about 2 huge world about so many details, and here we care for every little detail about its, we are not playing to survive and move forward like a train, we playing to get as more details on story as we can, and WE CANT NOW, thanks to TALETELLING this game!

Walking dead is CAVEMAN, Dreamfall \ TLJ is MODERN MAN, and you now turned him into caveman as well.

Well to be honnest Dreamfall TLJ already had part of this, but it was not sooo interactive and never stripped us out of something important, and there was rich gameplay, which is lacking in Chapters (no stealth, no fighting, no hard puzzles, only talk, walk, pickup that item, use it somewhere, walk and talk again).


This was really a bad design decision, this is really dissapointing. i really hope that at least part of this would be fixed in next chapters.. Dreamfall should have never gone TELLTALE!
And just look at their games before Walking Dead and after, look at Back to the future, which was a good avdentuge game and look at Walking Dead 2 which is almost not game at all and see where they gone wrong...

Withc current way of playing game you end up reloading checkpoint again and again just ot get better consequences, instead of enjoying story like we did before.

P.S. - Also even Telltale had options to turn off tips like "charater will remember this" in Wolf Amongs us, and you dont.

[WoM]

As this thread points out, there were indeed quite a few optional things, choices and secrets, in the first Dreamfall. It's just that they were more difficult to notice since you had no "xxx will remember this" notifications.
http://redthreadgames.com/forum/topic/362-a-guide-on-choices-consequences-and-optional-things-in-dreamfall-the-longest-journey-spoilers/

Obviously, the theme of choices and consequences is at the very core of the game. But in any case, I don't think you can miss major plot information, whatever path you choose.

Plus there are wikis and forums these days to share info you may have missed if you'd like.

[v00d00m4n]

This thread is not only about choices, is also about ♥♥♥♥♥ TELLTALE kind of gameplay, almost lack of puzzles and general lack of gameplay features.

Dream TLJ was clunky it its attempts of stealth and fighting and some other things, but i was trying not to be boring and repetitve, be inventive, combine various gameplay features.
Chapters does not even trying to improve on old formulas of both 1st and 2nd game, it just trows out most of their features to window and replace them with way too primitive surrogate borrowed from latest telltale games.

And what the hell? Game lore should be learned from game itsefl, not from wiki, forums and other external materials.

If game fails to put and show ENTIRE of its lore in its own self and relys on external sources, its not such a well designed game.

And learning story by reading wiki is like solving puzzle by reading a guide, like hearing other people talks about movie story instead of watching it with your own eyes, its like getting orgams (jesus steam, why do you censor this word? its not even offensive) from masturbation instead of sex.

[WoM]

Well, that's kind of the point of a game compared to a book or a movie. It's interactive, non linear. So either you're willing to explore by yourself and do multiple playthroughs to discover every secret, or you can share and interact with other players to learn small things you may have missed.
Yet again, you can also choose to do one single playthrough and create you own custom version of the story. It will also work nicely.

Oh, and I do agree with you that the game is a bit light on the puzzle side. Hopefully things will improve in the next books.

[Snow]

Voodooman, I think you're missing the point Wom is making... You say you miss the linear story in the previous games, and he's saying that the games might not have been as linear as you think they are. Many people don't, which is why we're now telling you explicitly that "Character X will remember this".

Everybody's entitled to their opinion, but the feedback we've gotten on choice and consequences has been really good, and it's something we will continue to do in the following books.

[v00d00m4n]

Първоначално публикувано от WoM:

Well, that's kind of the point of a game compared to a book or a movie. It's interactive, non linear. So either you're willing to explore by yourself and do multiple playthroughs to discover every secret, or you can share and interact with other players to learn small things you may have missed.
Yet again, you can also choose to do one single playthrough and create you own custom version of the story. It will also work nicely.

Oh, and I do agree with you that the game is a bit light on the puzzle side. Hopefully things will improve in the next books.

It could be a point, but this was not a point 2 games before, so they have to be more respectful to legacy of old games and have no rights to depart that much from what we had before, otherwise they are simply alienating and dissapointing old fans.

Problem of Chapters as i see it - instead of being THAT SEQUEL OLD FANS WAS WAITING FOR 7 YEARS, it tries to be more of THIS MODERN GAME TELLTALLES FANS WOULD LOVE TO PLAY.

They targeting it TO WRONG AUDIENCE! Balance shifted, and its shifted toward newcomers, and not us - old fans.

[Snow]

I respectfully disagree. I think just as Dreamfall evolved drastically from TLJ, Dreamfall Chapters brings something new and fresh to the series, while it (hopefully) still feels recognizable, and has the right to live on it's own. I think it would have been wrong of us to make a Dreamfall clone.

And you say we're disappointing old fans and catering to new ones. Again, you're of course entitled to your opinion, but the feedback we've gotten from old fans has been very good. People say it feels like a TLJ/Dreamfall game, and that makes us very happy :)

[v00d00m4n]

Първоначално публикувано от Snow:

Voodooman, I think you're missing the point Wom is making... You say you miss the linear story in the previous games, and he's saying that the games might not have been as linear as you think they are. Many people don't, which is why we're now telling you explicitly that "Character X will remember this".

Everybody's entitled to their opinion, but the feedback we've gotten on choice and consequences has been really good, and it's something we will continue to do in the following books.

Who gave that feedback? Newcomers? Players who never played TLJ and Dreamfall TLJ but played recent Telltale game and Quantic Dream's Heavy Rain?
Yeah they surely would be positive, but as old fan of series i feel betrayed, if feel that there is something wrong with game, that its not much of sequel to TLJ and Dreamfall i loved and expected, its feels like Dreamfall sequel outsourced to telltale.

And im aware of plot choices of previous games, i mentioned that in my 1st post:

Well to be honnest Dreamfall TLJ already had part of this, but it was not sooo interactive and never stripped us out of something important, and there was rich gameplay, which is lacking in Chapters (no stealth, no fighting, no hard puzzles, only talk, walk, pickup that item, use it somewhere, walk and talk again).

There was big difference in approach - most of dialogs in Dreamfall TLJ allowed to use them all and only some of them was there for making some choice.

In chapters its completely opposite, most of dialogs are - select one answer and never see any other.

Also these "character will remember this" tips are very annoying and they must be turned off at least in option. Because that probably one of the reason you feel frustrated with your choice, because games makes its consequences obvious and this make that feeling "that you skipped something important and made wrong choice" even worse and often push to reload last save.

Without such tips game flow would be more transparent and probably would feel a little more like old Dreamfall untill you will start playing again and will see different outcome.

Also i seel dont believe that Dreamfall really needs to be telltale interactive. Game story is too epic, and it was more linear before, and interactivity of story makes inconsistent contradicting plot lines, and to fight that in global picture of story such choices needs to be non significant, more or less cosmetic, and should not appear to offten, any key plot event should be linear simplye because dreamfall story is not as primitive as Walking Dead, wide variability of contradicting plot lines only hurts overall narrative.

And yet, gameplay issue is here.now have simplified adventure mechacnics and generic repetitve features.
Dreamfall TLJ used all 12 buttons of gamepad for various of features, Chapters uses about half of that, this also indicates well how much gameplay was simplified.

I still have good memories of Cav-Maze-Environment-Stealth-Puzzle from Dreamfall TLJ - it was clunky, but was an awesome mix of gameplay - you have to hide from creature, navigate the maze and solve puzzle all at the same time.

We have nothing even close to this now, new game feels simply inferior comparing to old one.

I doubt that if most of your feedback was collected from old fans for whom this game must be created - you could miss such an issue.
When sequel comes out, people who saw prequel expect sequel to be even more advanced and improved, not dumbed down. And you dumbed down this game to appeal to telltale and quantic dream audience, and that audience game you positive feedback, amd im representative of old audience you abandoned here and there, thats why my feedback is not so positive.

Its like doing a sequel for Batman and get feedback from IronMan fans.

New DFC looks like DF TLJ games, but its a shell, some fans may only jugde by it, but the core under shell is different, its a Telltale game in its core now and i doubt that old fans who loves old games not only by its look but for a gameplay as well, would not nottice that and be very possitive about it.

Also there is such thing as hype - after 7 years you would 1st feel hyped an happy that game just got released. But soon you will start to nottice things that makes you feel frustrated. I bet even if some old fans was positive they was simply hyped about continuation of game.

Damn, even i was hyped a week ago, untill i rage quit and dropped game due of many issue it has. Then week after, today i decided to continue it, and this time my dissapointment was so big since im less hyped now, so i cant just accept that and decided to "vocalyze" it here in a hope of improvementt impelemented with patches and\or in next chapters\books.

[Ailes]

I don't mind the lack of puzzles. I'm mostly interested in story, narration, character design, ambiance. I did play the previous two games and puzzle-wise I can see the big disappointment people who prefered "The Longest Journey" have. The first part with Kian was probably the most of puzzling I've seen since Dreamfall alltogether, but even then it's being made relatively easy seeing how you only have like one or two items in your inventory at a time.

There is no doubt this game is heavily inspired by Telltale's games. I enjoyed The Walking Dead and The Wolf Among Us quite a lot, but I'm not sure what to think about this whole choice & consequence thing. This concept has it's natural limits. No dev in this world can keep up working on two or even more story branches at a time in a satisfying manner. I haven't tried a second playthrough through book one just yet, but still I guess that your choices won't have the massive and meaningful consequences the devs may suggest through trailers and all. They can affect the story only so far or else RTG would get lost and never done with anything for all the possible imaginable variables.

If I were developing a game I guess I wouldn't want to go that way. It could be a waste of effort because only the most hardcore of players will actually do multiple playthroughs and see what happens. Some choices may get lesser attention than others. I was one of the few 6 % who, as Zoe in Europolis, told that older lady that my goal was to belong somewhere. So, if the majority chose another option it would seem almost inevitable to flesh out their consequences more than the one I am bound or at least predicted to experience by the past-game "stats" screen.

To be honest, rather than being given X choices with Y sub-story consequences I think I would simply prefer longer chapters. I don't feel like wanting to have influence on the world whatsoever. I don't believe in my "power" to adjust the world to my will because of mentioned technical-natural limits of game developing. I want you, Red Thread Games, to create a believable and deep world for me. Tell me a story. That's all I really need. Don't try to give me the illusion I was writing it, because I am just not really.

[Patience]

I've played TLJ, Dreamfall, and now Dreamfall Chapters. What keeps me interested in these games is the character development, the story, and the atmosphere. Though, probably the most important thing to me is the atmosphere of the game. I could explore Europolis forever just looking at all the details and taking in all the art that I know somebody worked really hard to create. It just takes me to a different world and I love it. The puzzles, while amusing, are just secondary to me. And I am glad that there is no combat in this game as there was in Dreamfall.

The artists who make this game I know have really tough choices to make and they know that they can't please everyone. I am sure if they put every single element into the game that everyone wants then it would ruin the game. The game maker has to choose a direction and a main focus or else the game would just be some disorganized hodgepodge of diferent elements. I really believe in the decisions the game makers have chosen and am so happy that they decided to continue with this game.

I never spend a lot of time comparing this game to other games. What worked in other games won't always work in this game. And using a formula to make a game sounds really boring - totally kills the creative artistic element. I think of each game as a discrete work of art that should be appreciated on its own. I'm probably a weirdo, though.

I am very happy with the game.

[Gobra]

That was quite painful to read.
The game is a true successor of Dreamfall: TLJ, for better or worse. The game yet again took a controversial route in the genre, as Dreamfall did. Dreamfall had next to none gameplay to it - DFC does the same. And, again as Dreamfall, DFC focuses heavily on it's best part - the story (at least so far, becase it's only one Chapter out and we can't really judge, tricky devs, whatever - it's 2014).

So I'm not sure what exactly do you mean by "taletelling". It's pretty hard to define how this game is like, say, The Walking Dead - except for the "he will remember this" method and the heavy bias towards dialogues - although it is a fact that they at least considered TellTale games' success.

Well, sorry you didn't like the non-linear story, but that alone doesn't make the game "badly designed". it mentioned TWD they didn't even have interactions sometimes, literally at all - you'd sometimes be left alone with one option to press W and move forward, from cut-scene to cut-scene. Here you at least have open world exploration, and while majority of the game is still, as in Dreamfall, just running and listening to dialogues - it's still a great "Dreamfall" with a superb story, just not great Adventure game.

There are different things to be concerned with. I'm not entirely sure what RTG, as a company, are doing with the game, but I've for some reason got a feeling this is going to be at the expense of The Longest Journey game series.

[v00d00m4n]

Първоначално публикувано от Gobra:

That was quite painful to read.
The game is a true successor of Dreamfall: TLJ, for better or worse. The game yet again took a controversial route in the genre, as Dreamfall did. Dreamfall had next to none gameplay to it - DFC does the same. And, again as Dreamfall, DFC focuses heavily on it's best part - the story (at least so far, becase it's only one Chapter out and we can't really judge, tricky devs, whatever - it's 2014).

So I'm not sure what exactly do you mean by "taletelling". It's pretty hard to define how this game is like, say, The Walking Dead - except for the "he will remember this" method and the heavy bias towards dialogues - although it is a fact that they at least considered TellTale games' success.

Well, sorry you didn't like the non-linear story, but that alone doesn't make the game "badly designed". it mentioned TWD they didn't even have interactions sometimes, literally at all - you'd sometimes be left alone with one option to press W and move forward, from cut-scene to cut-scene. Here you at least have open world exploration, and while majority of the game is still, as in Dreamfall, just running and listening to dialogues - it's still a great "Dreamfall" with a superb story, just not great Adventure game.

There are different things to be concerned with. I'm not entirely sure what RTG, as a company, are doiing with the game, but I've for some reason got a feeling this is going to be at the expense of The Longest Journey game series.

You should read carefully, its not interactivity makes its now good, it they way interactivity leaves lore of game out of players sight and non linear stories like this create contradicting sub-plots. Which was not the case in previous games of series, and which was an an issue with primitive plots such as Walking Dead was.

This game plot is too complex to be interactive and work right and interactive of this game does not work, instead of giving joy it gives frustration, feeling that you missing something important and doing something wrong, like if you reed book and skipped few pages of every chapter.

[TheDreamingGoat]

Първоначално публикувано от Voodooman:

Първоначално публикувано от Snow:

Everybody's entitled to their opinion, but the feedback we've gotten on choice and consequences has been really good, and it's something we will continue to do in the following books.

Who gave that feedback? Newcomers? Players who never played TLJ and Dreamfall TLJ but played recent Telltale game and Quantic Dream's Heavy Rain?

I doubt that if most of your feedback was collected from old fans for whom this game must be created […] amd im representative of old audience you abandoned here and there, thats why my feedback is not so positive.

You assume too much. You're not representative of the old audience. At best you're representative of a part of the old audience, but the only one you can be sure to speak for is yourself.

I bought TLJ when it was first released and then Dreamfall a few years later. And I really like Chapters so far. And I know many other longtime fans who like it, too. (Granted, some of that is based on the expectation that things will change in future books. There are five inventory slots, so I expect puzzles to become more complex later in the game. I expect the consequences of my choices to matter later in the game. If that doesn't happen my final verdict might be less positive than my initial impression of the game.)

I'm sorry that you don't like the game. I'm sure you're not the only one who feels that way because it is impossible to please everyone. But please stop talking so much in absolute terms and realise that it is only your opinion and not some universal truth.

[Lil Wil]

By The Ballance!
First of all it is the first part of the game. also you mentioned that the game has dramatically changed, well i got TLJ way back and the change from point and click to W A S D controls Dreamfall TLJ was a dramatic change then it was a new way to play. Playing the all three games i would say that ReadThread has made great improvements to the series, they have kept game play simalar. Although the puzzles are a bit more simple compaired to Dreamfall TLJ, i think you are forgetting that this is still the first part of the game, which i think is the Intro to the game and game play i have a feeling that the Puzzles, will get harder as we progress through the books. i think the fact that the choses you make will change the game you play is an amazing idea to aplay to the game. in TLJ and Dreamfall TLJ you were faced with choses but these choses resulted in having to do it again untill you got it right or had little or no effect on game play. the fact that in Book one the only example of the effect of choses we have seen thus far is the job you take when you wake. i am playing the game were my first play through is my genuine feelings to the choses and my second play through is just to compaire the differance and i think these differances are amazing and imaginitive. i really cant wait to see the differance in my two plays of the game. i think i have defersafided abit hear, but i honistaly feel that the work on book one has been amazing and I supose my point is that the TLJ titles all 3 of them are know to for their dramatic changes all games of this type have gone with these trends, such as Broken Sword although they for the last title returned to the point and click system. which i thought was lazy. the work Red thread has done as brought the game forward and into the Future, which the game is set in lol. i added my input because im NOT a new comer to the title, i dont feel abondoned. on relise i had problems getting game to work and as Redthread promised they pached the game within a week and i was able to play. i had a lot of contact with RedThred in dealling with these issues and they have the best suport and attitude to their costomers. dont you remember when Dreamfall TLJ stoped working, i spent weeks trying to find away to play on XP and i was and independant fan who developed softwear to fix it. Did you know that alot of the RedThread team played TLJ and Deamfall TLJ they are members of the old audiance and this is why I suport RedThread 110% and love everything so far. at lest give the game a chance its still early days yet. At least be thankful that RedThread picked up the title and put ther magic to the game, if it was left to FunCom this would have never happened.

[Santanico ♀]

This game is one of the best games i have played........Other then being too short (Book One) i don't see any issues....but then again its just me.

[Red Thread Games]

As others have already stated, Dreamfall did have alternate solutions to puzzles, along with some (relatively simple) choices (and consequences).

With Chapters, we're making a story that's all about the choices we make in life and about how our actions, big and small, shape our personal journeys — for better or worse. We're not jumping on any bandwagons (although we do acknowledge our influences; in some cases, maybe too clearly) because we were already on that wagon back in 2006. We're just being a lot more obvious about it this time around.

As for gameplay, Chapters isn't a million miles away from the first Dreamfall: in fact, aside from removing those gameplay elements that most players found disruptive and annoying (combat and stealth) we feel Chapters evolves and improves upon the core gameplay mechanics of Dreamfall. At the end of the day, our core focus is still the story — as it always has been — and this time that story has a lot more player agency.

As the game progresses, those choices will come into focus, the consequences will play out, and our overarching themes will become a lot more clear.

We look forward to hearing everyone's thoughts after the next couple of books have been released!