Caltrops - Gamerasutra





	[quote name="Mr. Copy"][quote name="Worm"]<a href="http://www.escapistmagazine.com/articles/view/issues/issue_244/7258-The-Last-Masquerade">http://www.escapistmagazine.com/articles/view/issues/issue_244/7258-The-Last-Masquerade</a> [quote]It was possible, for example, to complete much of the game using only its dialogue options, and the characters actually had interesting and unique personalities rather than just serving as ciphers that handed out quests.[/quote] [quote]Worst of all, some fights were unavoidable, which was frustrating if you had focused on social interaction; and the game's last act eschewed the social side entirely, instead focusing solely on fighting.[/quote] I was going to point that this first statement was kind of disingenuous, but then he went ahead and did it. I can only imagine his pacifist vampire he had worked out in his head. The rest of it is basically impressions anyone could get from playing the game for a few seconds, and he sums it up with informing us that they just needed a little more time but probably shouldn't have used the source engine, STUNNING INSIGHT. Too bad Troika couldn't use their Diplomacy skill to MAKE A MASTERPIECE.[/quote] It had some of the most insipid writing I've ever seen in a video game. I don't know how the thing being "rushed" or "taken out of their hands" by the publisher made the characters say stupid things and prevent second and third draft rewrites. The author of that article also ignores the fact that all their other games were unfinished as well. They had absolutely terrible and incompetent product managers at Troika. They consistently failed to manage the insane demands of terrible publishers versus the sketchy work of their employees. The five-year old writing AxeCop can let Activision bully their way into shipping a game early. It doesn't take any skill or talent to get bent over by a publisher who is only interested in enough of the game getting done to trick the amazingly lazy gaming press into giving unfinished, broken games <a href="http://www.metacritic.com/games/platforms/pc/vampirethemasqueradebloodlines#critics">7/10s</a>. I guess I don't understand what project managers think they're doing if they can't extract maximum time and money out of a publisher. Yes, it's very, very difficult. The relationship is antagonistic: Activision as a corporation exists in part by acquiring 60% of a game and suckering people into paying $50 for it. Managing that relationship is what a manager gets paid for, not... whatever it is they do at some of these development houses. Well, whatever, it all worked out for the worst, I guess. (Okay, if there are people, modders - whatever, able to successfully patch your game without access to the source code, why weren't those people discovered, identified and hired to work on the game in the first place?) [/quote]