Starting area progress - Burrwitch Prison

[eisprinzessin]

From the size of the NPCs in the screen I deduce this is a zoomed-out vista shot. I might be wrong, but I doubt you will be able to zoom out like this in the game. TQ didn’t allow this … unless you were using a mod.

[gesto21]

Don’t your breath yet!

[Dauntless]

I must ask:

Is that how large our screen will be? Or will the screen be half that size? Neither?

not quite sure on what u mean but USUALLY the UI and screen size will depend on what size your monitor is.

ex: 1280x1024
1920x1080
1024x720 ect.

[system]

Looks amazing.

[system]

Looks nice!

How many towns are we expecting? I much prefer a few memorable towns, be it in a game like Diablo II, or a game like Zelda.

I just hope that some of the future towns are a bit bigger and more spacious. Nothing too huge, but I find that towns in torchlight II and Path of Exile are rather cramped. I liked Diablo II’s much more.

[JohnNamikaze]

Looks nice!

How many towns are we expecting? I much prefer a few memorable towns, be it in a game like Diablo II, or a game like Zelda.

I just hope that some of the future towns are a bit bigger and more spacious. Nothing too huge, but I find that towns in torchlight II and Path of Exile are rather cramped. I liked Diablo II’s much more.

Actually, the towns in TL2 were the perfect size from my experience. In PoE, the third act’s town will be much bigger than the first two acts. PoE already disclosed how the town will look like in act 3.

[system]

Actually, the towns in TL2 were the perfect size from my experience. In PoE, the third act’s town will be much bigger than the first two acts. PoE already disclosed how the town will look like in act 3.

To be fair I am only in the second town of TL2 and they feel kinda cramped. I prefer Diablo II’s towns, and TL1’s town as well. PoE’s third town seems much better than the first two.

[JohnNamikaze]

To be fair I am only in the second town of TL2 and they feel kinda cramped. I prefer Diablo II’s towns, and TL1’s town as well. PoE’s third town seems much better than the first two.

D2’s towns were nice, but the size kinda bothered me, because it was mostly empty. TL1’s town was a bit too big, but was actually alright, but still a bit empty. TL2’s towns is perfect in a sense that feels alive, and not too small. While the first two act of PoE’s town are really cramped up.

But it is understandable, if you prefer the towns like in D2 and TL1 since they are very spacious.

[eisprinzessin]

About the starting town and additional ones:

[Devil’s Crossing] is a town you will frequently return to over the course of the game and it will contain memorable NPCs that you get multiple quests from. This is a significant shift from the find and forget towns of TQ. […]

We wanted to keep the town consolidated so it was easy to access everything you needed from vendors to quest NPCs without a lot of excessive running around.

Barricade revisited

We eventually intend for the player to make their way towards the heart of the old human empire on Cairn and the remains of the capital city. However, they won’t make it there in first release; that will come with later expansions. We actually have a pretty large world map sketched out and the first installment of the game will introduce only a small region of it.

That region will have some diverse environments ranging from swamp, to farmland, mountains, villages, and eventually an industrial town. It is sort of a backwater area though, so there won’t be any really ornate urban buildings yet. This also works for us because we don’t quite have the resources to build a giant urban area with tons of detail, so we want to save that for later when we’re in a better position to execute on it.

But a second town/quest hub will be added for the inital release of GD due to the success of the GD Kickstarter:

[UNLOCKED] $480k - New survivor town hidden in the remote wilderness for you to discover. Will include a new faction group and new quest-lines to unlock once you’ve gained their trust.

[system]

About the starting town and additional ones:

But a second town/quest hub will be added for the inital release of GD due to the success of the GD Kickstarter:

There are only 2 towns?

[eisprinzessin]

I guess in that sense it is sort of like Diablo1 or Torchlight where we are only planning to have one town.

Currently there are no respawn shrines in the game and I can’t say that I miss them. Instead we just have more portals and you always respawn in Devil’s Crossing. In the future if we build multiple “full-service” towns we might want people to be able to switch their spawn location.

Above is pre-Kickstarter feedback. The hidden town was announced only then. There will be town-like places for us to fight the enemies: Abandoned Waterfront, Slums, Merchant District and Mill Town. This map is from State of the Game Address and illustrates the state from March 2012.

[system]

Above is pre-Kickstarter feedback. The hidden town was announced only then. There will be town-like places for us to fight the enemies: Abandoned Waterfront, Slums, Merchant District and Mill Town. This map is from State of the Game Address and illustrates the state from March 2012.

I am confused. So that one screenshot of the rather small town (about the size of pandemonium fortress in DII) is the ONLY town in the game? Are there other NPC’s in the world? I ask not only because this is a concern of mine, but also because the dev (don’t remember which one) acted like there was multiple towns in the game.

I am fine with one town (though not preffered) as long as it is big and interesting.

[eisprinzessin]

You are referring to this post (1st quote), aren’t you? I think he used the plural to speak of towns in general - the ones from the initial release and also all in future expansions. The second quote is a bit older, but I believe still valid.

You’ll be returning here throughout the game but you’ll also find other survivor enclaves with new quest-lines. In TQ you often just ran through a town and never looked back or returned 1-2 times to complete quests / use the merchants but generally just kept moving on. I think that lessened the extent to which players formed any attachment or nostalgia for a town. We also invested a ton of resources in creating all the different towns for what I see as a relatively small pay-off in terms of the value they added to gameplay.

In Grim Dawn, we hope to have smaller, more frequently revisited and memorable towns while also investing a greater portion of our limited resources to creating gameplay spaces.

We’re planning only one main town for the initial release that all the primary quests will be tied to but there will be some other little safe areas where you’ll encounter small bands of survivors that will give side quests. Our thinking is that it is more interesting to invest our efforts in creating more unique art and level areas for exploration / combat than setting up a bunch of full-sized towns with redundant NPCs and merchants.

[system]

You are referring to this post (1st quote), aren’t you? I think he used the plural to speak of towns in general - the ones from the initial release and also all in future expansions. The second quote is a bit older, but I believe still valid.

Boo lol. I wouldn’t mind if the town was bigger or there were NPC areas scattered throughout the world. One small town is a bit disappointing for me, but I will reserve judgement.

[mamba]

I am confused. So that one screenshot of the rather small town (about the size of pandemonium fortress in DII) is the ONLY town in the game? Are there other NPC’s in the world? I ask not only because this is a concern of mine, but also because the dev (don’t remember which one) acted like there was multiple towns in the game.

I am fine with one town (though not preffered) as long as it is big and interesting.

I believe that thanks to the Kickstarter there now is a second town. Also, the town size etc. does not really matter at all. The town is where the merchants are, the quests / adventure is all outside of town.

They stated that they rather spend their limited resources on the world than towns, since most towns noone cares for anyway (i.e. you just pass through and sell / buy your stuff in whatever town you visited last)

I totally agree with that decision / rationale.

[system]

I believe that thanks to the Kickstarter there now is a second town. Also, the town size etc. does not really matter at all. The town is where the merchants are, the quests / adventure is all outside of town.

They stated that they rather spend their limited resources on the world than towns, since most towns noone cares for anyway (i.e. you just pass through and sell / buy your stuff in whatever town you visited last)

I totally agree with that decision / rationale.

while i hear you, I love towns in games, and hate feeling cramped.

[system]

while i hear you, I love towns in games, and hate feeling cramped.

So you’d rather have 27 cramped mini-towns which are more or less copy-paste from each other, with a few renamed cardboard-cutout NPCs, than one big town with a lot of stuff going on, and really some really memorable people among the townsfolk?

It’s the old question of Quality vs. Quantity.

[matthewfarmery]

one town VS many towns looking very samely

I would go for one town, and the change will change over the course of the game, not huge changes, but some changes, I think also NaveedLife is forgotting, we are talking anout a small team of people here, not a studio with a hundred odd people in it, or 20 plus like Runic, but I would like to see quality town /s rather then too many that are copy and paste from each other, besdies once the modding tools are out, people will be able to add on new towns to their game if they want too

[system]

So you’d rather have 27 cramped mini-towns which are more or less copy-paste from each other, with a few renamed cardboard-cutout NPCs, than one big town with a lot of stuff going on, and really some really memorable people among the townsfolk?

It’s the old question of Quality vs. Quantity.

Did you even read all of what I have typed in this thread? one is fine if it is big and well done (Torchlight 1 is pretty good). Or you could have a few good ones like DII. But to have one small one seems disappointing.

[system]

one town VS many towns looking very samely

I would go for one town, and the change will change over the course of the game, not huge changes, but some changes, I think also NaveedLife is forgotting, we are talking anout a small team of people here, not a studio with a hundred odd people in it, or 20 plus like Runic, but I would like to see quality town /s rather then too many that are copy and paste from each other, besdies once the modding tools are out, people will be able to add on new towns to their game if they want too

I know they are a small team, but if they can make this many hero monsters each with unique abilities and such, and all these other areas to fight in, I don’t see how a couple towns is too difficult.

Everything looks awesome so far, and really doesn’t seem like a low budget title. I know it is not a Blizzard game, but so far it seems like they are doing just fine and surpassing the presentation quality of Torchlight 1 and 2.