Torment: Tides of Numenera

The tabletop RPG system that powers the Numenera game Torment is based off of.

Yes, that’s the point.

It seems like a very PC interface to me - do you have a specific issue with it?

As I said, past experience.

I see. I maybe wouldn’t get too worked up about it then. Not that you are, just saying.

That screenshot clearly depicts a CRPG UI. No consoleitis at all. It would be insane to try to navigate it with a gamepad.

Just thinking about tabbing around that thing using a thumbstick and shoulder buttons is giving me RSI.

Obviously the console versions will have a different UI. As they should.

Think Diablo 3-- completely different UI on computer and console.

Any professional translation and localization project costs a lot of money. You can’t translate game text by rote in or isolation, you have to understand the context, and amateur efforts just suck. So you’re paying for probably thousands of hours of a professional’s contracted time, which is going to be at least five-figures. Was it promised in Italian? That would piss me off, for sure, if I was an Italian backer, regardless of the cost. But if it was a maybe-we-can-squeeze-it-in kind of thing I would have assumed they wouldn’t be able to.

Hopefully a competent engine will have all the strings available so it can be easily translated after release by the “community”.

I am guessing the Kickstarter didn’t offer an Italian sub as anything but a stretch goal, I’e “Optional Nice to Haves”

When it comes to “Paying” for Stretch Goals in a Kickstarter.

  • If you fund it when it is at the initial period, do you then “pay” for the Stretch goals or are they a nice bonus?
  • If you fund it after the “first” goal has been reached, yet stretch goal #3 hasn’t been reached yet, but you’re interested in it, if the title only reaches goal #2, can you then say you didn’t want to fund the game at all?

Hopefully all those “outraged” about it were only backing the title once “their” stretch goal was reached.

Alternate, but equally valid, behavior-interpretation:

Person who wants distant stretch goal X wants to encourage funding momentum to ensure X is reached. One of the best ways for a non-media-affiliated individual to encourage momentum directly is to just contribute themselves, knowing that if the game doesn’t reach a point they’re interested in by the end of its cycle, they can always cancel their pledge at any point before it all ends.

Therefore, it’s theoretically possible that every single backer who remained at project’s end were the folks who were pining for goal X, and that all the ones shooting for X+1 left off in the final seconds. The removal of X would constitute a dire offense to literally possibly 100% of all backers.

Please, someone tell Bethesda that they should be doing this.

Sadly, I think Bethesda actually are doing different UI between PC and console. You can assign hotkeys, for example. It just isn’t nearly good enough.

I was typing up a response much like this but then paid attention to what you wrote and voila! you said it better. So, yep, exactly this. People that keep backing may have been locking down a particular reward level with the intention of changing or bailing while waiting to see what stretch goals appear. The project isn’t funded until the date they charge everyone and until then you can do what you please.

I’ve backed a number of Kickstarters that I only had real interest in it with the top stretch goals in place. I also reviewed the stretch goals pretty carefully though… thinking to myself how realistic they were and if they might throw things out of balance. I mean adding another card to a card game doesn’t seem like a big stretch. Torment had a heck of a lot of stretch goals.

I guess that’s why they’re called “Stretch Goals” and not “Stretch Promises”.

Pretty sure it’s called stretch goal because it’s stretching the initial monetary goal, not because it’s a “goal” to deliver the extra feature.

Stretch goals are not actually a thing. Like, Kickstarter doesn’t support them and there is no actual legal or financial obligation involved, which there at least theoretically is to deliver the pitch of the Kickstarter itself. It’s just this weird custom that’s sprung up in the culture around Kickstarter. I think it’s fair to generally expect them to be fulfilled but it’s not binding and it’s honestly pretty rare for a game to come out looking exactly like it was pitched before development started so expecting that from a game just because it’s crowdfunded is probably not realistic.

There is a clear financial obligation. People specifically pay for them.

Official Apology Issued:

In essence, “We should have been more transparent” is the message and yeah, they should have been, but I at least understand where they were coming from. Like I said up thread, stuff gets cut all the time during a game’s development. But when it comes to crowdfuning, maybe they should have been more careful to word it “unless we determine it doesn’t make sense” - for example, I have grown to dislike crafting in games. What is junk and what are materials I need to hold onto? Can I sell this ruby or will I be kicking myself later? I’d much rather find awesome weaponry in the wild, in most cases (some exceptions apply, of course). I have seen first hand some, at least, of what they replaced crafting with in Torment ToN and it’s awesome in my book.