Wasteland 2: Game of the Year Edition [PS4, XO]

[Cyan]

More good news for consoles gamers!!

inXile, the developers of Wasteland 2, have been greatly redesigning the UI to work on consoles for efficiency, flexibility and usability... Plus, they are improving the assets of the original game -improvements that I think will make into the PC version too, I suppose-.

http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2015-03-27-channeling-xcom-porting-wasteland-2-to-ps4-and-xbox-one

Now, Wasteland 2 expands onto the current generation of consoles, addressing an entirely different audience and posing an entirely different set of questions. The Wasteland feels more daunting with a controller in hand. I was happy to read the thousands of words of text that that coursed through Wasteland 2's veins on PC, my body hunched over a desk, my face pressed up against a monitor. Sat back on my sofa in front of my TV, those words blur into a stream of fuzz.

And what about the interface? Wasteland 2 was - and inXile admits this - a bit cumbersome to navigate. It was just about doable with a mouse a keyboard. But with a controller?

"We know, and everybody else has stated, that how this thing plays and the controls are going to make it or break it on console," Keenan admits. "So we've been putting some good time into the controller, the inventory and what moves the camera versus the characters. You're going to be able to see a pretty big upgrade."

"Anything that needs unique UI for console is getting its own special UI," Keenan says. "We're touching everything we need to."

They also mention XCOM, like some fellow forumers did here.

"Their UI on console was the gold standard for handling a complex game in a way on console that was very satisfying," Fargo says. "We recognise that. We always look at the body of work that comes before us. We want to make sure we're looking at what gamers gravitate towards, and what they think is done right."

"[XCOM] is certainly a starting point for us," Keenan adds. "We want to make sure we have similar ease of use in controls."

The game also received a level art upgrade:

What's more, they also improved the in-game models.

Eurogamer's interview with the developers focuses on other aspects of the game too, and it's worth an in depth read.

 

[Silent_Buddha]

Plus, they are improving the assets of the original game -improvements that I think will make into the PC version too, I suppose-.

Yeah, they already stated that with the move from Unity 4.5 (original game) to Unity 5.0 they'll be taking advantage of the new features of the engine (like PBR) as well as sprucing up the graphics.

Absolutely one of the best Kickstarted games ever from a support perspective. Game was released last year and is still receiving updates and support.

Regards,
SB

 

[Cyan]

Gamingbolt has published an interview with the developers of the game, and they talk about the differences of developing for consoles compared to the PC, plus a few other interesting subjects.

http://gamingbolt.com/wasteland-2-interview-unity-5-and-developing-for-ps4xbox-one

What are your thoughts on developing for the Xbox One and PS4 in terms of the hardware itself? What advantages and disadvantages does it present compared to developing on the PC?


So far, it’s been great. I’m not sure we would be making a console version if we weren’t using a game engine that eases the process for us. Advantages would be that we know exactly what the hardware is for all console players. We don’t have to worry about compatibility problems or quality settings or bugs coming from various drivers not being updated. As for disadvantages, there tends to be more red tape on consoles. There are approval processes and technical requirements that you don’t have to worry about on PC.

 

[Deleted member 11852]

We don’t have to worry about compatibility problems or quality settings or bugs coming from various drivers not being updated. As for disadvantages, there tends to be more red tape on consoles. There are approval processes and technical requirements that you don’t have to worry about on PC.

Yes, if your game crashes constantly like it does on Macs released after 2013 with Nvidia GPUs, Sony and Microsoft will not let you take people's money. Thank the Lord for Parallels and Bootcamp.

 

[Silent_Buddha]

Gamingbolt has published an interview with the developers of the game, and they talk about the differences of developing for consoles compared to the PC, plus a few other interesting subjects.

http://gamingbolt.com/wasteland-2-interview-unity-5-and-developing-for-ps4xbox-one

Oooh that best part of that...

Chris Keenan: If you’re a fan of what we’re doing with Wasteland 2 or Torment: Tides of Numenera, keep an eye out for our crowdfunding campaign for The Bard’s Tale 4 in the near future!

Not a sequel to the mediocre but funny third person top down action game The Bard's Tale, but a sequel to the Bard's Tale RPG series. I do so hope it'll be faithful to that series as it was one of my favorites back in the 80's. If they do as good a job being faithful to it as Wasteland 2 has been to Wasteland, I think I'll be quite ecstatic. Please let it retain the turn based combat.

Regards,
SB

 

[Zaphod]

Wasteland 2 has a fixed camera 2D isometric world.

No, no, yes. It's fully 3D with a freely rotatable camera. The camera is also height-adjustable within a decent range. Can't get too close, though; so at least you got isometric part right. As you said yourself: "Have you played a lot of Wasteland 2?"

Superficially they look the same but they play nothing alike.

In terms of mechanics, combat plays very much like a worse version of the new X-COM. IMHO

Of course, with WL2 being only/fully isometric the main difference being that you can't get as close to the action. WL2 also suffers from a lack of progression in terms of interesting tactical options. My main gripe with the game is that combat got rather dull and repetitive pretty fast.

 

[Sigfried1977]

How so?

Ever tried playing Warcraft II on the original Playstation? I'd imagine playing Wasteland 2 on a controller might cause similar headaches.

 

[Deleted member 11852]

No, no, yes. It's fully 3D with a freely rotatable camera. The camera is also height-adjustable within a decent range. Can't get too close, though; so at least you got isometric part right. As you said yourself: "Have you played a lot of Wasteland 2?"

Wow, I did not know you can rotate the camera! My bad.

 

[Cyan]

Oooh that best part of that...



Not a sequel to the mediocre but funny third person top down action game The Bard's Tale, but a sequel to the Bard's Tale RPG series. I do so hope it'll be faithful to that series as it was one of my favorites back in the 80's. If they do as good a job being faithful to it as Wasteland 2 has been to Wasteland, I think I'll be quite ecstatic. Please let it retain the turn based combat.

Regards,
SB

Maybe if I have some spare money -which isn't usually the case- I will help crowdfunding the project. Alas, I've never ever played a Bard's Tale game. I know it's famous and it sounds very familiar, I heard about that game quite a bit, but never played it...

Ever tried playing Warcraft II on the original Playstation? I'd imagine playing Wasteland 2 on a controller might cause similar headaches.

I hope they get it working just like Blizzard did with Diablo 3. I don't see myself using a keyboard+mouse in a Diablo game in the future, because I lost practice with it.

 

[Deleted member 11852]

Out on October 13th [GameInformer]

 

[iroboto]

Out on October 13th [GameInformer]

Excellent. The director's cut for PC launches the same day (Unity5 engine); I've held off on playing it until that happened.

 

[Deleted member 11852]

Excellent. The director's cut for PC launches the same day (Unity5 engine); I've held off on playing it until that happened.

Wise. Wasteland has been flakey for me on both Windows and OSX. Random crashes and freezes under both OSs but I've not tried since they upgraded to the latest version of Unity.