I'm in the WoW Beta Test!

[OB1]

I was trying to explain how I disagree with your (flawed) depiction of interaction, "good" controls, etc. It's not my fault if thought is too much for you... :P

I said "it's called imagination" because a big part of games is of course imagination... if you spend the whole time you're playing BGII thinking 'i hate this' of course you will hate it, but when I play it it's just natural. Part is certainly how many hours I have put into that engine, so for me it is natural, but my point is that I do not view that interface as a significant block to immersion. Sure, it's less immersive in some respects than Grim Fandango. But as I said it really can't be. Not if it wants to be a good game. So instead it uses the system that works best, as all good games should. And if you have the imagination to look at the game and play it as a game depicting a world, you'll have fun. It shouldn't take much to get past the point where you aren't bothered by the control scheme and Baldur's Gate II is immersing you just as much as KotOR. Play each one for ten minuites and KotOR probably is more immersive because of the graphics (I don't count controls for a whole lot as far as immersion goes, it's more about graphics and interface on screen... like, Grim Fandango. Its use of the gamepad actually means a more complex and harder to use control scheme than a standard adventure game one of the period. And thinking about it, how different would GF be with a normal scheme? Somewhat, but not hugely. I VERY highly doubt that it'd affect the immersion or quality of the game. Certainly not for me at least. But I guess I just have a better imagination (for lack of a better word) for these things than you...

You say this because you don't even understand the meaning of good control design. You are fine with crap, which is great for you, but it is still crap that you're fine with. :p

Anyway, back to the point. BG uses what works. It's not immediately the most immersive system, but if you play it a lot you'll get drawn in and will forget all the little things like having to move people by mouse commands. At least I, and certainly many, many others, feel this way. Fine, I have to use the mouse to click and move them. So? For one thing BG has six people to control, not one, so it's got to have some kind of compromise... this is just the best one.

You control the main character and the other members follow your character. I already explained that.

I just fundamentally cannot understand how you could consider something as simple as clicking to move to point B or holding down the button to go to point B such a big difference in gameplay and design.
I do not see it that way. They are very similar in most all ways. They are different, have somewhat different applications... but you have gone on a huge rant against this and I still don't quite understand what you are ranting against... or rather why you are ranting against it. Clicking to move is an issue THIS big? It just makes no sense at all to me. It is not a big issue!

Exactly, you cannot even comprehend the idea of proper controls. Which is why I'm trying to educate you, even though I know deep down inside (well... really not that deep down) that you will not or cannot try to understand me.

Grim Fandango is unique because of its interface, but more so because of great game design. Escape from Monkey Island uses the same interface but is a much worse game... I was definitely more immersed in Curse of Monkey Island, a traditional mouse-click adventure, than I was in Escape. That is just one example of how good game design counts far more than some little thing like the controls.

Ah but if CoMI had better controls it would be an even better game.

KotOR vs. Baldur's Gate is the same, though much less extreme since the quality differnce between KotOR and BGII is a lot closer than CoMI and EFMI.

The Baldur's Gate games completely disinterest me, and why is that? Well first we have to look at why I play these games to begin with. It's certainly not for the stories which I could do much better with a book and it's not really for the combat which isn't all that. I like playing RPGs to become a part of a world, to inhabit a certain character and go on adventures. I cannot feel like I'm in that world if I'm seeing it from a bird's eye view, now can I? Then it's just like I'm a bird magically controlling a bunch of characters. If I'm not feeling like I'm in the game then there is no point to it. If I want to use my imagination to make the game not suck then why the fuck am I playing a game at all?? I could just run around the woods pretending the same damn stuff but with even more freedom and immersion. If the gameplay and/or story is good enough, however, then the perspective doesn't matter.