QUOTE]I read in a dev diary that Martin´s notebook was physically damaged the night before the German voice recordings started.[/QUOTE]Yep, that's true.

But actually, the database crash meant a loss of lines for some characters already - so... those of you who think the game's too chatty as it is can consider themselves lucky, I guess.

I was really sad back then to have lost some (I thought) rather cool parts of Big Mike's and Juan's dialog, for example. But in hindsight, maybe we're all better off without even more (back)story.

Hmmmm. Care to divulge the missing backstory? If you don't, I will always wonder what I will have missed....

Nice of you to drop in Martin! As usual, we're split between the people who prefer lots of puzzles, first person, mainly solo jaunts, and those of us that prefer third person games with lots of conversation. Like Becky, I would really like to hear what got left out that we missed.

Hi Martin

Me three! What did we miss? I thought Big Mike was especially interesting.

Melanie

Just wait for the monstrous three-million-non-skippable-dialog-lines sequel!

Heh.

Big Mike had interesting things to say about the Lower East Side riots, and a lot of it linked to details of the stories of Mr. Huntington and the guys at the subway station. It added more color to both those events and the biographies of the characters, and it really densified that part of the backstory IMO.

But then again, I've heard quite a few complaints about too much "superfluous" (not directly game progress related) talk in MOS, which makes me think that the game can easily do without that backstory layer.

Thanks for telling us about it - sorry I missed it. Have you been keeping up with Still Life that is releasing soon? They've employed an interesting tactic - you left click for plot related conversations, and right click for "superflous " conversations that flesh out the characters and story. Guess everyone could be happy that way.

Yeah, of course, I've seen that.

I'm not sure, however, if this means it is really implemented along the lines of "left button: progess relevant, right button: superfluous backstory".

Since the heroine's biography is apparently closely linked to the case (as far as I understand it), her private talk could easily reveal information that is important to the story progress as well.

Well, I guess we'll know the answer very soon.

Martin -- how do you feel about backstory presented in journals or diaries? Do you think that long passages of text draw the player out of the story too much? Is it better to hear the backstory than to read it?

I was also curious -- have you played Martin Mystere? (I heard that it has already been released in Germany.) Some of the backstory In MM is contained in short text passages (no voice acting) that you can access when you click on hotspots. So the backstory is in text (no voice acting) but unlike in journals it's given to the player a bit at a time. If you've seen it, I was curious what you thought of that idea too.

I'm sorry that part of the conversation was lost also, Martin. It sounds really good. I would have liked to learn more about Huntington via Mike and how it all tied in. I kept hoping for another scene with Mike & his evil counterpart.

I think that having fleshed out characters is very important to the story and loved that aspect of TMOS. I hope you continue to add character to the players.

I'm looking forward to Still Life and personally would never choose the option of less conversation but it seems like a good idea to make a game more satisfying to a larger audience by giving the option.

I don't think it's possible to always please everyone either though. We all are very unique individuals with our own likes and dislikes so there will always be something that someone doesn't like.

Melanie

You're so right, Melanie. Just looking at the voting for the top ten games gives one a real good idea of that. But MOS garnered some great praise, Martin, so I hope you're very proud!
Oh, and I played the preview build for Still Life, and although of course that was limited, at least that much held true for the conversations on the left versus right click. Anyway, not saying that all on the left click was strictly necessary for the plot, but so far all on the right wasn't, as best I can tell. It will be interesting to see if it is true for the entire game.

but just wanted to second Nickie's comment about the TMOS, Martin. Great game!

Melanie

for MM, i would prefer if all text passages and all journals were done in voice acting. but that won't stop me from playing the game. i just know that when i have to read it myself , the odds are very high it may be hard to read due to very small fonts thus i may just end up not even reding it. this is based on past experince in previous adventure games when i have had to read journals. often i just skip over them. it isn't worth the eye strain.now if they were read out loud so much the better plus it would give me a lot better feel for what is going on. it is so rare that journals are read out loud but when they are i really do appreciaate it and it makes it so much better. even if there wasn't a font problem this is the way to do it.

Me 3...Me 3 Martin...I loved playing TMOS...it had all the right ingredients to make it a great game for me and I was sorry when it ended.

I await your next venture...with great anticipation

Sue

Yes. I am.

That's a tricky question. There are many things that can be said against diaries. Games are an interactive medium that should be able to do more than mimic other media. Presenting people with the electronic version of a book isn't very interactive, and therefore not very desireable.

That said, MOS has a diary. I think the story provides a striking reason for it to be in the game; it is a believable part of the logic of the game world.

Still, I'm generally rather critical about diaries. Reading books isn't what games should be about; but neither should they be about listening to radio plays with static screens.

There is a lot to improve there, and we will do so.

YAAAAAA!!!! We ( actually JKEerie ) finally got The Moment Of Silence to work on my Computer!!! Just started it over the weekend, So Far, I LOVE IT!!!
We ( JkEerie ) played and finished BlackStone Chronicles over the weekend!!! That was a freaky game, not scary but freaky!!
Playing TMOS with my hubby and son on week nights!
So far so awesome, and SOOOO HAPPY!!!!
I Love it when a game works right!

Fantastic, Sandy! What did you have to change to make it run on your computer? I'm so glad you're able to play it!
Yeah, BC was freaky, wasn't it?! It is so much fun hearing your reactions to all the games you're finding!

It was an inept video driver that was screwing up Sandy's MOS characters. And Sandy was correct...they looked charred!!!!

Her computer guru installed an enhanced ASUS card that used an ATI chip, so we went to the ASUS website and downloaded and installed a driver just released this past March.

And joy of joy...it worked!

Thank you all for your suggestions! What a marvelous group y'all are!!!

Nickie,
I just copied and pasted what JKEerie wrote in Glitches for me! Ya, I'm so excited! My Hubby, LOVES this game, and that makes it 10x's MORE FUN!
It's so tempting to play it while he is at work!! But, I won't. I also Bought Return to Mysterious Island, so i can play that in the daytime. But I only installed it, haven't played it yet.
But ya GAMES ARE TO MUCH FUN!!! We are having a great time!!

I don't mind lots of dialogue, as long as it's well written and relevant to the game, which I think most of the dialogue in MoS is. I also think that most of the voice acting is above average, except for the main character. However, what I didn't like was that you had to backtrack all the time to make sure that all the dialogue options had been exhausted. There are other ways to do that.

I just started it and so far I like it.

Hated the empty walking though