Of Orcs and Men Impression - E3 2011

[risingsun]

This is a tale Of Orcs and Men, where the humans are the villains and the orcs and goblins are the sympathetic heroes. If that sounds like an interesting twist to you, then be sure to check out this E3 impression.

-Story Link

[Drav]

It’s story structure is a rather focused and linear affair broken up into chapters. However, the choices you make during dialog sequences will have an impact on the course the story takes. While there is a fixed ending to the story, how you get there is determined by the player.

Fake choice alert.

[Idhilsyn]

He also has a rage meter that fills up during combat, allowing him to go into a furry and unleash powerful attacks.

Oh dear God, that sounds brutal.

[Ocelot]

Fake choice alert.

To be fair, very few "choice and consequence" games allow you to seriously change the game's ending. It's rather unfortunate, but I guess that makes things easier for sequels. At least Of Orcs and Men is being honest about it.

[Drav]

If they end up doing something like The Witcher or Planescape: Torment then fine, but when someone says "it's a linear game with one ending and fixed characters... but you make choices along the way!", I can't help but wonder what it is these choices are actually going to effect.

I guess that after all these years of developers pretending their games are massively non-linear when really the biggest choice they offer is having to choose between two character no one likes anyway, my expectations for a game that doesn't hype its choices is, like, a JRPG.

[LegendaryZoltan]

I think the best thing they could do for the choices is like in FF tactics where you could choose the infiltrate the fortress from the front or the back and have a completely different battle or in Metal Gear 3 where you could choose to blow up the helicopter and then it wouldn't come and bother you in later levels.

I'm really hoping for a dramatic story. I want them to make us feel sorry for the orcs and make the humans seem really cruel. That reversal of roles is just too tasty.

[flamethrower]

Will the makers of this game get sued by Blizzard, who copyrighted / trademarked the name "Orcs and Humans?" Can you copyright an orc? Because you see them all over the place, it makes it seem like it's either widely licensed (from Tolkien) or can't be copyrighted.

[lolwhoops]

tolkien didn't copyright a lot of terms that became mainstays in the fantasy realm. Blizzard could never argue for them owning the word Orc since it predates their existence by a good while.