Couple of things I've already talked with and about in other places like FoH and our Reckoning forums.
1) "Derivative" Yes, and no. There was a review awhile back that spent most of the article labeling the things in our game 'taken' from other games. Loot = Diablo, Combat = GoW etc., it numbered them. The review ended up at like 14 games (can't find the review anywhere right now) but then went on to the point I try to make to anyone not already bleeding from the ears as I talk about the game.
They stated that ya, we did steal from many, but the difference was that we didn't skim the surface, we took that feature we loved and we added our personal touch and craft to it to make it ours, over and over. That's where I believe we did this so different. We're not the first company to take great gameplay and incorporate it, but I think we're one of the first in this genre, with this type of game, to do it so widely AND deeply in a way that in the end, makes this game it's own.
2) Jumping. For the folks in here that are in game dev you know this to be true. Jumping, the addition or subtraction of it has IMMENSE consequences on a few things. The first and biggest to me is world building, like climbing, swimming, etc, every one of those has huge implications on how you construct your world. I promise you had we included user desired jumping we'd have NOT had 130+ hand crafted dungeons, no shot. The other is our combat, if you could jump, we'd have to turn it off or completely change how our combat system works. We wanted a hand crafted very different combat RPG, and jumping would have only made our goal harder to achieve. You can disagree with the decision, but that's the main reasons we made it.
3) Multi-Player. MP is it's own game, period. It's an ENORMOUS undertaking in what was or is an already enormous job. Ask the ME guys. BHG was already 3+ years into the engine dev when we rolled up, MP was never an option.
4) Mod tools- We ABSOLUTELY want players to mod, but we made our own engine, our own tools, our own everything on the tech side. I have very little knowledge of the details but after hearing players early on comment about their desire to see and want them I went to Ian and to Joe and Mike to ask and talk about them. It's not a 'we don't feel like it' reason, it's actually a crap ton of reasons not the least of which manpower and resources, both dollars and time, are now invested in DLC and RPG2 and other Amalur related projects. If there is ever a chance to have it done and done right by us for Reckoning I promise we will try, if a player or players do it, awesome.
There's more, but for now, again, thanks to everyone in this thread, good posts and negative posts, for giving a shit, it matters BIG TIME to us that you do.
