Personally, when I play a new RPG (or, more generally, really any exploration/choices-based game) I prefer to progress on my own as far as I'm able to, without looking anywhere and spoiling "the fun". But when I reach a certain point that just feels like the point-of-no-return (e.g., I'm at levelcap and about to storm the final big bad bosses' castle), I stop and look for meta just to know, what I did miss and, more importantly, if I can still see it with my current character.
Which makes sense because 99% of RPGs go for length (of a single playthrough) instead of width of multiple playthroughs. Take Pillars of Eternity, for example, or any of the Witcher games. If you realize that you missed something cool in Pillars, you can't easily replay the game to make different choices as it takes forever due to all the filler combat and the overall structure. AoD was different in this regard (not better but different) as instead of lining up all 110+ quests in a row we split them between different faction questlines and character builds, making the game MUCH shorter than it would be otherwise, but very replayable as you get different quests, locations, points of view, etc.
Заблокированный контент - гадость. Во втором Ведьмаке так и не увидел вторую ветку, неохота было проходить заново первую главу.
Because the game wasn't designed for replayability and few people wanted to do the exact same quests and fights all over again just to unlock a different location.
Но к сожалению на практике всё это приводит к неизбежному метагеймингу (эдак у половины или более игравших в AoD, я думаю), который портит впечатление от игры. Альтернатива - когда ты чувствуешь что профукал 3/4 контента в игре просто провалив чеки которые мог бы выполнить прочитав прохождение, ещё хуже. Такой подход (много заблокированного контента, много в игре можно случайно пропустить; причем контент просто блокируется по проваленым чекам, а не является сюжетными альтернативами) просто вынуждает игрока к метагеймингу.
Which is one of the reasons we're going with an 'increase by use' system. From one of the updates:
You will not gain XP for killing, talking, sneaking, picking locks, using computers, fixing mechanical things and such. You will not increase your skills manually. Instead your skills will be increased automatically based on their use. Why?
- One of the most common complaints about AoD was meta-gaming, yet the problem wasn’t on the design end but on the player’s end. Basically, it was driven by the player’s desire to get more content in the course of one game. As that content required stats and skills, it forced some players to metagame, either to spread skill points in the most optimum manner or to hoard points and use them like currency to buy extra content. The ‘increase by use’ system eliminates this meta-gaming aspect as now there are no skill points to hoard or distribute. The content you get will be determined by your actions and choices (including which skills to use as your primary and secondary groups).
- The main problem with a party-based, skill-based (as of opposite to class-based) setup is that even with a 3-man party you can easily cover all skills you want to have. You’ll have a fighter/talker, fighter/thief, fighter/fixer, which is something we’d like to avoid. The ‘increase by use’ system solves this problem in the most natural and logical way possible. Your abilities reflect what you do, not how (usually arbitrary) you distribute your skill points.
- It reinforces the party-based design I talked about in the previous update. If you let one of the party members do all the repair work while you concentrate on other areas, losing this party member would hit you hard and you’d have to make sure (via choices made during quests) that he/she would stay with you no matter what.
- It rewards consistent gameplay. Let’s say you need to deal with a gang that stands between you and that door over there. If you kill them, everyone’s combat skills will improve a bit. If you talk your way through, only your dialogue skills will go up.
- We’re well aware of the possible exploits and want to reassure you that skill use will be a somewhat limited resource (no respawning enemies, silly things like greeting every NPC to increase your speech skills, spamming activities to max skills in 30 min, using faster weapons to level up skills faster, etc). Instead of counting how many times you did something, we’ll assign a certain value (let’s call it learning points) to each activity (attacking, killing, fixing, sneaking, convincing, lying, etc). So killing a tough enemy or repairing a reactor will net you more points than killing a weakling or fixing a toaster. Basically, it will work the same way as XP but go directly toward raising a skill that did all the work.
Взаимоисключающий контент, недоступный в 1 прохождение это неплохо. Но все же лучше, когда:
1)контент блокируется не провалеными чеками, а сюжетными выборами игрока, и является альтернативными ветками
We have that but it's not enough, in my opinion.
(разные сюжетные ветки за разные фракции - была хорошая идея, разные последствия/квесты открываемые в-зависимости от сюж.выбора)
2)давать возможность выполнить задачу 2-3-4 разными способами (пресловутое правило 3 У: убить, украсть, уговорить)
We have that to, but it's not enough either. Real life blocks 'content' left and right based on your stats and skills, why should games aiming for realism be any different?
Well, i'd like to add my 5 cents to the discussion. IMO the totally restricted by skills, "gated", as you call it, content based on skills/stats is bad idea. Cause it ruins the ability to play as you like without lots of metagaming...
It really doesn't. To play as you like, all you need is to make a logical character (i.e. not fighter/mage/thief) and take him through the game. You'll fail a lot of checks but you will make it through the game. The question is, can you accept it (failing checks left and right)? If not, you have to metagame, but that's your choice. A former co-worker played the new DOOM while alt-tabbing to watch the walkthrough to make sure he gets all the collectables. Is it the game's fault or his fault?
A "skills" should impact gameplay in the ways the content accessed (say you can break the door, or pick the lock, you can persuade character to tell info, or you can hack his PC and so on)...
Which means that all builds will be essentially the same, "anything you can do, I can do in a different way!"
Pretty much unrealistic. IRL someone determined to get somewhere, but lacking skills to do so himself - can do a multitude of things (from employing "skilled" persons to do the job, employing machinery (like explosives or bulldozer 
) to do the job,trying to get around and try to approach from another direction), not just "turn back 'cause you unskilled".
Multiple solutions should only go so far. Look at Feng, for example (one of the characters in AoD, in case you haven't played it). He wants to get rid of a rival, hires you to kill him, the rival offers you a better deal, you take it, Feng is fucked. Or the rival outsmarts you, says he'll leave town but runs straight to the local lord for protection. To me, that's a lot more realistic than magically solving ALL your problems via different skills.
Anyway, I feel it's getting a bit too abstract now, so let's use AoD as an example. Which gated content specifically was too restrictive and unrealistic?
Может они его еще и переработают и обогатят...
