KoA: Reckoning - Interview @ GameBanshee

GameBanshee caught up with Big Huge Games' Ian Frazier to talk about Reckoning - which is due in three weeks or so now. There's a lot to cover and, as usual, GameBanshee asks some good questions so I'm just going to take an early quote but make sure you head over:

GB: You've mentioned that killing an NPC linked to a quest will cause that quest to end - do we have the freedom to kill any NPC in the game, or are key NPCs invulnerable? If we're able to kill an NPC without any other NPC witnessing the crime, will the crime still get us into trouble? Finally, are we able to loot all items on a dead NPC, even quest-related ones?

Ian: Some characters are effectively invulnerable, at least for a while. In general we try to make it impossible to accidentally break the main quest or the faction quests by accidentally murdering someone important, whereas with the side quests we pretty much say “feel free to kill everyone, but don’t be surprised when suddenly you can’t do as many quests in this area.” It’s worth noting that even in the cases where we do make characters invulnerable to prevent quest breakage, we generally turn that state off when the quest is complete, so players can still indulge their darker natures afterwards if desired.

If you manage to do something devious (murder, theft, etc.) and no one manages to see you and report you to the guards, then yes, you can get away with it! For the purposes of Reckoning, a crime only exists if it’s witnessed. …I try not to ponder what that says about our designers’ personal philosophies.

As for the last question, yes, you can loot NPCs just as easily as monsters, and where appropriate you may find a quest item on them. For that matter, you might be able to pickpocket that item from them instead if you’d prefer not to opt for murder.