soteria wrote...
If Bioware could stand to learn something from Square, imo it's the cutscene. So many epic fights in Dragon Age could have been made better with a little bit more acknowledgement from the characters that something epic just happened. Some fights end without anyone even commenting on what happened, which is odd to me given that the stregnth of these games is usually the dialogue.
Agreed.
Taking an example from a totally different genre (RTS) in Dawn of War Dark Crusade, the sledging between the opposing army commanders during the epic 'base' fights was surprisingly effective at characterisation, making the whole thing feel very, very personal...and denoting that this was an important fight. They also opened and concluded with cutscenes. Its a very effective method and, eerily enough, surprisingly underused in DA:O.
In terms of the linearity discussion, its swings and roundabouts. True linearity gives a better potential for storytelling as you know what the player will see when, what he will have done (or not done) and who is with him, and that can all be used to craft an engaging plot line. However, that tends to come at the cost of a hefty dose of fatalism, with the player feeling that they're being forced along a defined path of completing (x) before (y) before (z).
Equally, it doesn't necessarily make for a better story. Cutting it up into four pieces makes it impossible to guarantee that
in any single playthrough the player will experience the full breadth of the game - especially as Bioware likes to plant NPC party members mid-way through the four key story arcs and give you more players than you have active character slots.
This doesn't add to the single playthrough experience, but gives way more to a replay than a second run of the linear story would. There are only a few honourable exceptions (Mafia, Deus Ex, Thief series) where I'd happily replay a heavily linear story-driven game over and over because the story (and game) are both good enough to warrant it.
Focusing on storytelling as the key quality, this isn't really about whether its linear or split into four interchangeable sections - its key qualities are going to be about how it engages with the player, how it surprises them and rewards them (figuratively speaking), how their actions in the game world affect the story and so forth.
At this point, linearity can be a millstone because player must do action (x) to allow story event (y) which always leads to part (z)...unless you start adopting a branching paths strategy where an early action can have severe repercussions later, or force you into a different story 'path'.
Personally, I'm a huge fan of the branching paths approach when its done right, as it can lead to wildly different conclusions to the same essential story. And, if given the effort, different sections, different quests and a whole different feel. KotoR had a huge branching paths feel to it (although it never stopped you going between branches in principle), albeit with only two outcomes and relatively limited consequences.
Dragon Age is clearly a spiritual successor, as each of the four major quest lines has a branching path in it (some quite dramatically, some only at a late stage), as does the finale with its endings. However, they're all relatively isolated and only rarely complement or interfere with future paths except in a very minor way.
In fairness to Bioware, that style of RPG in computer games is still in its infancy - at least amongst major, high cost titles. Not least because it requires a heck of a lot of extra work to get right, and gives more opportunities to get it wrong in some way without adding value to the first run of a story. You only ever benefit from that approach if you replay the game which, lets face it, not everyone will. For each of those people, its time wasted from a development perspective - even if the replayers tend to love it.
Anyway, I've rambled. Ultimately, branching paths works well with linear or non-linear storylines, although its more helpful in the 4-story arc approach as it helps to disguise the fact that the player is, somewhat inevitably, following a relatively linear path throughout the game.
I'd say the key thing is not the structure of the game, but the quality of its storytelling - and in my opinion, David Gaider and the other writers bloody well excelled themselves in DA:O on that score.
...and for what its worth, given the choice, I personally prefer the 4-arc approach to the linear one.
Modifié par Wozearly, 07 avril 2010 - 12:29 .
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