616 réponses à ce sujet

[Terror_K]

Pocketgb wrote...

Terror_K wrote...

Just like Halo is a success. And Gears of War is a success. And Modern Warfare 2 is a success. And...

ME1 :happy:?

Yes, I suppose it is to a degree. But nowhere near as much as those other games. And to be honest if it were such a big success and massively popular, I probably wouldn't like it. I generally don't like --or at least don't embrace-- mainstream things. I suppose one could say Star Wars was mainstream, but 90% of people out there probably don't know Star Wars much beyond the movies. Star Trek is pretty popular too, but more as a cult nerd thing.

I mean, for one thing the first Mass Effect figurines wouldn't still be a couple of months away if it was absolutely huge. For years you have been able to buy randomly coloured nameless Spartan or Locust Grunt #23, but I still don't have a Saren, Liara, Tali, Garrus, Wrex, etc. yet. The closest thing thus far is a lame Shepard statue that as far as I'm concerned ain't even Shepard.

Massadonious1 wrote...

Yes, I read it. If that's what you believe, then fine. I'm more bothered by the fact that the generalzation was ever being made in the first place, regardless of if it's partially true or not. The second paragraph was more reactionary than anything else. But, this has gone far off topic already, so I'll drop it.

For the record, the picture was a bunch of 40 somethings playing D&D, or something similar.

I'll just say that stereotypes exist for a reason, but that there are exceptions to every rule, and leave it at that. Oh, except for a quote that goes along the lines of "99% of lawyers make the others look bad" as well.

[KalosCast]

Seipher05 wrote...

My main is an adept, and the addition of the "Shields/Barrier blocks all Biotics" mechanic effectively makes Adepts gimped Soldiers. I can't speak for Engineers, since I've never played one, but I've had to rely far more on my weapons than I did in the first game. Indeed, the only Biotic power that's regularly used is Warp, and that's because Armor apparently stops a great deal of Biotic attacks, as well. I forget who posted it, but someone said that Biotics had effectively become pretty finishing moves instead of legitimate tactical options, and I find that description rather apt. 

Not really. While it's a shame that Warp counts for two things, both Engineer and Adept (the two "caster" classes) can deal with every defense but one (Shields for Adepts and Barriers for Engineers) which you can use your bonus power or allies for (almost like it's a squad-based game or something). And if you play on a higher difficulty, the ability to take a Krogan out of the fight for a few seconds (if not outright send them into low orbit) is beyond helpful.

And on lower difficutlies, you're an unstoppable machine of death without even firing your gun, especially given the mind-bendingly low cooldowns on Adept powers.

Modifié par KalosCast, 17 juin 2010 - 09:47 .

[KalosCast]

Terror_K wrote...
-snip, something about hating mainstream- 

So, basically you're the gaming equivalent of a hipster? That explains a lot, really.

And ME1 was an huge success, for the record. Better stop liking it. Hell, almost all my friends are fans of "Power-Armored Captain Scowlyface: Space Marine vs The Evil Alien Hordes" shooters and still played ME1 and were big fans of it so... I don't know how you want to fit that into the "ME2 is made for teh stupidz and Bioware is teh selloutz" argument.

[Terror_K]

KalosCast wrote...

Terror_K wrote...
-snip, something about hating mainstream- 

So, basically you're the gaming equivalent of a hipster? That explains a lot, really.

Not really. To fit that definition I'd have to pretty much only play RPGs and not like a wide range of gaming genres, including shooters. My favourite game of all time is a shooter, so I don't think the term applies.

And ME1 was an huge success, for the record. Better stop liking it. Hell, almost all my friends are fans of "Power-Armored Captain Scowlyface: Space Marine vs The Evil Alien Hordes" shooters and still played ME1 and were big fans of it so... I don't know how you want to fit that into the "ME2 is made for teh stupidz and Bioware is teh selloutz" argument.

Yes, but to how many of them see it as more than just another game? How many of them love the universe, the setting, the lore and really get into things, reading the novels and the comics, etc.? If Mass Effect really had only appealed to nerds I'd say it would have failed, and that would have, quite frankly, sucked.

In either case, just like not every shooter fan is a moron, not every sci-fi and/or RPG fan is intelligent. I know... I've actually played pen and paper RPGs before with the odd idiot in the past.

[Orchomene]

AlanC9 wrote...

Orchomene wrote...
That's why I think that lots of Bethesda games have the big advantage to let you decide what is the nature of your character.

Really? In Morrowind, for instance, you are the Nerevarine, which is as Chosen One as it gets. Of course, you can refuse to finish the game, but that's true for any RPG

Not exactly. You can play a character that thinks the Nerevarine is pure superstition. They did a good job leting you decide if this is fiction or reality (the Nerevarine part). Even the "gods" have some explanation that is less mystic than what is considered by the official Church. And you don't have at all to finish the main quest since it's not the end of the game. Of course, you would skip a bit part of the accomplishement that can be found in the game, but it's a possibility.

About leveling, there are different ways to increase the power. In Call of Chtulhu, the more knowledge you have in the mythology, the more you can lose your character, having him/her becoming mad and actually accumulating phobies and nevrosis. In Paranoïa, you have 6 clones and as you advance, you lose clones pretty quickly and have more and more issues keeping alive. In Stormbringer, your origin is determinant in the power you have. If you happen to be a burglar from Nadsokor, your doomed to be weak forever. If you have the luck to birth as a Menilbonean, then you are at birth already very powerful. This unbalance and lack of important evolution of your character gives some interesting way to roleplay. In the World of Darkness, you are naturally more potent than any human (or normal human if you happen to play Mage) with just a curse that gives a small counterpart. So you don't begin as a common person.
Diversity is good and leveling is essential only in games where the motivation to follow the story is not sufficiant. If you do only fight and explore dungeons, you are expecting a kind of reward for the time you invest in it (as it's in MMO games) whereas with an interesting story, playing is the reward by itself.
I've played a very interesting D&D campaign where the experience points were very few and I took more than 200 hours to go from level 1 to level 6 as a cleric. It was all about the story.

[Orchomene]

FlyingWalrus wrote...

On heroism, now that I see where you are coming from, I can agree with that. I suppose my expectations for that kind of malleability were already low, however, having played Mass Effect with no expectations and then going into the sequel with similar sentiments. Even then, you can play Shepard as someone cruel, so then it becomes a story more of angry survival than of actual valor.

Sure, you can. But you don't feel really that it's suiting well in a game where you save the world. That's more a pragmatic and cynical savior than being a selfish guy. You don't go save the world just to save yourself. But it may be a matter of taste. In many games tailored for a "good guy", it feels a bit unnatural when you play some selfish/evil/whatever guy.

[Seipher05]

AlanC9 wrote...

Seipher05 wrote...
I somehow doubt that every single Mass Effect player, or even the majority of them, have posted a review on Gamespot,

Don't be an idiot. You wouldn't have to get every single person.. Just a representative sample.

How wonderful, insults.

AlanC9 wrote...
So the question is, is this a representative sample? No, of course not.  It's almost certainly biased to some extent. But how biased, and which way? I don't know, and neither do you.  If you've got a better data sample, feel free to produce it.

Less than 500 XBox 360 gamers and less than 300 PC gamers isn't a representative sample for the ME fan base, period. The numbers are fra too small, and are all taken from the same source. Using your methods, I could easily claim that the majority of ME fans are Tali fanatics, simply by counting the number of pro-Tali threads and posts from this board alone. 

AlanC9 wrote...
I don't have a particularly high level of confidence in those numbers, no. But I've got a hell of a lot more confidence in them than the alternative view that since a dozen or so people on this board didn't like the changes to ME, it couldn't possibly have gone over well. Every time we look at any data, ME2 is a success.

You don't have a high level confidence in the numbers, yet you've repeatedly stated that "the majority of ME fans liked ME2 better" or that "the majority of ME1 fans enjoyed the game despite its gameplay", or things like:

AlanC9 wrote...
Truth is, the user reviews probably make the dissenting vote look larger than it is. 

The simple fact is, your "data" doesn't support ony of the "truths" you keep refering to. The only "fact" that's come to light is that the second your assumptions are questioned, you resort to personal insults.

What a strong position you must have...

Modifié par Seipher05, 17 juin 2010 - 12:43 .

[Seipher05]

KalosCast wrote...
Not really. While it's a shame that Warp counts for two things, both Engineer and Adept (the two "caster" classes) can deal with every defense but one (Shields for Adepts and Barriers for Engineers) which you can use your bonus power or allies for (almost like it's a squad-based game or something). And if you play on a higher difficulty, the ability to take a Krogan out of the fight for a few seconds (if not outright send them into low orbit) is beyond helpful.

And on lower difficutlies, you're an unstoppable machine of death without even firing your gun, especially given the mind-bendingly low cooldowns on Adept powers.

Right, but that's kinda my point. Shields render any Biotic powers moot, including those of your teammates, which severly reduces the usefulness of Biotic abilities. Sure, you can use a teammate that has Overload, but that means that, as an adept, you're now basically forced to take a specifc character on every mission simply for access to one skill that's become a de facto "pre req" to gain access to Warp to use on Armor, which is itself a "pre req" for access to your other Biotic abilities. 

In addition, Armor also negates many Biotic abilities, causing an overuse of Warp. So, in essence, by the time you've stripped away the defenses, the only reason not to simply continue shooting the guy is because you want to use a cool finishing move, not because Biotic powers offer any  significant advantage over guns.

Modifié par Seipher05, 17 juin 2010 - 12:57 .

[Alex_SM]

I'm usually a Soldier, but I found the powers of my crew very useful. Always use them to end up several enemies at a time. When there are strong enemies in the field I usually just kill the shields/barriers and then I start with another while powers end up the ones whose defenses I destroyed before.

I never let my crew use their powers at their free will. 

And I supose that if you carry a soldier with you anything you have to do is tell him to attack the objetive before you use your power. 

 

[Alex_SM]

Seipher05 wrote...
not because Biotic powers offer any  significant advantage over guns.

Well, Mordin's Incineration can kill an enemy just at one shot. That's an advantage over guns; you kill the enemy fast and save ammo for the next. 

 I didn't played a Biotic in ME2, but I suppose the player  can use something as effective.

Modifié par Alex_SM, 17 juin 2010 - 02:07 .

[Terror_K]

Alex_SM wrote...

I didn't played a Biotic in ME2, but I suppose the player  can use something as effective.

Warp. That's about it. And a Vanguard doesn't get it by default. Pretty much any other biotic attack is useless unless they're only on health, and in most cases a gunshot is more damaging then. Shockwave even does so little damage when maxed and they're only on health that they could have at least had it still knock down enemies with barriers, shields and/or armour. It's a neat power, but its so ineffective. Not sure how devastating Miranda's Slam is... never used it on a Shepard and haven't really paid attention to the enemy's health levels when she's used it automatically in-game. Pull and Throw are pretty weak though.

[SuperMedbh]

Or Singularity, which slows down the enemy and incapacitates them the moment they lose armour. And then warp explosion that baddie, whereupon all their nearby friends will be weakened/stripped of defenses. Toss another singularity and there you are. There's a spiff video series "Adepting Through Insanity" that explains things better than I just did.



But the real question from an RPG point of view is whether or not that fits with the story universe or not. I'd say it doesn't. In all the cutscenes we see of biotics, they're gleefully throwing their abilities around without a moment of "Oh, hai, Mordin, take down their armour first would you now?" As something of an experiment, I'm doing an NG Veteran Vanguard run right now without upgrades/better weapons. And the Pull Field/Area Charge abilities feel much more like what the writers had in mind with biotics. Lots of glowing mercenaries flying all about the place.

[tonnactus]

Skarr threw an armored army tank in the first Mass Effect Novel. The "protection system" is just a silly gameplay mechanic,nothing more.The adept get reduced to singularity and warp spam most of the time.Shockwave is only usefull on the collector platforms,that it.

Modifié par tonnactus, 17 juin 2010 - 06:18 .

[tonnactus]

Alex_SM wrote...

Seipher05 wrote...
not because Biotic powers offer any  significant advantage over guns.

Well, Mordin's Incineration can kill an enemy just at one shot. That's an advantage over guns; you kill the enemy fast and save ammo for the next. 

There is too much ammo in this game,even on insanity,to make this an important part.

[Alex_SM]

tonnactus wrote...

Alex_SM wrote...

Seipher05 wrote...
not because Biotic powers offer any  significant advantage over guns.

Well, Mordin's Incineration can kill an enemy just at one shot. That's an advantage over guns; you kill the enemy fast and save ammo for the next. 

There is too much ammo in this game,even on insanity,to make this an important part.

Also increases your destructive power. Squad mates using guns are really useless, using powers (not in auto, always manually) they become highly effective. 

[AlanC9]

Seipher05 wrote...


How wonderful, insults.

Perhaps idiot is not correct there. Idiocy isn't something you can just stop doing. How about "Don't be silly?" When you said we didn't have reports from every players, you should have known better. And in fact, you did know better, and that was just an attempt at misleading rhetoric

Less than 500 XBox 360 gamers and less than 300 PC gamers isn't a representative sample for the ME fan base, period. The numbers are fra too small, and are all taken from the same source. Using your methods, I could easily claim that the majority of ME fans are Tali fanatics, simply by counting the number of pro-Tali threads and posts from this board alone.

Don't be silly. (Hey, it works!) .The Tali fans are self-selected because of their view of the point in question. ME2 players who choose to review the game are self-selected because they're interested in the game., not because they liked it.

As for the sample size, it's perfectly adequate to get us to a reasonable level of confidence as long as I don't want to be exact about those percentages. You can argue that it's a bad sampling method, but the size is fine. Don't take my word for it; look it up.

As for the sampling method; sure, it's not ideal. But is the sample biased? Do review writers have a different view of ME2 from gamers as a whole? If so, which way would they be biased? I don't have any reason to think so. Do you?

You don't have a high level confidence in the numbers, yet you've repeatedly stated that "the majority of ME fans liked ME2 better" or that "the majority of ME1 fans enjoyed the game despite its gameplay", or things like:

That's what I get for using technical terms. What I meant was that the number is almost certainly off from the real figure by a few percent. I shouldn't have said it that way because I didn't give a confidence interval in the first place.

Modifié par AlanC9, 17 juin 2010 - 07:07 .

[AlanC9]

Orchomene wrote...

Not exactly. You can play a character that thinks the Nerevarine is pure superstition. They did a good job leting you decide if this is fiction or reality (the Nerevarine part). Even the "gods" have some explanation that is less mystic than what is considered by the official Church. And you don't have at all to finish the main quest since it's not the end of the game. Of course, you would skip a bit part of the accomplishement that can be found in the game, but it's a possibility.

This would mean that what you're told about the Moon-and-Star ring is a lie. Though I suppose that's possible. But once we start saying that parts of the lore are simply untrue....

Edit: and IIRC Azura flatly says you're Nerevar in Tribunal. Vivec is more ambiguous, but then again he's that way about everything.

Modifié par AlanC9, 17 juin 2010 - 07:19 .

[Seipher05]

AlanC9 wrote...
Perhaps idiot is not correct there. Idiocy isn't something you can just stop doing. How about "Don't be silly?" When you said we didn't have reports from every players, you should have known better. And in fact, you did know better, and that was just an attempt at misleading rhetoric

How wonderul that you continue attempting to insult me, are you incapable of being civil?

In addition, I'd be far less cavalier throwing around snide insinuations about other peoples' intelligence when you're using data from less than 700 ME players total as "proof" of what the majority of ME fans like; and to think, I'm the one using "misleading rhetoric"!!

Don't be silly.

AlanC9 wrote...
Don't be silly. (Hey, it works!) .The Tali fans are self-selected because of their view of the point in question. ME2 players who choose to review the game are self-selected because they're interested in the game., not because they liked it.

People who post in the Tali thread have an opinion about Tali, positive or negative. All of the threads contain posts about how she's unoriginal or uniteresting or whatever, they're just heavily outweighed by posts in her favor. In any event, the presence of negative posts refutes your arguement about the thread containing only one point of view quite handily, so using a Tali thread as "proof" of how popular she is is no less valid than using Gamespot as "proof" of what the majority of all ME fans think.

It also happens to be no less insane.

AlanC9 wrote...
As for the sample size, it's perfectly adequate to get us to a reasonable level of confidence as long as I don't want to be exact about those percentages. You can argue that it's a bad sampling method, but the size is fine. Don't take my word for it; look it up.

I don't need to look up anything to know that a sample size of > 700. all taken from the same source, is extremely poor for determining, with any degree of reliability, the opinions of 1.7 + million players.
 
Don't take my word for it though, look it up.

AlanC9 wrote...
As for the sampling method; sure, it's not ideal. But is the sample biased? Do review writers have a different view of ME2 from gamers as a whole? If so, which way would they be biased? I don't have any reason to think so. Do you?

Do I have any reason to believe that a miniscule sample taken entirely from a specific source might not be representative of a far greater and more diverse whole?

Are you for real, man? Seriously, stop being so silly

AlanC9 wrote...
That's what I get for using technical terms. What I meant was that the number is almost certainly off from the real figure by a few percent. I shouldn't have said it that way because I didn't give a confidence interval in the first place.

Hmm, I'd say that's what you get for misusing technical terms, but I agree you shouldn't have said it.

In any event, I can see that you honestly see Gamespot as an acceptable sample size / diverse sample pool, so this conversation is relatively pointless. I can also see that you seem unable to convey your ideas without insulting the person you're conversing with constantly, and since I tend to be unable to stop from responding in kind, I'm really going to have to assume that this conversation is going to go nowhere, and just degenerate into insults.

If you want to grow up a little bit and respond without calling me an idiot, or saying how I can't stop from being an idiot, great, but since I have great doubts about your inclination/ability to do so, I'm going to assume we're done?

[tonnactus]

[quote]Alex_SM wrote...


There is too much ammo in this game,even on insanity,to make this an important part.

[/quote]

Also increases your destructive power. Squad mates using guns are really useless, using powers (not in auto, always manually) they become highly effective. 
[/quote]

I wouldnt call Zaeed useless...
Even if he didnt have squad disruptor ammo early in the game. That is better then overload anyway just for the fact you activate it once and could use it the whole mission. This game favor shooting instead of using powers. The dumb "protection system", the double cooldown(at least) squadmates powers have, the smaller range of powers. (3 m at best) Dissapointing for people who like power classes like the adept and the engineer.

The squadmates in the first game were nearly equal compared with shepardt when it came to cooldown times of powers(and weapon damage). Just look what they did to tali. A global cooldown system and a cooldown for the drone of 30s.

Retarded is an understatement for this.

[Ross42899]

Illusivestofmen wrote...

I thought all we needed were some more skills, weapons, armor and maybe a few more open world elements and it would have the appropriate level of RPG. The first one had really confusing menus and too many items and ME2 was a bit too bare bones. I think they will find a sweet spot between these in ME3.

That's what I hope as well.

ME 1 was good at the RPG elements but the inventory/menu was a complete mess. The skill system was okay IMO and I liked the diversity of the armor.

In ME2 the inventory/menus are much better and I like the weapon/armor upgrading system but for my taste the skill tree is way too small, there are not enough things to buy in stores (more armor components, weapons upgrades) and it's a big lay down that you can't upgrade your squads armor as well. Only be able to change the appearance of their clothes doesn't do the same. Also it's too easy now that you can hack things with every character. Was better in ME were it really mattered who was in your team. (so no tech expert on away team = no hacking, etc.)

I hope for ME3 they will expand the skill tree again and give us again upgradeable armor for squadmates and more things to buy. Also I hope things like hacking will again require either special squadmates or special character traits of you Shepard. But they should keep the invetory/menus clean and short like they are in ME2.

So the best would really be a combination of ME1/ME2 regarding the RPG elements.

[N7Pharoah]

Mass Effect 1 like leveling system

Mass Effect 1 like inventory management

Mass Effect 1 like love scenes

Mass Effect 2 everything else

[Pocketgb]

I can dig with that.

[Onyx Jaguar]

I can't. Inventory management would negate weapon choice in missions and would make things extremely trivial. Also the leveling system in ME 1 is overcharged because it has emphasis on leveling up accuracy which makes the difficulty curve of the game really really strange.

EDIT:  Basically it didn't really make the game easier in a sense it made the game easier to play which in hindsight is quite horrible.  I did not feel like in Deus Ex that I started out gimped and ended competent, nor Planescape, Fallout 1, 2 even 3.  Oblivion etc.

I think it kind of resembles Morrowind in a way in regard to hit and miss but Morrowind stayed the same through and through.  It got easier once you over leveled your weapons.  But it played the same.  

Modifié par Onyx Jaguar, 18 juin 2010 - 01:21 .

[Terror_K]

There's no reason they can't give us more items overall and more choice and more depth to the system and not keep it limited to the ship, ala ME2. To me ME2's problem wasn't the lack of an inventory screen so much as the lack of inventory entirely.