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[TSamee]

If you can't be bothered reading this (I wouldn't be), just skip to the bold bit.
Alright, I understand that some of us are unhappy. I understand that many of us detest the Mass Effect dialogue system, and that the concept of a voiced protagonist in Dragon Age using it makes us angry. It is, after all, a controversial choice, it's guaranteed to attract some hate. What I don't understand is the constant complaints about character customisation. People are now likening it to Mass Effect, and saying Hawke is a replica of Shepard.

Sorry guys, but there's a fundemental difference that many of us are missing here: Hawke, Dragon Age's PC and Shepard are three differnt kinds of protagonist. Let me explain:

Your PC is fully customisable. You decide their backstory, their race, their looks, everything. But, because the only backstory you have is decided during the Origin phase, it's limited in its depth. You have no voice, no accent, no unique movements or quirks. You're simply the PC. In a nutshell, the PC is a way of telling a first-person narrative. Because you customise them and have a wide range of dialogue options, you feel that they are, essentially, you. The actual story of the game, however, isn't about you, it's about other people. It's about Alistair, Morrigan, Sten, Arl Eamon, Teagan, etc.

Next, Shepard. Don't get me wrong, I love Mass Effect, but I feel that Shepard occupies a pretty uncomfortable space as far as protagonists go. You see, you have the option of customising her/him to your liking, and can choose a very limited backstory for her/him. And yet, on the flipside, Shepard has his own voice, his own mannerisms. He's a mix of player customisation and defined character, and that's where the problem is. There's too much character provided by the voice-overs to make him seem like your own character, and there's too little backstory to make him feel like a fully fleshed-out protagonist either. He's the true focus of the story, and yet he feels hollow as a character. That's why many of us are disappointed by the DA2 announcements, because we're afraid of Hawke being another character that's too vocal and unique to simply be the PC, and without enough backstory or character to feel like a true member of the cast.

Finally, Hawke. Frankly, if Hawke was a Shepard-esque protagonist, I'm sure they'd let you pick a race. You'd have a fairly generic accent, one-size-fits-all, you'd pick a simple backstory out of a few choices with nothing but a paragraph of text summing up your entire life before the game. But my argument is that Hawke will be nothing like Shepard at all. All of Thedas's races have unique attributes and experiences depending on their culture. Hawke is human because his experiences are decidedly human, as are his emotions. That means that his past can't just be a paragraph, because it's not too much of a bother to write a paragraph per race. It means he's been given a full backstory, it means he's been given experiences. It means he has regrets and emotions of his own. In short, it means that Hawke is a unique character, unlike Shepard. Also, no "great central Evil", like the Blight, has been mentioned. Other than that, the only focus of the story can be Hawke, and his/her life. DA2 won't be about witnessing an awesome cast say great lines, it won't be about tagging along for the ride during the story. This time, you are the main focus for the story.
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Wait a minute here. Based on what we know right now, chances are that Hawke will be much more fleshed out than Shepard. Chances are that Hawke is the main focus of the story, and consequently BioWare have probably put a load of time into making him a deep, interesting character, no matter what choices you make during the game. This is what Mass Effect seemed to promise us, this time the player's a proper character, a member of the cast. This time your PC, your iteration of Hawke, will be just as important and relevant to the story as Morrigan and the Blight or Mordin and the Reapers.

So my question is: why, when given a change that will enhance the game's main focus (the story) are we getting angry? Personally, I'm this close to doing the fanboy dance.

[Stanley Woo]

Looks like there's a similar conversation going on in this thread that has more responses plus a Bio tag on it, so please take your discussion there. Thank you.



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