80 réponses à ce sujet

[dan107]

So it has been said in all the previews and confirmed multiple times by the devs that the story in DA2 is presented through flashbacks not from Hawke's own memory, but from the subjective perspective of several different narrators, who do not necessarily present the facts accurately. As Joystic succintly put it "The story you're playing is the story being told, not the story occurring in Ferelden."

The question is -- is that a good thing or a bad thing? On the one hand I applaud Bioware for finally going with a story structure that doesn't consisnt of a beginning, visiting 4 places in any order, and an ending. On the other hand, this 3rd person perspective seems like a very risky decision.

Feeling a connection to your character is crucial to player buy-in and enjoyment of an RPG. That connection is by no means a foregone conclusion, and is difficult enough to achieve even when every bit of the gameworld is presented from the character's perspective. To present the gameworld from an unreliable third party's perception of the character's perspective seems like an extra complication that's difficult to justify. I'll reserve my final judgement until I acutally play the game, but my gut tells me that this kind of presentation will lead to an unnecessary disconnect between myself as a player and my character.

Thoughts?

Modifié par dan107, 25 juillet 2010 - 02:18 .

[Arttis]

Lazy writing.

Easy way of getting rid of peoples complaints of why did this happen.And speculation and so on.

Almost as bad as saying at the end it was all a dream.

Thats enough of my opinion though.

[NugWrangler]

I'm still confused as to how this will be executed. When I first read about the framed narrative I assumed that when you were in control of your character that the choices you make are the true version of events. Then the narrator would cut in and tell his/her subjective version. That I would enjoy. But, it's also sounding like the opposite could be true as well. My character is who the narrator says he/she is and not who I decide they should be. That would be disappointing and I think would force people in to metagaming just to get a good outcome.

[Teh Chozen Wun]

It's actually quite excellent. I'm just giving my unbiased opinion.

I can understand why Bioware is heading into this direction. They want to tell a story that doesn't have limitations and doesn't require realism (in a sense). I'm quite fond of this idea, as Bioware will be able to create this sequel with as much imagination as they want.



Sure some people might not see it this way. Well then so be it. DA:O and DA2 are two entirely different games. Dragon Age is a franchise not a series. Wasn't that Biowares plan? To build a franchise? Games in a franchise tend to see changes from each generation. If you prefer DA:O then stick with it. Who knows? Maybe they will make a DA:O2. DA2 seems like it will be a fantastic game. It's just the community is being quite the thorn in Biowares side just because of changes. Change is good. That's why people voted for Obama wasn't it? Lol.

[Lord_Saulot]

To say "lazy writing" is outright ridiculous. An unreliable narrator is far more difficult to write than a straightforward narrative because there are multiple layers that have to be accounted for. If anything, this means the writing will have to be more difficult and complex.



In any case, this is very much in line with some of the decisions they made in the first game. Most of the codex entries were written as opinions by characters in game, and elements like the Chantry religion were always framed as a matter of "this is what is believed" in order to make clear the perspective element. An narration influenced by the interests of the narrator (is there another kind?) plays up many of these elements, which were one of the main things that Dragon Age had improved on over the D&D games that Bioware had done and made their franchise distinctive.



This is probably one of the elements of the game that I am most excited about.

[Arttis]

I say you are wrong.

Any writer writing up any story is showing off what he believes how the story went and so on.Its easy to exaggerate.Its easy to forget important info and so on.

Lazy way of doing imo.

Opinion.

OPINION.

Just making it clear.

[Vulee94]

Kordaris wrote...

Bad. I want to play a game with my character, not to watch some story of Game Masters Pet.

Play PnP...

[Rubbish Hero]

They should rip off Lord Of The rings.

http://www.youtube.com/watch

Modifié par Rubbish Hero, 25 juillet 2010 - 03:37 .

[Brockololly]

It depends on how they approach it. If we only get the narrator's exaggerated, maybe-maybe not view of Hawke, that potentially throws a wall up between the player and the PC, inhibiting my ability to give a damn about Hawke. If we're just playing as Hawke in some imaginary tall tale, does anything we do as Hawke then really matter in those flashbacks? As a player I don't want to get the rug pulled out from under me when the game switches to present day at the end to meet Hawke and realize everything I was playing in the flashbacks was a conflated lie by the narrator and Hawke is nothing like I was playing.

Conversely, if we play in a "legend" mode for Hawke like the Comic Con demo, do we play that section again in the "factual" mode so we know what really happened?

Thats what could bother me- in a player driven RPG like Origins or most BioWare games, any time the narrative starts ripping control away from the player, I think thats a bad thing. Sure, the Plot Hammer needs to fall every now and again to move things forward but I just want some reassurance that when I'm playing as Hawke, my actions actually matter and aren't just some byproduct of Varric's over active imagination. Narrative cleverness works in movies and books as they're a much more passive experience than an RPG dictated by player choice.

Personally, I like the premise of DA as being a more grounded fantasy world, where you're not doing anime leaps and every stab at an enemy causes them to explode into giblets. If they limit the "legend" parts to make them clearly stand out, thats ok. As for the narrator, I don't want the narrator interfering when I'm playing as Hawke- if they limit the narrator to a usage like in Baldur's Gate where you get the narration at the beginning and end of chapters, that would be fine.

And BioWare should absolutely bring back the BG2 narrator- that guy was awesome.

Modifié par Brockololly, 25 juillet 2010 - 03:53 .

[Artemis_Entrari]

Brockololly wrote...

It depends on how they approach it. If we only get the narrator's exaggerated, maybe-maybe not view of Hawke, that potentially throws a wall up between the player and the PC, inhibiting my ability to give a damn about Hawke. If we're just playing as Hawke in some imaginary tall tale, does anything we do as Hawke then really matter in those flashbacks? As a player I don't want to get the rug pulled out from under me when the game switches to present day at the end to meet Hawke and realize everything I was playing in the flashbacks was a conflated lie by the narrator and Hawke is nothing like I was playing.

Conversely, if we play in a "legend" mode for Hawke like the Comic Con demo, do we play that section again in the "factual" mode so we know what really happened?

Thats what could bother me- in a player driven RPG like Origins or most BioWare games, any time the narrative starts ripping control away from the player, I think thats a bad thing. Sure, the Plot Hammer needs to fall every now and again to move things forward but I just want some reassurance that when I'm playing as Hawke, my actions actually matter and aren't just some byproduct of Varric's over active imagination. Narrative cleverness works in movies and books as they're a much more passive experience than an RPG dictated by player choice.

Personally, I like the premise of DA as being a more grounded fantasy world, where you're not doing anime leaps and every stab at an enemy causes them to explode into giblets. If they limit the "legend" parts to make them clearly stand out, thats ok. As for the narrator, I don't want the narrator interfering when I'm playing as Hawke- if they limit the narrator to a usage like in Baldur's Gate where you get the narration at the beginning and end of chapters, that would be fine.

And BioWare should absolutely bring back the BG2 narrator- that guy was awesome.

The bold parts are what concern me, as well.  My worry is that with this narrative style, we're going to lose whatever "freedom" and "choice" BioWare says we'll have.

Example one: say at one point in the game I choose to intimidate one store keeper into giving me discounts at his store.  But the narrator at the time embellishes that action to "Hawke put the fear of the Maker into the entire village, making them fear to even come out of their homes".  In this case, my "good" Hawke did one slightly questionable act, but the narrator turns it into a case of "evil" Hawke terrorizing the village.

Or

Exampe two: An even bigger fear is the narrator at the time has a pre-determined way he's telling the story, and no matter what I do he sticks to his version.  For instance using an example from DA:O, say I chose to have the werewolves and the elves parlay and come to a peaceful solution, will the narrator decide that in actuality what happened was I sided with the elves, since the werewolves are no longer there (thus assuming I killed the werewolves, instead of actually freeing them from the curse and allowing them to leave the area as humans)?

Either of the above could turn a game about "choice" into a game about giving the player false choices that don't actually matter.  Hopefully it's not a case of "the PC can choose to solve quests any way he/she wants, but we already have a pre-determined outcome for each task that the narrator will describe regardless of player action".

Edit: The other possible problem, if the "action" is determined by who the narrator at the time is, is it could really disconnect you from the story and it'll seem like you're playing multiple versions of Hawke.

For example, if the narrator is over-the-top and likes to embellish, suddenly Hawke's Superman and can slice through an ogre with his pinky fingernail.  Then when it jumps to the next narrator, who may be more conservative, and I'll be wondering why Hawke's no longer super-human.

I don't know if that can be pulled off without it seeming like you're playing different characters throughout the game, depending on who the narrator is at the time.

Modifié par Artemis_Entrari, 25 juillet 2010 - 04:29 .

[dan107]

Lord_Saulot wrote...
In any case, this is very much in line with some of the decisions they made in the first game. Most of the codex entries were written as opinions by characters in game, and elements like the Chantry religion were always framed as a matter of "this is what is believed" in order to make clear the perspective element.

There is a crucial difference though, in that what you read about the Chantry as a player is the same information that your character has access to. It's not as if your character was there to know exactly what happened and you as a player are being kept in the dark.

However, in DA2 it seems like things that happen to your character, things that he should be intimately familiar with are presented as a matter of "this is what is believed". It's that disconnect that's concerning.

[Lord_Saulot]

dan107 wrote...

Lord_Saulot wrote...
In any case, this is very much in line with some of the decisions they made in the first game. Most of the codex entries were written as opinions by characters in game, and elements like the Chantry religion were always framed as a matter of "this is what is believed" in order to make clear the perspective element.

There is a crucial difference though, in that what you read about the Chantry as a player is the same information that your character has access to. It's not as if your character was there to know exactly what happened and you as a player are being kept in the dark.

However, in DA2 it seems like things that happen to your character, things that he should be intimately familiar with are presented as a matter of "this is what is believed". It's that disconnect that's concerning.

Good point.  I guess that that doesn't really bother me, though I can understand that it bothers others.  I'm quite curious as to how it will be handled.

[mildmort]

I think Hawke's code of acts does not basically change.
If it looks as legendary or different at times, he should explain.
But to explain and to avoid interfering or spoiling, sometimes it might limits his explanation.
Also there are limits caused by his ability. I'm sorry.

Modifié par mildmort, 25 juillet 2010 - 05:17 .

[DA Trap Star]

I think its good, unreliable makes the user get more freedom with his choices to change the story.

If the storyteller was reliable, the game would have to be very linear.

[Brockololly]

dan107 wrote...

Lord_Saulot wrote...
In any case, this is very much in line with some of the decisions they made in the first game. Most of the codex entries were written as opinions by characters in game, and elements like the Chantry religion were always framed as a matter of "this is what is believed" in order to make clear the perspective element.

There is a crucial difference though, in that what you read about the Chantry as a player is the same information that your character has access to. It's not as if your character was there to know exactly what happened and you as a player are being kept in the dark.

However, in DA2 it seems like things that happen to your character, things that he should be intimately familiar with are presented as a matter of "this is what is believed". It's that disconnect that's concerning.

Exactly- In Origins things like the codex were left vague, but the player knew they were just that. Everything your Warden was doing was being seen first hand- the events were transpiring as they happened. If something was unexplained or vague you knew thats just how the event played out.

The thing with DA2 and the narrator is that if some crazy thing like the Urn of Sacred Ashes quest plays out, how are we to know that maybe the Guardian speaking wasn't just dreamed up by the narrator? In Origins thats a very mystical, far fetched scene, but as the player you knew that it actually happened but the reasoning for all of the stuff surrounding the Ashes was left up to you- maybe it was just magical lyrium, maybe it was the divinity of the Maker.

Yet with DA2, the narrator potentially adds another lens to look through onto the events of Hawke- we're no longer seeing the events as they occur in real time, we're getting someone's interpretations of the events, or thats my impression thus far. It just seems like it could potentially create even more disconnect between the player and the PC and takes even more agency away from the player's actions and choices. We're at the whim of the narrator and not really in control.

Modifié par Brockololly, 25 juillet 2010 - 05:21 .

[mildmort]

As I have seen events have been explained many different viewpoints.

Juts to add some of mine won't harm.

[Valente11]

Arttis wrote...

I say you are wrong.
Any writer writing up any story is showing off what he believes how the story went and so on.Its easy to exaggerate.Its easy to forget important info and so on.
Lazy way of doing imo.
Opinion.
OPINION.
Just making it clear.

your opinion gives me the opinion that you are unfamiliar with writing and storytelling in general. Also, your opinion is misinformed seeing as you have no idea as to what the actual motives or process of writing the story is, so it's actual more of a theory, and a bad one.


OP: I like the concept. If executed well, it could make for a refreshing way to tell a story.

[mildmort]

I don't know the process of writing.

Even so, I saw sometimes being a narrator an actual playing player could be a problem.

For the narrator should know as many as possible while as a player the narrator want to avoid spoilers.

[Hawksblud]

I think it would be pretty epic if we have Hawke accidentally killing the evil Lord who's been terrorizing Kirkwall, a la Zevran's 'lucky' assassinations, while meanwhile the voiceover is telling of Hawke's noble planning and courage. And meanwhile, the player is laughing because he/she knows that it was all circumstance. Because that's the way these things happen, stories get told and mistold. Anyone ever watched Firefly and seen Jayne's Town? Same principle.

[mildmort]

Of course if it satisfies the narrator's story telling motives, no problem, I think.

[Roland Aseph]

I don't want to be forced to play someone else's Narrative, the whole "they may not be remembering events correctly or clearly" is just a chaotic mis-mash of possibilities.



I want a setting and a character (or characters) that I guide through that setting.



I don't want to be playing someone else's Fable!

[Arttis]

Valente11 wrote...

Arttis wrote...

I say you are wrong.
Any writer writing up any story is showing off what he believes how the story went and so on.Its easy to exaggerate.Its easy to forget important info and so on.
Lazy way of doing imo.
Opinion.
OPINION.
Just making it clear.

your opinion gives me the opinion that you are unfamiliar with writing and storytelling in general. Also, your opinion is misinformed seeing as you have no idea as to what the actual motives or process of writing the story is, so it's actual more of a theory, and a bad one.


OP: I like the concept. If executed well, it could make for a refreshing way to tell a story.

I disagree with it being bad and misinformed.