Sable Rhapsody wrote...
Funny that you bring up Baldur's Gate. My favorite game series of all time. And interestingly enough, what does it have? A single origin story where your backstory, childhood home, and even your family are predetermined by the game. An overall plot arc driven by your character rising to become the hero of the Sword Coast, then something more. A game that limits you a hell of a lot--your origin, heritage, general destiny, and even your party between BG1 and BG2 are canonized, and the overall plot is on one hell of a set of railroad tracks.
Or perhaps PS:T, in which you play the Nameless One. You start out as a level 3 fighter in a mortuary. The deeds of your past lives are completely set in stone. Your story is about discovering who you are, were, and will be, within a pretty narrow set of confines from the game, at least as far as origin and backstory are concerned.
How about Fallout? You start out as the Vault Dweller. You are human, have lived your entire life in a vault, and you're sent out into the world to get water. Can't change that either no matter what you do. No elves, dwarves, or mages here. And no, you can't start as a mutant. Boo hoo.
My point is that a lot of the most beloved old-school CRPGs share much more in common with the central plot conceit of DA2 than they do with DA:O; in this light, I find a lot of the complaints about DA2 very ironic. DA:O is actually relatively new and unique in that it gives you so many possible backstories. PS:T and Fallout are just as or more limiting than DA2, and the only addition customization BG2 has is that of race. And yet we love these CRPGs for the stories and characters they tell us, and it's absolutely true that limiting a few things at character creation allows the devs to pour more time and effort into the main plot.
Sable makes an excellent point here.
It is interesting to watch the discussion unfold. All kinds of ways to get our opinions across. Some more or less "violent" than others (I am not judging, just pointing out my observation). The question is just where our opinions come from, what is the source and reason. Most likely a mix of rational and irrational thoughts, behaviors, feelings, experiences etc. Which means we are dealing with something that is so personal. But what I like about Sables post is that it has such a clear idea, anyone can follow it and say "this makes pretty much sense to anyone". Still that does not mean that some people will not feel that DA2 in comparison to DA:O won't work for them. But again, ask yourselves where this disbelief comes from? Because there are so many examples of the past that show us that for a game to be great has nothing to do with expectations but with whether it is actually a great game or not. So, what defines that great game? I guess that is very personal. But I feel that the complaints towards DA2 are mainly based on nostalgic memories of past games that you actually cannot really compare with DA:O anyway, or a misdirected fear that I think is not based on enough information yet.
What is this worry about DA2 will be like Mass Effect for example? Just because of a dialogue wheel and a predetermined last name, which anyway is the case in DA:O also, Cousland etc.? It seems that Hawkes background is not more than what the origin stories are in DA:O. It has also been clearly stated that you are shaping Hawkes destiny and story. Just like DA:O. Instead of the Warden storyline we have a story about a man/woman but that does not limit itself in any way, worrying about that is just misdirected fear to me.
Oh, and my nickname is Discus.. It is like the sport Discus. Although I am aware and intentionally had it in mind that it relates to discussing, just never thought someone would mistake the name for the actual verb
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Discus..
And please do continue to discuss
Modifié par Discus, 30 juillet 2010 - 11:36 .
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