180 réponses à ce sujet

[Nerevar-as]

The interrupt system from ME?

[Bryy_Miller]

That wouldn't work in DA2 (well, maybe a little), since there will be no morality meter.

[hagren]

David Gaider wrote...

term8 wrote...
All of Mr.Gaider's posts on this thread have me really really excited about the new dialog system. the pc voice actors must have had to record a record number of lines for this game.

Sweet Jesus, you have no idea.

If you don't mind my asking, how on earth is BioWare able to pull off this game until March 2011 without cutting features and content left and right (Or dying from exhaustion)?

[Altima Darkspells]

hagren wrote...

David Gaider wrote...

term8 wrote...
All of Mr.Gaider's posts on this thread have me really really excited about the new dialog system. the pc voice actors must have had to record a record number of lines for this game.

Sweet Jesus, you have no idea.

If you don't mind my asking, how on earth is BioWare able to pull off this game until March 2011 without cutting features and content left and right (Or dying from exhaustion)?

Probably by cutting features and content.

Remember, we really haven't been show all that much.  The major differences are the changes for the console, and we can assume they've been working on that ever since they decided DAO should be on the PS3 and Xbox 360.

Frankly, I'll be (pleasantly) surprised if DA2 is thirty hours long without resorting to massive expanses of filler combat and dungeons.

[slikster]

"Hawke is a two-handed sword user for this demo, and he is able to dish out some serious damage with abilities like Whirlwind."

"...when the narrator offers a more honest account of Hawk's escape from Lothering. This time around, it's much harder to bring down the Darkspawn, and he lacks abilities like Whirlwind."



Am I to read this as we don't pick our talents anymore? We just pick the kind of warrior we want and everything is already set for them? That would be a huge deal breaker.

[Maverick827]

slikster wrote...

"Hawke is a two-handed sword user for this demo, and he is able to dish out some serious damage with abilities like Whirlwind."
"...when the narrator offers a more honest account of Hawk's escape from Lothering. This time around, it's much harder to bring down the Darkspawn, and he lacks abilities like Whirlwind."

Am I to read this as we don't pick our talents anymore? We just pick the kind of warrior we want and everything is already set for them? That would be a huge deal breaker.

That is exactly what that says.  Congrats.

[Altima Darkspells]

slikster wrote...

"Hawke is a two-handed sword user for this demo, and he is able to dish out some serious damage with abilities like Whirlwind."
"...when the narrator offers a more honest account of Hawk's escape from Lothering. This time around, it's much harder to bring down the Darkspawn, and he lacks abilities like Whirlwind."

Am I to read this as we don't pick our talents anymore? We just pick the kind of warrior we want and everything is already set for them? That would be a huge deal breaker.

The first part of the demo is Varric embellishing the events.  It's most likely an introduction into the combat, complete with tutorials and whatnot.

Odds are, they made the character super-strong, gave him end-game level abilities, and let the players have at weak little enemies.

Then Cassandra calls Varric out, and thus begins the 'real' game, with your every day, normal abilities, instead of your complete epicness.  Or whatever.

Remember, Iconic Hawke is manly, a warrior, and uses a two-handed sword, like Iconic Shepard is an assault rifle wielding vanguard.

[David Gaider]

tmp7704 wrote...
Just curious, but since the whole range of available options has to be recorded anyway, why take the direct control away from the player during these "action" cases and force them to work through such system? You have the icon system to indicate the tone of response so it's not like you can't show "threaten (jokingly) and "threaten (aggressive)" as available choices rather than just "threaten (and try to guess what personality your Hawke has at the given moment)"

Because if you have even two action options, that's already six entries you'd need to display on the GUI-- which was already our limit, even with DAO. And that ignores any questions you might want to ask, and God forbid you might want to add a third action option or more.

I don't think the differences between the options are as drastically different as you seem to think. Remember that you still have the paraphrase there to tell you what the gist of the action will be.

Perhaps i have difficulty of getting what exactly is benefit here, since i tend to pick tone of responses on case by case basis and a system which tries to second-guess me and presume based on (generally very much unrelated) choices made in the past without taking into account the targets of these previous choices, the circumstances etc.... feels pretty much like something that's just going to get in the way and add an extra layer between the player and the character they're supposed to control.

And you still have the option to pick the tone of your responses-- on the personality choices. With the action choices you're getting your intended action and possibly motivation (if it makes a difference)-- the dominant tone just determines how it's expressed. So, yes, sometimes you will say "no" diplomaticaly and other times be curt... but that's based on the choices you've made so far. The alternative (as it was in DAO) would be to simply not have those other choices available at all and have the choices all take one tone. Possibly this comes with it's own problems? We'll see. But the idea is to be more reactive to your choices instead of having you assume one personality, which I assume is the basis of most people's concern with the system to begin with.

[David Gaider]

slikster wrote...
Am I to read this as we don't pick our talents anymore? We just pick the kind of warrior we want and everything is already set for them? That would be a huge deal breaker.

Umm... no. That's for whatever character they were playing. You can be a mage or rogue as well, remember? And you'll be creating your character and choosing your talents-- what you're seeing in the "fake" version is an amped-up version of yourself.

[slikster]

David Gaider wrote...
Umm... no. That's for whatever character they were playing. You can be a mage or rogue as well, remember? And you'll be creating your character and choosing your talents-- what you're seeing in the "fake" version is an amped-up version of yourself.

That's not exactly what I meant, replace "kind of warrior" with "character subtype." i.e. two handed warrior/duel wield rouge, etc.

[RunNeonTiger]

slikster wrote...

David Gaider wrote...
Umm... no. That's for whatever character they were playing. You can be a mage or rogue as well, remember? And you'll be creating your character and choosing your talents-- what you're seeing in the "fake" version is an amped-up version of yourself.

That's not exactly what I meant, replace "kind of warrior" with "character subtype." i.e. two handed warrior/duel wield rouge, etc.

I don't think that will be the case. The statement was sort of worded awkwardly. What I got from it is that in the real scenario, you will have all the talents and things you picked out yourself, but in the exaggerated scenario you will have stronger moves from whatever talents trees you're picking. The Hawke they were using was a dual-wielder so it makes sense that he would have Whirlwind.

[tmp7704]

David Gaider wrote...

Because if you have even two action options, that's already six entries you'd need to display on the GUI-- which was already our limit, even with DAO. And that ignores any questions you might want to ask, and God forbid you might want to add a third action option or more.

I thought the questions were getting their own alternate wheel to which the player could switch... but anyway, hmm so basically, the conversation system UI wasn't exactly designed with this sort of functionality in mind, and this personality-tracking thing is there to allow somewhat fit the square peg into round hole?   Guess i can see sense in such work-around then, an alternative of changing the UI so the options and tone could be selected in some semi-independent manner could probably wind up too confusing.

So, yes, sometimes you will say "no" diplomaticaly and other times be curt... but that's based on the choices you've made so far.

Yup, i just don't see this system mesh very well with the way i tend to play, hence the concern. But considering this is enhancement from having single pre-defined approach it's a welcome development, overall. Just hoping it can eventually be brought to point where the player is given control over this aspect of conversation, too*. Maybe in DA3?

*) i mean, more direct and immediate control than just picking their "flavour responses" and hoping the math of determining the "dominant personality" works out down the road

Modifié par tmp7704, 19 août 2010 - 01:06 .

[David Gaider]

tmp7704 wrote...
I thought the questions were getting their own alternate wheel to which the player could switch...

They are-- but you still need the 9-o'clock spot on the wheel to direct you to the question wheel... leaving you 5 options left for other stuff. Even if it didn't, there'd stil be only six spots total. That's how many we had in Origins, but then there was no way for us to offer three tones for every action you selected there, either. This is intended to offer you more variety than Origins, based on your choices.

Yup, i just don't see this system mesh very well with the way i tend to play, hence the concern. But considering this is enhancement from having single pre-defined approach it's a welcome development, overall. Just hoping it can eventually be brought to point where the player is given control over this aspect of conversation, too*. Maybe in DA3?

*) i mean, more direct and immediate control than just picking their "flavour responses" and hoping the math of determining the "dominant personality" works out down the road

Well, I'm not sure what you're picturing but you're not going to see every action option work this way. For someone who's concerned about picking the tone for every option, yes, that's not going to be optimal-- but then, as you point out, neither is having a single tone with no other choices. We'll see how this pans out, but I think if we're going to have a voiced PC we may as well offer the player a chance to inject some life into him/her.

Modifié par David Gaider, 19 août 2010 - 01:17 .

[NICKjnp]

David Gaider wrote...

tmp7704 wrote...
I thought the questions were getting their own alternate wheel to which the player could switch...

They are-- but you still need the 9-o'clock spot on the wheel to direct you to the question wheel... leaving you 5 options left for other stuff. Even if it didn't, there'd stil be only six spots total. That's how many we had in Origins, but then there was no way for us to offer three tones for every action you selected there, either. This is intended to offer you more variety than Origins, based on your choices.

Yup, i just don't see this system mesh very well with the way i tend to play, hence the concern. But considering this is enhancement from having single pre-defined approach it's a welcome development, overall. Just hoping it can eventually be brought to point where the player is given control over this aspect of conversation, too*. Maybe in DA3?

*) i mean, more direct and immediate control than just picking their "flavour responses" and hoping the math of determining the "dominant personality" works out down the road

Well, I'm not sure what you're picturing but you're not going to see every action option work this way. For someone who's concerned about picking the tone for every option, yes, that's not going to be optimal-- but then, as you point out, neither is having a single tone with no other choices. We'll see how this pans out, but I think if we're going to have a voiced PC we may as well offer the player a chance to inject some life into him/her.

Is there anyway you can tell us what class Hawke was in that video?  He seemed to be an Arcane Warrior/Blood Mage to me.  Is he either of those in the trailer?

[Morroian]

hagren wrote...

If you don't mind my asking, how on earth is BioWare able to pull off this game until March 2011 without cutting features and content left and right (Or dying from exhaustion)?

1. The engine is largely the same.
2. By March 2011 they will have been working on it for at least 2 years given the PC DAO was reportedly finished 9 months before it was released. The delay was due to porting it to consoles.
3. It may be shorter but given I haven't fallen below 70 hours in any play through of DAO anything above 50 hours is fine IMHO.

[Brockololly]

As far as determining the "dominant" personality goes, does it just sort of keep track of the number of responses you had Hawke give using emotion X, tally that score and which ever "tone" comes out on top, thats Hawke's "dominant" personality?

I'm just curious as to how the "dominant" side would be determined for a given situation if say Hawke had 20 sarcastic responses, 10 angry responses and maybe 5 friendly responses. Assuming thats even how it keeps track, does it simply adopt the personality which has the most responses tallied up? So there wouldn't be a difference between someone with 50 sarcastic responses and 49 angry ones versus someone with 99 sarcastic responses and 1 angry one?

IF thats how its keeping track or determining the "dominant" personality, maybe if it simply utilized the percentages of past response emotions to generate a given "dominant" personality that could be more in keeping with the player's past actions rather than simply picking one purely on numerical supremacy?

So for example, if the player's past choices had him at 50% angry, 20% sarcastic and 30% friendly, then for a given moment when the "dominant" personality needs to be chosen, it generates the personality by kind of a weighted dice roll of sorts with the percentages affecting the outcome?

Yeah, that probably didn't make any sense...

[Fntsybks]

Brockololly wrote...

More responsive combat sounds good in theory- at least for big AOE spells like Blizzard or Inferno, seems there should be some casting time..Or some kind of significant mana hit so that you can't spam them.

My guess would be that they would have some sort of system similar to WoW's channeling, where you cast inferno immediately, and when the timer runs out, you stop casting. The only difference between channeling and the old system is that you cast during the timer in channeling, and after the timer in DAO

[UndercoverDoctor]

Zanderat wrote...

Thanks for the link. However, I saw nothing there to dissuade from the impression that this is a dumbed down version aimed at "Joe Sixpack".

Because those kind of people play RPGs right?

[David Gaider]

Brockololly wrote...
As far as determining the "dominant" personality goes, does it just sort of keep track of the number of responses you had Hawke give using emotion X, tally that score and which ever "tone" comes out on top, thats Hawke's "dominant" personality?

I can tell you how it works right now, with the understanding this is a system that's subject to testing.

The first time you pick a personality option, that's your dominant personality. That personality can "switch" the first time you total of any other personality exceeds that one by 1 (so if you then picked two different personality options after the first, it would switch). Each time it switches, the threshold you need to exceed the total by increases by 1... to avoid a feeling of schizophrenia (though the personalities aren't so divergent they feel like different people). So it's not quite as simple as just tracking the highest total.

IF thats how its keeping track or determining the "dominant" personality, maybe if it simply utilized the percentages of past response emotions to generate a given "dominant" personality that could be more in keeping with the player's past actions rather than simply picking one purely on numerical supremacy?

So for example, if the player's past choices had him at 50% angry, 20% sarcastic and 30% friendly, then for a given moment when the "dominant" personality needs to be chosen, it generates the personality by kind of a weighted dice roll of sorts with the percentages affecting the outcome?
Yeah, that probably didn't make any sense...

It makes sense, but I think it would be a little random.

The idea, as I said, was not to have the tones be wildly divergent in their outcomes-- so it's not as if you're unexpectedly punching Bethany in the face with one action option and sweetly patting her on the head in the other. This is just the tone of the option as it's written in the paraphrase. We use the tones here when we think it adds something extra. If we're in doubt, we default to the same "neutral" tone that DAO used.

An example: Paraphrase = "Explain yourself. Now."

This could result in "Start talking" with an aggressive step towards the target, "I think it's in your best interest to tell me what you did" or maybe even "If I were you I'd be talking as fast as I could-- but maybe that's just me?"

That's just off the top of my head... at the same time we could just opt for the neutral "Tell me everything you know" if we felt the tones used didn't really add anything.

On the other hand (and this is more likely, with my example) if having the target start talking wasn't really an action option and we wanted the guy to explain himself anyway we could just present all three tone options complete with their tone icons. It's a bit more elegant than the DAO solution, from a writing standpoint (which did, actually, force you into a set personality for the most part), with the context icons hopefully alleviating a bit of the trepidation some people might feel about their sense of agency.

Is that clearer? It might be something you'd have to see for yourself, I suppose, as we've nothing to really compare it to at this point.

[tmp7704]

David Gaider wrote...

They are-- but you still need the 9-o'clock spot on the wheel to direct you to the question wheel... leaving you 5 options left for other stuff. Even if it didn't, there'd stil be only six spots total. That's how many we had in Origins, but then there was no way for us to offer three tones for every action you selected there, either. This is intended to offer you more variety than Origins, based on your choices.

Heh, this thread got me thinking if there was a way to make something that'd be flexible but not too overwhelming... came up with this:



Basically the system from DA2 as i understand it, except with a twist -- if there's more than one tone option for the selected response, these options are shown as "tone icons" below the main wheel (can be more less than 3 options per choice and even more too, although i expect that'd drive the VAs insane unless reserved for some very rare cases) The currently selected tone is in colour and duplicated in the main wheel, other available options are greyscale. The "predominant personality" thing could be even used to pre-select the expected one i guess, and if player wanted to change it to another option they use either the shoulder buttons on the pad, or mouse whell or right mouse button, whatever. If there's only one possible tone to the option then the bottom icons just don't show up when that particular option is highlighted.

... okay so it's pretty much just excuse for more Varric. Still, wouldn't mind seeing that in some gome, some day

Modifié par tmp7704, 19 août 2010 - 01:57 .

[craigdolphin]

David Gaider wrote...
Ultimately, though, it's down to the writing. Trust us?

With regard to the writing, I have not the slightest doubt. You, Mary, and Sheryl will rock DA2 as you did DA:O. The personality system you're describing sounds intriguing. I'm looking forward to seeing/hearing it in action.

With regard to the combat, as long as the pause remains available, I trust you guys to make it even better than DA:O.

The animators are top notch and the new human models look great.

The new art direction for the 'barren' environments and the skeletor/darkspawn? Well, just not my cup of tea. I'll be buying the game despite the new art direction, not because of it, and hoping it doesn't detract too much from the larger experience.

It's true that people play Bioware games for the characters, not the environments. But as Tolkien understood perfectly, the world in which the characters live and breathe IS a character in it's own right. The visual expression of that character is what we see when we look at the environments. And right now, the environments look pretty darned dull. It's almost like you've cast Bill Gates as an action hero or something. I take some heart, though, in David's mention that we've only seen the blightlands so far. I am hoping that we see non-blightland environments soon and that the world of DA2 turns out to have some personality of it's own after all.

But regardless, I want to say I really appreciate the extensive and patient developer comments and explanation in this thread. Posts like these are the main reason for me regularly visiting this forum. So big kudos to David and Mike.

[Bryy_Miller]

David Gaider wrote...

The first time you pick a personality option, that's your dominant personality. That personality can "switch" the first time you total of any other personality exceeds that one by 1 (so if you then picked two different personality options after the first, it would switch). Each time it switches, the threshold you need to exceed the total by increases by 1... to avoid a feeling of schizophrenia (though the personalities aren't so divergent they feel like different people). So it's not quite as simple as just tracking the highest total.

That's really awesome, and it's going to give me fits 'cause I'm no good at math.

[David Gaider]

In case you missed it in the GamePro preview (or are avoiding it due to spoilers):

"Moral choices have been refined in that visual icons of your character's
dialog choices (like showing an olive branch for peaceful replies) will
create less confusion for the context of a reply, while consistency in
your character's tone will be reflected in battle cries and non-option
speech. I don't believe I've ever heard a sarcastic battle cry before,
but if you're glib enough during normal conversation, it'll start to
come out elsewhere."

This is another effect of your dominant personality: it will change elements of your soundset. So if you're picking the humorous options, as the previewer did, you're going to start cracking wise in combat (and other places).

[Dave of Canada]

David Gaider wrote...

This is another effect of your dominant personality: it will change elements of your soundset. So if you're picking the humorous options, as the previewer did, you're going to start cracking wise in combat (and other places).

Damn. How much dialogue is expected for Hawke? Hopefully you've got a voice actor that can cover all ranges of emotion.

[AngryFrozenWater]

Based on what Mr Gaider and others said this new dialog wheel might work and may be a welcome addition. There is one thing that puzzles me. From what I understand of ME2's voice acting the audio files take lots of space which limited the overall dialog options. If this new dialog system is using more voice acting per dialogue option will this result in even less overall dialog than ME2?

Modifié par AngryFrozenWater, 19 août 2010 - 10:37 .