645 réponses à ce sujet

[bzombo]

to me, dao was an rpg. to me, an action rpg is something like diablo, which i like a lot as well. they all have their place. da2 looks a bit more action oriented, but i wouldn't classify it a full on action rpg. i think action rpgs trim out complicated storylines and character development to create a good old fashioned dungeon romp. those can be fun too. it's essentially what torchlight is, and that is also a cool game.

[condiments1]

In Exile wrote...

condiments1 wrote...
Nice try but this hardly addresses my point. To me, Capcom is actually correct in their assestment that DMC3 is an action game with RPG elements. However, by your definition wouldn't it be considered an RPG regardless of developer label? It has all the components of an 'Action RPG' as defined by you, so wouldn't that be the case?

I have no problem admitting ME2 is a TPS action game with RPG elements, but I hardly think that makes it less of a game. I'm just not going to stretch definitions to fit my favorite game.

You're mixing your neccesary and sufficient conditions. What slimgrin is saying is that for an action RPG, it is neccesary that the combat is driven by motor skill, but not that it is sufficient. You are saying that motor skill is sufficient to make something an action game. These are two very different  points.

Put another way, slimgrim says: if something is RPG and that something relies on motor skills, then that something is an action RPG; you say: if something relies on motor skills, then that something is an action game. These are not the same arguments at all.

More broadly, DMC3 lacks features that ME2 has. For one, Dante is a fixed character with no gender, background or appearance customization. Two, there is no interactive dialogue. Three, there is no variable outcome to missions based on player choice.

We can say that all of the above are either neccesary or sufficient for an RPG, and that affects our definition.

A lot of games traditionally classified as RPGs don't fall under this criteria, especially action RPGs(Diablo, Torchlight) and jRPGs(FF, Xenogears).

To me, regardless of its narrative interaction, ME2 is a TPS first and RPG second. I stated DMC3 as an example because it offers similiar RPG upgrade system and its widely considered as action as you can get.

[JPR1964]

slimgrin wrote...

[An action rpg can still have terrific story like The Witcher, or solid tactics like ME2.

Solid tactics???

That's a joke? Shoot aand duck all day long is not what I call a solid tactics...

What a pity to read that...

JPR

[gotthammer]

Well...shooting and ducking to advance IS a tactic. There wasn't really much room for maneuver in ME2, anyway; seeing as most of the missions were quite linear (tho', the same, to some extent could be said of DA:O as well).

(I do think your point is more about how 'easy' or 'simple' things feel...you try the same kind of stuff that Shepard does in ME1 or 2 in a game like the early Rainbow Six or Ghost Recon games and you won't live past the first encounter lol)



I guess it's just that it feels quite 'simple'.



Going w/ the ME2 shoot/duck-for-cover thing: wouldn't it have been more 'immersive' if, prior to each mission, you could do something, say buy or personally gather intel so you can get something like schematics of a location you were going to?

That and if each mission were like the 'suicide run', where you can split up your team/crew (I never did like that, every time I leave Normandy, or the camp in DA:O, people get left behind...it's not as if they seem to be doing anything: I never got a new gun crafted by Jacob, nor did Wynne knit me anything ), there'd be an 'illusion' of greater 'tactical involvement', I guess.

Wouldn't it be cooler if missions can have you directing the other half of your team to perform diversions or maybe help you set up zones of fire for ambushes/defense, etc.

Alas...

[Raxxman]

Sylvius the Mad wrote...

They both lacked roleplaying, largely as a result of the dialogue wheel and the PC's pre-written personality.

ME2 implements the wheel better than ME1 does, but gives away those gains with the abysmal interupt system, so neither is an RPG.

You still haven't actually defined what you class an RPG to be. I can't reason with your argument unless I'm clear on what you define as an RPG.

Lets go with Wikipedias first paragraph on RPGs;

A role-playing game (RPG) is a broad family of games in which
players assume the roles of characters in a fictional setting. Players
take responsibility for acting out these roles within a narrative,
either through literal acting, or through a process of structured
decision-making or character development.[1]
Actions taken within the game succeed or fail according to a formal system of rules and
guidelines

Using that description of an RPG, I feel that both ME1 and 2 easily fall into the catagory. You get multiple structured decisions that you as Shepard have to make.

In principle, RPGs should also have stat-driven combat, but I could that as secondary to the ability to roleplay, and ME and ME2 didn't have it.

What type of combat they have doesn't matter.  You could have a top-flight RPG shooter, but ME isn't it.  I don't think abilities, or levels, or any of the "RPG elements" people keep talking about matter.  It's the roleplaying that matters.

I don't actually agree, while what you say could be somewhat boxed into the last sentence of the wiki quote, stats driven gameplay is only one way to to produce rules and guidelines.

[Kevin Lynch]

Let's try to stay away from too much discussion about the definition of an RPG in general. It's been debated for many years and I highly doubt anyone is suddenly going to decide that someone else is entirely correct and change their views because of it.



Feel free to continue discussing DA2's anticipated gameplay features, though.

[tpryan01]

Hmm well I think the point here is figuring out what an action RPG is. Is't the definition of action and RPG at the core of that?

Edit:

I had another point here but decided to move it to another thread

Modifié par tpryan01, 29 août 2010 - 01:19 .

[Kevin Lynch]

tpryan01 wrote...

Hmm well I think the point here is figuring out what an action RPG is. Is't the definition of action and RPG at the core of that?

Unfortunately, no one is going to "figure out" what the definition of an RPG is, since everyone has their own idea and there's no concensus being reached. You can, however, discuss the "action" that Ray mentioned, how you anticipate it being different than DA:O, whether that's good/bad, etc. It's the difference between being too broad in chatting about an entire genre of games and narrowing the discussion to specifics of DA2 gameplay.

[Hollingdale]

condiments1 wrote...

Hollingdale wrote...

Yeah and you completely ignore the actual story that enables roleplaying when comparing ME2 to Devil May Cry as if though you've failed to notice the RP part of the term RPG which strikes me as kind of weird, hencewhy I suggested that perhaps you don't want ME2 to be called an RPG because that in itself is a form of denotion to those who hold certain genres above others. You may deny this of course, but why else you would be so eager to prove that ME2 is not an RPG when it obviously is?

And with a certain kind of people, I meant the kind of people who focus on labels and genres rather than the actual elements that they contain and are made up of. You know, abstractions rather than objects.

There are no storyline decisions to be made in games like Diablo 1/2 which is widely considered by many to be one of the best action RPGs. So...its not a RPG by your definition? Or the fact that jRPGs there is literally no story interaction on any level...

I could use the same argument against yourself, considering your insistence that Mass Effect 2 IS an RPG despite some discrepancies somehow implies that you hold the RPG label over others.

No dude, I'm fine with them being called RPG's despite the fact that they contain much less of what is classically thought of as RPG elements than ME2.  And yes you could use the same argument against me no doubt, but I think it's more likely that I unlike you support the notion of ME2 being an RPG because it  has all the qualifications required to be labelled as such.

I assumed we were discussing WRPG's, which require greater orthodoxy, but apparently you meant the term it it's broad international sense which makes your case even weaker.

Discussing whether or not things belong to certain genres is allways troublesome because people allways think of genres as logically built around precise criteria whereas they are in truth simply terms that risen from need.
As such, genres are more often than not defined by the subjects that are labelled by them.

JRPG's for example, would perhaps not be called rpg's if they were a new phenomenon, but because of the fact that they have been part of the RPG genre for a long they have come too be part of what defines it.

This is a common occurence with words aswell, lots of words lose and change their original meanings over time because people find new ways to use them. Is this wrong? Should humans allways invent new words new words instead? The truth is that it's pointless to ask whether or not they should, because they wont. Humans have allways preferred to tread into the unknown wearing familiar shoes, and allways will unless biologically altered.

You might not feel gay about this, and you might even think it's gay (notice the two different meanings of the word gay) but it's the way things are and as such it is meaningless to discuss whether or not something falls under a certain genres on the basis of nought but precise criteria when what actually in practice matters is more or less simply what is associated with it.

Modifié par Hollingdale, 29 août 2010 - 03:13 .

[AlanC9]

The thing is, that debate's sort of inherent in the thread. Aren't we all trying to figure out what the hell Ray Muzyka meant when he called DA2 an action RPG?

[In Exile]

condiments1 wrote...

A lot of games traditionally classified as RPGs don't fall under this criteria, especially action RPGs(Diablo, Torchlight) and jRPGs(FF, Xenogears). 

You are still missing the point. We are not talking about traditional classifications. We are talking about slimgrin's personal classification. So it does not matter what other people classify an RPG as.

To me, regardless of its narrative interaction, ME2 is a TPS first and RPG second. I stated DMC3 as an example because it offers similiar RPG upgrade system and its widely considered as action as you can get.

Which is fine, because it is your standard. What I saying though is that you have to recognize this standard is as idiosyncratic as any other, and if you do want to push an objective standard by popular appeal, you have to accept ME2 is an RPG by that standard.

[Sylvius the Mad]

Raxxman wrote...

Using that description of an RPG, I feel that both ME1 and 2 easily fall into the catagory. You get multiple structured decisions that you as Shepard have to make.

I would argue that the structured decision-making needs to occur throughout all aspects of gameplay - particularly in dialogue - and ME simply doesn't allow it.  You're not allowed to choose to have Shepard say things (or not say things).  You're allowed only to suggest a tone (an ill-defined term at best) and hope Shepard doesn't do anything out of character (which invariably happened when I played the game).

[sw33t nothings]

Holy crap guys, DA:2 was just called an action RPG! Time to incite panic!

Seriously, though, I've described DA:O to my friends as an action RPG. You can disagree with that assessment as well, but as slimgrin said above, it doesn't change the product. I've gone into stores and seen Micheal Buble albums filed under 'jazz'. I may not agree with that personally, but it doesn't change the fact that it's a Micheal Buble album, and I'm not gonna buy it. But that's the beauty of free will, it's all about personal taste. 

They could call Dragon Age any other buzz word under the sun and I'll still probably pick it up, but then again, that's just me.

Modifié par sw33t nothings, 29 août 2010 - 05:46 .

[Marionetten]

In Exile wrote...

I don't understand. If you're saying your special mental experience is the most important part to you, I appreciated that and pointed out that many people disagree with my position. I am just saying that a silent VO is antithetical to what I consider roleplaying.

I'm saying that roleplaying encompasses your character's reactivity and that having a player voice adds absoutely nothing to the world's reactivity.

If anything having a player voice makes you more of a passive participant. It certainly did in Mass Effect.

Modifié par Marionetten, 29 août 2010 - 06:00 .

[AlanC9]

Marionetten wrote...
I'm saying that roleplaying encompasses your character's reactivity and that having a player voice adds absoutely nothing to the world's reactivity.

If anything having a player voice makes you more of a passive participant. It certainly did in Mass Effect.

This confuses me. The world's reactivity can't be based on anything but the dialog option chosen. How could making a sound and animation play after the option is picked reduce that?

[TMZuk]

Sylvius the Mad wrote...

slimgrin wrote...

I thought the battles took excessively long, with too much downtime waiting for orders to be carried out. It's not surprising given my back ground with fighting/melee type games. I only got into rpg's much later.

Have you ever seen medieval combat?  It was slow.

An excellent cinematic representation of medieval combat is the 1981 film Excalibur.  And that's eactly how DAO combat felt.  And it was great.

Everyone should have to play Wizard's Crown before they comment on how RPG combat should feel.

Look here!

THAT is medival combat. Blindingly fast and wickedly brutal. If they were wearing armour but still using longswords (yes, that -is- longswords they are using.) they would have one hand on the hilt, and the other halfway down the blade, to get the power to punch through the plate.

Now, with that out of the way, can we PLEASE forget all comparisons between FANTASY RPG combat, and medieval combat? The only thing they have in common is that they use swords. A good fantasy rpg combat systemis a system that is entertaining. Forget realism.

Modifié par TMZuk, 30 août 2010 - 12:06 .

[Noir201]

Meh, lets wait and see it in action, if done well, it could be good, wonder if Bioware been taking notes of other type of action rpg like the upcoming Hunted : The Demon's Forge maybe?

[Sylvius the Mad]

TMZuk wrote...

Look here!

THAT is medival combat. Blindingly fast and wickedly brutal. If they were wearing armour but still using longswords (yes, that -is- longswords they are using.) they would have one hand on the hilt, and the other halfway down the blade, to get the power to punch through the plate.

Without armour (particularly heavy armour) that combat isn't even vaguely comparable.

Now, with that out of the way, can we PLEASE forget all comparisons between FANTASY RPG combat, and medieval combat? The only thing they have in common is that they use swords. A good fantasy rpg combat systemis a system that is entertaining. Forget realism.

I enjoy lower fantasy.  Realism is part of the entertainment.

[CoS Sarah Jinstar]

AlanC9 wrote...

Marionetten wrote...
I'm saying that roleplaying encompasses your character's reactivity and that having a player voice adds absoutely nothing to the world's reactivity.

If anything having a player voice makes you more of a passive participant. It certainly did in Mass Effect.

This confuses me. The world's reactivity can't be based on anything but the dialog option chosen. How could making a sound and animation play after the option is picked reduce that?

In the case of ME, its already predetermined anyway, you pick a tone and hope that the VO actually says something in line with what you chose. Hardly role playing in the sense that there's very little user controlled substance in the first place. Again I'll say it in layman's terms, having VO's implimented in the way ME does it  ≠  roleplaying.

[Theagg]

Sylvius the Mad wrote...

Without armour (particularly heavy armour) that combat isn't even vaguely comparable.

I enjoy lower fantasy.  Realism is part of the entertainment.

Add to that, without armour AND without the actual threat of dying. The video clip is a display fight,  and an example of martial art technique. As such, its still stylised

Its surprising how quickly 'style' goes out the window in combat that has imminent serious harm and death involved, where the opponent actually wants to kill you. Real fights get messy, get awkward, people tire and end up flailing.

[PSUHammer]

NvVanity wrote...

"finishes first bag of popcorn"

Gotta say i'm impressed how one article can lead so many people into rants/debate/BS-speculation over whether or not RPG has an A or C in the beginning for DA2.

"Goes to get second bag of popcorn"

Nerdiness at it's finest...

[Raxxman]

Sylvius the Mad wrote...

Raxxman wrote...

Using that description of an RPG, I feel that both ME1 and 2 easily fall into the catagory. You get multiple structured decisions that you as Shepard have to make.

I would argue that the structured decision-making needs to occur throughout all aspects of gameplay - particularly in dialogue - and ME simply doesn't allow it.  You're not allowed to choose to have Shepard say things (or not say things).  You're allowed only to suggest a tone (an ill-defined term at best) and hope Shepard doesn't do anything out of character (which invariably happened when I played the game).

I gotta say, what I feel you're saying is that ME is an RPG, but a poorly designed one. You don't have anymore real control in DA:O than in ME2, just the descriptions of what is about to happen is often clearer.

That's just the impression I gleen from you.

Anyhow I will agree that ME2 puts too much focus on shooting things.

[Hollingdale]

ME2 focuses on having a filmlike narrative and storytelling rather than roleplaying which requires constant suspense hencewhy the dialogue doesn't tell you exactly what's gonna happen if you pick one alternative because it would be repititive and dull to pick one alternative and then have to watch that exact alternative being repeated and acted out by Shephard. Furthermore you often pick a mix between actions and words in ME2, causing a scene to play out in which Shephard may say several things which could hardly be included in a text message unless made very long and again repititive and dull to read through. No, the only alternative to today's system that I can see increasing roleplay value would simply be one in which you are able to view (not only read) the outcomes of all available alternatives. The dialogue wheel would look the same as it does today only with an extra button for viewing rather than executing choices.



Of course suspense would suffer heavily (since you will get to view not only what your character says but also, to the extent that is necessary, it's consequences) as would replay value and a large majority would probably dislike this however it could easily be made entirely optional hencewhy I still think it could be implemented realistically.



Things get much simpler with a non voiced PC though, since it is simply assumed that he/she has spoken the chosen words. There is still repitition in the cases where you select actions instead of dialogue but theese tend to occur more seldomly because games with non voiced PC's are not (and can not) be filmlike in their narrative and storytelling.



The more I think about it the more I believe that the matter of having a voiced PC or not is what ultimately decides if the game will be a long game with lots of roleplaying or a short intense movielike one