735 réponses à ce sujet

[Stanley Woo]

When arguing the particulars of what role-playing is, and whether a given game or set of rules constitutes role-playing, some folks tend to forget that they are doing this role-playing within the confines of a videogame, one that has a set of rules and limitations that the player implicitly follows as he plays.



If the game is a sandbox game, the player quickly learns that he can travel anywhere and do most anything he wants, and plays accordingly.



If the game does not allow the random killing of any and every NPC on the screen, the player will stop trying to kill everyone on the screen (except, perhaps, as a laugh).



Ignoring the rules and limitations of the world given to you as a player is to resist playing the game, regardless of the scope of those rules or limitations. Even if the game allows you to play any character except Arvid the Tap-Dancing Squirrel, you would be actively resisting the game if you insisted that that is precisely the character you wanted to play. Arguing that that limitation removes/reduces immersion is silly when you as a player are the one disallowing yourself from suspending your disbelief.



Sure, you can say that having X number of choices for character customization is fewer than having 2X number of choices, but there is no quantifiable number of choices which automatically removes immersion or magically turns a game from RPG to not-an-RPG. You as a player either buy into the scope and limitations of the rules, or you don't. This applies to, among other things, the number of options available at character customization, method of presenting dialogue, and amount of sandboxiness in the game.

[PoopyStuff]

"resurrection of the great rpgs of old"



Yea... Remember when a party member would explode in DA, and you could not raise them..

or if your healer died, you had to bring her body to a temple...



Remember how if a party member died, you could raise them and put all their armor back on ?



Oh wait.



Now we have immortal party members, who don't ever die in combat situations.

And all have wolverine healing factors after battles.

[MerinTB]

In Exile wrote...

MerinTB wrote...
So, when the DM makes his adventure and decides that a certain Baron will not negotiate regardless of any player's Diplomacy score, thus chosing at that point that no player (including you) can negotiate with the Baron, he's limited your options and no matter how many times you "choose to negotiate" it is not possible to do.

There is no comparable analogy for a cRPG here. In tabletop, you could say, "I want to negotiate," and the DM could simply counter with "You failed, fight anyway." A cRPG might never allow you the option to initiate a negotiation.

Here is an example. A Cousland at the Landsmeet in DA:O cannot try to rally the nobles to win the crown for himself/herself and depose both Alistair and Anora. In P&P, this could be acomplished by the PC trying to rally the nobles, and being refused. In DA:O, this course of action is just outright impossible.

Yes, there IS a comparable analogy - I've given it, repeatedly.

The store bought module OR the DM created campaign.

Let me tell you, if a player said "clearly you designed this story to have us working for the king - well, I want to rally the nobles and make myself king" in my game I wouldn't go "you try and fail" , I would say "No, that's not an option."  And if the player pushes I would say "This obviously isn't the game for you."

When the odd new player in a game I run tries to be evil or tries to backstab the party, I might be generous enough to take them aside and explain to them why I don't run that kind of game.  If they push, refusing to accept the kind of game I run, then I tell them that they are out of the game.  Doesn't come up often, but it has happened.

You speak of a DM who's willing to let players try things, or even "fail" at things they don't want to happen.

That's not how I run my games.  It's not my experience in many other games, either.  And the ones where the guy running the game DOES let players go wherever, do whatever tend to not last long OR I leave (and they may still fall apart, I'm just not there to notice.)

In Exile, you are describing maybe how you've experienced the game.  And I'm telling you that "players being able to do anything at all regardless of the story the DM/GM has created" is NOT a requirement of a game being a table-top RPG.

Different DM's run things differently.

You can continue to say, until you are out of breath and no one is listening anymore, that "you could go buy a beach house and not participate in the overthrowing of the evil tyrant"... and I'll tell you that I can do that, too, in any cRPG.  I turn the game off and say that it happened, or I delete the one character from the party and decide that's where he went.
Because in my game, if you were playing a character that way, you would effectively be "deleting him" from my game and having to "pretend on your own" that it happened.

To be right you are setting up a specific scenario, a scenario that is not regular nor required for a table-top RPG.

I am putting forth a general statement about that cRPG's can be very much like table-top RPGs.  Not like everyone's, perhaps, but the general experience is the same.

And it goes back to my point way back at the start of this - anyone who says "cRPGs cannot recreate the table-top experience" either hasn't played enough cRPGs, or is thinking of such a narrow experience that I guarantee you there are many, many table-top role-players out there who've never come across it in all their years of gaming.

If people want to say there's no way to define an RPG (which I still argue is silly), I think those same people will have to concede that there is definitely no way to argue what a "table-top RPG session" is like.  There are way too many variations on what that experience can be.

[Morrigans God son]

I'm also disapointed! But hey, I don't have to repeat myself again. Which I just did....but it doesn't count...so.

[Meltemph]

MerinTB wrote...

In Exile wrote...

MerinTB wrote...
So, when the DM makes his adventure and decides that a certain Baron will not negotiate regardless of any player's Diplomacy score, thus chosing at that point that no player (including you) can negotiate with the Baron, he's limited your options and no matter how many times you "choose to negotiate" it is not possible to do.

There is no comparable analogy for a cRPG here. In tabletop, you could say, "I want to negotiate," and the DM could simply counter with "You failed, fight anyway." A cRPG might never allow you the option to initiate a negotiation.

Here is an example. A Cousland at the Landsmeet in DA:O cannot try to rally the nobles to win the crown for himself/herself and depose both Alistair and Anora. In P&P, this could be acomplished by the PC trying to rally the nobles, and being refused. In DA:O, this course of action is just outright impossible.

Yes, there IS a comparable analogy - I've given it, repeatedly.

The store bought module OR the DM created campaign.

Let me tell you, if a player said "clearly you designed this story to have us working for the king - well, I want to rally the nobles and make myself king" in my game I wouldn't go "you try and fail" , I would say "No, that's not an option."  And if the player pushes I would say "This obviously isn't the game for you."

When the odd new player in a game I run tries to be evil or tries to backstab the party, I might be generous enough to take them aside and explain to them why I don't run that kind of game.  If they push, refusing to accept the kind of game I run, then I tell them that they are out of the game.  Doesn't come up often, but it has happened.

You speak of a DM who's willing to let players try things, or even "fail" at things they don't want to happen.

That's not how I run my games.  It's not my experience in many other games, either.  And the ones where the guy running the game DOES let players go wherever, do whatever tend to not last long OR I leave (and they may still fall apart, I'm just not there to notice.)

In Exile, you are describing maybe how you've experienced the game.  And I'm telling you that "players being able to do anything at all regardless of the story the DM/GM has created" is NOT a requirement of a game being a table-top RPG.

Different DM's run things differently.

You can continue to say, until you are out of breath and no one is listening anymore, that "you could go buy a beach house and not participate in the overthrowing of the evil tyrant"... and I'll tell you that I can do that, too, in any cRPG.  I turn the game off and say that it happened, or I delete the one character from the party and decide that's where he went.
Because in my game, if you were playing a character that way, you would effectively be "deleting him" from my game and having to "pretend on your own" that it happened.

To be right you are setting up a specific scenario, a scenario that is not regular nor required for a table-top RPG.

I am putting forth a general statement about that cRPG's can be very much like table-top RPGs.  Not like everyone's, perhaps, but the general experience is the same.

And it goes back to my point way back at the start of this - anyone who says "cRPGs cannot recreate the table-top experience" either hasn't played enough cRPGs, or is thinking of such a narrow experience that I guarantee you there are many, many table-top role-players out there who've never come across it in all their years of gaming.

If people want to say there's no way to define an RPG (which I still argue is silly), I think those same people will have to concede that there is definitely no way to argue what a "table-top RPG session" is like.  There are way too many variations on what that experience can be.

The Dungeon Master controls all aspects of the game, except for the actions of the player characters,  CRPG's do exactly this(controls, not all the time but on multiple occasions, your character).

Modifié par Meltemph, 09 octobre 2010 - 12:53 .

[Sylvius the Mad]

[quote]the_one_54321 wrote...

By your definition there is no such thing as a game that isn't metagamed unless it's the very first time you play it and you don't have any information about the game at all before you start it. [/quote]
Not at all.  You simply cannot ever use that information.
[quote]In Exile wrote...

I think it has to do with whether or not someone is an internal or external person. To some people, it seems control over the character has to do with how much control they have over internal states.[/quote]
Yes.  Exactly right.

This is how I perceive the real world.  This is how I play RPGs.
[quote]I would go further, however, and say that imagining "off-screen" content is like writting up an extra chapter in abook and just stapling it in. [/quote]
If you were trying to control one of the characters in the book, this would be a perfectly reasonable thing to do.
[quote]I am refering to the fact that it is in fact impossible to have that line delivered in any other way but one.[/quote]
That's not a fact.  You're arguing that it is, but you have yet to demonstrate that.
[quote]In Exile wrote...

From a design standpoint, it is not dialogue that advances the game. It is reaching the flags and killing the neccesary enemies. To complete the game, the only thing neccesarry is to hit each flag. [/quote]
I was about to ask you why you're looking at it from adesign standpoint rather than a gameplay standpoint, but it occurs to me that you might think that since there is clearly this truth of progress from a design standpoint, that truth about what progress is must then be true from all points of view, as facts like that aren't mutable.

Am I right?

As I see it, the point of a roleplaying game is to roleplay, so roleplaying is the only reasonable standard of progress from the player's perspective.
[quote]No; I think misunderstandings are possible. Except that they are only possible when they can be addressed as such.[/quote]
Right.  Things are only true if you can speak them aloud.

And yet I'm sure you don't think the same is true in the real world.  After all, some things are true and yet you're unaware of them; that you can't speak about them doesn't make them not true.

So why the different standard of evidence?
[quote]So for example, I tell Morrigan that my friend always told me I was a big man. She interprets this as some sort of sexual innuedo. I consider a misunderstanding possible only if there is a dialogue choice that lets you address it. Otherwise the line was said and delivered straight, because otherwise I am forced to assume that there is no established reality in the game.[/quote]
You keep using words like "forced".  You were absolutely not forced to do that.  You choose to do that.
[quote]Consider the statement: "That was a great idea."

There are multiple ways to interpret this. It could be "That was a great idea." and you want to point out that compared to other ideas, this particular idea was great. It might be "That was a great idea." and you are sarcastic; your meaning was in fact that this idea was not great at all. It might be "That was a great idea." and you want to point out that it was the theoretical formulation that was great, whereas the practical application was not.

Giving me only the sentence, even with context, still does not mean I can always know for certain how the line will be delivered and interpreted.[/quote]
Exactly.  But since you're expected to select or reject that line based on only that information, that information must be sufficient.  If there is extra meaning you need added, you're the only one who can add it.

If you wait for the game to add it, then you cannot reasonably be said to have chosen the line.

I do find interesting that sarcasm is often used as the counter-example in these discussions.  I don't particularly like sarcasm, and I tend not to use it.
[quote]All of this is to prove that in fact, it is not the case at all that merely having the full written statement and the time to interpet it is not sufficient to say that you can have it achieve any intended meaning at all. [/quote]
As long as there isn't sufficient cause to say that it is impossible to achieve that meaning, then it must remain possible to achieve that meaning.

This is a place where an excluded middle is entirely appropriate.  Something is either possible or impossible, and there's no middle ground.  Since the rational default position is uncertainty, everything starts out being possible.  It would then only be reasonable to believe that thing to be impossible when it has been proven to be so.

It has not so been proven, and as such the rational default position of possible persists.
[quote]In Exile wrote...

There is no comparable analogy for a cRPG here. In tabletop, you could say, "I want to negotiate," and the DM could simply counter with "You failed, fight anyway."[/quote]
[quote]In Exile wrote...

My human male noble would (and could only) rally the nobles to depose both Alistair and Anora. This was the plan since Cailan and his family died at Ostagar.

But this choice is impossible. There is never an option to do this. The game simply does not allow it.[/quote]
This is equivalent to the game saying "You failed, fight anyway."

[STEllUS-Swei]

Lady light doorbell wrote...

How do you know that the RPG elements has been removed? Are you part of their team? No? I thought so...

Well the lead designer that quit bioware becouse it wasent DA anymore was ^^ read abit more mate

[STEllUS-Swei]

PoopyStuff wrote...

"resurrection of the great rpgs of old"

Yea... Remember when a party member would explode in DA, and you could not raise them..
or if your healer died, you had to bring her body to a temple...

Remember how if a party member died, you could raise them and put all their armor back on ?

Oh wait.

Now we have immortal party members, who don't ever die in combat situations.
And all have wolverine healing factors after battles.

Have to agree.
-------------------------------------------

Stanley Woo wrote...

When arguing the particulars of what role-playing is, and whether a given game or set of rules constitutes role-playing, some folks tend to forget that they are doing this role-playing within the confines of a videogame, one that has a set of rules and limitations that the player implicitly follows as he plays.

If the game is a sandbox game, the player quickly learns that he can travel anywhere and do most anything he wants, and plays accordingly.

If the game does not allow the random killing of any and every NPC on the screen, the player will stop trying to kill everyone on the screen (except, perhaps, as a laugh).

Ignoring the rules and limitations of the world given to you as a player is to resist playing the game, regardless of the scope of those rules or limitations. Even if the game allows you to play any character except Arvid the Tap-Dancing Squirrel, you would be actively resisting the game if you insisted that that is precisely the character you wanted to play. Arguing that that limitation removes/reduces immersion is silly when you as a player are the one disallowing yourself from suspending your disbelief.

Sure, you can say that having X number of choices for character customization is fewer than having 2X number of choices, but there is no quantifiable number of choices which automatically removes immersion or magically turns a game from RPG to not-an-RPG. You as a player either buy into the scope and limitations of the rules, or you don't. This applies to, among other things, the number of options available at character customization, method of presenting dialogue, and amount of sandboxiness in the game.

This is a fair question not to be taken as "Aggressive"

1) Did you play d&d p&p?
2) A Forced Role is not a true rpg It's An Action Adventure with a few  "hints" of rpg elements

DA followed P&P Rpg's from biowares D&D Days.
If one want to make an action adventure why not just make "Action Adventure" in the "DA" Realm instead of scraping what made DA the game it was.

You can afterall make both a "Real" Dragon Age Continueation & Make a Action Adventure in the DA realm.

DA2 May turnout to be realy good:)
I just thought it were a fair question looking foward to feedback. Thanks VWG S2

Modifié par STEllUS-Swei, 09 octobre 2010 - 12:33 .

[TheMufflon]

STEllUS-Swei wrote...

2) A Forced Role is not a true rpg It's An Action Adventure with a few  "hints" of rpg elements

So you're saying that two of the most celebrated CRPGs of all time, Planescape: Torment and Knights of the Old Republic, are in fact action adventures?

[Ryuguy93]

DaerogTheDhampir wrote...

What features were removed? It is just sped up combat and a slight change to how the camera works.

Possible spoilers
BioWare has said that was an Exaggerated part of gameplay by Varric

Modifié par Ryuguy93, 09 octobre 2010 - 12:41 .

[Shreav]

I think people should stop arguing about what a role-playing game is and just cut to the chase. People just want old-style NWN DnD system implementations.

[Vaeliorin]

In Exile wrote...

MerinTB wrote...
That's an example of where all that matters is what you say - and that Alistair is going to tell you something anyway.

I should have elaborated more. If you choose that line, Alistair always interpets it as an insult and you lose influence. It is not possible to deliver the line as a joke, despite the fact that you can deliver other lines about his intelligence as jokes. It is possible and arbitrary to determine when exactly the game decides to let you do this, and across playthroughs, it is never possible for any choice to mean anything other than one thing.

While I don't recall ever making that exact dialogue choice and therefore don't know exactly what Alistair's reply is, just because Alistair reacts negatively and you lose influence doesn't necessarily mean that you said it in an insulting tone.  Maybe he's just upset that he's trying to be serious, and you're making jokes.  I certainly know it annoys me when I'm trying to have a serious conversation and my friends keep cracking jokes.

[Shreav]

Vaeliorin wrote...

In Exile wrote...

MerinTB wrote...
That's an example of where all that matters is what you say - and that Alistair is going to tell you something anyway.

I should have elaborated more. If you choose that line, Alistair always interpets it as an insult and you lose influence. It is not possible to deliver the line as a joke, despite the fact that you can deliver other lines about his intelligence as jokes. It is possible and arbitrary to determine when exactly the game decides to let you do this, and across playthroughs, it is never possible for any choice to mean anything other than one thing.

While I don't recall ever making that exact dialogue choice and therefore don't know exactly what Alistair's reply is, just because Alistair reacts negatively and you lose influence doesn't necessarily mean that you said it in an insulting tone.  Maybe he's just upset that he's trying to be serious, and you're making jokes.  I certainly know it annoys me when I'm trying to have a serious conversation and my friends keep cracking jokes.

Applejacks.

[STEllUS-Swei]

TheMufflon wrote...

STEllUS-Swei wrote...

2) A Forced Role is not a true rpg It's An Action Adventure with a few  "hints" of rpg elements

So you're saying that two of the most celebrated CRPGs of all time, Planescape: Torment and Knights of the Old Republic, are in fact action adventures?

No absolutly not Loved Kotor etc.


But Kotor for example wasent made to be the spiritual successor of D&D As DA:O was.
It worked greate for kotor / Masseffect

But DA wasent made as Kotor / Masseffect etc.

But you have a valid point aswell.

We will have to wait and see time will tell to soon to drop the hammer

[Shreav]

STEllUS-Swei wrote...

TheMufflon wrote...

STEllUS-Swei wrote...

2) A Forced Role is not a true rpg It's An Action Adventure with a few  "hints" of rpg elements

So you're saying that two of the most celebrated CRPGs of all time, Planescape: Torment and Knights of the Old Republic, are in fact action adventures?

No absolutly not Loved Kotor etc.


But Kotor for example wasent made to be the spiritual successor of D&D As DA:O was.
It worked greate for kotor / Masseffect

But DA wasent made as Kotor / Masseffect etc.

But you have a valid point aswell.

We will have to wait and see time will tell to soon to drop the hammer

It's kind of why I am wondering why OP made this thread.  Talks like he already played the game.

I think it's reasons like this why we don't see gameplay footage for DA2.

[Kusy]

RPG hurrr durrr...

If you want NWN - go play NWN, if you want to play Dn'D, find some time to move your ass from the machine and play it with your mates... yes, preferably instead of whining somewhere on the internet.



Seriously, if someone would take and combine all the time spent on writing complain and whine toppics since this forum was created and give that time a shape, we could create a new baby that would live untill it's late 90ts, even if it would start smoking at the age of 15.



Oldschool RPGs are not playable anymore, fun as a reminder or nostalgia trips but come on - who plays Daggerfall now? Who can even launch it? Who can stand Fallout 1 and 2 combat without a groan? Who doesn't laugh at smiling enemies in Morrowind?



Come on "Oldschoo RPG diehard fans"! We can finish the hard part now... die already!

[Faz432]

iShreav wrote...


It's kind of why I am wondering why OP made this thread.  Talks like he already played the game.

I think it's reasons like this why we don't see gameplay footage for DA2.

If that was the reason then I would be extremely worried.

Great products stand up to the most intense scrutiny and DA2 should be no different.

I'm hoping for gameplay trailer by the end of the month.

[Shreav]

Mr.Kusy wrote...

Oldschool RPGs are not playable anymore, fun as a reminder or nostalgia trips but come on - who plays Daggerfall now? Who can even launch it? Who can stand Fallout 1 and 2 combat without a groan? Who doesn't laugh at smiling enemies in Morrowind?

Come on "Oldschoo RPG diehard fans"! We can finish the hard part now... die already!

I still play Fallout 2.  Probably the best RPG I've ever played.  No one plays it anymore?  D:

Faz432 wrote...

If that was the reason then I would be extremely worried.

Great products stand up to the most intense scrutiny and DA2 should be no different.

I'm hoping for gameplay trailer by the end of the month.

[smilie]../../../images/forum/emoticons/wizard.png[/smilie]

Crossing my fingers, bro!

Modifié par iShreav, 09 octobre 2010 - 12:57 .

[In Exile]

MerinTB wrote...
The store bought module OR the DM created campaign.

I should have prefaced this by saying I have never played a P&P campaign, ever. I don't even understand how they work. I exclusively play RPGs on the PC. I can only go off what others on this forum have said about P&P, and my impression was that they were some paragon of unlimited freedom.

If they are as limited as a cRPG, I'd be more than happy to grant that. To be honest, I am not concerned with how a PnP game works. If it is as limited as a cRPG, that's fine. My only concern is illustrating how a cRPG is limited.

Let me tell you, if a player said "clearly you designed this story to have us working for the king - well, I want to rally the nobles and make myself king" in my game I wouldn't go "you try and fail" , I would say "No, that's not an option."  And if the player pushes I would say "This obviously isn't the game for you."

Okay, sure. So PnP is highly restricted too.

When the odd new player in a game I run tries to be evil or tries to backstab the party, I might be generous enough to take them aside and explain to them why I don't run that kind of game.  If they push, refusing to accept the kind of game I run, then I tell them that they are out of the game.  Doesn't come up often, but it has happened.

You speak of a DM who's willing to let players try things, or even "fail" at things they don't want to happen.

As it was described to me, this was the entire value of PnP. Again - consider this the ignorance of someone who overstepped his area of expertise.

That's not how I run my games.  It's not my experience in many other games, either.  And the ones where the guy running the game DOES let players go wherever, do whatever tend to not last long OR I leave (and they may still fall apart, I'm just not there to notice.)

In Exile, you are describing maybe how you've experienced the game.  And I'm telling you that "players being able to do anything at all regardless of the story the DM/GM has created" is NOT a requirement of a game being a table-top RPG.

Different DM's run things differently.

Fair enough.

You can continue to say, until you are out of breath and no one is listening anymore, that "you could go buy a beach house and not participate in the overthrowing of the evil tyrant"... and I'll tell you that I can do that, too, in any cRPG.  I turn the game off and say that it happened, or I delete the one character from the party and decide that's where he went.

Because in my game, if you were playing a character that way, you would
effectively be "deleting him" from my game and having to "pretend on
your own" that it happened.

This is uncalled for. I have been as charitable as possible to your position. I do not think I have been rude, or otherwise dismissive. I would appreciate the same courtesy in return.

I am putting forth a general statement about that cRPG's can be very much like table-top RPGs.  Not like everyone's, perhaps, but the general experience is the same.

Right, but I don't care about what cRPGs are similar to. I misunderstood, apparently, how a PnP RPG works. That's my mistake, but it's irrelevant to the point at issue between the two of us, which is whether or not a cRPG allows for significant choice.

And it goes back to my point way back at the start of this - anyone who says "cRPGs cannot recreate the table-top experience" either hasn't played enough cRPGs, or is thinking of such a narrow experience that I guarantee you there are many, many table-top role-players out there who've never come across it in all their years of gaming.

We're getting very side-tracked. Again, I never intended to argue what a cRPG was similar to; I only tried to illustrate my position with respect to a cRPG through an example, which was apparently mistaken because PnP is potentially as highly restricted as a cRPG.

But I do not see how any of this demonstrates that there is choice. Which is the point at issue, again.

If people want to say there's no way to define an RPG (which I still argue is silly), I think those same people will have to concede that there is definitely no way to argue what a "table-top RPG session" is like.  There are way too many variations on what that experience can be.

Well, sure, but again, not the point at issue.

[STEllUS-Swei]

iShreav wrote...

STEllUS-Swei wrote...

TheMufflon wrote...

STEllUS-Swei wrote...

2) A Forced Role is not a true rpg It's An Action Adventure with a few  "hints" of rpg elements

So you're saying that two of the most celebrated CRPGs of all time, Planescape: Torment and Knights of the Old Republic, are in fact action adventures?

No absolutly not Loved Kotor etc.


But Kotor for example wasent made to be the spiritual successor of D&D As DA:O was.
It worked greate for kotor / Masseffect

But DA wasent made as Kotor / Masseffect etc.

But you have a valid point aswell.

We will have to wait and see time will tell to soon to drop the hammer

It's kind of why I am wondering why OP made this thread.  Talks like he already played the game.

I think it's reasons like this why we don't see gameplay footage for DA2.

Yeah it's abit confusing allrght.
Yes it would be totaly plausible thats the reason mate.

As for myself i was just wondering accualy hope theyll send some gamefootage soon though that could have been just a "Small" Focused fight for example with abit more dramatic touch of deph & feeling during that battle.

Modifié par STEllUS-Swei, 09 octobre 2010 - 01:01 .

[TheMufflon]

MerinTB wrote...

Let me tell you, if a player said "clearly you designed this story to have us working for the king - well, I want to rally the nobles and make myself king" in my game I wouldn't go "you try and fail" , I would say "No, that's not an option."  And if the player pushes I would say "This obviously isn't the game for you."

That is a limitation voluntarily imposed by your own group. It is not inherent in the medium. When playing an P'n'P RPG you can choose to play that way, when you're playing a CRPG you have to play that way.

Modifié par TheMufflon, 09 octobre 2010 - 01:03 .

[TheMufflon]

STEllUS-Swei wrote...

TheMufflon wrote...

STEllUS-Swei wrote...

2) A Forced Role is not a true rpg It's An Action Adventure with a few  "hints" of rpg elements

So you're saying that two of the most celebrated CRPGs of all time, Planescape: Torment and Knights of the Old Republic, are in fact action adventures?

No absolutly not Loved Kotor etc.

Yet in KotOR you were forced to play a specific character, thus by your defenition it would be an action adventure.

Modifié par TheMufflon, 09 octobre 2010 - 01:12 .

[Morroian]

STEllUS-Swei wrote...

But Kotor for example wasent made to be the spiritual successor of D&D As DA:O was.
It worked greate for kotor / Masseffect

Planescape Torment was made using DnD rules, is one of the most highly regarded rpgs ever and it had a restricted protagonist, even moreso than DA2.

[Shreav]

TheMufflon wrote...

STEllUS-Swei wrote...

TheMufflon wrote...

STEllUS-Swei wrote...

2) A Forced Role is not a true rpg It's An Action Adventure with a few  "hints" of rpg elements

So you're saying that two of the most celebrated CRPGs of all time, Planescape: Torment and Knights of the Old Republic, are in fact action adventures?

No absolutly not Loved Kotor etc.

Yet in KotOR you were forced to play a specific character, thus by your defenition it would be an action adventure.

To be honest, I think there's a lot of grey areas associated with what is and what isn't an RPG...

I mean, realistically, an RPG involves you creating your own character.  Obviously in KotoR you created a character, but the twist was that you were a SPECIFIC person with a history.  A great idea, but not following the usual mentality behind RPGs character creation.  It's kind of like playing PnP and then the GM, midway game, tells you, "By the way, your history and all that you ever knew is false and this is who you really are".

Of course, everything else about the game was pretty much RPG (combat system, dialogue and choice, weapons and armor, etc).

Personally, I reckon it's an awesome game.  But, is it a cRPG?  Well yeah.  Why, you ask?  Well, who's the GM?  The developers are.  And rule numero uno:  The GM is always right.

[In Exile]

[quote]Sylvius the Mad wrote...
Yes.  Exactly right.

This is how I perceive the real world.  This is how I play RPGs. [/quote]

If we are speaking of the external world, if you only grant your internal experience as a valid standard of evidence, then you run into the problem of justifying your perception of the external world. Essentially, you have the brain-in-vat dilemma.

Insofar as you want to meaningfully interact with the world, you have to grant as your standard of evidence the fixed and independent nature of the external world.

Applied to a video-game, this essentially gives you the following problem: the game world (i.e. all things that are not internal states of the player) are either real or not. If they are real, you have granted an external standard of evidence. Once you grant an external standard of evidence, to preserve coherence, you cannot assume (for example) that characters misintepret you unless there is the possibility to react to misinterpretation (in the same way it would be inappropriate to assume that you are in a romance with a character unless the option exists to romance them).

[quote]If you were trying to control one of the characters in the book, this would be a perfectly reasonable thing to do. [/quote]

Certainly, but you can see how that is honestly and truly fan-fiction.

[quote]That's not a fact.  You're arguing that it is, but you have yet to demonstrate that.[/quote]

I do not think I made that claim in a debate with you... I tend to be far less judicious when speaking to others, and that just does not sound a post I would address to you.

Of course, that is what I am trying to demonstrate. I am pretty sure with that line I was being rhetorical as opposed to analytical.

[quote]I was about to ask you why you're looking at it from adesign standpoint rather than a gameplay standpoint, but it occurs to me that you might think that since there is clearly this truth of progress from a design standpoint, that truth about what progress is must then be true from all points of view, as facts like that aren't mutable.

Am I right?[/quote]

Yes, in a sense. Essentially I think that when we are arguing about possibility, we are essentially arguing about what is alowed under the ultimate rule (ultimate in the sense that Wittgenstein would use the word to desribe a rule; I want to be very particular about this meaning) of the game. For example, we can envision a world (as a thought experiment) whereby the laws of physics are different than they are in our world. But the mere fact we can envision this, which is justified by a set of physical rules in our world (which are relative to the rules we are using in the thought experiment, meta-level rules), does not in itself mean that such laws are in fact possible.

[quote]As I see it, the point of a roleplaying game is to roleplay, so roleplaying is the only reasonable standard of progress from the player's perspective.[/quote]

I understand your position, Let me try to explain my issue another way.

Would you agree that, as we are fallible, we mistake a set of propositions that jointly entail a contradiction as not doing so? I would assume yes. So you would agree that the mere fact that I believe a set of propositions to not be contradictory does not mean they in fact are not contradictory.

What I am in effect arguing is that you are applying the wrong standard.

[quote]Right.  Things are only true if you can speak them aloud.

And yet I'm sure you don't think the same is true in the real world.  After all, some things are true and yet you're unaware of them; that you can't speak about them doesn't make them not true.

So why the different standard of evidence? [/quote]

In the real world, I am not restricted in my action.

Let me put it like this. For a certain mental state, we can say that certain actions are neccesary, certain actions are possible, and certain actions are impossible. This is not an unreasonable claim, you would agree, yes?

If I take some mental state in game, which entails some action, and there is some consequence, what can follow is a reaction from me to that consequence. If my mental state is such that it neccesarily entails some action, but that action in the game is impossible, suddenly there is a problem - a significant contradiction, which destroys the coherence of the game. It needs to be addressed. 

This is, in general terms, the issue with restricted choice. 

To apply it to specific case, it would go like this. I have some mental state in mind and pick some dialogue choice. I intend it to mean x. The NPC interprets it as y. This is incorrect. My reaction to this consequence is to attempt to correct it. But it is not possible for me to do so.

Since I cannot resolve the incohrence by assuming the NPC insane (because this still does not address why I do not have the option to take the neccesary action) I have to reject that the mental state. This is why I argue that writing dialogue in a cRPG has an associated mental state. Because it is logically incompatible with any mental state but that.

To describe it as an experience, I suppose the best way to put it is that the frustration you feel with VO, I feel with the inability to clarify a misunderstanding.

[quote]You keep using words like "forced".  You were absolutely not forced to do that.  You choose to do that.[/quote]

See my explanation above. I honestly do not believe it is a choice; no more than you would say any action that you feel is logically neccesary is a choice.

[quote]Exactly.  But since you're expected to select or reject that line based on only that information, that information must be sufficient.  If there is extra meaning you need added, you're the only one who can add it. [/quote]

That does not make sense. Why could it not be the case that I am expected to choose a line but not given sufficient information to choose it? This happens all the time in real life. In fact, having limited and insufficient information to reach an inference versus a conjecture is the fundamental epistemological problem we have.

[quote]If you wait for the game to add it, then you cannot reasonably be said to have chosen the line.

I do find interesting that sarcasm is often used as the counter-example in these discussions.  I don't particularly like sarcasm, and I tend not to use it. [/quote]

Sarcasm is often used because it is an excellent example of how two identical phrases (as written) are in fact non-equivalent. It illustrates that there are other considerations to communication over and above just the words used. This is, as an aside, an argument for why non-verbal communication neccesarily exists (or rather, that there appear to be non-verbal aspects to communication, their accuracy or comprehensibility aside).
[quote]All of this is to prove that in fact, it is not the case at all that merely having the full written statement and the time to interpet it is not sufficient to say that you can have it achieve any intended meaning at all. [/quote]
[quote]As long as there isn't sufficient cause to say that it is impossible to achieve that meaning, then it must remain possible to achieve that meaning.[/quote]

I would argue that, when taken jointly with the reactions of the NPC and the neccesary suppositions you have to make about the game for it to be coherent, it does in fact mean that it is impossible for it to achieve that meaning. Again, see the treatment I gave of mental states and dialogue above.

[quote]This is a place where an excluded middle is entirely appropriate.  Something is either possible or impossible, and there's no middle ground.  Since the rational default position is uncertainty, everything starts out being possible.  It would then only be reasonable to believe that thing to be impossible when it has been proven to be so. [/quote]

Indeed. But my argument is that we can, in fact, be certain about which options are impossible.

[quote]This is equivalent to the game saying "You failed, fight anyway."[/quote]

No, we come right back to the analysis of mental states I gave above.

There is no issue if the circumstances and NPCs are such that they (for example) refuse to be persuaded. These are things outside of my control. What is not outside of my control is my own behaviour. And as I argued above, if we suppose we have mental states and that these mental states cause our actions, we can quite plausibly have neccesary actions following from mental states.

If these neccesary actions are impossible, then logically, the mental state must also be impossible.