129 réponses à ce sujet

[1483749283]

Let me preface this by saying that I think DAO and ME2 have been truly masterful, genre-shattering achievements.

However, Bioware, there is a misallocations of zots when you develop these games. Just read these forums and the ME2 forums. The people are continually clamoring for more story, more depth to your characters. More interactions. More dimension to the romances. Just look at the reaction to the LotSB. Wouldn't some of the resources spent on creating endless hurlock/merc waves be better spent on story and character development?*

Now I didn't say do away with battles. Battles are essential. But having fewer, more challenging, more thought-provoking and strategically sophisticated battles is better. Have fewer battles, but make them memorable.

It seems ungrateful to complain given that at any one time, there is more story in the top Bioware game than in all other the top games combined. However, Bioware, you have shown us the light. We are asking for fruition. Bringing fictional characters to life in a way that has never been done before: that's where this whole enterprise is going. That's what's unique and revolutionary about Bioware.

I'm frightened to think of what it will be like in twenty years. Holographic NPCs so realistic that you can almost believe they're real people. Heck, I can already almost believe that your NPCs are real people. Have you ever met someone briefly, spoke for a few hours, and never saw them again, yet he/she keeps on cropping up in your memories from time to time? How is that different than a well-written Bioware NPC, I ask you? You are taking us there.

Edit: Highlighting some of the stuff I said below

What's unique about these games is interaction with NPCs. There is no other medium that does this. All the other games mentioned in this thread have cutscenes where you don't interact. In the Bioware games you feel like you are getting to know an actual person. And influence them. And have an effect on their future. Yes, I think they've pulled that  much off. It's frightening to think how much more immersive it'll be in twenty years.

Stories, characters are what last... gameplay is forgettable.

Which brings me to my point regarding character depth. The writers spent god knows how many months writing all these codex entries. Surely if  it's worth all that time to lay down the wonderful background, then it's worth putting in a little extra time to add insightful conversation? 

The fact that love interests have nothing to say to you after romance is  the prime example of incredible potential unfulfilled. Surely if you  have the time to write dozens of pages regarding dead elven gods, then  you can afford a little time for writing some insightful heart-to-heart talk between the Warden romancing Morrigan or Leliana? This really is my main point here.

I cannot play a game without a good story. I am happy enough feeding the machine's random number generator if it  means at the end I get one more quip out of an NPC. But battle for its
own sake... no thanks. Once you know the game mechanics, it's all really just mathematics unfolding... and that's not nearly as entertaining to  me as the human element.

The human element has been with us for milllenia.. all the stories of the illiterate bards of Greece, of
Finland... audiences sitting mesmerized in front of them in the dark of the night all those centuries ago. These games have taken that and moved it into the interactive sphere. Our time will be marked as the  beginning of the moment that we can take the old stories and interact  with them in a human way, rather than be passive listeners. And like I said that is frightening to say the least.

*I realize that removing 1 units of hurlock/merc wave may only yield 0.1 units of story, if you get my meaning. Perhaps the point I should be making, given that combat zots do not easily translate into story zots, is that given limited writing time, some of the non-party NPC interaction would be best cut, and replaced with greater in party depth.

The value of a line of conversation rises exponentially the closer you are to a character. The writing time, however, does not. Ergo, more writing should be spent on characters close to the PC.

Modifié par Pausanias, 10 décembre 2010 - 05:30 .

[RussianSpy27]

Plebeans in Rome wanted Gladiator fight scenes, Pausanias. Without a good chunk of those, DA2 would be the best story ever told (which I hope it will be by the way!!!!) which nobody paid for.

[slimgrin]

Don't agree in the least. Not even a little bit. They already strike a nice balance between combat and story. And then there's the codex for even more story. How much freakin story do you want?

This isn't Heavy Rain. This is a violent, brutal, story based rpg. With combat.

Modifié par slimgrin, 10 décembre 2010 - 04:28 .

[Sharn01]

How about more story and more battles?



One of my smaller gripes with ME2 was that there was too little combat and missions ended far to quickly, and this is coming from someone who thinks that player input and story are the most paramount things to a games success.

[Leonia]

I'd like equal parts story and equal parts combat, please. Shaken, not stirred.

[MIke_18]

I'm playing a game for the game-play. If the strongest point of the game is talking to NPC's well then the game fails, it's simple as that.



Besides it doesn't impress me anymore. It was fun maybe in Kotor. But after seeing it in every Bioware game i got sick of it.

[Tiax Rules All]

DAo was more story to battles.. I wouldnt want any more combat then that...



Too much combat is Hack and slash territory, Biowares specialty is story

[MKDAWUSS]

I can agree with what you're saying, but let me just add this variant. I would like to see more take place in civilized locations rather than long hours digging around in dungeons. You can still have pretty good fights and battles in civilized areas.

Modifié par MKDAWUSS, 10 décembre 2010 - 04:31 .

[MIke_18]

The Good thing about it, in Kotor and ME it was optional. In ME2 all i did was walk arround that ugly ass ship trough that damn elevator hoping someone might have something more to say about their boring lives.

[Thunderfox]

MIke_18 wrote...

The Good thing about it, in Kotor and ME it was optional. In ME2 all i did was walk arround that ugly ass ship trough that damn elevator hoping someone might have something more to say about their boring lives.

I think you're playing the wrong games then

Modifié par ThunderfoxF, 10 décembre 2010 - 04:57 .

[Brockololly]

You're seemingly assuming that it takes equal resources to compose a battle as it would be to put together a story/cinematic/dialogue sequence.



I think maybe you can have more meaningful, with respect to story, combat and not just endless trash mobs. Combat that has some story justification and rationale. But still, a good RPG needs a good dungeon crawl like the Deep Roads or a Watcher's Keep, IMO.

[In Exile]

Brockololly wrote...

I think maybe you can have more meaningful, with respect to story, combat and not just endless trash mobs. Combat that has some story justification and rationale. But still, a good RPG needs a good dungeon crawl like the Deep Roads or a Watcher's Keep, IMO.

Nope. Never. A good RPG needs a good swath of combat encounters, but IMO that's pretty antithetical to a dungeon crawl.

[deuce985]

The amount of story/lore/character interactions is more than enough...

More than any other games on the market today(except MGS). This is a GAME, not a movie. You need a lot of gameplay to go with the great world...

Game definitely doesn't need more dialogue. I don't want this turning into Metal Gear Solid.

Modifié par deuce985, 10 décembre 2010 - 05:17 .

[Face of Evil]

While I do like conversing with my comrades, I get a bit anxious if I've gone too long without killing something.

[John Epler]

While there's an allocation of resources that does have some overlap in combat versus story, the fact is that five minutes of dialog is significantly more resource intensive than five minutes of combat. And there are people whose specialty is one thing or the other.



The people who are responsible for the various aspects of our game (whether that be combat or story) have spent quite some time refining their abilities in those particular arenas, and it's nowhere near as simple as saying 'okay, design some story, now design some combat'.

[Face of Evil]

JohnEpler wrote...

While there's an allocation of resources that does have some overlap in combat versus story, the fact is that five minutes of dialog is significantly more resource intensive than five minutes of combat. And there are people whose specialty is one thing or the other.

The people who are responsible for the various aspects of our game (whether that be combat or story) have spent quite some time refining their abilities in those particular arenas, and it's nowhere near as simple as saying 'okay, design some story, now design some combat'.

Well, I think you did a pretty good job of balancing combat and "story" in DA: Origins. Thumbs up.

[MIke_18]

ThunderfoxF wrote...

MIke_18 wrote...

The Good thing about it, in Kotor and ME it was optional. In ME2 all i did was walk arround that ugly ass ship trough that damn elevator hoping someone might have something more to say about their boring lives.

I think you're playing the wrong games then

I like story driven games. But the party interactions on your ship/camp whatever are too artificial and boring.

I can play Torchlight for hours on end, but i always skip the mindless pretentious dribble in ME2.

Like i want to hear the life story of lesbian Riddick or Profesor Boring.

[Maria Caliban]

I'd like an RPG with no combat whatsoever. I'm sure it would do poorly.

[deuce985]

JohnEpler wrote...

While there's an allocation of resources that does have some overlap in combat versus story, the fact is that five minutes of dialog is significantly more resource intensive than five minutes of combat. And there are people whose specialty is one thing or the other.

The people who are responsible for the various aspects of our game (whether that be combat or story) have spent quite some time refining their abilities in those particular arenas, and it's nowhere near as simple as saying 'okay, design some story, now design some combat'.

That is fine. Just keep doing what you're doing. Having less battles means the game will drag out more if you add more story. You guys do more than enough to perfectly balance it. Metal Gear Solid is a model of what not to do in a game. Watching 30 minute cutscenes is not fun. Although, I do love the franchise. That game probably had about 10 hours cutscenes and 5 hours gameplay...

My only complaint in DA:O is it dragged on at times. It seemed to have a lot of "filler" content. I'd say it was too long but in reality, that wasn't the problem. The problem was some parts of the game just were unnecessary and had little point. Like the Alienage in Denerim. Some areas of the game needed a better thought process. You can make a loooooooooooong game and still keep it interesting. Fallout games do a great job of keeping you interested in their world with unlimited content.

Modifié par deuce985, 10 décembre 2010 - 05:23 .

[upsettingshorts]

Maria Caliban wrote...

I'd like an RPG with no combat whatsoever. I'm sure it would do poorly.

I'd buy it.  What sort of skill allocation would take place, though?  How would inventories work?  Without attributes, skills, rulesets - etc - doesn't it become an adventure game?

[1483749283]

All I'm saying is, the story and characters is what's unique and what stays with us. Five years later, I remember the betrayal and the water dragon in Jade (and the orphans and Silk Fox's speech to her father, her court dress even)... I don't even remember what the combat was like.

Your lasting contribution is in your stories and your characters. The rest, as they say, is, dross.

A little more investment upfront in character development can lead you to break even more barriers. What you already do is amazing---like I said, you are breaking new territory in bringing fictional characters to life. As you break this new territory, amazing possibilities lie ahead, often unexplored.

JohnEpler wrote...

While there's an allocation of resources that does have some overlap in combat versus story, the fact is that five minutes of dialog is significantly more resource intensive than five minutes of combat.

Absolutely... there's that little asterisk in my original post that says the same.

[Leonia]

MIke_18 wrote...

ThunderfoxF wrote...

MIke_18 wrote...

The Good thing about it, in Kotor and ME it was optional. In ME2 all i did was walk arround that ugly ass ship trough that damn elevator hoping someone might have something more to say about their boring lives.

I think you're playing the wrong games then

I like story driven games. But the party interactions on your ship/camp whatever are too artificial and boring.

I can play Torchlight for hours on end, but i always skip the mindless pretentious dribble in ME2.

Like i want to hear the life story of lesbian Riddick or Profesor Boring.

Based on most of your posts around here, I find it hard to believe that you enjoy any Bioware games. It just doesn't seem to be the thing that floats your boat. Good thing there are other gaming developers making games more to your liking out there.

[ErichHartmann]

I play graphic adventure games when I want a heavy dose of dialogue and story with little or no combat.

[Leonia]

Upsettingshorts wrote...

Maria Caliban wrote...

I'd like an RPG with no combat whatsoever. I'm sure it would do poorly.

I'd buy it.  What sort of skill allocation would take place, though?  How would inventories work?  Without attributes, skills, rulesets - etc - doesn't it become an adventure game?

*hears skill allocation and perks up*

Oh that would be interesting but I can't imagine such a game would get a mass following. But hey, that's what niche games are for.

[MIke_18]

I like Bioware games, but mostly ...you know the dialogue is not really dialogue. It's just people telling you stories about their lifes and you make some kind of a decision. That's what it really boils down to.