250 réponses à ce sujet

[In Exile]

Rylor Tormtor wrote...
I wonder if there is a generational/age divide on this matter. I don't have a console, and never played any games (that come to mind, I could be missing something) with a voiced main character before ME1 was ported to PC. 

I don't think so. It is a preference divide.

Warning - Cranky Hyperbole incoming: Why don't we go further then, then I can press 2 for Calculon to do more tedious paper work, and you can press 1 next to me to have him rush to the laser battle in his hover Fierri. In fact, to make conversations more smooth and life like by removing the lag of player interaction. Also, to help Hawke stay in character, there is really only one likely option he/she would make, so there is no point in actually choosing anything that would get in the way of watching the game. Wait, I already have one of there, it is called a MOVIE. 

We can easily counter with the following hyberbole: instead of giving us a game, we should get a box of figurines and a script. Then, we can imagine whatever protagonist we want. Whatever race, whatever skills - they can give us some dice and a rule-set, and then you have your ready made adventure.

Not happy with a party member? Write your own! Not happy with the available choices? Invent some more!

As hyperbolic as you want to be with restriction of choice, the same extreme is very well possible with unlimited choice, where we simply get this nasty "video game" out of the way and really let the imagination run wild.

Anyways, that was over the top and while not completely off, fairly inflammatory and I apologize. Bottom line is, some people feel that the voice acting and a set protagonist take away their agency as a role player. 

Yes, but the important question to ask is why.

You can say that we just called our old warden, but there was such a wider variation between Wardens then there was between Shepards, and not just in the character creator.

And there you have it. Without a variable background (and without the game accounting for this background, which between Ostagar and your "return to your origin" it does not) I will absolutely and vehemtly deny it is possible to have a different character.

Yes, I am sure you will counter with things like "different Wardens could have different 'voices' or personalities," and argue that this makes them qualitatively different from a VO'ed character like Shepard or Hawke.. but this is simply running headling into the thing that separates our tastes in the first place.

Some people feel that role-play is about an internal experience. Other people feel that roleplay is a reactive experience.

You might say, my Warden is a different character when I can imagine a different voice and motivations.

I would say - my Warden is a different character whenever she can act differently and have other characters react to those actions.

And this is where we really see the difference. To you, the same exact line said by two different PCs and react to the same by the three NPCs could lead to you to different views of a character, because of whatever imagined content you add in. For some of us, myself included, this does not happen.

Since silent VO makes the character mute and passive, and we see no reteturn in terms of reactivity or connection to the world... silent VO is not a very meaningful feature.

Sure, I can make my Hawke look like Marty Feldman if I want (which would be awesome) but that doesn't change that there are going to more essentailly decided features of the character than there were in DAO. Now, this is all fine. This doesn't mean that those who disagree with me are wrong, we just have different aesthetic standards. However, it is not quite to dismiss these concerns as "hatin" in the same way I should not dismiss people who like this choice as "fanboi" (the irony being I think the longer particpants on this boards predecessor would in fact be against it, but I could be wrong).

This is the problem: you will not find concensus on the bold.

You want to frame this as a matter of preference, and fundamentally, it is. But things like 'impact on RP' are not determined at all.

Modifié par In Exile, 23 janvier 2011 - 04:18 .

[WidowMaker9394]

I am. An hero needs a voice.

Modifié par WidowMaker9394, 23 janvier 2011 - 04:17 .

[Guitar-Hero]

SetitUP wrote...

I'm loving the idea! Execution will be interesting but I have 100% faith in Bioware and David Gaider that it will work.

Execution? if its as cool as it sounds i am officialy estatic.. Can you give a further explanation please

[Naitaka]

FurousJoe wrote...

Trust me I've been gaming for a long time, in fact the very first rpg I played was Baldurs Gate.

The thing is to ME, the game becomes more appealing when your playable character has a life of his own. The generic customized characters seen previously are cool and all, but it just isn't the same.

Also your comparison is pretty skewed honestly, how does a predefined PC take away from the experience? In my opinion it only adds to the experience. In the future we can all hope that we can again make our own characters but use a set of voices so our character can actually speak during interactions, though I don't think we'll be seeing that because it simply takes too much time to make multiply voices, with different things taken into consideration.

IMO, while not exactly a generation thing, there are some corelation. Past experience often define who we are and what our perference may be. When some of us are so used to silent Protagonists, they are no longer a mere feature that you can do with or without, it becomes essential for some to fully immerse themselves in a game. No offense, but Baldur's Gate is by no mean an old game, the fact it's in real time already seperate it from most game I grew up on. I'm personally so used to having my imagination filling in the blank that it becomes a perference than something I have to put up with. I'm not going to scream bloody murder when I see what's considered clunky animation and low level of detail on character model in Alpha Protocol, because I once thought Virtual Fighter was the most amazing thing rendered in 3D I've ever seen. I'm not going to complain about lack of reactive combat because I thought turn base combat was such an intense and adrenline pumping experience in Pool of Radiance when I was a kid.

It's much easier to imagine a line to carry a different tone from its original intend, than to try to ignore a voice coming from your PC. All 12 of my Wardens were very different individual of different age, personality, speaking with different voice and influencing Thedas in their own way. Can I say the same for my Shepards? Not really, becuase everytime I hear that voice, it's always going to come back as the same person; even though I might be doing a paragon instead of renegade playthrough, it's still going to be the same Shepard, he's just acting out a different scenario than the previous one. Instead of being a character that I felt as if only I, and I alone, have created,  I felt like I was watching an interactive movie when I play ME, and from what I've seen of DAII, I don't expect it to be any different.

EDIT: Ugh...too tired to type properly, regardless of what Bioware have decided to do, I think I'll enjoy DAII. It just won't be the same kind of experience as DA:O and that can very well be a good thing.

Modifié par Naitaka, 23 janvier 2011 - 04:35 .

[In Exile]

To address the Escapist article, that quite frankly has missed the entire point in it's rather slanted take on VO:

If this were an old-school RPG like Fallout
or Planescape Torment, then we'd probably have many, many ways
we could approach this challenge:
1) Sneak or scam your way into prison and free Nancy, claim the
knickknack.
2) Murder your way into prison and free Nancy, claim the
knickknack.
3) Swipe the knickknack outright.
4) Kill King Bob,
then take the knickknack.
5) Get Nancy killed (or kill her yourself)
and then end up having to obtain the knickknack some other way.
6)
Kill Bob, take the knickknack, but later rescue Nancy anyway.
7) Kill
Bob, take the knickknack, enter prison, kill Nancy.
8) Free Nancy on
your own, then meet Bob for the first time and get the knickknack.
9)
Bribe Bob for the knickknack with a huge sum of money.
That's a lot of options, and players can have a lot of fun running
through the game again and again, experimenting with different actions
and seeing what the NPC's have to say.

Yes, you might have an old game with this many options (you don't; they're being hyperbolic).... but the NPCs would rarely respond differently to many of these options. They'd be treated in blocks, and get reduced to 2-3 options. Like so:

1) Sneak or scam your way into prison and free Nancy, claim the
knickknack.
2) Murder your way into prison and free Nancy, claim the
knickknack.
3) Swipe the knickknack outright.
4) Kill King Bob,
then take the knickknack.
5) Get Nancy killed (or kill her yourself)
and then end up having to obtain the knickknack some other way.
6)
Kill Bob, take the knickknack, but later rescue Nancy anyway.
7) Kill
Bob, take the knickknack, enter prison, kill Nancy.
(8) Free Nancy on
your own, then meet Bob for the first time and get the knickknack.)
9)

Bribe Bob for the knickknack with a huge sum of money.

In this case, if the developers allowed for 9 you'd have 5 ways that they'd need to script to solve the quest; otherwise you'd have 4 ways to solve the quest. A lot of these are redundant or would have the same consequences.

But if we were talking about a more modern RPG
like Oblivion or Fallout 3, then this quest is likely
going to be a lot less flexible. On the back of the box the game might
brag about how you'll have all kinds of choices to solve problems the
way you want, but in the end your options will boil down to:
1) Sneak into prison and free Nancy, claim the knickknack.
2)
Murder your way into prison, free Nancy, claim the knickknack.

And, of course, this is also quite false. A modern RPG like, say, New Vegas, would allow you for the option to bribe or kill Bob, and suddenly you are right back up to the 4 "true" options you had in these old RPGs.

This is nothing more than obsfucatory writing to make one particular non-difference seem like a difference.

They continue with this point:

Things get even more thorny later on. During
testing, someone will discover that if you steal the knickknack, rescue
Nancy, and then talk to Bob, his response won't make any sense. The
designer who scripted this quest didn't allow for this outcome, and now
the quest needs some extra dialog. If this was a text-driven game, then
fixing this is a matter of writing a few new lines and dropping them
in.

The cost isn't really VO.

In the old game, you had some barely recognizable sprite and barely recognizable PC and effectively very simple actions that were more written about than seen that would encompass any of these particular actions.

But now we have different graphical demands. The environments must be more detailed. The character models must be unique. The level must be designed in a way to make sneaking around sensible. The guards must have patrol routes and realistic reactions to stealth.

The article is absolutely right that to the extent that content is more linear today, a large part of that is cost. But that cost isn't just VO. A game like Oblivion barely has VO compared to a game like Dragon Age, and the design is quite open and free. New Vegas had quite a lot of freedom compared to most games in terms of the number of fundamentally irrelevant ways that you could solve a quest, which is what this magazine is arguing for.

The real costs comes from the much higher value production and graphical value of a modern game.

But here is the kicker: Watch anyone play these fully-voiced RPG's,
and you'll see they click right through the voice acting. People can
read a lot faster than they can talk, and so players end up hearing just
the first six words of every sentence. Unless the actor is Patrick
Stewart or Liam Neeson, people aren't going to sit still while an NPC
rattles on. We've lost so much in the way of freedom and depth, and in
return we've gained voice acting that everyone is in a hurry to skip.

This, of course, isn't really about an RP player at all. Yes, there are certainly players who will want to get to the killing faster. But these  are very well people who might skip the boring talking parts anyway.

The whole article is framed on trying to pin a problem that doesn't really exist on a feature that isn't really responsible for it.

[_Aine_]

Naitaka wrote...

All 12 of my Wardens were very different individual of different age, personality, speaking with different voice and influencing Thedas in their own way. Can I say the same for my Shepards? Not really, becuase everytime I hear that voice, it's always going to come back as the same person; even though I might be doing a paragon instead of renegade playthrough, it's still going to be the same Shepard, he's just acting out a different scenario than the previous one, instead of being a character that I felt as if only I, and I alone, have created. I feel like I'm watching an interactive movie, instead of creating my OWN story, when I play ME, and from what I've seen of DAII, I don't expect it to be any different.

Yes, this is what I was attempting to also say   If this is true of DAII I will be a bit sad. I enjoyed that aspect a lot in DA:O and it in particular is what made me really want another DA installment.   Will wait and see how how it plays out.  

[In Exile]

Naitaka wrote...
 I'm personally so used to having my imagination filling in the blank that it becomes a perference than something I have to put up with.

But this isn't per se a generational thing at all. You'll find gamers on this forum who haven't started with old RPGs at all - whose near first entry was Dragon Age, but who share your view.

And you'll find gamers like myself and Upsettingshorts who played these games at about the same time you did, but never liked this demand on the part of the designers.

It's much easier to imagine a line to carry a different tone from its original intend, than to try to ignore a voice coming from your PC. 

No, it isn't. It's easier for you, but for me they are the souless puppet that wants to be filled in by very narrow content that you have little choice in.

What if I want my Warden to be sarcastic? Tough luck -the writers didn't envision the line that way, so either 90% of the game misunderstands me or I suck it up and pick the line as designed.

All 12 of my Wardens were very different individual of different age, personality, speaking with different voice and influencing Thedas in their own way. Can I say the same for my Shepards? Not really, becuase everytime I hear that voice, it's always going to come back as the same person; even though I might be doing a paragon instead of renegade playthrough, it's still going to be the same Shepard, he's just acting out a different scenario than the previous one, instead of being a character that I felt as if only I, and I alone, have created. I feel like I'm watching an interactive movie, instead of creating my OWN story, when I play ME, and from what I've seen of DAII, I don't expect it to be any different.

But this comes right down to your idiosyncratic demands for a game. You have the same line for every Warden. You have the same response to the same line by every NPC.

So what exactly is different? That you imagine identical words being said a different way that are respond to exactly the same way? And this makes a distinct character?

I appreciate that this for you is what makes a rich experience - but you have to abandon your central notion that this is true for everyone. Imagining anything does not add to the game for me - the game itself is all there is, period.

If content does not occur on screen, it does not occur. The same line is always available, and NPCs react to it the same way. I never thought RPGs were different from ME/ME2 or DAII in terms of the freedom you had  to design a character - but what we have now is instead of a passive mute, an active hero.

This is the other side, and I am not willing to allow people to claim some kind of justified higher ground in terms of what really allows for more attachment to their character.

[FurousJoe]

Overall I'm glad Bioware went this direction with their games, now they just need to expand on it in creative ways.

[Naitaka]

In Exile wrote...

I appreciate that this for you is what makes a rich experience - but you have to abandon your central notion that this is true for everyone. Imagining anything does not add to the game for me - the game itself is all there is, period.

I never claimed it is true for everyone. I've said that it's my perference and my personal reaction to a voiced PC. If it sounded like I was stating it as a fact, that was not my intend.

[In Exile]

Naitaka wrote...

I never claimed it is true for everyone. I've said that it's my perference and my personal reaction to a voiced PC. If it sounded like I was stating it as a fact, that was not my intend.

To me, it sounded like this was more of a general ciaim:

It's much easier to imagine a line to carry a different tone from
its original intend, than to try to ignore a voice coming from your PC.

Which I think carries with it a general claim about imagined content I don't think is universal.

But fair enough.

[Naitaka]

In Exile wrote...

Naitaka wrote...

I never claimed it is true for everyone. I've said that it's my perference and my personal reaction to a voiced PC. If it sounded like I was stating it as a fact, that was not my intend.

To me, it sounded like this was more of a general ciaim:

It's much easier to imagine a line to carry a different tone from
its original intend, than to try to ignore a voice coming from your PC.

Which I think carries with it a general claim about imagined content I don't think is universal.

But fair enough.

Well, a line that says "Shut up" may have been said in anger, in good humor, and every possible tone of voice you can imagine. But when you hear a voiced PC say "Shut up", it is much less likely you can mistake his tone for anything different than what the actor intended, unless he's really really bad at it. To me, that extra layer of ambiguity allow me to role-play more comfortably than when I have little to no doubt what the PC's tone is.

I'm not arguing whether it's generally easier or harder to role-play with a voiced PC, but that it's much harder to have multiple interpretation on the tone of a line when it is voiced.

Modifié par Naitaka, 23 janvier 2011 - 04:52 .

[In Exile]

Naitaka wrote...
Well, a line that says "Shut up" may have been said in anger, in good humor, and every possible tone of voice you can imagine.

And then the NPC reacts, and you have no option to clarify your meaning.

So maybe I want to say "Shut up" in good humour. And maybe the NPC gets angry. That's fine - though rare, misunderstandings are possible.

But then in an RPG, it is impossible to correct this misunderstanding.

No matter how much time passes, what happens, what we do... I can never say, "Hey, that one time I said shut up - I was kidding".

So I can't say it in any tone I want, unless I want to start calling into question the mental competency of either my PC or the NPCs.

But when you hear a voiced PC say "Shut up", it is much less likely you can mistake his tone for anything different then what the actor intended, unless he's really really bad at it. To me, that extra layer of ambiguity allow me to role-play more comfortably than when I have little to no doubt what the PC's tone is.

Whereas, like I said, I don't think this lair of ambiguity exists at all. It is more... willfull denial. You can no longer get away with denying the very clearly narrow line with VO as opposed to without VO, but I don't see either the UI or developer being at fault for the fact that a change in a feature prevents you from convicing yourself of something that was never true.

I'm not arguing whether it's generally easier or harder to role-play
with a voiced PC, but that it's much harder to have multiple
interpretation on the tone of a line when it is voiced.

I know. I disagree with you. I do not think this is true; I think it is easier to lie to yourself that you have this freedom, which the RPG was never designed for, without VO.

But what you are doing would be the same as (to use a DA:O example) pretending Duncan never died at Ostagar, that he is just leading the party (but all his content is off-screen) and Alistair just lost his grip on reality after the battle.

Modifié par In Exile, 23 janvier 2011 - 04:55 .

[Guitar-Hero]

Rylor Tormtor wrote...

FurousJoe wrote...

I'm really happy about it, generic unvoiced characters is a thing of the past. ENTER THE FUTURE FOR BETTER GAMES!

I wonder if there is a generational/age divide on this matter. I don't have a console, and never played any games (that come to mind, I could be missing something) with a voiced main character before ME1 was ported to PC.

Warning - Cranky Hyperbole incoming: Why don't we go further then, then I can press 2 for Calculon to do more tedious paper work, and you can press 1 next to me to have him rush to the laser battle in his hover Fierri. In fact, to make conversations more smooth and life like by removing the lag of player interaction. Also, to help Hawke stay in character, there is really only one likely option he/she would make, so there is no point in actually choosing anything that would get in the way of watching the game. Wait, I already have one of there, it is called a MOVIE.

Anyways, that was over the top and while not completely off, fairly inflammatory and I apologize. Bottom line is, some people feel that the voice acting and a set protagonist take away their agency as a role player. You can say that we just called our old warden, but there was such a wider variation between Wardens then there was between Shepards, and not just in the character creator. Sure, I can make my Hawke look like Marty Feldman if I want (which would be awesome) but that doesn't change that there are going to more essentailly decided features of the character than there were in DAO. Now, this is all fine. This doesn't mean that those who disagree with me are wrong, we just have different aesthetic standards. However, it is not quite to dismiss these concerns as "hatin" in the same way I should not dismiss people who like this choice as "fanboi" (the irony being I think the longer particpants on this boards predecessor would in fact be against it, but I could be wrong).

EDIT: The funny thing is, I haev a really positive response to the idea of voice over in SWTOR, which means I suppose these sorts are genre dependent for me, and I don't view MMO as RPGs anymore.

While bearly got through the begining without thinking.. here we go again.. But then i got through it and what i found was a pretty reasonable individual who is frustrated, while i tend to disagree with some aspects, i think it depends on what you value most in a RPG, for me its story, or rather narrative, how well is the narrative integrated in the game, everything from gamemechanics to visual design, how do they use these tools to tell an interesting story about deep and interesting characters, if you see it like this the voiceover and dialogue wheel fits perfectly, i dont like the paraphrases,but they are accepteble, while it does take away player costumization, that for me is something i am willing to sacrifice if it makes me feel more intwined with the world.

I do think it can have something to do with generation, but even more so, its a matter of habit, i am an avid console player, and have been so for many years i think the first i had was an amiga or NES, anyways i am used to playing RPGs in a different way than say a PC-player, i have never been able to get involved with a game using keyboard and a mouse, wich is a shame, i would have loved to have played the Witcher or VTMB i jusut couldn't get into it, does this mean i rag on those that do, ofcourse not i am so happy that DAO is both a console game and a PC game, that means more people re able to share this amazing world we all love.  

[Z. Blackwood]

The dialogue wheel is the single greatest innovation in RPG interaction in the past ten years. It removes the distinct break in the flow of gameplay that occurs as the result of having to stop mid-conversation to read several dialogue options before making a choice.

Also, the dialogue wheel is a great story-telling device. It allows your character to react more naturally to people, places, and situations.

I will use Mass Effect as an example. Within ten minutes of playing, my character spoke on topics that I, as a player, could never have understood after only a short time playing the game. My character's experiences were not limited by my understanding of the galaxy. His dialogue told the story. Of course, this works only because Bioware's writers are masters of narrative.

The most immersive dialogue in Dragon Age Origins happened when I was able to control other party members—a character during the "Sacred Ashes" quest, and Leliana in the "Leliana's Song" DLC. In both cases, the dialogue menu essentially functioned like the dialogue wheel.

The dialogue wheel should be a feature of every narrative-centric role-playing game. I will look forward to seeing it in Dragon Age II. It will add even more depth to the already expansive Dragon Age mythos.

Modifié par Z. Blackwood, 23 janvier 2011 - 05:02 .

[Naitaka]

In Exile wrote...

*snip*

Isn't that what we are doing playing a RPG in the first place? Convincing ourself what is not real is in fact happening? I see it as a difference in how much we're willing to accept as the limitation of the engine/medium, and just say "to hell with it, I'll come up with some justification to suit my purpose."

When I wonder why my companions don't contract the Darkspawn taint, I make up some story in my head about how Morrigan, under Flemeth's instruction, is giving everyone antidote to the taint each night at camp. When I see hit points that wouldn't make any sense to my characte whatsoever,  I just imagine it to be a gauge of laxing concerntration in a fight. I think we all have to lie to ourself, so to speak, to maintain our suspense of disblief, it's just a question how much you're willing to go.

Modifié par Naitaka, 23 janvier 2011 - 05:12 .

[JamieCOTC]

I do like to RP the characters of games and as predetermined as Shepard was, I felt I was able to RP her just as much as I could the Warden. By adding a voice, it did strip out a few elements, but ultimately, it just gave me something else to build upon. Since Hawke is supposedly less predetermined than Shepard, I'm looking forward to see what happens in the game.

[In Exile]

Naitaka wrote...

Isn't that what we are doing playing a RPG in the first place? Convincing ourself what is not real is in fact happening?

No. Or  rather, that's certainly not what I do.

I see it as a difference in how much we're willing to accept as the limitation of the engine/medium, and just say "to hell with it, I'll come up with some justification to suit my purpose."

I never say that.

When I wonder why my companions don't contract the Darkspawn taint, I make up some story in my head about how Morrigan, under Flemeth's instruction, is giving everyone antidote to the taint each night at camp. 

Whereas I think: plot hole or gameplay convenience. The writers didn't account for it or it got cut.

When I see hit points that wouldn't make any sense to my characte whatsoever,  I just imagine it to be a gauge of laxing concerntration in a fight. I think we all have to lie to ourself, so to speak, to maintain our suspense of disblief, it's just a question how much you're willing to go.

Again, I disagree. I do not rationalize.

[Naitaka]

In Exile wrote...

Naitaka wrote...

Isn't that what we are doing playing a RPG in the first place? Convincing ourself what is not real is in fact happening?

No. Or  rather, that's certainly not what I do.

Ah, then our belief of what role-playing is about is fundementally different in the first place. No wonder we can't seem to agree on anything.

[In Exile]

Naitaka wrote...
Ah, then our belief of what role-playing is about is fundementally different in the first place. No wonder we can't seem to agree on anything.

Yes. But! This is a chance for us to try and understand each other. It's my favourite part of the forum.

When you say you try to convince yourself things are real, what do you mean? Is it something like putting yourself in the "mind" of the PC, and saying that from the PoV of the PC, this is the real world?

That's what I do, though it's tempered by meta-game knowledge that this is a game, so when I see a failure of design, I just recognize it as such.

[Sable Phoenix]

A voiced protagonist by its very nature interferes with the ability to roleplay a character, or with any attempt to define them yourself. You will always be playing someone else's character, in this case, the game developers', not your own. This alone places Dragon Age head and shoulders above Dragon Age 2.  And yes, I can state that as fact despite not playing Dragon Age 2, because of the dynamic of what roleplaying actually is.

The dialogue wheel? All we have to do is look at the hilariously cringe-inducing options like "I want you, Thane" (after just talking about his brutally murdered wife) which have almost nothing to do with what Shepard actually says in those situations to see whether that is a good idea.

Modifié par Sable Phoenix, 23 janvier 2011 - 05:31 .

[Naitaka]

In Exile wrote...

Naitaka wrote...
Ah, then our belief of what role-playing is about is fundementally different in the first place. No wonder we can't seem to agree on anything.

Yes. But! This is a chance for us to try and understand each other. It's my favourite part of the forum.

When you say you try to convince yourself things are real, what do you mean? Is it something like putting yourself in the "mind" of the PC, and saying that from the PoV of the PC, this is the real world?

That's what I do, though it's tempered by meta-game knowledge that this is a game, so when I see a failure of design, I just recognize it as such.

Yes but when you recognize something about a failure of design, it's metagame knowledge that your PC should not be able to recognize as such. I try to treat each of my playthrough as actively writting a story in my PC's perspective in real time. True, I will always have metagame knowledge out of character, but instead of accepting them and have my PC think "Maker's Breath! This has to be some cosmic mistake that I have no way of explaining" I just make up something more interesting so such glaring mistake wouldn't be apparent to the PC.

It just seem more fun this way than being annoyed by design flaws you have no way of correcting yourself.

Modifié par Naitaka, 23 janvier 2011 - 05:38 .

[Collider]

I could be.

Provided that the dialog labels match the dialog.

I had problems with this in Mass Effect.

[Katana_Master]

After playing countless hours of Mass Effect, it would just feel odd if an RPG had a fully-voiced protagonist that DIDN'T have a dialogue wheel.

[nightcobra]

In Exile wrote...

Naitaka wrote...
Ah, then our belief of what role-playing is about is fundementally different in the first place. No wonder we can't seem to agree on anything.

Yes. But! This is a chance for us to try and understand each other. It's my favourite part of the forum.

When you say you try to convince yourself things are real, what do you mean? Is it something like putting yourself in the "mind" of the PC, and saying that from the PoV of the PC, this is the real world?

That's what I do, though it's tempered by meta-game knowledge that this is a game, so when I see a failure of design, I just recognize it as such.

more or less what i do, i imagine myself as the little voice in the pc's head that tells him/her to do stuff, as in being a part of the pc's mind.
in real life when i'm bored and don't have anything to do i  create a persona inside my head and have a discussion with it, kind of a mental exercise. in videogames i imagine myself as that mental persona of the main character so that i can immerse myself in the game almost completely. 

[vallore]

Z. Blackwood wrote...

The dialogue wheel is the single greatest innovation in RPG interaction in the past ten years. It removes the distinct break in the flow of gameplay that occurs as the result of having to stop mid-conversation to read several dialogue options before making a choice.

To some Players, such is valid; to others the dialog wheel actually creates an unnecessary break in the flow of dialog: Such a player reads the paraphrase and then has to stop and guess what the paraphrase actually hinting at. Repeat this action each time the wheel is employed and the result will be anything but fluid.

Also, the dialogue wheel is a great story-telling device. It allows your character to react more naturally to people, places, and situations.

How so?

I will use Mass Effect as an example. Within ten minutes of playing, my character spoke on topics that I, as a player, could never have understood after only a short time playing the game. My character's experiences were not limited by my understanding of the galaxy. His dialogue told the story. Of course, this works only because Bioware's writers are masters of narrative.

But you have less potential control over your character. If carried to the
limit, in a movie, with no direct input from a player, the story should become even more fluid, the flow of the dialogs more natural and the understanding of the universe by the character would not have to be shackled by the limitations of the player’s ignorance; but it would no longer be a game.