47 réponses à ce sujet

[rcollins1701]

There be spoilers here!

I've noticed a common theme in many of the criticisms of DA2. A lot of folks have claimed the writing is poor or the story is lackluster or something similar. However, it also seems that the majority of these bad writing reviews are complaining about the difficulty and ambiguity of the story paths and decisions Hawke has to make through his/her journey. For example, despite Hawke's best efforts, s/he's unable to prevent a Qunari insurrection, the conflict between the mages and templars, save his/her sibling, reform blood mages and, most of all, prevent his/her mother's fate. Other complaints seem to stem from friends betrayals (i.e., why would Anders/Merrill not trust me and go behind my back? Why do pirates like to read so much?).

Is this bad writing? To me, it seems the characters are consistent enough to live and breathe as characters in their own right, yet they also have room to grow and change (i.e., sometimes pirate's return books to the library) depending on choice's Hawke makes. Also, politics suck. There is hardly ever a totally right choice. Chantry v. Templars v mages is purely political game. I find the writing team goes out of its way to make the choices as hard as possible to make and harder still to live with.

All of this spells good writing to me!

The alternative, I think, is a world where Hawke can make everybody love him, always arrive in the nick of time, always win every fight and live happily ever after. That means simple choices, simple conflicts, flat characters and unrealistic sentimentalism. Between the two, it seems perhaps a truly simple choice.

Thoughts?

[Trobon18]

I agree with you to an extent. However, I have to say my one major criticism with the game was that no matter what I did I couldn't change how things played out. In DA: I had to fight my way through the whole mage tower no matter what, but I got to side with the Templars or the Mages and in the end that made a difference. No matter what I had to fight my way to the werewolf den, but I go to choose how things went down.

While there are choices in this game, they don't feel as meaningful at times. Yes I can choose to side with the Templars or the Mages, but what does that mean to me? I fight a few less templars on my way to the mages? No matter what the First Enchanter does his little ritual and Merrideth does her little insanity dance. And no matter what it plays out the same way.

Now I can't say whether this is bad writing or not. It is just a departure from what I expect in a Bioware game. Even if it were minor things I would hope that I could make some difference. Even if its just that my reforming blood mages gave me some pals at the end or if my being merciless and ordering them all killed had made it so there would be less resistance in the final battle.

Still though, I think that a game where your mother dieing makes you want to bash in the face of the necromancer who did it can't have all that bad of writing.

[LeaveMeAlone9009]

rcollins1701 wrote...

There be spoilers here!

I've noticed a common theme in many of the criticisms of DA2. A lot of folks have claimed the writing is poor or the story is lackluster or something similar. However, it also seems that the majority of these bad writing reviews are complaining about the difficulty and ambiguity of the story paths and decisions Hawke has to make through his/her journey. For example, despite Hawke's best efforts, s/he's unable to prevent a Qunari insurrection, the conflict between the mages and templars, save his/her sibling, reform blood mages and, most of all, prevent his/her mother's fate. Other complaints seem to stem from friends betrayals (i.e., why would Anders/Merrill not trust me and go behind my back? Why do pirates like to read so much?).

Is this bad writing? To me, it seems the characters are consistent enough to live and breathe as characters in their own right, yet they also have room to grow and change (i.e., sometimes pirate's return books to the library) depending on choice's Hawke makes. Also, politics suck. There is hardly ever a totally right choice. Chantry v. Templars v mages is purely political game. I find the writing team goes out of its way to make the choices as hard as possible to make and harder still to live with.

All of this spells good writing to me!

The alternative, I think, is a world where Hawke can make everybody love him, always arrive in the nick of time, always win every fight and live happily ever after. That means simple choices, simple conflicts, flat characters and unrealistic sentimentalism. Between the two, it seems perhaps a truly simple choice.

Thoughts?

Its bad because, when your mom is murdered like that, and youre a no bs bad ass who kills ****. You dont just go "oh well, my mom is dead, I have a sad face now."

The Champion came to kirkwall as a mercenary, its his MOMs home. Once she died, and especially if you had a story where both your siblings died. There should have been more.. how do I say this.... "OOMPHFFF!" to the character.

He should have had more issues, and they should have been more apparent in the character. Just saying.

[Ghurshog]

Bad writing = spelling errors or faulty grammar.

Liking or disliking the content of a particular writing does not make it bad

[Captain_Obvious]

Trobon18 wrote...

While there are choices in this game, they don't feel as meaningful at times. Yes I can choose to side with the Templars or the Mages, but what does that mean to me? I fight a few less templars on my way to the mages? No matter what the First Enchanter does his little ritual and Merrideth does her little insanity dance. And no matter what it plays out the same way.

I think it's actually better in DA2, because while you still have the ability to choose, your ability to affect the outcome is limited.  This is more realistic to me than being able to be the final arbiter of everything.  Sometimes circumstances really are outside your control, and it's the ability to choose within those circumstances, and the choices that you make, that define you. 

[LeaveMeAlone9009]

Ghurshog wrote...

Bad writing = spelling errors or faulty grammar.

Liking or disliking the content of a particular writing does not make it bad

I disagree, making a character believable is up to the writers, it tells the voice actors how to act, and the animators what to animate.

AM I WRONG?

[Thalorin1919]

Captain_Obvious wrote...

Trobon18 wrote...

While there are choices in this game, they don't feel as meaningful at times. Yes I can choose to side with the Templars or the Mages, but what does that mean to me? I fight a few less templars on my way to the mages? No matter what the First Enchanter does his little ritual and Merrideth does her little insanity dance. And no matter what it plays out the same way.

I think it's actually better in DA2, because while you still have the ability to choose, your ability to affect the outcome is limited.  This is more realistic to me than being able to be the final arbiter of everything.  Sometimes circumstances really are outside your control, and it's the ability to choose within those circumstances, and the choices that you make, that define you. 

I think a reason alot of people are upset with the writing was beause a "decade" story had alot of potential to show the decisions a player has to make. The only ones I can think off that come off the top of my head are fighting the Qunari - which basically ends up throwing the city into a war no-matter what choice you make.

And the mage/templar conflict, and that's the very end. You don't see any significant changes to the city, it's people, or Hawke himself or herself, especially after all they had been through.

I enjoyed the story, but there is room for improvement like with everything.

[Malja]

Ghurshog wrote...

Bad writing = spelling errors or faulty grammar.

Liking or disliking the content of a particular writing does not make it bad

Mmm not entirely. There's a lot to what makes writing bad. Liking or disliking it can sway your judgement though, that's undeniable. 2-dimensional characters are a result of bad writing, for instance.

[Captain_Obvious]

Thalorin1919 wrote...

[I think a reason alot of people are upset with the writing was beause a "decade" story had alot of potential to show the decisions a player has to make. The only ones I can think off that come off the top of my head are fighting the Qunari - which basically ends up throwing the city into a war no-matter what choice you make.

And the mage/templar conflict, and that's the very end. You don't see any significant changes to the city, it's people, or Hawke himself or herself, especially after all they had been through.

I enjoyed the story, but there is room for improvement like with everything.

Yeah, it would have been nice to see how early choices would affect the city later, but oh well.

[RedDragynLady]

Video game writing is almost always bad.

Kidding, kidding. The thing about "bad" writing is that it's so subjective. I mean, "bad" writing sells millions of copies of books every year. If you read the NYT bestseller list... it's generally not Great Literature.

It's enjoyable, surprising, or even unusual writing that makes it. Often, the technical execution is terrible, the characters are cardboard... but to an unsophisticated reader, that doesn't matter. All that matters is they enjoy the story.

As a writer, I found the story in DA2 to actually be fairly strong. NOT as strong as DAO, but decent. I think it needed more, it needs greater depth, broader reach, but characterization was fantastic. All of the characters had solid personalities, in some cases more vivid personalities than DAO. There were actually some scenes in DA2 that I found particularly compelling. The mother scene, Merrill's quest ending, that sort of thing.

Seeing my old companions was fun, too...

I think that improvements could be made, but I don't know if the accusation of "bad writing" really stands on its own. I haven't seen any specifics that scream "bad writing" to me at all.

[Bryy_Miller]

I think a common problem is that a lot of people really mean "sandbox gameplay" when they say bad writing. A lot of people thought that being restricted to the main plot of Origins and Mass Effect 2 was bad writing.

[rcollins1701]

Trobon18 wrote...

While there are choices in this game, they don't feel as meaningful at times. Yes I can choose to side with the Templars or the Mages, but what does that mean to me? I fight a few less templars on my way to the mages? No matter what the First Enchanter does his little ritual and Merrideth does her little insanity dance. And no matter what it plays out the same way.

This is a fair point to be sure. You feel that siding with the templars should lead to a confrontation with only Orsino and vice versa with Meredith. Still, having both of them do the crazy dance means lots of rhetorical ammunition for both sides afterwards—which makes things harder down the road, no?

[Faridle]

I liked the story it surely filled out what Flemeth said in the first trailer "embrace destiny"

[Nathan Redgrave]

LeaveMeAlone9009 wrote...

The Champion came to kirkwall as a mercenary, its his MOMs home. Once she died, and especially if you had a story where both your siblings died. There should have been more.. how do I say this.... "OOMPHFFF!" to the character.

You know, a character doesn't have to be openly weepy to feel sad, and part of the whole "this is your character" thing is you deciding the finer points of how they feel and what they do with it. If they forced too much of any given viewpoint on Hawke's character, that would be hijacking that character from the player's hands.

[Merced652]

rcollins1701 wrote...

Trobon18 wrote...

While there are choices in this game, they don't feel as meaningful at times. Yes I can choose to side with the Templars or the Mages, but what does that mean to me? I fight a few less templars on my way to the mages? No matter what the First Enchanter does his little ritual and Merrideth does her little insanity dance. And no matter what it plays out the same way.

This is a fair point to be sure. You feel that siding with the templars should lead to a confrontation with only Orsino and vice versa with Meredith. Still, having both of them do the crazy dance means lots of rhetorical ammunition for both sides afterwards—which makes things harder down the road, no?

No it means you're railroaded in to the "story" and that it all boils down to is that your character was some joe who did some quests with 90% of them being meaningless. Given that orsino was a blood mage sympothizer and meredith was obviously crazy anyway, the war would've happened with or without Hawke. Now if you want to make the point that it only happened because of hawke then the writing did a ****** poor job of conveying that and so it stands that the writing was infact terrible.

However, my personal feeling on what is good writing is purely based on my enjoyment and sense of accomplishment. I had neither at the end, and few enough times inbetween that i can't even recall them. Also, bad writing also led to quite a few people feeling the characters sucked. I have to agree with them.

Modifié par Merced652, 14 mars 2011 - 11:56 .

[Ghurshog]

LeaveMeAlone9009 wrote...

Ghurshog wrote...

Bad writing = spelling errors or faulty grammar.

Liking or disliking the content of a particular writing does not make it bad

I disagree, making a character believable is up to the writers, it tells the voice actors how to act, and the animators what to animate.

AM I WRONG?

What is 'believable' is entirely dependant on person experience. What you find believable and what I might can be extremely divergent hence falls in to the "personal like/dislike" catagory. 

The same can be said for 2 dimensional character development, if you like or dislike it is a personal choice and reaction to the content of the writing.

However fundementally the 'written' text used is not in of itself 'bad' simply because some or even a majority of people 'personally' dislike it. 

The OP asked the question, How does one define "bad writing", and I did. 

If the question is "how do write something that I will like?" that is a personal perspective question that each individual must decide for themselves.

Also one could argue that statements presented as fact that are not, might construde 'bad writing' also. 

[Pyrate_d]

I think the writing is fine. By "writing" I mean that characters sound natural.

There are massive problems with the plotting though, but that has nothing to do with the writing.

[LeaveMeAlone9009]

Nathan Redgrave wrote...

LeaveMeAlone9009 wrote...

The Champion came to kirkwall as a mercenary, its his MOMs home. Once she died, and especially if you had a story where both your siblings died. There should have been more.. how do I say this.... "OOMPHFFF!" to the character.

You know, a character doesn't have to be openly weepy to feel sad, and part of the whole "this is your character" thing is you deciding the finer points of how they feel and what they do with it. If they forced too much of any given viewpoint on Hawke's character, that would be hijacking that character from the player's hands.

No, what I'm saying, is I disagree with all the voice options they had for Hawke during that scene. And basically, how they handled his personality afterward.

Also, why on earth would you think a man who just saw his mother, butchered in some blood mage experiment, and is a fighter for higher, who swallows alot of BS daily, and does crap he doesnt want to do. Would be "CRYING" at his mothers death?

The dude should have been in shock, the character should have been either, more cold, or have more explosive.

And it should have lingered on longer. Or they should have left the death of the mother out, it didnt seem to have any effect at all on the characters personality except to "just kinda happen."

And I'm not saying that doesnt happen in reality, if that is what they were trying to portray, then alright. I understand, Hawke is a cool character pretty much, whatever happens. I just think, if you're going to show a character like that, whats the point in showing something that the character doesnt care about?

Thats like, if there is a puddle no one notices, and then suddenly the king of the lands looks at that puddle once and shrugs and walks away, and everyone was told to look at him shrugging stuff, we should keep doing it. That's boring and pointless, at that point no one cares about anything, and then we should all stop caring, and then we should just stop watching.

It's not as interesting, its just boring.

But, I dont even believe they were making Hawke a cold, uncaring character, I think his emotions were emoticonned out like a robot, while everyone else gave a better preformance, they should have just added a Paragon/Renegade meter. Just saying. Its a more believable story.

[AtreiyaN7]

I found the story interesting, and I liked being put into situations that are not quite so black and white. Everything that happened was thought-provoking as far as the mage-templar-Chantry issue went, so for me it was good writing. I also feel that there were specific moments like Leandra's death and the bombing that were great. I don't think I've had as many instances in other games where I've been quite so shocked and horrified (and sad).

[Bryy_Miller]

Pyrate_d wrote...
There are massive problems with the plotting though, but that has nothing to do with the writing.

I think you're thinking of some other word. Because the plot definitely is up to the writing, but I hear you. The writers don't make up the gameplay steps of the games.

[rcollins1701]

Merced652 wrote...

No it means you're railroaded in to the "story" and that it all boils down to is that your character was some joe who did some quests with 90% of them being meaningless. Given that orsino was a blood mage sympothizer and meredith was obviously crazy anyway, the war would've happened with or without Hawke. Now if you want to make the point that it only happened because of hawke then the writing did a ****** poor job of conveying that and so it stands that the writing was infact terrible.

Backing the mages and inspiring an uprising of all fourteen Circles in Thedas and thus overturning centuries of Chantry control is hardly meaningless. Likewise, initiating a police state and Templar coup free from the oversight of the Chantry seems to be pretty consequential, wouldn't you say? I agree that sometimes who you fight or which battles you participate in happen regardless of choice, but your choices are shaping the entire DA universe. I would rate that as significant.

Also, I have to disagree with the idea that Orsino is a blood mage sympathizer. It was pretty clear that mages have options not available to non-mages and use them when adequately provoked and Orsino felt he was provoked…

[astranger_90]

To answer the original question of how one would define "bad writing,": Dan Brown.

But to be more on topic, I actually agree with you, I thought the pacing and the plot of the game were pretty gosh darn good. Aside from one thing that actually drove me crazy, the villains of the game. As Maric would say, "A man is made by the quality of his enemies."

I have an extremely strong dislike for villains that have no real motivation, and maybe it was just me, but all the main enemies seem kinda... one dimensional. Besides the Arishok, which I think should have been the main villain just because you get a better sense of who he is than Orsino or Glowing Red Templar Commander Lady.

[UltiPup]

A good villain isn't always defined by how obviously evil he is. If you know a villain is a villain, then there is all there is to it. You know the objective and will follow it through like always. At least Bioware took a different approach and kept their evils under wraps. It was a way bigger deal for me to learn about Meredith's own evils after I thought everything was good and done.

[rcollins1701]

Ghurshog wrote...

The OP asked the question, How does one define "bad writing", and I did. 

If the question is "how do write something that I will like?" that is a personal perspective question that each individual must decide for themselves.

Also one could argue that statements presented as fact that are not, might construde 'bad writing' also. 

Sorry, I didn't realize I had to specify for the semantically gifted!

By writing I am of course referring to the product of the work produced by writers, sometimes referred to as fiction writers, creative writers, authors, people of letters, essayists, poets, etc. Writing is often judged to be of good or bad quality based on several factors including (but not limited to) clarity, originality, verisimilitude, theme, tone, character and other such elements of the writing craft. While the quality all of these elements of craft are subjective, there are certain standards of quality that can be scrutinized with some degree of objectivity. These standards of quality often change depending on the type of work being discussed—especially, in cases such as these, with regard to genre expectation and achetypic thematic tropes among others.

My goal in starting this thread was to establish what the relatively objective standards of quality were with regard to Dragon Age 2. Since DA is game which defies many of the rules and expectation of genre, these standards can be hard to surmise, thus the appeal to the Bioware Community. In other words, is the expectation amongst the dissenting Bioware Community (those that complain of "bad" writing) that DA2 follow the formulaic, generic constructions of genre convention in order to be considered "good," or rather that the writing (again, the product produced by the authors and script writers) challenge genre stereotypes and convention by adding more complexity, depth and verisimilitude to character, dialogue, theme and plot?

I was not referring to elements of style such as grammar, punctuation, syntax and diction that one would discuss in technical (not creative) writing.

Modifié par rcollins1701, 15 mars 2011 - 02:43 .

[rcollins1701]

UltiPup wrote...

A good villain isn't always defined by how obviously evil he is. If you know a villain is a villain, then there is all there is to it. You know the objective and will follow it through like always. At least Bioware took a different approach and kept their evils under wraps. It was a way bigger deal for me to learn about Meredith's own evils after I thought everything was good and done.

I agree. I feel the best villains are those that don't believe they're evil. Meredith was the hero of her own story, after all. She's trying to save the world from the threat of blood magic, abominations and the specter of the Magisters, just as Anders believes he's doing good by murdering people at the Chantry. Villainy often depends on point of view.