47 réponses à ce sujet

[Trobon18]

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?

It wasn't even that in the end I had to fight them both, but its just that in the end there was no change at all. You would think if I had been killing blood mages left and right and sparing no one, then perhaps there would be less of them. If I helpped so many mages then perhaps a few could side with me.

I understand the point some have made that not being able to change things is a realistic way of dealing with it. I agree with that even. However, I became on of the most influential people in Kirkwall. I helpped almost everyone in that city. I just feel like there could be some acknowledgement of those choices.

For me, its not enough to not trust DA3 or anything. I will be buying that game no matter what based on the previous two games and the expansion. I just wanted to say my 2 bits on this matter. I thought awakening actually did a really good job at making your choices affect the final outcome even without focusing on that. Dragon Age 2 also told a great story, and in the end that is why I have always bought Bioware games.

[Sjofn]

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. 

That's pretty much how I feel about it, too. You're the hero, but you're not all-powerful, and you can't force everyone to see your way.

[Maria Caliban]

rcollins1701 wrote...

How does one define "bad writing?"

I assume that when you mean 'writing' you're talking about storytelling in general, which actually predates writing by a minimum of 30 thousand years, as well as issues specific to the written word.


If so:
Poor pacing. Lack of scene and summery. Mechanical and grammatical errors. Unresolved story questions. Sloppy prose. Irregular dialogue for the character. Improper use of exposition. Lack of clear motivation. Lack of well-defined opposition. Lack of escalation. One-note characters. Poor handling of genre elements. Unsympathetic (=! unlikable) main character(s). Unevocative or tired language. Mismatched linguistic style. Muddled themes.

There are also important elements to visual storytelling that I've skipped but they'd also apply to a video game.

1. Simply having one of these doesn't make for bad writing.
2. There are excellent stories that deliberately play with various storytelling conventions.
3. How important many of these are depends on the length of your work.

Modifié par Maria Caliban, 15 mars 2011 - 06:44 .

[Doright36]

You can have a badly written story that is also a great story. (Ie the original pre Jar Jar Star Wars)

You can also have a greatly written story that sucks.

But sad but true fact of the internet is that in this day in age "I don't like=Badly written"

Too many people mistake opinion for fact.

[Foolsfolly]

rcollins1701 wrote...

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.

Your post just made me wonder if Anders is the actual villain of the game.

....and if he is the actual villain of the game...then I think he's replaced the cunning brilliance of Master Li and tragic paranoid faults of Loghain as my favorite BioWare villain.

I need more time to consider Anders as the true villain of the game.

[Icy Magebane]

I think that the biggest problem with the writing (plot) was that all the time jumps felt very unnatural. 3 years really felt more like 3 weeks because nothing changed over the course of those years. You come back from the Deep Roads and it took that long to buy the mansion? It didn't feel like he'd been there more than a day, and pretty much every Act felt like it could have been conveyed over the course of a normal time frame... I don't know if I'm even expressing that coherently...

Basically, this story did not seem to take 10 years to tell. It was more like 3 years in total... or even less.

Okay here's one more thing... back to the mansion example... so Act 2 starts, and 3 years have passed.  In that time, Bodhan finally gets around to paying you for the Deep Roads excursion.  Over the course of those years, what was Hawke even doing?  You had no additional cash from ANY of the time jumps... so what, he just sat around for 3 years at a time?  I don't know... it just did not make any sense that time always stood still after every act.

Modifié par Icy Magebane, 15 mars 2011 - 09:37 .

[Statulos]

Among others, overuse of literary tropes and in this particular case, the Deus Ex Machina (external element that solves the plot).

Seems like nobody is taking full real blame for their actions: Anders is possessed, Meredith is corrupted, Orsino is tainted doe to magic...

At least Loghain was not ashamed of what he did and did so for a purpose, not because LSD-like induced states.

Modifié par Statulos, 15 mars 2011 - 09:37 .

[Ktula]

To me i get the feeling that the general feeling about stories that dont have the hero saving the world (with or without a personal cost) just dont seem to fly. But i thought it was good writing, its a dark ending, but it isnt an end, its just the beginning !

[Statulos]

Ktula wrote...

To me i get the feeling that the general feeling about stories that dont have the hero saving the world (with or without a personal cost) just dont seem to fly. But i thought it was good writing, its a dark ending, but it isnt an end, its just the beginning !

In one of the best narrations of all times, everyone dies and there is nothing left to be saved: it´s called Hamlet.

Like other players, I have no problem on the very, very grimn approach to this game where pretty much your whole family dies, that it´s possible that you slaughter a whole Dalish clan, that many innocents die because of a dude gone revolutionary and all the extra carnage that propells...

If in Origins you have a smile when the game ends because you did it, in DA 2 you basicaly considered that poor Hawke is the guy with the worst luck in the world. And there´s nothing wrong about that!

I have a problem with Hawke being considered that much of a Champion. Champion of what? Of things gone wrong? I mean, he didn´t even have much choice when crap hit the fan between mages and templars.

What I do have a problem with is plots using external elemets to justify actions (the idol, the possessions...) instead of allowing the internal elements to work or giving us extra reasons to at least put a human face to the characters.

Modifié par Statulos, 15 mars 2011 - 09:52 .

[Ktula]

Statulos wrote...

Ktula wrote...

To me i get the feeling that the general feeling about stories that dont have the hero saving the world (with or without a personal cost) just dont seem to fly. But i thought it was good writing, its a dark ending, but it isnt an end, its just the beginning !

In one of the best narrations of all times, everyone dies and there is nothing left to be saved: it´s called Hamlet.

Like other players, I have no problem on the very, very grimn approach to this game where pretty much your whole family dies, that it´s possible that you slaughter a whole Dalish clan, that many innocents die because of a dude gone revolutionary and all the extra carnage that propells...

If in Origins you have a smile when the game ends because you did it, in DA 2 you basicaly considered that poor Hawke is the guy with the worst luck in the world. And there´s nothing wrong about that!

I have a problem with Hawke being considered that much of a Champion. Champion of what? Of things gone wrong? I mean, he didn´t even have much choice when crap hit the fan between mages and templars.

What I do have a problem with is plots using external elemets to justify actions (the idol, the possessions...) instead of allowing the internal elements to work or giving us extra reasons to at least put a human face to the characters.

I get what your saying, maybe it could have been played out better, but i really think this is a story thats being used to weave into a much bigger story to come. kinda Like we shoulda just left Starwars at episode 4-6, but they insisted on making the 1,2,3.

By using Hawke who was around the same time as the warden, they have obvious tie-ins to the previous game, meaning you dont just play DA:O and walk into this without getting some gratification of meeting party members and feeling like a darkspawn arm that was cut off and left to rot.

But it does explain the massive turmoil that is ahead in the DA world, which is gonna be shiny steel vs cloth and bleeding wrists !

[Cajeb]

Bad writing to me is when things don't make sense and I sit back ad say WTF. Example Time

1) Why did Orsino turn into a Harvester when the mage side looks like it is winning? He is desperate? Then why does he FF the ramp and only attack his allies?

2) Why does the peaceful templar-mage faction attack Hawke on sight? Why can't Hawke join them?

3) Why does Isabela fall in love with Hawke after a 2-3 year gap? They had sex once a few years ago and then she disappears. I gave her an amulet and helped her with Castilon and suddenly she is in love with me. Why?

4) Why is Isabela so afraid of Castilon? I mean, if Hawke can duel the Arishok....

5) Was the idol turned into the sword or was it another artifact? Why did Meredith seem perfectly normal compared to Bartrand to only snap completely at the end?

6) Why is Zevran alive?

7) What happens in the time gaps? It seems like nothing happens. What is the point of them then?

[Statulos]

The problem is that this is not a novel nor a film, it´s a game; and I want to have a deeper word on what changes and what happens in the narration.

The only thing I can trully decide in DA 2 is who I´m having in bed!

[Ktula]

Statulos wrote...

The problem is that this is not a novel nor a film, it´s a game; and I want to have a deeper word on what changes and what happens in the narration.

The only thing I can trully decide in DA 2 is who I´m having in bed!

Yep, found it hard to look past the pirates jugs myself

[Foolsfolly]

I find both Isabela's deception about what the relic is, and her selfishness to return the relic to Castion out of fear, are both belief-suspending. It doesn't feel "real" or organic, it just feels like that is what the character needs to do or say in order to advance the narrative.

I felt quite the opposite. The moment I walked outside and there were dead bodies all around I knew she was already at the docks getting on the first ship out of Kirkwall...or wherever Castion or his goons could be found.

From the moment we met her she'd been all about herself. She's not hero material. In fact, I find it odd that if you have a high friendship score that she even comes back let alone fight in the finale which has nothing to do with her.

She does give a decent explanation for the finale though. Something about how we've helped and saved her ass many times and its time she repaid the favor.

But her running off with the book made character sense to me. As did Merrill betraying you in the Fade. She already sold herself to a Pride demon at the cost of loosing her clan. Who are you to instill more loyalty than family, friends, tradition, and honor did?

Leandra's murder was a bit over the top. Leandra suffered the same as everyone else. We barely talk to them. It was sad to hear her talk about dating...and then getting the flower...that was sad.

As for the Frankenstein creature...whatever. It worked and it was one of the better quests in the entire game.

[Caladors]

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?

 
No your not.
There is a whole generation called beat poets whom define grammar on there own terms.
English is wonderfully terrible in what it does, for example 'ough can be pronounced 9 different ways I do believe or something like that... rough, dough, thoughtful so on and so on.
Anyway moving on.

There is only only seven basic stories.
http://tvtropes.org/...SevenBasicPlots
For a quick guide.

So you can't really fault anyone for doing that.
I think 'bad writing' is in the eye of the beholder.
What I perceive as bad writing is cheapness.
What I mean by this is that it done in such away as one must feel this way or does not consider other things due to circumstance.

A wonderful example of this is in the movie Inglorious Bastards.
Aside from being a term from being born out of wedlock, Bastard is an all purpose bad guy slur.
In this way, what is set up through terms and common knowledge is that we are rooting for the 'bad guys' against the 'evil guys'.
Insidious indeed Mr. Tarantino but that is merely great design not bad writing.

So to quickly set the scene there is a whole lot of **** troops in a bar celebrating one of there fellows becoming a father.
The Bastards are posing as officers.
They are meeting with there contact a female film star.
This father too be notices a problem with an accent.
They chide him because they are officers.
And his officer comes to his add because he also notices the same thing as the troop.
There is a small conflict and then things settle.
But eventually it all goes to guns.
Everyone shoots everyone else.
The only people left are the father too be and the film star.
Now other Bastards come and demand he lowers his weapon so that they may rescue there contact.
He agrees because he wishes to raise his son.
As soon as he puts down the gun.
The girl shoots him.

That is cheapness right there.
Why?
Because the heroes never have to morally compromise.
There the big bad **** hunters.
But will they kill a father without a weapon who is sobering after the fact that all his friends are dead?
We will never know because Deus Ex Machina saved them.
(the god machine, the plot, or what have you)
The 'Bastards' still get to be the bad guys not the evil guys because they kill evil guys sure but do they cross that line well the plot saved them from that choice.

I am sorry I am taking an awful long time to answering the original question.

In my opinion, which I hope is informed.
Bad writing is where cheap tricks are played.
Deus Ex Machina the solution to complex problems.
Easy fumbles out of hard questions and easy slides to covenant plot lines.

The nature of an role playing game lends itself to some forms of bad writing.
For example how you meet with Varric is not exactly inspired.
However you must meet otherwise the story does not continue.
These are things that must happen.

However there are cheats to this also.
Take for example end of act one.
Carver or Bethany must leave you.
They must.
Regardless of the level of friendship you have built with Carver he will leave.
If Bethany's closest encounter to a dark spawn is is two yard she still dies.

I believe this to be cheap.
The greater majority of the game is great bar a few times.
But I refer you to Sturgeon's Law.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sturgeon's_Law

I apologize if you read through all of that and the amount of time that can never be returned to you.
Please do not lodge a form of complaint with accounts there are no refunds.

[Cajeb]

Wow that was a great example

[WidowMaker9394]

Some people see evil/bad characters or shocking events such as the death of a liked character as bad writing.

I personally believe that is excellent writing.

[AlexXIV]

'Bad writing' is for once a subjective perception. Some people say they like it and some not. Of course people are different, have different experience with literature. I think it is also a matter of age. I am sure when I was 10 years younger I wasn't as critic as now. Simply because I was a kid and what did I know? Not much.

I think what people expect of 'good writing' is that it is believable, plausible and of empotional and philosophical depth. But there is of course also good written humor, which is more or less only supposed to make you laugh.

I miss two things in Bioware writing in general. For once, subtlety. I think the Bioware writing is in too many cases too obvious. Almost as if someone yells at you what they want you to think and do. Good writing would be if you never even think about such things as plot devices or writing techniques. I mean they have to be there but they shouldn't jump at you and try to push you around. Subtlety.

The other thing is that while Bioware's strength are the dialogues and the in game characters, they almost always great and adorable. Their weakness is obviously the overall plot. I like and play Bioware games for more than a decade but their main plot, with exception of Planescape:Torment maybe is always somewhat generic. Something you heard or seen before and doesn't really surprise you much. Mostly about revenge and some ancient evil.

Now they wanted to make it different this time. So they kill off Hawke's family, make Hawke's mom's death the most emotional moment in the game and let it overshadow almost everything else. So they basically gave up on the rise to power midgame and decided to make some sort of family drama out of it. Basically human origins part 2. The whole family dies except one brother or sister. That's the Cousland story Bioware, how can you just copy paste it from your own game and nothing less than the prequel?

The supposed two main events get overshadowed. The rise of the qunari wasn't epic in any way. It started well iwth Hawke getting more or less ambushed in the qunari headquarter. But from then there was not one epic scene ala ME2 sucide mission or the battle at ostagar or denerim. Nothing. Just hack and slay until you kill the boss. At that point I just thought really, 'Champion'? For that? I thought Hawke deserved the title more for things he/she did before that than the actual duel with the Arishok. It felt more or less just like another quest. Maybe it was because of the destiny trailer which was actually epic that I expected more.

Then the end fight. again you spank your way through a flood of mobs, which is what you do most of the time in DA2. There isn't even something like a quest that actually doesn't involve killing a huge number of mobs. And then you get 2 bossfights. Half of the time you have no clue what the city guards or templars are doing, you are mostly on your own with your group. No epic cutscenes or whatever. At best you get a dialogue zoom before the fight and watch Orsino turn into a harvester. And after this boss fight you get the next since the crazy lady, surprise, is crazy.

And what made it all worse is that by the time you finish the game you realize you had no real means to change anything. You can choose winner or loser side. Mages or Templars. But you can't prevent or incite any of the really meaningful events. Only thing you could have maybe done was protecting your family, but even that was not possible due to plot fail.

In a theatre or movie or book this may all be fine. You don't read books expecting that you get to make any decisions. You sympathise with the hero or whatever character but they are not you. In RPGs you make decisions, you shape the hero of the story. That's point of RPGs or we wouldn't need them. I don't know how in the nine hells Bioware figured that going TFU is bringing RPGs on the next level. That's just unbelievable for me. How ignorant can you be?

Modifié par AlexXIV, 15 mars 2011 - 11:22 .

[AlexXIV]

WidowMaker9394 wrote...

Some people see evil/bad characters or shocking events such as the death of a liked character as bad writing.

I personally believe that is excellent writing.

And some people think a shock scene automatically qualifies as good writing, no matter how badly it is done. And some people assume and generalize too much.

[Sjofn]

The only reason Isabella ditching me annoyed me is because she has seen me stab many, many, MANY problems in the face. Why not just let me stab hers in the face instead of bothering with this stupid relic? Hm?

[Statulos]

AlexXIV wrote...

And what made it all worse is that by the time you finish the game you realize you had no real means to change anything. You can choose winner or loser side. Mages or Templars. But you can't prevent or incite any of the really meaningful events. Only thing you could have maybe done was protecting your family, but even that was not possible due to plot fail.

In a theatre or movie or book this may all be fine. You don't read books expecting that you get to make any decisions. You sympathise with the hero or whatever character but they are not you. In RPGs you make decisions, you shape the hero of the story. That's point of RPGs or we wouldn't need them. I don't know how in the nine hells Bioware figured that going TFU is bringing RPGs on the next level. That's just unbelievable for me. How ignorant can you be?

You have basicaly give nice English to my complains above. Ultimately your only decission is choosing who is in bed with you. In Origins you could see the influence of your decissions long before the final credits appeared, same for Awakening. You definetly changed the world. Here you´re just a privileged withness and I am still wondering what Cassandra may want from Hawke, because he was not really able to "fix" anything.

[Ghurshog]

rcollins1701 wrote...

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.

Then I would say the real question is not one of quality of the writing and more of the point "Did you enjoy the Writing?" 

Most (dare I generalize) would probably think of DA2 as Good who enjoyed it. And those that didn't enjoy it would view it as Bad. But again I completely admit this is a generalization. 

Modifié par Ghurshog, 15 mars 2011 - 07:54 .