33 réponses à ce sujet

[Wulfram]

There must be dangerous trees where you live

[JesterPsychotica]

Rifneno wrote...

Foolsfolly wrote...

I don't think this is a Greek tragedy, dude.

If it were then Hawke would have a tragic flaw that would destroy all of Hawke's efforts. And in the end Hawke would be undermined/killed/defeated/banished because of that character flaw.

Hawke has no character flaw.

Bad things just happen to Hawke, it doesn't make it a Greek Tragedy. I don't know what you'd call Hawke's story.

Unfinished comes to mind.

What was Hercules' flaw?  He's pretty much the greatest hero of ancient Greece and the only thing he had resembling a flaw was that he felt guilty his psychopath mother-in-law killed his wife and children.  And supposedly, scholars of the era say that kind of thing was pretty much how Greeks view things.  If bad stuff keeps happening because of you, you should feel like crap even if it wasn't your fault.

~eye twitch~

Heracles flaw was that he was a psychopath and would go into fits of murderous violent anger.

And he did this TWICE.

[JoHnDoE14]

I instead think that the shift from classic epic to tragic epic was most refreshing. Kuddos to BioWare for that!

[Medhia Nox]

I actually disagree that this game is a tragedy at all.

"The Poetics" of Aristotle states that a tragedy is made by the good intentions of a hero being turned into a terrible end. Oedipus actually wants to find "Truth" - admirable goal, with a very tragic end.

"It is the situation of the man of much glory and good fortune who is not too superior in excellence and uprightness and yet does not come into his misfortune because of baseness and rascality but through some inadequacy or positive fault." - Aristotle, The Poetics pg 24 ISBN: 080784017

BTW - a character's "Flaw" isn't the same as what it is today. A flaw could be "Trusting someone to a fault." Now - trust is a good thing - but, trusting someone who is betraying you - everyone else knows it, but you're too blind to see it because you "trust them to a fault" - would likely have a truly "tragic" end.

However - I think Dragon Age 2 is what Aristotle would have classified as a "misadventure". Simply a series of bad events that occur to a character regardless of intention. Think Jack Sparrow of the "Pirates of the Caribbean". While yes, he does survive his adventures (not true actually - he is resurrected by his allies in three), he is consistently getting into trouble... these are the "Misadventures of Jack Sparrow".

I believe that Hawke was both base and a rascal and came to his fortunes that way. And though Hawke could have been said to possess several inadequacies - it is important to note that "inadequacies" are not the same as "sins" and "faults". They are mere shortcomings - naive, simple, brash, etc. And Hawke certainly possesses no inherent 'positive fault' (like the trust example I gave).

Modifié par Medhia Nox, 21 avril 2011 - 09:25 .

[Coous]

I wouldn't exactly call the game a "tragedy", but there are many many tragic things that you encounter in the game. In very loosely and goofy way I compare this to Macbeth(but any tragedy would probably due) in the sense you rise to power you have it going for you and then one thing after another it comes crashing down on you. You end up losing all your friends(except a romance if you chose to do so) and finally once you think you've made your stay and establish Kirkwall just as home as your old you have to leave it. What the game lacks is the "downfall and fatal flaw of your hero that gets him killed".

[Niezabudka]

The theme with the family was one of the most grotesque elements of
DA2.

When at the very beginning a brother / sister dies then you just want
to show the monster the other two and yell "Bump them off too!"
I had an impression that BW would like to play on our emotions so much
that he went to gross exaggeration and ridiculousness ...

In ME you really felt sorry about the death of Kaidan / Ashley; in DA2
there are no such emotions despite the fact that a person can stumble
three times over a corpse of someone from their family.

In my opinion creating a compulsory family is merely building a
distance between us and the character we impersonate..... I hate having
siblings in a game and pretend that I care about them because it is
rather artificial and not
exciting enough.

Modifié par Niezabudka, 22 avril 2011 - 02:54 .

[Plaintiff]

I have to disagree. 'Tragedy' as a genre isn't just "bad things happen". Tragedy is characterized by inevitability, where the bad things happen as a result of the protagonists inability to overcome their fatal flaw.

But the inevitability of 'Tragedy' is negated by Hawke's ability to choose his outcome. The only flaws Hawke has are the ones players choose to give him. And ultimately, Hawke wins. Depending on how you play the game, he can be reunited with his lost sibling, find love, stand up against an army led by an insane bully and even become ruler of a city. Yes, he loses a lot along the way but that's how stories go. A victory that was obtained easily would feel cheap and hollow to us, the audience.

Meredith's story is a better example of  'Tragedy'. Her hubris and paranoia drive her subordinates to turn against her and ultimately she is destroyed by her own weaknesses. But it's not Meredith's story.

I think DA2 is still very much an 'epic' rather than a 'tragedy', it's different from Origins because there is no clear and distinct evil to fight and the story is based very much in one central location, there is no 'great quest' to embark upon. The drama is on a smaller scale, and is based in character rather than plot.

Personally, I never felt depressed after DA2, and I've played through it at least three times. My Hawke inspires the mages to rebellion and runs away with his lover to have new adventures, and that's just the way I like it.

[Wulfram]

I think saying that a mage supporting Hawke wins is pretty dubious. Fundamentally the game ends with the circle being destroyed despite their efforts and them driven from their home.

Of course, it depends what your Hawke wanted - if you were after provoking violent revolution, then you're good, and if you're more interested in the personal then getting out alive with sister and LI might do you OK - but the biggest thing my first Hawke had to celebrate from the ending was that she didn't end up having to kill Carver.

[Plaintiff]

Wulfram wrote...

I think saying that a mage supporting Hawke wins is pretty dubious. Fundamentally the game ends with the circle being destroyed despite their efforts and them driven from their home.

Of course, it depends what your Hawke wanted - if you were after provoking violent revolution, then you're good, and if you're more interested in the personal then getting out alive with sister and LI might do you OK - but the biggest thing my first Hawke had to celebrate from the ending was that she didn't end up having to kill Carver.

Yeah, violent revolution was pretty much what I was going for. Supporting the mages isn't about preserving the Circle so much as it is about simply saving the mages. I consider the Circle to be a broken system so to me personally, getting the mages to push back against centuries of mistreatment was really the best outcome.