650 réponses à ce sujet

[Dianjabla]

Luke Barrett wrote...

Somewhat related question:

Could this frustration with the voiced protaganist be somewhat alleviated if we were more specific with our chat options? My understanding of some of the issues with this is that the paraphrase text (the small text you pick from the wheel) wasn't closely related enough to what Hawke actually said. Would this be less of a problem if we were much more stringent with the paraphased text relative to what is actually said? This is much easier to accomplish than completely reinventing the wheel (I love when puns just appear by accident!)

Yes and no. Some of the frustration of VA is that they don't say anything like what you thought the paraphrase might have. More is when even if they do, they don't necessarily say it in the way you wanted to - the tone & body language is all wrong. Then some times you just plain don't like the sound of their voice - it just doesn't fit with what you want to play as a character. I guess it's like the difference in reading a book and watching the movie version. What your mind interprets is often very different to the movies version. Only as the character is supposed to be yours, this seems to take that away from you, cause a disconnect.

I'll stray a bit off topic here, but this does seem related to your question to me. I started ME & ME2 after DA2 and I'm really developing some intense hate for the dialogue wheel and the VA. The conversations in ME2 have Shepard some what bipolar with unexpected bouts of aggression for the "Paragon, talk rather than fight if you can" character I'm trying to be. I've all but given up actually thinking and reading what's written. Just chose blue when it's there, top right otherwise if you're not investigating. Actually that and the intent icons are the only redeeming feature of the wheel in these games. Knowing how to investigate further without closing off the conversation unexpectedly is a boon. Well done. Could we have more options on the wheel please? In all three games there seems to be only 3 main ways of dealing with any conversation - paragon, neutral & renegade or diplomat, snide & aggressive. Sure, for most things that's probably ok, but for really tough decisions, it doesn't leave a lot of room for the grey areas or compromise.

It's pretty much been said that the wheel and VA aren't going away. Ok, suggestions for improvements:
1. More dialogue options when it matters.
2. The option to see the full text of what will be said by hovering over a selection (or some button combo for consoles)?
3. The option to turn the VA off.

[Tommy6860]

Dianjabla wrote...

Luke Barrett wrote...

Somewhat related question:

Could this frustration with the voiced protaganist be somewhat alleviated if we were more specific with our chat options? My understanding of some of the issues with this is that the paraphrase text (the small text you pick from the wheel) wasn't closely related enough to what Hawke actually said. Would this be less of a problem if we were much more stringent with the paraphased text relative to what is actually said? This is much easier to accomplish than completely reinventing the wheel (I love when puns just appear by accident!)

Yes and no. Some of the frustration of VA is that they don't say anything like what you thought the paraphrase might have. More is when even if they do, they don't necessarily say it in the way you wanted to - the tone & body language is all wrong. Then some times you just plain don't like the sound of their voice - it just doesn't fit with what you want to play as a character. I guess it's like the difference in reading a book and watching the movie version. What your mind interprets is often very different to the movies version. Only as the character is supposed to be yours, this seems to take that away from you, cause a disconnect.

I'll stray a bit off topic here, but this does seem related to your question to me. I started ME & ME2 after DA2 and I'm really developing some intense hate for the dialogue wheel and the VA. The conversations in ME2 have Shepard some what bipolar with unexpected bouts of aggression for the "Paragon, talk rather than fight if you can" character I'm trying to be. I've all but given up actually thinking and reading what's written. Just chose blue when it's there, top right otherwise if you're not investigating. Actually that and the intent icons are the only redeeming feature of the wheel in these games. Knowing how to investigate further without closing off the conversation unexpectedly is a boon. Well done. Could we have more options on the wheel please? In all three games there seems to be only 3 main ways of dealing with any conversation - paragon, neutral & renegade or diplomat, snide & aggressive. Sure, for most things that's probably ok, but for really tough decisions, it doesn't leave a lot of room for the grey areas or compromise.

It's pretty much been said that the wheel and VA aren't going away. Ok, suggestions for improvements:
1. More dialogue options when it matters.
2. The option to see the full text of what will be said by hovering over a selection (or some button combo for consoles)?
3. The option to turn the VA off.

Good post and I agree with you here. My preference will always be for the silent protagonist, simply because I can use my own mentally created voice and inflections. But, I want to add this; had you (maybe) played ME before ME2 and most definitely before DA2, you may have gotten a different experience. DA2 is the absolute wost of the three to be honest, IMO, since I feel like my hand is held with the emoticons and paraphrasing. In ME, though I thought not much of it, it worked well, since that was developed for that game and the paraphrasing matched up decently with my expectations. You played DA2 first and that was a design placed in DA2 from ME, and was stated as such.

The biggest set-back for DA2 was that it is supposed to be a sequel to Origins, and Origins used the SP and I loved that game. When DA2 came along, it was just plain jarring to expereince the paraphrasing and icons when I considered it a DA game.. To be clear, going from ME to ME2 wasn't near as bad as going from Origins to DA2.

[Dianjabla]

Tommy6860 wrote...

Good post and I agree with you here. My preference will always be for the silent protagonist, simply because I can use my own mentally created voice and inflections. But, I want to add this; had you (maybe) played ME before ME2 and most definitely before DA2, you may have gotten a different experience. DA2 is the absolute wost of the three to be honest, IMO, since I feel like my hand is held with the emoticons and paraphrasing. In ME, though I thought not much of it, it worked well, since that was developed for that game and the paraphrasing matched up decently with my expectations. You played DA2 first and that was a design placed in DA2 from ME, and was stated as such.

The biggest set-back for DA2 was that it is supposed to be a sequel to Origins, and Origins used the SP and I loved that game. When DA2 came along, it was just plain jarring to expereince the paraphrasing and icons when I considered it a DA game.. To be clear, going from ME to ME2 wasn't near as bad as going from Origins to DA2.

One of the big things I've found with going from ME to ME2 conversation wise was the inexplicable accrual of Renegade points. That's confusing as I'm trying to be the Paragon like I was in ME. But this is getting further off topic...

I suspect had I not preordered DA2 I'd have read the reviews before I played it and had a chance to prepare for the, er, changes. I still honestly prefer silent protagonist, but if I'm not going to get that ever again might as well try give suggestions improve on it.

[CaribWarrior J]

Although overall I think DAO was a better game than DA2, I think Bioware should never go back to a silent character. The blank stare of the Warden in critical situations/conversations was really immersion breaking.

[Dianjabla]

CaribWarrior J wrote...

Although overall I think DAO was a better game than DA2, I think Bioware should never go back to a silent character. The blank stare of the Warden in critical situations/conversations was really immersion breaking.

Fair point.

[Leoroc]

Just started my third DA2 playthrough immediately following my third DAO playthrough.

While I'm not opposed to the idea of voiced main character...mHawke is just waaaaayyy too baritone to fit a lot of character appearances. I think you need to be more careful with who you pick for the main character's voice. fem Hawke seems good but I think Carver's voice actor would've been better for Hawke.

Generally I play more charming/pretty boy characters than the rough gruff voice for Hawke (as my main DAO character avatar shows)

[Sylvius the Mad]

CaribWarrior J wrote...

Although overall I think DAO was a better game than DA2, I think Bioware should never go back to a silent character. The blank stare of the Warden in critical situations/conversations was really immersion breaking.

They could fix that by not using a cinematic conversation style that shows the PC's face.

I very much want a silent PC back.  I would give up class selection to get a silent PC back.

Modifié par Sylvius the Mad, 30 mai 2011 - 06:20 .

[Huntress]

CaribWarrior J wrote...

Although overall I think DAO was a better game than DA2, I think Bioware should never go back to a silent character. The blank stare of the Warden in critical situations/conversations was really immersion breaking.

I agree with you! I was so wrong about voice character, now I wish Warden would at least smile in DAO.

[tmp7704]

Sylvius the Mad wrote...

They could fix that by not using a cinematic conversation style that shows the PC's face.

I very much want a silent PC back.  I would give up class selection to get a silent PC back.

Alternatively they could use the system from their older games, which had the PC change face expression depending on which dialogue line was selected.

[In Exile]

tmp7704 wrote...
Alternatively they could use the system from their older games, which had the PC change face expression depending on which dialogue line was selected.

Sylvius wouldn't be for that - he wants character mood, tone & expression to be independent from the dialogue chosen. That would be like a tone indicator, and he's opposed to that.

[Sylvius the Mad]

In Exile wrote...

tmp7704 wrote...
Alternatively they could use the system from their older games, which had the PC change face expression depending on which dialogue line was selected.

Sylvius wouldn't be for that - he wants character mood, tone & expression to be independent from the dialogue chosen. That would be like a tone indicator, and he's opposed to that.

True, but that would be better than having the tone provided by the game as a sort of surprise for the player, so he never knows what tone he's going to get.

I think we agree on that.  We don't want the tone of the line to be a mystery to the player when he selects it.  We only disagree about when that happens.

Modifié par Sylvius the Mad, 30 mai 2011 - 08:04 .

[Fallstar]

Personally? I'd prefer a voiced protaganist. But get rid of the accursed wheel. And the entire paraphrase system. I have never ever received a satisfactory explanation of why the paraphrase system is good. Why is it necessary?
 
When we are choosing our character's dialogue, why can we not just, say, choose our character's dialogue? A groundbreaking idea I know, and certainly not one that has been implemented in previous games and needlessly altered.

[Sylvius the Mad]

DuskWarden wrote...

Personally? I'd prefer a voiced protaganist. But get rid of the accursed wheel. And the entire paraphrase system. I have never ever received a satisfactory explanation of why the paraphrase system is good. Why is it necessary?

According to BioWare, it is because players tend to skip the voiced line when they already know what it is going to say.  So, in order to make the players sit through the voice-over, they hide that content from the player until then.

This is literally what they have said.  I am phrasing it in somewhat less flattering terms.

[Tommy6860]

Sylvius the Mad wrote...

CaribWarrior J wrote...

Although overall I think DAO was a better game than DA2, I think Bioware should never go back to a silent character. The blank stare of the Warden in critical situations/conversations was really immersion breaking.

They could fix that by not using a cinematic conversation style that shows the PC's face.

I very much want a silent PC back.  I would give up class selection to get a silent PC back.

This^

I wouldn't give up class selection, as it is already easier to leave out what you suggested and uses less development time. But I am totally in agreement here.

Considering that I am spoiled by the graphics capabilties of today, I wouldn't want class selection eliminated, that would take away too much flavor from role playing. Also, my PC should be mine in all respects and that's why I think using another's voice or expresssions are not mine. I've seen a few state that we do away totally with viewing their PC altogether, suggesting only a FP perspective, but then doing that simply eliminates the need for a character creator, if only having one for just developing the initial stats.

[Sylvius the Mad]

I wouldn't want to lose class selection, no. But class selection (and gender selection, and facial customisation) is less important to me that being able to control my character's behaviour, and that requires a silent PC.

[Tommy6860]

DuskWarden wrote...

Personally? I'd prefer a voiced protaganist. But get rid of the accursed wheel. And the entire paraphrase system. I have never ever received a satisfactory explanation of why the paraphrase system is good. Why is it necessary?
 
When we are choosing our character's dialogue, why can we not just, say, choose our character's dialogue? A groundbreaking idea I know, and certainly not one that has been implemented in previous games and needlessly altered.

I agree doing away with the paraphrasing, since many times, the answer were not what I expected. The problem with your suggestion is and I discussed this in another thread, if that showing the answer, then having the PC repeat, is just plain redundant. While I would rather have that redundancy instead of paraphrasing, I still would be bothered by another using their voice and character away from me. SP is the way to go while also removing the cinematics that would show my PC's face.

[Fallstar]

Sylvius the Mad wrote...

DuskWarden wrote...

Personally? I'd prefer a voiced protaganist. But get rid of the accursed wheel. And the entire paraphrase system. I have never ever received a satisfactory explanation of why the paraphrase system is good. Why is it necessary?

According to BioWare, it is because players tend to skip the voiced line when they already know what it is going to say.  So, in order to make the players sit through the voice-over, they hide that content from the player until then.

This is literally what they have said.  I am phrasing it in somewhat less flattering terms.

You have to be kidding me? Is it not the whole point of interactive, cinematic scenes that you choose (i.e. interact with the game) what you are going to say/do, then watch it play out? Urgh.

The reason I play Bioware games is for character interaction and dialogue. That has always been their strength. The combat in Origins was also superior in quality to, say, Oblivion. The point of Dragon Age to me (I understand this will vary from person to person) was to have a personal, involving story. That is what Bioware do better than other companies such as Bethesda. In my opinion, the paraphrase system removes from this experience, thus diminshing the edge games like Dragon Age have over fallout say.

[Tommy6860]

Sylvius the Mad wrote...

I wouldn't want to lose class selection, no. But class selection (and gender selection, and facial customisation) is less important to me that being able to control my character's behaviour, and that requires a silent PC.

I agree with that and I all but stated that. But as you suggested, removing the view entirely of the PCs face and expressions from all cinematics is the way to go, that right there would not necessitate the need to remove character customization, it would actually allow for more. You would be basically going against yourself here. You may as well simply make your PC FP perspective only; that would drive me mad really.

Example, while I didn't think Oblivion was that great of an RPG, I like the ability to go from FP to TP perspectives and then while in convo cinematics, no matter the perspective, the PC's face was never shown. I really liked that aspect with Beth games.

[Fallstar]

Tommy6860 wrote...

DuskWarden wrote...

Personally? I'd prefer a voiced protaganist. But get rid of the accursed wheel. And the entire paraphrase system. I have never ever received a satisfactory explanation of why the paraphrase system is good. Why is it necessary?
 
When we are choosing our character's dialogue, why can we not just, say, choose our character's dialogue? A groundbreaking idea I know, and certainly not one that has been implemented in previous games and needlessly altered.

I agree doing away with the paraphrasing, since many times, the answer were not what I expected. The problem with your suggestion is and I discussed this in another thread, if that showing the answer, then having the PC repeat, is just plain redundant. While I would rather have that redundancy instead of paraphrasing, I still would be bothered by another using their voice and character away from me. SP is the way to go while also removing the cinematics that would show my PC's face.

However, not having the dialoge removes the option for players such as myself; I don't get a 'talk' button. However, you do get a skip dialogue button. i do not believe it is redundant to have my protaganist repeat what i say; the point of cinematic dialogue to me is to be able to choose what my character says, then watch how that plays out. The way I see it:

1. Origins: Dialogue choice, Silent PC
2. What I'd like to see: Dialogue choice, Voiced PC. (Choice of voices would be best, but probably impractical.)
3. DA:2: Paraphrase system, voiced PC.

Though I'd prefer 2, if that is not possible, I would still prefer 1 over 3 by far.

[Tommy6860]

DuskWarden wrote...

Sylvius the Mad wrote...

DuskWarden wrote...

Personally? I'd prefer a voiced protaganist. But get rid of the accursed wheel. And the entire paraphrase system. I have never ever received a satisfactory explanation of why the paraphrase system is good. Why is it necessary?

According to BioWare, it is because players tend to skip the voiced line when they already know what it is going to say.  So, in order to make the players sit through the voice-over, they hide that content from the player until then.

This is literally what they have said.  I am phrasing it in somewhat less flattering terms.

You have to be kidding me? Is it not the whole point of interactive, cinematic scenes that you choose (i.e. interact with the game) what you are going to say/do, then watch it play out? Urgh.

The reason I play Bioware games is for character interaction and dialogue. That has always been their strength. The combat in Origins was also superior in quality to, say, Oblivion. The point of Dragon Age to me (I understand this will vary from person to person) was to have a personal, involving story. That is what Bioware do better than other companies such as Bethesda. In my opinion, the paraphrase system removes from this experience, thus diminshing the edge games like Dragon Age have over fallout say.

Bioware has pretty much stated the silent protagonist is gone. I have seen David Gaider say it as well as Mike Laidlaw. I think that is sad really, but they claim this is the way the format is going, Mass Effect was the beginning from a Bioware perspective. I think that takes away from making the game in a larger scope because doing VOs takes more time and resources since they not only have to get actors to do the voices, they then have to make the cinematics animate with movements of expressions and the lip movement. Then thye have less game to provide. One way around that in DA2 was to make near unending waves of ridiculous combat to make the game appear longer while providing less role playing content.

[centiumcuspis]

I think it depends on the type of PC. If the PC is developed, has own personality and background(even if choices change personality) then having its own voice is a good thing. If the character is supposed to be an extention of the player, a channel for thier personality and creativity then giving the PC a voice throws some of that off, but then again with writen conversation the "tone" is still implied one just can't hear it (I remember feeling in DAO that how I thought a line of diolauge would be interprated but the implied tone was different from the NPC's interpretation of it and I was left confused).

Unless one can enjoy both views on Player Characters one will contenue to be dissapointed I am afraid

[Zjarcal]

Tommy6860 wrote...
I agree doing away with the paraphrasing, since many times, the answer were not what I expected. The problem with your suggestion is and I discussed this in another thread, if that showing the answer, then having the PC repeat, is just plain redundant.

I gotta admit, from the little I played of The Witcher 1, it really is redundant, to the point that it really annoyed me.

While I would rather have that redundancy instead of paraphrasing, I still would be bothered by another using their voice and character away from me. SP is the way to go while also removing the cinematics that would show my PC's face.

I take it you didn't like those in Origins either?

As for paraphrases, I certainly agree that we need clearer paraphrases in many cases, though for the most part I'm okay with the system. At least they have improved from ME>ME2>DA2 in that aspect (in my view anyway).

[Tommy6860]

DuskWarden wrote...

Tommy6860 wrote...

DuskWarden wrote...

Personally? I'd prefer a voiced protaganist. But get rid of the accursed wheel. And the entire paraphrase system. I have never ever received a satisfactory explanation of why the paraphrase system is good. Why is it necessary?
 
When we are choosing our character's dialogue, why can we not just, say, choose our character's dialogue? A groundbreaking idea I know, and certainly not one that has been implemented in previous games and needlessly altered.

I agree doing away with the paraphrasing, since many times, the answer were not what I expected. The problem with your suggestion is and I discussed this in another thread, if that showing the answer, then having the PC repeat, is just plain redundant. While I would rather have that redundancy instead of paraphrasing, I still would be bothered by another using their voice and character away from me. SP is the way to go while also removing the cinematics that would show my PC's face.

However, not having the dialoge removes the option for players such as myself; I don't get a 'talk' button. However, you do get a skip dialogue button. i do not believe it is redundant to have my protaganist repeat what i say; the point of cinematic dialogue to me is to be able to choose what my character says, then watch how that plays out. The way I see it:

1. Origins: Dialogue choice, Silent PC
2. What I'd like to see: Dialogue choice, Voiced PC. (Choice of voices would be best, but probably impractical.)
3. DA:2: Paraphrase system, voiced PC.

Though I'd prefer 2, if that is not possible, I would still prefer 1 over 3 by far.

For me, actual dialogue choice, no PC face shown in a SP format.

While I would rather not have paraphrasing, the fact that the PC has a voice and expression, simply isn't mine, therefore I would disagree with you on that. We are just talking preferences. You want the cinematics, I don't. I want to make my character, my character, I don't want someone else to be my character for me. To be clear, I am not saying you are wrong, because between you and I, it is simply a preference, not any one is right.

[Fallstar]

I find that rather sad. Especially as the protaganist for Skyrim is going to be voiced. I can live with that, but if Fallout 4 has a voiced protaganist...

I know what you mean about waves, but lets try not to get onto that eh?

And yes, I do agree with you about Mass Effect being the point Bioware started to change the games they created. More specifically, I think something happened after the release of ME. Origins was pretty far ahead by this point, so it was pretty much undamaged, but from ME2 and DA:2, I think we can see the direction they were moving in. Hopefully the reaction to DA;2 has slowed them down a bit, but in general, I think that traditional crpgs are fairly dead. And the world in TW didn't exactly appeal to me, I found it a bit, meh.

The rpg series I still follow are basically DA, Fallout and TES. So I've only got this burst of NV dlc to look forward to

[Tommy6860]

Zjarcal wrote...

I gotta admit, from the little I played of The Witcher 1, it really is redundant, to the point that it really annoyed me.

Yes, that drove me nuts, but if i had a preference, I would rather have that than paraphrasing. Could you imagine having an actual convo with a good friend of yours, where you paraphrasd all of your remarks or qeuries to them, how that would turn out?

I take it you didn't like those in Origins either?

As for paraphrases, I certainly agree that we need clearer paraphrases in many cases, though for the most part I'm okay with the system. At least they have improved from ME>ME2>DA2 in that aspect (in my view anyway).

No, I didn't like seeing my PC's face during convos, but it was tolerable. Seeing the deer in the headlights look was off-putting, but not bad. It is better than a VO for me though. I have to admit though, that I wouldn't want my face removed during kissing scenes and romance is a must for me in role playing, that's not an option, so in that respect, I may be experiencing a bit of cognitive dissonance here.

Anyway, I actually think the wording in ME was better than DA2, as it fit the answers from the NPCs for the most part. I will say this, if they are going for a VO, I could probably accept that, if they didn't show my face during the convos, since if they left out paraphrasing, those would be my choices anyway. I don't know how that would work, since I haven't had the expereince with taht aspect before. Maybe make the game with that option. If they left out my PC face cinematics, they could offer more game content and role playing.

Modifié par Tommy6860, 30 mai 2011 - 08:57 .