41 réponses à ce sujet

[Hatchetman77]

All I know is that if my Shepaloo ends up in bed with Garrus cause there was no neutral option then I'm going to be pissed...

[In Exile]

javierabegazo wrote...

What I hate about the DA2 icons is that it doesn't really give a damm about what the Gamer's intent in the conversation is, it tells the gamer that THIS is the outcome, so who cares about what intent you had, just choose which ending you want.

It tells the gamer what the attempted outcome is on the part of the PC (e.g. be aggressive, or try to be funny, or try to be diplomatic). It's an improvement over the crapshoot options in any dialogue system Bioware's done thus far.

[Shadow of Light Dragon]

In Exile wrote...

javierabegazo wrote...

What I hate about the DA2 icons is that it doesn't really give a damm about what the Gamer's intent in the conversation is, it tells the gamer that THIS is the outcome, so who cares about what intent you had, just choose which ending you want.

It tells the gamer what the attempted outcome is on the part of the PC (e.g. be aggressive, or try to be funny, or try to be diplomatic). It's an improvement over the crapshoot options in any dialogue system Bioware's done thus far.

The icons are meant to portray personality and style of voice, they are NOT supposed to hijack your character's political/moral/etc stance by putting words into their mouths.

[In Exile]

Shadow of Light Dragon wrote...
The icons are meant to portray personality and style of voice, they are NOT supposed to hijack your character's political/moral/etc stance by putting words into their mouths.

The icons are meant to portray your intention. As for hijacking... that's an issue with the dialogue wheel, and given that this is the ME forum, you'd figure that horse has been dead and beaten for a while now.

[Shadow of Light Dragon]

In Exile wrote...

Shadow of Light Dragon wrote...
The icons are meant to portray personality and style of voice, they are NOT supposed to hijack your character's political/moral/etc stance by putting words into their mouths.

The icons are meant to portray your intention. As for hijacking... that's an issue with the dialogue wheel, and given that this is the ME forum, you'd figure that horse has been dead and beaten for a while now.

I think we're arguing different forms of intent. You are going with the intent of expression (diplomatic, snarky, aggressive, etc) while I am arguing the intent of motive ("I diplomatically/snarkily/aggressively agree to help because..."). The icons are meant to deal with expression, not motive. Paraphrases were supposed to deal with the latter, and did so poorly in some cases.

[Xewaka]

In Exile wrote...

javierabegazo wrote...
What I hate about the DA2 icons is that it doesn't really give a damm about what the Gamer's intent in the conversation is, it tells the gamer that THIS is the outcome, so who cares about what intent you had, just choose which ending you want.

It tells the gamer what the attempted outcome is on the part of the PC (e.g. be aggressive, or try to be funny, or try to be diplomatic). It's an improvement over the crapshoot options in any dialogue system Bioware's done thus far.

Unless the player considers content knowledge more relevant than intent knowledge. If so, DA 2 is the second worst dialogue system (after Mass Effect series).
To present how terrible paraphrasing is as a method to convey information to the player, I usually posit this challenge: It is possible for Shepard to avoid mentioning Cerberus in the Horizon conversation with the VS in ME 2 (the VS then brings it up). Try and do it based on the paraphrases, ignoring any previous knowledge of that part of the game you might have.
Parapgrases are terrible at conveying content information to the player and the icon make them only slightly better than nothing at conveying intent information. Paraphrases with icons are, at best, a zero sum of benefit vs drawback.

[snfonseka]

Not really, because there is a clear difference between dialogues as Paragon/ Renegade.

[In Exile]

Shadow of Light Dragon wrote..
I think we're arguing different forms of intent. You are going with the intent of expression (diplomatic, snarky, aggressive, etc) while I am arguing the intent of motive ("I diplomatically/snarkily/aggressively agree to help because..."). The icons are meant to deal with expression, not motive. Paraphrases were supposed to deal with the latter, and did so poorly in some cases.

I'm discussing attempted outcome, not motivation. Diplomatic isn't your motive, it's what you're trying to achieve (and the way you're trying to do it). That was the role of the icon. The paraphrase was supposed to get at the general content of hat you were supposed to say, so the actual expression.

David Gaidner had a post where he talked about the icons allow writers to try to be more clear with the paraphrase than in ME.

Xewaka wrote...
Unless the player considers content knowledge
more relevant than intent knowledge. If so, DA 2 is the second worst
dialogue system (after Mass Effect series).

Sure, but I think content knowledge is useless. What matters is not what the character says (insofar as the game is concerned) but what the game parses the attempt as. The issue is, really, behaviour, and DA2 (and ME) are much better than old systems at telling you what behaviour you're engaging in.

For example, in ME2 you almost always know when you're going to act (because actions are interrupts), when you're going to ask a question and not move on in the conversation (because of the investigation options) and when you're moving foward.

DA2 lets you know very clearly what outcome you're going to have; whether it's how you attempt to resolve a situation since correcting misunderstandings is impossible (and roughly how it will be perceived, which is important, because most people are always accurate in parsing what the attempt is meant to be).

To present how terrible
paraphrasing is as a method to convey information to the player,
I usually posit this challenge: It is possible for Shepard to avoid
mentioning Cerberus in the Horizon conversation with the VS in ME 2 (the
VS then brings it up). Try and do it based on the paraphrases, ignoring
any previous knowledge of that part of the game you might have.

That's just the paraphrase being poorly written, and stems from the silly inhouse rule Bioware has about the paraphrase not actually containing any of the words in the actual statement. And it's not localization. I played TW2, which was localized in English, and the paraphrases are generally very close (with a few really serious violations),

Parapgrases
are terrible at conveying content information to the player and the
icon make them only slightly better than nothing at conveying intent
information. Paraphrases with icons are, at best, a zero sum of benefit
vs drawback.

Paraphrases aren't bad. It's Bioware's execution. To use the DA2 example:

L: At least father will have company.
P: He won't be alone.

If we had:

P: Father won't be alone.

Then the line is clear (if you read the codex on Hawke, and really, why wouldn't you if you're a serious RPer?).

[Shadow of Light Dragon]

In Exile wrote...

Shadow of Light Dragon wrote..
I think we're arguing different forms of intent. You are going with the intent of expression (diplomatic, snarky, aggressive, etc) while I am arguing the intent of motive ("I diplomatically/snarkily/aggressively agree to help because..."). The icons are meant to deal with expression, not motive. Paraphrases were supposed to deal with the latter, and did so poorly in some cases.

I'm discussing attempted outcome, not motivation. Diplomatic isn't your motive, it's what you're trying to achieve (and the way you're trying to do it). That was the role of the icon. The paraphrase was supposed to get at the general content of hat you were supposed to say, so the actual expression.

That's what I just said. Are we going to argue semantics next?

[JRCHOharry]

Kandid001 wrote...

I hope there won't be spastic icons.

Agreed.

[Xewaka]

In Exile wrote...
Sure, but I think content knowledge is useless. What matters is not what the character says (insofar as the game is concerned) but what the game parses the attempt as. The issue is, really, behaviour, and DA2 (and ME) are much better than old systems at telling you what behaviour you're engaging in.

You have had this same argument with Sylvius various times, and his is the position I share regarding this issue. To save us both time, let us simply agree to disagree at this point, instead of trying to present the merits of both positions during ten pages, then agree to disagree.

In Exile wrote...
That's just the paraphrase being poorly written, and stems from the silly inhouse rule Bioware has about the paraphrase not actually containing any of the words in the actual statement. And it's not localization. I played TW2, which was localized in English, and the paraphrases are generally very close (with a few really serious violations)

That rule exists because Bioware wants to force their voice acting upon us, rather than let us enjoy the game as we see fit. This is the conclusion devired from their commentary on the dialogue focus testing for DA 2. When people was presented to the full line, people would skip Hawke's voice acting. When presented with the paraphrase (and no subtitles for the line, might I add), people would listen to the voice acting - as they were presented no other choice. If the paraphrase contains much of the spoken line, then people would more likely skip said line voice over more often, with opposes Bioware's objective behind the use of paraphrases.

In Exile wrote...
Paraphrases aren't bad. It's Bioware's execution. To use the DA2 example:
L: At least father will have company.
P: He won't be alone.
If we had:
P: Father won't be alone.
Then the line is clear (if you read the codex on Hawke, and really, why wouldn't you if you're a serious RPer?).

You will also notice that, between the spoken line and the paraphrase, there is a length difference of one word. In those cases, making a paraphrase accurate is easy. As the line gains complexity, paraphrases become more and more useless at conveying information. That is, when the paraphrase isn't directly opposed to the actual line, such as in Merrill's act 3 quest (the paraphrase "I take responsibility" and the line actually spoken are directly opposite in meaning).

Modifié par Xewaka, 20 juin 2011 - 09:45 .

[ItsFreakinJesus]

The only thing the ME3 wheel needs is randomized dialog placement so you actually have to pay attention to what you're choosing instead of knowing based on where the usual placement is.

[CroGamer002]

Hope not.

I did loved it in DA2, but that doesn't belong in Mass Effect games.

[whitey4444]

I just hope that the same button for skip conversation isn't the same button that selects the next bit of dialogue... extremely annoying.

[DAR7H_S7EWIE]

zeoduos wrote...

Don't think so. Mass Effect's dialogue wheel is iconic and it's something that imo doesn't need to be changed.

Agreed. The Mass Effect system made sure you paid better attention to the dialogue rather than in DA2 where you could just look for the Olive Branch/Angel Wings symbol to bail you out if you missed something.

The only thing that needs fixing with the ME dialogue wheel is the skip button being the same one that progresses the conversation. That and a fairer representation of the dialogue choice and what Shep actually says.

[Sanunes]

I could be misreading the arguments for I do that a lot with text, but I fail to see how having the icons is any different then the placements meaning pretty much the same thing. There is the paragon response and its always in the same location and the renegade is generally always in the same place too.

I don't always understand how the paraphrasing works or why BIoWare has the internal rules they do for them, but if they like changing up how things work I wish they would change that rule, for it doesn't have to be word for word to what is being said, but it made it annoying to chose what you wanted to say if you weren't just Paragon or Renegade.

[Siven80]

While i thought the DA2 icon system was fine, i dont think its needed for ME3 due to the paragon/renegade system it uses making imo the icons redundant.

Its more a case of bad paraphrasing in both series that mess up the dialogue. But that doesnt make paraphrasing bad, looking at TW2 for example, other than a handful of occasions its paraphrasing is fantastic compared to some of biowares attempts.