3223 réponses à ce sujet

[Someone With Mass]

The Collectors just kept to themselves until Sovereign was destroyed. And even if Shepard knew about them, there was nothing he could do about it, since they were operating within Terminus space.

Plus, their role wasn't to fight a war for the Reapers. Just preparing for it.

[JKoopman]

Nyoka wrote...

JKoopman wrote...

You yourself have admitted that things like weapon upgrades, weapon and armor mods, ammunition types, credits, resources and perhaps even things like omni-tool and implant modifictions and upgrades would make perfect sense for Shepard to salvage from downed enemies. Obviously loot and an inventory could work in the context of the Mass Effect universe.

I'm advocating the ME2 way of managing items, and you have described it very well. It's confusing how some people think ME2 had no inventory at all, don't you think?

No, that's not at all how ME2 managed things. Did you salvage credits from downed enemies? No, you took them out of random civilian safes effectively making Shepard a thief. The only resources you collected were minerals from big canisters conveniently scattered about the environment. What about collecting spare medi-gel and omni-gel from enemy supplies? Oh, right. Omni-gel was removed and medi-gel was relegated to Mass Effect's equivalent of a Phoenix Down due to the regenerating health and is only collected from convenient medi-gel dispensers. What about an enemy with a unique or interesting weapon mod that you could salvage? Right, the only weapons you could collect were those left conspicuously sitting in set places around the levels, mods were nonexistent and upgrades became one-off affairs scanned from random terminals and added to a universal and linear upgrade list that applied to all party members. In fact, you don't collect ANYTHING from enemy kills in ME2; not even EXP...

[Il Divo]

Fixers0 wrote...


The second game never botherd making a suspension of diseblief, it's just throws 'awesome' right in our face let me give you a thing that really botherd  me and which is a prime example of the overall style of this new direction.

Liara's stupid university doctorate, why the hell is it writen in english and looks its design came straight from earth?

It's because the desginers coul't come up with anything better and were afraid that if the tried something different people would not immediately recgonize for what it is, same as with the rest of the interior.

And if you want to talk suspension of disbelief, we could talk about any number of issues. Plot holes? Pseudo-science? Technobabble? Aliens acting like humans? Any number of things can break suspension of disbelief. Liara's doctorate didn't give me the same trouble it seems to have given you. I fail to see how this is "throwing awesome" in my face.

Or what about the stupid N7 armor, that appearantly is only used by one person but that is selled by shops all over the galaxy, what's even more annyong is that these parts are made by different companies, really did they made like a deal that they would create armor parts for an armor systems that would only be used one person, what a profit.

Are you really trying to argue for suspension of disbelief, about a gameplay mechanic? Do you have any idea how fail Mass Effect's shop system was to begin with? How about Ashley's white and pink armor?

 I never denied Mass Effect 1 is a video game or that it doesn't play like one, but it was like playing a vidoe game for the first time, it was a wondefull  experiance even with all it's flaws, were as Mass effect 2 is like eating a bukket of popcorn for the how-many-was-it time, and while that game used it's resourses more effecticly then it's predecessor, for me it ended up much less inspiring then the first game.

And I felt the exact opposite. I thought Mass Effect sunk beneath the weight of its inventory, "exploration", and empty world. But this is all getting beyond the point. We're simply discussing why you love ME2 better than ME. My point was strictly regarding Mass Effect and calling it anything besides 'video game'.

Modifié par Il Divo, 17 juillet 2011 - 04:57 .

[Il Divo]

In Exile wrote...

There's no way to fix ME1 without deleting it and starting from scratch. You can't polish a turd into something else. 

This is the problem. Mass Effect's inventory was not something which could be held onto with a few changes. The entire system needed to redesigned from the ground up, which costs resources. Resources which I'm not certain I want Bioware to expend, especially after seeing what the original inventory was like.  

[EternalPink]

SalsaDMA wrote...

PnXMarcin1PL wrote...

olymind1 wrote...

in ME2 the citadell felt like an office building instead of a giantic space station, even omega felt larger.

when finished me2 i went back to anderson, maybe now he has something to say about the reapers or the council, if i got proof about them, but nothing.

after ME1 there was a huge expectation about the sequel: the reapers are real, and they are coming, we have to prepare, and in ME2 there was nothing about that, like a side story or ME1.5 or an expansion. like an anime with fillers, which almost have nothing in common with the main storyline.

at least nothing we could make sense of it right now.

Would you want to fight Reapers with Collectors helping them and other bull**** going on between other species in the galaxy ? i just want simple anwser, yes or no

Considered the collecters 'fleet' consisted of a single ship that could get blown up by an oversized frigate, I wouldn't really feel intimidated by the collectors as an addition to the reapers in an open fight.

The collectors relied wholly on being able to pick off straggling colonies while nobody else was around or keeping an eye out on the colony.

Change oversized to modified and cutting edge technology, add in upgraded by each species - thrusters, shields, gun, armour and add in tactically stronger position (unlike the Normandy SR1 which was in stealth mode upon being attacked - which is why i presume we were hit by capital class weapons even though the codex says frigates are immune to these due to there speed and manuevability) and we are slightly closer to how i saw the fight.

Also we don't know that sovereign knew about the collectors since for him to know we are assuming that reapers all share there intelligence but if they are not actually a harmonious hive mind but a group of distinct indivuals then co-operation and sharing between them become much less likely.

The collectors could exist because harbingeer didn't trust/like/respect sovereign so that was the safety net if sovereign messed up and if thats the case then telling sovereign about them would not have made sense.

[littlezack]

 I think ME1's inventory could have been fixed by just having less stuff laying around all over the place. Maybe have one or two nice things as a reward at the end of certain levels, give ample credit bonuses, leave the rest of everything in stores, and let the player pick and choose what he wants and doesn't want.

[string3r]

Il Divo wrote...

In Exile wrote...

There's no way to fix ME1 without deleting it and starting from scratch. You can't polish a turd into something else. 

This is the problem. Mass Effect's inventory was not something which could be held onto with a few changes. The entire system needed to redesigned from the ground up, which costs resources. Resources which I'm not certain I want Bioware to expend, especially after seeing what the original inventory was like.  

I really don't see the problem that people had with the inventory. Sure it felt a little daunting and clunky at first, but once you got the hang of it it became second nature.

[didymos1120]

JKoopman wrote...
 No, you took them out of random civilian safes effectively making Shepard a thief.

Because all those crates, lockers, and yes, wall safes you were hacking open in ME1 belonged to Shep. No thievery involved there...

[littlezack]

And on top of that, you could just...not take the money, if it bothers you that much.

[Lumikki]

didymos1120 wrote...

JKoopman wrote...
 No, you took them out of random civilian safes effectively making Shepard a thief.

Because all those crates, lockers, and yes, wall safes you were hacking open in ME1 belonged to Shep. No thievery involved there...

The funny part isn't that person isn't right, but the hypocrisy behind the idea that it's only ME2 related.

[didymos1120]

JKoopman wrote...

....upgrades became one-off affairs scanned from random terminals and added to a universal and linear upgrade list that applied to all party members.

Um, not all of them.  There were a number you got by scanning a dead enemy's armor/corpse or weapon: Heavy skin weave from a damaged geth, heavy weapon ammo from an YMIR on Freedom's Progress (this is the very first upgrade you get, in fact), biotic damage from a dead Collector on Horizon, etc.  Sure, they were static objects, but they weren't terminals.

Also: you forgot the various PDAs found on/near bodies that you could hack for creds.

 In fact, you don't collect ANYTHING from enemy kills in ME2; not even EXP...

Thermal clips, though it is random.  At the final boss, you also get random power cell drops. But why this fixation on random drops from enemies? Because it's traditional? Because you need that incentive to make shooting them "meaningful" or whatever?

In any case, what ME2 did with loot was to basically just go for an "all treasure chest" approach, where the "chests" took various environment-appropriate forms: computer terminals, wall safes, PDAs, corpses, ammo boxes, etc.  Yes, the contents of the "chests" are static, but that's very often the case in RPGs. They don't all have randomized loot containers.  As well, the fact that they're conspicuous and in fixed locations is a pretty standard RPG thing as well.

Modifié par didymos1120, 17 juillet 2011 - 05:37 .

[Hulk Hsieh]

JKoopman wrote...
No, that's not at all how ME2 managed things. Did you salvage credits from downed enemies? No, you took them out of random civilian safes effectively making Shepard a thief. The only resources you collected were minerals from big canisters conveniently scattered about the environment. What about collecting spare medi-gel and omni-gel from enemy supplies? Oh, right. Omni-gel was removed and medi-gel was relegated to Mass Effect's equivalent of a Phoenix Down due to the regenerating health and is only collected from convenient medi-gel dispensers. What about an enemy with a unique or interesting weapon mod that you could salvage? Right, the only weapons you could collect were those left conspicuously sitting in set places around the levels, mods were nonexistent and upgrades became one-off affairs scanned from random terminals and added to a universal and linear upgrade list that applied to all party members. In fact, you don't collect ANYTHING from enemy kills in ME2; not even EXP...

With ME2 system, you can still loot credits from dead ememies. Just add a "Money from dead enemies" item in the end of mission report and it is done.

Inventory is still not needed.

[Il Divo]

string3r wrote...

I really don't see the problem that people had with the inventory. Sure it felt a little daunting and clunky at first, but once you got the hang of it it became second nature.

It stems from mainly six issues:

1) Omnigel. Due to the 150 item limit, eventually your character will be forced to break down omnigel on a regular basis, which makes the hacking minigame obsolete and tends to slow down the pacing of the combat/story.  

2) Inability to stack items. This simply increases inventory clutter, making it more troublesome to search for upgrades.

3) Linearity. Because of weapon stats, it's often very easy to discern what is the best weapon. Other RPGs do make use of linear upgrades, but often times there are other effects/styles to consider (Ex: Dragon Age).

4) All guns of a single type (Ex: Pistol) being used almost exactly the same way. For a game with so many weapons, they all tend to fire the exact same way, which makes the different gun types feel generic.

5) Naming scheme. Because many weapons/armor are the same type, with only a different rank attached, it becomes easier to forget what exactly your character is using, which often means going back into the inventory screen to double check, where the stacking/omnigel problems occur again.

Edit: 6) The interface, which made cycling through your different guns rather annoying.

These are just my personal issues, and it applies less to the upgrade system. YMMV, of course. To sum up, the overall issue is that the inventory is much larger than it needs to be and adds remarkably little to the game, given its size.

Modifié par Il Divo, 17 juillet 2011 - 05:50 .

[EternalPink]

didymos1120 wrote...

JKoopman wrote...

....upgrades became one-off affairs scanned from random terminals and added to a universal and linear upgrade list that applied to all party members.

Um, not all of them.  There were a number you got by scanning a dead enemy's armor/corpse or weapon: Heavy skin weave from a damaged geth, heavy weapon ammo from an YMIR on Freedom's Progress (this is the very first upgrade you get, in fact), biotic damage from a dead Collector on Horizon, etc.  Sure, they were static objects, but they weren't terminals.

Also: you forgot the various PDAs found on/near bodies that you could hack for creds.

 In fact, you don't collect ANYTHING from enemy kills in ME2; not even EXP...

Thermal clips, though it is random.  At the final boss, you also get random power cell drops. But why this fixation on random drops from enemies? Because it's traditional? Because you need that incentive to make shooting them "meaningful" or whatever?

In any case, what ME2 did with loot was to basically just go for an "all treasure chest" approach, where the "chests" took various environment-appropriate forms: computer terminals, wall safes, PDAs, corpses, ammo boxes, etc.  Yes, the contents of the "chests" are static, but that's very often the case in RPGs. They don't all have randomized loot containers.  As well, the fact that they're conspicuous and in fixed locations is a pretty standard RPG thing as well.

To be honest i'm yet to see a game that does loot properly

In BG2 they dropped pretty much everything when they died but unless you had a bag of holding or were willing to make lots of trips you couldn't loot all that shiny plate armour off the corpses so it sat where ever they died till the end of time.

In DA:O they dropped something yet it was not everything they were carrying so even though you've just killed someone in nice shiny plate mail, you can't have it (defies senses since if you really ran across a dead dude in plate mail armour you could strip it off him although it would probably need repairing)

DA2 enemies explode and while they may not actually have been carrying any gold a puddle of gold and misc items graphic appears and you get a piece of junk that has no relation to what the dead enemy was using.

ME1 we didn't loot the dead themselves but after killing them if you hit the inventory key you were told you had acquired something from the dead even if the dead happen to be a geth colosuss half the map away that you'd ranged with the mako and we still had chests/objects etc to open but we needed a character with the skills to do it

ME2 you didn't loot the dead themselves and the enemies you do loot for stuff are already dead and other than clips they don't drop anything, the containers such as safes etc you hack yourself which i never really understood.

Why am i hacking a safe when i have tali (tech expert) legion (tech expert) kami (thief) with me that should all be happy and willing to hack stuff for me at half the time it takes me.

The only reason i can think of is that players were annoyed with having to either play a character with the hack/eletronic skill or to always have a squaddie with the hack/electronic skill with them.

Modifié par EternalPink, 17 juillet 2011 - 05:48 .

[AlanC9]

JKoopman wrote...
Did you salvage credits from downed enemies? No, you took them out of random civilian safes effectively making Shepard a thief. 

My Shepards didn't do that. Didn't need to either; they got plenty of funding from Cerberus and looted enemy bases.

[JKoopman]

didymos1120 wrote...

JKoopman wrote...
 No, you took them out of random civilian safes effectively making Shepard a thief.

Because all those crates, lockers, and yes, wall safes you were hacking open in ME1 belonged to Shep. No thievery involved there...

The key difference being you could choose not to hack those terminals and crates in ME1 and still get plenty of credits from looting enemies and selling junk without feeling like you're robbing people (and in fact the amount of credits you got from containers, etc was negligible). In ME2, the ONLY way to earn enough income to get all uprades, buy all the equipment you want, etc is to pick every area clean and the VAST majority (as in 90%) of your credits come from the aforementioned safes as you can no longer sell useless equipment in shops.

Which is another thing I didn't like about ME2. You don't so much buy or find things as you do unlock them.

[littlezack]

 
The key difference being you could choose not to hack those terminals and crates in ME1 and still get plenty of credits from looting enemies and selling junk without feeling like you're robbing people (and in fact the amount of credits you got from containers, etc was negligible). In ME2, the ONLY way to earn enough income to get all uprades, buy all the equipment you want, etc is to pick every area clean and the VAST majority (as in 90%) of your credits come from the aforementioned safes as you can no longer sell useless equipment in shops.

90% is pushing it. Maybe 50%. And quite a few of those wall safes belong to people who weren't going to do good things with it, anyway. And really, how is hacking a merc's safe worse than stealing stuff off his dead body?

[Someone With Mass]

FYI, looting is also stealing, but in a different way.

[Gatt9]

didymos1120 wrote...

Thermal clips, though it is random.  At the final boss, you also get random power cell drops. But why this fixation on random drops from enemies? Because it's traditional? Because you need that incentive to make shooting them "meaningful" or whatever?

In any case, what ME2 did with loot was to basically just go for an "all treasure chest" approach, where the "chests" took various environment-appropriate forms: computer terminals, wall safes, PDAs, corpses, ammo boxes, etc.  Yes, the contents of the "chests" are static, but that's very often the case in RPGs. They don't all have randomized loot containers.  As well, the fact that they're conspicuous and in fixed locations is a pretty standard RPG thing as well.

Yup,  because repeating the same exact pattern in an non-stop series of corridors got really boring in the late 90's after Doom.  Maybe if the AI actually did something other than stand in the same spot and loop through "Fire/Pause" it would've been somewhat interesting.

Plus  when I see the letters RPG on a box,  I have certain expectations,  those expectations aren't to get a TPS's "Inventory" system.

The problem with ME2's chests is that there's nothing to put in them.  Since you can kill anything in the game at level 1 with starter weapons,  the entire progression of skill,  weaponry,  and defense is rendered moot.  All that can be in the chests is credits,  and they're effectively useless because you don't actually need anything they're used for,  it's all optional.

It stems from mainly six issues:

1) Omnigel. Due to the 150 item limit, eventually your character will be forced to break down omnigel on a regular basis, which makes the hacking minigame obsolete and tends to slow down the pacing of the combat/story.

2) Inability to stack items. This simply increases inventory clutter, making it more troublesome to search for upgrades.

3) Linearity. Because of weapon stats, it's often very easy to discern what is the best weapon. Other RPGs do make use of linear upgrades, but often times there are other effects/styles to consider (Ex: Dragon Age).

4) All guns of a single type (Ex: Pistol) being used almost exactly the same way. For a game with so many weapons, they all tend to fire the exact same way, which makes the different gun types feel generic.

5) Naming scheme. Because many weapons/armor are the same type, with only a different rank attached, it becomes easier to forget what exactly your character is using, which often means going back into the inventory screen to double check, where the stacking/omnigel problems occur again.

Edit: 6) The interface, which made cycling through your different guns rather annoying.

These are just my personal issues, and it applies less to the upgrade system. YMMV, of course. To sum up, the overall issue is that the inventory is much larger than it needs to be and adds remarkably little to the game, given its size.

1.  That's due to the limitations of the extremely outdated console hardware.  Seriously,  cell phones have nearly as much memory as these things.  Some Droids have 256 megs on them,  The 360 only has 512.  My computer has 8 gigs,  so does my laptop.  The solution isn't to elminate gameplay mechanics,  it's to get out of the outdated hardware.

2.  This is maybe 8 hours of dev time at worst.

3.  Design failure,  make designers produce better design.

4.  That's because guns do fire the same way,  within their type.  The differences are very minor between guns of the same type,  in terms of how they fire.  Edit:  Before someone tries it,  note the comment is how they fire,  not how accurate they are,  or their stopping power.

5.  Design failure,  make desingers produce better design.

6.  About 8 hours of dev time to dump all the objects into sortable lists,  maybe a week at most for a redesign UI,  assuming insufficient mountain dew for artists.  This is old,  well explored tech,  sorting and displaying lists of items has been thrashed out for decades.

My Shepards didn't do that. Didn't need to either; they got plenty of funding from Cerberus and looted enemy bases.

You're leaving out the part where it's sufficient only because there's nothing in the game to buy...nothing you need anyways.

Modifié par Gatt9, 17 juillet 2011 - 07:17 .

[slimgrin]

I wonder if Casey Hudsen gets off on threads like this.

Modifié par slimgrin, 17 juillet 2011 - 07:18 .

[Rovay]

slimgrin wrote...

I wonder if Casey Hudsen gets off on threads like this.

Personally, I think he just stares in disbelief and facepalms the further he gets into the thread... Well, at least that's what I do.

[Gatt9]

littlezack wrote...

 
The key difference being you could choose not to hack those terminals and crates in ME1 and still get plenty of credits from looting enemies and selling junk without feeling like you're robbing people (and in fact the amount of credits you got from containers, etc was negligible). In ME2, the ONLY way to earn enough income to get all uprades, buy all the equipment you want, etc is to pick every area clean and the VAST majority (as in 90%) of your credits come from the aforementioned safes as you can no longer sell useless equipment in shops.

90% is pushing it. Maybe 50%. And quite a few of those wall safes belong to people who weren't going to do good things with it, anyway. And really, how is hacking a merc's safe worse than stealing stuff off his dead body?

Most of those wall safes belonged to innocent people,  not at all involved with the problems,  as did the PDA's.  Shepherd was an unprecedented vulture in modern gaming. 

The wall safes in Omega belonged to innocent people,  not only could you loot them,  in one case in front of the owners,  you then got to take a paragon action of lecturing someone about the evils of looting...right after you just looted 4 apartments.

Looting the migrant fleet's ship?  Looting the factory in Miranda's mission?  Looting the innocent people's belongings in the first real mission and the mission where you meet the collectors?  More than a few other places.

Right now the Alliance really should be hunting Shepherd,  he's a theif easily on the level of Katsumi,  he'll rob you blind right in front of you.

[SalsaDMA]

EternalPink wrote...

SalsaDMA wrote...

PnXMarcin1PL wrote...

olymind1 wrote...

in ME2 the citadell felt like an office building instead of a giantic space station, even omega felt larger.

when finished me2 i went back to anderson, maybe now he has something to say about the reapers or the council, if i got proof about them, but nothing.

after ME1 there was a huge expectation about the sequel: the reapers are real, and they are coming, we have to prepare, and in ME2 there was nothing about that, like a side story or ME1.5 or an expansion. like an anime with fillers, which almost have nothing in common with the main storyline.

at least nothing we could make sense of it right now.

Would you want to fight Reapers with Collectors helping them and other bull**** going on between other species in the galaxy ? i just want simple anwser, yes or no

Considered the collecters 'fleet' consisted of a single ship that could get blown up by an oversized frigate, I wouldn't really feel intimidated by the collectors as an addition to the reapers in an open fight.

The collectors relied wholly on being able to pick off straggling colonies while nobody else was around or keeping an eye out on the colony.

Change oversized to modified and cutting edge technology, add in upgraded by each species - thrusters, shields, gun, armour and add in tactically stronger position (unlike the Normandy SR1 which was in stealth mode upon being attacked - which is why i presume we were hit by capital class weapons even though the codex says frigates are immune to these due to there speed and manuevability) and we are slightly closer to how i saw the fight.

Also we don't know that sovereign knew about the collectors since for him to know we are assuming that reapers all share there intelligence but if they are not actually a harmonious hive mind but a group of distinct indivuals then co-operation and sharing between them become much less likely.

The collectors could exist because harbingeer didn't trust/like/respect sovereign so that was the safety net if sovereign messed up and if thats the case then telling sovereign about them would not have made sense.

you could still blow up the collector cruiser without upgrading your ship. It just required one more shot then and caused a few deaths on your crew... Big woopidy doo.

Collectors as a threat in the grand scheme of things during a reaper invasion would be insignificant. As soon as the ship got involved in a fleet firefight, it would go down, making it a pointless 'threat'.
In a war against reapers, the collectors are really only the janitors of the reapers. Arriving and cleaning up after the reapers ravaged a world so they could get their yummy grey dna goo. Actually fighting they wouldn't participate in unless forced upon them by surprise attacks.

[slimgrin]

Rovay wrote...

slimgrin wrote...

I wonder if Casey Hudsen gets off on threads like this.

Personally, I think he just stares in disbelief and facepalms the further he gets into the thread... Well, at least that's what I do.

The content of this thread is more complex than the game will ever be.

[Someone With Mass]

slimgrin wrote...

Rovay wrote...

slimgrin wrote...

I wonder if Casey Hudsen gets off on threads like this.

Personally, I think he just stares in disbelief and facepalms the further he gets into the thread... Well, at least that's what I do.

The content of this thread is more complex than the game will ever be.

If I were in Casey shoes and saw this, I'd laugh my ass off at the amount of butthurt in this thread instead.