174 réponses à ce sujet

[the_one_54321]

MightySword wrote...
But you can choose not to. For example when I play, I only control my sim and never control another sim. Even when I have a family, I always let wife/kids run on automate. And don't be suprise, there are a lot of Sim player going with this style of playing.

Ok, but that's not what I mean. I mean house building and neighborhood layout management. I actually have not touched The Sims since 2, and even that was only very brief. If you can actually do nothing else except manage your one single character then yes, The Sims 3 can be played as an RPG.

[Gatt9]

Luc0s wrote...
If you know an RPG game that absolutely is an RPG but does not pass my list, tell me. I might then edit the list so it becomes a better list.

If you find a game that absolutely isn't an RPG yet it passes my list, also tell me. I then might edit the list so it becomes a better list.


My goal with this list is to find the best possible description of the RPG genre.

Planescape Torment,  Fallout,  and Fallout 2. 

Planescape Torment is more dialogue focused than combat focused.

Fallout is completable without firing a single shot (Which actually sets the gold standard for CRPGs)

Fallout 2 is potentially completable without firing a single shot,  but all but the most dedicated will have a single battle that's essentially unavoidable.

Sorry,  had to do it!  Your system is a very solid one,  but #7's a little iffy,  there's a number of conceivable ways to have an RPG without it.

Fallout is the pinnacle of RPG's though,  so flexible in design that you can win without even fighting,  attributes and skills matter deeply,  take an intelligence of 3 and you'll speak like an idiot.  Skills and Attributes create actual divergence,  certain quests and companions aren't achievable in F2 without certain stats.

It's been 13 years,  no one's come close to it in flexibility and features.

Imagine if you watched a movie. Then you watched the same movie, and in one of the scenes, the characters are saying completely different lines, resulting in a different closure to a minor story arc. The scene being different might not change the ending of the movie, but wouldn't you still say it was different? Take that and apply it to every scene and you might have quite a different movie. Same plot, same physical characters, but different individual scenes.

But this is actually my problem with it.  Games are interactive,  so an action should yield a reaction within reasonable constraints.  For example...

If I tell the trapped Krogan on the homeworld he's acting like a Quarian with a tummy-ache,  Tali gets huffy.

But if I'm a 100% paragon,  and boot someone off a building without any real cause,  No one blinks.

What you describe is 100% desirable,  but the problem with ME2 is that it doesn't want to commit you to any kind of character development.  While having an alternate scene is desirable,  the game doesn't really change based upon your actions,  it yields the same essential result regardless of path,  straight down to the entire crew thinking Samara's daughter is Samara.  The game goes to great lengths to keep everything as superficial as possible,  and in doing so,  eliminates character development.

It does this because Bioware's "New market" isn't a big fan of anything that gets in the way of them acting upon their whim.  Whereas a good solid story would account for your actions and develop accordingly,  Bioware's story gives you a brief alternate dialogue and then quickly forgets what you did at best,  usually not even that,  so that the "New market" can kick someone off a building and not deal with Samara leaving or attacking.

That's why I won't call it an RPG even on that basis,  because everything is transient,  even the romances,  for fear of someone not being able to do anything they like regardless of how contrary it is.

Because the "New market" isn't interested in assuming a Role and pursuing it,  they just want to react to whatever impulse they currently feel. 

I mean look at all the complaining about Morality dialogues,  they can't even stand the idea that good people should say good things,  and bad people should say bad things,  they want to randomly flip-flop between the two roles.

[AlanC9]

Gatt9 wrote...
I mean look at all the complaining about Morality dialogues,  they can't even stand the idea that good people should say good things,  and bad people should say bad things,  they want to randomly flip-flop between the two roles.

Are you actually saying that games shoudn't let the player do that?

[Il Divo]

AlanC9 wrote...

Gatt9 wrote...
I mean look at all the complaining about Morality dialogues,  they can't even stand the idea that good people should say good things,  and bad people should say bad things,  they want to randomly flip-flop between the two roles.

Are you actually saying that games shoudn't let the player do that?

That would be terrible. What I like about paragon/renegade is since they both strive for a beneficial outcome, it is possible to more easily mix/match paragon and renegade outcomes than previous Bioware games. KotOR's light/dark morality makes performing both types of actions feel very strange. On the other hand, with ME I can play someone who acts very sympathetic, or "paragon",  with his party members, but might take renegade actions when push comes to shove.

I also don't know of many Bioware games which implement real consequences for good/evil actions prior to the end game. The closest to this is Dragon Age. But with KotOR/Jade Empire/Mass Effect this typically results in a generic comment from each companion.

Modifié par Il Divo, 22 juillet 2011 - 05:07 .

[MightySword]

the_one_54321 wrote...
Ok, but that's not what I mean. I mean house building and neighborhood layout management.

Neighborhood layout management can be thought as a kind of mod, or world maker like the NWN toolset. House building and furniture buying are not unheard of in RPG. The ElderScroll series for example let you buy estates and upgrade with furniture.

I actually have not touched The Sims since 2, and even that was only very brief. If you can actually do nothing else except manage your one single character then yes, The Sims 3 can be played as an RPG.

The point is though even if it can be played like a RPG, no one in the right mind would call it a RPG, even though it would fit perfectly to any classical RPG check list. This just means (as I keep saying) that it proves a hard-list is a the wrong way to classify a game. It could serve as a general guide line, but by no mean a bibble to dictate this game is a RPG and another game is not which quite a few people enjoy doing.

Modifié par MightySword, 22 juillet 2011 - 07:30 .

[MightySword]

The Sims 3 can satisfy most of these criteria easily.

1. If you RP your sim, then that's the case. Quite common.

2. As already explained, Life Time wish and Opportunity system can serve as the main sub quest. The World Adventure Pack actually give you long quest lines to do. For example there are a quest chain with 4 different quests from gather material, information, seek approval, and lastly raid the tomb for an item. The final reward is a Miracle Axe that can break any boulder.

3. While the game depends on the player to be imaginative, it does have a lot of tool to help with the self narrative. In fact, if you want to go with the classical PnP RPG definition, the Sims 3 actually beat every other RPG in this department, since it is exactly how a story is told in a Paper and Pencil RPG.

4. See 2.

5. The Sims 3 passes with flying color.

6. Not many game can do better then The Sims in this regard.

7. Possible if you play Martial Art Master sim, or a Tomb Raiding Sim, or RP a Yakuza sim. Story about how a sim beat up and burn their entire neighborhood are actually quite common on a Sims forum.

8. The only games that has more loot and reward than the Sims 3 is probably a MMO. Seriously, you receive reward just for about every single thing you do.

9. Again, passes with flying color.

Modifié par MightySword, 22 juillet 2011 - 07:31 .

[MightySword]

Luc0s wrote...
My goal with this list is to find the best possible description of the RPG genre.

The point is, IMO, it's pointless to come up with such a list. There are 2 kind of people who try to do this:

- The people who hold the original Paper&Pencil RPG as the holygrail and refuse any derivation, change or adaptation. The thing is RPG is a product, and consumer invention. It's not a constitution or the law of physic. These people just refuse to acknowledge the modern RPG, and hence they make such claim as JRPG is not a RPG, or the Witcher is not a RPG. Because to them there is only ONE RPG. As you can see this board have a large number of those.

- The people who want to find a one definition fit all for all RPG like what you're trying to do. The problem is RPG nowadays is one of the gerne that have the most variety. Doing this risking either you gonna classify just about anythign a RPG, or refuse just about any game to be a RPG.

What I don't understand is what is so hard about realize the diversity of the Genre. It's like saying a Car is a vehicle that has 4 wheel and run on gasoline, anything with more or less than 4 wheels and don't run on Gasoline is not a car. Here is my own classification:

- PnP RPG: no need to say anything, that's when RPG was born.
- CRPG: game like Baldur's Gate or NWN with a balance between story, decision, and combat.
- Dungeon Crawl RPG: game like Diablo or Dungeon Seige that have a massive focus in combat.
- JRPG: Japanese RPG with linear story and characters.
- Action RPG: the new type of RPG that serve as an hybrid between RPG and Action game.


And before I move on let me just get this pet peeve out of the way. Even though the general consensus that BGII is the best representative of classic CRPG, and I agree. However, if someone just play BGII and nothing else, then go around talking like he has seen all there is of Western RPG and claim that's what all Western RPG are then exuse me if I give that person zero stock for his opinion. It's on the same token for JRPG, while FFVII does enjoy a cult status success, by no mean it is the defninte of all JRPG, so if you make such a claim on "all" JRPG base on FFVII then that just prove your opinion is not constructed on enough material regardless of how many fancy reason and word you use to describe it. A person with middle school physic can write a 20 pages essay about Newston's law, but it will never be the same as someone writting the same paper with a knowledge of  Engineering level Physic. And no Luc0s, this is not directed at you.


Moving on, an anology to this would be the class inheritance in C++ programming. You can come up with a list that serve as a base list, which like I said is a good guide line. It will be like the Parents class in C++. Then as other user look at your class, they like it and want to use it but not as is. There might be function in the original classes that they don't need, and there are new functions they want to add. However the point is your class have enough merit that it's more beneficial to derive it then writing a new class. That's how I see RPG, the original RPG is a solid concept but by no mean it was perfect. Espeically video game is an adaption to a new medium, so seeing developer derive it is common.

The thing is, as long as a child class justify the benefit of usage of the parent class, than it's justified even if it didn't inherit every single function from the parents class, or if it has new function of its own. In our case, it would be the question of "does this game have enough element of a RPG to be considered a sub class of RPG"? For example, most if not all modern shooter games started having a level up system since a few years back, but you don't see they get advertised as RPG. A game like Mass Effect on the other hand while doesn't have every single bulletin point of a D&D rule book, it still have enough element to be classified as a RPG. Trying to make a "perfect" list and demand every thing to fit perfectly just proves that you're inflexible and are behind the time. For me there are just many type of RPG, I don't believe in the assetment of either it is "THE" RPG, or it is NOT a RPG - which serve no purpose.<_<

Modifié par MightySword, 22 juillet 2011 - 07:28 .

[Sylvius the Mad]

[quote]Luc0s wrote...

This is simply not true. You clearly don't know what plot-points are.

All the minor plot-points are thrown at you by the game. The way these plot-points resolve is determined by the player, yes. But all the major plot-points, also thrown at you by the game, are always the same, they occur at the some moment and they resolve in the same way.

In ME2, the loyalty missions are minor plot-points. The Collector missions are major plot-points.

Ever noticed how the Collector missions are always the same and always occur at the same time in the game? That is because Mass Effect 2 has a well established story with a 3-arc story structure with 2 major plot points and 1 final resolution. All this stuff is linear. It's thrown at you by the game. It's always resolved in the same way and it always sends the story in the same direction.

It's also decided by the game that these major-plot points are more relevant than the minor plot-points. This is not something you as the player get to decide. It's decided for you.[/quote]
This is all supposition on your part.  There is no evidence in the game that this is true.
[quote]That's just philosophical BS.[/quote]
No it isn't.  You've drawn an arbitrary line, and I'm demonstrating that my line makes at least as much sense as yours does.

If you want to defend your arbitrary line, go right ahead, but just repeating the arbitrary assertion isn't going to convince anyone.
[quote]If you think this is true, then go ahead and make your own new book with using copy&pasted pieces from all the Harry Potter books. Then when you made your own Harry Potter book with the copy&pasted pieces, see if you can find a publisher who is willing to publish your book. After that, we'll see how long it takes before J.K. Rowling will sue your butt.[/quote]
1. What possible relevance does copyright law have?
2. If the book I write isn't recognisable as Rowling's work, then she would have no cause to file suit.
[quote]Okay, sure. Let's have it your way. Lets say that these decisions you make in The Witcher are part of the story. So what? What difference does it make?[/quote]
The difference is that I wrote the story.
[quote]You still only get to follow the paths that the developers layed out before you and eventually all the different paths come back together at the end.[/quote]
But those paths aren't precisely defined, so I can resolve those paths more clearly than the writers did.

If I say that you travelled from Berlin to Warsaw, but that's all I say, you could then decide that you flew there.
If I'd already said that you drove, you could decide that you drove a Mercedes.
If I'd already said that you drove a Renault, you could decide that you drove aggressively.
If I'd already said that you drove courteously, you could decide that you listened to news on the radio while you drove.
If I'd already said that you listened to music, you could decide that you listened to ABBA.
If I'd already said that you listened to Mozart, you could decide how the Mozart made you feel.

Everywhere the story leaves a gap, you can fill in that gap.  Every detail that isn't made explicit is yours to set as you prefer.
[quote]Sure they can! I'm the player! Without me, there wouldn't even be a game! Without me, Geralt would just be standing there. Without me, there would be no progression in the game.

I'm playing the game for MY entertainment and I make the decisions that I find entertaining.

If I decide to play I Warrior instead of a Mage, it's a decision I AS THE PLAYER make because I think Warriors are more fun than Mages.

If I decide that Geralt should fight the giant mantis instead of the warlock, it's a decision I AS THE PLAYER make because I rather kill the giant mantis.

If I decide that Geralt should specialize in Aard-magic, it's a decision I AS THE PLAYER make because I prefer Aard-magic to Igni-Magic.[/quote]
Then you're not playing the role.  You're playing a game.

We're talking about roleplaying, not game playing.
[quote]Then maybe you should learn to accept that the character isn't you. And you should learn not to be such a control freak too. 

Besides, this was not the point. The point is that good cutscenes from a good game-developer do not contradict the personality of your PC.

Seriously, I doubt that walking from one side of the room to the other side of the room while having a neutral conversation will contradict the personality of your character. Even if YOU would not walk to the other side of the room, that doesn't mean YOUR CHARACTER wouldn't do it. I believe we already came to the conclusion earlier that YOU ARE NOT THE CHARACTER and that the character is a person on his own?

So what YOU would do is irrelevant. It's what the CHARACTER does or would do.[/quote]
Yes, but I have to be the one who decides what the character will do.  Otherwise his behaviour might contradict me.

It doesn't matter whether I would cross the room.  It only matters whether the character would cross the room, but since I've designed the character's personality the developers CAN'T KNOW whether he would cross the room.  But they also don't know that he would stand still, so they cannot put him in the cutscene at all without potentially breaking him.
[quote]Maybe so. But this is obviously a gameplay decision. This is a moment where BioWare decided to put gameplay in front of storytelling.[/quote]
Yes, and I think that's a bad decision.

The setting's coherence should come first.  Player agency should come second.  Everything else should be subservient to those.
[quote]A cutscene is a sequence in a video game over which the player has no or limited control, breaking up the gameplay and used to advance the plot, present character development, and provide background information, atmosphere, dialogue, and clues.[/quote]
"or limited control" is an interpretive clause.  I can't know from that what your threshhold of "limited" is.  Unless you mean at all limited, but that would cover the entire game.

You've also failed to define gameplay.  As I see it, any part of teh game wherein the player has any control at all is gameplay.  Dialogue selection is gameplay.  Inventory management is gameplay.
[quote]Yes you DO have control, although limited.[/quote]
Choosing between Door #1 and Door #2 is a choice, yes, but I cannot then be said to have chosen the prizes behind those doors.

If I choose a Paragon interrupt, I did not choose to hug someone.  I cannot have, because I didn't know what the options were.
[quote]Yes, the ARE interactive, because they let you interact with the cutscene. You can interrupt the cutscene with a Paragon or Renegade action. That is by definition interaction.[/quote]
It's action.  It's not interaction because I got no feedback.

And it most certainly is not choice.

A well done interrupt system would let us see what it was we were about to do, and have us choose to do it or not once we knew exactly what it was.

I see exactly zero benefit to hiding my character's actions from me.  In fact, I'm comfortable asserting that there is no roleplaying benefit.

There might be a benefit for those people who like being surprised by the PC's actions, but those people, by defintion, cannot be roleplaying.
[quote]Shepard isn't aware that Udina is gay, IF he even is gay (you have no reason to assume he is at this point).

And given the fact that homosexual people are by FAR in the minority, it's more reasonable to assume that Udina is straight than to assume he's gay.[/quote]
No, it's not reasonable to assume either.  Assumptions cannot be reasonable.  Assumptions exist outside reason.
[quote]You're giving me the same BS that religious people give me when I say I'm an atheist. When I say I have no reason to believe that there is a God, they say I shouldn't have a reason to believe that there ISN'T a god either. Any person with at least 2 braincells can see how screwed-up that logic is.[/quote]
That logic isn't screwed up at all, but a religious person who uses it is clearly misapplying it (or it would convince him not to be religious).

Though, if the religious person is using proper definition of the word "athiest", that argument is a non sequiter.
[quote]Sure, but we have a word for people who do that: delusion.[/quote]
That's what roleplaying is.  You're playing the part of a fictional character is a fictional universe that lives inside your computer.

If you're roleplaying well, you're not even consciously aware that any of it isn't real.  Or even that you exist-- because inside the game, you don't, and that should be your sole perspective when roleplaying.
[quote]Sure you can act as if Udina is gay, but you're only kidding yourself because in reality you know damn well that there is no reason to believe Udina is gay.[/quote]
What I know doesn't matter.  What matters is what my character knows.  That's all that matters.
[quote]Do you know that fairies exist? And do you know the universe is created by The Flying Spaghetti Monster?

Seriously, with your reasoning I'm actually starting to doubt your mental health. Without some skepticism and a bit of Occam's Razor, you can believe ANYTHING YOU WANT, which is in fact why I'm concerned about your mental health.[/quote]
That's all belief ever is.  It's all completely foundationless.

More importantly, it's not necessary for you - the player - to believe that these things are true in the game.  you just need to act as if these things are true in the game, or even just as if your character believes them in the game.

Believing something is true and acting as if it is true are very different things.  And you probably disagree with that because you can't see the difference in the outcomes.  But it's the difference in the process that matters.
[quote]A healthy human has some skepticism and a BS-radar. That means that a healthy human usually goes for the easiest answer that takes the least assumptions and requirest the least amount of faith (e.g Occams Razor).

So let me put it this way:

Do you have any PROOF that Kaidan has a gambling addiction? No? then you have no reason to believe he has a gambling addiction. Same goes for your Shepard. If he beliefs Kaidan has a gambling addiction he's simply deluded and I'd start to worry about the mental health of your Shepard.[/quote]
Shepard has evidence.  It was collected off-screen.

See?  There's a gap.  There are lots of gaps - there have to be, because we rarely see Shepard eat or sleep.  So there is plenty of time for him to learn about his colleagues off-camera.

I have to ask you why you assume that you see everything Shepard experiences, expecially given those obvious gaps for eating and sleeping and using the toilet.  See, you've actually jumped to a conclusion, while I haven't.  The error in reasoning is yours.
[quote]Oh so now only important decisions are roleplaying and any non-important decisions are not roleplaying? You need to make up your damn mind.[/quote]
I said "important to Cloud".  You should be the one deciding what's important to Cloud.  Only you can know that.
[quote]No, buying 'sword X' instead of 'sword X' is not going to contradict anything. Just like me buying bananas instead of apples doesn't mean jack sh*t and isn't going to contradict anything.[/quote]
You can't know that at the time you're making the decision.

[Sylvius the Mad]

Gatt9 wrote...

I mean look at all the complaining about Morality dialogues,  they can't even stand the idea that good people should say good things,  and bad people should say bad things,  they want to randomly flip-flop between the two roles.

If "good" and "bad" are as detailed as the personalities get, then it's a lousy game.

I tend to play characters with very detailed personalities, and they're personalities entirely of my construction, so there's no way a pre-generated morality scale is going to fit them all of the time.

[Sylvius the Mad]

Luc0s wrote...

Okay you know what? Why don't you make a nice list of elements that you think a game MUST have in order to be
qualified as an RPG? That would make things much easier for the both of us.

I've already done that.  An RPG must permit in-character decision-making.  That is, the player is making decisions on behalf of the character (or characters - I see no reason to limit it to one).

This is different from the player making decisions on his own behalf.  The player's preferences extend only to the contruction of the character's personality (or characters' personalities), and then that personality can then me allowed to make the in-game decisions.

Note, I haven't required that the game force player to make in-game decisions like that.  I'm not willing to exclude a game simply because it permits metagaming.  But I will happily exclude a game that requires metagaming.

Luc0s wrote...

1. The game must set you up with a character from who's point of view you experience the world. In an RPG, you experience the world from the point of view from a character in that world. You play that character.

You just excluded party-based RPGs.  The entire Wizardry series, for example, has the player in control of an entire party.

There are hundreds of party-based RPGs which don't meet this criterion.

Unless you're willing to allow the player to roleplay more than one character at a time.

2. The game must set you up with an adventure. Somewhere at the beginning of the game, your character must have been given a quest or a mission. This mission is given by the game and not made up by you. If the game gives you the option not to follow the mission, that's fine, but at least the game should give you a mission, else it's not an RPG.

How close to the beginning does this need to be?

The first CRPG I ever played was Questron (released 1984), and it dropped you into the world without any explanation at all, and left you to fend for yourself.  Only after you'd gained a level (which took several hours of gameplay) would a shopkeeper (when you happened to visit a towne) say to you "Mesron wants to see you."  Now, if you'd read the manual you'd know who Mesron was, but otherwise you'd have no idea.  And you certainly wouldn't know where to find him.

7. Combat plays a huge part in the game. If combat does not make up a decent portion of the game, it's not an RPG.

If I recall correctly, there are only two unavoidable combat encounters in Baldur's Gate.  Both right at the end.

Modifié par Sylvius the Mad, 22 juillet 2011 - 08:54 .

[MightySword]

Luc0s wrote...
So maybe The Sims 3 indeed is an RPG?

No it is not. The reason it fit a RPG discription because using a description is wrong to begin with. It's like a bad tax code.

[the_one_54321]

MightySword wrote...
Neighborhood layout management can be thought as a kind of mod, or world maker like the NWN toolset. House building and furniture buying are not unheard of in RPG. The ElderScroll series for example let you buy estates and upgrade with furniture.

World building in NWN does not happen while the game is actually being played. Buying a house and furnature could be done in character.

MightySword wrote...
It could serve as a general guide line, but by no mean a bibble to dictate this game is a RPG and another game is not which quite a few people enjoy doing.

I disagree. A hard clear line that distinctly distinguishes RPG from not-RPG is exactly what I want. I want definition not this "it's all subjective and we're all right in our own way *hugs* " claptrap.

This much everyone seems to agree on: Role Playing Game means that you are playing a role. What seems to get muddy is "what is playing a role?" How about we ask this question instead: "what is not playing a role?"

I think that if you ever aim the gun, pull the trigger, or swing the sword directling through the UI or player interaction mechanics then that game play is not role playing because it is your own abilities dictating the game play. So any mechanics that work this way are not role playing mechanics.

[Sylvius the Mad]

Luc,

First, you need to learn the difference between necessary and sufficient conditions.  I'm talking about roleplaying as a necessary condition, but your attempts at refutation are treating it like a sufficient condition.

That you can roleplay in GTA4 does not, on its own, make GTA4 an RPG.

That you cannot roleplay a coherent Shepard in ME2 (because the game contradicts you) prevents ME2 from being an RPG.
[quote]Luc0s wrote...

Bullcrap. Everyone with some knowledge on story-structure can see the ME2's 3-arc story-structure with 2 plot-points and 1 final resolution clear as day. You don't need to be a genius to see how obvious Mass effect 2 is when it comes to story-structure and how the game forces each player through bottlenecks where the major plot events happen.[/quote]
See?  You're applying outside knowledge to reach your conclusion, exactly as I said you were.

From inside the game (the only perspective that matters), that story structure isn't there.
[quote]I already defended my position. In my opinion you're way to black-and-white about it. With your reasoning, you say that either you can't create anything yourself because the matter (building blocks) you use is not your own, or you can make everything yourself no matter how much you rip-off other peoples creations.

That's just bull. I think there is a fine line between that you can claim as your own creation and what you can't claim as your own creation. It's difficult to exactly define that line in words, but it is there and you know it.[/quote]
If you can't define it then you can't know it's there.

You believe something, but you don't know why you believe it.  So how did you form the belief in the first place?

[quote]Yes but that isn't roleplaying, that's just making stuff up in your head. And even if it is roleplaying, it's not in the game, it's only in your head.[/quote]
All roleplaying happens in your head.  That's the only place roleplaying ever occurs.

[quote]That's bull.[/quote]
The "That's bull" argument doesn't get any more compelling no matter how many times you use it.

[quote]The gaps in a game (whatever kind of gaps) does not define what kind of game we're dealing with. What IS in the game defines what kind of game we're dealing with.[/quote]
What is in the game demarcates what isn't in the game.  It's the same criterion.

[quote]You're taking this way to deep man.[/quote]
I'm taking it exactly deep enough.  I'm taking it as deep and reason requires.
[quote]With your logic, you could simply break EVERYTHING the developers made apart by saying that it might contradict the character you've made up in your head.

How the character walks might contradict what you've made up in your head. So, does that mean the game shouldn't have walking animations because it might contradict your character?

How your character uses his/her sword might contradict what you've made up for your character. Does that mean the game shouldn't have attacking animations because it might contradict what you've made up in your head?
[/quote]
It's up to me not to design a character that gets broken by basic features like that.  The game obviously cannot accommodate all possible designs.

But the rough scope of accommodated designs needs to be made known to the player prior to the start of the game, so that he can design his character to fit it.

DAO did this well, as the origins gave us specific frameworks within which to build, and we could choose the ones we preferred while ignoring the others.

KotOR also did this well.  KotOR made very few restrictions known at the start, but the game's events rendered the details of the PC's background irrelevant - only the resulting personality continued to matter.

ME does this horribly, because nearly every dialogue option features the possibilty of the character being broken without the player being able to do anything about it.

The player needs control.  The player needs confidence.  The easiest way to offer those things is to give the player certainty.  ME2, in particular, goes out of its way to eliminate certainty.  One of the developers even told me that was a design goal (I'd offer a quote, but the old BioBoards are still offline).

[quote]How NPCs respond to your character might contradict what you've made up in your head. Does that mean the game shouldn't have NPCs interacting with you?[/quote]
I hear this a lot, and it never makes sense.  How could NPC behaviour contradict my PC's personality?    Unless my PC's personality revolved around mind-control, the NPCs' behaviour would have nothing to do with him.
[quote]You know pall, I think RPG games just aren't your thing man. With your ridiculous standards you might just want to stick to PnP roleplaying, at least those games can't contradict anything at all because you make everything up in your head and your imagination is the only limitation of PnP roleplaying.

So yeah, maybe you should just give up on RPG video-games and stick to PnP roleplaying.[/quote]
PnP games require other players.  CRPGs do not.

That's the whole point of CRPGs - to recreate the PnP RPG experience without the need for other people.

There are, as I can see it, three ways to do that.  First, the CPU could play the part of the GM and the other players, while the player plays the role of a player.  This is how most BioWare CRPGs do it.

Second, the CPU could play the part pf the GM, leaving all of the players' actions in the hand of the player.  Party-based CRPGs tend to use this approach.

Third, the CPU could take the place of the players, and have the player act as GM.  The only game that comes to mind that did anything like this is Dungeon Keeper, but I expect there are others.

[quote]As a game-designer I fully disagree (and I think many other game-desingers will also disagree with you). Gameplay comes first. Without gameplay, there is no game. Gameplay is the most important part of a game, ever. Everything else comes second to gameplay.[/quote]
I think gameplay should be an emergent quality of games.  Designing a game around wanting the players to perform specific gameplay tasks is the wrong way to make games.  We can see this backward approach in the design of combat encounters in games like ME2 and DA2.  BioWare wants us to have a specific gameplay experience, so they throw up barriers preventing us from deviating from their plan.

I hate that.

[quote]In fact, story and narrative is one of the most irrelevant parts of a game. Until recently games didn't evem have stories or narrative at all.[/quote]
You have an incredibly narrow definition of narrative.

[quote]I think the interrupt is just fine as it is because it gives us a surprise. I like the surprise element of the interrupts.[/quote]
Because you clearly have no interest in playing your character.  By my definition, you're not roleplaying at all.  You're not even trying.

[quote]Please, go learn some bacic philosophy and please develop some basic coherent reasoning skills.[/quote]
I have a degree in Philosophy.

But more relevantly, I guarantee I am better at logic than you.  Throughout this conversation you've routinely drawn conclusions that are not fully supported by your premises, and you even seem to be unaware of those gaps in your reasoning.

[quote]Indeed. And Shepard doesn't know if Udina is gay or not.[/quote]
Unless you decide that he does.

Again, there's no reason why you can't do this.  Why are you so adamant that it's wrong?
[quote]I completely disagree. You can have REASON to believe X, or Z if the EVIDENCE points into that direction.

Belief is only foundationless if there is no evidence to support the belief.[/quote]
Your standard for justified belief is far weaker than mine.

You have a reason to believe something only if the evidence for it is conclusive.

[quote]Let me ask you: Why the hell would I act as if something is true when I don't even believe something is true?[/quote]
Because the absence of belief would then render action impossible.

If you were only able to act when you held a relevant belief, then you must therefore be unable to act whenever you're operating from a position of complete ignorance.  But you're not.

Modus tollens.

[quote]The only reason I can think of to act as if something is true while I don't believe something is true, is when I'm either acting as an actor in a movie or musical, or when I'm lying to someone.[/quote]
No, that's acting as if something is true when you believe it to be untrue.

Believing something to be untrue is not the same as not believing that it is true.

In logical terms, you're (baselessly) assuming an excluded middle.

[quote][quote]Shepard has evidence.  It was collected off-screen.[/quote]
No Shepard doesn't have evidence. It's not collected off-screen.[/quote]
Do you really not see how symmetrical those two statements are?  You can't possibly think that one of them has a stronger claim to truth than the other.

Since we have no evidence at all for what happens off-screen, it is just as unreasonable for you to assert that somethng didn't happen as it is for me to assert that something did.

Go back and read your argument from your religious friend, again.

[quote]Because I AM roleplaying Shepard. Without me, there wouldn't even be a Shepard. So I as the player should know what Shepard is up to. If I don't know that, then I can't make any decisions for Shepard. You said so yourself.[/quote]
EXACTLY.

So what did he have for breakfast?

You've just agreed that you need to know what Shepard is doing.  So either you KNOW that he didn't eat breakfast (possibly that he never eats), or you KNOW that he ats something in particular.

Which is it?

[quote]You're COMPLETELY CONTRADICTING yourself now. First you demand that you need to know details about your character before you can make decisions for the character, now all of the sudden you say you don't need details because you can just make stuff up yourself? Sorry, but MAKE UP YOUR DAMN MIND ALREADY! [/quote]
You're not paying attention.  Any details that the game is going to provide without my direct input need to be made available at the start of the game so I can plan around them.  After the game has started, the game cannot provide any new details without my input else it risks contradicting me.

[quote]You concluded that Kaidan has a gambling addiction without any evidence or knowledge on that.[/quote]
I concluded nothing of the sort.  I asked you if you knew about his gambling addiction.

I (the player) am well aware that no evidence of a gambling addiction ever appears in the game.  But all that means is that you can play through the game once as if Kaidan isn't a gambling addict, and then you can play through again as if he is.  You get to decide that every time you play because the game doesn't make that detail explicit.  The game doesn't care whether Kaidan's a gambling addict.

[quote]But neither can you in real-life.[/quote]
Sure you can.  You have perfect knowledge of your own preferences, so you know with certainty whether you want apples or oranges.  You can't ever be wrong about that.

I would like the game to at least try to give me that level of knowledge of my PC.  And any time the game, after I've already created the character, makes decisions regarding him without my direct input, it's doing the exact opposite.

[quote]Sure, I could pick the most fancy sword instead of the best sword, but as far as I personally (as the player) know Cloud, he doesn't give a jack about fancy stuff, he just wants to get the job done.[/quote]
See?  There, you just made a roleplaying decision.  You decided that Cloud doesn't care about fancy stuff, and that drove his sword-buying decision.

The problem is that Cloud often acts without your input, so you could well learn later in the game that he does care about fancy stuff.  What then?  For him to remain coherent, you need to back up and replay everything from that sword decision forward.  If there's an explicit contradiction, then you can't just retcon everything (and retconning while maintaining coherence is pretty difficult anyway).

Modifié par Sylvius the Mad, 22 juillet 2011 - 08:11 .

[slimgrin]

I think Sylvius is actually a computer. Wait...here he is.

Modifié par slimgrin, 22 juillet 2011 - 08:44 .

[Gatt9]

MightySword wrote...

Luc0s wrote...
My goal with this list is to find the best possible description of the RPG genre.

The point is, IMO, it's pointless to come up with such a list. There are 2 kind of people who try to do this:

- The people who hold the original Paper&Pencil RPG as the holygrail and refuse any derivation, change or adaptation. The thing is RPG is a product, and consumer invention. It's not a constitution or the law of physic. These people just refuse to acknowledge the modern RPG, and hence they make such claim as JRPG is not a RPG, or the Witcher is not a RPG. Because to them there is only ONE RPG. As you can see this board have a large number of those.

Um,  no.

An RPG has a fundamental basis in several concepts,  Character based skill.  You cannot eliminate the fundamental basis of the genre without shifting it into another genre.  You cannot have a Turn-based RTS,  you cannot have a top-down FPS,  and you cannot have a characterless RPG.

You keep using that word modern as if putting the RPG label on a TPS is somehow generating something new,  it's not,  it's still a TPS.

- The people who want to find a one definition fit all for all RPG like what you're trying to do. The problem is RPG nowadays is one of the gerne that have the most variety. Doing this risking either you gonna classify just about anythign a RPG, or refuse just about any game to be a RPG.

The most variety?  Play Gears of War with a different name is more variety?  RPG is the most stagnant of genres as it tries to ape the latest trends rather than continuing to make great games.

What I don't understand is what is so hard about realize the diversity of the Genre. It's like saying a Car is a vehicle that has 4 wheel and run on gasoline, anything with more or less than 4 wheels and don't run on Gasoline is not a car. Here is my own classification:

Um,  cars are defined by body styles,  it's their genre.

Now would also be a good time to realize that 2-wheel is a motorcycles,  3 is a trike,  6 is a full-size truck,  18 is an 18-wheeler.  There's nothing with more or less wheels that's still a car by definition.

Ironically similiar to what happens when you take the character out of an RPG.

- PnP RPG: no need to say anything, that's when RPG was born.
- CRPG: game like Baldur's Gate or NWN with a balance between story, decision, and combat.
- Dungeon Crawl RPG: game like Diablo or Dungeon Seige that have a massive focus in combat.
- JRPG: Japanese RPG with linear story and characters.
- Action RPG: the new type of RPG that serve as an hybrid between RPG and Action game.

You were good until the last one.  An ARPG is Diablo.  ME2 is a TPS,  that's what it's gameplay is,  that's what it is.  Games are defined by their gameplay,  and when it plays exactly like a different genre,  it was mislabelled.

"Hybrid" is a marketing buzzword.  It's invariably used to describe a FPS or TPS where the UI was intentionally crippled to implement a "Leveling" system that does nothing more than progress the gameplay to full Shooter.  It's never actually a hybridization of the features of the two genres,  because such a fusion is impossible.  Shooters are player based skill,  RPG's are character based skill,  and now we're back to making a turn-based RTS,  cannot do it.

And before I move on let me just get this pet peeve out of the way. Even though the general consensus that BGII is the best representative of classic CRPG, and I agree. However, if someone just play BGII and nothing else, then go around talking like he has seen all there is of Western RPG and claim that's what all Western RPG are then exuse me if I give that person zero stock for his opinion. It's on the same token for JRPG, while FFVII does enjoy a cult status success, by no mean it is the defninte of all JRPG, so if you make such a claim on "all" JRPG base on FFVII then that just prove your opinion is not constructed on enough material regardless of how many fancy reason and word you use to describe it. A person with middle school physic can write a 20 pages essay about Newston's law, but it will never be the same as someone writting the same paper with a knowledge of  Engineering level Physic. And no Luc0s, this is not directed at you.

I've a pet peeve too,  people who toss around marketing buzzwords but fail to properly analyze and catagorize the actual gameplay.

Moving on, an anology to this would be the class inheritance in C++ programming. You can come up with a list that serve as a base list, which like I said is a good guide line. It will be like the Parents class in C++. Then as other user look at your class, they like it and want to use it but not as is. There might be function in the original classes that they don't need, and there are new functions they want to add. However the point is your class have enough merit that it's more beneficial to derive it then writing a new class. That's how I see RPG, the original RPG is a solid concept but by no mean it was perfect. Espeically video game is an adaption to a new medium, so seeing developer derive it is common.

 
Your problem is that the base class is character based skill,  it is the focal starting point of all RPGs upon which every variation is based.

In contrast,  the base class of a Shooter is Player based skill,   the base class of an RTS is Real-time gameplay.

The thing is, as long as a child class justify the benefit of usage of the parent class, than it's justified even if it didn't inherit every single function from the parents class, or if it has new function of its own. In our case, it would be the question of "does this game have enough element of a RPG to be considered a sub class of RPG"? For example, most if not all modern shooter games started having a level up system since a few years back, but you don't see they get advertised as RPG. A game like Mass Effect on the other hand while doesn't have every single bulletin point of a D&D rule book, it still have enough element to be classified as a RPG. Trying to make a "perfect" list and demand every thing to fit perfectly just proves that you're inflexible and are behind the time. For me there are just many type of RPG, I don't believe in the assetment of either it is "THE" RPG, or it is NOT a RPG - which serve no purpose.<_<

It doesn't have anything to classify it as an RPG, the closest you come is it has dialogue,  which is present in many other games.  There's no defined character,  no progression,  it's a straight-up shooter.  Go analyze it's gameplay and come back,  you'll end up with the definition of a TPS.

You cannot have a Role if the Character is undefined,  Shepherd has no intrinsic qualities,  he's not good,  he's not bad,  he's not anything,  even when you try to play him as something,  he's just amorphic.  Just like any other TPS's main character.

Also,  The Sims definition evaluates to RPG,  because it is based on the same premise as an RPG,  to simulate a Character who is not you,  and seperate his abilities from yours except for overall guidance.  It could quite easily be translated to a PnP game,  though it'd be boring.

[Sylvius the Mad]

Luc0s wrote...

He might prefer fancy swords yet he can still buy the better uglier sword at that time because, well, who nows?

He does.  Unless he's completely insane, Cloud knows why he's doing the things he's doing.  And that means that if you're making the decision, you also need to know.  Otherwise you might contradict Cloud.

You're treating Cloud like he's someone you don't know, but then you say you have to know him to make decisions for him.  You can't have it both ways.

As for almost everything else, you need to go learn what an excluded middle is so you can stop assuming one.  You're misusing Occam's Razor because you're assuming an excluded middle.  You're misusing modus tollens because you're assuming an excluded middle.

And I doubt you'll stop doing that until you realise what it is you're doing.

First, you need to learn the difference between necessary and sufficient conditions.  I'm talking about roleplaying as a necessary condition, but your attempts at refutation are treating it like a sufficient condition.

I don't think I fully understand you. Care to explain this?

A necessary condition is one that must be met.

A sufficient condition is one that, if it is met, no other conditions must be met.

So, if I say that having roleplaying is necessary for a game to be an RPG, that means that every RPG will have roleplaying in it.

If I say that having roleplaying is sufficient for a game to be an RPG, that means that every game with roleplaying in it is an RPG.

I'm saying necessary, in in formal terms (using RP for roleplaying):

RPG --> RP

But your attempts to refute me are actually refuting the "sufficient" claim, which looks like this:

RP --> RPG

Those two are obviously not equivalent.

[Sylvius the Mad]

slimgrin wrote...

I think Sylvius is actually a computer. Wait...here he is.

That's remarkably accurate.

The endurance of the brain-in-a-vat problem drives my view of pretty much everything.