127 réponses à ce sujet

[CraigCWB]

Kalcalan,



"The way I see it this game offers a valid compromise, it would be impossible to have that much immersion without having origins in the game."



So you feel this game offers more immersion than KOTOR did? Really? I have to say, I'm not seeing it. The player character isn't even referenced much in the story in DAO. We learn far more about our companions than we do about ourselves. And after leaving the tutorial castle I never had to worry about actually being this 40ish year old dude over here on my portrait rather than the teenager the backstory implied I was.

[marshalleck]

Don't compare this to KOTOR, you know very well that your character's origin in KOTOR was very specific..to say the least, without spoiling it.

[CraigCWB]

marshalleck, I don't want to argue about it. The way the characters in the backstory talk to the player character is not how adults speak to other adults. It's how adults speak to teenagers.

[Maria Caliban]

By including origins, they traded breadth for depth.

[CraigCWB]

"Don't compare this to KOTOR, you know very well that your character's origin in KOTOR was very specific..to say the least, without spoiling it."



Yes. It was. But it wasn't age/race/etc specific, was it? Which is the entire point I was trying to make. It *is* possible to do detailed and in-depth backgrounds without predefining the age, race and family background for the player.

[marshalleck]

CraigCWB wrote...

marshalleck, I don't want to argue about it. 

Stop posting then? 

[aberdash]

I'm pretty sure one of the devs said the characters were all in their early 20's.

PC's that is.

Modifié par aberdash, 21 novembre 2009 - 08:49 .

[minamber]

aberdash wrote...

Sevas88 wrote...

Because that's boring(refering to the op), had you ever played an MMO you'd understand.

Yeah because the terrible and obscure games like Baldurs Gate, Icewind Dale, and Fallout had no origins and it made them the failures that nobody has ever heard of that they were.

I won't argue about Icewind Dale, but BG and Fallout had no origins? Really? DId you even play those games?
BG had your birth town, and your background set (you're a Child of Bhaal, like it or not). The same goes for Fallout (you're a Vault Dweller, like it or not).
The only thing DA does different from those is that it gives you a choice of background.

[CraigCWB]

"Stop posting then?"



I'm starting to get the impression you actually are a 14 year old in real life... am I right? Or are you going to claim I'm totally wrong and should shut up because you are actually 15?

[CraigCWB]

"I'm pretty sure one of the devs said the characters were all in their early 20's."



Prolly didn't wanna get sued for underage sex scenes

[aberdash]

minamber wrote...

I won't argue about Icewind Dale, but BG and Fallout had no origins? Really? DId you even play those games?
BG had your birth town, and your background set (you're a Child of Bhaal, like it or not). The same goes for Fallout (you're a Vault Dweller, like it or not).
The only thing DA does different from those is that it gives you a choice of background.

Origins as they are defined in Dragon Age... As in picking a origin...

[marshalleck]

CraigCWB wrote...

"Stop posting then?"

I'm starting to get the impression you actually are a 14 year old in real life... am I right? Or are you going to claim I'm totally wrong and should shut up because you are actually 15?

I'm asking you to justify your position. If you don't want to do that, it's your choice. And no, I'm well past that age.

[marshalleck]

Seriously, they've been marketing this game forever as having the origin stories as opposed to just a generic beginning for all characters. It's fine to like games with less specific player characters, but that's not what DA is nor was it ever intended to be.

Complaining about origins in DAO is like complaining that MW2 is a shooter.

Modifié par marshalleck, 21 novembre 2009 - 08:58 .

[Doright36]

Oblivion and Morrowind both had you start as a prisoner no matter what. You could pick your race but it was still limited and if you were going to build a backstory you would still have to include the fact you ended up in Jail.



KOTOR you were Revan... Period.



Jade Empire had a limited backstory.



MASS Effect had a few options but still limited and you were Shep no matter what you came up with.



This fact is going to be true of probibly 90% of computerized RPG's. If you want a good story then you need to fit yourself into the story a bit. Roll playing isn't always about making everything up about your character. Sometimes it's getting your head into 'a' character. Even one that is somewhat defined for you.

[minamber]

aberdash wrote...

minamber wrote...

I won't argue about Icewind Dale, but BG and Fallout had no origins? Really? DId you even play those games?
BG had your birth town, and your background set (you're a Child of Bhaal, like it or not). The same goes for Fallout (you're a Vault Dweller, like it or not).
The only thing DA does different from those is that it gives you a choice of background.

Origins as they are defined in Dragon Age... As in picking a origin...

...and? Picking a origin is worse than having it set for you? Because I fail to see the difference between, say, the human noble origin  in DA and the vault dweller backgound in Fallout, except for the fact that you can choose another background in DA.

[ScreamingPalm]

To put it simply, they severely restrict character creation and roleplaying in several instances...

Which is why I think NWN is more my style of RPG and am still lurking and deciding on this one. I hope Bioware decide to make a NWN-style game based on DA, or another setting of their own in the future.

That said, this game was never advertised as anything other than preset background linear developed characters, so your point is a bit moot.

[marshalleck]

ScreamingPalm wrote...

Which is why I think NWN is more my style of RPG and am still lurking and deciding on this one. I hope Bioware decide to make a NWN-style game based on DA, or another setting of their own in the future.

Don't lend forum complaints more credence than they deserve. Even with the origin stories setting your character's background, you're still given a great deal of flexibility in choosing how your character reacts to his/her circumstances. As much as any other Bioware game to be sure, and in the case of some games, more.

[Rayne Myria Solo]

CraigCWB wrote...


because Bioware always "presents" characters as being 14 year old boys who are preoccupied with rebelling against bad parents and heartless school teachers who are suddenly called upon to save the world, due no doubt to their extensive experience dealing with such evildoers as bad parents and heartless school teachers.

Now..I could be wrong, but the last time I checked, Commander Shepard from Mass Effect wasn't 14, nor was he/she rebelling against his/her parents (well I guess you could but..) the last time I checked he or she was a decorated military officer with extensive experience in dealing with "bad guys" and putting them down, but then..I could be wrong, of course.

[marshalleck]

Rayne Myria Solo wrote...

CraigCWB wrote...


because Bioware always "presents" characters as being 14 year old boys who are preoccupied with rebelling against bad parents and heartless school teachers who are suddenly called upon to save the world, due no doubt to their extensive experience dealing with such evildoers as bad parents and heartless school teachers.

Now..I could be wrong, but the last time I checked, Commander Shepard from Mass Effect wasn't 14, nor was he/she rebelling against his/her parents (well I guess you could but..) the last time I checked he or she was a decorated military officer with extensive experience in dealing with "bad guys" and putting them down, but then..I could be wrong, of course.

Don't ask him to explain himself. He'll just call you 14 years old and refuse to talk about it any further.

[Rayne Myria Solo]

Good point. To sum up this mess...if you're going to tell a good story..you lose some chance to be completely original. Because even tabletop GMs who allow total flexability (as my current Star Wars GM has) then begin to shape the vague campaign ideas around the characters their players have made, developing hooks for them (much like the DA Origin stories). They probably still have a general campaign outline in mind, and major plot points, NPCs and bad guys, good guys, etc. Now, what you do changes that (do you kill the assasin or try to recruit him), your tabletop GM has to go "ok, wow..I expected them to kill that guy, but they didn't..cool I can use that". really it's no different, just that the game can't react on the fly to what you do (and honestly, neither can some tabletop GMs). For example: my tabletop GM just informed me that the separate stories he'd planned for everyone he won't have time to do, and he'd rather focus on getting the party back together again after the last events, so he's going to give us guidelines, and let us write a short-medium story about what we were doing during "down time". I was a bit disappointed with this, but it is in the interest of the game, and the story, point being, it's not that Bioware is trying to pigeonhole anyone..they're trying to tell a story, and give you as many "ins" to it as you can get, to fit the way you want to play. As the old saying goes "you can please some of the people some of the time, but you cannot please all of the people all of the time.".

[JKoopman]

Koyasha wrote...

My first human noble character I created was in fact a black girl.  Once I met my family I realized that didn't work, so I rerolled and made an appropriate looking character.  It might have been nicer if they'd set it up so your family takes on key aspects of your character's appearance, sure.  But they didn't.  It's not a big deal.  I lost a whole five or so minutes in which I had the opening conversations and met my family, then I deleted the character and started again with an appropriate one.

See, this is exactly what I'm talking about. You created your character, realized that it didn't mesh with the restrictive origin and had to reroll. In essence, you're not playing the character you want to play, you're playing the character that BioWare wants you to play.

As for the "there are no africans or asians in Fereldan" argument or whatever some have been alluding to when they speak of elderly characters not making sense in context with the endings, if BioWare didn't expect people to play different ethnicities or ages then they shouldn't have included black and asian presets and wrinkled skin complexions in their character creator.

[JKoopman]

Also, why is everyone focusing on background story in this thread? My complaint wasn't that I couldn't give my character whatever history I wanted, it was that the origins limited my character customization options. If I want to be a human warrior or rogue, I HAVE to be young and white. If I want to be a mage, I HAVE to be in my mid-20s. If I want to be a grizzled warrior or a wizened old mage I can't because it doesn't mesh with the setting and timeline BioWare has chosen for me.



Yes, in Fallout you HAD to be a Vault dweller no matter what. And in KOTOR you HAD to be, well... I won't spoil it. But the point here is that regardless of that character's place in the story they could BE whatever you wanted. Young. Old. White. Black. Asian. Hispanic. You could customize and create the character that you wanted to play and to some extent fill in the blanks of their backstory where allowed.

[Vodrath]

As for the human noble, you have freedom of interpretation: Your character could be adopted, which solves the race problem. If your character was adopted after Fergus was giving birth, that also makes him the "youngest" member of the family.



The mage origin ties in very well and deep with the mage lore. Complaining about the mage origin is like complaining that Bioware makes you tap into the fade for casting a spell. The only possible other option would have been to let you start as an apostate, an interesting choice for sure, but then again which class does get a class specific origin? Imagine all the origins x classes, thats just an outrage combination of possible content to design, of which many players may not even see all.



So yes, its a computer RPG. Certain sacrifices must be made as opposed to PnP to make it real, we cannot change that.

[aberdash]

minamber wrote...

...and? Picking a origin is worse than having it set for you? Because I fail to see the difference between, say, the human noble origin  in DA and the vault dweller backgound in Fallout, except for the fact that you can choose another background in DA.

The backgrounds in Fallout and BG are very vague leaving a lot of room for roleplaying. In BG you were taken in by Gorion and raised in Candlekeep. Thats it, it says nothing about what you did there. In fallout you were a vault dweller, thats it.