337 réponses à ce sujet

[withneelandi]

Ostagar2011 wrote...

withneelandi wrote...

I mean this in the nicest way possible OP, but if you feel that alienated by the direction bioware is taking then stop venting on the bioware forums, and try and find someone that makes games that you actually enjoy, your time is better invested finding a game that gives you what you want.

That's our problem as "core" RPG fans - the genre is dying because there are "only" 2 million or so fans of that kind of game. But EA wants MOAR!! So it quietly retires RPG elements (under a blaze of misleading, cinematic, marketing) and slowly morphs all its games into lite shooters/adventures etc. Other than BioWare and Bethesda there is nowhere to go for cerebral/tactical games with a sophisticated story and mature themes. If you don't like the direction that a driving game or sports IP is going, you have a dozen alternatives per year. If one of your only source of RPG goodness is selling out to the 'button-awesome' crowd (and even failing at that, lol, as seen with DA2), slowly abandoning a genre you prefer over all others, the only thing you can do is "vent" on the forums. So its understandable why the OP is doing this.

I don't know if I see the RPG situation as bleakly as you do. I'm not quite the "core" audience but then again i'm not quite a casual gamer either.

I can't help but cite Dark Souls, which while not the most story driven game was one of the most exciting, enjoyable, challenging and games i've played in years (In many ways I think it's a better game than Skyrim, without meaning to be needlessly controversial). I took me back to the sort of gaming experience I remember as a child, rewarded risk, reward and exploration, never held the the players hand and was as 'traditional' an rpg setting as i've seen in years. It is almost the exact opposite of "awsome button" gaming.

I'm looking forward to playing Witcher 2  when it eventually gets and X-Box release, and i'm sure there are other RPG's out there from indie developers that i'm not informed enough to know about, the thing is, because they have a less mainstream appeal they don't have the budget off a mass effect and as such might not have the graphical flair you expect from a Bioware or Bethesda game. Then again, RPG gaming at its core isn't really about flashy graphics and such.

Bioware started life as a smaller developer making games to the core rpg market, but now their talents have been spotted by a massive company with shareholders who expect big profit for their investment., it's like when your favourite bands sign to a major label and have to start making "radio friendly unit shifters". In some ways it would be nice if you could continue to see them in tiny intimate venues making niche music, but they were probably half starving and driving around in a barely roadworthy van to do it, who can blame them for chasing financial security.

It might mean looking at indie developers, comunity funded efforts like the game being developed by double fine, but thats part of the being a fan of something niche. I listen to post-hardcore, my favourite bands are nowhere near major record labels or the top 40, that means to get my musical fix from indie labels, gigs in venues that could double up as toilets and reading obscure music blogs. Frankly when you don't like the mainstream, thats life, and in some ways its part of the fun!

This is a bit of a extreme solution, but my answer to people who are passionate about music, games, books or films or anything, but don't find anything to their taste out there is pick up a guitar, start a record label, make an independant film. Thats how companies like bioware started and games like BG etc were made in the first place. Venting on forums won't change anything but if there really isn't anything to your taste out there make it! you might end up making a fortune in the process.

[BatmanPWNS]

dragon_83 wrote...

BatmanPWNS wrote...

All I heard was "BLAH BLAH BLAH".

Learn to read, maybe that way you will understand what he wrote.

*Reads it*

Now it says "Blah, complain, Blah, complain"

[Lotion Soronarr]

TomY90 wrote...

Just got to look at games like Final Fantasy XII-2 that franchise is dying off because its too hard core and they are having to add game elements from other genres to lure people back to the game. (they have tried to implement dialogue decisions like you get in bioware games)

I'd saying it's dying because it sucks donkey balls.

[LostHH]

A levelling system of any sort, character creation and loads of exploration is what makes an RPG for me. ME1 had all of those.
ME2 got rid of the exploration. Shooting your way down a linear path on a small section of a 'landable planet' was not dungeon crawling.
I guess I'll have to wait to see whether ME3 brings anything worthwhile to the table.
Otherwise I'll just stick to Fallout and Elder Scrolls for games with real meat to them. Shame, I loved ME1 to pieces and still do, it was an RPG in a sci fi universe with some shooting mechanics. I prefer those settings to fantasy. 
So yeah, waiting to see hoe ME3 pans out but for sci fi RPGing I guess Fallout is my only option.

Modifié par LostHH, 17 février 2012 - 12:41 .

[Descy_]

 

egervari wrote...


Not all gamers are the same.

So, you're telling me that there are gamers who like more than RPGs?

Jason Statham is: Captain Obvious
Coming to a thread near you this summer.


Hey, OP, nobody's forcing you to play BF3. BF3 is one of their more recent titles, which is why they're giving it away.
They arent gonna give away a 10 year old game because "dats wen da games wer so gud and rpgs 4tw and evrytin else is ghey fps sucks n stuff".

[RSX Titan]

egervari wrote...

FemaleMageFan wrote...

DO you realize that by bioware doing this they making more people interested in rpgs and giving the genre more attention?? oh wait let me guess bioware makes games specifically for you and only you. OP with all do respect if i could get more exposure in producing a product i would definitely go for it. It's good for the genre and good for business too. Wait...what i'm i doing? Trying to speak sense on the BSN? impossibru.....let me join the hoard. I do not like femshep's finger nails!!!!!

I try not to bother responding to posts like this. You're not the first. If you track all of the pages, I've avoided all the sarcastic, childish, etc. comments and I only responded to the sincere and serious ones.

Having said that, you can't be all things to all people. When you take away from one aspect of the game to draw another audience in, it's going to weaken the draw that the original audience once had. Do this enough, and you water down the game for both audiences, making something that people may accept or enjoy, but will never consider the best possible version of the game - one side will want it more one way than the other, so it comes off as oddly mediocre. It is very hard to blend two genres together so that completely opposite gamers will love the game as much as they would have loved it if it was directly suited for them.

Essentially, these are trade-offs that the game designers have to make. It is not necessarily no-brainer decisions here, because you don't always get the best of both worlds. Adding one mechanic often destroys or minimizes another. So if the goal is to include a wider audience to increase sales, the devs have to ask one simple question: At what cost?

They tried to do this with Dragon Age 2, as I explained many times (please, just re-read my posts on this for more detail). It failed. That's it in a nutshell.

That doesn't mean the same fate is set in stone for ME3, but I have never seen the marketing and pandering done so badly as it has been done for ME3.

Honestly, I think it is very hard to make a 30-40 hour RPG with a deep, thoughtful story and setting to be appealing to gamers who want more condensed, action-oriented gameplay. Sure, they add "missions" into the game, which makes it more accessible to the FPS players... they like that gameplay split into smaller chunks... but it destroys the more cohesive, non-linear and patient gameplay the original fans liked. You can't have your cake and it eat too.

That is the whole point of what I'm talking about.

The real issue here is that the game has not been designed for your narrow view of what a Bioware title should be. 

[LostHH]

They're giving BF3 away so they can get more players to take a bigger slice of CoDs pie and seeing as how multiple times EA and Bioware have stated they want some of that market/larger audience (euphemisms ftw!) well it's simples!

[bennyjammin79]

I just saw the inside of my skull! Thanks OP!

[Kaiser Arian XVII]

I make 3 guesses:

1) Xbox Peasants
2) COD Crowd
3) New generation of Teens

[LenaMarie]

I think the funny thing is that EA/Bioware marketing would probably have said a game like Skyrim is crap and would never sell in this day and age because its like 80-90% RPG, its offline and has no multiplayer, has too complex skill trees etc. which is pretty much what the angry opposition to the OP is saying as to why its a good thing for Bioware to expand audiences... and yet skyrim sells so well regardless of the fact apparently it shouldn't pull such numbers that bioware has to admiringly look at Skyrim pretty heavily for ideas to add into Dragon Age 3.

That should say alot to people who have a brain at least, Bioware should just stick to making the games it wants and not what research indicates should sell. Core RPG gaming is not dying. We have the Witcher series that pulls down amazing numbers too.

Bioware is filled with some talented people who know the business, they dont need this, their games will sell far and wide without trying to grab the battlefield or gears fans..

That being said, I thought ME2 and even Dragon Age 2 was fun, though both rather RP lite. I still buy every bioware game for both Xbox and PC.

Modifié par LenaMarie, 17 février 2012 - 01:36 .

[Ostagar2011]

Sapienti wrote...

OP is completely ridiculous and borderline idiotic. For starters, you don't market your game to long term fans, that's just stupid and it wastes money. When you go to market a game you try and appeal to the hard sells. People outside of your usual pull range and markets you haven't tapped yet.

"Borderline idiotic" - pointless ad hominem. We're having a discussion about where the franchise is going, I'm sorry if you're having trouble understanding OP's point, or are so blindly supportive of BioWare, that you think they can do no wrong.

I don't wish to speak for the OP, but when he talks about "marketing", I think he means "designing for" or "aiming at". If ME 3 was the same mix of RPG:Shooter that ME1 was, I (and, I suspect the OP?) wouldn't care if the "marketing" was in "Plumbers' Weekly" magazine. This is a point I think many of posters ITT have misread. What I do care about is ME3 being aimed ("marketed", if you prefer) more at the Gears of War audience, rather than the NWN crowd. There is overlap, as seen in ME1, but now if ME3 is just a Gears clone with awkward "gigglesquee" slashfic sex, then that would be a great pity. So far, looking at the changes made from ME1 to ME2, DAO to DA2, and the ME3 demo, the OP is right to be concerned (though the futility of posting that point on this forum is exasperating).

[nitefyre410]

egervari wrote...

DarthCaine wrote...

With Dragon Age taking cues from Skyrim and Mass Effect getting multiplayer it's pretty clear EA is going where the money is

I wish someone behind Dragon Age had a clear vision for what Dragon Age's brand actually stands for... rather than it be dictated by marketing studies that often totally screw up the game.

You can't just make a skyrim rip off and think it's going to work. You gotta want to make a game like that at the core, whether the market research supports it or not. Bethesda has wanted to make RPGs like that for decades, and it shows. You can't just poop this crap out from a corporation gaming machine. It doesn't work that way. You can't make the magic of skyrim because you think it's a good idea to make money. You need to invest love, passion and your heart into producing something like that. You have to want to do it, whether you're going to break even or become a millionaire. The people at EA and the people behind Dragon Age really don't understand this.

And the people that once understood this about Dragon Age - as we can see from how awesome Origins was - have left the company.

  


Well I go to sleep and what was once a nice civil discussion that I was enjoying  has started to descend in to usually  madness of this place.  
 

Anyvway, to this comment.   This has been  what  I have been  saying from the start,  Dragon Age as a  franchise  completely lacks an idenity of its own. Not just DA 2 but  Origins as well.... its like a well cooked meal with no seasoning  its rather bland. It was almost like they were trying to piggy back this game off of Mass Effects sucess. 

[RyuujinZERO]

To the OP:
"I've had enough of your disingenuous assertions" <epic slap>

[RSX Titan]

LenaMarie wrote...

I think the funny thing is that EA/Bioware marketing would probably have said a game like Skyrim is crap and would never sell in this day and age because its like 80-90% RPG, its offline and has no multiplayer, has too complex skill trees etc. which is pretty much what the angry opposition to the OP is saying as to why its a good thing for Bioware to expand audiences... and yet skyrim sells so well regardless of the fact apparently it shouldn't pull such numbers that bioware has to admiringly look at Skyrim pretty heavily for ideas to add into Dragon Age 3.

That should say alot to people who have a brain at least, Bioware should just stick to making the games it wants and not what research indicates should sell. Core RPG gaming is not dying. We have the Witcher series that pulls down amazing numbers too.

Bioware is filled with some talented people who know the business, they dont need this, their games will sell far and wide without trying to grab the battlefield or gears fans..

That being said, I thought ME2 and even Dragon Age 2 was fun, though both rather RP lite. I still buy every bioware game for both Xbox and PC.

Maybe Bioware doesn't want to make the games you want them to anymore? After ME2 I realized this and now I'm able to enjoy ME2 and I'm sure ME3 much more than I thought I would. I happen to really like Shooters so maybe it was an easier transition for me. 

[JonathonPR]

It is simple. The EA hype engine is specialized to a few types of game quality. This usually falls under graphics and action. It is a lot like a movie company. In this case what they want to put out are action movies with enough of a plot to say there is one. When a well thought out story cannot be created they will rely on just having things happen with the barest connections. The human brain can be easily tricked into rating a lower quality portion of a product higher due to its association with something they enjoy. People often miss identify emotion driven thought and cognitive rational thought.

When EA acquires an ip they start adapting it to their strategy and rely on previous loyalty in the beginning of the new cycle. Again the brain will adapt its perception to facilitate the rational of its loyalty. As a simple test go play older games in a series. Many people will find that they don't enjoy games as much. This occurs because of two tricks of the brain. The first is nostalgia. This occurs after an event has occurred. The brain remembers experiences as being more positive than they were. The other is alteration to expectations over time. The end result is that EA can use the IP as a host for their game formula. They steer their demographic into their desired hype and game cycle.

The basics of marketing are social sciences. Think about why you are pre ordering. What incentives were used to attract you to an offer? What actual value do you gain from the purchase package? Now think of it from a business standpoint. Front loading the profit from a product is great for attracting investors. The current mentality is a short term strategy that moves quarter to quarter. They are a business. They have to pay employees, loans, and their investors. It would be nice to have long term profits but short term high yield gain is the goal. DA2 was bad game relative to its predecessor but as a product investment for EA it was great. It had a relatively short production cycle and made a huge profit relative to cost of production in the first few weeks thanks to preorders and hype. DLC helps prevent loss from the purchase of used games. The quality to profit equilibrium is plain to see.

Please read Dune and Thank You For Arguing. The first to read a good story and the second to understand basic social techniques.

[Mendelevosa]

Regardless of what you may think, creating video games is still a business. Although it's important for companies to satisfy their current consumers, it is also important that they attract new people as well if they want to make good money. The three different campaign modes pretty much reveals Bioware's marketing strategy. You have to admit, catering and appealing to multiple crowds is a brilliant strategy to earn profits.

BTW, Mass Effect was NEVER intended to be an solid RPG, but a RPG/TPS hybrid from the beginning.

Modifié par Mendelevosa, 17 février 2012 - 02:02 .

[Il Divo]

teh_619 wrote...

Il Divo wrote...

OP, do us all a favor: shut up.

Who the *** asked you about it?

Sorry mate. After your last crap of a thread, you'll understand if I don't feel the need to answer to you. OP's a self-entitled waste of a "fan", much like yourself.

Modifié par Il Divo, 17 février 2012 - 02:00 .

[teh_619]

Mendelevosa wrote...

Regardless of what you may think, creating video games is still a business. Although it's important for companies to satisfy their current consumers, it is also important that they attract new people as well if they want to make good money. You have to admit, there is good money to be made by appealing to other gamer crowds.

It's all good with that,

When you  modify your games to especially provide for the "new" players and disregard the older ones...well that's where it goes down.

[GnusmasTHX]

I like how BioWare makes game, he doesn't like it, complains.

OP makes thread, someone doesn't like it, "STFU GET OUT OF MY THREAD!"

[Il Divo]

GnusmasTHX wrote...

I like how BioWare makes game, he doesn't like it, complains nerd rages.

OP makes thread, someone doesn't like it, "STFU GET OUT OF MY THREAD!"

Fixed. Complaining is acceptable. Nerd raging is laughable.

Modifié par Il Divo, 17 février 2012 - 02:03 .

[Dave Exclamation Mark Yognaut]

So basically OP is mad because a shooter-RPG has shooter elements?

[teh_619]

Il Divo wrote...

teh_619 wrote...

Il Divo wrote...

OP, do us all a favor: shut up.

Who the *** asked you about it?

Sorry mate. After your last crap of a thread, you'll understand if I don't feel the need to answer to you. OP's a self-entitled waste of a "fan", much like yourself.

Bro,I don't care if you want to garble at every piece of *** you're thrown at.

When  you go around  though, telling people to shut up for actually thinking critically and not consuming without stop, then you've got a problem.

Look it through.

Modifié par teh_619, 17 février 2012 - 02:06 .

[GnusmasTHX]

teh_619 wrote...

Il Divo wrote...

teh_619 wrote...

Il Divo wrote...

OP, do us all a favor: shut up.

Who the *** asked you about it?

Sorry mate. After your last crap of a thread, you'll understand if I don't feel the need to answer to you. OP's a self-entitled waste of a "fan", much like yourself.

Bro,I don't care if you want to garble at every piece of *** you're thrown at.

but when  you go around telling people to shut up for actually thinking critically for a moment and not consuming without stop, then you've got a problem.

Look it through.

I didn't know you two were related, your avatars look nothing alike.

[Mendelevosa]

teh_619 wrote...

Mendelevosa wrote...

Regardless of what you may think, creating video games is still a business. Although it's important for companies to satisfy their current consumers, it is also important that they attract new people as well if they want to make good money. You have to admit, there is good money to be made by appealing to other gamer crowds.

It's all good with that,

When you  modify your games to especially provide for the "new" players and disregard the older ones...well that's where it goes down.

They added story mode and action to appeal to different crowds that may not be RPG fans, but at the same time, they added RPG mode to please those that still like Mass Effect's rpg mechanics. I don't think they are trying to shove the older consumers out of the picture.

[LenaMarie]

RSX Titan wrote...

LenaMarie wrote...

I think the funny thing is that EA/Bioware marketing would probably have said a game like Skyrim is crap and would never sell in this day and age because its like 80-90% RPG, its offline and has no multiplayer, has too complex skill trees etc. which is pretty much what the angry opposition to the OP is saying as to why its a good thing for Bioware to expand audiences... and yet skyrim sells so well regardless of the fact apparently it shouldn't pull such numbers that bioware has to admiringly look at Skyrim pretty heavily for ideas to add into Dragon Age 3.

That should say alot to people who have a brain at least, Bioware should just stick to making the games it wants and not what research indicates should sell. Core RPG gaming is not dying. We have the Witcher series that pulls down amazing numbers too.

Bioware is filled with some talented people who know the business, they dont need this, their games will sell far and wide without trying to grab the battlefield or gears fans..

That being said, I thought ME2 and even Dragon Age 2 was fun, though both rather RP lite. I still buy every bioware game for both Xbox and PC.

Maybe Bioware doesn't want to make the games you want them to anymore? After ME2 I realized this and now I'm able to enjoy ME2 and I'm sure ME3 much more than I thought I would. I happen to really like Shooters so maybe it was an easier transition for me. 

I did say I enjoyed ME 2 and loved the sp ME3 demo, you know, Im not complaining I was just stating a fact that market research is bs. That same research would say Skyrim and The Witcher 2 to name a few would never sell, meanwhile they sold millions of copies that even Bioware is watching them for ideas.