288 réponses à ce sujet

[Morducai]

First of all let me make it perfectly clear. This by no means is a rant or a personal attack on Jennifer Hepler. I came in here in order to rationally voice my position as to why I disagree with her and why I think her comments, while coming from an innocent point of view, are wrong and misguided.

I think she's forgetting the kind of medium she choose to apply her craft in. This is a video game with emphasis on the word GAME. Now I know in recent years that word took on a very wide interpretation, with games like Shenmue, Fahrenheit/Indigo ProphecyHeavy Rain, but at the core video games are just games and their main magic comes from it's interactivity and direct input  from and with the user. Games offer a "skip cutscene" because they are games and that's why we like them. 

What she wants, as a writer, is to enjoy a wonderful crafted story without having to, or to have as little to do, with the actual gameplay.  Basically what she describes is a game without gameplay which to all intent and proposes is a movie, book, interactive story, or what ever you like to call it. I understand her desire to have the same rules we apply on gameplay as they do with storytelling, but those rules just don't work well for this medium. As DA2 clearly demonstrated that the same formula can't work for two different situations. 


If you think I am wrong then look at the early video games and see how successful they were. Take Tetris for example, has zero story to it yet it still manage to be on top selling charts all over the world for more then 20 years. A game doesn't have to have a great story, or even any kind of story, in order to be successful, but if a game has bad gameplay then the whole thing simply collapses. 

Now I am not saying that story telling has no room in video games, quite the ooposite. I think story telling has become a very imprtant part of video games. However, I think gameplay should always take precedance over any other aspect of a video game. The minute you take gameplay out of the equation then it stops being a video game. 

Thoughts?

Modifié par Morducai, 21 février 2012 - 10:01 .

[Fox In The Box]

Wasn't it just to skip combat sequences for those who wanted to? There is more to gameplay than just combat, you know. While I like fighting, endless streams of enemies tend to become more tedious than fun for me. There were several points in DA2 - one where I had encountered no less than five night-time gangs in a row, each of them spawning three waves of enemies - where I really envied PC-users their "killallhostiles" console command.

Modifié par Fox In The Box, 21 février 2012 - 10:08 .

[Dr. wonderful]

...What happen now?

I swear, can't go 18 hours without something going down.

[Morducai]

Fox In The Box wrote...

Wasn't it just to skip combat sequences for those who wanted to? There is more to gameplay than just combat, you know. While I like fighting, endless streams of enemies tend to become more tedious than fun for me. There were several points in DA2 - one where I had encountered no less than five night-time gangs in a row, each of them spawning three waves of enemies - where I really envied PC-users their "killallhostiles" console command.

I wasn't only refering to combat. I agree with you that there's more to gameplay then combat but her comments, while refrencing combat, talked about how she would like to skip the gameplay parts and go stright for the story. The in this case then why even bother with video games if what you are looking for is good story telling. Books and movies are much better in story telling then video games. 

leeboi2 wrote...

I liek Mudkipz.

Meds...take them. 

Modifié par Morducai, 21 février 2012 - 10:17 .

[Meris]

I am of the belief that Combat is, or has always been, a far too much of a major aspect of gameplay in RPG. Roleplaying could stand to have more gameplay features, such as a expanded dialogue tree that deals in actions and gives you more options to complete a quest (or at least instances when you actually do have more options are more frequent than in, say Origins with, perhaps, 10 stat - other than coercion - checks throught the game).

But gameplay wise, BioWare rpgs are about both combat and dialogue. One cannot stand without the other since the first implies most of the gameplay and the latter, most of the storytelling. Simply skipping combat is too much of a superficial solution to satisfy.

On the more panicked hand, I believe that ME3's 'skip combat' and 'automate dialogue' options estabilish a dangerous precedent where the focus of one or the other might change. The storytelling might become more guided (JRPG style) than it currently already is.

[Dr. wonderful]

Wait, if you skip Combat then all you have is a Japanese visual novel.

[OdanUrr]

Dr. wonderful wrote...

...What happen now?

I swear, can't go 18 hours without something going down.

This.

[Meris]

We kind of already have gameplay modifiers that appeal to people whose interest is heavier on storytelling and the dialogue than in combat. Its called the easy/very easy/casual difficulty level.

I know many who went for lower difficulty in order to appreciate the story, but I also believe that more than a few didn't realize this. From what I can gather, in ME3 its just explicitly said 'here's the narrative difficulty'.

This is the difference between modifying a gameplay aspect to better suit the gamer's style and completely removing the largest portion of gameplay to suit a non-gamer's style.

[Morducai]

Meris wrote...

I am of the belief that Combat is, or has always been, a far too much of a major aspect of gameplay in RPG. Roleplaying could stand to have more gameplay features, such as a expanded dialogue tree that deals in actions and gives you more options to complete a quest (or at least instances when you actually do have more options are more frequent than in, say Origins with, perhaps, 10 stat - other than coercion - checks throught the game).

But gameplay wise, BioWare rpgs are about both combat and dialogue. One cannot stand without the other since the first implies most of the gameplay and the latter, most of the storytelling. Simply skipping combat is too much of a superficial solution to satisfy.

On the more panicked hand, I believe that ME3's 'skip combat' and 'automate dialogue' options estabilish a dangerous precedent where the focus of one or the other might change. The storytelling might become more guided (JRPG style) than it currently already is.

I think it'll fine as long as you offer it as an optional feature. I know it's gonna sound harsh but I think that people who want to play these kind of ROG but can't handle the gameplay features they come with should not play them. 

[TEWR]

OP, here's what I said in response to another poster on another thread dealing with this subject:

The Ethereal Writer Redux wrote...

Shadow of Light Dragon wrote...

I'm a fan of being able to skip any combat that isn't relevant to the story.

I don't agree that removing combat would make it more of a movie than game. Planescape: Torment had very little combat except in places where it made sense story-wise. There is plenty of gameplay in exploration and world/NPC interaction.

Where combat is boring, nonsensical, not story-related, or exists as filler material to artifically increase the length of a game, I'm wholeheartedly in favour of skipping it. To me it's like a tedious commercial break, but I admit I play RPGs for the story content more than the action.

Of course, combat should try its best to not be boring and nonsensical filler material with no real relation to the story. There does need to be combat that is related to the story. If not the main story, each quest's individual story.

Take for instance, Anders' quest in Act 2. That quest's combat serves a purpose, specifically during the confrontation with Alrik.

Now, there will be instances where combat is just filler related. Ambushes in DAO and Awakening and the gangs prowling Kirkwall's empty streets. Those have no relation to the story, but in their own way they do help to give the player a sense of the world they're in. And to an extent, make it feel more alive.

DAII less so because I think they were just thrown in there for "MOAR XP", but that's another matter. What I would've done -- I feel the need to always say this -- was have them tied to Aveline and the City Guard, where you can talk with her and she gives you information on each gang and asks that they brought in dead or alive. And the player could infiltrate a gang and turn them in to the City Guard.

And maybe as a result, you'd get more gold but less experience from Aveline. Or you could go the Red Jenny route and just kill them all, and Aveline would give you less gold then the arrest route, but you'd get more gold and more experience from the representative of the enigmatic Friends of Red Jenny.

That's just a rough idea but in a sense, this gives off a tiny story in and of itself where combat is essential to one route. Now obviously, the arrest route wouldn't apply to the Followers of She. At least, not so that you hand over the demon. That demonic wench needed to die , but maybe you could turn the rest over to the City Guard for them to deal with.

I think that DAII's combat sadly did fall into the boring category because there really was no sense of the need for tactical urgency. The combat in there was horribly one-sided, and Nightmare didn't do much to change that for me.

==================================================================

Also, just a friendly suggestion. Though this topic started because of how you disagree with Mrs. Hepler's comments from five or six years ago, I think the thread should avoid discussing Mrs. Hepler at all. Simply because it will probably eventually spiral into a stream of nonsensical backlash against her.

And then it will get locked.

To ensure that the need for gameplay is discussed in this thread, I think the title shouldn't talk about Mrs. Hepler specifically and just talk about how gameplay is crucial to a story.

Again, just a friendly suggestion

Modifié par The Ethereal Writer Redux, 21 février 2012 - 10:44 .

[Meris]

Morducai wrote...

I think it'll fine as long as you offer it as an optional feature. I know it's gonna sound harsh but I think that people who want to play these kind of ROG but can't handle the gameplay features they come with should not play them. 

It isn't harsh.

Harsh is saying that you should stick to <insert ridiculously easy and/or childish/girly/stupid game> because you're a bad player who must be lacking body/brain parts.

It isn't harsh that someone should stick to the mediums/genres they want to enjoy or simply actually like. It isn't harsh that I sometimes want to watch a cartoon or read a history book instead of playing games, or even want to play a strategy title instead of an RPG one. Neither is it that some people should just really stick to other mediums since they don't like gaming and aren't accessible as a market.

And that's why BioWare's current direction can be loathed both rightfully and not at the same time. They wish the 'streamline' a genre and partially alienate their niche in an attempt to please every type of gamer ever. This prospect is hard because, at times, BioWare is trying to please opposing gamer tastes (such as RTS rpgers and Action rpgers), and Dragon Age II clearly lacked the resources to that.

Skipping combat is beyond what BioWare is doing, its trying to get people who don't play games straight into an RPG, which is bound to both alienate BioWare's current niche, the rpg niche as a role, and make a BioWare game less of a game simply because Dialogue, as a gameplay mechanic, currently does not stand on its own - the storytelling is great but its not nearly interactive enough to constitute much more than a visual novel.

Regardless, as far as I know, people whose opinions really matter on game design are called designers. Writers do their thing and 95% of the game industry is just a reminder that BioWare's writting is great. Hell, I'm sure Gaider and the other writers created enough plot hooks for an epic game that somehow ran out of producer/developer support mid way through development.

Modifié par Meris, 21 février 2012 - 10:57 .

[Blacklash93]

I think they should be blurring the story and gameplay segments. I think Hepler misunderstood (at the time) that gameplay and story is something that needs to be segregated. The best games out there blur the line where it's appropriate and have the two aspects complement each other.

Good combat should be enjoyable like a good action sequence in a movie and they've already got the interactivity during story down.

Actually, kind of OT, but didn't L.A. Noire have a "skip combat" feature?

Modifié par Blacklash93, 21 février 2012 - 11:03 .

[Huntress]

I agree with The Ethereal Writer Redux on this, that comment was made 6 years ago.. come on is time to move on.

Modifié par Huntress, 21 février 2012 - 11:13 .

[Zanallen]

She didn't say they should remove gameplay, She didn't say they should remove combat. She suggested a skip combat button because she isn't very good at combat. She didn't have the time, what with having a career and being pregnant and all, to spend doing something that frustrated her. There is nothing wrong with that. It would the same as a skip cut scene button or a skip puzzle button as already found in several games.

[Sherbet Lemon]

The Ethereal Writer Redux wrote...

Also, just a friendly suggestion. Though this topic started because of how you disagree with Mrs. Hepler's comments from five or six years ago, I think the thread should avoid discussing Mrs. Hepler at all. Simply because it will probably eventually spiral into a stream of nonsensical backlash against her.

And then it will get locked.

To ensure that the need for gameplay is discussed in this thread, I think the title shouldn't talk about Mrs. Hepler specifically and just talk about how gameplay is crucial to a story.

Again, just a friendly suggestion

I agree with this.  You could change the title to something similar.  I know that the always fashionable John Epler suggested earlier that someone make a thread discussing this very subject (the intersection of gameplay and storytelling).

I think I have more a question than a comment.  I guess (and maybe this has been discussed already so forgive me if I'm rehashing old issues), but why do you think DA2 failed in this endeavor?  What could have made it better?  More specifically, that is.

[hoorayforicecream]

You're welcome to your opinion, but I disagree. I think that games should be made to meet the needs of consumers, and if there are enough people out there who would buy games like Mass Effect without too much time spent doing the combat, then someone should make games for them. There's more to Mass Effect and Dragon Age than a simple linear no-frills movie or book story. There's choices, there's reactions, there's different situations that you choose to put the characters in by selecting your team. A large part of replaying DAO and DA2 for me was to try making different story decisions and role-playing my character differently. That has very little to do with the numerous combats in the games, but is still very much playing the game.

I would say that, yes - if people don't like playing the kind of games that are currently being made, they should not buy or play them. But I would also say that they have a perfectly legitimate reason to say "Hey, we want games similar to this, but without the heavy emphasis on combat." And if someone out there decides that there's enough of a market that making such a game for them would be a profitable venture, then I think someone should make that game. If it's BioWare, I'd be more than happy to buy it.

[Xewaka]

Dr. wonderful wrote...
Wait, if you skip Combat then all you have is a Japanese visual novel.

Or Monkey Island.

[TEWR]

I think I have more a question than a comment. I guess (and maybe this has been discussed already so forgive me if I'm rehashing old issues), but why do you think DA2 failed in this endeavor? What could have made it better? More specifically, that is.

Is this question directed at me or the OP?

[lobi]

Is 'Esther' out yet? I am looking forward to that. I also loved 'The Graveyard'.
Games need not be restricted to Hi-Res Pong or 'combat'.
I loved the strory telling aspect of the Mako but because of arcade nubs they took it out.
Substance, if you no want go play angry birds or whinecraft.

[Sherbet Lemon]

The Ethereal Writer Redux wrote...

I think I have more a question than a comment. I guess (and maybe this has been discussed already so forgive me if I'm rehashing old issues), but why do you think DA2 failed in this endeavor? What could have made it better? More specifically, that is.

Is this question directed at me or the OP?

Er...both?

EDIT: Anyone? ^^

Modifié par Village Idiot, 22 février 2012 - 12:22 .

[hoorayforicecream]

Village Idiot wrote...

The Ethereal Writer Redux wrote...

I think I have more a question than a comment. I guess (and maybe this has been discussed already so forgive me if I'm rehashing old issues), but why do you think DA2 failed in this endeavor? What could have made it better? More specifically, that is.

Is this question directed at me or the OP?

Er...both?

EDIT: Anyone? ^^

I thought that some elements of it were done very well, and others needed work. I loved the companion interactions and found myself often reloading to see what other companion reactions were to the various situations. However, some other things (many of the core story plot points in act 3, for example) weren't done well at all.

[Trikun]

Oh, I came here looking for Dragon Age 2 related forum posts. Seems I've stumbled into 'not related to the game at all' forum. I apologize.

[ChandlerL]

Perhaps but unlike older games like Monopoly and Chess, video games are an ever evolving medium and I welcome new views on what this medium can be and as we move forward, I have more options available to me than different variations of Space Invaders.

Modifié par ChandlerL, 22 février 2012 - 12:54 .

[mousestalker]

Actually, gameplay without combat is fairly oldschool. Google 'Colossal Cave Adventure' and you will see what I mean. Infocom was one of the pioneers of computer gaming and they generally had very little combat.

[Mr Fixit]

Meris wrote...

I am of the belief that Combat is, or has always been, a far too much of a major aspect of gameplay in RPG. Roleplaying could stand to have more gameplay features

Indeed. BioWare's RPGs are a bit too combat heavy. Fallout 1/2 are a good example of RPGs that are pretty non-combat friendly, if a player so desires.

Meris wrote...
But gameplay wise, BioWare rpgs are about both combat and dialogue. One cannot stand without the other since the first implies most of the gameplay and the latter, most of the storytelling. Simply skipping combat is too much of a superficial solution to satisfy.

Which brings us to the second problem with BioWare's RPGs. They are extremely combat (and dialogue) heavy, but those two have nothing at all with one another. Dialogues and other non-combat features don't have any impact on combat sequences, while combat doesn't really influence the narrative. There is a large disconnect between those two modes of play, an abstraction almost. Reminds me of RTS games where the narrative doesn't really jive with the actual missions.

Modifié par Mr Fixit, 22 février 2012 - 01:07 .