228 réponses à ce sujet

[Mr. MannlyMan]

You know, having the relays explode at the end of the game DOES raise some very interesting questions.

Personally, I think the definitive "we win, Reapers are destroyed 4ever" ending SHOULD have come at the cost of the mass relays. It was the lack of any alternative that ruined it, though.

[Ostagar2011]

They let Brent Knowles leave as lead designer of Dragon Age Origins - and every aspect of DA2 goes to sh*t. They let Drew Karpyshyn walk off as lead writer on ME, and ME writing goes to sh*t in a spectacular way.

Brent's comments are spot on, and if BioWare re-hire him, I restart buying BioWare games. Since the fist part of that is not going to happen (they probably still think this is all a rpgcodex.net or reddit raid), I'll just sit on the sidelines and watch my once favorite developer implode.

[Kandid001]

No wonder why EA and Brent parted ways.

I miss him.

Modifié par Kandid001, 17 mars 2012 - 09:27 .

[Legendaryred]

How come people like him weren't doping ME? seriously common sense lacks in Bioware's department.

[Lux]

Great comment by Brent. He states the obvious which the "new" BioWare was unable to get. Where's the conclusion to three games of story customization by the players? Where's the balance to that depressive and poorly explained bitter-sweetness?

Star Wars is still alive and well. It's still making oodles of cash because it gave the audience what they wanted in the original trilogy. Mass Effect is (was?) the exciting sci-fi novelty of our time and BioWare didn't even need to deliver just what the audience wanted. They could have had their endings in the mix of any number of tailored outcomes inherent to an RPG that spanned THREE GAMES.

As things are, Mass Effect will be remembered as that series that presented one of the most incoherent and anti-climatic finales. There goes eight years of hard work down the drain, along with future appeal to the franchise. It's bad entertainment for us and certainly bad business for them. But at least they made the linear finale they wanted; nevermind the people who had played a highly interactive story up to those defining moments.

[Raizo]

Doofe2012 wrote...

http://blog.brentkno.../#disqus_thread

I read one recent blog post where the writer basically said "the ending was awesome because it was just like a movie" and I think she was missing the point. It is a game. Not a movie. And more specifically, its a role-playing game. The players are *part* of the game. Part of the process of building and experiencing the game, much more so than with most other forms of entertainment. Entitlement is really a right, for the gamer, because they have participated, actively, in the game itself. Again, I can't speak to the actual ending myself, because I have not
played it but in generally I'd say a Role-Playing Video Game Trilogy Ending should (try to) do the following:

1. Reward the player's choices throughout the series. The big stuff they did should be noted. They should *feel* like they had a unique impact on the world.

2. End on a positive note. This is really important for video games... life in general is full of ****ty stuff happening all the time. When I invest a hundred hours into a game I need to walk away feeling like a hero. When you waste a couple hours of a person's life with an artsy/depressing movie or short story or even a novel, it is more forgivable because the time spent is less. And presumably the consumer knew what they were going into when they started. Certain directors create certain styles of movie. Certain writers write specific types of fiction. On the other hand somebody playing an epic role-playing video-game trilogy is going to *expect* to be the hero and save the universe. That's why they are playing the game. When expectations don't match reality, disappointment is created. It might be an artistic/creative move to go with a different style of ending but I feel its the wrong choice, especially for a videogame *trilogy*. Make your middle game bleak if you want to, but end the series on a high note.

Pay attention here, Bioware. This man is everything that was right with the company. What he is saying is exactly how most of us players feel. DA:O was one of your most successful games, and the fact that its lead designer no longer works for you is a clear foreshadowing of why you will go downhill once people are done with ME3.

FINALLY, SOMEONE IN THE INDUSTRY GETS IT!

[Spiwerk]

The guy did make DAO which was pretty boss!
Nice to see his take on the matter, which sums up what people have been feeling.

*im gonna go look for my copy of DAO now, to get this ugly ME3 ending taste off.

[TuringPoint]

 I... don't really see how this proves anything about how Bioware changed.

He actually gives some reasonable, un-trollish opinions, as does the Forbes article he links to.  I think that is a very good read and the community needs to take that to heart.  If you want 'the old' Bioware back, whatever that is to you, you have to do it by maintaining a relationship with them, not by raging at them.

It's one way to be persistent, insistent even (good things), its another to throw your weight around verbally.  It's not just that its unpleasant, its that it doesn't work that well.

[Xandax]

Alocormin wrote...

 I... don't really see how this proves anything about how Bioware changed.

He actually gives some reasonable, un-trollish opinions, as does the Forbes article he links to.  I think that is a very good read and the community needs to take that to heart.  If you want 'the old' Bioware back, whatever that is to you, you have to do it by maintaining a relationship with them, not by raging at them.

It's one way to be persistent, insistent even (good things), its another to throw your weight around verbally.  It's not just that its unpleasant, its that it doesn't work that well.

People have 'retained a realtionship' and the games have changed - nobody can deny that objectively.
Clearly that doesn't work - just handing over money does not incite willingness to pause in the company you hand them over to.

[Harbinger of your Destiny]

Tazzmission wrote...

Redstar6 wrote...

ncknck wrote...

Good thing he was fired. Mass Effect is not an answer to his problems in life or lack of imagination. Its an immersive and epic drama story. Deal with it.

When did it become a drama?

i hope your kidding


mass effect has always had some form of drama in it to say it hasnt is just not right at all

how is the virmire situation not dramatic? you had to make a choice of who to save......


heck how was me3 not dramtic? if anything the drama grew alot better in it

Just because Rambo has dramatic themes in it does not make it a Drama.

[Tirigon]

Doofe2012 wrote...


2. End on a positive note. This is really important for video games... life in general is full of ****ty stuff happening all the time. When I invest a hundred hours into a game I need to walk away feeling like a hero. When you waste a couple hours of a person's life with an artsy/depressing movie or short story or even a novel, it is more forgivable because the time spent is less. And presumably the consumer knew what they were going into when they started. Certain directors create certain styles of movie. Certain writers write specific types of fiction. On the other hand somebody playing an epic role-playing video-game trilogy is going to *expect* to be the hero and save the universe. That's why they are playing the game. When expectations don't match reality, disappointment is created. It might be an artistic/creative move to go with a different style of ending but I feel its the wrong choice, especially for a videogame *trilogy*. Make your middle game bleak if you want to, but end the series on a high note.[/i]

Finally someone who understands my desire for an ending involving peace, love, understanding, rainbows, and if possible, unicorns.

[Tirigon]

ncknck wrote...

Good thing he was fired. Mass Effect is not an answer to his problems in life or lack of imagination. Its an immersive and epic drama story. Deal with it.

Aside the fact that you are very wrong, I would just add that it is scientififcally proven that saying "Deal with it" instead of an actual point is a sure sign of being a dick.

[Rockworm503]

Skelter192 wrote...

Too bad he's a former employee.

Just like I'm a former customer I guess.

[ShaggyWolf]

Maybe we should try and make sure Casey, Mac, and anyone else who's relevant on the dev team sees what Brent had to say, instead of suggesting we fire and replace them with somone else?

I agree with what Brent wrote, and I'll readily admit I hate the way ME3 ended, but there's a positive way to handle this, and suggesting that the ME3 writers and devs are some horrible monsters that are out to get money and sow destruction in the name of EA, is not it.

Let's not forget the other 95% of ME3, which is amazing and worthy of praise.

[Rockworm503]

Dean_the_Young wrote...

chengthao wrote...

the exploding relays would counter the "everyone is alive" arguement

If every sort of explosion were the same. Fortunately, they're not, nor are they ever implied to be.

plus no one knows how to build relays, hence why no one has built any

Besides the Protheans, who proved that it can be done? And the FTL com bouys, which are simply primitive mass relays?

You confuse current capability for potential. Not being able to do something now doesn't mean you can't do it later.

Most of the galaxy is stranded on earth.
You do realize that right?
The best possible outcome is they have to find some way to survive with each other sharing the same solar system.
Thats Quarians with their suits.  The Krogan..... eck need I go on?  Working together to stop the Reapers is one thing.  Living together for generations is another.  Best case scenario the Krogans eat everyone else.
How is that not bleak?

[The Nur]

Clean and concise.

He shows how he gets it and who DA;O was special, like this franchise once was.

Current business practices should learn from this man.

[Lux]

Alocormin wrote...

 I... don't really see how this proves anything about how Bioware changed.

It doesn't. It's just that after the years Brent left there was an increasing shift in marketability and streamlining of their games. That shift had a good outcome with ME2, no so much with DA2, and they almost got it with ME3...

Nowadays they're heavily geared on profit,  with their development seemingly based on pure market logic, number crunching and getting their games out there as fast as possible. Change is ok, search for profit is ok, mass appeal is very ok, but not at the cost of key areas of the final product.

No game company can please every player but this problem in particular affected a great deal of people and it was a downside on how they prioritized resources. The developers are also pretty smart and experienced people. The fact that their collective minds didn't see this coming denotes that there was something wrong during development which caused a disconnect with a good percentile of players.

They can certainly course correct and continue to improve the creation of their games. But they better get their "new" way of doing things fine tuned before they lose even more customer interest on their products / labour of love done with intense pressure.

[Ostagar2011]

Valadras21 wrote...

Maybe we should try and make sure Casey, Mac, and anyone else who's relevant on the dev team sees what Brent had to say, instead of suggesting we fire and replace them with somone else?

I agree with what Brent wrote, and I'll readily admit I hate the way ME3 ended, but there's a positive way to handle this, and suggesting that the ME3 writers and devs are some horrible monsters that are out to get money and sow destruction in the name of EA, is not it.

Let's not forget the other 95% of ME3, which is amazing and worthy of praise.

I don't agree that the other 95% was "amazing" - it felt like a loud cliched Hollywood movie interrupted by (now rapidly getting stale) shooty bits. Too much auto dialog. The story was Call of Duty with space invaders instead of Russians. And even the shooty mechanics were a poor cousin to Call of Duty or Gears of War. It felt "amazing" because of the interminable cinematics that gave the cheap illusion of immersion.

[chengthao]

Dean_the_Young wrote...

chengthao wrote...

the exploding relays would counter the "everyone is alive" arguement

If every sort of explosion were the same. Fortunately, they're not, nor are they ever implied to be.

plus no one knows how to build relays, hence why no one has built any

Besides the Protheans, who proved that it can be done? And the FTL com bouys, which are simply primitive mass relays?

You confuse current capability for potential. Not being able to do something now doesn't mean you can't do it later.

its never stated that the exploding relays WON'T destroy all life, so we have to assume that all life was extinguished where ever the relays exploded, there has been no indication in the game that there are different types of "Mass Relay explosions", so we have to make our own guesses on the exploding Relays based on the already given information (Arrival)

it took the Protheans a very long time to build a mass relay and even then they only built one and it was much smaller than an actual mass relay, and they only started building it when they went to war with the Reapers, and even if they were able to build Mass Relays, you need two to work, so that means you'd have to travel all the way to Thessia, Rannoch, Palaven, etc, etc and build a second one just to connect the two and with the Mass Relays now all destroyed, where exactly are they going to learn on how to improve, its going to take even longer just to research than to build and i'm going to assume that the scientists who built the Crucible were "left behind" since they are non-combatants

a bleak future for Earth with a huge fleet overhead, an Earth that's been turned into a buring husk with already limited resources is going to support entire fleets of different races with different DNA that could be deadly to to eachother, even though "peace" has been brokered doesn't mean old grudges could arise, especially if you have Wreav instead of Wrex and cured the genophage, he is hostile and wants to "unleash" the horde when this war is over, he wants the Krogans to return to greatness but he wants to do it violently and don't tell me about well Wrex doesn't blah blah blah . . . . .  because we all know that ppl play diffferently, and if you don't have an import, Wreav is the default Krogan leader, not Wrex

we all have to make our own assumptions as to what has happened and that's the problem, there isn't enough evidence that would lead to a "happy" ending, all the evidence points torwards a slow, bleak future for Earth and the ppl/aliens in the fleets overhead . . . its crappy writing, an ending where its "make your own conclusion" isn't good or smart, its LAZY . . . "i'm to lazy to make an ending so i'll let the player make his/her own ending"

Modifié par chengthao, 17 mars 2012 - 01:08 .

[Ronin1325]

Ostagar2011 wrote...

Valadras21 wrote...

Maybe we should try and make sure Casey, Mac, and anyone else who's relevant on the dev team sees what Brent had to say, instead of suggesting we fire and replace them with somone else?

I agree with what Brent wrote, and I'll readily admit I hate the way ME3 ended, but there's a positive way to handle this, and suggesting that the ME3 writers and devs are some horrible monsters that are out to get money and sow destruction in the name of EA, is not it.

Let's not forget the other 95% of ME3, which is amazing and worthy of praise.

I don't agree that the other 95% was "amazing" - it felt like a loud cliched Hollywood movie interrupted by (now rapidly getting stale) shooty bits. Too much auto dialog. The story was Call of Duty with space invaders instead of Russians. And even the shooty mechanics were a poor cousin to Call of Duty or Gears of War. It felt "amazing" because of the interminable cinematics that gave the cheap illusion of immersion.

Agreed Ostagar2011, the ending debacle has overshadowed it, but even without it, ME3 has serious issues. As I've said before, a game that tries to be all things to all people is going to end up making sacrifices, sacrifices that will hurt what it could have been had the game been focused. People who play Football generally aren't chess players & vice-versa. But EA has decided that they are going to try & grab the 'pew pew' crowd because it's a larger market and RPG's like ME have to suffer for it.

[FERMi27]

I hope Bioware gets fired by EA and they apply to Bethesda or at least THQ.

[Mcfly616]

Wow...all that logic he just laid out....kinda odd how he's a "former" employee....maybe Bioware got indoctrinated and he fought it....so they got rid of him

[Rafficus III]

While I agree with what he is saying and recognize Origins as being a gem, I can't help but wonder why I only hear about him when he's addressing something negative about Bioware... can't put my finger on it...