833 réponses à ce sujet

[AkiKishi]

David Gaider wrote...

Sylvius the Mad wrote...
Half of the problems with DA2's dialogue system could be eliminated by giving us full-text dialogue options, but the other half are caused by the voice.

I've explained above why full-text dialogue is not the answer, though the problem still relates in that case to player VO as well. If player VO is your issue, however, then that is simply a non-starter. There are benefits that come with player VO as well as weaknesses, but on the whole we feel that the benefits outweigh the weaknesses. That is going nowhere, and there's no point dilly-dallying around it if that's where your enjoyment breaks down.

VA's work much better when they don't have to act out soundbites. This was something I noticed in ME3. While I'm not a fan of autodialogue (more so in ME3 than in principle) I do acknowledge there are benifits when applied to a voiced protagonist.
I'm personally willing to have a more believable character than one I control directly.

[Sylvius the Mad]

David Gaider wrote...

I've explained above why full-text dialogue is not the answer, though the problem still relates in that case to player VO as well. If player VO is your issue, however, then that is simply a non-starter. There are benefits that come with player VO as well as weaknesses, but on the whole we feel that the benefits outweigh the weaknesses. That is going nowhere, and there's no point dilly-dallying around it if that's where your enjoyment breaks down.

You could let us turn the voice off.

But regardless, the paraphrse is the bigger problem.  What I say is much more important than how I say it.

[BillsVengenace]

The writers need to put a sign above their workstation saying "Anytime the PC speaks without player input is bad."

[Sylvius the Mad]

BillsVengenace wrote...

"Anytime the PC speaks without player input is bad."

Anytime the PC does anything at all without direct player input is bad.

I was annoyed enough by the murder knife.  But it was a small detail, and I could live with it.  DAO was the compromise I was willing to accept.  DAO made all sorts of concessions to new players and console limitations and supposedly changing market expectations. DAO was a compromise between the game I want and those newer trends.

I'm not really willing to compromise any further. If they want to take another good feature away, they need to replace it with something equally good. So far, they're not doing that.

[tmp7704]

David Gaider wrote...

What if the actual meaning of that line is conveyed via emotion or gesture?

I think that particular wheel has been invented long time ago, and is frequently practiced on the intertubes -- actions and emotions are put as part of the text, enclosed typically in asterisks. *smile*

Also, if i recall right, DA:O has made use of that option in number of dialogues, and even has custom text style defined for it, to make it stand out from actual spoken text.

Modifié par tmp7704, 20 mars 2012 - 09:13 .

[AkiKishi]

Sylvius the Mad wrote...
Do you at least recognise that the games you're making now allow a much narrower range of playstyles than your older games did?  Yes, you assume a typical playstyle, and you always have, but your older games allowed more different types of play to exist.

Times have changed. This is not BG where the characters don't even have a face, never mind facial expression.
Older games allowed more types of play because most of that play went on in your head. This is no longer possible because you can' imagine away something in the same way you can imagine something.

Cost issues mean compromise you get one VA for male/female different voices are going to just seem more natural with different concepts.

Rather than mourning the lost, we should be focusing about what in the system can make the experience better even if it's a different kind of experience than that provided by BG et al.

[Sylvius the Mad]

BobSmith101 wrote...

Times have changed.

I haven't.

This is not BG where the characters don't even have a face, never mind facial expression.

BG characters had both faces and facial expressions.  Those just weren't modelled by the game.

By hacing the game model them explicitly, the game denies the player direct control over them.  That's a loss of player agency, and it's worth discussing.

Older games allowed more types of play because most of that play went on in your head.

Yes.

This is no longer possible because you can' imagine away something in the same way you can imagine something.

Exactly.  As such, making the content explicit was clearly a mistake.

Cost issues mean compromise you get one VA for male/female different voices are going to just seem more natural with different concepts.

Those cost issues are of the developers' own making.  I see no benefit at all, for example, to the graphical advancements between NWN and DA2.  As such, the development of DA2's visuals were wasted resources.

The compromises you describe were unnecessary.

Rather than mourning the lost, we should be focusing about what in the system can make the experience better even if it's a different kind of experience than that provided by BG et al.

Whatever has been done can be undone.

Furthermore, you've created a false dilemma.  Asking for the elimination of some of these new "features" does not preclude participating in discussions about how to improve them.

Modifié par Sylvius the Mad, 20 mars 2012 - 09:27 .

[RosaAquafire]

David Gaider wrote...
There's more to it, though I'm afraid some of it would be hard to explain as it risks sounding kind of arrogant-- we have to make certain assumptions about how "the average player" plays their game, which is not true for everyone even though we have to make something as one-size-fits-all as we can.

I definitely see the point of this, but I'd also like to say, again, as a huge DA2 supporter -- I think right now you need to worry more about appealing to your hardcore market. This market is not me. I would like DA3 to be closer to DA2 than DA:O, if I had my way (though ideally a marriage of both.) But right now you guys have lost so much goodwill with this sort of gamernerd conciousness that, like it or not, people are going to demand mea culpas :/

*I* don't think it's fair. I loved DA2 and I don't think you should be beholden to, erm, certain subgroups. But it's getting a bit mission critical. DA:O was the result of trying to bring a niche genre into a new generation. DA2 was the result of trying to reach a wider average and a less targetted niche. Again, I preferred DA2's approach, but it was a pretty unqualified disaster on the PR and word of mouth fronts, in large part because of a perceived appeal to the "wrong kind of gamer."

In this particular case (where my opinions DO align, in the interest of disclosure), at least TRYING to find something other than paraphrases would be great. I realize that some people won't be happy without no voice and the return of the dialogue wall, but I think all most of us are really asking for is trying to find some way -- ANY way -- to use a DIFFERENT system that does NOT use the cutesy paraphrase system that everybody except you guys pretty much hates. I honestly stopped reading the paraphrases halfway through DA2 and just started roleplaying off the tone icons. A lot of others did the same. That's not great design when you're trying to get back in touch with a more customized, player-driven experience?

I'm okay with arrogant. I get it. I'm a writer myself. But right now it's not what you can really afford :/? Sorry. This sounds way douchier than I in any way actually feel about this issue. Again: DA2 is my bro.

[bEVEsthda]

Sylvius the Mad wrote...

BillsVengenace wrote...

"Anytime the PC speaks without player input is bad."

Anytime the PC does anything at all without direct player input is bad.

I was annoyed enough by the murder knife.  But it was a small detail, and I could live with it.  DAO was the compromise I was willing to accept.  DAO made all sorts of concessions to new players and console limitations and supposedly changing market expectations. DAO was a compromise between the game I want and those newer trends.

I'm not really willing to compromise any further. If they want to take another good feature away, they need to replace it with something equally good. So far, they're not doing that.

Agree.
Part of me want to wait to see. Let Bioware have their chance, to "show us" as they say.
Part of me feel they're so unreasonable about keeping broken elements, that it seems naive and delusional to expect anything.
Someday we'll have to hammer down the stakes and draw the line. Many have already. It's not as if this forum is really any capable of helping Bioware to understand or make any decisions, anymore. Most people who would have had something valid to say have long since left. Either on own free will, or in final disgust after a round of permabanning.

[tfive24]

wsandista wrote...

No dialogue wheel, just bring back the silent protagonist, having the character voiced really limits the character for me.

^ This x a million. 
Let the player voice the character, not the devs. 

[Koire]

It seemed to me that the thread was not about voiced vs unvoiced, but if this is what everyone is discussing.. I strongly prefer the voiced one.

[Nighteye2]

David Gaider wrote...

LobselVith8 wrote...
Doesn't
that leave a disconnect between what the the player wants his (or her)
character to say, and what the protagonist actually says? If the
protagonist ends up saying entire lines of dialogue that are different
than what's actually chosen, it ends up running the risk of saying
something entirely different than what was intended - which was the
primary problem with the paraphrasing in Dragon Age II.

Let
me be frank: there is no solution which will be the catch-all that
satisfies everyone. Ideally we could look at some options where the
player can set preferences (the dreaded toggle), but that's not going to
be an option where we are writing two or three versions of the
paraphrase for every single response in the game. That would be
mind-boggling. There is a point where we're going to have to pick a
route and try to implement it in the best way we can.

Again, this
is something that we'll have to eventually show to convey our meaning,
but we've some options. They all have their benefits and drawbacks--
and, yes, I agree not everyone is going to like them all equally, but
then again y'all are hardly interchangeable.

I wonder, is it really that much extra work when you already need to write out the full text of the dialogue for the voice actors? If you go with a non-full-text version and voice acting, you still need the full text anyway...

David Gaider wrote...
Namely that the dialogue options in DA2 were simply the dialogue options in DAO with paraphrases attached. This is not true. Good writing for a silent protaganist is not the same as good writing for a voiced protaganist. Why? Because with a voiced protaganist there is actual acting involved.

Let's say I have the option where the text pops up after a delay, providing you the full line of what follows. What if the actual meaning of that line is conveyed via emotion or gesture? That's often the case, and indeed we'd like to do that more and not less. You could also be seeing the first line of an exchange, as opposed to getting the gist of the entire exchange from it. So you'd be seeing something that could still not be the improvement you think it is, as the PC's dialogue is not written the same as DAO's was.

While I still prefer full-text, if that is not an option then giving at least the first line literally would be a good middle ground - the witcher 2 did it that way and it was a lot less jarring than the DA2 paraphrases were.

Also, if the actual meaning of a line is conveyed via emotions or gestures, paraphrases won't be helping with that at all. So in that case, why not try full text + tone/gesture/emotion icons?

The most important value in this discussion is that of player control, the sense of identification with and ownership of the PC by the player. If the player gets in any way surprised by what his/her character says or does, that sense of control evaporates and a virtual distance is created between your character and you as player.

To put it this way:
In DA:O, I played my warden in Bioware's world/setting.
In DA2, I played and watched Bioware's character in Bioware's setting.

That's how I, as player, experience it.

[Morroian]

David Gaider wrote...

Xewaka wrote...
Add a "[dismissive hand gesture]" tag at the end of the subtitle. Add a "[Smirking] at the beginning. If that information is so important, give it to us.

Possibly, though the room on the GUI is not infinite. Like I said, it's a potential issue, and not necessarily a deal-breaker. It is the kind of issue, however, that needs to come out as a result of using it and not one that can be solved theoretically.

I can understand your reservations but I really think you need to do what you need to to ensure there is an option for full text subtitle. While I am a DA2 supporter its become a non negotiable for many people IMHO. The same can probably be said of providing an isometric view.

[Chiramu]

Auto-dialogue is like Bioware holding your hand as you play the game :<. I'm not a baby, I can make my own choices lol.

[Tirigon]

I used to agree but I dont really care anymore. DA2 killed the Franchise, I wont even try DA3, let alone buy it.

[DarkAmaranth1966]

I would rather the dialog from DA2 than a non voiced pc. Perhaps you would like to spend hours upon hours recording your voice into the game? Sure wrong gender possibly but, then it would say what you want - oh but you'd need to play the game first to know what to say.

I just don't see how the scripted dialog is worse than a silent puppet. Silent puppet is a thing of the past - little different form a MUD, MOO, Mush or MIDI game anf those telnet games are ancient.

[Brockololly]

Nighteye2 wrote...
To put it this way:
In DA:O, I played my warden in Bioware's world/setting.
In DA2, I played and watched Bioware's character in Bioware's setting.

That's how I, as player, experience it.

Its the delineation between a first person narrative experience (DA:O) and a third person experience (DA2, ME). Its just not possible to play games like DA2 from a first person perspective. BioWare abandoning that method f play and method of telling stories is disheartening to say the least.


As for ways to convey more information, is there any reason why it has to be via graphical icons? That was a big part of my problem in DA2 is that the definitions of the icons were often incredibly broad or vague to the point of not helping- does the heart mean flirt or does it mean you're going to confess your undying love and immediately jump to cutscene sex? The manual says the heart icon indicates Hawke will "flirt or pursue deeper romance." Well which one? Can't you just flirt with somebody without meaning to pursue deeper romance?

I guess I'd just prefer simple text describing the tone or action instead of having to jump to the manual to look up what all the absract icons actually may or may not mean. Like the hammer icon in DA2, in the manual it says it indicates that Hawke will "speak directly or rudely." There is a difference in being direct versus rude.

Personally I think Vampire the Masquerade: Bloodlines has a great dialogue system where you see the full text but then they put the varying fonts and colors on top to supplement the exact text. 

[wsandista]

A silent protagonist is the best option because it lets us determine who the character is, which is why i like RPGs. Having the main character voiced significantly reduces character variety because each character you create should be unique, but giving them all the same voice really subverts that. I know that it is impossible to put in all of the options in a videoRPG that are available to players in a p&pRPG, but that doesn't make it a good idea to further restrict player interpretation by making the protagonist voiced.

[Pasquale1234]

Nighteye2 wrote...

To put it this way:
In DA:O, I played my warden in Bioware's world/setting.
In DA2, I played and watched Bioware's character in Bioware's setting.

That's how I, as player, experience it.

.... or perhaps:
In DA2, I directed and watched Bioware's character in Bioware's setting.

Yes, that about sums it up.  It seems they are committed to changing the game in ways that will invalidates certain playstyles.

wsandista wrote...

A silent protagonist is the best option because it lets us determine who the character is, which is why i like RPGs. Having the main character voiced significantly reduces character variety because each character you create should be unique, but giving them all the same voice really subverts that. I know that it is impossible to put in all of the options in a videoRPG that are available to players in a p&pRPG, but that doesn't make it a good idea to further restrict player interpretation by making the protagonist voiced.

More than that, it means you are playing a pre-defined character with a pre-defined morality, and pretty much eliminates the vast majority of types of characters you might otherwise be able to roleplay.

Modifié par Pasquale1234, 20 mars 2012 - 10:38 .

[Sylvius the Mad]

Pasquale1234 wrote...

More than that, it means you are playing a pre-defined character with a pre-defined morality, and pretty much eliminates the vast majority of types of characters you might otherwise be able to roleplay.

This is important.  If I can't decide what my character's opinions are regarding major social issues, what exactly is my job?  Why should I bother to play the game when my input doesn't make any difference at all?

I once built a DAO character entirely around a strong belief in the inviolability of property rights.  It turned out that was relevant to many quests throughout the game.

But in DA2, I couldn't do anything of the sort, because the game assumed the motives behind Hawke's actions.  If Hawke spared a murderer's life, the game assumed he was doing it because he thought the murderer could be redeemed (and Hawke said as much).  If Hawke stopped Fenris from killing a hated enemy, the game assumed he disagreed with Fenris's hatred for that enemy.

DA2 made far too many assumptions about Hawke's motives for doing just about everything, and that badly broke the game.

Modifié par Sylvius the Mad, 20 mars 2012 - 10:54 .

[MKDAWUSS]

I don't mind having an auto-dialog system - I think it's one way of allowing your character to talk a little more. In most conversations the NPC tends to filibuster the PC.

[AngryFrozenWater]

Yes. Auto-dialogue is bad. Especially at the start of ME3. I feel like watching and not playing the game. I remember when we had a discussion with the devs about ME1's Noveria in which they understood that those long sequences were bad (even with the usual dialogue in that game), when followed with combat and no chance to save the game. And to my surprise in ME3 we have lots of that. I am trying to replay ME3 now and I notice myself doing other things during those scenes. They are boring, because I cannot interact.

In fact I don't like the idea of setting the tone by investigating previous selections of the dialogue wheel either. In DA2 the options didn't make sense because no matter what you have chosen the story played out much the same, you visited the same locations, played the same quests, fought the same bosses, etc. The illusion of choice only works when, from time to time, there is really something significant to chose from. There was none in DA2. The dialogue has to glue all that together using nonsensical rationalizations to keep the story on the railroad track, which, in my opinion, hurt the quality of the storytelling BW is famous for.

Modifié par AngryFrozenWater, 20 mars 2012 - 11:34 .

[bEVEsthda]

Brockololly wrote...

Personally I think Vampire the Masquerade: Bloodlines has a great dialogue system where you see the full text but then they put the varying fonts and colors on top to supplement the exact text. 

I agree. I don't understand why that system hasn't been the standard way of doing it for all RPGs since.
It's very simple. Very elegant. Nothing fancy, yet works well enough for all the things we would want to use dialogue for.

"Not invented by us" might be one reason. Another might be misdirected, creative aspirations to write and direct a movie, rather than making a game. A jealous, creative desire to cram down 'your own' story down the throat of the gamer, instead of letting her/him making up his own.

Modifié par bEVEsthda, 20 mars 2012 - 11:34 .