96 réponses à ce sujet

[AshenSugar]

Well, at the risk of drawing attention to the elephant in the room;  DragonAge II presented us a situation in which Blood Mages and Abominations became virtually interchangeable - Mages gave every appearance of turning into Abominations at the drop of a hat! Even those Mages My Hawke was attempting to side with typically attacked her on sight, without giving her any opportunity to explain or hold any kind of dialogue!

The Templars, on the other hand were generally presented as callous, vindictive pseudo-Gustapo extremists who would go to any length, however immoral to keep Mages in their place.

My hawke was denied the option to say "A plague on both your houses", wash her hands of the whole thing, and refuse to side with either faction. It would have been equally feasible for her to decide to try and get her mother, loved ones and friends out of Kirkwall at the earliest opportunity.. once the reality of the situation, and the city she had made her home became clear.

Modifié par AshenSugar, 21 mai 2012 - 03:18 .

[brushyourteeth]

Incredibly great topic, OP. Seriously.

I think what was done in Origins was a perfect set up for what the Dragon Age series needs: a protagonist with an ulimate goal set early in the game, and that's it. The Warden needed to end the Blight, but he/she had many different avenues to choose from in order to do it. Your motivation for doing it was up to you, though the logic of not wanting the world to end is pretty universal.

Hawke was... different. His/her motivations changed from survival, to profit, to inserting herself in everyone else's business out of boredom. I found it hardly compelling.

On my first playthrough, I found myself hoping I could get the end faster in order to find out what on earth I was actually playing this game for. Hawke was keeping busy, but none of it seemed to point to any actual goal or achievement. Surprise! - at the end it did, just by chance. At the end of my third playthrough I decided that the only roleplay that made sense for Hawke was that she was a shameless opportunist with potentially altruistic motives when it suited her.

**EDIT**
This, coupled with what you pointed out so well - an obvious poke from behind by the game developers in our quests and dialogue choices, really lead me to believe that Hawke was a character surrounded by people with goals and convictions driving them, who really had none herself and was blown by whatever wind caught her in the moment. Strange that she ended up the leader. To tell this particular story, the DA team would have done better to actually preset her character and tell you what she cares about (which is to say, if their goal was to make an RPG, they shouldn't have forced you to choose a side ever.)

Modifié par brushyourteeth, 21 mai 2012 - 05:47 .

[Massakkolia]

brushyourteeth wrote...

I think what was done in Origins was a perfect set up for what the Dragon Age series needs: a protagonist with an ulimate goal set early in the game, and that's it. The Warden needed to end the Blight, but he/she had many different avenues to choose from in order to do it. Your motivation for doing it was up to you, though the logic of not wanting the world to end is pretty universal.

Hawke was... different. His/her motivations changed from survival, to profit, to inserting herself in everyone else's business out of boredom. I found it hardly compelling.

On my first playthrough, I found myself hoping I could get the end faster in order to find out what on earth I was actually playing this game for.

*snip*

Agreed. A clear but broad goal is essential for a plot-driven role playing game. Freedom to choose how you'll achieve that goal is just as essential.

Funny thing about DA2 is that structurally it might work as an open world instead of a linear game. Hawke would hang out in Kirkwall, form relationships, do some odd jobs, accumulate wealth, wreak havoc and so on. This is a pretty accurate description of what actually happens in the game but in a sandbox setting the player would have the freedom to decide what she actually wants to participate in, when she wants to do that and why.

The lack of distinct goal in DA2 resulted in a swarm of minigoals, which were far too restricting from the role playing point of view. Hanging out and killing time is fun when I'm given freedom to wander around in new environments and interact with the world as I please. Being railroaded into a riveting plot is fun when I'm given freedom to react to the plot in different ways, build my own motivation and influence the branching of the plot by my actions. DA2 suffered from an identity crisis.

[Blastback]

I agree with this. The writing needs to assume less about the character. That would solve a lot of the complaints from some of the fans who prefered Origins approach.

[Vormaerin]

Dragon Age: Origons is a classic case of "You can buy any color car you want, as long as its model T". (yes, I know that's a twist on the real quote)

You are railroaded from start to finish. But you are free to imagine whatever reasons you want for being on the railroad.

Whether you are a high noble, a ghetto dweller, or a gangster, you talk exactly the same way, with exactly the same options, to exactly the same people. 99.9% of whom don't notice anything about you other than that you are a Gray Warden (even when that's supposed to be secret).

Apparently, its the height of RPing freedom to be given the opportunity imagine why my dwarf gangster chats with human lords in fluent, educated "Fereldenese".

That isn't what I want, though. I want the writers to write a story where who my character is matters. If that means a fixed protagonist like Adam Jensen or the Nameless One, fine. Just give me enough STORY to understand my character and enough options that I'm doing "choose your own adventure" rather than watching a movie.

[brushyourteeth]

I'm pretty sure that David Gaider once said the common language in Thedas actually came from the dwarves.

Just in case that helps clear a few things up.

[Sylvius the Mad]

Morroian wrote...

You're describing self insertion/1st person role playing,

Self-insertion and first-person roleplaying are not equivalent.  Self-insertion is, I would argue, a very specific instance of first-person roleplaying.

Morroian wrote...

I'll agree that DA2 is more limited than DAO in the options it gives the player but there are still options.

DA2 is vastly more limited, and that limitation gives us nothing in return.

We need DAO's level of player control back.

[Sylvius the Mad]

Realmzmaster wrote...

With the Bhaalspawn or the Hero of Neverwinter you can pick a sex and race but the origin never changes.

The Bhaalspawn's background is fixed, but not the Hero of Neverwinter.  NWN's PC could have been literally anywhere before enrolling in the Neverwinter Academy.  NWN is so open in this regard that it doesn't even break the narrative if you import a higher level character to start the game.

Honestly, no BioWare game allows more background freedom than NWN does (KotOR arguably offers equivalent freedom).

All my Hawkes are different people from Garrett Hawke, Thomas Hawke, Michelle Hawke, William Hawke.

How did you design their personalities?  How did you avoid having the game contradict those designs?

This is my problem with DA2.  So much of the game, from the dialogue system to the quest design, was constantly breaking my character designs.

All had different personalities. 

But were they personalities you designed, or personalities you discovered through gameplay?

The former is a wonderful thing.  The latter I don't think works in a roleplaying game at all.

[Sylvius the Mad]

haroldhardluck wrote...

All any COMPUTER RPG game can do is give you the options that correspond to the most common belief systems.

That's patently false.  BioWare did a really good job of offering that level of player control prior to DA2.

If you want flexibility in defining your PC's belief system, you have to play with a live DM who can adjust the script on the fly to match your decisions. Your complaint is invalid as it asks for what is impossible to deliver in a COMPUTER RPG.

I've played many computer roleplaying games - particularly those made by BioWare - that have done exactly that thing.

The whole point of playing a computer roleplaying game in the first place is to eliminate the need for other players.  You're proposal - go play tabletop - defeats that purpose.

[Sylvius the Mad]

[quote]Sutekh wrote...

 @Sylvius:

For clarification purpose, are incentive and motivation different for you?[/quote]
Of course.

Incentives matter, and without offering incentives the game can't expect any character to have a relevant motive, but the motives themselves are what I'm saying need to be left up to the player.
[quote]Sir JK wrote...

In an attempt to bring it back to quests rather than character creation:

The big problem with having Motivation-Neutral quests is that you cannot actually bring the character into that quest's particular storyline.[/quote]
That's a small prive to pay for greater player control.
[quote]The only conflicts that they can evoke is either purely Game-Mechanical or a Impersonal Moral conflict (a moral dilemma in how to resolve a situation you have no stake in). With no motivation assumed then you cannot bring the character into the conflict.[/quote]
The game can't, but the player can.  If the player's character holds a strong opinion on some relevant issue, then that's the personal connection to that quest.

My very first Warden was built around a strong belief in the importance of property rights, so he had a strong connection to that brief episode in Lothering with the greedy merchant.  My Warden found that to be a clear and unambiguous moral issue, and he took a strong stand on it because it mattered deeply to him.
[quote]Sure, we can imagine a personal stake in them. Such as wanting to involve one's character into their romance option's troubles. But even there a motivation is sort of assumed, since otherwise that quest will be identical to all other. [/quote]
You shouldn't need to imagine a personal stake.  You've already done that at character creation.  Everything that happens after that is a natural consequence of the personality you crafted.
[quote]Thus, assuming no motivation at all turns the plot into a series of small stand alone episodes where our blank protagonist constantly hovers outside the storyline and never truly enters it. Not so much a story as a series of puzzles and quizzes. [/quote]
From the game designer's point of view, that's exactly what the plot should be.  From the PC's point of view, though, exach episode will be of differing importance.  Some will matter.  Some won't.  Those that dont matter probably get skipped.
[quote]A commonly used way around this is that many games involve a very broad motivation. Baldur's Gate 2 assumes you want to go after Irenicus. KotOR assumes you are somewhat loyal to the republic and the Jedi. DAO assumes your warden doesn't run away from saving the world. DA2 assumes you care about your family and your home (and eventually, the people in it).
The key being that they're broad enough to allow a range of more specific motivations. [/quote]
KotOR, I would argue, makes no such assumption.  There are other reasons the PC might pursue KotOR's main quest.  Pure self-interest works perfectly well in KotOR.

NWN assumes an interest in curing the plague, but again self-interest works there.  Not so much after the plague is cured, however.

BG2 requirement that you care either about Irenicus or Imoen is, I think, a significant problem with BG2.  Note that BG does nothing of the sort.

I conceded in my opening that DAO assumes the Warden accepts being a Warden.

DA2, though, assumes a great many more things, some of which I listed.  Morever, we were explicitly told during DA2's development that Hawke would not be required to love his family.  And yet so much of the game assumed that he did.
[quote]Naturally, this procedure works relatively decent for the main plot (it can still evoke the feeling that the player character isn't really part of the plot if not done well, though) but less so for many side quests. Sure, there are easy motivations here as well. Such as Not Wanting to Die, Recovering one's Property, Assisting a Companion or Being Paid to Do It.
But in order to handle a quest that is more personal, you need to bring the PC into it emotionally. And that means that the story requires a motivation since you cannot manipulate an unknown. A story about loss require desire. A story about humility require pride. A story about compassion require a sacrefice. [/quote]
And that's the problem.  I don't mind a quest requiring some sort of personal connection for the PC, but then that quest needs to be optional, because that personal connection is by no means guaranteed.
[quote]And really, rpgs should aspire to tell these stories. Because they make up the very best ones in literature and television.[/quote]
The best stories in roleplaying games are the ones that emerge through gameplay, not those that are planned in advance.  Stories in roleplaying games are not told, but lived.
[quote]But since inetractivity is the hallmark of games (and rpgs in particular) they should aspire to involve the PC as the true protagonist. [/quote]
Every character is the protagonist of his own story.  This never changes.
[quote]I feel the key to making it work, however, is to provide you with everything you need in order to form your own opinion well in advance. I should already know if my character is motivated or not well in advance. The cast should be familiar, the background known. It shouldn't be presented after me accepting the quest but prior to it.
The quest should essentially broadcast what motivation it will assume I take if I accept. And the accepting or rejecting of the quest should be me confirming or denying that this is indeed the motivation my character have. [/quote]
I completely disagree.  The game should give me options as to what my character can do, and I should be able to choose to do them or not for any reason I can imagine.  And this should be true for both quests and dialogue events.  Dialogue options are nothing more than "things I can say".  Any meaning or intent beyond that should come exclusinvely from the player.
[quote]Naturally, the more leeway it allows the better. But in the cases it requires a narrow motivation, I should always have the option to refuse (and not be mechanically punished for it) and perhaps most importantly... have the storyline accept my refusal and conclude that storyline without me (ie. I'll hear about how it turned out afterwards). [/quote]
It should offer this anyway, even without an assumed motivation.  Because, again, the game can't know why I refused something.

This is part of what I'm complaining about with DA2.  DA2 assumes Hawke's position on a variety of seemingly unrelated issues based on his actions and relationships.  I think it's most obvious with Fenris, which is why I mentioned Fenris in the initial post.
[quote]An alternative is to provide me with an ability to tell my companions my reaction to something after it's conclusion. Allowing me to lament that things didn't go as planned, express frustration of how I couldn't avert disaster, rejoice over a unusually agreeable conclusion or a resigned acceptance that it probably couldn't have ended any better. [/quote]
That would never work, because the writers can't accommodate every possible motivation.

[Sylvius the Mad]

brushyourteeth wrote...

Incredibly great topic, OP. Seriously.

I think what was done in Origins was a perfect set up for what the Dragon Age series needs: a protagonist with an ulimate goal set early in the game, and that's it. The Warden needed to end the Blight, but he/she had many different avenues to choose from in order to do it. Your motivation for doing it was up to you, though the logic of not wanting the world to end is pretty universal.

This is clearly how BioWare games have traditionally been built.  I've argued that the clear goal isn't actually necessary from the start, but when BioWare finally listened to me and got rid of it they ruined everything else to make up for it.  It wasn't worth it.

BG still stands alone as the BioWare game that let the player determine his character's motives for doing things, but also didn't hand the player an obvious objective early in the game.  I'd like to see that again, but if I can only have one of those two things (and every subsequent BioWare game has given us only one of them) then the freedom to determine motives is much more important.

[Wozearly]

Sylvius the Mad wrote...

But were they personalities you designed, or personalities you discovered through gameplay?

The former is a wonderful thing.  The latter I don't think works in a roleplaying game at all.

I'd personally want to tweak that comment ever so slightly.

Designing a personality and being able to run with it is fantastic and, sadly, relatively rare as RPGs have become more cinematic (and therefore more linear).

Discovering a PC's personality and motivations through gameplay isn't automatically a problem in two instances (IMO). The first is if its clear from the outset its clear that your agency as a player is restricted to the non-story driving parts of your PC's journey. You decide whether he's a warrior, or a mage, or a sneaky ninja, but when you hit a major story moment you get shown/told how he feels and why he's doing things.

This is probably too great a deviance from the desired levels of character agency amongst existing RPG fans to bring the majority of them willingly along for the ride, but there's no reason that a well-constructed cinematic-style game couldn't pull this off in principle. In practice, its rather odd for the player to discover his/her character's "real" motivations as they go along and my expectation is that this would lead to a severing of the player's emotional attachment to the character, because they're just doing the combat for someone else's story. By the end of the game, they're unlikely to see the PC as "their" character.

I think you could successfully argue that DA2 suffered somewhat from the "too much deviance" and "not my character" syndrome.


The second is where you discover more about your character's personality and motivations as you play the game because the situations that you're presented challenge your character's worldview (or your view of your character's worldview), and present you with multiple options for resolution.

Arguably, this is actually an offshoot of the first point - that the character's personality, their reasons for acting in certain ways, are left to the player to define. The game doesn't make assumptions about why you chose options - it either has you clarify your rationale, or simply leaves the options sufficiently different enough for you to apply different justifications to the same outcome.

DA:O managed to do this surprisingly well. Not all of my Wardens ended the game with the same motivations and observable personality that they started it with - some of them evolved along the way, as the events they experienced challenged their views and made them reconsider what they were doing and why.

However, the game didn't force this - it was my choice as a player in finding that the experiences they had once they left their Origin story would have changed them, particularly with the Origins that forced them to confront their past again along the way (distinct tip of the hat to the Dwarven origin stories, which handled this marvellously).

[Sylvius the Mad]

Wozearly wrote...

I'd personally want to tweak that comment ever so slightly.

Designing a personality and being able to run with it is fantastic and, sadly, relatively rare as RPGs have become more cinematic (and therefore more linear).

Discovering a PC's personality and motivations through gameplay isn't automatically a problem in two instances (IMO). The first is if its clear from the outset its clear that your agency as a player is restricted to the non-story driving parts of your PC's journey. You decide whether he's a warrior, or a mage, or a sneaky ninja, but when you hit a major story moment you get shown/told how he feels and why he's doing things.

This is probably too great a deviance from the desired levels of character agency amongst existing RPG fans to bring the majority of them willingly along for the ride, but there's no reason that a well-constructed cinematic-style game couldn't pull this off in principle. In practice, its rather odd for the player to discover his/her character's "real" motivations as they go along and my expectation is that this would lead to a severing of the player's emotional attachment to the character, because they're just doing the combat for someone else's story. By the end of the game, they're unlikely to see the PC as "their" character.

I think you could successfully argue that DA2 suffered somewhat from the "too much deviance" and "not my character" syndrome.

I think this game design fails fundamentally, because combat is itself a roleplaying event.  Why does a character employ any given tactic?

Only if the player approaches combat as a tactical exercise for himself, and treats his character like a toy rather than like a person, would this work at all.

But if the only gameplay is the combat, there are other games that do this better.  I'd rather play a strategy game if all I get out of it is combat.  And even then I'd probably play it like a roleplaying game, making decisions because I think that makes the character more interesting regardless of combat effectiveness.  I would argue that the Total War games offer deeper roleplaying opportunities than DA2 does.

The second is where you discover more about your character's personality and motivations as you play the game because the situations that you're presented challenge your character's worldview (or your view of your character's worldview), and present you with multiple options for resolution.

Arguably, this is actually an offshoot of the first point - that the character's personality, their reasons for acting in certain ways, are left to the player to define. The game doesn't make assumptions about why you chose options - it either has you clarify your rationale, or simply leaves the options sufficiently different enough for you to apply different justifications to the same outcome.

DA:O managed to do this surprisingly well. Not all of my Wardens ended the game with the same motivations and observable personality that they started it with - some of them evolved along the way, as the events they experienced challenged their views and made them reconsider what they were doing and why.

However, the game didn't force this - it was my choice as a player in finding that the experiences they had once they left their Origin story would have changed them, particularly with the Origins that forced them to confront their past again along the way (distinct tip of the hat to the Dwarven origin stories, which handled this marvellously).

DAO did this about as well as I have come to expect from BioWare's games, which is brilliantly.

The ME games and DA2 have really let me down in this respect.

[AkiKishi]

Sylvius the Mad wrote...

DAO did this about as well as I have come to expect from BioWare's games, which is brilliantly.

The ME games and DA2 have really let me down in this respect.

Both of which are cinematic games. DA:O was a stepping stone towards cinematic presentation, not having a voice left the character as the odd one out. As the technology improves things like body language will become more important further distancing the player created and the actual character.

The only solution that works is the Witcher/Deus Ex method of having the character fully generated, but letting the player still alter the situation based on actions and choose the approach.Otherwise you are left with people on one side who are trying to reconcile their own vision of the character with the real one, and people on the other side who are seeing a character that is less complete than its companions.

[Wozearly]

There is a (heretical) third way, which involves not pursuing the cinematic model. There's a clear belief at Bioware that cinematic is the better / more unique approach which will play to their strengths, but when a game like Skyrim can hit and hold 2nd position in the sales charts, it suggests that the old ways are very far from dead.

I admit an element of bias. The more cinematic any game is, the less I enjoy it. I don't believe that the holy grail of gaming is to achieve "interactive movie" status. But I'm kinda old skool when it comes to RPGs.

[AkiKishi]

Wozearly wrote...

There is a (heretical) third way, which involves not pursuing the cinematic model. There's a clear belief at Bioware that cinematic is the better / more unique approach which will play to their strengths, but when a game like Skyrim can hit and hold 2nd position in the sales charts, it suggests that the old ways are very far from dead.

I admit an element of bias. The more cinematic any game is, the less I enjoy it. I don't believe that the holy grail of gaming is to achieve "interactive movie" status. But I'm kinda old skool when it comes to RPGs.

If they want to make something non cinematic, then sure. But their style is heavily character based unlike TES where it's about the world.

Extreme example from White Knight Chronicle  the dark haired girl in the blue armour is the player created character.

It's partly to do with the multiplayer aspect of the game.But she sticks out like a sore thumb and has no dialogue or banter while everyone else does. In fact the best way to play it is to just sideline the player created character once you get the third NPC and leave them to level up offscreen for the multiplayer game.

[robertthebard]

Fast Jimmy wrote...

In the same vein. the option to refuse a quest should also always be given. Granted, main quests can't be not done, but at least give us the opportunity to go into them kicking and screaming. And side quests shouldn't be just hanging out in the journal if I want to refuse them. There is no reason for my Hawke to want to help a former dwarven noble exile out of the goodness of their heart, for example.

I helped him because he was going to pay me.

I think the problem with much of the quests assumptions in DA2 (and other games, I don't want to necessarily call out DA2 alone) is a PURPOSE. Hawke had very little purpose. Starting out, it was gather money. Then, after that, it gets muddled. If Hawke is supposed to be talking to the Qunari and finding out why they are here, why would Hawke need motivation to do quests that have nothing to do with that task for money? On the assumption that we always need more money for better gear? That is a meta-gaming need, not a character one. Without a clear goal, Hawke falters with purpose.

It's not metagaming to be greedy, or to open a vendor's shop and see something you want/need, and can't afford.

In DAO, everything you did could be traced back to a purpose. This doesn't have to be a Big Bad... in fact, the first two Fallout games had a clear purpose starting out (saving your vault/village) but then they expanded out into a Big Bad as the story moved forward. Instead, Hawke muddles around until the "purpose" lands in lap, assigning meaning and function to actions without any sense or logic, other than we are told to do X to move on to Y.

No purpose?  So the cutscene dialogs provided didn't inform you why they needed to make money?  Needing "status or coin to hide behind" didn't provide a purpose?  Having to raise enough coin to be a partner in a business venture to provide that status or coin didn't provide a purpose?  Why would the Arishok listen to just another street thug/apostate mage?  Building up some kind of rep didn't provide a purpose for him to deign to speak to you?  I'm not having any problem finding a purpose behind the side quests.  After all, you are, in DA 2, a refugee.  Why should you be allowed to just automatically rub elbows with the elite citizens, if you haven't done anything to get their notice?  Why would the Viscount tell you "You are apparently meant to have influence above your station" if you didn't do anything to earn that influence?

[Fast Jimmy]

^

None of that gives me any motivation, no.

Why stay in a city where mages are hunted even more so than regularly? Why by leave and stay in a smaller city or town, with a less strict Templar guard?

Why care about getting money and better equipment... better yet, why quest at all after you get your 59 sovereigns in Act 1? You are super rich, able to afford a mansion and servants.

Who cares about impressing the Arishok? Why do I care? And why do I get involved in the Templar/Mage conflict? Why can't I not take a side, and instead elect to help Aveline and the City Guard preserve order amongst the commoners?

DA2 ASSIGNS me motivation to do all of these things. I want to stay in Kirkwall because so. I want to get rich because so. I want to protect my family (even though there is none left by the middle of Act2) because so. My character is pro-mage, but still takes quests from the Kinght Templar (or vice-versa) because so.

The game tells you why you must do these things in dialogue and cutscenes... because so. You have to get rich to protect Bethany... except that turns into an epic fail. You have to talk to the Arishok and prevent them from attacking the city.... except that turns into an epic fail. And you have to help one group versus another in the end, hoping to avoid more bloodshed on either side.... except that turns into an epic fail.

We're told we have to care, that we have to do X quest in Y fashion and then we aren't even given the satisfaction of succeeding in doing anything except kill or negotiate with the Arishok at the end of Act 2 (the high point of the game).

So how is that not spoon feeding motivation?

[Sylvius the Mad]

BobSmith101 wrote...

Sylvius the Mad wrote...

DAO did this about as well as I have come to expect from BioWare's games, which is brilliantly.

The ME games and DA2 have really let me down in this respect.

Both of which are cinematic games. DA:O was a stepping stone towards cinematic presentation, not having a voice left the character as the odd one out.

I disagree, but that's neither here nor there.

As the technology improves things like body language will become more important further distancing the player created and the actual character.

Improving technology should give us more control, not less.

Otherwise it's not an improvement.

The only solution that works is the Witcher/Deus Ex method of having the character fully generated, but letting the player still alter the situation based on actions and choose the approach.Otherwise you are left with people on one side who are trying to reconcile their own vision of the character with the real one, and people on the other side who are seeing a character that is less complete than its companions.

I have zero interest in playing a pre-generated character.  The PC's personality needs to be my construction alone.

[robertthebard]

Fast Jimmy wrote...

^

None of that gives me any motivation, no.

Why stay in a city where mages are hunted even more so than regularly? Why by leave and stay in a smaller city or town, with a less strict Templar guard?

Why care about getting money and better equipment... better yet, why quest at all after you get your 59 sovereigns in Act 1? You are super rich, able to afford a mansion and servants.

Who cares about impressing the Arishok? Why do I care? And why do I get involved in the Templar/Mage conflict? Why can't I not take a side, and instead elect to help Aveline and the City Guard preserve order amongst the commoners?

DA2 ASSIGNS me motivation to do all of these things. I want to stay in Kirkwall because so. I want to get rich because so. I want to protect my family (even though there is none left by the middle of Act2) because so. My character is pro-mage, but still takes quests from the Kinght Templar (or vice-versa) because so.

The game tells you why you must do these things in dialogue and cutscenes... because so. You have to get rich to protect Bethany... except that turns into an epic fail. You have to talk to the Arishok and prevent them from attacking the city.... except that turns into an epic fail. And you have to help one group versus another in the end, hoping to avoid more bloodshed on either side.... except that turns into an epic fail.

We're told we have to care, that we have to do X quest in Y fashion and then we aren't even given the satisfaction of succeeding in doing anything except kill or negotiate with the Arishok at the end of Act 2 (the high point of the game).

So how is that not spoon feeding motivation?

None of it gives you any motivation, and yet you are spoon fed motivation?  This is not the first game that locks you into it's story, not by a long shot.  What options did you have in Diablo, Baldur's Gate, Ice Wind Dale, NWN's, Origins?  Could you walk away and let the blight go unchecked?  Why would a City Elf pit themselves against the Archedemon to save a city that does nothing but spit on it's people?  Why would a Dwarf care one way or the other, after all, darkspawn are nothing new to them.  I don't see what would motivate a Dalish to want to save humanity either.  "Pack up the clan, Keeper, we're moving on".  Yet being forced into that role was acceptable.  In fact, it's so acceptable to some that they want to play their warden in Kirkwall while their warden is supposed to be ending the blight in Ferelden.

[Sir JK]

Sylvius the Mad wrote...

That's a small prive to pay for greater player control.

…
*cut out for brevity*
…


That would never work, because the writers can't accommodate every possible
motivation.

 

A request

Please do not split up my posts like that.It serves no real purpose and you don’t need to explain how you disagree with every paragraph. If you feel something in particular needs to be addressed, then by all means. But otherwise, please take it all in its context and respond to my entire post and my point rather than individual parts of it. 

 

For clarification

In this post I’ll use a few phrases repeatedly to explain my point. To ensure clarity of what I really mean I’ll define them here.

With Integral I mean built in, what the game acknowledges and allows. This stands in opposition to Inferred
which is what the player projects onto the game.
With Story I mean either the entire experience, the game itself, a individual quest or even a single conversation.
With Player Character (or PC) I mean the character which we have created whereas Protagonist is the leading
participant of a Story.


My Response Proper

As you say the PC is the Protagonist of their own Story. But this Story is the Inferred one, the entire experience.
This story is a result of the Inferred and the Integral in combination. And it is herein that the heart of roleplaying lie and ultimately this Story is our goal.

But each quest can be seen as a Story of their own; there’s a background, a conflict and a resolution. Just like with the entire experience itself, once our PCs encounter it we project their personality and let them choose (or not choose) according to their motive and quirks and we have the Inferred Story as a result. But there is also the
Integral Story, which is how it is designed “prior” to the addition of your character.

In a Motive-Neutral quest, in the Integral Story the PC is a blank. It does not matter, who the PC is, what background or personality the PC has or why the PC does what the PC does. All this is added in projecting and creating the Inferred Story from the Integral Story. But this also means that the Integral Story will never truly acknowledge the PC. The PC is an agent of achieving the resolution but not an Integral Protagonist.

The most extreme examples are the typical bounties most rpgs provide (for example the Chanter’s Board in DAO or the Item deliveries in DA2). There’s a background, a conflict and a resolution. But the core sum of the PC’s Integral participation is acquisition, completing the objective and then turning it in. Why, how and why doesn’t matter in the design. The PC has no true involvement in the Integral Story.

Of course, Motive-Neutral is more of a sliding scale than a binary value. The quest you gave as an example, the
merchant in Lothering, is good. Unlike the bounties it allows you to actually express your PC beyond choosing not to complete the quest. But again, the Integral Story does not involve the PC in any way other than as an agent of
achieving a resolution. Again the PC is not an Integral Protagonist. The PC is merely an external arbiter, solving an impersonal moral conflict. Of course, to the Inferred Story this does not matter as you pointed out.

A Personal quest on the other hand, is a quest in which the PC is an Integral part of the Story. Here, the Integral
Story relies on that the PC is a part of the story itself and thus a Protagonist. The PC does not come in as an external agent but rather is what the entire quest revolves around.

The Dark Ritual was mentioned before and I think it is an excellent example of this. First of all the quest acknowledges background, in that it acknowledges your PC’s gender, the PC’s relation with Morrigan and, to an extent, whether or not you did her companion quest. Thus the Integral Story acknowledges what your PC is. The conflict is moral but upon expressing your initial stance your character may find their stance challenged,
thus the Integral Story acknowledges your character’s motive. And finally it gives you a consequence for the PC depending on the chosen resolution, thus once more acknowledging the character.

In short, a Personal quest is one where who your character is matters on an Integral level in addition to the Inferred. Whereas in a Motive-Neutral quest, while your PC’s personality is of great importance to which resolution that is picked, it is in no way actually involved in the quest itself.

As I mentioned in my first post, an assumed motive is essential to make a Personal Story. This tie in with the blank PC part of the Motive-Neutral quests, because personal stories are ultimately about emotion and a blank lacks emotion. Hence why I put them in opposition to one another. In order to be a Story about a facet of a person, the Protagonist need to be a person. Motive-Neutral quests assume and care nothing for the PC.

There is value in that and it should by no means be discarded. But it also means that if all quests are designed that way then the game will miss out on many gems of storytelling and at best the Integral Story of the game will be that the PC went from one thing to the other and never really grew, lost, felt or was in any way connected to the world around him/her. The Inferred Story need not be like that, but any personal growth will have to be completely and utterly Inferred and the game will not provide any tools to express that in the Integral Story.

The trick, as you correctly point out, is that a designer can in no way predict any and all possible motivations a PC can have. Nor can a DM in a regular tabletop rpg, but they have the advantage of being able to adapt the plot. And when what the Integral Story allows clashes with what the Inferred story needs there is a very unsatisfying  disconnect.

However, if they work with ambiguous motives, they can generally cover most motivations. It’s easy to imagine characters who wishes to live or who doesn’t want the world to burn (by someone else’s hand
anyways) for example. Within these broad motivations you can fit almost any possible PC. Similarily, a story that is about a choice between Revenge and/or the Recovery of something stolen (not necessarily an item, the Cousland-Howe plot is one of these) can also fit a broad range of PCs.

Through working with very basal and loose concepts and fundamental emotions they can provide Personal Stories without imposing much on the player’s freedom in creation of a character. Some Stories might
require a more narrow range of motivations, but this should then be broadcasted so that the player knows what motives this Story will expect from the player.
And indeed, the motives can be (and should be) plural.

The Integral Story (of Personal quests) should thus rather than work with a blank PC, work with a fundamental PC. Not a full character, but a core concept the player is free to fill out as they please or choose to avoid if that fits better. Sometimes, great things are created by their limits and not their possibilities.

However, I am not arguing for solely Personal quests. I am arguing for a mix between Motive-Neutral and Personal quests. A majority where you can act out your character with as little limitation as possible,
and a plurality of quests requiring a more involved role but that cover as many motives as is possible (collectively).

As a point of clarification, whether a quest is Personal or Motive-Neutral has no bearing on if there are one, two or
several resolutions.

And yes, I agree. DA2 did handle this a bit haphazard. Sometimes it worked and sometimes it most definantely did not work. When it did not work it assumed way too much and revealed way too little in advance.

Modifié par Sir JK, 23 mai 2012 - 07:06 .

[Fast Jimmy]

Thebard...

We are spoon fed the 'because so' motivation. Which is no motivation at all.

And yes, DA:O forced you to fight the Blight by destroying the Archdemon. It was neccessary, while unfortunate, to have this one thing firmly set, no other option.

However, THAT WAS IT. At every turn, Dragon Age 2 forces the player down a certain path. We have no idea where we are going or why we are even playing the game most of the time. My desire to complete my first playthrough of DA2 was simply to answer the question of what is the point of the game. There is lampshade after lampshade about why I would doing much of anything in the game, other than as an excuse to kill and loot.

Lots of other games do this, such as Diablo, as you said... and those are hack and slash or action games. A story-based RPG shouldn't put us on the rails of what we have to do so rigidly that the illusion of having our own character is completely thrown out the window.

Modifié par Fast Jimmy, 23 mai 2012 - 10:29 .

[AkiKishi]

Fast Jimmy wrote...

Thebard...

We are spoon fed the 'because so' motivation. Which is no motivation at all.

And yes, DA:O forced you to fight the Blight by destroying the Archdemon. It was neccessary, while unfortunate, to have this one thing firmly set, no other option.

However, THAT WAS IT. At every turn, Dragon Age 2 forces the player down a certain path. We have no idea where we are going or why we are even playing the game most of the time. My desire to complete my first playthrough of DA2 was simply to answer the question of what is the point of the game. There is lampshade after lampshade about why I would doing much of anything in the game, other than as an excuse to kill and loot.

Lots of other games do this, such as Diablo, as you said... and those are hack and slash or action games. A story-based RPG shouldn't put us on the rails of what we have to do sonrigidly that the illusion of having our own character is completely thrown out the window.

Don't mind that it's what I signed up for. It's either be a Warden or be dead after all so you owe them. Being a Warden is was also something of an honour in the game world. It was a part of you whether you liked it or not.
Duncan would have probably killed you if you tried to run off before Ostigar... 

That's pretty much it. Do this because we gave you no other options. Even though you have nothing linking you to the plot like in DA. After seeing the Mages and Templars in action I just wanted to walk out of the gate and say "screw you all, not worth the effort".

[Wozearly]

BobSmith101 wrote...

If they want to make something non cinematic, then sure. But their style is heavily character based unlike TES where it's about the world.

I picked Skyrim (5.91m sales) as an unusually strong-selling RPG to indicate that strong selling RPGs that aren't cinematic exist. Bethesda as a whole have performed consistently strongly in their franchises; Oblivion at 3.75m, Fallout 3 at 3.67 and Fallout:NV at 3.01m.

If you're looking for a more direct comparison, then in terms of Bioware's own franchises, Mass Effect came in at 2.58m, ME2 at 2.82m and ME3 at 2.22m (but its significantly newer, and so this figure is likely to continue rising).

DA:O came in at 2.29m sales. DA2 stands at 0.91m.

All figures courtesy of VGChartz.com. They may not be accurate, but they should be indicative of comparative sales rates between games as the methodology is consistent.

I hadn't gathered these figures beforehand, and I'm not sure anything conclusive can be drawn about cinematic elements. The ME series may be a strong seller because its a franchise with a greater appeal, and its cinematic nature may be relatively irrelevant. Or it could be a crucial factor.

What is clear is that DA:O wildly outperformed DA2. In other breaking news, the Vatican has confirmed that Pope is indeed a Catholic.