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[ajbry]

Despite being hopeful for (any) news at E3, it appears that there's still some room for brainstorming. Given that DA3 is likely to span across many territories in Thedas, some lengthy outdoor exploration would be appropriate and fun. Picture this: you need to traverse a mass expanse of land and there's no cutscene or implied loading screen that accomplishes it. I would love for it to resemble the role of the Deep Roads in Origins -- a long, arduous journey that forces you to stockpile supplies beforehand and bring along your strongest party.

You could pass through a forest (doesn't have to be exceptionally large, like Brecilian Forest) and end up in a more open area (such as the desert in Legacy). You may find a highway of sorts, navigate through some hills, walk along the shores of a sea, stumble through a treacherous marsh, and so forth. Basically, the terrain can be constituted in any number of ways.

Some of my favorite moments in games have been the result of feeling stranded, or knowing that you've got to trudge along and reach civilization for your mission to continue. There are plenty of interesting outdoor environments in the DA universe, and the dearth of these trips in DA2 was disappointing.

[Allan Schumacher]

@sjpelkessjpeler

So the idea of "magically appearing" at the Brecillian Forest is okay with you, with the Brecillian Forest having a bunch of smaller areas (like the Dalish Elf camp, etc) that are explorable once you arrive at the Forest is what you're looking for?

[Allan Schumacher]

sjpelkessjpeler wrote...

This is what I am trying to express. Thedas is a really big world wich would take an enormous time to cover on foot. You should have been there before if you want to explore the area more. But as I said in my previous post it would be great to know about places even if you are not strong enough to venture there yet at a certain point of the game. Thedas is overall covered walking. The areas that you visit should really make the effort consequential as you say @ajbry and make Thedas a complete world. Exploring and understanding a world is something that can be combined perfectly in a game if the player is taken to environments that make sense at that point or are being  interesting areas at a given point when the game requires it.

Heh, I for one really like different environments. Just take a look at the 'environment'  thread many others and I have posted on on BSN. Change in an environment is great in a game I think.

So, say a plot involves traveling to Val Royeaux from Kirkwall.  I'm definitely getting the impression that just "warping" from Kirkwall to Val Royeaux kind of makes some people go <_<.

So if you wanted exploration, here's a couple of thoughts and I'm curious which one is preferrable.  Assume that every exploration area could have gating encounters that require you to be of a certain power level to achieve.

• Allow the player to explore around Kirkwall and Val Royeaux (assuming the plot were to spend enough time around there).  That is, create exploration content around the main plot points.  This will result in the areas around those plot points being more fleshed out, but you may lose the sense of scale about the travel.
• The route from Kirkwall to Val Royeaux consists one large map that goes along the Imperial Highway.  Exploration off this highway exists (either the map is very large, and/or there are smaller maps for caves, or maybe smaller settlements to enter).  Basically this is a big "playground" and if you stick to the road, you'll get to Val Royeaux fairly quickly.  This would provide improved sense of scale for the distance traveled, but would result in the areas around the two cities to be minimal.  It does overlook some aspects of the region between Kirkwall and Val Royeaux.
• The route consists of two decently sized maps, one containing the Imperial Highway, one about traveling through the Planasene Forest.  The map isn't quite as grandiose, but you will get some variation on what you're exploring. Sense of scale of travel is maximal, as we travel through different types of areas to accent this, but ultimately it'd take longer to travel from Kirkwall to Val Royeaux and the areas around the two cities continues to be minimal.

[Allan Schumacher]

The lack of surrounding areas around the cities doesn't strike me as a big deal -- after all, the cities themselves should contain plenty of important things to do, and significant monuments. Furthermore, the surrounding areas are often just "enhancements" of the city and don't present any new landscapes; they're basically receptacles to complete side quests in.

That might be a bit too generous of an interpretation haha.  Exploring the city itself is still something of exploring.  With my example I was more trying to illustrate that there'd be less "exploration content" at the cities themselves (that doesn't mean NO exploration content), whether that necessarily mean specifically within the city or including the surrounding areas around it.

I was just trying to be as fair as possible with the costs.  I mean, if something has 400 hours of exploration around it, I think there's diminishing returns so taking 100 hours away from there and adding 100 hours of content in a new area probably results in more value added.

I also just thought it up on the spot so be gentle! :innocent:

[Allan Schumacher]

wsandista wrote...

If I am interpreting this properly, it is like NWN where there is a set area the PC may explore around a city or town. I personally would LOVE this idea. It avoids looking like a TES game and removes travel-by-map, which are two things I do not want to see in the next DA.

It is the most similar to NWN, but it'd probably still be "travel by map" unless the story were to prevent the player from returning to Kirkwall.


Though this does kind of surprise me though.  Why is it okay to do something like NWN, which effectively warped the player to another point just without needing the player to go to a world map?

[Allan Schumacher]

I figured the example used would have been BG1 haha. You have to explore along the way to get there, and there are free to zip over it if you want after.

[Allan Schumacher]

Haha. It's been so long since I played either of the games that it's hard for me to recall specifically.

[Allan Schumacher]

Sylvius the Mad wrote...

The story is always about what your character does.  That can happen anywhere.

I think it's fair that many people love a BioWare game due to the plot and how it progresses.  Baldur's Gate 2 is much more structured in its plot and you can make a reasonable argument that it's more Irenicus' story than the player's.  And this is the game that many consider the pinnacle of BioWare.

[Allan Schumacher]

Sylvius the Mad wrote...
The plot is a very important part of the game's setting, and BioWare's games are rightly heralded for having very good ones.

But in any roleplaying game, the point of the game is roleplaying.  Following along a pre-written story can be a part of that, but does not constitute that.

And I continue to maintain that BG2 is but a pale imitation of the original BG.

This just turns into a semantic argument about what the precise definition of an RPG is (to which I'll contend that there isn't a precise definition).

Sometimes I find games with similar premise (Fallout 3 vs. Oblivion) come across completely differently, and I infinitely prefer FO3 to Oblivion (which was a game that unfortunately took 40 hours for me to realize I wasn't really having any fun).  Essentially, I feel that a good RPG is a well done synergy of common themes that don't all necessarily need to be present to be an RPG, but typically have elements in common.

Though I'm sure we'll both have fun with Wasteland 2

[Allan Schumacher]

Or when the Super Friends are tromping along the road and encounter a story point.

If I'm reading this correctly, you're open to the "bridging zones" as long as there's a story (main plot) reason for being there, right?

[Allan Schumacher]

RinpocheSchnozberry wrote...

Allan Schumacher wrote...

Or when the Super Friends are tromping along the road and encounter a story point.

If I'm reading this correctly, you're open to the "bridging zones" as long as there's a story (main plot) reason for being there, right?

If by bridging zones you mean something like the road from Ostergar to Lothering where we meet The Bodster and Enchant-man, then yes, I'm ok with that kind of bridge zone.  An encounter like meeting new NPCs means something and is totally worth playing through.  A zone that offers me nothing but a delay between story points in exchange for an opportunity to kill some Bandits or spiders or bears for Old Man Crinkles, the random farmer...  That kind of bridge zone is not worth it to me.

Now, you turn those bandits into a trio of chevaliers flirting with a farm girl who is trying to herd her sheep across the road, and the knight's flirting is maybe edging up to or even going over the line...  Now I'm ok with that bridge zone.  Because that encounter tells me something about the city I'm travelling too.  It's not just random XP.

Okay I get what you're saying.  It doesn't need to be essential to the main plot, but at least provide some interesting context rather than just random.

[Allan Schumacher]

ajbry wrote...

Would team-building -- learning more about your party members and witnessing some humorous and/or interesting interactions -- fall under that label? Not that it'd be mundane battles and random banter, but the purposeful voyage to the next city as we've alluded to, and the potential challenges that accompany it.

It could.  Although arguably that could be done just as well (and maybe better?) with an interactive cutscene instead of a full level.  This is assuming the goal of said level was to perform team building stuff.

If you're going to create bridging levels for something like this, it'd have to serve into the level/exploration itself in order to work better.  This would include ambient talks about the journey, specifically about the area that you're in, leading up to probably something more specific and full fledged conversation.


If a level were to be created that wasn't random exploration, but was designed to learn about the party members, it'd probably be smaller.

Though ideally there's nothing stopping team building from being included in an area where some more specific plot (mainline or not) exists.  That'd probably work best and I find a part of team building exists with how they interact in other plots.

If not for meeting Morrigan, we'd never have gotten a "swooping is bad!"

[Allan Schumacher]

Bioware used to make the best story driven games on the market until they started hating their customers

???

[Allan Schumacher]

@Rahelron

The idea that BG2 is Irenicus' story is not mine (nor is it even one I agree with). It's just one that has been around as long as the game has.

Question for you then Allan.

If you make the game more open and longer. Does that mean you need more interaction to stop it feeling watered down ? Same principle as juice, you can have the same ammount of juice, but depending on how much water you add, the taste is very different.

Will the banter lines repeat ? Or will they just stop,once they are used up ?

I think that a game with more "level content" will need to be supplemented elsewhere to pad everything. Large, relatively empty levels can certainly convey a sense of exploration and vastness, but if it's not filled with additional interesting content, the game will begin to drag on IMO. If you're done all the party banters in the first 1/3 of the game, there's a good chance you'll notice that they aren't speaking up anymore and the game won't finish as strongly as it started.

I'd rather a 30 hour game with 30 hours of interesting content than a 60 hour game with 30 hours of interesting content.

To take an example of my favourite game, Planescape Torment had very mediocre combat elements which in many cases just prevented me from experiencing what it was I wanted to experience (the kickass writing). I remember using Annah to literally sneak through entire levels (especially places like Baator) because I just founds those elements less interesting.

[Allan Schumacher]

For an employee of Bioware, I would think this would have to be a pre-requisite.

If people are going to be pedantic about definitions, coupled with other people already scrutinizing other things that I say and what video games I'm supposed to like, then I'm already starting to feel more adversarial on these boards.

My point was that I don't think people need to even KNOW what "roleplaying" is in order to enjoy Baldur's Gate. Or KOTOR. Or Dragon Age. Heck, I'd even be willing to bet money that a significant majority of those that like those games have limited to no interest in even attempting to play a PnP game experience.

When I played my first CRPG, I had no idea what PnP was. I just know that I liked it. What I also know is that that one time I tried playing a PnP game, it was awfully run and soured me on the experience. It was something I only considered doing because I enjoyed CRPGs based on D&D so much (the Gold Box games in particular).


What I find most interesting is that, when comparing good PnP sessions (I sit in on the retellings with my team because they're damned entertaining), is that the "old school" RPG delivers very little of the experience provided in those retellings. Neither do the modern ones.


When I first played Ultima 6, it was a cool adventure with swords and sorcery. When I first played Eye of the Beholder (just the demo at the time!) it was cool playing around with the different characters running around the first two levels killing monsters and casting spells. I was hella confused why lower AC was somehow better, or even how the combat rules worked. But I didn't care, it was fun.

I dabbled a bit with FF6 and FF7, because they had fun stories and awesome characters. Ultima VII was effectively a "living world" with people running around on their own schedules. I was brutal at the game (needed a hint book to do anything productive), but it was fun. I loved it enough to ask for a gaming computer.

When I played Fallout, I basically created myself. "Roleplayers" have often told me that "I'm doing it wrong" by playing it this way. But it was fun. I loved how reactive the game was and it was the first game I'd played that seemed to properly account for such little nuances. This game (and Half-Life) turned me into a PC Gamer for life.

In Baldur's Gate I picked the Paladin because the idea of a magic casting warrior (I'm partial to warriors) was awesome. I rerolled until I was able to min/max my character, which was 18 in all stats except for intellect (which was 3). Because intellect was irrelevant for my character's power. I played it, and loved it (especially the MP). Unfortunately I never finished it because I had just borrowed a friend's DVD, but I did import that character into BG2 which was a fantastic game. I made my Paladin a Cavalier (since I hated switching to bows anyways). But all of my decisions revolved around "How can I make my character more powerful." I had no concept of what "roleplaying" was, and for me a roleplaying game was a game that had character progression (even mediocre character progression like martial classes had in AD&D). It didn't hurt that I was somewhat familiar with the AD&D ruleset.

When I first loaded up PST, it was a wall of text and too intimidating. I actually put it off and replayed BG2. It wasn't until I sat down and went "lets give this another try." It was the first game that really made me go "I like the characters in this game more than anything else about the game." It was the first game where I started to see appropriate reactivity to my alignment based upon my choices, which made me go "Hey, this is really cool" (I still save scummed because I saw myself as Lawful Good).

It wasn't until KOTOR (by this time I'm 22 years old and have been apparently playing RPGs wrong for the last 13 or so years) that I actually decided to go into the game with a player archetype that wasn't just myself, and (most importantly) decided that I was going to fully accept the consequences for all of my actions, [i]regardless of what they were.[/] I did go into the game with an idea of being a "good guy soldier" that rationalizes the dark side use "for the greater good." Ultimately I ended with a fully evil character as the dark side consumed me, and I was like "You know, I found this even more fun. I'll continue to play games this way."


But given that I actually thought that "Dungeons and Dragons" was a computer game franchise growing up, it's a bit of a sore point when someone implies that I'm not qualified for my job because I evidently don't understand roleplaying and the fact that I even need to ask is now cause for concern.

If knowing how to roleplay is so vital to enjoying RPGs, how come I was able to do it for so long without even having an inkling of a clue what a PnP roleplaying session was? My first experience with PnP roleplaying came in late 1997. This was after I had played more than a handful of CRPGs. Since the session was unfun (I died 10 minutes in) I went home and played this new game, Fallout. It was significantly more enjoyable for me. I hated PnP gaming but loved CRPGs. If understanding "roleplaying" and knowing that PnP is where it's all that is a prerequisite for liking RPG video games, then I guess I really slipped through the cracks.

Modifié par Allan Schumacher, 06 juin 2012 - 07:04 .

[Allan Schumacher]

And to BobSmith101, while I agree some might see an inconsistency in it or even laziness, I doubt it will be the main body of gamers, the, as you put it, average joe gamer. Some will rave and rant as some always do but I'm confident most of us do what we did with DA2, wonder why it's not like DAO, try it out and simply decide it's just different from the predecesser.

I haven't played Skyrim but IIRC Morrowind and Oblivion both have pretty open backgrounds. Skyrim in particular is quite popular. At the same time though a Bethesda game does differ from a BioWare game.

I actually haven't played Skyrim because after I felt I wasted about 40 hours of my life on Oblivion I was super hesitant to try it out.

[Allan Schumacher]

I grew up with PnP games... but it was never the dice and character sheets that mattered.

At the same time I know some PnP roleplayers that are just enamoured with the tactical combat elements and even use a projector to put a hex map onto a table so they can manipulate around. Different strokes for different folks and all.

[Allan Schumacher]

But PnP games let you craft your own character. You could control what he said or did.

These cinematic games do the opposite.

It's more to do with "Computer games" as opposed to "cinematics games." In any CRPG you're only allowed to do precisely what the program lets you do. You can only say what the writers have allowed you to say. You can only perform the actions that the designers have allowed you to perform. And so forth.

Unless some really good emergent gameplay devices start coming out, I don't expect this to change at all any time soon.

[Allan Schumacher]

Random generation isn't out of the question. Though IMO it works better for dungeon crawler type games.

I think 3D can pose some restrictions on random level creation. Or really, the engine itself. But I'm no engine guru so I'm mostly just speculating based on what I've seen about random level generation from the old 2D tile generation going forward. I think that randomizing the content within the level is a bit easier, in my experience, however.

For example, Diablo 3 still have random dungeon generation, but it's largely composed of a modular design so you get similar set pieces that are kind of connected together. Diablo 1 and 2's level creation seemed more random. You still had the odd specific set piece, but usually it was for specific encounters and whatnot.

[Allan Schumacher]

I know you think that choosing A, B, or C constitutes a meaningful level of control, but I don't agree. You are correct that autodialogue and paraphrasing have made the lack of control more obvious in recent games.

I'm pretty ambivalent towards the dialogue wheel itself, because I typically found myself picking the option that most aligned with the general intent/emotion that I wanted to convey because the specific words were rarely precisely what I wanted to say.

I do agree that when the character suddenly makes an action that is not anticipated though, it's an issue with how the wheel is done (this applies to full text too, if the text doesn't say [Bash head] or whatever, for that matter).

[Allan Schumacher]

The words determine what my intent is.

Words are only a fraction of determining intent. I can say "I like your hair" and have it convey very, very different messages based upon the inflection in my voice and my body language.

I found the words used in older games useful in determining what I felt the intent of the line was. I did not have any trouble converting this over to the dialogue wheel, and I think it shines quite brilliantly with Alpha Protocol to which it was impossible to mistake my intent because the paraphrase from Mass Effect had been outright replaced with the emotion by which I wanted to respond.

I can (and have) picked full written dialogue options because I assumed the line was sarcastic, and the game responded as though I was being genuine.

That's rather why I think the dialogue wheel in DA2 (not the paragon/renegade one in ME) is a significant improvement. I rarely find the full text to answer how I want to anyway, so I think that the different seven or eight "intent" icons to be more useful than the words. Especially with cinematic conversations and voice acting, where even if I picked the words, the presentation might or might not be what I expected in the absence of those icons.

I felt the icons were a significant improvement in helping the player make sure the intent of the statement was what I was looking for. I specifically avoided the ones with hearts for characters I didn't care to romance because the game was explicitly alerting me that this was a response which will be conveyed as a flirt. I know some felt it was too hand holdy, but I think that's more a reflection of "choose heart to do romance" maybe being too rigid. Maybe we shouldn't require the player to pick all the heart options all the time to do the romance, and maybe (like we did in DA2) have the heart option not actually lead to an actual romance sometimes.

Modifié par Allan Schumacher, 08 juin 2012 - 01:51 .

[Allan Schumacher]

Btw, the heart option doesn't always lead to an actual romance. I threw a lot of hearts at Avelline that went right over the girl's head...

Yes I know. I did say "and maybe (like we did in DA2) have the heart option not actually lead to an actual romance sometimes." I liked the fact that Aveline says no too!

[Allan Schumacher]

brushyourteeth wrote...

You do the same thing you would if you'd "created" the character. You decide.

This is much more easily done in situations where the game doesn't railroad you into conflict without any choice, or with choices that have no meaningful consequence.

I found the original Deus Ex did probably the most fantastic job of illusion of choice where I remember thinking that the game would have legitimately let me side with UNATCO and get a different game experience.

Though Deus Ex is a different type of choice.  The narrative only has a few places of actual choice (especially with consequence), but the gameplay choice is probably still unparalleled.  So well done!

[Allan Schumacher]

I found the emotion keyword response of Alpha Protocol also worked quite well too.

[Allan Schumacher]

I think it worked well given you were playing more of a fixed protagonist with an established personality in Mike Thorton and all the dialogues were timed, so the responses needed to be short by necessity.

I'm not someone that really plays someone like Mike Thorton any different than I would play the Warden.

Mike is effectively a blank slate of a character, with minimal history, and you're allowed to direct him much the way you can direct other created characters in CRPGs.

I disagree that Mike has an established personality. The player defines the personality that Mike has based on how he proceeds through conversations.