764 réponses à ce sujet

[Allan Schumacher]

I think it's mostly an empathy issue for me.

When I'm feeling an emotion, it's often me empathizing with the character. My reactions are often that which I am feeling as though I were the character. My character can't get angry if I can't understand the circumstances of what is happening in the game to know if being angry is an acceptable response.

Any emotions I can feel are still isolated to within the game. I turn the game off and my life is pretty unaffected emotionally. So when a game makes me feel an emotional response, I feel it has done a great job of creating a setting and story where the circumstances that are occurring allow me to empathize with the characters in the game (whether my own or even NPCs). I love those emotional responses and I consider it a high mark for a game if it can do that to me.

If a game doesn't illicit any emotional response from me, it likely means I just didn't care.

[AkiKishi]

Similiar. The character is the like an interface through which you experience the world. Different characters different mind sets and different emotions. Playing an evil character is quite different from playing a good character in that respect.
Once you shut down the game it breaks the link and that's that.

[Fallstar]

Personally I try to make my canon character's decisions as if it were me making them. I think to myself what would I do if I were in that situation. If I can successfully do this playthrough on a game, then that's great and any other characters are a bonus. E.g. I only have one skyrim character, (with lots of hours clocked ) but I still think the game was absolutely fantastic. 

After that, I then create characters with specific personalities and motivations, and play those characters. When I'm playing these characters, the game is less personal, and I normally know exactly what choices I'll make before I even enter CC. Whereas on my 'me' character, I still deliberate over the choice of whether or not to execute Loghain, and would probably go back and play through the game from a Landsmeet save just to alter that one choice if I felt I needed to. One of the reasons I love FO3 so much is because there are so many decisions in that game that aren't just black and white, and sometimes it felt I spent longer just staring at the screen thinking than actually playing 

So when it comes to roleplaying, anything that prevents me from doing that first 'me' playthrough is a bit of a pain. For example, the paraphrase system and to a lesser extent having a VP. (I can live with a VP). Those issues also affect other characters I make, but since I'm less invested in those playthroughs anyway, that doesn't come into it that much for me. I do invest a lot of time (and emotion) into that first character, so I love having the epilogue slides at the end to give me some idea of the impact my choices had. Slideshow epilogue screens with text are great, I'd far rather have a detailed one of those than a minute or two of video.

Modifié par DuskWarden, 02 juillet 2012 - 09:37 .

[Jormundgander]

Allan Schumacher wrote...

I think it's mostly an empathy issue for me.

When I'm feeling an emotion, it's often me empathizing with the character. My reactions are often that which I am feeling as though I were the character. My character can't get angry if I can't understand the circumstances of what is happening in the game to know if being angry is an acceptable response.

Any emotions I can feel are still isolated to within the game. I turn the game off and my life is pretty unaffected emotionally. So when a game makes me feel an emotional response, I feel it has done a great job of creating a setting and story where the circumstances that are occurring allow me to empathize with the characters in the game (whether my own or even NPCs). I love those emotional responses and I consider it a high mark for a game if it can do that to me.

If a game doesn't illicit any emotional response from me, it likely means I just didn't care.

That's just the same I think. On the one hand, I can remember all the companions from Dragon Age Origins (they were almost human beings). A great job from Bioware! In fact, this is why DA: O is my favorite game so far. I consider it a masterpiece, specially when talking about charismatic and memorable characters.

On the other hand, I can barely remember the names of the companions from Dragon Age 2. That's why I consider DA 2 a bad game, an fail because I didn't get any emotional response from any character. Even Anders had a better settup in Dragon Age Awakening. The fact of being Anders Justice (Vengeance)... doesn't appeal to me. Wynne should be the reference (a great character, also with a spirit from the Veil within her), so I cannot understand why Bioware ruined the essence from Origins this way... disappointing.

I hope DA 3 will recover that kind of feelings. Even if the OST made by Inon Zur and Aubrey Ashburn's voice are excellent, that's not enough if the characters don't have a setting and story where the circumstances allow me to empathize with them (as happened in DA 2). I would like to see Morrigan... I still have lots of things to talk with her. And also Flemeth is crucial for the story to redeem the saga.

For me, DA 2 didn't happen. Only Dragon Age Origins and Awakening belong to this saga, my favorite saga until DA 2 was released. After playing and finishing the game, I sold it to my worst enemy. I feel sorry for him...

DA 3 could redeem the saga if includes:

- Dragon Age Origins' dialogue system (the same that worked perfectly in Baldur's Gate and KOTOR).
- Silent main character.

Give DA 3 the same wheel as you did in DA 2, and a voiced main character, and you will go on your road to perdition. 

Modifié par Jormundgander, 02 juillet 2012 - 11:31 .

[Cimeas]

 Look at The Secret World.    Every main game site, and countless people on dozens of forums (and ingame) are complaining that the main character isn't voiced.   Voice acting means the character isn't just an NPC with a computer screen instead of a head but a real breathing part of the world.

The main character can take part in ambient conversations, can react and voice opinions.   And, in my opinion, to RP you do *not* need to choose EVERY SINGLE line of dialogue.  Good RP'ers build stories around those the game already creates, and if one 'rude' or 'kind' line of auto-dialogue kills your entire immersion, that's really a bit lame to be honest.

BioWare tells stories.  Finally they are at a stage where those stories can include the main character as well...a real character.  I really hope they don't go back.   If you want to make every decision yourself, why not write a fanfic or play the (http://greenronin.com/dragon_age/) Tabletop DA game?  Of course I want to make important choices, but look at a game like The Witcher 2, praised as the best fantasy RPG in years by many.  Geralt is a character with emotions and problems, who says things by himself, just like Hawke.   But when it comes to important choices, who to kill, which place to go, which ally to follow, which person should rule, YOU make them.   If auto-dialogue makes for a better story (which it does, they just didn't do so well with DA2) then I'm all for it. 

Modifié par Cimeas, 02 juillet 2012 - 12:00 .

[Corto81]

Cimeas wrote...

 Look at The Secret World.    Every main game site, and countless people on dozens of forums (and ingame) are complaining that the main character isn't voiced.   Voice acting means the character isn't just an NPC with a computer screen instead of a head but a real breathing part of the world.
 

The Secret World... Is an... MMO...  How can they voice you in an MMO... Must think....

What... Wait, WHAT????

...

Anyway, voiced characters or not don't make the game.
There were 3 really fantastic RPG titles last year:
- Skyrim (main character unvoiced)
- Dark Souls (main character unvoiced)
- Witcher 2 (main character voiced, but set)

What these games had was depth and a real world.
Beyond that, it was each to their own, but each to their own in terms of being a great game.

You can see these devs never tried to appeal to the CoD crowd, they set out to make quality RPGs and they sold more and more copies with excellent reviews and positive word-of-mouth recommendations.

Origins was on par with those 3 said titles, though all 4 games excelled at something different.
Compared to all of those, DA2 - the only game which set out to appeal to a wider audience, rather than to be a great RPG - was a major flop.
Commercially it sold less than a fantastic original game.
It got bad to mixed (at best reviews).
It's DLCs were shut down half way through.

...

Bioware's next game could be a big turning point for the company, for better or worse.

[jillabender]

Cimeas wrote…

Look at The Secret World. Every main game site, and countless people on dozens of forums (and ingame) are complaining that the main character isn't voiced. Voice acting means the character isn't just an NPC with a computer screen instead of a head but a real breathing part of the world.

The main character can take part in ambient conversations, can react and voice opinions. And, in my opinion, to RP you do *not* need to choose EVERY SINGLE line of dialogue. Good RP'ers build stories around those the game already creates, and if one 'rude' or 'kind' line of auto-dialogue kills your entire immersion, that's really a bit lame to be honest.

BioWare tells stories. Finally they are at a stage where those stories can include the main character as well...a real character. I really hope they don't go back. If you want to make every decision yourself, why not write a fanfic or play the (http://greenronin.com/dragon_age/) Tabletop DA game? Of course I want to make important choices, but look at a game like The Witcher 2, praised as the best fantasy RPG in years by many. Geralt is a character with emotions and problems, who says things by himself, just like Hawke. But when it comes to important choices, who to kill, which place to go, which ally to follow, which person should rule, YOU make them. If auto-dialogue makes for a better story (which it does, they just didn't do so well with DA2) then I'm all for it.

Personally, I'm not necessarily against the idea of having a voiced protagonist in a cRPG. I've just started playing Mass Effect, and it seems to me so far that it uses a voiced protagonist very well. But I don't personally care for the way Hawke was handled as a voiced protagonist in DA2. Part of the problem for me, I think, is that there are many kinds of responses to a situation that don't fall neatly into the category of "diplomatic," "sarcastic" or "aggressive," and the lack of such made Hawke feel rather bland to me at times. Another problem for me was the fact that Hawke felt peripheral to the main conflict of the story, which made it hard for me to feel invested. So, while I agree that a voiced protagonist can be used to good effect, I don't think that having a voiced protagonist automatically makes a story better.

I do enjoy building my characters' personal stories around the story established by the game, but I found that while DA:O allowed me to do that with ease, trying to do that in DA2 didn't work for me. Maybe it worked for you, and if it did, that's great, but personally, to make it work for me, I would have needed for certain things to have been left more to my imagination, and for certain details to have been fleshed out more. But maybe that's just me.

Modifié par jillabender, 02 juillet 2012 - 08:06 .

[Wulfram]

There's a place for RPGs with a set protagonists.

But it's not what I prefer, and I don't think that's what Dragon Age is/should be about.

[AkiKishi]

Wulfram wrote...

There's a place for RPGs with a set protagonists.

But it's not what I prefer, and I don't think that's what Dragon Age is/should be about.

If we were still talking about DA:O I would agree with you. But DA2 is fixed in all but name. Not only that,but it still fails to offer the variability that you got in the Witcher2 with regards to actions and consequences.This is in part to Bioware not being brave enough to take that final step and fix the character competely.

[wsandista]

BobSmith101 wrote...

Wulfram wrote...

There's a place for RPGs with a set protagonists.

But it's not what I prefer, and I don't think that's what Dragon Age is/should be about.

If we were still talking about DA:O I would agree with you. But DA2 is fixed in all but name. Not only that,but it still fails to offer the variability that you got in the Witcher2 with regards to actions and consequences.This is in part to Bioware not being brave enough to take that final step and fix the character competely.

Absolutely. The difference between choices in DA2 and TW2 are this: DA2 has you choose which tone to repsond in most of the time, while TW2 has you actually make a real decision.

Modifié par wsandista, 02 juillet 2012 - 03:11 .

[AlexanderCousland]

DA2 was awful at choices. It felt like David gaider & company shoved a story down our throats, DAO was like, here is our's our story, you put the pieces together. Every Major plot in DAO had two options. (Caridan or Branka, Elves or Wolves, Templars or Mages, Connor or Isolde or get a circle mage) but at the end of the story we ended up choosing a monarch and slaying the Archdemon. The only example i have of that In DA2 is Leaving Carver or Bethany behind or taking them to the deep roads. Romance options were good.. But they were worse then DAO. I remember being able to bang leiliana whenever i wanted. It seemed like bioware was trying to capture the players emotion solely through companionship, but they forgot we like to have an impact on our story as well. Hawke was Gaiders "word babie" So was the Warden...but we adopted him/her. Hawke's **** is still at the orphanage.

[Sylvius the Mad]

Allan Schumacher wrote...

I think it's mostly an empathy issue for me.

When I'm feeling an emotion, it's often me empathizing with the character. My reactions are often that which I am feeling as though I were the character. My character can't get angry if I can't understand the circumstances of what is happening in the game to know if being angry is an acceptable response.

But if his emotional reactions are not relevantly similar to your emotional reactions, would that empathy still apply?  You can understand intellectually that anger is appropriate for him without it being appropriate for you if you were in the same situation.

[Sylvius the Mad]

BobSmith101 wrote...

Wulfram wrote...

There's a place for RPGs with a set protagonists.

But it's not what I prefer, and I don't think that's what Dragon Age is/should be about.

If we were still talking about DA:O I would agree with you. But DA2 is fixed in all but name. Not only that,but it still fails to offer the variability that you got in the Witcher2 with regards to actions and consequences.This is in part to Bioware not being brave enough to take that final step and fix the character competely.

I don't understand how this would make the game any better.  It would still fail to offer control.

[EricHVela]

IMHO, Dragon Age: Kirkwall's choice-limits is because they went for the broader audience over a genre that appeals to a focused audience.

Many games that I have played are on rails because the story is just there for fascinating graphics and supplying a simple reason for the player to do something. From what I can tell, that appeals to the broader audience over stories where the player has to decide for themselves how to proceed.

Some of the earliest complaints I saw in regards to Oblivion and Skyrim were "it's too short" -- much more on Skyrim than Oblivion. It's too short if you do nothing other than follow the main plot. Those complaints faded quickly. My theory is that the broader audience went elsewhere after finishing the main plot. Yet, each one of those linear players was still a sale.

It's also a little easier to write linear stories than multiple stories that intertwine at random intervals based on the player. QA on the latter must be a nightmare. I also think that the non-linear story takes quite a bit longer to develop. (EA seems to like tighter schedules.)

[Allan Schumacher]

Sylvius the Mad wrote...

But if his emotional reactions are not relevantly similar to your emotional reactions, would that empathy still apply?  You can understand intellectually that anger is appropriate for him without it being appropriate for you if you were in the same situation.

Yes.

Even if something doesn't personally make me, Allan Schumacher the real person that lives in Edmonton, angry had it happened to me in real life, I can still feel the appropriate emotion if Total-Jerkface-McGee gets double crossed and now he wants to make those people suffer.

I can still chuckle to myself with satisfaction as I exploit those local peasants to do my bidding under threat of force to their families, and I still feel that satisfaction when I bend the world to my will.


Even then though, my empathy towards other character's still helps feed into understanding how the situation plays out.  While I can grin as my Revan convinces Zaalbar to kill Mission in KOTOR, I can also understand how that decision makes Zaalbar and Mission feel.

All of those emotions are exactly what I look for when playing video games.  If I don't care about the characters then I don't empathize with them and I consider that a huge failing of the game.

[deuce985]

I think Allan shares much of the same opinions as me.

Get out of my head Allan. *scary*

[Wulfram]

I don't see any reason to believe that a fixed protagonist would give you more choice in action.

And it stands a fairly high chance of leaving me with a character I don't particularly want to play. Like Geralt, for example.

[Cimeas]

Look, I would much rather have a fixed protagonist in DA, Shepard or even Geralt-style. Sure. choose the gender/appearance/whatever, but they should have a personality. Part of it can of course be determined through choices the player makes, but he should also have emotion etc.. that aren't all defined by the player.

A real issue on these forums is many people equate DA2 being a mediocre game to issues like having a voiced protagonist, but I would disagree. You only have to play Witcher 2 to see that a fixed protagonist can be great and yet still allow for a lot of choice. With Bioware's larger budget they could easily have one for both genders and let you customize their appearance.

Hawke was problematic because Bioware only half-fixed him. Instead of going Shepard or even Geralt, they tried to create a voiced character that had barely any personality or opinions without you specifically making that choice. Therefore he/she came across as bland.

In DA3 we already know there will be a voiced protagonist, but I at least hope they have personality this time.



Oh, and SW:TOR had voiced main characters, and it was an MMO. (not a particularly good one, but the stories were alright).

[Wulfram]

I don't think Shepard was particulary fixed compared to Hawke. At least not until ME3.

[jillabender]

Cimeas wrote…

Look, I would much rather have a fixed protagonist in DA, Shepard or even Geralt-style. Sure. choose the gender/appearance/whatever, but they should have a personality. Part of it can of course be determined through choices the player makes, but he should also have emotion etc.. that aren't all defined by the player.

A real issue on these forums is many people equate DA2 being a mediocre game to issues like having a voiced protagonist, but I would disagree. You only have to play Witcher 2 to see that a fixed protagonist can be great and yet still allow for a lot of choice. With Bioware's larger budget they could easily have one for both genders and let you customize their appearance.

Hawke was problematic because Bioware only half-fixed him. Instead of going Shepard or even Geralt, they tried to create a voiced character that had barely any personality or opinions without you specifically making that choice. Therefore he/she came across as bland.

In DA3 we already know there will be a voiced protagonist, but I at least hope they have personality this time.

I actually agree for the most part. While my first choice would be for DA3 to return to the silent protagonist style of DA:O, I realize that Bioware isn't interested in doing that. I wouldn't mind DA3 having a completely set protagonist if the protagonist is more compelling than Hawke.

Wulfram wrote…

I don't think Shepard was particulary fixed compared to Hawke. At least not until ME3.

Perhaps "fixed" isn't quite the right word to describe the difference between Hawke and Shepard, but from what I've played of ME so far, it seems to me that Shepard is much better written than Hawke (although some people might disagree), and I think part of it may be that Shepard still feels like a consistent character no matter which dialogue options you choose, which allows Shepard to feel more multi-dimensional. That's why I would prefer that DA3 use a style of story-telling that's more like ME than DA2.

Sylvius the Mad wrote…

I don't understand how this would make the game any better.  It would still fail to offer control.

It might not offer more control to the player, but I've pretty much accepted that in a game with a voiced protagonist, it's likely futile to look for the kind of control that I have over my characters in DA:O.

What using a set protagonist might accomplish, I think, would be to give the writers more freedom to create a more multi-dimensional character.

Modifié par jillabender, 02 juillet 2012 - 08:25 .

[Wulfram]

jillabender wrote...

Perhaps "fixed" isn't quite the right word to describe the difference between Hawke and Shepard, but from what I've played of ME so far, it seems to me that Shepard is much better written than Hawke (although some people might disagree), and I think part of it may be that Shepard still feels like a consistent character no matter which dialogue options you choose, which allows Shepard to feel more multi-dimensional. That's why I would prefer that DA3 use a style of story-telling that's more like ME than DA2.

I think that's got more to do with DA2's tones tending to be pitched rather extreme than anything else.  I think they could do with being moved closer to the middle generally - with the more extreme moments made clearer so you can choose whether to pick them or not

And, in ME1 and ME2, there's the presence of the neutral choice which helps keep a connection between Paragon and Renegade/

[jillabender]

Wulfram wrote…

I think that's got more to do with DA2's tones tending to be pitched rather extreme than anything else. I think they could do with being moved closer to the middle generally - with the more extreme moments made clearer so you can choose whether to pick them or not

And, in ME1 and ME2, there's the presence of the neutral choice which helps keep a connection between Paragon and Renegade/

It sounds like you're suggesting that by creating a character with less extreme responses, Bioware might be able to create a PC who's less of a "set" character than Geralt or Shepard, but still more convincing than Hawke. You may be right – I'll have to think more about that.

Modifié par jillabender, 02 juillet 2012 - 08:26 .

[Pasquale1234]

Sylvius the Mad wrote...

I create the character and set him loose in the world.  That is why I think any effort on the part of the game designers to get the player to experience an emotional reaction is futile.  My character might experience emotions, but my emotional state is entirely predictable when I'm roleplaying.  I'm calmly enjoying watching my character's behaviour.  He might be excited or frightened or angry or in love, but I'm still just a guy sitting in a dark room.

That sounds similar to my playstyle.  My gaming is generally an intellectual exercise, which is probably why I gravitate toward RPG and strategy sorts of games, and tend to avoid action or adventure games.  That has become much more difficult over time, as more and more action-adventure games adopt the RPG label.

When I want to be drawn into something on an emotional level, I look to books, cinema, theatre, or music - not computer games.

Wulfram wrote...

There's a place for RPGs with a set protagonists.

Perhaps, but my hard drive isn't one of them.

BobSmith101 wrote...

If we were still talking about DA:O I would agree with you. But DA2 is fixed in all but name. Not only that,but it still fails to offer the variability that you got in the Witcher2 with regards to actions and consequences.This is in part to Bioware not being brave enough to take that final step and fix the character competely.

Or they could just go back to supporting player-created characters...

ETA:

jillabender wrote...

What using a set protagonist might accomplish, I think, would be to give the writers more freedom to create a more multi-dimensional character.

Yes, I believe that is exactly what it can (and does) accomplish - while reducing the player's ability to design the character.  Whether that is desirable is a matter of opinion.

Modifié par Pasquale1234, 02 juillet 2012 - 08:56 .

[jillabender]

Pasquale1234 wrote…

Or they could just go back to supporting player-created characters...

Actually, a return to the DA:O style of storytelling with a silent protagonist and greater freedom for the player to define the character would be my first choice as well. But Bioware has stated that they're not interested in going back down that road with the Dragon Age series.

Pasquale1234 wrote…

jillabender wrote...

What using a set protagonist might accomplish, I think, would be to give the writers more freedom to create a more multi-dimensional character.

Yes, I believe that is exactly what it can (and does) accomplish - while reducing the player's ability to design the character.  Whether that is desirable is a matter of opinion.

I think the source of most of my problems with DA2 was the fact that it limited the freedom of the player to define the character, while at the same time limiting the freedom of the writers to flesh out the character, and the result was that we ended up with a protagonist who, while fun, wasn't the most interesting character Bioware could have come up with. While having a completely set protagonist wouldn't be my very first choice, I would happily choose that over a protagonist in the style of DA2.

Modifié par jillabender, 02 juillet 2012 - 09:36 .

[AlexanderCousland]

You guys must be on red lyrium...you guys want them to give us the 18th century version of shepard? You want linear story? Your content with our protaginist being "fixed"? A voiced protaginst does not bother me, but im not okay with Cameo's being the only difference in our playthroughs. At this point im cocerned with being promised player agency and all i'll end up with is an Antivan Milk Sandwich and a morning note saying " thanks for the good time"