778 réponses à ce sujet

[AkiKishi]

bEVEsthda wrote...


If the cinematic presentation is during ambient gameplay, like games like halflife and KotOR hinted, then it's "advance of technology". If it's cutscene movies in between forking choices, then it's not. It's an old concept that has already been tried and has failed miserably. Gamers have already long ago resoundly rejected gameplay like that.

Care to explain how FFXIII outsold DA at least 2-1 ? 

[bEVEsthda]

BobSmith101 wrote...

bEVEsthda wrote...


If the cinematic presentation is during ambient gameplay, like games like halflife and KotOR hinted, then it's "advance of technology". If it's cutscene movies in between forking choices, then it's not. It's an old concept that has already been tried and has failed miserably. Gamers have already long ago resoundly rejected gameplay like that.

Care to explain how FFXIII outsold DA at least 2-1 ? 

Franchise following. Same phenomenon we see in CoD and TES.

It would be real cool if Bioware had ever given any of their own successes, like BG and DA:O, the same chance.
As it is, BG2 sold NWN and DA:O sold DA2, to a lot of customers' disappointments.

Modifié par bEVEsthda, 22 juillet 2012 - 11:50 .

[Jerrybnsn]

FF has a large fan base. As bEVEsthda said up above, DA2 kind of ruin the momentum that Origins established for the Dragon Age IP. As I said in another post, but completely related to this topic, Bioware shouldn't have made so many changes with the DA IP because it alienated the original fans of rpgs. 


Trying to make DA like Mass Effect failed because of a different type of game play experience.  We want a modernized Baldur's Gate, not a copy-cat high fantasy clone of Mass Effect.

And importing your characters customization and stats would have been the right way to go.  Starting a new protagonists every game while the other characters from previous games keep being moved forward is maddening.  Did your DM ever tell you to keep remaking a new character everytime you sat down for some pnp rpging?

Modifié par Jerrybnsn, 22 juillet 2012 - 11:52 .

[Cimeas]

No, I don't think importing the warden would be good. We'd be a lord, have tons of money, the king's favour etc... Part of the fun in RPGs (imho) is building up from scavenged equipment and some dead thugs into a legend. Basically what DA2 should have been.

[Cutlasskiwi]

Jerrybnsn wrote...

Trying to make DA like Mass Effect failed because of a different type of game play experience.  We want a modernized Baldur's Gate, not a copy-cat high fantasy clone of Mass Effect.

And that's what I got. To me Dragon Age 2 is a modernized Baldur's Gate. Now if only the game hadn't been so rushed it would have been even better.

And importing your characters customization and stats would have been the right way to go.  Starting a new protagonists every game while the other characters from previous games keep being moved forward is maddening.  Did your DM ever tell you to keep remaking a new character everytime you sat down for some pnp rpging?

He did when the adventure/story/campaign was over and we started another one.

[Cimeas]

I don't know, but to be honest, if DA2 had had more abilities, more locations, a coherent story and companion gear, I would have loved it. DA2 imho is not a terrible game, it's a bad game. But I think that it's because the game was rushed. Thus I have faith in the Bioware team to deliver with DA3.

[AkiKishi]

Jerrybnsn wrote...

FF has a large fan base. As bEVEsthda said up above, DA2 kind of ruin the momentum that Origins established for the Dragon Age IP. As I said in another post, but completely related to this topic, Bioware shouldn't have made so many changes with the DA IP because it alienated the original fans of rpgs. 


Trying to make DA like Mass Effect failed because of a different type of game play experience.  We want a modernized Baldur's Gate, not a copy-cat high fantasy clone of Mass Effect.

And importing your characters customization and stats would have been the right way to go.  Starting a new protagonists every game while the other characters from previous games keep being moved forward is maddening.  Did your DM ever tell you to keep remaking a new character everytime you sat down for some pnp rpging?

It depends. If DA2 and maybe DA3 is a blip during which the fanbase undergoes transistion, then it's not really a mistake.
People said much the same thing when ME went from ME to ME2 but ME3 does not appear to have suffered for it (in sales terms at least). 
In order to want games like BG you have to know what BG is and now it's getting kind of old and will become less and less relevent to anyone not of a certain age.

Problem with DA is it played its big card from the start. The Wardens the Blight. Nothing is really going to measure upto that in epicness and Bioware have never been particularly good at the details required for non epic stories.This is where ME is now , it's done the Reaper thing and the Shepard thing. Where does it for from here ? 
Halo faced the same problem when they "killed" off Master Chief and promptly changed their minds after people lost interest.

Modifié par BobSmith101, 22 juillet 2012 - 01:18 .

[Ciryx]

Hm, I dont think all gamers dont want any cutscenes anymore. I liked the Cutscenes in the Diablo series very much and I also liked (gasp) the "interactive movies" like Metal Gear Solid 3 and Fahrenheit/Heavy Rain. I think there IS a target audience for these kind of games.
Its just up to the company to decide for which kind of audience they decide to make their games.

In my opinion the border between gamers who like cinematics and these who like -well- more "game" in their games, is fluent. Its about finding what target audience is the right for you product and get a good mix of these things to appeal to the biggest possible crowd of people. (Since, you know, things need to sell).

But finding the right mix for your game is where it gets tricky. For that you need to analyze what imapact cutscenes in a game have. Then what it would mean for your own game, how your other gameplayelements look like, what your audience is expecting etc
For example I think a fantasy game featuring deep, mysterious forest and beautiful landscape would suffer more from cutscenes then for example a flashy sci-fi game. There is no real totally rational reasoning behind this statement, just a feeling. (One could try to explain it with the millenia old habit of the human to explore natural enviroments and that this very base feeling isnt there when exploring a city... but that doesnt sound really conclusive.)

And now I dont know what point I was trying to make anymore. >,<

Basically I think its pointless discussing that kind of problem on such a general level. One need to analyze first what impact things have and how cutscenes are connected to the other gameplayelements. Before everyone isnt on the same standart regarding these things, there cant really be a productive discussion.

[nightscrawl]

BobSmith101 wrote...

Problem with DA is it played its big card from the start. The Wardens the Blight. Nothing is really going to measure upto that in epicness...

I think this is right, to a point. While that was their "big card," it also was the prefect environment to get everyone used to their new world, peoples, situations, and ways of life. If they had started with the mage/templar war, the other two races wouldn't really care very much, or be that involved, and there wouldn't be a reason to learn about them.

I suppose you could argue that they could have used the Qunari in place of the Blight, saving the Blight as a final world threatening culmination after a series of games. However, I think they are trying to present the Qunari in a more ambiguous light than as a "big bad" we need to defeat, so their gradual introduction via DAO Sten and then the events in DA2 (including MotA) seemed to fit well to me. Really, the darkspawn threat is the only thing that everyone (in Thedas) can get behind, because everyone is potentially threatened by it.

Now that I think about it, they could have gone a similar route as Neverwinter Nights: a very localized threat (the plague) that brings you into the world in a specific nation, which then takes you to other parts as you move on in the story.

If they had used the content in The Stolen Throne as the jumping off point for this, I could see the game series developing in a similar way: (1) you start off with the war with Orlais, which has you moving around the country, including through parts of the Deep Roads; (2) now that war is over, the next game is similar to content in DA2 where the focus is the mage/templar conflict and introducing the Qunari; (3) perhaps that goes on into the third game with a final culmination of the mage/templar issue; (4) the next game might be a side step into Tevinter, and can bring in the Qunari full-force, (5) and then after traveling all around, getting to know Thedas very well, you play your trump card: the Blight, in which you have to then bring in all of these disparate groups and have them work together to defeat the ultimate evil.

All of that said, I think the mage/templar and Qunari problems have great potential for "epicness," it just depends on how they do it, and whether there will be lasting ramifications, on par with those caused by Andraste herself.

Modifié par nightscrawl, 22 juillet 2012 - 01:51 .

[nightscrawl]

Cimeas wrote...

I don't know, but to be honest, if DA2 had had more abilities, more locations, a coherent story and companion gear, I would have loved it. DA2 imho is not a terrible game, it's a bad game. But I think that it's because the game was rushed. Thus I have faith in the Bioware team to deliver with DA3.

More abilities? I barely had space to stuff everything on my bar x_x. In DAO I just left off skills I rarely used because I really didn't have space. I even sacrificed potions on the bar in favor of additional skills. By the end of DAA at level 33/34 it was ridiculous. To be honest, I was glad there were fewer skills in DA2, even though it was a considerable amount as well.

[cuzsal]

bEVEsthda wrote...
 

Get 'Our old Bioware' back

Sorry wont happen Bioware as we all knew and loved is long dead now, all thats left is a husk thats run by EA :/

[Cimeas]

nightscrawl wrote...

Cimeas wrote...

I don't know, but to be honest, if DA2 had had more abilities, more locations, a coherent story and companion gear, I would have loved it. DA2 imho is not a terrible game, it's a bad game. But I think that it's because the game was rushed. Thus I have faith in the Bioware team to deliver with DA3.

More abilities? I barely had space to stuff everything on my bar x_x. In DAO I just left off skills I rarely used because I really didn't have space. I even sacrificed potions on the bar in favor of additional skills. By the end of DAA at level 33/34 it was ridiculous. To be honest, I was glad there were fewer skills in DA2, even though it was a considerable amount as well.

DA2 didn't have enough abilities, or if it did, they weren't good ones.  Why were the AOE's only like 5 seconds, why by the end of the game did my mage only have like 6 abilities he actually used?  I mean in Origins it was like 20.   I suppose as an MMO player I'm sort of used to large amounts of abilities I guess. 

[jillabender]

Cimeas wrote…

DA2 didn't have enough abilities, or if it did, they weren't good ones. Why were the AOE's only like 5 seconds, why by the end of the game did my mage only have like 6 abilities he actually used? I mean in Origins it was like 20. I suppose as an MMO player I'm sort of used to large amounts of abilities I guess.

I think part of the problem you describe results from the way encounters are designed in DA2. When combat is so fast-paced, and endless waves of enemies are constantly dropping from the sky, abilities that require tactical planning become redundant, and you're bound to end up relying mainly on a few powerful AoEs.

Something I did like about DA2, though, was that rogues and warriors had a greater variety of abilities to choose from than in Origins, so it was possible, for example, to create two sword-and-shield warriors with quite different combat styles. Unfortunately, the lack of tactically designed encounters meant that I didn't really feel motivated to explore different character builds the way I do when I play Origins.

Modifié par jillabender, 23 juillet 2012 - 12:10 .

[Pygmali0n]

JulyAyon wrote...

The problem is very basic, really. You hire good people to design a good game and you stick with them to the end. Instead these people get dropped after delivering good work and then some not so good people get hired to work with the good groundwork. These than think they can deliver just as good by "listening" to what fans want and just try to deliver on that basic. Which of course doesn't work. It always goes wrong. You can not add to a house of cards, no matter how good the foundation is build, it will always fall. Stick to the good crew that helped design a successful game or pay monkeys, get monkeys.
DAO has a lot potential to carry on (well, just like ME had), DA2 could have been a lot better, if they hadn't used the above mentioned "re-design tactics". ME3 is very disappointing in delivering replay value, good story line etc., SWTOR MMO troubles was blamed on the fans feedback.... stop making excuses and hire the right people and stick to them. I won't hold my breath and will be very careful before I get my hopes and faith up for DA3.

Yep, spot on.

BobSmith101 wrote...

It depends. If DA2 and maybe DA3 is a blip during which the fanbase undergoes transistion, then it's not really a mistake.
People said much the same thing when ME went from ME to ME2 but ME3 does not appear to have suffered for it (in sales terms at least).

That's a lot of wishing and hoping to hang a business on. If we are going to compare then ME3 is DA2, where fans bought on the expectation created by past games. After the first week sales jumped off a cliff. Part of the problem is that EA wanted DA and ME to be interchangeable when they weren't.

Someone at BW claimed that they wanted to make Dragon Age in different styles in different games. Now I assumed this was PR rubbish to try to placate people, because the real reason is that EA want titles rushed out the door as fast and as cheaply as possible, with too little thought for quality.

Of course, we know the PR rubbish is not true and EA/BW now want to make the same game every time for ME and DA: wheel, paraphrasing, cinematics and choice of either shooter or MMO style combat.

ME is a space opera (and one in which you usually need at least a little real-time skill at shooting) and was more amenable to changes to more action gameplay. Button mashing is always going to translate better to shooting a gun than it is waving a sword around. The loss of BW’s traditional RPG format is much more noticeable and damaging to DA. But JulyAvon’s point is probably more pertinent. As well as too little time, too many key staff have left BW.

At any rate, watching a sub-standard cartoon where I have to press a button to unpause it every so often does not make for great entertainment, it does make a terrible game.

Hanging around these forums like Miss Havisham is more entertaining.

(BTW thanks Pasquale for the links on emergent narrative).

Modifié par Pygmali0n, 23 juillet 2012 - 11:48 .

[Jerrybnsn]

Pygmali0n wrote...

ME is a space opera (and one in which you usually need at least a little real-time skill at shooting) and was more amenable to changes to more action gameplay. Button mashing is always going to translate better to shooting a gun than it is waving a sword around. The loss of BW’s traditional RPG format is much more noticeable and damaging to DA. But JulyAvon’s point is probably more pertinent. As well as too little time, too many key staff have left BW.

Exactly.  The whole argument of which game is better between ME and DAO always ended in the past with saying they are two different games.  Now, that argument is blurred since DA2 was more like the ME formula.  Bad move for the DA IP.

[AkiKishi]

Pygmali0n wrote...

BobSmith101 wrote...

It depends. If DA2 and maybe DA3 is a blip during which the fanbase undergoes transistion, then it's not really a mistake.
People said much the same thing when ME went from ME to ME2 but ME3 does not appear to have suffered for it (in sales terms at least).

That's a lot of wishing and hoping to hang a business on. If we are going to compare then ME3 is DA2, where fans bought on the expectation created by past games. After the first week sales jumped off a cliff. Part of the problem is that EA wanted DA and ME to be interchangeable when they weren't.

Someone at BW claimed that they wanted to make Dragon Age in different styles in different games. Now I assumed this was PR rubbish to try to placate people, because the real reason is that EA want titles rushed out the door as fast and as cheaply as possible, with too little thought for quality.

Of course, we know the PR rubbish is not true and EA/BW now want to make the same game every time for ME and DA: wheel, paraphrasing, cinematics and choice of either shooter or MMO style combat.

ME is a space opera (and one in which you usually need at least a little real-time skill at shooting) and was more amenable to changes to more action gameplay. Button mashing is always going to translate better to shooting a gun than it is waving a sword around. The loss of BW’s traditional RPG format is much more noticeable and damaging to DA. But JulyAvon’s point is probably more pertinent. As well as too little time, too many key staff have left BW.

At any rate, watching a sub-standard cartoon where I have to press a button to unpause it every so often does not make for great entertainment, it does make a terrible game.

Hanging around these forums like Miss Havisham is more entertaining.

(BTW thanks Pasquale for the links on emergent narrative).

ME2 threw out a lot of things from ME. People complained in droves. The key difference being that ME2 was a good game albeit different and most people got over it. The people who left were replaced.

Why DA2 failed could be any number of reasons.

Playing Hawke is like playing a Nerf Herder in a Star Wars game when you played a Jedi in the last one. As I pointed out eariler in the thread Halo had this problem and promply "resurected" MC. 
The art style was too different from DA
DA2 was less of a game, you went from a country to a city and it lacked epicness.
The demo sucked.

These are all things that could be seen before the game was actually released.Once it was released, well you can add to that list.

The reason I never bought DA2 was twofold. The demo sucking and day 1 DLC.

Modifié par BobSmith101, 23 juillet 2012 - 12:23 .

[Pygmali0n]

Ha Bob, I deleted a whole load of comment on epicness, Finn & Hengest vs Beowulf, blah blah, because it was getting too off topic. Nothing wrong with one of the DA games being lower key, if it was well implemented, but for one thing Lothering in DA:O felt more alive - and including the fields just as large as Kirkwall.

Also had similar thoughts about ME1 to ME2, but I don't think that allusion is too helpful to us here and doesn't negate what JulyAyon or I said.

The demo gave you the DA2 icon then? I had to spend over £20 to get that dubious honour.

Modifié par Pygmali0n, 23 juillet 2012 - 12:38 .

[AkiKishi]

Pygmali0n wrote...

Ha Bob, I deleted a whole load of comment on epicness, Finn & Hengest vs Beowulf, blah blah, because it was getting too off topic. Nothing wrong with one of the DA games being lower key, if it was well implemented, but for one thing Lothering in DA:O felt more alive - and including the fields just as large as Kirkwall.

Also had similar thoughts about ME1 to ME2, but I don't think that allusion is too helpful to us here and doesn't negate what JulyAyon or I said.

The demo gave you the DA2 icon then? I had to spend over £20 to get that dubious honour.

Nah the code was the barcode on the back of the box on the console version. I keep thinking I should pick it up now it's £8 but there always seems to be something better to spend £8 and even if I did own it I'd never want to play it again. Once was more than enough.

I think people who say JRPGs are nothing but cutscenes are kind of missing the point though. If you consider the game to be the story, then maybe so. But in a Bioware game the game is the story. In a JRPG you will usually find game content that lasts as long as the story.

Final Fantasy X for example, Bliztball was a game all of it's own. If you get into it traveling the world recruiting players, taking part in leagues (the only way to get Wakka's ultimate weapon) it's a long as the story element of FFX which is about 80 hours.

Also while people here have very clear opinions about cutscenes. The reality is that FFXIII outsold DA by a wide margin so the idea that gamers as a whole don't like or want cutscenes is highly flawed.

Modifié par BobSmith101, 23 juillet 2012 - 12:52 .

[Pygmali0n]

But again, to keep on topic Bob, and to remove in part the 'my game is better because it sold more than yours' argument (BW's present attempt to go jRPG ended up with DA2 in any case), which doesn't seem that productive and has already been discussed (with counter arguments such as non-cinematic games do well too, and that you need to build-up a reliable and trusted IP, not drastically reinvent it and have marketing lie about it)...

imho it is focus, time and resources and implementation in regard to cinematics that we should be discussing.

Yes cinematics can be good, but - BW are focusing on cinematics and because of time and resources (and previous form) I believe they will be implemented badly, to the detriment of the entire game.

Modifié par Pygmali0n, 23 juillet 2012 - 02:35 .

[AkiKishi]

Pygmali0n wrote...

But again, to keep on topic Bob, and to remove in part the 'my game is better because it sold more than yours' argument (BW's present attempt to go jRPG ended up with DA2 in any case), which doesn't seem that productive and has already been discussed (with counter arguments such as non-cinematic games do well too, and that you need to build-up a reliable and trusted IP, not drastically reinvent it and have marketing lie about it)...

imho it is focus, time and resources and implementation in regard to cinematics that we should be discussing.

Yes cinematics can be good, but - BW are focusing on cinematics and because of time and resources (and previous form) I believe they will be implemented badly, to the detriment of the entire game.

DA2 is NOT a JRPG it's not even close. Calling DA2 a JRPG is an insult to JRPGs. That's the problem with DA2 it has no idea what it wants to be. It's a mish mash of things all pulling in different directions.

DA2 and the Witcher2 are presented in the same manner, yet no one called Witcher2 a JRPG. The Witcher2 is the model I want them to follow.

[wsandista]

BobSmith101 wrote...

DA2 is NOT a JRPG it's not even close. Calling DA2 a JRPG is an insult to JRPGs. That's the problem with DA2 it has no idea what it wants to be. It's a mish mash of things all pulling in different directions.

DA2 and the Witcher2 are presented in the same manner, yet no one called Witcher2 a JRPG. The Witcher2 is the model I want them to follow.

I think that the reason most people call DA2 a jRPG is because of the artstyle, which is over-exaggerated like an anime.

DA2 wasn't a jRPG because it wasn't made in Japan. While jRPGs typically feature a set PC, it isn't exactly a rule or what makes a jRPG a jRPG.
Like you said, DA2 fails because it tries to be too many things at once and fails at them. DAO succeed because it tried to be an old-school RPG and did that well.

[AkiKishi]

wsandista wrote...

BobSmith101 wrote...

DA2 is NOT a JRPG it's not even close. Calling DA2 a JRPG is an insult to JRPGs. That's the problem with DA2 it has no idea what it wants to be. It's a mish mash of things all pulling in different directions.

DA2 and the Witcher2 are presented in the same manner, yet no one called Witcher2 a JRPG. The Witcher2 is the model I want them to follow.

I think that the reason most people call DA2 a jRPG is because of the artstyle, which is over-exaggerated like an anime.

DA2 wasn't a jRPG because it wasn't made in Japan. While jRPGs typically feature a set PC, it isn't exactly a rule or what makes a jRPG a jRPG.
Like you said, DA2 fails because it tries to be too many things at once and fails at them. DAO succeed because it tried to be an old-school RPG and did that well.

Quite.

[wsandista]

BobSmith101 wrote...

wsandista wrote...

BobSmith101 wrote...

DA2 is NOT a JRPG it's not even close. Calling DA2 a JRPG is an insult to JRPGs. That's the problem with DA2 it has no idea what it wants to be. It's a mish mash of things all pulling in different directions.

DA2 and the Witcher2 are presented in the same manner, yet no one called Witcher2 a JRPG. The Witcher2 is the model I want them to follow.

I think that the reason most people call DA2 a jRPG is because of the artstyle, which is over-exaggerated like an anime.

DA2 wasn't a jRPG because it wasn't made in Japan. While jRPGs typically feature a set PC, it isn't exactly a rule or what makes a jRPG a jRPG.
Like you said, DA2 fails because it tries to be too many things at once and fails at them. DAO succeed because it tried to be an old-school RPG and did that well.

Quite.

?

[AkiKishi]

wsandista wrote...

BobSmith101 wrote...

wsandista wrote...

BobSmith101 wrote...

DA2 is NOT a JRPG it's not even close. Calling DA2 a JRPG is an insult to JRPGs. That's the problem with DA2 it has no idea what it wants to be. It's a mish mash of things all pulling in different directions.

DA2 and the Witcher2 are presented in the same manner, yet no one called Witcher2 a JRPG. The Witcher2 is the model I want them to follow.

I think that the reason most people call DA2 a jRPG is because of the artstyle, which is over-exaggerated like an anime.

DA2 wasn't a jRPG because it wasn't made in Japan. While jRPGs typically feature a set PC, it isn't exactly a rule or what makes a jRPG a jRPG.
Like you said, DA2 fails because it tries to be too many things at once and fails at them. DAO succeed because it tried to be an old-school RPG and did that well.

Quite.

?

Confirming what you said.