184 réponses à ce sujet

[Cimeas]

This is afterall, a Bioware 'fan' community.   Seeing as you haven't been a Bioware fan for 3 years now, maybe it's time to move on?

Modifié par Cimeas, 18 juillet 2012 - 10:54 .

[Pasquale1234]

Sylvius the Mad wrote...
Roleplaying consists of in-character decision-making.  I'd be happy to define any game that permits that as a roleplaying game.

Brilliant - and deceptively simple.

Because it encompasses other things that I think are vital - like being in control of the character's behavior.

It doesn't address character agency at all, but I think most people expect some reasonable limits on the options presented to the character.  As long as the player is able to make an in-character decision from the choices available, the criterion is met.

[Cimeas]

Pasquale1234 wrote...

Sylvius the Mad wrote...
Roleplaying consists of in-character decision-making.  I'd be happy to define any game that permits that as a roleplaying game.

Brilliant - and deceptively simple.

Because it encompasses other things that I think are vital - like being in control of the character's behavior.

It doesn't address character agency at all, but I think most people expect some reasonable limits on the options presented to the character.  As long as the player is able to make an in-character decision from the choices available, the criterion is met.

So Baldurs' Gate 2 was not an RPG then?
Because I seemingly remember, after your buddies were arrested, the quest goal popped up to help them by raising the money to pay the guy in the slum, and you couldn't just say 'no, I'm going to go travel to Neverwinter and find a wife and have kids and live a happy peaceful life without killing' could you.   Your character DECIDED to help them, thus writing it down in his/her quest journal, without your consent.   

Modifié par Cimeas, 18 juillet 2012 - 10:20 .

[Maclimes]

Cimeas wrote...

The fact is no-one here can win this argument, we're now going around in circles on two threads, ...

Only two? Maybe only two are active, I'll grant you. But this has been a debate going on since before BG1 even came out. When people saw the change from text-based RPGs to graphics-based RPGs as a step in the wrong direction. Hell, it was probably going on even in the "text-based" versus "pen-and-paper" era.

[bEVEsthda]

As a player of action fighting games, FPS, strategy games, simulators, I came to RPGs by Baldur's Gate. I had heard the game's name pop up again and again, probably saw it in some magazine too. So I purchased it on impulse one day when I was in the video store. I really didn't had much idea of what to expect. I did NOT read the manual. I never did read the manual comprehensively, just a part now and then, as needed.

I did, however, lovingly create a player char, by my own means, from scratch. It was far from perfect, but it came to life with a unique personality from the start. All of it inside my head, of course. (But everything that happens in ANY game is ALWAYS inside our head. The rest is just scripts, pixels, ones and zeros). But I cherised that char, all the way, from a scared child to a bitter and tired god, through BG, TotSC, SoA, ToB. And exactly that experience is what got me hooked.

And that is the essential thing in what I consider "RPG". That the player makes the char come alive, creates the personality, moral, motives, will and desire, makes the decisions. It's not the 'story' in itself that is interesting, it is experiencing the story from this perspective, and thus - actually - create a good part of the story.

And this is, from what I understand, also the essentials of the origin of role-playing games, PnP. It lies at the very core of what originally was meant by a RPG game.
I do not, in my heart, feel that JRPG'ers and movie-watchers have any right to the RPG term. Japanese developers just hijacked the term and slapped it onto their games, which in reality is an entirely different genre of games, whatever label we put on things.

But Bioware do not even like us to have these discussions. This line of debate will see intervention by a moderator any time soon. So in the end, as several of us have already concluded, the 'RPG' label is meaningless. Not just because it's used for whatever, but because it's not even allowed to be used or defined as a label for something specific. At least not on these forums. So forget the 'RPG' label. We have to define our different preferences and different game genres by other means.

Modifié par bEVEsthda, 18 juillet 2012 - 10:28 .

[Cimeas]

Hmm I read them all, but many are drowned in so many layers of assumed intellectual superiority that sometimes it's hard to see if he's saying something as provocation to answer a point, for effect, or as an actual statement.

He seems the kind of person who enjoys having an argument for the sake of it, which is great, because so do I

[Maclimes]

Cimeas wrote...

So Baldurs' Gate 2 was not an RPG then?
Because I seemingly remember, after your buddies were arrested, the quest goal popped up to help them by raising the money to pay the guy in the slum, and you couldn't just say 'no, I'm going to go travel to Neverwinter and find a wife and have kids and live a happy peaceful life without killing' could you.   Your character DECIDED to help them, thus writing it down in his/her quest journal, without your consent.   

No. You're pushing it too far. There have to be guidelines. The Warden in DAO does not have the option to say, "F the Blight, I'm gonna move to Orlais and be a painter". You can't have true, uncontrolled freedom.

The ideal is that you are given a goal you must accomplish, and then you get to decide HOW you acccomplish that goal. But you must still accomplish the goal.

DA:O gave you many different ways to defeat the Archdemon, first in the many different ways you could assemble an army (and what the army consisted of), to the actual fight itself (Who, if anyone, needed to be sacrificed). 
DA2 did not give ... wait, what WAS the actual "goal" to accomplish in DA2?

[Cimeas]

Maclimes wrote...

Cimeas wrote...

So Baldurs' Gate 2 was not an RPG then?
Because I seemingly remember, after your buddies were arrested, the quest goal popped up to help them by raising the money to pay the guy in the slum, and you couldn't just say 'no, I'm going to go travel to Neverwinter and find a wife and have kids and live a happy peaceful life without killing' could you.   Your character DECIDED to help them, thus writing it down in his/her quest journal, without your consent.   

No. You're pushing it too far. There have to be guidelines. The Warden in DAO does not have the option to say, "F the Blight, I'm gonna move to Orlais and be a painter". You can't have true, uncontrolled freedom.

The ideal is that you are given a goal you must accomplish, and then you get to decide HOW you acccomplish that goal. But you must still accomplish the goal.

DA:O gave you many different ways to defeat the Archdemon, first in the many different ways you could assemble an army (and what the army consisted of), to the actual fight itself (Who, if anyone, needed to be sacrificed). 
DA2 did not give ... wait, what WAS the actual "goal" to accomplish in DA2?

The goal was to do the best you can in life.   Hawke is a person, just like us.  Instead of some god-given holy mission, his goal is to support his family, to become successful, to build a life for himself, and not ruin it by helping his city and (if you're playing nice-guy Hawke) out of compassion for it's people.  That is a far more noble and interesting goal than 'kill the dragon'.   It's just that the story was told badly.   You can argue about choices all day long, but the core idea at the heart of DA2, the 'goal' as it were, is to succeed. 

Modifié par Cimeas, 18 juillet 2012 - 10:45 .

[Pasquale1234]

Cimeas wrote...

Pasquale1234 wrote...

Sylvius the Mad wrote...
Roleplaying consists of in-character decision-making.  I'd be happy to define any game that permits that as a roleplaying game.

Brilliant - and deceptively simple.

Because it encompasses other things that I think are vital - like being in control of the character's behavior.

It doesn't address character agency at all, but I think most people expect some reasonable limits on the options presented to the character.  As long as the player is able to make an in-character decision from the choices available, the criterion is met.

So Baldurs' Gate 2 was not an RPG then?
Because I seemingly remember, after your buddies were arrested, the quest goal popped up to help them by raising the money to pay the guy in the slum, and you couldn't just say 'no, I'm going to go travel to Neverwinter and find a wife and have kids and live a happy peaceful life without killing' could you.   Your character DECIDED to help them, thus writing it down in his/her quest journal, without your consent.   

I think I already addressed that in the bolded paragraph above.

I'll grant you that, for any given game you could come up with some character definition that simply would not work with that game's goals or options presented, but the better games give you enough leeway that many different types of characters can work very well.

ETA:

Cimeas wrote...

The goal was to do the best you can in life. Hawke is a person, just like us. Instead of some god-given holy mission, his goal is to support his family, to become successful, to build a life for himself, and not ruin it by helping his city and (if you're playing nice-guy Hawke) out of compassion for it's people. That is a far more noble and interesting goal than 'kill the dragon'. It's just that the story was told badly. You can argue about choices all day long, but the core idea at the heart of DA2, the 'goal' as it were, is to succeed.

One of the reasons I had so much trouble understanding and role-playing Hawke is that I couldn't find any motives for the character that made sense to me.  Act 1: Raise $.  Check.  Act 2: Take care of Mom.  Oops.  The only other thing I could come up with was helping Kirkwall & the companions.  For a storyline that is so heavily on rails, the game didn't give me much in the way of motivation - and it seems like every time I was able to invent one, something else would happen to contradict it.

Modifié par Pasquale1234, 18 juillet 2012 - 10:58 .

[bEVEsthda]

Cimeas wrote...

Pasquale1234 wrote...

Sylvius the Mad wrote...
Roleplaying consists of in-character decision-making.  I'd be happy to define any game that permits that as a roleplaying game.

Brilliant - and deceptively simple.

Because it encompasses other things that I think are vital - like being in control of the character's behavior.

It doesn't address character agency at all, but I think most people expect some reasonable limits on the options presented to the character.  As long as the player is able to make an in-character decision from the choices available, the criterion is met.

So Baldurs' Gate 2 was not an RPG then?
Because I seemingly remember, after your buddies were arrested, the quest goal popped up to help them by raising the money to pay the guy in the slum, and you couldn't just say 'no, I'm going to go travel to Neverwinter and find a wife and have kids and live a happy peaceful life without killing' could you.   Your character DECIDED to help them, thus writing it down in his/her quest journal, without your consent.   

An argument for a contrieved point, which I believe has been addressed many times on this forum already. All story-driven RPGs, including PnPs to an extent, follow this pattern, that they only allow for a limited set of actions. A sandbox, like TES, does not have this limitation. But a story driven or dungeon mastered game cannot go far outside of what has been prepared for. This is selfevident. That is the meaning of "story-driven". And it's not much of a problem for roleplaying. As long as the limitations are written in such a way as to offer motivations for most conceivable characters.

Modifié par bEVEsthda, 18 juillet 2012 - 10:51 .

[wsandista]

Pasquale1234 wrote...

I think I already addressed that in the bolded paragraph above.

I'll grant you that, for any given game you could come up with some character definition that simply would not work with that game's goals or options presented, but the better games give you enough leeway that many different types of characters can work very well.

This.

Almost every story-driven has some railroading that can contradict some character designs.
DA2 did something far worse than that though. While most story-driven RPGs railroad the player externally, DA2 actually railroaded the PC internally, by making them feel greief at (spoiler involving dead family member). While I grudgingly accept that my PC might have to perform an action they don't want to(like joining the Wardens) as long as they are kept to a minimum. I can't accept having my PC forced have certain emotional responses to certain events. That will contradict more player designs than the external railroading ever will.

Modifié par wsandista, 18 juillet 2012 - 10:54 .

[Cimeas]

 Surely feeling grief at the death of a *parent* is a concievable limitation and could be worked into most characters.   Most people would be sad if their mother died, just like most would not abandon the last hope for everythign they've ever known to go be a painter in Orlais, as you said. 

[wsandista]

Cimeas wrote...

 Surely feeling grief at the death of a *parent* is a concievable limitation and could be worked into most characters.   Most people would be sad if their mother died, just like most would not abandon the last hope for everythign they've ever known to go be a painter in Orlais, as you said. 

No it isn't. Attending the funeral might be, but forcing the PC to think or feel a certain way should not be done.

[Cimeas]

'most concievable characters' etc. etc... it's all subjective. Isn't that the problem.

And anyway, you still haven't answered my question, which is:
Honestly why are you here in a Bioware fan community discussing how you dislike games like DA2 (Bioware's previous game) and DA3 (because it *will* have the wheel, it *will* have player voice acting) when there hasn't been a Bioware game that you have liked in 3 YEARS?

[Cimeas]

wsandista wrote...

Cimeas wrote...

 Surely feeling grief at the death of a *parent* is a concievable limitation and could be worked into most characters.   Most people would be sad if their mother died, just like most would not abandon the last hope for everythign they've ever known to go be a painter in Orlais, as you said. 

No it isn't. Attending the funeral might be, but forcing the PC to think or feel a certain way should not be done.

They forced the player to not run away from Duncan during the joining/Korcari wilds/recruitment process. 

[Pasquale1234]

simfamSP wrote...

I love reading Sylvius' posts... too bad people don't actually *read* them, a mistake I once made. I disagree on some things, but he makes very valid points.

+1

[wsandista]

Cimeas wrote...

They forced the player to not run away from Duncan during the joining/Korcari wilds/recruitment process. 

They didn't force the PC to feel anything about it though. DA2 did that.

[wsandista]

Cimeas wrote...

Honestly why are you here in a Bioware fan community discussing how you dislike games like DA2 (Bioware's previous game) and DA3 (because it *will* have the wheel, it *will* have player voice acting) when there hasn't been a Bioware game that you have liked in 3 YEARS?

I don't know if this is addressed to me but: off-topic forum, Sylvius the Mad's posts, and CrustyBot's "Lets play" thread.

[batlin]

[deleted]

Modifié par batlin, 18 juillet 2012 - 11:15 .

[batlin]

Cimeas wrote...

This is afterall, a Bioware 'fan' community.   Seeing as you haven't been a Bioware fan for 3 years now, maybe it's time to move on?

Yes, because being a fan means accepting whatever crap the object of your affection puts out and remain blind to all its faults.

No, I'm not a blind fan because Bioware hasn't been putting out the stuff that made me a fan of them in the first place. And because of that, I'll let them know.

[bEVEsthda]

Cimeas wrote...

 Surely feeling grief at the death of a *parent* is a concievable limitation and could be worked into most characters.   Most people would be sad if their mother died, just like most would not abandon the last hope for everythign they've ever known to go be a painter in Orlais, as you said. 

Excuse me, but you're jumping ahead to too far conclusions.
That the story only progress along a limited set of paths, is one thing, is necessary due to resource reasons, and is acceptable.

If the game continuosly displays and expresses the char's will and emotions, it does just that. All the time. And this time it's both completely unnecessary, and a waste of resources. It's not a question if one single case might be acceptable to how many gamers or not. It's a continuos function of the game. It's now a movie, not a role-playing game.

[Pasquale1234]

wsandista wrote...

Almost every story-driven has some railroading that can contradict some character designs.
DA2 did something far worse than that though. While most story-driven RPGs railroad the player externally, DA2 actually railroaded the PC internally, by making them feel greief at (spoiler involving dead family member). While I grudgingly accept that my PC might have to perform an action they don't want to(like joining the Wardens) as long as they are kept to a minimum. I can't accept having my PC forced have certain emotional responses to certain events. That will contradict more player designs than the external railroading ever will.

It's a huge problem when they animate all of the facial expressions.

I remember seeing quite a few complaints about, for example, Hawke's reaction when isabela first came on to her after her recruiting quest.  A lot of people read that as sexual interest, and were really annoyed.  I saw it as some sort of amusement at Isabela's brazen behavior - but in any case, it was wrong for some Hawkes.

Along those lines, I've seen requests for more emotional expressions right alongside requests for less.  As soon as a game starts dictating all of the character's emotive reactions - well, it leaves precious little room for role-playing, and requires every player to play essentially the same character - which some people will like and others will not.

[wsandista]

Pasquale1234 wrote...

It's a huge problem when they animate all of the facial expressions.

I agree. Which is why I would like to never see that in my games again.

I remember seeing quite a few complaints about, for example, Hawke's reaction when isabela first came on to her after her recruiting quest.  A lot of people read that as sexual interest, and were really annoyed.  I saw it as some sort of amusement at Isabela's brazen behavior - but in any case, it was wrong for some Hawkes.

Absolutely. Not every Hawke(if they were actually player-generated) would react to Isabela's advances with amusement or intrest.

Along those lines, I've seen requests for more emotional expressions right alongside requests for less.  As soon as a game starts dictating all of the character's emotive reactions - well, it leaves precious little room for role-playing, and requires every player to play essentially the same character - which some people will like and others will not.

If there is a voiced PC, I would much prefer a fixed PC over a semi-fixed PC(like Hawke). If you are going to remove player control over the PC, don't half-ass it.

[Pasquale1234]

wsandista wrote...

If there is a voiced PC, I would much prefer a fixed PC over a semi-fixed PC(like Hawke). If you are going to remove player control over the PC, don't half-ass it.

I've asked this question before, but haven't yet seen a response.

What, really, is the difference between a fixed PC and Hawke?

The player can choose Hawke's gender, customize the appearance, and decide whether Hawke took a nice pill, a snarky pill, or a pissy pill that day.  I guess you essentially have 3 versions of Hawke from which to choose...?

I've not played TW2, ME, or any similar games because their protags just don't interest me.  Maybe if I played one I would understand the difference...?

Would the benefit of a fixed PC mean that since the personality is already defined, the player is given more choice of different actions instead of multiple ways to say the same thing ala Hawke?

Inquiring minds want to know.