329 réponses à ce sujet

[Rxdiaz]

Can't wait until DA3 with Action Mode!

[Knight-Enchanter Lavellan]

LobselVith8 wrote...

Rojahar wrote...

Persephone makes some good points. There seems to be a double standard. People criticize DA2 for things like romance being too rushed... but wearing a necklace and someone randomly marrying you (but never having more than like 1 line of dialog ever) is a system with depth? People insert fanfiction headcanon into Skyrim "Oh, well I IMAGINED there was more dialog and events that happened off-screen." but that can be applied to DA2 as well.

People criticize the marriage system in Skyrim, and some feel it will improve because BSG has listened to fans and improved issues and gameplay with past games. Some people don't feel the same is true about Bioware. The romance in Dragon Age II is criticized for jumping from kissing to sex to moving in in a matter of minuets - it seems rushed; the poorly implemented marriage system in Skyrim doesn't change that.

I don't like the direction Dragon Age is heading towards, since Dragon Age III seems to be another Dragon Age II with the same graphics, the Mass Effect wheel, the paraphrasing, the auto-lines, the mandatory armor, the fixed protagonist, ect. Will we even have any genuine choices in Dragon Age III, or will we be railroaded again because the developers can't accommodate many choices into a sequel?

As for the protagonist in Skyrim, he isn't partly predefined, there isn't auto-dialogue, he can actually stop a murder attempt instead of standing idly by, and he doesn't start off as a default white protagonist like Hawke (which means Varric is telling stories about a white Hawke, even if he is black). The 'head canon' comes from coming up with a backstory to explain who the character is, which is the same thing the developers of New Vegas expected for the Courier. With Hawke, I get a defined protagonist who comes across as inept, stupid, and passive.

^This sums up how I felt about Hawke, his portrayal and his character as well as the design choices on some facets of Dragon Age II. Also, for some reason I feel a title when referring to the player character is better than a forced name. What has been heard of Dragon Age III thus far is likely subject to change, so I will wait and see what comes next.

[Killjoy Cutter]

I gave up on EAware. Even if they ever make a game that's worth trying in the future, there will always be Origin.

[Killer3000ad]

Can't wait till we hear,"Dragon Age 3 is the best place for new players to enter the series" lines from marketing.

[EricHVela]

Killer3000ad wrote...

Can't wait till we hear,"Dragon Age 3 is the best place for new players to enter the series" lines from marketing.

If they say that, I'll just stick to raising puppies for entertainment.

To try to get new players that were not fans, the game must try to appeal to players that are not fans.

What about the people that were already fans? Fans of an apple don't want an orange with a sticky label claiming it's an apple just because they hope more people will like the orange.

Wider audiences from formerly focused franchices possibly return quick cash but not sustainable for the franchise or its developer. From what I can tell based only on observation, franchises do best when they focus on an audience. If Dragon Age is supposed to have more than three, they need to pick a focus and stick with it.

If they were smart in my opinion, they would choose the same focus as Origins because that's where the fandom began and Origins will likely not incline players that are not fans to play. New players of the next Dragon Age should be able to go back to Origins and like it with some level of equality. If they cannot do that, they would rightly be suspicious about what kind of game will they get next with the Dragon Age label taped on it. It is one of the reasons many former (and some new) fans are worried about the next Dragon Age.

[Allan Schumacher]

Wider audiences from formerly focused franchices possibly return quick cash but not sustainable for the franchise or its developer. From what I can tell based only on observation, franchises do best when they focus on an audience. If Dragon Age is supposed to have more than three, they need to pick a focus and stick with it.

What are your thoughts on the Elder Scrolls games, as well as the Fallout franchise?

Both are franchises that, in my opinion, move significantly away from their core roots with later installments, and have seen significant growth in sales numbers.

Skyrim, in particular, seems to be a game that for the most part is quite successful with both "core" and "new" fans and make no mistake, Bethesda aims to make the games openly accessible to appeal to new fans. It explains a lot of the simplification the series has introduced which the adamant hardcore speak out against. You see this in Fallout as well, though you could argue it's different because Bethesda inherited the franchise.

[Lemina Ausa]

Allan Schumacher wrote...

What are your thoughts on the Elder Scrolls games, as well as the Fallout franchise?

Both are franchises that, in my opinion, move significantly away from their core roots with later installments, and have seen significant growth in sales numbers.

Skyrim, in particular, seems to be a game that for the most part is quite successful with both "core" and "new" fans and make no mistake, Bethesda aims to make the games openly accessible to appeal to new fans. It explains a lot of the simplification the series has introduced which the adamant hardcore speak out against. You see this in Fallout as well, though you could argue it's different because Bethesda inherited the franchise.

The elder scrolls (I didn't play fallout 3, so I can't comment on that) did not exactly move away from their core roots. The basic premise of the elder scrolls games are that they offer an open world enviroment where a player can do whatever he or she wishes, within the game's limits. You can kill guards who offend you. You can kill that shopkeeper for being rude, You can sneak into someone's house in the middle of the night and steal their stuff, you can engaging in mining if you wish, you can run around the countryside looking for herbs, etc. That's the biggest appeal of the elder scrolls games, imo, and it hasn't changed with skyrim, and that is exactly the reason why old fans still play the game, and new fans who have not played open world RPGs, are attracted to the idea - there aren't a lot of RPGs where you can run around and do anything (within limits), although in skyrim its disappointing they had more "immune to death" NPCs. .

Modifié par Lemina Ausa, 13 août 2012 - 05:58 .

[Fast Jimmy]

To the above point, I think what the developers of the Dragon Age franchise think was the core nature of the series and what the FANS thought was the core nature of the franchise might have been two different things.

With TES games, I think the above description is pretty spot on; the games are about being in an open world that truly feels like it is a living breathing being, where each area, town or cave feels like exploring part of a cohesive world, not just tons of random dungeons. And where the ability to do (at times, seemingly) anything is possible. Changes to the mechanics, such as the removal of attributes, the inability to float/fly after Morrowind, the ability to dual wield magic/weapon, the changes to the crafting system, etc., do change the game somewhat, but overall the flavor or Arena and Skyrim aren't that different.

Contrarily, many players who loved Origins thought the focus of the Dragon Age series was about creating the character you wanted, and being able to explore that character's personality, history, thoughts and feelings in a world that has interesting characters and involves deep choices, all while telling a gripping story. While I would say DA2 has very interesting characters and works at telling a good story, it does not succeed at making us feel as if Hawke is our character or that we are guiding his story with choices that affect the world or the story in any real way.

I'd say TES games make most of their changes by focusing mostly on what their most arduous fans say they like about the game and make some changes that the hardcore base doesn't like. After DA2, many feel that Bioware makes most of their changes by focusing mostly of what the most arduous DETRACTORS say they hated about Origins and then just keep a few of the features the hardcore base did like.

Then again, I might be speaking in sweeping generalizations that are neither accurate nor helpful. But hey... this is the Internet, right?

Modifié par Fast Jimmy, 13 août 2012 - 05:57 .

[Tommyspa]

Killjoy Cutter wrote...

I gave up on EAware. Even if they ever make a game that's worth trying in the future, there will always be Origin.

Eerie how you haven't given up posting on forums run by them.

[Weskerr]

Tommyspa wrote...

Killjoy Cutter wrote...

I gave up on EAware. Even if they ever make a game that's worth trying in the future, there will always be Origin.

Eerie how you haven't given up posting on forums run by them.

Old habits die hard, you know?

Anyway, to contribute to the topic, I sometimes think something might be wrong with me because I loved DA2 (as well as DA1). Yes, I noticed the repeating dungeons, the fact that every love interest can swing both ways, the changed art style (the Elves generally do look ugly now), enemies jumping from the sky etc..., but these faults never bothered me that much. The dialogue, character interaction, voice acting, and, yes, the main story itself are well done. 

[Androme]

In reply to Allan:
EaWare can't do the same thing as Bethesda has done. The Elder Scrolls: Skyrim, appealed to both old and new fans alike because like somebody mentioned earlier, the core structure of the game still remains, the open-world system remains, the RPG elements remains, the actiony-combat remains, the only main changes was the perk system, graphical upgrades and more content compared to past games. But DA2 did not, and ''The Next Thing'' (DA3) will not, if they try to do the same thing with it as they did with DA2.

edit:
Also, I'd just like to add that the only thing I personally care about is the story in the DA franchise, so that was why DA2 was such a huge disappointment for me.

Modifié par Androme, 13 août 2012 - 07:34 .

[Horus Blackheart]

I'd also like to respond to the devs question.  On the face of it, it seems simple enough.  However, in this case  compairing the changes made in fallout and the Elder Scrolls with the direction that dragonage is going in is whareI think a lot of the problems stem from. as others have said fallout and the Elder Scrolls have always been about the world.  I personally did not like the direction that was taken with fallout three.  I'm not going to go into too much detail, however, just dropping in first person shooter elements does not necessarily mean the game is "modern". also , fallout three, stripped away a lot of the Black  Humour.. 

To be fair , a lot of the narrative and tonal issues were addressed in fnv. the crux of the problem is this concept of taking " popular" concepts from other titles and just dropping them in so that you can sell more copies this is fundamentally flawed.  When I buy an RPG I expect certain things from it. if it's an Elder Scrolls game.  There are certain tenants it abides by.  While the gameplay may "evolve". the fundamentals remain the same.

However, what Dragon age 2 ( and Mass effect) did was introduce elements that were at odds with the core tenants established previously. While the games the dev mentions are good games in there own right.  I do not want to play carbon copies of the same game with a few minor design changes.  As I said earlier if I want to play a first person shooter I will one buy one..I know mass-market appeal is the ultimate goal from a marketing and business perspective, but from a game design prospective it makes  everything fairly stagnant and uninspiring.  So much so that any original ideas are in there  they don't get the attention they deserve. to be totally honest, a fundamental of game design is that artistic goals will always give way to practicalities people understand this, most infuriating however, is when developers try to pass off changes made for practical/ business reasons as the intended "artistic vision".

So what i'm getting at here is devs and suites need to remember there established audience and stop trying to fumbel around chasing people that frankly are probably not very interested in the first place, if they were they would by the game in the first place. whats hapening in gaming right now is simlar to what hollywood do  that is find somthing thats popular and make as many derivtives of that formular as posable. (romcom with car chaces in 3d anyone i think not..


 

Modifié par Horus Blackheart, 13 août 2012 - 12:42 .

[Sacred_Fantasy]

Allan Schumacher wrote...

What are your thoughts on the Elder Scrolls games, as well as the Fallout franchise?

Both are franchises that, in my opinion, move significantly away from their core roots with later installments, and have seen significant growth in sales numbers.

Their core roots, are

1. Open Background/Origins
2. Consistent Playable Race like Khajiit, Argonian, Orcs, Elven races etc.. This playable races are maintained ever since the first TES: Arena.
3. Open World, vast exploration. Consistent game philosophy, the developer create the world for the player to journey as the player see fit.
4. Consistent blank slate PC. The game is superior to view in first person camera view therefore easily attract FPS crowd and promote roleplaying. First person camera give impression that you, the player are the character, therefore allow deeper immersion. 

TES doesn't move significantly away from their core root. They improve on other gameplay mechanic and leveling system but the above 4 core elements are still the same since TES ARENA 

[Wulfram]

Skyrim did quite hefty rules changes, but I think it was remarkably successful at removing the dead wood while keeping what people actually liked - the only real loss for me was spell customisation, and though that was fun it was also unbalanced. And while it removed bad, unintuitive and uninteresting complexity in places, it added back in good complexity with the perks system.

There was a big change between Morrowind and Daggerfall, with the abandonment of randomly generated dungeons and quests and the consequent dramatic shrinking of the game world. But it was 6 years between those games, which changes things a bit - if Bioware was to bring out Jade Empire 2, people would be fairly accepting of major changes. And though I loved Daggerfall, it was also a game with a lot of obvious problems, which makes people more willing to accept a change.

[Darth Death]

Allan Schumacher wrote...

What are your thoughts on the Elder Scrolls games, as well as the Fallout franchise?

Both are franchises that, in my opinion, move significantly away from their core roots with later installments, and have seen significant growth in sales numbers.

But that's the thing, they didn't move away from what made them successful. BioWare took the core elements of Origins, threw it in the trash, & then came up with new core elements for DA2.  

[Wulfram]

Most of the core elements of DA:O are still there in DA2.

It's a party based tactical "dark heroic fantasy" RPG, with a focus on story and character interaction.

The only thing that I might count as a change to a core element is the voiced PC and the inherent switch to a less player defined and more 3rd person protagonist.

[Darth Death]

Wulfram wrote...

Most of the core elements of DA:O are still there in DA2.

It's a party based tactical "dark heroic fantasy" RPG, with a focus on story and character interaction.

The only thing that I might count as a change to a core element is the voiced PC and the inherent switch to a less player defined and more 3rd person protagonist.

Maybe to you it is, but in my opinion it isn't.
 
1. Exploration became linear.
2. Your decisions didn't matter.
3. Customization was limited.
4. Dialogue options limited (due to voiced protagonist). 
5. Realistic character models abandoned for cartoony ones. 
6. large amounts of fetch quest.
7. Playable different races gone.

There's a lot more, but I'll leave it at that. Concepts that didn't need change imo. 

Modifié par Darth Death, 13 août 2012 - 02:27 .

[Horus Blackheart]

Actually the core elements were shifted quite a bit from a game design and game play stand point. Tactical combat was practcaly non existent due to the awesome button antics and the wave implementation. Dont forget that it also had the same issues me3 has regarding it being liner and rail roading choices to the point there arn't any that matter particularly in the last act that was really jarring. But by that point I was just working my way though the train wreck so i could uninstall and forget about it. At least me3 held together (mostly) untill the end. da2 on the other hand was meh prity much from start to finish. Thats the issue a lot of people had with it, the fact it was rushed out the door on the back of pr buzzwords rather than speaking for its self . I liked the naritive concept it was just not executed very well. alpha protocol did it very well.

[They call me a SpaceCowboy]

Darth Death wrote...

Wulfram wrote...

Most of the core elements of DA:O are still there in DA2.

It's a party based tactical "dark heroic fantasy" RPG, with a focus on story and character interaction.

The only thing that I might count as a change to a core element is the voiced PC and the inherent switch to a less player defined and more 3rd person protagonist.

Maybe to you it is, but in my opinion it isn't.
 
1. Exploration became linear.
2. Your decisions didn't matter.
3. Customization was limited.
4. Dialogue options limited (due to voiced protagonist). 
5. Realistic character models abandoned for cartoony ones. 
6. large amounts of fetch quest.
7. Playable different races gone.

There's a lot more, but I'll leave it at that. Concepts that didn't need change imo. 

I'd add to this list:

8. Little to no lore/background to quests

Consider the curator in Denerim. You talk to her about Andraste artificats etc. Then you go to Haven, and find something in the temple. Come back and give it to her. More dialog with her to show you found something that really impressed her.

DA2: Find something, Magically knwo who it belongs to. Toss it to the person with barely any ackowledgement

9 Cardboard cutout NPCs - both follower and background

The dragon scale armour quest with Wade and Herren is hilarious. You can have some background chat with every vendor, pretty much.

In DA2 - Vendors are pretty much mute. You don't interact with them, only with some object beside them.

IN DAO each follower you could chat with about their background, history, maybe get them to share info with you as you got to know them better

In DA2 your 6 companions talk only about one facet of their personality, relating to their side quest. They have some good banter with each other while wandering around but can't be bothered having a conversation with you unless they need your help.

[Wulfram]

The number of fetch quests (which were incidentally pretty common in origins) or the talkativeness of merchants are not core elements. Minor changes in style or weaknesses in implementation are not the removal of core elements.

"Decisions that matter" I'd agree was a core element that was lacking. And yes the voice acting did cut down on customisation of the PC, as I said in my original post.

Combat is at it's core basically very similar. Just with bad encounter design and different animation.

Is there any game out there that you could say was more similar to Dragon Age: Origins than Dragon Age 2 was?

[Horus Blackheart]

By games out there to you mean recent? cause I can think of a few.older titles. I don't think anyone's disputing that origins had fetch quests, its more the point that the majority of side quests in da2 were fetch quests. Not only that the implementation of them was really disconnecting as was already stated. Now I understand you like the game wulfram and you are entitled to its just that under the hood the intent and implementation of da2 when compared to origins the games core focus tow shifted away from the tenants a lot of people expected. It was designed with the intent of getting as large an audience as posable with a really short development cycle.

So while it can be argued that core da is still there alot of it is lost in the hyperbole. the games to busy going "look how awesome I am" exept when you look to closely it all starts to fall apart for alot of people. That said taking the game as a stand alone with no connection to origins at all. It was like Marmite, prity overage fair. Whats more concerning is the apparent trend bioware are following. it's sadly not about one disappointing game. But about the design focas and goals of late that's why the devs earlier question was important. and while he cant speak for the design choices in question, its important that these issues are communicated. I want bioware to not only listen but to learn from their mistakes and they can only do that if we are honest with them. Sometimes that means calling a spade a spade. with out the finger pointing and "entitlement" loop, that helps no one.

Modifié par Horus Blackheart, 13 août 2012 - 04:34 .

[King Cousland]

Choices didn't matter in Origins either. At most we got cosmetic changes or alternate epilogue slides. The only difference is that DA II didn't even try to create the illusion of choice. Dragon Age has never featured a branching story where your actions change the course of your journey, and it's that which I'd hope to see in the future.

[Wulfram]

@Horus I mean any game ever. To take the most obvious comparison, DA:O is, to me at least, a lot more similar to DA2 than it is to it's spiritual predecessor BG2. The combat system is based on talents on cooldowns, it's got cinematic conversations, the art and graphics are obviously closer to DA2 than BG2. BG2 nominally has race choice, but fundamentally it's a fixed background more like Hawke's than the Warden.

You put your finger on the main problem when you mention the short development problem.

The chief issues with the game were down to slipshod implemention, not the relatively minor changes to the core concepts. The shift from ME1 to ME2 was in most ways a bigger change than from DA:O to DA2, but though some changes were controversial, it was successful because ME2 was ultimately a very good game.

Modifié par Wulfram, 13 août 2012 - 04:55 .

[Horus Blackheart]

yeah the reactivity of the world in da2 was lacking. not bad in and of it's self but combined with the other stuff I mentioned it stacked up. the ending section was prity bad and I dont just mean the end I mean the endgame section you could tell how rushed they were.

[Horus Blackheart]

@Wulfram i'm looking at this from a pc users perspective and this is not intended to start a platform war its just for ref. another part of this uncomfortably is development focas me2 might have refined the combat system to be more of a twitch shooter whether its a "better game" is debatable and while console focas would seem to be more profitable for the suits it does limit development scope cause after all they cant be seen to be developing an optimal version.(its bad pr and hurts sales)

I was never a fan of flashy pew pew or hack slash loot personalty I want more out of my rpgs than that . I guess what i'm asking for is less shovel ware more care and attention with less pr spin. The pr miss handling has been the biggest part of the problem at the moment. Bioware are basic coasting on its reputation and fan good will and thats been hit hard lately hopefully they start to put things right with da 3 (if there is a da 3) .

Ironical the direction they dragged da2 in would have worked fine for a jade empire 2 but then I got what I was expecting from that game which is sort of the point here. Bioware needs to dial-down the spin and spend more of that cash on something radical like developing the game maybe?