131 réponses à ce sujet

[Thalamask]

IanPolaris wrote...
I wouldn't say that.  ME3 used the ME2 system which highlighted class difference, but I've found a huge difference between playing a Soldier and an Adept and an Engineer in ME.  What you are forgetting is that the different classes have different skills that you can open (and at different places).  That makes the classes play much differently even in ME1.  At best you are exaggerating.

I've played every class though ME1. Because powers are usable so infrequently (once per fight, twice if you drag your feet), ME1 combat really comes down to which gun you're going to spam. Even with training, Shotguns are worthless at anything other than point blank (and you only get 3-4 shots before you're standing around waiting for a cooldown). Sniper rifle sway is ridiculous until you get at least 9/10 ranks in it. It basically comes down to Adepts, Engineers, Vanguards, Sentinels and Infiltrators spam Pistol, Soldier spams Assault Rifle.

Doesn't matter whether you like your steak rare, medium or well done... you're still eating steak.

This was actually more a problem in ME2 and not ME1.  In ME1 you could play a "grey" shepard just fine as long as you bumped the Paragon (Diplomacy) and Renegade (Indimidate) skills.  If you did a new game playthrough, you could even maximize both and get both Paragon and Renegade options.  So your criticism should be leveled far more at ME2 and not ME1.  Me1's morality system was far from perfect but is wasn't as bad as you are trying to imply....and you DID have very interesting coversations and chosing a playthrough where you don't get the blue or red options IS AN OPTION.

As noted in the post, ME2 wasn't under discussion. It is meant as a demonstration that ME3 isn't as rubbish as everyone says, and that ME1 isn't perfection by any definition.

At the end of the day, no matter which game you played, you would have at best, five options in a decision conversation. That applies to all three games. What applies equally to all three is that the conversation options and decisions are... limited... at best. There were a ton of times in all three games when I didn't want to select any option, because they were all stupid, and my Shepard isn't a retard (or so I tell myself).

And that's why I consider the ME3 system superior to the ME1 system. In ME1, your choices were based on 1) have you made enough similar choices in the past (to unlock Charm / Intimidate levels) and 2) have you spent enough points on Charm / Intimidate. This leads to "I haven't spent enough skill points here so my only option is to act like a moron even though anybody with half a brain could work out a better solution".

In ME Shep was hetero.  That was a deliberate change by BW/EA in ME3 for what should be obvious reasons...and I'll leave it at that.  However, in ME1 you had three choices.  You could chose not to romance at all.  Frankly a good argument could be made with ME when compared with ME3 that less is more (especially since only the Liara and Garrus romances really seemed fleshed out).

I'll admit I'd forgotten about the "no romance" option. But it's hardly a differentiating factor, since you can do that in all the other games as well. That said... Mass Effect is an escalating pressure scenario. In ME1, you might have time to dally around. By ME3, every second is precious and there's no guarantee any of you will be alive tomorrow, so it makes sense (to me, at least) that non-ongoing relationships would have far more in common with flings resulting from a whim of the moment rather than a deep ongoing relationship.

Except usually the skills in the ME2-3 system are not created equal creating "obvious" choices.  Really this is an improvement of ME2's that was simply carried over.  I'll agree that ME3's system is better, but I can't give ME3 the credit here.  That credit belongs to ME2.

As noted previously, I wasn't discussing ME2, but since you bring it up... ME2 started the trend, and ME3 perfected it as you noted. But that only demonstrates ongoing improvement. In no way does it interfere with my main argument, which is that ME3 is not nearly as bad as people say, nor is ME1 as good. That's just nostalgia talking. ME1 is a good game. Excellent writing somewhat let down by poorish gameplay. ME3 is also a good game (excellent gameplay somewhat let down by poorish writing and an epic fail of an ending). ME2 is, to me, the best of both worlds, with neither writing nor gameplay poor enough to really be a talking point.

In addition, I'll disagree with your "obvious" choice argument. Much like any other FOTM, it's only "obvious" if that's where you want to go already.

Yes inventory mgt in ME1 was terrible but see above.  ME3 really just continued the improvement that ME2 already did.

And see above for me too... still more continous improvement demonstrating that ME3 isn't terribad and ME1 isn't perfect.

Actually they don't.  There are only a few times where squade mate choice makes any difference in ME3.  In ME, chosing to take (or not take) Liara or even Wrex on Noveria had a rather large conversational impact for much of the life of the game.  In ME3 with very, very few exceptions, the only difference is which squaddie gets to say the same line.

This is only true if you limit the experience to the conversations. If you include the whole journey (gameplay experiences etc.) then ME3 choices clearly have more impact than ME1 choices.

ME3 invaladited ALL choices not just in ME3 but 1 and 2 by reducing everything to a number (and that number didn't make a big difference either).  In ME1, you could preserve the status quo or you could pave the way for human dominance.  Also the WAY you did either made a big difference in how you were perceived at the very end.  This is a big PAYOFF choice that matters in ME1.  Tuchanka mattered very little really in the end.  Same goes for Rannoch.  Like the Rachni queen decision being taken away from you, ultimate it doesn't matter if you helped the Krogan or not (nor the Geth and/or Quarians or not) as long as you (somehow) got that magic EMS number.

You're still condemning the entire experience because of the ending. If you're going to do that, then ME1 and ME2 should be condemned right along with it because, as you said... nothing that happens there has any impact on what happens in the end either.

The same argument can apply to your ME1 or ME2 decisions. Makes no difference who you select as councillor. Udina will get it anyways. Makes no real difference whether you save the council or not. Even if you save them, they still won't really give you the time of day in ME2, and if you let 'em get killed, you just get a different looking bunch of douches.

At the end of the day, ME3 or no ME3, pretty much all your decisions are meaningless anyway.

But what was important to me was those "stop and think" moments, and they were in all three games.

ME1: Should I save the council or let them die. Should I sacrifice the many for the sake of the few? Or is this a real demonstration that humanity is ready to make the sacrifices required of an intergalactic power.

ME2: Should I rewrite the Geth or exterminate them? Who am I to decide the fate of an entire people. Would I want somebody rewriting me so that I didn't even know I'd been rewritten? Is there any moral answer to this question? Would I personally really prefer to go down fighting, or would I rather have the decision taken out of my hands.

ME3: Should I let Mordin fix the genophage sabotage? Even if the genophage is cured, there's no time to grow more Krogan before the Reapers are here wholesale. Even if we somehow manage to defeat the Reapers, am I simply spawning the start of the second Krogan Wars that will finish what the Reapers started?

No... the deep questions run all the way through all three games. Or through none of the games. Can't have it both ways.

Which the game completely invalidated which means they weren't real choice points at all.

-Polaris

See above.

[Snypy]

I agree with what Thalamask is saying. Most fans give ME1 too much credit. It's a great game with perfect writing, but it has its flaws. On the other hand, they tend to see only the bad aspects of ME3. I personally enjoyed the journey in ME3, even though there were moments when I couldn't affect what happens next (too much autodialogue). I really like how the characters matured compared with ME1.

I think that if the Priority: Earth mission had played out differently -- that is if our decisions throughout the trilogy had had a real impact on the events there -- then ME3 would've been looked at absolutely differently. Perhaps as a game equal to ME1.

(edit: typo)

Modifié par Snypy, 26 août 2012 - 01:42 .

[Terror_K]

Thalamask wrote...

I've played every class though ME1. Because powers are usable so infrequently (once per fight, twice if you drag your feet), ME1 combat really comes down to which gun you're going to spam. Even with training, Shotguns are worthless at anything other than point blank (and you only get 3-4 shots before you're standing around waiting for a cooldown). Sniper rifle sway is ridiculous until you get at least 9/10 ranks in it. It basically comes down to Adepts, Engineers, Vanguards, Sentinels and Infiltrators spam Pistol, Soldier spams Assault Rifle.

Doesn't matter whether you like your steak rare, medium or well done... you're still eating steak.

I'll personally admit that ME3 has a better system to a degree, but ME1 had more powers, and wasn't just focused solely on combat-related ones at that. ME2 and ME3 are both too shallow: everything is about combat, and there's so few powers that the range of builds is actually rather limited. The powers branching off is nice, and ME3 did take this a step further than ME2, which was good, but in the end they're still the same powers. Unlike most proper RPGs with trees that branch off to completely different powers, ME3 just has the same power and a bunch of fairly menial branches that don't change that much, and are often copy'n'pasted between them with common splits like "More Damage vs. More Enemies Hit" or "More Damage vs. More Defense" etc. I'm not saying it's bad per se, but it's not as deep as some claim, and the overabundance of focus on combat and combat alone makes the whole system seem awfully shallow and narrow. In a sense, we're closer to an old shoot-em up like Xenon II or Project X where you can buy powers to up your damage rather than a proper RPG system.

At the end of the day, no matter which game you played, you would have at best, five options in a decision conversation. That applies to all three games. What applies equally to all three is that the conversation options and decisions are... limited... at best. There were a ton of times in all three games when I didn't want to select any option, because they were all stupid, and my Shepard isn't a retard (or so I tell myself).

And that's why I consider the ME3 system superior to the ME1 system. In ME1, your choices were based on 1) have you made enough similar choices in the past (to unlock Charm / Intimidate levels) and 2) have you spent enough points on Charm / Intimidate. This leads to "I haven't spent enough skill points here so my only option is to act like a moron even though anybody with half a brain could work out a better solution".

ME1's system was far more of a proper RPG system and actually made sense. It was based on the idea that your character had to be either Charismatic, Intimidating or possibly both in order to make those calls, and that when building your Shepard you had to maybe sacrifice some combat prowess or something to build up either one of these stats. ME2 and ME3 both did away with that, which was a bad move IMO, and just another example of how the powers are now totally focused on combat. It's also responsible for Shepard going from a character that has to be built to be good at certain things in ME1 to a Shepard who can just be a Master of All Trades with no costs, trade-offs or consequences, which IMO is dumbing down. The same goes for the tech skills for instance. In most RPGs it's good to have such limitations in place because it means the player has to try and balance their builds more and not sacrifice too much combat for charisma or non-combat skills, and visa versa. ME2 and ME3 did away with this, making the game shallower and narrow of focus. Shepard was just plattered far too much in the other games and too much of the RPG was removed. ME2's system was the worst of the three in this regard, because it's Charm/Intimidate was self-feeding, which ended up putting stupid restrictions on the players ability to roleplay just because they hadn't killed or kissed X number of babies.

ME3 also falls flat on its face as far as what you're talking about due to a good number of reasons, including...

1) The complete lack of choices as a whole, limiting dialogue options more than the other two games, even without alignment factors.
2) The sheer amount of autodialogue resulting in Shepard saying stupid things automatically, as well as inconsistent things that contradict prior events and things that take control away from the player. ME1 may have had the odd stupid dialogue choice, but at least it was a choice.
3) The fact that there's only a miniscule amount of Charm/Intimidate opportunities in the whole game. Port Hanshan in ME1 alone has more options than the entirety of Mass Effect 3.
4) The fact that so many of them are non-choices that result in the exact same thing.
5) The fact that ME1 would often have multiple ways to solve a quest via dialogue, sometimes with multiple Charm/Intimidate changes for both sides. Combined with the fact that ME1 (and ME2) had more dialogue choices as a whole compared to ME3's mere two 95% of the time, this provides far more options for the player. Quests such as Samesh Bhatia's wife and the Hanar preacher could be handled in about five or six different ways. In ME3 you only ever get two at most, and quite often not even that with sidequests.

I'll admit I'd forgotten about the "no romance" option. But it's hardly a differentiating factor, since you can do that in all the other games as well. That said... Mass Effect is an escalating pressure scenario. In ME1, you might have time to dally around. By ME3, every second is precious and there's no guarantee any of you will be alive tomorrow, so it makes sense (to me, at least) that non-ongoing relationships would have far more in common with flings resulting from a whim of the moment rather than a deep ongoing relationship.

ME3's romances were fairly lazy as a whole. If you'd romanced somebody from ME2 who wasn't in ME1 as well, you got a major short end of the stick. Even with ME1 L.I's things aren't that deep. I romaced Liara in ME1, and yet the first time I spoke with her on The Normandy there wasn't even a proper conversation. Devs also made a big deal out of the whole "cheating thing" but the whole issue is sloppily handled if you do cheat on an ME1 L.I. For example, if you're romancing Liara and decide to hook up with Traynor, there's no conflict or discussion or choice at all... Liara just gets snarky and dumps you and that's the end of that. And not even in a proper conversation. Kaidan and Ashley are kept out of a good portion of the game too.

On the plus side, the love scenes were closer to their ME1 stylings rather than the cheesy, "afraid of Fox News"feeling ME2 ones had. I think ME2 did the romances themselves better if you ignore this though. ME3's weren't awful by any means, but they didn't feel as deep as they should have been.

As noted previously, I wasn't discussing ME2, but since you bring it up... ME2 started the trend, and ME3 perfected it as you noted. But that only demonstrates ongoing improvement. In no way does it interfere with my main argument, which is that ME3 is not nearly as bad as people say, nor is ME1 as good. That's just nostalgia talking. ME1 is a good game. Excellent writing somewhat let down by poorish gameplay. ME3 is also a good game (excellent gameplay somewhat let down by poorish writing and an epic fail of an ending). ME2 is, to me, the best of both worlds, with neither writing nor gameplay poor enough to really be a talking point.

ME2 was far too shallow as far as basic gameplay goes. Too much TPS and barely any RPG at all. ME3 nailed the combat side of things and did some of the basic statistical RPG stuff justice, while ME2 had the dialogue and roleplaying downpat. Almost everything else I'd award to ME1, because it was at least trying to be an RPG, even if it didn't always pull it off. ME3 could have been the best had it stuck with ME2's way of going about dialogue and roleplaying and brought back non-combat RPG elements, but it didn't. And I honestly don't get why BioWare decided to change so much of the dialogue and roleplaying stuff considering ME2 had almost nailed it, with about the only real probelm being the bad self-feeding Paragon/Renegade stuff.

And see above for me too... still more continous improvement demonstrating that ME3 isn't terribad and ME1 isn't perfect.

ME1 was the only game that really even had an inventory. ME2's was too shallow, and ME3's was an improvement for sure, but still lacking. The upgrade system needed a bit more depth, and we should have got Omni-Tools and Biotic Amps back, IMO. Ammo mods should have also returned and powers be canned.

This is only true if you limit the experience to the conversations. If you include the whole journey (gameplay experiences etc.) then ME3 choices clearly have more impact than ME1 choices.

Uh... not really. But then in ME3, no choices really matter. And that's purely ME3's fault, not ME1's.

You're still condemning the entire experience because of the ending. If you're going to do that, then ME1 and ME2 should be condemned right along with it because, as you said... nothing that happens there has any impact on what happens in the end either.

The same argument can apply to your ME1 or ME2 decisions. Makes no difference who you select as councillor. Udina will get it anyways. Makes no real difference whether you save the council or not. Even if you save them, they still won't really give you the time of day in ME2, and if you let 'em get killed, you just get a different looking bunch of douches.

No. Not at all. You couldn't be more wrong.

For starters, it's not just the ending with ME3, it's the whole damn game. Nothing you do matters at all, not only just in what so-called "choices" you make in ME3, but all the choices you made in ME1 and ME2 too. We were told there was going to be varied and unique consequences for them and that our choices would matter, but they just don't, because BioWare got lazy making the final entry. You can't blame the other entries because the choices weren't really supposed to pay-off until the last one.

ME1 was pretty much purely choices, with only a few small consequences within the game itself. It was designed that way as the first chapter, because the consequences were supposed to be reflected in the following games. ME2 was supposed to be a mix, with a few consequences and also some choices. I think that ME2 suffered from a lack of true variation with a few minor exceptions here and there too to be honest, but I knew things couldn't be too story-altering because there was still another final part to come. It was up to ME3 to illustrate the consequences because that was it's job, and that where the choices should have mattered, and with nowhere else to go there's no real excuse why they shouldn't have.

ME1's job is to set things up, ME2's is to carry things on and bridge the gap between the start and conclusion, and ME3's job is to illustrate the outcomes from the prior two parts. You can't blame ME1 and ME2 for not doing a job they were never meant to do in the first place.

But what was important to me was those "stop and think" moments, and they were in all three games.

ME1: Should I save the council or let them die. Should I sacrifice the many for the sake of the few? Or is this a real demonstration that humanity is ready to make the sacrifices required of an intergalactic power.

ME2: Should I rewrite the Geth or exterminate them? Who am I to decide the fate of an entire people. Would I want somebody rewriting me so that I didn't even know I'd been rewritten? Is there any moral answer to this question? Would I personally really prefer to go down fighting, or would I rather have the decision taken out of my hands.

ME3: Should I let Mordin fix the genophage sabotage? Even if the genophage is cured, there's no time to grow more Krogan before the Reapers are here wholesale. Even if we somehow manage to defeat the Reapers, am I simply spawning the start of the second Krogan Wars that will finish what the Reapers started?

No... the deep questions run all the way through all three games. Or through none of the games. Can't have it both ways.

Yes they did. The problem was, the pay-offs were incredibly weak and lazy, with little to no real variations between them. With each game there were also less choices and ways of going about things as well. With ME1 there were several missions I could accomplish through various means, such as getting the garage pass on Noveria, which alone has no less than 7 solutions, all with various outcomes and consequences, different content and dialogue and even different combat encounters. Combine that with Peak 15 having a couple of different paths to get to Benezia and you've got an entire mission in ME1 that has 14+ ways of doing it. In ME3 everything is the same until the end, and only then do you make the choice, usually to side with one side or another. And that's only in the better quests like Tuchanka and Rannoch. Menae, Thessia, Sur'Kesh and almost everything else barely have choices at all.

In either case, the problem remains: a lot of deep questions and interesting situations, but in the end it doesn't matter, because the outcomes are essentially the same and all your choices are reduced to a silly, arbitrary number rather than any proper consequences. ME3 teaches us nothing you did matters and that nobody is special because there's almost always some weak substitute to step in and do things that the otherwise alive character would have done anyway. In Legion's case, it's literally the same character. The new Council may as well just be clones of the old one because they do exactly the same things. The Rachni Queen choice is a horrid joke as we still get a Rachni Queen anyway and still the same mission, just with some slightly differing dialogue.

All in all, ME3 is the most linear and choice-free of the bunch. Not only can players barely roleplaying their characters due to a complete lack of any real options and too much autodialogue, but there's barely any proper choices, the whole game is linear, and all our choices just get railroaded and turned into a stupid number instead of proper consequences.

Snypy wrote...

I think that if the Priority: Earth mission had played out differently -- that is if our decisions throughout the trilogy had had a real impact on the events there -- then ME3 would've been looked at absolutely differently. Perhaps as a game equal to ME1.

No... it was never going to get there. Not with all that autodialogue and a complete lack of dialogue choices that make it impossible to roleplay Shepard properly, as well as an almost total focus on combat, completely linear story where the player is constantly railroaded and awful plot devices like The Crucible, an overabundance of Cerberus and the Star Child. Again, ME3's ending and final moments were only a small portion of what was wrong with ME3. ME3's issues aren't so much problems as they are a symptom of a much bigger problem: BioWare's way of going about making games lately.

Modifié par Terror_K, 26 août 2012 - 02:13 .

[Thalamask]

Terror_K wrote...
Stuff

You have some good points, but I think we're going to have to agree to disagree.

To me, all three Mass Effect games are adequate to good. None of them are excellent (as many people seem to think ME1 is) and none of them are terrible (as many seem to think of ME3). Except the ending. Even  being a blind lemur, suffering from cocaine withdrawal and dying of scurvy wouldn't be an excuse for that ending.

At the end of the day, to be honest, I don't really consider any of them to be RPG's. They may have RPG elements, they may have different elements in each game but, at the end of the day the choices were too limited for me to consider them RPG's.

Even ME1 was less about role-playing, and more about following a pre-defined story arc that you could attach your own flavour of topping to.

Where's the Shepard that, half way through ME1 said "You know what? Sod this. You don't want to listen to me, you can sort your own problems out." and went and sat on a beach somewhere with a mohito.

Where's the Shepard that, at the very start of ME2, went to the Alliance and said "Right. Here I am. Gimme the support you should have done, so I can get out there and save people, or I'll go play with those who will." You get no choice. You're gonna stick with Cerberus 'cause that's how the story goes.

Where's the Shepard that, during the events of ME3 said "Hey! They're machines! Pop 'em with an EMP, then we'll just go aboard while they're rebooting and offload a nuke or three. See how they like indigestion!" Nope. Can't do that either. We wouldn't be able to foist our lame-ass Deus Ex Machina off on you then, would we?!

No. Mass Effect is not an RPG. They're good games, they have RPG elements, but quibbling about little details like whether having a red / blue conversation option means you have choice is ultimately totally missing the point (and I'll admit I'm as guilty of this as the next dude - it's easy to get buried in details and miss the big picture).

Modifié par Thalamask, 26 août 2012 - 03:10 .

[Snypy]

Terror_K wrote...

No... it was never going to get there. Not with all that autodialogue and a complete lack of dialogue choices that make it impossible to roleplay Shepard properly, as well as an almost total focus on combat, completely linear story where the player is constantly railroaded and awful plot devices like The Crucible, an overabundance of Cerberus and the Star Child. Again, ME3's ending and final moments were only a small portion of what was wrong with ME3. ME3's issues aren't so much problems as they are a symptom of a much bigger problem: BioWare's way of going about making games lately.

I guess you're right about that. It wouldn't make the game equal to ME1 in terms of story. But the entire trilogy would be a lot more replayable and enjoyable, for me at least.

The problem is that there is no other franchise similar to Mass Effect. So, although we may not agree with everything BioWare did in ME3, we don't have many choices. Because it's not like ordering a pizza from a local delivery shop. If you don't like their cheese pizza, you can order a better one from another store. It doesn't work this way with Mass Effect games. All we can do is to complain and hope that the writers notice something isn't right.

By the way, for whatever it's worth, I think BioWare should've hired you as a consultant for ME3.

Modifié par Snypy, 26 août 2012 - 04:58 .

[Overdosing]

EA finished off the Mass Effect series. New IPs. Dragon Age. End of Story.

[Grub Killer8016]

Overdosing wrote...

EA finished off the Mass Effect series. New IPs. Dragon Age. End of Story.

That's why I was cautious with EA jumping in mid-way through the trilogy. They did they're magic, ruin and bitterly end a trilogy. Thankfully, Bioware has said that the universe doesn't end with ME3, so I hope they detatch from the devils at EA and bring ME back to it's glory.

[LordMarrick]

What I would like to see is Mass effect game's with a dragon age choose your race set up or maybe a third person action game centered around Biotics or some metal gear type stealth with the infitators. there is so much left in the ME univirse it would be a waste not to use it more out side the main trilorgy story.

[crypticcat 2o2p]

Snypy wrote...

I agree with what Thalamask is saying. Most fans give ME1 too much credit. It's a great game with perfect writing, but it has its flaws. On the other hand, they tend to see only the bad aspects of ME3. I personally enjoyed the journey in ME3, even though there were moments when I couldn't affect what happens next (too much autodialogue). I really like how the characters matured compared with ME1.

I think that if the Priority: Earth mission had played out differently -- that is if our decisions throughout the trilogy had had a real impact on the events there -- then ME3 would've been looked at absolutely differently. Perhaps as a game equal to ME1.

(edit: typo)

I ponder this often. How could decisions have had an impact on the final battle? Being nice to Conrad Verner meaning no reaper on Rannoch? What do people actually envision when they want all decisions in the trilogy to weigh in on the ending?

[Thalamask]

crypticcat 2o2p wrote...

I ponder this often. How could decisions have had an impact on the final battle? Being nice to Conrad Verner meaning no reaper on Rannoch? What do people actually envision when they want all decisions in the trilogy to weigh in on the ending?

It's not about every decision having an impact on the ending, it's about those decisions that should impact the ending, but are being utterly ignored.

For example, if you work with Legion and Tali and bring peace to the Quarians and Geth, why the hell can you not point that out to Space Boy?

Or if you look at the Charge of the Beam Brigade... where were those hordes of Krogan soldiers who'd joined you because you cured the genophage? Why weren't they covering your approach (and if they where, why the hell were you never shown them). Where was the Volus bombing fleet? Why weren't they keeping the Reaper busy so you could get to the beam without getting shot in the face?

Where was Tali, the AI Hacker, or any of the newly advanced Geth awesome-dudes. Why weren't they with you on the Citadel? While you kept Space Boy busy, they could have been busily rewriting his control systems and making the Reapers shoot each other, or something.

There were plenty of opportunities for them to demonstrate the impacts of our decisions ingame, but because they don't seem to understand that their game is... well... a game, not a gorram' movie! they didn't take any of them.

[Snypy]

Thalamask wrote...

It's not about every decision having an impact on the ending, it's about those decisions that should impact the ending, but are being utterly ignored.

For example, if you work with Legion and Tali and bring peace to the Quarians and Geth, why the hell can you not point that out to Space Boy?

Or if you look at the Charge of the Beam Brigade... where were those hordes of Krogan soldiers who'd joined you because you cured the genophage? Why weren't they covering your approach (and if they where, why the hell were you never shown them). Where was the Volus bombing fleet? Why weren't they keeping the Reaper busy so you could get to the beam without getting shot in the face?

Where was Tali, the AI Hacker, or any of the newly advanced Geth awesome-dudes. Why weren't they with you on the Citadel? While you kept Space Boy busy, they could have been busily rewriting his control systems and making the Reapers shoot each other, or something.

There were plenty of opportunities for them to demonstrate the impacts of our decisions ingame, but because they don't seem to understand that their game is... well... a game, not a gorram' movie! they didn't take any of them.

Exactly. I couldn't have said it better myself.

[Terror_K]

Snypy wrote...

By the way, for whatever it's worth, I think BioWare should've hired you as a consultant for ME3.

Thanks.

I can tell you that if I had been in charge of ME3, there would have been about 10 times as many dialogue choices, and that's if the game was otherwise the same content, so there would be even more again because I would have had completely different content if the Rachni Queen was killed vs. whether she was alive, had very different Sur'Kesh and Tuchanka sections depending on things like Mordin and Wrex's status, and bigger roles for most of the ME3 companions. Ashley and Kaidan wouldn't have been out of more than half the damn game in hospital either (not to mention Ashley wouldn't be Miranda 2). Each location and quest would have more to it, with multiple ways to perform said quest. There'd be vehicle sections (e.g. I would have had a vehicle section on Menae), more hubs like Illium and Thessia would be about twice as big and have more missions to it. Shiala and Gianna Parasini would have definitely been present too. The Journal would have worked. The face import working would have been priority one. There'd be no Kinect or MP (the latter may have been added as a DLC though) and sidequests would consist of a mix of ME1 UNC quests, ME2 N7 quests and Overlord main hub style locations and missions. Every conversation with a squaddie or quest-giver would have dialogue and cinematics. There's be a lot more Charm/Intimidate opportunities. Ammo mods would be mods again and not powers, and there'd be more armour customisation, for Shepard and companions, as well as the return of Medi-Gel and Omni-Tools.

And most importantly, Every. Choice. Would. Matter.

There'd be no Starchild, and there'd be far more endings, none of which would be like the ones we got, and all of which would be completely dependent on your choices prior to the climax of the ending, so to get them you would not only get one or two final choices, but the choices put before you would also be completely dependent on the choices you'd made before, and not merely the same options no matter what you did.

[Thalamask]

Terror_K wrote...

Snypy wrote...

By the way, for whatever it's worth, I think BioWare should've hired you as a consultant for ME3.

Thanks.

I can tell you that if I had been in charge of ME3, there would have been about 10 times as many dialogue choices, and that's if the game was otherwise the same content, so there would be even more again because I would have had completely different content if the Rachni Queen was killed vs. whether she was alive, had very different Sur'Kesh and Tuchanka sections depending on things like Mordin and Wrex's status, and bigger roles for most of the ME3 companions. Ashley and Kaidan wouldn't have been out of more than half the damn game in hospital either (not to mention Ashley wouldn't be Miranda 2). Each location and quest would have more to it, with multiple ways to perform said quest. There'd be vehicle sections (e.g. I would have had a vehicle section on Menae), more hubs like Illium and Thessia would be about twice as big and have more missions to it. Shiala and Gianna Parasini would have definitely been present too. The Journal would have worked. The face import working would have been priority one. There'd be no Kinect or MP (the latter may have been added as a DLC though) and sidequests would consist of a mix of ME1 UNC quests, ME2 N7 quests and Overlord main hub style locations and missions. Every conversation with a squaddie or quest-giver would have dialogue and cinematics. There's be a lot more Charm/Intimidate opportunities. Ammo mods would be mods again and not powers, and there'd be more armour customisation, for Shepard and companions, as well as the return of Medi-Gel and Omni-Tools.

And most importantly, Every. Choice. Would. Matter.

There'd be no Starchild, and there'd be far more endings, none of which would be like the ones we got, and all of which would be completely dependent on your choices prior to the climax of the ending, so to get them you would not only get one or two final choices, but the choices put before you would also be completely dependent on the choices you'd made before, and not merely the same options no matter what you did.

I hate to say this, but.... while some of your ideas are great, you've fallen into the classic "not actually a game designer" trap of essentially creating an utterly impractical wish-list. Tons more content and dialog options would be awesome, but unless you've got a budget somewhere in the region of the United States annual deficit, there's simply no way you could ever implement all that stuff.

As good as some of your ideas are, I'm glad that you were not in charge of ME3. If you'd actually tried for the above, chances are that ME3 would never have been released.

[EpicBoot2daFace]

Hopefully the future includes better graphics and animations. Both are pretty poor in the ME games.

I hope it's closer to this.

[Thalamask]

EpicBoot2daFace wrote...

Hopefully the future includes better graphics and animations. Both are pretty poor in the ME games.

I hope it's closer to this.

Personally, I totally disagree with this. Graphics are more than good enough at current gen. I think far too many studio's spend too much time trying (and usually failing) to achieve some sort of photorealism, and forget about actually making the game, you know... fun and engaging without resorting to Skinner Box tricks.

[EpicBoot2daFace]

Thalamask wrote...

EpicBoot2daFace wrote...

Hopefully the future includes better graphics and animations. Both are pretty poor in the ME games.

I hope it's closer to this.

Personally, I totally disagree with this. Graphics are more than good enough at current gen. I think far too many studio's spend too much time trying (and usually failing) to achieve some sort of photorealism, and forget about actually making the game, you know... fun and engaging without resorting to Skinner Box tricks.

They are two totally different things. Some people do graphics and others work on gameplay. One doesn't have a negative effect on the other in most cases. At best, graphics should complement gameplay, story, and characters. If you are happy with unnecessary black crush, poor textures, poor lighting and shadows, poor character modeling, and jarring animations, etc, just stick with what you got.

But don't knock people who want improvement in those areas.

Edit: BTW, that's a PS3 game. It is current gen.

Modifié par EpicBoot2daFace, 27 août 2012 - 05:10 .

[Thalamask]

EpicBoot2daFace wrote...

Thalamask wrote...

EpicBoot2daFace wrote...

Hopefully the future includes better graphics and animations. Both are pretty poor in the ME games.

I hope it's closer to this.

Personally, I totally disagree with this. Graphics are more than good enough at current gen. I think far too many studio's spend too much time trying (and usually failing) to achieve some sort of photorealism, and forget about actually making the game, you know... fun and engaging without resorting to Skinner Box tricks.

They are two totally different things. Some people do graphics and others work on gameplay. One doesn't have a negative effect on the other in most cases. At best, graphics should complement gameplay, story, and characters. If you are happy with unnecessary black crush, poor textures, poor lighting and shadows, poor character modeling, and jarring animations, etc, just stick with what you got.

But don't knock people who want improvement in those areas.

Edit: BTW, that's a PS3 game. It is current gen.

You do realise that, although two different teams do graphics and story stuff, they both get paid out of the same budget, right? The more money spent on one, the less on the other.

ME3 may not have the eye-candy that comes with something like the Cry-Engine, but unlike Crysis, it actually has something resembling a story.

BW already has trouble keeping all the ME balls in the air. Imaging what a shocking disaster it would be if they spent even more time on, let's face it, nothing more than an extra layer of eye-candy. The graphics could be improved, but there are so many more things that need improvement first.

[EpicBoot2daFace]

Thalamask wrote...

EpicBoot2daFace wrote...

Thalamask wrote...

EpicBoot2daFace wrote...

Hopefully the future includes better graphics and animations. Both are pretty poor in the ME games.

I hope it's closer to this.

Personally, I totally disagree with this. Graphics are more than good enough at current gen. I think far too many studio's spend too much time trying (and usually failing) to achieve some sort of photorealism, and forget about actually making the game, you know... fun and engaging without resorting to Skinner Box tricks.

They are two totally different things. Some people do graphics and others work on gameplay. One doesn't have a negative effect on the other in most cases. At best, graphics should complement gameplay, story, and characters. If you are happy with unnecessary black crush, poor textures, poor lighting and shadows, poor character modeling, and jarring animations, etc, just stick with what you got.

But don't knock people who want improvement in those areas.

Edit: BTW, that's a PS3 game. It is current gen.

You do realise that, although two different teams do graphics and story stuff, they both get paid out of the same budget, right? The more money spent on one, the less on the other.

ME3 may not have the eye-candy that comes with something like the Cry-Engine, but unlike Crysis, it actually has something resembling a story.

BW already has trouble keeping all the ME balls in the air. Imaging what a shocking disaster it would be if they spent even more time on, let's face it, nothing more than an extra layer of eye-candy. The graphics could be improved, but there are so many more things that need improvement first.

I'm not a game dev, so I don't know how the budget works. But I don't see why they can't do it but other devs can.

Crysis does have a story. It isn't very good, but that has nothing to do with it's graphics.

Yes, what a disaster it would be if they spent more time polishing the game. The horror!

[Thalamask]

EpicBoot2daFace wrote...

I'm not a game dev, so I don't know how the budget works. But I don't see why they can't do it but other devs can.

Crysis does have a story. It isn't very good, but that has nothing to do with it's graphics.

Yes, what a disaster it would be if they spent more time polishing the game. The horror!

You don't have to be a game dev to realise that if you have £100 to spend, and you spend £80 of it making flashy eye-candy, then you've only got £20 to spend on everything else. This is not rocket science.

And Crysis only has a story if you consider a half-page of drunken rambling along the lines of ZOMG-ALIENS-SHOOT-THEY-ASS to be story. Personally, I don't. They spent most of their budget on flash and bling and it shows.

As you've already noted, you're not a game dev. Neither am I, but it doesn't take a genius to realise that significantly improving the graphics engine and creating a ton more art assets =/= polishing. Polishing is taking what's already there and smoothing it out, making sure it runs smoothly, has no bugs etc. Excl. MP, ME3 is pretty damn polished, if you allow for the fact that, in certain places, they've been trying to polish a turd.

[magneticpolarshift]

Grizzly46 wrote...

Autodialog is one thing (when starting my first playthrough of ME3 I thought I had made some mistake in the settings), but the entire future of the Mass Effect universe?

Nope, its dead. Remember, Bioware is a company, and a company's first task is to make money and keeping a good profile (thus generating a good revenue). The ME3 has gotten so much flak its unbeliavable, even forcing Bioware to make an extended ending - which probably cost a lot of money). If ME3 was an exception it could be ok, but remember how Dragon Age II was recieved? The downward spiralling Bioware is in has not stopped.

This means that Bioware will milk ME3 for all its worth, churning out a couple of DLCs but then move on to other projects which might be better recieved. Their reputation has taken a couple of severe blows the last few years, and it will take time to repair.

And as have been said in other threads: Shepard's saga ended in ME3, period.

His saga may very well be over, but the sheer amount of possiblities to breathe new life into ME, is to make another ME title that was every bit as enjoyable as ME1 minus the clunkiness.

[Terror_K]

Thalamask wrote...

Terror_K wrote...

Snypy wrote...

By the way, for whatever it's worth, I think BioWare should've hired you as a consultant for ME3.

Thanks.

I can tell you that if I had been in charge of ME3, there would have been about 10 times as many dialogue choices, and that's if the game was otherwise the same content, so there would be even more again because I would have had completely different content if the Rachni Queen was killed vs. whether she was alive, had very different Sur'Kesh and Tuchanka sections depending on things like Mordin and Wrex's status, and bigger roles for most of the ME3 companions. Ashley and Kaidan wouldn't have been out of more than half the damn game in hospital either (not to mention Ashley wouldn't be Miranda 2). Each location and quest would have more to it, with multiple ways to perform said quest. There'd be vehicle sections (e.g. I would have had a vehicle section on Menae), more hubs like Illium and Thessia would be about twice as big and have more missions to it. Shiala and Gianna Parasini would have definitely been present too. The Journal would have worked. The face import working would have been priority one. There'd be no Kinect or MP (the latter may have been added as a DLC though) and sidequests would consist of a mix of ME1 UNC quests, ME2 N7 quests and Overlord main hub style locations and missions. Every conversation with a squaddie or quest-giver would have dialogue and cinematics. There's be a lot more Charm/Intimidate opportunities. Ammo mods would be mods again and not powers, and there'd be more armour customisation, for Shepard and companions, as well as the return of Medi-Gel and Omni-Tools.

And most importantly, Every. Choice. Would. Matter.

There'd be no Starchild, and there'd be far more endings, none of which would be like the ones we got, and all of which would be completely dependent on your choices prior to the climax of the ending, so to get them you would not only get one or two final choices, but the choices put before you would also be completely dependent on the choices you'd made before, and not merely the same options no matter what you did.

I hate to say this, but.... while some of your ideas are great, you've fallen into the classic "not actually a game designer" trap of essentially creating an utterly impractical wish-list. Tons more content and dialog options would be awesome, but unless you've got a budget somewhere in the region of the United States annual deficit, there's simply no way you could ever implement all that stuff.

As good as some of your ideas are, I'm glad that you were not in charge of ME3. If you'd actually tried for the above, chances are that ME3 would never have been released.

That may be, but I wouldn't have wasted time on pointless content like Allers and Vega, nor MP and Kinect support. I would have also purposefully taken twice as long as BioWare did to make the game, largely because it's the final part of the trilogy. Considering the length of the game would be largely the same as it is now (slightly longer for larger sections on Menae and Thessia, more hubs and more in-depth sidequests) it would be of a relatively similar scale to that of Dragon Age: Origins as far as content goes. BioWare made that without too many issues, and that was before they had EA's backing and money. It's completely feasible, it would just take more time and effort. I'm not talking about making something anywhere near the scale of TOR, but with a little more scope and size than ME3 as it is now, but far more depth to both the gameplay, and the narrative.

[Thalamask]

Terror_K wrote...
That may be, but I wouldn't have wasted time on pointless content like Allers and Vega, nor MP and Kinect support. I would have also purposefully taken twice as long as BioWare did to make the game, largely because it's the final part of the trilogy. Considering the length of the game would be largely the same as it is now (slightly longer for larger sections on Menae and Thessia, more hubs and more in-depth sidequests) it would be of a relatively similar scale to that of Dragon Age: Origins as far as content goes. BioWare made that without too many issues, and that was before they had EA's backing and money. It's completely feasible, it would just take more time and effort. I'm not talking about making something anywhere near the scale of TOR, but with a little more scope and size than ME3 as it is now, but far more depth to both the gameplay, and the narrative.

They might have gotten EA's money and backing (which would let them spend more time on it), but the side effect of that is that they have to dance to EA's tune (which will stop them spending the time they could have). That means that the game will be rushed out before it's ready, watered down to appeal to the lowest common denominator and minimum-work-maximum-return stuff (like the MP) will get tacked on. It's just the way things go. Can't have your cake and eat it or something.

[Snypy]

Thalamask wrote...

Terror_K wrote...

Thanks.

I can tell you that if I had been in charge of ME3, there would have been about 10 times as many dialogue choices, and that's if the game was otherwise the same content, so there would be even more again because I would have had completely different content if the Rachni Queen was killed vs. whether she was alive, had very different Sur'Kesh and Tuchanka sections depending on things like Mordin and Wrex's status, and bigger roles for most of the ME3 companions. Ashley and Kaidan wouldn't have been out of more than half the damn game in hospital either (not to mention Ashley wouldn't be Miranda 2). Each location and quest would have more to it, with multiple ways to perform said quest. There'd be vehicle sections (e.g. I would have had a vehicle section on Menae), more hubs like Illium and Thessia would be about twice as big and have more missions to it. Shiala and Gianna Parasini would have definitely been present too. The Journal would have worked. The face import working would have been priority one. There'd be no Kinect or MP (the latter may have been added as a DLC though) and sidequests would consist of a mix of ME1 UNC quests, ME2 N7 quests and Overlord main hub style locations and missions. Every conversation with a squaddie or quest-giver would have dialogue and cinematics. There's be a lot more Charm/Intimidate opportunities. Ammo mods would be mods again and not powers, and there'd be more armour customisation, for Shepard and companions, as well as the return of Medi-Gel and Omni-Tools.

And most importantly, Every. Choice. Would. Matter.

There'd be no Starchild, and there'd be far more endings, none of which would be like the ones we got, and all of which would be completely dependent on your choices prior to the climax of the ending, so to get them you would not only get one or two final choices, but the choices put before you would also be completely dependent on the choices you'd made before, and not merely the same options no matter what you did.

I hate to say this, but.... while some of your ideas are great, you've fallen into the classic "not actually a game designer" trap of essentially creating an utterly impractical wish-list. Tons more content and dialog options would be awesome, but unless you've got a budget somewhere in the region of the United States annual deficit, there's simply no way you could ever implement all that stuff.

As good as some of your ideas are, I'm glad that you were not in charge of ME3. If you'd actually tried for the above, chances are that ME3 would never have been released.

I didn't actually say that Terror_K should be in charge of the entire project. I don't agree with all of his ideas, either. (ME3 is a good game in my opinion.) But most of them would've made the game better. It just seems that there were too many people in the ME3 development team who wanted to go against everything that ME1-2 stood for.

As for the wish-list, it's not necessarily a bad thing. Yes, it's quite unrealistic now (from the business point of view), but there would have had to be compromises along the way. Ultimately, only a handful of his ideas would've been implemented into the final game. Even so, fans would've benefited a lot from the improvements.

EpicBoot2daFace wrote...

Hopefully the future includes better graphics and animations. Both are pretty poor in the ME games.

I hope it's closer to this.

Photorealism is extremely difficult to make right -- devs have to spend countless hours working on their characters so that they show genuine emotions. Otherwise, it looks very, very odd. To put it in a nutshell, when the character should express sadness, it's no longer enough to just make her cry and/or sigh, but virtually every muscle has an important role to play. (Well, it's pretty difficult to make characters show emotions even now -- without photorealism -- but I needed to exaggerate it so that you would understand.)

Overall, I'm happy with graphics and animations in ME3. They are very good. The only thing I would change is the environment shadows which look terribly sometimes (especially on the Normandy).

EDIT: Check out this tweak guide if you want to have the best experience from playing ME3.

Modifié par Snypy, 27 août 2012 - 01:03 .

[Thalamask]

Snypy wrote...

I didn't actually say that Terror_K should be in charge of the entire project. I don't agree with all of his ideas, either. (ME3 is a good game in my opinion.) But most of them would've made the game better. It just seems that there were too many people in the ME3 development team who wanted to go against everything that ME1-2 stood for.

As for the wish-list, it's not necessarily a bad thing. Yes, it's quite unrealistic now (from the business point of view), but there would have had to be compromises along the way. Ultimately, only a handful of his ideas would've been implemented into the final game. Even so, fans would've benefited a lot from the improvements.

I'm not sure how much of the changes to ME2/3 were as a result of Bioware people, and how much was as a result of EA strategy (bland products to appeal to lowest common denominator).

[Justin2k]

I really would like them to just lay it to rest. I loved Mass Effect but I don't have any faith in Bioware looking after these characters and places anymore.