97 réponses à ce sujet

[deuce985]

While I respect your opinion, I'll also respectfully disagree.

I don't see the need to waste resources on something like that. We're playing a game...not watching a movie. No offense to Bioware or anyone else in the industry but their writing isn't comparable with the best literature out there. I'm not trying to down David or the other writers on Bioware. I realize that gaming has so much it needs to put in, they can't solely focus on writing. It works because a game has to do more than a movie or book.

I appreciate Bioware is trying to expand the storytelling in gaming and they do it better than anyone else. Gaming still has a long way to go before their writing is respected like books. Bioware is one of the few devs trying to help our industry this way. I find the best experiences come from games that motivate me through story but still have solid gameplay. It's the perfect merging. This is where gaming has the potential to surpass both books and movies. A great story doesn't necessarily have to be told through heavy dialogue either. It's how the story is told.

When you take the gameplay away, you take the one thing that separates it from movie/book mediums...

Am I reading what you said right? It sounded like you want the game to play itself except story sequences. Much like a Dear Esther? Which technically isn't a game but a great experience/interactive story/work of art.

Modifié par deuce985, 24 août 2012 - 07:07 .

[MichaelStuart]

deuce985 wrote...

While I respect your opinion, I'll also respectfully disagree.

I don't see the need to waste resources on something like that. We're playing a game...not watching a movie. No offense to Bioware or anyone else in the industry but their writing isn't comparable with the best literature out there. I'm not trying to down David or the other writers on Bioware. I realize that gaming has so much it needs to put in, they can't solely focus on writing. It works because a game has to do more than a movie or book.

I appreciate Bioware is trying to expand the storytelling in gaming and they do it better than anyone else. Gaming still has a long way to go before their writing is respected like books. Bioware is one of the few devs trying to help our industry this way. I find the best experiences come from games that motivate me through story but still have solid gameplay. It's the perfect merging. This is where gaming has the potential to surpass both books and movies. A great story doesn't necessarily have to be told through heavy dialogue either. It's how the story is told.

When you take the gameplay away, you take the one thing that separates it from movie/book mediums...

Am I reading what you said right? It sounded like you want the game to play itself except story sequences. Much like a Dear Esther? Which technically isn't a game but a great experience/interactive story/work of art.

You ever play a choose your own adventure story? I see a story mode playing out like one of those.

[Wulfram]

"The Walking Dead" does a decent job of being an RPG without combat

[Anvos]

In response to OP

*Sten Voice*

"No."

[ElitePinecone]

Wulfram wrote...

"The Walking Dead" does a decent job of being an RPG without combat

Yeah, but that at least allows you to walk around and explore.

Having the game shunt you from encounter to encounter would make a "gameworld" pointless. It'd be solely cutscenes and conversations - and how does game design work when quests require exploration and finding certain objects?

Making combat trivially easy is a good option to have - I liked ME3's Story Mode for quickly blasting through battles to get to conversations - but what this thread proposes is a bit too far, not to mention nearly impossible to implement. 

[MichaelStuart]

I confused, when has there been exploration in Dragon Age?
Is being able to walk around a small linear map really classed as exploration?

Modifié par MichaelStuart, 25 août 2012 - 11:03 .

[Uccio]

No. Rent a movie.

[ElitePinecone]

MichaelStuart wrote...

I confused, when has there been exploration in Dragon Age?
Is being able to walk around a small linear map really classed as exploration?

Yep - and not all the maps have even been linear. The Wounded Coast had a bunch of twisting paths (even if we had to go there eleven times), and many of Origins' areas were hardly linear. 

Exploration exists if corners/areas of that map have extra items, quest-givers, NPCs, crafting materials... which usully, they do. The player needs to search to find these things.

A mode that teleported the player from conversation to conversation or cutscene to cutscene would remove all of this (and how would it even work with the rest of the normal game, if it required players to find particular people or quest objects?).

[Wulfram]

ElitePinecone wrote...

Exploration exists if corners/areas of that map have extra items, quest-givers, NPCs, crafting materials... which usully, they do. The player needs to search to find these things.

Well, removing all that tedium would be a great move, independent of any "story mode".

[AlbinaTekla]

yes! There's nothing worse than having a great time and then suddenly getting stuck in a game that you love. I personally think that devs should allow this type of mode in every game or at least a *skip* option for IF you really really get stuck and can't advance on.

[Potato Cat]

What?! You want a perfectly doable and completely optional feature that would improve your gaming experience and many others?! You should just kill yourself. I don't want it in my game so you can't have it in yours.

No but seriously, I support this whole heartedly. I don't care for DA combat, the story is why I play the games. The only exception would be if the story wouldn't make sense without a certain fight. It's not like it didn't work in L.A. Noire where the story was the focus.

[zyntifox]

I'm fine with a story mode for DA3 given that they bring back the RP mode that they clearly forgot to put in DA2.

Modifié par Cstaf, 25 août 2012 - 12:27 .

[MichaelStuart]

ElitePinecone wrote...

A mode that teleported the player from conversation to conversation or cutscene to cutscene would remove all of this (and how would it even work with the rest of the normal game, if it required players to find particular people or quest objects?).

I see it working like a choose your own adventure story.
You choose the option to go look for the quest object and the game plays a scene of you doing that.
If say, the quest object was hidden in a random area, the game would give you several area options to choose from. You pick one of the options and the scene plays of you explore that area, fighting any enemies and picking up any loot. If the quest object is not found, you pick another area option and the scene plays of you exploring that area. When you find the quest object, you choose to bring it back or explore another area.

I remind people that a story mode would be in addition to a nomal play mode. 

[ElitePinecone]

MichaelStuart wrote...

ElitePinecone wrote...

A mode that teleported the player from conversation to conversation or cutscene to cutscene would remove all of this (and how would it even work with the rest of the normal game, if it required players to find particular people or quest objects?).

I see it working like a choose your own adventure story.
You choose the option to go look for the quest object and the game plays a scene of you doing that.
If say, the quest object was hidden in a random area, the game would give you several area options to choose from. You pick one of the options and the scene plays of you explore that area, fighting any enemies and picking up any loot. If the quest object is not found, you pick another area option and the scene plays of you exploring that area. When you find the quest object, you choose to bring it back or explore another area.

I remind people that a story mode would be in addition to a nomal play mode. 

It's a fine idea in theory but the extra development effort seems almost impossible to justify. 

Would this require new cutscenes of the player searching for things, or moving from location to location? Custom animations? Another interface for choosing areas to search? It'd need more programming, to handle 'going to look for quest object'. Would all the boss/mini-boss fight scenes be put in cutscenes rather than having the player play them? That's a lot of extra cutscene work. 

I'm seeing what you're proposing, but it's not simple from a development standpoint. Everything requires zots, and reducing a game designed primarily as a combat RPG to an interactive conversation RPG would take an enormous amount of money and time that could be spent on other things. Whole gameplay systems (combat, combat upgrades, the usable item inventory, crafting, the gameworld) would become redundant - they're not even required in what you're proposing. How any hours would the game be without combat, exploration or travelling back and forth for quests?

This isn't like the Story or Action modes that ME3 used - in those cases it was a matter of adjusting the difficulty level of combat (to the point where it was over in seconds), and auto-choosing conversation options, respectively. It's still programming work, but it doesn't fundamentally alter the game experience. 

Making a story mode like you've proposed above would be like.... grafting an entirely different type of game onto an existing product designed from the ground up as an action RPG with a movable character. I don't see how it could work, or why any dev studio would ever do it. The resources required would be enormous, and it's a game mode that basically discards half of what Dragon Age is meant to represent. 

Would it be an interesting thing to play? Probably. But skipping combat and exploration entirely and replacing them with cutscenes would take an enormous amount of effort. 

[Pasquale1234]

I think it would be more accurate to say that you are requesting a "Cut Scene + Dialogue" or "Interactive Movie" mode.

Because the only story that matters in an RPG is the one the player creates via gameplay, which you want to omit.

Traditionally, RPGs have offered an authored narrative to serve as a backdrop for roleplaying, and allowed the player to fill in the blanks, co-create the story, and they made it possible for emergent narrative to arise.  You seem to want to take all of that away and replace it with a highly-structured, fully defined story that allows no blank spaces for the player to fill.

What you're asking for is not a game, but an animated choose-your-own-adventure book.

[Fast Jimmy]

The problem is that this would only take about an hour to blow through. And it would completely remove the information given to you outside of conversations or cinematics. So, basically anything you heard someone say that WASN'T in the dialogue wheel, which is a pretty substantial amount when you think about it. You also miss lots of locations and scenes (well, not in DA2, but this is more for DA:O and the ME series) that really flesh out the world.

I'd just think there was serious logistical problems with an approach like this. And even if they pulled it off, it would assume your character talked to every available person. Also, how would you decide who is in your party at any given time?

I don't think this is a "simple" feature to implement, as it would need its own, independent UI and game logic. And I don't think it brings anything to the table - after all, for totally free, you could watch a playthrough of Let's Play on YouTube, make a note of any choice you'd want to see played out differently, and then look up THOSE YouTube videos. It wouldn't neccesarily be as cohesive, but it would be a lot less work for Bioware and a lot less work for you, rather than playing the actual game portion of the video game.

[MichaelStuart]

Pasquale1234 wrote...

I think it would be more accurate to say that you are requesting a "Cut Scene + Dialogue" or "Interactive Movie" mode.

Because the only story that matters in an RPG is the one the player creates via gameplay, which you want to omit.

Traditionally, RPGs have offered an authored narrative to serve as a backdrop for roleplaying, and allowed the player to fill in the blanks, co-create the story, and they made it possible for emergent narrative to arise.  You seem to want to take all of that away and replace it with a highly-structured, fully defined story that allows no blank spaces for the player to fill.

What you're asking for is not a game, but an animated choose-your-own-adventure book.

I don't see how a story mode would be any less a RPG. The story would still mold its self around your characters desicions.

To those who say a story mode would be really short. I say so be it.
A game (or any thing for that matter) should not be longer than it needs to be.

[Pasquale1234]

MichaelStuart wrote...
I don't see how a story mode would be any less a RPG.

Somehow, I'm not surprised.

The story would still mold its self around your characters desicions.

The purpose of an RPG is not to tell a story, but to role-play.  The story is nothing more than a game mechanic that allows role-play.  You're trying to make it much more than that.

Modifié par Pasquale1234, 25 août 2012 - 02:40 .

[ElitePinecone]

Fast Jimmy wrote...

I don't think this is a "simple" feature to implement, as it would need its own, independent UI and game logic. And I don't think it brings anything to the table - after all, for totally free, you could watch a playthrough of Let's Play on YouTube, make a note of any choice you'd want to see played out differently, and then look up THOSE YouTube videos. It wouldn't neccesarily be as cohesive, but it would be a lot less work for Bioware and a lot less work for you, rather than playing the actual game portion of the video game.

This is basically what I was trying to say above. It's not a simple feature at all, and there's a tonne of issues with how the game works when half the content is stripped away. Is everything replaced with cutscenes?

Wouldn't a 'very easy' or 'narrative' combat setting achieve virtually the same results, without having to excise most of the gameplay?

[MichaelStuart]

Pasquale1234 wrote...

The purpose of an RPG is not to tell a story, but to role-play.  The story is nothing more than a game mechanic that allows role-play.  You're trying to make it much more than that.

If a story allows you role play, what the problem?
Why do you think I'm trying to more than about role playing?

[MichaelStuart]

ElitePinecone wrote...

Fast Jimmy wrote...

I don't think this is a "simple" feature to implement, as it would need its own, independent UI and game logic. And I don't think it brings anything to the table - after all, for totally free, you could watch a playthrough of Let's Play on YouTube, make a note of any choice you'd want to see played out differently, and then look up THOSE YouTube videos. It wouldn't neccesarily be as cohesive, but it would be a lot less work for Bioware and a lot less work for you, rather than playing the actual game portion of the video game.

This is basically what I was trying to say above. It's not a simple feature at all, and there's a tonne of issues with how the game works when half the content is stripped away. Is everything replaced with cutscenes?

Wouldn't a 'very easy' or 'narrative' combat setting achieve virtually the same results, without having to excise most of the gameplay?

It would achieve the same results, it just wouldn't do it as well.
Gameplay would be reduced to moving to the next story point. At least a cutscreen would be intresting to watch.

[Pasquale1234]

MichaelStuart wrote...
If a story allows you role play, what the problem?
Why do you think I'm trying to more than about role playing?

Like I said, the authored narrative is really just a game mechanic that exists to allow role-play.  So, from my perspective, what you are proposing would bring a single game mechanic to the forefront and make it the entire focus of that mode.

Consider a "combat only" mode where the player would be transported from battle to battle with nothing else in-between.

Or a "shopping only" mode where your inventory would magically fill with all of the stuff you might have gathered if you'd actually played some part of the game, and then you're transported to all of the merchants.

Or an "exploration only" mode where you would traipse around all of the levels in the game, with or without looting and/or combat.

Or a "follower relationship" mode where you would just go through all of the possible companion dialogues.

Any of these things take one aspect of the game out of context with the whole of the game.

And since, imho, everything the protagonist can do in the game contributes to the creation of the story, it really isn't possible to present a complete story without the whole of the game.

It is only possible to present a "story only" mode when you render other aspects of gameplay meaningless and insist that the only narrative is the authored one.  And that is where it becomes an animated choose-your-own-adventure book instead of a game.

[MichaelStuart]

Pasquale1234 wrote...

Like I said, the authored narrative is really just a game mechanic that exists to allow role-play.  So, from my perspective, what you are proposing would bring a single game mechanic to the forefront and make it the entire focus of that mode.

That is exactly what I want tho.
I mode that let me enjoy the story with out the tediousness of combat and travel.

  

[Pasquale1234]

MichaelStuart wrote...

Pasquale1234 wrote...

Like I said, the authored narrative is really just a game mechanic that exists to allow role-play.  So, from my perspective, what you are proposing would bring a single game mechanic to the forefront and make it the entire focus of that mode.

That is exactly what I want tho.
I mode that let me enjoy the story with out the tediousness of combat and travel.

There are a lot of great movies to satisfy that desire.

[Rawgrim]

So the OP want to play an rpg, but not do any gameplay...sounds like a movie would be a better option.