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[toddx77]

 I remember hearing bioware say that the wardens story is pretty much done and if hawke were too appear in dragon age 3 it would probably be in DLC only.  Does anyone else find it hard to believe that both of them are finished though?  With the warden the last we saw was he/she either went into the portal with Morrigan or watched her go into the portal.  Not only that but there is still the whole issue of the god child.  Hawke became the champion of kirkwall and both the warden and hawke have gone missing and Leliana says that is no accident.  So wouldn't it make sense to put the 2 of them in dragon age 3 as playable characters or at least major characters?  The seekers need hawkes help and with the war about to start surly the warden is someone who the seekers would like helping them.  The only other reason for not having the warden and hawke being in 3 is that 3 will end with the war starting and the warden, hawke, and the new character from 3 will all be working together in dragon age 4.

[David Gaider]

Jerrybnsn wrote...
It wasn't unti they announced a new protagonist for DA2 did we hear that the Dragon Age series was just about the world of Thedas and not allow importing succesive characters.

That makes it nothing more than a MMO world designed for a single player experience.  Each game is nothing really more than a stand alone experience such as what the Final Fantasy series is.  Considering Bioware's legacy, it has surprise me that they would go with such a limiting standard. 

I too was under the impression that the Dragon Age series was going to be an epic saga connected by the characters and events experience.  Just like the high fantasy sagas that I read when I was younger.  But in a video game, I wouldn't be just reading it, I was actually participating in it and help shaping that world of Dragon Age.  I think  what all sagas have is that something keeps all the series connected by characters, and mostly a single hero.

There must be threads connecting a series-- but it needn't be the protaganist. For Dragon Age it's the setting and many of the events/characters within it.

Why do so many people assume otherwise? I imagine because there was a lot of PR for Mass Effect going on at the same time as when Dragon Age was created. I can't imagine what other "Bioware" legacy you could be referring to... as the only other Bioware game that even had a returning protaganist was Baldur's Gate.

Though, I suppose by the logic of some folks, even one game is enough to establish a pattern (like how some suggest that importing choices between games is also some kind of common CRPG mechanic when no games other than DA and ME have really even attempted it). And we did say that Dragon Age: Origins was a spiritual successor to the BG games (ignoring that BG also dumped every other variable), so fair enough... though it seems like a lot of assumptions to place on a game where the protaganist could rather definitively die.

At any rate, we'll say it again: DA is about the world of Thedas. Chances are there will never be a re-occuring protaganist between games, even if there is a common thread in the world and the plots that you've taken part in.

And thus the next series that BioWare makes can inherent all the assumptions from fans who assume it will work exactly the same was as Dragon Age. Good luck, imaginary next series!

Modifié par David Gaider, 19 septembre 2012 - 03:40 .

[David Gaider]

Jerrybnsn wrote...
Thank you for responding to my posting.  But, while I did recognize that Dragon Age was a series, it not being connected by a single hero or set characters carrying out a single overarching story doesn't make the series an epic or a saga.  (I just found out that I was pushing the redundancy button heavy in that epic and saga both mean the same thing--a long story)

So could you answer the question of whether or not the Dragon Age series was suppose to be a saga? 

It's not a single story. Mass Effect was announced as a trilogy from the beginning-- a single story spanning three games. Dragon Age was not, nor was it ever intended to be (if it was, we probably wouldn't have allowed the protagainst to die or had so many "walk into the sunset" type epilogues). We didn't say it wasn't at the time, but that's likely because we didn't think we needed to, and undoubtedly didn't assume that anyone would take the messaging for Mass Effect to automatically apply to Dragon Age as well. Our mistake, perhaps?

Yes, there are plot threads remaining from both DAO and DA2 which will carry forward, but they do not require a single protaganist to resolve. I get that some people like the idea of it doing so, but there's a difference between wanting it and it having some kind of literary/gaming necessity.

Modifié par David Gaider, 19 septembre 2012 - 04:05 .

[David Gaider]

nightscrawl wrote...
People may throw out DAA and Zombie Warden or Generic Orlesian Warden as an example, but DAA was an expansion and not a full fledged game. To be honest, I don't think Zombie Warden should ever have been allowed: import to recognize the player's choice with respect to the king/queen and possibly something relating to Howe, and then force you to make a new character. But again, it was an expansion, so I can see why the allowance was made.

Yeah, the possible ret-conning of the DAO protaganist's death for the Awakening expansion was less than ideal-- and more related to a technical limitation than any kind of narrative intent. If someone wanted to play their DAO character in the expansion, then they were free to do so and make up whatever reasoning they wanted. That was just for the expansion's tale, and not intended to have larger implications.

Personally, I'd have been fine had we proceeded from DAO in the same manner as we did from BG1-- just have a set, canonical point from which DA2 would have started. And it was something we strongly considered. Hearing some people react in horror to that idea when it's suggested on the forums, and say things like no RPG would nullify your choices when it was really only Mass Effect which did it... well, I wonder how that would have gone. Either way, even with a canon ending I doubt we would have remained with the DAO's Warden as the PC. Loose plot threads do not constitute an entire story, short of those people who feel their personal plot thread of "I had a child with Morrigan" or "I'm ruling Ferelden at Alistair's side" should be the basis for an entire game, regardless of whatever anyone else did.

[David Gaider]

Androme wrote...
Hey David, I've read something you wrote several months ago regarding our previous player characters, while I've understood (by now, lol) that they won't be returning as playable characters, you mentioned that doesn't mean we won't ever be meeting them again, in what fashion could we expect our former player characters to return?

If they return (and are alive to do so), it would be as an NPC-- and we've said previously that, if we include them, it would be important to do it right and not as an unsatisfying cameo that would just make the very people they're included for unhappy. If we can't do that, then we just won't have them appear. Whether they appear or not, however, the question of their disappearance will need to be addressed.

What we're doing, exactly? That's a question I can't/won't answer, along with so many other questions people will have about DA3 at this point.

[David Gaider]

Robhuzz wrote...
Romance with Morrigan is not canon.

The Old God Baby however, is. 

If you mean the so-called "Old God Baby" will exist, regardless of whether the player took the Dark Ritual decision in DAO or not-- I can categorically say that this assumption is incorrect.

[Allan Schumacher]

Splitting hairs over whether or not it is a "saga" or a "series" in their very literal (rather than colloquial) usage is kind of distracting the thread, isn't it?

[Allan Schumacher]

Last Vizard wrote...

Uh huh, I'd like more closure if characters are just going to be thrown away because keeping track of choices in sequels.

It's tricky to provide closure for the Warden if we aren't wanting to make the game about the Warden again.  Telling you explicitly what happens is a huge risk and generally not worth it.

[Allan Schumacher]

In what ways did you not receive closure after DAO Last Vizard?

IIRC there was an awful lot of closure in the epilogue slides.


EDIT:  Awakening is the cause Wulfram?

Modifié par Allan Schumacher, 20 septembre 2012 - 10:37 .

[David Gaider]

Um, yeah-- my answer was with respect to the use of a protagonist between titles. If someone wants to argue the semantics of whether it's a proper "sequel" or "saga", or demand to know what our entire plan is for the overall story arch of the series-- and, not knowing it, assume that it can't possibly be epic because it's not what they want-- then knock yourselves out.

No, seriously, go hard. It'll give you something to do because this is something we won't provide clarity on even when the information on the game begins to flow. I totally hear the people who say they want more closure... and while I believe some people want a type of closure we're just never going to provide, that's not the same as there being none at all and no points of continuuity between stories. That is, however, just something you'll need to see for yourselves.

Modifié par David Gaider, 20 septembre 2012 - 02:55 .

[David Gaider]

b09boy wrote...
If you want to do multiple protagonists then give the existing ones closure.  The stream of cliffhangers is nothing less than extremely annoying and very much detracts from individual stories.  It also makes it difficult to accept further protagonists when it feels we're backlogged and finishing prior protagonists.

Sorry, but I'm going to have to categorically disagree with you there.

The existence of unresolved plot threads is not a "cliffhanger". That is an abuse of the term (much like "cliche", "retcon" or "Mary Sure" in just about any Internet forum). A cliffhanger is when the central conflict of a story is not resolved. DAO would have been a cliffhanger if the story had ended en route to Denerim for the final battle.

You left wondering what happened to your Warden if you entered the Eluvian with Morrigan is more about closure... but that's another term that people like to invoke a bit too freely. An amiguous ending-- "walking off into the sunset"-- is often something that is done deliberately to allow the player to imagine where they went and what they did. Some people claim, however, that they will not ever get proper closure so long as there's still something they imagine their hero doing. They want to know what happened to them and Alistair, how they ruled Ferelden, where they went with Morrigan... if there's even a hint that it might have been something exciting, they consider that an unfinished story rather than a brand-new one.

But it would be a brand-new story, as the previous one was indeed resolved. The conflict ended, even if a new one began. The idea that we would have to either kill the hero or effectively kill all interest in their future in order to provide real closure is a bit ludicrous.

As for the territoriality involved in that character, as in the player feeling the character is "theirs" even if they've moved onto a new story and a new protagonist, that's probably inevitable. Short of skipping to another side of the world or another time, there's bound to be some contravention of headcanon ("I didn't imagine MY character doing THAT!"). Generally the rule is that we'll approach any use of the previous PC much more carefully than characters around the PC (like, say, Alistair or Morrigan). Inevitably it's possible we'll contravene the player's headcanon no matter what, and that's a possibility that exists the moment you stop playing the character, but we'll do our best to steer around it whenever we can.

[David Gaider]

Jerrybnsn wrote...
I for one would like to state that I never called the ending of Origins a "cliffhanger". I thought it was a perfect ending that ended either on a sad or high note. However, I do feel that the ending of Origins opened up a lot of "missed oppurtunities" for further adventers.

Many people have indeed called DAO a cliffhanger. As for further adventures, I've no doubt that many Wardens went on to do other adventures-- but those are brand-new stories. I suppose those are stories we could have done ourselves, with the Warden as the protagonist, but lacking the context of a Blight I'm not sure that the Warden being the protagonist would have been especially meaningful outside of the fact you'd played them previously.

Now Awakenings and WH seemed more like the Cliff Hangers.

Again, neither of these are cliffhangers. They had plots, and those plots were resolved. An unresolved plot thread is not the same as an unresolved plot, and the fact you might be interested in what comes next does not mean that what comes next is not a brand new story. I appreciate that some people want every single thing to be wrapped up neatly and completely final before they feel they can "move on", but that's neither something that stories always do nor is it something I would even consider a requirement.

David, will we ever find out what was in that package Morrigan left the non-romancing Warden?

Possibly.

Plot threads exist to be picked up and played with, like cats with string.

[David Gaider]

Wulfram wrote...
So why did you suddenly go "Warden's gone" at the end of DA2? 

What purpose did that achieve except to toss out any headcanon the player might have had, and to create the, apparently, false expectation that there was going to be something more to their story?

Why is that a false expectation? Obviously it's a plot thread we intend to play with. It's not going to be with you playing as the Warden, however -- ultimately that character is ours now, and while we'll tread as carefully as we can, the fact remains that new plots may use them in some capacity.

Contravention of headcanon is always a possibility whenever a sequel's involved. Gosh, I can't imagine the gnashing of teeth that would have occurred if we had used the Warden as the protagonist in DA2 and had something happen to them that they didn't imagine in their head-- like Leliana being alive. Oh noes! On that point, I'm afraid we will simply have to invoke authorial prerogative. Sorry. Hope it all makes sense once you see it play out, and thus eases your concern... but I can't promise that'll be the case.

[David Gaider]

Fawx9 wrote...
But with DA:2 you changed that to where something came up and now players are left wondering what that something is.

Excellent. That is, however, a new story.