895 réponses à ce sujet

[Todd23]

A bunch of people who don't appreciate saves that keep previous decisions. Are you happy Bioware?! These are the sort of people DA2 attracted! You did this!! ... (sobs) You did this.

[Scott Sion]

Todd23 wrote...

A bunch of people who don't appreciate saves that keep previous decisions. Are you happy Bioware?! These are the sort of people DA2 attracted! You did this!! ... (sobs) You did this.

It's all right, just take deep breaths. It'll all be over soon.

[wright1978]

Quill74Pen wrote...

If the writers wish to create a story and world set in the Dragon Age universe that's "unhindered" by those "pesky" choices made by players, then I not-so-humbly suggest they do what Bethesda does — simply set your stories centuries apart. There. "Problem" solved.

I fell in love with the DA universe precisely because Bioware and its talent hugely succeeded in immersing me in the world they created, and by making some of what I did count beyond the end of DAA. If they go away from this by adopting the Bethesda model, then they have nothing more than another generic sandbox universe that, frankly, has little resonance with me. I've played several characters in Skyrim, and as huge and open-world as Skyrim is, its storylines are entirely shallow and emotionless.

I would prefer Bioware not take that route, and stick to the path they've chosen WRT player choices having real ramifications in related DA games, even if those ramifications are viewed as "minor" by certain elements of the player base.

Exactly set the future games in future or far past if they are concerned about imports..

Modifié par wright1978, 04 novembre 2012 - 09:45 .

[esper]

wright1978 wrote...

Quill74Pen wrote...

If the writers wish to create a story and world set in the Dragon Age universe that's "unhindered" by those "pesky" choices made by players, then I not-so-humbly suggest they do what Bethesda does — simply set your stories centuries apart. There. "Problem" solved.

I fell in love with the DA universe precisely because Bioware and its talent hugely succeeded in immersing me in the world they created, and by making some of what I did count beyond the end of DAA. If they go away from this by adopting the Bethesda model, then they have nothing more than another generic sandbox universe that, frankly, has little resonance with me. I've played several characters in Skyrim, and as huge and open-world as Skyrim is, its storylines are entirely shallow and emotionless.

I would prefer Bioware not take that route, and stick to the path they've chosen WRT player choices having real ramifications in related DA games, even if those ramifications are viewed as "minor" by certain elements of the player base.

Exactly set the future games in future or far past if they are concerned about imports..

Then we need to rename the series, also technology marches on. If the series was set centuries apart we would have to introduceres guns and the like to the setting, because gun powder all ready exist, semi-automatic crossbow exist. If the stories are set centuries apart I will no longer buy that Thedas hasn't developed at all.

[voice_of_darkness]

Considering the save import bugs like the Awakening characters being dead if you saved the Keep even if you got all the upgrades means that our games will never be what we want because Bioware never bothered to fix these bugs

[cowoline]

Hell no! I want my story to continue. How can we complain that we did not have enough important decisions in DAII and then asked to have them removed in DAIII... I want MY Cousland to be queen and MY Hawke to have eloped with Anders, so that I can get myself involved in a third tragic romance in the third one.

[NomadDC]

Allan Schumacher wrote...
Imports done perfectly would require content to be removed, so I don't think this is a very strong argument, since imports would just be akin to choices and choices done well within a single game should still in some way remove/alter content.

Indeed.

@ppl who require removing save import:

You people ask for choices to matter and than you yell "make choices matter nothing" in this thread. What is the point in making this thread? You skipped content in previous game, whatever reason, and than you QQ that you don't get anything from content you skipped in later game? What is the point?
Let's say you never completed Awakening. Than you didn't meet Anders, Nathaniel, Justice and others. You never did anything in that zone, never faced Architect and others. Why in hell you should be given any bonus stuff from there than? You weren't there, you did nothing there. It was your choice. It does matter. You never recruited Nathaniel Howe, he never became Grey Warden, and so he never appeared in DA2. Maybe he died. Or was killed by guards in attempt to retrieve his heirlooms. The whole point in this is that not being there/not completing that piece of content is an option as well, and it has consequences. So face them.

Save import concept is a great thing that should never be removed. It may be buggy sometimes (I hope Bioware will look into current bugs with it and fix them at last), it's still has impact on your game setting, and that is one of the things that makes game outstanding. You get almost your personal story, and you complain? What's wrong with you, I don't really see any point in this thread. I'd rather suggest locking it as it looks more like some sort of trolling or trying to start flame/holywar.

Modifié par NomadDC, 06 novembre 2012 - 04:12 .

[cowoline]

NomadDC wrote...

Allan Schumacher wrote...
Imports done perfectly would require content to be removed, so I don't think this is a very strong argument, since imports would just be akin to choices and choices done well within a single game should still in some way remove/alter content.

Indeed.

@ppl who require removing save import:

You people ask for choices to matter and than you yell "make choices matter nothing" in this thread. What is the point in making this thread? You skipped content in previous game, whatever reason, and than you QQ that you don't get anything from content you skipped in later game? What is the point?
Let's say you never completed Awakening. Than you didn't meet Anders, Nathaniel, Justice and others. You never did anything in that zone, never faced Architect and others. Why in hell you should be given any bonus stuff from there than? You weren't there, you did nothing there. It was your choice. It does matter. You never recruited Nathaniel Howe, he never became Grey Warden, and so he never appeared in DA2. Maybe he died. Or was killed by guards in attempt to retrieve his heirlooms. The whole point in this is that not being there/not completing that piece of content is an option as well, and it has consequences. So face them.

Save import concept is a great thing that should never be removed. It may be buggy sometimes (I hope Bioware will look into current bugs with it and fix them at last), it's still has impact on your game setting, and that is one of the things that makes game outstanding. You get almost your personal story, and you complain? What's wrong with you, I don't really see any point in this thread. I'd rather suggest locking it as it looks more like some sort of trolling or trying to start flame/holywar.

Seconded!

[milena87]

NomadDC wrote...

You people ask for choices to matter and than you yell "make choices matter nothing" in this thread.

Wait, that's not the argument being made.

Setting a canon for the major choices would create the opportunity for the selected choices to matter. Keeping the save import feature would render all major choices meaningless however, simply because the devs can't possibly create all the content that would be required.

And neither should they: the argument for removing the save import feature is to allow the devs to create the best possible game.

[Snypy]

What's the point of making decisions if those decisions should be completely invalidated later on? Removing the option to import saved games is like forcing full autodialogue on players. And I certainly wouldn't be interested in such a game.

[Twisted Path]

The thing is the save import makes choices matter less in future games. One of the reasons Dragon Age 2's choices are so inconsequential is that the game was written with save imports in mind and they didn't want another situation like Leiliana and Anders getting resurrected.

Origins gave you an amazing amount of choice. You could side with all sorts of different factions, kill or get almost every character killed, determine who would rule Orzamar and Feredlan, etc. We're never going to get another game from Bioware with that much choice while they're writing stuff with save imports in mind. That's the reason some people think better games would be made if the feature was dropped. It's weird that people just don't seem to get that.

Personally, as I've said earlier in this thread, I think the best solution would be to avoid recurring characters and locations as much as possible in each new game and only bring up the really broad choices from save imports: who the king/queen of Fereldin is, if the old-god-baby happened or not, the gender, backgrounds and fates of the Warden Commander and Hawke. The more the writers can avoid bringing up stuff like whether the Circle Tower was purged or not the less they have to create complicated (and I think unnecessary,) branching dialogue based on save imports. I'd rather see new and original storylines then lots of little Mass Effect-style callbacks.

[Wulfram]

NomadDC wrote...

You people ask for choices to matter and than you yell "make choices matter nothing" in this thread.

Imports are exactly what destroy meaning in choices.  They stop there being impactful choices in the game, because the writers know they can't incorporate them into future games.

And they suck all meaning from choices that have been made, because all that can be done with them is to explain why they didn't really matter.

What is the point in making this thread? You skipped content in previous game, whatever reason, and than you QQ that you don't get anything from content you skipped in later game? What is the point?
Let's say you never completed Awakening. Than you didn't meet Anders, Nathaniel, Justice and others. You never did anything in that zone, never faced Architect and others. Why in hell you should be given any bonus stuff from there than? You weren't there, you did nothing there. It was your choice. It does matter. You never recruited Nathaniel Howe, he never became Grey Warden, and so he never appeared in DA2. Maybe he died. Or was killed by guards in attempt to retrieve his heirlooms. The whole point in this is that not being there/not completing that piece of content is an option as well, and it has consequences. So face them.

This is a total strawman.  No one is making the argument you're attempting to refute.

I am very much a completionist.  I have multiple complete playthroughs.

But all the imports do is explain why previous choices were meaningless, and avoiding trouble for future imports makes the current games worse.

[draken-heart]

Twisted Path wrote...

The thing is the save import makes choices matter less in future games. One of the reasons Dragon Age 2's choices are so inconsequential is that the game was written with save imports in mind and they didn't want another situation like Leiliana and Anders getting resurrected.

Origins gave you an amazing amount of choice. You could side with all sorts of different factions, kill or get almost every character killed, determine who would rule Orzamar and Feredlan, etc. We're never going to get another game from Bioware with that much choice while they're writing stuff with save imports in mind. That's the reason some people think better games would be made if the feature was dropped. It's weird that people just don't seem to get that.

Personally, as I've said earlier in this thread, I think the best solution would be to avoid recurring characters and locations as much as possible in each new game and only bring up the really broad choices from save imports: who the king/queen of Fereldin is, if the old-god-baby happened or not, the gender, backgrounds and fates of the Warden Commander and Hawke. The more the writers can avoid bringing up stuff like whether the Circle Tower was purged or not the less they have to create complicated (and I think unnecessary,) branching dialogue based on save imports. I'd rather see new and original storylines then lots of little Mass Effect-style callbacks.

Even though in doing so, you still "bind" the writers to work around those choices. The best thing would be to not even mention the choices at all, leave it in a codex and focus on the game itself.

Ruler of Ferelden: This choice will be mostly the same with either on the throne, so why not just have a steward give the quests with no mention of the king/queen, just call him/her "our ruler"

Orzamar: same thing here, except using "The king"

OGB: Will this even fit into the overarching plot of the game?

Point being, people expect that their choices will have a world-changing impact, when the game has to be mostly the same for both those who import and those who dont, so you are not getting a world-changing impact at all because Bioware already knows how they want the game.

[draken-heart]

Wulfram wrote...

NomadDC wrote...

You people ask for choices to matter and than you yell "make choices matter nothing" in this thread.

Imports are exactly what destroy meaning in choices.  They stop there being impactful choices in the game, because the writers know they can't incorporate them into future games.

And they suck all meaning from choices that have been made, because all that can be done with them is to explain why they didn't really matter.

What is the point in making this thread? You skipped content in previous game, whatever reason, and than you QQ that you don't get anything from content you skipped in later game? What is the point?
Let's say you never completed Awakening. Than you didn't meet Anders, Nathaniel, Justice and others. You never did anything in that zone, never faced Architect and others. Why in hell you should be given any bonus stuff from there than? You weren't there, you did nothing there. It was your choice. It does matter. You never recruited Nathaniel Howe, he never became Grey Warden, and so he never appeared in DA2. Maybe he died. Or was killed by guards in attempt to retrieve his heirlooms. The whole point in this is that not being there/not completing that piece of content is an option as well, and it has consequences. So face them.

This is a total strawman.  No one is making the argument you're attempting to refute.

I am very much a completionist.  I have multiple complete playthroughs.

But all the imports do is explain why previous choices were meaningless, and avoiding trouble for future imports makes the current games worse.

Arguing DA2? Everything from Origins had no reason to be in DA2, A codex would have been fine. You guys do not like the import feature, fine, you do not have to buy the game. Simple solution, just do not play the game, and you won't have to deal with the idea of save imports.

The best way to do this is to look at the overall plot and only set flags for the choices that make sense to the plot.

Modifié par draken-heart, 06 novembre 2012 - 06:59 .

[Realmzmaster]

Again you are just talking about the next games DA3. I am talking about any game in the series after DA2. The save import limits the stories that can be told. As I stated before the story of the OGB cannot be told in the series unless Bioware establishes the canon that the warden did the DR.  

The resurrection of Leliana in DA2 invalidated the choice that people killed her in the Sacred Ashes Quest. Bioware made her survival canon. 

Most of the cameos in DA2 by Howe, Zev, Alistair, Leliana etc were there for fan service. Even then a gamer could choose one of the pre-histories and still get those quests. So the save import in that regard did nothing.

Modifié par Realmzmaster, 06 novembre 2012 - 08:15 .

[draken-heart]

Realmzmaster wrote...

Again you are just talking about the next games DA3. I am talking about any game in the series after DA2. The save import limits the stories that can be told. As I stated before the story of the OGB cannot be told in the series unless Bioware establishes the canon that the warden did the DR.  

The resurrection of Leliana in DA2 invalidated the choice that people killed her in the Sacred Ashes Quest. Bioware made her survival canon. 

Most of the cameos in DA2 by Howe, Zev, Alistair, Leliana etc were there for fan service. Even then a gamer could choose one of the pre-histories and still get those quests. So the save import in that regard did nothing.

Look at it this way, the choices people want to have made canon, well, they are the ones that were never resolved yet. If the DR is canonized, then the choice that is not the canon one will never get resolved. Same with the Ruler of Ferelden or the king of Orzamar, if one choice is canon, then the other side of that debate is never resolved.

setting a canon might make the story stronger but you lose the possibility because the other side is never mentioned in-game. So why not only import the choices that make sense to the overall plot and not set flags for the rest. OR better yet, not mention the choice at all except for codex entries, and use Entirely new characters to solve the problem.

I don't understand what you are saying, but that is probably because I never use the default stories because the game would be the same regardless of what is in the background.

If the choices from previous games are made canon, then the writers need to resolve all choices in the game which takes from actually writing the story, so congrats, Bioware frees the writers to bind them again by forcing them to write in how this choice is resolved diffrently from that choice.

Modifié par draken-heart, 06 novembre 2012 - 08:31 .

[David Gaider]

Snypy wrote...
What's the point of making decisions if those decisions should be completely invalidated later on?

Because the primary reasons for decisions to be put into a game is not so they can be carried over to a sequel. They exist for the benefit of the game where you make those decisions. Importing decisions in any capacity is a feature of a sequel, not the reason you have decisions in the prequel.

And it's a feature we will continue to support. I appreciate the fact there are those who think establishing a canon with each new game will make for a stronger story, but in our opinion so does allowing you the benefit of believing this is your world. Yes, that is largely an illusion and one that may break down for some folks depending on how stringent thier requirements are for divergence. The fact that it'll never be enough for some doesn't, however, mean that the benefit it has for everyone else should be ignored.

And it won't be. As I've said here and elsewhere, how we're doing imports is something we'll eventually address. The issue for us has always been how to do it better, not whether to do it at all. Not doing it at all would be something to consider for some other game series that isn't Dragon Age.

[draken-heart]

^straight from the mouth of Gaider. Now can we lock this thread and all others that pop up?

[Realmzmaster]

draken-heart wrote...

Realmzmaster wrote...

Again you are just talking about the next games DA3. I am talking about any game in the series after DA2. The save import limits the stories that can be told. As I stated before the story of the OGB cannot be told in the series unless Bioware establishes the canon that the warden did the DR.  

The resurrection of Leliana in DA2 invalidated the choice that people killed her in the Sacred Ashes Quest. Bioware made her survival canon. 

Most of the cameos in DA2 by Howe, Zev, Alistair, Leliana etc were there for fan service. Even then a gamer could choose one of the pre-histories and still get those quests. So the save import in that regard did nothing.

Look at it this way, the choices people want to have made canon, well, they are the ones that were never resolved yet. If the DR is canonized, then the choice that is not the canon one will never get resolved. Same with the Ruler of Ferelden or the king of Orzamar, if one choice is canon, then the other side of that debate is never resolved.

setting a canon might make the story stronger but you lose the possibility because the other side is never mentioned in-game. So why not only import the choices that make sense to the overall plot and not set flags for the rest. OR better yet, not mention the choice at all except for codex entries, and use Entirely new characters to solve the problem.

I don't understand what you are saying, but that is probably because I never use the default stories because the game would be the same regardless of what is in the background.

If the choices from previous games are made canon, then the writers need to resolve all choices in the game which takes from actually writing the story, so congrats, Bioware frees the writers to bind them again by forcing them to write in how this choice is resolved diffrently from that choice.

 If you free the writers from having to worry about the import system they can write whatever story they wish and set the canon as they see fit. As I stated before all choices should be resolved in-game then there is no need for an import system.

The writters can then set the canon for the next game based on the canon they wrote for the previous game or change the canon to fit the new story they wish to tell.

I am far more concern with choices in game being consistent than from game to game.

Choices do not matter from game to game if Bioware can decide to retcon them for story purposes or fan service.

Modifié par Realmzmaster, 06 novembre 2012 - 08:59 .

[David Gaider]

draken-heart wrote...
^straight from the mouth of Gaider. Now can we lock this thread and all others that pop up?

Why lock it down? So long as people are polite and on topic, they can continue to advocate whatever they like. This just isn't something we will consider. There's no need to be concerned we will be persuaded by posts about it if nobody comes to the thread to argue the point-- you can safely ignore the topic if you wish.

Modifié par David Gaider, 06 novembre 2012 - 08:59 .

[draken-heart]

Realmzmaster wrote...

draken-heart wrote...

Realmzmaster wrote...

Again you are just talking about the next games DA3. I am talking about any game in the series after DA2. The save import limits the stories that can be told. As I stated before the story of the OGB cannot be told in the series unless Bioware establishes the canon that the warden did the DR.  

The resurrection of Leliana in DA2 invalidated the choice that people killed her in the Sacred Ashes Quest. Bioware made her survival canon. 

Most of the cameos in DA2 by Howe, Zev, Alistair, Leliana etc were there for fan service. Even then a gamer could choose one of the pre-histories and still get those quests. So the save import in that regard did nothing.

Look at it this way, the choices people want to have made canon, well, they are the ones that were never resolved yet. If the DR is canonized, then the choice that is not the canon one will never get resolved. Same with the Ruler of Ferelden or the king of Orzamar, if one choice is canon, then the other side of that debate is never resolved.

setting a canon might make the story stronger but you lose the possibility because the other side is never mentioned in-game. So why not only import the choices that make sense to the overall plot and not set flags for the rest. OR better yet, not mention the choice at all except for codex entries, and use Entirely new characters to solve the problem.

I don't understand what you are saying, but that is probably because I never use the default stories because the game would be the same regardless of what is in the background.

If the choices from previous games are made canon, then the writers need to resolve all choices in the game which takes from actually writing the story, so congrats, Bioware frees the writers to bind them again by forcing them to write in how this choice is resolved diffrently from that choice.

 If you free the writers from having to worry about the import system they can write whatever story they wish and set the canon as they see fit. As I stated before all choices should be resolved in-game then there is no need for an import system.

The writters can then set the canon for the next game based on the canon they wrote for the previous game or change the canon to fit the new story they wish to tell.

I am far more concern with choices in game being consistent than from game to game.

Choices do not matter from game to game if Bioware can decide to retcon them for story purposes or fan service.

It's how they are going about the issue, not the imports themselves. Why ask to have Bioware remove the feature when you should be asking them to only set the flags for the stuff that makes sense to the storyline?

You really don't understand the idea of what I am saying, Do you?

Modifié par draken-heart, 06 novembre 2012 - 09:07 .

[MillKill]

David Gaider wrote...

draken-heart wrote...
^straight from the mouth of Gaider. Now can we lock this thread and all others that pop up?

Why lock it down? So long as people are polite and on topic, they can continue to advocate whatever they like. This just isn't something we will consider. There's no need to be concerned we will be persuaded by posts about it if nobody comes to the thread to argue the point-- you can safely ignore the topic if you wish.

I do have a question for you, Mr. Gaider: If you could do the series again knowing what you know now, would you want to include imports?

Modifié par MillKill, 06 novembre 2012 - 09:21 .

[Realmzmaster]

draken-heart wrote...



It's how they are going about the issue, not the imports themselves. Why ask to have Bioware remove the feature when you should be asking them to only set the flags for the stuff that makes sense to the storyline?

You really don't understand the idea of what I am saying, Do you?

You do seem to understand what I am saying. If Bioware can set any flags it wishes why would it need a save import system? Bioware could just simply ignore the import and set up the story it wishes.

As far as locking down the thread as Mr.Gaider stated why? We are being civil and discussing the matter. At present Mr. Gaider may say no the import system stays, but I, Fast Jimmy and others will continue to be the flies buzzing in his ear whispering otherwise.

[Todd23]

David Gaider wrote...

Snypy wrote...
What's the point of making decisions if those decisions should be completely invalidated later on?

Because the primary reasons for decisions to be put into a game is not so they can be carried over to a sequel. They exist for the benefit of the game where you make those decisions. Importing decisions in any capacity is a feature of a sequel, not the reason you have decisions in the prequel.

And it's a feature we will continue to support. I appreciate the fact there are those who think establishing a canon with each new game will make for a stronger story, but in our opinion so does allowing you the benefit of believing this is your world. Yes, that is largely an illusion and one that may break down for some folks depending on how stringent thier requirements are for divergence. The fact that it'll never be enough for some doesn't, however, mean that the benefit it has for everyone else should be ignored.

And it won't be. As I've said here and elsewhere, how we're doing imports is something we'll eventually address. The issue for us has always been how to do it better, not whether to do it at all. Not doing it at all would be something to consider for some other game series that isn't Dragon Age.

  ... EGM (epic Gaider moment).

[David Gaider]

Realmzmaster wrote...
but I, Fast Jimmy and others will continue to be the flies buzzing in his ear whispering otherwise.

You appear to underestimate our ability to just ignore threads.

Which I will get back to, I suppose.