109 réponses à ce sujet

[DarkKnightHolmes]

I bet it'll be as significant as background stories from ME series....... which means none at all really.

[esper]

I want to know how the background works before I can choose. I wish bioware would go into it more.

Will it be station/childhood + (class) carrier ala something Me-like

Purely class carrier but different for each class. I really want to know how it works.

[Chaos Lord Malek]

I am just glad its not flat out Origins. That would have being seriously a waste.

Still i hope the backgrounds will be having big impact on story and npc interaction. And our own PC presentation as well. I don't know to what extend will the backgrounds go, but for instance - there could be choices like from:

*Spoiled* - so you are from rich family, you are spoiled, like wine, women, sex, etc... And you take your job(Inquisitor) with little easiness.

*Bad younghood* - best example would be Meredith, or even better the guy from Black Death movie (yeah, the one at the end, that starts executing all the females he sees, believing them all to be witches).

*cloister girl/guy* - you didn't get out to world much, and try to act a lot in accordance to what priests teached you. Probably orphan - so you don't got a family(or have and can discover it later during game)

And of course you should have options to use this backgrounds in dialogues - like the bad younghood character would mention something from the past, probably with blood mage, etc... like Meredith did. The *spoiled* would start talking about fancy parties with stinky cheases, etc..

[Fast Jimmy]

One thing I wouldn't want to see is the option play as an Orlesian.

Now... let me explain.

I don't want the OPTION to play as an Orlesian. Since the game looks to be centered (or at least starting) in Orlais, there is going to be a good chunk of gameplay there. Yet, it would make very little sense for every person in a foreign country to not be speaking their native tongue, 100% of the time. There should be chatter in marketplaces, or conspiracies spoken in quiet, where they would obviously be speaking in the language they grew up with, not in the Common tongue.

If we had the option of playing an Orlesian character, we would understand this. If we also had the option to speak Ferelden, we wouldn't (unless there is a hand wave saying our character knows multiple languages, I suppose).

If we are going to be in Orlais, where people would logically be speaking Orlesian (French), then either give everyone a character that doesn't speak this language, or give everyone a character that does. Having, instead, every single person speak in the Common tongue the entire game is a little silly.

[Rylor Tormtor]

I would like a system that makes the origin/background choice almost as important as your class choice. I think a good set up would be:

1) Pick your class (warrior/rogue/mage)

2) Pick appropriate background. These could be all class dependent, or mage/non-mage. Or something along the lines of three mage backgrounds (which would be ideal. You would have a circle origin, an apostate origin, and maybe some new and interesting twist origin). Now the non-mage background could either be shared (so 3 back grounds that a warrior/rogue could choose), ideally would be at least 2 or 3 for each one. but that might be a bit much, A compromise would be two general (retired soldier/mercenary thing, displaced villager/townsperson) and one each for warrior (templer recruit) and rogue (umm.. Orlesian court bard?).

[Cutlass Jack]

I'd like it to make a signifigant change (in dialogue at the very least) to a given playthough. The background should provide some more material benefit/penalty as well. That could be a bonus that helps in combat or could be opening up or closing an avenue in the plot.

For example, if I had a criminal/underworld background, it might make dealing with criminal/underworld elements possible, or at least easier. But I'd have a harder time dealing with the city guard because they'd mistrust me.

This is all wishful thinking though. Probably best to keep expectations low and be pleasantly surprised. If it were handled at least as well as backgrounds in Arcanum I'd be okay with it.

Modifié par Cutlass Jack, 23 octobre 2012 - 01:48 .

[RinpocheSchnozberry]

I wasn't particularly excited by how Mass Effect did backgrounds. They were the palest of lines when they could have been a full on racing stripes.

Mostly, I'd like the backgrounds to impact how other people see you. For example, if there are fisher, noble, and watchmaker background choices, I'd like the game's nobles to perhaps recognize you because of your family's work. Like you meet an older noble and he would be like "Wait! Aren't you Old Smithie's boy? I have a clock of his in the great hall that never fails to keep the time!" Of course the city's vendors would maybe give you a bit of a deal... but the lower classes wouldn't give a ****, maybe even thinking that you were too fancy for them and give you a harder time. To me, that's a real background. It give you a little something in one way... but it also costs you something in another. If you were a noble, and the game really is in Orlais, then the fishers might kowtow to you, hoping to avoid being killed to death... but the merchants might be more bold, since they can cause all kinds of problems for nobles if the nobles cause problems for the merchants. I'm not expecting wholesale plot changes, but I would like the flavor of dialogue and reactions to change.

I'd like to see NPCs change as they learn your background too. Like you chat with a noble and they're all friendly at first because you're dolled up perty, but then you mention "yes, I grew up on those docks, I know them well" and suddenly the noble is like "well, I still like you, but you will always be a fish in silk to me." Or as a noble you come shambling in to noble manor house in plate mail, lugging the small cow strapped to a handle that you call a warhammer, and suddenly when you go back to your castle, there's like sixteen invitations from noble houses asking you over to meet their marriable children.

Basically significant to me means that the backgrounds will give and take away from the life your character lives.

Modifié par RinpocheSchnozberry, 23 octobre 2012 - 02:21 .

[brushyourteeth]

Great topic, OP!!

To answer that question, I have to ask myself what I liked so much about DA:O origins throughout the game.

For me, a successful imlementation of the mechanic would involve little surprises, like finding out that that guy you agreed to kill for some gold is actually your brother in law. Little things like meeting up with Gorim in the Denerim Market or coming home to the alienage or Circle Tower made the whole thing feel fleshed out.

So did having origin-specific dialogue options, like being antagonistic toward Alistair for being a templar if you're a mage, or getting to assume that everyone's comments were racist as an elf.

Certain quests also had special meaning based on your origin that they wouldn't have otherwise. Like the choice of which king to elect in Orzammar if you were an Aeducan, or how to respond to the slaver's offer in Denerim if you were a Tabris. And your chance meeting with ghoul Tamlen if you played a Dalish was just plain brilliant and gutwrenching. I'd love the challenge of gaining new insight on those quests for replayability, and even the chance for different outcomes - like if you'd had the chance to reason with Leske as a dwarven commoner as a different way to handle the Jarvia situation.

I also hope that the backgrounds will have some unique interactivity with our classes, which are supposed to also change our gameplay (and I hope they do in a big way). Playing as a former pickpocket who's now an assassin should be totally different from playing a nobleman who's now an assassin. Maybe the latter could actually make you into a bard!!

Modifié par brushyourteeth, 23 octobre 2012 - 02:25 .

[Wulfram]

I'm not really looking for a big impact on the game, I'm looking for an impact on my thought process as I'm playing the game.

What's important is that the backgrounds give different perspectives on the world.

Otherwise, backgrounds should come up when relevant. Don't want any Akuze amnesia like in ME2.

[brushyourteeth]

RinpocheSchnozberry wrote...

I wasn't particularly excited by how Mass Effect did backgrounds. They were the palest of lines when they could have been a full on racing stripes.

Mostly, I'd like the backgrounds to impact how other people see you. For example, if there are fisher, noble, and watchmaker background choices, I'd like the game's nobles to perhaps recognize you because of your family's work. Like you meet an older noble and he would be like "Wait! Aren't you Old Smithie's boy? I have a clock of his in the great hall that never fails to keep the time!" Of course the city's vendors would maybe give you a bit of a deal... but the lower classes wouldn't give a ****, maybe even thinking that you were too fancy for them and give you a harder time. To me, that's a real background. It give you a little something in one way... but it also costs you something in another. If you were a noble, and the game really is in Orlais, then the fishers might kowtow to you, hoping to avoid being killed to death... but the merchants might be more bold, since they can cause all kinds of problems for nobles if the nobles cause problems for the merchants. I'm not expecting wholesale plot changes, but I would like the flavor of dialogue and reactions to change.

I'd like to see NPCs change as they learn your background too. Like you chat with a noble and they're all friendly at first because you're dolled up perty, but then you mention "yes, I grew up on those docks, I know them well" and suddenly the noble is like "well, I still like you, but you will always be a fish in silk to me." Or as a noble you come shambling in to noble manor house in plate mail, lugging the small cow strapped to a handle that you call a warhammer, and suddenly when you go back to your castle, there's like sixteen invitations from noble houses asking you over to meet their marriable children.

Basically significant to me means that the backgrounds will give and take away from the life your character lives.

Love it.

[Kail Ashton]

it means getting my hopes up just to find out the diff backgrounds just mean a few offhand comments from npcs & a throwaway 5 minute quest

[AllThatJazz]

Cutlass Jack wrote...

I'd like it to make a signifigant change (in dialogue at the very least) to a given playthough. The background should provide some more material benefit/penalty as well. That could be a bonus that helps in combat or could be opening up or closing an avenue in the plot.

For example, if I had a criminal/underworld background, it might make dealing with criminal/underworld elements possible, or at least easier. But I'd have a harder time dealing with the city guard because they'd mistrust me.

This is all wishful thinking though. Probably best to keep expectations low and be pleasantly surprised. If it were handled at least as well as backgrounds in Arcanum I'd be okay with it.

Aaahhh, the Arcanum backgrounds! I loved those. My gunslinging debutante is still one of my fave PCs ever ) Yes please to doing them as well as Troika! x

[fchopin]

Significant impact means the background picked will be important how the game develops and it matters how it progresses and should only be for that character alone.

If it does not do the above and it is just like Mass Effect then it’s just a waste of time and space.

[CrazyRah]

Significant impact to me means that some dialogue is different. How people react to my character is slightly different. I've heard the Awakening example that if you're Orlesian that people are a bit more hostile which i see as a good enough example. It also means that the story changes a bit and i don't mean totally different story but that during the course of the story things might react a bit differently depending on my background. Certain people perhaps will not ally themself with me as easily if i picked on background and not the others.

Significant impact is not the Mass Effect backgrounds that had almost no weight at all. You didn't even notice them. It was all vacuum

[Robhuzz]

Kail Ashton wrote...

it means getting my hopes up just to find out the diff backgrounds just mean a few offhand comments from npcs & a throwaway 5 minute quest

Probably this yes

[Palipride47]

PurebredCorn wrote...

In my head, with what tiny little bit of info we have, I liken the background choices to the background and psych profiles in ME. If they just stuck to having your choices mentioned a couple of times and a small (but awesome) side quest I would be happy with that. Anything more will be icing on the cake. It would be, after all, more than what was offered for DA2, and that makes me happy.

If they take what other races did in terms of immersion for DAO, and successfully implement that with nonplayable human backgrounds in DA3, I will be giddy.

However, kind of a tall order. 

Modifié par Palipride47, 23 octobre 2012 - 04:10 .

[Vandicus]

Coloring the dialogue and maybe a related quest or two(much like Origins did) is about what I expect. Anything more and I will be impressed.

[Rune-Chan]

I think how Origins did it worked well, but that required you actually controlling it.

If you chose a mage, then chances are you'd feel more inclined to help the circle as you knew the mages there. If you chose a City elf you'd have more sympathy for their plight. If you chose a Dwarf noble then you'd be confronting your own brother in the Orzammar section. Human noble you'd have a personal grudge against Howe when you come across him, etc.

It doesn't just need to affect dialogue, but if it changes the perspective of the game it works really well.

Although sadly, like I said, it'd require you actually playing it. Choosing a text based background like in ME saying "You are a mean person" isn't going to immerse you in the world.

[Palipride47]

Machines Are Us wrote...

I think how Origins did it worked well, but that required you actually controlling it.

If you chose a mage, then chances are you'd feel more inclined to help the circle as you knew the mages there. If you chose a City elf you'd have more sympathy for their plight. If you chose a Dwarf noble then you'd be confronting your own brother in the Orzammar section. Human noble you'd have a personal grudge against Howe when you come across him, etc.

It doesn't just need to affect dialogue, but if it changes the perspective of the game it works really well.

Although sadly, like I said, it'd require you actually playing it. Choosing a text based background like in ME saying "You are a mean person" isn't going to immerse you in the world.

I play pen-and-paper RPGs, write fiction (of non fan variety), and have an overactive imagination, so text IS good enough for me. 

But I understand your sentiment

[darrylzero]

Allan Schumacher wrote...\\

I'd also like some opportunity at the beginning to role-play my background a bit.

Why just the beginning?

Good question!  I thought maybe the rest of my post would explain a bit, but what I really meant was that I expect the impact of game events to change and develop my character's priorities, so I would love the chance to express my preexisting identity through words and deeds before the events of the game change the moral calculus my character is living in.

What I find really compelling in these kinds of stories is the transition from someone who is not likely to become particularly heroic (whether because they're up to no good or just too "ordinary" or whatever) into someone who finally becomes a hero (DAO after waking up in Flemeth's hut was pretty perfect in that regard).  Or a criminal (a la Breaking Bad) or a revolutionary -- or better yet a criminal and then a revolutionary and then a hero!  I know some folks are tired of rehashing origin stories (mostly because of endless superhero movie reboots probably), but that moment is the real key for me.  But while criminals and dissidents are the first to grab my imagination, there's a lot of other ways this principle applies, for me.  If anyone has read Garth Nix Sabriel series, they're for a pretty young audience, but Liriel's time in the library in the second book is a pitch-perfect origin story for a video game I think, if not for one set in Thedas.

Put another way, I was really, really bummed I didn't get to play any of Hawke's year as a smuggler.  That would have been the core of the story for me, a desperate refugee living on the margins of society, evading the law.  Once he's established, I'm a lot less interested -- but I would have been a lot more invested in the later parts of the game, I think, if I had been a part of that part of Hawke's story, particularly if the relationships I forged with the other characters came during that time.

Role-playing the background is important later too.  I'd just like to be the person I was before the game started for a while before the game asks that I begin to become someone else.

ElitePinecone wrote...

I suppose because, in general, it'd be nice to see a snippet of the character's worldview and life before they become the Inquisitor. 

Plunging us into the boots (or cloak?) of a significant character in the gameworld with only text (cinematic?) backgrounds for reference strikes me as an odd way to start the game, especially if characters then start reacting to us as our background when we don't really know what that is.

(I probably use this example too often, but the Human Noble origin in DAO handled this well, when the issue of Highever's line of succession or the territorial ambitions of the Howes came up in conversations, it made sense because we'd played through it - I don't know if that same sense of identification with the character can be imparted with text or static cutsenes.)

That too, all very well said.  I am generally uninterested in playing characters from a noble background, but I was perfectly able -- eager, even -- to play a Cousland character, because I was invested in what had happened.

Modifié par darrylzero, 23 octobre 2012 - 05:07 .

[mitthrawuodo]

I would like a chain of quests (a bit like your companions' in DA2) throughout the game with your background having a large influence on them and affecting other quests in minor/major ways plus it being mentioned by other characters

[JWvonGoethe]

Personally, I would rather miss out on substantial amounts of content on each individual playthrough if it meant only seeing everything on multiple playthroughs. That means I would like the backgrounds to contain lots of unique gameplay content, and preferably to have each background treated treated like a giant subplot. That means including a satisfying, game spanning narrative arc for each background story. There should be a fair number of quests, both short and long, associated with each background, as well as having this narrative sustained consistently throughout the game by including little references here and there, as well as by giving the player exclusive conversation options. Specialisation quests could also be treated in this manner. It's a lot to ask for, but oh well.

With regards to featuring background content at the beginning of the game, ElitePinecone and ianvillain are on the money here. We need to have the PC's history established clearly and memorably at the beginning of the game, otherwise players will find it difficult to relate to background story content when it appears during the game (a problem in Mass Effect.) I've never played Diablo III, but bob_20000's idea of a unique opening cinematic for each background would do the trick here, as long as each cinematic was substantial and really memorable. Maybe each cinematic could follow a single, big budget opening sequence that everyone gets to see in every playthrough. I should add, have the character creation on the menu screen before the beginning of the game, and before any cinematics play out.

Also, this might contradict my previous point, but having a moment of calm before the storm is a must. We had this, more or less, in the Origins stories, but not in DA2. We should have seen something like an opening cinematic of Hawke's family in Lothering, in a state of equilibrium, before being thrust into conflict and having to flee.