123 réponses à ce sujet

[bussinrounds]

Of course the BSN is gonna think any non story driven RPG isn't an RPG

Modifié par bussinrounds, 12 mars 2013 - 05:04 .

[Mystic dream]

slimgrin wrote...

When it drops to 10 bucks I'll give it a shot on PC. It may very well not be my type of game despite looking that way aesthetically. I hated the old school Nintendo games that predicated difficulty on memorizing vast passages where if you made one mistake, a broken save system meant repeating said passage. Over and over. This is an approach to difficult gameplay I am thoroughly done with.

Just be sure to play as hollow if you cant stand grieving hackers in pvp. All versions have this problem, but it's a real pain in the PC version in my experience.

[Eternal Phoenix]

EntropicAngel wrote...

The Hierophant wrote...

You should respond to Elton John is Dead's post, as he has valid reasons for labeling Dark Souls an RPG.

The things he states as consequences don't actually seem like consequences. Someone dying, and you not being able to buy things from them--that's not "choice and consequence."

Now, what he says about different endings sounds interesting, but based on that ^, I don't know if for him, different endings are simply a person is dead or they are alive. I don't consider that to really be a world difference.

Well...

• Attacking a certain character (actually an illusion) leads to an entire region changing along with the enemies within. The covenant in that region will be unjoinable for the rest of the game and they will hunt you down (NPC's and other players part of that covenant).
• The different endings don't just refer to a character being dead or not. Those characters can die in different ways at different points and not all endings have them simply dead or alive. One character for example can simply be killed by you (an ending itself which leads to you gaining large humanity, this choice is even proposed to you by one of the characters), abandoned and left to die, murdered by another character or later kidnapped, imprisoned and turned into a hollow. I guess you can narrow the scenarios down to just being alive, dead, hollow or insane. Still four endings based on your actions though.
• Other characters suffer different endings. One can become insane if you don't save him whereas saving him results in him helping you against the end boss. Another can become hollow and be killed by someone else or he can simply live on, die in battle helping you or commit seppuku (so it is believed by some).
• Maybe the best example comes with ignoring an NPC who reveals his sinister intentions to you and then murders an important NPC resulting in a quest-line. In another example within the expansion you get invaded by an evil NPC who tries to kill you if you spared him.
• Attacking covenant leaders lead to their covenant members becoming hostile towards you however successfully killing some of these leaders will result in unique items you won't find otherwise.
• Several covenants and progressing through them actually yield different rewards. One covenant allows you to skip two bosses while another makes enemies in one region friendly to you. Another covenant allows you to become a dragon practically. Since you can only join one covenant at a time you can't have the benefits of all and therefore your choice of covenant effects you and the game.

Maybe you don't consider the NPC endings to be a "world of difference" based on what I'm saying but since each death/fate can happen in different places, with different rewards, with different consequences and different dialogue you go through, that makes them a world of difference.

Meanwhile we play a game like Mass Effect 1 and the only consequence in that game is whether Wrex lives and who dies between Ashley and Kaiden. Games like Oblivion? Quest characters are immortal and the story-lines are linear so the only role-playing really came down to whether you would work for an evil organization like the Dark Brotherhood or not or if you would murder someone in the wilds. Even so I don't remember seeing the consequences of slaughtering an entire city and all guilds and characters had one ending. Meanwhile Martin dies no matter what. At least Dark Souls gives you multiple endings for characters even if they all narrow down to whether they live, die or become hollow.

Oh and don't just lose the ability to buy stuff from some of the NPC's, You lose information and story that they would have revealed otherwise and even their assistance in battle (as there are several NPC's in the game who help you providing they aren't your enemies and you've agreed to this with them). People aligned with these NPC's will also attack you.

Kill the people who provide you with curse cures and then get cursed and you're pretty much screwed for the rest of the game (as you can be cursed to where your health becomes a very tiny bar of about 200 HP and late game this means you'll be one hit killed by everything). There are curse cures you can pick up from certain enemies but reaching them means you'll have to trek through a rather dangerous area and their attacks are pretty powerful, even when killed it's not graunteed that they'll drop anything.

So for a character who isn't chaotic evil and doesn't wish to kill everyone they could just take a quick visit to three characters who'll cure them but a character who has killed these people will have a more dangerous and lengthy journey searching for a cure that could otherwise be brought. So that is choice and consequence and just another example of why keeping some characters alive as an evil character can be beneficial. Merchants are more important in Dark Souls than in most RPG's and while killing them might yield some instant benefits this would have a consequence in the long-run when you need certain items that only that merchant in the Undead Burg sells...

So at the end of the day you can't come and say Dark Souls is not a role-playing game when there are people who create characters who are anti-gods and proceed to kill all the gods and those aligned with them in the game and others who make it their goal to save every character, wipe out members of a certain covenant, rise to the top in their covenant, worship a god of their choosing, become a dragon, fight against those supporting the Dark or join those of the Dark and fight against those advocating the Age of Fire.

The fact that you can role-play a Darkwraith (invading other players and murdering NPC's for their humanity with the dark hand) or a Warrior of the Sun (helping other players and generally bringing light to the darkness) is more than enough to make DkS a role-playng game if the prior is not enough for you. Meanwhile the game allows you to simply ignore everyone and get the job done. This itself leads to consequences (i.e a certain NPC will still murder a certain someone).

Sorry for the long reply. I just have so much to say about DkS and about its features that not may other RPG's attempt. There are many unofficial forums that discuss DkS but I can't be bothered joining them and the official forum is dead (for some reason or the other) despite the community still being active.

tl;dr

You say that an RPG is about defining character. You can do that in Dark Souls with the character. You can define whether they are religious, what god they worship, who they like, whether they like magic, what their morality is and who they side with concerning the main story which is also instrumental to their character especially with the ambiguous endings that can be interpreted to mean anything.

Modifié par Elton John is dead, 12 mars 2013 - 10:03 .

[Chromie]

EntropicAngel wrote...

sympathy4sarenreturns wrote...

Black Ops II has choices affecting story.

Obviously an rpg.

I would disagree. I would say an RPG is a game where you define your character.

So Dark Souls is an rpg? Zing. 

[sympathy4sarenreturns]

Define character, eh? Feel free to define your Dark Souls character all you want. Start with appearance, class and your attributes. Pick a gift. Find hordes of unique weapons and armor, enchanted rings and upgrades to further define who your character is. Mine was a Pyromancer using only Pyromancies (as opposed to Miracles and Sorceries) who also was a member of the Chaos Covenant and branded a steel axe +10 and later to a fire steel axe + 5, spider shield +10 and a combo of Havel's armor and gold-trimmed robe set. Then fulfill the prophecy of the undead branded with the accursed darksign. There are four beings with Lord Souls. At least originally. Ring the bells of awakening, find the lordvessel, fill it with powerful souls and fulfill the prophecy.

Unless your definition of 'define character' is sex in underwear as the epitome of a romance, long conversations and cutscenes.

Have you folks played Dark Souls? Stop being afraid and jump in

Modifié par sympathy4sarenreturns, 13 mars 2013 - 03:42 .

[RedArmyShogun]

A Wizard did it.

[The Hierophant]

EntropicAngel wrote...

sympathy4sarenreturns wrote...

 Mine was a Pyromancer using only Pyromancies (as opposed to Miracles and Sorceries) who also was a member of the Chaos Covenant and branded a steel axe +10 and later to a fire steel axe + 5, spider shield +10 and a combo of Havel's armor and gold-trimmed robe set. Then fulfill the prophecy of the undead branded with the accursed darksign. There are four beings with Lord Souls. At least originally. Ring the bells of awakening, find the lordvessel, fill it with powerful souls and fulfill the prophecy. 

This tells me nothing about your character. Does your character feel compassion? Is your character a murderer? A thief? How do they feel towards X and Y, and how did they express that ingame?

A list of equippables isn't character-defining.

Even though sympathy didn't list his encounters with the npc or online play, the pc's actions help to define their character. Stuff like who they aid or kill, factions they join, comments left behind, and how he/she conducts him/herself online like their interactions with other players even adds a layer to their character's personality.

With games like FO, and TES the emotions, and logic the pc is supposed to express is wholly up to you as the pc is an extension of your will in that world. It requires imagination as you don't have a set character like Mario, Solid Snake, Leon Kennedy, Kratos or partially set characters like Shepard, and Hawke. 

[sympathy4sarenreturns]

I prefer imagination, some prefer spoonfed cutscenes and dialogue. Both are reasonable. Unless paper and pencil rpgs "aren't rpgs".

[sympathy4sarenreturns]

Next we are going to hear The Witcher isn't an rpg or that Heavy Rain or Red Dead Redemption is.

Silly argument. Dark Souls not an rpg is beyond funny.

[The Hierophant]

EntropicAngel wrote...

The Hierophant wrote...

Even though sympathy didn't list his encounters with the npc or online play, the pc's actions help to define their character. Stuff like who they aid or kill, factions they join, comments left behind, and how he/she conducts him/herself online like their interactions with other players even adds a layer to their character's personality.

With games like FO, and TES the emotions, and logic the pc is supposed to express is wholly up to you as the pc is an extension of your will in that world. It requires imagination as you don't have a set character like Mario, Solid Snake, Leon Kennedy, Kratos or partially set characters like Shepard, and Hawke. 

That's called "headcanoning." And you know what? If the game doesn't recognize it, how is it a role-playing game?

 
The games recognize your actions which are guided by your emotions at that moment.

The games i listed do not need cutscenes to show the player how their character feels as it will conflict with the players interpretation of their own character, as the pc is an extension of the player's will. The games i listed recognize your actions which help define your character in combination with the occasional dialogue choices to support them. How you respond to the situations, and a npc's comments is a result of how you the player feels at that moment, and vice versa. Plus actions speak louder than words.

Modifié par The Hierophant, 14 mars 2013 - 03:16 .

[sympathy4sarenreturns]

For those interested in Dark Souls lore, and who are new to the game, I recommend, of course, EpicNameBeo on YouTube.

[The Hierophant]

They have to release Demon's Souls for the 360 as i'd like to hear some new horror stories about people's encounters with..

[Corto81]

EntropicAngel wrote...

And based on what I snipped, I'd put it in the same category as Skyrim, a lite RPG.

So you haven't actually played the game?

And let me guess, DA2 IS an RPG?

Witcher 2, Skyrim, Dark Souls, Dragon's Dogma (hell even KoA) are all RPGs (and very good ones) that all let you connect with your character and the world they live in .... And each have their own strength.
In Skyrim it's the world and exploration (if you can't RP in Skyrim btw, you have no business playing RPGs...calling it an RPG-lite is beyond ridiculous), in TW2 it's the story, characters and choices and consequences, in Dark Souls it's the atmosphere, the world, the consequences of your action again, DD sorta similar etc.
They all let you develop your character with different builds, etc.

If anything, they beat a so-called story-driven, party-based RPG like DA2 into a bloody pulp,
together with it's tiny, claustrophobic world, non-believable characters and lack of anything you chose to do reflect in the game's events.
(DA:Origins, mind you, is a proper, good, deep RPG)


Anyway... Yes, Dark Souls is an RPG. And a fantastic one at that.

[Il Divo]

sympathy4sarenreturns wrote...

I prefer imagination, some prefer spoonfed cutscenes and dialogue. Both are reasonable. Unless paper and pencil rpgs "aren't rpgs".

Depends what you mean by imagination, with regards to pen and paper because it's typically not the same as imagination in games like Skyrim.  

Headcanon is the kind of thing which only occurs in your mind. There is nothing external to validate its existence. In pen and paper, if my character has a conversation with another character, yes, it was "imagined". But I can have it referenced with that particular character/player, on whom the conversation was also dependent. 

 

Modifié par Il Divo, 14 mars 2013 - 01:48 .

[Eternal Phoenix]

EntropicAngel wrote...

Elton John is dead wrote...


*amazing wall of text*

You say that an RPG is about defining character. You can do that in Dark Souls with the character. You can define whether they are religious, what god they worship, who they like, whether they like magic, what their morality is and who they side with concerning the main story which is also instrumental to their character especially with the ambiguous endings that can be interpreted to mean anything.

There's a lot there, but I'll respond primarily to this. How do you define whether they are religious? What god the worship, etc.? It's easy to claim that, but how?

And based on what I snipped, I'd put it in the same category as Skyrim, a lite RPG.

As I said I have a lot to write on Dark Souls so just used this chance to do so...

Yeah Dark Souls allows you to choose what god you worship by the covenants. Four covenants allow you to bow before a god themselves and offer things up to them. You can even get armor to symbolize your commitment to them.

So unless Skyrim allows you to worship Sheogorath (and every other god in the game whose names I couldn't care to remember) I can't see how you can consider Dark Souls to be in the same line especially since you can kill the Emperor too in Skyrim and suffer no consequence. Kill a god in Dark Souls and you have all of his followers after you.

In Skyrim choices like killing the Emperor all boil down to you accepting the quest from the Dark Brotherhood. In Dark Souls I can kill Gwyndolin (a god) for whatever reason I want and I don't need to progress through an evil quest-line to get to that bit either. Therefore my actions for killing him could well be down to a cause my character perceives as good and subsequently I have to live with the consequences of killing him (his followers coming after me for the rest of the game).

So it's not a "lite" RPG unless you consider only games with dialogue systems to be heavy RPG's. This is using the same logic like that one guy on this forum who said pre-defined characters in RPG's don't make them RPG's which means Planescape, The Witcher series, Arx Fatalis, The Ultima Series and the Deus Ex series aren't proper RPG's. In this case you're saying RPG's without a dialogue tree aren't proper RPG's even if you can define your character by choices and actions.

In a way that's like saying a person who can't talk has no personality.

Perhaps you should have a try of Dark Souls and then come back. You may find your opinion has changed.

Edit:

I see some of the other comments here. Skyrim is a full-blown action RPG just like Dragon's Dogma and Dark Souls are. However one can debate how good the RPG mechanics are. Skyrim doesn't handle choice and consequences rather well whereas Dragon's Dogma is quite lacking in that department altogether (there are two choices to be made in the main quests and they have no impact whatsoever while other choices in the main quest involve creating forged items which simply only effects dialogue and rewards) save for a few side quests which have some consequences to your choices (like one where you have to resolve a housing dispute).

Modifié par Elton John is dead, 14 mars 2013 - 05:29 .

[Eternal Phoenix]

If those words hold no meaning or consequence then they are meaningless. If I say in a game like Dragon Age 2 "I hate all mages and want them dead" but can't enact that then my character saying that becomes pointless. It's hard to role-play when you can't bring words to fruition.

Do I believe role-playing could be increased in Dark Souls if there was a dialogue tree? Absolutely but in its current form it still allows for better defining of the character than many RPG's out that have a dialogue tree.

Words are pointless if you never enact what you claim to hold true.

[Il Divo]

I love the Bioware style, but really don't think a game like Dark Souls would be improved by dialogue trees. Mainly because the Bioware approach lends itself to exposition dumps and what I love about Dark Souls is how minimalist the story actually is. The player really has to fight for the tiniest bit of information. It's like putting together a puzzle.

Modifié par Il Divo, 14 mars 2013 - 08:39 .

[eroeru]

I didn't read much of the for me still-spoilerish answers of Elton John is dead, and left the topic be. But last I read this, EA claimed it didn't matter if NPCs are killed, right?

Now imagine a hypothetical game with a character named Hawke stranded in a desert where weird illusions and demons taunt. He's there with Bethany. They've been on their journey for days, getting to oasises on the way, meeting caravans and acquired spirit acquaintances. And even though speaking is scarce in this situation, you've felt Bethany's character, she seems really human to you, and very believable as a companion/sibling - even though any communicating with her has become dysfunctional due to the timeless, hopeless, lightless abnormal circumstances. Now, as this is a game that doesn't restrict you, you at one moment kill her, in a moment where she starts to feel dangerous and hint towards going insane or that there'd be evidence she's actually a demon or something (and has been there to daunt you all along). Or *you've* become delusional or at hardship and want her equipment or her herself out of the way. Just like that it's possible, and she's gone. Now what happens? Nothing, besides the comments and different behavior of the people you've met, given they'll know of your deed (though they themselves are in a similar situation, and won't project "normal sociaety" norms, for from it - they can answer more with opposition or with a sigh). Yet you'll really feel that desperate and sad situation.

This is how in my opinion Dark Souls plays out. There's plenty of consequence in the game world to any deed, but given the game-world's heightened almost as-if otherworldy tensions, killing, sparing or ignoring others becomes more relevant and weighty yet in the context these extremes are totally understandable and in a melancholic way normal to happen.


Edit: My explanation is vague, yet I can't seem to find a way to describe Dark Souls' RP relevance which is in stark contrast with other titles, like Dragon Age series. These titles really try to do something much differing. But it's particularly difficult to describe Dark Souls' world's RP restrictions because it really is a... one might say "abnormal" world.

I'd say the main thing Dark Souls expresses to me is an emotional realm tied in with grief and death. Dark Souls expresses this wholly, very eloquently and with many nuances. The game's pretty mournful, in its overarching aestheticand setting at least.

Modifié par eroeru, 14 mars 2013 - 09:31 .

[Eternal Phoenix]

Il Divo wrote...

I love the Bioware style, but really don't think a game like Dark Souls would be improved by dialogue trees. Mainly because the Bioware approach lends itself to exposition dumps and what I love about Dark Souls is how minimalist the story actually is. The player really has to fight for the tiniest bit of information. It's like putting together a puzzle.

No not the story but to have a few dialogue options for the player wouldn't be too bad. It saves going through repeated dialogue...

I suppose they could resolve that in DSII by giving NPC's more random dialogue once you've exhausted all their relevant dialogue that is allowed until progessing further into the story/world.