132 réponses à ce sujet

[nightscrawl]

Ieldra2 wrote...

I'm making this topic to discuss the question:

Should characters (NPCs) be consistent between different playthroughs of the same game?

My short answer: no, and they already aren't, but first things first. The desire to write this was triggered by some people on other threads dismissing certain lines of arguments as metagaming, implying that because it involves meta-level information, these arguments are invalid. Some time later, the same people expressed a desire to have characters consistent between different playthroughs with regard to certain character traits they express or not. However, the absence of character consistency between playthroughs only becomes apparent if you use meta-level information, which means that if you expect characters to be consistent that way, then meta-level information is not irrelevant to you.

Going to start off by saying that this whole thing was a really interesting read.

Here's an example:

Suppose you play a game with a branched storyline and different companion NPCs plus romance. Your PC gets into a romance with a certain NPC, you make some decisions, and to you utter delight, this story turns out to have everything you ever wanted from a video game romance, and you come to love that NPC and get highly invested in the story. Then you come to a discussion forum, and you realize, had you chosen an alternative branch at some point, the same NPC would have done something you didn't like and even more importantly, through that action expressed a character trait you really despise.

How do you react?
(1) "Oh no, it's all ruined. I can never play that romance any more and I hate that character now"
(2) "Doesn't happen in my game, the character is as is in my game, what do I care about others."

If you react with (1), you are from the traditional school of thought where a character is one unified entity  just as in linear stories, and everything the writers have written about them in any continuity also applies to yours. "The character" is seen as the sum of all potentialities, regardless of whether they're realized in your game or not. You may be of the opinion that meta-level information should not matter, but nonetheless it matters to you.

If you react with (2), you are from the school of thought that every playthrough is an alternative universe and that unrealized potentialities do not exist in any given continuity. "The character" is what you experience in a single playthrough only, and others have different versions of them which don't necessarily have the same traits. Meta-level information really doesn't matter to you.

I appreciate that you tried to make this issue as general as possible, but let's face it: this was inspired by the various arguments surrounding the "all bisexual" follower romances. The reason I feel the necessity to bring this up is because I don't think that sexuality can be compared to someone who has "expressed a character trait you really despise."

I will put this in non-romance terms. Let's say I do a play as a non-elf and really like a certain NPC. Then in my next play as an elf I sadly discover that the same person is racist against elves. Will this affect my future plays, even as a non-elf PC? It probably would. I would certainly get the feeling that the NPC was a racist the whole time, I was only ignorant about it since I wasn't the race that he or she is prejudiced against.

Let's use a real life meta-knowledge example: Mel Gibson. I could meet Mel Gibson in real life and he might be extremely nice and friendly. However, in vino veritas, we know his views on certain groups. You don't say garbage like that when you are drunk if it's not a part of who you ARE. Just because he is nice to me doesn't mean I have to be totally accepting of his behavior or opinions. I dislike rudeness, so if I met him IRL I might be polite, but that is all.

On the other hand, I don't have any issue whatsoever with the LI being open to everyone, and I don't feel that it is a "personality trait." Someone being gay or straight is NOT the same as being a racist, or just being a general a-hole. I would associate and be friendly with a someone who is gay or straight, but probably not with an a-hole.

Modifié par nightscrawl, 05 juillet 2013 - 01:18 .

[Ieldra]

nightscrawl wrote...
I appreciate that you tried to make this issue as general as possible, but let's face it: this was inspired by the various arguments surrounding the "all bisexual" follower romances. The reason I feel the necessity to bring this up is because I don't think that sexuality can be compared to someone who has "expressed a character trait you really despise."

The immediate cause was that thread, yes, but the example which brought me to use this expression is from ME3. Miranda's romance scene in the Citadel DLC heavily suggests that she wants nothing more than to get out of the life she's been living and settle down into a normal life (that's the part I despise), while the friendship scene with femShep has her quite happy to continue as a "troubleshooting space diva". Different traits expressed based on the PCs gender, and it is only peripherally related to romance.
I can't think of an example quite as fitting from the DA universe, but characters expressing different traits because of what happens in the game - like Leliana's and Alistair's optional hardening - also reinforrce the notion that every playthrough is an AU. If the characters were really one between playthroughs, with fixed traits, then  they would never be written to change into alternative personalities. 
So this goes well beyond the sexuality issue.

I will put this in non-romance terms. Let's say I do a play as a non-elf and really like a certain NPC. Then in my next play as an elf I sadly discover that the same person is racist against elves. Will this affect my future plays, even as a non-elf PC? It probably would. I would certainly get the feeling that the NPC was a racist the whole time, I was only ignorant about it since I wasn't the race that he or she is prejudiced against.

Let's use a real life meta-knowledge example: Mel Gibson. I could meet Mel Gibson in real life and he might be extremely nice and friendly. However, in vino veritas, we know his views on certain groups. You don't say garbage like that when you are drunk if it's not a part of who you ARE. Just because he is nice to me doesn't mean I have to be totally accepting of his behavior or opinions. I dislike rudeness, so if I met him IRL I might be polite, but that is all.

The difference here is that real people have character traits regardless of whether you hear about them, while that's not so with fictional characters, who only have certain traits because you hear about them. I can't say I'd remain uninfluenced by such an unpleasant revelation, even it was in another's playthrough, but if I otherwise like the character enough, I can adopt mindset (2) and legitimately treat that trait as nonexistent because they're defined by what I hear about them and every playthrough is an AU. The justification is that every playthrough already is an AU by virtue of having a different protagonist and different decision sets compared to almost everyone else if the set is big enough. I just extend that rationale to NPCs.

On the other hand, I don't have any issue whatsoever with the LI being open to everyone, and I don't feel that it is a "personality trait." Someone being gay or straight is NOT the same as being a racist, or just being a general a-hole. I would associate and be friendly with a someone who is gay or straight, but probably not with an a-hole.

That's a question better debated in the other thread.

[LPPrince]

I want my in-game characters to feel as real as possible, so when they have traits expressed in another's playthrough that I didn't experience, I still attribute it to them, even in my playthroughs. Why? Because its the same person.

Thats why I had no idea Anders was playersexual till I found out online, since I only played a FemHawke and thought Karl was just a buddy of his. The lack of Anders telling FemHawke about a relationship with Karl was not appreciated by me, mainly because it made it come across like a FemHawke would be less inclined to romance him if she was made aware of it.

[Jorji Costava]

The difference here is that real people have character traits regardlessof whether you hear about them, while that's not so with fictional characters, who only have certain traits because you hear about them. I can't say I'd remain uninfluenced by such an unpleasant revelation, even it was in another's playthrough, but if I otherwise like the character enough, I can adopt mindset (2) and legitimately treat that trait as nonexistent because they're defined by what I hear about them and every playthrough is an AU. The justification is that every playthrough already is an AU by virtue of having a different protagonist and different decision sets compared to almost everyone else if the set is big enough. I just extend that rationale to NPCs.

I think the more plausible thing to say here is that a character trait can exist as long as you could have heard about it (or alternatively, could have inferred it from their behavior), even if you don't ever actually hear about it. If anyone's played Alpha Protocol, there's a lot of character information available through unlockable dossiers, and if you're not spending money on intel, exploring and hacking computers, etc., you'll miss a lot of it. But it's still true in-game, regardless.

Moving closer to home, does Bhelen stop being a reformer, or does Harrowmont stop being weak, simply because you never accessed the parts of the game that would have made this information available to you? Does Ashley Williams from ME stop being a nationalist simply because you never spoke to her? A game isn't obligated to explicitly tell you everything that is true of its game world; it's only required to make that information available to you, should you be curious enough to pursue it.

There's also a difference between (A) not finding out that a character has some trait simply because you never accessed the relevant information, and ( not finding this out because you didn't make certain choices which are such that had you made them, that would have influenced the character in such a way that she would have acquired the trait. So if it's knowable in-game that Bob is a racist, but you never speak to him and so never find this out, then that doesn't make him a non-racist. But you never hear that Bob is a racist because you didn't make the choices that would influence him into being a racist, then I think you're free to ignore other people's playthroughs where they did make those choices, and so free to treat him as not a racist. That's my two cents, anyway.

EDIT: Fixed formatting

EDIT #2: Changed some wording in the third paragraph

Modifié par osbornep, 05 juillet 2013 - 06:57 .

[Ieldra]

osbornep wrote...
I think the more plausible thing to say here is that a character trait can exist as long as you could have heard about it (or alternatively, could have inferred it from their behavior), even if you don't ever actually hear about it.

Well yes, it can exist, but it need not. It's left in an undefined state. And sometimes one branch suggests one trait and the other branch suggests a contradictory trait. In these cases it's rarely explicit, but it becomes pretty clear that they're not really the same person in two different playthroughs. 

I think the distinction to make is whether alternative versions of NPCs exist because you make certain decisions in the game - as in hardened Leliana and Alistair - or if the differences are based on something preset when you start the game like the PC's race, class. gender or background. The former feels more natural, but in both cases the basic idea remains the same: characters have unrealized potentialities that don't exist in playthroughs where the conditions for their existence aren't fulfilled.

Modifié par Ieldra2, 05 juillet 2013 - 06:46 .

[Jorji Costava]

Ieldra2 wrote...

osbornep wrote...
I think the more plausible thing to say here is that a character trait can exist as long as you could have heard about it (or alternatively, could have inferred it from their behavior), even if you don't ever actually hear about it.

Well yes, it can exist, but it need not. It's left in an undefined state. And sometimes one branch suggests one trait and the other branch suggests a contradictory trait. In these cases it's rarely explicit, but it becomes pretty clear that they're not really the same person in two different playthroughs. 

I think the distinction to make is whether alternative versions of NPCs exist because you make certain decisions in the game - as in hardened Leliana and Alistair - or if the differences are based on something preset when you start the game like the PC's race, class. gender or background. The former feels more natural, but in both cases the basic idea remains the same: characters have unrealized potentialities that don't exist in playthroughs where the conditions for their existence aren't fulfilled.

My concern is this: The idea that you can change the properties of the game world simply by being lazy (not accessing the codex, having few to no conversations with NPC's, etc.) rubs me the wrong way. It undermines the reality of the game's universe, making it seem like more of a toy world than anything. I prefer to be made to feel that the game world doesn't just exist for the sake of the player and his or her preferences; of course there's a sense in which this isn't true, since it is a fictional world marketed to an audeince of gamers, but games, like movies, are an exercise in a kind of illusionism.

As far as characters having conflicting tendencies based on what dialogue is chosen, perhaps this is simply a result of the character herself having conflicting attitudes towards something. We can often be simultaneously drawn to and repulsed by one and the same thing. If it can't be explained this way, I'd say it's not great writing; it undermines the integrity of the world, for me anyways.

Generally, I feel that the only time the same character should have different traits from playthrough to playthrough is if it is a result of events that can be represented in-game. You choosing certain dialogue options with Bob might correspond to influencing his attitudes in a certain way with the persuasiveness of your words, for instance. Changing a character's attitudes, beliefs, dispositions, etc. based on what race or sex you chose isn't like this. What option you clicked at the beginning corresopnds to no event that can be represented in-game. So that doesn't completely work for me.

[AstraDrakkar]

OP I usually react as #2. I always see my playthrough as the true reality.

[Maria Caliban]

The Uncanny wrote...

Maria Caliban wrote...

Ieldra2 wrote...

Should characters (NPCs) be consistent between different playthroughs of the same game?

Yes.

Why?

Because a good character is one with a strong, well-defined nature.

If you want a good example of this I'd suggest Red Letter Media's review of Star Wars: The Phantom Meneses. Specifically, where they contrasted characters from the original film to that of those in TPM.

Characters aren't actual people. A writer and/or actor has to create the illusion of a fully fleshed out person in, typically, a couple of hours. Even in a BioWare game, the amount of character building moments, as opposed to just mindlessly following the PC around or stabbing at people, is quite small.

This is why even 'nuanced' characters tend to be far more basic and straightforward than the average person.

Modifié par Maria Caliban, 05 juillet 2013 - 10:15 .

[Qyla]

Maria Caliban wrote...

The Uncanny wrote...

Maria Caliban wrote...

Ieldra2 wrote...

Should characters (NPCs) be consistent between different playthroughs of the same game?

Yes.

Why?

Because a good character is one with a strong, well-defined nature.

If you want a good example of this I'd suggest Red Letter Media's review of Star Wars: The Phantom Meneses. Specifically, where they contrasted characters from the original film to that of those in TPM.

Characters aren't actual people. A writer and/or actor has to create the illusion of a fully fleshed out person in, typically, a couple of hours. Even in a BioWare game, the amount of character building moments, as opposed to just mindlessly following the PC around or stabbing at people, is quite small.

This is why even 'nuanced' characters tend to be far more basic and straightforward than the average person.

BUT you are a good writer if people get the feeling that the chara could be a real person as they read/play/whatever

[Sylvius the Mad]

Ieldra2 wrote...

I'm making this topic to discuss the question:

Should characters (NPCs) be consistent between different playthroughs of the same game?

My short answer: no, and they already aren't, but first things first.

If I didn't know otherwise, I'd think you were me.

[Maria Caliban]

Qyla wrote...

BUT you are a good writer if people get the feeling that the chara could be a real person as they read/play/whatever

The thing is that when a gamer (or reader, viewer) says that a character feels real, they often mean that the character touched them on an emotional level.

Tyrion from a Game of Thrones is wildly praised as a 'real' character by people who've never met or interacted with scheming, noble born dwarves who commit patricide.

But, Tyrion is looked down upon by society and his family but continues to do his best and get what dignity he can. That's something the reader can emphasis with. They know what it feels like for others to look down on them. They know what it's like to try your best even when they'll likely not be as true as others.

What makes Tyrion real is that he's expressed in a way that's psychologically true. Not that he fits in nicely with all those real people we know.

Many of the real people we know are a rather boring compared to a well-realized character.

Xilizhra wrote...

Question: is bisexuality or playersexuality a better option for you?

Assuming you're asking me, I assume that if a character expresses interest in women and men, they're bisexual. This doesn't matter if they express this interest during one play through or over several.

People who use the term 'playersexual' seem to be suggesting that, for example, Isabela is more properly bisexual than Merrill because Merrill is virginal while Isabela is licentious. That viewpoint displeases me.

Modifié par Maria Caliban, 05 juillet 2013 - 10:34 .

[Sylvius the Mad]

Maria Caliban wrote...

Xilizhra wrote...

Question: is bisexuality or playersexuality a better option for you?

Assuming you're asking me, I assume that if a character expresses interest in women and men, they're bisexual. This doesn't matter if they express this interest during one play through or over several.

People who use the term 'playersexual' seem to be suggesting that, for example, Isabela is more properly bisexual than Merrill because Merrill is virginal while Isabela is licentious. That viewpoint displeases me.

Playersexuality is just an acknowledgment that a character's possible preferences in another playthrough are not necessarily relevant to the person that character is in this playthrough.

That Merrill is virginal means we cannot tell if she is bisexual within any given playthrough, because she doesn't express any interest in anyone but Hawke.

Leliana is plausibly bisexual when the Warden is male, but when the Warden is female Leliana could simply be gay.  If she doesn't express any interest in men in those playthroughs, then she might not have any interest in men in those playthroughs.

[Maria Caliban]

I love your current signature.

Your definition of playersexual is one I'm comfortable with. I've seen others who don't seem to have that definition, but I was incorrect to suggest everyone who uses it is doing so in the way I described.

Sorry.

[AlanC9]

osbornep wrote...

My concern is this: The idea that you can change the properties of the game world simply by being lazy (not accessing the codex, having few to no conversations with NPC's, etc.) rubs me the wrong way. It undermines the reality of the game's universe, making it seem like more of a toy world than anything. I prefer to be made to feel that the game world doesn't just exist for the sake of the player and his or her preferences; of course there's a sense in which this isn't true, since it is a fictional world marketed to an audeince of gamers, but games, like movies, are an exercise in a kind of illusionism.

I think this is the core of the question. Is a game primarily a simulation of the world it's depicting, or is it primarily a story-delivery system?

[nightscrawl]

AlanC9 wrote...

I think this is the core of the question. Is a game primarily a simulation of the world it's depicting, or is it primarily a story-delivery system?

My initial reaction was to say "a story-delivery system." BUT, that description sounds rather passive, as in a movie, whereas games are interactive. The story does not progress unless it has player input, and in that sense the player is participating in the delivery of the story.

[Wulfram]

Sylvius the Mad wrote...

That Merrill is virginal means we cannot tell if she is bisexual within any given playthrough, because she doesn't express any interest in anyone but Hawke.

She thinks the Qunari were "easy on the eye"

[AlanC9]

nightscrawl wrote...

My initial reaction was to say "a story-delivery system." BUT, that description sounds rather passive, as in a movie, whereas games are interactive. The story does not progress unless it has player input, and in that sense the player is participating in the delivery of the story.

But if that's true, what's the objection to the story being rewritten around player inputs?

[Jorji Costava]

AlanC9 wrote...

I think this is the core of the question. Is a game primarily a simulation of the world it's depicting, or is it primarily a  story-delivery system?

I don't see these goals as mutually exclusive. Why can't one do both of these things, and do them well? One could easily argue that far from being exclusive, the two goals are complementary: A story that isn't set in a believable world will be less compelling, and a richly detailed setting with no story will be far less immersive (this is kinda how I feel about Skyrim, actually).

EDIT: Fixed formatting.

Modifié par osbornep, 06 juillet 2013 - 05:48 .

[nightscrawl]

AlanC9 wrote...

nightscrawl wrote...

My initial reaction was to say "a story-delivery system." BUT, that description sounds rather passive, as in a movie, whereas games are interactive. The story does not progress unless it has player input, and in that sense the player is participating in the delivery of the story.

But if that's true, what's the objection to the story being rewritten around player inputs?

For me, it depends on what criteria you are using. I know that sounds like I want to have my cake and eat it too, but that's just how I feel about it. /shrug

[In Exile]

Ieldra2 wrote...
Well yes, it can exist, but it need not. It's left in an undefined state. And sometimes one branch suggests one trait and the other branch suggests a contradictory trait. In these cases it's rarely explicit, but it becomes pretty clear that they're not really the same person in two different playthroughs. 

Does poor writing really create multiple dimensions, in your view? 

Modifié par In Exile, 07 juillet 2013 - 04:31 .

[In Exile]

AlanC9 wrote...
I think this is the core of the question. Is a game primarily a simulation of the world it's depicting, or is it primarily a story-delivery system?

I don't think the game being fixed outside the involvement of the player really relates to whether the game is about delivering a story or not. 

[Ieldra]

In Exile wrote...

Ieldra2 wrote...
Well yes, it can exist, but it need not. It's left in an undefined state. And sometimes one branch suggests one trait and the other branch suggests a contradictory trait. In these cases it's rarely explicit, but it becomes pretty clear that they're not really the same person in two different playthroughs. 

Does poor writing really create multiple dimensions, in your view?

It's not a bug, it's a feature. Well, at least depending on your preferences. If you're fine with one branch, ok, but if you're not then you'll be glad the other one exists. It's only bad if you presume that characters need to be consistent between playthroughs.

[Ieldra]

nightscrawl wrote...

AlanC9 wrote...
I think this is the core of the question. Is a game primarily a simulation of the world it's depicting, or is it primarily a story-delivery system?

My initial reaction was to say "a story-delivery system." BUT, that description sounds rather passive, as in a movie, whereas games are interactive. The story does not progress unless it has player input, and in that sense the player is participating in the delivery of the story.

As soon as we have decisions with in-world consequences, the player also shapes the world and creates their own AU which is different from the AU of those who made different decisions. 

So even if you see the game as a story-delivering system, such a game doesn't tell the same story to you as it does to me. It already has "different dimensions". All I ask is whether it isn't plausible that NPCs are also somewhat different depending on points of divergence, even those that don't necessarily have anything to do with them.   

[The Red Onion]

I hope to add an extra quibble to the convo, more than anything else.

[1] I'm somewhat Lacanian about this whole character-consistency business. People who brave my textwalls probably have guessed as much, but what I want to stress here is that fragmentation can also happen in the reader. We may want inconsistency in characters if both contradictory sides signify something we desire. We may become angry at inconsistency itself at moments where it poignantly suggests that we ourselves may be split. And so on. If we are to acknowledge inconsistency in the text, perhaps we can also acknowledge inconsistency in the reader.

[2] The appeal of Schrodinger's Alistair's is this: a) you cannot know someone until you observe, and there is no observation without interaction. Inasfar as these quantum metaphors are concerned, there is actually an appeal in such a message. In essence, "knowing" always constitutes an operator, and you can't poll a person without changing a person. Of course this is not to say tautologically that an orientation-change operator can always be supplied, but IRL it is not so farfetched to have someone "become questioning once (s)he is questioned."

[3] To combine 1 and 2, and at the risk of being annulled by both physiscists and psychoanalysts alike, I'd say this is my outlook on the issue. The "self" is not continuous, but split by her context. In the "classical limit" where one's context is stable, her persona will seem stable. What is in question, is whether Hawke can disrupt this limit; insofar as I can entertain that she might, it follows that I can entertain the result of discontinued selves. For instance, think on the moment of HawkeXFenris in Act 2. The triggering of memeories can indeed be such a disruptive moment, where a "self" becomes split between past and present, memory and amnesia, engagement and disengagement, and so on.

Modifié par alexbing88, 07 juillet 2013 - 07:52 .

[nightscrawl]

Ieldra2 wrote...

All I ask is whether it isn't plausible that NPCs are also somewhat different depending on points of divergence, even those that don't necessarily have anything to do with them.

In the previous thread, the issue of the Ostagar prisoner was raised: "In DAO there's a quest at Ostagar where a prisoner begs you for some food. If you take certain dialogue options he'll tell you that he has a key that can open one of the chests in camp, and will give it to you if you feed him. However, it is possible to go through the entire quest without ever learning that he has that key. If he doesn't mention it, did that key ever exist? "

My response was:

You basically have one shot to do this quest, and that is when you are wandering around the camp before you are sent into the Korcari Wilds. During that time, you just go up to him in camp and talk to him. There is nothing that is affected by your actions.

From the prisoner's dialog, I would say that yes, regardless of whether you ask him or not, he does indeed have the key. You have the option to ask, "Why should I help you?". To which he responds, "Because you may want something I have." If you do NOT ask this and simply agree to his request, you never learn about the key at all. In this instance, your PC's knowledge of the key is the only thing influenced by your own actions.

So, if I were to follow my own words there, my answer to you would be: No, NPCs are not different, the only variable is the player's knowledge of said difference that occurs in the different AU states. In one reality my PC learned of the key, in another she did not. However, the prisoner still has the key, regardless of whether or not I know about it.


Unfortunately, suggestive dialog options are one of the barriers to having a completely ignorant AU state. Keeping with the same prisoner, if you are the type of player to pick all of the dialog options when you talk to people (as I am), you would likely learn of the key. If you are more rigidly RP minded ("My character wouldn't ask that"), or trying to hurry along in the game, you might never know.

Some dialog options invite you to be suspicious of certain NPCs, like Berwick or Weylon in DAO, even if you might not have been from your own previous knowledge. Similarly, going through the dialog in Redcliffe where you have to make the choice regarding Connor, you are asked several times whether you really want to go with a certain choice, and IMO it takes a great deal of effort to ignore the other suggestive dialog options there.

Modifié par nightscrawl, 07 juillet 2013 - 12:37 .