Fast Jimmy wrote...
And who made the decision to keep the silent PC? The group I outlined. And their reasons why? They likely thought the game (and, by virtue of extension, we might assume the series) likely were made better for it. And with those people gone, obviously those replacing them did not have the same beliefs (or, at least, were compliant enough with requests from higher up to agree without resistance)
Which
group? Again - DA:O was not a reflection of a great deal of design choices that Bioware had been consistently making since 2005. And all of the ways that it different from BG2 - all of the ways that it was heavily criticized for, see e.g. RPGCodex - were illustrative of design choices Bioware made since 2005.
BTW, I can 100% guarantee that DA:O would not have sold as well if it had a voiced main character. Not because of any lack of quality or ability to enjoy, but because the game was eaten up and promoted like crazy by fans for being the "spiritual successor to BG."
You mean like how KoTOR had a silent PC, and ME was the called its spiritual successor, but somehow became a great hit for Bioware on the back of cinematics and a voiced PC?
Please tell me how the sacred ashes trailer, or the violence trailer, illustrate that DA:O was meant to be a "spiritual successor" to BG. I'm honestly curious. Not that Bioware didn't initially market it as such, but when it came time for the final push, it wasn't BG2 that they were selling.
Not to mention how the DA:O forums were
filled with threads on how DA:O was nothing like BG and Bioware was misleading their fanbase. Let's just list some of their complaints:
- Regenerating health and mana dumb down the game with MMO-like combat.
- 3D portraits don't allow us to imagine the character that we like to have.
- Origins wreck roleplaying because they force us into backgrounds we don't like. If I want to play a human, I'm forced to be a noble. DA:O can't be an RPG with origins.
- I can't kill characters anywhere in the gameworld. This makes it impossible to RP. I need biff the understudy.
- Being forced to save the world wrecks RP. Why can't I have my evil protagonist?
Ah, but of course, the one feature that you like is the ultimate feature that decides how closely the game tracks BG2, right?
That claim would have fallen on its face with a cinematic voiced main character. Again, not making any judgment calls about what the game would have been, but strictly based on the grognards such as myself viewing it with skepticism instead of embracing it wholeheartedly from the start.
Grognards such as yourself had entire threads about how DA:O was nothing like BG2.
At what point, anywhere, did I make the statement that the EA acquisition had anything to do with this?
You've consistently implied that the decision to change what DA:O was made late in its development/after its release. I'm saying that based on the games Bioware's development since 2002, that can't have been the case, because Bioware had been going in a different direction for a long time.
I honestly think that if DA:O had come before Mass Effect, it would have been allowed to maintain its own identity instead of being rolled in under the ME vision of how Bioware games should be made. Of even if it had been released on PC in early 2008, instead of being delayed until the consoles were ready. I think it gave Bioware a lot of time to think of the ME formula as the best they'd seen to date, not considering the fact that they were actively trying to kill a better one (given their existing audience).
Mass Effect was released in Nov 2007. If you're actually right and it was the commercial success of ME that prompted Bioware to change directions somehow - which again, completely ignores all of the games they designed between BG2 and DA:O - then it was alreayd too late for DA:O's design philosophy.
You keep saying there was a "vision" of what kind of game DA:O should be like, but Bioware's "vision" of what makes a game a spiritual successor and what the core part of their gameplay isn't like what you seem to think it is. Again, just look at KoTOR, Jade Empire and ME and see what Bioware consistently did over that period.
No multiple fantasy species, even in Star Wars. Increasingly cinematic design. Simplified combat. A focus on console gaming. The VO is just the culmination of cinematic design that Bioware had been pursuing since KoTOR was in development.
I don't think that "move to the ME formula" mandate came from EA. If anyone, I'd say it came from the Doctors themselves. Which makes it no more better, it simply is my perception.
Haven't followed Bioware for almost a decade now, I can guarantee you that you're overestimating how much the Doctors were involved in dictating by ultimate fiat what the game should be shaped like. Cinematic story-driven games were the core of Bioware's experience
since BG. Just compare how restricted the character design is in BG versus Icewind Dale. Not to mention BG2.
Modifié par In Exile, 04 août 2013 - 02:27 .
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