91 réponses à ce sujet

[Aaleel]

I care about replay value more than length. A 40 hour game I play over and over is better than an 80 hour game I play once and never touch again.

Length depends on too many things anyway. My first playthrough of any game is always far longer than any subsequent ones because I use no guides, ask no questions in forums or anything. I try to find as much as I can on my own. Which means talking to everyone and looking everywhere. So there's a lot of time that won't be there in subsequent playthroughs because I know where to go. Plus I skip dialogue at times.

[snackrat]

Considering that all the areas are huge, and will involve slowly jogging around them, and returning to those areas to 'maintain a presence', it will be very, very, very long, whether we like it or not.

That's all that matters in your question, isn't it? How much time it takes? Since no one is asking about the wealth of content available, just how long it is.

I wish people would stop putting such emphasis on time, it discourages skipping boring bits (or even encourages putting them in) so they can boast longer playtime.
Seriously, please stop doing that.

[AlanC9]

Bionuts wrote...

One thing that annoys me with many games is that they don't inform you on how long the journey is.

I want to know how long it takes to get from Point A to Point B. I also want to know how many years have passed from the beginning to the end.

So, the thread's supposed to be about in-universe time rather than gameplay hours?

We have problems with this over on the ME3 boards. Some people get the rather ludicrous idea that the game takes place over a few weeks, and there's not too many dialogues that disprove this. We shouldn't have to sift through dialogues to find out something that our PCs are well aware of.

[SirGladiator]

It would be nice to have like, a little calendar in the game that gets updated from time to time, when something important happens, that gives you an idea how much time has passed. It's not something that's 'important' to me per se, but I'd find it to be a neat little thing, and apparently for some folks it really would be a big deal, so I'd say have a little calendar that updates as important events transpire, that would be cool.

[Bionuts]

Silfren wrote...



And it's a really silly thing to be worried about.  Bioware excels at storytelling.  I don't think you have to worry about a major world-changing war such as the one Inquisition will involve taking place over the span of a mere month.  I just don't see how this is such a hugely important detail as to warrant any concern.  Origins took place over the span of a year at least, closer to two years according to some, depending on which source you go by, but at least a solid year.  So why are you concerned that they'll suddenly drop the ball on that detail for Inquisition? 

I. Want. To. Know.

I want to know how many years are going by in the game. I also want to know the distances between areas. I never said I was going to kill myself if I didn't. It's just something I want to know.

[Knight of Dane]

iakus wrote...

Bionuts wrote...

Volus Warlord wrote...

I thought this was about how long the game was.

I'd be happy with 20-30 hours in vanilla SP.

Too small. I have high hopes for DAI, so 50+ hours is what I want.

Indeed.

DAO length, at least.

DA:O legth is 20-30 hours.

[Dominus]

I. Want. To. Know.

Well, don't worry too much - I'm sure it's long, strong, and you'll be down to get the friction on when it comes out. Not sure of the likelihood that a BioWarian is feeling generous on that sort of information, but it's fair to guess that it'll be around 20-30 hours as others have stated.

Modifié par DominusVita, 15 septembre 2013 - 12:35 .

[Dean_the_Young]

Is it difficulty, or deliberate obfuscation?

I can see a minor gain in saying 'the adventure takes this long,' but I also see the disadvantage of people arguing that a concrete time scale is too short/too long/too unrealistic given how long they imagine it takes them to walk across Ferelden a hundred times.

[AlanC9]

scyphozoa wrote...
Passage of time is something Bioware has had difficulty conveying in most/all of their games, IMO. Even in games where they state that a year has passed like DAO, it still feels like I ran around the country solving everyone's problems over the span of a few days.

It sure doesn't help that the seasons never change. It's always -- what? Fall? Changing this would have been fairly difficult to do, though. Programatically generate different versions of the area, with snow textures, different trees, etc? I can see that failing the laugh test during initial requirements gathering. They did do it for Ostagar, but they had to do it by hand.

Dean's right that vagueness helps with some things. Let's say the game really enforced that it's four weeks to Orzammar. No way you're doing that trip more than once. It's interesting to plan out an efficient route through the missions, but this would ruin the whole leisurely exploration thing that a lot of CRPG players want. I'd personally like to see that aspect of CRPGs destroyed, but there's little chance of that happening.

Modifié par AlanC9, 16 septembre 2013 - 05:42 .

[Either.Ardrey]

Bionuts wrote...

Either.Ardrey wrote...

but my own initial play-through of DAO was over 140 hours

Did you stand around and observe the scenery or something?

Lots of back tracking, taking forever to make important dialogue choices, standing around looking at the map trying to figure out where I'm supposed to go next, searching every nook and cranny while I'm getting there, searching again in case I missed something, etc. I'm also the kind of person that does all the available sidequests first before doing any crit path quests, so there was a lot of travelling involved making sure I didn't miss any quests. And probably around ten of those hours were food and/or bathroom breaks where I left the game running on pause. Sometimes I guess I'd look at the scenery, but it wasn't often there was much scenery to look at in DAO. DAO wasn't exactly built to be a graphical powerhouse in comparison to other games at the time of its release.

Though for DAI, yeah...a lot of time probably will be spent just taking in the scenery. 

[Boiny Bunny]

 Ideally, I'd like DA:I to be between DA:O and DA2 in length. While I vastly preferred DA:Os narrative structure, it felt like there was a bit of filler content (the Deep Roads come to mind) which didn't add much to the plot. Around 50 hours would be fantastic if it was all non-filler content.

[mcd42313]

Knight of Dane wrote...

iakus wrote...

Bionuts wrote...

Volus Warlord wrote...

I thought this was about how long the game was.

I'd be happy with 20-30 hours in vanilla SP.

Too small. I have high hopes for DAI, so 50+ hours is what I want.

Indeed.

DAO length, at least.

DA:O legth is 20-30 hours.

The only time DA:O was 20-30 hours was my first play through which I barely did any side quest. But now when I do sidequests I can get 40+ hours

[FeliciaM]

I'd be happy with 40 hours. That's how long it took me to beat DA:O with all side quests. It takes me about 30-35 hours with DLC to beat Dragon Age 2.

I can beat me1 in 10 hours if I just do the story line missions. But that is extremely difficult for a completionist... so I end up starting over and doing everything. Even the mining quest. No quest must go undone! And I don't like dying in me2 or me3, so... complete all the quests! Scan all the planets! Those average about 30-45 hours, too. Depending how 'complete' I'm feeling

[Rylor Tormtor]

mousestalker wrote...

As with anything it needs to be long enough to be stimulating without being so long it's painful.

That's what SHE said. 


Ahem.....

Also, I would almost bet that people with their 30 hour DAO never listen to one full dialogue or watch an entire cut scene. This is not a particularly bad thing in and of itself, as probably like me you have played the game to cimpletion near a dozen times. However, you should not use that play period as a meaningful metric for a new game. 

My first playthrough of DAO was 103 hours, the next couple were around 116. If I sped through faster than something like 60 hours, the only way the game would make sense would be because I already knew all the dialogue and outcomes. 

Even DA2 I drag out to around 38 hours. 

[Giant ambush beetle]

At least 6 inches

50 hours would be great, I don't think thats too much to ask for since the developers got an extra year of development time and there is going to be exploration in the game.

Modifié par The Woldan , 17 septembre 2013 - 02:03 .