1331 réponses à ce sujet

[In Exile]

David7204 wrote...
The reason why is simple. BioWare has gone out of it's way to portrays themes of heroism and power. The trailer for Dragon Age is filled to the brim with such themes. They've promised a powerful, competent character whose choices matters. Not a tired old soldier whose life sucks and wants to die.

You can be such a horrible monster in both games that to say that they're just about heroism is not true.

For example, in DA2 you can sell a sexually and physically abused former slave to his master who will, right away, begin the abuse all over. 

[Xilizhra]

Dave of Canada wrote...

Xilizhra wrote...

From what I recall, you didn't want to play through an optimal path, and I have no problem with this. However, you also wanted to prevent me from having one, and that, I did have a problem with, as mentioned prior.

Therein lies the problem. You seem perfectly fine in wanting an optimal solution in everything you do and everyone who disagrees with you gets less-than-stellar results but misunderstand our position, we--or atleast, myself--don't want only one "side" to have optimal results. I'll dismiss the fact that you believe your side is the only one that deserves optimal results.

Considering you brought up mages and the "happy ending" again, I'll use it as an example:
Mages shouldn't get a happy ending.
Templar shouldn't get a happy ending.

They should get endings which are the culminations of their decisions, the sacrifices made and the things they've done in the name of their own beliefs.

I understand what your position is, but your position interferes with my agency. You don't want an optimal solution, and you don't have to take one. I do, and you want to remove that option from me? I don't see that as being fair.

[Estelindis]

Xilizhra wrote...

Again, which ending is optimal will differ based on character and playthrough.  Many people don't want happy endings, after all.
For some reason, most of these people are also pro-templar, which makes me think that we could make the mage ending happy and the templar one bittersweet to satisfy the majority.

If we're just talking about mages and templars, I'd prefer a happy and bittersweet ending for each, along with a compromise ending where each get some but not all of what they want.

Ultimately, though, I don't think that Dragon Age endings work best when they focus on factions.  I think they work best when focused on people, i.e. characters.  I am on record as stating multiple times, many times in this thread even, that I think the endings of DA:O were better than DA2.  One of the reasons is that, in DA:O, you're not just choosing a side.  You can get any of the four endings, regardless of which faction you picked at any of the main quest hubs or who you supported at the Landsmeet.  The ending-defining choices of DA:O are much more about the characters.  Do you want to give Loghain another chance?  Can you bear to see Alistair die?  Do you trust Morrigan?  Whatever endings DA:I offers, I would like them to be based much more on this way of doing thing.

[Allan Schumacher]

Steelcan wrote...

David7204 wrote...

That depends, very, very precisely on what exactly the 'something more' is.

For Rannoch, the player has to save Legion. Get Tali off without betraying her. Get the two to cooperate. Complete Legion's mission. Do all the geth missions before assault the base in ME 3.

All of those are...pretty obvious. At least I thought. And that's good.

And its good IN YOUR OPINION, others disagree

Just to note, while someone may come across as being very terse or direct in their delivery, the vast majority of things stated on the internet are opinions.

While I can try to be clear with "in my opinion" inclusions from time to time, I don't think it's really necessary for it to be explicitly stated.


That said, it's important for both sides of the conversation to try to maintain a degree of amicability and if you're finding it necessary to respond in this way, it does send the message that you feel the opinion is being positioned too forcefully.

[Dave of Canada]

Xilizhra wrote...

I understand what your position is, but your position interferes with my agency. You don't want an optimal solution, and you don't have to take one. I do, and you want to remove that option from me? I don't see that as being fair.

And your position opposes mine, thus the crux of the argument.

[Xilizhra]

Estelindis wrote...

Xilizhra wrote...

Again, which ending is optimal will differ based on character and playthrough.  Many people don't want happy endings, after all.
For some reason, most of these people are also pro-templar, which makes me think that we could make the mage ending happy and the templar one bittersweet to satisfy the majority.

If we're just talking about mages and templars, I'd prefer a happy and bittersweet ending for each, along with a compromise ending where each get some but not all of what they want.

Ultimately, though, I don't think that Dragon Age endings work best when they focus on factions.  I think they work best when focused on people, i.e. characters.  I am on record as stating multiple times, many times in this thread even, that I think the endings of DA:O were better than DA2.  One of the reasons is that, in DA:O, you're not just choosing a side.  You can get any of the four endings, regardless of which faction you picked at any of the main quest hubs or who you supported at the Landsmeet.  The ending-defining choices of DA:O are much more about the characters.  Do you want to give Loghain another chance?  Can you bear to see Alistair die?  Do you trust Morrigan?  Whatever endings DA:I offers, I would like them to be based much more on this way of doing thing.

Mage/templar was just an example.

However, I prefer the ending of DA2, in part because your PC is somewhat less screwed at the end than the Warden (vanished with LI, as opposed to just vanished alone). DAO's multiple ending scenario was interesting, to be sure, although sometimes I suspect that too many options just means that fewer things will get imported.

[Semi-confirmed Rumor]

David7204 wrote...

However, I am completely justified in expecting heroism to exist and to be effective for BioWare games.

They've promised a powerful, competent character whose choices matters. Not a tired old soldier whose life sucks and wants to die.

No, you're not, and no, they haven't.

You are promised -a- character with choices that (theoretically) have consequences. You are in no way promsied or guaranteed that "being a hero" is the best path.

[David7204]

In Exile wrote...

David7204 wrote...
The reason why is simple. BioWare has gone out of it's way to portrays themes of heroism and power. The trailer for Dragon Age is filled to the brim with such themes. They've promised a powerful, competent character whose choices matters. Not a tired old soldier whose life sucks and wants to die.

You can be such a horrible monster in both games that to say that they're just about heroism is not true.

For example, in DA2 you can sell a sexually and physically abused former slave to his master who will, right away, begin the abuse all over. 

This is true. Which is why I also completely support 'evil' playthroughs being successful as well.

Mostly. 'Evil' is far trickier to define than good. Let's not go into that.

Modifié par David7204, 31 octobre 2013 - 05:37 .

[Xilizhra]

Semi-confirmed Rumor wrote...

David7204 wrote...

However, I am completely justified in expecting heroism to exist and to be effective for BioWare games.

They've promised a powerful, competent character whose choices matters. Not a tired old soldier whose life sucks and wants to die.

No, you're not, and no, they haven't.

You are promised -a- character with choices that (theoretically) have consequences. You are in no way promsied or guaranteed that "being a hero" is the best path.

Well, to be fair, it never hasn't been.

[Estelindis]

Xilizhra wrote...

I understand what your position is, but your position interferes with my agency. You don't want an optimal solution, and you don't have to take one. I do, and you want to remove that option from me? I don't see that as being fair.

Quick question.  Do you distinguish here between what you want as a player and what your character wants?  

Presumably, a rational player character will always want the optimal ending - their problems come from not necessarily being able to work out how to get there.  A player may enjoy a suboptimal ending for dramatic reasons, but, again, at least on the initial playthrough, it may not come about on purpose.

[Semi-confirmed Rumor]

Xilizhra wrote...

From what I recall, you didn't want to play through an optimal path, and I have no problem with this. However, you also wanted to prevent me from having one, and that, I did have a problem with, as mentioned prior.

There is zero reason for an ending where total mage freedom with zero consequences and sexual relationships between adults and children to be the "optimal path", as you would want.

[Dave of Canada]

Morocco Mole wrote...

Do happy endings with heroism even fit the DA setting?

Closest thing I'd say is the Redeemer ending for DA:O.

[Xilizhra]

Estelindis wrote...

Xilizhra wrote...

I understand what your position is, but your position interferes with my agency. You don't want an optimal solution, and you don't have to take one. I do, and you want to remove that option from me? I don't see that as being fair.

Quick question.  Do you distinguish here between what you want as a player and what your character wants?  

Presumably, a rational player character will always want the optimal ending - their problems come from not necessarily being able to work out how to get there.  A player may enjoy a suboptimal ending for dramatic reasons, but, again, at least on the initial playthrough, it may not come about on purpose.

I personally don't. I tend to have a single canon character. I may have multiple playthroughs to determine what said character should be, but in terms of decisions, I don't change things much if at all.

[In Exile]

Xilizhra wrote...
I understand what your position is, but your position interferes with my agency. You don't want an optimal solution, and you don't have to take one. I do, and you want to remove that option from me? I don't see that as being fair.

I didn't want to wade into the discussion, but I think you and Dave are talking at a bit of a cross-purpose. If someone has a very pragmatic and utilitarian morality - and the basic reality of the game world is that any attempt to save everyone, no matter what, always suceeds  - there are no actual satisfying in Bioware-style games. 

Anyway, the real issue is that both sides want a particular moral framework to be taken-up by the game, and that's just impossible. One side has to lose. 

[MassivelyEffective0730]

Plaintiff wrote...

MassivelyEffective0730 wrote...

Xilizhra wrote...

This can backfire of course for narrative things like the Reapers being sympathetic, especially when it is so suddenly and jarringly heaped on the player after 2.9 games told and showed you how bad, irrational, destructive, and pointless the Reapers are and why, for the good of the galaxy, they need to be destroyed.

This is true. They needed to foreshadow the Reapers as having sympathetic qualities, at least in potentia, far earlier.

Or, and this is where we'll disagree, they needed to cut the sympathetic qualities from the Reapers entirely, especially since by the point of the endings, there was literally no sympathetic quality to the Reapers in the entire trilogy. I'm fine with Control (even if I don't agree with it), but I believe synthesis should not have existed. We've discussed this before, such as we have now on how the narrative and themes of the trilogy simply don't support it (especially since the particular issue had already been narratively and thematically resolved at Rannoch), to the parts where the writers {pardon me Allan} came up with a frankly poorly written and executed concept that simply makes no sense within the realms of biology, logic, or meta-ethics as well as blatantly violating and contradicting not only established lore, but basic scientific laws of physics.

Why does Mass Effect have to acknowledge "basic scientific laws of physics"? Science Fiction flouts scientific 'laws' pretty much all of the time.

Because it established them pretty quickly in the lore that it follows real science to the closest extent possible. It's limited with it's Applied Phlebotinum, which means that unless specifically stated otherwise, we are to assume that the same universal laws exist in the ME universe as our own (discounting gameplay of course). It's not Star Wars or Babylon 5 or Warhammer, which are all very, very liberal with their AP. It's why my suspension of disbelief is different for each series. I'd be pretty nerd-angry if the force suddenly came into existence in the ME universe. 

Also, about your terse comment ("Scientific 'laws'"), I'll say this: Science is real whether you like it or not. Belief isn't mandatory. Participation is.

Modifié par MassivelyEffective0730, 31 octobre 2013 - 05:47 .

[Mr.House]

Dave of Canada wrote...

Morocco Mole wrote...

Do happy endings with heroism even fit the DA setting?

Closest thing I'd say is the Redeemer ending for DA:O.

That and US where DAOs best endings. I don't think anyone wants me to do another rant about the ritual, or worse. Alistair.

[In Exile]

[Edited out an incredulous reaction because it's not really on-topic]. 

Modifié par In Exile, 31 octobre 2013 - 05:45 .

[Estelindis]

Xilizhra wrote...

You are in no way promsied or guaranteed that "being a hero" is the best path.

Well, to be fair, it never hasn't been.

To be fair, we actually don't know that.  We still don't know the ultimate consequences of several central choices in the Dragon Age series.  Moreover, heroism can be subjective in this world.  Some people can choose to reject the Dark Ritual for what are, to them, heroic reasons.  Others can accept it for different reasons and still believe their reasons are heroic, in their own way.  (And, of course, this is one of the choices whose consequences we still don't know.)

Edit: Fixing up my messed quotes.

Modifié par Estelindis, 31 octobre 2013 - 05:43 .

[Xilizhra]

There is zero reason for an ending where total mage freedom with zero consequences and sexual relationships between adults and children to be the "optimal path", as you would want.

Thank you for your input, ban evader.

Do happy endings with heroism even fit the DA setting?

DAO had one. DAA had one. Golems of Amgarrak had as happy an ending as you can get from a single dungeon crawl. Witch Hunt was a bit ominous, but nothing bad happened. DA2 definitely had a more bittersweet ending, but you can easily see the end as still being heroic.

[Steelcan]

Xilizhra wrote...

I don't want an option with no negative side effects

Then don't take them, and we all win.

I don't want them to exist

[In Exile]

EntropicAngel wrote...

(did you see my reply in off-topic, InExile?)

No. Where at? Off-topc looks like it had no activity for quite a while..