710 réponses à ce sujet

[In Exile]

Schneidend wrote...
I'm not sure how the ability to go through the single-player with a friend controlling Varric or creating his own character would cause you to relate the game to Halo or Tomb Raider, whose main multiplayer modes are competitive affairs with capture the flag and team deathmatch.

Because the game would have to be radically redesigned to allow this to happen. Even controlling another party-member would require the game to be totally rebalanced for a complete lack of pausing and upping the difficulty for two players, and then there'd have to be a way of sorting out who controls the remaining characters. Adding in a whole other PC means either having to sort out who does the talking (and having multiple voices to boot!) or literally having one character stand around mute in the background as a pack mule. 

[celestial_emperor]

I'm really, really not excited about a Dragon Age multiplayer. The Dragon Age games have always surprised in terms of beautiful pre-set worlds, intriguing characters, and fascinating stories (with a few minor misses that you can find elsewhere on the forum by people who got pissed about that sort of thing).

Multiplayer almost always degrades a RPG video game experience to "kills," "builds," and the inevitable trying to find a few people to talk to online who don't make you grate your teeth.

[Nightdragon8]

Allan Schumacher wrote...

iakus wrote...

Allan Schumacher wrote...

BG (and BG2's) SP was so awesome it completely eclipsed multiplayer in a lot of people's minds.

If DAI is that high quality, then sure, mp is fine.  I may pick up the game eventually

But at this point I personally will accept nothing less.

I guess what I am saying here is that you don't appear to be coming across as an advocate for a strong single player experience, but really more of an advocate for ensuring that the game will not feature multiplayer.

I do not understand why you are saying that you'd be okay with a lesser quality single player game simply because it has no multiplayer.  Both as a gamer and a developer, I have a hard time reconciling your perspective.

I'm not so sure where the confusion lies here.  My post is pretty clear that I do want a strong single player experience.  Like BG and particularly BG2.   If DAI were to deliver such a high quality game, then I could be confident that multiplayer did not in fact take anything away from it, quantity or quality wise.  Or if it did, then the amount was trivial.  

I've been replaying both BG games recently (about to head to Spellhold now ) And the SP game is so vast, so immersive, and filled with memorable characters that it's easy to forget it has MP at all.  I want that experience.  I don't want a "Thedas Readiness" screen greeting me every time I open the game.  I don't want to be "encouraged" to use an aspect of a game I don't want to use to get a "better outcome"  I want a single player experience so enjoyable and immersive that it completely eclipses any multiplayer that may end up in the game.

I bring it up because you appear to hold a game with MP to a higher standard than one that does not.  To the point of literally saying that you'll only pick up the game if it is of BG quality.  This implies that you are okay with the game having a weaker single player.  You definitively state that it's a requirement for you to even consider buying the game.

So what you're saying is... we increase the chances of you buying the game simply by not having any multiplayer.  Regardless of what state the single player game is in.

I mean, if a a game that is  purely single player ends up sucking, you can't really blame multiplayer for messing anything up.  The game would still suck though   I don't want a mediocre SP game.  I've got plenty of those already.  What I want is a great SP game.   And I don't see MP contributing to that at all.  And I can imagine it potentially harming it..  If MP does end up in the game, it will make it that much harder for me to have faith that absoloutely everything was done to ensure that top-tier SP experience.

This is what I was referring to earlier by allowing excuses.  You effectively allow the developers, including me, a free pass for why you didn't like the story for ME3 (and even DA2).  It's not the bleak ending, or the various issues that were fundamentally the problem.  It's the multiplayer that was the problem.


As such, I'm at a point where I think if I had the choice of "making sure the game had a great single player campaign" or "making sure the game didn't have multiplayer" then the decision that I think would be most appealing to you is "making sure the game didn't have multiplayer."  Especially from the perspective of whether or not you purchase the game.

Again: "If DAI is that high quality, then sure, mp is fine.  I may pick up the game eventually"

So if MP is not in the game, you're okay with lesser quality.  And that's where I get confused.  I guess it comes down to whether or not you'd be willing to blame any perceived faults on the multiplayer components existing, but at the end if all you care about is the single player experience, does this mean that you are more tolerant to a lesser single player experience since you know that "all" the effort went into the single player game?

Ok here is MY point of veiw on everything. First I will tell you where my opinions are coming from. I started DA universe from DA2. Honestly I thought it was a good game, somewhere between great and good. The major problems i had was with graphic and texure stuff. Then I found out, hey you could import saves from the older titles, and so I bought the DA:O steam uber dulx thing (was on sale so lucky!!) but i did find it better than DA2, mailny for the multi race selection the orgin stories (but i did get sick of going though ostgar got to the point I knew exactly where to stand to dodge the flaming cataplut on the bridge) and it was fun to see how the story changed from the different point of views.

But it wasn't just the story that i thought was better overall, it was also the enchantment effects on the weapons ,DA:O effects where I think extremely supiour that it made DA2 look worse in comparasion. So there was that. Now lets switch gears to the ME

I started out with ME1 and went to the end. Now Loved the story and honestly don't regeret buying it. Now I'm not saying ME3 was prefect (it was so close expect for the bad practice of story telling. but anyway, at frist I also thought that it was because of the MP that the SP suffered. Then a dev on here explained exactly how they get the money, that the money for each part of the game is given to the SP then if they decide to go for MP then they add on money for the MP and the added on money is only used for the MP, and SP. Now I wouldn't doubt that there is some money that can go between the 2 of them but, they finish the game to there likeing with the amount of money they have.

So while we all like to think that BW pretty much sold out to the Micro transaction trend, that is more of an EA than a BW thing. The truth is that, it wasn't a resource issue it was just bad story telling. Now don't get me wrong, 99% of the game was great and honestly the storytelling was great till the last 5 mins. (I still think we should have been given the option to salute Mordin as he was going up the elevator, cause I don't think there is a solider alive that wouldn't do that to someone who is going to make the "ultimete sacerfice" to save a large group of people.)

My point is that, I'm fine with there being multiplayer (i'm going to assume its going to be horde, arena type of fighting) as long as it doesn't cut into the SP. and as long as MP doesn't effect the SP storyline like it did in ME3. I draw the line where i HAVE to play MP in order to get the "best" ending for a SP game. (yes yes i know fixed in EC but should not have been in the game in the first place)  I don't mind being able to "import" MP characters to help out the SP or completeing the SP to get some stuff in MP as long as its still balacened

Modifié par Nightdragon8, 11 novembre 2013 - 02:38 .

[Hilarystamp]

As long as it doesn't take away from the game itself I'm willing to give it a shot. But the single player story rich game must come first!

[Schneidend]

In Exile wrote...


Because the game would have to be radically redesigned to allow this to happen. Even controlling another party-member would require the game to be totally rebalanced for a complete lack of pausing and upping the difficulty for two players, and then there'd have to be a way of sorting out who controls the remaining characters. Adding in a whole other PC means either having to sort out who does the talking (and having multiple voices to boot!) or literally having one character stand around mute in the background as a pack mule. 

Complete lack of pausing? Ha! Nope. Remember, Baldur's Gate/Icewind Dale. Host gets to decide who can pause.

Infinity Engine games already did the character control thing. Host assigns slots to players.

Only the Inquisitor/Warden/Shepard talks.

All of these issues have been solved by other games already. Bioware games, even.

[Icinix]

Not opposed, but would like it kept as separate as possible to single player.

I don't want to have to log on to my account just to access single player etc.

[Arisugawa]

Schneidend wrote...

Arisugawa wrote...

Because in both cases, they are additional content that I am paying for but do not want and will not intend to use.

You're going to be paying 59.99 regardless of whether the game has multiplayer. That's a foregone conclusion.

someguy1231 wrote...

Arisugawa wrote...
Because in both cases, they are additional content that I am paying for but do not want and will not intend to use.

But you're still paying the same amount of money for the game. ME3 still cost the usual amount for a game despite having MP. Your complaint makes absolutely no sense.  If you went to a restaurant and ordered your favorite meal, and found that it now included a free dessert which you weren't interested in, would you complain that your meal had been ruined?

Both of your arguments assume that everything will be equal. It is not necessarily so.

The dinner comparison is flawed.

A brand new game is not necessary my favorite meal. It's something new. I'm taking a chance on it. It is going to have elements of things I enjoy, of course. For example, the chef knows like I like pasta and chicken and asparagus because I have enjoyed these things on two previous visits to the restaurant. With that in mind, the chef has included them but they are being prepared in a new way. Perhaps spiced different, or a different glaze or marinade is used. But it isn't something I've eaten before. I'm still taking a gamble on it.

With that in mind, is a dessert really an incentive, regardless of it being free? I've already said that I'm generally not a fan of multiplayer, so the equivalent is offering me a free dessert that I wouldn't ordinarily want. For example, I hate coconut. Offering me a coconut dessert free with the new meal I'm about try isn't an incentive nor is it welcome. Will I like it if I try it? Maybe. That possibility exists. But I'm not grateful it is part of the dinner regardless.

I'm also keenly aware that the dessert isn't free. The cost of the dessert is already factored into the asking price of this new meal I'm about to try. It costs the same as the meals I've previously enjoyed, but the restaurant isn't losing money by giving out free desserts with this new item. The cost is recovered somewhere. Often in smaller portions of the stuff I normally get the meal for.

In my jaded little head, I expect that a game that has no multiplayer component will have more single player content for the 59.99 I'm going to play. It certainly felt that way with the Mass Effect trilogy, where a single run of either of the two first games takes me longer than a run of the third game. I base this on the time total from my save files. Mass Effect 3 has always taken me less time to complete than either Mass Effect or Mass Effect 2.

It's true that other factors could go into this: Mass Effect had long stretches of driving in the Mako and Mass Effect 2 had mineral mining, though how much these activities extended the duration of a single playthrough I'm not certain of.

I would still say that on the average, most of the games I've purchased with multiplayer included have had a shorter overall single player campaign. And since my 59.99 is going towards the single player campaign and not the multiplayer, if it feels shorter I cannot help but assume the inclusion of multiplayer had some factor in that.

59.99 is not an insignificant sum. That's why one of the reasons that despite how entertaining it might otherwise be, one of the loudest criticisms of Portal 2 was its brutally short single player campaign. Did Valve expect the co-op to compensate for that? I'm not sure.

Either way, if I spent 59.99 into Dragon Age: Origins and put well over 200 hours worth of time into it, and spent the same price on Portal 2 and got only 15 or so hours of it, the justification for the 59.99 comes into question.

Or, to put this back into food terms, if I have an absolutely marvelous dinner that cost me 59.99, and then I'm offered a dinner with slightly smaller proportions of the stuff I like and a dessert I'm not likely to enjoy, I don't consider the two equal regardless of the similar price tag.

Modifié par Arisugawa, 11 novembre 2013 - 04:49 .

[In Exile]

Schneidend wrote...
Complete lack of pausing? Ha! Nope. Remember, Baldur's Gate/Icewind Dale. Host gets to decide who can pause.

That was 10 years ago, and those games were played by a small minority of people often over LAN and commonly with people that they knew. Now we're talking about an entirely different audience. 

Infinity Engine games already did the character control thing. Host assigns slots to players.

Yes, and that won't erupt into a cluster of rage at all. It's totally manageable with the perfectly reasonable people we've seen living on the internet.

Only the Inquisitor/Warden/Shepard talks.

And like TOR proved, no one will rant at you for refusing to skip all dialogue and get to the killing faster. 

[TurretSyndrome]

In Exile wrote...

Schneidend wrote...
Complete lack of pausing? Ha! Nope. Remember, Baldur's Gate/Icewind Dale. Host gets to decide who can pause.

That was 10 years ago, and those games were played by a small minority of people often over LAN and commonly with people that they knew. Now we're talking about an entirely different audience. 

Infinity Engine games already did the character control thing. Host assigns slots to players.

Yes, and that won't erupt into a cluster of rage at all. It's totally manageable with the perfectly reasonable people we've seen living on the internet.

Only the Inquisitor/Warden/Shepard talks.

And like TOR proved, no one will rant at you for refusing to skip all dialogue and get to the killing faster. 

So what? You're afraid that people on the internet will ruin the experience for you? If that's the case, then just play alone or with someone you know.

[Schneidend]

In Exile wrote...

That was 10 years ago, and those games were played by a small minority of people often over LAN and commonly with people that they knew. Now we're talking about an entirely different audience.

I'm not even sure what your argument is anymore. Is multiplayer bad because it would require a massive redesign, which it doesn't, or because a co-op campaign doesn't have mass appeal?

Yes, and that won't erupt into a cluster of rage at all. It's totally manageable with the perfectly reasonable people we've seen living on the internet.

I'm not sure how that's a problem. Play single-player, create your own lobby, or only play with people you know.

Only the Inquisitor/Warden/Shepard talks.

And like TOR proved, no one will rant at you for refusing to skip all dialogue and get to the killing faster.

Also solved by my three solutions above. And, anecdotal though it is, I never encountered such issues in TOR.

[Sylvius the Mad]

TurretSyndrome wrote...

So what? You're afraid that people on the internet will ruin the experience for you? If that's the case, then just play alone or with someone you know.

This is why I avoid multiplayer everything.  It's always people that ruin the experience.  Everything enjoyable is more enjoyable when done alone.

[Star fury]

Sylvius the Mad wrote...

This is why I avoid multiplayer everything.  It's always people that ruin the experience.  Everything enjoyable is more enjoyable when done alone.

Except sex.

[Kidd]

Arisugawa wrote...

With that in mind, is a dessert really an incentive, regardless of it being free? I've already said that I'm generally not a fan of multiplayer, so the equivalent is offering me a free dessert that I wouldn't ordinarily want. For example, I hate coconut. Offering me a coconut dessert free with the new meal I'm about try isn't an incentive nor is it welcome. Will I like it if I try it? Maybe. That possibility exists. But I'm not grateful it is part of the dinner regardless.

You may be right, depending on how a possible MP mode in DAI ends up. ME3's certainly didn't seem like it cost anything extra, considering they got more funding to keep more people on the payroll in Montreal to work on the MP.

The money spent on Montreal's content didn't seem like it was intended to be repaid with the $60 price point you paid for at the store, but rather the micro transactions within the MP itself. It seemingly did so well the team could chuck out several free expansions with the profits they were making.

If there is no planned additional revenue stream for DAI however, I will readily agree that your dinner argument holds water.

EntropicAngel wrote...

AppealToReason wrote...

I am not opposed. I play with myself often enough. I want to play with others too.

*cough*

Isn't it nice that the definition of the term "fan love" is getting broader by the day here at the BSN?  Sylvius sadly seems opposed to the idea. I propose the theory that he simply has never played with a fellow fan with the same desires as him.

[Rodia Driftwood]

Allan Schumacher wrote...

A general question:

What would your thoughts of ME3 be if the single player experience existed exactly as is, and there was no multiplayer component at all?  In fact, for those that see ME3's MP as the proof that it takes away from the Single Player experience, I ask you to ask yourselves "is it possible that BioWare just made a single player experience that I didn't care for?"

Many seem to insist that it's a causal relationship, and it tends to come across as insulating us in a way that may not be as productive as people think.  A bit like when people blame EA for what they dislike in new BioWare games (I actually don't like this, and feel it is people giving me a Get Out of Jail Free card and letting me off without being accountable for decisions that I make).

IF(and this is a huge 'if') the exclusion of MP in ME3 meant we would have had a better ending, better side-quests and a richer experience, then yeah, I would have opted for no MP at all. But, it isn't that simple, and it wouldn't have been the case, so this is mostly pointless. 

[Fast Jimmy]

Schneidend wrote...

In Exile wrote...

That was 10 years ago, and those games were played by a small minority of people often over LAN and commonly with people that they knew. Now we're talking about an entirely different audience.

I'm not even sure what your argument is anymore. Is multiplayer bad because it would require a massive redesign, which it doesn't, or because a co-op campaign doesn't have mass appeal?

The argument, as far as I see it, is that the only type of MP that doesn't require a massive game redesign (simply because DA is a series where party management and tactics differ from many other genres/franchises, that focus on controlling a single character and root the experience in player skill over character skill) is a co-op feature for the SP game... and that this market is so small that it is likely not the MP component EA or Bioware would choose to go with, since it results  in a small amount of increased sales and no (clear) method of earning extra revenue, such as through microtransactions or item packs.

So while a SP co-op mode like what we have seen with games like BG is likely to be (relatively) harmless to any changes in how the SP portion of the game has worked for the rest of the series, it is also the most unlikely MP mode that DA:I will have. 

Modifié par Fast Jimmy, 11 novembre 2013 - 01:23 .

[A Crusty Knight Of Colour]

Star fury wrote...

Sylvius the Mad wrote...

This is why I avoid multiplayer everything.  It's always people that ruin the experience.  Everything enjoyable is more enjoyable when done alone.

Except sex.

Multiplayer Cybersex Mode semi-confirmed.

[spirosz]

Sylvius the Mad wrote...

Everything enjoyable is more enjoyable when done alone.

My friend, that is so not true, lol.  

In context of gaming, depends.  I've always had more fun playing Halo co-operatively, or Gears of War.  In relation to real life, doing certain activities alone is nice, but how dare I say (in relation to music) I'd rather jam with dozens of people, with each bringing their unique influence on their instrument, then just "jam by myself".  

[GreyLycanTrope]

I'm not too fond of the monotony of MP, but so long as I'm not forced to participate to get the most out of SP I guess I really wouldn't care if it was included.

But if it's something like this:

Chris Priestly wrote...
The original experience of the game was meant to reward players who did extra work (multiplayer, importing a save, playing the iOS games, etc) with greater levels of success in the end, which is appropriate to a story about a war that needs every possible advantage in order to win. But now that we are moving to a post-launch period and have additional content for the endings, we wanted to make it easier for all players to experience even the best-cast endings.

Yeah, we were told specifically that wouldn't be the case from the get-go, not a few months after launch. Don't do that, ever. You can reward players who go the extra mile by giving them bonus items like the N7 hoody for the Collector's edition of ME3, don't purposefully block people from being able to unlock content without it.

Modifié par Greylycantrope, 11 novembre 2013 - 02:17 .

[spirosz]

^

[Vortex13]

I don't want to see a requirement placed on players to play MP in order to unlock things in SP, but I am not against the idea of MP/SP integration.

I think that a big part of the problem is that developers, and publishers tend to think of said integration of: "How can SP benefit from MP while at the same time encouraging players to play MP?" The problem there being the belief that players would need to be coerced into playing the MP mode in order to enjoy it.

I am more of the mindset that "honey catches more flies than vinegar". Saying that players HAVE to do something is not nearly as effective as providing a means to enjoy the game, if one so wishes. What I mean by that is instead of MP being some required task that has to be played in order to reap the rewards of SP, why not turn it around and have the SP accolades tie into MP?

A perfect example (IMO) would be the game Batman Arkham: Origins, in that game you have no requirement placed on MP, you can play and unlock everything that SP has to offer without even touching the online component; there is, however, a reward for playing SP in the form of that game's version of Premium Specter packs.

By preforming a certain side mission, players are rewarded with free MP packs, these packs which normally require several MP games to earn are given free of charge in SP. There are no strings attached, just an optional reward that might make a person initially against MP try it out because of the reward earned.

If devs are looking to have an integration between the two modes I would highly recommend looking at Batman Arkham Origins' approach.

[tehprincessJ]

I'm not opposed to it, just to the idea of it being REQUIRED in any way to get the best single player ending. I was violently opposed to Mass Effect multiplayer pre-ME3, and then, when it came out, I ended up pleasantly surprised at how fun it was. It was like having 2 games (although, having a ton of friends that play, too, was probably the biggest reason I enjoyed the multiplayer so much). But the fact that it is necessary to play quite a bit of it to hundred percent achievements wasn't something I agree with, and the entire way galactic readiness was implemented was awful.

I don't really play games that are dependent on others to make them enjoyable, which is the entire point of multiplayer. I play BioWare games for a whole other reason. At the end of the day, I'll buy 'Inquisition' for the single player. But to say multiplayer will "mess it up" is just silly.