197 réponses à ce sujet

[MassivelyEffective0730]

David7204 wrote...

And sometimes there's very solid reasoning behind it. Perhaps you should consider that more often.

Reorte wrote...

Tell me how they work then.

Oh no, no, no. I don't have to explain or prove anything. You're making the accusation, the burden of proof rests entirely on you. If you find something inplausible in fiction, you're the one who has to prove that it's unlikely or impossible to work.

Actually, no David, it is up to the writer (or supporter) to explain why some sufficiently advanced technology is possible and how it works. They aren't obligated to do so, but anyone who points out a deficiency with real physics or impossibility in reality doesn't have to prove that it's impossible to work. For example, we know magic does not exist like it does in Harry Potter. A skeptic does not need to prove how it can't exist given the fantastical nature of what is portrayed. A wooden stick that has the power to create fire? A flying broomstick (flying under its own power at speeds comparable to WWII-era prop-fighter)? A teleportation device that is made out of enchanting a shoe? Especially if the writer does not elaborate on the forces behind such effects (which them being magic it would not be acceptable with reality anyway), one does not need to explain impossibilities in fiction to know that they are indeed impossible.

[MassivelyEffective0730]

David7204 wrote...

So that makes every single popular science fiction story of any considerable length in existence 'bad fiction,' then? Since every single one qualifies under that definition?

No. You just haven't been exposed to much fiction. You just proved it with your last sentence.

Modifié par MassivelyEffective0730, 23 novembre 2013 - 12:59 .

[David7204]

AlexMBrennan wrote...

Bioware was to cheap to hire consultants for parts of the story which require expert knowledge which Bioware writers obviously lack? That's how we got "pure krogan", Elder Space Gods with less advanced security than your average bank and so on.

I'm guessing you work in some field that handles data encryption, hmm? Perhaps you should consider your own 'expert knowledge' on genetics? Grunt saying 'Pure krogan' is hardly a big deal. Not like he's a scientist himself.

In any case, assuming that any deviation from reality must be due to imcompetence on behalf of the writers is very, very foolish. Storytellers intentionally fudge science to make a better story all the time. I don't particularly like the IFF, but even in the alternate plot of ME 2 I myself wrote, I have Shepard and the team destroying a data cache at the Collector base and severely weakining the Reapers. I would ideally like some reason as to why the Reapers couldn't or didn't transfer the data elsewhere but I admit I can't really come up with anything. So I would probably leave it as is. And you assuming that must mean I'm incompetent and am clueless on the issue is, as I said, very foolish.

[Rasofe]

I still agree with David that there's more to discuss on the writers' comptence than whether or not the physics is realistic.
It's really not such a reduced issue as "They're incorrect about an element, so they're wrong about the compound." As true as that is naively, calling it bad fiction because of a few contrivances (which as I outlined can and have lead to productive results) is shortsighted.

[Rasofe]

Has anyone else noticed that if you don't do Aria's fetchquests before the coup, there'll be two Darner Vosques: one playing poker with Vega and one waiting for you?

[Yougotcarved1]

Rasofe wrote...

Has anyone else noticed that if you don't do Aria's fetchquests before the coup, there'll be two Darner Vosques: one playing poker with Vega and one waiting for you?

thats completely unrealistic

[MassivelyEffective0730]

Rasofe wrote...
Personally I think that barring thematic pitfalls, anything inplausible in fiction can just as easily be overlooked. It's only self-destructive to worry too much about these thngs.
No one needs to prove anything. Besides, this is the internet: one does not prove things on the internet.

Honestly, I haven't been responding to all your posts on this issue of 'don't think about it, just enjoy it' because it's essentially one big appeal to moderation.

It's not bad at all what we do. As I said, internal and external consistency with lore and physics is what I believe must come first, even before your thematic pitfalls (which I honestly have no idea about what you're talking about). The lore of the story must make sense with its own rules (internal consistency), and if the nature of the story's science is largely based on real life science (Mass Effect is), it must make sense with real life science that applies(external consistency). It doesn't need to keep up with things that have already been established to exist in the games lore, since that ultimately precludes the real science, but it must maintain that establishment to be consistent.

If it breaks that, it's broken my willingness to follow the story or take it seriously. I can no longer enjoy the story.

[MassivelyEffective0730]

Rasofe wrote...

I still agree with David that there's more to discuss on the writers' comptence than whether or not the physics is realistic.
It's really not such a reduced issue as "They're incorrect about an element, so they're wrong about the compound." As true as that is naively, calling it bad fiction because of a few contrivances (which as I outlined can and have lead to productive results) is shortsighted.

It's a small issue in the scheme of things, but it adds up with many other small issues to become a very large issue

[Yougotcarved1]

MassivelyEffective0730 wrote...
It's not bad at all what we do. As I said, internal and external consistency with lore and physics is what I believe must come first, even before your thematic pitfalls (which I honestly have no idea about what you're talking about). The lore of the story must make sense with its own rules (internal consistency), and if the nature of the story's science is largely based on real life science (Mass Effect is), it must make sense with real life science that applies(external consistency). It doesn't need to keep up with things that have already been established to exist in the games lore, since that ultimately precludes the real science, but it must maintain that establishment to be consistent.

If it breaks that, it's broken my willingness to follow the story or take it seriously. I can no longer enjoy the story.

To be honest I can't believe the Alchera dispute could have broken suspension of disbelief. They said he was just meat and tubes, which is entirely plausible. The real suspension of disbelief is Lazarus project but with billions of dollars I don't even think we're that far off bringing someone back to life today. Maybe a couple of hundred years from it, but that puts it in line with Mass Effect.

I can see how the Alchera thing would be a bit of a fridge logic thing. Like maybe while you're walking to work you think "wait..wouldn't he have burned up?" but I can't imagine it would be something that you would see while playing and be like "BULL****".

[Yougotcarved1]

David7204 wrote...
Telling a good story always come first.

Within reason. There is a minimum level of adherence to lore beyond which a good story is ruined, which is partially a function of the intended audience. And in sci fi the minimum level is pretty high.

That said I don't think the Alchera thing should break that. It can absolutely be explained no problem it just might not seem 100% plausible.

[Rasofe]

MassivelyEffective0730 wrote...

Rasofe wrote...
Personally I think that barring thematic pitfalls, anything inplausible in fiction can just as easily be overlooked. It's only self-destructive to worry too much about these thngs.
No one needs to prove anything. Besides, this is the internet: one does not prove things on the internet.

Honestly, I haven't been responding to all your posts on this issue of 'don't think about it, just enjoy it' because it's essentially one big appeal to moderation.

It's not bad at all what we do. As I said, internal and external consistency with lore and physics is what I believe must come first, even before your thematic pitfalls (which I honestly have no idea about what you're talking about). The lore of the story must make sense with its own rules (internal consistency), and if the nature of the story's science is largely based on real life science (Mass Effect is), it must make sense with real life science that applies(external consistency). It doesn't need to keep up with things that have already been established to exist in the games lore, since that ultimately precludes the real science, but it must maintain that establishment to be consistent.

If it breaks that, it's broken my willingness to follow the story or take it seriously. I can no longer enjoy the story.

A thematic pitfall is when your story has a central theme and you either abandon it, resolve it too quickly, resolve it in a way that makes it irrelevant, or make the main characters independent from it. A good example in this context would be the ME endings, but there's other strains within Mass Effect 3 that - because of the central conflict being a global war against the Reapers - that also prohibit it, such as Cerberus being an obvious evil and not an optional choice to side with. Because stories can only retain narrative cohesion when built around a theme, commiting a thematic pitfall will break narrative cohesion for everyone, no matter how flexible your mind is.

Let me put my response to your statement in the mode of enlightened selfishness. There are literally not enough good things in the world, and not enjoying the stuff that's available because of this... rigidness... doesn't yield any benefits to anyone, least of all yourself. The "willingness" to follow the story or take it seriously is ENTIRELY your own choice of whether you want to be entertained or not. If I'm not interested in being presently invested into Citizen Kane, it doesn't matter how great that film is at all. Consider that an exercise in self-consciousness. Not liking something with high potential to be good because of a percentile detail is only harming yourself.

[Rasofe]

Yougotcarved1 wrote...

David7204 wrote...
Telling a good story always come first.

Within reason. There is a minimum level of adherence to lore beyond which a good story is ruined, which is partially a function of the intended audience. And in sci fi the minimum level is pretty high.

That said I don't think the Alchera thing should break that. It can absolutely be explained no problem it just might not seem 100% plausible.

What is the intended audience for Mass Effect though? It can't be just Star Trek Original Series fans.
I liked Mass Effect's (the original) conversationalist tone but 150 hours of that was enough. It needed to pick up the pace with some "style before substance" fast.
The important thing isn't whether something is contrived, but whether you can do some nice work with the idea and if you take the opportunity to have some character development. As long as the character development's cause can't be reduced to the contrived crisis, it's perfectly above the infinum.

Also: David, behave, or this will turn into another gif spam fest. I don't want to hear about conversations that may have or may have not happened in the past.

Modifié par Rasofe, 23 novembre 2013 - 03:05 .

[MassivelyEffective0730]

It's my belief that substance should always come before style. I'm a practical person. I physically cannot enjoy a story if it doesn't follow some kind of rules about lore and internal/external plausibility.

I feel perfectly fine feeling this way.

Believe me, I agree with you on your idea of thematic pitfalls, but for me to be interested in whether something is a thematic pitfall or whatever, I have to know the story makes sense with itself on a physical level. I don't want to see things get hand waived because of the cool factor.

Essentially, what you're advocating is 'rule of cool'. What I'm getting from what you're saying is that as long as it adds drama or action or whatever, to hell with the lore technicalities. 

I'm utterly, completely, and inflexibly against that concept. I want style, yes, but I want the style to fit with the substance. If it doesn't, I don't care how cool it looks, if it doesn't have some kind of substance to it, it's going to look like crap to me.

That's why I loved the conversationalist style that we had in ME1, with the added components that ME2 gave. I prefer that conversation, talky-tech style. That's what Mass Effect is. Talky-Tech. You spend the vast majority of time in the game talking to people, observing the story, and weighing in on what's going on. I strongly disliked and disparaged the turn ME3 took for the sake of action and drama. That's not compelling to me.

Modifié par MassivelyEffective0730, 23 novembre 2013 - 03:41 .

[dreamgazer]

MassivelyEffective0730 wrote...

I strongly disliked and disparaged the turn ME3 took for the sake of action and drama. That's not compelling to me.

That transition started, quite noticeably, in ME2, though. 

[MassivelyEffective0730]

dreamgazer wrote...

MassivelyEffective0730 wrote...

I strongly disliked and disparaged the turn ME3 took for the sake of action and drama. That's not compelling to me.

That transition started, quite noticeably, in ME2, though. 

It did, yes. With this very issue here. I feel however that most of Mass Effect 2, and indeed, more than I give credit to ME3, they did manage to keep things consistent and practical. I think the ones with ME3 were most jarring to me.

[Rasofe]

Ah.
But if it is not I who is inflexible, how can my vision be the one that's limited? My advocation is NOT the rule of cool. My advocation is partially that of a balanced breakfast making everyone's day better, and partially something a little more important.

Erez didn't deserve the treatment you lot gave him. He posted his original thread by just expressing his explanation for what the circumstances were of Shepard's death. As aware as you are of its errors, what makes it a brute necessity of life to confront him about it? Hell, I'd asked him why the topic really mattered and suddenly I was the new target for his opponents.

This whole stuff you're saying now, Massive, about how it's really because you're a practical person, that wasn't present in that thread. What I saw was you guys tearing him a new one because he dared to be wrong about something that you have now admitted is a personal issue with YOU, not a global offence.

Then it became a gif-and-image fest to which he reacted by slurring your military status. That's not mature behaviour. Neither is half-targetting anyone else who could be just passing by for expressing their indifference.

You all have a good day now, you hear?

[Seboist]

David7204 wrote...

Funny you say that.

Pound for pound, it's actually not too unlikely that bone and the helmet's materials are stronger than ship armor.

[AlexMBrennan]

That must be why all advanced armour (e.g. tank armour) is made from bones. Seriously, if David was headhunted by the US Army they'd be able to cut casualties by 90% of 10% of the budget thanks to insights like "Bone is superior to kevlar"

[Yougotcarved1]

Rasofe wrote...

What is the intended audience for Mass Effect though? It can't be just Star Trek Original Series fans.
I liked Mass Effect's (the original) conversationalist tone but 150 hours of that was enough. It needed to pick up the pace with some "style before substance" fast.
The important thing isn't whether something is contrived, but whether you can do some nice work with the idea and if you take the opportunity to have some character development. As long as the character development's cause can't be reduced to the contrived crisis, it's perfectly above the infinum.

I'd say as a work of sci-fi it needed at least the major plot points to be consistent and plausible.

Style vs substance isnt one or the other. It can be as stylish as you like and remain plausible, just means you have to take more effort to fine tune the scenarios so it's plausible.

@MassivelyEffective but there was a fair amount of implausible stuff in ME1 too. It wasn't like ME1 was perfectly consistent and plausible all the way through

[KaiserShep]

Rasofe wrote...

You're saying they should make ships out of human skulls?

The ship of every reaver's dreams.

[Rasofe]

What's a reaver? You mean the firefly creatures?

[Rasofe]

Yougotcarved1 wrote...

Rasofe wrote...

What is the intended audience for Mass Effect though? It can't be just Star Trek Original Series fans.
I liked Mass Effect's (the original) conversationalist tone but 150 hours of that was enough. It needed to pick up the pace with some "style before substance" fast.
The important thing isn't whether something is contrived, but whether you can do some nice work with the idea and if you take the opportunity to have some character development. As long as the character development's cause can't be reduced to the contrived crisis, it's perfectly above the infinum.

I'd say as a work of sci-fi it needed at least the major plot points to be consistent and plausible.

Style vs substance isnt one or the other. It can be as stylish as you like and remain plausible, just means you have to take more effort to fine tune the scenarios so it's plausible.

@MassivelyEffective but there was a fair amount of implausible stuff in ME1 too. It wasn't like ME1 was perfectly consistent and plausible all the way through

Well, when I found the Thorian upsetting I decided to take my frustration out on it. Then kill it. It's what Captain Kirk would do (in some episodes).
Unfortunately, Leviathan DLC gave me no such chance.
Anyway, if there's something to note of ME trilogy it's how all the DEW's keep hitting their intended targets. Space is three dimensional guys...

Modifié par Rasofe, 23 novembre 2013 - 04:35 .

[KaiserShep]

Gorram right.

[Yougotcarved1]

Rasofe wrote...
Well, when I found the Thorian upsetting I decided to take my frustration out on it. Then kill it. It's what Captain Kirk would do (in some episodes).
Unfortunately, Leviathan DLC gave me no such chance.
Anyway, if there's something to note of ME trilogy it's how all the DEW's keep hitting their intended targets. Space is three dimensional guys...

Why does 3d mean DEWs should miss?

[Rasofe]

How does the firing ship know where the target will go? No matter what its current velocity vector is, it can have an unlimited number of potential accelerations. Sensor data also having light-speed timelag, and space being big, an instant travel weapon shouldn't hit unless the target is literally travelling at uniform velocity or something else unlikely.

Obviously space combat would be impossible if that was the case and I can waive it off with the idea that advanced Quantum Computers would have the processing power to predict and react to any maneuvers within a reasonable frame. I'm not sure if quantum computers exist in ME, though. It would actually be an additional physics-alteration if it did though, since modern science doesn't know if such a device is possible at all.