197 réponses à ce sujet

[In Exile]

EntropicAngel wrote...

That's a function of the tones, not the dialog wheel itself. ME, for instance, didn't really have that. Different people reacted differently to paragon/renegades.

Jack: "Who are you?!!"

Shepard [Paragon]: "My name is Shepard. I don't want to hurt you."

Jack: "Sheeeeeeeeee**t, you sound like a p*ssy."

Specifically, it's a function of tone indicators. But the list absolutely refuses to tell you what the tone is, and proponents of the list tend to be against indicators like [Sarcatic] or [Aggressive] or (see Sylvius) even [Lie], so I would couple that functionality with the wheel/PC VO for the purpose of this conversation. 

[Fast Jimmy]

In Exile wrote...

Fast Jimmy wrote...
I'll just say we disagree on this. Saying text is ineffective at eliciting human reactions is like saying books are inferior to movies in every way possible. That's just not true.

I didn't say "text is ineffective at eliciting human reactions". I said that text-based RPGs have, so far, failed completely at creating any emotional linkages between the Protagonist - who is often not even treated like a person in the game world, but a violent object to solve quests - and the various NPCs. 

A book does a lot of work to describe things like expression, emotions, feelings, etc. A movie shows it. A book is not a screenplay. But a text-based RPG is a lot like a pared down screenplay, representing just the script (because all you have is the dialogue - you have no cues about expression, emotion, etc). 

Okay... so a play (in written form) is ineffective at eliciting emotions? That is all simply dialogue text, with very few cues on inflection, facial expression and contextual data. 

Also, people here talk about "their" Wardens all of the time. They were sad when they died in the US, they were happy when they knocked boots with their desired LI and they felt betrayed when X NPC/companion did Y to backstab them. 

Sure, it leans itself more towards self-inserts more often than note... but self-inserts often can elicit a stronger reaction than an outside NPC who the player just happens to be controlling in combat or a dialogue selection screen at times.

[rasloveszev]

EntropicAngel wrote...

rasloveszev wrote...

I'm guessing I'm the only one who liked the dialouge wheel? Unlike Origins, the Dialouge Wheel kind of shows you how your answer will be perceived and allows you to task futher questions. While with the Dialouge tree you don't know what to expect.

That's a function of the tones, not the dialog wheel itself.

Okay, I'm confused. What's so special about the dialouge wheel, then? The fact that it's a wheel?

[AlanC9]

Fast Jimmy wrote...


Okay... so a play (in written form) is ineffective at eliciting emotions? That is all simply dialogue text, with very few cues on inflection, facial expression and contextual data. 

Ineffective compared to a staged version of the play, or in some absolute sense?

[AlanC9]

rasloveszev wrote...

EntropicAngel wrote...

That's a function of the tones, not the dialog wheel itself.

Okay, I'm confused. What's so special about the dialouge wheel, then? The fact that it's a wheel?

List systems don't have tone indicators. You can make a case that they should, but so far they haven't.

[St. Victorious]

Has anyone in this thread paused to think that the dialogue wheel gives you more text options that the text tree? DAO never offered 9847 responses, typically only giving out 3-5.

Text Tree: Max 5 options
Dialogue Wheel: Max 10 options (5 responses, 5 questions)

The problem is not in the presentation of the dialogue, but in its paraphrasing/voicing. Bioware feels that the wheel is less clumsy and offers more choices, so that's what they're sticking with.

[In Exile]

Fast Jimmy wrote...
Okay... so a play (in written form) is ineffective at eliciting emotions? That is all simply dialogue text, with very few cues on inflection, facial expression and contextual data.

Plays are very different in terms of structure and style from just plain dialogue, especially as we talk about older plays that revolve around, for example, solliliquies as a means of presenting characters (which are infodumps in very different forms). 

Let's take Shakespeare as an example. Putting aside the register, the language is very rich in metaphor, allusions, etc. that paints a scene in the imagination of the reader (or lister). 

More importantly, the dialogue is often about feelings and emotions. RPG dialogue is not. Take New Vegas. 

So there's no meaningful comparison between what you're drawing, other than the tired approach of "look, this incomparable medium uses text, and therefore the mere existence of text justifies the analogy!" that comes up every time in these VO vs. non-VO discussions. 

Also, people here talk about "their" Wardens all of the time. They were sad when they died in the US, they were happy when they knocked boots with their desired LI and they felt betrayed when X NPC/companion did Y to backstab them.  

Whatever fantasy people construct in their head is not what exists in the writing. As a five year old, I could tell you all about this elaborate fantasy land I constructed in my head: I had real feelings about the characters in it and they had very developed personalities. 

But whatever fantasy exists in my head is not a product of anything other than my imagination, and it's certainly not the souless writing in an isometric RPG that gives rise to it. 

I'm not contesting whatever connection people make up in their head. I'm arguing that making up a connection in your head has nothing to do with the game conveying that emotion. In fact, people who argue in favour of all these connections that exist in their head argue in favour of as much ambiguity as possible in the game itself so they can imagine all these wonderful emotional states and reactions. 

So insofar as the actual content displayed in the game is concerned, there's no conveying of this. 

Sure, it leans itself more towards self-inserts more often than note... but self-inserts often can elicit a stronger reaction than an outside NPC who the player just happens to be controlling in combat or a dialogue selection screen at times. 

No, it doesn't. A self-insert is about whether the game allows you to express your own personality. I dislike silent VO because it prevents any possibility of a self-insert for me. Ignoring the fact that the PC is a souless construct otherwise. So I can't act as if it's separate from me, because there's nothing there. And it can't be a self-insert, because the game does not support my personality. Often, it actively works against it. 

So the silent PC is just a souless construct that completes quests. 

The only RPG I've ever played that came close to allowing a self-insert was DA2. 

Modifié par In Exile, 04 janvier 2014 - 06:18 .

[Hiemoth]

Fast Jimmy wrote...

Okay... so a play (in written form) is ineffective at eliciting emotions? That is all simply dialogue text, with very few cues on inflection, facial expression and contextual data. 

Also, people here talk about "their" Wardens all of the time. They were sad when they died in the US, they were happy when they knocked boots with their desired LI and they felt betrayed when X NPC/companion did Y to backstab them. 

Sure, it leans itself more towards self-inserts more often than note... but self-inserts often can elicit a stronger reaction than an outside NPC who the player just happens to be controlling in combat or a dialogue selection screen at times.

This comparison makes no sense whatsoever. A play, by almost definition, is something written to be performed by actors who are there to convey the emotion and give depth to the written word. Shakespeare didn't write his plays for people to read, he wrote them for people see performed. Your comparison actually supports voice acting in games.

As for the BG comparison, I am always slightly curious when it is mentioned as the golden standard, as it was at least to me already clear there that Bioware wanted to move towards a more cinematic presentation. They could write more with that system and have larger fields, but there were also problems with pathfinding system and giving places the scale they seemed to want to give them. Additionally, companion interaction was extremely limited there, outside the romances, which had their own problems. And finally, KoTOR came out after that, which was then hailed as the great masterpiece of Bioware and had voice acting as well as 3D animation in it and actually set forward the future direction of Bioware games.

[Sylvius the Mad]

In Exile wrote...

If you want a game that's reactive to you as the PC, then a text-based game is a failure at that.

Only because you insist on believing that those reactions are predictable.

Everything the game does after you act within it in potentially a reaction to what you did.  It doesn't matter whether it always does the same thing, because you can't know that from within the game's reality.

If I knock a bottle off a table, and then an NPC walks into the room, was the NPC responding to the sound of the fallen bottle?

[Sylvius the Mad]

St. Victorious wrote...

The problem is not in the presentation of the dialogue, but in its paraphrasing/voicing. Bioware feels that the wheel is less clumsy and offers more choices, so that's what they're sticking with.

Placing the wheel in the middle of the screen, though, limits the lengths of the paraphrases unnecessarily.  If they put the selection mechanism at the edge of the screen, and stopped supporting 640*480 displays, we could then be given much more information in the dialogue options.

My objection to the dialogue systems in DA2 and the ME games is that I don't know what my character is going to say, and as such I cannot make a reasoned decision as to which option to select in order to express my character's personality.

[Sylvius the Mad]

In Exile wrote...

It's funny you say that, because in no isometric RPG is this ever an option. In fact, most RPGs don't even allow you to express thoughts at all - just ask questions and agree to take on questions in a variant of 2 different ways.

Not being able to express thoughts is, I insist, far less damaging that being forced to express thoughts you weren't aware your character even had.

People so often focus on the ability within each system to cause your character to take certain actions or say certain things.  I'd much rather focus on the ability within each system to have my character avoid certain actions or avoid saying certain things.

But this is impossible in any system that doesn't provide full information about which options we're choosing.  We can't know what our characters won't say unless we know exactly what they will say.  And since I want my character's behaviour not to contradict my design (and because I deem inaction to be meaningless), it's much more important that I be able to avoid actions than it is that I be able to choose them.

[Il Divo]

Sylvius the Mad wrote...

In Exile wrote...

If you want a game that's reactive to you as the PC, then a text-based game is a failure at that.

Only because you insist on believing that those reactions are predictable.

Everything the game does after you act within it in potentially a reaction to what you did.  It doesn't matter whether it always does the same thing, because you can't know that from within the game's reality.

If I knock a bottle off a table, and then an NPC walks into the room, was the NPC responding to the sound of the fallen bottle?

Or, at the least, that we have the ability to inquire when our predictions don't pan out. If I were to walk into a hundred different bars in New York City and ****** on the bartender, I would likely have 100 different bartenders angry with me. This is one of those great advantages of pen and paper, since I have a dynamic DM available at all times, he can respond to whatever reactions my character may have predicted, correctly or incorrectly.  

The example you provide, while valid, doesn't demonstrate the extreme end of the spectrum in which reactions are considered to be predictable.

[ames4u]

*gasp* You fiends! How dare you mock the dialogue wheel which consists
of a Smiley, Frowny or Sticky-Outy-Tongue emote!!

But in all seriousness, yes, I would like the full text to be shown.
I was majorly p*ssed off with the dumbed down DW that held the player's
hand all the way through the game. Want to be a good guy? Select the Smiley
option! You know, the bright blue or green icon? Ah screw it, it's the very
first option on the wheel! See? Simple!



And then there were the outright red herrings.
The wheel choice was nowhere near the actual response given.

Modifié par ames4u, 04 janvier 2014 - 03:50 .

[CybAnt1]

I agree in the end it comes down to the writing. Maybe I remember Planescape Torment fondly because it not only had dialogue trees, they also contained rich dialogue. It's true you can have a tree, which still contains a lot of shallow, poorly written, maybe even ridiculously simple, dialogue.

Again, I'm not against cinematic presentation. I do think it promotes immersion. I certainly want to see moving and flowing expressions on the faces of people I'm talking TO. Of course I want VA for everybody ELSE. When they're getting angry with me, let those veins on their face bulge. Let me hear the rage in their voice.

But why do I have to hear myself getting angry to know I'm angry? I know I'm angry. 

In Exile, all I can say is, I had the opposite experience to you in DA2. There were many moments where I wanted to feel immersed in being Hawke/The Champion. But I kept saying to myself, "Does this guy have more than 3 emotions? When does he get sad? Regretful? Surprised? Fearful? Bewildered?" To me having very cinematic depiction of a person with a shallow inner life doesn't feel immersive.

As I said, I'm not against a voiced protag in-and-of-itself. But, yes, I know the budget-for-VA issue creates the constraint, forces the choice, so I have to take a side. Of course, I know we're all arguing for nought. What little is known to date says we are getting a reaction wheel, which seems to be a modified dialogue wheel.

Modifié par CybAnt1, 04 janvier 2014 - 03:53 .

[JoltDealer]

Champion1 wrote...

So I'm sure this has already been thought of by other fans and BioWare staff, then been turned down because it would cost a fortune, but it won't stop buzzing in my head.

In DA2 there were three base options: dipolmatic, sarcastic, and aggressive, which were substituted on rare occasions for peaceful, charming, and absolute.  Over the course of the game many players like myself realized that 99% of the time these options were tied to being helpful, inqusitive, and uncooperative, respectively.  In some conversations you had the chance to say no or perform an action, but otherwise the game continued on its way.  But what if those three weren't tied together?  Instead there could be nine options: diplomatic helpful, diplomatic inquistive, diplomatic uncooperative, sarcastic helpful, sarcastic inquistive, sarcastic uncooperative, aggressive helpful, aggressive inquistive, and aggressive uncooperative.  The first, fifth, and last are what we already have, but I think making the other six options could make the idea of a dominant voice more refined if BioWare ever wanted to try it again, or if not just give the player a more personal feeling when talking through the PC.

Obviously it's too late in the game to work something like this into DA:I, but opinions?

In game design, much like other aspects of life, there's a bit of a rule that one should always remember.  It's called the "KISS" rule.  Keep It Simple Stupid.  While the idea you just presented may sound great to you, somebody who has never played the game or any game at all is suddenly presented with nine options.  I know what you're getting at, but the way you suggested it be implemented is much too complicated.  

An easier solution?  Maybe select a "default" personality preference when you create your character.  It'd be like race, sex, and class.  I would be a sarcastic, male, human mage.  Then when I play the game, the three dialogue options in the wheel will be sarcastically influenced.  Now I would also gives players the ability to change their personality in the dialogue wheel with the press of the button.  Hit R1 or RB to toggle your personality from your default choice to another, with the color of the dialogue wheel being indicative of the new personality.  Purple for sarcastic, red for aggressive, and green for diplomatic.  After you respond, your dialogue options would return to their default settings, but this would allow players to have "emotional moments."  As in, "I am outraged at the death of countless innocent civilians."  Sarcasm may not be the best choice on that moment.

[In Exile]

Sylvius the Mad wrote...
Only because you insist on believing that those reactions are predictable.

 

They are no more or less predictable than the real world is predictable, and you insist on believing that by acting in it. 

For example, you type on your computer instead of attacking it with a banana to defeat demons that might be inside of it. Assuming a lot about the real world behaving according to predictable rules. 

People so often focus on the ability within each system to cause your character to take certain actions or say certain things.  I'd much rather focus on the ability within each system to have my character avoid certain actions or avoid saying certain things.

Preventing me from taking certain actions or saying certain things breaks my character. I can salvage a character acting "out-of-character" for some reason, but I don't have a character at all when I'm not allowed to control the action - it's just a quest completing object, a set of polygons that's barely a person. Moreover, as I discuss below, being prevented from taking action is not (from an RP perspective) different from being forced to take action. 

Not being able to express thoughts is, I insist, far less damaging that being forced to express thoughts you weren't aware your character even had.

Not being able to express thoughts breaks my character, because I designed them to have those thoughts. Saying certain things differently is a 'meh' because I never typically directed my mind to those things. And games with a silent PC like DA:O fail completely in not forcing me to express thoughts I wasn't aware my character had. Like, for example, forcing me to identify myself as a GW. There is no option but to be a GW, in the conversation with Wynne. 

Not to mention (see below) that not acting is, on any meaningful level with respect to RP, the same as being forced to do something out of character. Because not being allowed to act when you would is being force - by the game - not to do what your character would do. 

But this is impossible in any system that doesn't provide full information about which options we're choosing.  We can't know what our characters won't say unless we know exactly what they will say.  And since I want my character's behaviour not to contradict my design (and because I deem inaction to be meaningless), it's much more important that I be able to avoid actions than it is that I be able to choose them

I understand why you deem inaction meaningless, but you're still wrong about that. Not acting is  (a) as informative about character as acting; ( only passive from an external POV, not an internal POV, and © for that reason, being restrainted from acting is the same as being forced to act from an RP perspective. 

Everything the game does after you act within it in potentially a reaction to what you did.  It doesn't matter whether it always does the same thing, because you can't know that from within the game's reality.

When you act with a purpose - when you want to achieve something in the game world - then it's all about controlling reactions. It doesn't matter if your theory is wrong; it's like science in that regard. Phlogiston chemistry (by our modern perspective) is not a 'true' theory. It doesn't describe properties of the real world. But it was incredibly useful for making predictions and explaining how certain chemical reactions operated. We made real progress on its back. 

It matters that (a) I can't fine tune my control over people; and ( same, identical stimuli cannot lead to different outcomes from the same people. The only explanation that you can offer is that differences that are never shown or discussed must exist that never lead to observable differences, which is a worthless intellectual notion. 

It has no value in-game for the same reason it has no value IRL. 

Modifié par In Exile, 04 janvier 2014 - 06:01 .

[In Exile]

CybAnt1 wrote...
But why do I have to hear myself getting angry to know I'm angry? I know I'm angry.

Because I need to know that the game actually recognizes - and can react to - my character being angry. A great example is discussing things with Morrigan about her old life in DA:O. At one point, you can pick "did all the bad touching make you uncomfortable?" as a dialogue line. Morrigan's response to it is blatantly that she can understand "that" sort of touching (men's sexual desire). That's a plain WTF for me, because that's not even close to what I read that line to be, i.e., that handshakes somehow make her uncomfortable, which is funny. 

In Exile, all I can say is, I had the opposite experience to you in DA2. There were many moments where I wanted to feel immersed in being Hawke/The Champion. But I kept saying to myself, "Does this guy have more than 3 emotions? When does he get sad? Regretful? Surprised? Fearful? Bewildered?" To me having very cinematic depiction of a person with a shallow inner life doesn't feel immersive.  

Okay, that's ridiculous, because no RPG lets you express "sadness" or "surprise" or "bewilderment". Very rarely can you express fear or regret, and DA:O doesn't really let you express fear. 

Silent PCs barely have one emotion, which is neutral stoic (if that counts). 

[St. Victorious]

Sylvius the Mad wrote...

St. Victorious wrote...

The problem is not in the presentation of the dialogue, but in its paraphrasing/voicing. Bioware feels that the wheel is less clumsy and offers more choices, so that's what they're sticking with.

Placing the wheel in the middle of the screen, though, limits the lengths of the paraphrases unnecessarily.  If they put the selection mechanism at the edge of the screen, and stopped supporting 640*480 displays, we could then be given much more information in the dialogue options.

My objection to the dialogue systems in DA2 and the ME games is that I don't know what my character is going to say, and as such I cannot make a reasoned decision as to which option to select in order to express my character's personality.

Again, not a problem of the medium. Its in the delivery. Something that could be easily remedied by putting the actual spoken line below the wheel when highlighted. Doubt Bioware would do that, but it seems like a good solution to me. 

[Lady Niltiak]

Didn't they show off a toggle that would explain dialogue options more in depth for DA:I? You would hover of a response and get a longer explanation or a transcript or something for what you are going to say. I thought that was a pretty cool feature.

I remember making characters angry with me because I would interpret the DA:O options the wrong way, and I would have to quick load to redo the conversation.
DA:2 fixed that with the tone indicators, but had Hawke say things I didn't expect. If I had to pick between the two, I'll go with the dialogue wheel so I understand what my tone was. DA:O was a better game, but the dialogue system was lacking IMHO.

[Hiemoth]

Lady Niltiak wrote...

Didn't they show off a toggle that would explain dialogue options more in depth for DA:I? You would hover of a response and get a longer explanation or a transcript or something for what you are going to say. I thought that was a pretty cool feature.

I remember making characters angry with me because I would interpret the DA:O options the wrong way, and I would have to quick load to redo the conversation.
DA:2 fixed that with the tone indicators, but had Hawke say things I didn't expect. If I had to pick between the two, I'll go with the dialogue wheel so I understand what my tone was. DA:O was a better game, but the dialogue system was lacking IMHO.

The hover-over didn't exactly go like that, if I understood it correctly. It doesn't show exactly what you are going to show, but rather what is the message being conveyd. In the example shown, those hover-over summarized what you were ordering your troops to do, not a transcript of what you were going to say to them.

[Lady Niltiak]

Hiemoth wrote...


The hover-over didn't exactly go like that, if I understood it correctly. It doesn't show exactly what you are going to show, but rather what is the message being conveyd. In the example shown, those hover-over summarized what you were ordering your troops to do, not a transcript of what you were going to say to them.

Well It has been a while since I watched it, I'll assume you're right. It still seems better than what we currently have, better than the text only or the DA2 wheel anyway.