Looks like we'll need to go back to the basics:
101 - Videogames are not real.
In your opinion.
Of course you can, they did.
You were the one that was just saying the content wasn't covered enough, but when I hold it to task suddenly I'm taking a game too seriously. Your logic is flawed and you are wasting my time.
Stop engaging. He's only here to ruffles feathers and thinks Dorian is the worst queer man Bioware's written.
Anyway, the Josephine romance wasn't bad, it just wasn't what I was hoping for. I don't need every romance to be dramatic or angst ridden, but I definitely do want to feel something deeper. Josephine and the Inquisitor never went past the superficial level of a relationship for me, which means people aren't off-base comparing her to Disney.
And I wish I could get on board with Sera as a love interest. I like her in general, but I just can't imagine the motivation of anyone falling in love with her. (Not to say there's no reason for anyone to, it's just that I can't personally grasp them.)
Anyway, the Josephine romance wasn't bad, it just wasn't what I was hoping for. I don't need every romance to be dramatic or angst ridden, but I definitely do want to feel something deeper. Josephine and the Inquisitor never went past the superficial level of a relationship for me, which means people aren't off-base comparing her to Disney.
And I wish I could get on board with Sera as a love interest. I like her in general, but I just can't imagine the motivation of anyone falling in love with her. (Not to say there's no reason for anyone to, it's just that I can't personally grasp them.)
Josephine's romance felt too much like a Disney romance for me personally. Especially the dual part. I'm glad I watched it on youtube instead of dedicating a whole playthrough to the romance.
You were the one that was just saying the content wasn't covered enough, but when I hold it to task suddenly I'm taking a game too seriously.
you are wasting my time.
Can we not? Didn't we already go over this, multiple times? Nobody cares about your dismissal, and you don't care what we think. So, move on already.
Josephine's romance felt too much like a Disney romance for me personally. Especially the dual part. I'm glad I watched it on youtube instead of dedicating a whole playthrough to the romance.
From what I remember from the developers, it was sort of meant to be that way...and doesn't the Josie thread call her the Disney Princess of Dragon Age.
IDK, if I had to go for a lady, I'd probably go for Cas over Josie, but I liked Josie as a friend in the game as well.
Spoiler
Thank you!
Josephine's romance felt too much like a Disney romance for me personally. Especially the dual part. I'm glad I watched it on youtube instead of dedicating a whole playthrough to the romance.
I just really like the idea of a dwarfy gal engaging in a heroic romantic duel for her lovely lady's honor. It falls into that damned KISA thing that I can't get enough of. I'm not sure if I'll go through with it though. Josephine just seems so dull in comparison to the other LI's. I'm on my fourth playthrough and I still find myself skipping some of her dialogue because it's like an Antivan history lesson. Yawn-o!
But I digress. I've put my dwarf gal away in favor of finishing my qunari re-playthrough, so that means that I get to romance sassy Dorian in all his splendor. Love that romance.
From what I remember from the developers, it was sort of meant to be that way...and doesn't the Josie thread call her the Disney Princess of Dragon Age.
IDK, if I had to go for a lady, I'd probably go for Cas over Josie, but I liked Josie as a friend in the game as well.
I am so into Cassandra. I've intended to romance her twice now, but I just get distracted by Dorian if he's available. (Same reason I've never stuck with Miranda into ME3 because of Kaidan.) Both her character and romance are perfect, in my opinion. If I could romance her with a female she'd beat out even Liara and Isabela for me.
Uhhm... Anyone got some good screenies of Dorian's face?
Like front + profile at least?
I just really like the idea of a dwarfy gal engaging in a heroic romantic duel for her lovely lady's honor. It falls into that damned KISA thing that I can't get enough of. I'm not sure if I'll go through with it though. Josephine just seems so dull in comparison to the other LI's. I'm on my fourth playthrough and I still find myself skipping some of her dialogue because it's like an Antivan history lesson. Yawn-o!
But I digress. I've put my dwarf gal away in favor of finishing my qunari re-playthrough, so that means that I get to romance sassy Dorian in all his splendor. Love that romance.
Yeah I totally can understand why people would enjoy it. It just isn't my personal taste. If there would have even been another path other then the sword fight, I think I would have been fine with it. I just can't get into it. 
I just really like the idea of a dwarfy gal engaging in a heroic romantic duel for her lovely lady's honor. It falls into that damned KISA thing that I can't get enough of. I'm not sure if I'll go through with it though. Josephine just seems so dull in comparison to the other LI's. I'm on my fourth playthrough and I still find myself skipping some of her dialogue because it's like an Antivan history lesson. Yawn-o!
But I digress. I've put my dwarf gal away in favor of finishing my qunari re-playthrough, so that means that I get to romance sassy Dorian in all his splendor. Love that romance.
I find myself skipping a lot of her stuff too, unfortunately. I wish we would have gotten more of the Josephine who was talking about her experience as a bard in training and how that motivated her to pursue being a diplomat. That Josephine was brilliant. Actually, now that I think about it, that's another problem I had with that romance. You don't get any of those additional 'man behind the curtain' moments that you get in other romances. Josephine doesn't reveal any more of herself in a romance than she does in a friendship.
I find myself skipping a lot of her stuff too, unfortunately. I wish we would have gotten more of the Josephine who was talking about her experience as a bard in training and how that motivated her to pursue being a diplomat. That Josephine was brilliant. Actually, now that I think about it, that's another problem I had with that romance. You don't get any of those additional 'man behind the curtain' moments that you get in other romances. Josephine doesn't reveal any more of herself in a romance than she does in a friendship.
I like Josephine, but yeah. I often skip through her dialogue. There's a few I can listen to everything. Dorian, Cullen, and Solas I find very engaging. Cassandra not quite as much, but her Seeker revelations were definitely interesting. Sera is... Sera. She can be amusing, but she insults my elves and they don't like that
I am finding even Varric is hard to listen to 
his conversations in DA2 were one of my favorites, but he's just not the same to me. It's not the same dynamic. Hawke always ended up best friends with him, but my Inquisitor just finds it offputting that Varric believes the Herald hoopla.
Yeah, I don't like that "heavy" atmosphere in DAI either.
Why in Andraste's name they decided to turn DA into some Mass effect clone? That's not how DA works. Duh. I thought I would like DAI better than DA2, but even with all the hate and bickering going on in DA2,it was friendlier to pc. I don't like it sooo much. I hope I either lose all interest in the series in the years to come or they won't make DA4 as they made DAI. Because seriously, I'm just draging myself through the game, and it's my first playthough. What's the point of having all those choices and 8 LI's if I have to force myself to finish it even this one time... Goddamit.
Yeah, I don't like that "heavy" atmosphere in DAI either.
Why in Andraste's name they decided to turn DA into some Mass effect clone? That's not how DA works. Duh. I thought I would like DAI better than DA2, but even with all the hate and bickering going on in DA2,it was friendlier to pc. I don't like it sooo much. I hope I either lose all interest in the series in the years to come or they won't make DA4 as they made DAI. Because seriously, I'm just draging myself through the game, and it's my first playthough. What's the point of having all those choices and 8 LI's if I have to force myself to finish it even this one time... Goddamit.
I am definitely enjoying DAI. I like it for different reasons and mostly in equal measure with DA2- but it's been a month, more than a month, and I still haven't finished. (Having two jobs over Thanksgiving/Christmas didn't help, though.)
I loved my team members moving around in ME3 and talking to each other. It gave it more life. I wish DAI had done similar. DA2 did it, and made them all feel like a variety of friends/rivals
It's not that I don't enjoy it, but god it changed so much.
And in the certain matters, not for good. DA was unique because of the companions and their relationship with pc. And I just don't see them as companions anymore, they're just some employees. If it weren't for Dorian and Sera (who can become friends more or less with the Inq) it would've been a complete disaster for me. I get it the game is more serious now, good for them, but I don't like the undertone of it.
DAI is the game I enjoy the most of the three, but I have to agree that I miss the closeness that you can have with companions. I was obviously close with Dorian from romancing, but Cassandra was the only person I felt like I was genuinely friends with. Everyone else was somewhere between friendly acquaintance and flat out co-worker.
DAI is the game I enjoy the most of the three, but I have to agree that I miss the closeness that you can have with companions. I was obviously close with Dorian from romancing, but Cassandra was the only person I felt like I was genuinely friends with. Everyone else was somewhere between friendly acquaintance and flat out co-worker.
Too much companions/advisors...and also almost all companions you can skip .
So you end up with advisors sort of "involved " in the main story , but since Josephine ,Cullen (and even Cass to a certain degree) are just there to agree with you and do their jobs...that's just not thrilling.
It's sad we never got the whole party to actually fight together , and the only moment you see all of them (well minus Solas) is the short cutscene at the end.
Also your companions are not there during the whole journey to Skyhold ,etc..well they are there just not in cutscene.
It 's nice for people who really liked advisors , but since I'm not one of them , I'm slightly irritated.
Too much companions/advisors...and also almost all companions you can skip .
So you end up with advisors sort of "involved " in the main story , but since Josephine ,Cullen (and even Cass to a certain degree) are just there to agree with you and do their jobs...that's just not thrilling.
It's sad we never got the whole party to actually fight together , and the only moment you see all of them (well minus Solas) is the short cutscene at the end.
Also your companions are not there during the whole journey to Skyhold ,etc..well they are there just not in cutscene.
It 's nice for people who really liked advisors , but since I'm not one of them , I'm slightly irritated.
Yeah, I did fine that pretty annoying. Almost every major cut scene they used NPCs that they knew had to be there rather than the companions (except for Companions they knew had to be there). During that singing scene, it would have been nice to see all the companions rather than just Cassandra and either Dorian or Cole. or in the Fade you saw them all landing rather than just Hawke and the Warden. I can understand why they did that, but it does take away when they rarely include the companions in major cut scenes (especially cut scenes that should include them).
I have to agree on all counts that the relationships were definitely sacrificed to make room for other things. This game is great and beautiful, well written and all around amazing, but that lack of closeness with so many companions is offputting and shouldn't have been sacrificed for hours of mapping massive areas and trudging across deserts.
So how the hell do you trigger the scene where Dorian asks if the rumors about them are true? I think I've picked all different combinations during his first personal quest. No flirting before that point, but nothing will trigger that conversation. I either end up with them getting together when back at the library again, or if I wait for Giselle to show up, it's just the boring "click here to begin relationship" that has zero interesting actual content. Getting super frustrated, because that would be such a better way to initiate it with my mage character, but it just never, ever happens.
Angry Dorian
Sad Dorian
Lovey Dorian
I don't get the people that say the facial expressions are a step backward. Their expressions are very clear. People are being nitpicky, but they need to understand, it's an empty wire frame, there's no actual muscles on the mesh, so of course it's not going to be perfect.
If it were perfect, we'd be hitting uncanny valley, and that is not the place to go. That would make it worse. EDI actually gives me a bit of uncanny valley, and several hyper-real CGI commercials do as well. When Final Fantasy: Advent Children was made, they made their meshes very realistic, but deliberately exaggerated in order to avoid the uncanny valley effect. The Japanimation style would not translate well into live action. None of those characters bother me, despite using extremely high-rez graphics.
BW games don't hit Square Enix's levels, and it'd probably be a disservice if it did.
I've done meshwork (just the frames, not the rigging or animating) and it's an awful lot of work, very intensive. It's not easy to design an organic body in a way that's acceptably "real" for humans to accept without crossing the border into unnerving and creepy.
I honestly think the facial animations are excellent, for the most part. I've taken a few screenies that just look weird while the character is speaking, but that happens in photos of real people all the time.
What does bother me is the stiffness of the body and the clipping. I think those two things are their biggest weaknesses, not the faces. The faces are beautiful and expressive, able to convey a range of emotions. The bodies don't have nearly the same level of finesse, though that's to be expected; our characters aren't naked or interacting physically all the time, but we always see their faces.
That does beg the question; are the bodies stiff because they don't put a lot of effort into them physically interacting, or do they not interact because it's difficult to rig and animate the bodies? We'll probably never know.
I imagine a major concern for the animators would be that the Inquisitor can be a number of different heights. That affects even the direction Dorian's moving in - he leans up to kiss Adaar, more-or-less across to kiss Trevelyan, slightly down for Lavellan and down to kiss Cadash.
Might also be why I think the DA2 romances were the most passionate - the physical interaction didn't stop with kissing. Anders coils himself around Hawke, and Fenris jumps on him/her at the final battle...which I assume would be an easier scene to design because the animators only had to consider two different heights (male and female Hawke), and Fenris was shorter than both of them, so at least he always had to jump (imagine Dorian jumping on Lavellan - crash!). Personally, though, I thought one of the most heartwarming/heartbreaking scenes was when Fenris brings his hand up to Hawke's face after the fight with Denarius - it only lasts a moment, but the small gesture and the facial expression (Puppy Eyes of Doom!) speak volumes.
I mentioned before that more hugs would be nice (especially post-Adamant), but there must be a number of "tricks" that would reduce the problem of different races of Inquisitors, especially if the LI took the initiative in the scene, instead of Quizzy always having to do the chasing. Having them sitting down while the LI stands over them, for example. Even a close up of hand-holding or hand-covering would get the message across. I could see Dorian being the type to tap the Quizzy's nose when chiding him, or lean on his shoulder, or sidle up beside him protectively in times of stress - the shot of the Inquisitor coming up beside Dorian when Mother Giselle gets started is similar, and tells you a lot about their solidarity. The final shot, with Dorian hugging the Quizzy from behind, is one of the loveliest scenes in the series, but I keep getting slightly distracted by the thought of "Geez, poor Trevelyan's shrunk!"
Then again, I'm no animator. I'm positive someone who made the game must have thought of these already, meaning there's another reason why they're not in the game - I can imagine that hands are a nightmare to animate, for example. Plus, I stand by my view that the facial expressions are a thing of beauty, and Dorian's the best of the lot. Still, something akin to DA2, where the characters aren't forced to maintain a distance of three feet between them unless kissing or having sex, would be a nice bonus.
I imagine a major concern for the animators would be that the Inquisitor can be a number of different heights. That affects even the direction Dorian's moving in - he leans up to kiss Adaar, more-or-less across to kiss Trevelyan, slightly down for Lavellan and down to kiss Cadash.
Might also be why I think the DA2 romances were the most passionate - the physical interaction didn't stop with kissing. Anders coils himself around Hawke, and Fenris jumps on him/her at the final battle...which I assume would be an easier scene to design because the animators only had to consider two different heights (male and female Hawke), and Fenris was shorter than both of them, so at least he always had to jump (imagine Dorian jumping on Lavellan - crash!). Personally, though, I thought one of the most heartwarming/heartbreaking scenes was when Fenris brings his hand up to Hawke's face after the fight with Denarius - it only lasts a moment, but the small gesture and the facial expression (Puppy Eyes of Doom!) speak volumes.
I mentioned before that more hugs would be nice (especially post-Adamant), but there must be a number of "tricks" that would reduce the problem of different races of Inquisitors, especially if the LI took the initiative in the scene, instead of Quizzy always having to do the chasing. Having them sitting down while the LI stands over them, for example. Even a close up of hand-holding or hand-covering would get the message across. I could see Dorian being the type to tap the Quizzy's nose when chiding him, or lean on his shoulder, or sidle up beside him protectively in times of stress - the shot of the Inquisitor coming up beside Dorian when Mother Giselle gets started is similar, and tells you a lot about their solidarity. The final shot, with Dorian hugging the Quizzy from behind, is one of the loveliest scenes in the series, but I keep getting slightly distracted by the thought of "Geez, poor Trevelyan's shrunk!"
Then again, I'm no animator. I'm positive someone who made the game must have thought of these already, meaning there's another reason why they're not in the game - I can imagine that hands are a nightmare to animate, for example. Plus, I stand by my view that the facial expressions are a thing of beauty, and Dorian's the best of the lot. Still, something akin to DA2, where the characters aren't forced to maintain a distance of three feet between them unless kissing or having sex, would be a nice bonus.
Yeah, the sizes is clearly a problem for the animators and while they do a pretty good job, there are definitely problems. I've seen one shot, the Dorian kissing you scene after Mother Giselle, done from a different angle and you can see Trevelyan shrinking and growing. (Like one minute he is suddenly a couple inches shorter, the next he is taller, and then suddenly he is the same size again). That is one of the challenges of working with PCs with such different heights, but I think that is something that really needs to be worked on in future games.
I think one of the things that disappointed me is the fact they told us you could hug characters in game when they were upset, but it was just Varric if Hawke died (unless it happens again for one of the other characters during their romances and I just missed it). It was a little misleading making it seem that you were going to have more physical interactions with the characters when it actually seemed like less.
Oh well, one thing I will say is that the faces were beautifully animated and it was pretty amazing how many emotions, especially the subtle ones, they got across.
Retour en haut
