IIRC, there was also a weapon you couldn't get in one of the ME games unless you played on Hardcore or higher. Rare occurrences though, and definitely narratively insignificant and not in any way necessary for any outcome.
ME2's Geth Pulse Rifle, correct.
In my opinion it is less because it takes away features of gameplay and show programmers, that there's no need to put much effort in their work, because out there are enough people who want to buy it but not really "play" it.They just want to see the story whichfor - to me - youtube is enough. I mean, what's next? Narrative mode for dark souls? Or diablo 4? Or QTE-battles in DAI? Ain't it enough if telltale does these things?
Narrative Mode strips a RPG of one of it's core-features and my fear is, that as a result, the gameplay suffers from that becuase developers stop putting time and effort into it -> the gamer will buy it anyway just for the story. That's exactly what you are telling them and i don't stand with that - especially not with BIOWARE, creator of Baldur's Gate. I want a game and not just an interactive movie.
Guys, i'm not someone who favors nightmare-difficulty, but that`s no reason fpr me to ask for a narrative mode in... for Example: dark souls.
Really? You actually think people who design levels for a living, and who will sit and argue the minutiae of a boss fight over their lunchtime board game and forget to eat, are going to go "you know, 10% of people played though that last fight in Narrative mode, and only 8% played though it in Nightmare mode, so screw it, let's not bother with the nifty fight mechanics we thought up and tested ... " I don't even know where to begin with that.
In my experience, (I know more roleplaying writers than game designers these days, with the collapse of the Melbourne software industry, but the principle holds; they are creative and sadistic mofos) they are far more likely to go "Hey; we can really ramp up the difficulty in this boss fight, and use that vicious AoE we came up with, because people always have the option of turning the difficulty down if it's too much for them."
You speak as if all RPGs were the same. They are not. Diablo is a hack-n-slash CRPG; if you take out the combat, there's frankly not much there. A one track plot and a lot of repeated battle cries. Tactics and multiplayer are its selling point. Dark Souls' whole point is that it's brutal and you are going to die a great deal and feel really clever when you manage not to; that's its selling point. So, no, I can't see a Narrative Mode would benefit it much either. DA, though, puts a lot of its effort into branching storylines and its interparty banter, and writing generally. That's what they do better than anyone else, and that's their selling point. But their level designers have never skimped on inventive ways to mess with us in the boss fights. And the engine they are designing on gives them all sorts of painful new possibilities.
TL;DR; your fears are unfounded.
In my opinion it is less because it takes away features of gameplay and show programmers, that there's no need to put much effort in their work, because out there are enough people who want to buy it but not really "play" it.They just want to see the story whichfor - to me - youtube is enough. I mean, what's next? Narrative mode for dark souls? Or diablo 4? Or QTE-battles in DAI? Ain't it enough if telltale does these things?
Narrative Mode strips a RPG of one of it's core-features and my fear is, that as a result, the gameplay suffers from that becuase developers stop putting time and effort into it -> the gamer will buy it anyway just for the story. That's exactly what you are telling them and i don't stand with that - especially not with BIOWARE, creator of Baldur's Gate. I want a game and not just an interactive movie.
Guys, i'm not someone who favors nightmare-difficulty, but that`s no reason fpr me to ask for a narrative mode in... for Example: dark souls.
Actually, I think if you take the literally defanition of an RPG - it's a role playing game. It's putting yourself in the role of another character. So as long as you're doing that, it's an RPG. No combat necessary.
What about skipping cutscenes? Can't the same argument be made for that? Players who skip cutscenes don't get to see all the hard work the writers and cinematic artists put into the game, yet people would rage if they took that ability out of the game. So really, isn't it more fair to let people also skip/have very easy combat if that's not the part they're interested in?
YouTube is not enough for people just interested in the story, because the reason Bioware stories are as compelling as they are, is because they are interactive.
Adding a super easy narrative mode in no way harms the people who want a challenge. It only allows more people to experience the game.
Its a good idea for new fans or people who want a easy way to get to the story and bosses but what about a harder difficulty then nightmare like insanity or last man standing
Its a good idea for new fans or people who want a easy way to get to the story and bosses but what about a harder difficulty then nightmare like insanity or last man standing
Narrative, Casual, Normal, Hard, Nightmare, GTFO
Narrative, Casual, Normal, Hard, Nightmare, GTFO
I don't see any problem with this set up. I won't play narrative and I won't play Nightmare, definitely not GTFO 
But yeh, I "get" that some people just want to more or less hear the story and some want to play at a level that would make me want to through a brick at someone.
If BW can do it, why not. For me, I want the story and the fighting and all the quest. I always start on casual so i can learn how everything is set up and after a few years, I move on to normal. I think I even played DA:O on hard one time. 
I won't say how long that took. ME1 my husband had to remind me more than once that I always have a hard time when I start a new game and to keep trying. Eventually i played all of the ME series on normal. I wouldn't want just one choice, even it was a choice I always play.
DA2 - the Arishok dance was a nightmare for me on casual. I think they eventually fixed that. i do love the dual with the Benny Hill music added. I can relate to it.
Actually, I think if you take the literally defanition of an RPG - it's a role playing game. It's putting yourself in the role of another character. So as long as you're doing that, it's an RPG. No combat necessary.
What about skipping cutscenes? Can't the same argument be made for that? Players who skip cutscenes don't get to see all the hard work the writers and cinematic artists put into the game, yet people would rage if they took that ability out of the game. So really, isn't it more fair to let people also skip/have very easy combat if that's not the part they're interested in?
YouTube is not enough for people just interested in the story, because the reason Bioware stories are as compelling as they are, is because they are interactive.
Adding a super easy narrative mode in no way harms the people who want a challenge. It only allows more people to experience the game.
Skipping cutscene is standard mostly because of it's comfort. Think about playing a game 8-10 times through. It's like watching a movie over and over and it get's boring... especially if the scene is right bevore a boss, you keep dying on, so you have to retry and watch the scene again. That's why skipping exists.
But you argumented about the essence of roleplay... well let's see. I play these games for about 20 years so i got a pretty good standard - even though i'm far from some hardcore-guys i know. So, what makes RPGs...? Creating a char, or taking the role of an existing one and live his/her story...setting your own class, gear, skills...leveling up and becoming stonger... oh, wait, none of that mattters in narrative mode. Why leveling up, if you breeze through everything? Why searching or forging for the best items? Why learning the most powerful skills? None of that matters.
So what's left? Story... conversations... cutscenes. In other words an interactive movie - NOT an Rpg. I mean, why even call it "playing"? Why call it a "game"? It's not. It's an interactive movie.
I mean, come on! Neither Mass Effect nor Dragon Age were ever that difficult, that someone couldn' play through (no dark souls which isalso to hard for me and not enjoyable but fans want it that way). So what? No enjoying the fight? Oh, i'm sorry! i always thought it's part of the RPG-experience... starting weak but steadily getting stronger until you can compete with the strongest enemies in the game. And i thought as well, that it's part of the developers job to make this experience challenging but not frustrating. And i always thought sequels had t deliver MORE, not less.
But this narrative thing just means scr** that. Not needed, fans will buy it anyway.
If you don't agree, fine. But please stop calling yourself gamers, cause you're not. You just wanna watch how things play out but you don't wish to immerse.
Skipping cutscene is standard mostly because of it's comfort. Think about playing a game 8-10 times through. It's like watching a movie over and over and it get's boring... especially if the scene is right bevore a boss, you keep dying on, so you have to retry and watch the scene again. That's why skipping exists.
[snip]
But this narrative thing just means scr** that. Not needed, fans will buy it anyway.
If you don't agree, fine. But please stop calling yourself gamers, cause you're not. You just wanna watch how things play out but you don't wish to immerse.
First of all, you do not get to say who is a gamer and who isn't. You also don't get to say who is a role-player and who isn't. Nobody died and made you Gary Gygax, so quit it with the gate-keeping nonsense.
There is more than one way to play a Bioware game, and that is one of their strengths. No one is going to take away the crunchier modes. If you've got the leisure and the inclination to spend countless hours replaying the same combat so that you can get to the major plot point which advances the story, you'll be able to do that.
But actually, the definition of a Role-playing game--the thing that makes it different from a combat sim-- is that you play a character who adapts to their situation and plays a part in the story being told. And there are different types of RPG. Dragon Age is NOT Diablo, where the focus is on grinding for loot, and it's pretty much all you do. DA's more complicated. You get to interact with the characters and landscape, and choose paths based on the sort of character you are playing.
And replaying a game five or ten times to see what happens to your carefully thought out character if you go left instead of right is, by definition, immersion. Not to mention heavy investment in that character, so if you're intent on handing out scr**s, please keep one for yourself.
Skipping cutscene is standard mostly because of it's comfort. Think about playing a game 8-10 times through. It's like watching a movie over and over and it get's boring... especially if the scene is right bevore a boss, you keep dying on, so you have to retry and watch the scene again. That's why skipping exists.
But you argumented about the essence of roleplay... well let's see. I play these games for about 20 years so i got a pretty good standard - even though i'm far from some hardcore-guys i know. So, what makes RPGs...? Creating a char, or taking the role of an existing one and live his/her story...setting your own class, gear, skills...leveling up and becoming stonger... oh, wait, none of that mattters in narrative mode. Why leveling up, if you breeze through everything? Why searching or forging for the best items? Why learning the most powerful skills? None of that matters.
So what's left? Story... conversations... cutscenes. In other words an interactive movie - NOT an Rpg. I mean, why even call it "playing"? Why call it a "game"? It's not. It's an interactive movie.
I mean, come on! Neither Mass Effect nor Dragon Age were ever that difficult, that someone couldn' play through (no dark souls which isalso to hard for me and not enjoyable but fans want it that way). So what? No enjoying the fight? Oh, i'm sorry! i always thought it's part of the RPG-experience... starting weak but steadily getting stronger until you can compete with the strongest enemies in the game. And i thought as well, that it's part of the developers job to make this experience challenging but not frustrating. And i always thought sequels had t deliver MORE, not less.
But this narrative thing just means scr** that. Not needed, fans will buy it anyway.
If you don't agree, fine. But please stop calling yourself gamers, cause you're not. You just wanna watch how things play out but you don't wish to immerse.
What makes a game without combat still a game is that it is a system governed by defined rules; even if the rules governing how conversations work are a lot simpler than the ones governing combat and related functions, they're still there. And if you want, conversations can even have various win-states and failure-states as well. Sounds game-y enough for me; not really sure what else you want, unless by "game" you simply mean "the kind of game you like." Your last sentence is a bit confusing given that for many players, combat is one of the most immersion-breaking parts of games. Stealing an example from MrBTongue, Cole Phelps of LA Noire is supposed to be a relatively ordinary LA police officer but by the end of the game has most likely accumulated a body count in the hundreds; that's a little odd, to say the least.
What it boils down to is this: I can get that if you're reading a mystery novel, you may not want to skip to the end, but I don't see how the simple knowledge that other people are doing so should affect your enjoyment of the novel. Similarly, I don't see how the fact that other people are skipping out on combat or making it far easier for themselves should undermine your enjoyment of that combat.
But please stop calling yourself gamers, cause you're not.
Lol. 
People who play games aren't "gamers."
What are they then? Gardeners?
The choose your own adventure element of The Walking Dead and The Wolf Among Us from TellTale has done nothing to diminish their power in story telling and the impact they have.
I've always been a strong advocate for a super easy mode for games like Dragon Age, Mass Effect etc - because of the power of their story telling.
In Dragon Age 2 - parts felt greatly cheapened by the combat parts of the game because they were handled so poorly (waves of paratrooper Templars YAY!)
I played through the first Mass Effect and the first Dragon Age something like a combined 40 times since their release - and at least half of those were easy modded games just for the story and the choices / consequences.
More power to the gamer for how they choose to play is always a good thing.
Hear, hear! Here, here! Narrative mode, please.
Lol.
What are they then? Gardeners?
Isn't it amazing how people who spout this nonsense about who is and isn't a "real" gamer seems to always be included in the definition of a "real gamer"? They might as well just say: "Only people who play games exactly like I do are real gamers." Even more amusing is how many of these "real gamers" disagree with what makes a real gamer. They want to restrict people from using a term and can't even agree on a standard.
It's nonsense. The only people who spend lots of time figuring out who does and doesn't match their arbitrary guidelines over who belongs to an unrestricted group of hobbyists attaches way too much of their own sense of self-worth to the title of a group they'd like to restrict so it retains some sense of deep meaning other than a rather open-ended identifier.
Look, no matter if you like it or not, you don't get to decide who gets in the club. It's open membership. From everyone who only plays everything on super-insane-hell mode to the people who play Barbie Horse Adventure. They're aaalllllll gamers. And you can't do a thing about it.
This isn't some exclusive club you can only join if the Duke of Cheevos decides your e-peen is large enough. Everyone who calls themselves a gamer is a gamer and whether or not others agree is completely irrelevant. They deserve the chance to express their gaming desires just as much as anyone else. If there's a market for their request, it has just as much chance at being included. If you dislike the feature they want, don't use it. It's as simple as that.
I find the combat tedious. I loved DA2, but when the enemies kept jumping off buildings I was ready to be done. I also like to play the game multiple times playing as different folks or just to see the story again.
Adding an easy mode doesn't mean canceling all the other ones. Even if it did the strength of RPG's for me is the world, the characters, and the narrative, honestly if there were less killing I'd enjoy it. I don't want my hero to be a mass murderer.
Even if it did the strength of RPG's for me is the world, the characters, and the narrative, hinestly if there were less killing I'd enjoy it. I don't want my hero to be a mass murderer.
Who is your avatar?? Verrrr nice. 
Yeah particularly with the average-ish combat system of the past two DA games, it's not hard to understand why a lot of people would prefer to bypass it as much as possible.
ME2's Geth Pulse Rifle, correct.
It was not until I started my Insanity run(for the trophy) that I discovered that the game had the pulse rifle.
my only qualm with this is that I would still want to be able to make choices and stuff. So not like the me3 thing where all the choices were made for you, but still where it was easy enough to where the main focus is the story.
I always play the many games I have played in my life in normal except the dragon age games, I guess it has to do with the combat gameplay, I cant believe people actually pause,select,attack,etc and repeat the process. I just dont have the patience for it. DA:O was very pause like if you wanted to strategize in hard difficulty. DA:2 Kind of less "pause-play" but you had to teamwork when using your abilities to make effective combo damages. In DA:I however it looks like the game would be more combat like but still with team working combos and pause-play in higher difficulty in seems. Love both games, DA:O more than DA:2 with only the combat being the worst thing about the games beside minor other things. Looking forward for DA:I though. (by the way I loved DA:O finishing animations blows)
why pander to the people who can't even play on easy mode? should the devs even care to make a mode for those people? they can always watch a let's play on YT.
why pander to the people who can't even play on easy mode? should the devs even care to make a mode for those people? they can always watch a let's play on YT.
Because people want to create their own character? Because encouraging people to play your games will make you a lot more money? Because those people might be encouraged to play on harder difficulties, building the fan-base? Because being a hipster about games does not, contrary to popular belief, increase your odds of an awesome afterlife?
I don't see why anyone would object to this.
"I SPECIFICALLY WON'T USE THIS FEATURE SO IT SHOULDN'T BE IN THE GAME!"
It was not until I started my Insanity run(for the trophy) that I discovered that the game had the pulse rifle.
It was a bucket of ****** anyway I found.
Because people want to create their own character? Because encouraging people to play your games will make you a lot more money? Because those people might be encouraged to play on harder difficulties, building the fan-base? Because being a hipster about games does not, contrary to popular belief, increase your odds of an awesome afterlife?
where does the hipster part even come from?
Because people want to create their own character? Because encouraging people to play your games will make you a lot more money? Because those people might be encouraged to play on harder difficulties, building the fan-base? Because being a hipster about games does not, contrary to popular belief, increase your odds of an awesome afterlife?
Isn't that why we have casual/easy mode?
My friend has a "super-easy mode" where he picks all the choices and makes his boyfriend do all the combat.
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