254 réponses à ce sujet

[Nashiktal]

"This isn't NEARLY as restrictive as people are making it out to be. And, again, it is a suggestion for DISCUSSION, not a demand I'm making or even an idea I'm married to as something I'd even LIKE to see in the game. If you can't have a discussion about a theoretical game design idea without becoming emotional and antagonistic, you may want to seriously take a step back and reconsider your interaction with others online."

I don't think many realized how non-restrictive this system would supposedly be. I'm assuming they followed your anti-meta gaming mechanics, and your outspokenness of meta gaming and assumed as such. I thought the same thing for most of the thread. Probably just miscommunication.

Personally though I don't agree with your proposed system. I do agree with why you want it though. I have always felt that bioware, (and every other company that offers similar choices) have never really done alternative outcomes very well to satisfy me as a player. Roleplaying wise how would my character know about the best outcome? Player wise I feel I am just losing if I don't get the third option. I don't know how it can be done but I wish someone could find a good middleground here.

Sometimes I think that just not including the best outcome would help, but then that means the player loses no matter what. This has to be a nightmare for game designers and writers.

[Brass_Buckles]

I don't know about others, but the reason I don't like this idea is I tend to reload frequently, not because I'm metagaming, but because I'm trying to decide which response best suits the character I'm playing.  I often change my mind and go back and reload.  I'm replaying DA:O and I reloaded a conversation with Alistair about 10 times trying to decide on the most appropriate thing for my Warden to say to him, whether he liked what she was going to say or not.  Before that, I reloaded several times before entering Lothering because I couldn't decide whether it was more in character for her to kill the bandits or let them live.

 

So no, I don't want to be punished for reloading saves.

[Fast Jimmy]

I don't know about others, but the reason I don't like this idea is I tend to reload frequently, not because I'm metagaming, but because I'm trying to decide which response best suits the character I'm playing. I often change my mind and go back and reload. I'm replaying DA:O and I reloaded a conversation with Alistair about 10 times trying to decide on the most appropriate thing for my Warden to say to him, whether he liked what she was going to say or not. Before that, I reloaded several times before entering Lothering because I couldn't decide whether it was more in character for her to kill the bandits or let them live.

So no, I don't want to be punished for reloading saves.

Reloading based on conversations would be totally unaffected by this idea.

[Realmzmaster]

I think the biggest concern that posters has is that it takes away an option that was there before. It would be far better not to offer the option in the first place than to offer it and take it away. That is the sore point I get from reading posts in the thread.

[Brass_Buckles]

Reloading based on conversations would be totally unaffected by this idea.

 

But not reloading based on whether or not I feel it's appropriate for my character to kill bandits, because that's a plot-related decision.

 

Regardless, even if metagaming may not be ideal, some people actively metagame and that's just how they play.  Some people enjoy metagaming.  Punishing people for playing the way they want to play seems wrong, somehow.  It's understandable for multiplayer, but not for singleplayer.  As others stated, some people play through a first game without metagaming, and then metagame thereafter.  I kind of do that, too.  And sometimes, I will deliberately choose an option I wouldn't normally have chosen on that playthrough, just to see how it ends up, then I will reload and pick my "real" choice.  I guess it's sort of like reading ahead in a book, except this book has a different outcome.  So I'm not really metagaming because I still go back to what I originally meant to choose, but with a mechanic in place to prevent me reloading, I'd be treated as if I were, solely because I want to see what the other option would have caused.

 

I suppose it boils down to my not wanting myself, or others, to be punished based on how they want to play a game on their own time.  Playing games is supposed to be entertaining, and maybe even fun.  People have fun in different ways.  Why must we try to think of means to keep people from enjoying a game in the way they prefer?

[Shadow Fox]

I think the biggest concern that posters has is that it takes away an option that was there before. It would be far better not to offer the option in the first place than to offer it and take it away. That is the sore point I get from reading posts in the thread.

Exactly.

[Fast Jimmy]

I think the biggest concern that posters has is that it takes away an option that was there before. It would be far better not to offer the option in the first place than to offer it and take it away. That is the sore point I get from reading posts in the thread.

Which I can understand. And is exactly what I stated in the OP would be what I expected the major concern to be.

And to address a further concern... my solution isn't to counter meta-gaming. At least not entirely. Only to limit the ease with which someone can pick the rainbow and sunshine outcomes that are heads above the other options, even if they know exactly which option can give them that outcome. It's not about stopping meta gaming, but rather limiting its effectiveness in the situations where the choices being offered are exceptionally lopsided.

In reality, if no choices were that lopsided or just putting a choice to include a choice that is little more than evil-for-lolz, then my entire suggestion would be not only unnecessary but also non-existent. After all, the function would only be theoretically implemented when a choice was offered that was clearly better than all the rest. If that was simply not the case, then there would be no point in the game where it could even be applied were Bioware to consider adding it to the game.

[nightscrawl]

Now... what if the encounter was made incredibly hard if you tried this "cowboy" method of saving both (after all, you are working to take out a group that would otherwise take a small army) and, if you failed and had to reload, the game would not let you try the "cowboy" method again, but made you choose between the Keep and the Village, as a true struggle? This way, it would be exceptionally difficult to get the best outcome (ideally, even on the lowest difficulty levels, the encounter design would still be tougher than the regular fights on the same difficulty level, but with the Narrative/Easy difficulty boosts).

 

While an interesting idea, you will still run into the same problems that exist for removing the reload altogether: it penalizes the player if something happens through no fault of their own, having nothing to do with player skill or game difficulty. What if someone's anti-virus kicks it at a pivotal moment and lags their game? What if their power goes out? What if there is some weird game bug that prevents completion, or causes a terrible combat error? These can and do happen. So hinging everything on a 100% perfect performance not only by the player, but by the game itself, as well as other factors, seems a tad unreasonable.

 

I expect those kind of things to happen in online games because everything is "live" and once you do it, it's done, but not in a single-player game that can be played offline.

[Eveangaline]

Why only restrict it from the 'heroic' option now that I think about it. If someone is doing a sociopath run and fails in the meanest option, they should be barred from trying it again the next time.

 

In fact, every time you try something and fail you lose the chance to do it again. If you lose all the options you have there's some default option where you get no choice and something shitty happens.

[Allan Schumacher]

Only to limit the ease with which someone can pick the rainbow and sunshine outcomes that are heads above the other options, even if they know exactly which option can give them that outcome. It's not about stopping meta gaming, but rather limiting its effectiveness in the situations where the choices being offered are exceptionally lopsided.

 

To echo EntropicAngel (and apologies if it was stated as I missed it), but why would it be considered good to limit the ease at which someone can pick the "rainbow and sunshine outcomes?"  Further, when does it become clear in, for example, Redcliffe that you are taking the ideal solution and as such the code now must alter save games on party wipe?

 

 

As a follow up question: are there alternative things that could be done that could achieve a similar goal?  If we make it so big choices don't have clear optimal solutions, would that just be preferred all along?

[Allan Schumacher]

If the game doesn't actually have any choices that are clearly optimal and sunshine/rainbows, it seems to me that a feature like wouldn't be necessary at all.

[Jorji Costava]

I'll attempt to play a little bit of devil's advocate here:

 

If the game doesn't actually have any choices that are clearly optimal and sunshine/rainbows, it seems to me that a feature like wouldn't be necessary at all.

 

On the other hand, it might be a good idea to have "rainbows and sunshine"-type outcomes (or at least, outcomes that are clearly better than the alternatives) to at least some of the decisions. If we think of dialogue and C&C mechanics as being as integral to gameplay as combat, then plausibly, it should be possible to sometimes 'fail' conversations and decisions in the same way you can fail or achieve suboptimal outcomes in combat. Both Planescape: Torment and Arcanum had conversations like this, as did Alpha Protocol IIRC.

 

To echo EntropicAngel (and apologies if it was stated as I missed it), but why would it be considered good to limit the ease at which someone can pick the "rainbow and sunshine outcomes?"  Further, when does it become clear in, for example, Redcliffe that you are taking the ideal solution and as such the code now must alter save games on party wipe?

 

 

As a follow up question: are there alternative things that could be done that could achieve a similar goal?  If we make it so big choices don't have clear optimal solutions, would that just be preferred all along?

 

I think it all goes back to Roger Ebert's old argument that games can't be art: If you could go back and change the outcome of Romeo and Juliet so that Romeo and Juliet lived happily ever after, would that not destroy the entire point of the play? Without entering into the "Are games art?" debate, I think Fast Jimmy's idea is that save scumming to get the best possible outcome is essentially akin to changing Romeo and Juliet in the way I described above, which is why it should be prevented. I don't agree with his proposed solution (and I think he's made it pretty clear that he isn't exactly wedded to it either), but I think I at least understand the idea behind it.

[Bob from Accounting]

And here we see the problem.

 

This is a video game. Not a chore. Not an exam. Not work.

 

Video games are built to be beatable. And that's exactly what players will do. They'll beat them. So if we decide that 'sunshine and rainbows' options need to be earned in comparison to 'lesser choices', we head into absurd territory very quickly.

 

We start thinking that the player should have to do something tedious or frustrating to 'earn' these choices. Or worse, we decide that since there's no real way for players to 'earn' their 'sunshine and rainbow', they must be purged from the narrative altogether. Both of these views are rife on the BioWare forums.

 

And of course, it leads to suggestions like the one this thread is focused on.

 

This concerns me greatly. It seems to be something that some of the BioWare writers might be falling into, at least based on Patrick Weekes comments on the persuasion options in ME.

[Bob from Accounting]

I just explained what the problem is...

 

The context is the entire premise of 'earning' superior choices somehow.

[Bob from Accounting]

Don't insult me.

 

I play as a good character. Always. In fact, I often go ahead and pick what the narrative defines as 'good' options even when I don't agree they're good.

 

You think that because of that I'm mindless and passive?

[AresKeith]

Don't insult me.

 

I play as a good character. Always. In fact, I often go ahead and pick what the narrative defines as 'good' options even when I don't agree they're good.

 

You think that because of that I'm mindless and passive?

 

Getting a little defensive there David

[Jorji Costava]

 

Were Dragon Age not an RPG, with a pre-defined character who had a pre-defined plot, I'd say you had a point. However, it is not. This series, and RPGs as a whole, are based around extensive player agency, or character choice.

 

The thing you're suggesting lends itself to adventure games, with a completely defined protagonist and a completely (or nearly so) defined story. And as an aside, I think these types of games can be very well done, and have very good (and to jump into the ring, very artistic) themes or explorations within that. However, because an RPG is based on choice (not consequence--choice), these types of things--the player changing the "point" of the game--are simply par for the course. That might be considered the entire purpose of role-playing, after all--crafting one's own character-based story within the game (along those lines, I know a certain person here who created a character who ended up dying in a Game Over screen on the Sacred Ashes quest--they changed the point of the game, or the game's story).

 

It can still be done, of course--see DA ][--but doing so carries heavy risk *cough* of an arbitrary limitation of the character you're creating.

 

RPG's give you a great deal of control over your character and the choices the character makes, but little to no direct control over how the game world reacts to those choices. If any semblance of reality is to be maintained, then at least some of the time, those choices should be able to go against the player and/or the character's wishes. Fast Jimmy's question, I take it, is whether or not we can get the player to accept such outcomes without feeling pressure to reload to a prior point, or without feeling like they are being somehow penalized for not doing the thing the developer intended them to do. I'm not sure how what you said addresses this issue, unless you think it's an issue that's either not possible to deal with or not worth addressing in the first place.

 

I just explained what the problem is...

 

The context is the entire premise of 'earning' superior choices somehow.

 

I know that this is territory that's been covered extensively on the ME forums. I'm pretty sure this is a rehash of something I've said before, but it bears repeating: Cycles of challenge and reward are part and parcel of probably 99% of games ever made. Metroid assigned you better or lesser endings depending upon how quickly you completed the game. If you failed too many missions in Wing Commander III, you ended up on the 'losing' mission path, which could end no other way than with the defeat of the Terran Confederacy at the hands of the Kilrathi. If you took too long to beat Star Control II, the Kohr Ah would begin their "death march," wiping out species one by one until they finally wiped out humanity itself. Examples like this could be multiplied forever. I just don't see what the problem is at all.

[Allan Schumacher]

Video games are built to be beatable. And that's exactly what players will do. They'll beat them. So if we decide that 'sunshine and rainbows' options need to be earned in comparison to 'lesser choices', we head into absurd territory very quickly.

 

I disagree and I don't think it'd be particularly fruitful to resuscitate a months old conversation on the BSN when the reality is that people will want different things from their games.

 

Stating that my gaming tastes are "absurd" immediately shuts down productive conversation.

[Bob from Accounting]

The problem is that content such as having to do an extra mission or something isn't seen by some as a legitimate 'price.'

 

Suppose you have two choices, with one obviously far better than another, but the better choice requires the player to do something extra like go into a dungeon and kill a monster or something. Whatever. People have and do complain that the choices are still pointless because going into the dungeon isn't a 'cost' in any real sense. After all, the player bought the game to delve into dungeons and kill monsters! According to many, it's not good enough to merely play more of the game. The player must suffer somehow to get the best option. Only when the player suffers can the choice be 'earned.'

 

Of course, this is absurd, and collapses the entire notion of video games and stories in general as entertainment. Nevertheless, this is where we see the demands for purposely frustrating and tedious gameplay arise, as well as the demands for the choice to be narratively dragged down to an equal level with the 'lesser' choice.