129 réponses à ce sujet

[Das Tentakel]

My concern is that the quotes reduce the character to very simple concepts and could make more casual observers believe that BioWare can't write good characters anymore. Bio took criticism for its storytelling after both DA2 and ME3, and there are a fair few folks out there looking for the next thing to have a go at. But characterisation has been recognised as being pretty solid throughout the ride on the BioWare hate train. I wouldn't want critics to be able undermine the game by saying, effectively, 'lol Bioware cannot into characters anymore' just because these soundbites make the personalities sound more simplistic than they actually are. Whereas the character-writer interviews and the more extended blurbs do a great job of giving us a bit more 'meat' and making the individuals sound interesting (imo). 

 

Could this be a baseless concern and nothing more than an 'I don't like it'? Absolutely, and I hope it is. But for whatever it's worth and to answer your question, Allan, that's my worry.

 

Same here. BioWare's main strengths in DA are characters and combat. The little blurbs (and bad portraits / unflattering stills) seriously undermine the belief, particularly with an on-the-fence-sitter like me, that characters are still a strong point.

If you look around the Internet and visit various forums, the reactions aren't pretty, and not just among the hate crowd.

[Yanagi_Uxinta]

Personal taste obviously, but I don't have a problem with the little quotes. Anyone who has played a previous Bioware game knows that the characters are one of their strongest points. The 'casual observers' that AllThatJazz mentioned, to me, means a casual gamer OR someone who has neither played a Bioware game, nor possibly even heard of the studio. As such, they would have no basis for comparison - they would have no idea how strong Bioware's characters are, in this game or previous ones.

 

These quotes aren't meant to sum up the whole character - they seem to me to be quotes from the characters themselves that represent that particular character's general personality or cause in the game, e.g. Dorian is out to do the right thing, but he's good-looking and knows it, and can be cocky about it. That already tells us two things about his personality, but not his whole personality. Cole's shows he wants to help people, regardless of how it impacts on him. He comes across as selfless. Yet even from that same screenshot, we can tell there's something a little off about him.

 

These quotes/screenshots are here to give us a general idea of what we can expect the character to be like - what their ideals might be. They're here to create interest in learning more about this character in-game. For the longer blurbs on the website - again, they aren't telling us the whole story. They don't want to spoil a character's arc before the game even comes out, so we get a small bit of information in more words than the quotes. We get a little bit about their background, but not much more. Again, designed to make people curious about the character. Have they worked for everyone? No, of course not. Have they worked for some people? Yes, very well. I think people are possibly getting worked up over something very small, that is just meant to be taken at face-value.

 

Don't worry too much until the game comes out, and we've got all the information in front of us. Chances are, any casual observers will wait for release and see what word of mouth is before buying. I can't see these little blurbs actively driving people away - they just won't guarantee a preorder, or purchase on release day, and honestly, I doubt that is their intended function anyway, so Bioware isn't losing anything.

 

Of course, I may be completely and utterly wrong, and all of this is conjecture. Just my opinion

[Aaleel]

Some of the quotes were cringeworthy honestly.

 

But I bet if one heard them in the game in whatever scene they were taken from, they wouldn't come across as bad.

 

As for the marketing, I really haven't been impressed with it, and it really hasn't done anything to move me out of my wait until after release to decide whether to pick up position.  Cementing it honestly.

[Examurai]

Same here. BioWare's main strengths in DA are characters and combat. The little blurbs (and bad portraits / unflattering stills) seriously undermine the belief, particularly with an on-the-fence-sitter like me, that characters are still a strong point.
If you look around the Internet and visit various forums, the reactions aren't pretty, and not just among the hate crowd.

No matter what Bioware does or how they market the game, its never gonna be pretty in the forums. In fact nowadays how the hell can you tell whose among the hate crowd and who isn't? There's no convincing them. Some maybe just jumping on the bandwagon, some maybe legit, or some are just pretty much trolling. Gamers grudges know no bounds in this modern gaming era.

[Zazzerka]

So the Dorian one with him talking about looking dashing.. that's authentic?

[Andraste_Reborn]

So the Dorian one with him talking about looking dashing.. that's authentic?

 

Why wouldn't it be? I can't imagine the marketing department is inventing things to write on the pictures.

[Zazzerka]

Why wouldn't it be? I can't imagine the marketing department is inventing things to write on the pictures.

 

It just popped up in a recent Google search, and I assumed it was fan-made. I don't really follow the blogs or twitter or Facebook or anything like that.

[Ianamus]

While I honestly couldn't care less about the blurbs either way, since they are basically just a few words cobbled together on a much more interesting image from my perspective, I have to agree that the marketing for the game overall so far has hardly done much for me in terms of hype. I've seen it elsewhere as well, people saying that while the game does look good there is just no hype there.

 

I think the closest I came to actually being excited by a trailer for the game was in the "sad piano" trailer, when it shows Sera leaping out of the way of of a dragons fire breath. The fast paced music, demonstration of a cool gameplay mechanic visuals all came together to get me excited. Similarly, the few lines of dialogue Cassandra said as she put the knife to the Inquisitors throat in that trailer were by far the best part of it. 

 

The issue really is that the vast majority of "screen time" in these trailers is just pretty environment shots. While it is very pretty I've just started to feel like 'Yes I know the game has beautiful environments, can we actually see something else now?'. The first environmental trailer was fantastic, but with over half of every subsequent trailer revolving around environment shots it has become tediously dull. 

 

The Mass Effect team has always done a much better job of marketing, be it due to budget or just the skill of the people involved. Re-watching those character trailers for Mass Effect 2 reminded me just how much they encouraged me to buy the game, and it's something that Inquisition sorely needs. Not a spoken-over line briefly describing the companions but clips of the actually fighting and talking, snippets from their more emotional moments and personal quests. 

 

At the moment the marketing for Inquisition hasn't really got me hyped. I'm excited for the game, but that's all due to prior experience with the series and things I know about it from the forums.

 

Though as a final note I must say that I really do like the games website, that was very well put together. But you need trailers that actually encourage people to check that awesome website out. 

[Heimdall]

I can't say I've been impressed by the quotes, but a bigger annoyance for me its the incredibly melodramatic (And fairly generic) trailer voice overs that make me cringe.

[Vegeta 77]

Don´t care about the blurbs are some crap yeah but not a big deal.

[Mathias]

I understand that not every piece of marketing is going to work for everyone.  So I'm more curious is this more along the lines of "I want you to release something I like" or is there a genuine belief that we're undermining our game and it will be less successful as a result.

 

Because you're really going to need more for me to look over for the latter.  If it's the former, well that's fair I expect that from any customer.

 

I've never been very good at explaining things, but I'll do my best with the allotted time I currently have (which isn't a lot), and obviously this is just my opinion on the matter.

 

I do agree that the marketing for Dragon Age: Inquisition hasn't been great. There are some things that come to mind such as clipping and glitches visibly shown in screenshots and trailers. It does feel like whoever has been putting these things together wasn't too careful with his/her work. If it happens once or twice then no big deal, but it's happened a lot and it's made me raise an eyebrow.

 

The 2nd big thing that comes to mind is the quotes in the character introductions. I think the idea is pretty solid and it reminds me of the character quotes from Final Fantasy IX. However one of the big criticisms made towards Bioware these past few years is the drop in quality of writing. I'm not gonna get into past games for obvious reasons, but with Dragon Age: Inquisition I figured that this game has been in development a lot longer than DA2 and ME3, so I felt confident that the team could pull off a better job. Well if the character quotes are a true reflection on what the dialogue is going to be like, I can't say I'm too optimistic towards DA:I's writing being an improvement.

 

Like I said I'm not good at explaining things so I'm not gonna attempt to describe what's wrong with these quotes from an academic point of view, but all I can say is that to me they don't seem cleverly written. When I look at the character quotes from FFIX, some of the quotes speak volumes of that character and make me think about what they're saying. My three favorite lines are:

 

Freya: "To be forgotten is worse than death."

Zidane: "You don't need a reason to help people."

Vivi: "How do you prove that you exist...? Maybe we don't exist..."

 

By contrast, DA:I's quotes (with the exception of a couple imo) come off as a bit juvenile, which is the only word I can think of to describe them. Now obviously not everyone will feel that way so I know this is purely subjective. However to me, if you're gonna have these quotes, I want the quotes to make me feel for the character, not chuckle at how witty they sound. Dorian, Iron Bull and Sera's in particular I find to be a pretty bleh. I don't mean to offend anybody over in the writing team, this is just how I feel.

[Heimdall]

I've never been very good at explaining things, but I'll do my best with the allotted time I currently have (which isn't a lot), and obviously this is just my opinion on the matter.

I do agree that the marketing for Dragon Age: Inquisition hasn't been great. There are some things that come to mind such as clipping and glitches visibly shown in screenshots and trailers. It does feel like whoever has been putting these things together wasn't too careful with his/her work. If it happens once or twice then no big deal, but it's happened a lot and it's made me raise an eyebrow.

The 2nd big thing that comes to mind is the quotes in the character introductions. I think the idea is pretty solid and it reminds me of the character quotes from Final Fantasy IX. However one of the big criticisms made towards Bioware these past few years is the drop in quality of writing. I'm not gonna get into past games for obvious reasons, but with Dragon Age: Inquisition I figured that this game has been in development a lot longer than DA2 and ME3, so I felt confident that the team could pull off a better job. Well if the character quotes are a true reflection on what the dialogue is going to be like, I can't say I'm too optimistic towards DA:I's writing being an improvement.

Like I said I'm not good at explaining things so I'm not gonna attempt to describe what's wrong with these quotes from an academic point of view, but all I can say is that to me they don't seem cleverly written. When I look at the character quotes from FFIX, some of the quotes speak volumes of that character and make me think about what they're saying. My three favorite lines are:

Freya: "To be forgotten is worse than death."
Zidane: "You don't need a reason to help people."
Vivi: "How do you prove that you exist...? Maybe we don't exist..."

By contrast, DA:I's quotes (with the exception of a couple imo) come off as a bit juvenile, which is the only word I can think of to describe them. Now obviously not everyone will feel that way so I know this is purely subjective. However to me, if you're gonna have these quotes, I want the quotes to make me feel for the character, not chuckle at how witty they sound. Dorian, Iron Bull and Sera's in particular I find to be a pretty bleh. I don't mean to offend anybody over in the writing team, this is just how I feel.

Well, they're all supposed to be snarky characters I gather. That might be a problem, too much snark not enough serious writing.

[Andraste_Reborn]

It just popped up in a recent Google search, and I assumed it was fan-made. I don't really follow the blogs or twitter or Facebook or anything like that.

 

No, they're each part of the current marketing campaign. Recently BioWare have been giving us images with quotes followed by interviews with each character's writer. (Sorry for assuming you would already know this - I tend to assume everyone on here haunts the forums as pathetically as I do, which is obviously not the case .)

[azarhal]

 

If you look around the Internet and visit various forums, the reactions aren't pretty, and not just among the hate crowd.

 

People are complaining about witty one-liners has if it was super awful writing and hating BioWare for it when they had the companions spout them since the first Baldur's Gate game that I can assure you all these people loved (if they were BioWare fans). Especially the "Go for the eyes Boo, for the eyes!". In fact, BioWare gain in "you're writing crap" feedback is inversely proportional to the gain in complexity of their plot and characters.

 

The other complaints is about lack of footage and spoilers, which has nothing to do with writing and everything to do with people have no patience to discover things and wait for the game to be released.

[dutch_gamer]

If you look around the Internet and visit various forums, the reactions aren't pretty, and not just among the hate crowd.

If you look around the Internet and visit various forums you will realize that this happens with almost every game. However, it does happen more with game companies gamers love to hate, namely EA and so also Bioware. It is just band wagon behavior at this point. Also, if you take a gander at the Witcher 3 forums you will see what is universally loved company the hardcore followers of that game seem to nitpick at everything shown so far to the point they actually sound more like haters. In other words gamers just love to complain.

[Maraas]

"Miranda. We're both under so much pressure to be perfect, we never give ourselves a break."
"We can't give ourselves a break. There's too much at stake."

They've written that after browsing through BSN. True story.

[byeshoe]

what does all of this matter if nothing will be done about it..

[fchopin]

I was not impressed with the E3 presentation or with the quotes but some were better than others.

The only thing that was a little impressive was the live game play they showed and the interviews.

I was much more impressed last year with what they showed.
The companions so far have been disappointing but i think the story will be good so i am hopeful.

[Reznore57]

I like the character profiles , the pics were nice (well The Iron Bull could have shown his face)

The quotes are ...well quotes.Of course without voice acting and context , it doesn't really shine .

But I wouldn't call it bad.

+ the writer interviews give a bit more knowledge without going all spoilery.

 

There's no way characters are going to have a great depth in some marketing campaign.

The best I think we can hope for is just not having something like a blonde with huge breats with a quote like "I enjoy running on the Beach."

As far as I know , marketing strategy is showing something pretty simple "The Muscle " "The Spirit" + something that makes you feel like there's some potential for badassery.

Nothing too complicated.

[fchopin]

"I enjoy running on the Beach."

I am a guy and i enjoy running on the beach and see nothing wrong with it.

[Reznore57]

I am a guy and i enjoy running on the beach and see nothing wrong with it.

 

It was a joke?

[Lebanese Dude]

Really?
 

I enjoyed all the trailers and reveals so far. Not all of them sang to me, but they were rather exciting.

 

I guess it's because unlike most people I play games as an awestruck kid rather than a cynical adult. Sure it makes me naive sometimes but I'd rather have a positive or neutral stance rather than an incredibly pessimistic attitude I see some employ...

 

Lighten up will you

[Afro_Explosion]

We will really complain about anything

[AllThatJazz]

Just so I'm understanding, we're talking about the pictures like of Dorian, with the quote about how he's here to set things straight, and look terrific or whatever it was?

 

Apologies for the late reply, my 4 year old had a playdate!

 

Yes, I'm meaning the little quotes on the pictures. 

[Rosey]

This is a silly thing to be grumpy about. It's three days from July - which means it's Three Months and Ten days until DA:I releases. I absolutely prefer they continue with the slow release of weekly blurbs and pictures then for them to spoil the way we find/meet these companions. I really don't even want to know if they're LI's for the most part -- because I'm looking FORWARD to meeting them and finding out about them myself.

 

Three Months, Ten Days. We really do not need full on movie introductions and breakdowns of these characters because it's Dragon Age. We already know they're going to be fantastically written characters who will eventually be more real to us then actual fleshy folks in our lives