426 réponses à ce sujet

[Lady Shayna]

 
Regarding Kevin van Ord not liking 'older' type of RPG's, I'm not sure. He really, really seems to like Divinity: Original Sin, which is in many ways 'modernized old school'.

His impressions do seem to align with Jeff Gerstman's though. Very unsure about the gameplay to be honest; I don't like the look of it, but the real test is actually playing the game. Shame there's not going to be a demo.

 

If so, then I am more concerned about how the combat will play.  Alas.  Still clutching my little jar of hope, though.

[Fast Jimmy]

I'm assuming he's basically stating that the involvement of the player creates a balancing tip where the rules of the game are less important than ability of the player. Meaning that in a "Tactical" Game, the action element lets reflex outperform strategy.
 
FastJimmy will let me know if that's fair or not.
 
I personally just don't believe the two are mutually exclusive, as such I'm not willing to dismiss DA:I out of hand just because it has this.

That is a fair assessment. And I respect why others feel like you do, but someone asked my why the interview (and what we've see. In the gameplay) had me worried. That is my concern - that the option of being a party-first combat game will be an uphill battle I will have to fight with the mechanics, just like I did with DA2.

[CronoDragoon]

Did your character attack faster in DA2 with manual control than auto-attack?

[Fast Jimmy]

He's not talking about auto-attack. What he's saying is that it's bad when a character performs better, like attacks faster, stronger, when the player is controlling them.
I aggree with him, although i can't quite remember. Were your characters actually stronger while you controlled them? I mean the game did enough else to ruin any attempt at thinking and using tactics, but that would be another stupidity on biowares part that i wouldn't have thought them possible of.

Stronger? No. But they could do more normal damage if you button mashed and you could avoid nearly any animation attack (including a Rage Demon's OHK assassinate) by taking direct control and looping around the enemy, something that was impossible if you didn't directly control the character, even if you told them to move to the same spot. Also, kiting in DA2 made getting hit virtually impossible if you kept moving, despite being able to get fairly close to your enemies.

All of this sums to an experience where a player who takes direct control of a character deals more damage and takes less damage than if a player gave the exact same commands to a party member they did not control. That's the crux of the problem I have. With. DA2 and, ostensibly, DA:I.

[Enigmatick]

Did your character attack faster in DA2 with manual control than auto-attack?

This, if tapping the button on consoles in DA2  made you attack faster there has to be a top speed. Was auto attack set to this top speed?

[Paul E Dangerously]

Did your character attack faster in DA2 with manual control than auto-attack?

 

No, not really. You're still limited by animation speed. Hawke doesn't go measurably faster if you're jamming on the A button than he does if you're waiting for the AI to do it. Otherwise, things like the Haste trick would be useless.

[Deflagratio]

That is a fair assessment. And I respect why others feel like you do, but someone asked my why the interview (and what we've see. In the gameplay) had me worried. That is my concern - that the option of being a party-first combat game will be an uphill battle I will have to fight with the mechanics, just like I did with DA2.

 

 

I can appreciate that.

 

 

Stronger? No. But they could do more normal damage if you button mashed and you could avoid nearly any animation attack (including a Rage Demon's OHK assassinate) by taking direct control and looping around the enemy, something that was impossible if you didn't directly control the character, even if you told them to move to the same spot. Also, kiting in DA2 made getting hit virtually impossible if you kept moving, despite being able to get fairly close to your enemies.

All of this sums to an experience where a player who takes direct control of a character deals more damage and takes less damage than if a player gave the exact same commands to a party member they did not control. That's the crux of the problem I have. With. DA2 and, ostensibly, DA:I.

 

 

The damage mitigation is probably unavoidable outside of class rigidity. Obviously a player who who is invested into the micro of the character will be able to perform better on some degree, the only way you can stop that is literally taking the player element out of it and letting the AI resolve the whole battle.

 

 

To some extent, this is a good thing because obviously a computer can operate on a much more fine standard. You can have a program optimize an action to methodical perfection (MMO crowds call these bots) so I believe you have to balance where the involvement of the player and what's handled by the AI fall.

 

 

DA2 took it too far, DA:O wasn't far enough... Though DA:O was much closer to my preferred balance than DA2.

[Das Tentakel]

Stronger? No. But they could do more normal damage if you button mashed and you could avoid nearly any animation attack (including a Rage Demon's OHK assassinate) by taking direct control and looping around the enemy, something that was impossible if you didn't directly control the character, even if you told them to move to the same spot. Also, kiting in DA2 made getting hit virtually impossible if you kept moving, despite being able to get fairly close to your enemies.

All of this sums to an experience where a player who takes direct control of a character deals more damage and takes less damage than if a player gave the exact same commands to a party member they did not control. That's the crux of the problem I have. With. DA2 and, ostensibly, DA:I.

 

That is what I remember most from the Arishok boss battle (PC version). My poor Hawke was a warrior, and basically won by carefully avoiding the Arishok, which required constant 'action-y' movement. I would call it 'tactics', but it's the difference between what I would call 'single-character action-tactical' (somewhat akin to Dark Souls or Bound by Flame) and 'planned squad-tactical' styles of gameplay. 

Thing is, I didn't feel that DA2 did either style of gameplay well, though encounter design probably had a lot to do with it.

[Fast Jimmy]

It's a strawman argument. I don't respond to strawman arguments.

Do you not like the use of chess? We can go wih checkers instead, but it's not really representative since the pieces are all the same, something that's not true for a party-based RPG.

[Sister Goldring]

Well the article doesn't give me what I wanted to hear about combat and I am becoming convinced that DAI will be an action RPG with a capital A.  This may be however just a result of the preference of marketing the game towards the most dominant player base, they want the game to sell and look exciting and accessible to the widest possible group of gamers.  Real time action looks more impressive visually than top down paused combat.

 

They have mentioned repeatedly that they have tried to accommodate those players who prefer a more classic RPG tactical experience and I hope we will see some marketing focusing upon this aspect of the game in the future.

 

I have enough affection for and interest in the Dragon Age franchise to suffer through whatever combat they have chosen.  I really hope that there is some capacity to replicate an Origins style playthrough, I would be satisfied with that.  However, at this point I'm really just hoping for something that annoys me less than DA2's combat.  

[KC_Prototype]

Not very much new info or footage but ok.

[Deflagratio]

Well the article doesn't give me what I wanted to hear about combat and I am becoming convinced that DAI will be an action RPG with a capital A.  This may be however just a result of the preference of marketing the game towards the most dominant player base, they want the game to sell and look exciting and accessible to the widest possible group of gamers.  Real time action looks more impressive visually than top down paused combat.

 

 

 

This is my belief too... I think they show the action gameplay not because it's better, but because it shows much better in press.

[In Exile]

It wasn't. I did mean to imply it was. But the mechanics at least attempt to focus on character skill instead of cheap aher tricks. Something the Arishok fight in DA2 seems to make extremely difficult for most players.

 

I think the collision detection in DA:O was a cheap trick. You can't have a fully 3D, real time combat system and then rely on turn-based mechanics for hit boxes. 

[Fast Jimmy]

I can appreciate that.
 
 

 
 
The damage mitigation is probably unavoidable outside of class rigidity. Obviously a player who who is invested into the micro of the character will be able to perform better on some degree, the only way you can stop that is literally taking the player element out of it and letting the AI resolve the whole battle.
 
To some extent, this is a good thing because obviously a computer can operate on a much more fine standard. You can have a program optimize an action to methodical perfection (MMO crowds call these bots) so I believe you have to balance where the involvement of the player and what's handled by the AI fall.
 
DA2 took it too far, DA:O wasn't far enough... Though DA:O was much closer to my preferred balance than DA2.

I'm not advocating bot battle. That would be horrendous.

I'm advocating party control over individual control. I want to be able to tell all of my party exactly what to do (where to move, who to attack, what skills to use, what items to use, etc.) without the mechanics of the game being designed for A) the character I'm "controlling" to stand around like an oaf when I'm not directly guiding him with analog sticks and attack button spamming and to not only have cheap meta-gaming as an option, but make it tied to success (again, see the Arishok duel which ludicrously impossible without the right build or kiting tactics).

I'm not advocating for ultimate AI determinations. That's watching the computer play itself. I'm advocating the player's role in the gameplay to be purely strategic, not reflexive. I shouldn't be faster (or slower) than the characters in my party. I should contr how they develop and what they do... but I shouldn't control if they succeed. Not directly, at least.

[Lady Shayna]

 

I have enough affection for and interest in the Dragon Age franchise to suffer through whatever combat they have chosen.  I really hope that there is some capacity to replicate an Origins style playthrough, I would be satisfied with that.  However, at this point I'm really just hoping for something that annoys me less than DA2's combat.  

 

Between the dialog wheel and the combat in DA2, I got maybe ten hours in before I just set it aside, never to return.  And I have a framed poster of the map of Ferelden on my den wall!

 

Now, I've spent the last 8 months playing SW:Tor to develop an immunity to iocane powder...errr...the dialog wheel.  I've found letting my finger hover over the ESC key keeps me from grinding my teeth too much.  Huzzah!  But it remains important to me that I don't have to fight the design of the game in order to play the tactical view pretty much 100% of the time.  PR shinies aside, I hope they can still demonstrate this is viable and fun, but the media has been a very mixed message on this topic so far.

[Elhanan]

Jumping in w/o reading everything, but it is my hope that Kiting will not be needed. Using the Arishock battle as an example, it is a lot more enjoyable and tactical to take on all of the Quanari, and skip that duel. It would be grand to see the end of hour long Kiting sessions like in GoA.

I also look forward to Esc from dialogue if desired; a great feature of SWTOR. Just leave the WASD there; prefer the DA point and click movement.

[Sister Goldring]

The posts in this topic got me thinking about what my ideal demo would be and how it would perform as a marketing device.  I suppose a close up of a player setting up their companion tactics screen while chuckling like a Disney villian for a couple of hours wouldn't exactly lead to the game flying off the shelves.  

[ghostzodd]

Well the article doesn't give me what I wanted to hear about combat and I am becoming convinced that DAI will be an action RPG with a capital A.  This may be however just a result of the preference of marketing the game towards the most dominant player base, they want the game to sell and look exciting and accessible to the widest possible group of gamers.  Real time action looks more impressive visually than top down paused combat.

 

They have mentioned repeatedly that they have tried to accommodate those players who prefer a more classic RPG tactical experience and I hope we will see some marketing focusing upon this aspect of the game in the future.

 

I have enough affection for and interest in the Dragon Age franchise to suffer through whatever combat they have chosen.  I really hope that there is some capacity to replicate an Origins style playthrough, I would be satisfied with that.  However, at this point I'm really just hoping for something that annoys me less than DA2's combat.  

 

 

Yea  Bioware trying to accommodate the "largest" player base (which would be the dude bro cod audience) worked out really well for DA2

[Paul E Dangerously]

Yea  Bioware trying to accommodate the "largest" player base (which would be the dude bro cod audience) worked out really well for DA2

 

Sloppy writing, increased focus on romance, heavy-handed altering of characters to appeal to other fanbases: Just fine. Faster combat to appeal to COD fans: Intolerable. Funny how that works.

[Brogan]

I pray that's all it is...

[ghostzodd]

Sloppy writing, increased focus on romance, heavy-handed altering of characters to appeal to other fanbases: Just fine. Faster combat to appeal to COD fans: Intolerable. Funny how that works.

 

So your putting words in my mouth ? because never did I say in the comment I just made that was the  only reason DA2 tried appeal to the "largest audience". Its not like Fernando Melo said they were aiming for the Cod audience or anything........... oh wait  a minute he did

[Sister Goldring]

Yea  Bioware trying to accommodate the "largest" player base (which would be the dude bro cod audience) worked out really well for DA2

 

My observation of the reception of DA2 here on the forums was that combat wasn't universally reviled by any stretch of the imagination.  A great many vocal consumers regarded it as a great improvement upon Origins.

 

It's not my preferred style but action combat is enjoyed by a substantial amount of players and clearly DAI wants to appeal to that market.  I don't have to like it myself to see that it's not a bad thing to get into the pockets of the 10 million Skyrim purchasers if you are speculating however many millions making a RPG.  

 

I think we are lucky if DAI supports a tactical option supplementary to it's action gameplay.

[In Exile]

Yea  Bioware trying to accommodate the "largest" player base (which would be the dude bro cod audience) worked out really well for DA2

It's clearly the dudebro Skyrim audience. 

[ghostzodd]

It's clearly the dudebro Skyrim audience. 

 

and what did skyrim have...... Extensive mod tools