147 réponses à ce sujet

[AlanC9]

Meh....I can't say I like having artificial restrictions placed on me just to make the game challenging.It reeks of fake difficulty.

Is there any game difficulty that isn't "fake"?

[cjones91]

Is there any game difficulty that isn't "fake"?

Yes there is,it's called not designing games that were made in the 90s where the player had to deal with unfair A.I and other obstacles just to make the game challenging.

 

I thought games were supposed to move past placing artificial restrictions on the player but I guess not.

[Sylvius the Mad]

The first part is just semantics and there's no point debating that since we clearly have different definitions of exploit or cheat.

Importantly, though, you do seem to equate exploits with bugs, and I think those are two very different things.

One involves the player behaving differently from thr developer's intent or expectation. The other involves the game itself behaving differently (like DAO's dex bug). I have no objection to the developer fixing bugs, especially when the bug causes the game to behave in way that contradicts the documentation.

But I also think bug fixes should be optional

The second though is important, hypothetically you play a game where unintentionally a sleep spell which was supposed to succeed 1-100% of the time based on an enemies resistances, but due to an error it's now simply 100% of the time. You find this out early on and proceed to put every enemy to sleep in every fight and just wail on them until they die with little to no challenge from them. You then build your character's stats and abilities to focus on the highest DPS attacks only because what need of you of any other skill since you just put every enemy to sleep without fail.

So finally you come to late game boss who has, as many bosses do, an immunity to sleep. Now this game was intended to be hard, requiring the player to use buffs and debuffs, other various status attacks and abilities that influence the battle, but now all you have is a bunch of high dps abilities and as good as those seem you cannot for the life of you beat this boss. He's too strong, too tough and too big a challenge and you not only don't have the skills you need to defeat him, but you also lack all the experience and understanding of the ways of how combat works in the game to even mount an even passable offense. After attempting the fight a dozen times you quit the game out of frustration and never pick it up again.

This is a bit extreme, but it's a theme that has occurred in many games and by many players in varying degrees. Where a useful trick or otherwise unintended feature removes all or most of the challenge from a game, but then at some point becomes null or ineffective compared to before, leaving the player unable to cope with the game in it's actual intended form and ultimately ruining their overall experience.

That's a bug, not an exploit.

However, such a thing can also occur without bugs. KotOR is an excellent example. For almost the entire game, KotOR is party-based. There are also many support abilties available, and it has been argued that support is encouraged by the Jedi code. But a support-centric PC will probably get obliterated by the end boss, because that's a solo fight.

It's possible for a non-combat PC to win that fight (using Demolitions), but a support character has little hope.

Sometimes games are designed badly. Sometimes just the very end of a game is designed badly. That is not an excuse to restrict playstyles in order to make that bad design look better.

[fchopin]

This is just my guess, but they way I see it, if you remove the limitation from the PC version, you've now broken every encounter in the game. It was designed based on the player having access to a set amount of abilities. If you remove that limitation, and let the player have every ability at their disposal, the difficulty takes a nose dive, and the game becomes a cake walk. The PC version would then have to balanced on it's own. It's much easier to work on balance when every platform has the same set limitations.
 
That's just my guess though.

That is my guess also and i think the decision to limit abilities was made from the MP perspective.
I don’t think there would be ability restrictions in DA:I if there was no MP.

As i said in the past i don’t care if there is MP in the game and they can do whatever they want if it is kept separate from SP. Don’t understand why both teams worked together as it is obvious they would influence each other.

[Jimbo_Gee79]

It's not cheating. You cannot cheat in a single-player game.

And I don't think developers should care how we play. While I really like what Obsidian is doing with most of Pillars of Eternity, I don't like the restricted camping supplies at all. It is not their job to tell us how to play their game.

Like save scumming. Why such a pejorative term? It's just reloading - that's a much more neutral term that describes exactly the same thing. And sometimes I do it a lot. Why? Because I enjoy it.

Isn't that the point of games? That we'll enjoy them? If you didn't want to "cheat", as you put it, you wouldn't have done so. So why should it matter to BioWare or Obsidian or any other players of you do it?

 

You cant cheat on a single player game? What planet do you live on? If you are playing GTA for example and you enter a code which gives you unlimited ammo for your guns then you cheated. Cheating is defined as acting dishonestly or unfairly to gain an advantage.

 

You're right it's not their job to tell us how to play the game but they do have to provide restrictions  to balance out gameplay/difficulty. if you choose to circumvent those restrictions then your cheating. It doesn't matter that there was nobody else around.

 

Save scumming is cheating. You manipulate the encounter to get the desired outcome. If you were playing chess with someone and they took one of your peices would you then be allowed to put that peice back on the board because you were losing?.

 

The problem with todays gamers is they want a challenge and when its given to them they all of a sudden dont want it. Players moaned that DA2 was too hack and slash so now we have this which is a good thing.

[Kage]

That is my guess also and i think the decision to limit abilities was made from the MP perspective.
I don’t think there would be ability restrictions in DA:I if there was no MP.

As i said in the past i don’t care if there is MP in the game and they can do whatever they want if it is kept separate from SP. Don’t understand why both teams worked together as it is obvious they would influence each other.

 

But why are people saying this, I really do not understand it. What has to do MP with the skill limitation of SP? It has nothing in common. Heck, even MP has not the same amount of abilities of SP, they only have 4. And ME3 had unlimited SP and limited MP.

 

MP only has to do with the skill limitation of MP.

SP has another reason why it is limited, and you can think whatever you want. I think the reason is the new gameplay Bioware has decided to implement on Dragon Age, nothing more. I dont think the reason is even the consoles, due to the wheel we have seen in DAO and DA2. The new gameplay, the new mechanics, is the only reason I see to limit the skills to 8.

[Sylvius the Mad]

You cant cheat on a single player game? What planet do you live on? If you are playing GTA for example and you enter a code which gives you unlimited ammo for your guns then you cheated. Cheating is defined as acting dishonestly or unfairly to gain an advantage.

You're right it's not their job to tell us how to play the game but they do have to provide restrictions to balance out gameplay/difficulty. if you choose to circumvent those restrictions then your cheating. It doesn't matter that there was nobody else around.

Save scumming is cheating. You manipulate the encounter to get the desired outcome. If you were playing chess with someone and they took one of your peices would you then be allowed to put that peice back on the board because you were losing?.

Chess is a multiplayer game, so it's not relevant to my point.

You're writing as if we have some sort of social obligation to play the game a certain way, and we don't. There's no wrong way to play with a toy. If it's fun, you're doing it right.

The problem with todays gamers is they want a challenge and when its given to them they all of a sudden dont want it. Players moaned that DA2 was too hack and slash so now we have this which is a good thing.

DA2 had a similar potion limit. DAO didn't. The potion limit is part of what was wrong with DA2's combat. DA2's combat was disliked because it felt gamey rather than natural. The absurd animations, the waves falling from the sky, the prohibition on using abilities outside the metaphysical state of "combat" - this is certainly what I was complaining about with DA2's combat, snd now we're getting the same artificiality. They've kuat remived one flavour and added another.

If you offer me ice cream, and I respond that I don't like ice cream, offering me a different flavour is not going to change my answer.

[Jimbo_Gee79]

Chess is a multiplayer game, so it's not relevant to my point.

You're writing as if we have some sort of social obligation to play the game a certain way, and we don't. There's no wrong way to play with a toy. If it's fun, you're doing it right.
DA2 had a similar potion limit. DAO didn't. The potion limit is part of what was wrong with DA2's combat. DA2's combat was disliked because it felt gamey rather than natural. The absurd animations, the waves falling from the sky, the prohibition on using abilities outside the metaphysical state of "combat" - this is certainly what I was complaining about with DA2's combat, snd now we're getting the same artificiality. They've kuat remived one flavour and added another.

If you offer me ice cream, and I respond that I don't like ice cream, offering me a different flavour is not going to change my answer.

 

Take Civ V as an example. From Civ 1-4 they had tech trading and unit stacking. Then they took it away. Players raged and vowed never to buy this wretched game again and that Sid Meir had sold his soul to the devil. I was one of those players. There didn't seem to be a valid reason (at least to me) for removing these gameplay mechanics. But one day I realized that this wasn't a bad thing and that in actual fact it changed the entire way I played Civ. Now, I had to find an entirely new way of beating the AI. The stack of doom feature was gone.

 

Dragon Age 2 wise I honestly didn't notice the limit of potions and I think I only raged once at the enemy waves thing. Graphical glitches don't bug me too much because I can usually ignore them pretty well unless they are glaringly obvious like a missing head or something.

I also know that people dont play games like I do. I take my time pause the game look around even when playing RTS games.  When I played Baldurs Gate I stood in the tavern and read a book rather than pursuing the next objective. I immersed myself into the game that much, that the little things faded away.

 

You seem to be dismissing something before you have even got your hands on it.Maybe you are like me and you realise that you will now have to think up a new way of beating the AI that doesn't involve potion spamming/stack of doom. This is good man, it means were two intelligent guys (?) who can adapt to any given situation.

[Messi Kossmann]

But why are people saying this, I really do not understand it. What has to do MP with the skill limitation of SP? It has nothing in common. Heck, even MP has not the same amount of abilities of SP, they only have 4. And ME3 had unlimited SP and limited MP.

 

MP only has to do with the skill limitation of MP.

SP has another reason why it is limited, and you can think whatever you want. I think the reason is the new gameplay Bioware has decided to implement on Dragon Age, nothing more. I dont think the reason is even the consoles, due to the wheel we have seen in DAO and DA2. The new gameplay, the new mechanics, is the only reason I see to limit the skills to 8.

this.

I think it's easy too understand. DAI have this "limitation" for gameplay reason. For the devs think this is the way you will play now. I understand if someone not buy the game for this reason, but they have to understand that not exists one evil conspiracy against pc gamers.

And i'm a pc gamer, by the way...

[Illyria God King of the Primordium]

Yes there is,it's called not designing games that were made in the 90s where the player had to deal with unfair A.I and other obstacles just to make the game challenging.

 

I thought games were supposed to move past placing artificial restrictions on the player but I guess not.

But 90s games have the best difficulty!  I still play SS2 to this day mostly because of the bullshit difficulty curve where if you levelled up one point wrong you basically couldn't complete the game.  That's a lot closer to what seems to be happening here, which is why I'm not too bothered about the 8 ability thing.  My two cents anyway.  

[Icy Magebane]

But 90s games have the best difficulty!  I still play SS2 to this day mostly because of the bullshit difficulty curve where if you levelled up one point wrong you basically couldn't complete the game.  That's a lot closer to what seems to be happening here, which is why I'm not too bothered about the 8 ability thing.  My two cents anyway.  

You have to be exaggerating...  Sounds like that would be a huge step backward if gaming were to return to this kind of restriction.  They may as well just auto-level the characters if it's going to be that strict.

[Illyria God King of the Primordium]

You have to be exaggerating...  Sounds like that would be a huge step backward if gaming were to return to this kind of restriction.  They may as well just auto-level the characters if it's going to be that strict.

Dude, that level up system is PERFECT.  Seriously though, SS2 on higher difficulties will ruin you if you misspend your upgrades - mostly because a bunch of the early enemies are biological, and the penultimate level is ALL The Many, so lots and lots of bio enemies - but then the last level is all incredibly hard to kill cyber enemies which the best gun in the game literally won't hurt, because it only works on bio enemies.  So if you've specced yourself out wrong, you're humped.  

 

But I enjoy that, because you (the Soldier) have woken up in a concrete situation you don't have all the pieces of.  It makes SENSE that you might install the wrong cyber modules, or master the wrong weapons for the situation, because you don't entirely know what the situation is before you get into it.  Anything that reminds me of SS2 is good - hell, I was willing to forgive Bioshock 1 and 2 their numerous faults because they basically WERE SS2.  

[Icy Magebane]

Dude, that level up system is PERFECT.  Seriously though, SS2 on higher difficulties will ruin you if you misspend your upgrades - mostly because a bunch of the early enemies are biological, and the penultimate level is ALL The Many, so lots and lots of bio enemies - but then the last level is all incredibly hard to kill cyber enemies which the best gun in the game literally won't hurt, because it only works on bio enemies.  So if you've specced yourself out wrong, you're humped.  

 

But I enjoy that, because you (the Soldier) have woken up in a concrete situation you don't have all the pieces of.  It makes SENSE that you might install the wrong cyber modules, or master the wrong weapons for the situation, because you don't entirely know what the situation is before you get into it.  Anything that reminds me of SS2 is good - hell, I was willing to forgive Bioshock 1 and 2 their numerous faults because they basically WERE SS2.  

Doesn't that mean that metagaming is the only way to complete the game?  If we're going by what the PC knows and expects, then they'd almost always select the upgrades that give them an edge over biological enemies, as they are more common... if they rarely encounter cyber enemies, why would they ever take upgrades that are effective against them in the first place?  I don't think I'd be too happy if i played through an entire game only to find out in the final hours that a build that has worked in every other situation is now ineffective to the point that I can't win at all (or perhaps with Herculean effort... I don't know).  Then again, I've never played this game so maybe there is some hint that cyber enemies will become more common in the future... 

 

I guess I'll just take your word that it was enjoyable.  If this only applies to the higher difficulties, it's probably not as bad as it sounds... I mean, you are signing up for a challenge when you increase the difficulty, after all.

[CronoDragoon]

That sounds a little too restrictive to me, and also a much different type of restriction. It sounds like SS2 has builds that are either fantastic the whole game or awful the whole game, whereas Inquisition is more about building each character several different ways and switching dependent on the situation.

[Sylvius the Mad]

Take Civ V as an example. From Civ 1-4 they had tech trading and unit stacking. Then they took it away. Players raged and vowed never to buy this wretched game again and that Sid Meir had sold his soul to the devil. I was one of those players. There didn't seem to be a valid reason (at least to me) for removing these gameplay mechanics. But one day I realized that this wasn't a bad thing and that in actual fact it changed the entire way I played Civ. Now, I had to find an entirely new way of beating the AI. The stack of doom feature was gone.

I play Alpha Centauri to this day. Every time I play, I play the same way. Because that's the playstyle I enjoy.

If my starting location doesn't lend itself to my preferred approach, I won't find a way to make it work. Instead, I'll resign that game and start over.

I have made those gamea work, but that's now a previously solved problem. I don't want to solve it again.

Dragon Age 2 wise I honestly didn't notice the limit of potions and I think I only raged once at the enemy waves thing.

I don't use potions much. I'm a hoarder; I tend to save consumables for when I need them, and then I reach the end of the game with a mountain of potions.

But I will use them if I have lots. If I know I won't run out, then I'll use them.

In DA2, I never had enough to be confident I wouldn't run out. So I never used them. I had whatever the limit was, and I never found any more. So they seemed really scarce to me.

But they weren't scarce. The game was just built to spawn potions in loot only when you weren't at the limit. But because this feature was undocumented, I didn't know about it, so it broke the game a little.

If they'd documented their game better, I would have been better at playing it. Hopefully that problem won't exist in Inquisition.

You seem to be dismissing something before you have even got your hands on it.Maybe you are like me and you realise that you will now have to think up a new way of beating the AI that doesn't involve potion spamming/stack of doom. This is good man, it means were two intelligent guys (?) who can adapt to any given situation.

I don't look to these games for challenge. All I want to do is play my character. Mechanical features that get in the way of that are going to draw complaints from me.

[polemists02]

To each their own I guess. The only game I played that was rather restrictive was fallout 1. I mean sure you could be a doctor but good luck. Games have been trying to get more casual so more people play and less people rage quit. I mean they always have a easy mood for story folks and a nightmare keep the lights on at night mode for hardcore. I assume difficulty will determine how fast you heal in. DAI and therefore how many potions you would need.

As for Potion limits. It is a valid argument but I need to play the game to know what that means for gameplay.

[bEVEsthda]

I don't use potions much. I'm a hoarder; I tend to save consumables for when I need them, and then I reach the end of the game with a mountain of potions.

But I will use them if I have lots. If I know I won't run out, then I'll use them.

In DA2, I never had enough to be confident I wouldn't run out. So I never used them. I had whatever the limit was, and I never found any more. So they seemed really scarce to me.

But they weren't scarce. The game was just built to spawn potions in loot only when you weren't at the limit. But because this feature was undocumented, I didn't know about it, so it broke the game a little.

If they'd documented their game better, I would have been better at playing it. Hopefully that problem won't exist in Inquisition.
 

 

Somewhat OT, but just some thoughts that occurred to me.

I generally use up my potions rapidly, mostly for role play reasons. I don't use them for easy fights, but as soon as a battle looks tough, my character will typically spam every advantage there can be for my party. The reasons are simple: Lives are at stake; better be safe than sorry. Health is a resource for the mission. Winning faster and easier conserves health. If that leads to problems further down the road, that will be an enjoyable problem of hardship. DA defeats that concern, of course, by re-setting everything for every battle. But my character doesn't know that, so ends up acting as if it was BG or IWD.

A more compressed version of that reasoning is used in DA2. Spend all stamina and mana as rapidly as possible. It's weird how effective that tactical principle is in DA2. But it ruins the delightful pleasure of waiting for the right moment, that you had with Vancian casting in BG and IWD. The major reason I don't like mana systems.

[Sylvius the Mad]

To each their own I guess. The only game I played that was rather restrictive was fallout 1. I mean sure you could be a doctor but good luck. Games have been trying to get more casual so more people play and less people rage quit.

They should keep the advanced options and just hide them behind an "I am not an idiot" button.

If you break your game, it's your own fault.

[Cainhurst Crow]

Then why are we getting a limit of 8 abilities if it is not MP related?

 Maybe because they wanted to have a greater focus on planning out strategy?

[Sylvius the Mad]

Totally OT, but just some thoughts that occurred to me.
I generally use up my potions rapidly, mostly for role play reasons. I don't use them for easy fights, but as soon as a battle looks tough, my character will typically spam every advantage there can be for my party. The reasons are simple: Lives are at stake; better be safe than sorry. Health is a resource for the mission. Winning faster and easier conserves health. DA defeats that concern, of course, by re-setting everything for every battle. But my character doesn't know that, so ends up acting as if it was BG or IWD.
A more compressed version of that reasoning is used in DA2. Spend all stamina and mana as rapidly as possible. It's weird how effective that tactical principle is in DA2. But it ruins the delightful pleasure of waiting for the right moment, that you had with Vancian casting in BG and IWD. The major reason I don't like mana systems.

I remember when KotOR came out, I objected to the lack of permadeath. Characters who fell in battle got right back up at the end.

To me, this trivialised combat, as you were no longer trying to minimize the amount of damage taken. Instead, just charge Canderous into the room to draw fire (and often die) while everyone else did damage from a safe distance.

I found this remarkably unfun, so I stopped doing it. Instead, I decided that my characters didn't want to take damage, so my objective was never to take damage. It is for this reason (partly) that I don't use melee warriors. Because they're designed to absorb damage, they lack the tools to avoid it.

So I'm confident I'm not going to use the warriors in Inquisition. I hope rhe game allows for that.

[bEVEsthda]

I remember when KotOR came out, I objected to the lack of permadeath. Characters who fell in battle got right back up at the end.

To me, this trivialised combat, as you were no longer trying to minimize the amount of damage taken. Instead, just charge Canderous into the room to draw fire (and often die) while everyone else did damage from a safe distance.

I found this remarkably unfun, so I stopped doing it. Instead, I decided that my characters didn't want to take damage, so my objective was never to take damage. It is for this reason (partly) that I don't use melee warriors. Because they're designed to absorb damage, they lack the tools to avoid it.

So I'm confident I'm not going to use the warriors in Inquisition. I hope rhe game allows for that.

 

Yes. I essentially play rpgs as if permadeath exists. Particularly in games like Morrowind, Fallout 3 and Skyrim, there's a lot of enjoyment to be had from being as cautious as if death really would be the end of your character and game. I greatly dislike when games defeat that ambition by insisting on trial and reload gameplay, i.e. feature problems which are only solvable with information which can only learned by trying and dying repeatedly. Such gameplay is acceptable in a platformer, but IMO should be avoided in rpgs.

[robertthebard]

This is just my guess, but they way I see it, if you remove the limitation from the PC version, you've now broken every encounter in the game. It was designed based on the player having access to a set amount of abilities. If you remove that limitation, and let the player have every ability at their disposal, the difficulty takes a nose dive, and the game becomes a cake walk. The PC version would then have to balanced on it's own. It's much easier to work on balance when every platform has the same set limitations.
 
That's just my guess though.

 
How are they broken? How does what you do on your PC affect what I do on my console, or anyone's console, and vice versa, since I don't have a console. The simple answer is, nothing you do in your SP game affects anything I do in my SP game. Wouldn't it suck to be you if it did, and I finished Origins first, let Loghain live, killed Alistair, told Morrigan to take on hike on the DR and let Loghain kill the Arch demon? Especially if, you wanted to, for example purposes only, marry Alistair and be queen, and so used the DR so nobody had to die? Sorry, Rob finished first, the next game's states are all set because he won the game. So no, it doesn't "break" anything. Contrary to what people are going on about here, there is no "right" way to play a SP game. If you're capitalizing on exploits in MP, you'll be banned. Limiting what everyone can do in MP makes sense, if, and only if, all platforms can play together. If they can't, then these limitations across the board are unnecessary. However, taking advantage of all the tools available on a platform shouldn't be considered an exploit by the other platforms.

Meh....I can't say I like having artificial restrictions placed on me just to make the game challenging.It reeks of fake difficulty.

 
 

Is there any game difficulty that isn't "fake"?

I certainly can: Any game that allows me to play within the confines of skills I have available to me through training against an AI that is set to be competitive to my level. If I have 12 active skills trained, I should be able to use them. Disallowing that is artificial difficulty. Fake difficulty is "Well, we can't do anything else, so we'll take stuff away from them so that they have to make 'choices' about what's important to take into a fight situation.

This is all going to lead to really generic builds, so that everyone can be "prepared" for anything, and lots of 2-nth button spamming to make sure you're using only the abilities that will work, instead of taking advantage of the tactics system provided by the devs. It's not like the tactics screens were tacked onto the previous two games by mods for PC only. They existed across the board, and they had a very specific purpose, to make combat more fluid, especially in DA 2. In Origins, it meant that I didn't have to pause the game to have everyone drink a potion, if needed, at appropriate times, they had a tactic set up for that. That tactic is out the window, depending on how curatives drop this time around, because it might be too easy to overconsume them and find you don't have any when you need them. Now, it's generic builds are FTW, so that you don't have to spend a lot of time, and time is money, revamping over the course of the entire game.

I get it, some people have unlimited time to play, I certainly do, but not everyone does, and maybe, just maybe, they'd prefer to spend the vast majority of that time playing the game, instead of playing the "Respec the party mini game"?

[robertthebard]

Maybe because they wanted to have a greater focus on planning out strategy?

What strategy? Peak over the hill, mouse over the enemy, rebuild party as necessary? Maybe you mean the "just make generic builds with a splash of everything, so you're always ready for what comes" strategy, in which case, why even bother to limit the abilities, since a majority of them, depending on class and spec won't ever see the light of day in favor of more generic skills that will always be useful on something. Sorry, I just can't bring myself to seeing any situation where "less is more".

[Cainhurst Crow]

What strategy? Peak over the hill, mouse over the enemy, rebuild party as necessary? Maybe you mean the "just make generic builds with a splash of everything, so you're always ready for what comes" strategy, in which case, why even bother to limit the abilities, since a majority of them, depending on class and spec won't ever see the light of day in favor of more generic skills that will always be useful on something. Sorry, I just can't bring myself to seeing any situation where "less is more".

 

Well lets be honest here, once you get at higher levels there's only 4 or 5 abilities you use that pretty much kill everything. For mages its the AOE spells, for warriors it was either the super chain of buffs that made you practically invincible or the few weapon abilities you were allowed, and for rogues it was also AOE attacks and high level critical chance abilities. Passives and low level damagers and buffs never saw the light after.

 

So why not take that system and have a bit more fun and chance into the mix? Make things less boring later in the game and have the stakes a bit higher, without having to crank everything else to 11.

[Sylvius the Mad]

Well lets be honest here, once you get at higher levels there's only 4 or 5 abilities you use that pretty much kill everything. For mages its the AOE spells, for warriors it was either the super chain of buffs that made you practically invincible or the few weapon abilities you were allowed, and for rogues it was also AOE attacks and high level critical chance abilities. Passives and low level damagers and buffs never saw the light after.

With friendly fire enabled, an excessive reliance on AoE attacks doesn't seem like the best idea.

Also, we don't all choose abilities just based on their combat effectiveness. I had one mage Warden who refused to use the Maker's Gift (magic) to do damage, so she was all debuffs and crowd-control.

That said, the high number of passive abilities might make my coward character (my favourite Warden to play) viable again.