43 réponses à ce sujet

[Above Good and Evil]

This has gotten to me ever since reading the Maric books but it seems like the PC's choices or the game's events totally invalidate or trivialize a lot of the book's struggles and events: Loghain? Can be executed like a dog. Cailan? Dies half an hour into his segment. Maric? Dies off-screen etc etc. I know its to make the PC feel special, but it sort of makes these character's struggles less important in the long run. 

Masked Empire is a pretty good example. This entire book is about the civil war, the complex characters, Michel's redemption for Imshael etc etc. In-game? One quest and the Inquisitor can cow all three political leaders, possibly killing two out of the three. Likewise Michel just stands around in a side-quest and the Inquisitor does all the work or a deal can be made in which case Michel dies. Masked Empire's struggles then can be resolved in one main quest and one side-quest with three out of four core character biting the dust. 

 

[Panda]

The game is more important than novels in this sense. The novels are side product of the game. Because different choices that player makes the novels can't always portray the truth. For example Wynne is always alive in Asunder no matter if you kill her in DAO.

 

I wouldn't mind if the game took more inspiration from the books but the books are still just creation of one of the DA writing team (Last Flight was even by outsider writer if I got it right). So the other parts of the team might have different ideas for the game.

[rda]

Yeah, I used to read Star Trek books (nerd, I know) and those didn't tie into the Tv show at all. It was more like, "stories that tied in to the universe, using characters we were familiar with."

I think it's the same thing here.

[Former_Fiend]

I'm certainly not complaining given that I didn't like any of The Masked Empire's characters. Gaspard, Celene, and Briala all deserved being taken down a peg by the Inquisitor. Michel would have been slaughtered by Imshael, so this was pretty much the only way that plotline was going to end without either being convoluted or having Michel brutally murdered(though that can still happen). 

 

I think the bigger issue with The Masked Empire is how Briala gaining control of the Eluvian network was completely forgotten. There's no indication of that plotline at all in the game despite the Eluvians being a decently major plot point in and of themselves. 

[Above Good and Evil]

I'm certainly not complaining given that I didn't like any of The Masked Empire's characters. Gaspard, Celene, and Briala all deserved being taken down a peg by the Inquisitor. Michel would have been slaughtered by Imshael, so this was pretty much the only way that plotline was going to end without either being convoluted or having Michel brutally murdered(though that can still happen). 

 

I think the bigger issue with The Masked Empire is how Briala gaining control of the Eluvian network was completely forgotten. There's no indication of that plotline at all in the game despite the Eluvians being a decently major plot point in and of themselves. 

Wasn't it mentioned that Elven assassins were screwing both sides? Given how good Orlais' armies are I doubt a bunch of untrained Elves could disrupt them without magic. 

[Former_Fiend]

Wasn't it mentioned that Elven assassins were screwing both sides? Given how good Orlais' armies are I doubt a bunch of untrained Elves could disrupt them without magic. 

 

It really wouldn't be that hard, given how little attention humans are established as paying the elves.

 

The only thing mentioned in game is that Briala has organized the elves of Halamsharal - or however it's spelled - into a resistance force. There's never an indication that she's moving them around in a way that's "like magic".

 

More over, Morrigan doesn't say anything about sharing the Crossroads with an elven resistance force. This is, of course, assuming the Crossroads she shows you is the same central hub Briala's using in TME; they don't appear similar at all, they don't appear to work under the same principles - travel in Morrigan's crossroads is apparently instantaneous where as in the novel it still took a good deal of time to travel between Eluvians, just not nearly as much as it would take to travel over land. And Morrigan does mention that not all the Eluvians go to the real world so it's possible there's more than one nexus of them, I suppose.

 

Just would have thought there would be some overlap, there.

[Steelcan]

clearly Gaspard had all those mirrors smashed over the course of the war

 

#justrollwithit

[Former_Fiend]

clearly Gaspard had all those mirrors smashed over the course of the war

 

#justrollwithit

 

Seems legit.

[CreepingShadow]

Expanded Universe, never has much of an impact on the Core Story, yes they can be enjoyable, and yes they flesh out certain characters and plots, but the most important stories will always be told in-game.

 

Plus a lot of the Dragon Age E.E (The Masked Empire/Asunder/The Comics) is only semi-canon anyway, and can contradict a lot of the possible choices in game, which according to Bioware currently has no offical canon, just a default state.

[Nightdragon8]

It really wouldn't be that hard, given how little attention humans are established as paying the elves.

 

The only thing mentioned in game is that Briala has organized the elves of Halamsharal - or however it's spelled - into a resistance force. There's never an indication that she's moving them around in a way that's "like magic".

 

More over, Morrigan doesn't say anything about sharing the Crossroads with an elven resistance force. This is, of course, assuming the Crossroads she shows you is the same central hub Briala's using in TME; they don't appear similar at all, they don't appear to work under the same principles - travel in Morrigan's crossroads is apparently instantaneous where as in the novel it still took a good deal of time to travel between Eluvians, just not nearly as much as it would take to travel over land. And Morrigan does mention that not all the Eluvians go to the real world so it's possible there's more than one nexus of them, I suppose.

 

Just would have thought there would be some overlap, there.

 

SPOILORS

 

 

 

In the game with a Romanced Warden, Morri talks about living in the nexus space with the Warden for some times.

[Morroian]

I think the bigger issue with The Masked Empire is how Briala gaining control of the Eluvian network was completely forgotten. There's no indication of that plotline at all in the game despite the Eluvians being a decently major plot point in and of themselves. 

 

Agree with this, those eluvians should have been a major plot point in the game.

[Mims]

The Eluvian's may yet come in to play.

 

Spoiler

Dialogue between Solas and Cole strongly implies that the elven "gods" are trapped in an eluvian.

[Kevs]

I honestly feel that Bioware should stop giving us so many damn choices! Choices make it hard for me to grow attached to any of the characters. Take Alistair, for example. "Ooo, fun, we get to make him king!" What do we get? One cutscene in Awakening, one cutscene in DA2 and one cutscene in DAI. In all 3 cases, they just replace Alistair with Anora and everything works out. In other words, there's 0% chance of Alistair's character being further developed now since whatever he does, Anora can also do.

 

Another example would be Fiona. She has an incredibly back story, and her status of being the only Warden cured of the Taint, in addition to being the only Mage alive who saw and experienced firsthand the magical acceleration of the Taint (and subsequently cure it), can make her an important character when the HoF goes around searching for a cure to the Calling. Being Alistair's mom and all, and given how she made a subtle inquiry about the King of Ferelden when you talk to her, you'd think that she can be worked into the story of curing the Taint for the sake of her son. Instead, she was not developed at all in DAI. I mean, for someone who has personally experienced a magically induced Calling, why the heck does she not offer even the slightest bit of relevant dialog during the whole Wardens part of the game??? At best, she becomes a whining freeloader in Skyhold. At worst, she becomes a random mini-boss who fights and dies without so much as a cutscene.

[wright1978]

The Eluvian's may yet come in to play.

 

Spoiler

Dialogue between Solas and Cole strongly implies that the elven "gods" are trapped in an eluvian.

 

Must have missed that dialogue.

[Wolfen09]

so yeah, this happens in movies too.... the book was better.... oh they left this part out... or this part was different.... its the same damn thing....  Truly i wish they wouldnt bring the novels or characters into the games, at most a small war table type mission that gives them a subtle nod.  Other than that, it has the possibility of screwing up a lot of things either the game tried to do or the novel tried to do.

 

The whole eluvian thing and briala is a good example

[CapivaRasgor]

Honestly, as much as I enjoy a good read and have the lore enriched, I hope BioWare puts a stop on making novels for their games, or any external media whatsoever. It’s just not working, and don’t believe it will ever do, they introduce interesting parallel plots and characters then fail at tying them to the plot in a satisfactory manner. Thus they end up with both lacking, which IMO is a disservice to the very lore they created in the first place. It’s something I think it’s born from the necessity of not alienating the fans who didn’t read the books/comics, they can’t assume all their players read them but have to slap those plots/characters in there since they literally went out of their way to introduce them, it’s tricky...

In ME we had Kai Leng and Kahlee Sanders, both are major characters in external media, but their representations in game are just… lacking, from the perspective of someone who didn’t read any external media until after playing ME 3 I had little reason to care for the recently introduced girlfriend of Anderson and also had a hard time figuring out why that over the top ninja assassin was suddenly my Shepard’s most bitter rival, or how I as a player was supposed to regard him as anything more than the almost forgettable(almost… he did kill Thane after all) Cerberus sub boss I would have to eventually face.

In Dragon Age I expected something similar, but with some improvements(one can hope right?) … but then came the ball at Halamshiral… just… lacking… again. Seriously on my first playthrough, which I was roleplaying a Qunari Inquisitor with a neutral stance on the whole matter, I had little reason to bother with anything else other than doing what I went there for: save Celene’s life. None of the three sides made a compelling case for themselves so I just went with was least likely to result in more chaos, which was just… bad, the whole thing felt like “hey I hope you read the novel, because we don’t have time to go in depth with the characters and their motivations”. Also, one has to go out of their way to see the civil war in its fronts, not to mention the completely forgotten Eluvian network or Felassan’s master and “clan”, again, lacking.

Having said that, the only way this could work is have any external media set in a very distant past or a very distant land, featuring characters that we’ll never be able to interact with, The Last Flight seems like a step on this direction so I may have to take back the bit I said in the first paragraph about this never working, but given recent history, I’m not exactly holding my breath.

[Kevs]

It's not just with the novel characters. Every npc whose fate we get to decide in the Keep (doomed or alive) end up being underdeveloped.

-Connor was just there to say "hey, this is what happened in Redcliffe 10 years ago". He contributed nothing to the plot.

-Alistair/Anora just show up to kick the mages out, plus a few war board missions.

-Zevran just gets a war board mission

-Harrowmont/Bhelen gives the exact same war board mission, just either signed Bhelen or signed Harrowmont

-Anders (one of big reasons the war broke out), if alive, is simply mentioned as missing by Varric. If dead, Hawke just has this very pissed off tone when talking about him.

-Sebastian has a war board mission. Either mourns for Justinia if Anders is dead, or is besieging Kirkwall if Anders is alive.

-Amalia (girl from Shale dlc) wasn't mentioned. Why did we save her again?

-Feynriel (Dreamer boy from DA2) wasn't mentioned. And we saved him twice, both in main plot quests.

-Keran (templar kidnapped by blood mages in DA2) wasn't mentioned. We also saved him twice, both in main plot quests.

 

These are the guys that I can remember off the top of my head. I'm sure that if I combed through the Keep, there are more npcs there that are barely mentioned, or not mentioned at all.

[MisterJB]

It really wouldn't be that hard, given how little attention humans are established as paying the elves.

The only thing mentioned in game is that Briala has organized the elves of Halamsharal - or however it's spelled - into a resistance force. There's never an indication that she's moving them around in a way that's "like magic".

More over, Morrigan doesn't say anything about sharing the Crossroads with an elven resistance force. This is, of course, assuming the Crossroads she shows you is the same central hub Briala's using in TME; they don't appear similar at all, they don't appear to work under the same principles - travel in Morrigan's crossroads is apparently instantaneous where as in the novel it still took a good deal of time to travel between Eluvians, just not nearly as much as it would take to travel over land. And Morrigan does mention that not all the Eluvians go to the real world so it's possible there's more than one nexus of them, I suppose.

Just would have thought there would be some overlap, there.

Technically, Gaspard does mention how Briala's weapon could win not just thei war bit all wars.
But, on the whole, I agree with you. The Eluvians needed to be featured more prominently bu when even Celene has only three scenes, what chance did they havê?
Bottom line, this game needed more sidequests centered around the main plot points. Imagine if the Inqusition had to work for anos invitation to the ball. We could, for instance, find ourselves in the middle of one of the battlegrounds, interact with agents and soldiers and refugees, learn the motives of each faction and discover the Eluvians. Only then do we go to the Winter Palace as guests of whichever side We supported the most in previous quests.

[LilyasAvalon]

This sort of pissed me off about Masked Empire as well. While I agree with Panda, and think that they should not be too overly immersed to avoid outing fans who haven't read the books, for fucks sake, please give me more than one evening in the future to choose who the next emperor/empress should be. Thanks.

 

Spoiler

I got Briala and Celene to reconcile and get back together, Briala got made Marquis of the Dales. Which was great, yeah, but this should've involved a LOT more work then just giving Celene a necklace and saying 'btw, i snooped around in your private vault'. Also, Briala, did you forget what Celene DID!? Not even the Hamalshiral rebellion, but to your parents?!

 

Also, what the hell happened to Briala and her whole sector of Eluvians? Go after HER, Corypheus!

 

Technically, Gaspard does mention how Briala's weapon could win not just thei war bit all wars.
But, on the whole, I agree with you. The Eluvians needed to be featured more prominently bu when even Celene has only three scenes, what chance did they havê?
Bottom line, this game needed more sidequests centered around the main plot points. Imagine if the Inqusition had to work for anos invitation to the ball. We could, for instance, find ourselves in the middle of one of the battlegrounds, interact with agents and soldiers and refugees, learn the motives of each faction and discover the Eluvians. Only then do we go to the Winter Palace as guests of whichever said We supported the mostra in previous quests.

 

That would've been a LOT better imo. The problem I'm having with Inquisition so far is that the main quests barely, if at all, tie with a lot of the areas in Inquisition. Origins did a much better job where you HAD to go to Denerim or Orzammar to progress the story and you were like 'eh, let's look around anyway'. This of course, was a risk they took when they made the game more open world though.

[KillTheLastRomantic]

I honestly feel that Bioware should stop giving us so many damn choices! Choices make it hard for me to grow attached to any of the characters. Take Alistair, for example. "Ooo, fun, we get to make him king!" What do we get? One cutscene in Awakening, one cutscene in DA2 and one cutscene in DAI. In all 3 cases, they just replace Alistair with Anora and everything works out. In other words, there's 0% chance of Alistair's character being further developed now since whatever he does, Anora can also do.

 

Another example would be Fiona. She has an incredibly back story, and her status of being the only Warden cured of the Taint, in addition to being the only Mage alive who saw and experienced firsthand the magical acceleration of the Taint (and subsequently cure it), can make her an important character when the HoF goes around searching for a cure to the Calling. Being Alistair's mom and all, and given how she made a subtle inquiry about the King of Ferelden when you talk to her, you'd think that she can be worked into the story of curing the Taint for the sake of her son. Instead, she was not developed at all in DAI. I mean, for someone who has personally experienced a magically induced Calling, why the heck does she not offer even the slightest bit of relevant dialog during the whole Wardens part of the game??? At best, she becomes a whining freeloader in Skyhold. At worst, she becomes a random mini-boss who fights and dies without so much as a cutscene.

 

I understand what you're saying and in ways I agree. Choice and consequence are great, but especially with ME3 and now DAI we're given such huge, worldwide game-changer choices that it just gives Bioware a ton of work to do future developments of those plots justice, so they have to either completely abandon the setting until various Monarchs you put in power etc are long dead or just have brief cameos. I don't really get this need to have the player character be some epic political power who manipulates the fates of nations.

[CreepingShadow]

There's isn't anything wrong with Expanded Universe, but it should be relegated to side stories, not to develop the main plot, otherwise it really takes away from the game. For example if you didn't read Asunder or The Masked Empire, you miss a lot of important plot details for the game's story, which just isn't cool.

 

Like in Halamshiral you're given very little information on any of the three leaders, just tidbits, everything else is in the novel. Celene and Briala's love affair, Gaspard's wife killing Celene's parents, really the motivations of all three are largely left out or given passing mentions.

 

As for choices I'm in agreeance with some posters, that Bioware writes themselves into a corner with some of the major world altering choices, that eventually because of all the different outcomes have no real impact anyway. Making your mark only in small ways like saving the Feros colony in Mass Effect doesn't take away from the experience. In Origins a lot of problems would be solved if Alistair married Anora, killed Loghain, and fathered Kieran, without the players imput.

 

Honestly I wouldn't mind if Bioware retcons some choices to put the story on track.

[Mr.House]

 

 

Another example would be Fiona. She has an incredibly back story, and her status of being the only Warden cured of the Taint, in addition to being the only Mage alive who saw and experienced firsthand the magical acceleration of the Taint (and subsequently cure it), can make her an important character when the HoF goes around searching for a cure to the Calling. Being Alistair's mom and all, and given how she made a subtle inquiry about the King of Ferelden when you talk to her, you'd think that she can be worked into the story of curing the Taint for the sake of her son. Instead, she was not developed at all in DAI. I mean, for someone who has personally experienced a magically induced Calling, why the heck does she not offer even the slightest bit of relevant dialog during the whole Wardens part of the game??? At best, she becomes a whining freeloader in Skyhold. At worst, she becomes a random mini-boss who fights and dies without so much as a cutscene.

lmao.

[Former_Fiend]

Honestly, this doesn't bother me much at all because the Dragon Age novels are kind of sh*t to start with. Asunder was decent, and admittedly I haven't read Stolen Throne or Last Flight, but The Calling and Masked Empire were both just bad. 

 

That being said, I think the issue is less "we need fewer choices" and more "we need choices with more immediate consequences". At this point I'm resigned to the fact that major decisions are going to have as visual of an impact as we may have previously hoped, and that's fine. Frankly I didn't play Inquisition to see how my Origins choices played out, I played Inquisition for it's own story. But I think we need more choices that pay off in the game they're made instead of making decisions and hoping they pay off in a future installment.