253 réponses à ce sujet

[wolfhowwl]

You know, there's reasons why Sovereign was often called space Cthulhu.

Cthulhu called people over the equivalent of Skype and delivered bombastic chest-thumping speeches?

[hong]

Cthulhu called people over the equivalent of Skype and delivered bombastic chest-thumping speeches?

No, but he/she/it got his/her/its agent, HP Lovecraft, to do it for him/her/it.

[KaiserShep]

No, it was empty bluster at the time. Sovereign was going to lose. We all knew it the second he gave that speech. The quality of a villain's speech isn't based on the idea the villain can win because we all know it's hopeless - it's the quality and character of the speech itself. And the speech such as a speech. "We're beyond your comprehension?" No, you're not. You're very clearly artificial intelligence. Maybe really advanced, but a very simple thing to understand. Just because you won't tell me your reason doesn't mean I don't understand it. 
 
There was absolutely no way that speech wouldn't end in disappointment.

Even Legion calls them mundane.

[RepHope]

Even Legion calls them mundane.

You sure about that? In ME3 after linking with the Reaper controlling the Geth, he goes on about how a single thought was unknowable.

[KaiserShep]

"They are advanced, but mundane." Legion says this in the war room, I believe in this same string of dialogue.

[Solbranthius]

The problem is that whatever Bioware tried to portray here they did with little "show-dont tell" and not enough subtlety. Bad writing is spotted when characters aren't treated like real human beings by the writers. Florianne is an archetype. Her motivations are straightforward and evil. She doesn't feel very realistic, and if that's Bioware's idea of "Mature HBO-material storytelling" then they need to look at their groundwork again.

 

Opportunistic, narcissistic individuals like Florianne exist in pretty much every society. We also need to remember that mainstream storytelling has to be watered down and made obvious to appear to mainstream audiences. Even Game of Thrones - as complex as the story may be - ended up having the character name Asha changed to Yara because the directors thought that it was too similar to Osha and would confuse viewers.

 

Don't get me wrong, I do wish Florianne had more of a build up and perhaps showed up earlier on in the story as an ally to add a better bite to her betrayal later on. Yet going by what we got I'm still somewhat satisfied.

[Steppenwolf]

The reapers would still be a natural intelligence. Chuthulu obviously isn't beyond the realm of human comprehension since we invented the concept of it. There's wonderful speculative science fiction out there that does potray life so alien it's hard for us to wrap our heads around it. But the Reapers aren't that sort of thing. They're perfectly understandable creatures. 
 
The IRL examples are what's stupid. No dictator stands up and says "My regime is beyond your comprehension." Political speeches are used as propaganda tools, sure, and they're filled with jingoism, but they're all about thinly veiled threats. Even ignoring the fact that the major difference between them is that they're actually a risk to occur. Hitler isn't the Red Skull, giving some weird speech to a fire-team he's got tied up in his basement. 
 
In character, Shepard isn't intimidated. Hell, you're locked into saying the Reapers are just machines, and machines can be broken. l'm as unimpressed behind the screen as Shepard was in person. 
 
The point about the OOC line is this: in-setting, the idea of giving a speech like this is moronic. They make fun of it in just about every parody ever - look at Austin Powers, for example. It's not something to be taken seriously.

Good lord, where could I even start with this?
 

[TEWR]

I think it's due to the fact people complained why the hell should they see Loghain and what he's doing, when you are not involved in any way with him.

 

I can understand why people would act like that, as it's player knowledge vs. character knowledge, but an antagonist should always wow the player because while we wouldn't be able to apply what we know about the antagonist from such scenes to our PC, we could at least apply the scope of their actions and persona to our PC.

 

I have yet to see a truly excellent video game villain.

 

 

The Choreographer from the Ghost in the Shell video game for the PS2.

[Swordfishtrombone]

Starchild.

 

This. By light years. No contest.

[In Exile]

Good lord, where could I even start with this?

Apparently you're going to start with a patronising insult.

[Steppenwolf]

Apparently you're going to start with a patronising insult.

 

I didn't patronize you, I just insulted you. The way that you view/understand the world and interact with human beings makes me sad.

[Captain_Crunch]

Took me 3 playthroughs to find out that you can skip the fight with Florianne and shank her right in front of everyone, but when I suddenly did it I was soooooo satisfied

[tmp7704]

The reapers would still be a natural intelligence. Chuthulu obviously isn't beyond the realm of human comprehension since we invented the concept of it. There's wonderful speculative science fiction out there that does potray life so alien it's hard for us to wrap our heads around it. But the Reapers aren't that sort of thing. They're perfectly understandable creatures.

I think it's possible to consider the Reapers (and their logic) as incomprehensible, from certain view point -- as example, I don't know if it's possible for a normal human being to *truly* understand a psychopath (and vice versa) because you can't really shut off your knowledge of what things like empathy or remorse are and how they affect your thoughts, in a way you could maybe close your eyes or cover your ears to imagine what it's like to be a blind or deaf person.

So if Reapers are operating with such 'cold' logic and no concept of empathy etc, then their conclusions may invoke a "That's stupid" or "Why don't you see these things the way I do" reaction, but that's precisely where this lack of comprehension comes in -- both the inability to *really* explain to them the concepts which to us may feel obvious, and the inability to *really* understand what it's like to think without these concepts playing part in your reasoning. And when they tell you, "You wouldn't understand" that may not be so much condescension, but just acknowledging the reality -- because you think differently, you won't understand their own thought process any more than a blind person could understand the concept of "blue".

[cronshaw]

Or read it, I prefer the graphic novel over the film.

That's because it is 100x better

Zach Snyder butchers the ending because he didn't have the balls to actually set the movie in the time period it was supposed to be set in

 

On topic I guess you don't like James Bond movies OP

[Medhia_Nox]

@simfanSP:  And I would argue that you should have a better idea of what a well designed character should entail... umm.. yo. 

 

So, now that we've established we both have opinions. 

 

@In Exile:  I totally disagree with you about Cthulhu.  I'm not talking about the mass marketed idea that most pop culture kiddies would know (that concept of him would I'd agree with you about). 

 

Have you read any of Lovecrafts works?  I think he's absolutely masterful in designing situations and experiences for this characters that not only seem truly alien - but also induce, at least for me, genuine feelings of dysphoria.

 

@TEWR:  I am not familiar - though, I would have to ask.  Is the Choreographer taken from the film?  As I am not a fan of anime - I am not familiar with the Ghost in the Shell, though I recognize it as a masterpiece of that genre.  If this choreographer is from the film - I stand uncontested.

 

As it is - I did say that "I" have yet to see a video game villain I consider truly excellent.  There's actually no villain you can bring up that "I" have seen - though I respect that appeal to potentially remind me, or otherwise direct me, to villains "you" consider excellent.

[Tyrannosaurus Rex]

I would vote for Lord Seeker Lucius for being DA:I's worst villain.

 

Cassandra's personal mission is in my opinion the worst writing of DA:I.

[Feranel]

If you watch the cutscene, the inquisitor hides the Anchor from her. Of course she had heard the stories but, I think she thought them just that, stories. She didn't beleive that Quizzy could actually seal rifts and, she expected the demons to kill him/her and, all companions. She was bragging and, as is always the ultimate downfall in the DA world, her price (hubris) got the better of her.

 

Actually, near as I can tell, she wasn't even aware the rift was there.  It was a pseudo-tear that the inquisitor opens up at will, she had the inquisitor trapped with a bunch of archers, but the inquisitor opens a rift and pulls through demons as a distraction.

[sunnydxmen]

villains always reveal themselves in gloat on how they fooled you in talk about there plans revealing everything to you ,cause they think they can kill you this not just in dragon age but anywhere with villains they get over confident thinking know one can stop them,  its a classic villain move that always leads to their down fall basically she overestimated her power.

[Steppenwolf]

That's because it is 100x better

Zach Snyder butchers the ending because he didn't have the balls to actually set the movie in the time period it was supposed to be set in

 

The original ending would have never worked on film. It's too silly. Nothing to do with time period.

[Hurbster]

Rule of monologue isn't it ?

[Big Bad]

Watchmen. Watch it. It's one of the best movies ever.

Better yet, read the comic which is about 100x better and contains 100% less slow-mo. 

[TEWR]

 

@TEWR:  I am not familiar - though, I would have to ask.  Is the Choreographer taken from the film?  As I am not a fan of anime - I am not familiar with the Ghost in the Shell, though I recognize it as a masterpiece of that genre.  If this choreographer is from the film - I stand uncontested.

 

As it is - I did say that "I" have yet to see a video game villain I consider truly excellent.  There's actually no villain you can bring up that "I" have seen - though I respect that appeal to potentially remind me, or otherwise direct me, to villains "you" consider excellent.

 

Nope! The GitS video game actually follows more along the lines of the anime, rather then the movies. The movies stand in their own universe and the anime in their own, though with some natural overlap in themes explored and characters and such.

 

At any rate, the game has one of the best video game antagonists I've ever seen, more so when I played it again a few months back and realized even more of what drove said antagonist. The Choreographer exists purely in the realm of the video game and is not taken at all from the other media forms, though the explorable setting was I believe referenced a few times in the anime -- never in depth, just a passing mention.

 

Also, Final Fantasy XII's Vayne Solidor is a really phenomenal antagonist (FFXII has many great characters)

[Deus Shepard]

Just once I want a villan to have a monologue then win the battle and go through with his/her plans. 

Play Final Fantasy 6 if you want to see the villan go through with his plans.

[vbibbi]

It wasn't the ceasefire, but rather the lack of reasons for the war or why different factions had chosen who to stand behind. There was no moment with someone explaining why Celene was destroying everything, why Gaspard was a traitorous traitor who traitors, no one to speak of those caught in between. There was destruction, but that destruction would have been the same if the undead had swiped the area, if the Cory's forces had hit it.

 

To me, it didn't provide any real information or context for the conflict, it just felt destruction and desolution that didn't really build the story. As an example of what I would have preferred is actually the Hinterlands, which shows you on multiple situations the conflict between the Templars and Mages, where it is stemming from and how it is affecting those caught in between.

 

BTW, on the Elven uprising, I was also aware of TME, but it was still so weirdly handled on the game that for a long time I thought they just dropped it. But my favorite how they casually mention in war table operation that the Elves can use the Eluvians after making it such a huge plot point for the main story.

 

Apologies for the necro, but I found this thread after a recent discussion of some of the odd plot points.

 

This thread brought up a question I hadn't really considered before...so apparently the ceasefire in EP is because both sides are under siege by the Freemen raising the dead to attack everyone, right? Is there another reason for the ceasefire? So, was Cory's plan to help the Freemen raise the dead (we know the red templars are supplying them with lyrium and I think the Freemen leader in EP is venatori) knowing that this would cause a ceasefire and instigate the peace talks at Halamshiral? And then have Celene assassinated there?

 

That seems way more elaborate than NOT raising the dead, allow both sides to kill each other off more and further weaken Orlais. Why does Celene need to be assassinated at the Winter Palace when she could be killed anywhere, also have Gaspard killed, meanwhile the armies are shrinking and will be easy pickings for Tevinter. This seems more important than framing Gaspard for Celene's murder. Especially if it's Florianne who kills Celene, not Gaspard.

 

And yeah, dropping the entire elven uprising and eluvian network is so odd. Especially since Weekes wrote TME, and he was on the DAI writing team since ME3, right? It's not like someone forgot about these plots and then Patrick joined after the game was close to completion.

[TeffexPope]

The reapers would still be a natural intelligence. Chuthulu obviously isn't beyond the realm of human comprehension since we invented the concept of it. There's wonderful speculative science fiction out there that does potray life so alien it's hard for us to wrap our heads around it. But the Reapers aren't that sort of thing. They're perfectly understandable creatures. 

 

The IRL examples are what's stupid. No dictator stands up and says "My regime is beyond your comprehension." Political speeches are used as propaganda tools, sure, and they're filled with jingoism, but they're all about thinly veiled threats. Even ignoring the fact that the major difference between them is that they're actually a risk to occur. Hitler isn't the Red Skull, giving some weird speech to a fire-team he's got tied up in his basement. 

 

In character, Shepard isn't intimidated. Hell, you're locked into saying the Reapers are just machines, and machines can be broken. l'm as unimpressed behind the screen as Shepard was in person. 

 

The point about the OOC line is this: in-setting, the idea of giving a speech like this is moronic. They make fun of it in just about every parody ever - look at Austin Powers, for example. It's not something to be taken seriously. 

The more I learned about the Reapers, the more I was doubting that they even were true artificial intelligence. They seem more like slaves. Slaves to their purpose, and of course to the Catalyst, who created them. By the end of ME3 they seemed more like VIs to me, really.