126 réponses à ce sujet

[Dermain]

 

Yes that is probably what the writers meant for him to believe but his actions contradict this belief, even if we take Loghain as a blind fool it is hard to believe that somebody would lack so much self awareness to not see how performing the actions he did were destroying the country from within, especially when it is hard to see what possible benefits any of his actions could have for Ferelden or his position of power, not only are his actions destructive to Ferelden but they also put him in a much weaker position by creating unnecessary enemies which leads to the whole "mustachio twirling villain creating chaos for the sake of it" conclusion

 

He DOES NOT KNOW that he is making Ferelden worse off by his actions. Mustachio twirling villains do. Look at Howe for example, he knows he's doing bad things, he just doesn't care. Howe doesn't have any rationalizations for his actions besides "I deserved more!".

 

Which would all be fine and dandy if his actions actually showed any potential to help secure his power base which they did not, as for the claim Ferelden desperately needed the money and the only way to raise it was an under the table deal with Tevinter selling slaves there is no evidence to support this in the game or any official Dragon Age related material so it is nothing more than speculation on your part

 

As for Loghain poisoning Eamon because he wanted to become regent unchallenged his daughter is the queen and I am not sure her right to rule would not have come under such harsh scrutiny if Loghain had not gone out of his way to make an enemy of everyone in the country.

 

We can debate Loghain's intent and characterization until we are black and blue but this is exactly my point, due to the contradictory and inconsistent nature of the writing it is entirely possible for the player to form any number of contradictory conclusions each with a number of contradictory pieces of evidence to support them leading to a circular debate with no end.

 

It is NOT a contradiction unless you find it impossible to believe that he is both a patriot and power hungry. 

 

Loghain discussing the battle of Ostagar:

 

Loghain discussing why he sold the elves into slavery for the GOOD of Ferelden:

[wolfhowwl]

Maybe. But DA2 tried things differently and look how that turned out.

 

DA2's problem was that it was starved of time and money as well as hurt by some just poor decisions.

 

If the game had been properly executed with

• escaping from Lothering instead of wandering through **** Mountain
• showing not telling and actually letting you play through mercenary or smuggler questlines where Hawke makes their name
• fleshed out questlines for dealing with Act II's church vs. qunari conflict and Act III's mages and templars
• an endgame with actually different content for your choices, maybe a neutral path as well
• giving Fenris a haircut
• a reasonably well-constructed city and outskirts. We're not talking AssCreed here, just something decent.
• no waves

the reception would have been a little different. The lesson here isn't that changing from the generic, tired storytelling of a game like DA:O is a bad thing, it's that poorly made games are received poorly.

[LPPrince]

DA2's problem was that it was starved of time and money as well as hurt by some just poor decisions.

 

If the game had been properly executed with

• escaping from Lothering instead of wandering through **** Mountain
• showing not telling and actually letting you play through mercenary or smuggler questlines where Hawke makes their name
• fleshed out questlines for dealing with Act II's church vs. qunari conflict and Act III's mages and templars
• an endgame with actually different content for your choices, maybe a neutral path as well
• giving Fenris a haircut
• a reasonably well-constructed city and outskirts. We're not talking AssCreed here, just something decent.
• no waves

the reception would have been a little different. The lesson here isn't that changing from the generic, tired storytelling of a game like DA:O is a bad thing, it's that poorly made games are received poorly.

 

Sounds like a totally different game. hahaha

[B.A. Broska]

He DOES NOT KNOW that he is making Ferelden worse off by his actions. Mustachio twirling villains do. Look at Howe for example, he knows he's doing bad things, he just doesn't care. Howe doesn't have any rationalizations for his actions besides "I deserved more!".

 

Yes I believe you already said that and I believe I said that was probably the writers intent for the chatacter, however the actions performed by the character are stuck so deep in the realm of stupid it is very hard to take this characterization seriously, I am not questioning the writer's intent but the quality of their writing.

 

We are just going in circles hence the circular debate.

 

Loghain discussing why he sold the elves into slavery for the GOOD of Ferelden:

<snip>

 

Well it is more Loghain stating that he sold the elves into slavery for the good of Ferelden rather than actually telling us how it benefits Ferelden, probably an important detail that needs addressing as I am still failing to see how this cruel act has a tangible effect on the welfare of Ferelden.

[Seraphim24]

Yes I believe you already said that and I believe I said that was probably the writers intent for the chatacter, however the actions performed by the character are stuck so deep in the realm of stupid it is very hard to take this characterization seriously, I am not questioning the writer's intent but the quality of their writing.

 

We are just going in circles hence the circular debate.

 

 

 

Well it is more Loghain stating that he sold the elves into slavery for the good of Ferelden rather than actually telling us how it benefits Ferelden, probably an important detail that needs addressing as I am still failing to see how this cruel act has a tangible effect on the welfare of Ferelden.

 

I can't really comprehend the slaving/Grey Warden enmity overall. I think the slavery thing was just for money for preparing for war, which was.. eh... wasn't good, I mean, I killed Loghain my first round. My initial instinct was to judge him that way.

 

As for the Grey Warden thing well, I think that was all he felt they would serve as a relatively easy scapegoat, being that they were a somewhat dis-repaired order that had no real relevance because there were no more true blights of thousand of years... I think I'm remembering that right.

 

All in all, he had a goal and yet particular paranoias from the past seem to exaggerate the impact of his decisions and all that to the point where they may have seemed excessive.

 

Like any character though, for me, taken in the aggregate I was definitely entertained, especially because of Simon Templeman's voice acting. He also obviously commanded immense respect from people such as Ser Cauthrien who seemed willing to follow him at least because of past accomplishments, it's entirely possible he took that kind of thing to make him over-play his hand under the impression it would never come back to haunt him.

 

If you press me though again, I mean, someone like Kain from Blood Omen (Another Templemen dark fantasy character), I felt more pulled into different directions by his plight.

 

Overall though, Loghain, Morrigan, Alistair were a far shot more interesting to me than any of the DA:2 cast.

[Dermain]

Well it is more Loghain stating that he sold the elves into slavery for the good of Ferelden rather than actually telling us how it benefits Ferelden, probably an important detail that needs addressing as I am still failing to see how this cruel act has a tangible effect on the welfare of Ferelden.

 

I'm going to highlight how selling the elves into slavery helps Ferelden...

 

If you sell something, you get money. 

[B.A. Broska]

Yes and where exactly did that money go and how exactly was it used to benefit Ferelden? We have no idea where the money went, how much the deal was for or even if the money was used for the good of Ferelden, for all the information we are given it could have just gone into Howe and Loghain's personal bank accounts.

 

There is nothing in the writing that suggests Ferelden is financially destitute (at least to my knowledge) and that the only avenue open for the country to raise money is to sell the elves into slavery, I mean if that were the case then surely Loghain would have stated that in his defense but oddly enough he does not, the only reason he gives for this action is that the Alienage is a shithole that can't be defended so selling the elves into an even worse existence was the best move for everyone somehow. While there are a lot of blanks here that can be filled in with your imagination the truth is none of these explanations are supported by the writing, with the writers failing the flesh out Loghain's reasoning and motivation for performing this act we can only assume that the only reason this scene was included in the game was to paint Loghain as a dick and give the player evidence to use against him in the Landsmeet.

[Fast Jimmy]

Well, it obviously doesn't need to change. But would I like it to change? Yes.

I would prefer BioWare stop giving me non-choices presented as choices in their games.

Save Import.

[Fast Jimmy]

I'm going to highlight how selling the elves into slavery helps Ferelden...

If you sell something, you get money.

Money doesn't make things better, inherently.

Especially if he was using that money to find a civil war that depleted troops from defeating the Darkspawn.

[Dermain]

Money doesn't make things better, inherently.

Especially if he was using that money to find a civil war that depleted troops from defeating the Darkspawn.

 

My point was that Loghain does tell us how selling the elves into slavery helps Ferelden by providing another source of income. 

[Kaiser Arian XVII]

I don't know what happened to me but after playing DA:I, these DA:O videos look too cheap in graphics to me that NWN2 looks better than them! Maybe they're recorded on low graphic settings?

 

Nevermind. It was the dumbed down thumbnail of YT videos.

[Fast Jimmy]

My point was that Loghain does tell us how selling the elves into slavery helps Ferelden by providing another source of income.

Not to violate Godwin's Law, but Hitler could clearly explain why imprisoning those he considered ethnically unclean and waging war across multiple continents was improving Germany. That doesn't mean he was doing anything of the sort, at least in the long term.

[Riven326]

Save Import.

Cold you be more specific?

[Fast Jimmy]

Cold you be more specific?

The Bioware Dragon Age Save Import.

EDIT: Or also the Bioware Mass Effect Save Import. Either/or.

[Riven326]

The Bioware Dragon Age Save Import.

EDIT: Or also the Bioware Mass Effect Save Import. Either/or.

It doesn't mean the choices they give you shouldn't matter.

[Fast Jimmy]

It doesn't mean the choices they give you shouldn't matter.

Sure it does.

How can they possibly account for large scale changes if they have to create a sequel that manages a bifurcated, exclusive path? There's a limit to how much custom content Bioware is committed to creating and they have both stated as well as demonstrated that this limit is rather low, allowing for primarily cameos, coded entries and minor side quests.

So how can you present a choice that feels large and which matters if those are the only tools you will employ?

[Riven326]

Sure it does.

How can they possibly account for large scale changes if they have to create a sequel that manages a bifurcated, exclusive path? There's a limit to how much custom content Bioware is committed to creating and they have both stated as well as demonstrated that this limit is rather low, allowing for primarily cameos, coded entries and minor side quests.

So how can you present a choice that feels large and which matters if those are the only tools you will employ?

Because it ruins the whole idea of having choice in games. For example, they'll put you in a tense situation where you are given three or four choices on how you want things to play out. It all sounds good until you realize that no matter what choice you make, events always play out the same way and it's always out of your control. So, why bother with the illusion of choice at all?

[FlyingSquirrel]

Bioware's strong point to me has always been building worlds with loads of lore and creating great characters. The problem Bioware has is telling a story within the worlds they create. I think Bioware really needs to work on their story telling for their games. If they would work on writing a more cohesive story and really focus on having better pacing, Bioware's games could be so much better.  

 

I've played the two newer trilogies (ME and DA) and I agree that pacing is frequently a problem.

 

ME1: A "Race Against Time" that really isn't one.

ME2: Not as big of a deal given that the game is largely about the team-building, but I do feel like there isn't much of a sense of build-up, just Collector-related missions triggered at different intervals.

ME3: Mostly OK since even the side missions relate to the war, but some of the lower-key moments might have worked better if they'd waited until relatively late to have the full Reaper invasion begin.

DAO: Not too bad since the Blight is an ongoing problem rather than a single attack, but passage of time does get a little fuzzy in places. 

DA2: No major complaints here - the story was small-scale enough to accommodate a lot of diversions.

DAI: The open world environments feel very disconnected from the narrative at times, not to mention quite repetitive with all the fetch quests and combat missions.

 

I think getting away from stories about existential threats posed by ancient evil something-or-others would be a good start - whatever DA2's faults, this was not one of them, IMO. ME2 also managed to accommodate a diverse range of mission styles by toning the threat down a little bit. Given that the writing of the companion characters tends to be a strong point for Bioware, lower-stakes stories are perhaps a better fit. If nothing else, you avoid the problem of having to wonder why these people are doing anything other than freaking out about the impending End Of All Life As We Know It.

[Fast Jimmy]

Because it ruins the whole idea of having choice in games. For example, they'll put you in a tense situation where you are given three or four choices on how you want things to play out. It all sounds good until you realize that no matter what choice you make, events always play out the same way and it's always out of your control. So, why bother with the illusion of choice at all?

Because it is an illusion people still seem to believe in, despite the team's own inability to follow up on said choices in a way that gives truly different outcomes.

If you Import it, they will come.

[Fast Jimmy]

A good design could easily combat this.

Sure, enough resources, time and dedication and you can build a corn dog that flies to the moon.



Doesn't mean it's going to happen anytime soon.

[Fast Jimmy]

Well it's not even about throwing resources at it, a good design is created by the amount of resources available. Something would have to be sacrificed.

 

I agree. But what would be sacrificed? 

 

Would the new game be made shorter, to account for more varied content from choices carried over in previous games? I'm not sure that will sit well with fans who won't even consider a video game an RPG if it doesn't have a 50+ hour main campaign.

 

Would the new game sacrifice gameplay in other respects, such as combat, to allow more resources and money to be shifted to exclusive story elements or quest areas? I'm not sure that will sit well with fans who won't even consider a video game an RPG if it doesn't have a strong combat system that features prominently throughout the game. 

 

Would the new game sacrifice cinematics or higher polish graphics to allow more content to be made at lower cost? I'm not sure that would sit well with fans who won't even consider a video game an RPG if it doesn't resemble an interactive movie experience.

 

 

 

Bioware knows it can please the most people by keeping all elements roughly the same level as previous games and then seriously nerf C&C, especially as it pertains to items that carry over from a prior game. They still devote a good share of resources in ACKNOWLEDGING these choices (in most cases, at least). A dialogue line change here, a Codex entry update there, a former game NPC making an appearance instead of a DIFFERENT former game NPC... all of this takes planning, writing and resources. But significantly less so than making the player feel like they really did have an impact on the world and the people in it.

 

So by keeping all things equal, they can pull of the magic trick without most people complaining. That's what they see as the winning formula for their series.

[Riven326]

Because it is an illusion people still seem to believe in, despite the team's own inability to follow up on said choices in a way that gives truly different outcomes.

If you Import it, they will come.

This reminds me of the many conversations I've had with religious folk over the years. It's strange to be on the other side of the argument, I must say.