34 réponses à ce sujet

[FlyinElk212]

I don't understand why Bioware switches protagonists and stories with each iteration of the Dragon Age universe. It seems like a very arbitrary mentality that the developers and fans alike have adapted.

 

I would argue that the most intriguing aspect of the universe thus far has been the continual storyline of Flemeth/Mythal's revenge plan, aka the only thing that has really carried over from game to game. This, combined with the fact that players have admitted to having a hard time connecting with and investing into their main characters (other than the Hero of Ferelden), makes the decision to consistently switch perspectives from game to game look like a poor decision.

 

Is there any advantage to doing this? It just seems as though this is a stance Bioware has taken simply to differentiate itself from Mass Effect...which is a very, very arbitrary reason to do something that may be negatively affecting the quality of the games they could be producing.

[Shechinah]

Someone can probably explain it better than me but mainly because the Dragon Age games are about Thedas and the events that transpire and a none-continual protagonist allows better movement between the events.

 

The Mass Effect trilogy has the story centered around the Reapers from the beginning of discovering the Reapers' existence, the middle and finally defeating them.  

 

Additionally, having a continual protagonist as oppose to a non-continual protagonist can just as easily feel like a decline in quality as some would argue were the case with Shepard in Mass Effect 3 because it felt like the game was, among other things, shoehoning in a paragon personality in their opinion. 

[Sanunes]

Really it boils down to Dragon Age is about Thedas and not a specific character and instead of having to shoehorn a reason to why our characters from previous games are involved yet again in a major conspiracy or cataclysm someone else gets to deal with it.

 

With Flemeth it could be that she is more interesting because our avatar into the game world is changing and you are learning more about her for there are a different set of virtual eyes viewing what is happening with her.  The other major benefit is that it opens the game to more new players for they don't feel like they must play the older games to understand everything that is going one.  This is completely anacdotal, but I know more people that moved into the later games of Dragon Age that didn't play the earlier games instead of Mass Effect where they always felt obligated to go back and play the earlier ones.

[panda_express12]

As others have said, the stroy is about Thedas, the world and it's inhabitants. The Elderscrolls games are similar in this regard.

 

You keep calling it arbitrary, but it isn't arbitrary at all. It is just a diffreent way of telling a story.

[Mirrman70]

Elder scrolls is actually a great comparison from a story point of view in my opinion. Don't think of it as multiple chapters in one book, but multiple books in one franchise. Not every game is a continuation of the story from the last game and it is completely possible to play each game as a standalone game.

[Heimdall]

As others have said, the stroy is about Thedas, the world and it's inhabitants. The Elderscrolls games are similar in this regard.

 

You keep calling it arbitrary, but it isn't arbitrary at all. It is just a diffreent way of telling a story.

Rather, its a way to tell many stories, not just the story of one character's perspective.

[Antergaton]

The reason The Warden was so likeable is because they were the 'Silent Protagonist'. Their voice options were all scripted and we could choose many replies for many situations. With Hawke and the Inquisitor, them having voices meant that certain lines would never work in real spoken dialogue. One of my favourite quotes is when a Dalish Elf meets King Cailan for the first time. They can say something like "You are no friend of mine, human lord.", this would never really work in spoken dialogue as it would sound weird or out of place.

 

Also, with the Inquisitor we were playing someone who was generally nice, even the bad options were nowhere near that of the Warden. They could be ruthless.

 

Anyway, as mentioned before this is no different to really to Elder Scrolls, Dragon Age is about the Dragon Age era of Thedas. While Elder Scrolls, each game entry is about a different time in Tamriel. I personally could care less about the underlying Flemeth story. I just want another game in Thedas during the Dragon Age.

[mopotter]

As others have said, like Elder Scrolls,  Dragon Age is about the world, not one specific character; it spans a fairly long time and can jump as far as they like.  Personally, I'm very glad they are doing it this way.   By being stand alone games I've gotten to meet many characters I've enjoyed getting to know.   I enjoyed all of my Wardens, I liked the Hawkes I brought into the game and I'm having a wonderful time with the different Inquisitors.  

 

Plus, while I liked the idea of having Shepard grow over 3 games, I watched my Shepard change in ways I had no control over and saw events I had worked hard to get, have little or no effect in the next game.  Separately, with different main characters, I wouldn't have had the past I  brought to each game and would not have cared.  

 

So maybe someday when choices from one game can be carried over in detail, it might be nice to see it again, but until then, let each game stand alone and bring a new interesting story with new and interesting characters that I can love or hate.  

[Unpleasant Implications]

Well, Dragon Age is about... Well, the Dragon Age, and all the crazy **** that happens therein. Different protagonist allow easy exploration of different areas at different times and different scopes without seeming to jarring.

Mass Effect was about Shepard and their actions up to and in theReaper war. You could say the title had two meanings. Dragon Age is about a certain period in time and all of the history of that time. All the important players and big events. To reduce that perspective to one character would be... Not only hard to keep track of, but hurt the true potential of seeing so many parts of the world through different eyes.

[Fiery Phoenix]

There's no 'advantage'. It's about what you planned and intended. Dragon Age is a story about the world, much like Elder Scrolls in that regard. The protagonist is simply a vessel through which you explore this world and all it has to offer.

[SomeoneStoleMyName]

The reason The Warden was so likeable is because they were the 'Silent Protagonist'. Their voice options were all scripted and we could choose many replies for many situations. With Hawke and the Inquisitor, them having voices meant that certain lines would never work in real spoken dialogue. 

 

 

I still don't see how a voiced protagonist is an improvement over the silent one. 

If the protagonist was silent and not voiced, the opportunity cost in production would go from lost voice - to more dialogue options and other improvements. It takes a lot of time and effort into fully voicing the main character. Especially with M+F and with 2x options for both.

At the expense of less dialogue options it is hardly worth it. Not only that, with a silent protagonist it is not possible to be dissatisfied with your character's voice or reactions. As imagination fills these out automatically. 

I do not understand why or how a voiced protagonist was even considered, much less actually implemented. Because what we lose vastly outweighs what we gain from such. I really wish the devs could explain why they felt they had to make this choice

Edit: Even more cringe-worthy is how the devs advertise voiced protagonist as a feature. Its like saying: "This car I'm selling you has only one door instead of four, but hey - this means we could add one hell of a spraypaint, look how shiny it is!".

[Aaleel]

The advantage would have been going to different parts of Thedus at different times during the Dragon Age. Then you could have had more diverging story paths because you would not have to worry about respecting the decisions in follow up games.

But the way Bioware is doing it, even changing protagonists, they're still trying to connect the games. This has in turn kept the story in one area of Thedus.

Elder Scrolls moves around to show off different areas, DA should have done the same thing. Here we are three games in and there's still so much of Thedus untouched.

[mopotter]

I still don't see how a voiced protagonist is an improvement over the silent one. 

If the protagonist was silent and not voiced, the opportunity cost in production would go from lost voice - to more dialogue options and other improvements. It takes a lot of time and effort into fully voicing the main character. Especially with M+F and with 2x options for both.

At the expense of less dialogue options it is hardly worth it. Not only that, with a silent protagonist it is not possible to be dissatisfied with your character's voice or reactions. As imagination fills these out automatically. 

I do not understand why or how a voiced protagonist was even considered, much less actually implemented. Because what we lose vastly outweighs what we gain from such. I really wish the devs could explain why they felt they had to make this choice

Edit: Even more cringe-worthy is how the devs advertise voiced protagonist as a feature. Its like saying: "This car I'm selling you has only one door instead of four, but hey - this means we could add one hell of a spraypaint, look how shiny it is!".

 

I actually like having a voice.  I go back to play DAO or one of the other games without a voice and for me it's flat.  I still enjoy it, but actually not quite as much as the voiced characters.  

[AlanC9]

Keeping the same protagonist would be awfully difficult unless they slowed down levelling so that the PC doesn't get to godlike levels in a single game. Although I guess they coukd segregate gameplay and story even further and just reset the PC every time.

[AlexMBrennan]

I do not understand why or how a voiced protagonist was even considered, much less actually implemented. Because what we lose vastly outweighs what we gain from such.

For starters, you can have actual conversations instead of the warden telepathically projecting his thoughts to whoever is talking

[Fireheart]

The "different protagonists every game" thing is just some excuse Bioware used to get rid of HoF and make way for Hawke, their would-be Shepard. But since he failed, they brought out another new protagonist, the Quiz. I honestly believe that Bioware really does want to continue the Quiz for da4 but at the same time they have painted themselves into a corner by stating in the past that there would be a different protag each game. However, they ARE the developers. If they wanted to, they could retcon what they said and put Quiz back in da4, and players would just have to deal with it. They've said we're going north, and we don't need a new protag to go north. The inquisition is a multinational organization. Possibly with a few alliances with some Tevinter peoples and the Qunari. This is a good starting point to have the Inquisitor go north, because Tevinter and the Qunari could use a good "sorting out".

One could argue the "advantage" is showing Thedas in different time periods (but still within the Dragon age), and the multiple events going on, through the eyes of many different protags and companions. They have started before that Dragon age is about the events that occur in the Dragon age, not about any one person. Then again, I still believe you could effectively do this using the same character throughout the series, but whatever. Bioware is the developer here, not me.

[KaiserShep]

Keeping the same protagonist would be awfully difficult unless they slowed down levelling so that the PC doesn't get to godlike levels in a single game. Although I guess they coukd segregate gameplay and story even further and just reset the PC every time.

 

Yeah, a good example is Mass Effect. Shepard can reach level 60 in ME1. Where the heck could you go with that over the course of 3 games? Killing Shepard was the only way to reset the character "properly".

[Steppenwolf]

Trying to shoehorn the same character into every major event in Thedas would be silly. Why would the Hero of Ferelden have been in Kirkwall for 7 years? Why would the Hero of Ferelden's family have anything to do with Corypheus? Why would the Hero of Ferelden have been at the Templar/Mage summit? Etc.It becomes more and more contrived. And how would you get around the HoF being dead? Just use the Orlesian Warden?

[Legion of 1337]

Its telling the history of the Dragon Age through the eyes of its actors, not a personal story of one character (Mass Effect). The Warden stopped the 5th blight, Hawke enabled the collapse of the circles which led to the Inquisition, which of course best described through the Inquisitor. If you think about it DA2 is like a prologue to Inquisition, and theres little connection in game between Origins and Inquisiton, so the next game will skip ahead in time to the next significant event to wrack Thedas.

[Farangbaa]

About this little voiced/unvoiced discussion going on:

With a voiced protagonist you can actually have them walk around and talk during cutscenes and that way create way more immersion, instead of just seeing your flat silent face in close up and motionless body in every conversation.

Sure, it still happens that you only see close ups with little body motion going on. But with a silent protagonist it's impossible to have him do things like locomotion and talking at the same time and showing it to the player.

Or well you probably could, but that would be so incredibly weird.

[Legion of 1337]

Anyone who argues a silent protag is superior just has nostalgia tinted glasses. The reason you hate voiced characters like the Inquisitor is because the lines they say have to be written like something theyd axtually say and cant be so over the top and extreme as the Warden. I get people like those options but lets be honest: the Inquisitor acts much more believably.

[Phoe77]

I'm really glad they didn't go with a single protagonist.  Nothing annoys me in quite the same way as when every important event that happens in a setting is tied to a single person or small group of people.  I wouldn't want to see my Warden become the Champion of Kirkwall and the Inquisitor  as well.  

[Raiil]

The DA series takes place over a longer stretch of time. Imagine the HoF constantly having to break in new companions and figure out why the old ones keep mysteriously disappearing.

 

It could have happened had they following through with Origins, but they didn't so it's a little late now. Maybe the next Age?

[Aaleel]

Anyone who argues a silent protag is superior just has nostalgia tinted glasses. The reason you hate voiced characters like the Inquisitor is because the lines they say have to be written like something theyd axtually say and cant be so over the top and extreme as the Warden. I get people like those options but lets be honest: the Inquisitor acts much more believably.

People always say nostalgia or rose colored glasses as if no one still plays these games. Plenty of people still play the game and can compare silent to voiced without having to think or look back to it.

Three of my favorite games ever I've played recently and have a silent protagonist, Skyrim, Dragon's Dogma and Origins. Still works fine for me.

[Abelas Forever!]

When there is a new protagonist in every game then it enables to experience the beginning of a romance in every game and that is the best part in romances. I think there are also risks that the relationship becomes boring if it last multiple games. LIs in ME1 carried out to ME3 but there wasn't anything with Shepard/Ashley or Shepard/Kaidan in ME2. So if you stayed loyal to your LI in ME2 then there wasn't any romantic content for you and it was quite boring. Expect for Liara.