Success in marketing maybe and compared to DA2 a better game, However it is not even close in high quality storytelling as DAO was. So in marketing a success, but as a game in the franchise not so much, not much you can describe a game where the developers play safe.
By changing almost everything about the Bioware formula besides having companions? I think there are lots of things we can criticize DA:I for, but playing it safe is not one of them.
Hope you're right and I'm sure you will be but still I'm not willing to say something is great until I've made my own mind up. Been burnt before. Not from CDPR granted so they have benefit of the doubt.
I saw the first 20 minutes or so of cut-scenes from Witcher 3 so far. Not too bad, although I think it's a bit ham-handed in terms of hitting the point home regarding Geralt and the family.
By changing almost everything about the Bioware formula besides having companions? I think there are lots of things we can criticize DA:I for, but playing it safe is not one of them.
By changing almost everything about the Bioware formula besides having companions? I think there are lots of things we can criticize DA:I for, but playing it safe is not one of them.
I don't actually agree with this. At least from the perspective of the story and narrative I felt it was probably the safest Bioware has played in ages, especially coming after both DA2 and ME3, which were both probably ambitious narrative games Bioware has ever attempted with the game, for me, only rarely even feeling like it was trying to say something or really resonate. Note that the effect is a personal opinion, but I still feel comfortable in arguing that they were playing it really safe on that part and I do understand why, as the focus on exploration and requirements of a bland organization that can be lead by any kind of leader.
Also, I do feel a lot of their choices on combat mechanics were playing it really safe, but that I more assume is trying to get adjusted to the new engine, which was in itself a big move.
I saw the first 20 minutes or so of cut-scenes from Witcher 3 so far. Not too bad, although I think it's a bit ham-handed in terms of hitting the point home regarding Geralt and the family.
Somewhat amusingly, for me learning that the story is focusing and Geralt and the concept of family, with his relationship with Ciri being like a father with a daughter, actually made interested in the game to the point that I will probably get it at somepoint. But agree on the ham-handedness, but since Witcher games never really felt subtle to me to begin with, it doesn't bother me that much.
I don't actually agree with this. At least from the perspective of the story and narrative I felt it was probably the safest Bioware has played in ages, especially coming after both DA2 and ME3, which were both probably ambitious narrative games Bioware has ever attempted with the game, for me, only rarely even feeling like it was trying to say something or really resonate. Note that the effect is a personal opinion, but I still feel comfortable in arguing that they were playing it really safe on that part and I do understand why, as the focus on exploration and requirements of a bland organization that can be lead by any kind of leader.
YES in fact it is, storywise they havnt really let go of the leash, considering that the main campaing is only 12 hours long the last mission was a text book playing safe from bioware, classic components. they had good main missions but they didn't want to risk anything by adding something to the story. That would be like a icehockey player saying: I have played brilliant the first period and that is enough. But you still have 2 periods left. They don't take any chances by offending people which is one of the main reason why it feels like you are playing a medieval game with present day ideals and so on.
I don't follow the argument here. You're saying that Bio held the critical path down to ME1 length because they were playing it safe? That making that longer would have been riskier? No, that's obviously nonsense. So what are you getting at?
Though trying to fit a Bio-standard narrative onto an open-world structure is a risk in itself. They got away with it in ME1, but that's because the UNC worlds were not only cheap irrelevant crap, but were obviously cheap irrelevant crap.
That is true and the pacing of the story if obviously suffering greatly because of the open world approach. But while I will admit that they took a risk in shifting to that open world structure, I still will defend my own stance the story and narrative themselves they were trying to implement in that setting was about as safe as you could get.
However, I will also be honest in the sense the reason it sticks out to me personally as much as it does is because I loved how daring DA2 and ME3 were in that regard.
First of all pay attention im not talking about ME1. Second its how they present it, develop it and urge you to experience.
Tell me this HONESTLY can you seriousley say that bioware with its trackrecord , that they have given 100% and more in this game regarding regarding story, combat and everything
I feel that is easy to say. They had ambitions, clearly overtly so at times, but they did their best to actualize their goals. How well they succeeded is completely beyond the fact that they give 100 %. The person finishing last in the Olympic spring probably still gave their all even if they came in last.
And just as a pet peeve, it is impossible to give more than your 100%.
Combat wise same thing they didn't want to take any chances with a new combat style even though the current builds on DA2 which was highly questioned.´
I agree with you that despite DAI being very different to DAO they played it safe but the above statement is incorrect. the DA2 system built on the DAO system. DAI discards that system almost completely.
First of all pay attention im not talking about ME1. Second its how they present it, develop it and urge you to experience.
Tell me this HONESTLY can you seriousley say that bioware with its trackrecord , that they have given 100% and more in this game regarding regarding story, combat and everything
Here's the thing- aside from story (which I will address later), I think that they probably did give more than 100% on this game regarding everything. They had to basically take a notoriously capricious engine and beat into into an entirely different mold, building new parts and new systems as they did. If the end result fell short of the OMG BioWare Perfection mark, then it's because they were starting well below level and had to claw their way upward before they could even begin that climb.
As for story- I don't know. DAI occupies a weird space, because it was tasked with "making up for DA2", tying up a lot of loose ends that were (unexpectedly) left loose due to DA2's truncated DLC run (and DA2 itself was not entirely what they wanted to do, but because of EA's meddling they had to churn out a full length game in ~one year's time which is a pretty remarkable achievement). Not only that, they had to work within the expectations imposed by their previous games and ensure SOME continuity between various world states. There is no doubt that the writing was impacted by the aforementioned complications with the new engine, because they have to write what their programmers/cinematographers are able to implement. Given that there is a ton of written material in the game, never mind the World of Thedas II, I get the distinct impression that they had a lot more content, and possibly a very different overall plot arc, and were forced to truncate the story and stretch the side stuff over a much broader frame (ie. the open world) than they were expecting.
I mean, DAI is not a perfect game, but just because you don't like it as much as previous iterations of DA games doesn't mean the people who made it half-assed it. Implying as much is unfair and disrespectful.
I don't actually agree with this. At least from the perspective of the story and narrative I felt it was probably the safest Bioware has played in ages, especially coming after both DA2 and ME3, which were both probably ambitious narrative games Bioware has ever attempted with the game, for me, only rarely even feeling like it was trying to say something or really resonate. Note that the effect is a personal opinion, but I still feel comfortable in arguing that they were playing it really safe on that part and I do understand why, as the focus on exploration and requirements of a bland organization that can be lead by any kind of leader.
Also, I do feel a lot of their choices on combat mechanics were playing it really safe, but that I more assume is trying to get adjusted to the new engine, which was in itself a big move.
I can't describe ME3 as ambitious. It was nonsensical from the get-go. It tried to halfway adopt the same B-movie heroic themes it operated under, then halfway through decided to be a grimdark portrayal of war (but only in the background), and then just decided the end of Deus Ex was great and they should copy it. It's gibberish through and through. But anyway.
I think DA:I is risky from a narrative POV for a number of reasons. The first is Bioware's adherence to an incredibly basic Hero's Journey at a time when popular works - even its own most popular entries - were all about moving toward a more grimdark and gritty direction. This is why I found Skyrim to be a breath of fresh air as well - a truly chosen one type hero fell out of style for almost a decade.
The writing also focuses entirely on inverting tropes tied in with this hero's journey style of narrative. I mean, the whole narrative around being the Herald of Andraste is about how being a "chosen one" is kind of indistinguishable from just being inspirational by murdering the right people at the right time and not dying.
If DA2 is a deconstruction of Bioware games, DA:I is a reconstruction. It's like Toppa Toppa Gurren Lagan contrasted with Evangelion. Except, you know, not even in the same sphere of existence as good.
First of all pay attention im not talking about ME1. Second its how they present it, develop it and urge you to experience.
Tell me this HONESTLY can you seriousley say that bioware with its trackrecord , that they have given 100% and more in this game regarding regarding story, combat and everything
At the end of the day people who hate on CDPR are just fanboys.
I can't describe ME3 as ambitious. It was nonsensical from the get-go. It tried to halfway adopt the same B-movie heroic themes it operated under, then halfway through decided to be a grimdark portrayal of war (but only in the background), and then just decided the end of Deus Ex was great and they should copy it. It's gibberish through and through. But anyway.
I think DA:I is risky from a narrative POV for a number of reasons. The first is Bioware's adherence to an incredibly basic Hero's Journey at a time when popular works - even its own most popular entries - were all about moving toward a more grimdark and gritty direction. This is why I found Skyrim to be a breath of fresh air as well - a truly chosen one type hero fell out of style for almost a decade.
The writing also focuses entirely on inverting tropes tied in with this hero's journey style of narrative. I mean, the whole narrative around being the Herald of Andraste is about how being a "chosen one" is kind of indistinguishable from just being inspirational by murdering the right people at the right time and not dying.
If DA2 is a deconstruction of Bioware games, DA:I is a reconstruction. It's like Toppa Toppa Gurren Lagan contrasted with Evangelion. Except, you know, not even in the same sphere of existence as good.
I disagree on Mass Effect, in particular the ambition came from the high amount of consequence for your actions. I would also argue that the whole game is extremely somber from the get-go, this veneer of hopelessness pretty much clouded everything, and while there were some bits here and there that felt very "action-movie" standard in terms of their structure or delivery, it was a game where you feel hopeless, even as you stack up wins against the enemy.
In fact, the Citadel DLC breaks from that so much, it serves as the goodbye and the antithesis of what the main game is.
Everyone else, yeah pretty on the money, although I think Dragon Age 2 should also be given credit where it's due too by breaking away from the mold of BioWare by being a grounded, interpersonal story. The characterization of your companions and the NPCs, as extreme as it can be sometimes, was pretty much pitch perfect id argue for that game, where you trade fighting werewolves and archdemons for thugs and madwomen. It's a different beast and is really unique as it took a lot of big risks with narrative that never paid off fully, probably because of a 18 month development time.
I can't describe ME3 as ambitious. It was nonsensical from the get-go. It tried to halfway adopt the same B-movie heroic themes it operated under, then halfway through decided to be a grimdark portrayal of war (but only in the background), and then just decided the end of Deus Ex was great and they should copy it. It's gibberish through and through. But anyway.
I think DA:I is risky from a narrative POV for a number of reasons. The first is Bioware's adherence to an incredibly basic Hero's Journey at a time when popular works - even its own most popular entries - were all about moving toward a more grimdark and gritty direction. This is why I found Skyrim to be a breath of fresh air as well - a truly chosen one type hero fell out of style for almost a decade.
The writing also focuses entirely on inverting tropes tied in with this hero's journey style of narrative. I mean, the whole narrative around being the Herald of Andraste is about how being a "chosen one" is kind of indistinguishable from just being inspirational by murdering the right people at the right time and not dying.
If DA2 is a deconstruction of Bioware games, DA:I is a reconstruction. It's like Toppa Toppa Gurren Lagan contrasted with Evangelion. Except, you know, not even in the same sphere of existence as good.
First of all, as I mentioned ME3 as the example, I naturally disagree with you on your assessment of it. However, since this is not the ME forums, I will simply argue that the game was quite dark throughout it, with everyone telling from the start that this was a war that would not be won by conventional means and the sense of loss permeating everything. Just as an example, when you first walk in the hallways of Normandy, there isn't the triumphant tone of ME1 or defiant sense of ME2, but a constant of subdued sense of disbelief and sadness. It is a game where every victory, even the small ones, requires sacrifice and enemy is constantly there as uinstoppable as ever, no matter how much Shepard pushes him/herself to new achievements. And, for me, the game also told that by showing how Shepard felt the weight more and more on him/herself. It is by far the darkest game Bioware has done, in many ways one of the darkest RPGs out there, and whetever or not Bioware succeeded in it, it still doesn't change it's ambition as a story.
Also, at this point I kind of feel I have to mention that utterly hate the term grimdark and it usually causes very negative responses in me, so if it bleeds through in my response, I am really sorry about that. I am trying my best not to have it affect my argument.
Then to the narrative of DAI, with which I still disagree with. For me personally, I felt that if I had gone to the local bookstore, I could have found a similar story and narrative in most of the books in the fantasy section. Even if I agreed, which I really don't, to that the classic hero's journey is rare these, it doesn't change the fact that the story and narrative were about as simple as it gets. And I would like to point out that not just Skyrim, but also Oblivion, Fallout 3 and Fallout New Vegas followed the classic hero's journey to a ridiculous degree. As does PoE for the most part in my opinion, although the narrative is really muddled at times, as did the new Divinity and so forth. Because of this, for me, games that don't follow that simple approach are actually less common than those that do, and thus to me was the exact opposite of fresh air. Especially since it is a story Bioware really has done a lot. Now this isn't to say that one shouldn't like that narrative, but I also don't feel DAI can be called ambitious in this regard as there is really no push to try anything new.
As for inverting the story, I don't see how it did that. The villains were pretty much paperthin for the most part, nothing the character did was really challenged by anyone or anything, the game felt like it constantly needed to stop to tell the PC how awesome they really were and nothing was ever truly looked from a personal perspective. Even the argument about how the narrative you brought up wasn't really examined in the game, because there was really no antagonist to press that point and everyone around the Inquisitor certainly wasn't pushing the point. This is, of course, just my opinion, but I genuinly do not see how the narrative and story in DAI can be called ambitious by any stretch of imagination, although I guess you feel the same about ME3, so we probably balance things out in that regard.
I guess, to go to your final point, I didn't feel that DAI could even be called reconstruction, as it never attempted to deconstruct anything. It was what it was and just went with it.
Everyone else, yeah pretty on the money, although I think Dragon Age 2 should also be given credit where it's due too by breaking away from the mold of BioWare by being a grounded, interpersonal story. The characterization of your companions and the NPCs, as extreme as it can be sometimes, was pretty much pitch perfect id argue for that game, where you trade fighting werewolves and archdemons for thugs and madwomen. It's a different beast and is really unique as it took a lot of big risks with narrative that never paid off fully, probably because of a 18 month development time.
I just wanted to write that I almost completely agree with this argument and it is also one of the reasons why I am so sad that DA dev team seems to go out of their way to label it as a mistep as it them basically saying they shouldn't try anything new.
I guess the only thing I would slightly disagree with is that while I agree it took some big risks, I would rather actually say it worked astonishgly well for something that had 18 months of development time.
For whatever reason this post ate my ME3 related stuff. It wasn't long but I suppose I'll be even briefer in addressing your point. ME3, in my view, isn't ambitious because it's so nonsensical and inconsistent in tone from start to finish that anything it does right is, in my view, an absolute fluke. More than that, though, if you play a 100% paragon throughout the story isn't really dark at all. And then thematically.. ugh. Suffice it to say I think ME3 is a failure on every possible level besides its character arcs for Tuchanka and Rannoch, and the latter is a total tone shift from the other two games.
Then to the narrative of DAI, with which I still disagree with. For me personally, I felt that if I had gone to the local bookstore, I could have found a similar story and narrative in most of the books in the fantasy section. Even if I agreed, which I really don't, to that the classic hero's journey is rare these, it doesn't change the fact that the story and narrative were about as simple as it gets. And I would like to point out that not just Skyrim, but also Oblivion, Fallout 3 and Fallout New Vegas followed the classic hero's journey to a ridiculous degree. As does PoE for the most part in my opinion, although the narrative is really muddled at times, as did the new Divinity and so forth. Because of this, for me, games that don't follow that simple approach are actually less common than those that do, and thus to me was the exact opposite of fresh air. Especially since it is a story Bioware really has done a lot. Now this isn't to say that one shouldn't like that narrative, but I also don't feel DAI can be called ambitious in this regard as there is really no push to try anything new.
There's no way to take the other three games you list as a heroes journey. In Oblivion, you are very much the side character. I mean, I suppose the fact you're awesome at murder and kill everything in your path is "like" being the chosen one, except for the fact that's not really particularly pushed at in the story (as much as there is a story). New Vegas goes even further than this, where there's no heroes journey to speak of in the game at all. In fact, I think it's fundamentally mscharacterizing the brilliance of the narrative to reduce it to that. It would be like saying NWN2:MOTB is a traditional heroes journey. And if that's your view of it, then we just fundamentally disagree.
Now, I don't disagree that what DA:I does is conventional by trash fantasy standards. But fantasy - at least big ticket high concept stuff in the public consciousnes - has experienced a pretty big tone-shift with ASOIAF. By comparison to that series, stuff that adheres to the ol' D&D or Dragonlance type stuff (i.e., most of fantasy, which is, again, trash) is treated as being very bad.
Fundamentally going back on the direction the company has been going since - at least - ME2, if not DA:O, is a pretty ambitious move. It's as ambitious as DA2 attempting a radical move away from the traditional Bioware story. Which I still maintain is a mistake - Bioware just doesn't have the design knowledge to build a game that would work on the level of what DA2 should be and they certainly don't have the writing attitude that would make that kind of game work.
As for inverting the story, I don't see how it did that. The villains were pretty much paperthin for the most part, nothing the character did was really challenged by anyone or anything, the game felt like it constantly needed to stop to tell the PC how awesome they really were and nothing was ever truly looked from a personal perspective. Even the argument about how the narrative you brought up wasn't really examined in the game, because there was really no antagonist to press that point and everyone around the Inquisitor certainly wasn't pushing the point. This is, of course, just my opinion, but I genuinly do not see how the narrative and story in DAI can be called ambitious by any stretch of imagination, although I guess you feel the same about ME3, so we probably balance things out in that regard.
I guess, to go to your final point, I didn't feel that DAI could even be called reconstruction, as it never attempted to deconstruct anything. It was what it was and just went with it.
A reconstruction doesn't have to simultaneously deconstruct the trope. That's why I cited Toppa Toppa Gurren Lagan as illustrative of this type of approach.
As to the merits of DA:I, I don't see why a heavy focus on an antagonist is particularly necessary. Ignoring the fact that DA:I is the only game Bioware's had besides ME3 that actually coherently ties the majority of its main quest to the antagonist, the Elder One is pretty clearly written to be the antithesis of the Inquisitor. I thought that this was so on the nose in the writing that it was one of the biggest weaknesses in the game. As for what DA:I addresses that's both a deconstruction and reconstruction with Corypheus, well, there's a big one. Repeatedly losing as an antagonist actually saps Corypheus's strength. Unlike every fantasy villain since Sauron, he's not a load bearing boss. This concept is stupid and Bioware uses it again and again pre-DAI. The best examples are Sovereign/Saren and the Archdemon.
To have the villain lose in a way that's actually realistic - slowly being whittled down to nothing - is ambitious. And it's led to a great deal of hate specifically because it's not the usual nonsensical encounter where the enemy has an overwhelming force and then just gives up and runs away when the load bearing boss ™ loses.
I disagree on Mass Effect, in particular the ambition came from the high amount of consequence for your actions. I would also argue that the whole game is extremely somber from the get-go, this veneer of hopelessness pretty much clouded everything, and while there were some bits here and there that felt very "action-movie" standard in terms of their structure or delivery, it was a game where you feel hopeless, even as you stack up wins against the enemy.
To me, that hopelessness just never comes through in a pure paragon playthrough. You go from victory to victory, with strong personal bonds and almost no loses becomes incredibly meaningful personal sacrifices from two former companions in Legion and Mordin. The rest of the galaxy is incompetent, but that's every single action game ever. You get your MacGuffin super weapon, and besides the tonically inconsistent darkness to the set pieces for action, it all looks like smooth sailing. I'll keep my comments fixed to that point.
Everyone else, yeah pretty on the money, although I think Dragon Age 2 should also be given credit where it's due too by breaking away from the mold of BioWare by being a grounded, interpersonal story. The characterization of your companions and the NPCs, as extreme as it can be sometimes, was pretty much pitch perfect id argue for that game, where you trade fighting werewolves and archdemons for thugs and madwomen. It's a different beast and is really unique as it took a lot of big risks with narrative that never paid off fully, probably because of a 18 month development time.
oh I hated Final Fantasy XIII too
what a first game for me to pick to get into that franchise
And I am sure we will one day see Dragon Age 4: Solas Strikes Back
Da-4: A new hope
Da-5: Solas strikes back
Da-6: Return of the Warden
For whatever reason this post ate my ME3 related stuff. It wasn't long but I suppose I'll be even briefer in addressing your point. ME3, in my view, isn't ambitious because it's so nonsensical and inconsistent in tone from start to finish that anything it does right is, in my view, an absolute fluke. More than that, though, if you play a 100% paragon throughout the story isn't really dark at all. And then thematically.. ugh. Suffice it to say I think ME3 is a failure on every possible level besides its character arcs for Tuchanka and Rannoch, and the latter is a total tone shift from the other two games.
Since this isn't a discussion on ME3, I'll not go in to depth on it here, although I might refer your stance on it at a couple of points in reference to your other answers. I guess I'll just write that I utterly disagree with you concerning ME3 and while I have played pretty strong paragon runthroughs, it is still insanly dark as you seem to completely ignore the constant of loss in the game and how each of those victories require sacrifice. Besides, from your arguments, it almost seems that you are claiming that the only way a game is ambitious is if it succeeds, but those are two different things?
There's no way to take the other three games you list as a heroes journey. In Oblivion, you are very much the side character. I mean, I suppose the fact you're awesome at murder and kill everything in your path is "like" being the chosen one, except for the fact that's not really particularly pushed at in the story (as much as there is a story). New Vegas goes even further than this, where there's no heroes journey to speak of in the game at all. In fact, I think it's fundamentally mscharacterizing the brilliance of the narrative to reduce it to that. It would be like saying NWN2:MOTB is a traditional heroes journey. And if that's your view of it, then we just fundamentally disagree.
Now, I don't disagree that what DA:I does is conventional by trash fantasy standards. But fantasy - at least big ticket high concept stuff in the public consciousnes - has experienced a pretty big tone-shift with ASOIAF. By comparison to that series, stuff that adheres to the ol' D&D or Dragonlance type stuff (i.e., most of fantasy, which is, again, trash) is treated as being very bad.
Fundamentally going back on the direction the company has been going since - at least - ME2, if not DA:O, is a pretty ambitious move. It's as ambitious as DA2 attempting a radical move away from the traditional Bioware story. Which I still maintain is a mistake - Bioware just doesn't have the design knowledge to build a game that would work on the level of what DA2 should be and they certainly don't have the writing attitude that would make that kind of game work.
Now somewhat amusingly, I don't consider FO:NV to have a brilliant narrative at all, I actually found it to be really dull and predictable in most cases. Hero wakes up, no reference they are, drifts through wasteland, is just really special, solves all problems by mostly killing everything, becomes the central operative competed by three different factions, and so on. And no, I don't consider NWN2:MOTB to be a traditional hero's journey and consider it quite brilliant, hence my not listing it or even mentioning it, but I also don't see why you feel it is simlar to FO:NV. NWN2 itself, though, is again as traditional as it gets.
After that we get to the central argument that I don't get. If we agree that DAI narrative is the same basic narrative than in most trashy fantasy books, I don't see how we can in any way argue it to be ambitious. The thing is I don't think the classic fantasy stories are considered bad, I would rather say they are considered bland and boring for the most part. The reason I feel we saw the movement away from it is not because they are looked down on, but that there is a want from the writers to do something more, especially more they write.
I assume at the heart of the disagreement here is that when speaking of narrative ambition, can we separate the narrative from the medium. For example, can we say a movie that used this narrative would not be ambitious while a RPG doing it really ambitious. To me we can't, as it is as traditional fantasy story as can be and while one can argue that there haven't been that many stories like it lately, which I still disagree with, it doesn't change the fact that it is as basic as it gets. At least if the argument of ambition was based on what Bioware itself discussed how the game was about faith and hope. In that case I would agree that as a concept it is ambitious, but DAI's unwillingness to truly thematicall engage on those subjects prevents me from considering it ambitious.
As for Bioware having the design and writing knowledge, I disagree on that, but then again I liked DA2 and ME3 and considered them ambitious. However, unless Bioware continues test those waters, to try something new, then they really can't develop better skills at it. If we argue that the only story Bioware should be telling is the basic hero's arc journey, then that will be the only story they can tell and they themselves have in the past seemed to have becomed bored with that narrative.
A reconstruction doesn't have to simultaneously deconstruct the trope. That's why I cited Toppa Toppa Gurren Lagan as illustrative of this type of approach.
As to the merits of DA:I, I don't see why a heavy focus on an antagonist is particularly necessary. Ignoring the fact that DA:I is the only game Bioware's had besides ME3 that actually coherently ties the majority of its main quest to the antagonist, the Elder One is pretty clearly written to be the antithesis of the Inquisitor. I thought that this was so on the nose in the writing that it was one of the biggest weaknesses in the game. As for what DA:I addresses that's both a deconstruction and reconstruction with Corypheus, well, there's a big one. Repeatedly losing as an antagonist actually saps Corypheus's strength. Unlike every fantasy villain since Sauron, he's not a load bearing boss. This concept is stupid and Bioware uses it again and again pre-DAI. The best examples are Sovereign/Saren and the Archdemon.
To have the villain lose in a way that's actually realistic - slowly being whittled down to nothing - is ambitious. And it's led to a great deal of hate specifically because it's not the usual nonsensical encounter where the enemy has an overwhelming force and then just gives up and runs away when the load bearing boss ™ loses.
The Archdemon is really bad example for this, as it doesn't really encounter setbacks that would sap it's strength. Loghain does and that is at least attempted to show weaken him. And yeah, Bioware did attempt not load bearing villains in, wait for it, DA2 and ME3. DA2 doesn't follow that story structure, and yet according to your arguments is not that ambitious, and in ME3 the central point of the game is the Reapers are so overbearing that no matter how many victories you get, it doesn't matter to the enemy.
And again, how is it realistic or ambitious in DAI? We had a ridiculously ineffective villain that was supposed to be this great threat, yet its forces were just unable to do anything against the Inquisition after Haven and his lieutenants basically just talk about how hollowly evil they are. I don't think it has lead to overwhelming hate because of the loadbearing argument, but because the opponent really feels threatening to begin with and is just there to be walked over.
The reason the weak villain is mentioned in the ambition discussion is that Cory never poses any kind of ideological or actual threat, again contributing to the fact that there is basically nothing challenging the main character in DAI. And I cannot comprehend how that can be considered ambiitous in anyway.
If we agree that DAI narrative is the same basic narrative than in most trashy fantasy books, I don't see how we can in any way argue it to be ambitious.
Well no... that doesn't follow at all. The basic narrative (a very vague term, that can really encompass everything, btw.) is in no way an indicator of how ambitious or trashy a project is. HOW a thing is done is more important WHAT it is - a creative person or team can take the most basic idea that is and still turn it into something compelling. The devil, as always, lies in the details.
Just look at the latest shower of praise Mad Max: Fury Road got - it's a simple action movie with bare-bones story and dialogue yet people are absolutely delighted with the masterful work it does with telling complex tale and worldbuiliding through its visuals, design, camerawork and top-notch acting. It used schlock formula, yet the end product is an art form.
Well no... that doesn't follow at all. The basic narrative (a very vague term, that can really encompass everything, btw.) is in no way an indicator of how ambitious or trashy a project is. HOW a thing is done is more important WHAT it is - a creative person or team can take the most basic idea that is and still turn it into something compelling. The devil, as always, lies in the details.
Just look at the latest shower of praise Mad Max: Fury Road got - it's a simple action movie with bare-bones story and dialogue yet people are absolutely delighted with the masterful work it does with telling complex tale and worldbuiliding through its visuals, design, camerawork and top-notch acting. It used schlock formula, yet the end product is an art form.
Except my answer referred to my understanding of the argument that the story and narrative is pretty much the same as in countless stereotypical fantasy books, but it is ambitious here because it is a game.
I agree competely that the devil is in the details and that there is a great many ways one can approach even those basic ideas. It's just that for DAI does nothing with, it goes the simplest possible route and doesn't take any kinds of risks with the story. For me, there isn't even an attempt to take a risk, which makes it feel like a run-of-the-mill fantasy book for me, and thus not ambitious in that sense.
Oh, and Mad Max Fury was so, so good, but I would actually disagree that is used schlock formula, as it breaks that formula in so many places. There have been really great articles about how astonishing it is that something like Mad Max Fury Road got even made.
Except my answer referred to my understanding of the argument that the story and narrative is pretty much the same as in countless stereotypical fantasy books, but it is ambitious here because it is a game.
I agree competely that the devil is in the details and that there is a great many ways one can approach even those basic ideas. It's just that for DAI does nothing with, it goes the simplest possible route and doesn't take any kinds of risks with the story. For me, there isn't even an attempt to take a risk, which makes it feel like a run-of-the-mill fantasy book for me, and thus not ambitious in that sense.
I disagree that it takes the simplest possible route - what it does it simply tricks people into thinking that it's that way. Mind you, I'm not saying that what they're doing is revolutionary or that there's an endless amount of depth found underneath the surface (if we chose to scratch it), but it's hard for me not to appreciate and enjoy the type of subtle subversion and nuance they've added to the tale. At worst, I could call it solid and that's aside from the fact that many elements of this tale aren't set in stone.
I mean, with everything that happens aside from fighting Cory as well as the slow, but inevitable resurgence of Thedas' lost past in form of ancient elven beings and whatnot, it's hard to accuse DAI of being just a simple story about good heroes defeating the Big Bad. On surface, yes - just like on surface it's a story all about Andrastian beliefs and Maker's chosen...
Corypheus should probably be better characterized, but at the same time I wonder how much it would take from his 'red herring' status... not in a sense that he wasn't a legit threat (he almost got mages, templars, Wardens, Tevinter supremacists and an army of demons led by ginormous Fear monster, ready to march and conquer) up until we've pulled all but last ace from his sleeves - I just can't help but to think of him as a flashy villain that was supposed to pull our attention from the - slowly, but steadily - real story and conflict unfolding in he background.
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