106 réponses à ce sujet

[DaemionMoadrin]

ME3 had proper side quests. Eden Prime, the whole Citadel business or for non-DLC examples the Cerberus/Geth Fighter bases, the missions with Jacob, Grunt and Samara... those were all side quests.

 

What you are thinking of are DA:I style fetch quests, similiar to ME3's "I overheard you talking, here is that relic I somehow got from your planet with a probe."

 

I would prefer it if we had legitimate sources for side quests. ME3 had an excellent opportunity with the Spectre office, that would have been a good source for intel. Or Shep could have mentioned their name in the hospital or C-Sec and told them to call if they need help. In the end we would have been given a list of tasks we could have done (or not). Much better than walking all over the Citadel, listening in to every conversation in hopes it leads to a mission... or at least to a decision that ultimatively doesn't influence anything.

[Mercyva]

@Mercyva - welcome to the forum. I'm one of the forum smart asses. The sarcasm runs deep in me. I love your idea by the way, hence my post about the Pillars of Strength. That was the side-quest that could have been. Instead we got mouse clicks. That crap has been a sore spot with me since 2012.

 

 

Heeeeyy!! thank you! i just want to fully enjoy ME:A and since we're WAY OFF to see anything, its a good place to start, tho i know i'm not the only one who noticed this issue, at least to me.. if people like that sort of quests then good for them... but i wish they make it less in my face if thats the case

[Mercyva]

ME3 had proper side quests. Eden Prime, the whole Citadel business or for non-DLC examples the Cerberus/Geth Fighter bases, the missions with Jacob, Grunt and Samara... those were all side quests.

 

What you are thinking of are DA:I style fetch quests, similiar to ME3's "I overheard you talking, here is that relic I somehow got from your planet with a probe."

 

I would prefer it if we had legitimate sources for side quests. ME3 had an excellent opportunity with the Spectre office, that would have been a good source for intel. Or Shep could have mentioned their name in the hospital or C-Sec and told them to call if they need help. In the end we would have been given a list of tasks we could have done (or not). Much better than walking all over the Citadel, listening in to every conversation in hopes it leads to a mission... or at least to a decision that ultimatively doesn't influence anything.

 

 

yeah i know, i LOVED those. i just... wanted more of it. instead of collecting stuff for random NPC on the citedal and stuff... i loved the spectre office! and secretly i wanted more of that also.. its just about moderation, i dont want to roam the galaxy and scan planets in the way ME3 did it, if i do, at least make them interesting

[Pee Jae]

I agree. I don't want to hunt 10 varren because people are starving in Raloi village # 3 or fire a probe at a planet and let the probe hunt the varren for me. However, I would like to get a message from the Raloi ambassador who would like to meet with me in the Raloi embassy because his people are starving, go hunt the varren with my squad, get a sample of varren blood, find out that there's a virus that's killing the varren, making them scarce enough that people are starving, have my doctor formulate a cure for the virus, take the cure to a facility being held by pirates, kill the pirates, inject the cure, then send a message to the ambassador letting him know it's all good now.

 

It's kind of like that mission in ME2 with the rogue robots. 

[Mercyva]

You have completely missed the point.  It's a creepy and weird way to receive missions.

 

 

i know right? i find myself creepin' all the time.. xD 

[Mercyva]

I agree. I don't want to hunt 10 varren because people are starving in Raloi village # 3 or fire a probe at a planet and let the probe hunt the varren for me. However, I would like to get a message from the Raloi ambassador who would like to meet with me in the Raloi embassy because his people are starving, go hunt the varren with my squad, get a sample of varren blood, find out that there's a virus that's killing the varren, making them scarce enough that people are starving, have my doctor formulate a cure for the virus, take the cure to a facility being held by pirates, kill the pirates, inject the cure, then send a message to the ambassador letting him know it's all good now.

 

It's kind of like that mission in ME2 with the rogue robots. 

 

 

its all about the journey!

 

 

joking aside, i really believe that being smart about it is the solution  

[AlanC9]

You have completely missed the point. It's a creepy and weird way to receive missions.

And you've missed mine. If you think Shepard's behavior is creepy and weird, don't engage in it.

Unless maybe you mean that it's the mission log that's being creepy and weird, rather than Shepard? Is the journal even a thing that can have creepy and weird behaviors??

[Aesa]

And you've missed mine. If you think Shepard's behavior is creepy and weird, don't engage in it.

Unless maybe you mean that it's the mission log that's being creepy and weird, rather than Shepard? Is the journal even a thing that can have creepy and weird behaviors??

 

They mean that obtaining quests solely via eavesdropping on a stranger's conversation is creepy and weird. And it is. Imagine you were on the phone at the bus stop discussing how much you really wanted a certain rare item that was only available in another country and then X weeks later a complete stranger finds you, drops the desired item in your lap and walks away. Creepy. And weird.

 

"Don't engage in it if you don't like it" is often said to people who point out flaws in video games, but it's just excusing poor or lazy mechanics. "Oh, you think it's too easy? Well, it's your fault for min/maxing and picking the class you picked and playing the way you play, you should do THIS to make it more challenging." No. It's the devs' fault, and players should not have to go out of their way to avoid key mechanics and gameplay because it's silly or bad.

 

Besides it's impossible to avoid them. As soon as you pass the NPCs the quests pop up in your log. It's like Shepard walks around with a mental notebook open, scribbing down what everyone wants. But hey, maybe I've just been playing Mrs. Santa Claus this whole time....

 

Anyway, I personally don't think that the ME3 fetch quests ruined the game, but they also added nothing to it. They were just fluff, and not done well.

[timebean]

Side quests and fetch quests serve a different purpose.

 

Side quests, as stated before here, serve to give the player extra information about the world and even help develop side characters.  They can also give the player the opportunity to develop their play style (ie, problem-solver versus fight-em-all styles). A great example -  DAO was full of side quests and these goals were accomplished beautifully in that game.

 

Fetch quests force exploration on a good day and are there to help the player level up on a bad day - The whole fetch-quest thing in DAI was a way to force the player to explore the landscape (I am looking at you shards).  Problem is, that is only effective in the first play through.  After that, you've already seen the massive landscape and thus going to those areas becomes absolutely pointless.They used the same mechanic in ME1 with the Mako, which felt way less tedious than hunting shards (though I know several folks will disagree).  However, it served the same purpose...exploration.

 

My biggest concern about the upcoming game is that in being focused on exploration, the fetch quests will dominate and the game will be as mind-numbing as DAI.  I have my fingers crossed...perhaps the return of the Mako will make "exploration" less tedious and more interactive than mere shard-hunting.  But we will have to wait and see.

 

I hope meaningful side-quests are in there and dominate the gameplay, compared to fetch-quests. They add to overall enjoyment and replay-ability, imo.

[AlanC9]

"Don't engage in it if you don't like it" is often said to people who point out flaws in video games, but it's just excusing poor or lazy mechanics. "Oh, you think it's too easy? Well, it's your fault for min/maxing and picking the class you picked and playing the way you play, you should do THIS to make it more challenging." No. It's the devs' fault, and players should not have to go out of their way to avoid key mechanics and gameplay because it's silly or bad.

The problem with this argument is that it's listening to the conversations that's going out of your way, not ignoring them. Those conversations are no different from any other Citadel ambients where Shepard listens in without interacting.

Edit: I should have drawn a clearer distinction betweem ignoring them and avoiding them. The former is easy; the latter, as you say, isn't.

Besides it's impossible to avoid them. As soon as you pass the NPCs the quests pop up in your log. It's like Shepard walks around with a mental notebook open, scribbing down what everyone wants. But hey, maybe I've just been playing Mrs. Santa Claus this whole time....

So it is the journal that's the problem, rather than the conversations themselves. OK. Honestly, I don't pay attention to the journal for these missions in the first place, and I wouldn't have even put them in it.

[wright1978]

Yep i definitely want a return to meatier side quests.

If they do them as well as TW3 that would be ideal.

I do worry that there's going to be extra fetch instead like Inquisition if it turns out there's going to be masses of exploration.

I'd very much prefer more limited exploration with interesting story side missions.

[Jaquio]

The problem with this argument is that it's listening to the conversations that's going out of your way, not ignoring them. Those conversations are no different from any other Citadel ambients where Shepard listens in without interacting.

Edit: I should have drawn a clearer distinction betweem ignoring them and avoiding them. The former is easy; the latter, as you say, isn't.

So it is the journal that's the problem, rather than the conversations themselves. OK. Honestly, I don't pay attention to the journal for these missions in the first place, and I wouldn't have even put them in it.

 

Right, it's not the actual act of me, the player behind the keyboard, listening to the conversation that I find creepy.  It's the fact that the entire mechanic is built around the premise that the character I am role playing is going around eavesdropping on people and performing unsolicited deeds for them.

 

If I were at the bus stop and I overheard a college student complain about the price of her physics textbook, and the next day I showed up at the the bus stop with a textbook for her, without ever speaking to her, society would not deem that noble.  Society would deem that creepy.  Yet the entire premise of the fetch quests in ME3 is based around Shepard performing that behavior.

 

And while one could say "just don't do them," the game also punishes your final war score for not pursuing these missions, so while not mandatory, the game actively encourages the behavior based on this premise.

[FlyingSquirrel]

I do agree. I prefer a few side quests that matters and treated like miny stories than tons that mean nothing. In general when i'm playing i tend to do all the quests without any exception, sometimes it's just hard to repeat the "collect ressources" in ME3. It is fun the first time, but during a second or third playtrough it's a nightmare. Same as Dragon Age inquisition.

 

Even some of the fetch quests and short combat missions in ME3 were better than a lot of the stuff in DA:I, in my opinion. The ones centering around talking to people on the Citadel did at least have some brief dialogue, and the scanning missions were short and had a minor puzzle element in trying to do the scans without Reapers coming after the Normandy.

 

DA:I would make you spend a ton of time doing the same things over and over again. For example, there was one of the regional maps where you run into a guy who doesn't have much to say besides "AHHH!!! ZOMBIES!!!!!" and then you have to spend at least an hour or so doing nothing but killing zombies with the same final fight and the same combat mechanics in five separate areas, and then you finally go back to talk to the guy and he just says "Thanks for killing all those zombies" and that's it.

[Hiemoth]

Something that always bothers me in these discussion about fetch/side quests is this constant concept that you could swap one for the other. The fetch quests, by nature, require only a minimal resource cost and even if they removed them from the game, it is very unlikely that there would be anything that would be in the game because that decision. For example, the Varren meat example given above sounds like a pretty resource heavy sidequest for something that is essentially a fetch quest. So the discussion should be framed do fetch quest do more damage than good rather than should we have immersive side quests instead. Because those two things are completely irrelevant of each other.

 

Also, I can never really wrap my mind around the constant use of ME3 as the bad example here of side quests. ME3 probably has, on average, the most expansive and intricate side quests Bioware has done, with the possible exception of DA2, yet they are apparently considered so good that they can't be really considered side quests leading to the complaints about the fetch quests. Which, as already pointed out, are a really small part of the game. And while it can be debated, I think I understood why they wanted those quests to be overheard instead of getting them from Central command as this way the player heard the context for from people it affected. You heard the Volus merchant beseeching the lost values of his people, you heard the Batarian preacher urging his people to continue to be strong. Compare that to just getting a message from SPECTRE control about how it would be great to get those pillars back. Implementation can be dicussed, but the context of the decision is also important to be noted.

 

And even with those, while I will freely admit that subjective experience matters, it is pretty much the same thing that ME1 and ME2 did. ME2 literally had overheard missions on both Ilium and Citadel. In addition most of the fabled side quests was Shepard flying in to a system and randomly stumbling over something happening. Yet it is constantly used as a golden standard of side quest design here. As for ME1, even ignoring the exhausting fetch quest system it had implementd, here are some of the side quests from ME1: Walk past a random people and end up deciding a fundamental healthcare question for them. Walk by a random admiral and suddenly get involved in Cerberus plot. Walk on the Citadel and end up deciding where a Hanar preacher is able to act. Walk by a random waitress and get involved in a deep level infiltration operation. How exactly are those functionally different in hearing that someone want something?

[Mercyva]

 

They mean that obtaining quests solely via eavesdropping on a stranger's conversation is creepy and weird. And it is. Imagine you were on the phone at the bus stop discussing how much you really wanted a certain rare item that was only available in another country and then X weeks later a complete stranger finds you, drops the desired item in your lap and walks away. Creepy. And weird.

 

"Don't engage in it if you don't like it" is often said to people who point out flaws in video games, but it's just excusing poor or lazy mechanics. "Oh, you think it's too easy? Well, it's your fault for min/maxing and picking the class you picked and playing the way you play, you should do THIS to make it more challenging." No. It's the devs' fault, and players should not have to go out of their way to avoid key mechanics and gameplay because it's silly or bad.

 

Besides it's impossible to avoid them. As soon as you pass the NPCs the quests pop up in your log. It's like Shepard walks around with a mental notebook open, scribbing down what everyone wants. But hey, maybe I've just been playing Mrs. Santa Claus this whole time....

 

Anyway, I personally don't think that the ME3 fetch quests ruined the game, but they also added nothing to it. They were just fluff, and not done well.

 

 

 

i dont want to mention the witcher 3 too much, but its the last RPG that i played, and i really liked it, that being said, i think a proper way to do this without being 'creepy' or whatever, is how the witcher did it. for example: in every area/planet you have a 'board' or whatever that people of THAT area can summit their needs or if they want help, so whenever we go to new area's we check that board and take future missions off it. BUT you also gotta talk to the quest giver so you can officially do whatever they need you to do, that way you wont be creepy. because they already posted that they need help. you just talk to them again to confirm it.... again this is just an idea i liked in the witcher. and how they did the whole 'gather quests' things without being creepy.... and persoonally after playing it, i have HIGH standard for my RPG's now. ME:A need to step it up.

[Mercyva]

Yep i definitely want a return to meatier side quests.

If they do them as well as TW3 that would be ideal.

I do worry that there's going to be extra fetch instead like Inquisition if it turns out there's going to be masses of exploration.

I'd very much prefer more limited exploration with interesting story side missions.

 

 

i agree! i can officially say that i found all of the side missions interesting, even liked some MORE than some plotline quests... i think its about quality. i think if anyone can pull that off, its bioware. after all its the best RPG right now. in my opinion.

[Hanako Ikezawa]

At this point I'd settle for getting side quests like a well-adjusted person, rather than eavesdropping over random people in the marketplace and fixing their problems like an obsessive stalker.

Relevant:

Spoiler

[Aesa]

Something that always bothers me in these discussion about fetch/side quests is this constant concept that you could swap one for the other. The fetch quests, by nature, require only a minimal resource cost and even if they removed them from the game, it is very unlikely that there would be anything that would be in the game because that decision. For example, the Varren meat example given above sounds like a pretty resource heavy sidequest for something that is essentially a fetch quest. So the discussion should be framed do fetch quest do more damage than good rather than should we have immersive side quests instead. Because those two things are completely irrelevant of each other.

 

Also, I can never really wrap my mind around the constant use of ME3 as the bad example here of side quests. ME3 probably has, on average, the most expansive and intricate side quests Bioware has done, with the possible exception of DA2, yet they are apparently considered so good that they can't be really considered side quests leading to the complaints about the fetch quests. Which, as already pointed out, are a really small part of the game. And while it can be debated, I think I understood why they wanted those quests to be overheard instead of getting them from Central command as this way the player heard the context for from people it affected. You heard the Volus merchant beseeching the lost values of his people, you heard the Batarian preacher urging his people to continue to be strong. Compare that to just getting a message from SPECTRE control about how it would be great to get those pillars back. Implementation can be dicussed, but the context of the decision is also important to be noted.

 

Just to be clear, I don't think ME3 has bad side quests. I don't think any of the Mass Effect games have bad side quests. I love the side quests! It's the fetch quests that are done poorly. The reason 3 is so often used as an example over 1 and 2 is because they're more abundant in it, and because you're punished for not completing them. 

 

But that's not why I'm worried about Andromeda. My concern comes from the direction Bioware took with DAI, in which nearly all the side content is just fetch quests...and those fetch quests are about the only thing you're "rewarded" with for exploring its big, otherwise empty, zones. If BW is going to make exploration Andromeda's theme I do not want it to end up like another Inquisition--that is to say, vast beautiful worlds with no real content. 

[Hiemoth]

 

Just to be clear, I don't think ME3 has bad side quests. I don't think any of the Mass Effect games have bad side quests. I love the side quests! It's the fetch quests that are done poorly. The reason 3 is so often used as an example over 1 and 2 is because they're more abundant in it, and because you're punished for not completing them. 

 

But that's not why I'm worried about Andromeda. My concern comes from the direction Bioware took with DAI, in which nearly all the side content is just fetch quests...and those fetch quests are about the only thing you're "rewarded" with for exploring its big, otherwise empty, zones. If BW is going to make exploration Andromeda's theme I do not want it to end up like another Inquisition--that is to say, vast beautiful worlds with no real content. 

 

 

But they aren't more abundant in ME3, nor are you really punished for doing all of them as you can get enough points for a successful detonation just by doing the story and side missions. Actually, ME2 punishes the player far more severely as you need the resources from planet scanning in not just upgrading your weapons, armors and abilities, but also as not upgrading the ship will literally lead to squad members dying. And if we are looking at the amount thing, look at the time required to complete ME1 fetch quests, which the mineral/asari matriarch/turian colony/salarian squad mission essentially are. The thing that always confusion with that is that you needed to fetch ten things for that one fetch quests in ME1 instead of needing to get that one thing for a fetch quest in ME3 leading to this argument that somehow ME3 had more of them than ME1. Or how ME2 just didn't label the resource hunting as a fetch quest even though it basically was.

 

As for DAI, we can't really discuss it here as a source of concern as the ME and DA teams are separate. They have different leads, developers and core staff.

[Aesa]

But they aren't more abundant in ME3, nor are you really punished for doing all of them as you can get enough points for a successful detonation just by doing the story and side missions. Actually, ME2 punishes the player far more severely as you need the resources from planet scanning in not just upgrading your weapons, armors and abilities, but also as not upgrading the ship will literally lead to squad members dying. And if we are looking at the amount thing, look at the time required to complete ME1 fetch quests, which the mineral/asari matriarch/turian colony/salarian squad mission essentially are. The thing that always confusion with that is that you needed to fetch ten things for that one fetch quests in ME1 instead of needing to get that one thing for a fetch quest in ME3 leading to this argument that somehow ME3 had more of them than ME1. Or how ME2 just didn't label the resource hunting as a fetch quest even though it basically was.

 

As for DAI, we can't really discuss it here as a source of concern as the ME and DA teams are separate. They have different leads, developers and core staff.

 

There are definitely way more fetch quests in ME3 than the previous two titles--and even with the Extended Cut and all the DLC it's difficult to reach the required readiness for the best ending without doing them. As for ME2's required resource gathering, yeah, you're right about the game punishing you for not doing it. It slipped my mind because I just use a save editor when I replay. Ain't nobody got time for that. 

 

DAI is actually relevant, because it's the direction the company as a whole is moving towards. 

[Mercyva]

 

There are definitely way more fetch quests in ME3 than the previous two titles--and even with the Extended Cut and all the DLC it's difficult to reach the required readiness for the best ending without doing them. As for ME2's required resource gathering, yeah, you're right about the game punishing you for not doing it. It slipped my mind because I just use a save editor when I replay. Ain't nobody got time for that. 

 

DAI is actually relevant, because it's the direction the company as a whole is moving towards. 

 

 

 

I agree with you. its unfair to judge Mass effect just YET, we ONLY mention DAI because its the most recent one, plus its also unfair to compare what DAI is and what ME:A will be.. they are both completely different! we only make assumptions now, hoping that bioware get better with every release. plus we are more scared than ever, because i dont think Mass effect had gone a full ''exploration'' game...yet. i always thought of it as an Action/RPG. as you were limited to the certain area's, so ME:A will take that big risk that we all wanted for them to make... explore space FULLY. in my mind, DAI is a mirror on how bioware picture ''exploring'' to be.  plus we know they can do better in that regard, so yeah...

[AlanC9]

Right, it's not the actual act of me, the player behind the keyboard, listening to the conversation that I find creepy. It's the fact that the entire mechanic is built around the premise that the character I am role playing is going around eavesdropping on people and performing unsolicited deeds for them.

Ok, but what about when your character finds stuff and then tries to see who has a use for the stuff?

[Hiemoth]

 

There are definitely way more fetch quests in ME3 than the previous two titles--and even with the Extended Cut and all the DLC it's difficult to reach the required readiness for the best ending without doing them. As for ME2's required resource gathering, yeah, you're right about the game punishing you for not doing it. It slipped my mind because I just use a save editor when I replay. Ain't nobody got time for that. 

 

DAI is actually relevant, because it's the direction the company as a whole is moving towards. 

 

 

According to the ME3 guide, there 20 Citadel fetch quests which require you to find something and bring it back to someone. If we add to this just random stuff you can find, it mounts to 35 things you need to find. Each of these is a single thing you need to find, so you have technically 35 fetches here.

 

Now in ME1 the Prothean data disc quest requires you to fetch 7 discs, the Turian insignia quest requires you to find 13 insignias, Asari writing quest requires you to find 10 slates and the Salarian battle quest requires you to find 13 items. Those summed together are 43 things you need to fetch in order to complete those quests with the quest lacking really true dialogue or reaction when given or finished. And as you may have noticed, I didn't even include the mineral extraction there or hunting down the Citadel keepers. So how is my math wrong here? How do you have more fetching in ME3 than you did ME1?

 

As for DAI, again DA dev is different than ME dev team. Our previous game from the ME dev team was ME3, which is very different from DAI. So we really, honestly cannot jump to this great point about the greater direction of Bioware as it is nothing more than fan conjuncture at the moment and can't be really debated with any kinds of facts.

[Hiemoth]

Ok, but what about when your character finds stuff and then tries to see who has a use for the stuff?

 

Isn't that essentially DA2, which also got blasted for the fetch quests?

 

What to me is really weird is that ME3 and DA2 are always singled out for the fetch quests while they didn't really have any more of them than the other games, they just tried to add some context to the fetch quests. In DA2, they were rewards for thoroughly exploring and noticing atypical items, while trying to tell the story of Hawke knowing and understanding Kirkwall. In ME3, they tried to give them the context by having the people needing them express that need instead of getting a bland message.

 

I'm not saying it was perfect by execution, but the way both games were attacked on the subject was confusing. Especially when DAO and ME1/2 keep getting brought up as the golden standards while the truth that they just didn't really react to their fetch quests.

[CronoDragoon]

I have no problem eavesdropping. I am Space Jesus after all; I would hear of their plights one way or another.