74 réponses à ce sujet

[Larry-3]

Did anyone on here ever play Splinter Cell 4: Double Agent? If you did, remember how grim the settings were? And you were working for both the good and bad guys? You had a trust meter, and would make decisions that would move you more closer to a faction... I would usually side with the good guys... until I found out that most of them turn on me in Splinter Cell 5: Conviction. Anyway, the point is, BioWare should make it to where we work for both the good and bad guys. I like being a gray character.

[Celtic Latino]

Definitely. 

 

Don't get me wrong, I'm not opposed to playing a lawful good space (or wasteland) paladin (and often in most rpgs I have at least one character who takes that route). But the whole choice narrowed down to 'goody-good' and 'hero with a slight attitude problem' has gotten old after several games. Not to mention most of the 'morally grey' options are usually represented as being chosen for the 'greater good'. 

 

I'd like to play actual true-neutral, anti-villain and even true evil characters in addition to good aligned characters. Dragon Age: Origins has plenty of options that come close to being more neutral or evil despite being heralded as the 'hero' of Ferelden. The first Mass Effect (and bits of ME2) you can at least suggest where your character leans on certain topics (and morality). 

 

I think Pillars of Eternity had a pretty good 'disposition/alignment' route where characters were reactive to your consistent personality and alignment. If you're notorious for being pro-human or expressed an anti-alien sentiment, for example, sometime later where a mission either involves an alien squadmate or dealing with a group could potentially be more difficult or even lose an ally. If you're overly heroic to the point of being passive, it may not be possible to negotiate with a cartel of thugs and slavers since your reputation of being soft precedes you (and they already figure you out to be easy prey).

[HK-90210]

Statement: I am tired of playing an organic hero. I find the Masters discriminate against droids.

 

 

Accusatory Statement: Disney does it. Why can't the Masters?

[Hair Serious Business]

....in meantime somewhere in parallel universe Commander Shepard, Lone Wanderer and Dovahkiin have teamed up on a mission to exterminate all kids !

[sH0tgUn jUliA]

My lone wanderer was a liar, cheat, and a sh*t. When she found Paradise, she signed on and captured those talon mercs that had been hunting her down and sold them into slavery. Then after completing their quests, and getting one of their companions to accompany her, stuck a grenade in the pocket of our friend at the gate for lols.

[Linkenski]

I'm definitely interested in seeing them be subversive with either the hero's journey or just the "good guy protagonist". Flawed but likeable characters are the best. In its most basic and classic form I always compare it to Disney's characters. Mickey Mouse is presented as a good guy and just an innocent character often placed in bad situations but Donald Duck is arguably a more popular because he has some damn character and the bad situations we find him in are usually caused because of his own actions.

 

Very banal, but in the most basic form I think that's the difference between interesting vs boring protagonists.

[Fortlowe]

The opposing force does not always have to be the exact opposite of the protagonist, it is possible to have another villain opposing a darker protagonist, the sort of antagonist that brings out the worst in the protagonist, the sort that requires the protagonist to become almost as bad in order to defeat them.

Precisely why BioShock is the only example that comes to mind. Choosing to exploit the little sisters to increase your power and odds of survival is pure villainy. But a lesser, or at least different, villainy than both creating them and continuing to enslave them as the games antagonist intends.

But it is still a very focused and contained choice. Survive. Do it nobly or ruthlessly. That's the choice. Success is survival. In Mass Effect, the choices will almost certainly not directly factor in the protagonists survival. Success will not simply involve survival but a larger purpose against a more complicated opposition.

That additional complexity carries with it a certain narrative momentum. That momentum must be followed through with. Imagine early in the next game a fundamental choice is made: Settle Andromeda or conquer it? How much different a game would it have to be to follow through on either of those choices? Different gaming mechanics, different narratives, different voice work; different games.

Essentially, to support your request, Bioware would have to commit to a villainous path for the next games protagonist, and leave out the heroic path altogether.

[sH0tgUn jUliA]

But the flawed character should be choice. And certain potential recruits shouldn't be available to you if you don't meet certain criteria. For example if you are a liar and a cheat, in Fallout 3 Fawkes wasn't available to you as a companion. If you were a goodie two shoes, that other raider guy in Megaton wasn't available to you. But Butch and the Brotherhood were always available.

 

Also in DA:O, I think Wynne and Leiliana would attack if you desecrated the sacred ashes. Morrigan, however, would not.

 

Your character's reputation should precede her/him, and you shouldn't be able to treat your squad like sh*t without consequences. If, however, you wanted to play as totally evil, you might want to be able to play squaddies against one another. Then expect a "Shut Up Kirk" speech from the antagonist and don't expect your ending to be all rainbows and unicorns. Sacrifices must be made.

[AgentMrOrange]

yes.

 

I would like to see something like a cross between cowboy bebop and black lagoon and let us play a mercenary/bounty hunter/pirate and choose what mission we decide to do whether it a mission from the alliance helping them secure one of their colonies or a pirate that needs some help raiding a colony. Having a variety of missions to choose from some from the "good guys" and some from the "bad guys" would be fun IMO. are credits just credits and everyone credits are good enough for you or do you have a line you won't cross. 

[Kierro Ren]

No such thing as good, or evil. It's all perspective. One person's heroism, is another's evil and vice versa. There was an example of this is ME2, you had to stop a missle launched by Batarians. You had to choose a colony or a military base. You choose either, the families or public, would call you a murdering monster (In real life anyways).

[Hathur]

There's enough cruelty, suffering and pain in the world as is. I have no desire to fantasize about inflicting undue suffering and misery upon fictional characters. It's tedium enough that most games involve solving problems at the barrel of a gun / end of a sword, I see no reason to make it less unpleasant by turning those guns / swords upon innocents undeserving of such a fate.

 

I could certainly play a non-hero .. a self-centered character interested in personal gain only, so long as they aren't cruel or evil in the process. 

 

Making a game where you're just a cruel villain wouldn't appeal at all to me... RPGs need to give that choice (I have no opposition to it being a matter of choice in game.. but if the protagonist can only be evil then I don't want to play it).

 

If you really have a desire to be cruel and evil, you could always get that disgusting game called "Hatred".. it might sate your lust for fantasy cruelty (or better yet.. pass on the game entirely and don't give them money)

[Mdizzletr0n]

I say have it as an option. That said, I think the area in between should be a lot wider than it has previously been. Instead of 1 as "good," 2 "neutral" and 3 as "evil," maybe a scale of something like 1 to 10. With 1 and 10 being the absolutes.

[Monica21]

I think that a Renegade Shepard who chooses the Refuse ending is pretty villainous. Not only can he do terrible things throughout the course of three games, but he actively chooses to let the Reapers win.

[Indigenous]

Are you being serious? Those 'children' are monsters. There is a difference between killing an actual baby in a crib and a deformed monster climbing a wall. If you can't see the difference...

 

But that said homosexuality and trans gendered characters arent taboo, there is a massive push for them to be included in more video games and they are a cheap way for developers to say "hey look how progressive and tolerant we are for including minorities in our games", they are the best way to get the SJWs and the gaming media on your side and deflect any and all criticism.

 

Homosexual and trans gendered characters are taboo. It isn't an argument dude. There is no 'massive push' for them. Gay characters in video games. People only pay attention to gay characters in video games if they themselves are gay or someone objects to it. I can only see EA using this as a strategy if they know some homophobe will have an issue with it and they will be seen as championing a cause. Otherwise it is a non issue. What criticism did it deflect?

 

 

With a character as obnoxious as Eli I don't see why you would not want to kill child soldiers.

 

Come on you can't expect us all to want to kill children.

[dreamgazer]

I think that a Renegade Shepard who chooses the Refuse ending is pretty villainous.

A Paragon Shepard who does it out of some moral indignation could be seen as even more villainous.

[Guitar-Hero]

Yes, i wanna be the bad guy. Its just more relatable that way

[Gothfather]

Frankly I don't see what the frak the OP is talking about. With the exception of DA:I you could be a murderous antihero that acted frankly in a manner that would and should get the player standing before the war crimes court. If people honestly hold the position that you don't have the choice to be evil in Bioware games then frankly you are either a troll or lying to yourself.

 

Inquisition limited your dickishness because it was a story that REQUIRED you to act in a manner that wouldn't get you executed by the very organisation you are leading that at first had you arrested for blowing up the conclave. That story REQUIRED limitations on player freedoms but it hardly forced you into being a saint. You had many opportunities to let people die, or kill them outright. You just couldn't be as murderous as the warden or shepard.

 

There is very little drama in a pure evil protagonist. Hatred is so boring because the protagonist is completely bat sh!t crazy on a killing spree. It has no drama. Frankly I don't see any appeal to the call for being more evil.

 

Most people have this idea that being a dick is pragmatic and is actually the better choice than being 'good' yet the prisoner's choice dilemma actually can show mathematically that the people who are not dicks get better results on average than the people who are "pragmatic" and try to sell out their partners. Being a pragmatic dick is not actually mathematically speaking the better option. Being heroic is mathematically the better option as much as people think pragmatism is better the facts remain that the prisoner's dilemma show this isn't the case.

 

And do we really want a game where Bioware writes in an option to either kill children or get hurt? That seems the exact same BS of the ME3's dream child being used to manipulate players but in reverse. Why is it okay to use emotional manipulation of children if you get to kill them vs the emotional manipulation of children in a dream? I am all for consequence with choice but frankly most players don't honestly have any idea WTF they are talking about when they want the "pragmatic" options to be more beneficial then the "heroic."

 

I'd much rather have the rule of unintended consequences shown where things do wrong due to unforeseen reasons with all types of choices on the moral spectrum be they the 'good,' the 'bad,' and the 'neutral.' Yet they shouldn't be for the same decision. Have different choices throughout the game give unintended consequences for different moral choices. For example if you gave each moral path 2 unintended consequences you would spread that out over 6 events in the game so the player wouldn't know (at least during the first run through) which choices were sticky ones. And if you have these choices occur early in the game and their unintended consequence happens late you are pretty much stuck with the choice. And better yet have the unintended consequence not happen all the time so you don't know if you are going to get hit with it or not.

 

I'd much rather have untended consequences then greater choice to be a dick in Bioware games. I have all the freedom I need to be a complete tool in the DA series and the ME series not to mention KOTOR. So I really don't see this vast wasteland of opportunity to be a tool the OP is trying to cage their request in.In fact I am pretty sure the OP is being trollish with this thread the more i think about it. If there is one company that allows you to be a complete dick in their games  it is Bioware.

[sH0tgUn jUliA]

See the problem I have with the "I want to be an ass" in a game is that traditionally there are very few consequences to it. Well, in Dishonored, you could choose the violent expedient path and get the horrid ending. But in Mass Effect it never mattered. You could do pretty much anything you wanted without consequence unless like in ME2 and 3 you wanted to carry the idiot ball. You really had to try hard to get bad results. 

 

Interesting that the Prisoner's Dilemma is brought up. Basically the thought behind things is - don't be a jerk.

 

Being pragmatic does not mean being a jerk or without ethics. One can be a complete ass and be an idealist. An idealist can do far worse things than a pragmatist. And they don't carry any of the guilt afterward.

[Monica21]

An idealist can do far worse things than a pragmatist. And they don't carry any of the guilt afterward.

 

And we have many real life examples of that, especially in regards to religious zeal.

[DarkKnightHolmes]

I want to be a space pirate. Time to go credit hunting!

[Nayawk]

I'm not sure how well a canon pure evil for evils sake, complete arse of an PC would go down with the ME market. I remember seeing stats of how many play throughs are paragon vs renegade and it was very heavily in in paragons flavour. ME players just don't like to be mean dicks I guess.  

 

If being pure evil is one of a few choices, then sure add it in, if and only if the story can support it.  But choice is key and I would hate to be railroading into a set in stone moral stand alignment that I can't change, thats not what I play Bioware games for.

[dragonflight288]

I think you can already be pretty ruthless anti-hero especially in ME3. Sabotaging cure and killing Mordin, killing Samara's daughter after Samara committed suicide and so on. You can't be villain, you don't get good guys trying to kill you although they might not approve what you did. But you can be pretty evil already.

 

In other hand.. I'd like heroic stuff take backseat for while and maybe have protagonist who, well, is normal person who gets caught up with things, but doesn't evolve into this OP character that everyone worships and maybe doesn't end up saving the world. I think this could achieved by having character who is simply trying to survive in Andromeda and build up life there, get some friends, search some treasures and so on. But I'm sure this won't happen, we will be this heroic commander once again no matter how paragon or renegade we are.

 

So....you want Hawke from DA2 (at least up to the end of Act 2) in MEA?

[Panda]

So....you want Hawke from DA2 (at least up to the end of Act 2) in MEA?

 

Perhaps.

[rashie]

Id love a story were we are the bad guy from the outset, but I don't think we are going to get anything of the sort, short of kicking puppies renegade actions because of how much people tend to do self inserts no matter how well defined a character is.

 

Id love to be playing as a crude racist space pirate but I simply don't see it happening any time soon, because it would be really messy trying to shoehorn the ability to be a goody two shoes into such a plot.

[Sylvius the Mad]

They should give us a world in which to play and let us decide what to do in it. Forcing a heroic (or villainous) storyline on us is unnecessary.

Let us decide for ourselves whether our actions are heroic or villainous.

Moral scales are always arbitrary. Don't force one on us.