391 réponses à ce sujet

[Fortlowe]

All videogames are time syncs. Hell, all hobbies are time syncs. WTF is this topic?

[9TailsFox]

Mass Effect 1 was full of open ended exploration.

 

Honestly, if you want a linear, tightly authored narrative, I don't even know why you're playing a Bioware game in the first place. It's not something they've ever really done, and there are a lot of great games that offer just that.

Ahhhh.... Wut? Are we play same games? This is why I like Bioware games they focus on story which DA:I was opposite. All ME was linear.

[FKA_Servo]

I'd take DAI filler quests over ME1 filler quests any day.

 

I probably would, too. I don't think I'm even defending filler - they can and should step up their game with the secondary content.

[Akrabra]

You can probably count on it at least not being as big a time sink as your enduring investment in "I hate DAI" threads. 

Oh snap, love it

[Sylvius the Mad]

I knight thee Ser Semanticus Obvioso, Master of Incredibly Apparent Domain.

There is context, and there is meaningful progression or even time spent furthering the esoteric.

Driving the Mako at 270' up yet another identically textured impassable mountain range for the 12039821094810250th satellite salvage is neither engaging nor meaningful. Clicking for literal hours to turn the next batch of junk into omnigel which makes your "bank acount" larger than the Illusive Man's Racist Space ****** fund is not stimulating and furthers nothing other than your carpal tunnel syndrome.

Same for planet scanning.

DA:I world jobs lack empathy, gnosis and most importantly, fun. They are the product that evokes an image of people stuck to desks fulfilling what they hope is their superiors version of "sandbox engagement", that in reality is nothing of the sort, and because of their cartoonish level of insulation, there's no one there to gently take their hands off the keyboard or read to their handlers that you can't feed them after midnight.

This was deftly shown in sales for DA:I.

If your game lacks greater engagement, people are less likely to play it. It's not a terribly complicated paradigm.

Of your 3 examples of unengaging content, I really enjoyed two of them.

DAI's side-quests and driving the Mako in ME were both really fun for me.

[o Ventus]

Of your 3 examples of unengaging content, I really enjoyed two of them.

DAI's side-quests and driving the Mako in ME were both really fun for me.

 

I can't say I agree with you very often, but I do here. I really did dig the Mako in ME1, and I don't mind the side quests in DAI nearly as much as some others here.

[FKA_Servo]

Ahhhh.... Wut? Are we play same games? This is why I like Bioware games they focus on story which DA:I was opposite. All ME was linear.

 

I obviously disagree.

 

I think the best Bioware games haven't been particularly linear and have had a lot of tangential areas to get lost in. ME2 and ME3 are a lot more linear and "Story driven" than ME1, but I regard them as cartoonishly bad as Mass Effect sequels. DA2 was constrained to far too small an area. DAO was fairly non-linear, but as much as I love it, I still don't hold it in as high esteem as I do ME1.

[Pasquale1234]

DAO was fairly non-linear, but as much as I love it, I still don't hold it in as high esteem as I do ME1.

What was it about ME1 that so captured you?

The alien life-forms and technology? Setting out to explore in the final frontier? A general preference for sci-fi over medieval(ish) fantasy?

In both cases (DAO and ME1) we were introduced to a new world, lore, etc. DAO has been my #1 since the first time I played it, and ME1 is my favorite of the trilogy (by a longshot).

[Dean_the_Young]

I can't say I agree with you very often, but I do here. I really did dig the Mako in ME1, and I don't mind the side quests in DAI nearly as much as some others here.

 

I've never understood the condemnation for DAI sidequests myself- mainly because the coherent objections tend to either be highly selective examples, ignore the standards for the genre as a whole, or both.

 

I mean, some of the stuff I can understand in abstract, but not really see how DAI is in any way remarkable. Stuff like 'I don't fetching that thrice-damned goat, I'm the leader of the Goddamn Inquisition! I should be more important that that!' Okay- sure... but how is that particularly different from most sidequests in most other RPGs?

 

In pretty much any RPG, 'Priority' plots almost always mean 'do this last', so that the imminent narrative disaster waits around while you do... well, anything else. ME1 had its keeper scanning and planet exploration that made no sense in the context of the main plot. ME2 was entirely built around side quests that had nothing to do with the plot, along with even smaller sidequests that didn't have anything to do with the big side quests. DAO had chantry board quests, DA2 had 'return the pants' joke quests. Even The Witcher has its share of tedius, inglorious, and downright banal activies- and I'm not talking the crafting and resource gathering system either.

 

I give a pass to the early Inquistion quests, the gathering food and what not, because they're precisely in the early phases of the Inqusition. You aren't important. The Inquisition at the very start is worried about getting food for peasants. The Hinterlands as a whole is the exemplar for 'this is the problems affecting the little people' sort of thing. And it's not like the early-game quests are the standard for quests across the game... or should only be judged against the best of other games.

[Dean_the_Young]

I obviously disagree.

 

I think the best Bioware games haven't been particularly linear and have had a lot of tangential areas to get lost in. ME2 and ME3 are a lot more linear and "Story driven" than ME1, but I regard them as cartoonishly bad as Mass Effect sequels. DA2 was constrained to far too small an area. DAO was fairly non-linear, but as much as I love it, I still don't hold it in as high esteem as I do ME1.

 

Hm? All Bioware games are pretty linear by designs. Some of them try for illusions of non-linearity by turning the 'creamy middle' into a series of 'pick your order' core quests, but the quests themselves are just as linear narratively as anything else, and changing the order make no different to the overall story no matter what order you pick them in. If the story doesn't change to reflect a change of order, it's kind of hard to claim there's a difference in pathing.

 

Take DAO, since it's the 'archetype' of the old Bioware model. You have the intro section- a series of chained missions with no divergence (Origin to Ostagar), the creamy middle in which the player gets to choose quest order (the Treaty quests), and the resolution arc that brings it to the finale (the Landsmeet and Denerim).

 

It looks non-linear on the grounds of the Treaty Quest option... but narrative, the design is fundamentally linear because the treaty quests only function to move the plot when they're all done, rather than changing the plot individually and progressively. It's still 'Intro-Creamy Middle-Finale', no matter what the composition of the creamy middle is.

 

And that composition itself is uniformly made of linear plots and, in most respects, maps with linear design philosophy that leads to an end-chapter Moral Choice that doesn't actually carry forward the plotline. The Dwarven Civil War is compositionally the same in set up, (actually single corridor) Deep Roads, and Branka. The Werewolves, the Mage tower climb, and so on.

 

ME1 is the same thing- replace the treaty quests with the leads on Saren- and lacks pathing distinction as well. It's a series of linear small plots, with the same results regardless of order, ultimately leading to the same line points.

 

 

The games that have come closest to breaking the mold have been ME2 and DAI.

 

ME2 does it by mostly ignorring the plot with the focus content- the suicide mission- and actually allowing the effects of the suicide mission to change the outcomes... but that's weak, and still pretty linear. The best example in ME2 is actually Zaeed's loyalty mission- in which there actually is divergence, with the Renegade/Paragon routes giving (slightly) different routes, encounters, and outcome.

 

In DAI, the example of note is Mages/Templars. While collectively they serve an identical purpose for mostly linear main storyline- 'close rift, serve as token allies, be ignored thereafter', there are some distinctions that result from the choice. The Venatori/Red Templar balance is shifted, and the epilogue suggests divergent potential end-states. But most important is the two separate missions: Champions of the Just and Hushed Whispers are two entirely unique, completely distinct missions that diverge from the choice. The pathing comes back together at the end- that return to the overal linear narrative- but the choice really does cause mutually exclusive content and a divergent narrative for the Mage/Templar plots.

 

Bioware's got a ways to go for the gold standard, but their earlier games are the worst at actually attempting branching narratives.

[Pasquale1234]

It looks non-linear on the grounds of the Treaty Quest option... but narrative, the design is fundamentally linear because the treaty quests only function to move the plot when they're all done, rather than changing the plot individually and progressively. It's still 'Intro-Creamy Middle-Finale', no matter what the composition of the creamy middle is.

The overall plot and story remains the same, but I would suggest that how you fill that creamy middle ultimately creates a distinct narrative.

I view RPGs like DAO and ME1 as toolsets - building blocks, if you will - that allow me to compose my character's narrative.

[Dean_the_Young]

The overall plot and story remains the same, but I would suggest that how you fill that creamy middle ultimately creates a distinct narrative.

I view RPGs like DAO and ME1 as toolsets - building blocks, if you will - that allow me to compose my character's narrative.

 

You can- but mostly out of headcanon, rather than the building blocks in the game. It's the same with characterization arcs of the PC- most Bioware PCs until recently have been so afraid to express any un-selected emotion, that they had the emotional development arcs of a hamster. You could headcanon great character drama, but it was more head than canon.

 

As far as the player pretends, there could be huge significance between choosing the Dwarves over Mages. Did the Orzammar Succession crisis kick off because your Dwarf Noble didn't return in a timely manner, and goofed off chasing a cremation urn for who knows how long? Sure, that could be a character moment- but as far as the story's own blocks are concerned, doing Orzammar first is the same as doing Orzammar last.

[Pasquale1234]

You can- but mostly out of headcanon, rather than the building blocks in the game. It's the same with characterization arcs of the PC- most Bioware PCs until recently have been so afraid to express any un-selected emotion, that they had the emotional development arcs of a hamster. You could headcanon great character drama, but it was more head than canon.

It doesn't play out on the screen via animations, but that doesn't mean it didn't happen in my story. The more emotion and drama the PC expresses in voice and cutscenes, the more the character belongs to the writers, the less the character is defined and shaped by the player.
 

As far as the player pretends, there could be huge significance between choosing the Dwarves over Mages. Did the Orzammar Succession crisis kick off because your Dwarf Noble didn't return in a timely manner, and goofed off chasing a cremation urn for who knows how long? Sure, that could be a character moment- but as far as the story's own blocks are concerned, doing Orzammar first is the same as doing Orzammar last.

Yes - story and plot, not narrative. Narrative (at least the way I generally use the term) is the way the story is told - the point of view, order of events, the character's motives and reasons behind the choices made (including whether to engage optional content and in what order), etc. What do you do when you arrive at Orzammar? Go straight to the main content, or explore the place and talk to other characters milling around? Those are some of the in-character decisions that shape the narrative being created in that playthrough.

[Il Divo]

I obviously disagree.

 

I think the best Bioware games haven't been particularly linear and have had a lot of tangential areas to get lost in. ME2 and ME3 are a lot more linear and "Story driven" than ME1, but I regard them as cartoonishly bad as Mass Effect sequels. DA2 was constrained to far too small an area. DAO was fairly non-linear, but as much as I love it, I still don't hold it in as high esteem as I do ME1.

 

Still, personal opinions aside, I think it's a stretch to claim that the Bioware's games are largely successful due to "non-linearity".

​

BG1, ME1, and DA:I are the closest to sandboxes in terms of the Bioware spectrum of non-linear design. And in ME1's case, I can't say that Bioware received anywhere close to universal applause on that front. BG1's a bit harder to rank due to its age, but most opinions I see tend to rank it below BG2 .

[RatusMachina]

Mass Effect 1 was full of open ended exploration.

 

Honestly, if you want a linear, tightly authored narrative, I don't even know why you're playing a Bioware game in the first place. It's not something they've ever really done, and there are a lot of great games that offer just that.

Yes, but it wasn't pushed on you as in for example DA:I. In which you had to go through large portions time-wasting areas and fight enormous numbers of mobs for an exhausting amount of time. While on the other hand, the story input was rather scarce. I'd like it the other way around. In ME:1 you were not forced to explore massive pointless areas with a billion side quests to succeed. The few actually good side quests had their own story, cutscenes and had some effect on the story. I just don't want to be forced to wander planets for hours in search of some ancient totem so I can continue in the main storyline. If there's going to be exploration and other nonlinear gameplay aspects, I'd prefer them being optional and not necessary to the main story. What Bioware is the best at, is the story and that's why I play their games, great memorable characters and moments are what makes my time well-spent.

[rashie]

RPG's have always been timesinks of several dozens of hours in a single playthrough, this isn't a problem as long as it doesn't turn to filler.

 

ME1 and DA:I suffer greatly from that in my eyes. Id say BG1 too but that game gets a pass because of the gameplay in my opinion, despite low level D&D.

[FKA_Servo]

What was it about ME1 that so captured you?

The alien life-forms and technology? Setting out to explore in the final frontier? A general preference for sci-fi over medieval(ish) fantasy?

In both cases (DAO and ME1) we were introduced to a new world, lore, etc. DAO has been my #1 since the first time I played it, and ME1 is my favorite of the trilogy (by a longshot).

 

I have a very hard time putting my finger on exactly (or all the little reasons) why. Some of it is probably just nostalgia, some of it's just weird. I'll try to do it without a huge wall of text, though.

 

A big part of it was timeliness. Mostly due to school, I was sort of off RPGs for a few years after the KoTORs (which I love to tiny little pieces), so Mass Effect (especially considering it had Hale and Sbarge on cast) was super welcome in that regard. I also think they nailed the aesthetic, especially in the first game. The art design is so beautiful, it all coheres so nicely, and given that it was one of the first games I played on the (staggeringly powerful, I thought at the time) Xbox 360, I couldn't believe how great it all looked, and especially how powerful the character creator was (it knocked my potato faced Oblivion creations down a few pegs). There's plenty to say about the design of the aliens, who are still just people in rubber masks and body paint. I think they're kind of hammy, but still charming. I was also a Lovecraft wonk in high school, so the reapers as "eldritch space horror" was appealing to me.

 

The thing that really sells it to me though is hardly even part of the gameplay - it's the sense of scale and age. The setting is so expansive, and in our explorations, we encounter allusions and references to all this galactically (to invent a term that makes no sense) old stuff. I like uncovering little things like that in the Mako explorations - in fact, I love it so much that I've never even skipped over that stuff, even on subsequent playthroughs, and even though all the planets are just palette swapped clones of one another. And honestly, I'm not exaggerating either when I say my absolute favorite part of the game was just poking around the galaxy map, listening to the music and reading the descriptions of all the different stars and planets. It all just set my imagination on fire like very few other things have.

 

There's nothing super revolutionary about it, and I can see how it is in many ways a pastiche of other popular sci-fi shows, but it comes together in a way that's very satisfying to me. Though it is also true that I slightly prefer sci-fi to fantasy (and where fantasy is concerned, the DAS is also my favorite setting, also by a longshot).

[Cyberstrike nTo]

All videogames are time syncs. Hell, all hobbies are time syncs. WTF is this topic?

 

If you love a game then all the time playing it is worth, now if you don't like a game then it's a waste of time. 

[FKA_Servo]

Yes, but it wasn't pushed on you as in for example DA:I. In which you had to go through large portions time-wasting areas and fight enormous numbers of mobs for an exhausting amount of time. While on the other hand, the story input was rather scarce. I'd like it the other way around. In ME:1 you were not forced to explore massive pointless areas with a billion side quests to succeed. The few actually good side quests had their own story, cutscenes and had some effect on the story. I just don't want to be forced to wander planets for hours in search of some ancient totem so I can continue in the main storyline. If there's going to be exploration and other nonlinear gameplay aspects, I'd prefer them being optional and not necessary to the main story. What Bioware is the best at, is the story and that's why I play their games, great memorable characters and moments are what makes my time well-spent.

 

I don't think it was pushed on you though. I find that I collect plenty of power without even trying, and I'm never actually forced to go grind for it specifically. Even then, if you've picked up Trespasser (which is legit one of the best DLCs they've ever offered, and well worth it), there are new game modes included to alleviate this further.

 

Broadly speaking, I think Bioware is great at stories, but specifically speaking I think they're especially terrific at characters and moments. Which is why I don't even think we need a central plot - or a central villain, which is another of their weaker points -  in MEA. I do like exploration a lot, and I think the Mass Effect setting, and what I perceive to be the MEA scenario, is really well suited to a lot of exploration. The prospect of exploring all those planets and going through smaller, more localized storylines with a terrific cast of characters (who hopefully get a lot more development than they have in past games) is basically heaven to me.

[CronoDragoon]

I think this just boils down to what a person feels the ideal length for a completionist playthrough is. That length hasn't been consistent across BioWare games - hell the jump from DA2 to DAI is the difference between 50 hours and 150 for completionist. Myself I think there's something nice about the vanilla ME games being mostly complete in ~40 hours. It encourages replays as I'm not as exhausted by a playthrough. And I think Dutch does have a point that longer games can discourage replays for some players, which is ashame since BioWare games are so replayable.

[FlyingSquirrel]

I would deem 80-100 hours per playthrough to be the minimun acceptable for an RPG.

How long does it actually take people to get through a game that long, though? I might, in a week where I have a lot of free time, spend about 20 hours playing games, and yet I'd like to be able to play and finish more than, say, 7-8 games per year.

[von uber]

I would deem 80-100 hours per playthrough to be the minimun acceptable for an RPG.

You obviously don't have kids.

[The Antagonist]

ME2 and ME3 took me less than 30 hours to complete, with DLC. I think that's the perfect amount of time for MEA because any longer and it will surely have too much filler.

[Larry-3]

I'm seeing this trend lately of games taking to long to complete. For example, DAI is a massive game filled with time sink moments and my first playthrough ended at 130hours, then Witcher 3 which took me about 106hours to complete with still plenty of content still not experienced and MGSV took me 81hours to complete. I ended each game being exhausted and unable to fire up a second playthrough immediately after.

Games are getting to long and I know that people have always wanted long games but AAA games like DAI and MGSV have too much filler content, Witcher 3 being a phenomenal game has filler as well but it's better disguised with cutscenes.

I hope MEA isn't a massive timesink but knowing that it will follow in the footsteps of DAI it will probably be, hopefully they look at Witcher 3 and how they disguised filler than DAI and MGSV.

"Larry-three Slightly Disapproves"

[Lady Artifice]

An rpg without optional filler still sounds like a terrible idea to me, but I do think more cutscenes can help.