154 réponses à ce sujet

[AlanC9]

The game world is hardly affected by anything but the endings. Having Major Kirrahe or a Geth Prime standing around at the FOB near the end of the game instead of Wrex/Tali doesn't make a meaningful difference to the story. They're entirely interchangable, with the themes and overall narrative remaining completely intact and largely identical until choosing an ending, where it wildly diverges into 4 outcomes that can be argued to be different (albiet, control and destroy much less so than the other two).

Movies are capable of greater changes than those in directors cuts or re-releases. Greedo shooting first as opposed to Han has a more meaningful effect on the narrative tone of ANH than picking the geth or quarians does in ME3.

I'm having genuine trouble telling how seriously I'm supposed to take this. I think you may have drawn from this well a few too many times.

[Sylvius the Mad]

I thought Deus Ex: Human Revolution had an interesting way of handling how you can interact with people based on their personality type. Maybe we can get an optic upgrade or some other super cool thingy device that allows us to read people beyond just their words.

As long as I can continue reading only their words.

[Fortlowe]

I still think tone and message can be separate choices for the player. Just because you have decided to do the diplomatic option doesn't mean you have to like it. The vice versa is also true.

I'd like the wheel to display what phrases I will respond with, but the face buttons to decide what tone I would use in those responses.

[Display Name Owner]

We've had some revisions of the wheel along the way, but I still often see people say they think it's a flawed interface for dialogue. What would you do to make the dialogue wheel work?

 

My solution: Don't allign morality to predetermined spaces in the wheel. Make it unpredictable when the bottom-right option is the bad-guy one and then of course, make hovering over the option show a preview of the actual response so we don't misinterpret the paraphrasing.

 

Agreed, I found things became that little bit less interesting when I clocked on to the fact that top = nice and bottom = mean. I started finding myself going by how nice Shep would be in the situation rather than what they should actually say. Had to kind of condition myself to go back to really thinking through the dialogue instead of the associated morality.

[AlanC9]

But, again, Bio's always arranged dialogues that way.With the exception of one dialogue, you could plan a LS character in KotOR by always hitting the top option.

Also... "clocked onto"? Doesn't the manual explicitly tell you how dialogues are arranged?

[Linkenski]

DAI has this already.

And it was not executed the right way imo. In Witcher 3 (bear with me) I noticed that if you ride on your horse and enter a conversation/cutscene trigger it first shows a quick scene of Geralt stepping off his horse. Similarly a quick revamp of the "leave conversation" would be where you press Esc/B/O and Protagonist goes "I should go" and whatever dialogue branch you were in will not be saved as if it had been chosen, just like leaving mid-conversation in DAI only here it would be in a cutscene and not static crap conversation.

[Fixers0]

I'm having genuine trouble telling how seriously I'm supposed to take this. I think you may have drawn from this well a few too many times.

 

It's a perfectly valid argument. Despite their profound implications, the differences in consquences for many choices throughout ME are all but cosmetic.

[Vit246]

 

Agreed, I found things became that little bit less interesting when I clocked on to the fact that top = nice and bottom = mean. I started finding myself going by how nice Shep would be in the situation rather than what they should actually say. Had to kind of condition myself to go back to really thinking through the dialogue instead of the associated morality.

 

This articulates another problem of mine with the wheel. Nobody has to really think anymore about what their character should actually say in the situation. Almost every conversation gets met with one variation of nice, mean, and neutral/sarcastic.

[SlottsMachine]

A timer is one thing I definitely don't want, I like taking my time and sometimes it's a nice place to pause when I got into a conversation but need to do something.

 

Yeah, I ****** hate the timer. Such a cheap mechanic. 

[AlanC9]

It's a perfectly valid argument. Despite their profound implications, the differences in consquences for many choices throughout ME are all but cosmetic.

Not much gameplay consequence, sure. But they're obviously consequential for the game-world itself, which is so different from those choices that we all know that the divergent world states can't be convincingly reconciled in a sequel. And RP-wise, that's what's important, not the trivia of presentation.

[Quarian Master Race]

I'm having genuine trouble telling how seriously I'm supposed to take this. I think you may have drawn from this well a few too many times.

You have no idea how serious I am right now. 


 

[Display Name Owner]

But, again, Bio's always arranged dialogues that way.With the exception of one dialogue, you could plan a LS character in KotOR by always hitting the top option.

Also... "clocked onto"? Doesn't the manual explicitly tell you how dialogues are arranged?

 

Manuals are for cowards and fools. A real man clumsily fumbles his way through the first act.

 

IIRC, dialogue options in KotOR 2 (which is the only one I actually played) were pretty obvious without even considering the order. And I had a habit of making my characters as evil as I could back then, when it came to ME I liked to put a bit more thought in.

[Absafraginlootly]

Well, except that they generally followed the same order. Remember the fuss over the big choice in KotOR where the DS choice came at the top for once, and all the players who had clicked the top option for the entire game suddenly fell to the Dark Side?

 

No timer on dialogue. Real life events do come up. Like taking out the dog. Dealing with a child. Or spouse. All it does is force a save before every single dialogue and one simply reloads. It's a pain in the ass.

 

Yes no timers, and preferably the ability to pause dialogue/cinematics, cause life interrupts and reloading is a pain.

 

I've mentioned the paraphrasing as the primary problem with the wheel in my earlier post. I see discussion has switched to other aspects, so here's my take on it:

 

Morality indicators like Paragon/Renegade are too restrictive because in that case the story makes the decision about what is good for you and you can't disagree. They have to go completely.

 

I rather like DAI's system with attitude indicators plus perks. You can be stoic, sad, aggressive etc... and you can have additional options from several different knowledge perks. Combine this with "show complete text on hovering over an option", and you'll have a rather good character interaction tool.

This.

 

I like sitting down and thinking about how my character thinks and what they think is right or wrong and that can vary wildly across characters, morality systems are just an annoyance that get in the way of that. Even more annoying I when I myself disagree with them.

 

Plus when you insist on giving points either way in all conversations, which choice gives which points ends up being rather arbitrary and silly in a lot of conversations. There were an awful lot of conversations that dealt out renegade/paragon point over dialogue that had nothing to do with ruthlessness/compassion or ends-justify-the-means/idealism.

 

Leaning off the subject of morality systems..

 

I'm very much in the 'tone indicators and hover/click for full text' camp.

[Lady Luminous]

Firstly I think summarizing needs to be way better. My character's speech should not be as surprising to me as it has in the past.

And I think 4 choices might be better than 3. I'm basing this off the fact that the centre choice tends to be a sarcastic question, So "good", "questioning/insightful", "snarky" and "agressive", which I feel would make for more well rounded roleplaying.

[Sylvius the Mad]

But, again, Bio's always arranged dialogues that way.

But that's bad. We should want them to stop.

Ideally, we'd be able to randomize them, so their positions would change on each playthrough.

[AlanC9]

Sure. I was just pointing out that Bio's approach to writing dialogue didn't change much when they went to voiced. (DA:O's something of an outlier here -- it goes to four or more options more often than Bio games typically do, and thus often breaks from the nice/neutral/aggressive scheme.)

As for what Bio should do, I'm a little fuzzy on the advantages of randomization. I support going to tone icons over the vertical Paragon-neutral-Renegade scheme, but that's because I've got no use for morality systems in the first place. But what problem is randomization solving? Too much information about the writer's intent for the line?

This isn't one of those cases where we're worrying about how other people are approaching the game, is it?

[KaiserShep]

I don't see the problem with tying a line's intent with its position on the dialogue wheel. Is the concern that some people will just mindlessly select an option?

[Lady Luminous]

I don't see the problem with tying a line's intent with its position on the dialogue wheel. Is the concern that some people will just mindlessly select an option?

That is the concern. They want all the Paragon points, so refuse to select anything other than the top option, even if they dislike or disagree with the option for whatever reason.

[PhroXenGold]

That is the concern. They want all the Paragon points, so refuse to select anything other than the top option, even if they dislike or disagree with the option for whatever reason.

 

If people want to be able to play that way, why shouldn't they?

[KaiserShep]

That is the concern. They want all the Paragon points, so refuse to select anything other than the top option, even if they dislike or disagree with the option for whatever reason.

I don't see the problem, or why we should care how these people play. If the options are more clearly defined and the player is made aware of what will be said or what will happen, what difference does it make to people who don't play like this? I guess my confusion here is that I'm not sure if people want a dialogue roulette game or not.

[wolfhowwl]

That is the concern. They want all the Paragon points, so refuse to select anything other than the top option, even if they dislike or disagree with the option for whatever reason.

 

Wouldn't the solution here be to ditch karma meter?

[Quarian Master Race]

Wouldn't the solution here be to ditch karma meter?

the solution is to ditch that wusslord Paragon so everyone is forced to play Renegade like they should be doing anyway.

[KaiserShep]

Wouldn't the solution here be to ditch karma meter?

Sort of. I do want something like reputation where characters will remember what you did and act based on that to some degree.

[Lady Luminous]

Wouldn't the solution here be to ditch karma meter?

I suppose so, but I like a system where your choices and dialogue have impact, so...

[Lady Luminous]

I don't see the problem, or why we should care how these people play. If the options are more clearly defined and the player is made aware of what will be said or what will happen, what difference does it make to people who don't play like this? I guess my confusion here is that I'm not sure if people want a dialogue roulette game or not.

I think it's a case of getting into thought/play policing a bit too much. You're correct, there is no affect on our play style, so I don't know why it really matters.