121 réponses à ce sujet

[Hiemoth]

I think Mass Effect 3 is a perfect example of a developer trying too hard to give players what they want and and the side effect of doing that in both how the community reacts and limitations on how they can be implemented in the game.

 

I don't actually agree the latter part, as I think it puts a lot of the pressure on BW in this matter. They had stumbles in their side quest implemention, every game does, but ME3 has some of the best side quests I've ever played just from the point of view of content and stories told. The fact that it then becomes a subject of insane amount of moving goal posts is something I think the community itself should in the mirror about.

 

 

Well if you would have paid some attention, you get pretty sizabele list of arcs from mostly unc quests:

 

Arc: Cerberus.

Assignements: Citadel: Docter Michel, UNC: Missing Marines, UNC: Cerberus, UNC: Hades' Dogs, UNC: Colony of the Death, UNC Depot Sigma-23, UNC: Dead Scientists.

 

Arc: Rachni from Noveria

Assignements: Noveria: Geth interest UNC: Listening post Alpha, UNC: Listening post Beta, UNC Depot Sigma-23.

 

Arc: Exogeni experiments.

Assignements: Feros: Geth Attack, UNC Colony of the death, UNC: Exogeni Facility,

 

Arc: Biotic Extremism.

Assignements: UNC: Hostage, UNC: Major Kyle, UNC: Besieged Base.

 

Arc: Geth attacks.

Assignements: UNC Geth Incursions, UNC: Distress call, UNC Lost Module.

 

As you can see there are a lot of arcs to be found in ME1's sidequests, some sidequests are even part of multiple arcs, something that is rarely seen.

 

I have actually paid some attention during the numerous times I've played through ME1 and as was already pointed out there, there's almost nothing to most of the stuff posted here as an 'arc'. Most of ME3 side quests have more content and dialogue than any of the arcs pointed out here, and that is even ignoring the fact that the argument presented here seems to ignore what a mission arc is as  it lists both Biotic Extremism and Geth attacks as arcs despite the fact that they are completely independent missions that don't affect each other at all. Or the fact that the Cerberus arc is handled similarly with bundling together missions that werent at all connected the main Cerberus arc. The two arcs I do admit is the shorter Cerberus arc and the Rachni arc, but again, there is very little there. They are literally go to the generic map, drive to a base (Or in one case a space station) and kill everything without dialogue.

[Gothfather]

Id honestly say Pillars of Eternity is the best kickstarter game to come out so far.

 

Of course, mileage may vary on that of course. Divinity Original Sin, Shadowrun Returns and Wasteland 2 all fell flat for me hard. Pillars at least had a lot of good things going for it.

 

Although I think it does show limitation to the isometric deisgn as well. If Pillars is the evolution of isometric-styled RPGs, I would argue it has hit its peak as a genre in the end. That's not a bad thing though. 

 

I found POE to be a huge annoyance to play. Having so many encounters result in a text pop up for the quests and having 1/2 of that text pop up voice acted was a real immersion breaker for me. Because it wasn't fully voiced i had to read the text pop up of something I just listened to so it was redundant but i need to read it because I need the added information the text provided for the quest. That got old real fast. The companions all fell flat for me. I frankly could not finish the game. i was like this story isn't as good as PS:T or BG1&2 yet it looks 20 years old. But this is simply a subjective disagreement there is no right or wrong.

 

I really don't want a big name studio like obsidian going a kick started period. They made KOTOR2, NWN2, and Fallout:New Vegas, kickstarting was their way to put all the risk of development onto fans and then reap all the rewards. Normally investors get a return for their investment but kickstarters frak over their investors by giving them all the risks and just  giving them the product in return with pointless "extras." that with games get pirated and lose all exclusivity. I understand a small company starting out with looking to kickstarters but frankly Obsidian is an ESTABLISHED developer with multiple successful games under their belt they did not need to use crowd funding. They basically wanted interest free loans that if the project failed they were not required to return, these are the practices that gamers should NEVER tolerate but gamers are stupid. It is why pre-order culture exists in this media and no other media, the idea of pre-ordering a movie not yet finished filming would be laughable.

[MrFob]

I couldn't agree more with the OP. Great post.
 
Here is a text passage of Shamus Young's retrospective on the ME series about the importance of peasants that describes very well why the old BW way of approaching misions worked so well. Even if you don't agree with a lot of this guy's views, this is a worthwhile read:
 

The Importance of Peasants

In Mass Effect 1, there were four main worlds to visit on your quest, plus the Citadel and Iilos. Aside from Therum, they all had a certain degree of universe-building going on. There were people to meet who weren’t directly related to your main goal. You’d run into regular people who would tell you stories that would help you understand how this world worked.

Something like:

John Q. Peasant:
At first the plague seemed like a lucky break. Before that, the only place that would hire Humans was the refueling station, and that's hazardous work. But then the plague hit and suddenly there were lots of jobs open and everyone wanted to hire me because I'm immune."

(Looks down, rubs hand on back of neck awkwardly.)

But now? Nobody's coming to the station these days, and my Turian buddies won't visit me anymore. They won't even talk to me. I dunno. This job won't do me much good if the whole colony dies out. I wish things could go back to the way they were.

And then maybe he’d ask you to grab [some bullshit item] from [place where you’re already going] for him. When the quest was done, he’d give you a picture of how life on the station has changed because of your actions, or what people think of it.

The point of the quest wasn’t to get you to fetch the quest item, the point was to give you a reason to talk to this peasant before and after your adventure. This would put your actions into a more local context. In just a few lines of dialog it gives you a sense of how the culture around here works, what daily life is like, and gives you a frame of reference for how Humans are doing compared to other races. Without these quests, you might assume everyone feels the same way about the council, or other races, or Spectres, or Shepard. These moments give us different viewpoints, which make the world seem larger and more complex. It puts a personal face on a tragedy and maybe even helps build a little emotional connection. The quest reward was just a little incentive to seek out other people to talk to.

But here in Mass Effect 2 they’ve sacrificed depth for breadth. The text blurb for the planet where you meet Okeer and Grunt sounds pretty interesting:

It’s supposedly this polluted, corrupt, crime-ridden landfill of a planet with 3.8 billion inhabitants. On top of all its other problems, it’s currently suffering from an internal power struggle.

If this had been Mass Effect 1, then we’d probably have started off this mission at some sort of civilian site, perhaps an outpost or village. We’d talk to the locals, and all the stuff from the text blurb above would be portrayed or hinted at. NPCs would also give their thoughts on the distant base that Okeer is running: What they thought of it, how its presence impacted their lives, how long it’s been running, and even hint at what we’ll find there. Perhaps they comment on how many mercs travel to the base, but very few return. Or perhaps someone will remark on how curious it is that the place is always receiving Krogan supplies, but they never see any Krogan going in. They might also remark on the planet in general and round things out with their thoughts on the Citadel or the Council races. Then we’d jump in the Mako, drive to the base, and then we’d have our shooty bits. Those early conversations would whet our curiosity, and then we’d get a nice payoff when we learn what’s really going on.

But none of that text blurb makes it into the game. None of it. Okeer’s base is a completely arbitrary maze of chest-high shootin’ walls with no indication that anyone lives there, works there, or does anything except shoot stuff. You do meet one Blue Suns Merc who gives enough exposition to explain that waves of Mercs are fighting waves of Krogan, but his exposition is a far cry from the stories you take part in at Zhu’s Hope.

He covers the basics, but there’s no worldbuilding, no culture, no flavor-text civilians, and nothing for you to learn or think about until you reach Okeer. From a worldbuilding standpoint, this mission is completely sterile.

I understand you don’t have infinite money, and if you increase the number of locations in the game then you have to cut something else. But while I can appreciate the financial realities that caused this, I can’t help but lament at the loss of depth and nuance. It’s one thing to hear about ExoGeni using humans as test subjects, but it’s another thing to see what this did to the lives of people at Zhu’s Hope. It’s one thing if the Codex tells you that the Rachni are scary space bugs, but it’s so much more potent to see how the Rachni ravage and terrify the research staff on Noveria.

In the struggle to show instead of tell, these flavor-text peasants are the key to making places memorable and building an emotional connection with the locations we visit. I’d go so far as to say they’re one of the key things that gives a game the “Classic BioWare” feel, and their absence is why so many old fans aren’t connecting with the newer titles.

There are a few “fetch quests” in Mass Effect 2, but the writer has apparently forgotten what they’re really for. If you run around Illium or the Citadel you can find a few people who need some object. Then you get the object and bring it to them for a reward. But they have no dialog wheel, no story, and nothing they say helps build up the world. It’s just a way to get credits and XP, which were never the point of these quests.

One exception is the Quarian accused of theft on the Citadel. That one quick exchange tells you how people feel about Quarians and how bureaucratic C-Sec can be. It’s this wonderful flash of conversation-based storytelling and worldbuilding, and this game needed a lot more of it.

The Mass Effect 1 style “villages” are a good place to sell the audience on an idea that’s hard to swallow. If you’re trying to convince the audience that anyone seriously believes that Cerberus is a “humans first” group and not a cabal of sadistic, moronic, mad-scientist terrorists, then this is the place to do it. Have a bunch of people that were abandoned by the Alliance because of some bureaucratic politicking, and Cerberus came to help them in some way. If you want to convince us that Shepard is “A hero, a bloody icon” after the events of Mass Effect 1, then have us bump into a fan on some backwater world who has heard of Shepard and wants an autograph. If you want to motivate us to go after the Collectors, then let us meet just one colony of people who are scared stupid, watching the skies furtively, and desperate for Shepard’s protection. Show their anger towards the Alliance, or their willingness to believe in anything – even Cerberus – if it will give them hope.

Yes, the world of Mass Effect 2 is larger than Mass Effect 1 in terms of raw square footage, but much of it feels so very empty, unfulfilling, and lacking in the kind of humanity that made the series special to begin with. And even when the spaces do engage in a little worldbuilding, they usually reaffirm what we already know from the last game[2], instead of attempting to sell us on the shaky premise of this one.

 
I really hope they will go back to this older kind of story telling. It's harder to do but it is so much more rewarding that I'd happy to sacrifice other game aspects for it.

[LinksOcarina]

KotOR was a great game, though. It was the story that ruined KotOR2.

As KotOR and Torment demonstrate, discovering details about your own character as part of the story can work, but only with amnesia. In KotOR2 it was character-breaking.

 

It's funny, id say Kotor 2 did it better than Kotor, mainly because of presentation and framework. Not to mention the dynamics of the characters involved.

 

It is a weakness though, if you consider the games party to be all under the same milieu of your character and motivation. Kreia is a fantastic personality, but one that has to be seperate for Kotor 2 to work, if you ask me. 

[wright1978]

I couldn't agree more with the OP. Great post.
 
Here is a text passage of Shamus Young's retrospective on the ME series about the importance of peasants that describes very well why the old BW way of approaching misions worked so well. Even if you don't agree with a lot of this guy's views, this is a worthwhile read:
 

 
I really hope they will go back to this older kind of story telling. It's harder to do but it is so much more rewarding that I'd happy to sacrifice other game aspects for it.

Personally don't agree. Much preferred the multiple hub approach of me2. Don't see how you can compare okeer recruitment with main quest area of me1.

[Shechinah]

It's funny, id say Kotor 2 did it better than Kotor, mainly because of presentation and framework. Not to mention the dynamics of the characters involved.

 

It is a weakness though, if you consider the games party to be all under the same milieu of your character and motivation. Kreia is a fantastic personality, but one that has to be seperate for Kotor 2 to work, if you ask me. 

 

While I love KOTOR II and will always adore it for what it tried to explore like war trauma, I did feel it had it's flaws and while most were tied to the early release, there was a few that were not.

 

One was especially felt to me because of it being connected to roleplaying: it was how the player was not let in on a major event that occured during the player character's time in the Mandalorian Wars. Unlike the Revan Revelation, I do not remember there being much in the way of reasons why the player should not have access to this information since the player character does.

 

This event is rather important in terms of roleplaying since the event did canonically have an impact on the player character that was so strong it led to the temporary loss of the Force. Basically, the player has to roleplay the effect of something that they do not know the weight or size of and only gradually learn.

 

Also, if a remake is ever made then I'm hoping for a Bao-Dur romance because there is some wonderful and tragedy potential in adding such a component to the relationship. 

[Sylvius the Mad]

It's funny, id say Kotor 2 did it better than Kotor, mainly because of presentation and framework. Not to mention the dynamics of the characters involved.

 

It is a weakness though, if you consider the games party to be all under the same milieu of your character and motivation. Kreia is a fantastic personality, but one that has to be seperate for Kotor 2 to work, if you ask me. 

I don't mind Kreia being her own character.  I mind the Exile being his own character.

[Sylvius the Mad]

One was especially felt to me because of it being connected to roleplaying: it was how the player was not let in on a major event that occured during the player character's time in the Mandalorian Wars. Unlike the Revan Revelation, I do not remember there being much in the way of reasons why the player should not have access to this information since the player character does.

 

This event is rather important in terms of roleplaying since the event did canonically have an impact on the player character that was so strong it led to the temporary loss of the Force. Basically, the player has to roleplay the effect of something that they do not know the weight or size of and only gradually learn.

This.  This is what fundamentally broke the game for me.  KotOR2 was ruined by this design.

[MrFob]

Personally don't agree. Much preferred the multiple hub approach of me2. Don't see how you can compare okeer recruitment with main quest area of me1.

 

The okeer mission is just an example to show how little world building there is. And personally, I did have the problem when I first played it that I didn't have a clue what the heck was actually going on there or what I was doing there. If you ask me to start shooting people, you'd better make that clear first. Maybe it's because I didn't read the dossier for okeer in the team selection screen (which was a rather obscure place to put it anyway) but even with that information, it was still atrocious.

You fly in, you hear shots, you shoot a bunch of mercs but you have no idea what's going on, who is who or why your shuttle actually dropped you in that exact location. There is nothing there.

Granted, some of ME1's side quests with the empty planets weren't much different (although at least for 90% of them you did get a briefing from Hackett as you entered the system or the plant's orbit) but arguably Grunt's recruitment mission is not a side quest, it's a mandatory mission.

 

You are right, the missions that start out of hubs are better (such as Garrus', Mordin's, Samara's or Thane's recruitment because they have exactly that kind of world building. Jack's also has it because we get to talk to Warden a*hole and the pride-less prisoner. So ME2 doesn't always do badly in that regard.

 

Interestingly, the main missions especially are the worst offenders when it comes to this kind of world building in ME2. We are supposed to defend colonies from collector attacks but we never get a connection to the people we are supposed to care about. The best we get is a 45 second cutscene of the attack on Horizon. Otherwise it's all action without a lot of context. Did you care (or could you even relate to) those colonists? "We fight for the lost" was the tag line of the game. But who were "the lost"? The only guy I ever talked to was that dude on Horizon and he was one of the survivors (which would be fine) but he was also a complete douchebag.

 

I really hope BW gives us proper world building again and not this kind of "drop me into the missoin and get me back out as fast as possible" approach the adopted quite extensively, especially in ME2.

[CronoDragoon]

^Damn straight. JE was always one of my favorites, but the more I look back, I think I like it even better than KotOR. And that's what I love about the Imperial Arena story-line; Jade Empire takes what easily could have been a straight-forward beat 'em up quest line, and adds a whole bunch of dimensions to it. In general, the companion design was probably Bioware's most diverse to date (Lord Lao's furnace anyone?, Wild Flower?). 
 
And I think Phoenix Gate is always something that's going to sting a little bit. I don't even need a sequel, if they had just given a couple hours of content there (kinda like Two Rivers at the start) as a tie in expansion, I would have been more than happy with that.

Jade Empire's companions are damaged by the game's length, though. Especially for characters like Silk Fox: interesting people that tell you their whole life story and fall in love with you in a matter of about 5 hours.

Nevertheless after replaying it recently I did love how fleshed out the side content was. It was really the last BioWare game where a ton of side content could be completed without combat. I wasn't too keen on a Jade Empire 2 until I played Mass Effect 2 and 3 and Dragon Age: Inquisition, because JE has about the worst real-time combat I've ever played. But now I think they have some experience under their belt and could pull off an action title if they chose.

[Chealec]

Id honestly say Pillars of Eternity is the best kickstarter game to come out so far.

 

Of course, mileage may vary on that of course. Divinity Original Sin...

 

...

 

I actually prefer DoS... it's sillier

 

"No-one has as many friends as the man with many cheeses"

[Nattfare]

I actually prefer DoS... it's sillier

 

"No-one has as many friends as the man with many cheeses"

 

Oh boy. I couldn't stand in that square for long before the shouts from those merchants started to get on my nerves.

[Sanunes]

The okeer mission is just an example to show how little world building there is. And personally, I did have the problem when I first played it that I didn't have a clue what the heck was actually going on there or what I was doing there. If you ask me to start shooting people, you'd better make that clear first. Maybe it's because I didn't read the dossier for okeer in the team selection screen (which was a rather obscure place to put it anyway) but even with that information, it was still atrocious.

You fly in, you hear shots, you shoot a bunch of mercs but you have no idea what's going on, who is who or why your shuttle actually dropped you in that exact location. There is nothing there.

Granted, some of ME1's side quests with the empty planets weren't much different (although at least for 90% of them you did get a briefing from Hackett as you entered the system or the plant's orbit) but arguably Grunt's recruitment mission is not a side quest, it's a mandatory mission.

 

You are right, the missions that start out of hubs are better (such as Garrus', Mordin's, Samara's or Thane's recruitment because they have exactly that kind of world building. Jack's also has it because we get to talk to Warden a*hole and the pride-less prisoner. So ME2 doesn't always do badly in that regard.

 

Interestingly, the main missions especially are the worst offenders when it comes to this kind of world building in ME2. We are supposed to defend colonies from collector attacks but we never get a connection to the people we are supposed to care about. The best we get is a 45 second cutscene of the attack on Horizon. Otherwise it's all action without a lot of context. Did you care (or could you even relate to) those colonists? "We fight for the lost" was the tag line of the game. But who were "the lost"? The only guy I ever talked to was that dude on Horizon and he was one of the survivors (which would be fine) but he was also a complete douchebag.

 

I really hope BW gives us proper world building again and not this kind of "drop me into the missoin and get me back out as fast as possible" approach the adopted quite extensively, especially in ME2.

 

The problem I had with that article was the same as Wright1978 was the comparison felt off for different areas of the games are focused on differently.  If he wanted to compare Okeer he could have used Liara's recruitment since they are more alike or if he wanted to continue to use Noveria/Feros he could have used one of the colony missions.  At least for me then it wouldn't feel like he was picking the best and worst to prove a point which seems to be a common feeling I get when it comes to his articles about BioWare/EA.

[MrFob]

The problem I had with that article was the same as Wright1978 was the comparison felt off for different areas of the games are focused on differently.  If he wanted to compare Okeer he could have used Liara's recruitment since they are more alike or if he wanted to continue to use Noveria/Feros he could have used one of the colony missions.  At least for me then it wouldn't feel like he was picking the best and worst to prove a point which seems to be a common feeling I get when it comes to his articles about BioWare/EA.

 

Fair enough but the point - i.e. that the view from the perspective of more "down to earth" characters is needed for meaningful worldbuilding and for the player to care about what s/he's actually doing - still stands.

 

And by the way, I just forgot it but I was actually going to mention Therum as a negative example from ME1 as well. AFAIK, Therum was supposed to have a village area, just like Feros and Novaria but it was cut due to time and budget constraints ... and that shows.

[AlanC9]

The okeer mission is just an example to show how little world building there is. And personally, I did have the problem when I first played it that I didn't have a clue what the heck was actually going on there or what I was doing there. If you ask me to start shooting people, you'd better make that clear first. Maybe it's because I didn't read the dossier for okeer in the team selection screen (which was a rather obscure place to put it anyway) but even with that information, it was still atrocious.

The dossier just tells you that Okeer's in a Blue Suns camp and that the relation between them is unclear, and the Codex entry tells you what the general situation on Korlus is. So, yeah, you don't know what's going on there, but Shepard wasn't supposed to know.

This premise is a bit odd, yeah. The Blue Suns may not yet have been established as a hostile force depending on your path through the narrative. And if they are, it's not clear what Shepard's going to do if Okeer is willingly working for the Suns or is an outright member of them. Shanghai him?

Interestingly, the main missions especially are the worst offenders when it comes to this kind of world building in ME2. We are supposed to defend colonies from collector attacks but we never get a connection to the people we are supposed to care about. The best we get is a 45 second cutscene of the attack on Horizon. Otherwise it's all action without a lot of context. Did you care (or could you even relate to) those colonists? "We fight for the lost" was the tag line of the game. But who were "the lost"? The only guy I ever talked to was that dude on Horizon and he was one of the survivors (which would be fine) but he was also a complete douchebag.

I'm not sure this is a great example. Surely it can't always be the case that we're defending places we've spent a lot of time in.
 

[AlanC9]

And by the way, I just forgot it but I was actually going to mention Therum as a negative example from ME1 as well. AFAIK, Therum was supposed to have a village area, just like Feros and Novaria but it was cut due to time and budget constraints ... and that shows.

This is correct. The main structure was recycled into the main structure for BdtS.

[MrFob]

I'm not sure this is a great example. Surely it can't always be the case that we're defending places we've spent a lot of time in.

 

Even if they come up with a good in-universe reason why we should, I maintain that from a narrative perspective, it's a bad decision to do so.

If you don't have any emotional connection to what you are doing, this lessens the impact of any story the author wants to tell us about the events that we are involved in.

Granted, this is the case for most shooters (not only these days but always, in fact, this has gotten better over the years) but since BW wants to paint itself as a premier story teller in the industry and the mass effect trilogy was supposed to be based on story telling and characters, this is a mistake that is of particular relevance here and that has plagued all three games to different extents. In ME2, it is the worst because they don't care to flesh out even the objects of main motivation - and the frigging tagline - of the game, i.e. "the lost" {colonists).

 

Besides, in the case of Horizon, the apology of "it wouldn't have made sense" doesn't even apply. We are there after the collectors leave and we did save half the colonists. Do we see any of them? Any thankful people or traumatized victims who just got out of stasis, any desperate wives/husbands/fathers/mothers, trying to find their loved ones? No, all we see is that idiotic mechanic yelling at you because you weren't good enough for his standards. Is that who we are fighting for?

And this flaw is not limited to Horizon, it persists throughout the entire game. The only partial exception is the derelict reaper, where at least we hear some logs of the cerberus scientists that get indoctrinated. It's not much but I guess it's better than nothing.

 

ME3 does the same with earth. we are supposed to have this big emotional connection with earth but the only time we see it is one corridor where we have an awkward conversation with the VS and when a committee yells at us stupidly for no reason. They never bother to give us any meaningful emotional connection (oh wait, there is that one child - well, that worked well but I guess they tried).

 

I really hope we won't have such a "statistical" goal like "save the colonies because there are a lot, look at this number here" or a presumed motivation like "care because we use a familiar name without any buildup or exposition" again.

[Hiemoth]

Jade Empire's companions are damaged by the game's length, though. Especially for characters like Silk Fox: interesting people that tell you their whole life story and fall in love with you in a matter of about 5 hours.

Nevertheless after replaying it recently I did love how fleshed out the side content was. It was really the last BioWare game where a ton of side content could be completed without combat. I wasn't too keen on a Jade Empire 2 until I played Mass Effect 2 and 3 and Dragon Age: Inquisition, because JE has about the worst real-time combat I've ever played. But now I think they have some experience under their belt and could pull off an action title if they chose.

 

As much I love JE, and I love it a lot, man that combat system is bad. Although it is important to remember it is a product of its time, which makes it easy to forget that before the Arkham games, the thought of introducing RPG elements to such a system seemed almost impossible. However, with the Arkham games and the basic mechanism they introduced, I can't help but to imagine JE with that system.

 

By the way, my 'favorite' companion in JE was Dawn Star who somehow managed to turn every situation in to an opportunity for self-pity. I will forever remember her talking how seeing those slaves reminded her of her own situation.

[CronoDragoon]

As much I love JE, and I love it a lot, man that combat system is bad. Although it is important to remember it is a product of its time, which makes it easy to forget that before the Arkham games, the thought of introducing RPG elements to such a system seemed almost impossible. However, with the Arkham games and the basic mechanism they introduced, I can't help but to imagine JE with that system.

 

By the way, my 'favorite' companion in JE was Dawn Star who somehow managed to turn every situation in to an opportunity for self-pity. I will forever remember her talking how seeing those slaves reminded her of her own situation.

 

The best of that was how self-aware the writers were. I remember that convo and being allowed to take her to task for dumb things she'd say, or for being self-centered. The best of course being when she told me I shouldn't trust Silk Fox, and I basically just told her to quit the possessive jealousy nonsense.

[wright1978]

Even if they come up with a good in-universe reason why we should, I maintain that from a narrative perspective, it's a bad decision to do so.

If you don't have any emotional connection to what you are doing, this lessens the impact of any story the author wants to tell us about the events that we are involved in.

Granted, this is the case for most shooters (not only these days but always, in fact, this has gotten better over the years) but since BW wants to paint itself as a premier story teller in the industry and the mass effect trilogy was supposed to be based on story telling and characters, this is a mistake that is of particular relevance here and that has plagued all three games to different extents. In ME2, it is the worst because they don't care to flesh out even the objects of main motivation - and the frigging tagline - of the game, i.e. "the lost" {colonists).

 

Besides, in the case of Horizon, the apology of "it wouldn't have made sense" doesn't even apply. We are there after the collectors leave and we did save half the colonists. Do we see any of them? Any thankful people or traumatized victims who just got out of stasis, any desperate wives/husbands/fathers/mothers, trying to find their loved ones? No, all we see is that idiotic mechanic yelling at you because you weren't good enough for his standards. Is that who we are fighting for?

And this flaw is not limited to Horizon, it persists throughout the entire game. The only partial exception is the derelict reaper, where at least we hear some logs of the cerberus scientists that get indoctrinated. It's not much but I guess it's better than nothing.

 

ME3 does the same with earth. we are supposed to have this big emotional connection with earth but the only time we see it is one corridor where we have an awkward conversation with the VS and when a committee yells at us stupidly for no reason. They never bother to give us any meaningful emotional connection (oh wait, there is that one child - well, that worked well but I guess they tried).

 

I really hope we won't have such a "statistical" goal like "save the colonies because there are a lot, look at this number here" or a presumed motivation like "care because we use a familiar name without any buildup or exposition" again.

 

Horizon doesn't strike me as tremendously different to Eden Prime and I don't think it's particularly a bad thing to have these parachute in missions. That said i do hope their are certain major colony areas that act as hubs to provide that deeper attachment alongside more shake and bake ones.

[Il Divo]

Granted, this is the case for most shooters (not only these days but always, in fact, this has gotten better over the years) but since BW wants to paint itself as a premier story teller in the industry and the mass effect trilogy was supposed to be based on story telling and characters, this is a mistake that is of particular relevance here and that has plagued all three games to different extents. In ME2, it is the worst because they don't care to flesh out even the objects of main motivation - and the frigging tagline - of the game, i.e. "the lost" {colonists).

 

 

I agree with a lot of what you're saying, but I think the scope of this is too narrow. I don't view this as a "shooter problem" so much as a more generalized story-telling issue. 

 

Most stories with save the world plots get by well enough by introducing an interesting cast of characters that we're supposed to care about, with the average citizen having negligible importance. Hell, the entire plot of Star Wars runs with that in mind: it's not about saving the random rebels we know nothing virtually about, it's about Luke, Leia, and Han. As Alderaan goes, short of a line from Obi-Wan, the annihilation of a planet goes completely unnoticed. 

 

I like the hub-style approach more because it allows for more world-building, ambience, and opportunities for different perspectives on the lore. But I don't think we spend enough time with these random civilians for their lives to have a high impact. That's something I think Watchmen was going for when it killed most of the secondary characters at the beginning of Chapter XII which was great. But they also spent more time developing/getting to know these characters. 

[vbibbi]

Jade Empire's companions are damaged by the game's length, though. Especially for characters like Silk Fox: interesting people that tell you their whole life story and fall in love with you in a matter of about 5 hours.

Nevertheless after replaying it recently I did love how fleshed out the side content was. It was really the last BioWare game where a ton of side content could be completed without combat. I wasn't too keen on a Jade Empire 2 until I played Mass Effect 2 and 3 and Dragon Age: Inquisition, because JE has about the worst real-time combat I've ever played. But now I think they have some experience under their belt and could pull off an action title if they chose.

I just replayed JE for the first time in years, thanks to it being free on Origin. I still really enjoyed the setting, story and characters, although the combat was awful. But I was surprised to find how short it really was. It didn't seem that way when I first played it, but now it seemed to take no time at all. Granted, first playthroughs are always going to be longer since I don't know what I'm doing. And maybe it has to do with the fact that the "end game" for me seemed to be from the palace through the end, which is a good third of the game. In Bio games, I'm used to most of the world being accessible for 90% of the game, and the final areas being locked in at the very end.

 

Horizon doesn't strike me as tremendously different to Eden Prime and I don't think it's particularly a bad thing to have these parachute in missions. That said i do hope their are certain major colony areas that act as hubs to provide that deeper attachment alongside more shake and bake ones.

Yes, more hubs please. Both ME3 and DAI were severely lacking. And going from Bio's track record, the majority of NPCs outside of our party are located in those hubs. So when there's only one or two, the world feels less populated.

[Iakus]

 

Besides, in the case of Horizon, the apology of "it wouldn't have made sense" doesn't even apply. We are there after the collectors leave and we did save half the colonists. Do we see any of them? Any thankful people or traumatized victims who just got out of stasis, any desperate wives/husbands/fathers/mothers, trying to find their loved ones? No, all we see is that idiotic mechanic yelling at you because you weren't good enough for his standards. Is that who we are fighting for?

And this flaw is not limited to Horizon, it persists throughout the entire game. The only partial exception is the derelict reaper, where at least we hear some logs of the cerberus scientists that get indoctrinated. It's not much but I guess it's better than nothing.

 

Well, it did turn out that Samantha Traynor was one of the colonists we saved.  But that is another bit of retroactively filling in the story 

[MrFob]

Horizon doesn't strike me as tremendously different to Eden Prime and I don't think it's particularly a bad thing to have these parachute in missions. That said i do hope their are certain major colony areas that act as hubs to provide that deeper attachment alongside more shake and bake ones.

What? Eden Prime is not at all like Horizon. You got Ashley, who is both terrified and guilt ridden over the geth attack (and just during the mission but for the rest of the game or even the trilogy). You got the scientists, one of which is shaken up, the other went all out crazy (Manuel), you got the two farmers who are scared to death by Sovereign's weird noises, you got Cole, the dockworker, who got caught by surprise during his nap. You even got exposition prior to the mission from Jenkins who grew up on that planet, gives you an impression of what it was like before the attack, is shocked when he sees what happened and gets killed in an ambush.

 

So more than enough peasant perspectives to give you an impression how scary these attacks are if you are not a super-commando here and that's just for one little mission, not about the entire main plot. I am not saying that Eden Prime was perfect (it was one of the weakest main missions of the game, next to Therum IMO) but how is that even comparable?
 

Well, it did turn out that Samantha Traynor was one of the colonists we saved. But that is another bit of retroactively filling in the story

Yea, Kelly Chambers also tells us how awful it was to be trapped in the collector pod (if you rescue her). But that's after we already finished the plot. It's a bit late to build up the enemy when you already thoroughly stomped them into the ground.

[Sanunes]

I just replayed JE for the first time in years, thanks to it being free on Origin. I still really enjoyed the setting, story and characters, although the combat was awful. But I was surprised to find how short it really was. It didn't seem that way when I first played it, but now it seemed to take no time at all. Granted, first playthroughs are always going to be longer since I don't know what I'm doing. And maybe it has to do with the fact that the "end game" for me seemed to be from the palace through the end, which is a good third of the game. In Bio games, I'm used to most of the world being accessible for 90% of the game, and the final areas being locked in at the very end.

 

 

I agree, its been awhile since I replayed Jade Empire, but at that point of no-return the game also starts to feel like its taking another direction as well almost like they ran out of production time and rushed that part of the game.