322 réponses à ce sujet

[vbibbi]

We don't? Because I have no idea what Ostwick is like, or what being a noble there is like. We've had no information about it in previous games. Are there crazy politics there like Orlais and Tevinter? Is it more subdued? How are nobles treated by the commoners? There is a lot more that we don't know than we do. That applies to being a Dalish First as well, though slightly less so. So no, that information isn't assumed, and it wasn't enough to craft a personality for me.
 
Common doesn't mean good (or bad), it just means common.

And the Qunari Inquisitor is the first time in the entire series that we've even dealt with Vashoth at all. It's been Tal Vashoth or the Qun up until now. I would have liked to see if Vashoth try to assimilate into Southern Thedas culture or keep some elements of their heritage.

[JadeDragon]

I think DA4 needs to have playable origins. Because if it is truly in North culturally and lore wise all players new and old are starting from 0 perspective wise. We need to be introduced to the each race and there cultural difference in the north and those who have stuck around since Origins would see the difference from the south as well. It would be a huge disservice for the series to go the codex route again and make us assume how things work Northern Thedas.

Human Mage Noble - Since the situation is flipped up north.

Human non-mage commoner

Dwarf Ambassador

City Elf Slave - Dalish had 2 games plus city elf life would more interesting to play up north

Qunari Qun-turned Tal-Vashoth - if a invasion is coming it would be cool to play a origin story as a  Qunari part of the Qun that rebels and turns Tal-Vashoth. Would be are best chance to get a glimpse of being in the Qun.

 

And that is the beauty origin stories can create and the advantage race selection in Dragon Age has over other series. It allows the players to get that extra insight and if you want to play as a Magister's child and a experience the Qun then you have to play the game twice(or make two characters). Either way you will replay the game more times.

[BansheeOwnage]

And the Qunari Inquisitor is the first time in the entire series that we've even dealt with Vashoth at all. It's been Tal Vashoth or the Qun up until now. I would have liked to see if Vashoth try to assimilate into Southern Thedas culture or keep some elements of their heritage.

Good point. We know next to nothing about Vashoth, and that would have been a great time to enlighten us. The one background that wouldn't have mattered much would be the dwarf, since we know a lot more about the Carta and lyrium smuggling etc. than the rest.

[Hanako Ikezawa]

I don't. When it comes to protagonists whom are influenced by the player, I much prefer that they have an ambiguous or vague backstory over a more explicitly predefined one like origins would do. 

[In Exile]

I don't think so. Origins are introductions to the world, eg the mage origin shows you the circle, the templars, etc. We don't need to learn what dalish firsts or noble marchers are like by now. That information is assumed, now you can build upon that to craft a personality.

Regarding being put in the middle of things all of a sudden, that's common, remember Neverwinter Nights or Kotor.

They specifically weren't meant for that purpose. If you followed the development of DAO, Origins were pitched as giving your character a connection to the world unparalleled for an RPG. It wasn't about an introduction to the setting - it was about creating an active background. There were lots of cut features tied to this - including the idea of a personal nemesis tied unquestionably to your origin.

[KaiserShep]

Qunari Qun-turned Tal-Vashoth - if a invasion is coming it would be cool to play a origin story as a  Qunari part of the Qun that rebels and turns Tal-Vashoth. Would be are best chance to get a glimpse of being in the Qun.

 

 

I feel like this would bring up pesky questions about why your character can't just stay Qunari. It's easier when the character was always an outsider, like how Hawke never has the opportunity to become a Viddathari, and eventually has no choice but to fight the Arishok. I don't think we'll ever be welcome in the Oxmen Bas-Haters Club.

[SkinVision]

Honestly, I would never have been able to learn and experience life as a City Elf, Dalish, etc if it weren't for Origin's prologue. Head canon won't do that.

 

 

This. I started DAI with noch knowledge about dragon age except for reading brief summaries online. I spent the first five hours of the game utterly confused. I couldn't enjoy the storyline because I didn't know what the **** was going on. I read the codex entries but the codex is pretty cryptic without any background information. So basically I was playing 5 minutes, reading codex entries then googling stuff mentioned in codex entries, getting spoilered, rinse, repeat.


 

On top of that you get a a lot of codex entries AFTER important decisions, pretty useless.


 

A little bit of information about mages, templars and my inquisitors background in a quite setting where I don't also have to seal rifts while getting to know three advisors and three companions with way too many dialogue options would have been nice.


[Lezio]

I think DA4 needs to have playable origins. Because if it is truly in North culturally and lore wise all players new and old are starting from 0 perspective wise. We need to be introduced to the each race and there cultural difference in the north and those who have stuck around since Origins would see the difference from the south as well. It would be a huge disservice for the series to go the codex route again and make us assume how things work Northern Thedas.

Human Mage Noble - Since the situation is flipped up north.

Human non-mage commoner

Dwarf Ambassador

City Elf Slave - Dalish had 2 games plus city elf life would more interesting to play up north

Qunari Qun-turned Tal-Vashoth - if a invasion is coming it would be cool to play a origin story as a  Qunari part of the Qun that rebels and turns Tal-Vashoth. Would be are best chance to get a glimpse of being in the Qun.

 

And that is the beauty origin stories can create and the advantage race selection in Dragon Age has over other series. It allows the players to get that extra insight and if you want to play as a Magister's child and a experience the Qun then you have to play the game twice(or make two characters). Either way you will replay the game more times.

 

I agree with everything you said but one thing.

I actually believe that qunari should not be a playable race in Tevinter(and my Inquisitor is a qunari). I just can't realistically see a Vashot/Fog Warrior rising to power in Tevinter, maybe if the character starts out as a "Fenris" for some (creepy) magister or if the story is about something much more covert but dunno. From what we've heard, it feels like Tevinter is the kind of place where a qunari would be cut open and used for blood magic for the crime of drawing breath

[JadeDragon]

I agree with everything you said but one thing.

I actually believe that qunari should not be a playable race in Tevinter(and my Inquisitor is a qunari). I just can't realistically see a Vashot/Fog Warrior rising to power in Tevinter, maybe if the character starts out as a "Fenris" for some (creepy) magister or if the story is about something much more covert but dunno. From what we've heard, it feels like Tevinter is the kind of place where a qunari would be cut open and used for blood magic for the crime of drawing breath

To be honest I am split on the Qunari being playable in the next game. I would totally understand if they are not because just like I cant see a mage openly walking around a Qun society without getting there head cut off I can not see a Qunari walking around Tevinter without getting blasted by a fireball every 5 mins. But I know how the fanbase is once you give them something it is hard to take it away. I can barely imagine a elf having equal influence to a human as well but that is much easier to work around. If Bioware is going to bring the Qunari back as a playable race they would have to really do some amazing writing to avoid messing up the lore they have established. Only other work around I can imagine and is extremely doubtful would happen is if there is two different starting stories for the races, Humans and Dwarves start off in Tevinter while Elf and Qunari start off in Qun-controlled Rivani. Like I said doubtful because its basically like two totally different stories up until the medium point.

[sim-ran]

Argh levels and abilities are just game mechanics, they are not representative of the PC's actual ability!

When the player is level 1 it doesn't mean they are really weak in the story or that the only battle skills they have are the ones you can use in battle.

[Almostfaceman]

Topic title, basically

 

I just feel like it's quite difficult to roleplay in this game because we are litterally dropped into the center of things, with no real character establishment or anything like that

 

Like, for example, my Inquisitor is a Tal-Vashot and in the codex it's stated that he was hired to keep watch on the Conclave, it would have been awesome to actually get to know the emrcenary band, maybe see the bonds, establish how my character feels about his work and his mercenary-companions and then BOOM, the life he knew was over and it's Corypheus' fault, it would have made the rivalry between Cory and The Inquisitor feel a lot more personal.

 

Instead there is never even the chance to talk about the guys he probably knew back at the Conclave whom died because of the explotion.  At one time, i actually thought the character was supposed to have total amnesia since he felt so estranged to hsi life Pre-Conclave. Which would have been quite awesome if only during Here Lies the Abyss we could actually choose how s/he behaved in regards to Cory and Justinia, instead of just going the generic hero route (which, luckily, fit my character just fine but doesn't really fit ALL kinds of characters)

 

Firstly, "Anyone else feel..." is always YES. Someone will always agree with your idea. It may not be a lot of someones, but they will always exist. 

 

In a perfect world, with infinite time to work on the project, super-duper writers, infinite money... yes. Serve up them origins. 

 

In practice, no. The method would get boring after a while. The implementation would always take away resources from the rest of the game. Bioware could barely handle how large Inquisition was... I shudder to think what will happen with Andromeda. 

 

This is not a dig at Bioware. I really like Inquisition. Like all their games, however, they could have benefited from more time and money. 

 

Do I want more for my money? Yes. I think they're trying. I definitely feel like I got more out of Inquisition than I got from Origins. However, it doesn't hurt to keep one's expectations realistic. 

[Lezio]

Firstly, "Anyone else feel..." is always YES. Someone will always agree with your idea. It may not be a lot of someones, but they will always exist. 

 

In a perfect world, with infinite time to work on the project, super-duper writers, infinite money... yes. Serve up them origins. 

 

In practice, no. The method would get boring after a while. The implementation would always take away resources from the rest of the game. Bioware could barely handle how large Inquisition was... I shudder to think what will happen with Andromeda. 

 

This is not a dig at Bioware. I really like Inquisition. Like all their games, however, they could have benefited from more time and money. 

 

Do I want more for my money? Yes. I think they're trying. I definitely feel like I got more out of Inquisition than I got from Origins. However, it doesn't hurt to keep one's expectations realistic. 

 

After playing Witcher 3 i don't really feel like "time and money" are appropriate excuses anymore, if i have to be honest. Especially since a good 70% of Inquisition is (boring) filler and grinding.

 

This is a dig a Bioware, but a "well-meaning" one. Already with Trespasser they went in the right direction, i wish the Exalted Council was better flashed out but eh, i hope that seeing Witcher 3's succes they (and EA) will realize that RPGs with good stories sell because, shockingly, they're just that, RPGs with good stories (and actual, engaging RP oriented sidequests, not MMO stuff)

 

But i've gone kind of Off-Topic (in my own topic )

 

Suffice to say, i don't agree with the belief that 30 minutes/1 hour to get better acquainted with one's character and the state of the world would have cost them unparalleled resources or 2 years worth of time

[JadeDragon]

After playing Witcher 3 i don't really feel like "time and money" are appropriate excuses anymore, if i have to be honest. Especially since a good 70% of Inquisition is (boring) filler and grinding.

 

This is a dig a Bioware, but a "well-meaning" one. Already with Trespasser they went in the right direction, i wish the Exalted Council was better flashed out but eh, i hope that seeing Witcher 3's succes they (and EA) will realize that RPGs with good stories sell because, shockingly, they're just that, RPGs with good stories (and actual, engaging RP oriented sidequests, not MMO stuff)

 

But i've gone kind of Off-Topic (in my own topic )

 

Suffice to say, i don't agree with the belief that 30 minutes/1 hour to get better acquainted with one's character and the state of the world would have cost them unparalleled resources or 2 years worth of time

The whole time and resources argument is not a excuse because honestly I dont feel like the time and resources that went into Inquistion all went into the right place. It doesnt matter if you have more or less it matter what you do with what you got I mean did all of the areas HAVE to be has large as they were would it have taken anything from the story or game if certain maps were scaled down and certain side quest were not there in order to put that time and resource towards a origin map or quest?  Do we honestly believe that they used there resources the best they could this game? To say that a origin quest or pre-temple of ashes moment would take up resources would hold water if the game was not filled with so many quest that would surely not be missed. Like the Shards quest we find all these shards to get a weapon that by that time we should have crafted weapons way better, could have at least gave us the agony dagger with a tier 3 or 4 schematic of it as well

[Ash Wind]

Yep, sure could have used something.

 

Its the Awesome Button syndrome. IQ's are dropped in with next to no explanation. But, because 27 people complained (hyperbole) we get the awesome button... press a button and something (not-so) awesome happens.

 

It didn't even have to be an origin per se, but just something that says, yo... here's what's happening.

 

Yes, some people think that would be boring... to me, its not as boring^6 as weak writers attempting to give you douchey exposition after the fact in little snippets as you fight uninteresting and stupidly weak adversaries designed to be ABSOLUTELY nothing more than combat fodder with all the challenge of a PAC-MAN game (ooooh, look out, that level 0.1 ghost, goblin, snake, darkspawn, monkeyman, boogeyman) is gonna get you.... NOT... while a NPC slowly and lamely.... gives you... wait for it...

 

EXPOSITION... its better because I get to button mash... <awesome button mash>; <awesome button mash>; <awesome button mash>...NOT!

 

But, no, its ok, because you get to kill some of the weakest enemies in the game, while you get a slow, disjointed explanation as to why you're important.

 

#winning

[FiveThreeTen]

After playing Witcher 3 i don't really feel like "time and money" are appropriate excuses anymore, if i have to be honest. Especially since a good 70% of Inquisition is (boring) filler and grinding.

 

This is a dig a Bioware, but a "well-meaning" one. Already with Trespasser they went in the right direction, i wish the Exalted Council was better flashed out but eh, i hope that seeing Witcher 3's succes they (and EA) will realize that RPGs with good stories sell because, shockingly, they're just that, RPGs with good stories (and actual, engaging RP oriented sidequests, not MMO stuff)

 

But i've gone kind of Off-Topic (in my own topic )

 

Suffice to say, i don't agree with the belief that 30 minutes/1 hour to get better acquainted with one's character and the state of the world would have cost them unparalleled resources or 2 years worth of time

Highlighted because I think that's exactly what the thread is asking. Not forcing a characterization on your character (and not more and less that some characterization is also subtly forced when you choose your background in Inquisition, a Circle mage of Ostwick hasn't had the same life than a Dalish first etc...) (Doesn't prevent you from headcanoning your Dalish mage escaped a Circle/Alienage, and I don't see how having a playable background would prevent you of headcanoning this in the same fashion)

 

But agreed, same sentiment of hope with Trespasser and criticism regarding the political aspect of the Exalted Council

 

OT: Well to be fair, I think its best to see what Bioware can learn from its own franchise and look for what worked/didn't worked in all 3 games. TW serie is a whole another genre of RPG (at least for me in terms of RP since I think it's very relevant to the theme of your thread) where you are forced to play a very predefined character despite the RP opportunities that do provide choices, but it's another approach from Bioware games in general. It's still hard for me to care about Geralt. But in terms of presentation? The few things I have seen about TW3 convinced me they managed to render their world in a very satisfying manner.

Origins/playable backgrounds don't force that much on you in term of roleplay. You still create your own character and define it, just better introduced in the world than in Inquisition in my book.

 

The whole time and resources argument is not a excuse because honestly I dont feel like the time and resources that went into Inquistion all went into the right place. It doesnt matter if you have more or less it matter what you do with what you got I mean did all of the areas HAVE to be has large as they were would it have taken anything from the story or game if certain maps were scaled down and certain side quest were not there in order to put that time and resource towards a origin map or quest?  Do we honestly believe that they used there resources the best they could this game? To say that a origin quest or pre-temple of ashes moment would take up resources would hold water if the game was not filled with so many quest that would surely not be missed. Like the Shards quest we find all these shards to get a weapon that by that time we should have crafted weapons way better, could have at least gave us the agony dagger with a tier 3 or 4 schematic of it as well

well I have that feeling as well. Even if  arguing about resources management is always tricky honestly and I can admit they provided things that I liked that likely cost a lot too (like they provided 4 full voiced for the Inquisitor, which was kind of unexpected, and I think it was a nice surprise, the Dragons animations were beautiful, etc).

 

I suspect a lot of resources went into adapting the Forstbite engine 3 and trying to make it work on older gen consoles. Which was really a money grab since I think many people could agree (the PC jerks like myself  ) that even the current consoles are already outdated in term of hardware and don't run Inquistion that well.

Outdated is objectively a strong term relative to most people's equipment. yeah they run Inquisition decently but still

Regardless, solely focusing on PC/current gens might also have been more honest (or at least decent) on their part towards old gen players and maybe less costly in terms of resources.

I completely agree about the fetch quests and MMO-like feeling you get while doing those and did we really needed like 3 desert maps?

 

As I understand the extra year they got was to implement the extra races beside humans, so by that time, it may have been impossibe or too late since different playable races weren't part of the original design.

I wonder if they originally designed a more contrasted path between human mage PC/non-human mage PC. It's not even guaranteed we would have had that if the extra race were "scrapped".

Or maybe I'm mixing things and multiple races DID were planned from the beginning but the extra year "ensured" they wouldn't get scrapped.

Ideally it would have been nice having different races with a small playable background in the original concept.

[Lezio]

Highlighted because I think that's exactly what the thread is asking. Not forcing a characterization on your character (and not more and less that some characterization is also subtly forced when you choose your background in Inquisition, a Circle mage of Ostwick hasn't had the same life than a Dalish first etc...) (Doesn't prevent you from headcanoning your Dalish mage escaped a Circle/Alienage, and I don't see how having a playable background would prevent you of headcanoning this in the same fashion)

 

But agreed, same sentiment of hope with Trespasser and criticism regarding the political aspect of the Exalted Council

 

OT: Well to be fair, I think its best to see what Bioware can learn from its own franchise and look for what worked/didn't worked in all 3 games. TW serie is a whole another genre of RPG (at least for me in terms of RP since I think it's very relevant to the theme of your thread) where you are forced to play a very predefined character despite the RP opportunities that do provide choices, but it's another approach from Bioware games in general. It's still hard for me to care about Geralt. But in terms of presentation? The few things I have seen about TW3 convinced me they managed to render their world in a very satisfying manner.

Origins/playable backgrounds don't force that much on you in term of roleplay. You still create your own character and define it, just better introduced in the world than in Inquisition in my book.

 

I completely agree, most of all with the bolded part

To make my prior statement clearer, what i truly hope is that TW3's succes will allow them to tell the story they want to tell without having to worry about how much it will sell, because, IMHO, that's Inquisition problem in a nutshell. They tried to make it so many things that, in the end, it's just average at being what it really should be, namely a storydriven, character focused RPG

[AlanC9]

Like the Shards quest we find all these shards to get a weapon that by that time we should have crafted weapons way better, could have at least gave us the agony dagger with a tier 3 or 4 schematic of it as well

I thought the point was to get the resistances, not the dagger. Or even the vitaar, which is a more useful item than the dagger.

Though I wouldn't have a problem with cutting the whole thing. But unless you cut the whole thing including the entire Oasis area, you're not going to save all that much dev time. Only a handful of the shards required solving a real puzzle to reach.

[AlanC9]

Yes, some people think that would be boring... to me, its not as boring^6 as weak writers attempting to give you douchey exposition after the fact in little snippets as you fight uninteresting and stupidly weak adversaries designed to be ABSOLUTELY nothing more than combat fodder with all the challenge of a PAC-MAN game (ooooh, look out, that level 0.1 ghost, goblin, snake, darkspawn, monkeyman, boogeyman) is gonna get you.... NOT... while a NPC slowly and lamely.... gives you... wait for it...

This is just silly. Starting with a tutorial level has nothing to do with how they handle the exposition for the game's start.

[vbibbi]

I thought the point was to get the resistances, not the dagger. Or even the vitaar, which is a more useful item than the dagger.
Though I wouldn't have a problem with cutting the whole thing. But unless you cut the whole thing including the entire Oasis area, you're not going to save all that much dev time. Only a handful of the shards required solving a real puzzle to reach.

I think A LOT of people would be happy cutting the Oasis and shards altogether. Especially casual gamers, who are apparently a prime audience for Bioware (since their game endings are usually rushed due to the majority of players never even reaching the end of the game).

I personally recall being very disappointed when I discovered that the cool concept art of the oasis temple they kept sharing was not actually relevant to the story or uncover lost mysteries as the marketing claimed. Yes, it's marketing and the writers have no control over it, but I think the game suffered from way too much optional content which didn't even add that much proportionally to the resources committed to it.

[JadeDragon]

I thought the point was to get the resistances, not the dagger. Or even the vitaar, which is a more useful item than the dagger.

Though I wouldn't have a problem with cutting the whole thing. But unless you cut the whole thing including the entire Oasis area, you're not going to save all that much dev time. Only a handful of the shards required solving a real puzzle to reach.

ok but unless you decide to back trach which i personally hate doing, Du Lion and the Waste lets call them tier 3 zones are the hardest zones in the game level wise and  require playing through it to get all the shards even some shards in the dragon area. What use is the resistances if the main elemental enemy (The Dragons) are all dead by then. Realistically if you decide to finish everything possible in each zone before you leave All the dragons are dead and now you have a resistance to every element but for what to say you have it?

[BansheeOwnage]

Whether or not qunari are playable in DA4, I really hope they make them look like qunari again. No more grey humans with horns and crappy hair, please. And no more crappy hair at all. Thanks.

[BansheeOwnage]

I thought the point was to get the resistances, not the dagger. Or even the vitaar, which is a more useful item than the dagger.

Though I wouldn't have a problem with cutting the whole thing. But unless you cut the whole thing including the entire Oasis area, you're not going to save all that much dev time. Only a handful of the shards required solving a real puzzle to reach.

If they wanted to keep the Solasan Temple they could have easily transposed it to the Wastes, or, more preferably, the Approach (so they could cut the Wastes too ).

[Hanako Ikezawa]

If they wanted to keep the Solasan Temple they could have easily transposed it to the Wastes, or, more preferably, the Approach (so they could cut the Wastes too ).

I love the Hissing Wastes. I love how beautiful it looks, with the night sky and the dunes basking in the moonlight.

 

Whether or not qunari are playable in DA4, I really hope they make them look like qunari again. No more grey humans with horns and crappy hair, please. And no more crappy hair at all. Thanks.

I liked how the female Qunari looked, other than the hair options. Then again the female Qunari in DAI match what they already looked like. 

 

ok but unless you decide to back trach which i personally hate doing, Du Lion and the Waste lets call them tier 3 zones are the hardest zones in the game level wise and  require playing through it to get all the shards even some shards in the dragon area. What use is the resistances if the main elemental enemy (The Dragons) are all dead by then. Realistically if you decide to finish everything possible in each zone before you leave All the dragons are dead and now you have a resistance to every element but for what to say you have it?

Well, that frost resistance sure comes in handy when you go to the Frostback Basin. 

[vbibbi]

But are we saying that Bioware specifically designed an entire map zone and the occulara zoom and find mechanics in order to provide vitaar, which is for one of four PC background options which was only added in an extra year of development, or elemental resistances? This is the argument?

Can we not be a little honest and say that the shards were added as a filler to expand gameplay time? And yes it can be argued to encourage map exploration, but that seems to be circular logic if people interested in exploring would explore regardless of picking up shards. And perhaps testing out the new jumping capability in Frostbite and how to incorporate that into quests.

From a game developer standpoint, Bioware knew that they couldn't include anything too significant in the temple since players would froth at the mouth if they had to collect dozens of shards in order to access important content. So they shot themselves in the foot by creating an entire zone built around a collection quest, knowing that the content in the final room, treasure or lore, could not be that relevant to the overall game or DA series.

It just seems like such bad resource management to me and a large departure from Bio's previous emphasis on using resources mostly for the narrative.

[Shechinah]

Whether or not qunari are playable in DA4, I really hope they make them look like qunari again. No more grey humans with horns and crappy hair, please. And no more crappy hair at all. Thanks.

 

I just want the qunari eyes from Dragon Age II back.