769 réponses à ce sujet

[Cyonan]

Well tbh the voice actors have read the lines exactly as I'd imaguine my character would anyway so the voice acting has never really been a problem for me. But that's just my opnion rather than a fact. Others may may feel differently but I personally have been pretty happy with the voice acting.

 

I've never really had much of a problem with it.

 

I just mentioned it because "Well you can define the tone" is a common argument against voiced protagonists when the reality is that both voiced and silent ones have a pre-defined tone to most of their dialogue options.

[Sylvius the Mad]

That's not a problem of a voice character though, it's a problem of them using paraphrasing to let the player know what the dialogue will be. You could easily show the player the entire text with a voiced protagonist.

Except they don't.

The most important aspect of the full line is that it tells us, with 100% certainty, what will not be said. For any possible statement or piece of information, if it's not in the line you're choosing you can be absolutely confident that it isn't there.

The paraphrase fails completely at this.

The tone of it is something you have to hope on in both types of characters. You can try to act as though a silent character uses the tone you want, but the game plays it like you used the tone the devs had in mind.

The game reacts. What that reaction means, in-game, might change based on the tone you selected.

The tone the devs had in mind doesn't matter, because that tone isn't actually in the game.

[Sylvius the Mad]

I've never really had much of a problem with it.

I just mentioned it because "Well you can define the tone" is a common argument against voiced protagonists when the reality is that both voiced and silent ones have a pre-defined tone to most of their dialogue options.

I completely disagree. When I play with a silent protagonist, I get to control the tone.

Sometimes my character will make a joke that the NPCs completely miss. It goes completely over their heads. You might interpret that as the devs not intending that line as a joke, but I derive no value from that interpretation, so I don't do that.

From an in-character perspective, the writers don't exist. Therefore, they can't have an intent, because things that don't exist can't exhibit characteristics.

[Cyonan]

I completely disagree. When I play with a silent protagonist, I get to control the tone.

Sometimes my character will make a joke that the NPCs completely miss. It goes completely over their heads. You might interpret that as the devs not intending that line as a joke, but I derive no value from that interpretation, so I don't do that.

From an in-character perspective, the writers don't exist. Therefore, they can't have an intent, because things that don't exist can't exhibit characteristics.

 

You don't get to choose what the NPC is thinking, so you can't say they missed the joke. I don't get to say that Alistair is deflecting my insults with sarcasm because all of those "jokes" I assumed weren't said sarcastically but insultingly.

 

All you can work with is how they've reacted, which when you have full control over your own tone but they react in the same way regardless of tone chosen it can result in NPCs acting completely out of what is their established character.

 

It makes for not only bad story telling, but bad roleplaying.

[AlanC9]

You don't get to choose what the NPC is thinking, so you can't say they missed the joke.

inb4 Sylvius saying that he can say that the NPC missed the joke.

Remember, Sylvius compartmentalizes better than you do. You can't stop knowing that what's actually happened there is that the writer intended certain tones and the player misread them, but he can.

The downside is that you're now introducing garbage data into your understanding of the NPC's personality, but that's only a problem if you think that personalities can be understood.

[rocklikeafool]

Sometimes my character will make a joke that the NPCs completely miss. 

I think you're misunderstanding how this stuff works...

[Sanunes]

I completely disagree. When I play with a silent protagonist, I get to control the tone.

Sometimes my character will make a joke that the NPCs completely miss. It goes completely over their heads. You might interpret that as the devs not intending that line as a joke, but I derive no value from that interpretation, so I don't do that.

From an in-character perspective, the writers don't exist. Therefore, they can't have an intent, because things that don't exist can't exhibit characteristics.

 

The thing is with my experience with Dragon Age: Origins I had the exact same problem with a  silent protagonist.  There were plenty of times I tried having a conversation with a party member and was given negative reaction because what I thought I was saying was the opposite of what I wanted.  The only way in my opinion you can get what you are asking for is the removal of the voiced protagonist, voiced party members/NPCs, and reputation systems that way there is nothing in the game that could have something you say taken the wrong way and I don't see all of that going away from a big budget game.

[Wonder Woman]

No.

[fizzypop]

They won't do it. So yeah pointless.

[Sylvius the Mad]

You don't get to choose what the NPC is thinking, so you can't say they missed the joke.

As much as I can in the real world. They act as if they missed the joke.

I don't get to say that Alistair is deflecting my insults with sarcasm because all of those "jokes" I assumed weren't said sarcastically but insultingly.

Why not? If that's what he appears to be doing, why would you think something else?

All you can work with is how they've reacted, which when you have full control over your own tone but they react in the same way regardless of tone chosen it can result in NPCs acting completely out of what is their established character.

Their established character is determined by their behaviour. Moreover, we don't spend more than a few hours directly interacting with these people; we don't know them well enough to predict how they'll react to new stimulus.

It makes for not only bad story telling, but bad roleplaying.

You're basically saying that we can't control tone because the NPC reactions are only consistent with the writers' intended tone, but how can we know that without reading the NPC's mind, which you explicitly say we can't do.

I think the silent protagonist lets us control tone. That's how I always played it, and I can't recall the NPC reaction ever being a problem. That's the level of control I want with the voiced protagonist.

[Sylvius the Mad]

I think you're misunderstanding how this stuff works...

If you make a joke, and the other person responss as if you weren't joking, what would you call that?

[Sylvius the Mad]

The thing is with my experience with Dragon Age: Origins I had the exact same problem with a silent protagonist. There were plenty of times I tried having a conversation with a party member and was given negative reaction because what I thought I was saying was the opposite of what I wanted.

Explain that reasoning to me. Why would you conclude from that that you said something differently, rather than concluding that the NPC just interpreted it wrong?

One interpretation gives you greater control over your character. Why not choose that one?

The only way in my opinion you can get what you are asking for is the removal of the voiced protagonist, voiced party members/NPCs, and reputation systems that way there is nothing in the game that could have something you say taken the wrong way and I don't see all of that going away from a big budget game.

This would only be true if it were somehow necessary that all people everywhere always understood each other perfectly, and that's nothing like how human interaction works.

[RoboticWater]

If you make a joke, and the other person responss as if you weren't joking, what would you call that?

The writers not expecting you to think that their dialog option was a joke?

[Cyonan]

As much as I can in the real world. They act as if they missed the joke.

 

That doesn't mean they missed the joke. There are a number of reasons they might be acting like that, you don't get to choose which is the correct one.

 

Why not? If that's what he appears to be doing, why would you think something else?

Their established character is determined by their behaviour. Moreover, we don't spend more than a few hours directly interacting with these people; we don't know them well enough to predict how they'll react to new stimulus.

 

It makes their behaviour inconsistent. If we assume that there is no writers and thus no intent of tone, then there becomes no discernible pattern as to Alistair's behaviour when I assume an insulting tone of what the writers intended as a joke line because eventually I'm going to start hitting upon dialogue options the writers did intend as insults and he's going to react differently to those.

 

Even as much time as you spend with him in Origins is enough time to start seeing the patterns, unless you break the character by assuming random tones of dialogue.

 

You're basically saying that we can't control tone because the NPC reactions are only consistent with the writers' intended tone, but how can we know that without reading the NPC's mind, which you explicitly say we can't do.

I think the silent protagonist lets us control tone. That's how I always played it, and I can't recall the NPC reaction ever being a problem. That's the level of control I want with the voiced protagonist.

 

I said all we have to go on is their reactions, and their reactions aren't being consistent when we get to choose any random tone of voice that we so desire because the game always plays it like you used a very specific tone.

 

We can't tell their mind but we can discern patterns in behaviour, as everybody has them. Anybody who was 100% unpredictable would not be able to hold a normal conversation.

 

I mean I don't know your mind, but I do know with a decent level of certainty that you're going to continue your personal crusade for turning Mass Effect into your very specific definition of a RPG. If you ever stopped doing that, it would be inconsistent with your behaviour.

[rocklikeafool]

If you make a joke, and the other person responss as if you weren't joking, what would you call that?

...I would say there are number of reasons. Maybe they got the joke, thought it was a bad joke, and decided it was more polite to just act as if you didn't say anything funny.

[Sylvius the Mad]

That doesn't mean they missed the joke. There are a number of reasons they might be acting like that, you don't get to choose which is the correct one.

Nor do you. That's the point.

Since we can't read the NPC's mind, we'll never really know why he reacted as he did.

But it also doesn't matter what conclusions you draw. It only matters if your character draws conclusions about the NPC. Our characters fan use whatever standard of evidence or mode of reasoning we want, and I can't imagine they would ever think that the NPC's reaction was based on the intent of the writers (who don't even exist from the character's perspective).

It makes their behaviour inconsistent. If we assume that there is no writers and thus no intent of tone, then there becomes no discernible pattern as to Alistair's behaviour when I assume an insulting tone of what the writers intended as a joke line because eventually I'm going to start hitting upon dialogue options the writers did intend as insults and he's going to react differently to those.

Just like when dealing with real people. Isn't that the goal?

Even as much time as you spend with him in Origins is enough time to start seeing the patterns, unless you break the character by assuming random tones of dialogue.

I am not Bertrand Russell's inductivist turkey. We learn things about the characters only when we fail to predict their behaviour.

I said all we have to go on is their reactions, and their reactions aren't being consistent when we get to choose any random tone of voice that we so desire because the game always plays it like you used a very specific tone.

We can't tell their mind but we can discern patterns in behaviour, as everybody has them. Anybody who was 100% unpredictable would not be able to hold a normal conversation.

This happens for me just as often with the voiced protagonist, so I don't see how this is an argument against the silent protagonist.

And again, it doesn't matter whether we can. What matters is whether the character you're playing thinks the NPC is inconsistent. And this happens for me all the time, voiced or not.

I mean I don't know your mind, but I do know with a decent level of certainty that you're going to continue your personal crusade for turning Mass Effect into your very specific definition of a RPG. If you ever stopped doing that, it would be inconsistent with your behaviour.

I find this observation very amusing, as you've misidentified my objective.

[Sylvius the Mad]

...I would say there are number of reasons. Maybe they got the joke, thought it was a bad joke, and decided it was more polite to just act as if you didn't say anything funny.

And we can't tell the difference.

So why would we conclude, instead, that we hadn't actually been trying to make a joke (even though we had - we don't get to change our motives retroactively)?

[Sylvius the Mad]

The writers not expecting you to think that their dialog option was a joke?

As far as I'm aware, I don't have writers.

[RoboticWater]

As far as I'm aware, I don't have writers.

You do pay for them.

[Cyonan]

This happens for me just as often with the voiced protagonist, so I don't see how this is an argument against the silent protagonist.

And again, it doesn't matter whether we can. What matters is whether the character you're playing thinks the NPC is inconsistent. And this happens for me all the time, voiced or not.

 

I never was trying to argue against the silent protagonist.

 

If you re-read my posts, I'm saying that "you can choose the tone" isn't a very good argument for a silent protagonist because you really can't choose the tone. It results in breaking the character of NPCs and causing them to act in ways that real people don't act.

 

I find this observation very amusing, as you've misidentified my objective.

 

Your objective isn't what was being identified, merely your behaviour.

 

You do constantly make points about what "pure RPGs" ought to do and how Mass Effect needs to do those things.

[serviteur de femto]

No way we are going back to a silent protagonist, especially for mass effect.

 

I cannot stand silent protagonist, I actually start to gave a **** about my main character in fallout 4 because finally he was not an empty shell like in the previous fallout he was a real character. It is actually what made me buy the game earlier (well one of the reason) because if not, the story would not have been as exciting as it was.

[MichaelN7]

Just picture the dialogue options!

 

          ...

        /

... -   -  ...

        \ 

          ...

 

Such immersion!

 

Seriously though, I don't have a problem with voiced or silent protagonists, since both have their merits.

With a voiced protagonist, you can use the "abbreviations" in dialogue options, which allows for greater cinematic flow, since you don't have to parse through lines while the other character stares at you.

With a silent protagonist, you read the lines as if it were being said by you, so the tone can be whatever you want it to be.

 

In one case, the protagonist is more "real".  In the other, it's more "you".

With Mass Effect, the protagonist has always been voiced, so the chance of him/her being a silent one is virtually nil.

That said, there's the possibility that your character's radio could go out, and have to use a datapad/gestures to communicate.  That would make for an interesting mission indeed.

[Sylvius the Mad]

I never was trying to argue against the silent protagonist.

If you re-read my posts, I'm saying that "you can choose the tone" isn't a very good argument for a silent protagonist because you really can't choose the tone. It results in breaking the character of NPCs and causing them to act in ways that real people don't act.

That's exactly how real people act. You never know how people are going to respond, and you can't ever be sure that they've understood you correctly. At least, I don't. This is my experience of talking with people. So, from my point of view, the dialogue in BioWare's silent protagonist games mimics real world conversations just about perfectly.

In the voiced games, however, we end up with the protagonist being genuinely unaware of what's going to come out of his mouth. We end up choosing not what we want the character to say, but where we want the conversation to go, which, again, is entirely unlike how real world conversations work.

Your objective isn't what was being identified, merely your behaviour.

You do constantly make points about what "pure RPGs" ought to do and how Mass Effect needs to do those things.

I'm not the one calling them "pure RPGs". They're just RPGs, unless they're not. And I am describing the features Mass Effect needs to have to be one.

But that next leap was entirely yours.

[Sylvius the Mad]

You do pay for them.

No, I'm asking how you interpret the situation in the real world if you make a joke and get an unexpected reaction in response?

Are you convinced that you didn't actually tell a joke? Do you question whether you misinterpreted the intent of your writers? Of course not.

So why would you do that in-game?

[RoboticWater]

No, I'm asking how you interpret the situation in the real world if you make a joke and get an unexpected reaction in response?

I say, "that was a joke," or some such and move on. In a game, if that option doesn't exist after I've told an alleged misinterpreted joke, then that option likely wasn't a joke in the first place.
 

Are you convinced that you didn't actually tell a joke? Do you question whether you misinterpreted the intent of your writers? Of course not.

Of course I do. This is a game with writers. The most sensible answer isn't that Alistair only misunderstands my sarcasm for whatever reason and then never has an explanation; it's that the writers never intended for certain lines of dialog to be sarcastic.
 

So why would you do that in-game?

Because unlike you, I'm not a practiced mental gymnast.You're the one who always drones on about experiences that ruin the credibility of the setting. Characters acting inconsistently ruins the setting.