114 réponses à ce sujet

[BloodyTalon]

Toussaint will be even better than the Val Royeaux we deserved.

Also should have a more of a medieval feel to it, got some Victorian era vibs from the dragon age take on  France honestly  The masks and  outfits

Two different flavors honestly.

[MisterJB]

Really though *why* was Val Royeux a huge let down?  We essentially saw one bit of it from the trailers we were shown over the years.  They did not advertise it, did not tell us anything, did not hype it up, we did that all on our own.  As far as comparing Val Royeyx to Novigrad.  Different design decisions, different themes explored in the game, and different fcus for those themes. 

A location does not need to be advertised in order for fans to be hyped. We knew Val Royeaux was the capital of the most powerful empire in Thedas, we knew it was the very heart of the Andrastian Chantry. We expected something to come from this much like we expect Minrathous to impressive because it is the oldest city in Thedas and one where magic is part of everyday life.

What we got in DAI was a not a city, it was a neighborhood, at best, where groups of NPCs were clustered in small groups doing nothing. Novigrad was HUGE and it felt alive, you had people dressing differently dependong on their social strata, we had large groups of people walking around everywhere, tending to their daily affairs, we had troupes playing and performing, we had areas of the city that looked different depending on the social classe of the people that lived there and the purpose of the area, etc.

 

Overral, I would say that DAI is the better game but there really is no comparing Val Royeaux and Novigrad regardless of theme and focus. One is a realistic city bursting with life, another is something I could have put together in VTM:Redemption.
 

[Al Foley]

A location does not need to be advertised in order for fans to be hyped. We knew Val Royeaux was the capital of the most powerful empire in Thedas, we knew it was the very heart of the Andrastian Chantry. We expected something to come from this much like we expect Minrathous to impressive because it is the oldest city in Thedas and one where magic is part of everyday life.

What we got in DAI was a not a city, it was a neighborhood, at best, where groups of NPCs were clustered in small groups doing nothing. Novigrad was HUGE and it felt alive, you had people dressing differently dependong on their social strata, we had large groups of people walking around everywhere, tending to their daily affairs, we had troupes playing and performing, we had areas of the city that looked different depending on the social classe of the people that lived there and the purpose of the area, etc.

 

Overral, I would say that DAI is the better game but there really is no comparing Val Royeaux and Novigrad regardless of theme and focus. One is a realistic city bursting with life, another is something I could have put together in VTM:Redemption.
 

My feelings exactly.  Novigrad was the best.  If it weren't for the rampant racism and purges I kinda wanna live there. 

[Fiskrens]

As good as Novigrad was, I still got kind of bored running around there when searching for Ciri. It worked much better during the final part, when you got to mix rural and urban areas more. Hope Bioware learns from that when doing Minrathous (which I'm quite sure will be part of DA4 in some way).

[Cz-99]

Aside from them both having French names, I don't see any resemblance - especially since I despise Orlais and I'm not gettin' that feeling from Toussaint. Toussaint is very fairytale like, and its focus on wine, the arts, etc makes it more like Renaissance Italy than France.

[ArcaneEsper]

As far as Val Royeaux being a letdown goes, I've gotta say it's not a fans overhyping thing. I knew diddly squat about DA when I started my first playthrough and I was kinda miffed resources were devoted to VR when it had just about nothing going on.

[MattH]

Also should have a more of a medieval feel to it, got some Victorian era vibs from the dragon age take on France honestly The masks and outfits
Two different flavors honestly.

Dragon Age seems to be moving past its medieval origins, a lot of the design work in DAI feels very Renaissance, and Orlais is heavily influenced by the Baroque/Rococo artisit periods.

Hopefully Tevinter will balance the medieval/fantasy better.

[vbibbi]

Really though *why* was Val Royeux a huge let down?  We essentially saw one bit of it from the trailers we were shown over the years.  They did not advertise it, did not tell us anything, did not hype it up, we did that all on our own.  As far as comparing Val Royeyx to Novigrad.  Different design decisions, different themes explored in the game, and different fcus for those themes. 

 

Speaking personally, having been interested in the lore of DA, apart from Ferelden culture, Orlais is the country we have the most information on. At least of the contemporary world, not the ancient elves and Tevinter. I think it's fair to assume that after two games of mentioning one of the world's superpowers and having significant influence from the country (occupation and strained relations with Ferelden, emigrants to the Free Marches and the country manors still own by Orlesians in the FM, the Southern Chantry and Circles both headquartered there) it was surprising that so little of DAI was actually about Orlais as a country. It was all wilderness and reading about the culture in the codex.

 

It's not like they would have had to invent a whole bunch of new content to fill a city with; we already know the White Spire, the Grand Cathedral, the University, templar headquarters (I still can't believe the Southern Chantry's headquarters were in bumblef Ferelden), we know that Val Royeux is the largest city in the known world, rivaling Minrathous.

 

So to then have this city with so much lore already advertised and it being such an important aspect of the past few games reduced to a Disney marketplace was immensely disappointing. No, the developers never claimed that we would explore the city but they can't reasonably expect people not to be disappointed to have a game set in this location and provide a subpar experience.

 

There's a difference between "But I wanted to visit Starkhaven in DA2!" and "Wait, we actually go to Val Royeux in DAI but it's one city block? And none of the iconic buildings or organizations from multiple sources are present?"

[MisterJB]

Another thing to note regarding Novigrad is the fact that the city changed the more we played.

When we first enter sure, the influence of the Church of the Eternal Fire is felt in the priests and the Witch Hunters everywhere but other that a couple of pyres in the main square, everything seems normal.

Then suddenly people are being checked at the entrance, interrogated for ridiculous reasons. Then books are burnt, people's homes searched. Finally, there are pires lining every entrance into the city.

Imagine if Kirkwall had done something similar as the situation between Templars and Mages deteriorated in Act 3.

[Aren]

 

Overral, I would say that DAI is the better game but there really is no comparing Val Royeaux and Novigrad regardless of theme and focus. One is a realistic city bursting with life, another is something I could have put together in VTM:Redemption.
 

The better game between who the others DA games or the WH3?

[DarkAmaranth1966]

...but is anyone getting a very Orlesian feel from Toussaint in "Blood and Wine"? Even the accents sound French to my admitadelly less that knowledgeable ears?

 

If the city is half as large as Novigrad, we may finally have the Val Royeaux we deserved.

 

Well since there was a Touissaint Charbonneau in real life who was a guide for Lewis and Clark and, married Sacajawea and, he was French, that makes sense.

 

As for Orlais, I think people tend to associate French with luxurious, especially in wine and food. Blow it a bit out of proportion and , it works well to make an in game culture based on that perception of opulence, luxury and pampered nobles.

[Statare]

I noticed with DA:I that the designers were still relying on their "closed world" design choices from DA:O and DA2 for key elements of DA:I despite it being designed as a more "open world" game. When a plot moment would occur in a characters story arc, or even the actual plot, we would go to a "theatrical set" zone, which mostly act as a theatre-like stage for whatever is happening like many of the random encounter zones in DA:O or all the zones in DA2 and is not really meant to be explorable. This creeped into actual, permanently visitable areas like Val Royeaux, which really could have just been a repeated set of assets for certain quests for how little development the zone had. 

 

This affected a lot of elements of the game, in my opinion because you had this "segmented" design and instead of thinking about how progression through a zone should naturally affect or lead to the story, you often abruptly get jumped to another place (the Western Approach is barely related to Adamant, with the two places having little to no affect on each other) and you "trigger" the story by clicking a button on an interface (the War Table) or talking to an NPC, you rarely "stumble" upon or enter into story content. Cutscenes and temporary quest effects are how the designers attempted to add some life to a place (like the temporary crowd when you first visit Val Royeaux) and this only further disrupted the flow of the zones or when these ended, the zone felt gutted. Only one area had a true sense of progression, Crestwood, and it was pretty minor.

 

Looking at DA4, Jaws of Hakkon had a better sense of flow to the zone. Tresspasser, though, did not do anything noticeable to make the Winter Palace feel more alive, though there were some minor changes that occurred as you progressed through the story it still felt like Disney Land: The Winter Palace. So, I'm kind of wondering if BioWare could do a more vibrant, human populated zone when their primary ways of telling a story are codex, set design, static dialogue, and cutscenes, and not really haphazard occurrences, "AI" scripted NPCs, and progression in or of the environment. For instance, one of the few ways they made an effort to make Skyhold more "alive" was having static NPCs talk when you approached them, in the same key spots, but them being a different NPC. It felt very much like the "theatre stage" idea that permeates BioWare's design, only all the actors are giving a very stiff/self conscious performance. To me, BioWare still seems to be imagining world design from an almost isometric style, though DA:I is definitely the one that broke the mold the most.

 

Hopefully for their next games they will break away from the isometric/stage-like funk they are in that detracts more than it adds.

[Bayonet Hipshot]

CDPR will do a fictional adaptation of French culture far better than Bioware will.

[Al Foley]

*pounds head into table* Why must everything be a pissing match between the two companies?  And I include myself in this too because my first reaction to every time someone says that CPDR does something better then BioWare is to disagree...because first of all I do disagree.  I contend that the only thing that Witcher 3 did better then DA I were graphics, the side quests, and Novigrad, as in the city itself.  But yet I also really loved the Witcher and think it was a great game and given in these pissing matches when I say I liked almost everything about DA I more it feels like I am trashing the Witcher which is not my intention. 

[Bayonet Hipshot]

Because CDPR > Bioware and TW3 > DAI.

 

Its like saying Civil War > BvS and The Flash > Agents of Shield.

 

Some things are just better than others.

[Lunatica]

Because CDPR > Bioware and TW3 > DAI.

 

Its like saying Civil War > BvS and The Flash > Agents of Shield.

 

Some things are just better than others.

I once saw a famous comment of yours about the matter in you tube..

(i presume it was yours )

[In Exile]

Because CDPR > Bioware and TW3 > DAI.

 

Its like saying Civil War > BvS and The Flash > Agents of Shield.

 

Some things are just better than others.

 

Sure, but that comparison doesn't work. Are you comparing TW3 to the Flash? Because that show is awful - it's B v. S level bad. 

[Gold Dragon]

Because CDPR > Bioware and TW3 > DAI.

 

Its like saying Civil War > BvS and The Flash > Agents of Shield.

 

Some things are just better than others.

 

Actually, it's DAI > TW3.

 

I've never played TW3, so....

[Al Foley]

Having played both games I think DA I is the better one.  Across the board in almost every way and the ways Witcher is better then DA I is things I really do not care about.  However: I do love both games and it is a close matchup in some of them. 

[Cz-99]

Oh, we're arguin' opinion 'ere are we?! Oooool'righ, I'm in!

 

Pokemon Crystal > TW3 & DA:I

 

It's kinda weird that, after perusing like 7 "Top X RPG Games of All Time" on 7 different sites none of them had the same game in the #1 slot. It's like they don't understand that there can only be 1 greatest RPG game of all time; 6 of those fools are lying.

 

Also, solve for X.

 

And to keep this post on-topic, I hope to Zeus that the denizens of Toussaint will not have punch-able faces and accents that the Orlesians did/do.

[Shaftell]

You do realize comparisons are unfair, Dragon Age inquisition was gimped from the start due to cross generation hardware limitations. Witcher was strictly a current gen game where they can utilize more lush settings due to the better hardware. All the problems can stem from the one issue that EA got greedy and sacrificed quality by releasing DAI to old gen, so devs had to find a workaround that was suitable for both generations.

[Al Foley]

You do realize comparisons are unfair, Dragon Age inquisition was gimped from the start due to cross generation hardware limitations. Witcher was strictly a current gen game where they can utilize more lush settings due to the better hardware. All the problems can stem from the one issue that EA got greedy and sacrificed quality by releasing DAI to old gen, so devs had to find a workaround that was suitable for both generations.

And yet somehow DA I ended up being the better game.

[Andraste_Reborn]

 

Its like saying Civil War > BvS and The Flash > Agents of Shield.

 

 

This is the part where I point out that I like Agents of SHIELD more than The Flash, right?

 

I mean, I only watched a couple of episodes of The Flash and then decided it wasn't for me, so I don't really have a fully-rounded opinion of its quality beyond 'I don't like it' but that just goes to show that opinions of entertainment are subjective.

[nici2412]

Wrong. CDPR didn't create the Witcher. It's based off of the books, which sometimes mention Toussaint.

Evidently it's based on the French. Just like BW based the Orlesians on them.

They not only mention it but a part of the novel Lady of the Lake (published in 1999) takes place in Toussaint and it's clearly France-inspired in it's description.

[Shaftell]

This is the part where I point out that I like Agents of SHIELD more than The Flash, right?

 

I mean, I only watched a couple of episodes of The Flash and then decided it wasn't for me, so I don't really have a fully-rounded opinion of its quality beyond 'I don't like it' but that just goes to show that opinions of entertainment are subjective.

I think Flash had a stellar first season and a mediocre second season. I think it was the opposite for SHIELD, season two was actually very good.