264 réponses à ce sujet

[RoboticWater]

I have to wonder what people think "integrity" means in this context. The one thing that BioWare has probably had the most control over is the story, which the fanbase almost universally believes has generally gotten worse over the years. The only thing that seems to matter in the story department is the creative talent behind it, and unfortunately that will always be a mixed bag. EA-controlled BioWare has actually been lucky enough to retain quite a few good writers on staff. That's more than I can say for Bungie or 343.

 

Even what I might consider both a beacon for the classic CRPG in the modern era and crowd funded game to boot, Pillars of Eternity, had incredibly generic lore. Most of it seemed like copy/paste D&D with some interesting mechanics surrounding souls sprinkled in. I was surprised at how little I cared about a lot of this world, but that's on the developers. We can't just chalk up that failure to a lack of integrity.

 

You could say that the gameplay of these games has gotten worse or more generic, but I don't think that's true. Mass Effect's combat has only gotten better and I think DA:I's only sin is not improving DA's combat by a significant margin. This again, seems to come down to creative talent. BioWare's combat has never been top-notch, so Mass Effect 3's great game design likely happened because of EA not in spite of them.

 

Hell, did Witcher 3's "integrity" (independence I suppose) make it so great? I applaud CDPR for having a number of well-written sidequests and well realized original setting, but that doesn't mean I can overlook the fairly bland 3rd person action combat, repetitive mission structure, and often only adequate main quest writing. And CDPR had the benefit of Poland's cheap-as-dirt cost of living and the GOG storefront subsidizing development. If we ever wanted BioWare to make a game with Witcher 3's scale, it would have to be with EA.

 

Ultimately, that's the rub. We can't get sprawling RPGs with fully realized 3D worlds without a publisher like EA and their oodles of sports game cash. If BioWare "going back to their roots," means getting rid of the shooter combat, the voiced characters, the setpieces, the cinematics, etc., then I don't want BioWare to go back. I played Pillars of Eternity. It was pretty fun, but it was no Mass Effect.

 

I'm tired of this "corporations ruin everything, man," rhetoric. It's childish and inane. Yes, publishers do some pretty lame stuff, and yes, corporate agendas to sometimes get in the way of good game design. However, those are prices that sometimes need to be payed to make a BIoWare game. The AAA space still exists for a reason, and it's not just because "idiot casuals," are lapping all of them up. There are some games that need that AAA scale, that AAA polish, that AAA talent magnet that can bring together the best writers, artists and game designers in the industry. Those things might not always happen (especially in the exact ways we want), but when they do, they hit harder than any indie game. If you want an independently developed RPG full of "integrity," then go for it. There are tons of them. Just don't expect another Mass Effect or another Dragon Age or even another KoTOR for that matter. You can't have the best of both worlds.

[Il Divo]

I will concede the point if the Mass Effect franchise is still cranking out content a decade from now   

 

 

For better or worse, I think that's very likely to happen. 

 

And I think you are doing Bioware fans a disservice.  At least as far as BG2 goes.  Characters like Minsc, Edwin, Imoen, Haer'dalis, etc are still remembered today.

 

 

Well, to be blunt, remembering a character and a character having any sort of depth aren't exactly the same thing. People remember Jar Jar Binks, after all, and he probably had more thought put into him than the BG1 cast. I generally avoid commenting too much on BG2 because I don't think I've had enough time with it to say much of value - I've beaten BG1 more times than I'd like to admit, sadly. 

 

Let's put it this way: if Bioware were to release ME:A with a BG1 style cast - I expect you'd see fans in an uproar that would put the ME3 endings to shame. 

 

THing is, I don't think KOTOR 2 was a "bad" game.  It certainly had it's problems.  Especially with the endgame.  But I say it "didn't achieve its potential"

 

 

Bad might be excessive (I actually do love KotOR 2 almost as much as the original), regardless my point is that knowing why the game is the way it is doesn't give it any sort of extra quality. 

 

Avatar: The Legend of Korra ran into a similar issue in its 4th season. The writers had to choose between laying off many of their employees and producing an episode, with very limited animation to save costs. They went with the latter and needless to say, it was the worst episode of the entire series by a long margin. I'm sympathetic to why they had to do it, but that still leaves us with a very bad episode of TV, regardless of how admirable the motive was. 

 

As for BG1 characters.  Again, you have to look at when the game was made.  Nowadays, the characters are primitive.  But at the time, I found it effing revolutionary!  Light years ahead of Ultima, or the Gold Box games.

 

 

That  works if we assume game quality has to be static but that's by no means the case. I can appreciate why Bioware's cast is so primitive in BG1. But that still leaves the issue that if I want to have any sort of significant interaction with Bioware companions, I'm going to have to turn later games. If BG's cast was "good for its time", that's essentially saying that it's no longer any good in the present sense. It's similar to saying the spell/magic effects were amazing "when it was released" - but despite that, we don't talk about how great the spell effects are now adays - we'd say they're terrible. 

[AlanC9]

Hell, did Witcher 3's "integrity" (independence I suppose) make it so great? I applaud CDPR for having a number of well-written sidequests and well realized original setting, but that doesn't mean I can overlook the fairly bland 3rd person action combat, repetitive mission structure, and often only adequate main quest writing.

I wouldn't be surprised if the bland action combat had turned out to be a selling point for TW3, but I've given up on trying to figure out what gamers writ large like. Thank god I don't work in the industry.

[AlanC9]

Let's put it this way: if Bioware were to release ME:A with a BG1 style cast - I expect you'd see fans in an uproar that would put the ME3 endings to shame.

Suddenly I'm reminded of the original NWN design.

[Seraphim24]

I wouldn't be surprised if the bland action combat had turned out to be a selling point for TW3, but I've given up on trying to figure out what gamers writ large like. Thank god I don't work in the industry.

 

Haha! Well no one says you had to or anything 

[Sanunes]

Unless the game was designed with modders in mind?  I mean, I honestly can't say if the BG games were made with them in mind (though there are certainly a LOT of mods out there) I know for fact that NWN was designed that way, with the OC being essentially an extended demo to show what "DMs" can make for players.  I don't think it's quite fair to put such games in the same category as those which the main plot is supposed to be the selling point.  

 

I can only speak for myself, but having mods would be the same for me as praising Mass Effect 3 for having good combat. The difference is what that feature means to you specifically for I really don't use mods in my games for I want to enjoy them as the developer envisioned.

[KotorEffect3]

Well I have never seen these threads before.  People pining for the "good old days", proclaiming that "bioware is dead".   Blah blah blah these same threads were popping up 5 years ago.  Well guess what bioware is still here, DAI made a crap ton of money, and MEA will probably do so as well.  Is it the same as it was before?  No, people change, people come and go, and companies change.  Is bioware worse?  No it is just different.  Accept it.

[Commander Rpg]

Well I have never seen these threads before.  People pining for the "good old days", proclaiming that "bioware is dead".   Blah blah blah these same threads were popping up 5 years ago.  Well guess what bioware is still here, DAI made a crap ton of money, and MEA will probably do so as well.  Is it the same as it was before?  No, people change, people come and go, and companies change.  Is bioware worse?  No it is just different.  Accept it.

Six years ago, to be precise, since Mass Effect 2 had been on the shelves. That game marks the starting of the current bland games' cycle. I frankly don't care too much if DA:I made money or not, it's still a flavorless game with a lot of money put into it, and what will happen with ME:A is even little concerning for me (since I I bought the first and won't buy the second one). However I'm very sad that a company that used to do good rpgs, that gave new life to the c-rpg genre, is now its former self's wraith. If you accept people (in general) to change for the worse, then you won't mind if I start calling certain games "Artist's crap".

Like this one

 

 

Then we will remember the good old days when in 2010 a lot of these cans came out...

[Iakus]

 

Well, to be blunt, remembering a character and a character having any sort of depth aren't exactly the same thing. People remember Jar Jar Binks, after all, and he probably had more thought put into him than the BG1 cast. I generally avoid commenting too much on BG2 because I don't think I've had enough time with it to say much of value - I've beaten BG1 more times than I'd like to admit, sadly. 

 

 

 

Then perhaps I should say they are remembered fondly.   

 

And I think I can say without hyperbole, that BG took what worked in BG1 and made it better.  Much of what you say about BG1 was largely ironed out in BG2.  

 

Evolution can be wonderful 

 

 

 

Let's put it this way: if Bioware were to release ME:A with a BG1 style cast - I expect you'd see fans in an uproar that would put the ME3 endings to shame.

 

 

Sure.  But this isn't 1998. Beamdog just released an expansion to BG called "Siege of Dragonspear"  So while it's not Bioware, it most certainly does have a "BG1-style cast" in that the BG1 cast is in fact there.  

 

 Look at Pillars of Eternity.  A game which BG was specifically mentioned as being an inspiration for it.  Games like BG are still being released today.  But they build upon it rather than merely copying.

 

Or, if you want to get closer to home, look at DAO.  The "spiritual successor" to Baldur's Gate.  Popular enough to launch a franchise of its own.

 

 

 

 If BG's cast was "good for its time", that's essentially saying that it's no longer any good in the present sense. It's similar to saying the spell/magic effects were amazing "when it was released" - but despite that, we don't talk about how great the spell effects are now adays - we'd say they're terrible.

 

Good for its time means exactly that:  good for its time.  There's no reason it can't be further developed, polished, and improved upon as technology advances.  Just compare BG1 with BG2.

 

Sadly, though, in recent years Bioware prefers to abandon what works in exchange for the new and shiny rather than continue to improve.

[SofaJockey]

Sometimes I wonder what kind of games would have we got if BW was bought by Bethesda or was an independent studio like CDPR. 

• Bethesda takes charge: Each planet would now include settlements to build out of debris. The relationships would get dumbed down, but you would be told if a settlement needed help.
• CDPR takes charge: Even more sex scenes, and soundtrack with Polish bagpies.

Actually, I like both those companies, but good that BioWare is separate as well...

[Seraphim24]

There's a word for companies that don't care about how many copies of their product they can sell. The word is "bankrupt."

 

There's a word for companies that care exclusively about how many copies of their product they can sell. The word is "bankrupt." 

[AlanC9]

Six years ago, to be precise, since Mass Effect 2 had been on the shelves. That game marks the starting of the current bland games' cycle. I frankly don't care too much if DA:I made money or not, it's still a flavorless game with a lot of money put into it, and what will happen with ME:A is even little concerning for me (since I I bought the first and won't buy the second one). However I'm very sad that a company that used to do good rpgs, that gave new life to the c-rpg genre, is now its former self's wraith. If you accept people (in general) to change for the worse, then you won't mind if I start calling certain games "Artist's crap".
Like this one.

It'd probably be clearer if you defined terms like "bland." I get that you have personal tastes which aren't being served, but the particulars are not really obvious.

[AlanC9]

There's a word for companies that care exclusively about how many copies of their product they can sell. The word is "bankrupt."

Sure. Your point?

[Seraphim24]

Sure. Your point?

 

Nothing else, that was it.  

[Commander Rpg]

It'd probably be clearer if you defined terms like "bland." I get that you have personal tastes which aren't being served, but the particulars are not really obvious.

https://www.vocabula...ictionary/bland

 

It's not obvious? well, it requires to turn the brain cells on and to read.

[Cyonan]

Six years ago, to be precise, since Mass Effect 2 had been on the shelves. That game marks the starting of the current bland games' cycle. I frankly don't care too much if DA:I made money or not, it's still a flavorless game with a lot of money put into it, and what will happen with ME:A is even little concerning for me (since I I bought the first and won't buy the second one). However I'm very sad that a company that used to do good rpgs, that gave new life to the c-rpg genre, is now its former self's wraith. If you accept people (in general) to change for the worse, then you won't mind if I start calling certain games "Artist's crap".

 

I think at this point it's more wondering why anybody who appears to hate everything EA era BioWare has done is still around, because it's been 6 years since the supposed "death of BioWare" and people are still moaning about it on a regular basis.

 

BioWare's legacy is great and all, but they weren't going to just remake Baldur's Gate ad infinitum(which I get the sense from some people around here that is exactly what they want). Mass Effect was still as a whole a very good series of games. Yes, even with the crap ending.

 

You might not care for the direction personally, but to call it all crap because they're not catering to you is just being petty.

[Seraphim24]

I think at this point it's more wondering why anybody who appears to hate everything EA era BioWare has done is still around, because it's been 6 years since the supposed "death of BioWare" and people are still moaning about it on a regular basis.

 

BioWare's legacy is great and all, but they weren't going to just remake Baldur's Gate ad infinitum(which I get the sense from some people around here that is exactly what they want). Mass Effect was still as a whole a very good series of games. Yes, even with the crap ending.

 

You might not care for the direction personally, but to call it all crap because they're not catering to you is just being petty.

 

Well one interesting thing is you can see people who seem to clearly and absolutely despise gamers and gaming trying to find ways to like them, that part is, well, different. 

[SKAR]

Well, that's where the question becomes: how much control has Bioware actually lost under EA? It's tempting to believe they have no say, but that doesn't really tell the whole story.

Somebody could point out a loss of originality since post-EA Bioware seems addicted to sequels - Bioware made Mass Effect with an import trilogy in mind and Dragon Age had too much time/energy invested to abandon after a single game. BG/NWN and KotOR reusing the Sword Coast and Star Wars settings are also examples of a lack of originality, in terms of setting.

Somebody could mention that post-EA Bioware has really cut out the "meat" of RPG gameplay - but then Jade Empire and Mass Effect 1 had an insane level of action focus to them. If you look at Bioware's gameplay trends, there is a pretty consistent move away from DnD mechanics with their additional games even before EA took over.

Those are just a couple examples. No doubt, having a boss over your head changes aspects of the development process. But if we're going to make the jump to "everything pre-EA is amazing and everything post-EA is terrible", then it's a pretty good idea to consider what Bioware actually prioritized even before EA took control. It's rarely as simple as complete artistic freedom to do whatever you want vs. being a slave to the new overlords.

True.

[AlanC9]

https://www.vocabula...ictionary/bland

It's not obvious? well, it requires to turn the brain cells on and to read.

Look, I get that you have trouble expressing this stuff, but this response is just lame.

If CRPGs from a few years ago had specific features you liked, you should be able to explain what they were and what was good about them.

[Sylvius the Mad]

As somebody who only first actually finished Baldur's Gate a few years ago, I think that it does still have appeal but there are also a lot of design choices in there that would be highly questionable by today's standards.

A lot of the characters are one dimensional to the point where my latest playthrough I just finished in BGEE I just created my own party and didn't feel like I really missed a whole lot.

I maintain that vanilla BG is better than BGEE. the EE took several of the "improvements" that were implemented in BG2 and added them to BG, and I don't think they serve BG well.

The combat also is just horribly outdated, and not just because it's using the outdated AD&D2 ruleset(but that doesn't help because THAC0 is stupid). Basically none of the terms are actually explained in the game which means the tooltips are going to be incredibly unclear to anybody who hasn't been playing tabletop games.

Baldur's Gate came with excellent documentation. You just had to read it.

I expect BGEE includes the documentation as digital content somewhere. There's dozens of pages of tables and charts to explain how the rules work.

This is actually the standard of documentation I expect today, and every game disappoints me.

Allied AI pathing is dumb as a rock and will often get stuck on an actual rock or other party members, so your melee characters will sometimes be sitting in the back letting your casters sit on the front line. Even setting all my tankier characters to the front in the formation, I would often find them sitting in the back for reasons unknown.

At least BioWare is consistent. The pathing in the DA games remains pretty awful.

On top of that, and this is against the D&D ruleset itself, magic becomes completely broken in the game. It turns every single fight into a CC based fight. Either you CC them before they CC you, or you have to stack CC resistance because CC will absolutely wreck anybody in the game. Often my strategy for beating a difficult fight was to just have my Sorcerer web spam the entire area and let my Paladin/Barbarian deal with everything, as they were wearing items which rendered them immune to web.

This is partly the EE problem again. BG didn't have Sorcerers (or Barbarians), so arcane casters were significantly less flexible in how they could be deployed. This helped a lot.

I also remember that BG2 broke how specialist mages worked. I don't know how BGEE handles them.

The point you raise, though, about combat, is an interesting one. I've long preferred low-level gameplay in CRPGs, and one of the reasons I like BG so much is that it only has low-level gameplay. Even with TotSC installed, the level cap is around 8 (9 for Thieves).

I also have to applaud AD&D's exponential XP curve. It allows characters to fall behind the rest of the party (so no nonsensical XP sharing with unused characters), but still catch up within one level.

I will note: I did find Baldur's Gate to be a very good game even going back and playing it for the first time years after the fact. I just think a lot of the design decisions didn't age well at all from the 90s. Especially in the combat area of the game.

I'd like to make a combat system by frankensteining together my favourite elements from BG, NWN, DAO, and DAI.

[Seraphim24]

this response is just lame.

 

As much as I rarely agree with AlanC9 on anything and actually see where CommanderRPG is coming from a lot of the time... I'd have to agree this time..

 

At the same time the reality is overall Bioware angst and Bioware defense are in the same boat and should recognize they sit closer together than they realize...

[Sylvius the Mad]

I can only speak for myself, but having mods would be the same for me as praising Mass Effect 3 for having good combat. The difference is what that feature means to you specifically for I really don't use mods in my games for I want to enjoy them as the developer envisioned.

I do not care how the developers envisioned the game. The game is useful to me only insofar as what I can do with it.

[Monk]

 

Spoiler

  ​   when they had integrity.

 

Gotta pay the bills sometime, bro.

 

 

For me what is ruining BioWare games isn't EA, but the requests you keep seeing in threads here, so I wish BioWare would stop trying to give people what they want since people don't know what they want or believe they speak for everyone when they don't.

 

Dragon Age 2 had many people wanting the game to go open world, and BioWare gave us an open world with Dragon Age: Inquisition and then people were upset that it was open world.

 

Mass Effect 1 had the annoying segments with the Mako so they might have to the extreme and removed the Mako from Mass Effect 2, but that was because people were complaining.

 

After Mass Effect 2 people wanted "their" favorite companion to return to Mass Effect 3 and boom we got them all to return, it just was a horrible diluted experience.

 

All those things are to get more people to buy copies of the game, but at the same time it is what we are asking for.

 

What's wrong with experimentation? Yes, not every game's perfect but it not only pushes BioWare to continue for a better game but keeps the development fresh for them.

 

Yes, some features were flawed but by listening to us and their own experience with what we want, they learn how to tweak features so that they come off better. Taking the example of exploration with the Mako, i bet the percentage of players complaining this time around with the MEA Mako will be smaller.

[AlanC9]

As much as I rarely agree with AlanC9 on anything and actually see where CommanderRPG is coming from a lot of the time... I'd have to agree this time..
 
At the same time the reality is overall Bioware angst and Bioware defense are in the same boat and should recognize they sit closer together than they realize...

Well, when his actual argument shows up, I'll probably be against it -- I've got no use for many CRPG traditions--so we can go back to disagreeing then.

[Sanunes]

I do not care how the developers envisioned the game. The game is useful to me only insofar as what I can do with it.

 

That is fine, but my response was don't project how good that modded content is onto BioWare because they are not the ones that made that content.  Having or not having mods in a game is fine, but I don't judge how good a game is because of the content I download for it.