214 odpowiedzi w tym temacie

[Gothfather]

This is part of why you cannot directly compare a game to some sort of classic tragedy or even cinema.  The only literature that works even remotely like a game is a "choose your own adventure" type deal.  The player has some agency, and it makes sense to reward performance.

 

It isn't as if ME2 is such that any strategy or path through the game results in the perfect ending.  It actually would make less sense if you make every preparation possible, play the game as well as possible, and then essentially the same people die as if you hadn't done anything.

 

This is not entirely different than what happened with ME3.  The real complaints were not that Shepard died, it was that the endings were largely the same regardless of player choice, and there was hardly any difference between EMS levels.  It makes sens for a piece of literature to have one iteration of events with a single outcome.  It doesn't really make sense for a game promoting player choice to end up with essentially identical outcomes for various iterations.

 

False. This is the what uniformed people think. They honestly think that a commander if they are super duper so damn awesome can eliminate casualties. That is a false ideal it is impossible. You can not eliminate casualties in an armed conflict they will happen to soldiers under your command. A reward for "performance" need not be perfect happy endings, it can be an ending with far fewer casualties. A perfect ending for SOME stories should be an impossibility. This idea that agency trumps all is BS it doesn't. Players constantly complain about bad stories in games and this is because they demand agency to the point where it trumps storytelling. Bioware has consistently said nope we will NOT let agency trump story telling. So players praise the story but then ignorantly whine that Bioware games don't have as much agency as other RPGs.

 

There was ZERO way to play a psychopath in DA:I because the story demanded that player agency to be able to be as psychotic as you could in DA:O was eliminated. It would make no sense for a religious order to follow a psychotic prophet. So you simply were NOT given the agency to be one. Agency=/=role playing. Zero agency isn't what i am ascribing here either. I am saying as a MINOR partner and make no mistake the player is a MINOR partner in the storytelling process in any Bioware game. You are limited in your choice in the game from your background, to your voice to actions within the gamescape. 

 

The limits on agency should include endings this doesn't mean that you should have zero agency only that some stories do not lend themselves to rainbow and unicorns this is especially true about MATURE titles. And yes you can directly compare games with other forms of storytelling media because the rules for good storytelling are universal. I am not saying a good story = a good game. I am saying a good story requires LIMITS on agency in a game. Also many good games have limited agency so lots of agency =/= a good game either. In fact you are REQUIRED to have limits on agency to even have a game.

 

Here is a character concept with total agency:

 

I am an all powerful all knowing entity that lives in the centre of the universe. This character has ultimate agency I can do and know ANYTHING but because of my ultimate agency this is no game that can be created with unlimited agency because I know all and can do all so there are no mysteries or obstacles to this character. This shows the fallacy many gamers have in equating agency with a good game. Some agency is required yes more agency does not automatically equate to better and this is proven because total agency equates to no game.

 

Which takes us back when and where should agency be limited to the player well surprise surprise in a Story driven RPG the narrative should trump player agency because without it you can't craft a well structured narrative and a story driven rpg is specifically designed to tell a... wait for it... a STORY. So the story being the foundational block upon which a story driven rpg is built should be written in a manner that the needs of the story trump the desire of the player for agency. You don't have much agency in a telltale game why? because it is a story driven experience.

 

just to be clear many games are successful and well crafted games that have almost no story and include lots of player agency. I am not stating that player agency is wrong or that a good game has to have a strong narrative what I am saying is that a game designed to tell a story MUST limit player agency to accomplish this and it must be based upon the millennia of knowledge we have in word smithing and this agency limitation will require that SOME stories limit the possible endings. Again to stress this does not mean you have no ability to shape an ending or that all stories require a sad ending. I am saying that the needs of the story dictate what endings fit a given story driven game and this SOMETIMES means your rainbow and unicorn ending isn't possible.

[Gothfather]

I too worry that they learned the wrong lessons from Mass Effect 3, especially if you look at the ending of DAI.

 

The ending didn't suck because Shepard dies, and can't retire to a beach on Bekelstein and have cute blue babies with his asari waifu.

 

The ending sucked because the truth behind the reapers, the biggest mystery of the series, makes no sense, and it didn't feel like your choices made a difference in the end. And all this nonsense from an exposition AI instead of actually discovering things yourself.

 

Solution: figure out the motivation for your villains now, at the start of your trilogy, rather than coming to the end and having to cobble together whatever nonsense you can. Show the effects of the player's choices, preferably not in a slideshow.

 

Another solution: Make sure you get whoever wrote the first one and set it all up to stay on a lead writer (there's this cool thing called a contract, look it up) so you don't have to get someone else to finish what wasn't their vision to begin with.

 

I agree and disagree on your position of the ME3 endings.

 

I do actually think your are right that Shepard dying isn't a factor in the quality of the endings. But I think the motivation of the Reapers is very well thought out but it requires a DLC to get said information and even then this doesn't save the endings. I go into depth about this in another post with video sources to show that teh reapers make sense but only in the context of what we learn in the leviathan dlc.

 

if interested...

 

https://forum.biowar...9#entry20047711

 

The endings fail because despite the hugely divergent 'world states' you can construct within the game upon reaching the endings the game doesn't reflect that in your available endings. Instead you get a clunky war assets gate for two out of the three/four endings which do not in any way reflect the 'world state' the player crafted by their decisions. So literally no choice you made in the series mattered all that mattered was what is my total war assets and given how MP created automatic war assets to the game this also created even more weight on how your actual decisions had little to no impact on the endings. And when the player feels that their choices don't matter the endings will feel hollow.

 

Secondly the endings fail because the game mechanics where in opposition to the story narrative. Mechanics of a game create a narrative unto themselves. This is why the 'power fantasy' fails in a horror games or survival games. If the mechanics let you indulge in the power fantasy then you won't feel unempowered and thus scared in a horror game which utterly defeats the purpose of playing a horror game. likewise a survival game requires that you feel you might not survive so you can't feel empowered because when you feel empowered you are not worried about survival. In the ME trilogy you are told over and over again that the reapers are so powerful they can't be defeated conventionally but Shepard defeats them conventionally EVERY TIME. Post prologue of ME2 you can go the entire series with ZERO casualties under your command. Every scripted death is of a FORMER crew member. Every reaper encountered DEAD. So by the time you reach priority earth you are not thinking 'I might lose this.' You are thinking 'reapers smeapers. I got this.' Yet when you arrive you are told the plan has gone to sh!t and things are even more of a hail mary then before but you never feel this is the case. This create two conflicting narratives in the game the story and the mechanics and because these two narratives are in opposition there isn't an ending that will resolve both because they are mutually exclusive so any ending will feel off.

[themikefest]

 I hated the breath and dumb smile your LI had and I don't think this will happen again. 

The problems I have with that scene is if Shepard didn't romance anyone or romanced Miranda or Jack, one of the other characters holds the nameplate. How would that character know if Shepard could still be alive? The hesitation wasn't needed. Someone had to of informed them that Anderson is dead for them to put up his nameplate. I would guess those who found his body were the same ones that found Shepards body, if destroy is chosen. The character is quick to put up the nameplate if ems is below 3100, but hesitates if above 3100. With the other two, how do they know Shepard is dead? If anything, he/she is currently missing in action.

 

Had all squadmates been on Earth fighting at Shepard's side along with the ME2 squadmates, like the suicide mission, the memorial scene wouldn't of been needed

 

Too bad the breath scene couldn't be expanded further.  I do agree that something like that won't happen again

[DuskWanderer]

The ending controversy was that the logic of it only applied to a small portion of the game (The quarian/geth conflict), and you could spit in the face of the Reapers with that. The rest of it didn't follow the theme. 

 

DA: I lacked tension, it was not controversial. I don't mind being an unambiguous good guy against a villain as long as it can appeal to my emotions, but I never thought Inky would lose. The whole SJW ridiculousness of the characters is just poor writing. 

[Sanunes]

I wonder what the devs and writers actual thoughts on the matter are.

Anybody heard anything Casey Hudson has said on the matter since leaving EA/Bioware and joining Microsoft?

 

I doubt you will see anyone really give an opinion unless they are done with the industry for sometimes having an opinion can come back to haunt a person that makes those comments.

 

 

I too worry that they learned the wrong lessons from Mass Effect 3, especially if you look at the ending of DAI.

 

The ending didn't suck because Shepard dies, and can't retire to a beach on Bekelstein and have cute blue babies with his asari waifu.

 

The ending sucked because the truth behind the reapers, the biggest mystery of the series, makes no sense, and it didn't feel like your choices made a difference in the end. And all this nonsense from an exposition AI instead of actually discovering things yourself.

 

Solution: figure out the motivation for your villains now, at the start of your trilogy, rather than coming to the end and having to cobble together whatever nonsense you can. Show the effects of the player's choices, preferably not in a slideshow.

 

Another solution: Make sure you get whoever wrote the first one and set it all up to stay on a lead writer (there's this cool thing called a contract, look it up) so you don't have to get someone else to finish what wasn't their vision to begin with.

 

That is your view of the endings and it is perfectly valid, but the problem is the loudest cries about the problems about the endings of Mass Effect 3 were that Shepard didn't live to fight another day.  As far as choices not mattering that should have been obvious across all three games that our choices will never have a major impact on anything, they didn't matter during Mass Effect 1 nor did they matter during any of the two sequels, I don't see why they would change direction just for the ending of the game.  Especially with people saying that one of the problems of the endings of Mass Effect 3 was that the endings were too divergent so making them even more divergent would make the problem worse for others.

 

For me the biggest problem with Mass Effect as a whole is that the expectation of what we could get with technology and man power available would never ever match the expectations of people that play the game.  To me the biggest flaw of BioWare is the save import system for I think it gives people an unrealistic expectation of what can really progress through the game.  I think Mass Effect would have been better as a series if all we carried forwards was Shepard and all choices and consequences were handled in the game they happened in and I think that would have prevented a lot of expectations of an ending that BioWare tried and failed to give us.

Użytkownik Sanunes edytował ten post 13 lipiec 2016 - 07:12

[Fredward]

Yeah, anodyne endings aren't very memorable. Although, in the case of DAI I don't think Cory was the real villain, that was Solas. Cory was lame but Solas got everything he wanted, I almost feel like Corypheus only existed to contrast with Solas, similar in some ways but Solas' is just so much better at... everything.

 

Of Bioware's games I think I like DAOs endings the best, all the endings had some sense of bitterness or unease about your choices.

[Remix-General Aetius]

The ME3 endings weren't bad. That's just YOUR opinion and of those who didn't get their bunnies-n-rainbows sparkly-ponies happy ending.

[AngryFrozenWater]

The ME3 endings weren't bad. That's just YOUR opinion and of those who didn't get their bunnies-n-rainbows sparkly-ponies happy ending.

Ghehe. That really got to you, didn't it? Didn't it occur to you that you just happen to have a different opinion. Your opinion. Of course that's OK, but don't throw ridicule back.

[straykat]

Yeah, anodyne endings aren't very memorable. Although, in the case of DAI I don't think Cory was the real villain, that was Solas. Cory was lame but Solas got everything he wanted, I almost feel like Corypheus only existed to contrast with Solas, similar in some ways but Solas' is just so much better at... everything.

 

Of Bioware's games I think I like DAOs endings the best, all the endings had some sense of bitterness or unease about your choices.

 

Possibly because they didn't know if it'd be a success. It worked like the first Star Wars movie, I think. Sort of ties up most loose ends, but open ended enough just in case.

[dorktainian]

If their aim was to create controversy with the endings, they certainly achieved that goal.

Evidenced by all the threads and different posters, myself included.

I wonder what the devs and writers actual thoughts on the matter are.

Anybody heard anything Casey Hudson has said on the matter since leaving EA/Bioware and joining Microsoft?

 

i dunno, but when he said he thought an end boss battle with harbinger would be 'a little too video gamey' I honestly wondered what the point was of making the video game that was mass effect 3.  What was he trying to accomplish?  You don't plan something out not knowing your final destination.

[straykat]

i dunno, but when he said he thought an end boss battle with harbinger would be 'a little too video gamey' I honestly wondered what the point was of making the video game that was mass effect 3.  What was he trying to accomplish?  You don't plan something out not knowing your final destination.

 

I think that was dumb, although I'm still not a big ending hater. It's like he was letting their flair for the Cinematic get to his head or something. AS IF they really believed they were making movies now... rather than games.

[TheJediSaint]

I think that was dumb, although I'm still not a big ending hater. It's like he was letting their flair for the Cinematic get to his head or something. AS IF they really believed they were making movies now... rather than games.

And not very good movies, at that.

[Gwydden]

 I really think Bioware should simply ignore their fans and make the game they want to. Gamers are not a homogenized demographic they are in fact a fractured community with different groups wanting mutually exclusive things. This means that anything they do will ****** off someone so it this is the case, better you make a game you want than try and cater to a group that will still hate what you did because they are not a united voice.

Oh, definitely. They should just do whatever it is they want and let the cards fall where they will.

 

If Bioware was unable to try different things and succeed we would never have gotten ME. Which is a rather large departure from Kotor which was a rather large departure from Baldur's gate. ME2 is a significant departure from Me as well. I don't beleive you have actually looked at Bioware's game catalogue and seen just how divergent their games are from each other and how successful they are with their changes. Do they succeed all the time? No but they are never stale compared to so many other studios.

 

Not quite what I meant by saying they always stick to a formula. I was referring to the storytelling in their games: most if not all of them have basically the same plot and more or less the same characters.

[Chealec]

I would be happy with an everybody dies ending as long as it made sense and didn't come out nowhere.

 

Play ME3 then and shoot the starbrat ... it's the only ending that makes sense IMO.

[Chealec]

The ME3 endings weren't bad. That's just YOUR opinion and of those who didn't get their bunnies-n-rainbows sparkly-ponies happy ending.

 

The ME3 endings were terrible - Refuse was the only one that made sense and that's hardly bunnies and rainbows.

[straykat]

Play ME3 then and shoot the starbrat ... it's the only ending that makes sense IMO.

 

Perhaps it makes sense, but it's still uncool.

 

I'll take nonsensical instead.

[Sanunes]

 

Not quite what I meant by saying they always stick to a formula. I was referring to the storytelling in their games: most if not all of them have basically the same plot and more or less the same characters.

 

That is because people won't accept any changes to that formula.  Yes Dragon Age 2 reused dungeons, but it also was a completely different approach they got raked over the coals for as well.

[Iakus]

That is because people won't accept any changes to that formula.  Yes Dragon Age 2 reused dungeons, but it also was a completely different approach they got raked over the coals for as well.

They got raked over the coals because Hawke had very little agency.   Ten years and nothing really changed.

 

People complained about how monotonous the side quests were in DAI?  I was wondering why Hawke gets to spend ten years as Batman beating up street gangs without getting any of the benefits of being Bruce Wayne... I felt little reason why he'd want to stay in Kirkwall after Act 1.

 

Edit:  The story itself was okay.  There's nothing wrong with a small, personal tale.  But the player seems to be a passenger observing the story rather than participating.

[straykat]

They got raked over the coals because Hawke had very little agency.   Ten years and nothing really changed.

 

People complained about how monotonous the side quests were in DAI?  I was wondering why Hawke gets to spend ten years as Batman beating up street gangs without getting any of the benefits of being Bruce Wayne... I felt little reason why he'd want to stay in Kirkwall after Act 1.

 

I can answer the last one at least. A main theme of the game is family and home. Not just for Hawke.. pretty much everyone. They're not going to leave like that. They're trying to create a home.

 

7 years

 

I'm surprised you focused on that as a bad sidequest though. It's better than the hit n run fetch quests there. DA2's got it's share of them. They kind of have 3 types of sidequests, and the best are the dialogue driven ones. Not even DAI has those.

[SKAR]

What part of that makes any sense? They made a mistake and learned their lesson. Why would they want to make that mistake again? Shut it.

[SKAR]

Double post.

[Gileadan]

I can answer the last one at least. A main theme of the game is family and home. Not just for Hawke.. pretty much everyone. They're not going to leave like that. They're trying to create a home.

7 years

I like small personal stories a lot, but I disliked DA2 for the asset reuse, the hamfisted storytelling with its forced drama, the "brown tube" outdoor level design and the tumbleweed town of Kirkwall.

And for some reason, the game was not advertised as a personal story at all. The pre launch trailers had big badass Hawke walk towards the camera to the tagline "the rise to power begins on march 8th" or something. People might have gotten the impression that they were going to be served another power fantasy.

Remembering DA2 makes me wary whenever BioWare mentions family, because their idea of it seems to be "forced drama cannon fodder".

[Iakus]

I can answer the last one at least. A main theme of the game is family and home. Not just for Hawke.. pretty much everyone. They're not going to leave like that. They're trying to create a home.

 

7 years

 

I'm surprised you focused on that as a bad sidequest though. It's better than the hit n run fetch quests there. DA2's got it's share of them. They kind of have 3 types of sidequests, and the best are the dialogue driven ones. Not even DAI has those.

Not every Hawke is going to feel that way, though.

 

I mean the sibling is either dead or a Warden or part of the Circle (mage or Templar) Leandra is finally set up in her family home.  What's left for Hawke?  Besides beating up street crime?  Especially after Leandra dies in Act 2, I felt no compelling reason for Hawke to stay.

 

Which I suppose is a reason for "save the world" plots, as they do give a reason for sticking around.  Self-preservation, if nothing else.

 

It was an example of how nothing really changed in Kirkwall in 10 (7) years.  AS a penniless mercenary you're beating up bandits, the carta, and other thugs.  As a scion of Amell you're beating up bandits, the carta, and other thugs.  As Champion of Kirkwall, well, you get the idea.

 

I'd hoped that running the Bone Pit would become an aspect of the story.  Or maybe playing politics as one of Kirkwall's elite.  Or playing diplomat to other Marcher cities.  Or...something that makes Hawke more than a hired sword.  Something that shows that Hawke's "rise to power" has an impact on Kirkwall.

[straykat]

Not every Hawke is going to feel that way, though. 

 

That's what the game is largely about though. Like I said, even with companions. Almost every one of them talks about finding a home or searching for an identity/roots in some way or another.

 

It's like saying someone doesn't care that DAO revolves around themes of survival vs death. It's kind of everywhere in the game.

 

I agree about the Bone Pit though. I get the feeling they had a good idea for it once.

[mopotter]

I disagree. The story should dictate things. The player is a MINOR partner in the storytelling process this means sometimes you have to accept things are not in your control this includes endings. Having Shepard die was a smart move, it fills the narrative archetype Shepard was filling which was a messiah and that was what Shepard was from a literary archetype standpoint not a religious one. And Shepard paying the price to save the galaxy is 100% fitting and frankly player QQing that writers actually follow millennias' worth of literary knowledge on story telling trumps player agency in my book. 

 

Hell i felt they shouldn't have been an "out" in DA:O. A warden should have HAD to die period. Doesn't have to be the player but no "easy" button. Players are too ignorant of their own literary history and culture and when games ignore the knowledge we have on how to craft stories we complain the stories are crap and when they actually follow them we complain yet again.

 

Some stories lend themselves to mainly positive endings like ME1 other do not like ME2 which makes the perfect suicide run feel so fraking stupid. oooh the reapers are so scary that no one dies in my crew? because what? i am so damn super awesome special? The reapers were suppose to represent a force that could not be defeated by conventional needs but some how Shepard does at every opportunity? Not really the threat presented are they now.

 

This I must have the option of a happy ending just flies in teh face of all the knowledge we know about storytelling. If a story is about armed conflict there should be no hope of a casualty free ending. The player doesn't have to die but armed conflict comes at a COST and MATURE titled games should not make it possible to have a cost free ending. Tragedy should ALWAYS be part and parcel of a mature RPG's story when armed conflict is involved. Want happy cost free endings buy a teen title. mature should mean mature not just sex and/or boobs found here. And don't give me dark=/=mature argument either people this is about not shying away from MATURE consequences of our actions and choosing to kill the enemy means the enemy will sometimes kill you and yours. And the player shouldn't be able to choose NOT to suffer these consequences because they are sad.

Ugh.  something went wrong and my eloquent words went to the land of the lost thought.

 

Yes, I play video games, read books and go to movies  to get away from the "real" world once in awhile.  Don't like it too bad.   I have never understood the idea I've seen  that there should not be any options for an ending except whatever it is that the person making the statement feels is correct.  I can't remember anyone who wants the option to survive saying JUST GIVE ME LIFE nothing else,  I know I haven't said it.  I like choices and I like replaying games and making those different choices. 

 

Having options does not diminish any choices someone else makes.  It's no skin off my nose if someone wants to die every time they play ME2 or DAO, ME3 or any other game.  They should not care that I have more than one game where different choices were made.  Tali dies, Tali lives, Garrus dies, Garrus lives, the crew melts, the crew is saved, almost everyone dies, everyone survives.   

 

Sometimes a Shepard wants Joker and Edi to be happy so she pushes the green button and sometimes she want something else (as indicated in my signature).

 

DAO Alistair dies, Loghain takes it for the team, my character dies, My character talks Loghain into having sex with the witch and I go off with Zev.  My warden becomes queen or king.   i certainly would not have played any of these games for years without these differences.  Those options make the game so much more than it would be if everyone or most everyone died every time it's played.  

 

Bioware has always been pretty good at giving me bang for my bucks.  KOTOR sith or jedi; Jade Empire closed fist or open palm.  Then they increased the options and it is good.  I plan on keeping all of their games and playing them in the nursing home.  Hopefully some enterprising youngster will think about all of us "mature" gamers and include this within the next 10 years or so.

 

Bottom line for me, Video games should be entertaining.  Having my character die means I'm not going to play it more than once and that's not entertaining.