10 réponses à ce sujet

[TheAtomicSurvivor]

I am not necessarily a fan of how games have handled the approval and disapproval system. They automatically think that a disapproving with someone means, automatic disrespect or that you don't like someone. No, I have not agreed with someone's actions before, but I still respect them as an individual. It seems Dragon Age, and many other RPGs fall into this category of not understanding that

 

You can agree with someone and still disrespect them as a person

 

You can disagree with someone and still respect them as a person

 

I think I'd like to see more of a Loyalty system instead. Companions give their opinions about each circumstance, giving you the details of how they think. The player determines from there what their companions agree and disagree with, and the Companions are then rewarded with loyalty points instead.

 

Loyalty points determine how much someone is willing to open up with you. Much like how the Divine points worked with Vivienne and Cassandra.

 

If they don't agree with the circumstance:

 

0 Loyalty points

 

If it's a neutral stance:

 

+2 Loyalty points

 

If it's a stance they agree on:

 

+4 Loyalty points

 

These points would then determine whether or not they stay in your service. Whether or not they disrespect you. Because it shouldn't be:

 

Oh I disagree with you, I hate you, how dare you not cater to me

 

It should be:

 

I disagree with you, but I respect you still or can see the logic in your thinking

 

Because I think that's a much more realistic take. 

[Pokemario]

This is partially why I liked the Friendship/Rivalry system so much.

[Rascoth]

As long as they stop locking companion quests behind aproval, they can keep the system. If not... I really hope they do something with it.

[TheAtomicSurvivor]

As long as they stop locking companion quests behind aproval, they can keep the system. If not... I really hope they do something with it.

 

Well for me, I have a number of friends where I disagree with a few of their political stances or religious. But! That doesn't mean that I am generally going to stop talking to them. To me it seems immature and childish. As much as its funny to see Cassandra drunk because she doesn't agree with the Inquisitor, honestly real people do not behave like that. Well real, mature people don't.

 

The simple example I have is this;

 

You and a friend get into a heated argument about politics. You and your friend do not agree with a certain stance. The next thing you know either of you are removing each other off of facebook. It's childish.

 

You are not going to agree with everyone. And everyone will not have the same beliefs as you. To expect that someone will and will consistently please you with every decision they make is an unrealistic expectation. And completely unrealistic. If video games want to be the future of narration and storytelling, they need to start thinking in a more.....

 

Grown up way.

 

Mature, decent, common sense Adults do not go, "Rawr I do not agree with you, I'll take you off my social media"

 

The social media is a metaphor. 

[Tidus]

I like the approval/disapprove because it lets me know how I stand with my mates. While I don't always agree with others on this and other forums I keep  respectful in my replies..

[FieryDove]

This is partially why I liked the Friendship/Rivalry system so much.

 

I liked it too but it needed work.

 

"No Anders, I support mages! I just don't like blood magic, abominations or...you!"

 

"You want to enslave mages!" No Justice I....oh just forget it, I give up!

[PhroXenGold]

This is partially why I liked the Friendship/Rivalry system so much.

 

While it was an interesting system, and I did love some of the results, ultimately, I felt it didn't completely work, in particular because there was no distinction between "disagree but respect" and "straight out dislike". I mean, take, Merril for example.You can, in general, gain rivalry points with her by either 1) opposing her use of the mirror, trying to protect her from the consequences of blood magic etc. or 2) abusing mages and elves, and generally treating her cruelly. Given how her story works out, you can see the first path ending up with her respecting Hawke and being loyal to her even though they have their differences. The second path....less so.

 

It strikes me that we rather needed two separate measures - say "approval" or "affection"  and "loyalty" or "respect" - to distinguish between them. Some actions will raise both, some will raise one, some will raise one but lower the other and so on. Negative approval means they don't agree with your views, negative loyalty means they actively oppose what you're doing. Having just "loyalty" means that you lack the distinction on the other axis (respecting someone and liking them are not the same thing) and leaves us with basically the same problem as we started with.

[nightscrawl]

As long as they stop locking companion quests behind aproval, they can keep the system. If not... I really hope they do something with it.

 

I disagree. I don't think you should have the opportunity to see the personal side of some follower if they dislike you.

 

However, they are not consistent with this. You can get Vivienne's quest even if she hates your guts. Bull's quest, which ostensibly (being about the Qun) doesn't have anything to do with his personal life, IS gated by approval, when I don't think it should be. But I do think it's appropriate to gate Dorian's quest, and Solas's quest, since the Inquisitor is approached on a personal level concerning these followers.

[CronoDragoon]

I'd rather them do away with points systems. Instead, track key pieces of personal dialogue while allowing a few important events in the game to pivot your relationship permanently.

 

So, for example, if you and a follower have a conversation about mages, and you express an opposite opinion, the character remembers that and the game reacts if in a later conversation the topic is brought up. Otherwise, the relationship stays the same. Where the relationship can change is when the game has several large branch paths based on your decisions. So if you do something the follower is so totally opposed to that it contradicts basically who they are, then stuff gets real. They try and kill you, or hate you after, or leave the group, etc. I think eliminating the gamification of relationships entirely also provides the benefit of having players focus more on finding out about the character and less about trying to influence the character's opinion of them.

[nightscrawl]

I'd rather them do away with points systems. Instead, track key pieces of personal dialogue while allowing a few important events in the game to pivot your relationship permanently.

 

So, for example, if you and a follower have a conversation about mages, and you express an opposite opinion, the character remembers that and the game reacts if in a later conversation the topic is brought up. Otherwise, the relationship stays the same. Where the relationship can change is when the game has several large branch paths based on your decisions. So if you do something the follower is so totally opposed to that it contradicts basically who they are, then stuff gets real. They try and kill you, or hate you after, or leave the group, etc. I think eliminating the gamification of relationships entirely also provides the benefit of having players focus more on finding out about the character and less about trying to influence the character's opinion of them.

 

I think that simplifies things too much, and -- I almost hesitate to use the word -- is not realistic for how people behave toward each other. People form opinions on others based on large events, and also continuous small things that build up over time. You may have the same opinion as someone else about politics, but may also think they are just a general a-hole, and I think that should be reflected. I quite liked the DAI method of having the follower's on-click one-liners change based on approval, Cassandra's curt "What is it?" changes to "Yes, my friend?" and so on. I think it's a nice touch.

 

But there will always be some sort of point system that the game uses to keep track of these things. Whether it is hidden from the player, or not, is another matter entirely. Consequently, players will always try to "game" the game to get the results they want, even if there are no meters or numbers shown. Look at the Divine election. While every aspect of that in DAI hasn't been worked out by players, there are general things they have managed to figure out to influence the outcome and get the result they want, despite there being no indication in the game itself.

[CronoDragoon]

I think that simplifies things too much, and -- I almost hesitate to use the word -- is not realistic for how people behave toward each other. People form opinions on others based on large events, and also continuous small things that build up over time. You may have the same opinion as someone else about politics, but may also think they are just a general a-hole, and I think that should be reflected. I quite liked the DAI method of having the follower's on-click one-liners change based on approval, Cassandra's curt "What is it?" changes to "Yes, my friend?" and so on. I think it's a nice touch.

 

 

You can also express the stance that someone is a general a-hole by tracking enough of the small discussions I mentioned, though. There are only so many topics that are going to come up in the course of one of these games, and of those only so many will justify a change in attitude for a follower. Instead of just assigning points values and having one general catch-all attitude for "I like you, I don't like you", followers will react about what specific topics have made them like or not like you. I also feel it's more rewarding for the player to know why someone likes or doesn't like your character, and this is better expressed by dialogue chains than points that all get thrown into the same bucket.