[quote]Sylvius the Mad wrote...
What the core features are doesn't change over time.
If you want different core features, define a new genre. [/quote]
Let me put this simply:
Core features - of everything[/i] - do change - over time. It’s all a matter of what a given name start to encompass in the experience of the people using a given language or even a given action.
Take the word “hospital” for instance. Hospitals were originally rest rooms attached to monasteries and convents, originating as religious communities, with care provided by monks and nuns. The name [/i]hospital has the same roots as “hotel” and “hospitality” and this is especially apparent in many languages (including my own) which still has words like “hóspede” (guest) and “hospedar” (to house, to receive someone). Oh, and by the way, did you knew that the act of putting your hand over your mouth when you yawn or sneeze has its origin in superstitious beliefs that your spirit would leave your body through your mouth if you didn’t put your hand on its way like a
barrier, only to become a basic norm of politeness in our days? So what are you going to do next time you yawn, just leave your mouth open because you're not superstitious or follow the current notion that not covering your mouth is impolite, despite the fact that the latter is a result of changed perceptions?
So, as you can see, what a word or act actually means does [/i]change with time, so you’ll just have to accept that RPG will follow the same route as everything else in the history of Mankind.[/b]
[quote]Sylvius the Mad wrote...
Again, you're just assuming that the authored narrative is paramount. Why do you think that? [/quote]
Because it’s already being used in
everything else in the story besides the main catalyst of all the events? There’s nothing inherently wrong with the way you build a given vehicle, but if its engine isn’t compatible with everything else, then it’s not doing much good, now is it?
[quote]Sylvius the Mad wrote...
That's considerably better than being stuck to the limitations of dialogue options you're not even allowed to choose between.
Mass Effect may as well never offer you choice at all and just be a movie. It would be the game amount of roleplaying. [/quote]
Nelly21 summed it up pretty well a few pages back. I could add a few things on everything that’s said in this post, but it will do:
[quote]nelly21 wrote...
Mass Effect 2 is not an rpg.
The decision whether your Shepard is male or female: not a choice
The class you choose to play as: not a choice
Playing the game as paragon, renegade or something in between: not a choice
Choosing what order to recruit your squad mates and whether to recruit them
all: not a choice
Choosing between moral issues and squad loyalty: not a choice
Deciding who survives the suicide mission: not a choice
Deciding whether to hand over the most advanced artifact in the galaxy to
arguably the most organization in the galaxy: Not a choice
Mass Effect 2 is clearly devoid of all choice. [/quote]
Maybe ME2 feels more like a movie, and you know what? It’s a pretty good one for all the unique things that it allows you to do with it.
[quote]Sylvius the Mad wrote...
You had plenty of opportunities to choose to do things differently in DAO. It just didn't have a simply good/evil meter to tell you how you were doing.
Look at Redcliffe. I think an altruistic character saves the town. I think an evil character saves the town. I think a
duty-driven character leaves the town to die. [/quote]
And no matter what character you are, you
are going to save the world from the Archdemon and like it,[/i] Mr.!
That’s what a defined character does for you in a game: it actually makes sense when you’re given more limited choices because you have a clearly defined reason as to why you’re not allowed to go a given way. In games like DA, you just get stuck on a wall because there’s not a “I want to go this way” option. That’s why, for instance, becoming a Specter felt like a natural development of the story while becoming a Grey Warden was just
another
But Thou Must moment out of many.
[quote]Sylvius the Mad wrote...
BioWare explicitly told you in advance that your character in DAO was the hero. But what sort of hero you were was entirely up to you, and you had the ability to play a coherent character from start to finish with only minor issues here and there.
Mass Effect, on the other hand, denied you obvious choices (like responding negatively to Ashley's religion) and never let you know what sort of person you were playing until after you'd done something. [/quote]
So… you’re upset you couldn’t tell Ash to stuff it about religion but you’re fine that my City Elf, who has a deep resentment against humans, can only express his aggressiveness towards humans once in every blue moon. Oh, and that’s when he doesn’t end up bowing to them at the end (as he did with Caillan). “You had the ability to
play a coherent character from start to finish”, was it? That’s great…
[quote]Sylvius the Mad wrote...
It's that kind of empty response that will make people reaslise your position
is baseless. [/quote]
Sometimes I just get a bit tired of replying with long explanations that will be ignored and then I don’t feel like typing it all over again on the next time you complain about something I’d already retorted to a few moments ago.
Oh, and given the fact that people are actually siding more with me than they are with you (even if we might diverge on various opinions), I’d reconsider that statement. After all, I don’t believe you’ve got a lot of
[quote]Gorn Kregore wrote...
Murphy's law of rpg purists. "we're always right ur always wrong, since ur
wrong ur inferior to us purists ha-ha-ha"[/quote]
kind of guys running around, do you?
[quote]Sylvius the Mad wrote...
Why would I need to revise the lines after the fact? Why not accept that people can misunderstand me?
Communication isn't a thing. I can't control how people react to what I say or do. But I can control what I say or do.
Unless I'm Commander Shepard. Then I'm an out-of-control lunatic. [/quote]
Why would you need to revise that? Because half of the time it will sound like a goddamned
poorly translated Anime:
“I would like to know more about you
The Sacred Chalice of Onkatosh.”
“So, you’re ready for the Proving Trial! Go on, it’s all ready and good luck.”
“Wait, no, I didn’t say I wanted to try to get the - *gets locked up*
Goddamnit!”
[quote]Sylvius the Mad wrote...
So your insistence that he is is your own fault. Stop blaming the game for your own lack of imagination. [/quote]
I’ll try to explain this in small words so you can understand: I know that he’s not a mute because I’m apparently able to talk to people (so either my character can talk or everyone else has telepathic abilities in order to read my mind and know what I can say) but that doesn’t change the fact that it feels [/i]like I’m a mute, given that I never heard my character talk during
freaking dialogs! It doesn’t really feel like a normal conversation if one side is using his mouth and the other just stand there creepily looking into the other person without ever opening his mouth.
[quote]Sylvius the Mad wrote...
I choose to pause constantly to aim in Mass Effect because it improves the game.
I was really annoyed that I couldn't do that with the sniper scope. And why couldn't I fire while puased? I got trigger biotic while paused. Why not my weapon?
ME was just inconsistently assembled. The more I talk about it the less good I think it was. [/quote]
Do I really [/i]need to explain this to you? Seriously, do I need to break it down as to why an ability that you use once every so often is used in a different way than an action which is done continually until stopped? I mean, how did you want shooting to be handled in the game? Keep imputing the exact number of bullets that you want to fire before getting back into cover when there’s a perfectly functional and
natural keep-shooting-until-I-tell-you-to-stop mechanic that we’ve used since ever? Oh, and apparently I also have to remind you that, when you use a one-shot ability, you don’t have to worry about
keeping your aim on the freaking MOVING target as you do in continual-fire situation.
Good Lord, my younger sister could figure this out and she doesn’t even know what Mass Effect is!
[quote]Sylvius the Mad wrote...
Sure. The problem with ME is that it forces you to ruin the game by acting out of character. The only way to avoid acting out of character is not to have a personality at all. Let Shepard be nothing more than a puppet, and only then can the game make any sense. [/quote]
Again, the game makes perfect sense as is
because you have a well-defined character whose actions you can understand, so long as you don’t choose your options by spinning a roulette. The player directs the character whoever they see fit and if there’s inconsistency, then that’s because they purposefully sought it out.
[quote]Sylvius the Mad wrote...
That sort of system rewards you for having people skills. You tell people what they want to hear, and they like you.
Some games require that your character actually believe all the things he says, and that can easily break a character in the way you describe. But a good RPG doesn't do that. Those dialogue options are simply
things you can say, and there's nothing more to them than that. Your character might be lying; only you would know. [/quote]
Given the fact that the game conveniently points out when your character is lying, your argument makes no sense. That’s why these games often have options like:
1. No, I won’t help you.
2. I don’t want to get involved in this.
3. OK, you can trust me.
4. (Lie) OK, you can trust me.
#4 is the only option that is considered a lie, every single other option is a sincere response.
Also, “the system rewards you for having people skills”? You honestly believe that saying “amen” to every single thing that someone says is having people skills? Then if you ever have to lead a group, you’ll be in deep trouble.
Having people’s skills means possessing the ability to make people see things
your way, to be able to persuade them, not just blindly agree with everything they say, because inevitably someone is going to realize that you’re not actually acting on what they thought was your honest opinion, and end up seeing you as a liar.
On the other hand, someone who can work around another person’s divergent opinion and make them see things their way,
that is someone with actual people skills. You know, just like what you do on Mass Effect when you convince Garrus, Ash and Kaidan to see the merits of doing things by the book/being less/prejudiced/becoming
more prejudiced, even though they started off on the opposite spectrum.
Dragon Age actually has a few moments like this, like when you convince Leilianna to become a bit “tougher” after facing Marjolaine or when you persuade Zevran that siding with the werewolves isn’t such a bad thing. The only difference is that Shepard actually presents a convincing argument instead of just uttering the most convincing “(Persuade) It’s for the best.” in History.
[quote]Sylvius the Mad wrote...
Yes, the difference is that you can't create a character that you find compelling. There's something wrong with you. [/quote]
There is nothing wrong in not being so in love with myself that I can’t automatically adore a character I created just because I created it[/i]. I just believe that a professional writer can do a better job at creating a compelling character than me, and
given the quality of 95% of all fanfics running around, I’d say that the same holds true for the vast majority of all other people who aren’t insanely egotistical.
[quote]Sylvius the Mad wrote...
There were several facial expressions in DAO, and I actually didn't like them. I played a terribly stoic Dalish archer, and during the joining he got this entirely out-of-character look of dismay on his face when someone else
died. That wasn't like him at all.
The only one I liked was the grimace that accompanied being shot with an arrow. That was good.
If you missed all the facial expressions in the game, I daresay you didn't pause enough. [/quote]
When did I say anything about missing facial expressions? And besides, given the fact that we’re talking about reactions to
story elements and the characteristics that make characters feel compelling and human… what
the hell do battle animations have to do with anything?
[quote]Sylvius the Mad wrote...
I'm cleraly not the target audience of Mass Effect. What I'm trying to do here is demonstrate that the target audience for Mass Effect doesn't really exist, is much smaller than it thinks it is, and would rather play a game with more roleplaying in it.
You are an outlier. [/quote]
Right, that’s why Mass Effect is such a critical and financial success and has such a huge and active fanbase: because it has absolutely no target audience.
My God, I’d love to try that stuff you’re on, it just seems to be out of this world.
And speaking of which, don’t call me an outlier when, again, you’re the dying Dodo here.
Look around you! Look at what the perceptions of RPGs are now. See all these posts on this thread? If you actually read [/i]them, you’ll notice that they’re discuss things like choices, customization, skills, story elements (above all, story elements), inventories and the like. Hell, I’ll just throw a few quotes here:
[quote]Murmilloswrote...
RPGs require you playing a "role". The more choices a game gives you in the ability in letting you customize and letting you play a role, the more "RPG" elements a game have, and the strong it is perceived as an PRG. If the game has weak elements, or less choices in allowing you in playing a role, the lesser the game is perceived as an RPG.[/quote]
[quote]Razyxwrote...
What is an RPG?, it's really a wide and large definition that affects many sides of a game but in a sentence; interact and choice at will. Then you can go deepest and ask for things that complete or complement those words, like shops, level up systems, skill systems, weapons (or tools), accessories, etc...
Anyways there’s a part that belongs to any RPG (lite, purist, whatever) and that is choice and / or customization, around the character. Obviously this could be as large and complex as Bioware or X wants, but more of this,
made in a good way, never hurts.[/quote]
[quote]TJSolo wrote...
You're dissecting the acronym R P G but not what makes an RPG and RPG.
If you just use the acronym and the definition you provided any game that has a role which you play in the game is a RPG.
The acronym isn't as simplistic as current acronyms. [/quote]
[quote]Jaysonie wrote...
[quote]Elvhen Veluthil wrote...
Ok, here is a question to all of you that say that ME2 is a game that can be defined as a RPG (not just having RPG elements, a lot of games these days have RPG elements), is Bioshock 1 a RPG or not?[/quote]
You role play as shepard. You are shepard and you decide what course of action he/she takes threw out the game. You dont get that type of freedom from bioshock. So no, bioshock is not an rpg.[/quote]
As you can see, I might not agree with everything that’s been said here, but it gives you an idea that at least we have something in common: we believe that RPGs have become much more than what they are when someone decided to slap a name on them some decades ago.
So no, I’m not the outlier.
You are.
[quote]Sylvius the Mad wrote...
If someone could ever enumerate the contents of "common sense", I'd give it a shot. [/quote]
Well, that’s just the thing with common sense and the definition of RPG: no one person can just give you a list and tell you “this is it, that’s all you need to know” because that opinion it will always be different depending on who you ask them.
So I’m sorry to tell you that common sense is not something I can hand to you, it’s just something that you have or you don’t. It still might be worth a try to at least
attempt to use it now and then, though.
[quote]Sylvius the Mad wrote...
Yes, but I don't believe that, and neither do you.
Based on the wheel options alone (and their relative position), you would need to be able to describe, in advance, exactly what Shepard is going to do (is he going to pull his gun, punsh somebody, walk away, shake his head?) and what he's going to say - word for word.
But you can't do that. I guarantee you can't. No one can without having played through the dialogue previously.[/quote]
If I choose to go the diplomatic route, Shepard will be diplomatic and if I choose to be aggressive, Shepard will be aggressive. I don’t need to predict the future to know that, nor do I need a warning in full detail as to what
exactly is Shepard going to do to know the consequences of my actions. If I decide to choose a given path I know Shepard will follow it and I’ll have to deal with the consequences. It’s that simple.
So don’t tell me what I do or don’t believe or guarantee what I can or can’t do. And could you please stop making all those “universal claims”? That would be great.
[quote]Sylvius the Mad wrote...
To be fair, BioWare hasn't actually produced a good inventory system since NWN. List inventories are bad; no wonder people didn't like ME's inventory system.[/quote]
Again, you missed the point. Most people didn’t like the inventory system, not because it was a list (that’s the least of our worries, a list still keeps things sorted out), but because a) there was always a better set of items that you could equip that would be better than anything else, and every item you picked up until then was just a build-up to that point, and
you received so much crap, that after a while it just felt like clutter that you had to clean up by either selling it or turning it into omni-gel because you didn’t need any of that.
[quote]Sylvius the Mad wrote...
That said, simply removing inventory was a gross overreaction.
[/quote]
It managed to clean up the gameplay
and it means that now you only need a few moments to suit up accordingly before a mission and there you go, back to the game.
[quote]Sylvius the Mad wrote...
What would the game need to be to cease being an RPG in your eyes? You're defending the game, saying it's an RPG, but you're not telling us why you think so.
It doesn't allow roleplaying. It allows you to choose (broadly) what sort of protagonist you're watching, but there's no ability at all to flesh out his personality and have that affect his decisions.
[/quote]
That’s what
defined characters do: they let you shape their existences but they won’t allow you to turn their whole lives upside down just because you felt like messing around.
[quote]Sylvius the Mad wrote...
Right. So that you could do it in Bioshock is not sufficient reason for you to think it isn't an RPG.
Ultima IV is an RPG - I don't think anyone disputes that - and you don't even choose dialogue options. Instead, you typed in keywords you gleaned from NPC dialogue.
Wizardry is widely viewed as an RPG, and it was basically all combat in a single dungeon. I might call Wizardry the first action-RPG (because there was no real gameplay beyond equipping your characters and fighting things).
So any definition of the genre needs to accommodate those games.
[/quote]
And here’s the major flaw in your logic: the firm belief that everything should just
stagnate and die just because you said so. That’s lovely.
By the way, what’s the next step? Start whining about how hospitals should revert housing facilities run by religious institutions? After all, that’s what they were when they first came to be, so logically, they should adhere to it no matter how incredibly
stupid and impractical that might sound.
Modifié par Lusitanum, 18 mars 2010 - 07:32 .
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