What happened to this being a rpg?
#801
Posté 29 mars 2010 - 08:08
Having the Grey Wardens is a good thing, but that doesn't mean that turning every single one of your recruits is necessary. If all the Joining gives you is the ability to sense the Blight and the Darkspawn, then wouldn't it make a lot more sense to only make a few select recruits go through the Joining and not have the fact that your members die during the Initiation affect that pesky "too few Grey Wardens to defend the world against the Blight thing"?
Just remove the obligatory Joining and suddenly you have a lot more soldiers who can help you fight the Darkspawn and, should the need arise, make a few of them go through the Joining. It's just common sense: a big army with a few seers to sense the Darkspawn is a lot more effective than a small army in which everyone can sense exactly just how outrageously outnumbered you are.[/quote]
But the Grey Wardens are those limited seers. The rest of the force you describe is made up by regular soldiers compelled to help by the Grey Warden treaties.
You're asking for something that's already in the game.
[quote]The choices are there for you to make throughout the game, that's just what they are: they're choices, not a template and everyone makes their choices based on their own reasons. That's why you see so many "mostly Paragon" players who chose the Paragon options most of the time but still made a few Renegade choices when faced with them, like giving the confidential information to the Shadow Broker, punching the reporter or Manuel and letting the council to die. Why did they do that? They had their own reasons, be it not wanting to stay on the Shadow Broker's bad side, finding a character particularly annoying or just feeling that a given option is the most sensible one. Quoting the Digital Cowboys again on why Alex chose to let the Council die on ME1:
"Here's the thing, I wasn't playing as a Renegade, I was just playing naturally, as close as I would honestly choose to make these decisions. And I thought that technically what I'd done had been totally against the will of the Council and totally against what I was supposed to do and I wasn't basically being a good guy, but it was a decision that had to be made, rang so true with the character and so true with the game, I really didn't mind the fact that I was judged a Renegade at that point. I was like "you know what? These guys have pledged their lifes to serve the people, the can die for the people." And I made that call and I felt it was totally right. And the game justified it and I thought "Yeah, totally, I loved it"."
There you have it, another example of how people played the game.[/quote]
But what happens then when Shepard does something I didn't want him to do - something I would have specifically avoided having him do had I been given the option? Am I still the one making the choices?
[quote]And so the dozens of millions of gamers around the world who play their games in the same way and love their characters. And all that without having to waste your time on a pointless essay around a character's life story.[/quote]
Yes, but they're not roleplaying. They're just playing with a toy.
[quote]Because that's your failling that you let Shepard get killed, and just like in any other game, the death of the character you control sends you to the Game Over screen.
It's actually quite simple, really.[/quote]
It makes no sense at all. Why not let the fight continue and then have Shepard get up at the end if the squad wins? That would be far more consistent, and thus far more fun.
[quote]This "shallow, one dimensional explanation" isn't my starting point, it's yours.[/quote]
You just provided it. You wrote out what you liked about Shepard, and there was no content there.
Again, tell me about Shepard.
[quote]SInce when what you think matters to anyone? Especially when compared to the opinions of the general public?[/quote]
Since when is the generally held opinion at all relevant to what is true in the world?
[quote]Take the much faster, well-armoured and well-armed tank into a place where you have no idea of what you'll face (except for all the confirmed hostiles) while on a race against time to save the galaxy?[/quote]
We don't know it's a race against time until later. Ostensibly the whole game has been a race against time, except the gameplay shows that not to be true.
That it's a race against time only becomes explicit when they put a clock on the screen. I think Shepard has a reason to think it's a race against time upon speaking with Virgil. You think it changes somewhere before that. When? Exactly when does Mass Effect become a race against time? How can the player tell?
[quote]And walked you did, for about... what? a full hour through the same identical scenery on the climax of the game.[/quote]
Eight minutes. I timed it.
[quote]We don't need elevators to bore us to death when people are stupid enough to find fresh new ways to do it.[/quote]
I didn't think the elevators were boring. I much prefer them to loading screens.
[quote]Or blast it with the Mako. Much faster, much safer, much smarter.[/quote]
The mako is a much bigger target, it's less agile, and it's loud enough to prevent you from sneaking up on anyone. There are all sorts of in-game reasons to want to travel on foot.
[quote]And to think I once thought Liara was an idiot for wanting to keep talking to Virgil in the middle of all this. Only she was at least recognize her mistake and how unreasonable she had been.[/quote]
That's makes perfect sense, though. Only upon talking to Virgil is it clear that you're in a race against time. You should find Liara taking her time frustrating there.
But at that point, the Mako might be very far away. Do you run back to get it or just take off after Saren? I went after Saren, and that made the game unwinnable. Had I gone back for the Mako (wasting even more time), then the game would have let me win.
That's idiotic.
[quote]Some definitions of sound:
- Financially secure and safe;
- Exercising or showing good judgment;
- In good condition;
- Reflects weight of sound argument or evidence;
- Thorough.
Not one reference of "infallible". What was it you said about not using words when you don't know what they mean?[/quote]
The word was used with regard to reasoning. If you had a decent grasp of how logic works, you'd know that sound reasoning is necessarily infallible.
[quote]I can compare some relationships, but that still doesn't say what they mean to me. I might consider some to be worth protecting more than others, but I still can't put a stamp on them saying how much they're worth.[/quote]
Value is always relative. If you can compare some relationships, then you can value them relative to each other.
[quote]Never enough, I'm not for sale, unlike some of the few people you seem to be familiar with to bring that up so quickly.[/quote]
Really?
Do you have a job (or will you ever)? Does it take time out of your day? During that time, are you choosing to work rather than something else you'd rather do? And are you making that choice because someone's paying you?
Everyone's for sale.
[quote]The same as for everything else. For instance, I know I'd love to play Assassin's Creed 2, I loved the first game, the sequel is set in Italy during the Renaissance, the main character seems to be a lot more interessting this time around, but I refuse to pay 60€ for a brand new game when all the others are at 50€.
Again, I'm not for sale.[/quote]
But you are. You clearly value fairness more highly that you value the playing of Assassin's Creed 2. You think the higher price is unreasonable (which I don't get, given the collapsing game prices over the past 20 years), so you're willing to give up playing AC2 to avoid sacrificing your principles.
See? You just assigned a value to that. You didn't even need my help to do it.
[quote]In a nutshell, you still keep finding new ways to show how you know nothing of what you're talking about.[/quote]
That you refuse to monetise things is not evidence that you can't. It's only evidence that you think there's something wrong with the idea.
[quote]So great, you didn't even bother to justify it against my rebutal between natural phenomenon and intended game design![/quote]
Because it was nonsense. Your example accepted that the events were random, so they're behaving exactly like the weather. Randomness is incapable of malice. That you feel like the game is working against you even though you know that it isn't in insane.
[quote]How about you read it again. What I'm saying is that even when you know you lost due to randomness, even if you know that's the reason, it can feel like it's more a matter of the computer cheating in his favor than anything else.[/quote]
I know that's what you're saying. I'm saying that's crazy. No reasoning person could ever hold that opinion.
[quote]Hospital. [/quote]
Sure, return to a point I already refuted.
What a hospital is never changes. What a hospital is called changes all the time.
I'm talking about what RPGs are, not what they're called.
[quote]I don't need infinte wisdom, all I have to do is keep you from doing what you're trying to: circle around the issue, dropping those little parts you don't want to answer and expecting me to forget about them.[/quote]
No, instead you just ignore the parts where I show you're wrong and then repeat the same discredited points again and again.
[quote]And here we go, you're out of the "what makes an RPG discussion". I'm sorry, you just can't expect to say "you can kick levelling out of RPGs" and still mantain what little shred of credibility you were still clinging to. That's "just" the basis around which the genre, the industry and the public in general revolve around when you bring up the word RPG.[/quote]
That just reinforces my point. What everyone thinks an RPG is is irrelevant. I want to know what actually makes a game an RPG.
And I repeatedly point to the roleplaying, the feature for which the genre is named.
That everyone thinks something is true does not make it so. The world isn't flat.
[quote]... and a complete flop because you're taking away its very identity and unique features that set it appart from all the others in the RPG genre.[/quote]
Don't the shooty parts already do that?
Mass Effect already has optional action combat (as I've pointed out, it also has optional point & click combat). If they'd just make the cinematics and voice-over optional as well then almost every one of my complaints about the game would go away.
[quote]My point exactly.[/quote]
Some people adapt to suit their environment. Others demand their environment adapt to suit them.
All progress is caused by the latter group.
#802
Posté 29 mars 2010 - 08:30
Modifié par Bigeyez, 29 mars 2010 - 08:38 .
#803
Posté 29 mars 2010 - 09:50
FlintlockJazz wrote...
Terror_K wrote...
I think most people understand, it's just that they don't understand... if you follow me.
I'm sorry, I just have to answer that one bit. I understand and I understand perfectly fine, I still disagree. Claiming that people don't understand because they don't share the same opinion as yourself is incredibly close-minded, people have different perspectives. When people disagree with you its usually because of one of the following reasons:
1. They understand perfectly what you are saying but have a different perspective on the matter.
2. It is a case of there is no right or wrong answer to the situation.
3. You are trying to enforce a way that is great for you but bad for them or others.
4. It is all just meaningless opinion.
5. They have indeed misunderstood due to you failing to put across your side of the argument in a way that can be understood.
Okay... clearly when I said "if you follow me" you didn't at all, because it appears you've taken what I said entirely out of context. I wasn't referring to my personal opinions on the matter at all really.
#804
Posté 29 mars 2010 - 10:08
There's another great example. The vast majority of people think that marriage is a useful institution, but that doesn't make it so. I'm not married because I would rather not invite the government into my personal life (and as long as marriage is regulated by the government, that's exactly what marriage does). But Lusitanium would probably insist that marriage doesn't behave the way I think it does because most people disagree with me.Bigeyez wrote...
Can I please get an invite to your wedding?
#805
Posté 31 mars 2010 - 03:42
But the Grey Wardens are those limited seers. The rest of the force you describe is made up by regular soldiers compelled to help by the Grey Warden treaties.
You're asking for something that's already in the game.[/quote]
Those are allies called in in times of extreme need, and that's only if your ancient Grey Warden treaties didn't get burned, stolen or in any other way lost throughout the centuries. They also have their own business that they need to take care of themselves. You know, like the thing I've mentioned 193 times: the Grey-Warden-turned-Darkspawn who gave the Architect all the information he needed to attack Thedas even without an Archdemon.
[quote]Sylvius the Mad wrote...
But what happens then when Shepard does something I didn't want him to do - something I would have specifically avoided having him do had I been given the option? Am I still the one making the choices?[/quote]
Yes. Just as you are when you make a choice in Dragon Age and things just don't go the way you planned it because the game was built that way.
[quote]Sylvius the Mad wrote...
Yes, but they're not roleplaying. They're just playing with a toy.[/quote]
You mean like when you make up the voices and stories in your head about things that aren't even there?
[quote]Sylvius the Mad wrote...
It makes no sense at all. Why not let the fight continue and then have Shepard get up at the end if the squad wins? That would be far more consistent, and thus far more fun.[/quote]
Yes, sitting on your ass, praying that your squadmates call kill everyone on the room while standing in the same spot, that sounds like Dragon Age kind of fun.
[quote]Sylvius the Mad wrote...
You just provided it. You wrote out what you liked about Shepard, and there was no content there.
Again, tell me about Shepard.[/quote]
Again, that's not my point. Don't try to divert this issue too and just answer the damned question instead of trying to dodge it.
[quote]Sylvius the Mad wrote...
Since when is the generally held opinion at all relevant to what is true in the world?[/quote]
Hemm... pretty much all the time? Especially since the alternative comes from those who want to shape the truth to their own views?
[quote]Sylvius the Mad wrote...
We don't know it's a race against time until later. Ostensibly the whole game has been a race against time, except the gameplay shows that not to be true.
That it's a race against time only becomes explicit when they put a clock on the screen. I think Shepard has a reason to think it's a race against time upon speaking with Virgil. You think it changes somewhere before that. When? Exactly when does Mass Effect become a race against time? How can the player tell?[/quote]
So, you know Saren is on Ilos, you know he plans to attack the Citadel, you're right behind him, he has a headstart on you since you had to fight to get that door he locked on your face open and yet you still think you're just supposed to take your sweet time getting there because you don't get a clock on your face. That's brilliant.
[quote]Sylvius the Mad wrote...
Eight minutes. I timed it.[/quote]
Congratulations, that took forever.
[quote]Sylvius the Mad wrote...
I didn't think the elevators were boring. I much prefer them to loading screens.[/quote]
Oh, elevators were a pretty good way of catching up on my reading. Everytime I got into one, I pulled up a book to pass the time. Now that's some great sense of immersion.
[quote]Sylvius the Mad wrote...
The mako is a much bigger target, it's less agile, and it's loud enough to prevent you from sneaking up on anyone. There are all sorts of in-game reasons to want to travel on foot.[/quote]
Sneak? Since when you can you sneak up on anything in the game? Not to mention that 1) you're a much bigger target, but you make up for that by being much better armored (and it's not like the geth will stop hitting you, what with the whole guns with auto-targetting fired by advanced sentient beings thing and all), and 2) it might be less agile, but it's faster and it has a cannon that lets you snipe enemies before they can even land a shot, while walking on foot would require making a much slower approach while being filled with bullets.
You're really trying hard as hell to make a non-sensical idea sound remotely reasonable, aren't you?
[quote]Sylvius the Mad wrote...
That's makes perfect sense, though. Only upon talking to Virgil is it clear that you're in a race against time. You should find Liara taking her time frustrating there.
But at that point, the Mako might be very far away. Do you run back to get it or just take off after Saren? I went after Saren, and that made the game unwinnable. Had I gone back for the Mako (wasting even more time), then the game would have let me win.
That's idiotic.[/quote]
No, what was idiotic was your idea of going on such an important mission on foot, in a place you knew nothing about, following an enemy that was way ahead of you and had time to not only get further away but also set all sorts of traps for you along the way just because you felt like admiring the view.
[quote]Sylvius the Mad wrote...
The word was used with regard to reasoning. If you had a decent grasp of how logic works, you'd know that sound reasoning is necessarily infallible.[/quote]
And so where all the definitions I gave. And don't act all high and mighty about logic just because you're so in love with yourself and your sig, because so far the characteristic that you've shown the most is also farthest from logic: the belief that your opinion rules over everyone else's.
[quote]Sylvius the Mad wrote...
Value is always relative. If you can compare some relationships, then you can value them relative to each other.[/quote]
Great, then how is that measurable? Because you can say "I like this more than that", but exactly how many "likes" are we talking about here?
[quote]Sylvius the Mad wrote...
Really?
Do you have a job (or will you ever)? Does it take time out of your day? During that time, are you choosing to work rather than something else you'd rather do? And are you making that choice because someone's paying you?
Everyone's for sale.[/quote]
Idiot, in case you haven't noticed, we live in a society. A society demands that you abide its rules, and one of the most common rules is that you have to pay for services, hence you need something to pay them with, or you have to become a hermit. So, having to work to earn money and being for sale are not the same thing.
[quote]Sylvius the Mad wrote...
But you are. You clearly value fairness more highly that you value the playing of Assassin's Creed 2. You think the higher price is unreasonable (which I don't get, given the collapsing game prices over the past 20 years), so you're willing to give up playing AC2 to avoid sacrificing your principles.
See? You just assigned a value to that. You didn't even need my help to do it.[/quote]
Great, how many "principles" is it worth? 10? 20? 50?
[quote]Sylvius the Mad wrote...
Because it was nonsense. Your example accepted that the events were random, so they're behaving exactly like the weather. Randomness is incapable of malice. That you feel like the game is working against you even though you know that it isn't in insane.[/quote]
And how do you know it isn't unless you open up its code? Pazaak was also a game that seemed to rely heavily on luck, but in the end the AI knew when it was going to go bust and would almost always never keep playing if it knew it was going to lose, always playing safe enough to win and only "risking" another hit when it knew it couldn't lose. Or in the Triple Triad mini-game on Final Fantasy VIII, which had a rule where the cards in each player's hands where supposed to be hidden from the other player, but the AI could see your hand and plan its game accordingly.
And those are just a few examples of games where the CPU cheats its way through the supposed randomness of the system. So, without knowing anything for certain, it can feel like the game is cheating if you keep losing to randomn outcomes.
[quote]Sylvius the Mad wrote...
I know that's what you're saying. I'm saying that's crazy. No reasoning person could ever hold that opinion.[/quote]
Unlike you, I have experience on all kinds of different games (and social situations), so I'm talking from a much broader perspective than you can think of.
[quote]Sylvius the Mad wrote...
Sure, return to a point I already refuted.[/quote]
You refuted nothing. Your last retort was that stupid comparisson between what the dollar was worth before and what it's worth now, I refuted that by saying that "meaning" and "value" are not the same thing and you just dropped it and tried to ignore, just like you did with so many other points I've made so far.
[quote]Sylvius the Mad wrote...
What a hospital is never changes. What a hospital is called changes all the time.
I'm talking about what RPGs are, not what they're called.[/quote]
We've been through this. A hospital about 10 centuries ago was one thing, a hospital now is something completely different.
And RPGs today are what they represent : games that fit on the most common elements of the genre. And pretty much none of the things you've been ranting about is among them.
[quote]Sylvius the Mad wrote...
No, instead you just ignore the parts where I show you're wrong and then repeat the same discredited points again and again.[/quote]
Am I really hearing this from the guy who keeps dropping my points without, sweeping them under the rug when they become too hard to refute and hasn't stopped going on and on about how "my vision of what RPGs are is supreme!"? Really?
[quote]Sylvius the Mad wrote...
That just reinforces my point. What everyone thinks an RPG is is irrelevant. I want to know what actually makes a game an RPG.
And I repeatedly point to the roleplaying, the feature for which the genre is named.
That everyone thinks something is true does not make it so. The world isn't flat.[/quote]
Nor does it revolve around you and your ideas. Wake up.
[quote]Sylvius the Mad wrote...
Don't the shooty parts already do that?
Mass Effect already has optional action combat (as I've pointed out, it also has optional point & click combat). If they'd just make the cinematics and voice-over optional as well then almost every one of my complaints about the game would go away.[/quote]
Maybe they would... but I think Bioware prefers to mock your kind, rather than catter to it.
[quote]Sylvius the Mad wrote...
Some people adapt to suit their environment. Others demand their environment adapt to suit them.
All progress is caused by the latter group.[/quote]
Right, because human beings are all about not living in society and not about working together and conforming with our differences to achieve a common goal. Nah, they're all about adapting everything to their own liking, with each pulling their own world to their respective side, like a global game of Pull the Rope.
And you're right in one thing: there are those who demand their environment adapt to suit them. But those are the ones who did something to warrant that, they had reasons to want a change in their world and people followed them to achieve that vision.
You, on the other hand, are nothing and yet you still expect the world you revile to follow you and adapt itself around you just because you want to. And I'm sorry to break it to you, but that ain't happening.
[quote]Sylvius the Mad wrote...
There's another great example.
The vast majority of people think that marriage is a useful institution,
but that doesn't make it so. I'm not married because I would rather
not invite the government into my personal life (and as long as marriage
is regulated by the government, that's exactly what marriage does).
[/quote]
Well, that and 1) you actually need someone else to marry you and 2) you're again expecting the world to bow before you.
[quote]Sylvius the Mad wrote...
But Lusitanium would probably insist that marriage doesn't behave the
way I think it does because most people disagree with me.
[/quote]
Every time you make an assumption about me it never fails to completely miss its mark, does it?
First off, you're once again ignoring your little world doesn't rule everything outside of it. Different countries have different rules over marriage, so the meaning of what it is and what it represents may vary according to whom you ask.
Secondly, I'm not that big on marriage either. I'm more concerned with the oaths that you have to make, to which you are honor-bound, and in an ever-changing world filled with situations you can't possibly predict, that's not something I would do lightly.
But for all those of you who see marriage as a beautiful thing, as a dream, as a hallmark in life and can't wait for the day you finally get hitched, or for all those of you who still have fond memories of that day, I just hope you're happy and everything works out allright. I doubt it will, since most people (including myself) aren't aware of how complex a marriage really is, but I still believe it can be a step worth taking, even if it's not something I expect to do.
And that is the difference between me and Sylvius.
#806
Posté 31 mars 2010 - 06:45
You know, like the thing I've mentioned 193 times: the Grey-Warden-turned-Darkspawn who gave the Architect all the information he needed to attack Thedas even without an Archdemon.[/quote]
I don't recall you mentioning that at all. I didn't even know about that.
[quote]Yes. Just as you are when you make a choice in Dragon Age and things just don't go the way you planned it because the game was built that way.[/quote]
Except that never happens. My DAO PC will never do anything I didn't explicitly tell him to do.
Because I can see the full options presented, and there's no tone conveyed with them, my PC says exactly what I ask him to say exactly as I would have him say it. Every time.
That's entirely unlike Mass Effect.
[quote][quote]Yes, but they're not roleplaying. They're just playing with a toy.[/quote]
You mean like when you make up the voices and stories in your head about things that aren't even there?[/quote]
Yes. That's roleplaying.
[quote]Yes, sitting on your ass, praying that your squadmates call kill everyone on the room while standing in the same spot, that sounds like Dragon Age kind of fun.[/quote]
Okay, so there we differ on what's fun. I think the inconsistency kills the fun. You think the gameplay is fun enough to trump the inconsistency.
This is why saying that something is good because it's fun isn't helpful. Different people find different things fun.
[quote]Again, that's not my point. Don't try to divert this issue too and just answer the damned question instead of trying to dodge it.[/quote]
Your question doesn't make any sense because it starts from a faulty premise. You're attributing characteristics to Shepard that even you can't describe, and you're doing it because you liked that game more (for other reasons, obviously).
[quote]Hemm... pretty much all the time?[/quote]
No, never. This is just like the distinction between what something is and what it is called. The two are unrelated.
I'm starting to think you're a sociologist.
[quote][quote]Eight minutes. I timed it.[/quote]
Congratulations, that took forever.[/quote]
But far less than the hour you claimed.
Again, if it matters, measure it.
[quote]Oh, elevators were a pretty good way of catching up on my reading. Everytime I got into one, I pulled up a book to pass the time. Now that's some great sense of immersion.[/quote]
Have you ever ridden in an elevator in the real world? They take time. Just like in Mass Effect. How can a realistic feature break immersion?
[quote]1) you're a much bigger target, but you make up for that by being much better armored (and it's not like the geth will stop hitting you, what with the whole guns with auto-targetting fired by advanced sentient beings thing and all)[/quote]
The most damaging projectiles fired by the geth are quite slow moving, and can be easily dodged on foot. And the Mako is far less able to take cover to avoid small arms fire. At worst, those options are even.
[quote]2) it might be less agile, but it's faster and it has a cannon that lets you snipe enemies before they can even land a shot, while walking on foot would require making a much slower approach while being filled with bullets.[/quote]
This is false. The sniper rifle has exactly the same maximum effective range as the Mako cannon, thus preventing the need to close with your target.
No, the only tactical differences are the noise (which isn't modelled by the game, but I roleplayed it in), and the XP penalty (which is modelled by the game, and thus known to Shepard).
[quote]You're really trying hard as hell to make a non-sensical idea sound remotely reasonable, aren't you?[/quote]
No, that would be rationalizing. I don't rationalize. I reason in advance. I make decisions after I've worked out the reasoning - not before.
[quote]No, what was idiotic was your idea of going on such an important mission on foot, in a place you knew nothing about, following an enemy that was way ahead of you and had time to not only get further away but also set all sorts of traps for you along the way just because you felt like admiring the view.[/quote]
If I take the Mako, he'll know exactly when I made it through that door. If I come on foot, he won't know I'm coming until I arrive.
And he wasn't way ahead. He was a couple of minutes ahead, and he was travelling with large, slow-moving geth. Remember that we see him go.
[quote]Great, then how is that measurable? Because you can say "I like this more than that", but exactly how many "likes" are we talking about here?[/quote]
Measurable is not equivalent to quantifiable.
If I give you two rocks, you can discern which one is heavier even if you don't have a precise scale handy.
[quote]Idiot, in case you haven't noticed, we live in a society. A society demands that you abide its rules, and one of the most common rules is that you have to pay for services, hence you need something to pay them with, or you have to become a hermit. So, having to work to earn money and being for sale are not the same thing.[/quote]
Yes, they are. You choose to sell your time.
Oh, and way to presuppose the existence of society.
[quote]And how do you know it isn't unless you open up its code? Pazaak was also a game that seemed to rely heavily on luck, but in the end the AI knew when it was going to go bust and would almost always never keep playing if it knew it was going to lose, always playing safe enough to win and only "risking" another hit when it knew it couldn't lose.[/quote]
But that's not true. Pazaak was more a game of skill than a game of chance. It was a winnable game based on resource allocation. Since the advantage always fell to the player to reach a high score second, it required you to determine early in each handy how likely you were to be that player, and then to use your extra cards accordingly (if you were going to reach 20 first, it made moer strategic sense to concede the loss on that hand and use no cards, thus saving then for the hands where victory was more likely).
Pazaak was a winnable game.
[quote]And those are just a few examples of games where the CPU cheats its way through the supposed randomness of the system. So, without knowing anything for certain, it can feel like the game is cheating if you keep losing to randomn outcomes.[/quote]
You just changed the example. You're now talking about willful ignorance.
[quote]You refuted nothing. Your last retort was that stupid comparisson between what the dollar was worth before and what it's worth now, I refuted that by saying that "meaning" and "value" are not the same thing and you just dropped it and tried to ignore, just like you did with so many other points I've made so far.[/quote]
Your retrot had nothing at all to do with the relevant parts of the analogy, so I just chalked that one up as a victory.
[quote]We've been through this. A hospital about 10 centuries ago was one thing, a hospital now is something completely different.[/quote]
And that you keep saying that only shows how much you don't understand what I'm saying.
If I take a modern hospital, load it into my time machine, and take it back to the 10th century, what is it when I get there? The contents of the building haven't changed. The skills of the people working in it haven't changed. So, given that it being a hospital in the modern period is based on it exhibiting the characteristics of a hospital - it meets the necessary conditions of hospital-ness - then when I get to the 10th century it continues to be a hosputal. Since it's exactly the same thing it was when it left, and it was a hospital when it left, then it's still a hospital when it gets there.
The people of the 10th century would probably have no idea what to call it. That's completely irrelevant.
And we can do it the other way. If I load a 10th century hospital (what was called a hospital in the 10th century - the clerical boarding house) into my time machine and bring it here, it continues to be exactly what it is. It's still run by the church. It's still a place to sleep and be fed. It still offers hospitality. And while modern people might call it an inn, that doesn't change what it is.
[quote]Nor does it revolve around you and your ideas. Wake up.[/quote]
Nor does it revolve around popular opinion. The world is as it is, no matter what any of us would like.
[quote]Maybe they would... but I think Bioware prefers to mock your kind, rather than catter to it.[/quote]
So it's my job to show them that accommodating me isn't much work.
[quote]Right, because human beings are all about not living in society and not about working together and conforming with our differences to achieve a common goal. Nah, they're all about adapting everything to their own liking, with each pulling their own world to their respective side, like a global game of Pull the Rope.[/quote]
There you go again, assuming the existence of society.
[quote]Well, that and 1) you actually need someone else to marry you[/quote]
That's not much of a barrier.
[quote]2) you're again expecting the world to bow before you.[/quote]
I don't need them to do anything other than allow me to opt out.
Which they do. Marriage isn't mandatory.
[quote]Every time you make an assumption about me it never fails to completely miss its mark, does it?[/quote]
That wasn't an assumption so much as a reasoned conclusion based on your other assertions.
Modifié par Sylvius the Mad, 31 mars 2010 - 07:52 .
#807
Posté 31 mars 2010 - 07:31
Wizard Weatherwax is my name, but you can call me WW. Or tuna. But tuna without any cheese on, please. On second thought, forget the tuna and bring me just the cheese.
Well, regarding this infamous argument I would like to add my thoughts. Because the internet allows me to do that. Ah! FEAR MY USE OF THE CAPS LOCK KEY! Buuuuu!
Old RPGs vs New RPGs
Personally I like playing RPGs. I like all the leveling, moral choices, characterization and whatnot that are usually present in these kind of games.
I love the old RPGs, such as Baldur´s Gate and Icewind Dale, or the new RPGs, such as Dragon Age and Mass Effect. Oh, and I also like Neverwinter Nights, but I don´t know if I should consider it an old or new RPG. I would probably file it under “old RPGs”.
It´s true that RPGs have evolved. Some people like that evolution, others don´t. I can respect that. But personally I am satisfied with the evolution.
When I play Dragon Age, I can clearly see the evolution. I like the new graphics, the open world (limited, nonetheless, but I guess we can call it an open world), the story, and so on.
Mea culpa, I usually don´t read all of the codex, but that´s just me. And a bit less dialogue now and then would be nice (but I dig BioWare´s style).
Baldur´s Gate is a great RPG (Baldur´s Gate II in my opinion is even greater), but when I played it recently I did wish I could play it under Dragon Age´s game presentation. I don´t know, I guess I liked the evolution. I wouldn´t call it more user friendly, but it´s definitely easy on the eye.
But in terms of games, if the gameplay is okay and the story great, I usually don´t care much for the graphics (although playing a pretty game sure helps establishing the mood).
So I like both types of RPGS (old and new), but I welcome the evolution.
Mass Effect is a RPG vs Mass Effect killed my gold fish and isn´t a RPG
Well, I think that Mass Effect is a RPG. Believe it or not I truly think that.
Maybe it´s all the levelling up, party members, quests, dialogues and choosing attacks/ powers thingies that got me confused, but when I played the game I truly thought that I was playing a RPG.
But I could be wrong. I mean it could happen.
Maybe Max Payne was in reality a poorly made RTS (ME LIKES MAX PAYNE!
Okay, maybe it´s not a RPG like Dragon Age, but it´s definitely a RPG. If there are different types of FPS, why can´t there be different types of RPGs?
Shepard is a RPG character vs Shepard killed my new gold fish and isn´t a RPG character, honest
Sure, Shepard isn´t a “proper” RPG main character, but I guess that´s what makes the old guy special.
And I think that everyone has a different way of playing Shepard, when it comes with the choosing of dialogues, decisions, weapons and armours... And, yes, even face.
But WW, there´s bound to be similar Shepards, right?
Sure, says I. But I guess that´s bound to happen in any RPG. I mean, when you play the good guy, you usually choose all the good answers and actions. But nevertheless you – the gamer - will be making those choices, therefore I consider Shepard a RPG character.
I for one never encountered a scene when Shepard refused to follow my command.
WW: Say hello to the nice man, Shepard.
Shepard: No! I don´t want to.
WW: Whaaaa?
Shepard: I AM SHEPARD!!! I DON´T NEED TO FOLLOW YOUR BIDDING! AND I WANT A PONY!
Mako the vehicle is so cool, I want to marry it vs Mako the vehicle is the Devil´s car
Mako the actor was a really cool guy, I will give you that.
But the Mako sequences in Mass Effect were a real pain. I think that I prefer the boredom of the probes in Mass Effect 2 instead of the moments of frustration of the Mako sequences in Mass Effect.
So I guess I am with Team “Mako the vehicle is better off dead”.
And we should burn it down. Mako, the vehicle, is a witch.
It turned me into a newt.
I got better.
OMG, KotOR II´s Influence System was great!1!1!!! I totally thought that it increased immersion! vs KotOR II´s Influence System was pretty lame and Mass Effect´s Influence System is way more immersive
HA! HA! HA! HA! HA! HA! HA! HA! HAAAAA!
I mean, do I really need to answer this one?
Modifié par Wizard Weatherwax, 31 mars 2010 - 07:33 .
#808
Posté 31 mars 2010 - 07:47
#809
Posté 31 mars 2010 - 07:55
#810
Posté 31 mars 2010 - 08:01
TheLostGenius wrote...
I agree with your statement. I liked the RPG elements of ME1. ME2 is dumbed too much to cater to a more popular genre, Shooting.
hey atleast this will encourage the rpg nerds to go outside some more
#811
Posté 31 mars 2010 - 08:06
Lets be honest the inventory system in ME1 was a joke. You were basically marking time until you could afford Specter X gear and either Colossus or Predator M series armor.
As to the stats yes they have been simplified but has that adversely affected the game play? I'd say no (the only gripe I have is the global cooldown for powers)
As to the Mako vs Planet Scanning it's a choice between frustration and boredom. I'd pick frustration personally but at least with a level 60 import you can skip most of the stupid planet scanning.
But in the end Mass Effect is about the story. Is the story in ME2 weaker than in ME1? No, it is different, it's focused on individual characters rather then on a galactic chase. But think about it, in ME1 we had no idea what the threat was or how this crazy new sci-fi world worked, we had to be told. But in ME2 we know what the threat is it's been named, the challenge is gearing up and creating a team that's capable of dealing with the threat. So it makes perfect sense that the story shifts to focus on your individual team mates.
Just my $0.02
#812
Posté 31 mars 2010 - 08:46
This has been my entire point, and neither Mass Effect game permits significant roleplaying.Gilead26 wrote...
People seem to forget that RPG means "Role Playing Game", not "Inventory and stat building game"
#813
Posté 31 mars 2010 - 08:50
Just out of curiosity what do you consider 'significant roleplaying'?Sylvius the Mad wrote...
This has been my entire point, and neither Mass Effect game permits significant roleplaying.Gilead26 wrote...
People seem to forget that RPG means "Role Playing Game", not "Inventory and stat building game"
I, personally, think there is alot of roleplaying in Mass Effect.
#814
Posté 31 mars 2010 - 09:04
There's not a single conversation in Mass Effect where you're meaningfully in control of Shepard. You can point him vaguely in one direction or the other, but it's impossible to make any fine distinctions or nuanced choices because the actions and dialogue that result from your selections on the dialogue wheel aren't shown to you when you're making the choice.LostInSanity wrote...
Just out of curiosity what do you consider 'significant roleplaying'?
I, personally, think there is alot of roleplaying in Mass Effect.
Letting us choose Shepard's actions directly (by showing us the full text of his lines so we can make an informed choice) would be a huge step toward permitting roleplaying in Mass Effect.
#815
Posté 31 mars 2010 - 09:13
Gilead26 wrote...
But in the end Mass Effect is about the story. Is the story in ME2 weaker than in ME1? No, it is different, it's focused on individual characters rather then on a galactic chase. But think about it, in ME1 we had no idea what the threat was or how this crazy new sci-fi world worked, we had to be told. But in ME2 we know what the threat is it's been named, the challenge is gearing up and creating a team that's capable of dealing with the threat. So it makes perfect sense that the story shifts to focus on your individual team mates.
Just my $0.02
Except it really doesn't, 2 mission a piece for 12 characters doesn't feel like it focused on anything really(except shooter combat). There was never really an oh s**t that's where the story was going moment. There was a very megaman feel where you could do these in any order but eventually you have to do them. Garrus my old buddy barely even talked to
me. They could have made 6 characters with 4 missions a piece and the rest optional dl characters with 4 missions per and given them dialog on the ship. Instead 12 barely knowable characters that I must depend on for my life. Think if you had to follow 3 missions with Thane before you finally caught him and he talked to you because he was curious about you and then joined your team if you made a good argument because he respected you. You'd feel like you accomplished something vs "Hi mr. assassin wanna join my team?" "hmm ok."
#816
Posté 31 mars 2010 - 09:19
I can see where you are coming from on this. I guess in a way its more like roledirecting then roleplaying. What I mean by that is the game feels more like a movie where you are the director telling Shepard what to do as opposed being Shepard and really doing it.Sylvius the Mad wrote...
There's not a single conversation in Mass Effect where you're meaningfully in control of Shepard. You can point him vaguely in one direction or the other, but it's impossible to make any fine distinctions or nuanced choices because the actions and dialogue that result from your selections on the dialogue wheel aren't shown to you when you're making the choice.
Letting us choose Shepard's actions directly (by showing us the full text of his lines so we can make an informed choice) would be a huge step toward permitting roleplaying in Mass Effect.
Modifié par LostInSanity, 31 mars 2010 - 09:20 .
#817
Posté 31 mars 2010 - 09:25
That's a great description. That's exactly my problem with Mass Effect.LostInSanity wrote...
I can see where you are coming from on this. I guess in a way its more like roledirecting then roleplaying. What I mean by that is the game feels more like a movie where you are the director telling Shepard what to do as opposed being Shepard and really doing it.
Since I didn't get to decide what sort of person Shepard was, I was forced to play this character I didn't like and didn't find interesting.
#818
Posté 31 mars 2010 - 11:49
I suppose I have, for quite some time now, known that it was not a true RPG, but, well, I never much cared to define it. RPG or not, it is enjoyable for me, and it is enjoyable because I have a hand in someone's epic tale and I get to watch it. LostInSanity sums this up quite nicely, which made me realize that I have actually never role-played within a game, even within games that would call for it. E.G. In DA:O, I don't role-play, I create someone and I try to steer him/her towards a desired path, not necessarily as a reflection of what I would do (simply because I have no idea what I would do and would embed myself within a loop of replays, which is one of the major factors of why I stopped playing Oblivion, and probably never will again). Put simply, I have never assumed the role of a character, I enjoy creating someone else and learning from what they do, especially if it ends in tragedy. This doesn't make any game any less of an RPG in itself because that's how I choose to play (I am rather passively hoping that I am not alone in this sense *lol*).
More to the point, however, when put to perspective, I suppose it would be difficult to role-play within the Mass Effect games. An obvious example is in the quick-time events of Mass Effect 2. I can see that pressing RT (I play on a console) when a Renegade opportunity is displayed makes Shepard perform a Renegade action but, unless I have already played through the scene on a previous playthrough or load, I have no real idea as to what Shepard will do.
Considering that most people seem to agree that ME2 is less of an RPG than ME1, I'll use an ME1 example. When dealing with Conrad Verner, I remember I posed for a picture so that he could take it home. That was totally *not* what I was expecting even though I agreed to humor him. I didn't want this creepy fellow taking a picture of me and hanging it up in his home. The context in which I agreed was completely taken out because Shepard already had a set reaction. Bad decision on my part? Maybe. I am willing to agree that BioWare can't possibly write in every situation, so I do not hold that against them. In DA:O, though, for example, I do not ever become surprised at what I make the character do, only at how NPCs react, which is nice.
Another example, though, in case Verner was just the exception and not the rule: When Shepard punched the reporter. I was amused, yes. Heck, I choose that option just to see it, most of the time. But, when I think about it, I realize that, if I wanted to role-play, that would break any of my role-playing focus (aha, I am currently attempting to role-play as a role-player. Silly...). Prior to the punch, as a role-player, I would probably tell myself "Oh heck no, she's trying to twist my words and blah blah blah." So, I choose an option which enables me to tell her just how I feel rather than tactfully evade the situation with words. Much to my surprise, Shepard punches her. Uhm...okay...
Well, I am not sure if any of these examples can get to the heart of what was being argued over for many many many many many pages. I just wanted to write this because it seemed interesting to me that something has not so much changed my opinion but re-defined things. I've always been aware that Mass Effect was more an adventure game with decisions to change the story, not an actual RPG wherein *you* assume the role of a character (even at that, I am unsure if that makes any game an RPG). To quote, "[It] depends on what your definition of 'is' is."
#819
Posté 01 avril 2010 - 02:03
[quote][quote]Isolrenia91 wrote...
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#820
Posté 02 avril 2010 - 06:59
I don't recall you mentioning that at all. I didn't even know about that.[/quote]
I did mention the whole "Grey Warden turning Darkspawn with all the knowledge of the order". That's from The Calling, the DA novel that revolves around a Grey Warden who was captured by the Darkspawn during his Calling, starts turning into a Darkspawn himself due to the curse in his blood and ends up helping the Architect and his brethren, partially due to his resentment over being forced to become and serve the Grey Wardens all his life with no real choice on the matter.
And the only surprising thing in the middle of all this is why the hell didn't any of this happened sooner.
[quote]Sylvius the Mad wrote...
Except that never happens. My DAO PC will never do anything I didn't explicitly tell him to do.
Because I can see the full options presented, and there's no tone conveyed with them, my PC says exactly what I ask him to say exactly as I would have him say it. Every time.
That's entirely unlike Mass Effect.[/quote]
But you still get consequences that you couldn't foresse without the need of metagaming. Like Lothering getting arbitrarly destroyed at the beggining of the game while the rest of Thedas doesn't get attacked until the end of the game, Wynn leaving your party when you return to camp because you defiled the ashes, the vendor at Wade's shop trying to recoup his expenses on the Drake/Dragon Armor by pouting and not letting you (a.k.a. the person with hundreds of Sovereigns in his pockets) buy anything from him or the party members who just decide to leave with all your hard-earned (both in gameplay time and actual money) equipment on them.
[quote]Sylvius the Mad wrote...
Yes. That's roleplaying.[/quote]
No, that's playing with computer dolls, and for that we already have The Sims.
[quote]Sylvius the Mad wrote...
Okay, so there we differ on what's fun. I think the inconsistency kills the fun. You think the gameplay is fun enough to trump the inconsistency.
This is why saying that something is good because it's fun isn't helpful. Different people find different things fun.[/quote]
I never said that the gameplay was fun enough to make me ignore the inconsistency, all I said was that giving you a Game Over screen because your party members died through no fault of your own is incredibly frustrating. And furstration is the opposite of fun.
[quote]Sylvius the Mad wrote...
Your question doesn't make any sense because it starts from a faulty premise. You're attributing characteristics to Shepard that even you can't describe, and you're doing it because you liked that game more (for other reasons, obviously).[/quote]
What faulty premise? It's very simple:
You already shown in the Arcane Warrior example that you can make up your own excuses to explain something as ludicrious as why a mage can use any kind of weapon and armor without even needing to think about it in a game where manipulation of the Fade and magic should impose a toll on the caster. Then you boasted about how much imagination you had because you came up with that flimsy and inconsistent justification in 10 seconds.
Now, tell me how hard can it be to come up with a justification as to why an Alliance Marine would try to fight a threat to Humanity and the Galaxy as a whole, after your came up with the previously mentioned example. What, is your "imagination" not capable of handling something when it doesn't involve mercilessly beating the crap of established lore?
[quote]Sylvius the Mad wrote...
No, never. This is just like the distinction between what something is and what it is called. The two are unrelated.
I'm starting to think you're a sociologist.[/quote]
Then that would be another baseless assumption, but then again, seeing the sun rise each morning is more surprising than that, so it just doesn't matter anymore.
[quote]Sylvius the Mad wrote...
But far less than the hour you claimed.
Again, if it matters, measure it.[/quote]
I claimed nothing, I made a vague guess. You know, like when you pass value judgements on things, with the exception that my guess comes from not having played that bit for months, so my memory is a bit iffy, so at least I have a reason for making a mistake.
[quote]Sylvius the Mad wrote...
Have you ever ridden in an elevator in the real world? They take time. Just like in Mass Effect. How can a realistic feature break immersion?[/quote]
1) The future. There's bound to be a faster way to get from point A to point B, even if it just means faster elevators;
2) It breaks the immersion because I know that's just a cover to the loading of the next area I'm going. Not to mention that the moment the game asks you to just lean back and wait for something, it's taking you away because you're not playing anymore, which is why people don't like loading screens. Now when your alternative to loading screens has the same effect of taking you away from the game and it has the added "bonus" of taking even longer, then that's a problem, no matter how "realistic" it might be.
[quote]Sylvius the Mad wrote...
The most damaging projectiles fired by the geth are quite slow moving, and can be easily dodged on foot. And the Mako is far less able to take cover to avoid small arms fire. At worst, those options are even.[/quote]
Unless you consider jumping or just driving out of the way of said slow moving projectiles while you blast the enemy away with superior firepower. And with the added bonus that getting hit by accident while in the Mako just means that your shields are going down a bit, and not that you have to restart from your last save point.
[quote]Sylvius the Mad wrote...
This is false. The sniper rifle has exactly the same maximum effective range as the Mako cannon, thus preventing the need to close with your target.
No, the only tactical differences are the noise (which isn't modelled by the game, but I roleplayed it in), and the XP penalty (which is modelled by the game, and thus known to Shepard).[/quote]
Becase you really need to be careful with the noise when chasing the guy who saw you coming and let all those geth behind in an effort to stop you. Not to mention that the Mako can blast several enemies at the same time, with 100% accuracy, unlike the Sniper rifle, which only two classes know how to use effectively.
[quote]Sylvius the Mad wrote...
No, that would be rationalizing. I don't rationalize. I reason in advance. I make decisions after I've worked out the reasoning - not before.[/quote]
Yeah, and that's why you keep wanting things to adapt to your way of seeing the world while making your trademarked poorly based assumptions on things you don't know anything about. Right...
[quote]Sylvius the Mad wrote...
If I take the Mako, he'll know exactly when I made it through that door. If I come on foot, he won't know I'm coming until I arrive.
And he wasn't way ahead. He was a couple of minutes ahead, and he was travelling with large, slow-moving geth. Remember that we see him go.[/quote]
And he sees you come too. He knows you're coming and he can perfectly just leave those geth behind to try and stop you (which he did) and fly at full speed on his Back to the Future-esque flying skateboard... thing, while leaving you way behind.
[quote]Sylvius the Mad wrote...
Measurable is not equivalent to quantifiable.
If I give you two rocks, you can discern which one is heavier even if you don't have a precise scale handy.[/quote]
That's comparing not measuring. If something is measured, then it has to be "determined by measurement".
Using your example, I can possibly tell you if one of them is clearly heavier than the other if there's a significant difference in their weight but I can neither tell you exactly how heavy it is, nor could I give you a clear answer if one of them was only slightly heavier than the other, in which case I would have to measure them first.
[quote]Sylvius the Mad wrote...
Yes, they are. You choose to sell your time.[/quote]
Exactly: my time. Just like I can sell any other of my posessions, it's just something I'm offering in exchange. That's selling something I own, not something that makes my who I am. You know, like my personality.
[quote]Sylvius the Mad wrote...
But that's not true. Pazaak was more a game of skill than a game of chance. It was a winnable game based on resource allocation. Since the advantage always fell to the player to reach a high score second, it required you to determine early in each handy how likely you were to be that player, and then to use your extra cards accordingly (if you were going to reach 20 first, it made moer strategic sense to concede the loss on that hand and use no cards, thus saving then for the hands where victory was more likely).
Pazaak was a winnable game.[/quote]
With lots of saving and loading. Because there was no way to predict how likely it was for you to get a given number, it was perfectly possible for you to be at 12, draw a 9 or a 10 and then lose. Oh, and since in KotOR1, you always drew first, the odds were against you from the start since you were more likely to bust while your opponent would only need to adapt to your game.
[quote]Sylvius the Mad wrote...
You just changed the example. You're now talking about willful ignorance.[/quote]
I'm talking about games of chance and Pazaak was a prime example of the genre.
[quote]Sylvius the Mad wrote...
Your retrot had nothing at all to do with the relevant parts of the analogy, so I just chalked that one up as a victory.[/quote]
A "victory"? Seriously, is that how you see this? A battleground to be won or lost? You're really taking this seriously, aren't you?
And if my retort was so flawed, why not point it right there. You only "win" something when your "victory" is clear, not when you back down claiming "I win!" to yourself.
I mean, I guess that's how it's supposed to work, you're the one who's talking about "victories" here.
[quote]Sylvius the Mad wrote...
And that you keep saying that only shows how much you don't understand what I'm saying.
If I take a modern hospital, load it into my time machine, and take it back to the 10th century, what is it when I get there? The contents of the building haven't changed. The skills of the people working in it haven't changed. So, given that it being a hospital in the modern period is based on it exhibiting the characteristics of a hospital - it meets the necessary conditions of hospital-ness - then when I get to the 10th century it continues to be a hosputal. Since it's exactly the same thing it was when it left, and it was a hospital when it left, then it's still a hospital when it gets there.
The people of the 10th century would probably have no idea what to call it. That's completely irrelevant.
And we can do it the other way. If I load a 10th century hospital (what was called a hospital in the 10th century - the clerical boarding house) into my time machine and bring it here, it continues to be exactly what it is. It's still run by the church. It's still a place to sleep and be fed. It still offers hospitality. And while modern people might call it an inn, that doesn't change what it is.[/quote]
Aaaand... completely missed the point again. Great...
If you take a modern hospital that far into the past, it might still be a hospital to you, but it stops being one in the world that it's in. That's how definitions work: the concept of a given thing changes depending on when and where you are.
Using your time machine and that ridiculous comparisson you used a while ago, if I go into the past (or if I just go to another country), I don't have to get used to the concept of money all over again. I know what it is and what it does: it's a currency used to trade for goods and services. I might have to adapat to its value but that doesn't change it's definition and function.
Now a hospital, that's a different story. Someone coming from the past would have to wrap his mind around the fact that a hospital does not share the same signified that he's used to, it's no longer a place used to "hospedar" people, it's a "Krankenhaus", a house of sick people. Or does the whole "follow the root of the name to the letter" thing only bug you when it's in a language you can understand?
[quote]Sylvius the Mad wrote...
Nor does it revolve around popular opinion. The world is as it is, no matter what any of us would like.[/quote]
But a language is shaped by its speakers. That's how they change, adapt and evolve no matter how much a given sole person might complain about it.
[quote]Sylvius the Mad wrote...
So it's my job to show them that accommodating me isn't much work.[/quote]
You're not getting it again. They really, REALLY don't care about what people like you think. You noticed that "I wish they made RPGs like they used to" bit? Guess which group of elitists they're refering to?
Because making Dragon Age doesn't mean that they're accommodating to you or anyone. They're just making what they do best: RPGs. And they just happen to want to avoid following in the JRPGs footsteps of making the same damned thing over and over and over again until there's nobody, appart from a handful of demented fanatics, with the patience to play the same game they've been playing their whole life.
So be glad that a game like Mass Effect exists. It's one of the reason why Dragon Age still has a broad target audience for people to enjoy them. And I'm included in it.
[quote]Sylvius the Mad wrote...
There you go again, assuming the existence of society.[/quote]
Oh great, so that doesn't exist either. Do I even want to know why you think the most basic pillar of human existente is just an illusion?
[quote]Sylvius the Mad wrote...
That's not much of a barrier.[/quote]
When you're a loner that avoids "pretty much everyone"... it kinda is.
[quote]Sylvius the Mad wrote...
That wasn't an assumption so much as a reasoned conclusion based on your other assertions.[/quote]
And since it couldn't have missed its mark more stupendously if you had shot in the air after being blindfolded and turned around about 15 times, that's another hit to your ability for "reasoned conclusions".
#821
Posté 03 avril 2010 - 09:26
I am terribly sorry for cutting in your conversation, old chaps, but there are some points that I wish to comment on.
Lusitanum wrote...
Sylvius the Mad wrote...
Have you ever ridden in an elevator in the real world? They take time. Just like in Mass Effect. How can a realistic feature break immersion?
1) The future. There's bound to be a faster way to get from point A to point B, even if it just means faster elevators;
2) It breaks the immersion because I know that's just a cover to the loading of the next area I'm going. Not to mention that the moment the game asks you to just lean back and wait for something, it's taking you away because you're not playing anymore, which is why people don't like loading screens. Now when your alternative to loading screens has the same effect of taking you away from the game and it has the added "bonus" of taking even longer, then that's a problem, no matter how "realistic" it might be.
I have to agree with Lusitanum on this point, Sylvius the Mad.
I am all for immersion in videogames, but the elevators in Mass Effect weren´t immersive, or at least I wouldn’t call it that.
Sure, we could listen to the news and such, but the news usually ended way before the ride was over. In Mass Effect 2 you can click in some computers in order to hear the news, instead of taking a ride in those boring slowpokes.
Actually, in my opinion – meaning that this isn´t a written commandment by the Easter Bunny – Mass Effect 1 was a great game in terms of immersion. I truly liked the story, the characters, the world around me and the action. And those final hours in the game were full of immersion, because I truly felt that I was needed to finish the job and save the universe from the metallic squids. (note: I think that everyone has their own notion of immersion and that´s fine by me. In my opinion Mass Effect 1 is an immersive videogame and a RPG, since it involves making moral decisions, doing quests, levelling up, etc)
But… I also thought that the elevators were BORING. I mean not just boring, but boring boring. I felt that those sequences were breaking the game´s flow.
Ah, says you: But real life can have boring moments!
True, true, but I think that boring moments in a game can cut the immersion from the player. The probe section in Mass Effect 2 did that, for example. I never thought for a moment that I was really probing minerals, only wasting my time looking for minerals in order to buy upgrades. But again, I prefer boredom to frustration, so I am glad that we didn´t have to use Mako in Mass Effect 2.
But coming back to the elevators: in my opinion neither the game nor the player benefited from the elevators and I was glad that they didn´t make an appearance in Mass Effect 2.
Actually that is a bit of a lie; there is indeed one time that we must use an elevator in Mass Effect 2. I remember that moment because it made Miranda angry and full of despair. She even asked if the elevator couldn´t go any faster. Lol, at least BioWare has a good sense of humour.
A videogame should have in mind that a gamer plays it in order to have some fun. The elevators might be realistic, but so would be filling up tax forms, calling your mother every now and then telling her that everything is fine and that you are dating a blue alien, filling up some red tape every time you leave and enter a space station, taking your cold medicines, breaking your arm and spending some time in the hospital, etc.
It would make the game more realistic, no doubt about it, but I think that the gamer would start to forget why he was playing the game. And while life can be boring, a good videogame should not, since it´s job is to entertain the gamers.
Lusitanum wrote...
Sylvius the Mad wrote...
So it's my job to show them that accommodating me isn't much work.
You're not getting it again. They really, REALLY don't care about what people like you think. You noticed that "I wish they made RPGs like they used to" bit? Guess which group of elitists they're refering to?
Because making Dragon Age doesn't mean that they're accommodating to you or anyone. They're just making what they do best: RPGs. And they just happen to want to avoid following in the JRPGs footsteps of making the same damned thing over and over and over again until there's nobody, appart from a handful of demented fanatics, with the patience to play the same game they've been playing their whole life.
So be glad that a game like Mass Effect exists. It's one of the reason why Dragon Age still has a broad target audience for people to enjoy them. And I'm included in it.
Lol, yeah, that really does happen, doesn´t it?
In Mass Effect 2, if I am not mistaken. One of the aliens starts talking about the “good old times” and that a good RPG should be full of boring and needless moments.
Yeah, 5 hours real time to travel somewhere should be quite immersive and amusing for the gamer, lol.
Again, nice to know that BioWare has a good sense of humour.
Lusitanum wrote...
Sylvius the Mad wrote...
There you go again, assuming the existence of society.
Oh great, so that doesn't exist either. Do I even want to know why you think the most basic pillar of human existente is just an illusion?
Well, if society doesn’t exist then it´s sure doing a fine job at fooling me.
#822
Posté 03 avril 2010 - 01:51
#823
Posté 03 avril 2010 - 03:18
RyuGuitarFreak wrote...
What happened? They left the dumb parts of it (inventory, looting and grinding) gone. The good ones, which are related to play a role in a huge story, is there.
#824
Posté 03 avril 2010 - 04:05
Wizard Weatherwax wrote...
I am all for immersion in videogames, but the elevators in Mass Effect weren´t immersive, or at least I wouldn’t call it that.
Sure, we could listen to the news and such, but the news usually ended way before the ride was over. In Mass Effect 2 you can click in some computers in order to hear the news, instead of taking a ride in those boring slowpokes.
Actually, in my opinion – meaning that this isn´t a written commandment by the Easter Bunny – Mass Effect 1 was a great game in terms of immersion. I truly liked the story, the characters, the world around me and the action. And those final hours in the game were full of immersion, because I truly felt that I was needed to finish the job and save the universe from the metallic squids. (note: I think that everyone has their own notion of immersion and that´s fine by me. In my opinion Mass Effect 1 is an immersive videogame and a RPG, since it involves making moral decisions, doing quests, levelling up, etc)
But… I also thought that the elevators were BORING. I mean not just boring, but boring boring. I felt that those sequences were breaking the game´s flow.
Ah, says you: But real life can have boring moments!
True, true, but I think that boring moments in a game can cut the immersion from the player. The probe section in Mass Effect 2 did that, for example. I never thought for a moment that I was really probing minerals, only wasting my time looking for minerals in order to buy upgrades. But again, I prefer boredom to frustration, so I am glad that we didn´t have to use Mako in Mass Effect 2.
But coming back to the elevators: in my opinion neither the game nor the player benefited from the elevators and I was glad that they didn´t make an appearance in Mass Effect 2.
Actually that is a bit of a lie; there is indeed one time that we must use an elevator in Mass Effect 2. I remember that moment because it made Miranda angry and full of despair. She even asked if the elevator couldn´t go any faster. Lol, at least BioWare has a good sense of humour.
A videogame should have in mind that a gamer plays it in order to have some fun. The elevators might be realistic, but so would be filling up tax forms, calling your mother every now and then telling her that everything is fine and that you are dating a blue alien, filling up some red tape every time you leave and enter a space station, taking your cold medicines, breaking your arm and spending some time in the hospital, etc.
It would make the game more realistic, no doubt about it, but I think that the gamer would start to forget why he was playing the game. And while life can be boring, a good videogame should not, since it´s job is to entertain the gamers.
But here in the present we have load times which is what the elevator sequences tried to cover up. Load screens vs elevators. No load time is NOT an option currently.
#825
Posté 03 avril 2010 - 04:09
Gorn Kregore wrote...
RyuGuitarFreak wrote...
What happened? They left the dumb parts of it (inventory, looting and grinding) gone. The good ones, which are related to play a role in a huge story, is there.





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