Dragon age 3 you will once again be playing as a human
- Thread starter disgruntledgamer
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Well seeing as I roll human about 90% of the time in RPGs this really doesn't bother me.
We get it guys, you hate EA and Bioware. That's cool for you, but just shut up about it and let those of us who enjoy the games, enjoy them.
We get it guys, you hate EA and Bioware. That's cool for you, but just shut up about it and let those of us who enjoy the games, enjoy them.
I promised myself I wasn't going to jump into this debate since wherever EA gets mentioned, well, the 'I like where this is going /sarcasm' meme seems appropriate. None the less, wall of text incoming:
Firstly, to address the main point of the thread: as far as I'm concerned there are two kinds of protagonist for RPGs, there's the player created protagonist common in sandbox RPGs like Skyrim and there's the developer created protagonist more common in the so called 'action RPG' like Darksiders II. Generally speaking the distinction is made clear by two key points: the former tends to be a silent protagonist most of the time, and they will be referred to be title ('The Warden', 'The Fateless One', 'The Monster Hunter' etc.) while the latter will generally be fully voiced and will have at least one name already defined. ('Hawke', 'Shepard', 'Rush Sykes' and so on) There are exceptions: Link would be an example of a silent protagonist whose character is fully defined and very much falls into the second category by means of very much being a protagonist designed by the developer; Gordon Freeman is the same. On the other hand you have game protagonists referred to be title only who are very much developer designed: The Prince of Persia would be an example of this, as would 'The Kid' from 'Bastion,' although in this case it's more a point the game is making about how the characters define themselves. I'll stop talking about Bastion before I go off on a tangent - and I have a feeling I'd be treading on EmceeProphIt's toes if I started expounding my own ideas on the meaning of names in Bastion before he's had the chance to cover it - so I'll just make the observation that Zulf is most often referred to by name and lets his past and cultural heritage inform his actions while The Kid is never referred to by name and is the epitome of being defined by his actions rather than his past or his heritage.
I would posit that no-one here would hold lack of customisable main characters against a game series like 'The Legend of Zelda' or 'Final Fantasy,' which raises an interesting question. Does the name of a series refer to the style of game-play or to the world in which it's set? Both of the examples above tend to play fast-and-loose with any form of established chronology or canon (pet peeve I'll mention here: 'canon' is the established narrative of a work of fiction as laid out by the author (or a rank within the hierarchy of the church - or if capitalised a manufacturer of printers), 'cannon' is a medieval piece of ordnance, I've seen this mistake made on this forum quite frequently), making them strong arguments in favour of game-play style over fictional universe. Off the top of my head I must admit I can't think of any examples to the contrary. It could be argued that Resident Evil changed from being a survival horror game into either an action game or third person shooter, and then to an interactive storyboard of QTEs but that would be being facetious. The point I'm leading to is this: If a game is presented as a sequel, is the consumer justified in expecting it to play the same way - with the same kind of protagonist as framed in the first paragraph? I don't have an answer to that, but for it even to be open to discussion it has to be framed that neither of the two is objectively inferior to the other, and that's where this gets a bit sticky.
The argument that keeps popping up against developer designed protagonists is this: 'If I wanted to experience a story that I wasn't controlling/influencing I'd read a book.' In my view this is much the same as saying all books have to be philosophical deconstructions of the protagonists' morality, all films have to be action flicks and all stage productions have to be period dramas. This may look like a complete strawman but hear me out: much as games by nature of being an interactive medium have a natural strength towards non-linear narrative design (that is to say - telling a story that isn't fixed to the artist's vision), these other media forms are also naturally inclined towards the content mentioned.
Books can go into far more detail on a character's motivations due to the use of narrative voice, furthermore they don't have a fixed pace. In a film or game, within a single scene one second of screen-time can be reasonably expected to correlate to one second of actual in-universe time. Books don't have this constraint, letting the author delay the action as long as is necessary to make a point insofar as they do not trespass unduly on the reader's patience.
Films, being a purely visual and auditory experience (excluding use of subtitles) naturally lend themselves to genres that emphasise spectacle. Stage productions with the impracticality of special effects and large casts in a small space as well as the added production hassle of blocking the scenes with account for the audience line of sight, have a strength when dealing with dialogue heavy productions.
I very much expect that none of this has done much to assure you of the validity of the three comparisons made, and quite rightly so. Imposing arbitrary limitations on what an artistic medium can explore holds it back unduly. Most of the modern classics defy the expectations of the genre in some way, but to attack the original premise: that games should not be restricted to non-linear stories directly, that would prohibit titles as wide-ranging as 'Halo', 'Half-Life', 'Final Fantasy', 'Command & Conquer', 'Starcraft' etc. So for those of you who've ever uttered the words 'If I wanted to experience a story that I wasn't controlling/influencing I'd read a book.' then I hope you treat the games listed above with a similar amount of scorn, at least then you'd be being consistent. I would also refer you to the most recent Extra Credits video on gaming and 'fun' as a tangential evaluation of the impact of placing arbitrary constraints a medium. You might prefer a game with a player-created protagonist, but that is a matter of personal choice, not objective quality.
Now to deviate a bit from the topic, but in a way that's still relevant. The issue of the developer's history cannot be dismissed; pertinent comparisons to 'Dragon Age II' and 'Dragon Age Origins' have been raised as examples of each storytelling technique and the studio's strength at delivering an enjoyable game-play experience through them. At this point some words have to be said in defence of 'Dragon Age II'. I'd first like to be clear that the copy-paste dungeons were frankly inexcusable, especially for a studio with the size and the resources of Bioware. I also haven't played 'Dragon Age Origins', making any form of comparison impossible. Treating those two points as no contest but only tangentially relevant to the matter of narrative technique, (I'll come back to them later when I discuss developer credibility) the other main criticism I've seen levelled at 'Dragon Age II' is that the story made no sense. This is objectively wrong.
To begin, go read this article on wikipedia, it's only 25 lines (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ergodic_literature), the rest of this passage will sound like gibberish without a solid understanding of the concept detailed within. The second relevant distinction to the following discussion topic is what constitutes a plot hole. The widely held understanding is that any point that is vital to the understanding of events as detailed in the narrative that is not explicitly stated is a plot hole. The very concept of ergodic literature throws this out the window as it places the onus of working to understand a text on the audience, rather than the more widely held belief that it is the responsibility of the artist to make the text widely understood. A more useful definition for the use of this investigation then is that a plot hole is formed when any and all possible rationales for explaining the way events occur in the narrative is actively contracted within the text. To simplify: within this discussion a plot hole is not when the text does not explain itself, it is when no explanation is possible.
To give an example, also from the same developer, it was stated in the backlash from the community against 'Mass Effect 3's original cut that the motivation for the Reapers constituted a plot hole. Their logic was represented as 'I created synthetics to kill organics so that organics would not be killed by synthetics,' quite clearly a flawed premise. Except that Reapers were only stated to be synthetic once, by Shepard who couldn't be expected to give a flawless judgement and based almost purely on Sovereign's affiliation with the Geth. By contrast, Mass Effect 2 showed the putrefied biomass of captured humans being pumped to the chamber in the Collector base where a Reaper was being created, making it possible to infer that they have at least some organic parts. I won't waste time emphasising just how much information there was in the original cut to make it clear that the Reapers were bio-synthetic as the extended cut explicitly states it so it's no longer in doubt. The point of the matter is that the aforementioned summary was at best a misrepresentation, at worst a deliberate straw-man. Put the work into understanding the text and you instead get 'I created bio-synthetics to act as data storage for the DNA and cultural history of organics, before they get killed by synthetics and lost forever.' still a less than ideal solution and one that reflects a machine's lack of understanding for the elements of life that are important, but then that's the whole reason why Shepard's fighting, and definitely not a plot hole.
Most of the comments I've read about the plot of Dragon Age II just stated 'it didn't make sense' as self evident fact, so I'll make an open request for people to point out what exactly 'doesn't make sense' and I'll do my best to explain it, referring to what elements of the source material I'm using to back up my interpretation. To address what I expect will be the two most common causes for confusion though:
1) It doesn't follow a 3 act structure, despite showing clear act headings. This is to some degree a legitimate complaint as it highlights how the presentation actively serves to confuse the reader. I believe that if we take the theory of ergodic literature, the text does have a responsibility to give the audience a fair chance of understanding it by not deliberately obfuscating the information. Rather than having a clear beginning, middle and end each act serves as its own self-contained story, with the conflict of the last act tying back to events and objects set in place by the first two. This may make the whole thing seem to lack cohesion but...
2) It's a story about a person, not a conflict or an event. The story of the series may be open to debate: the first game focused heavily on the Darkspawn threat, but if the name of the third and the plot of the second are anything to go by it seems that the conflict between the Templars or the Chantry and the Circle is going to be the main source of conflict for the rest of the series, however far it goes. 'Dragon Age II' is about that so far as it's the reason the story is being told, don't forget that most of what we see as the audience is a story within a story: namely the story that Varric is telling the Chantry seeker and the question the dwarf is asked is not 'Tell me about the battle' it's 'Tell me about The Champion.' (Referring back to my first point about deliberately misleading the audience about the text structure, and to my first point about how the game refers to the protagonist being important for purposes of distinction in terms of who is making the story, the criticism that this phrasing misleads the player into believing the protagonist will be entirely of their own creation is a legitimate one.) The story therefore follows Hawke, not necessarily a single event. The event the Seeker is of course interested in is how the conflict between the Circle and the Templars escalated. Some of the information is irrelevant, because Varric has his own agenda in his retelling which is representing Hawke in a way that suits him and will therefore add details that colour the Seeker's view of Hawke appropriately, but most of it ties back to the causes for the escalation: namely the lyrium idol in act I, the death of the Viscount in act II, and the ongoing presence and influence of Anders across all acts.
Any other points I will address on request regarding 'Dragon Age II's storyline, I am fully prepared to defend my statement that the criticism that it doesn't make sense is objectively false insofar as the definitions of a plot hole and ergodic literature stand. (Do quote me please, I probably won't check this thread again otherwise)
Lastly, the matter of the developer's credibility. I'm not going to try to defend this to any great length, it's frankly a lost cause at this point. 'Dragon Age II's copy-paste dungeons were inexcusable and the series' departure from its previous format and storytelling style was misleading from a consumer perspective. On the flip-side, I very much hope the people who are complaining that they mixed up the formula aren't the same people blaming the guys behind Call of Duty for releasing the same game year after year. The thing with innovation is that it doesn't work every time, and if getting it wrong once means that your fanbase turns hostile overnight then frankly I wouldn't want to risk innovating in that kind of environment. Mass Effect 3's ending was a monumental cock-up, even ignoring the whole issue of it not making sense (debunked as shown above) it was a de-railing of Shepard's character taken to the extreme and the extended cut again re-writes Shepard's character by giving the audience the freedom to decide if s/he is enough of a moron to sacrifice the whole galaxy just to flip-off a millennia-old AI. (In the original cut Shepard wasn't, and I respect the developer's view on that) Given the number of people who missed it as well the game clearly didn't do a good enough job of communicating to the player that they didn't win the battle either. This was however an extremely costly mistake for the developer; the changes for the edited cut could not have been cheap, so I imagine they will be wary of making that mistake again.
Bioware have also recently cocked up an MMO, so yeah, the last three titles from the studio have had some major issues so the immediate scepticism for another title from the developer isn't entirely unfounded.
Referring back to my point about the cost of getting it wrong when a developer tries to innovate; I'm going to leave the blame for this one at the door of the games press and the publishers. With the practice of pre-release reviews only being admissible if they give over a certain score, the consumer is essentially being cut off from any way of evaluating the merits of a product before purchasing it, the same with pre-order bonuses. This means that the sale of any individual product is not a reflection on it's quality, but on the last title to be released by that studio. The consumer has no way of protecting themselves from a substandard product other than to look at a studio's past titles because the review process is flat out broken. If the reviews of any given product were accurate and unbiased then if a studio made a high profile mistake through innovation then the only sale that would be impacted would be of that one specific product.
Oh and as a parting note, I quite liked 'Dragon Age II', but it has some serious issues.
Firstly, to address the main point of the thread: as far as I'm concerned there are two kinds of protagonist for RPGs, there's the player created protagonist common in sandbox RPGs like Skyrim and there's the developer created protagonist more common in the so called 'action RPG' like Darksiders II. Generally speaking the distinction is made clear by two key points: the former tends to be a silent protagonist most of the time, and they will be referred to be title ('The Warden', 'The Fateless One', 'The Monster Hunter' etc.) while the latter will generally be fully voiced and will have at least one name already defined. ('Hawke', 'Shepard', 'Rush Sykes' and so on) There are exceptions: Link would be an example of a silent protagonist whose character is fully defined and very much falls into the second category by means of very much being a protagonist designed by the developer; Gordon Freeman is the same. On the other hand you have game protagonists referred to be title only who are very much developer designed: The Prince of Persia would be an example of this, as would 'The Kid' from 'Bastion,' although in this case it's more a point the game is making about how the characters define themselves. I'll stop talking about Bastion before I go off on a tangent - and I have a feeling I'd be treading on EmceeProphIt's toes if I started expounding my own ideas on the meaning of names in Bastion before he's had the chance to cover it - so I'll just make the observation that Zulf is most often referred to by name and lets his past and cultural heritage inform his actions while The Kid is never referred to by name and is the epitome of being defined by his actions rather than his past or his heritage.
I would posit that no-one here would hold lack of customisable main characters against a game series like 'The Legend of Zelda' or 'Final Fantasy,' which raises an interesting question. Does the name of a series refer to the style of game-play or to the world in which it's set? Both of the examples above tend to play fast-and-loose with any form of established chronology or canon (pet peeve I'll mention here: 'canon' is the established narrative of a work of fiction as laid out by the author (or a rank within the hierarchy of the church - or if capitalised a manufacturer of printers), 'cannon' is a medieval piece of ordnance, I've seen this mistake made on this forum quite frequently), making them strong arguments in favour of game-play style over fictional universe. Off the top of my head I must admit I can't think of any examples to the contrary. It could be argued that Resident Evil changed from being a survival horror game into either an action game or third person shooter, and then to an interactive storyboard of QTEs but that would be being facetious. The point I'm leading to is this: If a game is presented as a sequel, is the consumer justified in expecting it to play the same way - with the same kind of protagonist as framed in the first paragraph? I don't have an answer to that, but for it even to be open to discussion it has to be framed that neither of the two is objectively inferior to the other, and that's where this gets a bit sticky.
The argument that keeps popping up against developer designed protagonists is this: 'If I wanted to experience a story that I wasn't controlling/influencing I'd read a book.' In my view this is much the same as saying all books have to be philosophical deconstructions of the protagonists' morality, all films have to be action flicks and all stage productions have to be period dramas. This may look like a complete strawman but hear me out: much as games by nature of being an interactive medium have a natural strength towards non-linear narrative design (that is to say - telling a story that isn't fixed to the artist's vision), these other media forms are also naturally inclined towards the content mentioned.
Books can go into far more detail on a character's motivations due to the use of narrative voice, furthermore they don't have a fixed pace. In a film or game, within a single scene one second of screen-time can be reasonably expected to correlate to one second of actual in-universe time. Books don't have this constraint, letting the author delay the action as long as is necessary to make a point insofar as they do not trespass unduly on the reader's patience.
Films, being a purely visual and auditory experience (excluding use of subtitles) naturally lend themselves to genres that emphasise spectacle. Stage productions with the impracticality of special effects and large casts in a small space as well as the added production hassle of blocking the scenes with account for the audience line of sight, have a strength when dealing with dialogue heavy productions.
I very much expect that none of this has done much to assure you of the validity of the three comparisons made, and quite rightly so. Imposing arbitrary limitations on what an artistic medium can explore holds it back unduly. Most of the modern classics defy the expectations of the genre in some way, but to attack the original premise: that games should not be restricted to non-linear stories directly, that would prohibit titles as wide-ranging as 'Halo', 'Half-Life', 'Final Fantasy', 'Command & Conquer', 'Starcraft' etc. So for those of you who've ever uttered the words 'If I wanted to experience a story that I wasn't controlling/influencing I'd read a book.' then I hope you treat the games listed above with a similar amount of scorn, at least then you'd be being consistent. I would also refer you to the most recent Extra Credits video on gaming and 'fun' as a tangential evaluation of the impact of placing arbitrary constraints a medium. You might prefer a game with a player-created protagonist, but that is a matter of personal choice, not objective quality.
Now to deviate a bit from the topic, but in a way that's still relevant. The issue of the developer's history cannot be dismissed; pertinent comparisons to 'Dragon Age II' and 'Dragon Age Origins' have been raised as examples of each storytelling technique and the studio's strength at delivering an enjoyable game-play experience through them. At this point some words have to be said in defence of 'Dragon Age II'. I'd first like to be clear that the copy-paste dungeons were frankly inexcusable, especially for a studio with the size and the resources of Bioware. I also haven't played 'Dragon Age Origins', making any form of comparison impossible. Treating those two points as no contest but only tangentially relevant to the matter of narrative technique, (I'll come back to them later when I discuss developer credibility) the other main criticism I've seen levelled at 'Dragon Age II' is that the story made no sense. This is objectively wrong.
To begin, go read this article on wikipedia, it's only 25 lines (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ergodic_literature), the rest of this passage will sound like gibberish without a solid understanding of the concept detailed within. The second relevant distinction to the following discussion topic is what constitutes a plot hole. The widely held understanding is that any point that is vital to the understanding of events as detailed in the narrative that is not explicitly stated is a plot hole. The very concept of ergodic literature throws this out the window as it places the onus of working to understand a text on the audience, rather than the more widely held belief that it is the responsibility of the artist to make the text widely understood. A more useful definition for the use of this investigation then is that a plot hole is formed when any and all possible rationales for explaining the way events occur in the narrative is actively contracted within the text. To simplify: within this discussion a plot hole is not when the text does not explain itself, it is when no explanation is possible.
To give an example, also from the same developer, it was stated in the backlash from the community against 'Mass Effect 3's original cut that the motivation for the Reapers constituted a plot hole. Their logic was represented as 'I created synthetics to kill organics so that organics would not be killed by synthetics,' quite clearly a flawed premise. Except that Reapers were only stated to be synthetic once, by Shepard who couldn't be expected to give a flawless judgement and based almost purely on Sovereign's affiliation with the Geth. By contrast, Mass Effect 2 showed the putrefied biomass of captured humans being pumped to the chamber in the Collector base where a Reaper was being created, making it possible to infer that they have at least some organic parts. I won't waste time emphasising just how much information there was in the original cut to make it clear that the Reapers were bio-synthetic as the extended cut explicitly states it so it's no longer in doubt. The point of the matter is that the aforementioned summary was at best a misrepresentation, at worst a deliberate straw-man. Put the work into understanding the text and you instead get 'I created bio-synthetics to act as data storage for the DNA and cultural history of organics, before they get killed by synthetics and lost forever.' still a less than ideal solution and one that reflects a machine's lack of understanding for the elements of life that are important, but then that's the whole reason why Shepard's fighting, and definitely not a plot hole.
Most of the comments I've read about the plot of Dragon Age II just stated 'it didn't make sense' as self evident fact, so I'll make an open request for people to point out what exactly 'doesn't make sense' and I'll do my best to explain it, referring to what elements of the source material I'm using to back up my interpretation. To address what I expect will be the two most common causes for confusion though:
1) It doesn't follow a 3 act structure, despite showing clear act headings. This is to some degree a legitimate complaint as it highlights how the presentation actively serves to confuse the reader. I believe that if we take the theory of ergodic literature, the text does have a responsibility to give the audience a fair chance of understanding it by not deliberately obfuscating the information. Rather than having a clear beginning, middle and end each act serves as its own self-contained story, with the conflict of the last act tying back to events and objects set in place by the first two. This may make the whole thing seem to lack cohesion but...
2) It's a story about a person, not a conflict or an event. The story of the series may be open to debate: the first game focused heavily on the Darkspawn threat, but if the name of the third and the plot of the second are anything to go by it seems that the conflict between the Templars or the Chantry and the Circle is going to be the main source of conflict for the rest of the series, however far it goes. 'Dragon Age II' is about that so far as it's the reason the story is being told, don't forget that most of what we see as the audience is a story within a story: namely the story that Varric is telling the Chantry seeker and the question the dwarf is asked is not 'Tell me about the battle' it's 'Tell me about The Champion.' (Referring back to my first point about deliberately misleading the audience about the text structure, and to my first point about how the game refers to the protagonist being important for purposes of distinction in terms of who is making the story, the criticism that this phrasing misleads the player into believing the protagonist will be entirely of their own creation is a legitimate one.) The story therefore follows Hawke, not necessarily a single event. The event the Seeker is of course interested in is how the conflict between the Circle and the Templars escalated. Some of the information is irrelevant, because Varric has his own agenda in his retelling which is representing Hawke in a way that suits him and will therefore add details that colour the Seeker's view of Hawke appropriately, but most of it ties back to the causes for the escalation: namely the lyrium idol in act I, the death of the Viscount in act II, and the ongoing presence and influence of Anders across all acts.
Any other points I will address on request regarding 'Dragon Age II's storyline, I am fully prepared to defend my statement that the criticism that it doesn't make sense is objectively false insofar as the definitions of a plot hole and ergodic literature stand. (Do quote me please, I probably won't check this thread again otherwise)
Lastly, the matter of the developer's credibility. I'm not going to try to defend this to any great length, it's frankly a lost cause at this point. 'Dragon Age II's copy-paste dungeons were inexcusable and the series' departure from its previous format and storytelling style was misleading from a consumer perspective. On the flip-side, I very much hope the people who are complaining that they mixed up the formula aren't the same people blaming the guys behind Call of Duty for releasing the same game year after year. The thing with innovation is that it doesn't work every time, and if getting it wrong once means that your fanbase turns hostile overnight then frankly I wouldn't want to risk innovating in that kind of environment. Mass Effect 3's ending was a monumental cock-up, even ignoring the whole issue of it not making sense (debunked as shown above) it was a de-railing of Shepard's character taken to the extreme and the extended cut again re-writes Shepard's character by giving the audience the freedom to decide if s/he is enough of a moron to sacrifice the whole galaxy just to flip-off a millennia-old AI. (In the original cut Shepard wasn't, and I respect the developer's view on that) Given the number of people who missed it as well the game clearly didn't do a good enough job of communicating to the player that they didn't win the battle either. This was however an extremely costly mistake for the developer; the changes for the edited cut could not have been cheap, so I imagine they will be wary of making that mistake again.
Bioware have also recently cocked up an MMO, so yeah, the last three titles from the studio have had some major issues so the immediate scepticism for another title from the developer isn't entirely unfounded.
Referring back to my point about the cost of getting it wrong when a developer tries to innovate; I'm going to leave the blame for this one at the door of the games press and the publishers. With the practice of pre-release reviews only being admissible if they give over a certain score, the consumer is essentially being cut off from any way of evaluating the merits of a product before purchasing it, the same with pre-order bonuses. This means that the sale of any individual product is not a reflection on it's quality, but on the last title to be released by that studio. The consumer has no way of protecting themselves from a substandard product other than to look at a studio's past titles because the review process is flat out broken. If the reviews of any given product were accurate and unbiased then if a studio made a high profile mistake through innovation then the only sale that would be impacted would be of that one specific product.
Oh and as a parting note, I quite liked 'Dragon Age II', but it has some serious issues.
As someone who thinks Dragon Age II did many (but not all) things better than Origins, I quite like everything I've heard so far about DA3. I never play as a dwarf or elf anyway, so their absence doesn't bother me at all, but I could see how someone who liked those options would be missing them. I am quite glad that they're sticking with a voiced protagonist, because whether or not you think they have much depth, they can't possibly be as bad as the mute cardboard cutout from Dragon Age Origins that repeatedly broke immersion for me.
It can be quite frustrating to be a relatively level headed (I would like to think) Bioware fan. You see, they, like every developer that has ever existed, often make mistakes that I and others like me would love to provide constructive criticism and feedback on. Sadly this feedback is almost always drowned out by the small but vocal portion of the fan base who will take any excuse to complain loud and long about everything and anything the company does, usually without a great deal of substance behind their whining. I am not an apologist; companies need to be held accountable when they screw up, but the cacophonous wails of the entitled twats who ***** and moan about everything make this impossible to achieve.
It can be quite frustrating to be a relatively level headed (I would like to think) Bioware fan. You see, they, like every developer that has ever existed, often make mistakes that I and others like me would love to provide constructive criticism and feedback on. Sadly this feedback is almost always drowned out by the small but vocal portion of the fan base who will take any excuse to complain loud and long about everything and anything the company does, usually without a great deal of substance behind their whining. I am not an apologist; companies need to be held accountable when they screw up, but the cacophonous wails of the entitled twats who ***** and moan about everything make this impossible to achieve.
I'm all for bashing EA and bad game design in general, but this is a little premature don't you think? While I do miss the ability to choose your character's race, I acknowledge there are legitimate narrative reasons for doing that. Since the main character of this one is likely going to be associated with the Chantry Inquisition, it would probably be very hard to explain why an elf or especially a dwarf would be working with the human Chantry. Besides, say what you will about Hawke, but he received more in-game characterization than the Warden ever did whose modus operandi was to stare blankly in the foreground and occasionally giving one line statements.
So no, I don't worry when the developers says we'll be playing a human again this time around. I worry when the developers say "Hey, you know how in Dragon 2 the action took place in 6 or 7 copy pasted rooms? Well now it takes place in 9 copy pasted room! Give us your money!"
So no, I don't worry when the developers says we'll be playing a human again this time around. I worry when the developers say "Hey, you know how in Dragon 2 the action took place in 6 or 7 copy pasted rooms? Well now it takes place in 9 copy pasted room! Give us your money!"
I do not see being a human as much of an issue, seeing as the story is centred around a human faction, and a mostly human faction. Considering that the average dwarf is a stranger to the wider world, and the average elf is treated as a second class citizen, it makes more sense for the player to be a human character in the story that's being told.
In Origins race wasn't as much of an issue because being a Grey Warden was the larger point. While some people didn't like you for the race you were, it didn't really matter because your goal was to fight a common enemy. Dragon Age 2 and Dragon Age 3 centre around stories without any clear bad side.
As for the non-playable background I will reserve judgement until I actually know more about it. The chances are it will be as minor as the ones in Mass Effect, but that doesn't necessarily mean that it will. Bear in mind that unlike Mass Effect, the decisions made in this game do not need to then carry on and affect two other games afterwards. The Dragon Age games are standalone titles essentially, so knowing that, they can concentrate on making it relevant to the story in DA3 without worrying about what it might affect later down the line.
Dragon Age 2 had a lot of flaws, and trust me, Bioware are more than aware of them because people literally do not stop mentioning them on their forums. Mass Effect 3's issues have been mentioned all over the internet, so I imagine they are very conscious of those too.
So with any luck they will have learnt from their many mistakes over the last few games, and hopefully EA will realise that they are not going to keep being able to get away with rushed products, because the backlash is starting to catch up with them. So perhaps this time they will give Bioware enough time to make the product as good as it can possibly be, as opposed to trying to rush it out the door to make some quick sales.
I will remain cautiously optimistic about Dragon Age 3 until I have a reason not to be, and I won't know enough details to make that judgement until much nearer the time. Like a lot of people, this is pretty much Bioware's last chance for me.
In Origins race wasn't as much of an issue because being a Grey Warden was the larger point. While some people didn't like you for the race you were, it didn't really matter because your goal was to fight a common enemy. Dragon Age 2 and Dragon Age 3 centre around stories without any clear bad side.
As for the non-playable background I will reserve judgement until I actually know more about it. The chances are it will be as minor as the ones in Mass Effect, but that doesn't necessarily mean that it will. Bear in mind that unlike Mass Effect, the decisions made in this game do not need to then carry on and affect two other games afterwards. The Dragon Age games are standalone titles essentially, so knowing that, they can concentrate on making it relevant to the story in DA3 without worrying about what it might affect later down the line.
Dragon Age 2 had a lot of flaws, and trust me, Bioware are more than aware of them because people literally do not stop mentioning them on their forums. Mass Effect 3's issues have been mentioned all over the internet, so I imagine they are very conscious of those too.
So with any luck they will have learnt from their many mistakes over the last few games, and hopefully EA will realise that they are not going to keep being able to get away with rushed products, because the backlash is starting to catch up with them. So perhaps this time they will give Bioware enough time to make the product as good as it can possibly be, as opposed to trying to rush it out the door to make some quick sales.
I will remain cautiously optimistic about Dragon Age 3 until I have a reason not to be, and I won't know enough details to make that judgement until much nearer the time. Like a lot of people, this is pretty much Bioware's last chance for me.
Yeah, I really like dragon age 2, and I am looking forward to this, though I am healthily skeptic thanks to me3 ending.NoneOfYourBusiness said:
I gotta disagree on your second point, I really liked the combat, it was fun and fast fluid.
Though the act of spawning a few enemies right after combat was done was pants on head retarded.
Beyond that I didn't really have any problems with the second game, I loved it, and will look forward to the third.
I had a few modules on narratology on my university course, which I've now finished, so I have to keep the technique of analysing a text polished somehow.Odgical said:
Regarding citations, the majority of the post was first hand analysis of existing patterns within the medium of video-games, backed by examples. It could be argued that the examples are insufficient, or that there are too many examples that contradict the rule (in the case of outlining the two types of storytelling) for it to be considered credible, but as a first hand analysis the lack of citations doesn't undermine its credence substantially in and of itself. The definition of ergodic literature would have been supported by a source of more provenance if I'd cited the original work 'Cybertext' rather than a wikipedia article but for the reader's convenience I felt a work that was already publicly available would be more helpful. I will concede that the definitions of 'plot hole' could do with some citation and will replace the statements positing objective fact with constructions more like 'for the purposes of this investigation...' and so forth until I can find some. Where source texts and examples are referenced knowledge of them and their content is assumed. As for the comment about the review practices, it's tangential to most of the content anyway but my source for that would be this video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S2keHyS_Ooo&feature=plcp (apologies, I don't know how to embed the video) I would rate the provenance of the source quite highly because of the creator's first hand experience of the review process.
Moving on to the points you raised:
1) As far as I'm aware, the only back-story options available in 'Dragon Age II' correspond to Hawke's combat class. As said, I haven't played Origins but I can infer from the points that you've made that this had a large impact on the character's back-story. From what I've picked up from reviews and the lore of the setting I'm assuming a mage would have started in the Circle in Origins for example? It can be assumed that the character class choice in 'Dragon Age II' would have had no-where near as much effect on the character; for a start they are the same person while the same inference cannot be made for the choices in Origins, secondly it's strongly implied in some of the dialogue trees with Carver that a mage champion would have been raised in secret much the same way Bethany was, further reducing the impact on starting story variance, with no cause for any difference at all between the rogue and warrior stories. Furthermore, the majority of the narrative serves as an extended back-story to inform the audience (and the Seeker) of what made Hawke who they were and why they acted the way they did during the battle.
From a story-telling justification I'd have to say that it wouldn't make sense for Varric to go back that far during his interrogation, (although to say he wouldn't know is too much of a stretch given the amount of time he and Hawke must have spent talking for him to know all the other details he wasn't present for if the player doesn't keep Varric in their party) from a game-design perspective, I'd like to be able to say that again, it wasn't relevant to the meat of the story and the developers wanted to avoid this being another story about Ferelden. (spelling?) The city of Kirkwall has character in and of itself, and I think some of that would have been lost if it was introduced only after several hours of game-play. That's what I'd like to be able to say - the copy and paste dungeons though make sheer laziness seem far more likely.
2) Yes, this definitely does seem like the developer being interviewed was careful with their exact words. Still, that makes the game bigger than DA2 which can only be an improvement, right? The idea of a 'level' is really just a legacy feature from arcade machines anyway, the parlance could really do with being updated. Anyway, I'd refer back to my point about the developer's track record, healthy cynicism certainly wouldn't be amiss.
3) Again, not having played Origins I'll have to respond to this in fairly general terms. I understand that within the lore of 'Dragon Age', being a Grey Warden made a lot of the back-story, cultural heritage etc. fairly immaterial. Whatever prejudice exists towards different peoples in the established lore is easily super-ceded by the uneasiness everyone feels around Grey Wardens if I recall correctly. Accepting that Yahtzee's 'Zero Punctuation' is a hyperbolic parody of a negative review and so of limited usefulness in this case, I vividly remember him stating that once the origin stories were concluded in Origins, the extent of their impact was whether people respond to the player by saying 'Oh, you are an elf.' or 'Oh, you are a dick.' I understand that there was also some possibility of marrying into the royal family of Ferelden given a very specific choice of origin story. The point I'm leading towards is that I've very much been given the impression that the origin story choices are more of an illusion of choice than events that truly impact the story in a meaningful way.
As for the issue of different possibilities being available for different backgrounds, I would argue that it would go against the main themes expressed in 'Dragon Age II'. Hawke's story is very much one of self-betterment and raising one's standing against the odds. (To some degree it also looks into the responsibilities that comes with, as well as the consequences for the methods involved) As far as I can tell, having some events that are completely closed off to some characters, even if it would make perfect sense within the lore, would undermine that a great deal.
Of course I can I just want you to list them so I can point out the obvious flaws and out and out lies you seem to be taking a blind eye to.Revnak said:
i.e the pre-production time being longer than Origins and Mass effect which unless Bioware has access to a time machine is impossible.
But the gayness was forced onto the buyer of the game, do you realize how dangerous that can be? What would happen if peoples friends and family found out that they had bought a gay game? They would be forever tainted after catching the gay from the game, they might even be gay. Why else would someone buy a game with gayness in?Knight Templar said:
This guy gets it and isn't blinded by a ray of fanboy retard.alphamalet said:
Actually if they keep the current trend of using the same levels over and over again with each level just being slightly different anyway this is more than feasible.alphamalet said:
Seriously revisiting the same areas over and over again is an old EA trick to cut down on costs, whilst barging about it at the same time.
I dunno. I mean, I liked both Dragon Age games. I understand why people didn't like the second one, but for me, it wasn't as outright terrible as a lot of them were saying. It was still, at best, a shaky step sideways that resulted in the game tripping over its own shoelaces, and at worst, an outright step backward, but there were parts of the experience I liked.
Ignoring the earlier argument as to whether the 'positives' listed are really positives at all, and getting back to the root of the question, I don't really care what races they let me play as. If the story they're telling with this game is, for whatever reason, centred around a human, that's fine. As long as they tell it well, it's not a detriment. Then again, if it turns out to be poorly told, even being able to choose race wouldn't really save it.
And the background story not being playable anymore isn't a big thing to me either. There are lots of games that don't reveal your background. Hell, the Elder Scrolls games make a point to always have you imprisoned at the start of the game, and never say why. It's not detrimental to the overall experience to not see your character rise to whatever role they have to fulfill.
If they can make a game with writing that's as solid as old-school Bioware, that takes what was good about, and corrects the mistakes of, the the other two DA games, and craft a really well-rounded RPG experience, they can make me play as whatever race they want, and let the character's background be as vague as they want. Just give me a good RPG. That's all I ask. I still have faith in Bioware.
Ignoring the earlier argument as to whether the 'positives' listed are really positives at all, and getting back to the root of the question, I don't really care what races they let me play as. If the story they're telling with this game is, for whatever reason, centred around a human, that's fine. As long as they tell it well, it's not a detriment. Then again, if it turns out to be poorly told, even being able to choose race wouldn't really save it.
And the background story not being playable anymore isn't a big thing to me either. There are lots of games that don't reveal your background. Hell, the Elder Scrolls games make a point to always have you imprisoned at the start of the game, and never say why. It's not detrimental to the overall experience to not see your character rise to whatever role they have to fulfill.
If they can make a game with writing that's as solid as old-school Bioware, that takes what was good about, and corrects the mistakes of, the the other two DA games, and craft a really well-rounded RPG experience, they can make me play as whatever race they want, and let the character's background be as vague as they want. Just give me a good RPG. That's all I ask. I still have faith in Bioware.
Well if they make the story not a pile of shit trainwreck, don't re-use environments, make characters that are at least somewhat interesting instead of terrible cliches, make it so the combat isn't like a fucking anime and let me use the overhead camera again; then, and only then, will I even be slightly interested in DA3.
They're already picking your character and voicing them for you, which to me is a very bad thing. Bioware says this will lead to better story telling. Yet if we look at DA:O and DA2 I think it's quite clear which one had the better story. My hopes for this game aren't very high.
They're already picking your character and voicing them for you, which to me is a very bad thing. Bioware says this will lead to better story telling. Yet if we look at DA:O and DA2 I think it's quite clear which one had the better story. My hopes for this game aren't very high.
I feel I need to make a comment here. Firstly, dont do this a forum is not the place to post a dissertation unless your entire topic is about it (even then its not the best idea). You took a uni course and want to practice, fine. Blogs are an excellent place for that. The idea behind a forum is to convey an idea in a short and precise manner. This becomes exceptionally bad if you cant explain a point without referencing an idea field of narratology. If your going to do that ATLEASt break it down into a single sentence explanation Ergodic Literature: Literature you need to work to read, usually because its non-linear i.e. Video Games. Done, I dont have to perform my own reasearch to read a forum post and any more complicated explanation of the term is irrelevent (looking at what you wrote its irrelevent to bring up anyway). Buuuut having said that you want that kind of discussion so I'll try and give it to you, though it seems you really want something a forum isn't designed to give you.Hydro14 said:
(Please dont argue this point either just say im wrong and dont take the advice or take it and move on)
You also (though its very clear its not just you) fail to fully comprehend how human arguements are even formed. The vast majority of people who make a comment about a video game are not going to performed extended analysis of why they did not like some but rather jump on top of the first thing that they feel relate to the problem and claim that it itself IS the problem. Hence comments of 'the combat sucked' or 'the story didn't make sense'. They recognise as a far as the context of the problem but not the problem itself. Thats why you get such support of things like Red Letter Media or Tasteful Understated Nerdrage, these people are able to verbalise their thoughts and explain the root causes of the problem.
To follow your concept, Mass Effect's ending didnt make sense but then again neither did much of the series to begin with. The point is the plot holes are there but they aren't the problem, they are simply a symptom of the problem: narrative dissonance (Go watch that im not going to simply rehash his points, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7MlatxLP-xs).
Anyway to Dragon Age 2. Similiar issues of the 'the plot doesnt make any sense', there are two failing in story telling that leads to this. The first is a failure to accurately convey how the story makes sense and for the story to actually not make sense. I dont want to argue this because i've done it before and I'm tired of it so I'll make the assumption that it makes perfect sense. People are complaining about it not making sense. A lot of people too. That is a failure of the narrative regardless of how you spin it that your audience cannot understand on a basic level what and why things just happened.
The is as a result of a poorly connected narrative structure as you have alluded to. I call it the D&D effect. In a Dungeons and Dragons campaign a Game Master sets a story to last for a few sessions and the party plays through it and resolves the plot, everyone gets rich and goes home. Then they need to keep playing so a new plot is created and a loose reason is created to connect it narratively and the players keep going. Thats what happened to DA2 though the major difference is the players invested in a D&D game dont care about the connection relative to the importance of their character's new adventure. DA2 on the other hand is a pregenerated story with a large number of pregenerated outcomes. Your going to go on an expedition, its going to go bad but you get rich, your relative is either dead or joining faction X, you go save the town from the orks and become a hero and then you fight the Mages and the crazy paladin. These events will happen regardless of your decisions which isn't inherently bad but it suddenly places a HUGE emphasis on how the Acts of each story connect.
The starting interaction with the character is problem. You dont know anything about them and they are just kinda running around fighting for their life. Great I guess? Why do I care about anything involved in this process? It is profoundly difficult to put a character in a dangerous situation and then retroactively work to have an audience care about them. When its done well its great, when its not....you get Dragon Age 2. One common trend I find for players who liked the game is they really felt invested in the characters. Those who disliked the game failed to becoming invested. This highlights to me that theres a major problem going on here so I think its something to consider moving through the game.
I played a Mage which creates the core motivation to get rich so you can protect yourself from the Templars (from memory its been a while) once you reach the city. Since I don't get to choose what my path is, its important that the details are in place to provide justification. So I need reasoning. Why does money protect me from the templars? Can I sick my lawyers on them?
The game explicitly states that you survive without drawing attention for a year. Why isn't every criminal organisation trying to recruit me, hell why arent major powers trying to recruit me? I'm an Mage without anyone holding my leash. Given everything thats discussed about the totalitarian nature of the Templar control particular under High Templar Crazy Pants this should be a pretty rare thing. So why is the best option to work with a random, likely extremely dangerous operation in the Deep Roads.
Theres no solid reasoning behind it, its not a critical flaw but its a little flimsy, alone not a problem and this is a GREAT idea for a sidequest but for the core introduction to how this character is deciding to change his situation is important to build a connection. Does he do it out of desperation? Not likely has hes kept himself hidden for a whole year now. Does he just want to get rich? Maybe but its hard to empathise with a character for that. Ultimately all we know before now is that Hawke wants to protect his family. There is no plot at this point, no solid backbone to fall back on so everything falls to how the character of Hawke works out. This is a big ask to not develop a very clear motivation for whats going on.
Lets compare this exact same plotpoint to another Bioware game, Baldur's Gate 2. The opening is very similiar your escaping from a dungeon and after a series of unfortunate events a character from your party is taken away. A character players would know from the original game, a character you might have grown a fondness for and a connection that the game works hard to build upon and develop pity for the ordeals they have needed to go through and shes taken away to rot in some prison with the villain. The goal is to raise X amount of money to pay some theives to help you go save her. This works as through your own actions so far you've encounter these thieves as mutual enemies to the main villain and you have built upon a relationship with body the main and the character taken away. Your a fish out of water in an unknown city and your there with limited choices, limited options and you need to move ASAP. This isn't perfect but it create ENOUGH of a varied motivation to get that gold and pay for a rescue.
Contrast with DA2 and your own connection is: Hawk wants to protect himself, his family and/or get rich. All very short term goals, his development? Very little of the 5 major characters we have known so far (Your Brother/Sister/Mother/Avaline/Flemeth - not counting the Metaplot investigation we dont have anywhere near enough knowledge to completely grasp at this point) are really relevent. The intro has a very limited time to give you enough to care about Hawke and his family, something THE ENTIRE GAME DEPENDS ON. One family member is dead (and your borther sucks!), your mother has some development enough to instill the protection instincts in the players atleast, Flemeth.....she has absolutely no purpose whatsever in showing up, taking away critical development time from those characters.
So anyway, these problems dont break the game, they just criple the opening, we can move on. The connection is the next point of potential failure, why is getting rich and engage in the Quanari the natural evolution. We got to have a little information on how they operate but for the most part we had nothing to do with them. Thankfully the Game Master spent a bunch of fleshing out the city and had a internal political conflict for us to deal with. Convient huh! Not sure why we are the ones dealing with it but whatever Im up for some adventure. This a big connection problem, I dont know why I need to care about the entire experience but despite this, it is perhaps the best section of the game. This city is something you inherently become connected to simply as a result of running around and getting money. Your dealing with various groups you actually have a chance to see whats going on. Your assests, your family and your connection to the world is tied up in this city. You get the chance to charge up the palace steps with big music playing and get to play the big damn hero.
Then the mage templar plot rears its ugly head. Sure there some discussion of it but ultimately its something that doesn't have any where near enough exposure ot really warrant it to become THE critical point of the game. It leads to the ultiamte decision and the ultimate showndown. Of ultimate destiny......
Firstly, Im a Mage, why the hell would I ever help the Templars who by all rights should be arresting me? The game spends the rest of the game trying to show you that its a tough issue. Its not, the way the Templars are operating reflect the standard practices of the Imperium of Man and anything that can remotely be connected to warhammer 40,000 is bad. Your treating people as guilty until proven innocent and even if you dont agree...IM A GODDAMN MAGE. Its a weak decision, I've already save the city. Your constantly stopped from making a middle ground decision, everything is either back the mages or back the templars. That makes me rapidly stop caring as the issue is inherently broke for my character. The whole plot of the High Templar taking the super magic sword of doom is its own kind of sillyness but its minor relative to final act failing to invest the player in the character's decisions and experiences. This is probably mitigated by the player being a rogue or a warrior but if 1/3 of your options cripple the final act of the game, you need to rework your story.
Anyway thats my obsessively long rant so I'll give you favourite conversation in the game. Its with Isabella right after she comes back after running off with the Qunari book (despite me telling her directly to her face that if we find it she was going to have it). She makes an offer to the player, that Hawke her get on her ship and sail away for an adventure. I realised thats what I wanted to do and would have made a far better game. You going around hunting for treasure, exploring the world and ultimately getting caught up in the Templar/Mage conflict that was going to start consuming the world. They wanted a character story, they should have just done that.
Just to respond to this when you have a game designed around creating your own character and your own personality. Illusion of choice isnt a bad thing particularly if you dont explain what 'impacting the story in a meaningful way' represents. I played a Mage in Origins too, an Elf Mage. The major change is that everyone who doesnt know who you are treats you like dirt because your an Elf and fear you if your a Mage. This has zero impact on the story BUT it does impact how you think. If MY Grey Warden has spent his entire life being treated like an monster and second class citizens, you can bet your ass when the time came to spare or save the cursed humans I slaughted them and took the Daelish forces with me. When King Alister asked me what boon he could grant me, I ask for the Mage Tower to be free of the Templars. When I played a Human Noble Warrior who got to witness his family being murdered at the hands of Arl Rendon and later it came time to confront him I killed him and offered no mercy for what he had done. When I played a Dwarf Noble I made sure to stop Lord Bhelen from coming into power and dooming dwarves to adopt an isolatest policy and seperating them from the upper world. That illusion of choice had consequences on how I as a player perceived events, you take that away and I suddenly change how I react in future situations.Hydro14 said: