What is it about Bioware that makes people insane?

[Rooster Cogburn]

For me, Bioware is that one dev that releases some okay-to-good games, some hilariously bad games, and gets praised to the sky for no apparent reason. Add to that a fanbase with a tendency to over-invest to an epic degree in the bad-to-mediocre romantic subplots, and you have a winning recipe for something that is fun to laugh at.

Summed up my feelings for Bioware completely. Bioware's just really overrated, they don't understand the powers of subtlety, don't do morally grey situations properly, and JRPGs create better characters than them.

I have similar feelings but perhaps less harsh. I do think there is a lot that's admirable about their games. But I don't like the bad romance plots, the very flat characters, and most of all the moral simplicity. If you're going to offer choices, they need to have some moral complexity to be interesting choices. Most of the time, you are being asked to pick from options you already chose at the beginning of the game. Good, bad, or waste of time. Um, Okay? I already know what I'm going to pick, so what's the point? The VERY few times when a choice in a Bioware game has made me ponder the best answer were by FAR my favorite examples. My favorite part of Dragon Age: Origins was at the end when

Spoiler

you confront Loghain and he explains his actions. The whole game you thought this man was just a ruthless monster, but now you begin to wonder if he wasn't really trying to save the kingdom, and if he wasn't right! You sympathize with your enemy, but he is your enemy, and you must decide his fate. For once, not an easy choice to make

But normally the writing and choices are very black-and-white. Other games can get away from this kind of stuff, but Bioware games aren't gonna sell on the combat alone. This isn't easy stuff to get right but when it's more-or-less the only draw your product has...

 

[Bostur]

People get riled up when expectations are high, and dissappointment sets in. I really liked KOTOR, Jade Empire, ME1 and ME2 and I loved DA:O. They all had some serious flaws, but also a unique lovable Bioware flavour.

I hated DA2 with a passion. I thought SW:TOR was a tolerable game for 30 levels, and an incredible waste of ressources. And in the end I wanted to save myself the frustration of ME3, for me the series ended with ME2.

From DA2 and onward it seems Bioware wanted to focus on things I never liked about their games in the first place. Generic dialogues with way more options than effects, unpolished gameplay elements and DLC hell. Adding EA and Origin to the mix doesn't exactly help either.


I feel similar about Blizzard, they are one of the few developers that have still retained some of the craftmanship of old, but they are moving towards business models that I hate. And they completely ruined WoW. I'll probably buy Diablo 3, because hey it's Blizzard. Parts of it will be awesome. But parts of it will most likely also be horrible.

Bethesda? I never cared for them in the first place. So I expect their games to be sub-par. Skyrim was actually playable which was more than I expected after having tried Oblivion.

Valve? They stick to what they know, and what they are good at. An example of solid craftmanship without hype and marketing guys taking over. With Valve you know what you get.

 

[Vault101]

People get riled up when expectations are high, and dissappointment sets in. I really liked KOTOR, Jade Empire, ME1 and ME2 and I loved DA:O. They all had some serious flaws, but also a unique lovable Bioware flavour.

I hated DA2 with a passion. I thought SW:TOR was a tolerable game for 30 levels, and an incredible waste of ressources. And in the end I wanted to save myself the frustration of ME3, for me the series ended with ME2.

have you played Mass effect 3?


[quote/] I feel similar about Blizzard, they are one of the few developers that have still retained some of the craftmanship of old, but they are moving towards business models that I hate. And they completely ruined WoW. I'll probably buy Diablo 3, because hey it's Blizzard. Parts of it will be awesome. But parts of it will most likely also be horrible. [/quote]

blizzard seem to be similar....a well loved and long running developer shackled to a publishing deamon...perhaps they havnt released enough games to be accused of "sliding in quality"


[quote/] Valve? They stick to what they know, and what they are good at. An example of solid craftmanship without hype and marketing guys taking over. With Valve you know what you get.[/quote]

I think the difference with valve is that they are not shackled to any publisher, they could make a game about sapient fruit escaping from a grocery store if they wanted...(oh and they make good shit too..not just games)

 

[Don Savik]

Its a mix between good rpgs and sexing everyone in your party....just because. Ever since they added companion sexin' the fan base has been in overdrive mode.

I like Kotor and Swotor (too young for baldurs gate / hated Mass Effects characters and 3rd person gunplay / found dragon age way to boring) but overall I don't think Bioware's game are as mature as they think they are. And the fanbase doesn't help coining terms like "talimancer" either. They're ok, but not as good as Bethesda/CDprojekt/all the other good rpg devs.

 

[Bostur]

have you played Mass effect 3?

No. I can't accept the license terms. And my experience with DA2 and SWTOR suggest that I would probably be dissapointed. I also read a few serious reviews that mentioned things that would probably drive me crazy, inaccurate controls being one of them.

I think the difference with valve is that they are not shackled to any publisher, they could make a game about sapient fruit escaping from a grocery store if they wanted...(oh and they make good shit too..not just games)

Indeed, independent developers tend to get their artistic visions through. Also if they make a game about fruits escaping from a grocery store, they call it exactly that so everyone knows what to expect.

 

[Vault101]

have you played Mass effect 3?

No. I can't accept the license terms. And my experience with DA2 and SWTOR suggest that I would probably be dissapointed. I also read a few serious reviews that mentioned things that would probably drive me crazy, inaccurate controls being one of them.

.

ah k..fair enough

I will say that keeping my expectations low (well...low for "me") I had some reservations but was FAR from disspointed with ME3

then again my veiw isnt the most Pragmatic,

when and why did Bioware sell out to EA anyway? Im guess it was because of the money?

 

[Bostur]

ah k..fair enough

I will say that keeping my expectations low (well...low for "me") I had some reservations but was FAR from disspointed with ME3

then again my veiw isnt the most Pragmatic,

when and why did Bioware sell out to EA anyway? Im guess it was because of the money?

I've been tempted to buy ME3 for sure, parts of what I've seen seems pretty good. But overall it just seems like more of ME2 so I don't think I'm missing out on much.

I think EA simply bought enough shares to make a takeover, real fans can correct me if I am wrong. I believe it happened between ME1 and ME2.

 

[Vault101]

ah k..fair enough

I will say that keeping my expectations low (well...low for "me") I had some reservations but was FAR from disspointed with ME3

then again my veiw isnt the most Pragmatic,

when and why did Bioware sell out to EA anyway? Im guess it was because of the money?

I've been tempted to buy ME3 for sure, parts of what I've seen seems pretty good. But overall it just seems like more of ME2 so I don't think I'm missing out on much.

I think EA simply bought enough shares to make a takeover, real fans can correct me if I am wrong. I believe it happened between ME1 and ME2.

gameplay wise Id say its better than ME2...

ohh....really? I know EA was Biowares publisher but...well I really dont know much about this

 

[Fieldy409_v1legacy]

when and why did Bioware sell out to EA anyway? Im guess it was because of the money?

Who knows why, probably just for the money. Youd have to be working at bioware to know that, all we got was PR reasons.

When, was a month before the release of Mass effect 1 I believe. I remember people getting all worked up and declaring they wouldnt buy Mass effect due to it now being an EA game.

So Mass effect 1 was mostly developed by an independant Bioware. Consider that before you accuse EA of forcing them to go mainstream.

 

[spartan231490]

Bioware made games with aggressive levels of complexity and difficulty on the upper levels. Then they dramatically cut that complexity, and in many ways the difficulty as well. How would this not attract the hatred of people on the internet. any mention of less complex controls and people explode, to actually implement controls that much simpler than a predecessor is near suicide.

 

[Vault101]

when and why did Bioware sell out to EA anyway? Im guess it was because of the money?

Who knows why, probably just for the money. Youd have to be working at bioware to know that, all we got was PR reasons.

When, was a month before the release of Mass effect 1 I believe. I remember people getting all worked up and declaring they wouldnt buy Mass effect due to it now being an EA game.

So Mass effect 1 was mostly developed by an independant Bioware. Consider that before you accuse EA of forcing them to go mainstream.

yeah....

comapred to Mass effect 2 theres hints of a pattern


capitcha:sulpher smell <-yeah..somthing smells off

 

[endtherapture]

Most other developers are allowed to have mistakes (Bethesda games are notorious for being buggy; Valve lives where "Episodic gaming" and "multi-year development" are allowed to be in the same sentence, Blizzard releases a game once a decade, etc.) but for some reason, Bioware is not allowed to slip.

It's cos Bioware games and the problems with them are not easily as fixed/overlooked as the problems with other games.

Bethesda games, whilst buggy, are eventually fixed by mods.
Valve's episodic gaming produced some damn fine games, and whilst they've dropped the concept now, it was just an experiment that gave us some great games.
Blizzards games are just so damn polished that people will happily wait a decade for the next Diablo/Starcraft.

Bioware's recent problems are just intrinsic to the game and can't be easily fixed. Recent games are released unfinished, with sub standard story, graphics, and gameplay. Mods can't fix games as broken and mediocre as Biowares recent offerings.

Bioware just isn't up there with other companies anymore - we keep expecting awesome games from them, but we should expect average games now.

Captcha: khyber pass

 

[Tiddles]

I like BioWare because they make games I love but I don't love them. I do however love, adore, revere etc the universes they create and dear god the characters are awesome. It's been more than a year since I played DA:O and I can still remember Alistair, Morrigan, Zev and Leli and I remember all their idiosyncrasies and I can't help but feel deeply attached to them and their personal struggles.

It's much the same though lessened with the Mass Effect series, I think it's the emotional attachment people have to the characters that prompts this kind of outpouring of emotion. You can't feel the same way about game mechanics as you do about personal struggles because while game mechanics are how you enter the world and realise it the characters that occupy it speak directly to your emotions.

 

[Rheinmetall]

Because Bioware has changed and this is what hurts the most, at least me. Some people still think it's the good old studio of Baldur's Gate era. And instead of that they see the typical EA partner, with new people, new philosohpy and everything that this partnership means.

 

[Gunner 51]

I think the main reason why folks go nuts when Bioware gets mentioned is because they were a damned fine developer whose games were worth their weight in gold until EA got it's claws into them.

Nowadays Bioware since the days of Dragon Age 2, the games have had the stink of Executive Meddling about them because EA simply won't leave Bioware alone to do their own thing. Before the moneymen got involved, Bioware were the darlings of the gaming world - but are now looked upon as little more than overhyped sellouts.

But the sad thing is, Bioware may have been daft enough to have EA as a publisher - but EA were the ones who are getting Bioware to make the crappy changes to make the game more profitable for them. EA are little more than psychotic sugar daddies to me and they shouldn't so much be stopped - but reigned in.

 

[Distance_warrior]

I think it is the nature of their games. Many people enjoy Bioware games for the story or the mechanics or the characters and so they have mass market appeal but that not all they do.

To me a good Bioware game is more than just a series of events but an entire world that you can get lost in full of adventure and emotion that uses its 3 levels of emotional attachment (the world, the characters and the self)in perfect unison to compel you and drive you through the story and its this blend that allows you to get lost and want to stay lost. So for some people a Bioware game is kinda like refuge -as hopeless as that sounds- from boredom, insigificance, lack of power and any number of things.

However when Bioware fails to deliver on this refuge the illusion is lost and something special is lost for good. The world becomes a game, the people NPCs and the protagonist a puppet instead of fully realised locations human beings and reflections of yourself.

Bioware is not allowed to slip up because by slipping up they destroy something that people care about not just failing to give someone what they want like other studios. some see this as pathetic others see it as amazing but if a Boiware game resonates with you you care about it more than just another western RPG with a party and dialogue.