alanschu

need an "Age of" in the title.

I think fixing that is as simple as finding an .ini file or something, and changing the path for your CD.

Okay, but that doesn't really change anything, does it. Wals, think about it this way. For many people, it is now socially acceptable, economically viable and 'normal' to spend most of your teenage years not reading or writing anything beyond what you do at school (which is, by the way, roughly 1/3-1/2 of what you'd have done, both in difficulty and quantity). What are you trying to say? Jerk!

THat's possible and perhaps even likely. I just don't think that that is what Niten was talking about. Regardless, that's only a piece of the pie. There are smaller (mostly cosmetic I assume, since I haven't played through with a different character and likely won't get a chance unfortunately) references to your character's background at various points. I'm very curious how some things play out with some of the different backgrounds, though I probably shouldn't hope for too much as it'll likely be, as I said, mostly cosmetic.

I agree and totally support text descriptions for that sort of stuff.

Mea culpa, not intended. It's okay. I've been pretty snappy lately. Real life is annoying sometimes

I think he phrased it poorly. I read it as he meant that more people would not even bother finishing the game, than people that would finish it and play through it several times in order to appreciate the differences of the origin stories. It's a bit ambiguous.

Too bad Mikael didn't make the response you just did. No need for the sardonic "pleeeaase." Unless you're actually trying to incite more hostile responses.

Well, I can definitively state that the Origin beginnings have an influence beyond just the origin part haha.

Uh, in-built PIP-Boy 2000 encyclopedia? Scanner? Read the manufacturing stamp on the weapon? There's a myriad of possibilities, all fitting in with the universe. I disagree that it's fitting with the universe. Playing the game with an intelligence of 1 where your character's dialogue is little more than "wubba wubba" would lead me to believe he wouldn't even know how to read about something from the PIP-Boy 2000.

"Show don't tell" is an axiom you hear most commonly in the world of film and screenwriting. When you work in an interactive medium, especially when you make a 3D first-person game, you abandon the tools of cinema. Composition, movement, montage are out of your hands and the control ceded to the player is not equivalent to the control you would possess as a filmmaker crafting a linear visual sequence. I disagree on some level. For instance, I don't care to read something like "<NPC X> gets in a huff, crosses his arms and paces around the room." I'd much rather they show me that. The nice thing about Fallout 3's "stories" is that they let you draw your own conclusions, since that's what you'd have to do in the position of the player anyways. It's a bit different, but there's a uniqueness of "Hmm, what happened here....I think this is what happened" that comes with how Fallout 3 does it, rather than the descriptive ways Fallout 1 and 2 do it. I can agree with Aram's concern that it's a bit silly that some "Wubba wubba" type character is able to discern that the armor is made of advanced defensive polymers.

I don't think it's because of the long development time. I think BioWare just wanted to give players some flexibility in how they start things off in the game. It also lets them make use of the world they created. I know there aren't going to be huge differences no subsequent playthroughs, but I am curious how some places are different because of your origin story.

Found my MOTB and am finally playing that. Rogue/Blackguard.

There's an old hieroglyphic that basically says that society is doomed because kids don't respect their elders, so yeah. Having said that, I like to think I am a fairly well spoken individual, if perhaps a bit wordy. I didn't do very much reading though, outside of computer games. I will not dispute that reading helps with that sort of thing, but based on my anecdotal personal experiences, I wonder if there is something else there. For probably 10 or so years, the only reading I did was the required reading in school.

Him, might be because when people use the term "Microsoft" they are using it to describe the many people that work for Microsoft.

To be perfectly honest, I'm not saying I'd go out of my way to read them-- I don't really care about the lore of the dumb sword. I'm just saying that even this: is better than in my book I agree. Just stating that it's frustrating as a game developer to put so much effort into stuff only to have many people (I'd argue most) not even care. While it sucks, I can understand why these types of write ups are less and less. At the same time though, as graphical fidelity improves and animation systems get better, there are a lot of things that used to be very wordy but no longer need to be. This can be a good thing.

Because that's exactly what we're saying. If you have grievances towards what you perceive from DA to not be what you're looking for, then fine. The game doesn't seem to interest you and virtually every facet of it seems to be subpar. But hey, I'm sure if Gorion's last name had been Cousland and hence your character was known as a Cousland by some in the game, Baldur's Gate would have been an infinitely subpar game. I agree. The concerns about things like the E3 trailers are valid. If you mention you'd be interested in a more unique setting then fine. Creating threads about writing the most generic RPG story ever while at one point stating that it'll be hard to do because a name of a mountain range in DA is called the Frostback Mountains is getting pretty trivial. Dragon Age is not a game without fault. There are some things I really like about the game, and some things that I don't care so much for. There are certainly things I think can be improved upon, and I'll join in on discussions that people have about what could have been done better, what they liked, and so forth. No I certainly think that plays a part. You are right that one advantage that games like Fallout and Baldur's Gate have is simply that they came sooner. I think that in spite of people's claims, more games just like Baldur's Gate would be bad because it'd just be more of what we've already experienced. However, I think given the circumstances, games like Fallout and Baldur's Gate, as well as Planescape: Torment, are put up on pedestals simply because they were new and fresh, coming during a huge cold spell for RPGs. A lot of people, myself included, have such powerful memories about the great times we had playing those games. At the same time though, I don't really know what to think about people that are disheartened by the fact that Dragon Age is a "generic" fantasy setting with some common fantasy archetypes in it. It seemed like that was the way from the get go.

For the record, you do a good job of this.

Depends on how you pronounce historic. I clearly enunciate the 'h' and would say "a historic." But many people have a silent 'h' and would effectively say -istoric.

Haha that's Max alright!

Yeah, if there's anything I hate in an RPG its stats being described by nonsense acronyms, or worse icons. DAMs, CONDs, DRs, even Fire Resistance +10s... I hate feeling like the loot I'm picking up is there just to be loot I think it was someone from Black Isle, but I can't remember specifically, that commented that one thing that was very disheartening was coming up with all of these neat item descriptions and backstories, only to see an overwhelming majority of gamers immediately scroll to the bottom to see what the stat boosts were.

The gameplay is of utmost importance to me. As someone that is frequently too wordy I am pretty tolerant of their verbose descriptions

Except backwards, as 98SE was fine but ME was junk.

Hmm, so there are exceptions. Wondered me why people also say "an RPG". It's because it's spelled AAaaaaarrrr Peeee Geee. Interesting. So, "a" Youniversity, then. Yup. The crux of it is really the sound the following word makes. For instance: "an hour" EDIT: As someone else pointed out

Was that mentioned in a preview? I've seen the references to nercomantic enslavings a few times now haha.