Aristes

Oh, yeah, I see. I was mixed up, not you. I think in terms of getting more folks to play through several times, it'll fail. I do think that it's a clever idea if done properly and I'll play more than once if it's good. In that respect, I refuse to complain about something that might benefit me, at least until I find out it doesn't.

See, now I had the opposite experience. I thought some of the vignettes were relatively subtle and I enjoyed most of them I noticed in the first place. They're in place for folks who enjoy them. On the other hand, some of the text was clever and funny in FO 1/2, there was a lot that lacked delicacy or was downright hammer handed.

You misread the sentence. He said that he believes more players won't even finish the game than will try more than one origins. In other words, less folks will check out the origins than go through the entire game. But I don't know that's an issue. If Bioware wants to try it in the effort to get more folks to play multiple times, or if they're simply willing to trade the extra time for the extra buzz even if it doesn't pan out in terms of player demographics, why shouldn't they? Sure, they need to look at the bottom line, but 1. the cynical view is that will generate enough buzz to make it worth while even if it doesn't get more folks to play or 2. the rosie view is that it will result in more multiple completions or 3. the view that gives them a break is that they would like to see something like this feature in games and they can afford to take the time to do it. I've heard of brainstorming, and it really sounds like, whether the beancounters get the final word, folks tend to offer stuff they personally want to see or think has a coolness factor that the consumer will appreciate.

That's a nice ride and a nice trip. About a year ago, I did a cross country trip from Las Vegas to Virginia. I've been through some 20+ states in the past two years. Driving, that is, not counting airports. We do have high gas prices, Calax. California is such a screwed up state.

Lets hope its deeper than say TOEE alignment beginnings (How could it not be?) I remember lurking while folks defended the ToEE alignment beginings and thinking that they had a point. Then I remember playing ToEE and seeing that the folks defending the alignment beginnings had been wrong. They were virtually pointless. The idea was, "While alignment sucks, the game will feature alignment and so maybe this will actually make the mechanic worth something." Nope.

You get a pass. You're from Minnesota. Seriously, dude, chill out. If you're not one of the folks who has a hard time understanding when to use slang and when to use more formal speech and/or writing, why sweat it?

I'm not quite so impressed that I want to have sex with you, jjc. I agree that text is necessary. However, text is no more central to the Fallout experience than graphics. Oops, should I say 'graphics' or 'graphical representation' or some other jargonistic term? Yes, text is vital, but conveying ideas through pictures or even music is no less powerful and has no less a place in the Fallout experience than written words. I mean, I don't know how many copy BIS produced for blind players, but I assume not a lot. So, in some cases I'm sure the design team wants to use text. In other cases, I'm sure they want to use pictures. The idea isn't that one is inherently better than the other. The point is that both are necessary and each lends its own strength in telling the story. Frankly, I like text. I'm for more text.

Remember to post a few pictures of the wedding day, you glorious bastard!

Actually, I see a lot of confusion and or individuality in the use of the ariticle before any h word. Sometimes it's undoubtedly an affectation, but... what the hell? The important thing is to convey the idea in the first place. If you do that, then it really doesn't matte. However, the better you are able to articulate your ideas, the better folks will accept them. For that reason, the youngsters who run around with some sort of language deficiency will shore up those shortcomings and improve their presentation. It's just how it works.

Hey, rat bastard, the bottom line is I use at the end of the day with alarming regularity. Every other sentence, just about.

Plato complained about those damned kids. Society has been going downhill for thousands of years. Amazing how we really aren't any worse today than we were thousands of years ago. I mean, maybe we're a bad bunch compared to those happy, go lucky ancient Assyrians? The US, when it went into Baghdad, hearkened to the life preserving Roman method and divided the invasion force between one group who surrounded the enemy bastion and the other group who slaughtered every living thing in the way? Now, I'm a complete slob, so I just jot crap down as it pops in my head. I have a lot of patience with others who do the same.

This is true, but if you read the back of the book, the impression you might get is that it will be cliched. You might think individual ideas are cliched, but the presentation or the mix or some other aspect of the story might make up the difference. This was true for KotOR, where I saw the plot twist coming a mile away, but I thought the actual moment was so well done I enjoyed it immensely. This could very well be true for every complaint I have about what I see in the DA story. I might think the part elves and dwarves play in the story is compelling. I might see the social aspects of society as gripping. So, I might rightly think an idea sounds cliched right now, which is no different than getting an impression from reading a book jacket. In that sense, I'm still trying to assess the title before I purchase it. I figure that's what most folks do before they buy something. Once I buy it, however, all my assumptions fly out the window because I have actual experience. In that sense, all you have to do is convince me to purchase and I'll see for myself. But, hell, I'm buying this title anyhow. If one of our regular board monkeys is working on it, I'm going to buy it. So, Alan assured the oh so important demographic of Aristes. As far as the 6 origins... I don't really care. I guess I see it as a net positive, but I don't expect it to start a revolution in game story design. I never thought it would. The three different antagonists idea is intriguing. You've posted it before, but I didn't really catch what you were saying until now. It's a possible fix if it makes meaningful consequences easier to implement without sacrificing the integrity of the story line. I guess most folks would rather see it from the prots point of view, and that is undoubtedly more intuitive, but the point is to create a great story with meaningful consequences. If an antagonist centered design makes that possible, then there is no arguing with success.

You are well on your way to being massively disappointed by Max Payne 3 What, Max Payne: Return of the Middle Aged Overweight Guy in a Wifebeater Shirt?

Get along lil' dogie!

That made me laugh out loud. You're nuts. ...But, yeah, I don't figure we've been visited and, if we have, then clearly they're so advance it doesn't make any difference. I mean, that's what I was saying about literally destroying the earth. There might be infinite ways, but since we can't imagine them, we can't really discuss them.

I'm in touch with that emotion, bro.

But, ~Di, can we just lay down some criticism of particular features without panning the whole game or Bioware? Can we call criticism where we see it is warranted, such as cliched stereotypes, without letting it decide our purchase or define our experience?

I liked Max Payne, but I'm really digging Max Payne 2. It's a blast. By the way, Purkake, I was confused about the tower, but I finally figured out what to do with it and it was quite fun. The only thing I downright prefer from MP1 is the hero. The new one is darker and stockier. I liked the sardonic crooked smile on the face of the guy who modeled the first Max Payne.

Might have been Puuk. I seem to recall the same thing as well. For my part, I'm happy to have minimal flavor text on weapons as long as the truly unique ones have something about them. The vast majority of weapons can have a standard snippet applied to them. IWD, Kelverin pointed out in the now playing thread, had some great flavor text. I'm thinking especially of the mace (or flail or whatever) where the handle was wrapped in the skin of elven maidens or some such. It wasn't just the idea, but the phrasing that was excellent.

I'm leaning towards the purchase at this point. I really liked those character portraits. The other graphics have been lackluster, but I'm not a graphics whore anyhow.

I wasn't really complaining at you Virumor. It's pointless to discuss things in terms of what we don't understand. It's just kind of like extra terrestrial life. On the other hand, while we have absolutely no evidence of other sentient species, it just boggles the mind to think all life in the universe is on the Earth. Good chance it exists but we'll never see it. Does that make sense or am I just going gonzo?

What I mean to say is that I'm a big pretentious poser who makes literary references in his posts to try to make himself look like he's read a book or two, which is exactly the truth. I've read a book or two. Keeping an eye on the 'physics' is a good idea. I read some post on another forum and then make cracks about people on ours? Good Lord, what a ****. ...But, enough drama. Someone will flame me soon to right the universe.

There isn't much that we can envision destroying the earth. Literally destroying the planet is beyond our abilities, sure. By and large, the ways in which the earth could be destroyed, by which I'll mean reduced to chunks less than a third of it's current size, are currently beyond our imagination. However, while we are confined to our imaginations and observations, both of which are imperfect, we should not make universal statements based on either one. I'll admit I'm being a bit picky, Virumor, but I'm not trying to insult you in the process. I'm just saying I'd be happier with the statemtn "...there's not much that we know of that can destroy the Earth beyond a journey into the sun or a Death Star." Even so, the means of our demise could be imminent but we might be oblivious. If this were strictly a logical thread in which we were making cold hard predictions about the demise of the planet, we would simply acknowledge the imperfections in our understanding and then put them aside in order to have a reasonable conversation. However, that doesn't change the fact that those imperfections exist. It just means that those imperfections are irrelevant to a more rigorous discussion and largely a waste of time otherwise. EDIT for clarity.

Haha We're listening to Achy Breaky Heart and my wife is dancing to it! Yee Haw!

Hell, that's World of Warcraft. I mean, instead of crocodiles, they're crocolisks? Instead of scorpions, they're scorpids? Good Lord, man! haha Still, WoW is one big cliche, and that's fine because you know what it is when you get it.