Monte Carlo

I think a politics game, or a game about economics, where you played a Gordon Gekko type character would be an arena where you could explore ideas like good and evil without scaring the horses too much. Having said that, and unfashionable as it may be, I think Gordon Gekko isn't necessarily evil...

I'm glad we got that one sorted out.

I think it will be fun, but here at the Schloss Monte, our main query is will it be fun in the way the developers intended? I'm waiting for Vol to turn up to lecture me about hype... but Bio's insistence that each of their games raises the bar, to the extent that it's basically the video gaming version of Penicillin, is lame. Wouldn't it make a refreshing change for them to say, "we've made a game. It's fun." Hey, it's shipping with tools. This is a massive and kudos to Bio. Fans can put it right - look at the Total War series. Plus, I can see an Obz forum 'make-your-own-cutscene' competition coming on... Cheers MC

Warhammer: Mark of Chaos I like a war-gamey RTS. I bought it when it first came out, had a mad surge of activity at work and forgot about it. Have unearthed it, am re-installing / patching it to see if it's fun and worth getting the XP (which is now probably at uber-bargain bin prices). Have tinkered with it, at max resolution with all the settings up high it's quite purdy. However, it lacks that visceral CRUNCH one now expects from cavalry charges (etc) that one enjoys from MTW2. I'll wait to see how the tactical aspect works out. The setting is utterly ridiculous, the most ripped-off high vanilla phantasy. So much so, in fact, it's almost... cute. Cheers MC

^ The obvious answer is Regeneration - the worst fantasy setting would be heavily powagaemed and munchkin-central.

^ I've no reason to disbelieve you. Personally, I think Bio have form for saying one thing and delivering another over NWN1. Let's hoped they've learnt from the experience.

Riverworld by Philip Jose Farmer, it's a series but (gasp) there is an end. It might not strictly count as 'fantasy', nary and elf or a magic sword to be seen, but it's pretty cool nonetheless. Cheers MC

No, I didn't, I'm as guilty as the next bloke of making assumptions. It still makes me wonder about the volte face. EA are likely to have had an input, right?

Er, forget the E3 videos, what about the new website? And marketing campaign? And that the developers are clearly embarrassed by the marketing campaign? And that on the website the origins / RPG stuff is hidden in a bit about 'The Hero', as if your are playing a game where you're a pre-defined character? And the Paper / Scissors... review that outs the frankly toe-curling romance content? Hey, I know you are involved in all this and you know stuff we don't, but please don't take us for complete mugs. Cheers MC I only interact with a small group of people on a consistent basis, but where are you getting the idea that the developers are clearly embarrassed? From Bio's boards? I've been browsing a number of threads where concerns such as the ones raised here have been addressed by Dave Gaider. Now Dave has always engaged with the fans... so, on the now infamous sex scene he says... OK, it's a gentle rebuke to the marketing guys at EA, but you'll see other comments that share the hey-it's-those-chumps-up-at-marketing-not-me theme. Bio Kremlinologists may well translate this into 'Dave Gaider is pissed off with EA marketing.' If it is indeed the case that DA is a serious, mature, DaRK HeROIc FanTaSY (etc) and one or two scenes have been represented as what the game's all about just to market it to the non-CRPG market then I think he's got a point. Then again, DA might be unintentionally hilarious, campy, mainstream CRPG fun. We'll see. But as usual, the problem is the usual Bio hype machine, which looks like it might have collided, messily with the Imperial Battlecruiser that is EA marketing. Cheers MC

Er, forget the E3 videos, what about the new website? And marketing campaign? And that the developers are clearly embarrassed by the marketing campaign? And that on the website the origins / RPG stuff is hidden in a bit about 'The Hero', as if your are playing a game where you're a pre-defined character? And the Paper / Scissors... review that outs the frankly toe-curling romance content? Hey, I know you are involved in all this and you know stuff we don't, but please don't take us for complete mugs. Cheers MC

I still don't get it, maybe someone who's followed it more closely can explain? You start off with touting a game with a five-fricking-year plus dev cycle as the spiritual successor to one of the most loved CRPGs ever made. You bang on, for five years, about the rich characterisation, NPC dynamics and personalised impact on plot outcomes. Even I'm impressed when you announce your in-house world lore wiki whereby everything is carefully planned under the hood to make the setting unique and crunchy and cool. You feed the Bioware forum fanbase all of this, and they are some of the neediest, passionate people out there in fanboy land. Your website reflects this and starts stoking the fires of slightly-geeky excitement. For chrissakes Dave writes his fan-fic and Green Ronin announce a pen and paper adaptation. Even by Bioware's standards, this is a carefully planned and focussed marketing assault. It's the D-Day landings of pre-release hype operations. Then... BOOM. This is the new faeces muzak, gore, sex and the least subtle assault on the console market I've ever seen. It's dressing up BG2 as Crysis and nobody at all is fooled. It's like 3/4 of the way through the LotR filming cycle somebody hit Peter Jackson over the head with a hammer and replaced him with the people behind xXx. Happily, I find this marginally amusing. DA will be, as I have always predicted, campy hack'n'slash fun made even funnier by it's pretensions to greatness. Now all I'm wondering is, like my learned friends, how much of this damascene conversion to action-RPG (which has to be EA-driven) will impact on the finished product. Perversely, I'm looking forward to it even more, but in a sort of "Wow, that's a really interesting car crash" type way. So, please can someone who's followed this explain? And, as our friendly half-orc used to say, Why, Bio? Why? Cheers MC

Because, as a Moderator, it is your fell responsibility. You knew the risks.

Some excellent stuff here, but Virumor's contribution is especially awful: cliche ridden, derivative, full of silly, pretentious naming conventions largely free of vowels. I salute you. Here I present you with a fallen elven anti-hero who hopefully is as awful. X'Yaris D'Athbringer of the Nightvelvet Helm hefted his mighty war-blade, Heart-Eater, and contemplated his foe. The hated Corsairs of Odge, scarlet-clad pirates wielding cruelly curved swords and wearing the ears of their enemies in their hats, snarled and spat on the deck of the Moon-Cutter Sh'Rll. They had already slain his faithul retainer, Z'larg, a deaf mute Kozolani, one of the hardy reptilemen that live under the Scoldingash Mountains. He had died bravely, performing a blood-spattered calypso of death with his spear. A dozen Corsairs had fallen by his hand already, their heads and other bodyparts littering the bloodstained decking. "By the Night-Lord!" cried X'Yaris, his heavy, ash-coloured mail sodden with blood and his long yellow hair falling in bloodied strands across his face. Heart-Eater split the first corsair in two and X'Yaris cried a a hideous cackle as he fell on the next pirate. The Corsairs of Odge knew that they were, indeed, in the presence of the companion of death and prepared for oblivion as the mighty elven war-sword glittered and danced and spilt hot blood like it was the unique Zxly't''ian chocolate drink they call "Drthhyl'op." "Ouch!" They cried as they were split asunder. Then, like the first and unexpectedly sudden ray of sunlight piercing a particularly fat raincloud, a young woman dressed in white appeared on the deck between the dark elven swordsman and the ragged curs of Odge. "Hold, X'Yaris D'Atbringer," she said. Her large amber eyes and ridiculously short skirt marked her as one of the warrior sun-maidens of Laaaa, the golden god of all that is good and banishing all that is bad. A corsair lunged at her with his sword, and she snapped her fingers. A cloud of light engulfed the pirates and they were taken by the destructive rapture of Laaaa, melting like candals tossed into the giant hell volcano of the war-god Xok. "Enough of this mortal foolery," she said, fixing him with a stern but actually rather hot stare, "The sun-maidens of Laaaa seek your assistance, hell-bound avatar of chaos. The ancient dead sorceror-god of F'lik' stirs again. Can we count on your fealty?" "Perhaps..." said X'Yaris... (hopefully not to be continued)

The re-marketing might make commercial sense but what strikes me as interesting is the downgrading of the whole origin story / RP aspect of the game. Why was that?

Ouch. That's the most damning testimony I've spotted so far.

^ Actually, I think you're right. I've been waiting for the gap DA was meant to fill for a long time... and maybe the gap closed while I wasn't paying attention.

"Something that can shovel. Audi S6..." Larry the Wheelman, Ronin. Now it would be an RS6 I guess, mebbe an Avant. I like German cars.

Look, in Dragon Age they've actually named a region of wintry mountains "The Frostbacks." So I know our struggle is, indeed, a tough one.

Nobody link to FATAL. Please. FATAL is ridiculous for reasons unconnected to cheesy cliche.

The banter on the numerous Dragon Age threads amuse me a great deal, and I want to avoid filling them up with too much invective. Therefore I thought we could direct the collective creative will of the forum to creating the worst fantasy setting ever. The most hackneyed, cliched, unappealing piece of vanilla rubbish ever. Something that makes the Forgotten Realms look like Elric's Melnibone by comparison. But careful, my friends! You might just think that a Scottish-accented dwarf here, a chainmail bikini there and a dash of slumbering ancient evil will be enough. But no, like playing the piano badly, this game actually takes skill. It is free-form - post a brief idea, a character, a magic item, a monster..... anything that, collectively, would add up to the Worst Fantasy Setting Ever. Cheers MC

Sad thing is, they look much cooler after the EA thing.

Although I suspect that it's going to be about as dark and gritty as an episode of Go Diego, Go! I suspect it might be quite epic, in a sort of er, big way...

alanschu has a special Bio-Licence to talk about the game. He is a psychological warfare operative for the sneaky Biowarians, his mission is to blast a hole in the carapace of cynicism that exists here about DA:O and the DaRK heRoiC FAntASy (etc). Greg and Ray sit up at night fretting that the Obz board regulars are unimpressed so far. Honest. Cheers MC

A friend's father is a seasoned civil engineer with extensive experience of commercial / retail development. However, on his own, he'd struggle even to build a brick wall (he's not a bricklayer), render and skim it (he's not a plasterer), or fix the lighting (for the skills of the electrician tend to be discrete to that role). As for a multi-unit shopping mall? Hmmm. Not a perfect analogy, but not entirely innapropriate either. Cheers MC

Clearly it wasn't disingenuous. If you think my comments lacked sincerity then I'm not sure what to think.