PaganPoetry

I'm a linguist!! I would love for PE to have a detailed, realistic and most of all consistent system of language since I think it's so rarely seen in fantasy games. I think the most important place to start is with the phonetics and the alphabet, since those are the most prevalent things one would come across. I don't believe that syntax would be as important, but... maybe a few morphological rules. I really don't see it as hyper-nerdy or even that time consuming; I remember speaking to someone at my school about how there used to be a class dedicated to creating artificial languages. Also, I for one am sick of Latin being the default language that people turn to. I think it's such a boring language compared to much more intriguing possibilities.

I personally didn't like multiclassing (I always felt like I was doing it... wrong, I dunno, and I'm a bit of a purist I guess) but I'm not opposed to its inclusion since I know a lot of people enjoy it. I agree though that I am more looking forward to potential specializations within classes.

The threads aren't "should romance be included?", that's a fraction of what they contain. There are also other questions posed, such as how it should be implemented, in what capacity, etc.

just a gentle reminder... If you feel like someone is harassing you or attacking you for simply stating your opinion on the topic, it is probably better to not engage them. If you feel it is particularly egregious, use the report feature. I know it's hard not to respond... but nothing good can come from it. Nothing is gained from commenting on each other's personal lives and levels of maturity. and now back to our regularly scheduled discussion... But clearly there's a lot to be gained by opening circle-jerking threads where you have to agree with the op and using the "Codexers made me cry" excuse to try to ignore arguments that might make look silly your request for asinine features. Meanwhile pretty much every romancer goes:"i swear the fact that i obsessivly post about romances is not an indication i'm obssessed about this feature!!1!see i even voted that option in the poll number159!1!!" Actually, this is exactly the type of post that Merin is talking about ignoring/reporting. It is one thing to disagree and it is another to specialize in these ad hominem, vitriolic posts. The issue is not people engaging in a dialogue with conflicting opinions, it's using these generalized statements to degrade the poster or devalue his/her contribution. "Nobody should take your opinion seriously since you're just an obsessive Bioware loving, sex-depraved basement dweller!" Something that occurred to me reading this thread: many people have stated they hope that if romance is included, it doesn't follow the Bioware model. To me, this actually goes without saying. Even if one likes the Bioware model (I personally am ambivalent towards it), this is an Obsidian game and I would not want them to squander their creativity by copying Bioware's model for romance progression regardless of the quality of said model. Innovation is key, and I think that in addition to maturity and relevance most people probably want to see something new and uncharted in regards to romance.

I would be fine with all of the above. I think that maybe an easy way to alleviate some of the people's concerns that have been voiced in this thread would be to keep the companions (or at least most of them) off-limits, so it ensures that they're "interesting" and "unique" or whatever the argument against romancing companions is, and maybe have a few options with random NPCs scattered around. Seeing other characters hooking up is always a great option, too.

You're right. I feel for all of the poor people who open the thread and see all of the comments against their will.

Actually I hope the final game will include some kind of murder mystery you have to solve. I kind of do too. Oblivion sort of had a murder mystery, except you were the murderer, and I loved how well executed that was. If they took it and maybe made it more serious, a genuine whodunnit, I would enjoy it a lot. Although I do feel like a lot of games have the rather tired subplot of murders occurring across a city. I don't find that as compelling as an isolated setting murder mystery.

That presumes that anyone who has a sexuality is immediately defined by it, Gurkog. Ever play The Longest Journey? Gay/lesbian characters in that were all over and they were hardly "defined" by the fact that they were gay/lesbian; instead, it was just another thing about them, no different than the fact that they had a certain hair or eye color. I hate this idea that including a gay character will make him DEFINED by the fact that he's gay? And of course, I will just say that for many people their sexuality is an important part about them... so there's that, too. It likely has to do with the culture/setting of the game though with regards to whether or not they'd even be interested in putting in somebody like that.

I would be fine with that mya, but I do not think that uniquely hetereo/gay love interests are very realistic only because it potentially alienates so many people. I would love to see it though since it really does potentially add a lot to the characters if they have more concrete sexualities.

I am 20, and my favorite RPG is the Baldur's Gate series (or more specifically, Baldur's Gate 2). It really changed my perspective not only on RPGs but on videogames in general. But I would have to add Morrowind as a very close second. I have also never played Planescape: Torment, so maybe I should get on that.

To anyone complaining: It's one thread. ONE THREAD. If you dislike the discussion then why are continuing to open it? Like..........? When a romance thread (because it gets too long, or goes off topic, etc.) gets closed, a new one is opened to continue the discussion. I think it's official: the people complaining about the BSN mindset as it concerns romance now outnumber the number of people supposedly adopting that mindset here. Like I said in the last thread, I am all for the inclusion of romance in the game. If it's included, I hope it's open to all types of players, not just the (male) hetero crowd. But it will never be a deal breaker for me. I think it's a very good way to explore some emotional and potentially moral landscapes, the latter of which seems particularly untouched (Bioware was almost... almost there with the Anders arc, but didn't quite reach the moral complexity I was looking for). I think it makes sense for a traveling party to see some of its members, who depend upon one another and are presumably fiercely loyal to one another (or else why would you be there?), take the next step emotionally and physically if they choose to go there.

The idea of good vs. evil and morality has been touched on a lot in this thread, but I am so over the way it is portrayed in games now and I hope to see a change in this one. One of my favorite TV shows is Battlestar Galactica and perhaps my favorite thing about it was the way that it managed to subvert the very nature of good and evil and questioned every action and showed the conflict between the need to survive vs. the means to assuring survival in ways that always were so morally thorny they were exhilarating to watch. You end up rooting for the characters you love to do all of these morally "bad" things and basically all arguments of good vs. evil were thrown out the window. I loved it so much. I would love to see that type of morality in a game, but too often they give you the "easy way out" option; that is, since it's a video game and not real life, the "not hurting anybody's feelings" option. I'm also all for allegories in games; I don't think there's enough emphasis on just how much fantasy can act as a mirror for real life. So many interesting contemporary issues can be tackled in creative ways due to the setting.

That's true, I thought about the lack of appeal but... it does seem like that region would be in the most need of a translation, since Europe is about 500x more likely to have the English competency necessary to play. No idea about how hard it is to translate though. That could be true.

Of course, but have professional translations really been that much better? I can't say since I always play games in English but I can just imagine European gamers getting an influx of "this guy are sick" in most of their translated games.

Contrary to popular belief, professionally minded people can be found online who are not caught up in the "drama" all of the time.

Certainly Russian and Italian should be priorities, no? Followed by Chinese/Japanese/Korean I would think, if only because speakers of those languages are so much less likely to know English. I don't even know why they bother to hire people to do professional translations though. Not that I don't think the game should be translated (I think it absolutely should), I just think having a large volunteer base help them with it would actually be cheaper & better quality. Volunteers care the most. Like, if they asked me to translate it into French I would be there in a heartbeat, no pension required.

It kind of does justify it, though. Not the validity of the theory but how impressive/important it is. I shudder to think what you might think of the people who analyze David Lynch films though, since you think it's so delusional and crazy to look a bit deeper into something that you don't think is comprehensible otherwise. ETA: I also think conspiracy theories are impressive, since they require quite a bit of research and thinking for yourself . A conspiracy theory can be incorrect or it can actually be true, but that's very rarely what anybody is interested in when it comes to them. Just food for thought. But this is getting way off topic so I'm done talking about it, lol.

Lol Grimlorn, disregarding my own feelings on the theory, I don't think that the accuracy of it is what is so incredible but the fact that the series allowed for such an interpretation to begin with and that the fans worked so hard to look at a video game beyond what was presented to them at face value. That is not something that happens very often with games (are there other examples of such a widespread theory for a game?) but you see it a LOT with literature and film and even TV. Not every analysis of The Sopranos' ending can be correct, for example, but the argument over it is what makes it brilliant (and this will make it sound like I'm calling the ME3 ending brilliant so... I'll stop there). Well, I wasn't talking about Anders specifically. I did have an issue with the fact I couldn't let him down easy and had to lose a bunch of "yay, friendship!" points or whatever. That's less a romance issue though and more an issue with them not giving enough options for Hawke's responses. I had the same issue regarding Merril's quest. I do, however, prefer each character to have their own sexuality. Largely because it just feels more...plausible I guess. Its not really a huge issue for me in the long run though. Again, my biggest issue is just that they turn characters, no matter what their sexuality, into strictly sexual objects in their romances. I find this offensive for both straights and gays, men and women. I did somewhat understand that although I never actually encountered it in the game (or I should say, I never encountered it and found it problematic since I've played Dragon Age 2 several times without romancing him). It's a complaint I hear constantly and I dislike that Bioware's response was basically "you can gain the influence points back" since that wasn't really the issue at hand, but what I dislike about the entire thing is how much it blew up and became one of the biggest criticisms ever. Like, they forced me to be mean to Anders/Merill/whomever and I'm so mad about that. =\. And I guess for those of us who believe strictly in the Kinsey scale your second point is not as big a deal . Bioware worries too much about the backlash though, and I hope Obsidian tries to avoid that. I want equal opportunity and I will probably voice my disappoint if it's not included, but I do think that having a defining sexuality for each character is good goal albeit one that I don't see as realistic for gay/lesbian options so I won't be too upset if/when it doesn't happen.

Yes, this. Timing is everything and I find that this is where a lot of games kind of falter. I also have been replaying Neverwinter Nights 2 recently, and I just wanted to say that the humor in that game seems to stem mostly from... everyone hating each other and arguing, which I find a bit uncompelling when the only tone that accompanies it is a humorous one. I think the humor needs to be spread around a bit. I love the witty Alistair companion too but the same old back and forth with Morrigan is only funny for so long to me before I want some other part of the game to make me laugh as well. I don't know if I'm the only one who feels this way?

I just can't agree with this at all, I guess. I have never understood the Anders... controversy, I guess. I don't see what people dislike about having the freedom to pursue whom you want, especially when all romanceable characters are objects defined by their sexuality; at least I get to choose which one I want regardless of my sexual orientation? There is nothing more frustrating than finding out that a developer had no desire to implement something so harmless and engaging for a large minority of players. Lol, I have! A lot of them are very... eager to a fault, sure, but the passion that they display in certain areas leads to things that really fascinate rather than repel me. For all of the whining and the obsessive demands, there's also an Indoctrination Theory to show how deep they can go as well. There are places to go on that forum to have discussions that are as thought provoking and interesting as the ones here, IMO.

Question: why is it that people demand more maturity out of the plotlines (romantic or otherwise) for Project Eternity and in the same breath attack Bioware and its community? That strikes me as a bit immature, especially considering how much Bioware has done to really make different groups of people feel included in their romances and how astute and intelligent some of the posters on the BSN are. Like, Bioware's romances are not perfect (the way sex always seems to be an end goal rather than a natural progression within the romance itself, for example; I was particularly disturbed with how they handled Jack in ME2) but come on now. That said, to the topic at hand: I am all for romances in Project Eternity, and I do not subscribe to the idea that whatever they've already planned is somehow sacred and must remain untouched insofar as romances are concerned. There's this growing fear that character growth and development is actually stunted by the presence of romance and that's simply not the case. That is always a developer flaw. Characters do not become cliches purely because there's a romantic option tacked on to them. Well written characters are well written with or without romance, and the opposite stands true as well. What I DO hope for is, as virtually everyone has brought up, a mature progression of the romance and one that is not necessarily written as a "reward" for the player. Romance should never be treated that way. It should flow naturally, it should make you want to pursue it because you like the other character and not because you feel it will "pay off" in the end. I don't see this as something difficult to accomplish or unreasonable, either; I think that people who face adversity together share a pretty tight bond as it is, and if there is an attraction there it's highly likely that it WILL evolve into a romantic relationship. Obsidian can pull that off, I'm sure of it. And it will make the experience a lot more fulfilling in the end, because it quite clearly adds to the emotional impact. I do also think though that if you go for romance in a game, you shouldn't half-ass it. Go big or go home; I want to see it included but it would be way worse to be disappointed by it than to see it discluded completely, in my opinion. I would also really like for some form of friendship that works in the same way as romance, just obviously without the relationship angle; companions are such an important part of RPGs, especially in one like Project Eternity, and you should be able to experience the full range of emotions and complexities of characters even if you decide you don't want to romance them. And of course, I'm all for equal opportunity. Options for men AND women, options for same sex romance, etc. That much should go without saying.