Chris Avellone interview @ RPGDot

[Dhruin]

Dialog that seems to be cinematic would fit that style but at the same time it shouldn't sacrifice good role playing and good role playing options.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

 

What exactly does "cinematic" dialog mean?

[Judge Hades]

Cinematic dialog is dialog that feels it comes from a movie. If you notice how movie dialog flows then actually listen to how people speak you will find it quite different.

[Shadowstrider]

Well, thanks to Bioware the Betrayer story element has become cliche.

 

Yoshimo betrays you...  SHOCK!

Melissan betrays you...  Shocked?

Aribeth betrays you...  Um, okay.

Bastila betrays you...  Yawn.

master Li betrays you...  Whatever.

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I gotta admit I agree with you.

 

More of the same is never a good thing.

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This is so overly simplified it is a completely irrelevent criticism.

 

It is not the fact that people are betraying you in games. It is HOW the treachery is enacted which makes or breaks it as a plot device. Simplifying a critique to "there is always treason in your stories" hardly makes a difference.

 

Treachery is a perfectly valid plot hook. Betrayal CAN BE a very heart-wrenching and anguish-inducing device. The reasons, and build-up to the event make or break the act, not the act itself.

[Judge Hades]

Thing is there is no significant build up in Bioware games.

Edited December 22, 2005 by Judge Hades

[Kaftan Barlast]

Im just a young, naive Gamedev student but it seems quite apparent that we need to reverse the rut of backwards-striving that the game industry is stuck in. Someday, consumers are going to get fed-up with being spoonfed the same games over and over again in a slightly different package. It also needs to change to reach out beyond todays consumers(although most people are already reached today).

 

 

There are some things that a game story must have in order to satisfy the player, like how there must always be something to give a sense of accomplishment.

 

But if you changed the entire concept of what a game is supposed to be and made it somekind of 'interactive exerience' then there would be no limit to what you could do, and then it gets really exciting.

 

 

 

mmm... this turned into a rant

[Plano Skywalker]

there is nothing wrong with using traditional storytelling devices...just don't use the same one every time. The "betrayal" and "secret revelation" hooks are used quite often. If you are going to use those, plan the actual implementation very carefully and not be too predictable. Example? What if Mission betrayed you instead of Bastila? I certainly wouldn't have seen that coming.

 

and not every story needs a nuclear twist. I don't remember Hamlet or Antigone having one but they were both solid stories...obviously, a more straight-up story will need things to help it along such as really funny NPCs, alternate paths, party management, etc and that means more work. The M Night twist helps avoid those things and that it why it is used in games so much, IMO.

[Kitch]

I remember one of the Devs making a comment along the lines of 'a double twist that untwists itself' or something. I'm still not quite sure what that was all about, but maybe it's the sign of progress

[Gabrielle]

Well, thanks to Bioware the Betrayer story element has become cliche.

 

Yoshimo betrays you...  SHOCK!

Melissan betrays you...  Shocked?

Aribeth betrays you...  Um, okay.

Bastila betrays you...  Yawn.

master Li betrays you...  Whatever.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

 

I gotta admit I agree with you.

 

More of the same is never a good thing.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Time for some originality to step in I would think.

[Gromnir]

I think cliche reversal is an okay tool until the reversal or twist becomes the new cliche.  Just look at every M. Night movie.  Everyone waits for the twist because they know it's coming.  The twist becomes an impotent tool in many cases because the viewer either sees it coming or the twist is so far-fetched that it comes off as absurd.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

 

 

agreed. some writers gots this notion that they gotta surprise a reader, and to a certain degree this is true. unfortunately, they achieves this end by coming up with ever more implausible "twists" rather than some more subtle or deft method. even so, we did not mind the kotor2 twist as did many... did not have us rolling our eyes, and for the most part, we liked the kotor2 main plot (save for how it concluded.)

 

"Bio has improved up to BG 2. Neverwinter Nights and beyond they have stagnated in their story design and writing. We still get the predictable plot twist. We still get the same betrayer scenerio. We still get "role play" options that mean very little in the scope of the game. We still get very linear gameplay."

 

don't be a yutz. you took writing classes and yet you pretend (we hopes) to be ignorant. following a broad formula ain't where these games thrive... ain't where they live. main plot can be archetypical and clich

[Darque]

Treachery is a perfectly valid plot hook.  Betrayal CAN BE a very heart-wrenching and anguish-inducing device.  The reasons, and build-up to the event make or break the act, not the act itself.

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Except when you see it coming a mile away, in which case it's lame.

[Gabrielle]

josh actually likes crap like the silmarillion

 

HA! Good Fun!

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Infidel, defiler of all that is great and just. Surely you error with that remark.

[J.E. Sawyer]

josh actually likes crap like the silmarillion,

I do, but I like it more for how and why it was made than for its stories. It's a piece of literature that I find fascinating, but it isn't full of events that make me go, "Oh man, that part was so great!" or "Oh man, E

[Gromnir]

if Gromnir could error we might give it a whirl.

 

in any event, josh is a history major, and the silmarillion reads more like some crappy and antiquated history text than it does like a modern prose novel. the writing of the silmarillion is even more tedious and tortured than tolkien's lotr works, which is saying quite a bit.

 

prose eddas were a major influence on tolkien... and so were beowulf, but that is no excuse for copying the style of those works.

 

HA! Good Fun!

[Gromnir]

josh actually likes crap like the silmarillion,

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

I do, but I like it more for how and why it was made than for its stories. It's a piece of literature that I find fascinating, but it isn't full of events that make me go, "Oh man, that part was so great!" or "Oh man, E

[Nathaniel Chapman]

in any event, josh is a history major, and the silmarillion reads more like some crappy and antiquated history text than it does like a modern prose novel.  the writing of the silmarillion is even more tedious and tortured than tolkien's lotr works, which is saying quite a bit.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

 

I don't think you understand the point. Simply because one likes or dislikes a certain novel does not imply that they believe that everything about that novel is perfect, or that they believe that all works should emulate that novel.

 

For instance, I think Lolita is one of the greatest books ever written. That does not mean that I think games should include long sequences where the characters travel across the story's setting with little or no conflict. I enjoy aspects of the novel and the fact that I like it doesn't really mean anything as to what kinds of games I might want to make.

[Shadowstrider]

 

Treachery is a perfectly valid plot hook.  Betrayal CAN BE a very heart-wrenching and anguish-inducing device.  The reasons, and build-up to the event make or break the act, not the act itself.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

 

Except when you see it coming a mile away, in which case it's lame.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

 

Some people predicted Yoshimo's treachery, while others were completely surprised. The same with most betrayals. There is no universal theorum for tricking the reader/gamer, some people pick up on clues that other people do not. Some people pick up on clues that don't actually exist. There is also the portion of people who claim they saw an action coming from a mile away, even if they didn't.

 

The only traitor I didn't see coming was Melissan. That did actually surprise me a bit. The rest I predicted ahead of time, at verying lengths. Bastilla from the moment I picked up the game and interacted with her at length, versus Aribeth as I played into the 2nd or 3rd chapter, for example. I suspected Yoshimo was a traitor from the begining, at the same time as the game progressed I forgot about that. I found Yoshimo's treachery well written, while I found Melissan's lame despite the surprise.

 

You can't please everyone all the time. Thus my previous statement, the fact that many of the games have a traitor in them is not a valid criticism due to its sheer simplicity. It'd be similar to critiquing a romance on the premise that they've had them in alot of their games as well.

 

P.S. Silmarillion and the LotR books are not all they're cracked up to.

[Gromnir]

in any event, josh is a history major, and the silmarillion reads more like some crappy and antiquated history text than it does like a modern prose novel.  the writing of the silmarillion is even more tedious and tortured than tolkien's lotr works, which is saying quite a bit.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

 

I don't think you understand the point. Simply because one likes or dislikes a certain novel does not imply that they believe that everything about that novel is perfect, or that they believe that all works should emulate that novel.

 

For instance, I think Lolita is one of the greatest books ever written. That does not mean that I think games should include long sequences where the characters travel across the story's setting with little or no conflict. I enjoy aspects of the novel and the fact that I like it doesn't really mean anything as to what kinds of games I might want to make.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

 

 

what point did Gromnir not understand? we wrote our response to gabby before we read josh's most current response... which is why we replied to him separate from our response to gabby.

 

oh, and we ain't sure 'bout your nabokov comments. we weren't limiting our comments 'bout silmarillion to applicability to games. maybe a bad analogy.

 

the silmarillion, as a piece of literature, were brain numbingly tedious. as a work of mythology we can appreciate... maybe. as an academic exercise in myth building on a scale previously not thought possible... or at least not plausible? but as literature? is not good lit... period. however, Gromnir is willing to accept that josh can appreciate silarillion for more thn well crafted stories and character.

 

HA! Good Fun!

 

ps

 

for the tolkienites we has no doubt offended... we likes tolkien's work on beowulf and gawain very much indeed, but if you is gonna try to convince us that he were a greate writer of literture, you is gonna be wasting your breath. save such stuff for off-topic threads so that we can keep this one 'bout obsidian writers and writing.

Edited December 23, 2005 by Gromnir

[alanschu]

I agree Shadow. Hindsight bias is a pretty powerful one.

[Judge Hades]

I found Yoshimo's surprising, but after that I knew what to look for in a Bioware traitor story and it just gotten more repetitive and more obvious. I don't like obvious betrayels because if it is obvious and I figure it out then I shopuld be able to role play that obviousness. That goes with the major plot twist in KotOR 1. It was so freaking obvious who Revan was and I would loved to role play that out.

 

Malak: You are Revan.

Revan: So, I figure that out yonks ago. Get with the times, man.

Bastila: You knew you are Revan all this time?

Revan: Nah, but you and the Jedi council were as transparent as glass. I mean common already, I might have had amnesia but I am not stupid.

Malak: No matter, I will kill you.

Revan: Yeah right. Some one with your taste in hair style is going to defeat me. I am Revan, remember.

 

Blah blah blah. Seriously. Bioware twists and betrayels weren't be so bad if they weren't so obvious in their foreshadowing or allow the player to role play his character knowing that it is coming and prepare for it.

 

Tolkien was an entertaining writer. A good writer, maybe, but he's no John Milton.

Edited December 23, 2005 by Judge Hades

[Shadowstrider]

I found Yoshimo's surprising, but after that I knew what to look for in a Bioware traitor story and it just gotten more repetitive and more obvious.

 

Uh... there are very few similarities in the traitors.

 

Yoshimo, is the placed traitor, who shows relatively no signs of it until the Underdark.

 

Melissan is the puppetmaster who guides you along with very few clues as to her treachery.

 

Aribeth is lead down the path to treachery by a series of events, even a child could've seen this one coming.

 

Bastilla is unexplicably a turncoat, and there is no rationale given for her betrayal. She is captured and turns traitor.

 

So, unless I am missing something there is no link for you to "know what to look for," other than all these games were made by BioWare.

 

I don't like obvious betrayels because if it is obvious and I figure it out then I shopuld be able to role play that obviousness.  That goes with the major plot twist in KotOR 1.  It was so freaking obvious who Revan was and I would loved to role play that out.

 

Malak:  You are Revan.

Revan:  So, I figure that out yonks ago.  Get with the times, man.

Bastila:  You knew you are Revan all this time?

Revan:  Nah, but you  and the Jedi council were as transparent as glass.  I mean common already, I might have had amnesia but I am not stupid.

Malak:  No matter, I will kill you.

Revan:  Yeah right.  Some one with your taste in hair style is going to defeat me.  I am Revan, remember.

 

Blah blah blah.  Seriously.  Bioware twists and betrayels weren't be so bad if they weren't so obvious in their foreshadowing or allow the player to role play his character knowing that it is coming and prepare for it.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

 

So, basically you want the game to not only account for your character's knowledge and biases, but also your own. Thats not asking too much. Not at all...

[Diamond]

How you perceive the "Traitor scenario" depends on the overall feel of the game.

Yoshimo - very compelling I must say.

Melissan - surprise, though no emotions, the game is too "munchkin" for the treachery to look believable (also horrible voice acting).

Aribeth - due to poor OC implementation, Aribeth's treachery looked really dull.

 

Can't say anything on KOTOR games (didn't play).

[Cantousent]

Sawyer's style, judging from those areas I recall him designing, is a bit on the anti-septic side of sterile, but at least it gets from point A to point B without embarrassing side-routes through points C, D, and Z. His writing is by and large grammatically correct and it conveys the idea in a way that most players will understand. Kind of like most of his posts. So, as a consumer, I'm happy with Sawyer

[CoM_Solaufein]

Yoshimo's class gave it away for me, bounty hunter. Plus he asked a lot of nosey type questions.

[Pope]

The only traitor I didn't see coming was Melissan.  That did actually surprise me a bit.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

I probably wouldn't have seen it coming IF ONLY BIO HADN'T PUT A HUGE PICTURE OF HER ON THE DAMN ToB WEBSITE!

[Kaftan Barlast]

Kaftan says that designers should look at dialogue specifically and I can imagine he means writing in general.  I agree completely.  Speak it, brother!