Bioware on Writing for Digital Actors

[alanschu]

alan, that's like saying choosing "Candy" or "Chocolate" is the same as choosing "Apple-flavoured Candy" or "Chocolate-flavoured Chocolate". Now, you may say: "it doesn't matter whether you pick "Evil" or you pick "Haha I kill you now", the outcome within the game is the same and the code responds the same way". This is true, but it is logically too response-centric. There is a choice and difference in the PLAYER choosing "I kill you now" over "Evil"; it need not be responded to by the mechanisms of the gameworld for it to be a worthwhile choice. Otherwise it would be like saying it doesn't matter how you kill this critter, upon death the scripts that fire are exactly the same; so why have the choice between killing him with a sword or a bow?

 

The impression I get is that the option Bioware will present will be a condensed, paraphrased term. So you wouldn't see "Evil," but rather "I'll kill you!" or some other short phrase.

 

Answer is that the killing itself gives the player a different choice and experience, even if upon the act of killing the response is the same. I often find myself in great dilemma when picking some dialogue choices in RPGs, because sometimes I really can't bring myself to pick an option even if I 'should' (to get the outcome I want). Will we have the same level of dilemma and empathy and involvement with paraphrased options? No, rather we would have "Hell no, that's not what I wanted to say".

 

Fair enough...but, from your next point...

 

You must remember that human language is one that is not there to be deciphered, but to be interpreted. People can look at a dialogue option and interpret it different ways: I have often found optins that were clearly designed to be "good" or "evil", but did not agree that they were. I was clearly interpreting them in a different manner to the author of the text; we are not afforded this variety with paraphrased options. It is killing something beautiful that can only be achieved with the delicate touches of the written word, and not the crude pressing of buttons.

 

You say you were misinterpreting what lines were saying and didn't really know what message they were conveying. Wouldn't Bioware's approach help reduce this ambiguity, helping you to pick an option with the intent that you would like your character to have?

 

mkreku: it is true that dialogue options are still grossly limited (e.g. 3-4 out of infinite number of answers) - but it is so, so much better than paraphase wheels. And even if it is not 'realistic', the offered responses themselves can be literary gems - how many of you have read one of the dialogue options in a CRPG and laughed at it, or found that it was great, or later quoted it for various purposes? They too can be memorable just like NPC quotes, and while they are limited for roleplaying purposes it is a step in the right direction. Mass Effect is NOT.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

 

I see no reason why you could not still quote the stuff that a Mass Effect PC says because of some witty remarks he has.

 

 

I'll continue to reserve my judgement until I actually see it in action.

[Dark_Raven]

I'm iffy on BIO's plan for their dialogue wheel, and keeping the actual content of the words secret from the player. That sounds silly. Hmmm.

 

However, from what I've seen and heard of Oblivion's 'dialogue system'; it's just friggin' lame.  The mini game is retarded, and has no soul.

 

If done right, ME's dialogue system might be really good. Done poorly, it might be really bad...

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

If it was in fact done bad, would you critize your beloved Bioware?

[mkreku]

Remember, this is the guy who thinks Jade Empire is one of the best RPG's ever.. including the fantastic shoot'em up sequences.. complete with crappy programming and optimization that makes the framerate drop into singulars for extended periods of time.

 

Oh, and Neverwinter Nights has beautiful models and a better original campaign than 80% (I think it was) of the RPG's out there!1!

[Judge Hades]

He has in the past.

 

I have never had single digit frame rate with Jade Empire.

Edited September 8, 2006 by Judge Hades

[Dark_Raven]

NWNs models are archaic even when it was released.

[mkreku]

Yeah, I'm sure your Xbox is much better than mine (or my cousin's in this case)..

[Judge Hades]

Nearly all X Boxes are the same unless damaged in some way or modified.

[Dark_Raven]

Or bought at a pawn shop.

[Judge Hades]

That is where I bought mine.

[Dark_Raven]

I have a good memory.

[Tigranes]

You say you were misinterpreting what lines were saying and didn't really know what message they were conveying. Wouldn't Bioware's approach help reduce this ambiguity, helping you to pick an option with the intent that you would like your character to have?

 

Oh, no, alan. I don't mean 'misinterpreting'. There is no problem there. I mean interpreting it differently. When my friend comes up to me and says "3pm" and I think he means "3pm but fashionably late" then that is misinterpretion. In the literary field, however, the connotations of the author cannot be and need not be interpreted according to the 'canon' cognitive processes; these 'misinterpretions' rather make the text that much more rich, everyone's different perspectives able to directly influence the nature of the situation and of the dialogue options. As for a total misinterpretion that detracts from the experience - I can't say that would happen often with quality texts.

 

I think above all, what you lose when you pick a paraphrase as opposed to picking an exact line, is just like picking any small gun instead of a specific one, or picking a book from its synopsis instead of reading the whole thing. It saves you a few seconds each time, if you're really slow at reading, I guess (hell, judging on JE, Mass Effect responses wouldn't be that long to begin with.), but what is lost in that paraphrasing, while it is revealed to us later, will never come into account when we make our CHOICES in dialogue - not the best, but one of the greatest extents to which we can roleplay in video games. I can feel that I am really the character - or even if I don't, I can face dilemma about what to say and how to say it. A lot of that can be taken away quite brutally with ME's paraphrase system.

 

And I can't think that their gesture/expression system will be detailed enough to compensate, say, by having gestures like 'grab his hand in supplication' or 'pat his head and infuriate him' and have proper reactions past '+2 if good, +2 if evil" and "-2 reaction".

[alanschu]

Oh, no, alan. I don't mean 'misinterpreting'. There is no problem there. I mean interpreting it differently

 

I'm at a loss. Isn't that exactly what misinterpreting means? To interpret something in a different way than intended?

 

 

In any case, I'm guessing that Bioware is thinking (and I don't disagree) that most people pick their lines of dialogue based on the intent, rather than the specific words.

 

 

As for it's roleplaying elements, I find the roleplaying element in dialogue comes from how NPCs react to you based on what's been said. Few (if any) dialogue options ever reflect what I would actually want my character to say, so my pick is already stymied. As a result, there are many times my choice is determined by the intent of the dialogue line. If I feel that being nice to the person will yield more information out of them,

 

In fact, I thought that this type of dialogue worked quite well in Fahrenheit, since your options in conversation where summarized by a key word. The lines were particularly well written, and there was never a time when I'd think "Pffft, if I had known that THAT is what he was going to say, then I'd never have picked that option."

[Judge Hades]

I prefer to know exactly what my character is going to say, if it is in fact suppose to be my character.

[alanschu]

I prefer to know exactly what my character is going to say, if it is in fact suppose to be my character.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

 

And I think you're just splitting hairs because different = bad.

 

Though one could probably argue that no "PC" in a video game RPG is ever "your character."

[Judge Hades]

If I choose a character's skills, gender, abilities, and so forth then he or she is mine. At least in theory.

[Tigranes]

Well, take a look at a book. Do all people interpret it the same? No. At high school they try to teach you what the 'author intended', but a lot of what they teach you really isn't what the author intended, just what others thought of his work. There are always great diverging theories on just what the author intended - meaning that nowadays, in true postmodernist sense, it is accepted that a single text, or a single scene, or a single line of dialogue can have different meanings for different people, and rather than misinterprtion it is a wealth of interpretion. I believe this happens with video games too; in a very general sense, for example, how people perceive a character and whether they empathise with them; in a more specific level, what a certain event means to the plot, or what a certain line means in the context. I believe in the sense of dialogue such subtleties can be lost with the paraphrase technique; if we compare this to the visual, where we once used to describe the room with words, we now do so with graphics. But imagine the graphics engine was still back in the 8-bit engine or worse; there will be a great wealth of detail lost in that transition because of the incompleteness of the new technique. Still, the very transition to the visual medium itself was a great benefit. The same cannot be said for this.

 

I find the roleplaying element in dialogue comes from how NPCs react to you based on what's been said. Few (if any) dialogue options ever reflect what I would actually want my character to say,

 

I do agree with you here, in that dialogue options are a very inadequate way of 'covering your bases'. I am not disputing that, as I think you know. I am merely saying that the paraphrase wheel is a backward step.

 

besides, the existence of options means that you can sometimes be made aware of options you did not even think of - or ways to say it that you ddid not think of. In good CRPGs I take great pleasure in reading well-written dialogue choices, and sometimes spend 10 minutes sitting there, loathe to choose one over the other. It is not an ideal experience, but a good one, and I believe nothing is gained by paraphrasing!

 

Fahrenheit is the same as Indigo Prophecy, I believe? I must admit I had forgotten that example, but that game has a much more controlled and selective delivery, and probably a good deal less dialogue due to the length. (I remember it being a short game; am I right?) Still, if the quality of the dialogue is up to Fahreinheit's standard, I should be much appeased.

 

Still, the question I must put to you is this; what is the ADVANTAGE of the paraphrase wheel OVER the dialogue options? ME interview's mentions of utilising visuals more (e.g. expressions/gestures) could be done with dialogue options anyway, so that is a completely separate matter, isn't it? Why change to a system when there is no new advantage, only possible disadvantages?

 

edit:

I'm guessing that Bioware is thinking (and I don't disagree) that most people pick their lines of dialogue based on the intent, rather than the specific words.

 

I suppose I am a minority, but I knew that already, right?

Edited September 8, 2006 by Tigranes

[alanschu]

I believe in the sense of dialogue such subtleties can be lost with the paraphrase technique; if we compare this to the visual, where we once used to describe the room with words, we now do so with graphics. But imagine the graphics engine was still back in the 8-bit engine or worse; there will be a great wealth of detail lost in that transition because of the incompleteness of the new technique.

 

I don't know if I agree with the analogy, since you'll still get the full line of dialogue spoken (and you could probably turn on subtitles too if you wanted to specifically read the line). I'm not sure how the wealth of interpretation disappears, since you could still make interpretations of what was said.

 

besides, the existence of options means that you can sometimes be made aware of options you did not even think of - or ways to say it that you ddid not think of. In good CRPGs I take great pleasure in reading well-written dialogue choices, and sometimes spend 10 minutes sitting there, loathe to choose one over the other. It is not an ideal experience, but a good one, and I believe nothing is gained by paraphrasing!

 

Games don't really have multiple options that still represent the exact same intent, so you'll still get the options you didn't think of with the current system.

 

Still, the question I must put to you is this; what is the ADVANTAGE of the paraphrase wheel OVER the dialogue options? ME interview's mentions of utilising visuals more (e.g. expressions/gestures) could be done with dialogue options anyway, so that is a completely separate matter, isn't it? Why change to a system when there is no new advantage, only possible disadvantages?

 

I'm not familiar with the development of Mass Effect, so it's hard to say what the advantages/disadvantages of it could be from a programing perspective.

 

One advantage is that it would allow for them to circumvent arbitrary word count limitations imposed by publishers (which unfortunately do exist).

 

Like I've said, I'll wait until how it works before I ultimately pass judgement on it. Right now, I'm indifferent.

[Tigranes]

I'm not sure how the wealth of interpretation disappears, since you could still make interpretations of what was said.

 

Sorry, I meant the wealth of interpretion BEFORE you pick. I think it's clear why I think that's important?

 

One advantage is that it would allow for them to circumvent arbitrary word count limitations imposed by publishers (which unfortunately do exist).

 

I would certainly hope so, but wouldn't the publishers count the 'hidden' words too? Ultimately they too are revealed to the player.

 

I think we do understand each other by now, though. I hope. Certainly I would be happy to change my mind upon release of more information (or the game itself), but an informed estimate at this stage does not make me hopeful, especially since they are so busy trumping up this new system but can't cite a single real advantage except that it's 'easier'.

[alanschu]

Sorry, I meant the wealth of interpretion BEFORE you pick. I think it's clear why I think that's important?

 

Actually, it's not. I asked Hades for examples, but he opted not to.

 

 

As for the word count, I think it's actually lines of text in the game. There's market research done by suits that indicate that people don't like to read text in video games.

Edited September 9, 2006 by alanschu

[Judge Hades]

I just could think of any in which to choose an intent and your character had spoken lines to act on that intent in a CRPG. As far as I know, Mass Effect is the first one.

Edited September 9, 2006 by Judge Hades

[alanschu]

I'm not asking for examples of a Mass Effect style game.

[Judge Hades]

That is what we are discussing, isn't it? Intent based conversation options in which the PC speaks the lines instead of using specific sentences and phrases, right?

[alanschu]

Yes. And in this discussion, we naturally have to compare with the other implementation, which is full dialogue options.

 

How could I ask you for examples for a paradigm that hasn't been implemented yet?

Edited September 9, 2006 by alanschu

[Judge Hades]

 

I'm thinking.

 

 

Um... Back to Oblivion!

 

[Spider]

As for the word count, I think it's actually lines of text in the game.  There's market research done by suits that indicate that people don't like to read text in video games.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

 

And they're probably right. I know several people who are totally put off with games that have too many words. I have, for example, a friend who thought the IWD games were much better than Torment due to there being too much text in the latter. He's a huge fan of Planescape, liked the game mechanics (hence liking IWD better) and did think the text in Torment was good (Dionarra's soulstone for instance) but just didn't want to spend as much time reading when playing a game.

 

Although when it comes to modern video games, word count could very well apply to the numbers of lines spoken as well. Voice actors aren't free after all. But Bioware is likely in a position where they can have as many words they damn well please in their games, they've been succesful enough in the past.