New Dragon Age discussion thread

[Wombat]

But, they're not orcs. Orcs aren't creatures that were corrupted when they wrongly entered heaven. Of coruse, that is if what the Chantry teaches *is* true, Not guaranteed.

Yes. The protagonist will almost definitely end up with finding "truth" behind it. However, if I have to repeat, is it original?

 

Anyhow, if Volourn's right and these orcs are the way they are because they 'wrongly entered heaven', well, that doesn't seem like such a terrible crime. Moral ambiguity is always entertaining, although this writer does make some valid points, too.

In other established media, they have gone far beyond moral ambiguity...moral ambiguity is just a sub product of more complex characters and interesting themes.

 

I like my share of sweet BIO goodness but this explanation ain't cutting it. I hope at least that int he game they turn out to have complex political and social structures of their own that don't revolve around THE STRONG RULE ALL, WE KICK EACH OTHER IN THE BACKSIDES FOR DISCIPLINE and ENSLAVE NORMAL HUMANZ RAWR RAWR.

I think I generally agree with you except the expression in the latter sentences.

[SteveThaiBinh]

I think you can never know how deep or original things will get until you actually play the game. You cannot assume from the presence of orc-like creatures that this game will be one long cliche, nor that it will be a stunningly original take on the orcish condition that will redefine fantasy for future generations. That kind of information doesn't get into previews or hype. It also depends on your own experience of playing and what you yourself bring to the game.

[Volourn]

"So is there a reason they look and behave and smell like Orcs? I mean, really?"

 

They're not orcs. That's like saying any ugly vaguely humanoid is an orc. That would be like saying creatures in D&D like gnolls, bugbears, etc. are just orcs. Those creatures have a lot more in common with orcs than the spawn too.

 

In fact, outside of being ugly humanoids who love war they have nothing in common with orcs at all. And, being a ugly humanoid who loves war is nowhere near being unique to orcs.

 

Might as well just say the spawn are just bugbears. *shrug*

 

I think why people call them orcs , and refer to them as that it's because people feel the need to stereotype things into neat little packages. Sad, really.

 

I mean the spawn - fhwat we're told are true - aren't even natural creatures.

[Xard]

well, it's hard to blame people after such LotR ripoff trailer

[newc0253]

I think why people call them orcs , and refer to them as that it's because people feel the need to stereotype things into neat little packages. Sad, really.

yes, i'm also sick of all this hate speech.

 

from now on, we should refer to them as 'differently-abled demihumans' instead of 'orcs'. the term 'orcs' is just more anglo-saxon prejudice.

[Wrath of Dagon]

I hope at least that int he game they turn out to have complex political and social structures of their own that don't revolve around THE STRONG RULE ALL, WE KICK EACH OTHER IN THE BACKSIDES FOR DISCIPLINE and ENSLAVE NORMAL HUMANZ RAWR RAWR.

I don't think so, they're more like a force of nature, probably hellspawn would be most accurate. Complex political and social structures seem to be reserved for the playable races. Also it's been said that the Darkspawn stay as the main event through the entire game, although there's a lot more to the story than that.

[WILL THE ALMIGHTY]

Okay, so they have a different backstory than orcs.

 

But why the hell do they have to look like Orcs? Think of a new concept, damnit.

[newc0253]

actually i'm not that bothered by the orc-like nature of the bad guys.

 

most heroic fantasy has need of an evil footsoldier of some kind, and it don't matter if you call them orcs, goblins, narfs or slorms, so long as they get the job done.

 

i agree with gromnir though that gaider's little backstory doesn't seem chillingly different from previous stock fantasy, maybe with a little hint of phillip pullman mixed in with the miltonic overtones. i also reckon bio's "dark but not too dark" approach isn't gonna make this a tectonic shift in fantasy CRPGs. witcher already stole a march on the whole dark & gritty fantasy deal & i don't think anyone's gonna be sacrificing babies in this one.

 

so it has orcs? plus

[taks]

i agree with gromnir

taks

[newc0253]

i agree with gromnir

even a busted clock is right twice a day.

[Moatilliatta]

Why is Volourn among the few reasonable people in this thread? Is this a sign of the end-times?

 

There is nothing wrong with the whole DA art-direction or writing direction unless you have a general issue with general dark fantasy in which case I suggest you stop responding in this thread as incessant whining about Bioware being Bioware is pretty darn tiring, and we all know that Bioware is genreic.

 

The interesting things about DA is that David Gaider, as far as I'm aware, hasn't been the Lead anything on anything since ever. I believe he was senior designer, whatever that means, on TOB and he did some design on KOTOR (Korriban I think but don't quote me). Someone correct me if I'm wrong.

 

Beyond this Bioware seems to be trying to give us relatively demanding and relatively interesting combat which is something that RPGs has lacked since the death of Troika.

 

Even further they're talking of a toolset that will be able to do stuff, we don't know specifics, but I don't think it would be too much to expect that interesting combat and possibly interesting quests, within DA, could be created by skilled users.

 

Now I obviously agree, since I'm writing on this board and not the Bioware one, that the Blight is ever so slightly generic and it would be nice if Bio broke the mold somewhat more, but that isn't in anyway something to expect and it would be like expecting Blizzard or Valve to keep on Schedule. It doesn't happen.

 

On the other hand I do believe that there is room for optimism that this will be both Bioware at their best (again this isn't what we want but it'll be much closer) and that they might even break the mold a bit.

 

The entire internet (the part that matters anyway) has already decried the LOTR-ripoff trailer and the generic looking blight. Some of us though aren't yet jaded and hollow and we would like to move on and admire that Bioware is actually doing something interesting for once.

 

Again, no real reason for praise yet but complaining is way premature.

 

tl;dr Start chilling and be happy for once.

 

 

Also, seriously, that gamers with jobs interview with DG is awesome and people who don't listen to it/reads it are inhuman.

[Xard]

Beyond this Bioware seems to be trying to give us relatively demanding and relatively interesting combat which is something that RPGs has lacked since the death of Troika.

 

You had me up to this part

 

 

LOL

[Moatilliatta]

I'm assuming that you're not judging the DA combat since we know very little of how it actually feels and even works. And I'll ask when there have been challenging combat since Troika?

 

Edit: Wait... you agree that Volo is reasonable in this thread?

 

Edit2: That's challengin and interesting combat, for the record.

Edited August 27, 2008 by Moatilliatta

[Monte Carlo]

^ Hmmm, there has been some generic Bio-scepticism but no more than you'd reasonably expect from this forum. I think that my opening post was more than reasonable and fairly balanced and sort of says what your saying.

 

People are trying to reconcile the stated intention of the developers / writers versus the rather generic look of what we've seen so far. And, yes, the overt LotR style visuals are part of the issue there. Of course, Dave G could be the sneakiest person ever and use the whole vanilla look as a trojan horse to smuggle in some searingly radical stuff. We wait and see.

 

I've been up front: I'm looking forward to DA immensely, will buy it and most probably enjoy it. However, if you are a gaming fan and post on developers boards then I think you're bound to be looking beyond the hype and want to know what's going on under the hood.

 

Cheers

MC

[Moatilliatta]

I'm totally aware that this forum consists mainly of jaded soulless husks that only slightly resemble human beings. What I'm attempting is to get people to discuss the rather interesting stuff like Bio using some interesting christian ideas to create a world that I'm personally pretty optimistic about.

Or any of the other stuff that Bioware didn't give us in ME, like anything resembling something interesting.

 

You know, instead of just whining down the boulevard of frozen hearts.

Edited August 27, 2008 by Moatilliatta

[Monte Carlo]

Yes, the religion thing is interesting. I've referenced the amount of world-building Bio have done on this project. People want to discuss the writing mechanic behind romances instead, what can you do?

[Moatilliatta]

DG said he has worked on it for half his career now so I'm pretty excited about the world. Even more because they're doing nice thouches like books to read in game.

[Volourn]

I'm glad the game is 'generic'. As long as its good. The thing I hate the most is people actually celebrating crappy unique stuff. L0L

 

P.S. They're not orcs. Not even close. Any similarities are superficial. I'm gonna call the spawn gnolls as they have lots in common with them.

[Moatilliatta]

They lack the whole hyena-ish-ness that gnolls have to have.

 

Generally they're large hulking brutes with the same kind of sloping round forehead that we usually associate with orcs.

[aries101]

I know it can be a little frustrating to remember what David G. actually has said.

 

The Chantry teaches that men wanted to go into Heaven and so were cast out because of their mortal sin. (hey, Milton did not live in vain, right?)

It was not only men, but the mages of Ferelden that went to Heaven. That is why the mages of Ferelden are mistrusted. They started the first Blight.

The mages were cast out of Heaven down into the pits of the Earth. Here the old Gods lived. And when they touched these, and then corrupted them, the Dragon raised itself as the Archdemon. And the underlings? became the darkspawn. And so the orcs we see are orcs, but they're not orcs. At least not orcs in the traditional sense of LotR, Tolkien or D&D fantasy.

 

If people were to look at one of the videos on Bioware's forum page for DA: Origins, they get to see a fairly lenghthy video on how the combat at Ostagar plays out. Watching this in its entirety convinced me that this battle is not just a LotR Helms Deep rip-off, but something unique in itself.

Of course, it might seem similar to the Helms Deep battle and LotR, but I do think it is very difficult to no compare any fantay, low or high, dark or light, to Tolkien and D&D.

[Xard]

I'm assuming that you're not judging the DA combat since we know very little of how it actually feels and even works. And I'll ask when there have been challenging combat since Troika?

 

Edit: Wait... you agree that Volo is reasonable in this thread?

 

Edit2: That's challengin and interesting combat, for the record.

 

I laughed at the implication that RPG's haven't had good combat since Troika died which is silly considering how phail combat in Troika games were.

 

People are trying to reconcile the stated intention of the developers / writers versus the rather generic look of what we've seen so far. And, yes, the overt LotR style visuals are part of the issue there. Of course, Dave G could be the sneakiest person ever and use the whole vanilla look as a trojan horse to smuggle in some searingly radical stuff. We wait and see.

 

Yeah, what we've actually seen doesn't seem to match at all the info I scoured from DA boards before trailers.

 

Anyway, they could have MGS2 in their sleeve when it comes to marketing, that would be hilarious

 

(but propably not)

 

I'm glad the game is 'generic'. As long as its good. The thing I hate the most is people actually celebrating crappy unique stuff. L0L

 

P.S. They're not orcs. Not even close. Any similarities are superficial. I'm gonna call the spawn gnolls as they have lots in common with them.

 

give me example of crappy uniquiness and why it is worse than crappy genericness

 

And on these Freaky Humanoids thing I agree with Volo.

 

They're not very orclike. Reasons why they seem such bad carbon cut copy of Uruk-Hai is due to other reasons

Edited August 27, 2008 by Xard

[Pidesco]

I'm assuming that you're not judging the DA combat since we know very little of how it actually feels and even works. And I'll ask when there have been challenging combat since Troika?

 

Edit: Wait... you agree that Volo is reasonable in this thread?

 

Edit2: That's challengin and interesting combat, for the record.

 

I laughed at the implication that RPG's haven't had good combat since Troika died which is silly considering how phail combat in Troika games were.

 

I think he's just talking about TOEE.

[Tigranes]

Moatilla you're conflating various people's different positions into one thing, which means all the separate points roll up in to one big WE HATE DA LULZ... in which context your post last page makes sense. But since that's not true, it seems rather overreaching.

 

Basically, my particular annoyance was that: DA is stated to be such-and-such. Then it comes up looking all like a bad LOTR clone; quite apart from not fitting what its supposed to be, I just don't even want to look at it. Carry that into the orc debate: I don't like 'generic baddies' but I can live with it, they're pretty hard to dispose of. I like that they have a different backstory and hope there will be more there. But it doesn't explain at all why they have to look and smell like orcs. They could look completely different and still be 'darkspawn'; hell, that'd make a lot more sense. And that's a criticism you can't answer with placard mantras. (not saying you personally have Moat)

 

Oh, and about combat? I said it looks pretty 'go up whack' in the video... but the point of the video seemed to be to rush past the combat. I'm saying "looks meh here, lets wait for proper info". I doubt anyone here's actually saying OMGCOMBAT IS SO CRAP THEY LIED ABOUT BG SIMILARITIES.

 

Keyworld: Conflate

[Volourn]

"But it doesn't explain at all why they have to look and smell like orcs."

 

They smell like orcs? How do you know this? And, to me, they don't really all that orcish to me outside of being ugly. L0L

 

 

 

"give me example of crappy uniquiness and why it is worse than crappy genericness"

 

When did I say this? Crappy is crappy. 'Originality' is a near useless buzz word much like 'epic' is.

 

R00fles!

[WILL THE ALMIGHTY]

"But it doesn't explain at all why they have to look and smell like orcs."

 

They smell like orcs? How do you know this? And, to me, they don't really all that orcish to me outside of being ugly. L0L

 

True, they look more like the monstrosity born from an orc and the Locust Horde.