New Dragon Age discussion thread

[Gromnir]

am reasonably certain that da will be a good game. combat will be engaging and story will be good, and at least a few o' the characters will be borderline exceptional.

 

...

 

our reservations come 'bout 'cause of origins (which we thinks is a flawed notion) as well as biowarian design philosophy predicated on making mostest people happy.

 

if you try to make dark and gritty but is worried that you might be too dark and gritty for some...

 

if you tries to add tough moral choices, but you is worried that many gamers will be discouraged...

 

if you tries.... whatever. why is there a rogue class? why you got mana/health? 'cause is expected?

 

haven't heard much 'bout combat or details o' magic system, but am reasonably certain that much like the setting, da rules and gameplay will be familiar enough not to discourage anybody. is a smarty approach to game development, and no doubt bio will end up with yet another quality game that most peoples enjoy.

 

the thing is that Gromnir is always a little saddened when we sees that a developer like bio... a developer that got 'nuff built up good will with fans to do something more, chooses to play safe. different for sake o' different is stoopid, but doing same 'cause you believe it is expected is understandable but maybe a little discouraging too.

 

well, at lest there ain't no stoopid alignment and no silly faith based magic...

 

am expecting a very nice game. the thing is we ain't expecting sea change kinda stuff neither. too risky.

 

HA! Good Fun!

[WILL THE ALMIGHTY]

I still don't see anything peeking my interest.

 

The art style is derivative, the lip synching is (frankly) god-awful on some parts and the voice acting sounds rather bland on the king's part.

 

I have one problem with Bioware's recent dialog tendencies. A large lack of eprsonnality. Lots of genericness in characters. For example, Mass Effect hardly EVER went beyond "Serious soldiers in space" talk, which just didn't inspire any emotion at all.

 

Also, if you're going to have an alignment wheel, FFS please make it have at least some sort of use. Mass Effect's Paragon and Renegade alignment wheel was utterly useless and never brought ANYTHING to the game other than a small achivement on the 360.

Edited August 29, 2008 by WILL THE ALMIGHTY

[Gromnir]

I still don't see anything peeking my interest.

 

The art style is derivative, the lip synching is (frankly) god-awful on some parts and the voice acting sounds rather bland on the king's part.

 

I have one problem with Bioware's recent dialog tendencies. A large lack of eprsonnality. Lots of genericness in characters. For example, Mass Effect hardly EVER went beyond "Serious soldiers in space" talk, which just didn't inspire any emotion at all.

 

Also, if you're going to have an alignment wheel, FFS please make it have at least some sort of use. Mass Effect's Paragon and Renegade alignment wheel was utterly useless and never brought ANYTHING to the game other than a small achivement on the 360.

 

no alignment. there will be reputation.

 

personally, am not too concerned 'bout art style... looked good enough from screenies we has seen.

 

as for generic me stuff...

 

me actually were actually encouraging for Gromnir. more than one quest ended with an unhappy resolution, and they even killed off a party member. is a step in right direction. you ain't never gonna have genuine heroic unless loss is also part o' the equation.

 

HA! Good Fun!

[Volourn]

"well as biowarian design philosophy predicated on making mostest people happy."

 

Their philososphy has worked well for them thus far.

 

 

 

"Also, if you're going to have an alignment wheel, FFS please make it have at least some sort of use. Mass Effect's Paragon and Renegade alignment wheel was utterly useless and never brought ANYTHING to the game other than a small achivement on the 360."

 

Nah. ME's 'alignemnt wheel' was to show the player where theyw ere. They also gave gameplay/dialogue/story differences too consdering it effected your character's dialogue choices which is a HUGE part of the game. So, in essence, you played a different ME than me if your version they brought NOTHING to the game otehr than small achievements.

 

 

R00fles!

Edited August 29, 2008 by Volourn

[Gromnir]

"well as biowarian design philosophy predicated on making mostest people happy."

 

Their philososphy has worked well for them thus far.

 

yes. sad, isn't it? got no motivation to do otherwise.

 

HA! Good Fun!

[Jaesun]

I haven't played any of the Troika games except Arcanum, ( *shudder* Arcanum was enough Troika for me) so I can't really compare combat styles. Since I'm more of a story-oriented than a combat-oriented person when it comes to games, I can pretty much deal with any type of combat used... except the super-hardcore stuff that makes you reload 20 times for every battle. I will say, however, that I had a great deal of fun with Jade Empire's combat! Acrobatics, lots of cool whacking and bowing... what's not to love??

 

You need to play Bloodlines. I think you would really like it. And you should be able to find it for cheep!

[WILL THE ALMIGHTY]

"Also, if you're going to have an alignment wheel, FFS please make it have at least some sort of use. Mass Effect's Paragon and Renegade alignment wheel was utterly useless and never brought ANYTHING to the game other than a small achivement on the 360."

 

Nah. ME's 'alignemnt wheel' was to show the player where theyw ere. They also gave gameplay/dialogue/story differences too consdering it effected your character's dialogue choices which is a HUGE part of the game. So, in essence, you played a different ME than me if your version they brought NOTHING to the game otehr than small achievements.

 

 

R00fles!

 

No.

 

Showing the player how much of an **** or good person they have been so far is boring and useless if it has no consequences at all. Also, the dialogue choices were not changed by your alignement wheel, they were changed by your Intimidate or Charm skill.

[Volourn]

"Also, the dialogue choices were not changed by your alignement wheel, they were changed by your Intimidate or Charm skill."

 

Thanks for allowing me to win this 'debate' easily. You just confirmed what i said. The 'alignment wheel' greatly effected your ability to increase your intimidate or charm skills which means the alignment wheel does have an effect on gameplay. You lose.

[tripleRRR]

"Also, the dialogue choices were not changed by your alignement wheel, they were changed by your Intimidate or Charm skill."

 

Thanks for allowing me to win this 'debate' easily. You just confirmed what i said. The 'alignment wheel' greatly effected your ability to increase your intimidate or charm skills which means the alignment wheel does have an effect on gameplay. You lose.

 

 

It would have been nice if the alignment wheel actually affected more than your choice of dialog though. If I remember correctly it didn't present much in the way of gameplay effects aside from a couple times where it was much harder to avoid killing everyone.

[WILL THE ALMIGHTY]

"Also, the dialogue choices were not changed by your alignement wheel, they were changed by your Intimidate or Charm skill."

 

Thanks for allowing me to win this 'debate' easily. You just confirmed what i said. The 'alignment wheel' greatly effected your ability to increase your intimidate or charm skills which means the alignment wheel does have an effect on gameplay. You lose.

 

Since when does the alignement wheel affect your intimidate/charm skills? I didn't see that mentioned anywhere...

[Gromnir]

mootness factor 10. as already stated, da got no alignment.

 

HA! Good Fun!

[Volourn]

"Since when does the alignement wheel affect your intimidate/charm skills? I didn't see that mentioned anywhere..."

 

Since the was created. Read the manual. Check out your skill screen. Pay attention!

[WILL THE ALMIGHTY]

Well, the manual only says it tracks your choices throughout gameplay. I'll check skill screen tooltip as soon as I can.

[Monte Carlo]

A question for Dave, if he returns (and thanks for coming BTW)...

 

I was very interested in your comments about art direction. If I'm reading you right, you create something, pass it to the art department and they choose to draw / create / conceptualise it?

 

Because, if I as lead writer, wrote "The darkspawn horde look like malformed beasts from a Bosch painting - men cursed with the heads of animals, or with their mouths in their chests, or with no eyes in their faces, wearing scraps of armour and carrying crude staves, spears and axes..."

 

I'd expect the art guys to give me that. I wouldn't expect them to go "Er, I know Ed, lets draw some orcs in Medieval themed mail and plate, OK? That writer dude won't notice."

 

Is it like a movie, where the guy who wrote the damn thing gets locked in a trailer while the directors and producers violate the whole thing at their whim?

 

It's interesting. I read in the GwJ interview that you write areas and let the designers populate them / create combats. Because I don't work in your world I rather imagine that your job was a bit like writing a big PnP module, just with more dialogue and plot branching... how compartmentalised is the process?

 

Cheers

MC

[Wrath of Dagon]

I think it's primarily the job of the art designer to come up with how a character looks, although of course it has to fit into the story and writers would have to have some input.

[Rylock]

It's interesting. I read in the GwJ interview that you write areas and let the designers populate them / create combats. Because I don't work in your world I rather imagine that your job was a bit like writing a big PnP module, just with more dialogue and plot branching... how compartmentalised is the process?

It's not completely compartmentalized... we have input on the process as a whole, and if anyone has an issue with something they see they can raise a flag about it and it is dealt with accordingly. But each of us does have our particular bailiwicks, as well as a degree of ownership over what we do. I may pass my vision of what things in the world might look like on to the artists, but I can't tell them what their job is. I know I sure wouldn't want them telling me how I should be writing things. Very often they'll come to me for ideas or input as the creator, but in the end as artists they know what looks good better than I do.

 

Same goes for the technical designers who do the implementation. As I said in the interview, sometimes I'll leave a portion of the plot blank and leave it to them to arrange an action sequence or a puzzle or something else to fill that area in. Some of the technical designers specialize in this, in fact. I'm sure they prefer it if I have suggestions, and often I do have a number of ideas-- like you said, it's like building a module. Very seldom will I have no idea. But while I can set up an encounter, I'm just not as focused as some of the tech designers on making combats tactical and interesting.

 

In other words, a writer may be the one who sits down initially and fleshes things out-- but the other folks down the line are not our clients, implimenting our vision to our specifications. It is a collaborative process, with each of us having our particular areas of expertise. When interests conflict, the leads try to work it out with the Project Director having the final call.

 

Does that make sense?

 

David Gaider

Lead Writer - Dragon Age

Bioware corp.

[Monte Carlo]

^ Thanks, that makes sense. I suppose the term 'writer' to me conjures up someone with more direct creative and editorial control. But in the terms of the different parts of a computer game what you say makes sense.

 

My only concern would be "a-camel-is-a-racehorse-designed-by-a-commitee" syndrome. I'd want to be a crop-headed Prussian movie director, complete with jodphurs and a whip barking orders and wanting everything my way. Which is why it's probably best I don't work in creative, collaborative processes.

 

Cheers

MC

[Morgoth]

Each company handles their creative processes the way they think fits to the kind of game they're trying to make. With a typical Bioware RPG, it's clear you need a lot people with certain expertise and disciplines to put everything together. A movie-director hirachy could possibly be contraproductive and sluggish. However, a filmic-sytle "game" like Fahrenheit or Heavy Rain certainly benefits from a movie-like team structure, having a director with a clear vision that is responsible for story, character design and cutscenes.

[Dark_Raven]

"BG2 is their best and most successful ever."

 

You cna argue about which is the 'best'; but the 'most successful' is not really a matter of opinion. Sorry, but I didn't make up the 'NWN is their most successful game' mantra. That was BIO that did. I'd think they know what game of theirs is most successful.

Keep telling yourself that if it makes you sleep better at night.

 

Game Over!

[Dark_Raven]

NWN Series Is The Worst Ever!!!

Sure, if you're a singleplayer ingrate.

 

And romances have been confirmed. I mean, what would we do without our romance fix.

Yeah single player. The single player story was lacking.

[Moatilliatta]

NWN Series Is The Worst Ever!!!

Sure, if you're a singleplayer ingrate.

 

And romances have been confirmed. I mean, what would we do without our romance fix.

Yeah single player. The single player story was lacking.

Which is why you play multiplayer and have loads of fun.

 

[Ontopic]

Bioware will be revealing details about the toolset at PAX in the next couple of days.

[Wombat]

I dropped by again since I heard that the lead designer of Dragon Age came to Obsidian board somewhere else. I wonder if he is still around but I'll fire up some of my questions about Dragon Age since I think some questions won't make people at Bioware boards happy.

 

Bioware NPCs have failed to catch my interests partly because they are too stereotypical and expectable to me and, to be honest, I'm still suspicious of how the designers who are accustomed to making stereotypical NPCs heavily influenced by clear-cut D&D alignment and Sword Coast fantasy setting. Now the designers are free from these things with Dragon Age, I'd like to see a more independent and through world rather than yet another fantasy world with different name. So, I don't mean originality for originality's sake,which is totally nonsense to me. I'm against moral ambiguity for moral ambiguities' sake, too. IMO, It should be based on different views from various cultural views and religious beliefs.

 

Naturally, I'm interested in "origin" of player characters. If I understand it correctly, it seems to be social, cultural and religious background settings assigned to each character upon character creation, which influence role-playing, means, NPC interactions in the world of Dragon Age. Is there enough room for players to assume variety of interpretation of stories and characters of Dragon Age? Or, is it going to end up with a story of good forces defeating a "villain" in the end? I know designers at Bioware have tried to make their villains interesting and three dimensional but, if the story begins from various view points, it would be rather odd if it were going to end up like other endings of Bioware products.

 

As for combat, I cannot connect massive battles involving many characters and the party battle with the 4 member limit. Is the former for massive multi-player online while the latter is for single player modules? Also, I'm expecting the combat is more like Baldur's Gate systems rather than more recent Bioware products. Is my expectation is going to be failed since Dragon Age is now multi-platform?

[Bamfy]

Explain to me as if I`m an 4 years kid,the fighting sytem of BG? ( shame on me,but I didn`t find it:( )

[Gorth]

Explain to me as if I`m an 4 years kid,the fighting sytem of BG? ( shame on me,but I didn`t find it:( )

BG = Baldurs Gate. Combat System... I think some refer to it as "phase based", some as RTWP (Real Time With Pause). It is basically a continous turn based system, where a real time engine is used to emulate 6 second turns or some such (I was never Pen&Paper player). The emphasis in the game is/was on tactical combat and decision making rather than hand/eye coordination (also called "twitch based" combat )

[Monte Carlo]

Explain to me as if I`m an 4 years kid,the fighting sytem of BG? ( shame on me,but I didn`t find it:( )

 

^ What the man said, but I'll elaborate.

 

BG was based on a pen & paper games system where you had six-second rounds. So it's turn-based as in "it's your turn."

 

What the Infinity Engine did was basically segue those turns into real-time, i.e. under the hood they were still turns but they were continuous: the game knew what instruction you'd given and applied it then moved onto the next. This gives the feeling of simultaneous combat. Turn-based purists didn't like it, but it was probably the best compromise. It's still not twitchy, really, you have to think. Trying to twitch your way through some of the tougher fights in the high level IE games would be virtually impossible - you have to think.

 

The real time with pause allowed you to go "whoah!" stop the combat, issue orders, resume combat, pause it again (etc). Again, not twitchy. This allows for all the stuff you can do in a pen and paper game like attack, switch weapons, cast spells, drink potions, move, fire a bow, activate a magical item, turn undead creatures, use innate special abilities (like shape-changing etc).

 

Another feature commonly attributed to Infinity Engine games was full party control, which also features in Dragon Age. Again, there are two camps. Some people hate it - citing micromanagement. Some people love it, citing full tactical control (and poor AI which has dogged CRPGs for ever). So if you have three fighters and a wizard in your party taking on two enemy warriors, six zombies and a wizard you would...

 

Pause.

 

Decide what to do (i.e. Fighter one attacks the wizard with his bow, fighter two engages the zombies, fighter three takes out the enemy warriors whilst the wizard preps a spell, say a fireball).

 

Allocate orders.

 

Unpause.

 

See what happens.

 

Maybe pause again and give new orders.

 

Rinse and repeat.

 

That, in essence, is BG / Infinity Engine style combat.

 

Cheers

MC