Unofficial P.E. Relationship/Romance Thread pt. 3

[evdk]

Uh oh evdk, if you didn't put up more money than him your word is meaningless!

 

The point that it's not very effective use of time (I still think they should have made it a stretch goal, that way you people can pay for the extra time needed) may or may not be true - which is what this is all about - but it is something worth considering. Then again, why Obsidian would give a rat's tail about threads wanting X,Y and/or Z is another question.

You almost get my point which is why I provoke him. I see too many pledgers who think they should 'dictate' things that, imo, they shouldn't. It is tiring to hear arguments based on the money this kickstarter collected and refreshing when people put forward a coherent argument. I don't get all the people who feels a need to decide what is the best use for the money.. they obviously had little faith in Obsidian to begin with, or want another game than was described by them from the start.

I strongly hope Obsidian doesn't care a rats ass about all these threads with x,y and z wanting this and that, because their brains might melt if they did, by now.

I have a lot of faith in Obsidian, which is why I have pledged based only on their promises, past works and one mock up screen shot. I was merely reacting to the argument that including romances does not mean any more resources need to be used just because there are no cinematics, by presenting our side of the debate.

 

PS Do you think I am sufficiently provoked because I responded or is more aggro necessary?

[jarpie]

There’s something that’s been bugging me in this thread and I think it’s the argument I keep reading that developing romances would somehow swallow up so great a proportion of the ‘character’ budget that it would reduce the funds available to develop well rounded interesting non-romanceable companion subplots to a triviality.

 

Now this would in fact be a pretty reasonable argument in a Bioware AAA game where the romances have unique models, cinematics, additional voice acting and even unique animations associated with them but I don’t think these features are even on the table for PE.

 

One of the greatest advantage for me of a non cinematic or text based game is the ability for it to include so many more dialogue options for the NPCs and PCs because it’s just so much cheaper to produce them when it’s text typed in a box without all the fancy bells and whistles associated with modern AAA titles.

 

So assuming that no cinematic, animation or special resources are required for developing a romantic subplot for some characters (because we aren’t having the grand kissy-kissy scenes) I fail to see how adding a romance could eat up any more budget than any other branching type of NPC character exposition. And if romances in fact aren’t any more expensive to implement than other NPC features doesn’t the whole argument really devolve into an individual’s personal opinion that they would prefer it if the money was to be spent elsewhere or aspects other than romance were focused on? Just as the support for romances is a statement of personal opinion that an individual enjoys this feature and would like it included.

 

I feel that having available to them close to 4 times the asking price for funding the original PE model then the developers should be able to provide us with quite a comprehensive array of possible NPC interactions including friendships, rivalries, dislike, affection and romantic love.

The companion interaction scenes do not write themselves and are not done in two hours in between design meetings (were they might be, if you work at Bioware). On a project like PE, with limited funding and people, effective usage of manhours is essential. But we've been over this already in this thread, several times, and we obviously do not agree with one another's premises.

 

I would also add that if you want to make romance as in-depth written as non-romance, then it would have to have basicly same amount of dialogue as non-romance branch or at least very close to what non-romance has, thus meaning that the amount of the dialogue would be divided for both and then both would suffer.

 

If you would give romance-branch say 10% of the dialogue what non-romance branch has then you would basicly have just about 3-6 conversations, and the romance would be as shallow as they are in Bioware games and Obsidian is not doing that.

 

Sistergoldring, don't forget that the game will be much bigger now than what it was at 1,1 million; they originally had just three races, five classes and five companions, one big city, no mega dungeon and since then they have added:

three races (six altogether)

six classes (11 altogether)

three companions (8 altogether)

another big city (plus the quests, sub-plots, etc what goes with it)

15 level mega-dungeon

one extra region (plus the quests, sub-plots, etc what goes with it)

one major plot (plus the quests, sub-plots, etc what goes with it)

one extra faction (plus the quests, sub-plots, etc what goes with it)

Expert-, Trial of Iron- and Path of the Damned-modes

Crafting and Enchanting

Adventurer's Hall with full party creation

Player House

Stronghold.

Edit: Mega dungeon with 15 levels.

 

You don't think those require quite a hefty amount of funding and especially writing since they are keeping the development time the same as it was in 1,1 million?

Edited October 26, 2012 by jarpie

[Amentep]

Game reactions to the player's character don't have to depend on the player's character's motivations for what the PC did...

but the game really should NOT dictate what the PC's motivations were, either.

 

I think that's the difference.

 

An NPC can assume (or if you prefer, infer) the PC's motivations - they can't KNOW it. I suppose for better C&C the developers should allow the PC to correct the NPC on their inference vs what the PC intended, but ultimately the simpler (to implement) reaction is for the NPCs to react to the actions - not why unless the story itself provides a greater context.

 

I'm not sure I follow you, or if you didn't follow me. I'll try to make myself clearer just in case.

 

First off, you seem to be assuming that the game cannot react to the whys, only to the whats. You do things, but people don't know the motivations behind them. Like in real life, you can't know the motivations of many people, only react to their actions. Am I right?

 

Lose that notion. Forget it. For the sake of this discussion, imagine that the game can react to the whys.

 

The game can react to them if you input them, via dialogue. Restrictive, but it can be done. That way, if you input these whys, the game and the people of the world can react to them. And this is like in real life too. It's deontology versus consequentialism: some people care about the whys. And if these people care about the whys, then giving you the option to input them in the game adds to the C&C and reactivity of the world. For the people who like reactive worlds, this is a good thing.

 

Did I make myself clear?

 

But why can the game assume you inputing the "whys" is "true"? If I shoot my wife and the police come and I say she tried to stab me with a knife, that doesn't make my motivation true even though I stated them. By stating intentions to an NPC a PC isn't nailing an intention down, they're presenting an intention they want the NPC to believe they have. Therefore, again, the game can only react to what the PC does (in this case, indicate a motive) but not why they actually did it.

 

The assumption you're making is that the player (and by extention the PC) can't lie to make themselves look better (or because they don't have the option that fits their motive).

 

If I help a peasant who I have some vague intel may be inherting some money and tell them its because I hate injustice, then later the peasant is revealed to be the last of the scions of a royal house and I ask for some money from the royal treasury and its given to me, what is my motivation? I said its because I hate injustice, but if I know the guy is getting money and accept it was I motivated by greed? Your way would assume that I did it because I hate injustice...but maybe I just told the peasant that so that they'd think I was a great guy worth giving money to down the road if my intel panned out.

 

In KotOR2, there was no reason why the Exile wouldn't have known about his past actions. The player didn't, so the player couldn't ever correctly adopt his character's perspective. There's a pivotal scene with Atris that made no sense because the player had no idea what she was talking about, but she was talking to the Exile like he knew what was going on (and he should have, given what it was). But because the player was kept entirely out of the loop, the game just fell apart.

 

I had always assumed the trauma of being ripped from the force had made some of the memories of the Exile lost as well. In fact I thought it was stated (but perhaps I just inferred it?)

 

I didn't say it wasn't technically impossible just unrealistically possible. When you set out not to do romances, you have more room for character depth because you can focus on giving your companions unique personalities and their own motivations without worrying whether it will clash with the player's character if they try to romance them.

 

I think I understand the point; I still think there can be value in romances, but I'd argue they shouldn't be done at the expense of having a well-realized NPC as well.

 

]Because that's how the PC culture is and because developers aren't going to make a ton of content that is only going to be accessible to 5% or less of the players playing the game. If they create a romance with a companion, they are going to make that companion appeal to a large part of their player base so that player base can enjoy the content. Hence the shallowness you get. Just look at Bioware's romances. If they could do what you're talking about they'd do it, but they don't even with their huge AAA budgets.

 

I'd disagree with that design point, though. However the more specific features, quests, character relationships become the less prioritized they should be, I'd think.

 

Then again I'm also for a game not having any romances if that's the way to make the best game, so...

I think I'm being pretty objective considering the pros and cons of implementing romances into a game of this scope with a limited budget. It's just not practical. And yes the best way to make the game is to not have romances so welcome to anti-romance side.

 

Hahah, not really what I meant. I can't class myself as anti-romance even if I will admit there would be a lot of pitfalls (time investment/resources in dev, careful planning, very specific NPC perspective framework) with implementing them "properly" (or at least what I see as properly).

[BBMorti]

Uh oh evdk, if you didn't put up more money than him your word is meaningless!

 

The point that it's not very effective use of time (I still think they should have made it a stretch goal, that way you people can pay for the extra time needed) may or may not be true - which is what this is all about - but it is something worth considering. Then again, why Obsidian would give a rat's tail about threads wanting X,Y and/or Z is another question.

You almost get my point which is why I provoke him. I see too many pledgers who think they should 'dictate' things that, imo, they shouldn't. It is tiring to hear arguments based on the money this kickstarter collected and refreshing when people put forward a coherent argument. I don't get all the people who feels a need to decide what is the best use for the money.. they obviously had little faith in Obsidian to begin with, or want another game than was described by them from the start.

I strongly hope Obsidian doesn't care a rats ass about all these threads with x,y and z wanting this and that, because their brains might melt if they did, by now.

I have a lot of faith in Obsidian, which is why I have pledged based only on their promises, past works and one mock up screen shot. I was merely reacting to the argument that including romances does not mean any more resources need to be used just because there are no cinematics, by presenting our side of the debate.

 

PS Do you think I am sufficiently provoked because I responded or is more aggro necessary?

Having a lot of faith and voicing concerns such as how they should spend their backing funds can easily be seen in contrast.

 

I am sorry if my provocation 'hit' harder than intended, I just wanted to make a point.

[evdk]

Having a lot of faith and voicing concerns such as how they should spend their backing funds can easily be seen in contrast.

 

I am sorry if my provocation 'hit' harder than intended, I just wanted to make a point.

I am well aware that they owe me jack, except from possibly releasing some reasonable facsimile of a BG clone on the promised date or within allowable time frame. I am also trying to argue within the scope of the project - ie you won't find me pushing TB on the devs, because even if I personally dislike RTwP I fully recognize what kind of project I have backed. Romances for are on the fence - they are not a typical feature of neither BG nor old school games and so I believe the discussion is a fair game.

[Merin]

That cRPGs are about choice and consequence. Choice and consequence is a defining characteristic of cRPGs. I disagree, but BioWare champions this

 

No, they don't. They champion the illusion of choice. Most of their choices have no consequence. Later games from them are limiting choice due to their focus on cinematic presentation and full VO.

 

To be honest though, I don't understand you desire for romance. When you claim you can imagine party members on the one hand, and prefer that to dev designed companion. Then on the other championing dev developed romances.

 

Surely you could just imagine the romance, right?

 

Your problem - and that of so many others in this thread - is your presumptions.

 

You (in general, the anti-romance people, not you specific, Bos_hybrid) presume, because I don't insult BioWare or the BSN endlessly, that I don't call all romance in games crap, that I say that I enjoy romance in games...

 

that I want romanceable companions or romanceable NPCs for my character (or characters) in some kind of dating simulation.

 

I don't.

 

You (again, general, not you specifically) also presume that when I say that the gutter is the best part of the comic that I somehow am saying that I don't want the panels that surround the gutter.

 

Hint - you can't have the gutter without the panels.

 

This is the barest simplicity of story-telling: deciding what to show, what not to show, which moments are critical, which moments are unimportant, and which things to leave to the imagination of the reader / viewer / player. Engaging someone in your story requires pulling them in, and you pull them in by making it personal to them on some level. You can't possibly create a story that is personal to most of your audience, but you CAN leave gaps for them to fill in themselves (almost always without them consciously doing it - this isn't Mad Libs) which makes the story their own.

 

It's like Seal used to say about his lyrics for his songs - he didn't want to print them because he wanted his audience to get what they wanted out of his music.

 

It's like every detective story where the murder happens off screen, or horror movie where you never see the creature, or love story where the movie ends when the couple gets together.... it leaves the details unspoken up to you, and you'll imagine what best fits your tastes, and you'll like the experience better than if it's all spelled out for you.

 

Arguing this point is a derailment of the thread - and it's not like I have a stake in defending the concept. It isn't mine, and frankly, you can disbelieve it all you want. If I have to go through the day knowing that many people don't believe in climate change, evolution, or that trickle-down doesn't work... I can live with people refusing to accept sociological notions about how we enjoy fiction.

Edited October 26, 2012 by Merin

[Nidrolok]

that I want romanceable companions or romanceable NPCs for my character (or characters) in some kind of dating simulation.

I don't.

Let me get this straight, you do not want an in depth written "romance" since it would compromise your imagined character and you keep championing shallow relationships that only consists of a couple of conversations because it leaves a lot of things left to the imagination. Lastly you must feel rather strongly about this to keep making these lengthy posts advocating it.

 

You didn't even answer his question, why not just imagine the whole thing yourself? Write a line or two about it in the character's bio and you're all set, right? Because that's what you usually do anyway, you said so yourself.

[Jasede]

On that note, Notepad is the best RPG ever!!!

[Merin]

You didn't even answer his question, why not just imagine the whole thing yourself? Write a line or two about it in the character's bio and you're all set, right? Because that's what you usually do anyway, you said so yourself.

 

 

Hint - you can't have the gutter without the panels.

Edited October 26, 2012 by Merin

[evdk]

You didn't even answer his question, why not just imagine the whole thing yourself? Write a line or two about it in the character's bio and you're all set, right? Because that's what you usually do anyway, you said so yourself.

 

 

Hint - you can't have the gutter without the panels.

Hint more, I'm lost in your devious analogy. English not my first language and all that jazz...

[Malcador]

On that note, Notepad is the best RPG ever!!!

 

I prefer Sublime Text 2, graphics are better and overall it's more immersive.

[evdk]

I am fan of Notepad ++ GOTY edition, it even helps me to script romance scenes better.

[Amentep]

You didn't even answer his question, why not just imagine the whole thing yourself? Write a line or two about it in the character's bio and you're all set, right? Because that's what you usually do anyway, you said so yourself.

 

 

Hint - you can't have the gutter without the panels.

Hint more, I'm lost in your devious analogy. English not my first language and all that jazz...

 

Its an analogy to comic art. Comic art is a series of sequential images that tie together to form a narrative; because it is static image the reader's imagination has to fill in the action going on between the panels. The area between the panels is referred to as "the gutter" between panels, thus the imagined connection between panel A and panel B is what the reader invests in "the gutter".

 

From a video game perspective, this might be something like in BG2 when your party is traveling for a day (or so) from Athkatla to Umar Hills (IIRC), the player might assume, conjecture or imagine that the party might have conversations, or camp, or whatever during the trip that happens between "gather your party to venture forth" and arrival in Umar Hills. The trip doesn't exist in the game, only in the mind of the player.

 

Other people will play the game and not assume anything happened during the trip since for them the game only exists based on their explicit input and what they see. This is where comic art storytelling and video game storytelling differ, since comic art storytelling can't exist without an assumption of action happening that you don't see, whereas I'm not 100% sure the same can be said for video games (although certainly there are those who do "expand on the action" that could happen "off-screen").

 

EDIT: poor grammar

Edited October 26, 2012 by Amentep

[Merin]

You didn't even answer his question, why not just imagine the whole thing yourself? Write a line or two about it in the character's bio and you're all set, right? Because that's what you usually do anyway, you said so yourself.

Hint - you can't have the gutter without the panels.

Hint more, I'm lost in your devious analogy. English not my first language and all that jazz...

 

You (again, general, not you specifically) also presume that when I say that the gutter is the best part of the comic that I somehow am saying that I don't want the panels that surround the gutter.

 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Understanding_Comics - "Closure, reader participation between the panels"

http://www.epinions.com/review/Understanding_Comics_by_Scott_McCloud/book-review-431B-4A6E317-3910B824-prod4?sb=1 - “The art of comics is as subtractive an art as it is additive,” McCloud writes. “And finding the balance between too much and too little is crucial...” (page 85) Figuring out exactly how many panels are needed to tell a story, as well as how to arrange them, is not a simple thing. Allowing an audience to make their own assumptions about what happens in the gutter can make the story more engaging, but “as closure between panels becomes more intense, reader interpretation becomes far more elastic. And managing it becomes more complicated for the creator.” (page 86) If an artist describes every action in mind-numbing detail, utilizing hundreds of panels, he risks losing the interest of his audience. If he’s too vague, it’s more likely that the readers will misunderstand what he’s trying to say."

 

Merin saying that you should imagine the entire game and the game shouldn't show or tell anything = red herring

[Malcador]

Its an analogy to comic art. Comic art is a series of sequential images that tie together to form a narrative; because it is static image the reader's imagination has to fill in the action going on between the panels. The area between the panels is referred to as "the gutter" between panels, thus the imagined connection between panel A and panel B is what the reader invests in "the gutter".

 

From a video game perspective, this might be something like in BG2 when your party is traveling for a day (or so) from Athkatla to Umar Hills (IIRC), the player might assume, conjecture or imagine that the party might have conversations, or camp, or whatever during the trip that happens between "gather your party to venture forth" and arrival in Umar Hills. The trip doesn't exist in the game, only in the mind of the player.

 

Other people will play the game and not assume anything happened during the trip since for them the game only exists based on their explicit input and what they see. This is where comic art storytelling and video game storytelling differ, since comic art storytelling can't exist without an assumption of action happening that you don't see, whereas I'm not 100% sure the same can be said for video games (although certainly there are those who do "expand on the action" that could happen "off-screen").

 

EDIT: poor grammar

 

Can't see how one could say the "in between" is the best part of the story, as it's something you're making up in your head rather than being the story crafted by the writer. Well, maybe if the writer alludes to something happening in that time and letting you finish off the rest ?

 

Meh, reminds me of people saying FO3 had awesome storytelling with the random skeletons in houses and players imagining what happened to them - so those spooning skeletons were old people that cuddled up to end their lives together or something suitably sappy.

[Merin]

Its an analogy to comic art. Comic art is a series of sequential images that tie together to form a narrative; because it is static image the reader's imagination has to fill in the action going on between the panels. The area between the panels is referred to as "the gutter" between panels, thus the imagined connection between panel A and panel B is what the reader invests in "the gutter".

 

Precisely. It's a concrete example, easily visualized. You can see the space between the panels, the gutter, and so it's a very easy analogy.

 

Another example is when someone reads a book, like Harry Potter or Lord of the Rings, and imagines what Harry or Frodo look and sound like. The author guides you, with descriptions of features and voice, but ultimately your imagination shapes their character based on your personal preferences. When you then see the movie casting, or even just hear an full cast audio production, many people are often mildly to majorly disappointed. Some don't care, but many prefer their version of the character than the director's (or voice casting director's) version. This is where you get the oft-said adage "the book is better than the movie" - for many, it's because how they imagined events suited them much more than the director's vision of the story.

 

Not everyone prefers books to movies. And not everyone prefers silent protagonist, create your own character to pre-designed, pre-determined, voiced and set appearance character in games. But many do (in both instances, prefer the former to the latter.)

 

From a video game perspective, this might be something like in BG2 when your party is traveling for a day (or so) from Athkatla to Umar Hills (IIRC), the player might assume, conjecture or imagine that the party might have conversations, or camp, or whatever during the trip that happens between "gather your party to venture forth" and arrival in Umar Hills. The trip doesn't exist in the game, only in the mind of the player.

 

That's a pretty direct comparison to the gutter, yes...

 

but I'm also speaking about all the things the game can never show. What do your party members talk about around the campfire? What kind of breakfast do they eat? What do they do in their down time? Who are their parents, best friends, what are their hobbies? Do they take good care of their weapons, or wear them out and just replace them? All these details are best left to the player's imagination - UNLESS they serve some very specific story point to give that information to the player. Like, you know, whom your daddy is in Baldur's Gate or whom your best friend was in KotOR.

 

Other people will play the game and not assume anything happened during the trip since for them the game only exists based on their explicit input and what they see. This is where comic art storytelling and video game storytelling differ, since comic art storytelling can't exist without an assumption of action happening that you don't see, whereas I'm not 100% sure the same can be said for video games (although certainly there are those who do "expand on the action" that could happen "off-screen")

 

And it's also why much of this is often best left to the player. Many players may not care about their character's motivations. Many cRPG players are in it for XP, loot, killing things, and not making choices in-character. And that's absolutely fine. You have to balance things, pick what to show and what not to show.

Edited October 26, 2012 by Merin

[kenup]

On that note, Notepad is the best RPG ever!!!

 

I prefer Sublime Text 2, graphics are better and overall it's more immersive.

I prefer textpad, it's great for bringing the story into my daydreams life.

 

And again, Merin what you want is Bioware's best achievement yet, they can't surpass Bethesda but both of them let you "imagine" the character. instead of the character being there.

Imagining part story in your head is fan fiction, the writer didn't write that, it wasn't there and it's never going to be. That's called a plot hole. Whether something happens on screen or the player is informed through other means, alluding to it perhaps, it has to be there in some form.

 

And it's one thing to want romances added(which by it self, the verb doesn't denote anything negative), but to want to sacrifice what others like(which are very basic stuff expected from a story), just to not get a good story and narrative so you can imagine you are the main character(you aren't) and having a relationship with an other character? Damn, that's being selfish if I ever saw one.

Edited October 26, 2012 by kenup

[jarpie]

Merin, since you are against reactivity and showing/asking motivations from the player (or want to keep them at minium at least), and especially making the player to react to the gameworld.

 

Then tell me this:

How they could deal with any themes concerning for example, friendships or how the souls affect the behaviour unless they write player character reacting to the other characters and what happens in the gameworld, also if they wouldn't give player any motivations to choose from how they can deal with the soul possibly influencing the choices you make?

 

If for example they write that player character makes a choice, like Tale said either to save a baby or not, and then they show player character remembering the soul's past lives or talking about the soul influencing that action, wouldn't the motivations be important in dealing with the choice and not just the actions since they are dealing with the themes that does soul and its history influence the player characters and NPCs behaviour?

 

More places/options there are for choosing potential motivations, the more in detail (in depth) they can deal with the theme of having souls influencing player characters and NPCs choices, actions and motivations - also with how the soul possibly influences your potential motivations for actions toward the companions and other NPCs - if you just show soul possibly influencing the motivations and actions of the NPCs then the player character is just an empty puppet what is completely removed from the gameworld and not actively participating in it and in the themes thus dealing with the whole theme is pointless as I explain it below.

 

I'll give you an example: The PC and the NPCs are discussing does the soul influence their motivations and actions, and since the PC is the one doing the (most) choices concerning what the group does, then he must be one of the main points in the discussion so there has to be motivation behind the actions since otherwise the whole theme is worthless because soul would be influencing his motivations behind the actions and not the actions directly - and how they can write lines for the NPCs (like the people in the world who are studying the effect of the souls) having the view of the PCs actions unless they know the motivations also?

 

Now, this is important - they have to show the motivations in the context of the gameworld how it (the world itself, characters etc) react to the motivations and the actions of the player character or otherwise dealing with the whole theme is moot because there would not be points of reference to which compare player character's motivations and actions vs. the gameworld for how the writers want to deal with the theme in the gameworld.

Edited October 26, 2012 by jarpie

[Tale]

if they wouldn't give player any motivations to choose from how they can deal with the soul possibly influencing the choices you make?

They shouldn't. The idea of souls influencing characters should be left for NPCs. Maybe if they want to get meta, the player can be a stand-in for the character's soul.

 

If the soul is influencing character decisions, you either remove player agency by declaring it for the player. Or you're making a silly distinction of letting the player choose between soul and self which is needless complication that doesn't actually explore the theme. It's just letting the player pretend he's exploring a theme he probably doesn't even understand.

[kenup]

if they wouldn't give player any motivations to choose from how they can deal with the soul possibly influencing the choices you make?

They shouldn't. The idea of souls influencing characters should be left for NPCs. Maybe if they want to get meta, the player can be a stand-in for the character's soul.

 

If the soul is influencing character decisions, you either remove player agency by declaring it for the player. Or you're making a silly distinction of letting the player choose between soul and self which is needless complication that doesn't actually explore the theme. It's just letting the player pretend he's exploring a theme he probably doesn't even understand.

You're missing it. The player has a choice as to how and why do something. For example, save that pregnant woman or the king? You can save the woman because you save two lives and the king has more people caring after him, or you can do it because you hate the guy, and other possibilities that can be presented in the dialogue and the narrative. Some time later you learn that something similar has happened in the soul's past. At that point, we see whether the pc made the choice influenced by the past, and in which way, or not if he didn't get influenced.

Edited October 26, 2012 by kenup

[jarpie]

if they wouldn't give player any motivations to choose from how they can deal with the soul possibly influencing the choices you make?

They shouldn't. The idea of souls influencing characters should be left for NPCs. Maybe if they want to get meta, the player can be a stand-in for the character's soul.

 

If the soul is influencing character decisions, you either remove player agency by declaring it for the player. Or you're making a silly distinction of letting the player choose between soul and self which is needless complication that doesn't actually explore the theme. It's just letting the player pretend he's exploring a theme he probably doesn't even understand.

 

They can do it similarly to what was done in PS:T where the player character remembered parts of his past life as the game progressed, and since PE World has different kind of souls that could affect on what kind of memories etc the soul gives to the player character - they could do it in discussion such as (this is just rough example) "I remember this and this thing from the soul's past doing for these reasons, and then I remember this other previous owner doing this for these reasons" - which would be affected on what type of soul player chose for example.

[jarpie]

if they wouldn't give player any motivations to choose from how they can deal with the soul possibly influencing the choices you make?

They shouldn't. The idea of souls influencing characters should be left for NPCs. Maybe if they want to get meta, the player can be a stand-in for the character's soul.

 

If the soul is influencing character decisions, you either remove player agency by declaring it for the player. Or you're making a silly distinction of letting the player choose between soul and self which is needless complication that doesn't actually explore the theme. It's just letting the player pretend he's exploring a theme he probably doesn't even understand.

You're missing it. The player has a choice as to how and why do something. For example, save that pregnant woman or the king? You can save the woman because you save two lives and the king has more people caring after him, or you can do it because you hate the guy, and other possibilities that can be presented in the dialogue and the narrative. Some time later you learn that something similar has happened in the soul's past. At that point, we see whether the pc made the choice influenced by the past, and in which way, or not if he didn't get influenced.

 

Exactly this too.

Edited October 26, 2012 by jarpie

[kenup]

Exactly this too.

Glad to be of service!

[jarpie]

Maybe this discussion should be moved to it's own discussion, mods?

[Merin]

Merin, since you are against reactivity and showing/asking motivations from the player (or want to keep them at minium at least), and especially making the player to react to the gameworld.

 

Let me try and make this abundantly clear. Forgive the excessive dramatics of the next sentence, but I'm hoping it might be memorable and could possibly stick...

 

I want Project Eternity to have choice and consequence.

 

Of course the game has to react to the player's actions. Furthermore, of course in a role-playing game the player's choices about his or her character and what his or her character does in the game world matter, and the game should have reactions to the player.

 

I have never said otherwise.

 

Red herring. Look it up. translation - stop believing what you see others say about me, and please stop adding to the misdirections - read the red bold above, and accept that I'm not advocating lack of game reactivity

 

 

How they could deal with any themes concerning for example, friendships or how the souls affect the behaviour unless they write player character reacting to the other characters and what happens in the gameworld, also if they wouldn't give player any motivations to choose from how they can deal with the soul possibly influencing the choices you make?

 

... avoiding the temptation to argue that themes could be presented in so many very different ways, knowing full well some sentence will be grabbed by somebody and used, out of context, to create an army of straw men that even fire could not stop ...

 

In a role-playing game, especially one where you are allowed to fully create your own character (as PE will be, in the great IE following of the greater cRPG tradition), the game writers should almost never write the player character's reactions.

 

They should, can and do write NPC reactions to the game world and the player character, and other game world reactions to the player character, NPCs and other game world events.

 

If for example they write that player character makes a choice,

 

They write that the player character makes a choice, or the player / player character makes a choice? Distinction is important.

 

like Tale said either to save a baby or not, and then they show player character remembering the soul's past lives or talking about the soul influencing that action, wouldn't the motivations be important in dealing with the choice and not just the actions since they are dealing with the themes that does soul and its history influence the player characters and NPCs behaviour?

 

No, you really do mean the writers saying what the player character decided, and writing why they did it?

 

In a cRPG, especially one where you can create your character in the way of IE following the great tradition of cRPGs letting you make your own character, the writers should not be dictating to me my character or my actions. Stuff like KotOR or PS:T, in the Total Recall method of "here's a unique character born from the mind-wiped husk of a previous villain", is a special case of that's not your character the stuff they relate to you, it's the personality of whom inhabited your character's body earlier.

 

Digression aside, I reject the scenario because I don't believe PE should be dictating my character's motivations to me.

 

 

I'll give you an example: The PC and the NPCs are discussing does the soul influence their motivations and actions, and since the PC is the one doing the (most) choices concerning what the group does, then he must be one of the main points in the discussion so there has to be motivation behind the actions since otherwise the whole theme is worthless because soul would be influencing his motivations behind the actions and not the actions directly - and how they can write lines for the NPCs (like the people in the world who are studying the effect of the souls) having the view of the PCs actions unless they know the motivations also?

 

Let me try and pick out the salient point in here, and feel free to correct me if I've missed it -

 

How can the game writers create reactive dialog for the NPCs if they haven't dictated ahead of time the PC's motivations?

 

The same way they've done it for all the other IE games where NPCs spoke to the player's characters - by first giving the player enough options to reasonably represent where most players would like be playing their characters from (what number of options is the trick - too many and the game takes way too long to write, especially if these options keep branching.... too few and you get Mass Effect 3 where you can choose to say yes in a nice voice or yes in a mean voice) and then crafting NPC responses to those options.

 

In a perfect role-playing environment, each character would have it's own player so each character was super-realized and each character could react to whatever each other player said or did without limitations. And this is how simulations for group therapy and training exercises work, but let's not go there for now. With role-playing games, you aren't going to get that many people involved - you have a handful of players controlling their own characters, and as such their characters have the most reactivity and are the most realized... whereas all the other characters in the world are controlled by the GM, and therefore are less realized. Still, the GM can try and react to most anything the players do, so it's not so bad, just the GM can't spend lots of time fleshing out every other character in the world. Now you move to cRPG's, and the limitations grow. You don't have an active GM (in single player cRPGs), you have prescripted dialog and such for the NPCs before the player has even bought the game, let alone made a character. And because of the limitations of prescripted reactions, the player becomes limited in how many choices he or she has as well. The game developers have to prescript the options for the player.

 

So, yes, the player's options are pre-scripted. His character can only be player defined, as far the game world will react to him or her, inside of the boundaries of what the game developers made possible. There are limits to what you can create inside the game rules and options.

 

But you still create it. You still choose the dialog your character speaks. And all the nooks and crannies that aren't covered by the character creation system you can imagine to help add the height to Harry Potter or the style of shirt that Frodo is wearing (referring to books, movies, reader vs. writer vs. movie director visions of characters, etc, from earlier post.)

 

Games used to (some still do) give you bio blocks to fill in your character's biography. Clearly the designers meant these to be YOUR characters, not their characters.

 

 

Now, this is important - they have to show the motivations in the context of the gameworld how it (the world itself, characters etc) react to the motivations and the actions of the player character or otherwise dealing with the whole theme is moot because there would not be points of reference to which compare player character's motivations and actions vs. the gameworld for how the writers want to deal with the theme in the gameworld.

 

The player character's motivations shouldn't enter into the design of the game at all, with the exception of what the player choose to have as his character's motivations.

The game designers (for a cRPG in the style of PE, the older IE games, etc.) give you options of what you character says or does. The game world (including NPCs) should react to your characters words and actions - words and actions that chosen by the player, not by the writers.