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

[Amentep]

In my conclusion I made a side-point though. Not to you, but just to the people who outright rejected the premise of a romance all together. I think THEY have a problem if they can't ignore the fact that some people like 'romances'.

 

Care to elaborate? Because I view my 'problem' (not needing bogus emotional and / or sexual validation and / or gratification via a virtual digital relationship) as being a pretty healthy one TBH.

 

Why do you think people who want romance are needing emotional or sexual validation / gratification?

 

I mean we keep circling the drain on this -

 

Anti-Romance: "Romances are stupid"

Pro-Romance: "I like romances as a character option."

Anti-Romance: "OMG, you **** to pixels!"

 

The logic doesn't seem to follow, IMO, and seems to have no connection to what the pro-romance crowd are generally speaking about.

 

There have been plenty of good points raised by the anti-romance crowd - resource cost of implementing a romance dialogue option with real depth; previous romances showing weakness in current implementation models, just plain focus issues with limited time to develop the game. But the "ooo, people who want romances are looking to make games their stroke material! Ick! Horror!" shtick doesn't make sense.

 

I just want my barbarian, Tahvo Ukonnen, of the Northern Steppe to be able to cleave that goblin in twain without having to ego stroke a bunch of navel gazing, water drinkers that choose to tag along after him.

 

I'm not sure what anything in the pro-romance suggestions would alter this. I don't think anyone has said that your barbarian HAS to romance an NPC...or even that you'd have to take NPCs along.

 

i'm still for my idea of fullretard mode. it got things for everyone, and everyone is people who hate video games and love bestiality rape romance novels. which is a pretty big market. obsidian would be foolish not going after that.

 

kobold gang rape, think about it, chris! think of the possiblities!

 

I didn't realize Obsidian had licensed F.A.T.A.L....

 

EDIT: Horrible grammar (may still be but I fixed the one that glared back at me).

Edited October 30, 2012 by Amentep

[BasaltineBadger]

Anti-Romance: "Romances are stupid"

Pro-Romance: "I like romances as a character option."

Anti-Romance: "OMG, you **** to pixels!"

 

The only reason why the topic went that way recently is because pro-romance guy said that people who are against romances are lonely and insecure, so this point is invalid.

Edited October 30, 2012 by BasaltineBadger

[BruceVC]

In my conclusion I made a side-point though. Not to you, but just to the people who outright rejected the premise of a romance all together. I think THEY have a problem if they can't ignore the fact that some people like 'romances'.

 

Care to elaborate? Because I view my 'problem' (not needing bogus emotional and / or sexual validation and / or gratification via a virtual digital relationship) as being a pretty healthy one TBH.

 

Why do you think people who want romance are needing emotional or sexual validation / gratification?

 

I mean we keep circling the drain on this -

 

Anti-Romance: "Romances are stupid"

Pro-Romance: "I like romances as a character option."

Anti-Romance: "OMG, you **** to pixels!"

 

The logic doesn't seem to follow, IMO, and seems to have no connection to what the pro-romance crowd are generally speaking about.

 

There have been plenty of good points raised by the anti-romance crowd - resource cost of implementing a romance dialogue option with real depth; previous romances showing weakness in current implementation models, just plain focus issues with limited time to develop the game. But the "ooo, people who want romances are looking to make games their stroke material! Ick! Horror!" shtick doesn't make sense.

 

I just want my barbarian, Tahvo Ukonnen, of the Northern Steppe to be able to cleave that goblin in twain without having to ego stroke a bunch of navel gazing, water drinkers that choose to tag along after him.

 

I'm not sure what anything in the pro-romance suggestions would alter this. I don't think anyone has said that your barbarian HAS to romance an NPC...or even that you'd have to take NPCs along.

 

i'm still for my idea of fullretard mode. it got things for everyone, and everyone is people who hate video games and love bestiality rape romance novels. which is a pretty big market. obsidian would be foolish not going after that.

 

kobold gang rape, think about it, chris! think of the possiblities!

 

I didn't realize Obsidian had licensed F.A.T.A.L....

 

EDIT: Horrible grammar (may still be but I fixed the one that glared back at me).

 

Good comments Amentep. But using logic and reasonableness on the anti-romance crowd won't resonate with them. They can't seem to grasp a simple statement, having the option of Romance\Sex in the game is irrelevant as this will do nothing to interfere, diminish or alter your experience of the game in any way (now who said that? )

You can just choose to ignore it

Edited October 30, 2012 by BruceVC

[Malcador]

Good comments Amentep. But using logic and reasonableness on the anti-romance crowd won't resonate with them. They can't seem to grasp a simple statement, having the option of Romance\Sex in the game is irrelevant as this will do nothing to interfere, diminish or alter your experience of the game in any way (now who said that? )

You can just choose to ignore it

 

Well, oh paragon of reason that you are, you could see that romance might affect other areas - the decent post you're uselessly QFT'ing with some pathetic snark says as much - they have a finite set of resources and this can detract from other areas potentially. None of us being the PM on this we can't actually state to what degree this is though.

[kenup]

Anti-Romance: "Romances are stupid"

Pro-Romance: "I like romances as a character option."

Anti-Romance: "OMG, you **** to pixels!"

 

 

The logic doesn't seem to follow, IMO, and seems to have no connection to what the pro-romance crowd are generally speaking about.

But you see there is some connection. HereticSaint brought "***ping to cartoons" as an argument against me - and Merin defending him on that later on-, even though I never said anyone in here was ***ping to pixels(though them and others certainly did defend the non-separation and abundance of porn mods on nexus with a passion). So is ***ping that important to HS and Merin, that they need to defend themselves from something like that?

 

It's not that we say something, it's that most responses don't have any argument, or tone, besides one that points to that something. Jarpie, Living One, others and myself did bring arguments against romances, but they were just crying about the once in the thousand ***ping comment then. When we got mostly fed up with their attitude, they started changing the term cRPG to fit their own ends and calling us the insecure ones.

Edited October 30, 2012 by kenup

[rjshae]

Is this the right room for an argument?

[BasaltineBadger]

Is this the right room for an argument?

 

The whole argument is already ridiculous. People could as well argue if we should include investigations and escorting NPCs, it's that irrelevant. If Bioware didn't wrote some bad romances that got people who only care about character relations interested in RPG games this topic wouldn't even exist.

[Amentep]

Anti-Romance: "Romances are stupid"

Pro-Romance: "I like romances as a character option."

Anti-Romance: "OMG, you **** to pixels!"

 

The only reason why the topic went that way recently is because pro-romance guy said that people who are against romances are lonely and insecure, so this point is invalid.

 

I'm not so sure that's the only reason.

 

That said, I don't believe the anti-romance crowd are lonely and insecure for not wanting romance anymore than I believe the pro-romance crowd is lonely and insecure for wanting romance in games. (Really? Is this what its come to - people on either side of a position calling each other THE SAME THING AS AN INSULT?)

 

Good comments Amentep. But using logic and reasonableness on the anti-romance crowd won't resonate with them. They can't seem to grasp a simple statement, having the option of Romance\Sex in the game is irrelevant as this will do nothing to interfere, diminish or alter your experience of the game in any way (now who said that? )

You can just choose to ignore it

 

Actually I've found some good discussion going on with the anti-romance crowd. Even if I disagree with them (considering myself pro-romance in games), I like to try to understand their position.

 

Most of the arguments about resource allocations, for example, are fair - and even I've said that PE's limited resources could easily mean that development resources could be used elsewhere. This part of the topic tends to devolve into debates over how "trivial" implementing romances are, but long dialog trees, reactivity for the world and other party members - there's a lot going on there that really needs to be taken into account. The arguments about poor implementation in the past is certainly subjective but subjectivity doesn't mean invalidity. For a group of anti-Romances the past implementations of romances have been such that they'd rather not see developers try (either because they don't think the resources are there (see pt 1 of this paragraph) or because they don't believe games (either as they exist currently or period) can't really deal with in a credible way the complexities of a romantic relationship (some people think it can but think the game basically has to be about that).

 

So again there have been a number of good arguments.

 

And in the end if they honestly believe that adding "Romance as a feature" will detrimentally impact the game (by taking development time and effort away from other parts of the game) then ignoring it really wouldn't be an option for them *now* when development is going on (only really an option after development time and effort was spent and they had the game in their hands).

 

tl;dr - there's value in discussion, not in arguing past one another.

 

But you see there is some connection. HereticSaint brought "***ping to cartoons" as an argument against me - and Merin defending him on that later on-, even though I never said anyone in here was ***ping to pixels(though them and others certainly did defend the non-separation and abundance of porn mods on nexus with a passion). So is ***ping that important to HS and Merin, that they need to defend themselves from something like that?

 

It's not that we say something, it's that most responses don't have any argument, or tone, besides one that points to that something. Jarpie, Living One, others and myself did bring arguments against romances, but they were just crying about the once in the thousand ***ping comment then. When we got mostly fed up with their attitude, they started changing the term cRPG to fit their own ends and calling us the insecure ones.

 

To be honest, though, I've seen the ***ping to pixels argument made in other earlier threads (as well as references to romance being "creepy" in RPG games); I can understand trying to head that argument off or feeling it mischaracterizes the pro-romance crowd. Can't really speak to the specific back and forth between you and the other users because I've found some of the arguments and dialogues a bit hard to follow.

[-Zin-]

Anti-Romance: "Romances are stupid"

Pro-Romance: "I like romances as a character option."

Anti-Romance: "OMG, you **** to pixels!"

 

The only reason why the topic went that way recently is because pro-romance guy said that people who are against romances are lonely and insecure, so this point is invalid.

 

I never said people who didn't like romance were lonely. I'm not sure where you got that from.

 

I said people who don't like romances and can't ignore other people liking it have an insecurity. It's harmless preference that some people have that doesn't affect anyone else in any way. It's in fact, entirely up to you what you want to do in that game. So for some people with one trivial taste to tell other people that their taste in something trivial is less valid, then those first mentioned people just have a problem.

 

For example: I don't like certain types of food, but if other people like them, then more power to them. I don't like certain types of music, but if it makes other people happy, then yeah, great for them. I don't like to dance, but other people seem to like it, and they should go nuts and have fun. Some people like racer games where your car doesn't get destroyed, and I don't like it, so.. yep. It's not for me. Instead I'm just gonna do the things that makes me happy with like-minded people. I'll happily leave other people alone to do things they like doing.

 

Now, if certain people liked torturing animals or hurt other people, then yeah.. that's something I would have concerns about, but I'm not going to waste my time about something unimportant like: "omg?! y u liek this music band and not this one?" I don't care. It has zero affect on me what other people like. If PE had not been an RPG, or Obsidian hadn't made RPGs, I would not be here. Easy as that.

Edited October 30, 2012 by -Zin-

[kenup]

To be honest, though, I've seen the ***ping to pixels argument made in other earlier threads (as well as references to romance being "creepy" in RPG games); I can understand trying to head that argument off or feeling it mischaracterizes the pro-romance crowd.

But why focus on that? Or any joke, for that matter. All jokes, no matter how light hearted or not, make them go ballistic. They call ad hominems and strawmen on us, while they are the ones doing them. Unless someone is actually insecure, and for some the "wanting sexual gratification" thing, there is no reason to get offended by stupid things like that and on top of that reply to posts that have other/actual arguments in the same way. They didn't get offended for mischaracterization, they never said anything like that. The just thought we were hitting "below the belt". And even an argument of it being against forum regulations!"Below the belt" is a weak spot. That shows insecurity, not trying to remove a wrong accusation.

[Amentep]

To be honest, though, I've seen the ***ping to pixels argument made in other earlier threads (as well as references to romance being "creepy" in RPG games); I can understand trying to head that argument off or feeling it mischaracterizes the pro-romance crowd.

But why focus on that? Or any joke, for that matter. All jokes, no matter how light hearted or not, make them go ballistic. They call ad hominems and strawmen on us, while they are the ones doing them. Unless someone is actually insecure, and for some the "wanting sexual gratification" thing, there is no reason to get offended by stupid things like that and on top of that reply to posts that have other/actual arguments in the same way. They didn't get offended for mischaracterization, they never said anything like that. The just thought we were hitting "below the belt". And even an argument of it being against forum regulations!"Below the belt" is a weak spot. That shows insecurity, not trying to remove a wrong accusation.

 

Perhaps this is just not interpreting intent properly with regard to what each other are saying; I've never really seen these type of comments as a joke myself but as something that posters were really advocating as the "position" of pro-romancers.

 

So I can understand people being confused and regarding it as a straw-man ("we never argued for romances to wank to") or as an attack on the poster ("You can't refute my points so insteaed you're calling me a creepy guy who gets off on pixels") as opposed to taking it as a joke.

 

Again I can't speak to the specifics of the early discussions since I didn't follow all of it closely (and apparently may have interpreted part of it wrong re: how I read it vs authorial intent).

Edited October 30, 2012 by Amentep

[BruceVC]

Good comments Amentep. But using logic and reasonableness on the anti-romance crowd won't resonate with them. They can't seem to grasp a simple statement, having the option of Romance\Sex in the game is irrelevant as this will do nothing to interfere, diminish or alter your experience of the game in any way (now who said that? )

You can just choose to ignore it

 

Well, oh paragon of reason that you are, you could see that romance might affect other areas - the decent post you're uselessly QFT'ing with some pathetic snark says as much - they have a finite set of resources and this can detract from other areas potentially. None of us being the PM on this we can't actually state to what degree this is though.

 

Let me get this straight, the primary argument from the anti-romance crowd is that the implementation of Romances will\may detract from other areas of development, yet you can't actually say if it will\may detract from other areas of development because none of us really know the programming effort required to implement said Romances. So the premise of the anti-romance crowd is based on conjecture. Nice one boys, imagine the debate we could have if you guys actually had facts to substantiate your disapproval of Romance\Sex in PE

[Monte Carlo]

Let me get this straight, the primary argument from the anti-romance crowd is that the implementation of Romances will\may detract from other areas of development, yet you can't actually say if it will\may detract from other areas of development because none of us really know the programming effort required to implement said Romances. So the premise of the anti-romance crowd is based on conjecture. Nice one boys, imagine the debate we could have if you guys actually had facts to substantiate your disapproval of Romance\Sex in PE

 

Sorry to go over old-ground, Bruce, but there were several fairly astute arguments from the anti side on this subject (on the writing aspect of NPCs) and some fairly made-up-as-they-went-along type guesstimates of how long it takes to write one a few threads back. "Oh, I've figured out it will take a week" was a favourite of mine.

 

As 'Tep has agreed, resources is a valid argument. Please also see MCA's take on this, quoted fairly unambiguously earlier on.

 

He hates them too.

[BruceVC]

Let me get this straight, the primary argument from the anti-romance crowd is that the implementation of Romances will\may detract from other areas of development, yet you can't actually say if it will\may detract from other areas of development because none of us really know the programming effort required to implement said Romances. So the premise of the anti-romance crowd is based on conjecture. Nice one boys, imagine the debate we could have if you guys actually had facts to substantiate your disapproval of Romance\Sex in PE

 

Sorry to go over old-ground, Bruce, but there were several fairly astute arguments from the anti side on this subject (on the writing aspect of NPCs) and some fairly made-up-as-they-went-along type guesstimates of how long it takes to write one a few threads back. "Oh, I've figured out it will take a week" was a favourite of mine.

 

As 'Tep has agreed, resources is a valid argument. Please also see MCA's take on this, quoted fairly unambiguously earlier on.

 

He hates them too.

 

I respect your opinion but we will have to agree to disagree on this one Monte.

 

That is until I hear official comment from Obsidian about the status of Romance\Sex in PE.

[Malcador]

Let me get this straight, the primary argument from the anti-romance crowd is that the implementation of Romances will\may detract from other areas of development, yet you can't actually say if it will\may detract from other areas of development because none of us really know the programming effort required to implement said Romances. So the premise of the anti-romance crowd is based on conjecture. Nice one boys, imagine the debate we could have if you guys actually had facts to substantiate your disapproval of Romance\Sex in PE

 

Well I'm sure it will detract and distract from other areas of writing at least, as it would be something someone on the team has to do and they'd want to (I assume you people will as well) do it properly with believable characters and development of the mushy stuff. Programming wise, I doubt it would distract that much to be honest, the engine's set up to handle dialogue and animations. My comment about the PM is towards knowing the exact degree of which, in terms of days, and what not. Same reason I'm sure you'll bring up if one the plebes here trucks out some outlandish feature they want.

 

Although I think you people will be happy in the end, Avellone's comment about relationships leads me to believe there'll be a couple of NPCs for you to get emotionally involved with but at least some better style of relationships as well.

[Amentep]

 

Sorry to go over old-ground, Bruce, but there were several fairly astute arguments from the anti side on this subject (on the writing aspect of NPCs) and some fairly made-up-as-they-went-along type guesstimates of how long it takes to write one a few threads back. "Oh, I've figured out it will take a week" was a favourite of mine.

 

As 'Tep has agreed, resources is a valid argument. Please also see MCA's take on this, quoted fairly unambiguously earlier on.

 

He hates them too.

 

I don't think you really need hard numbers to look at a project with a finite budget and a finite production time to realize that ANY element included will alter the focus on other elements. I think the debate devolved into how "trivial" or not this alteration would be but I'm not convinced that complex dialogue trees and world reactivity would be able to be trivial (unless the dialogue itself was rendered trivial which seems counter to romance inclusion).

 

But that's not the only anti-argument; there has also been a lot discussed about whether its possible for even a game with plenty of time / resources to create a romance that has depth, that doesn't defy logic to some sense and that has loads of reactivity from the world as it develops to manage a successful romance. I think the most firmly anti-romance just don't believe it can be done (either now or ever) right, so don't want time spent trying for something that can't be achieved. And that's a valid argument as well, just not one that I'd agree with (I think it can be done).

Edited October 30, 2012 by Amentep

[BruceVC]

Let me get this straight, the primary argument from the anti-romance crowd is that the implementation of Romances will\may detract from other areas of development, yet you can't actually say if it will\may detract from other areas of development because none of us really know the programming effort required to implement said Romances. So the premise of the anti-romance crowd is based on conjecture. Nice one boys, imagine the debate we could have if you guys actually had facts to substantiate your disapproval of Romance\Sex in PE

 

Although I think you people will be happy in the end, Avellone's comment about relationships leads me to believe there'll be a couple of NPCs for you to get emotionally involved with but at least some better style of relationships as well.

 

Thats all most of us ask, and its not unreasonable.

[Tamerlane]

Funny you'd mention Gann. He was written by Chris Avellone. That's the guy mentioned in this quote:

MCA doesn't like writing them and I sure as **** don't care about Hepler. There is a general rule of thumb, if a writer likes to write romances in games, he most likely sucks.

He had intended to go heavier on the romance angle with Gann. Make him bisexual, even, but the publishers balked. NWN2 was actually a far more... "romance-heavy" game in intent than in actuality. Infamous time and budgeting issues got in the way.

 

I think it's a good deal more fair to say that MCA - and the rest of the Obsidian staff - don't like being pigeonholed. That means not being forced to hit romance checkbox A B and C and not making every meaningful bit of character interaction revolve around it. It also, I figure, means not being forced to ignore an important and basic part of human interaction because some people like GI Joes.

 

Why did I enter this thread?

 

Direct quote from gamasutra interview:

 

Also, I'd have dropped one romance, at least. I hate them normally, and having 4 in one game, all of which I had to write, was a pain in the ass. I lobbied for killing the Scarlet romance (spoiler, though probably not a shock if you've played past the first mission) and successfully got a 5th romance kicked from the game, but the others remained like a taint

 

http://www.gamasutra...lep__Part_2.php

And yet, he wanted to make a male romance for another character of his.

 

It's almost as though there's more nuance to the man than you can get from a single quote...

[Corvus Metus]

I'm not a fan of the modern Bioware-style romances.

 

"Hey, you're cute."

"Want to ****?"

"Sure!"

"*Cue porno music.*"

"Awesome. We're a couple now!"

 

It comes off as to me, more as fan service, than legitimate character development. I don't mind the concept of in-game romances, in theory but most of the time the Bioware-style is disappointing, especially with the "love = sex" portrayal. I'd personally want to see a well-written chaste/asexual romance in a game for once, rather than everything basically leading up to sex and that being the end of it. Likewise, I'd like to see a relationship that's purely sexual, with no emotional l attachment involved - and unlike a certain character in DA2, they never come around to the idea of monogamy.

 

But more than that, I want to see other sorts of relationships. I felt that Imoen and <CHARNAME> had a lot of potential, developing their brother and sister relationship - and I want to see oaths of brotherhood, and just close friendships.

[nikolokolus]

Perhaps we need a moratorium on the word "romance"? It implies something quite few despise in games.

[Amentep]

Perhaps we need a moratorium on the word "romance"? It implies something quite few despise in games.

 

I'd like a moratorium on the the word "immersion" while we're at it.

 

I prefer talking about PC-NPC relationships which is broader in scope and of which romance would be one "tool" in the "toolkit" for the developers to have when creating NPCs and doesn't imply that romances HAVE to be used only that they COULD be used if it fit the character, story, etc.

[Monte Carlo]

Immersion on this forum has the tendency to mean "Ahhh! You're not playing the game the way I like and you talking about it is making me rock-backwards-and-forwards"

 

[Tamerlane]

Perhaps we need a moratorium on the word "romance"? It implies something quite few despise in games.

 

I'd like a moratorium on the the word "immersion" while we're at it.

 

I prefer talking about PC-NPC relationships which is broader in scope and of which romance would be one "tool" in the "toolkit" for the developers to have when creating NPCs and doesn't imply that romances HAVE to be used only that they COULD be used if it fit the character, story, etc.

Just like "realism" became "verisimilitude", you know those two would shamble on in the flesh of other words...

[PK htiw klaw eriF]

This is what I gather the positions are for the more reasonable of the pro and anti crowds.

 

Pro- We want romance in PE because we believe that it can be done well and will enhance our experience.

Anti- We don't want romance in PE because we don't believe that it can be done well, it won't enhance our experience, and can take away resources from other parts of the game that we find more important.

 

About right?

 

Both positions seem reasonable to me.

 

The problem when this thread occurs when...

Anti- You **** to pixels!

Pro- You are a socially stunted ****head!

 

Seriously guys, we aren't five year olds or politicians. We can have a calm, respectful debate about the value of romances(or any other feature) in PE without mudslinging if we just state our respective cases and let the other side state theirs. Also it would help if Obsidian could give us some idea of how much it would cost to implement romances, so we could all have some hard data.

 

Anyways, I would like to see romances, because I see attraction to NPCs as something that quite a few of my PCs would have. Romances would enhance the game for me because it works well with my playstyle.

[HereticSaint]

I'm not a fan of the modern Bioware-style romances.

 

"Hey, you're cute."

"Want to ****?"

"Sure!"

"*Cue porno music.*"

"Awesome. We're a couple now!"

 

It comes off as to me, more as fan service, than legitimate character development. I don't mind the concept of in-game romances, in theory but most of the time the Bioware-style is disappointing, especially with the "love = sex" portrayal. I'd personally want to see a well-written chaste/asexual romance in a game for once, rather than everything basically leading up to sex and that being the end of it. Likewise, I'd like to see a relationship that's purely sexual, with no emotional l attachment involved - and unlike a certain character in DA2, they never come around to the idea of monogamy.

 

But more than that, I want to see other sorts of relationships. I felt that Imoen and <CHARNAME> had a lot of potential, developing their brother and sister relationship - and I want to see oaths of brotherhood, and just close friendships.

 

See, it's funny, because I almost yelled, "Please, for the love of God, nothing as retarded as Isabella." but then, I, unlike apparently half the people still in this thread realized that Obsidian isn't Bioware and therefore won't completely fail at writing. Seriously, anyone who is mentioning Bioware at this point is either entirely new to this threads (in which case, run while you can), or missing the point.

 

Very few people have said love has to explicitly mean sexual intercourse between two characters and if it's explained in a well written way why there can't be then I'm all for it. However, it the whole world is suddenly chaste then I'd like that explained as well.

 

Having a few romances in the game isn't all of a sudden going to completely hamstring their writing process like some people are trying to argue, either and if you want to state putting in said romances would take several months of writing then I don't see what your problem is unless you completely lack any and all faith in the people writing for this game to get something right, or you (speaking in general terms) are just like, "I don't like romances, so no" (which is a stupid reason).