Just because you don't get the jokes doesn't mean they didn't happen.

 

I will say this though: if you go for a custom party right out the gate, a lot of the humor in the game dissappears.

I'm sorry to see so many people find the humor lacking. I personally find this game very funny. Almost every scrap of party banter, ambient comments from companions about random places we visit (for example, everyone's comments when we visit The Salted Mast), random comments from NPCs (quest-givers or otherwise), many of the PC's own dialogue options, some paths the PC can choose to go down for quests... I'm having a ball.

 

I find the humor this game a little more subtle and understated than, say, BioWare games (that includes Baldur's Gate, btw), but I still think it's present and I enjoy it immensely. ^_^

There is humor, it's just less slapsticky and goofy. Eder has some cutting remarks, and Durance has my favorite lines:

 

"The Shining One. Never shined brighter than when the Godhammer hit him.

 

The epithet is outdated. Ash doesn't shine."

 

"It's like if someone called you the Attractive Priest, Durance."

 

I love Edér's trolling of Aloth. ^^

 

I just figured he had a crush on Iselmyr XD

Durance gets taken out by a trap

Eder: "Did it get quieter all of the sudden?"

Éder, Hiravias and Durance provide much of the humor. Without them, the game can get a bit dry and dull admitedly. 

 

I think it's kinda down to the lack of colorful non-companion NPCs. Most of them are nondescript and don't provide much levity.

Éder, Hiravias and Durance provide much of the humor. Without them, the game can get a bit dry and dull admitedly. 

 

I think it's kinda down to the lack of colorful non-companion NPCs. Most of them are nondescript and don't provide much levity.

 

Huh, I think they are much better than BG companions in terms of their conception and writing.  Them not being funny matters not a whit to me.

It's the Obsidian house-style. They don't do humour much, and if they do it's very low-key.

I got impression that the writers purposely stifled their senses of humor. Like the story was intended to be a drama and they didn't want to risk trivializing it.

 

It's a shame. Comic relief could have really breathed some extra life into the game. Remember how Saemon Havarian finally died? Sacrificing himself to pay for all the times he screwed you? That scene had a powerful emotional effect on me. Because Saemon was such a hilariously slimy backstabber up until that point. His character was a running joke...and the writer turned that into amazing drama.

people who find minsc and his hamster funny and worthy of emulation have the sense of humor of dull children

 

 

Just because you don't get the jokes doesn't mean they didn't happen.

 

Way to keep it classy people.

 

Humour is and always will be subjective, and that is just fine.

 

Haven't finished the game yet mind you, but so far there have been some decent moments that got a smile out of me. Nothing that had me in tears, but neither am I expecting that from this game.

Uhm ... the humor is more ... subtle ... like in arrested development

 

 

 

But ye I miss those goofy characters like minsc, or, if i may - Xzar.

a bit of humor

I like Durance's line in the Salty Mast, something about satisfying his "other staff"...

 

 

 

He's talking about his ****.

Hiravias's line on entering the Salty Mast is my favorite so far. Spoilers, kinda

The humour in this game is drier, wittier and subtler than in BG seriers and I love it. I know humour when I see it, there's no need to underline it.

"The Master Below is below. Sacrifice is stupid."

 

There is wit, even some teasing between characters, but there's no light-heartedness and laughing out loud. It's all very low key. Hiravias might be an exception, but half his jokes are about sex and this kind of humor rarely amuses me. I enjoyed the banter between Eder and Aloth, though. Oh, this reminds me, Iselmyr's appearances are usually a comedic relief too.

Do the songbird quest and opt not to talk him out of it. 

Hiravias = comedy

 

There's also one paralytically nasty involving him and Kana.

There are few humors that i have heard of during my playthrough. It's pretty nice. Like Eder and even Durance when in the brother. That was hillarious!

It's the Obsidian house-style. They don't do humour much, and if they do it's very low-key.

other than big head modes, yes?

 

...

 

is likely a good thing that they don't try more humor.  some folks simple don't have a knack for funny in writing.  am recalling a interview we read o

 elmore leonard speaking o' his influences.  according to leonard, hemingway made writing look easy and getting into mood to write westerns were easy after reading passages from  for whom the bell tolls. sadly, leonard realized that hemingway had no demonstrable sense o' humor in his writing and so he needed a new spirit guide as there were things leonard wished to say that were amusing or quixotic or whatever. am thinking that if the obsidians could be as unfunny as hemingway, it wouldn't be a bad thing.  'course lack o' humor don't result in increased writing talent.

 

*shrug*

 

for popular entertainment that spans tens o' hours, humor is something one should try and cultivate.  keep reader or player on edge for +40 hours?  am not saying that obsidian don't have such humor in their games, but as mc noted, obsidian humor is tending to be low-key or noticeably infrequent.  that being said, we enjoyed morte as a humors jnpc.  is perhaps a bit cliché, but the sad clown can be more tragic than a similarly preternatural serious character.  morte were a good example o' black isle humor done well.  

 

side note: in retrospect, am thinking the voice acting actual helped morte considerable.  authors can be funny, but if you have a voice-over, the actor better be good. if tiger woods had delivered morte lines, am doubting we woulda' seen the funny.

 

HA! Good Fun!

Durance's Realtalk is funny.

Sure hope we get more humor in the expansion.

 

Maybe even a companion that always tells jokes or the like.

I don't mind the presence of humor in RPGs, but I prefer darker RPGs and too much humor and it ruins them imo.

I haven't come across a whole blamed exchange with npcs that goes on for at least 5 minutes and is really funny all that time yet in this game.

In BG2 I found myself quicksaving before I talked to the adventurers led by Tess Ironeye (Rasaads Quest) and reloading several times, just to try out all dialogue options.

I liked Minsc when I first played BG. I was 15 or 16 at the time. I wouldn't expect to find him very funny if I first encountered him in a game today (I certainly don't find him particularly funny when replaying the games). He's exactly the type of character I would throw out of my party instantly.

 

That said, Hiravias is also really hit and miss.

 

But I find that the level of humor in the game was spot on. It never tried to overpower the player. The banters can be quite funny. Edér is probably the funniest character in there but even-so, it's just a part of him. He doesn't need to dress up in a clown suit and throw pies to get the I'M FUNNY point across.

 

I hope they keep it on a similar level for future projects.

As we all have different humour tolerance (I like some slap-stick, I loved Edwin's pantomime villain act in the BG games) you usually answer this question with a bigger stable of NPCs. Minsc, for example, is completely optional - he's a solid melee fighter but nothing exceptional and easily replaced. So a token funny guy NPC you could take or leave would be no biggie. I can't really get my head around mystical too-serious NPCs like Grieving Mother, for example.

 

I'd like a totally humorous RPG, a video game version of Hackmaster for example. Creeping around in dungeons lends itself to Monty Python stupidity but context is all.