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I finally understand how shitty the Codex is

1eyedking

Erudite
Joined
Dec 10, 2007
Messages
3,591
Location
Argentina
So I decided to reinstall Dragon Age, just for shits and giggles and see if I could extract any anecdotal material I could share with people should they ever ask me what I thought about the game.

I fired up the game, and just from watching the intro I had a sudden urge to uninstall it because from what I could see it was going to be one hell of a generic, grand and supposedly epic popamole ride into Ferelden about fighting darkspawn, level-scaled bandits, and boredom.

So I kinda went like "Hey, if I'm to to get some juice out of this piece of crap I'm going to have to ignore some of the stuff in it and just enjoy the gameplay ride and have fun min-maxing stats, picking skills, talents, and tackling encounters that aren't as easy as those in The Witcher."

But that's when it hit me. I had to "turn my mind off" to enjoy whatever gameplay bits (and they're few) the game had to offer. I had to stop juding the voice-acting, the aesthetic design decisions, the way characters acted and behaved, the completely horrible and unbelievable writing, the reasons why a dungeon should or shouldn't exist, the economic and political landscape of the world, the uninspired monster lore, the whole Witcher rip-off vibe you get out of every corner of the game, and a myriad of other stuff that I simply couldn't bear to ignore.

Thus, my conclusion: the Codex is fucking mindless when it comes to playing games. It cannot into critical thinking, it can only think in terms of flowchart C&C, "functional" HUDs, item progression, spreadsheet leveling, encounter difficulty, turn-based vs. real-time...and all of this because judging said things is easy. Too easy. To this day the Codex still can't appreciate good writing (DA:O has some of the worst writing I've ever read and witnessing VD defending it was hard enough), it doesn't get what good music is all about, it knows fucking nothing about atmosphere, world design, lore, economics, basic human behavior, etc. The worst? Nobody seems to be making an effort to really understand this things. Instead you just call 'storyfag' all the other people that despite how utterly misguided they are (such as saying Mass Effect makes sense, or finding 13-year-old-aimed anime dungeon crawlers deep) at least put some (albeit incredibly small) amount of thought into why the goddamn Astral Dominae would fall into the Dark Savant's hands and if the war they mentioned between the ant-things and lizard-things was just mindless fluff to make the world sound epic, contrived and "alive".


To be honest, as I write this I've just realized I've outgrown this place. Before I registered I used to lurk the Codex a lot, and enjoyed reading how people here liked classics like Fallout, Arcanum, PS:T, but over time I've learned they've come to like them for the wrong reasons. I got in here because I wanted to promote my Witcher translation patch, because I thought people here cared about that sort of things in games (because Fallout and PS:T had them), and felt as bad as I did at the prospect of missing out all of the juicy art direction games could have, but I found out that still people couldn't really nail what it is that makes games truly great. It's like you all got stuck in this hivemind mode and couldn't really see the good and the bad in a game and just thought in terms of the buzzwords I mentioned above. "If it's turn-based, it's good!", "If it's got Tim Cain or Avellone in it, the writing's goode!", "Torchlight's music is good because it's got Uelmen in it!", and stupid crap like that.

To this day I can't understand how some people enjoyed DA:O. It's somewhat of a throwback to party-based RPGs but the content is so goddamn abysmal that you actually have to turn your mind off, but isn't the Codex all about being critical & intelligent when it comes to games? Then why did I have to actually not-think to wade my way through the first chapters? This never happened in The Witcher. I also can't understand how some people liked the new King's Bounty with all its kiddy stuff, abysmal music and shitty-quality sound effects, completely non-credible world and mindless grinding; or how someone could have said that DA2's Black Emporium has good voice-acting in it.


You really have to start growing, people. Judging games by their gameplay alone is too fucking easy.
 

Icewater

Artisanal Shitposting™
Patron
Joined
Jun 12, 2011
Messages
1,952
Location
Freedomland
Project: Eternity Wasteland 2
But the majority opinion on The Codex seems to be that DA:O is mediocre at best.

I don't understand.
 
Self-Ejected

Excidium

P. banal
Joined
Aug 14, 2009
Messages
13,696
Location
Third World
Don't leave mang. You're one of my favourite characters.

Somebody should make a Codex card game, something like VtES but with our posters.
 

racofer

Thread Incliner
Joined
Apr 5, 2008
Messages
25,573
Location
Your ignore list.
Admit it, hermano, you got scared because the ending made you discovered something in yourself you didn't know was there.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hUmmw1_Uw9k

gseX8.jpg


CNsVY.jpg


bG96i.jpg
 
Joined
May 6, 2009
Messages
1,875,967
Location
Glass Fields, Ruins of Old Iran
1eyedking said:
So I decided to reinstall Dragon Age, just for shits and giggles and see if I could extract any anecdotal material I could share with people should they ever ask me what I thought about the game.

Stage 1: Denial and Isolation.

At first, we tend to deny the loss has taken place, and may withdraw from our usual social contacts. This stage may last a few moments, or longer.

I fired up the game, and just from watching the intro I had a sudden urge to uninstall it because from what I could see it was going to be one hell of a generic, grand and supposedly epic popamole ride into Ferelden about fighting darkspawn, level-scaled bandits, and boredom.

Stage 2: Anger.

The grieving person may then be furious at the person who inflicted the hurt (even if she's dead), or at the world, for letting it happen. He may be angry with himself for letting the event take place, even if, realistically, nothing could have stopped it.

So I kinda went like "Hey, if I'm to to get some juice out of this piece of crap I'm going to have to ignore some of the stuff in it and just enjoy the gameplay ride and have fun min-maxing stats, picking skills, talents, and tackling encounters that aren't as easy as those in The Witcher."

Stage 3: Bargaining.

Now the grieving person may make bargains with God, asking, "If I do this, will you take away the loss?"

But that's when it hit me. I had to "turn my mind off" to enjoy whatever gameplay bits (and they're few) the game had to offer. I had to stop juding the voice-acting, the aesthetic design decisions, the way characters acted and behaved, the completely horrible and unbelievable writing, the reasons why a dungeon should or shouldn't exist, the economic and political landscape of the world, the uninspired monster lore, the whole Witcher rip-off vibe you get out of every corner of the game, and a myriad of other stuff that I simply couldn't bear to ignore.

Stage 4: Depression

The person feels numb, although anger and sadness may remain underneath.

Thus, my conclusion: the Codex is fucking mindless when it comes to playing games. It cannot into critical thinking, it can only think in terms of flowchart C&C, "functional" HUDs, item progression, spreadsheet leveling, encounter difficulty, turn-based vs. real-time...and all of this because judging said things is easy. Too easy. To this day the Codex still can't appreciate good writing (DA:O has some of the worst writing I've ever read and witnessing VD defending it was hard enough), it doesn't get what good music is all about, it knows fucking nothing about atmosphere, world design, lore, economics, basic human behavior, etc. The worst? Nobody seems to be making an effort to really understand this things. Instead you just call 'storyfag' all the other people that despite how utterly misguided they are (such as saying Mass Effect makes sense, or finding 13-year-old-aimed anime dungeon crawlers deep) at least put some (albeit incredibly small) amount of thought into why the goddamn Astral Dominae would fall into the Dark Savant's hands and if the war they mentioned between the ant-things and lizard-things was just mindless fluff to make the world sound epic, contrived and "alive".


To be honest, as I write this I've just realized I've outgrown this place. Before I registered I used to lurk the Codex a lot, and enjoyed reading how people here liked classics like Fallout, Arcanum, PS:T, but over time I've learned they've come to like them for the wrong reasons. I got in here because I wanted to promote my Witcher translation patch, because I thought people here cared about that sort of things in games (because Fallout and PS:T had them), and felt as bad as I did at the prospect of missing out all of the juicy art direction games could have, but I found out that still people couldn't really nail what it is that makes games truly great. It's like you all got stuck in this hivemind mode and couldn't really see the good and the bad in a game and just thought in terms of the buzzwords I mentioned above. "If it's turn-based, it's good!", "If it's got Tim Cain or Avellone in it, the writing's goode!", "Torchlight's music is good because it's got Uelmen in it!", and stupid crap like that.

To this day I can't understand how some people enjoyed DA:O. It's somewhat of a throwback to party-based RPGs but the content is so goddamn abysmal that you actually have to turn your mind off, but isn't the Codex all about being critical & intelligent when it comes to games? Then why did I have to actually not-think to wade my way through the first chapters? This never happened in The Witcher. I also can't understand how some people liked the new King's Bounty with all its kiddy stuff, abysmal music and shitty-quality sound effects, completely non-credible world and mindless grinding; or how someone could have said that DA2's Black Emporium has good voice-acting in it.


You really have to start growing, people. Judging games by their gameplay alone is too fucking easy.

Stage 5: Acceptance

This is when the anger, sadness and mourning have tapered off. The person simply accepts the reality of the loss.
 

1eyedking

Erudite
Joined
Dec 10, 2007
Messages
3,591
Location
Argentina
There are some posters who understand and do get it (and they don't necessarily think exactly like me), and they're the reason why I stay.

But I would say that 95% of the Codex is pure crap. That other 5%, every now and then, makes it pure gold, though.
 
Self-Ejected

Excidium

P. banal
Joined
Aug 14, 2009
Messages
13,696
Location
Third World
1eyedking said:
But I would say that 95% of the Codex is pure crap. That other 5%, every now and then, makes it pure gold, though.
So the Codex is just like the CRPG genre?
 

MMXI

Arcane
Joined
Apr 28, 2011
Messages
2,196
Not everyone appreciates what you do in RPGs. I'm sure a lot of people here don't give a fuck about art direction.
 

Serious_Business

Best Poster on the Codex
Joined
Aug 21, 2007
Messages
3,909
Location
Frown Town
Wow, you're a gigantic intellectualist faggot. Since when did critical thinking had anything to do with entertainment?

You're everything the Codex used to stand for. Abusive langage-constructs that trap experience into abstract judgemental considerations. Fuck you and innapropriate standards. You didn't outgrow this place, the Codex outgrew you when it stopped taking itself seriously. Get the fuck out of here

Also : Why The Witcher Is An Intelligent Game

Arrgghh. You speak about aesthetics all the time, then you pretend to be the last defender of rationalism. You're a misguided little punk. Just shut the hell up
 

Mastermind

Cognito Elite Material
Patron
Bethestard
Joined
Apr 15, 2010
Messages
21,144
Steve gets a Kidney but I don't even get a tag.
Serious_Business said:
Wow, you're a gigantic intellectualist faggot. Since when did critical thinking had anything to do with entertainment?

You're everything the Codex used to stand for. Abusive langage-constructs that trap experience into abstract judgemental considerations. Fuck you and innapropriate standards. You didn't outgrow this place, the Codex outgrew you when it stopped taking itself seriously. Get the fuck out of here

Also : Why The Witcher Is An Intelligent Game

Arrgghh. You speak about aesthetics all the time, then you pretend to be the last defender of rationalism. You're a misguided little punk. Just shut the hell up

ivan.jpg
 

Destroid

Arcane
Joined
May 9, 2007
Messages
16,628
Location
Australia
It's hard to believe that shitty wedding scene comes straight out of a triple A game and not some pathetic romance mod.
 

Deleted Member 10432

Guest
Admiral jimbob said:
Will you stop fucking whining about it and leave, then?

"I HATE IT HERE"
"*POST POST POST*"

You are not in a position to judge others' mental capacity.
:salute:

1eyedking said:
In a way, I've already left.
That must be in the same way that your opinion is valuable.

1eyedking said:
There are some posters who understand and do get it (and they don't necessarily think exactly like me), and they're the reason why I stay.
Goodness, how lucky we are to have such enlightened individuals walk amongst us.

But I would say that 95% of the Codex is pure crap. That other 5%, every now and then, makes it pure gold, though.
Oh no. How awful. How would we survive if you left? Please, give us more of your great and manifest wisdom.
 

Rivmusique

Arcane
Patron
Joined
Mar 14, 2011
Messages
3,489
Location
Kangarooland
Divinity: Original Sin Project: Eternity Pillars of Eternity 2: Deadfire
You seem to forget that 'fun' is subjective and so are most of your points here. Also nobody really thinks the Codex is a hivemind do they? I have seen an extreme spectrum of opinions on cRPG's alone here, not mention the crap in general discussion. In short:
mangsy said:
I mean, I mostly agree with you about DA:O, but you're an idiot.
 
Joined
Apr 4, 2007
Messages
3,585
Location
Motherfuckerville
1eyedking said:
But that's when it hit me. I had to "turn my mind off" to enjoy whatever gameplay bits (and they're few) the game had to offer. I had to stop juding the voice-acting, the aesthetic design decisions, the way characters acted and behaved, the completely horrible and unbelievable writing, the reasons why a dungeon should or shouldn't exist, the economic and political landscape of the world, the uninspired monster lore, the whole Witcher rip-off vibe you get out of every corner of the game, and a myriad of other stuff that I simply couldn't bear to ignore.

A question for you...what other games have provoked this sort of reaction? I mean, yeah, Dragon Age can be pretty anemic on the gameplay side of things, shifting a lot of the focus to the other elements. Elements that don't hold up well under a lot of scrutiny. So I can understand this reaction to Dragon Age, even though I had no problem tuning things out and trying to have as much fun as possible with it (then again, I expected THE NEW SHIT going in, so mileage may vary). But being critical about the storyline of Wizardry? That the lands of DWBradleyville weren't perfectly crafted virtual worlds that never broke verisimilitude? Really?

Thus, my conclusion: the Codex is fucking mindless when it comes to playing games. It cannot into critical thinking, it can only think in terms of flowchart C&C, "functional" HUDs, item progression, spreadsheet leveling, encounter difficulty, turn-based vs. real-time...and all of this because judging said things is easy. Too easy.

I think you're selling the gameplay side of things short. They aren't easy to judge, especially judging them well. I mean, yeah, you can just say it's simply a matter of feel, but the same could be said about the aesthetic elements you listed. That's not a very "good" judgment though, in fact it's kind of useless, not even attempting any sort of inter-subjectivity yo. Good judgment about anything is usually not "too easy".
 

1eyedking

Erudite
Joined
Dec 10, 2007
Messages
3,591
Location
Argentina
Usually stuff goes like this:

1. Play shitty game, outraged at how 3 million people found nothing wrong about it.

2. Log in on the Codex, post impressions in impression thread, expecting to find some sanity in the-

























Mistake spotted.
 
Self-Ejected

Excidium

P. banal
Joined
Aug 14, 2009
Messages
13,696
Location
Third World
Are you implying the Codex likes DA:O?
 

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