Review VD holds forth on Dragon Age Quest Design

[Brother None]

Someone should have told me earlier that I have to ignore the whole concluding paragraph, which is nothing but a culmination of superlatives. Any reviewer will place some nitpicks to demonstrate that he really played the game, but it's the conclusion that matters.

As a professional reviewer...no, no it isn't. The conclusion is where you tie together statements made earlier to explain why you - personally - liked or didn't like the game. The whole point of leading into that with stacks of facts and info is so the reader can decide whether or not he - personally - agrees. It's not an absolute neutral statement on whether or not the game is good because that doesn't exist, the reader is not supposed to buy blindly by either the score or the summary.

 

[Vault Dweller]

I don't deny that you pointed at weaknesses. But then you still called it a masterpiece. Do you still stand behind that?

Yes, I still stand behind it. Why wouldn't I? Two questions:

1) What's your opinion of the game and where do you disagree with the review?

2) I'm sure you're aware that MotB is a very well liked game around here and that most people agreed with my review, yet you claim that the review was one-sided and the worst ever. How do you explain it?

Any reviewer will place some nitpicks to demonstrate that he really played the game, but it's the conclusion that matters.

This is the Codex. A Codex review is a thoughtful piece, aimed to help you form an opinion, not to give you a summary or tell you which game to like and which game to hate.

 

[Burning Bridges]

Ok, here we reached the point where we could go back and forth for another 2 pages. I have already answered your questions, that imo MotB is one of the worst games I ever bought, that I bought it because I had trusted your reviews until that (all negative ones btw), and that you are completely off the mark calling it a masterpiece. Yes, I should have been more observing. Certainly I am the one who is responsible for what I did with my money. But I would think twice to go out and buy DA after VDs review, especially if you already have a bad feeling now.

 

[Vault Dweller]

I have already answered your questions, that imo MotB is one of the worst games I ever bought...

That's not an answer. That's how ESF kids review games - "worst game evar", "best game evar". Surely you can do better?

... that I bought it because I had trusted your reviews until that (all negative ones btw)...

False. I've reviewed 6 games for the Codex in the following order:

Lionheart - crap
Space Rangers 2 - great
Oblivion - crap
Gothic 3 - good
Mask of the Betrayer - excellent
Mysteries of Westgate - good

... and that you are completely off the mark calling it a masterpiece.

Because?

But I would think twice to go out and buy DA after VDs review, especially if you already have a bad feeling now.

Bad feeling because I said that the quest design is top notch and provided numerous and detailed examples?

 

[Burning Bridges]

Get off your high horse, I don't give a fuck when you finally decide if I haven't answered a question or not. And in which psycho seminar did you learn this interrogation technique? I know you want to play the two-fisted academic, but you're doing it all wrong.

Edit: You can scratch "one-sided" from my statement about your review, that came from my bad memory, but the rest stands: misleading and a low point in codex reviews.

 

[racofer]

 

[Fat Dragon]

 

[Melcar]

Is this the official Codex review? If not then I don't see why everyone is giving ol' VD shit about it. From previous threads it's really no surprise that he would say it's the second coming. The guy liked the game, we all knew it, and his review reflects it. Done business. Now can we rage about something else?

 

[Vault Dweller]

Get off your high horse, I don't give a fuck when you finally decide if I haven't answered a question or not. And in which psycho seminar did you learn this interrogation technique? I know you want to play the two-fisted academic, but you're doing it all wrong.

Mental much?

You haven't said anything other than "worst review ever", "worst game ever". If you think that you've explained anything to anyone and that I'm being picky about your answer, you need to check your head and clean up all the sand from your vagina.

... misleading and a low point in codex reviews.

Ok.

 

[Volourn]

"Oh. In that case: Made you post. Dance, puppet, dance."

Except, am I really a puppet when I would dance no matter what?




"Get off your high horse, I don't give a fuck when you finally decide if I haven't answered a question or not. And in which psycho seminar did you learn this interrogation technique? I know you want to play the two-fisted academic, but you're doing it all wrong.

Edit: You can scratch "one-sided" from my statement about your review, that came from my bad memory, but the rest stands: misleading and a low point in codex reviews."

Seriosuly, why the fuck are you such a loser? You gotz skewled. Deal with it. So full of shit, it's embarassing.


"The conclusion is where you tie together statements made earlier to explain why you - personally - liked or didn't like the game. The whole point of leading into that with stacks of facts and info is so the reader can decide whether or not he - personally - agrees. It's not an absolute neutral statement on whether or not the game is good because that doesn't exist, the reader is not supposed to buy blindly by either the score or the summary."

MFG This comment is made of so much fuckin' win. So much fuckin' win. Listen to this fucker - he's absolutely correct here.

I never buy a game because x person thinks game y is awesome. If you do, you are fuckin' stupid, and a brainwashed follower who can't think for himself. Period.

 

[Joe Krow]

So if this is a "masterpiece" what will AoD be? I sometimes think your recent lack of standards is just a way to lower expectations.

 

[Zomg]

Fouche?

 

[Azrael the cat]

"Oh. In that case: Made you post. Dance, puppet, dance."

Except, am I really a puppet when I would dance no matter what?




"Get off your high horse, I don't give a fuck when you finally decide if I haven't answered a question or not. And in which psycho seminar did you learn this interrogation technique? I know you want to play the two-fisted academic, but you're doing it all wrong.

Edit: You can scratch "one-sided" from my statement about your review, that came from my bad memory, but the rest stands: misleading and a low point in codex reviews."

Seriosuly, why the fuck are you such a loser? You gotz skewled. Deal with it. So full of shit, it's embarassing.


"The conclusion is where you tie together statements made earlier to explain why you - personally - liked or didn't like the game. The whole point of leading into that with stacks of facts and info is so the reader can decide whether or not he - personally - agrees. It's not an absolute neutral statement on whether or not the game is good because that doesn't exist, the reader is not supposed to buy blindly by either the score or the summary."

MFG This comment is made of so much fuckin' win. So much fuckin' win. Listen to this fucker - he's absolutely correct here.

I never buy a game because x person thinks game y is awesome. If you do, you are fuckin' stupid, and a brainwashed follower who can't think for himself. Period.

Ah, I see now, 'r00fles' must be the sound his head makes when his brain wrenches itself free from another failed brainwashing attempt.

 

[Jaesun]

But I still knew the moment I saw the options that the whole "but you have to hurry!" thing would be false. And that means the Mage Circle help is the "perfect" option. Why? Why did BioWare have to do this? This is a horrible situation tensely balanced on a knife's edge, why am I given a "perfect out", when in fact every choice I make should have negative consequences? There's no logical reason for this (and no, a handful of knights suddenly being able to contain the mind-dominating demon for 2 days is never logically explained), it's a pure out to go easy on the player.

Does it stop the quest from being great? Nah. Does it damage the quest? Yihup.

This.

 

[Lesifoere]

I'd like to join in in the debate, but Volly's stupidity reeks worse than usual today and seems to have created an impenetrable fog. Goddamn, don't quote his long posts.

Except, am I really a puppet when I would dance no matter what?

So you're a rabid dog?

 

[Haba]

VD is actually correct, however he had chosen the wrong quest.

Like someone said above, the problem with the Redclife quest is that you can leave for the Circle of Magi or some-other-place, but the boy will still be locked in his room until you come back. Because of this, the entire enter-Fade-save-boy quest is feeling artificial and unnecessary. This is a thing that it will break immersion for an experienced gamer.

First, when you are told about the Circle, you are told that it's only a day away, which makes the trip logical.

O.K., that is a good starting point. But does it make the whole trip logical?

- When you enter the circle grounds, you're presented with another quest with even bigger urgency
- The quest that brought you to the tower in the first place is not ever referenced once!
- CoM option totally removes the C&C from the quest. It screams "bad option 1.) bad option 2.) the right option" at you.

Second, for it to "break immersion for an experienced gamer", all other games should handle the effect of long trips on quests better, which they don't.

Oh come on, even Sengoku Rance handles effects of sidetracking better (even if it means just a game over screen). It has been done well in games, can be done well in games and is no fucking rocket science either.

--

I simply do not understand how you can find the quest design in DA laudable. Maybe if you compare it to other recent games, yes they've made a good effort. But the state of recent 'RPG' games is not much to celebrate.

I've not yet finished all the main quests, but so far most of them have had very unsatisfactionary designs. You are presented with seemingly multiple paths, but in the end the result is very similar no matter what you choose, or the right choice is made too obvious.

It seems that in many quests the designers simply quit halfway through. Mild spoiler on trivial side quest follows:

For example, in the wood elf camp there is that one love-struck moron who gives you a quest involving his loved one. So, since I've put all those points into persuade, I proceed to persuade the chick to taste my hyper weapon in the haystack.

So now I have only the option of lying to the guy that she doesn't love him or telling him that I boof'd the broad. If I tell him the truth, he runs to the woods and the quest ends.

In its current state the quest screams "irrelevant side quest" all over. O.K., it is a trivial side quest and so on, but the way it is resolved also trivializes the whole quest area. It would've just required a few more lines of writing and maybe a scripted encounter later (find his dead corpse in the woods, get attacked by him etc.) to make the quest seem meaningful, but the designers opted out.

Optional, additional content of no value. And DA:O has presented me with a lot of that lately. I feel I am not making choices with the quests, but rather trying to select the (glaringly obvious) optimal end result.

 

[Naked Ninja]

Fouche?

Be of good cheer, I is here.

About the fact that the option to go fetch the Mage Circle to help at Redcliffe doesn't result in any consequences due to time lost :

I do agree that it would have been better if you'd arrived back at the castle and the Demon had killed a few more NPCs thanks to you "playing it safe" and wasting time.

HOWEVER.

A number of times in SoW development I've toyed with the idea of time-constrained questlines. It makes sense, when designing a quest, that if an NPC says "you need to do something urgently!" that wandering off and fucking around will fail the quest or have serious consequences.

But, each and every time I've polled people, both online and friends, the response is almost universal hatred for the concept. Even the people who like the idea only do so half-heartedly, with caveats. They hate that feeling of constraint.

I'm still going to implement it to a degree in SoW (Not anywhere as much as I was going to), but I can understand why Bioware didn't at all. You may say "it's shitty design", but it's not so much shitty as simply unrealistic, gamey. If 90% of gamers hate playing under those constraints, it is perfectly logical/good design not to force it upon them, just as you don't force people to eat and shit in games.

Your primary design goal is an enjoyable gameplay experience for your player. I think time limits can work, but that doesn't mean you can just universally claim the lack thereof is bad design or a design oversight. Clearly Bioware are aware of that kind of design, as demonstrated by the fact that Lothering is obliterated when you leave, incomplete quests or not. But they chose not to do it with Redcliffe. I'd guess it was probably a conscious choice on their part.

 

[denizsi]

I looked for a hidden line of text like "you've been trolled LOL" in GlobalExplorer's posts , like I sometimes do.

There wasn't one.

ơ__ơ

I'm still going to implement it to a degree in SoW

You're the man

 

[hakuroshi]

One of Redcliff quest problems, as pointed out before is that mage Circle options is optimal as it has no drawbacks at all.

Also, am I correct, that regardless of the solution of demon problem the final outcome does not change - the arl gets well and help you the same? In a way all options are the same then.
Does the way how you solved demon part influence arl actions on the Lansdsmeet?

On the bright side - the Redcliff gives much more impact if done after the Mages. I was very glad that I saved mages despite all pressing from Templars.
Imagine some paladin-type, who first destroyed mages as they may be tainted, then quite justly killed jason guy in prison and then left only with option to butcher the kid. Though, if he's just ruthless it may not pose a problem.

 

[Lonely Vazdru]

If 90% of gamers hate playing under those constraints, it is perfectly logical/good design not to force it upon them, just as you don't force people to eat and shit in games.

Why pretend to put it in then ? If it's so disliked, they/you could just ditch it altogether instead of implementing those false time constraints.

I didn't play DA, but it sure pissed me off in many other games.

"You have to hurry !"
"Sure !"
*Sleeps for 38 days *

 

[Naked Ninja]

Why pretend to put it in then ? If it's so unpopular, they/you could just ditch it altogether instead of implementing those false time constraints.

Why put dinner table models in a game when no one, NPC or player, ever has dinner? What about toilet models?

It's a theme thing. The player is able to hold the idea that "people shit in this fantasy world" in mind even while also understanding that, from a gameplay perspective, they aren't required to, and because it would be an arbitrary expenditure of artist time, none of the NPCs are ever going to be animated taking a dump.

The concept is there (and it would probably be noticed if none of the game buildings had toilets or dinner tables), but the player mentally makes a concession to gameplay with the understanding that these things don't actually mean anything to said gameplay. This is true for arbitrary game meshes, and also true for some lines of dialogue.

It would be odd if the NPCs in Redcliffe didn't express a sense of urgency in their situation. However, from the gameplay side, you can mentally make the concession to the idea that there isn't actually a time limit. Some people dislike that, or find it cheap, and I do too, to a degree. But I understand the reason, and think more people would complain if actual logical time limits were imposed on quests in RPGs, based on what evidence I've seen.

 

[Lonely Vazdru]

So that's a no-win situation.

You put it in :
- without constraints, people are pissed because it's a cheap trick.
- With constraints, people are pissed because it's friggin' hardcore.

You don't put it in at all, people are disappointed because the world lacks coherency.

People are bitches.

 

[Naked Ninja]

Pretty much. It's impossible to build a design that satisfies everyone, I've just learned to accept that reality.

Though I do think the number of people who would be pissed at the time constraints outnumber the people who are pissed at not having them. I can't say for certain, but that is based on what I have seen when I've experimented with the idea. And I'm not talking just casuals, I've put the idea to the hardcore crowd and time limits just aren't popular at all.

 

[denizsi]

Even most resident Fallout fans here hated the time limit in Fallout, even though it was a very relaxed limit and you could finish the game multiple times in that time. People are so primitive and underdeveloped, mere mention of "time limit" is enough to make them feel constricted.

 

[Lonely Vazdru]

Then, soften the blow with some humor. Like the quest giver giving the PC a lecture on the meaning of "urgency" if he took too long, or something...