Zeo Punctuation on Mass Effect

[Mayday]

word cunt

 

[Astromarine]

:D Just too perfect to correct


[edit] bah. I thought I had made the mistake. way to ruin my fun

 

[Mayday]

You should be ashamed that you DIDN'T make it.

 

[Section8]

Right, it's fine because it's Yahtzee and a Bioware game. But when your average gamer complains about Torment for that exact same reason, they're just a dumb mainstream console n00b. Amirite?

I've never been one to get on the "console games are for idiot console gamers" bandwagon, though I will happily oppose ignorance.

Now, let's examine the difference:

Yahtzee (paraphrased and jokes aside) says "Mass Effect has to much wordy dialogue. Dialogue ought to be succinct and punchy. Thankfully, you can skip it if you like, but it comprises the most significant portion of the game's content, and the actual gameplay avenues are largely unfulfilling."

Fictional "dumb mainstream console n00b" says: "Planetscape: Torment? Moar liek tl;dr"

Can you see why one is an intelligent, valid criticism based on logic, and relevant to the actual product being reviewed, while the other is nothing more than a product of ignorance expressed in a equally ignorant manner?

I have no idea why, but Yahtzee has some kind of iconic status amongst many people, despite the fact that's he's just a really funny but very mediocre reviewer who only highlights games from one side (the negative side).

Well, I think it has a lot to do with him aiming specifically for shits and giggles, yet managing to also deliver a succinct and insightful summary of a game's bad points. In the current gaming market, there's barely any reason to make mention of positive qualities and high points - we hear all about them for months prior to a game hitting shelves.

 

[Müg]

lol "Zeo"

 

[Xi]

I think all reviews should aim to supply more bad than good. If this is part of the scope of the written article, a review that has more good than bad should be far more appealing. I'm glad that he mainly focuses on the bad for this reason. That makes sense because those are the things you won't like about it. If the bad things described are enough to warrant you skipping a purchase, then the review has done its job.

This beats out the lolly-gagging, shit-for-brains, copy-cat reviewers we see spewing out of the common video game media sites. These places tend to focus only on the good, and they always fall short because the player inevitably runs into the bad things and wonder why the review didn't include them.These same people then either logically learn to hate or be indifferent to the reviewers they've read, or continue to bask in their own stupidity and let the world be moronically-interpreted for them.(Something like that)

The real point is that even dialog can be a bad thing, having "too much" of anything, especially if it's something that is largely uninteresting and fails on many levels, is just a bad idea. I've not played ME so I cannot comment on whether I agree with him, but having too much dialog is not a reason for me to forgo a game. I'll gladly purchase if it ever makes it over to PC, too much dialog or not. Had he based his video on some other aspect like combat, or (insert random feature here), we may have more of a reason to be concerned. Not bad...

 

[Gromnir]

a few quick observations:

bg characters and dialogue were pretty damned terrible. the joinable npcs were a catchphrase and a character record sheet; no more. the story o' bg were just plain silly... and the mental gymnastics or innate stoopidity needed to makes the bg plot reasonable and rational is extreme.

bg2 fixed most o' the above issues... though they dropped ball with irenicus development. coulda' been a great UBG (ultimate bad guy,) but insistence 'pon keeping focus on protagonist story robbed irenicus needed development. good cast o' characters, and some nice-sidequest stuff, but ended up feeling like bg2 were far less than it coulda'/shoulda been.

never finished je, so can't comment... but complaints that kotor characters were lacking in originality is making it obvious to Gromnir that some o' you folks deserves a boot kick to the temple. the fact that kotor writers obviously and purposefully strove to recreate and reinvent the more well-loved characters from the original star wars films makes obvious that "original" weren't their goal. heck, the major plot points from the original trilogy o' sw movies were mirrored in kotor as much as were the characters. fact that some o' you clowns not "get it" makes Gromnir chuckle more than just a little. complain that kotor characters were unoriginal is a bit likes complain that magnificent 7 characters were unoriginal and ripped off from Kurosawa. duh.

ps:t IS overrated. some of the characters and dialogues were fantastic... and others were mind numbingly terrible. philosophy for dummies? got some o' the same crap with kotor 2. you all love when ps:t overt forces ridiculous navel gazing at you, but when kotor 2 does less... well, nostalgia gives a rosy hue to the often lugubrious excess o' chris A's craft. ravel (and her multiple incarnations) were a fantastic character (the best crpg character evar,) and some of the joinables were incredibly well written, but fall-from-grace were absolute terrible (you can only drag out the "mystery that is woman" shtick for so long w/o it becoming tedious,) and if me were too wordy, then ps:t were hardly an exercise in artistic brevity.

fo? don't get us started. writing were not the strength o' fallout. am not sure that such an observation would need any exposition or explanation anyplace other than here or at nma. however, is no use arguing with zealots.

as for me... am not sure "too wordy" is the problem. however, am mighty disappointed with the stoopid dialogue wheel. has a dialogue wheel with 5 choices... that meld and merge down into 2 genuine options? is as if me protagonist is simply one o' those elcor thingies... replaces any sorta artistry or craftsmanship with writing o' dialogues. dialogue wheel, as utilized in me, is simply a cheap way to reduce writer workload... any one dialogue response can be given multiple meanings by use o' elcor pre-exposition. me dialogue wheel, in practice, reduces dialogue tree bifurcation. result is a writer man-hour savings and lessening o' need for well-crafted writing.

...

is not that me writing is bad... 'cause for the most part it ain't bad. most o' the characters were compelling, and bioware finally seems to grasp notion that heroism requires some proportional sacrifice. finally their games has grown up a bit and the biowarians seems to have gotten over their great fear that the Average Gamer couldn't endure bad things happening to beloved party members. they made baby steps in me, but am approving o' the direction they is headed. am a bit troubled by some o' the wacky anime-inspired plotting, but unless you is named tolkien, plot is always a secondary or tertiary consideration with sci-fi/fantasy writing... which is a good thing.

me story and characters is relative strong, 'specially compared to some other crpgs noted in this thread. am loathing the dialogue wheel cheat and the return o' mindless bg1 style "exploration" of uncharted planets... and the rule system seems very shallow, but much as kotor were better than the sum o' its parts, am also enjoying me to a similar degree.

HA! Good Fun!

 

[Otingocni]

never finished je, so can\\\'t comment... but complaints that kotor characters were lacking in originality is making it obvious to Gromnir that some o\\\' you folks deserves a boot kick to the temple. the fact that kotor writers obviously and purposefully strove to recreate and reinvent the more well-loved characters from the original star wars films makes obvious that \\\"original\\\" weren\\\'t their goal. heck, the major plot points from the original trilogy o\\\' sw movies were mirrored in kotor as much as were the characters. fact that some o\\\' you clowns not \\\"get it\\\" makes Gromnir chuckle more than just a little. complain that kotor characters were unoriginal is a bit likes complain that magnificent 7 characters were unoriginal and ripped off from Kurosawa. duh.

Wow, there is going over your head, and then there is this. Satellites have less distance to the top of your noggin.

No one ever complained about KoTOR characters being copies of Star Wars characters, that would even be a refreshing change. The complaint is that BioWare recycled characters from their other games, like they have been doing for ages now. We have the \"Heroic but ultimately insecure female love interest\" the \"plucky young female thief,\" the \"grizzled neutral mercenary,\" and countless other examples. BioWare recycles characters (not to mention plot-lines, quests, and even game systems) from it\'s past games mercilessly.

Another example, Korriban from KoTOR and the Lotus Assassin\'s base from JE; which reuses situations, gameplay, and characters.

 

[Gromnir]

"The complaint is that BioWare recycled characters from their other games, like they have been doing for ages now"

*chuckle*

talk 'bout being unclear on concept. of course people didn't complain that characters were recycled from star wars... 'cause they didn't GET IT. star wars were a movie that embraced all the traditional fantasy archetypes, and then stuck in a sci-fi setting.

regardless, complain that kotor characters lack originality is asinine... 'cause it misses point completely... just as you did. congrats.

HA! Good Fun!

 

[almondblight]

Just watched it...he said most of the complaints were probably just him not liking RPG's, so if you like them ignore his review. How the hell can anyone be pissed? He was pretty up front as to why it wasn't entertaining to him.

 

[Erzherzog]

From what I understood, and this comes entirely from one line,but the dialogue is not only wordy but very repetitive

 

[Edward_R_Murrow]

From what I understood, and this comes entirely from one line,but the dialogue is not only wordy but very repetitive

Repetitive, maybe. But wordy? Only if you make it so. At anytime where there might be more than a line of text you can pretty much tell the person you are talking to either to elaborate and talk more, or shut up and let you go save the galaxy, shag aliens, and grab collars. And besides the two dialogues with Saren towards the end, there isn't a heck of a lot of stuff forced down your throat. And if the stuff with Saren is too much for someone, then they probably have ADHD, because it's not a lot of text at all. His claim is made especially stupid looking when one considers his love for the Paper Mario series, both of which threw more required text at the player than Mass Effect and had a lot of the same problems within the dialogue as well. Hypocrisy much?

Sure Yahtzee's a pretty funny guy and can make for quite an amusing review of shitty games with a great sense of wit, but fails utterly in so many other areas. Take for instance his Guitar Hero 3 review in which he complains that it is a bad game because the later songs on the Hard difficulty are actually, you know.....hard. What a fucking surprise smart one. Or perhaps his Orange Box review in which he gives Valve a monstrous blowjob for making the fucking paragon of FPS gaming but beforehand ripped Halo 3 a new one for doing tons of the exact same things Half Life 2 did.

 

[SuicideBunny]

Or perhaps his Orange Box review in which he gives Valve a monstrous blowjob for making the fucking paragon of FPS gaming but beforehand ripped Halo 3 a new one for doing tons of the exact same things Half Life 2 did.

portal.

 

[SpaceKungFuMan]

Sure Yahtzee's a pretty funny guy and can make for quite an amusing review of shitty games with a great sense of wit, but fails utterly in so many other areas. Take for instance his Guitar Hero 3 review in which he complains that it is a bad game because the later songs on the Hard difficulty are actually, you know.....hard. What a fucking surprise smart one. Or perhaps his Orange Box review in which he gives Valve a monstrous blowjob for making the fucking paragon of FPS gaming but beforehand ripped Halo 3 a new one for doing tons of the exact same things Half Life 2 did.

To be fair, he spends a decent amount of the orange box review talking about Portal, which is a very original game. Portal alone justifies praising OB for originality while decrying Halo 3's genericness.

 

[Lurkar]

Take for instance his Guitar Hero 3 review in which he complains that it is a bad game because the later songs on the Hard difficulty are actually, you know.....hard. What a fucking surprise smart one.

The issue isn't that they're hard. Lots of things on Guitar Hero 1, 2, and 3 are hard. The issue is, they're as close to "impossible" as you can get without making it so completely obvious that people don't bother. To put it another way - they aren't even feasably doable unless each of you've gone through years of very specific martial training to allow your fingers to move faster then any normal person's fingers can.

 

[Edward_R_Murrow]

The issue isn't that they're hard. Lots of things on Guitar Hero 1, 2, and 3 are hard. The issue is, they're as close to "impossible" as you can get without making it so completely obvious that people don't bother. To put it another way - they aren't even feasably doable unless each of you've gone through years of very specific martial training to allow your fingers to move faster then any normal person's fingers can.

What songs exactly are you talking about and on what difficulty? Because at least on Hard it isn't impossibly difficult to me and I am far from good at Guitar Hero. Sure, if I try certain songs on Expert or even ridiculously difficult ones on Hard, I fail out faster than a lazy pothead in law school, but that doesn't seem wrong at all. I should fail because I'm not an Expert. Just like it's stupid for an inexperienced FPS player to whine because Doom on Ultra-Violence or Nightmare is too hard, it's stupid for someone to whine they bit off a challenge too great for them in Guitar Hero. I could sympathize if the lowest difficulty was incredibly hard or some such, but it just seems kind of baseless a complaint with the way things are.

To be fair, he spends a decent amount of the orange box review talking about Portal, which is a very original game. Portal alone justifies praising OB for originality while decrying Halo 3's genericness.

I can deal with the Portal love, it's just the Team Fortress 2 and especially the Half Life 2 infatuation is what reeks of hypocrisy. Half Life 2 has almost all the flaws of modern FPS including Halo, but somehow Yahtzee completely skips over all that or even how Valve has made absolute sure that they have released Half-Life 2 on every platform known to man.

 

[obediah]

is not that me writing is bad... 'cause for the most part it ain't bad.

Ha hahahahahahha. Ha ha Ha HA HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA ha. Ha Ha Ha Ha Ha Ha.
HA HA Ha Ha Ha HAHAHAHAHHAHAHAHAHAHAHHAHAHAHAHA. HA Ha HaHAhAhahahaha
HAHAHAHAHAHHAHAHAHAHAHAHHAHAHAHAHHAAHHAHAHAHAHa ha ha ha ha ha ha ha
hahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahhahahahahahahahahahahahahhaha
hahahahahahahahhaha.

EDIT: hahahahahhahaha HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA ha ha ha ha ha ha ha
hahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahaha HaHaHaHaHaHaHaHa ha ha ha haha
hahahahahahah ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha

 

[Keldorn]

And, no, PST deserves criticism for it's spamming of nonsensical wiriting. It doesn't get a pass as an 'interatcive novel'. That's retarded.

Actually Volourn, YOU are retarded on this particular matter. Your blatant and profound lack of cerebral depth, your catastrophic lack of imagination, your incessant propensity for two dimensional data regurgitation, and your shallow, juvenile dismissals, all seem to indicate what is indeed the impetus, the precursor, the enabler of your lack of artistic understanding : your pathetically deficient intellectual faculty and your woefully deficient creative faculty.

PS:T's "nonsensical wiriting" is quite obviously perceived as such due to your obstinance and chronic inability to interpret it in any other way. You, and others, are immune to highly developed, uniquely progressive true art, and yet you *boast* about that self-limiting condition and use it in order to catapult insults towards those who DO understand and appreciate said art.

I've never encountered a blind or deaf person, abrasively insisting on how their lack of perception, awareness, appreciation or understanding is a sort of universal standard of irrefutable truth which must be adopted by all, unconditionally. Maybe they are actually aware, and subsequently, *enlightened*, with regards to their particular lack of awareness.



-Keldorn, the Paladin, and defender of all things PS:T. *Gregariously*, I might add.

 

[Volourn]

R00fles!

 

[Keldorn]

I approve *heartily* of the path I have taken.

The *good* has been upheld.

 

[Keldorn]

That said, there are TONS of game whose writing is as good as PST's. TONS.

Like NWN 1?

NWN 1, AND, Two Worlds, of course.

I distinctly remember a certain poster RAVING about how extraordinarily *underrated* Two Worlds is.


Lolly-Volly.

 

[Volourn]

Yeah, because we all know I have said I think NWN and TW have writing as good as PST. Oh yeah, oops, I didn't say that. HAHAHAHA!

 

[Keldorn]

Yeah, because we all know I have said I think NWN and TW have writing as good as PST. Oh yeah, oops, I didn't say that. HAHAHAHA!

My first sentence in the post above yours was a sarcastic carry-on.

I never actually claimed that you stated NWN & TW had better writing, only that you had raved about how incredibly underrated TW is.

 

[Volourn]

Considering all the qyoting is about the quality of writing, the implication is clear - sarcastic or not.


TW *is* underrated. But, it's writing is nothing special, and certainly not PST worthy. And, while NWN has some good writing; it's most cetrianly not at PST's level writing wise.


R00fles!

 

[Keldorn]

PS:T's writing is pure creative genius. Extremely unique, dynamic, beautiful and stimulating.