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Interview Bioware's Zeschuk on Dragon Age and stuff

Monolith

Prophet
Joined
Mar 7, 2006
Messages
1,298
Location
München
Tags: BioWare; Dragon Age

<a href="http://www.eurogamer.net/">Eurogamer</a> scored an <a href="http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/biowares-dr-greg-zeschuk-interview?page=1">interview</a> with Bioware co-founder Dr Greg Zeschuk. The topics he covers are maturity (or their distorted definition), game design, acting in games and how it enhances DA, some technical aspects and a Mythic-Bioware merger I've never heard of before.
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<blockquote><b>Eurogamer: Does graphics and animation technology influence this too? It seems that you can tell slightly more complex stories now: there's a mixture of humour and fear in Dragon Age, and all of these things which would have been harder to get across when you didn't have digital actors.</b>
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Dr Greg Zeschuk: Exactly. You start to see the story in their faces. I just did this one other quest where it was really neat: I kind of knew what the story was, but I'd kind of forgotten how it went. We prototype a lot of our games on the Neverwinter Nights engine, and I'd played this sequence on the Neverwinter Nights version but I couldn't remember who the good guys and the bad guys were in this particular scenario. Then, to be playing in the final engine with the lighting, digital acting and the recorded dialogue: it was awesome. I noticed this one guy was acting kind of shifty, kind of weird, and I wondered if he was the baddy, and lo and behold, a few twists later... It was amazing. It was subtleties in the digital acting which made me suspicious of his motivations. I compare that to the 16 pixels of Baldur's Gate: that was compelling at the time, but this is so much more compelling.
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[...]
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But I was actually really impressed with this suspicious guy from earlier, I was like, "Wow, that's pretty subtle." In Baldur's Gate, you'd have a bracket saying "So-and-so looks around suspiciously," and now you're actually paying attention and thinking, "That guy's acting weird". That's a real improvement.
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</blockquote>
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Yeah, beacuse "That guy's acting weird" is the epitome of writing. He's comparing movies to novels while preaching to a crowd of illiterates.
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Spotted at: <a href="http://www.rpgwatch.com">RPG Watch</a>
 

Sulimo

Arcane
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Wasteland 2
Did they:
A) put his doctorate in his name for the proverbial shits 'n giggles;
B) Put his doctorate in his name as a token of respect;
C) Put his doctorate in his name to appease the mighty Biowarian gods;
D) Put his doctorate in his name to give Greg Zeschuk a +1 charisma bonus?
 

Fat Dragon

Arbiter
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May 24, 2007
Messages
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Location
local brothel
I got a few laughs from that article. Read the first set of comments there, everyone has aspergers apparently. :lol:
 

Data4

Arcane
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Sep 11, 2005
Messages
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Location
Over there.
Fat Dragon said:
I got a few laughs from that article. Read the first set of comments there, everyone has aspergers apparently. :lol:

Asperger's is just politically correct for "moronic imbecile". There's no such thing as personality flaws, y'see. Everything is a syndrome.
 

Multi-headed Cow

Guest
Sulimo said:
Did they:
A) put his doctorate in his name for the proverbial shits 'n giggles;
B) Put his doctorate in his name as a token of respect;
C) Put his doctorate in his name to appease the mighty Biowarian gods;
D) Put his doctorate in his name to give Greg Zeschuk a +1 charisma bonus?
I sometimes wonder about that actually. Whenever a gaming website/magazine talks about Bioware, it always seems to make a big deal out of it.
 

circ

Arcane
Joined
Jun 4, 2009
Messages
11,470
Location
Great Pacific Garbage Patch
Also videos:

#1 - Woah, banter overload. Camera with potential to suck even worse than NWN 2 camera.

#2 - Looks like a remake of Gauntlet.

#3 - Boring combat is boring.

Really shit backgrounds in everything but 2 too.
 
Joined
Nov 8, 2007
Messages
6,207
Location
The island of misfit mascots
Data4 said:
Fat Dragon said:
I got a few laughs from that article. Read the first set of comments there, everyone has aspergers apparently. :lol:

Asperger's is just politically correct for "moronic imbecile". There's no such thing as personality flaws, y'see. Everything is a syndrome.

In fairness, as someone who worked many years as a lawyer within the mental health system before leaving for academia, that's exactly what psychiatrists mean by 'personality disorder'. They certainly don't mean that the person is mentally incompetent or lacks the ability for free will, or can't control their actions - you ask a decently qualified/experienced forensic (the 'forensic' part is important - otherwise they're giving evidence out of their field of expertise) psychiatrist whether he'll give evidence that 'borderline personality disorder' or similar reduces someone's responsibility for a crime, and he'll write back saying 'politely, fuck no', or words to that effect. Doesn't stop GPs, psychiatrists practicing outside their area and the patients themselves for misusing the terminology to make it sound like they lack responsibility.

Psychiatrists call it a disorder because it affects the person's ability to socialise productively, affects their quality of life, and people expect psychiatrists to do something about it. That 'something' is almost always a referral to a psychologist as soon as the psychiatrist realises its a 'personality disorder' as opposed to a 'mood disorder' or schizophrenic disorder etc - there is no pretence that personality disorders can be effectively treated by drugs (as opposed to, say, bipolar disorders which are the poster child for effective psychiatry, wherein 90% + of patients are near symptom-free within a couple of weeks of going on epilepsy medication).

Basically, don't blame the psych's in that area - they're just using their own special term for 'fuckwit', and they use it in the same kind of way. I suspect that it arose more than partially b/c patients take issue with having 'fuckwit' written on their medical records.

For a fuller version of my opinion, I've got an article to the above effect (talking about what 'counts' as mental illness) coming out in a psychiatric philosophy cross-discipline journal - though if anyone is nerdy enough to actually dig the fucker up I'll obviously have to deny all association, as I'm fairly certain that membership of the rpgcodex is enough to end any prospective career at a decent university:)
 

Shannow

Waster of Time
Joined
Sep 15, 2006
Messages
6,386
Location
Finnegan's Wake
Volourn said:
DA > BG

Discuss.
Comparing an existing game with one nobody of us has played yet... That is how awesome you are.

Obviously shady character turns out to be shady... Plot twist!
(And I found Saemon Havarian in BG2 perfectly fine. Everytime the bastard left me in the cold it came as a surprise.)

BCD
 

MetalCraze

Arcane
Joined
Jul 3, 2007
Messages
21,104
Location
Urkanistan
Multi-headed Cow said:
Sulimo said:
Did they:
A) put his doctorate in his name for the proverbial shits 'n giggles;
B) Put his doctorate in his name as a token of respect;
C) Put his doctorate in his name to appease the mighty Biowarian gods;
D) Put his doctorate in his name to give Greg Zeschuk a +1 charisma bonus?
I sometimes wonder about that actually. Whenever a gaming website/magazine talks about Bioware, it always seems to make a big deal out of it.

Before Bioware were making polygons have sex with each other they were developing medical software. That's how they became doctors.
 

Spectacle

Arcane
Patron
Joined
May 25, 2006
Messages
8,363
Sulimo said:
Did they:
A) put his doctorate in his name for the proverbial shits 'n giggles;
B) Put his doctorate in his name as a token of respect;
C) Put his doctorate in his name to appease the mighty Biowarian gods;
D) Put his doctorate in his name to give Greg Zeschuk a +1 charisma bonus?

He doesn't even have a real doctorate, he's just an M.D. :D
 

Texas Red

Whiner
Joined
Sep 9, 2006
Messages
7,044
MetalCraze said:
Multi-headed Cow said:
Sulimo said:
Did they:
A) put his doctorate in his name for the proverbial shits 'n giggles;
B) Put his doctorate in his name as a token of respect;
C) Put his doctorate in his name to appease the mighty Biowarian gods;
D) Put his doctorate in his name to give Greg Zeschuk a +1 charisma bonus?
I sometimes wonder about that actually. Whenever a gaming website/magazine talks about Bioware, it always seems to make a big deal out of it.

Before Bioware were making polygons have sex with each other they were developing medical software. That's how they became doctors.

For once I agree with skyshit. I doubt that after 10 years of real med university and practice, they would say fuck you and go on creating some software or whatever they did before getting the chance for MDK. I'd say they finished 4 years of some general practice or medical science and now go around calling themselves doctors.

Even if they were real doctors it's pretentious to go around calling themselves that in a completely different industry and environment. What doctor are you? A doctor of sociology or theology? Why should I give a fuck that you're a doctor when you introduce yourself?
 

Lesifoere

Liturgist
Joined
Oct 26, 2007
Messages
4,071
There are people who introduce themselves as doctors of creative writing.

*cackles*
 

Darth Roxor

Rattus Iratus
Staff Member
Joined
May 29, 2008
Messages
1,879,074
Location
Djibouti
You know, if Dragon Age is supposed to have dark, mature boobies, maybe it's a game about nigger milfs then?

A whole new perspective. Think about it.
 

Jasede

Arcane
Patron
Joined
Jan 4, 2005
Messages
24,793
Insert Title Here RPG Wokedex Codex Year of the Donut I'm very into cock and ball torture
Guys, I think it'll be even more dark, gritty and mature (BOOBIES) than The Twitcher.

*Rimshot*
 

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