Linguistic comparison of IE games with Nu-Games

[Hafnar the Jester]

How is this new? These English compounds are baked into, say, the Forgotten Realms/D&D (Underdark, Waterdeep, hell, Ravenloft and Dragonlance). This was also a feature in Tolkien, though there's an additional twist where the names are compounds of, say, Old English / Old Norse (e.g. Gandalfr means staff-elf), as well as plain old compounds like Treebeard.

It's interesting, though, because I find English compounds irritating as well, and would almost prefer fampyrs or Drizzt than a game full of Promisebreakers and Oatmealcrunchers. But I've seen people here suggest that the latter 'feels' familiarly fantasy.

Are you autistic?

There's nothing wrong with the idea of a compound. Actually, it is a super neat idea.
There's nothing wrong with a "bookbinder" or a gandalfr, or Daggerford, or Daggerfall. Because these words either:
a) describe what they represent (a bookbinder is a dude who binds books for a living, which is a tangible process done 8 hours a day.)
b) are but an ornament with a sole purpose of sounding good (No one actually expects that in the city of Daggerford, there's a river ford filled with daggers. Get it?)

What we hate on here are these uberpompous madeup meaningless post-modernist wordsalads that sound important and clever and supercool but are utterly meaningless. All your "Airstompers", "Firesayers", "Sunsmellers", "Soulmongers" and "Moonlickers" are just much ado about nothing. They pretend to be what they are not. They're a false promise. They are linguistic corpses smeared with lipstick to appear animated. A fake drama.

 

[Humbaba]

Re: Compounds

This has been touched on but Warhammer Fantasy vs. Age of Sigmar is a good example on how to make good compounds vs. bad compounds.

Exhibit A: Kholek is called "Suneater" because the sun refuses to shine on the ground whereupon he treads, hence the perception that he just eats the sun wherever he goes.

Exhibit B: Archaon is the "Everchosen" because he is chosen by the chaos gods to be their champion forever.

Simple. Both are examples of warranted compounds because they are fairly straight forward descriptive titles regarding a key characteristic. Now Age of Sigmar has the bad habit of giving every unit a two-compound name, usually following the pattern of "Nounadjective Adjective" or "Nounadjective Nounverb".

Exhibit C: AoS not!Space Marines are called "Stormcast Eternals". I challenge you to ask your grandma what comes to mind when hearing the term "Space Marine". Probably a military type of person in space, probably wields a space gun etc. Now ask her what she thinks a fucking "Stormcast Eternal" is. It's also borderline untranslatable into other languages. A term like that makes no sense in our world and would only make sense in a dumbass hyper-high fantasy setting like AoS, which creates a disconnect between setting and consumer, hindering immersion. The same can happen in a setting that is meant to be somewhat more grounded but still exhibits relatively unfitting naming conventions.

The world of Tyranny is fairly standard as far as fantasy settings go but still has your job description be "Fatebinder". The title implies that you bind fates, somehow, and makes your tasks sound a lot more mystical than they actually are; you are a legal firm on wheels. You don't "bind" fates as much as you "seal" them. Besides, you seal fates anyway, you don't bind them. Wtf does it even mean to bind a fate or several fates? Bind it to what? Crippling lawyer fees? The writers didn't think about this.

This whole debate extends to naming conventions in general I suppose. In PoE you are of course a "Watcher" but you don't watch jack shit. You see and commune with the dead. "Seer" or "Speaker" would've been better titles. This conundrum makes you dwell on the thought process the inhabitants of the Sawyerverse must've had when coming up with the title "Watcher" but I can't imagine why Watcher was collectively determined to be the most apt descriptor, which ultimately makes the setting feel fake and written instead of organic. In conclusion: names be important. Don't be an American and just throw together words and put some thought into things.

 

[Hafnar the Jester]

Re: Compounds
This has been touched on but Warhammer Fantasy vs. Age of Sigmar is a good example on how to make good compounds vs. bad compounds.

Preach, my friend.
A Spacemarine or a Knight-Captain may be somewhat cheesy but, again, they describe what they are.
It's not even a case of calling a random 5'2 Indian janitor a "Flat surfaces conservator", it's more like being a CEO and creating a position of "Strategic Data Analyst" just for your son, whereupon he just watches YouTube all day long sipping soylatte.

 

[Lacrymas]

RE: Translations - I don't know how it's in other languages, but the German translations of the WH40k games don't translate the names of the units or space marine chapters. That's the case in an least Gladius, Dawn of War, and Sanctus Reach. Contrary to that, however, they do translate the names in WH fantasy titles.

 

[Camel]

God damn, decline hit even the language of RPGs. I quite enjoyed writing of BG2 with each character having own unique style of speech especially Jaheira and Keldorn medieval-style language.

Viconia: My mistress of the Gray Wastes is not deserving of her reputation. There are no hatreds too petty, Keldorn, as to compel forgiveness. And as I'm certain you're well aware, all pains are hidden.
The mandate of your loyal order is deception and ruse, so misery is just another disguise for your gang of holy thugs' agenda is my guess. Yes?
Keldorn: Shar is a perverse travesty, drow! Her cult is seething with evil and bitter yield. She's a coven for the morose and pathetic.
Add another slight to the Order and you'll not reckon her secrets in the world of the living. Do you understand me, witch? Not a word in my direction. EVER.
Viconia: Stay your hostility, paladin. I seek no conflict with you or your order. I've witnessed your sargh and streeaka firsthand. My humblest apologies, suliss.

Compare it to queen Galfrey talking about a date with a MC in Pathfinder. "The word "dating" entered the American language during the 1920s".

 

[Tigranes]

How is this new? These English compounds are baked into, say, the Forgotten Realms/D&D (Underdark, Waterdeep, hell, Ravenloft and Dragonlance). This was also a feature in Tolkien, though there's an additional twist where the names are compounds of, say, Old English / Old Norse (e.g. Gandalfr means staff-elf), as well as plain old compounds like Treebeard.

It's interesting, though, because I find English compounds irritating as well, and would almost prefer fampyrs or Drizzt than a game full of Promisebreakers and Oatmealcrunchers. But I've seen people here suggest that the latter 'feels' familiarly fantasy.

Are you autistic?

There's nothing wrong with the idea of a compound. Actually, it is a super neat idea.
There's nothing wrong with a "bookbinder" or a gandalfr, or Daggerford, or Daggerfall. Because these words either:
a) describe what they represent (a bookbinder is a dude who binds books for a living, which is a tangible process done 8 hours a day.)
b) are but an ornament with a sole purpose of sounding good (No one actually expects that in the city of Daggerford, there's a river ford filled with daggers. Get it?)

What we hate on here are these uberpompous madeup meaningless post-modernist wordsalads that sound important and clever and supercool but are utterly meaningless. All your "Airstompers", "Firesayers", "Sunsmellers", "Soulmongers" and "Moonlickers" are just much ado about nothing. They pretend to be what they are not. They're a false promise. They are linguistic corpses smeared with lipstick to appear animated. A fake drama.

?

We had a good discussion about this and other people brought up many good points that I acknowledged. You should probably try reading.

 

[mondblut]

The important part of this scientific endeavour is proving that the more storyfag the game is, the less it "would".

Soyness of storyfags proven again.

 

[KateMicucci]

God damn, decline hit even the language of RPGs. I quite enjoyed writing of BG2 with each character having own unique style of speech especially Jaheira and Keldorn medieval-style language.

Viconia: My mistress of the Gray Wastes is not deserving of her reputation. There are no hatreds too petty, Keldorn, as to compel forgiveness. And as I'm certain you're well aware, all pains are hidden.
The mandate of your loyal order is deception and ruse, so misery is just another disguise for your gang of holy thugs' agenda is my guess. Yes?
Keldorn: Shar is a perverse travesty, drow! Her cult is seething with evil and bitter yield. She's a coven for the morose and pathetic.
Add another slight to the Order and you'll not reckon her secrets in the world of the living. Do you understand me, witch? Not a word in my direction. EVER.
Viconia: Stay your hostility, paladin. I seek no conflict with you or your order. I've witnessed your sargh and streeaka firsthand. My humblest apologies, suliss.

This dialog is bad. If you told me you google translated the real dialog into german and back I'd almost believe you. Man, was BG2 really like this? No wonder POE turned out like it did if this is what the writers were imitating.

If we're going to talk 1920's, here's some dialog from a famous 1920's fantasy novel for comparison.

"You must straightway forth from Carcë," said Prezmyra, "and that o' the instant. My step-son Hacmon, which was sent to gather strength to awe thee if need were, rideth by now from the south with a great company. Thy horses are fresh, and ye may well outdistance the King's men if they ride after you. If thou wilt not yet raise up a river of blood betwixt us, begone."
"Why fare thee well, then, sister. And doubt it not, these rifts 'tween me and Witchland shall soon be patched up and forgot." So spake the Prince with a merry voice, yet grieved at heart.

 

[KateMicucci]

None of this can be said about TYRANNY which jumps out of the bush and rapes you with the MOST USED WORD fatebinder, followed closely by KYROS, ARCHON, CHORUS, DISFAVORED, BEASTWOMEN and many more. The writers don't even attempt to convey ideas elegantly.

Tyranny has a much tighter narrative focus than any of those other games. There are no sidequests that aren't directly tied into the main plot. You aren't reading Kyros's edict and then two minutes later dealing with a hostage crisis at a magic circus.

That's not a necessarily good or bad thing, but some recent RPGs could benefit from applying some Tyranny-like discipline to their themes.

 

[rusty_shackleford]

God damn, decline hit even the language of RPGs. I quite enjoyed writing of BG2 with each character having own unique style of speech especially Jaheira and Keldorn medieval-style language.

Viconia: My mistress of the Gray Wastes is not deserving of her reputation. There are no hatreds too petty, Keldorn, as to compel forgiveness. And as I'm certain you're well aware, all pains are hidden.
The mandate of your loyal order is deception and ruse, so misery is just another disguise for your gang of holy thugs' agenda is my guess. Yes?
Keldorn: Shar is a perverse travesty, drow! Her cult is seething with evil and bitter yield. She's a coven for the morose and pathetic.
Add another slight to the Order and you'll not reckon her secrets in the world of the living. Do you understand me, witch? Not a word in my direction. EVER.
Viconia: Stay your hostility, paladin. I seek no conflict with you or your order. I've witnessed your sargh and streeaka firsthand. My humblest apologies, suliss.

Compare it to queen Galfrey talking about a date with a MC in Pathfinder. "The word "dating" entered the American language during the 1920s".

Kinda ironic considering how easy it would be to use automation to check text for anachronisms now compared to when BG2 was written.

 

[Camel]

Kinda ironic considering how easy it would be to use automation to check text for anachronisms now compared to when BG2 was written.

Someone on Beamdog foums wrote about their writing in BG1/2 EE:

no affection for BG,
no respect for BG,
an arrogant disrespect of what the original writers created

You can replace it with no respect for fantasy and its roots in medieval folklore and you'll have an answer why legendary characters in modern RPGs speak like modern teenagers.