The Mass Effect 3/BioWare Thread

Regdar · May 2, 2012

Gayderp is not persuaded by criticism unless it's not criticism.

Whisky · May 2, 2012

Ah, it's been awhile since I saw a bitter, passive-aggressive Gaider reply.

J1M · May 3, 2012

I'm surprised nobody has posted that EA iOS Rock Band cancelled thing yet.

RPGMaster · May 3, 2012

Brofist if you last the 30 minutes. I only lasted about 10.

Regdar · May 3, 2012

I lasted up to seeing their stupid faces on the thumbnail.

Bahamut · May 3, 2012

Gaider... creepy, bald, narcistic fat fuck who writes homo romances and being pround about that

just.... :what:

frogmouth · May 3, 2012

Bioware writers seem to start showing problems when they're let off their leashes and put in charge of things.

Gaider should've been fired after saying that he liked Twilight.

CrustyBot · May 4, 2012

If you've watched the video, why not read the BSN thread, too?

:love:

for anyone who manages to get through both.

CrustyNotes summary:

Thank you! And holy crap, a cat!!! We must know its name!

Interesting fact: Fenris gave Felicia a lot of hard time. xD

The more I see and here from David Gaider the more like.

Qunari romance? This must happen!!!!

Nice interview
Too bad there was no questions story oriented .And I hope if somebody else than David Gaider write Dragon Age Books , they pick a good writer who knows the universe.
And yeah I'm also for a qunari romance !The Arishok was hot (in a "cold" way :D).I wanted to make him blush .

A few posts into this thread and it's already turned into a weird David NinjaGaider cult "like omg you guys! did you see DG's used socks in the corner at 5:47!? like i'd totally want to do his laundry for him and stuff!" "i'd totally steal his under wear tee hee"

So does "DG" just sleep with a loaded shotgun everytime he looks at these forums? i'm amazed someone here hasn't went all "misery" on him "you didn't write Ander's romance in DA2!? *slams a sledgehammer into David's knees"

Of course, that is just the beginning.

Much like BioWare's games, there is only one direction a BioWare thread can end up:

The problem with the everyone is bi model is it's not reflected anywhere else in the game. It's like your party exists in it's own bubble of unreality. Could be one of those things that made DA better than DA2 when it came it companions. DA2 felt too much like they had been created to pander to the player, rather than being inhanbitants of a real world.
...

When it gets to the point that it starts to effect the integrity of the world it's a bad idea. If you had a gay society (don't ask me how that would work) then having more gay characters would make sense. Just like if you had a game in Amazonian society you would expect most of the the characters to be women.

Political correctness is not a good enough reason to ignore those aspects of world building. Maybe with the game set in Orlais it will feel less forced..

Click to expand...

What exactly is a "gay society?"

The world we live in is made up of all sorts of people - across various spectrums of ethnicity, religion/creed, and sexual orientation/identity. It's simply a society of human beings.

Thedas seems to be akin to that, however, it is (most wonderfully) lacking much of the social stigma that we see present in our real world. The game is set up to allow for a player to role-play as (s)he sees fit - to follow a romance arc as (s)he so desires, if (s)he so desires.

It's about inclusion - allowing those options to be available for the player.

Then Gaider himself descends from the heavens and engages the puny mortals:

I get why some folks might not like the "subjective sexuality" of some of the characters, even if that subjective nature only becomes evident on multiple playthroughs (or if you spend a lot of time on the forums, first). For some, it's an issue of verisimilitude... because once they understand that this character might also romance different genders in alternate realities (other games) they have difficulty wrapping their minds around which neat little box they can put that character into.

The benefit, of course, is that it allows others to play their game the way they wish. Whether it's a good enough trade-off is up to the individual, but from our perspective the ability to provide more choices to our fans far outstrips the "oh but that's not realistic" argument.

What I don't get is how some people go right to "everyone is bisexual". Which they're not. Fenris might romance a male character or Merrill a female character in an alternate reality from the game you're currently playing, but that does not make them "bisexual". That seems to stem from a need to slap a label somewhere where it doesn't belong.

Whether or not we'll change our approach in the future depends mostly on time/resources. The "spread" of options that gets mentioned from time to time is probably the ideal in terms of options/verisimilitude, but it's also the most expensive in terms of resources... which is why it gets mentioned so often on forums, as resources are never an issue here.

That's pandering to a players whims, not creating a a world. I want my party to refelct the world they live in, or the region the game is set in and not have a bunch of Bi characters because it's inclusive.

Click to expand...

So you see it as not an issue because it's not an issue for you. That's understandable, but please recognize that it's a privilege to be in such a position. For many players, not having an equal amount of access to content is a slightly larger issue than verisimilitude... and it's an issue that is neither as subjective as verisimilitude is nor is it a "whim". We can, will and do consider their concerns to be worth addressing whenever we can.

Where's hoopy? :lol:

However, when someone tl;drs, bringing up the issue of reactivity and decent branching content:

But then you have characters like Alistair or Morrigan, whose sexuality does make up one facet of their characterization. And I think they were more interesting characters for having a more defined sexuality as opposed to simply having an amorphous sexuality that changed based on the player character. I actually like having more defined NPCs. And I don't really get why one's sexuality wouldn't come up, especially if you were romancing a given character, at least to some extent.

So I'd welcome more exclusivity in that sense, if it meant more reactivity to the more player defined player character and the more fixed character of the NPC reacting to my PC. So have somebody like a heterosexual Aveline or Samara turn down the player character due to their personal beliefs. Or have Morrigan turn down the PC if they've specialized as a Templar. Or have Leliana have a preference for people with blond hair and blue eyes and comment on that if thats how you made your PC. Or having Alistair react like an awkward virgin, complete with Morrigan and Oghren banter calling Alistair's sexuality in question because he's an awkward virgin. Or Alistair turning down an elf or dwarf as queen. Or Morrigan only letting a romanced Warden go with her into the Eluvian. Thats "exclusive" content that I enjoy since its the game reacting to my player character or a defined NPC bumping up against my PC. That sort of thing makes the world feel more real and not like its only revolving around every whim of the PC and makes me want to play the game again since I can't see or experience everything in one playthough.

Thats part of my whole issue with DA2, was that maybe by making the romances more inclusive thats a nice idea, but they felt pretty generic and one size fits all. That mentality seems to stretch to other areas of the game too, like the end game bosses being one size fits all no matter your choices too.

Thats something that I like about The Witcher 2. You've got the giant game changing branching paths, but if you're paying attention, the other characters you might not meet in a given branch still exist and are still players in the world without the input of the player character, because they're defined NPCs with their own motivations. So when you go back and play the other path, you're filled in on who those characters are and you come to realize some pretty amazing things that fill in the story that you didn't realize before... I won't say more for the sake of spoilers. Same thing with something like Alpha Protocol, the game doesn't necessarily revolve around the PC but you have meaningful reactivity and consequences.

Meaningful C&C you say?

While the topic of sexuality is interesting and all, it's not really relevant. So let's please drop it rather than turn the entire thread into a "why are romances all bisexual?" thread-- which I'm pretty sure exists elsewhere. Thanks.

And so the thread eases back into it's intended role:

... so, how about we go back to talking about David Gaider's cats?

Any chance of another zombie kitten army for DA3? I missed them in DA2.

Click to expand...

I wonder what his cats names are?

I was also kind of excited at the comment about the potential for a kossith/qunari romance in the interview.

Its posts like this that make me not even want to bother coming online. I feel that for all the assurances that its not personal prejudice to not want bisexual characters ...that its somehow "cheapens " the character to make them bisexual..it feels an awful lot like homophobia to me. This makes me sad.

Makes me sad, too.

RPGMaster · May 4, 2012

Guess which word Gaider uses whenever he wants to make people think he's smart.

LundB · May 4, 2012

CrustyBro, I applaud you for venturing into the depths of BSN to bring us this. It may even equal the horrors sgc_meltdown must face to bring us the most intriguing fan art.

CrustyBot said:
Then Gaider himself descends from the heavens and engages the puny mortals:

...verisimilitude...verisimilitude...verisimilitude...verisimilitude

Click to expand...

...I guess someone just discovered the word verisimilitude, and wants to share it with the world.

Seriously, even as a fucking high schooler, I would have been criticized by teachers for repeating the same goddamn word so much in such a short space, without a legitimate reason. I know it's to be expected at this point, but it's still absolutely shocking that anyone who writes so badly is allowed to do it professionally.

Aeschylus · May 4, 2012

LundB said:
...I guess someone just discovered the word verisimilitude, and wants to share it with the world.

Seriously, even as a fucking high schooler, I would have been criticized by teachers for repeating the same goddamn word so much in such a short space, without a legitimate reason. I know it's to be expected at this point, but it's still absolutely shocking that anyone who writes so badly is allowed to do it professionally.

But simply saying "Realism" doesn't make me sound smarter than you! And besides, I can't just let this thesaurus collect dust! :roll:

Helly · May 4, 2012

Gaider & Felicia, full derp combo

sgc_meltdown · May 4, 2012

Aeschylus said:

Tycho from penny arcade and Gaider should collaborate on some linguistically turgid gay ero fanfics

John Walker and Kieron Gillen to review the result

Angthoron · May 4, 2012

sgc_meltdown said:
Aeschylus said:

Click to expand...

Tycho from penny arcade and Gaider should collaborate on some linguistically turgid gay ero fanfics

John Walker and Kieron Gillen to review the result

The verisimilitude of his vestments was forsooth disposed of with nary a shrug. Gaiderus observed Tychus' well-toned, glistening corpus longingly, lovingly caressing his extremities. "Forsooth", he uttered with a wistful sigh, "My loins ache to meet with thine, to intertwine, to soothe and to gyrate, 'til in thy noble sphincter doth my rod then rest"

Whisky · May 4, 2012

Interesting fact: Fenris gave Felicia a lot of hard time. xD

Ewwww.

Where's hoopy?

Running Fox's rape thread scared him off the Codex. Hasn't been here since.

toro · May 5, 2012

On BSN there is a clear dissonance between the posts content and the avatars picture: the majority of bland avatars have the same emotionless expression.
Biodrones could be the most fitting description for these poor souls. What the heck, Codex is a happy place compared to this shit and ... is creepy as fuck.

frogmouth · May 5, 2012

toro said:
On BSN there is a clear dissonance between the posts content and the avatars picture: the majority of bland avatars have the same emotionless expression.
Biodrones could be the most fitting description for these poor souls. What the heck, Codex is a happy place compared to this shit and ... is creepy as fuck.

I know. I can't believe I actually used to like Bioware. If it wasn't for the Codex for showing me what real rpgs are... :love:

CrustyBot · May 5, 2012

LundB said:
CrustyBro, I applaud you for venturing into the depths of BSN to bring us this. It may even equal the horrors sgc_meltdown must face to bring us the most intriguing fan art.

...I guess someone just discovered the word verisimilitude, and wants to share it with the world.

Seriously, even as a fucking high schooler, I would have been criticized by teachers for repeating the same goddamn word so much in such a short space, without a legitimate reason. I know it's to be expected at this point, but it's still absolutely shocking that anyone who writes so badly is allowed to do it professionally.

I don't actually blame Gaider for using that word (though he does repeat it a bit). You get blasted by the drones if you try and use realism as a means of being critical of any aspect of the DA games.

The moment you go "realism", there's always drones who flood the thread with "well, realism doesn't apply. It's a fantasy setting with Dragons and everything. That's not realistic to me" or some other disingenuous line. BSN is big on semantics, it's one way it's able to de-legitimize and dismiss negative opinion.

You have to use a term like verisimilitude just so you don't get that bullshit.

Angthoron said:
The verisimilitude of his vestments was forsooth disposed of with nary a shrug. Gaiderus observed Tychus' well-toned, glistening corpus longingly, lovingly caressing his extremities. "Forsooth", he uttered with a wistful sigh, "My loins ache to meet with thine, to intertwine, to soothe and to gyrate, 'til in thy noble sphincter doth my rod then rest"

And rest it did.

:salute: