inherit
1033
0
Member is Online
31,063
colfoley
16,485
Aug 17, 2016 10:19:37 GMT
August 2016
colfoley
|
Post by colfoley on Apr 4, 2019 18:35:34 GMT
A few points: 1. There's no such thing as objectively good art. Therefore, any form of art criticism, no matter how high or how lowly, is "just" an opinion. Yes, that includes everything I've said in this thread. 2. In this marketing age, I'm doubtful of any definitive statements that try to correlate sales with people's wants and preferences. 3. No, pretty sure I'm talking about fantasy. Just like Frankenstein is often cited as the first sci fi novel even though the genre wouldn't be called by that name until the twentieth century, you get authors like William Morris, George McDonald, Rudyard Kipling, Lewis Carroll, E. Nesbit, and many, many fairy tale writers in the nineteenth century, before "fantasy" became the official name for the genre they were writing in. 4. You seem to be implying that I favor "whimsical and lighthearted fantasy," which I never said. I also don't consider grimdark to be realistic. In fact, as far as I know, the term was coined by Warhammer 40k's tagline in the 80s. Warhammer 40k is melodramatic and over the top by design, and said tagline ("In the grim darkness of the future, there is only war.") is a dead giveaway that its creator were taking themselves either too seriously or not seriously at all. Bet's on the latter. 5. I'm not sure what you mean by your comparison of Dragon Age to those other works. 6. So far I have merely stated what I consider good and bad fantasy. If you recall point number one, this is all "just" my opinion. At no point have I attacked people for what they enjoy; my criticism has been squarely directed at authors and their work. 7. This is fun! Please let's not get personal. 1: I see. It sounds like when you speak of good and bad art and talk about the alleged degeneration of a widely beloved genre you're expressing your own taste as a matter of course, while when others use them or point out the opposite then they're imposing objectivity on the indefinite and trying to impose their taste on you. I'm not nearly as prepared to accuse you of hypocrisy as I am Panda, but some wires have crossed in one or both ends of this discussion. It's possible I've read you as more categorical than you intended and vice versa. 2: In this age of people having unsurpassed spare time and purchasing power for indulging their interests, and commercially available entertainment being the primary way everyone does so, I don't see that you have much of a choice if you want perspective with any root in reality at all. 3: By that definition "fantasy" has probably been around for hundreds of thousands of years, and the nineteenth-century writers you refer to are nowhere near classical or original examples of it, making the significance of the preservation of their styles in particular over modern ones as a matter of principle rather arbitrary. It's fine if you like them better than Game of Thrones, but that doesn't make the rest of us modern deviants mindlessly pissing on their legacies, which is pretty much what you've seemed to be saying. 4: In that case I'd advise you to retire the "grimdark" expression entirely, because using it to describe every kind of fantasy or sci-fi that has noticeably dark themes gives exactly that impression. Throwing A Song of Ice and Fire and Warhammer 40K in even remotely the same box, for example, really does imply that you don't distinguish between shades of gritty storytelling at all, at least when that's specifically what we're discussing. I've read a few of the 40K novels, though never played either video or tabletop games, and you're exactly right that it doesn't take itself too seriously. The ones that make the best use of the setting in my estimation read more like action-adventure comedies than anything. 5: The various epic and much-loved mainstream fantasy series that you and Panda apparently have a hard time with for being too dark and mundane are funnily enough the ones that follow the fairy tale and mystery and mythological themes you say you miss in Dragon Age most diligently. And I entirely agree. Dragon Age, like a lot of the modern incarnation of Dungeons and Dragons that inspired it, is an amalgamation of cherry-picked fantasy elements shoved into fairly lighthearted and optimistic postmodern narratives. Which can be fun and cool and interesting for a while, but lacks either the emotional weight of history or transcendent power of mythology. And turning up for the wonky magic and zany plotline dials isn't going to fix that. 6: Likewise, if that's the case. 7: This is okay interesting, is as far as I'm willing to go this late in the evening. *head cocks at number 5* Elaborate?
|
|
Noxluxe
N4
Games: Mass Effect Trilogy, Dragon Age: Origins, Dragon Age 2, Dragon Age Inquisition, KOTOR, Baldur's Gate, Neverwinter Nights, Jade Empire, Mass Effect Andromeda, SWTOR
Posts: 1,979 Likes: 3,490
inherit
10359
0
Mar 14, 2019 16:10:11 GMT
3,490
Noxluxe
1,979
Jul 21, 2018 23:55:09 GMT
July 2018
noxluxe
Mass Effect Trilogy, Dragon Age: Origins, Dragon Age 2, Dragon Age Inquisition, KOTOR, Baldur's Gate, Neverwinter Nights, Jade Empire, Mass Effect Andromeda, SWTOR
|
Post by Noxluxe on Apr 4, 2019 18:46:28 GMT
*head cocks at number 5* Elaborate? I wouldn't mind. Can you specify which part? Going deeper into all of it would turn into an essay, and that just isn't going to happen.
|
|
inherit
1033
0
Member is Online
31,063
colfoley
16,485
Aug 17, 2016 10:19:37 GMT
August 2016
colfoley
|
Post by colfoley on Apr 4, 2019 19:00:09 GMT
*head cocks at number 5* Elaborate? I wouldn't mind. Can you specify which part? Going deeper into all of it would turn into an essay, and that just isn't going to happen. second paragraph of five... Not having a weight of history in DA...Etc. I disagree with that statement but i also feel like I'm missing something.
|
|
inherit
104
0
Mar 27, 2024 14:16:40 GMT
6,849
The Elder King
5,733
August 2016
theelderking
Mass Effect Trilogy, Dragon Age: Origins, Dragon Age 2, Dragon Age Inquistion, KOTOR, Baldur's Gate, Jade Empire
19631
|
Post by The Elder King on Apr 4, 2019 19:04:15 GMT
I wouldn’t define honestly the DA universe as having a particularly positive narrative. Unless the reference to ‘postmodern’ positive narrative is about women often in equal role/position of power, or the (general) acceptance of same sex relationships.
|
|
inherit
3439
0
9,073
alanc9
Old Scientist Contrarian
7,791
February 2017
alanc9
|
Post by alanc9 on Apr 4, 2019 19:32:36 GMT
I have no idea what "postmodern" was supposed to mean there, either. I can see a case for DA2, but that's hardly optimistic.
|
|
Noxluxe
N4
Games: Mass Effect Trilogy, Dragon Age: Origins, Dragon Age 2, Dragon Age Inquisition, KOTOR, Baldur's Gate, Neverwinter Nights, Jade Empire, Mass Effect Andromeda, SWTOR
Posts: 1,979 Likes: 3,490
inherit
10359
0
Mar 14, 2019 16:10:11 GMT
3,490
Noxluxe
1,979
Jul 21, 2018 23:55:09 GMT
July 2018
noxluxe
Mass Effect Trilogy, Dragon Age: Origins, Dragon Age 2, Dragon Age Inquisition, KOTOR, Baldur's Gate, Neverwinter Nights, Jade Empire, Mass Effect Andromeda, SWTOR
|
Post by Noxluxe on Apr 4, 2019 20:11:42 GMT
I wouldn't mind. Can you specify which part? Going deeper into all of it would turn into an essay, and that just isn't going to happen. second paragraph of five... Not having a weight of history in DA...Etc. I disagree with that statement but i also feel like I'm missing something. Okay, my point with that was that as DA has moved further away from a realistic depiction of how people used to live and how power and influence have historically been distributed between various classes, the conflicts in the setting have started to ring hollow. By this I mostly mean DAI, and mostly the game's presentation of human society in it. I have a dozen examples and comparisons between the games swimming around, but I really am too tired to frame them right now. The simplest image I have in my head is Empress Celene standing in the middle of a forest outside three dank-looking tents. Without anything resembling an entourage or personal guard. In the same dress she wore to her own ball days or weeks earlier. Less than two hundred meters away from an active battlefield. Essentially just there, rather than back home in her capital, to give moral support. All to give the player that stupid "great job! you've united the world!" feeling going past the point of no return of the main story. That image alone completely robs her character, and the Orlesian nobility by extension, of any feeling of authenticity or them deserving to be taken seriously, because the game clearly doesn't and can't be bothered trying to immerse you. It's just going through the motions, crossing off the lists and pretending that what they present us with means something without them having to think about it or put in effort. Total and utter lack of regard for the player's suspension of disbelief. I wouldn’t define honestly the DA universe as having a particularly positive narrative. Unless the reference to ‘postmodern’ positive narrative is about women often in equal role/position of power, or the (general) acceptance of same sex relationships. I have no idea what "postmodern" was supposed to mean there, either. I can see a case for DA2, but that's hardly optimistic. You guys are kidding, right? The ideas that you can decide who you are and where you belong, that you have to go with your gut and your understanding of right and wrong because institutions and history and accepted norms all can't be trusted, that no hard truth is to be found and everything is up for interpretation, and that the structures of the world are all corrupt and falling apart and must be reformed by moralists all feature pretty heavily throughout the series and come up in mostly affirming "it's all up to you, and you deserve to make the decision because of how special you are" ways during gameplay. I hope I'm not just imagining that, because then there actually is something I've misunderstood about the word. In which case I apologize for confusing everyone. In any case, I really am too tired to drag this out any longer. Good night, guys.
|
|
inherit
3439
0
9,073
alanc9
Old Scientist Contrarian
7,791
February 2017
alanc9
|
Post by alanc9 on Apr 4, 2019 20:22:33 GMT
That's hyperbole, right? Or is your immersion that fragile?
My own immersion's hurt worse by other things Bio does. None of the ME ships ever have enough bunks; the SR-1 didn't even have heads. None of ME1's UNC missions make any sense while Saren's trying to destroy civilization. The time sequence of missions never makes any sense. And so forth. If you go looking for flaws, you will find them.
I also think your cause-and-effect there is just wrong. Celene et al. are there to provide some indication that choices have consequences, and do it on the cheap. RPG players always complain when they can't see the effects of their choices play out in-game, and that's the last opportunity to see any result from the WEWH outcome in-game.
But what on earth does this have to do with "optimistic postmodern narratives"? (I'm still thinking that's an oxymoron.)
|
|
inherit
104
0
Mar 27, 2024 14:16:40 GMT
6,849
The Elder King
5,733
August 2016
theelderking
Mass Effect Trilogy, Dragon Age: Origins, Dragon Age 2, Dragon Age Inquistion, KOTOR, Baldur's Gate, Jade Empire
19631
|
Post by The Elder King on Apr 4, 2019 20:42:42 GMT
That's hyperbole, right? Or is your immersion that fragile? My own immersion's hurt worse by other things Bio does. None of the ME ships ever have enough bunks; the SR-1 didn't even have heads. None of ME1's UNC missions make any sense while Saren's trying to destroy civilization. The time sequence of missions never makes any sense. And so forth. If you go looking for flaws, you will find them. I also think your cause-and-effect there is just wrong. Celene et al. are there to provide some indication that choices have consequences, and do it on the cheap. RPG players always complain when they can't see the effects of their choices play out in-game, and that's the last opportunity to see any result from the WEWH outcome in-game. But what on earth does this have to do with "optimistic postmodern narratives"? (I'm still thinking that's an oxymoron.) I agree with your points. If you want to find things in Bioware takes that suspend disbelief, there’s plenty of go around. Another egregious cases, for example, were DAO’s execution scenes, thar can very well be triggered in fights such as Zevran’s ambush, Howe’s right, and Loghain’s duel, all of which have post battle dialogues. But there’s many more. Let’s not forget that in DAO already we had Anora on the battlefield as well, and she wasn’t really a warrior. I do think that Celene’s scene on the battlefield could’ve been handled better or differently, but it’s not honestly the worst suspension of disbelief breaking moment in Bioware games, for me at least.
|
|
inherit
3439
0
9,073
alanc9
Old Scientist Contrarian
7,791
February 2017
alanc9
|
Post by alanc9 on Apr 4, 2019 20:47:29 GMT
I don't want to come across as defending that scene, by any means. And in fairness, Bio often does prioritize emotional impact over sense. I don't think the Arbor Wilds intro is an example of that, but that's because if the intent is just to add a reward for the player, there are ways to do that which don't involve restaging a scene multiple times with different VAs.
|
|
Noxluxe
N4
Games: Mass Effect Trilogy, Dragon Age: Origins, Dragon Age 2, Dragon Age Inquisition, KOTOR, Baldur's Gate, Neverwinter Nights, Jade Empire, Mass Effect Andromeda, SWTOR
Posts: 1,979 Likes: 3,490
inherit
10359
0
Mar 14, 2019 16:10:11 GMT
3,490
Noxluxe
1,979
Jul 21, 2018 23:55:09 GMT
July 2018
noxluxe
Mass Effect Trilogy, Dragon Age: Origins, Dragon Age 2, Dragon Age Inquisition, KOTOR, Baldur's Gate, Neverwinter Nights, Jade Empire, Mass Effect Andromeda, SWTOR
|
Post by Noxluxe on Apr 4, 2019 20:55:03 GMT
1) That's hyperbole, right? Or is your immersion that fragile? My own immersion's hurt worse by other things Bio does. None of the ME ships ever have enough bunks; the SR-1 didn't even have heads. None of ME1's UNC missions make any sense while Saren's trying to destroy civilization. The time sequence of missions never makes any sense. And so forth. If you go looking for flaws, you will find them. I also think your cause-and-effect there is just wrong. Celene et al. are there to provide some indication that choices have consequences, and do it on the cheap. RPG players always complain when they can't see the effects of their choices play out in-game, and that's the last opportunity to see any result from the WEWH outcome in-game. 2) But what on earth does this have to do with "optimistic postmodern narratives"? (I'm still thinking that's an oxymoron.) 1) Nope. I can headcanon a lot of shit away, but an Empress visiting a battlefield with no protection whatsoever just to say hello? At least Anora wore proper armor, performed an actual leadership role and kept herself well far away from Denerim itself during a battle. I don't see that a few bunks being tucked out of sight or sci-fi ships being weird sci-fi ships being weird or RPG side quest timing being silly comes anywhere close to the narrative laziness on display in Inquisition, though I do agree that all of those are laziness. 2) Elaborated above. Postmodern and optimistic narrative should be a self-contradiction, but for whatever reason it tends not to be treated as such these days. I'm seriously, seriously too tired to have this discussion. Good night.
|
|
Kabraxal
N4
Games: Mass Effect Trilogy, Dragon Age: Origins, Dragon Age 2, Dragon Age Inquistion, KOTOR, Baldur's Gate, Neverwinter Nights, Jade Empire, Mass Effect Andromeda
Posts: 1,004 Likes: 2,731
inherit
3790
0
2,731
Kabraxal
1,004
Feb 23, 2017 18:40:36 GMT
February 2017
kabraxal
Mass Effect Trilogy, Dragon Age: Origins, Dragon Age 2, Dragon Age Inquistion, KOTOR, Baldur's Gate, Neverwinter Nights, Jade Empire, Mass Effect Andromeda
|
Post by Kabraxal on Apr 4, 2019 22:27:57 GMT
Why do people want a fantasy world with magic and dragobs to react and grow like vageuly similar ages in our world? Hell, why assume any worlf is going to develop and react as ours did? That’s just a bad argument to make from the start.
|
|
inherit
1033
0
Member is Online
31,063
colfoley
16,485
Aug 17, 2016 10:19:37 GMT
August 2016
colfoley
|
Post by colfoley on Apr 4, 2019 23:10:10 GMT
second paragraph of five... Not having a weight of history in DA...Etc. I disagree with that statement but i also feel like I'm missing something. Okay, my point with that was that as DA has moved further away from a realistic depiction of how people used to live and how power and influence have historically been distributed between various classes, the conflicts in the setting have started to ring hollow. By this I mostly mean DAI, and mostly the game's presentation of human society in it. I have a dozen examples and comparisons between the games swimming around, but I really am too tired to frame them right now. The simplest image I have in my head is Empress Celene standing in the middle of a forest outside three dank-looking tents. Without anything resembling an entourage or personal guard. In the same dress she wore to her own ball days or weeks earlier. Less than two hundred meters away from an active battlefield. Essentially just there, rather than back home in her capital, to give moral support. All to give the player that stupid "great job! you've united the world!" feeling going past the point of no return of the main story. That image alone completely robs her character, and the Orlesian nobility by extension, of any feeling of authenticity or them deserving to be taken seriously, because the game clearly doesn't and can't be bothered trying to immerse you. It's just going through the motions, crossing off the lists and pretending that what they present us with means something without them having to think about it or put in effort. Total and utter lack of regard for the player's suspension of disbelief. I wouldn’t define honestly the DA universe as having a particularly positive narrative. Unless the reference to ‘postmodern’ positive narrative is about women often in equal role/position of power, or the (general) acceptance of same sex relationships. I have no idea what "postmodern" was supposed to mean there, either. I can see a case for DA2, but that's hardly optimistic. You guys are kidding, right? The ideas that you can decide who you are and where you belong, that you have to go with your gut and your understanding of right and wrong because institutions and history and accepted norms all can't be trusted, that no hard truth is to be found and everything is up for interpretation, and that the structures of the world are all corrupt and falling apart and must be reformed by moralists all feature pretty heavily throughout the series and come up in mostly affirming "it's all up to you, and you deserve to make the decision because of how special you are" ways during gameplay. I hope I'm not just imagining that, because then there actually is something I've misunderstood about the word. In which case I apologize for confusing everyone. In any case, I really am too tired to drag this out any longer. Good night, guys. Ah. That clarification is really helpful. To your specific point about Celene, while i acknoedge you know history... I think you're wrong. I can think of many examples throughout human history of nobility or "people who shouldn't be there" being on battlefields. Hell i can even name one historical ruling monarch who assumed an identity just so he could lead troops into battle. Dragon Age itself has always played fast and loose with this concept given all three of the main human protagonists are nobility. As well as several of your companions and enemies. DAI was especially egregious because the Inquisitor was a noble and was especially important... And yet led troops into battle. I give them a pass because they used it to good effect. Just like Celene. As to your larger point I don't give it that a fictional setting has to copy ours for realism. Yes I've given thedas a lot of credit for mirroring certain aspects of real world history and yes there is a market for such things but Thedas is very much it's own entity with it's own problems. I prefer it that settings should, rather then trying to imitate ours, try to maintain internal consistency. Take an idea; a technology, a resource, some phenmnon, and run with it. IE: 'Whaat if humanity encounters an element which enables us to lower the mass of our ships, change the laws of physics, and start exploring the stars?' 'What if the world is beset by a magical plague which hits it every couple of centuries?' Yes, fictional settings should take their own inspiration from our world but it is often the differences that make our world and fictional worlds so interesting. And finally the spiel on post modernism...I think you really miss the boat here. I mean first of all most of the problems you are ascribing to Dragon Age seems to be fairly typical of the medium...if not of the specific genre. Most games I have played are power fantasies with only a few examples that don't go out of the way to treat the protagonist with a certain speciality within the world. But with specifics to Dragon Age, again, I think you underestimate just how dark Dragon Age continues to be even in Inquisition. It still is a dark world where horrible things happen and our best intentions often lead us astray. Yes, in Inquisition you can defeat Corypheus and win the game fairly easily...but as far as it goes my Inquisitor left a lot of bodies in her wake. People she didn't mean to kill and people she didn't want to kill and even people she regrets killing. So much so that it really effects her arc. And if you don't take certain steps or make certain choices in the game the world could be a whole lot emptier. (See what happens with the Wardens, the Elves, Celene and her court etc.) The game often presented us with difficult morally ambigious choices and asked us to make them based on limited information, which could easily get people killed.
|
|
inherit
∯ Alien Wizard
729
0
Sept 14, 2023 6:08:41 GMT
9,897
Ieldra
4,771
August 2016
ieldra
Mass Effect Trilogy, Dragon Age: Origins, Dragon Age 2, Dragon Age Inquisition, KOTOR, Baldur's Gate, Mass Effect Andromeda
25190
6519
|
Post by Ieldra on Apr 5, 2019 10:06:58 GMT
And what is the "fantastic" for you? I would agree that fantastic elements are sparse in a work like A Song of Ice and Fire, but much more present in DA, in spite of its very conventional setting. And mentioning Sanderson, his Cosmere novels have very fantastic underpinnings down to their roots. Or does the fantastic, in your opinion, necessarily include an attitude of passivity in the face of mystery, rather than active engagement with the goal of understanding? Edit: I couldn't find a free copy of LeGuin's article and I'm not willing to pay for it. Do you have a full-text link? You know, after panning Tolkien, I feel like saying something nice about him. I do like his work on the whole; it's his imitators I don't care for. So as to your "what is the fantastic" question, I happen to agree with at least one of Tolkien's stated purposes for fairy stories e.g. recovery, the ability to present a jaded audience with the world in a whole new light. It is a Romantic impulse, and goes to explain why fantasy tends to look towards the past, towards a time when there was a troll under every bridge and lightning was the work of Zeus atop Mt. Olympus. Which is why fantasy takes place mostly in secondary worlds these days. We know too much about the real world to be taken in by stories featuring trolls under bridges, and so mysteries of worlds analogous to the real world have come to be the purview of SF. As for Tolkien, the Romantic impulse you mentioned is very noticeable in his works. Being more of an Enlightenment person, I am not immune to its effects but the thought that the future is more important than the past is always present alongside. There is always something lost when the world changes in a way that reduces its mysteries and empowers human agency, and that doesn't leave me untouched. Yet, I would, as a rule, not want to stop the change that makes it so. Consequently, I'm much more critical of fantasy where it appears to glorify the past. I don't disagree with all that in principle. Yet, I maintain that those stories don't really serve an exploratory impulse in this day and time. At least, not in the way that they did in their time. Because we know too much about the real world now, those stories are now mainly allegorical and explore, if anything, landscapes of the mind. Compare, for instance, The Expanse (the books). That story features an encounter with fantastic elements that go beyond what we think life can be, and change humans by interaction, calling into question what we perceive ourselves to be. It is my impression that calls for fantasy to be more grounded have their roots in the recognition of this difference. The question is what can be meaningfully explored by a fantasy story like Mieville's Bas-Lag series (of which I have read only the first part)? I liked that story because I like to decipher worlds and follow the actions of fictional characters who do that, but that motivation is, or so is my impression, somewhat rare. I agree with that in principle, too, but IMO the threshold of "too much" is subjective. Of course does incomplete information drive engagement, but where do you want to end up in the end? Simply defeating the monster will never be enough for me, I want to understand where it came from and why it did what it did, and there was never a statement more anthithetical to my viewpoint than Shepard's statement in one of the ME games that "it's not important to understand the Reapers, only to defeat them" (paraphrased). Which is, btw. an excellent example for this discussion. There were people who wanted the Reapers to remain a mystery, and I truly understand why they wanted that. They thought any explanation - one we could understand, anyway - would cheapen them. Meanwhile, I think the explanation they came up with, badly executed and full of otherwise extremely annoying tropes as it was, was alien enough to be counted a success. It was a motivation that gave the impression that a human mind could never have come up with it (although, by the fact Casey Hudson and Mac Walters did, this wasn't the case), yet could be understood. If a story has definitive truths, it's likely one I'd find much too paternalizing for my taste. Tolkien's statement about allegory and applicability comes to mind (one with which I most definitely agree). Furthermore, my definition of "truth" does not appear to encompass yours. Stories evoke feelings and thought, but most of the time what exactly you get from them should depend much more on you as the recipient than on the story itself. Where the author attempts to get around that and present a "definitive truth", things get problematic. Which is why I actually appreciate stories that attempt to recreate the messiness of history. They are purposely crafted so they can't ever be as meaningless, but it usually means they're complex enough to not throw allegorical anvils at me (I really hate that).
(And now I wish I had written this yesterday. I forgot some of what I wanted to say. Can't even say how much since, well, I forgot, only that I did. Annoying).
|
|
Noxluxe
N4
Games: Mass Effect Trilogy, Dragon Age: Origins, Dragon Age 2, Dragon Age Inquisition, KOTOR, Baldur's Gate, Neverwinter Nights, Jade Empire, Mass Effect Andromeda, SWTOR
Posts: 1,979 Likes: 3,490
inherit
10359
0
Mar 14, 2019 16:10:11 GMT
3,490
Noxluxe
1,979
Jul 21, 2018 23:55:09 GMT
July 2018
noxluxe
Mass Effect Trilogy, Dragon Age: Origins, Dragon Age 2, Dragon Age Inquisition, KOTOR, Baldur's Gate, Neverwinter Nights, Jade Empire, Mass Effect Andromeda, SWTOR
|
Post by Noxluxe on Apr 5, 2019 10:32:30 GMT
Ah. That clarification is really helpful. To your specific point about Celene, while i acknoedge you know history... I think you're wrong. I can think of many examples throughout human history of nobility or "people who shouldn't be there" being on battlefields. Hell i can even name one historical ruling monarch who assumed an identity just so he could lead troops into battle. Dragon Age itself has always played fast and loose with this concept given all three of the main human protagonists are nobility. As well as several of your companions and enemies. DAI was especially egregious because the Inquisitor was a noble and was especially important... And yet led troops into battle. I give them a pass because they used it to good effect. Just like Celene. As to your larger point I don't give it that a fictional setting has to copy ours for realism. Yes I've given thedas a lot of credit for mirroring certain aspects of real world history and yes there is a market for such things but Thedas is very much it's own entity with it's own problems. I prefer it that settings should, rather then trying to imitate ours, try to maintain internal consistency. Take an idea; a technology, a resource, some phenmnon, and run with it. IE: 'Whaat if humanity encounters an element which enables us to lower the mass of our ships, change the laws of physics, and start exploring the stars?' 'What if the world is beset by a magical plague which hits it every couple of centuries?' Yes, fictional settings should take their own inspiration from our world but it is often the differences that make our world and fictional worlds so interesting. And finally the spiel on post modernism...I think you really miss the boat here. I mean first of all most of the problems you are ascribing to Dragon Age seems to be fairly typical of the medium...if not of the specific genre. Most games I have played are power fantasies with only a few examples that don't go out of the way to treat the protagonist with a certain speciality within the world. But with specifics to Dragon Age, again, I think you underestimate just how dark Dragon Age continues to be even in Inquisition. It still is a dark world where horrible things happen and our best intentions often lead us astray. Yes, in Inquisition you can defeat Corypheus and win the game fairly easily...but as far as it goes my Inquisitor left a lot of bodies in her wake. People she didn't mean to kill and people she didn't want to kill and even people she regrets killing. So much so that it really effects her arc. And if you don't take certain steps or make certain choices in the game the world could be a whole lot emptier. (See what happens with the Wardens, the Elves, Celene and her court etc.) The game often presented us with difficult morally ambigious choices and asked us to make them based on limited information, which could easily get people killed. Except we're not just talking about a military leader or hands-on royalty, we're talking about the de facto most powerful and influential woman in the world with no combat or survival training that we know of standing in the middle of the wilds, right next to a battlefield, in a dressing gown, completely unguarded and apparently just banking that nobody is going to notice her and she won't get in the way. Entirely by her own choice, and for no practical reason whatsoever, except to boost the player's ego. Any wandering enemy could spot her, walk up to her and murder her, and that would be the end of the stability in Orlais. And she would deserve it. Such a situation has never occured so far as I know, because nobody has ever been that stupid and careless. It's not only historically and realistically ludicrous, it's also completely out of character for her and her culture to allow this to happen. But it's treated as her arbitrarily making the decision because... she wants to be seen as a dynamic leader who didn't just sit the battle out? In that case she could have been decked out in dress armor and surrounded by the most loyal and skilled Chevaliers in the Empire and looked like a badass without actually putting herself in danger, like Anora tried to do. And she could have been doing it to win over the faction of Chevaliers who followed Gaspard in a bid to consolidate her power, like Anora tried. But no, she just stands there alone looking like a peacock copy-pasted in from an earlier quest, complimenting the player. I almost had her killed in this playthrough just to avoid seeing her there being so stupid and pointless and disrespectful of basically everything else in the setting, nakedly trying to manipulate me into feeling more excited than I am. Barf. I never said those themes weren't typical to the medium these days, or that Dragon Age doesn't have dark themes. I do still enjoy the series, you know. Just pointing out some tendencies I'm not enjoying about it at the moment, and where it diverges from classical fantasy in my view.
|
|
inherit
∯ Alien Wizard
729
0
Sept 14, 2023 6:08:41 GMT
9,897
Ieldra
4,771
August 2016
ieldra
Mass Effect Trilogy, Dragon Age: Origins, Dragon Age 2, Dragon Age Inquisition, KOTOR, Baldur's Gate, Mass Effect Andromeda
25190
6519
|
Post by Ieldra on Apr 5, 2019 11:04:12 GMT
second paragraph of five... Not having a weight of history in DA...Etc. I disagree with that statement but i also feel like I'm missing something. Okay, my point with that was that as DA has moved further away from a realistic depiction of how people used to live and how power and influence have historically been distributed between various classes, the conflicts in the setting have started to ring hollow. By this I mostly mean DAI, and mostly the game's presentation of human society in it. I have a dozen examples and comparisons between the games swimming around, but I really am too tired to frame them right now. The simplest image I have in my head is Empress Celene standing in the middle of a forest outside three dank-looking tents. Without anything resembling an entourage or personal guard. In the same dress she wore to her own ball days or weeks earlier. Less than two hundred meters away from an active battlefield. Essentially just there, rather than back home in her capital, to give moral support. Rulers on battlefields haven't actually been *that* rare in history. And the specific circumstances are, so I suspect, more due to resource constraints than historical ignorance, though of course I'm convinced there's a lot of that going around as well. Also, I really don't see how Celene standing around there is stroking the player's ego. Which brings me to the larger point: I do not think that a fantasy society has to model RL history. My immersion is only broken if people aren't convincingly human or the picture has contradictions. My concern is rather different: that people get a false impression of history if they *think* a story models it more or less correctly when it doesn't. I don't think people these days can really appreciate the evils of a thoroughly stratified society, and fake-historical depictions often overstress the less meaningful evils but ignore the more meaningful ones. It's the same with ME and biology. It's hard to find words that would give justice to my level of annoyance about the MET's blatant disregard of biology (*known* biology, not hypothetical) but in itself it wouldn't be an issue unless it was presented in a way to make people think it wasn't fake. Which it was. Which made me write several now-forgotten rants. I think this is an accidental impression. Here you have a story where your decisions supposedly have some impact on the world. People are different so people want to make different decisions, and decisions in these fictional settings are often determined by morality (where they would be more often driven by self-interest IRL, LOL). The people at EA, businesspeople as they are, want them all to get a satisfying outcome, so of course they write things in a way that different players' understanding of right and wrong can predominate. In short, I see business logic, not postmodern ideology. Also, the alternative would be to stick to a specific vision of human nature and society, and I can't see how *that* would not be ideologically prejudiced unless you aim for presenting history and sell it as such, rather than fantasy. Our nature is circumscribed by this odd mix between inviduality and community which is a result of our evolution as a social species, but there's very little to derive from that in specifics for a human-appropriate society except that we naturally have both ethics of community and ethics of autonomy.
|
|
Noxluxe
N4
Games: Mass Effect Trilogy, Dragon Age: Origins, Dragon Age 2, Dragon Age Inquisition, KOTOR, Baldur's Gate, Neverwinter Nights, Jade Empire, Mass Effect Andromeda, SWTOR
Posts: 1,979 Likes: 3,490
inherit
10359
0
Mar 14, 2019 16:10:11 GMT
3,490
Noxluxe
1,979
Jul 21, 2018 23:55:09 GMT
July 2018
noxluxe
Mass Effect Trilogy, Dragon Age: Origins, Dragon Age 2, Dragon Age Inquisition, KOTOR, Baldur's Gate, Neverwinter Nights, Jade Empire, Mass Effect Andromeda, SWTOR
|
Post by Noxluxe on Apr 5, 2019 13:59:17 GMT
Rulers on battlefields haven't actually been *that* rare in history. And the specific circumstances are, so I suspect, more due to resource constraints than historical ignorance, though of course I'm convinced there's a lot of that going around as well. Also, I really don't see how Celene standing around there is stroking the player's ego. Which brings me to the larger point: I do not think that a fantasy society has to model RL history. My immersion is only broken if people aren't convincingly human or the picture has contradictions. My concern is rather different: that people get a false impression of history if they *think* a story models it more or less correctly when it doesn't. I don't think people these days can really appreciate the evils of a thoroughly stratified society, and fake-historical depictions often overstress the less meaningful evils but ignore the more meaningful ones. It's the same with ME and biology. It's hard to find words that would give justice to my level of annoyance about the MET's blatant disregard of biology (*known* biology, not hypothetical) but in itself it wouldn't be an issue unless it was presented in a way to make people think it wasn't fake. Which it was. Which made me write several now-forgotten rants. I think this is an accidental impression. Here you have a story where your decisions supposedly have some impact on the world. People are different so people want to make different decisions, and decisions in these fictional settings are often determined by morality (where they would be more often driven by self-interest IRL, LOL). The people at EA, businesspeople as they are, want them all to get a satisfying outcome, so of course they write things in a way that different players' understanding of right and wrong can predominate. In short, I see business logic, not postmodern ideology. Also, the alternative would be to stick to a specific vision of human nature and society, and I can't see how *that* would not be ideologically prejudiced unless you aim for presenting history and sell it as such, rather than fantasy. Our nature is circumscribed by this odd mix between inviduality and community which is a result of our evolution as a social species, but there's very little to derive from that in specifics for a human-appropriate society except that we naturally have both ethics of community and ethics of autonomy. All by themselves, completely unprotected and totally superfluous to the command structure? Obviously rulers and nobility have engaged in battle, that's what plate armor was developed for. But they've never been strolling around alone just behind a few trees in their daily-wear while waiting to see how it would turn out. I know it's because of resource constraints, video game developers aren't stupid. But then they should have cut her out and let us go into battle without that pointless exercise in immersion-breaking instead of leaving her there yammering platitudes in her ball gown. And what I find so galling about it is specifically how unnatural and out of character it is. She isn't presented as suicidally careless or vainglorious - like Cailen, for example - or plain stupid enough to be there, at any other point in the series. She just is. Because the developers thought it would make us more excited to see her and hear her talk about how great it was that we came along and fixed things. And then they half-assed it, cheapening her and everything connected to her in the game. I'm not saying that games should model history perfectly, I'm saying that those moments of the writers so brazenly can sacrificing the world's own internal consistency in order to make the player feel more important ruin the series' credibility for taking their setting and world-building seriously. The story and roleplaying both become less meaningful, because the rules of the world in which they take place are revealed as completely arbitrary, ruining the immersion. I can see what you mean about the format of this kind of RPG kind of mandating the postmodernist approach. I'm not sure I buy it wholesale, but I can see it.
|
|
inherit
376
0
Oct 17, 2016 19:19:36 GMT
3,474
opuspace
2,129
August 2016
opuspace
|
Post by opuspace on Apr 5, 2019 14:31:06 GMT
Rulers on battlefields haven't actually been *that* rare in history. And the specific circumstances are, so I suspect, more due to resource constraints than historical ignorance, though of course I'm convinced there's a lot of that going around as well. Also, I really don't see how Celene standing around there is stroking the player's ego. Which brings me to the larger point: I do not think that a fantasy society has to model RL history. My immersion is only broken if people aren't convincingly human or the picture has contradictions. My concern is rather different: that people get a false impression of history if they *think* a story models it more or less correctly when it doesn't. I don't think people these days can really appreciate the evils of a thoroughly stratified society, and fake-historical depictions often overstress the less meaningful evils but ignore the more meaningful ones. It's the same with ME and biology. It's hard to find words that would give justice to my level of annoyance about the MET's blatant disregard of biology (*known* biology, not hypothetical) but in itself it wouldn't be an issue unless it was presented in a way to make people think it wasn't fake. Which it was. Which made me write several now-forgotten rants. I think this is an accidental impression. Here you have a story where your decisions supposedly have some impact on the world. People are different so people want to make different decisions, and decisions in these fictional settings are often determined by morality (where they would be more often driven by self-interest IRL, LOL). The people at EA, businesspeople as they are, want them all to get a satisfying outcome, so of course they write things in a way that different players' understanding of right and wrong can predominate. In short, I see business logic, not postmodern ideology. Also, the alternative would be to stick to a specific vision of human nature and society, and I can't see how *that* would not be ideologically prejudiced unless you aim for presenting history and sell it as such, rather than fantasy. Our nature is circumscribed by this odd mix between inviduality and community which is a result of our evolution as a social species, but there's very little to derive from that in specifics for a human-appropriate society except that we naturally have both ethics of community and ethics of autonomy. All by themselves, completely unprotected and totally superfluous to the command structure? Obviously rulers and nobility have engaged in battle, that's what plate armor was developed for. But they've never been strolling around alone just behind a few trees in their daily-wear while waiting to see how it would turn out. I know it's because of resource constraints, video game developers aren't stupid. But then they should have cut her out and let us go into battle without that pointless exercise in immersion-breaking instead of leaving her there yammering platitudes in her ball gown. And what I find so galling about it is specifically how unnatural and out of character it is. She isn't presented as suicidally careless or vainglorious - like Cailen, for example - or plain stupid enough to be there, at any other point in the series. She just is. Because the developers thought it would make us more excited to see her and hear her talk about how great it was that we came along and fixed things. And then they half-assed it, cheapening her and everything connected to her in the game. I'm not saying that games should model history perfectly, I'm saying that those moments of the writers so brazenly can sacrificing the world's own internal consistency in order to make the player feel more important ruin the series' credibility for taking their setting and world-building seriously. The story and roleplaying both become less meaningful, because the rules of the world in which they take place are revealed as completely arbitrary, ruining the immersion. I can see what you mean about the format of this kind of RPG kind of mandating the postmodernist approach. I'm not sure I buy it wholesale, but I can see it. You could always headcanon that she was wearing that dress because preparations for war started immediately and that she hasn't rested since. But I get that in a way. Some things simply don't mesh that headcanon can't fix.
|
|
Noxluxe
N4
Games: Mass Effect Trilogy, Dragon Age: Origins, Dragon Age 2, Dragon Age Inquisition, KOTOR, Baldur's Gate, Neverwinter Nights, Jade Empire, Mass Effect Andromeda, SWTOR
Posts: 1,979 Likes: 3,490
inherit
10359
0
Mar 14, 2019 16:10:11 GMT
3,490
Noxluxe
1,979
Jul 21, 2018 23:55:09 GMT
July 2018
noxluxe
Mass Effect Trilogy, Dragon Age: Origins, Dragon Age 2, Dragon Age Inquisition, KOTOR, Baldur's Gate, Neverwinter Nights, Jade Empire, Mass Effect Andromeda, SWTOR
|
Post by Noxluxe on Apr 5, 2019 15:21:27 GMT
You could always headcanon that she was wearing that dress because preparations for war started immediately and that she hasn't rested since. But I get that in a way. Some things simply don't mesh that headcanon can't fix. I appreciate the thought, but it just doesn't work. The Inquisitor and co. have time to travel all the way home to Skyhold around the Frostbacks to meet with advisers, have Morrigan introduce the Eluvians, and complete quests and potentially DLC, and only then travel all the way back into Orlais to start the campaign against Coryphewhatshisface. I¨d be more inclined to expect Celene to stay at home rather than give representatives of a foreign power the impression that she only has one dress, or that her maidservaints are too incompetent to pack proper outfitting for a trip to a military camp, let alone a battle.
|
|
inherit
3439
0
9,073
alanc9
Old Scientist Contrarian
7,791
February 2017
alanc9
|
Post by alanc9 on Apr 5, 2019 16:21:34 GMT
Which brings me to the larger point: I do not think that a fantasy society has to model RL history. My immersion is only broken if people aren't convincingly human or the picture has contradictions. My concern is rather different: that people get a false impression of history if they *think* a story models it more or less correctly when it doesn't. I don't think people these days can really appreciate the evils of a thoroughly stratified society, and fake-historical depictions often overstress the less meaningful evils but ignore the more meaningful ones. It's the same with ME and biology. It's hard to find words that would give justice to my level of annoyance about the MET's blatant disregard of biology (*known* biology, not hypothetical) but in itself it wouldn't be an issue unless it was presented in a way to make people think it wasn't fake. Which it was. Which made me write several now-forgotten rants. One of the prominent wargame designers of the '70s -- Richard Berg, or maybe Frank Chadwick -- operationalized this into a design principle called "perceived realism." The audience for a game comes with notions about how the event worked, and while you can build some education into the game systems, if you violate the existing model too broadly the game is just going to fail. Conversely, you don't have to worry about modeling stuff most of the playerbase doesn't think about. Which is good when that stuff is hard -- picture a PnP Waterloo game where the designer wanted to model what Wellington could actually see or read about happening and the mechanics by which he could transmit orders to units. ME can play fast and loose with biology because most of us don't know or care much about biology. Didn't one of the designers say something like "we can say 'the Protheans did it' the way a fantasy designer can say 'a wizard did it.'"? IIRC the topic was how something like the asari could evolve in the first place. Don't forget the constraints of development. The amount of divergence in our outcomes which Bio will deliver is smaller than either we or our characters want. Put another way, I strongly suspect that Vivienne's approach to Divineship will end up being a lot more realistic than Leliana's, and more successful on its own terms.
|
|
inherit
3439
0
9,073
alanc9
Old Scientist Contrarian
7,791
February 2017
alanc9
|
Post by alanc9 on Apr 5, 2019 16:32:33 GMT
Dragon Age itself has always played fast and loose with this concept given all three of the main human protagonists are nobility. As well as several of your companions and enemies. DAI was especially egregious because the Inquisitor was a noble and was especially important... And yet led troops into battle. I give them a pass because they used it to good effect. Just like Celene. Extend it further. In ME1 Shepard shouldn't ever be used in battle, because Shepard really is indispensable; anyone can shoot enemies, but only Shepard can use a beacon. (It'd be true for ME:A too, but SAM can transfer if Ryder gets killed.) Similarly, in DA:O after Riordan's reveal the three available Wardens shouldn't be in any battles unless the Archdemon is actually present.
|
|
Iakus
N7
Games: Mass Effect Trilogy, Dragon Age: Origins, Dragon Age 2, Dragon Age Inquisition, KOTOR, Baldur's Gate, Neverwinter Nights, Jade Empire, Mass Effect Andromeda
Posts: 20,866 Likes: 49,310
inherit
402
0
Dec 21, 2018 17:35:11 GMT
49,310
Iakus
20,866
August 2016
iakus
Mass Effect Trilogy, Dragon Age: Origins, Dragon Age 2, Dragon Age Inquisition, KOTOR, Baldur's Gate, Neverwinter Nights, Jade Empire, Mass Effect Andromeda
|
Post by Iakus on Apr 5, 2019 17:29:37 GMT
Dragon Age itself has always played fast and loose with this concept given all three of the main human protagonists are nobility. As well as several of your companions and enemies. DAI was especially egregious because the Inquisitor was a noble and was especially important... And yet led troops into battle. I give them a pass because they used it to good effect. Just like Celene. Extend it further. In ME1 Shepard shouldn't ever be used in battle, because Shepard really is indispensable; anyone can shoot enemies, but only Shepard can use a beacon. (It'd be true for ME:A too, but SAM can transfer if Ryder gets killed.) Similarly, in DA:O after Riordan's reveal the three available Wardens shouldn't be in any battles unless the Archdemon is actually present. I always thought I would have been interesting if inME1, Ashley/Kaidan was the one to receive the beacon message and Shepard, as the first human Spectre was tasked with escorting them about and protecting them as they worked the message out. As for DAI, given that the protagonist was originally going to be human only with several backgrounds, I suspect those other backgrounds got rolled up into the other races when they got the time to work on that. Thus there would originally have been a human Inquisitor mercenary, criminal, hedge mage, wanderer, etc...
|
|
mousestalker
Inactive Moderator
ღ The Untitled
Just here for the cosplay
Staff Mini-Profile Theme: Mousestalker
Games: Mass Effect Trilogy, Dragon Age: Origins, Dragon Age 2, Dragon Age Inquisition, Baldur's Gate, Neverwinter Nights, Jade Empire, Mass Effect Andromeda, SWTOR
Posts: 12,116 Likes: 30,348
inherit
ღ The Untitled
72
0
1
Jan 31, 2024 11:38:50 GMT
30,348
mousestalker
Just here for the cosplay
12,116
August 2016
mousestalker
Mousestalker
Mass Effect Trilogy, Dragon Age: Origins, Dragon Age 2, Dragon Age Inquisition, Baldur's Gate, Neverwinter Nights, Jade Empire, Mass Effect Andromeda, SWTOR
|
Post by mousestalker on Apr 5, 2019 17:29:49 GMT
I'd love for BW to depart from the grittiness that's been present in the previous three and pursue a plot and setting derived from Regency romances. No one has done a game of manners . And if they threw in ponies as well along with a pastel colour palate that would be awesome!
|
|
inherit
9105
0
Aug 11, 2017 18:04:01 GMT
8,817
slimgrin727
I don't stir, I work the material.
3,636
Jul 28, 2017 17:05:24 GMT
July 2017
slimgrin727
|
Post by slimgrin727 on Apr 5, 2019 17:35:49 GMT
I'd love for BW to depart from the grittiness that's been present in the previous three and pursue a plot and setting derived from Regency romances. No one has done a game of manners . And if they threw in ponies as well along with a pastel colour palate that would be awesome!
|
|
mousestalker
Inactive Moderator
ღ The Untitled
Just here for the cosplay
Staff Mini-Profile Theme: Mousestalker
Games: Mass Effect Trilogy, Dragon Age: Origins, Dragon Age 2, Dragon Age Inquisition, Baldur's Gate, Neverwinter Nights, Jade Empire, Mass Effect Andromeda, SWTOR
Posts: 12,116 Likes: 30,348
inherit
ღ The Untitled
72
0
1
Jan 31, 2024 11:38:50 GMT
30,348
mousestalker
Just here for the cosplay
12,116
August 2016
mousestalker
Mousestalker
Mass Effect Trilogy, Dragon Age: Origins, Dragon Age 2, Dragon Age Inquisition, Baldur's Gate, Neverwinter Nights, Jade Empire, Mass Effect Andromeda, SWTOR
|
Post by mousestalker on Apr 5, 2019 17:39:13 GMT
I'd love for BW to depart from the grittiness that's been present in the previous three and pursue a plot and setting derived from Regency romances. No one has done a game of manners . And if they threw in ponies as well along with a pastel colour palate that would be awesome! What about the idea do you not like? It would be a great way to draw in new fans. Women now make up the majority of gamers, you know.
|
|
LadyofNemesis
N5
Games: Mass Effect Trilogy, Dragon Age: Origins, Dragon Age 2, Dragon Age Inquisition, KOTOR, Baldur's Gate, Neverwinter Nights, Jade Empire, Mass Effect Andromeda, SWTOR, Mass Effect Legendary Edition
Posts: 4,822 Likes: 11,917
inherit
10314
0
Mar 28, 2024 18:31:36 GMT
11,917
LadyofNemesis
4,822
July 2018
ladyofnemesis
Mass Effect Trilogy, Dragon Age: Origins, Dragon Age 2, Dragon Age Inquisition, KOTOR, Baldur's Gate, Neverwinter Nights, Jade Empire, Mass Effect Andromeda, SWTOR, Mass Effect Legendary Edition
|
Post by LadyofNemesis on Apr 5, 2019 18:12:18 GMT
I'd love for BW to depart from the grittiness that's been present in the previous three and pursue a plot and setting derived from Regency romances. No one has done a game of manners . And if they threw in ponies as well along with a pastel colour palate that would be awesome! and if you are serious...did you know there's a mod for Skyrim the does exactly that? (personally never used it, I like my mods to be immersive and making sense)
|
|