Should Bioware Invent a new Dialogue System?

a voiced protagonist will never say what you really wanted to say when you choose an option in the dialogue, not even the tone of it. I see no point in putting more dialogue options that hardly have any difference or just continues to extended the problem that the voice doesn't have the tone/reaction/dialogue that you thought you were going to get, and turns to be the other way around, multiple options and vast customization only works in silent protagonist where you set any kind of personality/voice (in your head).

the only thing you should want if you want a fully voiced protagonist, it's a more improved wheel system.

What the problem was is that there were far fewer dialogue branching paths and the 3 Right side choices sometimes had little difference between them. Wheras the LEft sided dialogue options blew it out of the park. DAI has Perks Dialogue, Racial specific dialogue, class specific dialogue.

I hope they stay far away from MEA dialogue, however. "four personalities" all mostly nice, and over 50% of the time, you only get to choose right or left or Two of the four personalties.

I noticed this as well. It kept me from using the bottom right almost entirely. when I played a kinda throwaway inquisitor, I started using it more and realized it wasn't actually that aggressive.

I endorse this (voted yes). In both the DA and the ME franchises, the dialogue system was changed for every installment. So a change for DA4 is a foregone conclusion. The question in, what should the change be?

ME2 was my all around favorite dialogue system of the Bioware franchises. I wouldn't mind DA4 going with that system. Maybe don't go as far as Renegade/Paragon, but do have some cruel/selfish choices.

Speaking of Renegade/Paragon, I'd like to see something like the Horizon:Zero Dawn idea, where instead of extremes on a moral spectrum, the dialogue choices are on a personality spectrum. HZD used three choice categories: Feeling, Thinking, Fighting (my terms, not the game's). These roughly translate to the SDI (Strength Deployment Inventory) personality test axes of People (blue), Process (green), and Performance (red).



I can think of other categorizations that might be fun, like Bartle's Taxonomy (always 4 choices: Achiever, Explorer, Killer, Socializer), or another 4-way personality space that's a little more relevant to gamers (Help/Hurt x Selfish/Selfless): so Help+Selfish would mean a, "I'll help you, but I expect a reward," type statement, where "Hurt+Selfless" might mean a, "I'm sorry, I can't help now, I have more people to save than just you," type statement.

I've also liked the idea of past decisions influencing future dialogue choices. Perhaps something like this: For any given dialogue, there are ten choices total, 9 active, 1 passive (do nothing), but only 3 choices are shown to the player at any dialogue wheel. The 9 active choices are split into groups of 3 that align with something like that SDI personalities: Feeling, Thinking, Fighting. Hidden from the player, the dialogue choices are arranged on a spectrum: on the left, three Feeling choices, on the right three Fighting choices, and in the middle three Thinking choices. Of the three Thinking choices, the leftmost one is a transition towards Feeling, and the rightmost is a transition towards Fighting. Likewise, the rightmost of the group of 3 of Feeling is a transition to Thinking, and the leftmost of the group of 3 for Fighting is a transition to Thinking.

Your dialogue choices at any given time are a sliding window of 3 choices that start centered on the Thinking 3 choices. If you choose the middle choice, the window doesn't move. If you choose the leftmost Thinking choice, the window slides 1 to the left, so that the next time you have a dialogue choice, you'll have 1 Feeling choice, and 2 Thinking choices. If you pick the leftmost again, the Feeling choice, you move the window 1 to the left again. Now you have 2 Feeling choices, and 1 Thinking. And so on until the window hits the end of the line. You can still transition to another state, but if you are all the way over on the left, with 3 Feeling choices, you have to go through several dialogue choices to start having Fighting choices.

In other words, a leopard doesn't change it's spots over night. Once you establish your character as mostly making Feeling choices, you're not suddenly going to turn into a badass fighter and want to kill everyone in sight, and so on.

Personally, I liked the QT interrupt system of MEA. It wasn't always executed perfectly -- as I believe that the "normal" narrative should be when you let the timer run out and don't take the QT action, but several of the interrupts in MEA were constructed so that 99% of the time the player was going to take the action -- but when it's done right, it provides a feeling of more player agency, even if that's an illusion. Alternatively, used the "timed do nothing" third option in Telltale games. There are often A/B dialogue choices, with an implied third option of choosing neither one, because the A/B choice is on a timer. If you don't make a choice before the time runs out, neither one happens. Again, this gives some additional player agency and a more realistic depiction of how people really talk. Sometimes you just choose to say nothing.

No, that's exactly what it doesn't do. Nothing is locked. You can't instantly change, but you can slowly change. It would only take four choices that are "to the right" to get into Fighter territory. You could never do that with Renegade/Paragon.

Alternatively, instead of a line, the choices could be arranged on a ring, like the SDI. So if you keep going left, you're only 1 choice away from Fighting choices. That would address your Leandra's death situation. There ought to be extenuating narrative circumstances that "unlock" that choice, though. Maybe it's a relatively rare fourth choice.

I gotta go with phoray here. I don't see any value in putting restrictions on the player. If I don't think a response suits my character then I can just not pick it. I don't need the game to police my RP.

I recall this more from DA2 then the Solas romance. and agree

This!

Not really interested in the system, I'd rather Bioware concentrate on providing sufficient options and choices during dialogue rather than how those choices are presented to the player.

I do like the skill checks for dialogue options, though that would first require the return of skills. I don't see that happening, though I guess the perk options in DAI kind of replace them.

Not really.

At the same time I don't see a reason why it should be changed anyway.

Although I hope they bring back Friendship/Rivalry. Such a damn good mechanic.

This is why I think they NEED to implement an option that you can turn on/off which let's you see the full and exact answer by hovering it with your mouse. Maybe they can add the tone before it, like [sarcastic], but I think just being able to read the exact reply would help a lot, at least for me, since I never had a problem with it in DAO. The fact that NPCs might take it in a different way doesn't exactly mean that the tone wasn't meant to be sarcastic, since many people genuinely get offended by it or just don't understand sarcasm.

However, Telltale's way of doing dialogue isn't exactly perfect either because they also suffer from replies that aren't exactly the same as described or that have the exact opposite effect that players wanted. This is the most famous one, but I honestly don't know if it was Telltale screwing with players or if it was an actual accident, but almost everyone fell for it. And a more recent one, which I also fell for it. But anyway, no dialogue system will ever be perfect, I think.