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Post by Deleted on Feb 27, 2019 22:13:14 GMT
The Initiative's motives were all about exploration. There was nothing promised to the player about the game being mainly about the player's exploration of worlds full of loot sites and whatever else you seem to think is missing that makes ME:A's worlds "completely" empty. There are caves, vaults, structures, views, foliage, alien animal species, and unique climate challenges on each planet on whichwe can land. In space, where we can't land, there are wonderfully rendered universe features like black holes, nebulae, and a variety of planetoid types, along with a unique anomaly that plays a key role in the game (the scourge). The game world is still just the set-piece for the game... same as ME1. Also, it's not my comparison... it's a comment about how many others here have stated how ME1's "exploration" is superior to ME:A's. I'm commenting on why, psychologically, I think that's so.
As to how ME:A was an "open-world" game - I believe it was actually stated to be a "semi" open-world game and just more open than previous ME games... which it was. You could drive anywhere within the map areas of the planets on which we could land and those map areas were larger by far than the little maps we got in ME1. In ME2 and ME3, we basically could not go outside the mission area. The nomad was, IMO, a big improvement over the mako and I personally enjoyed driving it around wherever I had the open space just to kick it open and drive. You didn't like it, but you should still be able to admit that the driving mechanic were improved by quite a bit over the mako.
Gosh, it's hilarious the heights fanboys go to defend this crappy game. Almost everything you said are ENVIRONMENT FEATURES, which, as I said, is sightseeing. If every open world is "full" by having mountains, caves, views and structures, then EVERY OPEN WORLD GAME IS FINE. If making an open world game was that easy, any idiot could make a great open world game. I (and most people) don't play games to do sightseeing and watch animals. And seriously, if you go to the height of denying that ME:A is about exploration, I'm done talking. You said it yourself, the Initiative, the main part of the game, is about exploration, and then you deny that it is about exploration, ugh. Comparing it with ME1 is just stupid. I said "the Initiative's motives were all about exploration" NOT that "the Initiative... is about exploration." There is a difference. Furthermore, that doesn't translate to the game or even the game's story being all about exploration. Gosh, the extent that "haters" will go to defend their hatred of a game and game developer. Just imagine, a game-world environment filled with "environmental features" somehow translates to it being "completely empty." BTW, the game's story was more about environmental manipulation than it was about exploration. There was a weakness directly related to the game being as "open" as it was. Had the game been more linear, it would have been more possible to dramatically show the planets responding to the activation of each vault since quests designed to take place while the environments were harsh would not have remained open to be done after the vaults were active and/or even after the endgame run.
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Post by anarchy65 on Feb 28, 2019 0:02:58 GMT
Gosh, it's hilarious the heights fanboys go to defend this crappy game. Almost everything you said are ENVIRONMENT FEATURES, which, as I said, is sightseeing. If every open world is "full" by having mountains, caves, views and structures, then EVERY OPEN WORLD GAME IS FINE. If making an open world game was that easy, any idiot could make a great open world game. I (and most people) don't play games to do sightseeing and watch animals. And seriously, if you go to the height of denying that ME:A is about exploration, I'm done talking. You said it yourself, the Initiative, the main part of the game, is about exploration, and then you deny that it is about exploration, ugh. Comparing it with ME1 is just stupid. I said "the Initiative's motives were all about exploration" NOT that "the Initiative... is about exploration." There is a difference. Furthermore, that doesn't translate to the game or even the game's story being all about exploration. Gosh, the extent that "haters" will go to defend their hatred of a game and game developer. Just imagine, a game-world environment filled with "environmental features" somehow translates to it being "completely empty." BTW, the game's story was more about environmental manipulation than it was about exploration. There was a weakness directly related to the game being as "open" as it was. Had the game been more linear, it would have been more possible to dramatically show the planets responding to the activation of each vault since quests designed to take place while the environments were harsh would not have remained open to be done after the vaults were active and/or even after the endgame run. Yeah yeah, right, any open world game with forests and caves is "full" and "great", ok. Again, play Dynasty Warriors 9, the map is absurdely huge, you'll love it, lots of sightseeing.
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Post by Deleted on Feb 28, 2019 11:52:22 GMT
I said "the Initiative's motives were all about exploration" NOT that "the Initiative... is about exploration." There is a difference. Furthermore, that doesn't translate to the game or even the game's story being all about exploration. Gosh, the extent that "haters" will go to defend their hatred of a game and game developer. Just imagine, a game-world environment filled with "environmental features" somehow translates to it being "completely empty." BTW, the game's story was more about environmental manipulation than it was about exploration. There was a weakness directly related to the game being as "open" as it was. Had the game been more linear, it would have been more possible to dramatically show the planets responding to the activation of each vault since quests designed to take place while the environments were harsh would not have remained open to be done after the vaults were active and/or even after the endgame run. Yeah yeah, right, any open world game with forests and caves is "full" and "great", ok. Again, play Dynasty Warriors 9, the map is absurdely huge, you'll love it, lots of sightseeing. Again, you're deliberately misconstruing what I'm saying. At any rate, I'm not looking for game recommendations ATM... I'm quite happy playing the games I already have... including ME:A.
FYI, definition of empty (Merriam-Webster Dictionary): "containing nothing" - ME:A worlds do contain some things (see my previous list). Many of the features I listed were relevant to the story and I did say a weakness was that the planets couldn't respond with visual changes after the vaults were activated because of quests designed to make use of the harsh environments were to be left open to be done even after the player may have activated the vault. For example, the quest "Remove the Heart" on Voeld which takes place in the city frozen in the ice (Ja Niihk) could not have been left accessible to be done if Voeld suddenly became a balmy paradise after the vault was activated. The effects of climate manipulation (both positive and negative) could have been visually illustrated and animated in the game IF the game had a linear rather than open quest design.
Alternative defintion of empty (Meriam-Webster Dictionary): "not occupied or inhabited" - Since, you admit, we encountered species on every planet, they were undeniably occupied and inhabited... and NOT "completely empty."
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Post by anarchy65 on Feb 28, 2019 14:18:06 GMT
"If it's not a complete black screen, it's not empty" Gosh...
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Post by Deleted on Feb 28, 2019 14:33:02 GMT
"If it's not a complete black screen, it's not empty" Gosh... Wherre in any of what I said is that even implied? Yet again, you're misconstruing what I'm saying and now you're putting words in my mouth (in quotes) that are no where near what I've stated. So, a Picard back at you bud. Pity your argument is so "completely empty" that all you can think to do with it for the last three posts is try to insult me.
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Post by anarchy65 on Feb 28, 2019 14:39:37 GMT
"If it's not a complete black screen, it's not empty" Gosh... Wherre in any of what I said is that even implied? Yet again, you're misconstruing what I'm saying and now you're putting words in my mouth (in quotes) that are no where near what I've stated. So, a Picard back at you bud. Man, you think putting some animals, forests and caves make an open world "not-empty". You clearly don't understand what the word "empty" means ON THIS SPECIFIC CONTEXT, no dictionary will tell you that. As I said A MILLION TIMES ALREADY but STILL you don't seem to get it, if it was that easy to make a "full" open world, any idiot could do it. But as you can't understand something so simple, I'm done talking
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Post by Deleted on Feb 28, 2019 15:05:06 GMT
Wherre in any of what I said is that even implied? Yet again, you're misconstruing what I'm saying and now you're putting words in my mouth (in quotes) that are no where near what I've stated. So, a Picard back at you bud. Man, you think putting some animals, forests and caves make an open world "not-empty". You clearly don't understand what the word "empty" means ON THIS SPECIFIC CONTEXT, no dictionary will tell you that. As I said A MILLION TIMES ALREADY but STILL you don't seem to get it, if it was that easy to make a "full" open world, any idiot could do it. But as you can't understand something so simple, I'm done talking The features I mentioned do have a context related to what the game is about. Mithrava is involved in the main story on Havarl and it is not empty. The vaults involve main story content and they too are not empty. Ja Niihk is not empty. The ice cave the Yevara quest takes place in is not empty. You clearly don't understand what is not "just scenery" and what is attached to the quests in the game itself. In TLD, the environment (snow, cold, darkness, wolves, bears, etc.) are all part of the core of that game. It's not empty even though it's not "filled" with loot crates and cities pr reams of shoot 'em quests like FO4.
Even though ME:A did not have "first contact" doesn't mean that its worlds were empty... By definition, they were inhabited and not empty. It doesn't match your preconceived expectation, but there is CONTENT there. It's just not the content you would have liked to see... and that's because you still think the story is about "exploration" of the unknown. - which it actually isn't about. People dreamed that up in their own heads long before the game was released based on a trailer that was merely stating the Initiative's motives for going Andromeda. It wasn't telling us what the game's story was going to be about. The game's story main theme is about environmental manipulation... not first contact, not meeting a ream of new species. (From the IP perspective, the move to Andromeda was made to preserve the MW species we knew basically in their original forms, keeping the green ending of ME3 "valid" in addition to keeping the "red" and "blue" endings valid). The game outright tells us in several places that what the people in the Initiative found when they arrived in Andromeda was NOT what they expected to find. As a result, the job of Pathfinder was not what Alec Ryder envisioned.
People are just refusing to "explore" the game's story on the basis of what IS there rather than what they assumed should be there prior to the game's release. You don't have to "like" the game. IDC if you hate it... but saying it's "completely empty" is an inaccurate statement in a factual sense. It's not empty... and it's certainly not "completely empty." It contains more than 200 quests with related NPC's and settings in the worlds on which we can land. Sure, some of those are fetch quests, but not all are fetch quests. ME1 (the alleged jewel of the ME franchise) also had fetch quests (e.g. collecting 20 of 3 different minerals and then 7 gases for no purpose other than XP and credits). ME2 also had fetch quests (e.g. Ish's packages) and so did ME3. In ME:A several of those little tasks often connected together to add some additional context to the story (e.g. gathering items for the bar... and then getting to listen to Turian poetry about his hopes and expectations... and disenchantment in that bar).
Furthermore, I'm not upholding ME:A as an open world done right. I'm still of the view that open-world design is basically incompatible with a plot-driven, character development driven story. I don't think Bioware should try to stick with the open-world design. ME:A suffered for it. They;re better at doing a more linear (although not completely linear) design... like they did in ME2 and ME3. We'll get better stories out of them if they make their games more linear than ME:A.
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Post by Elfen Lied on Feb 28, 2019 16:51:51 GMT
You get it right by removing the "open" from the world.
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Post by Ieldra on Mar 1, 2019 11:11:39 GMT
Furthermore, I'm not upholding ME:A as an open world done right. I'm still of the view that open-world design is basically incompatible with a plot-driven, character development driven story. I don't think Bioware should try to stick with the open-world design. ME:A suffered for it. They;re better at doing a more linear (although not completely linear) design... like they did in ME2 and ME3. We'll get better stories out of them if they make their games more linear than ME:A. It depends on what you mean exactly by "open world". You mentioned the problem of not showing us the effects of our environmental changes in MEA (which I, too, found very disappointing since this was one of the main themes of the story) and the possible reasons, but I don't think it has to be that way. While "Open World" may mean you can attempt to go anywhere at any time, it does not necessarily mean you can do anything in any order without consequences. You would have to make changes to the world depending on the story and your protagonist's earlier actions, and that's not impossible. What it is is expensive, though, and IMO that's the real reason we don't see the environment change in MEA. You could adapt the quests to a changed environment, write non-standard outcomes for them or simply mark them as failed.
I've recently replayed Gothic 2, which has an open-world design in that there are no separate areas you technically can't get to except the location of the final encounter, and it has a story, i.e. there is a defined sequence of meaningful events. However, there are in-world hindrances like powerful enemies and NPCs blocking your way into certain areas, and they keep those aspects of the story intact that depend on not being able to go to A or talk to X before event Y happened.
All in all, while I tend to agree with you that an open-world design creates problems with storytelling that may not be worth sticking to the design, I think the reason why people like open worlds should be taken into consideration when designing worlds that are less open. I can't speak for everyone, but IMO people like open worlds because they appear to be more alive, contain things not connected to the story, which just exist to illustrate the world and make it feel more alive and more complete. In order to make it feel more alive, the content must be convincing, and in order make the player engage with the open areas, the things you can do it them must be interesting. Here is where MEA failed IMO. Too much of the open-world content was boring, and doing it felt like a chore. On the other hand, I would've been perfectly fine just exploring the maps and doing non-dramatic everyday stuff stuff for a while, if the maps themselves had any appeal. Consider DAI: the small things you did on the larger maps were often as boring as they were in MEA, but at least the maps themselves were done really well, and you occasionally found a piece of lore.
Edit: I should mention TW3. It worked for me, and I think the main reason is that side content was not treated like an afterthought. Interactions with people and world actions in side-quests always felt as if those who created that content had paid as much attention to them as to the main plot, and the Witcher contracts and the side quests felt like their own stories as a result. Even some of the treasure hunts felt like their own stories.
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Post by alanc9 on Mar 1, 2019 16:46:23 GMT
Of course, the TW3 approach isn't just a matter of feel. They really did burn more resources -- dev time, wordcount, etc. -- on the OW side content. Rebalancing ME:A along these lines, assuming the budget and developer efficiency are held constant, would have mean cuts elsewhere. Worse companion missions, shorter main plot missions, less ambient settlement dialogues, fewer planets.
Probably a better game that way, though.
In retrospect, I think the Vault mechanic was a mistake, so I might have looked for cuts there. Each planet's got one main quest through-line, and one big Vault (plus a couple of smaller ones.) The main quests work, but I don't think the Vaults do. They can be challenging, in a somewhat arbitrary way; I wonder if maybe the Jardaan could fly short distances, which would explain the design. But the payoffs aren't all that great. The viability boost isn't necessary to settle planets, ME:A's loot engine is so broken that it's not worth thinking about finding loot, the Remnant data cores lead to nothing... about the only useful thing you'll find is Remnant research points, and those are only useful if you're looking to use a Shadow or some such.
Edit: in a sense, I think the Vaults exist to rationalize Ryder being important, since they represent a problem which only Ryder and SAM can solve.
Edit: it's funny how ME:A gets grief both for there not being enough exploration -- either the angara or exiles have already been everywhere the pathfinder goes -- and for not having enough stuff to do on the OW maps. I don't see how you simultaneously do more of both of these things.
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Post by Deleted on Mar 1, 2019 23:06:42 GMT
Furthermore, I'm not upholding ME:A as an open world done right. I'm still of the view that open-world design is basically incompatible with a plot-driven, character development driven story. I don't think Bioware should try to stick with the open-world design. ME:A suffered for it. They;re better at doing a more linear (although not completely linear) design... like they did in ME2 and ME3. We'll get better stories out of them if they make their games more linear than ME:A. It depends on what you mean exactly by "open world". You mentioned the problem of not showing us the effects of our environmental changes in MEA (which I, too, found very disappointing since this was one of the main themes of the story) and the possible reasons, but I don't think it has to be that way. While "Open World" may mean you can attempt to go anywhere at any time, it does not necessarily mean you can do anything in any order without consequences. You would have to make changes to the world depending on the story and your protagonist's earlier actions, and that's not impossible. What it is is expensive, though, and IMO that's the real reason we don't see the environment change in MEA. You could adapt the quests to a changed environment, write non-standard outcomes for them or simply mark them as failed.
I've recently replayed Gothic 2, which has an open-world design in that there are no separate areas you technically can't get to except the location of the final encounter, and it has a story, i.e. there is a defined sequence of meaningful events. However, there are in-world hindrances like powerful enemies and NPCs blocking your way into certain areas, and they keep those aspects of the story intact that depend on not being able to go to A or talk to X before event Y happened.
All in all, while I tend to agree with you that an open-world design creates problems with storytelling that may not be worth sticking to the design, I think the reason why people like open worlds should be taken into consideration when designing worlds that are less open. I can't speak for everyone, but IMO people like open worlds because they appear to be more alive, contain things not connected to the story, which just exist to illustrate the world and make it feel more alive and more complete. In order to make it feel more alive, the content must be convincing, and in order make the player engage with the open areas, the things you can do it them must be interesting. Here is where MEA failed IMO. Too much of the open-world content was boring, and doing it felt like a chore. On the other hand, I would've been perfectly fine just exploring the maps and doing non-dramatic everyday stuff stuff for a while, if the maps themselves had any appeal. Consider DAI: the small things you did on the larger maps were often as boring as they were in MEA, but at least the maps themselves were done really well, and you occasionally found a piece of lore.
Edit: I should mention TW3. It worked for me, and I think the main reason is that side content was not treated like an afterthought. Interactions with people and world actions in side-quests always felt as if those who created that content had paid as much attention to them as to the main plot, and the Witcher contracts and the side quests felt like their own stories as a result. Even some of the treasure hunts felt like their own stories.
True, Fallout 4 has a progression of sorts that the world reacts to in a limited sort of way. The player can change settlements, but only in very limited areas and in limited ways (without mods). It is expensive and it's fraught with the risk of ample bugs... so bad for me in Fallout 4 that I have had to start numerous new files due to various forms of bugs and file corruption and I doubt I will ever get a file save to hold together long enough to get me through the game along the RPG path I want my character to take. I could forfeit that character path and rush through the BoS arc to "beat the game" sure, but that's not really leaving the world very open then, is it?
I still feel the better route for Bioware is to do a strong story progression and forfeit the huge open-world thinking. Limit the game to 50 to 60 hours of heavily storied gameplay with some ability to shuffle quests around and some ability to freely move around a planet or two... and then focus on making sure the game world and the NPCs respond appropriately to whatever the player's choices are. They wouldn't have quite so much money invested in the game (taking some of the pressure off the devs to put out a huge blockbuster hit) and the development time would be shorter (we wouldn't be waiting another 5-6 years for the next ME game).
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Post by ahglock on Mar 2, 2019 3:29:35 GMT
Of course, the TW3 approach isn't just a matter of feel. They really did burn more resources -- dev time, wordcount, etc. -- on the OW side content. Rebalancing ME:A along these lines, assuming the budget and developer efficiency are held constant, would have mean cuts elsewhere. Worse companion missions, shorter main plot missions, less ambient settlement dialogues, fewer planets. Probably a better game that way, though. In retrospect, I think the Vault mechanic was a mistake, so I might have looked for cuts there. Each planet's got one main quest through-line, and one big Vault (plus a couple of smaller ones.) The main quests work, but I don't think the Vaults do. They can be challenging, in a somewhat arbitrary way; I wonder if maybe the Jardaan could fly short distances, which would explain the design. But the payoffs aren't all that great. The viability boost isn't necessary to settle planets, ME:A's loot engine is so broken that it's not worth thinking about finding loot, the Remnant data cores lead to nothing... about the only useful thing you'll find is Remnant research points, and those are only useful if you're looking to use a Shadow or some such. Edit: in a sense, I think the Vaults exist to rationalize Ryder being important, since they represent a problem which only Ryder and SAM can solve. Edit: it's funny how ME:A gets grief both for there not being enough exploration -- either the angara or exiles have already been everywhere the pathfinder goes -- and for not having enough stuff to do on the OW maps. I don't see how you simultaneously do more of both of these things. Yeah I think the vaults on their own can work. Scattered structured dungeons in a open world are fine. But as a key mechanic to getting viability it felt kind of canned.
I'm not sure I get your edit 2. If the Hyperion just showed up first it would handle the most of it already being explored, if the story needed to stay roughly the same replace the exiles with another race faction new to andromeda. And having more to do is just having more to do and seems separate to that. I suspect I am just not getting the point you are making.
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Post by alanc9 on Mar 3, 2019 2:17:52 GMT
I was referring to the complaint about not really being explorers since every place we go is already inhabited. Does making all the planets more like Voeld and Havarl solve this? I couldn't say, since it isn't my complaint in the first place. It mostly comes from people who really liked the ME1 UNC missions, I think.
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Post by ahglock on Mar 3, 2019 6:42:44 GMT
I was referring to the complaint about not really being explorers since every place we go is already inhabited. Does making all the planets more like Voeld and Havarl solve this? I couldn't say, since it isn't my complaint in the first place. It mostly comes from people who really liked the ME1 UNC missions, I think.
Ah, my take on the we aren't really explorers as its already inhabited is I guess different. I've had that complaint and for me it isn't that they were inhabited but that when it came to the MW races we got their second. Sort of like in our history I wouldn't say famous explorer X didn't discover or explore things because people were already there, but if people from his society had showed up first mapped the areas, named them, met the locals, tried to set up colonies, him showing up later doesn't feel like exploration. Exploration is about from the milky way perspective not the perspective any any locals, because in fact meeting those locals and seeing the inhabited areas is part of the exploration. So making the places more packed actually helps with exploration as you are finding and discovering more things whether they are inhabited or not. Havarl and Voeld for the most part have the lack of MW exploration in advance, but in the case of Voeld it is pretty barren, with long drives between any point of interest. Havarl was better in these respects and I think more places like that would help, though I think why it was more packed was it was just a smaller map, not that there was more to do.
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Post by degs29 on Mar 6, 2019 20:24:15 GMT
You get it right by sizing it based on its depth of content.
Too many developers create a giant world, then struggle to fill it with a good density of interesting content. Such a method drastically impacts the power of a narrative, which is a big problem for a historically narrative-driven dev like BioWare.
I long for the days of linear, narrative-driven epics. Stop drowning us in dull open worlds!
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Post by griffith82 on Mar 6, 2019 22:04:51 GMT
You get it right by sizing it based on its depth of content. Too many developers create a giant world, then struggle to fill it with a good density of interesting content. Such a method drastically impacts the power of a narrative, which is a big problem for a historically narrative-driven dev like BioWare. I long for the days of linear, narrative-driven epics. Stop drowning us in dull open worlds! I disagree. Open worlds are the future imo and while Andromedz wasn't perfect most of the quests were good and interesting. Even some of the fetch quests.
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Post by alanc9 on Mar 18, 2019 19:08:10 GMT
Played a bit more ME:A this week, and it left me wondering exactly what we want from an open world.
I took my usual approach to the game, which is to talk to the people in the settlements and go into the map with particular targets in mind. Sure, I don't stumble onto much stuff on the map, but I'm only on the map for a couple of minutes until I get to something I am looking for.
Is the stumbling onto stuff part the point of OW?
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Post by kalreegar on Mar 21, 2019 20:43:18 GMT
A sci-fi open world set in an entire galaxy, or a portion of a galaxy, is super-difficult to realize.
I would say that the easiest way is: 1)a huge, open, main world, with a big modern city overflowing with life + dangerous wilderness all around. You spent 70% of time here, you have your HQ, tons of quests, random events, exploring etc. Pick the best of zelda + rdr2 + the witcher3 and make something good.
2) 10-12 smaller worlds/location where you go for specific quests. Maybe a couple you can go back when you want to do side-quests and such.
Anyway, it's a big challenge.
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Post by Andrew Lucas on Mar 23, 2019 2:22:42 GMT
Horizon Zero Dawn is not an example they should follow, the game is riddled with fetch quests and there's nothing dynamic about it, it's just pretty to look at it, it's static, same as Andromeda, but the AAA value is leagues above MEA so that makes it slighly more tolerable.
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mmoblitz
N3
USN-Retired
Games: Mass Effect Trilogy, Dragon Age: Origins, Dragon Age 2, Dragon Age Inquisition, KOTOR, Mass Effect Andromeda
Origin: mmoblitz
PSN: NotPC
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Post by mmoblitz on Mar 24, 2019 22:44:52 GMT
For me the best open world game has been skyrim. It has a decent main story and the side stuff, your going to have to look for it. That isn't it's strong point though, it's the exploration. In Skyrim I wanted to see what was in that cave I can see towards the top of the peak or I wonder whats in that old broken down shack? Some times my curiosity was rewarded with a cool boss battle or perhaps I would find a journal that would lead me on a quest for a rare weapon or piece of armor. Never once did I get that sense of accomplishment from MEA or even wanted to explore anything.
As mentioned I also liked how it was done in HZD and even in AC: Odyssey. If they want to use an open world and do the exploration theme, they need to set it up so you want to explore. Setup quests, companions, even love interests in various locations that don't have anything pointing you there. Reward the player for checking out that cave or whatever with something cool or start a quest chain. What I don't want to see is when you through something and kill everything around it, only to find nothing and then later, pick up a quest that takes you back there and you have to do it all over again.
There are plenty of dev studios that handle open world right, but so far, Bioware isn't one of them. I hope that changes in the future.
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Post by alanc9 on Mar 26, 2019 15:29:10 GMT
Well, part of the problem is that ME:A's design rules out rare weapons and armor. Or really, any kind of loot besides research points once you get the baseline mods you want.
Edit: another part is that the design deems to assume that you won't be doing this in some places. Particularly on Kadara, there are a lot of missions where either the people or objects relevant to the mission simply won't be present, or doors will be locked, if the mission isn't active. This suits me fine since driving aimlessly around looking for stuff never worked for me RP-wise -- I haven't liked this much since BG1 -- but if you are doing that, you won't find a lot of stuff because the game's hiding it from you.
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Praise the Justicat!
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Post by Pounce de León on Mar 26, 2019 15:50:37 GMT
... Too many developers create a giant world, then struggle to fill it with a good density of interesting content. .... ^^Such condensed, much insight, very understanding.
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Kabraxal
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Games: Mass Effect Trilogy, Dragon Age: Origins, Dragon Age 2, Dragon Age Inquistion, KOTOR, Baldur's Gate, Neverwinter Nights, Jade Empire, Mass Effect Andromeda
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Post by Kabraxal on Apr 1, 2019 0:42:45 GMT
I found ME:A to have done it pretty damn good. But then, this mystical “bursting with god tier content as side quests” idea has never flown with me. Every time I see that and the argued premiere example is The Witcher 3, Breath of the Wild, or a Skyrim... well, I just end up laughing because it’s hilarious how bias blinds people to the simple truth there is no open world title filled with the greatest quality side content and not just different levels of filler. It just depends on the filler you prefer.
Inquisition and Andromeda fill there worlds with content I like. Others like TW3 bored me to tears. It’s a matter of preference.
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Finished Dissertation long ago lol. Now happily employed :D
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Post by biggydx on Apr 1, 2019 21:06:42 GMT
So far at least, BioWare has shown they're able to make interesting enough worlds. They've even shown they have the ability to alter then drastically in Inquisition (ex. Crestwood). To me, their biggest hurdle is getting AI populations and behaviors right. There were outposts and settlements in certain zones of Inquisition, but the people there weren't fleshed out in terms of their AI scheduling. At this point, I'd argue that even Ubisoft has done a better job of this than BioWare; especially if you look at AC:Origins. NPC's would literally come over to you, if you were on fire, and try to stamp it out. They also had their own set routines and times they would fall asleep.
Then again, I also imagine how much (and what type) of immersion you need to carry you through. I know people who like open world RPG's (such as myself) prefer for large landmasses that can be traversed seamlessly, I think that would probably limit BioWare in taking players to places they've never been before. I'd rather theyd have numerous small to medium locales that are engrossing a tell a story, rather than one giant map littered with stuff I wouldn't care about.
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Post by river82 on Apr 1, 2019 21:24:52 GMT
I found ME:A to have done it pretty damn good. But then, this mystical “bursting with god tier content as side quests” idea has never flown with me. Every time I see that and the argued premiere example is The Witcher 3, Breath of the Wild, or a Skyrim... well, I just end up laughing because it’s hilarious how bias blinds people to the simple truth there is no open world title filled with the greatest quality side content and not just different levels of filler. It just depends on the filler you prefer. Inquisition and Andromeda fill there worlds with content I like. Others like TW3 bored me to tears. It’s a matter of preference. I have very rarely seen Skyrim argued to have "God tier sidequests" especially considering Morrowind and Oblivion were slammed for "cookie cutter fetch quests" IIRC. Skyrim gets the "this world is absolutely interesting to explore" part of the open world genre pretty much spot on. Their worlds feel like they have a history to it, they feel lived in. Andromeda's feels empty in comparison. Wide, beautiful, and superficial.
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