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BioWare Calls Dragon Age 4 a Single-Player game "Built on Choices that Matter"

DonkeyPunchJr

World’s Biggest Weeb
I actually really liked Inquisition, it was the last good game BioWare made. I’d be very happy if they make a decent follow up.

That said I have absolutely zero faith in BioWare today. No expectations of a good game. If they deliver, I will be pleasantly surprised.
 

Georome

Member
WRPGs have some weird fixation towards choice and consequence, something that most JRPGs don't really bother with.
It usually ends up making players think that every choice in the game has some major world changing impact in the game or the devs corner themselves into something like the ME3 ending.

Yeah, good point. I never really understood the burning desire to have these choices matter. Even when I was young, I intuitively knew that having choices change the game would lead to 2, 4, 8, 16, 32, 64, 128, ... n different games, which wouldn't be feasible to actually program. So in the end, it's most likely going to be a choice of a small group of scenarios. I guess I would rather just navigate a single storyline than try to worry about which scenario my choices will trigger.
 

DonkeyPunchJr

World’s Biggest Weeb
And if we’re making predictions about wokeness, my prediction is that all straight male characters will either be:

1. milquetoast beta males who gladly defer to others

2. Cocksure authority figures who constantly make wrong/foolish decisions so that the others can correct them

3. Villains
 

Werewolf Jones

Gold Member
What an awful early 2010s buzz phrase that people bought into it. Remember games where choices matter, like every Telltale games release?
 

Rest

All these years later I still chuckle at what a fucking moron that guy is.
Where have I heard that lie before?
 

Andodalf

Banned
I honestly likely the story of Inquisition. I want to see if they can make this one at least on the same level. Fingers crossed.
The overarching narrative of the dragon age universe is very interesting, and the games do a good job of displaying the scale of different events.
 

RiccochetJ

Gold Member
I enjoyed Inquisition quite a bit. Much better than DA2 and the trials of the perpetually reused cave system. I'm hopeful for this one and hope that Bioware can get back on track. I have to think that this game and ME:4 are their last chances to turn things around before EA will have to make a decision about what the future of Bioware as a studio in Edmonton actually is. I think Bioware Austin is relatively safe.
 

RavageX

Member
DA 2 was awful, but I did enjoy DA I. Dont understand the hate behind it. I didnt care for some of the characters but was pleased with it otherwise.
 

poppabk

Cheeks Spread for Digital Only Future
Surprised Jocelyn GIF by Schitt's Creek's Creek
A. "Tell me more about the mission"
B. "What will the mission entail"
C. "Let's hear about the mission"
D. Have sex with them
 
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How many times have we heard this line in countless game PR/marketing statements? STFU and work on the game. You have so much to prove Bioware. If you haven't noticed lately, your reputation is in the gutter.
 

Y0ssarian

Banned
I really liked Inquisition. It was one of the better games I played last year. Andromeda was ok and Anthem was fun for 15 hours or so. Picked up all these games for cheap.

I am looking forward to DA4, will probably pick it up release week, assuming reviews aren't carp
 

Tschumi

Member
Inquisition wasn't that bad tbh. I remain cautiously hopeful.
I like the inquisition story, but i found the gameplay to be pretty bland.. the worlds seemed less meaningful than even Ubisoft open worlds, the combat really lacked lunch, the choice to align the gameplay to the old republic was pretty grating

Yeah no fun for me. I hope that retain the scope, the story, but readdress combat and exploration.
 
Okay, how you you have ended the game? Keep in mind you have a deadline, budget, and if you write a personal fanfic ending, you have to make that for a million other people, going far over budget and time.
Since the illusion of choice was so shattered by that ending, the obvious thing would have been to just focus on writing a good general story wrap-up with things built up to regardless of player agency. See: Whatever JRPGs that don't go for some "subversive" or "mindscrew" plot ending. Actually, maybe a subversive one could have worked; After all, the illusion of choice was already destroyed, so you may as well roll with it and explicitly un-do choices the player made to rub it in, at least then the player might think there's some kind of narrative purpose in subverting their options. But yeah, I was thinking more along the lines of a typical "trilogy" ending would be serviceable. You could even reduce the budget required for this since you technically wouldn't be writing "3" very similar endings.

Heck, let's make an exercise out of this; Imagine the ending is mostly the same but the game makes it a point to discuss your lack of options, rather than put up a mask with fake options. I bet a simple detail such as that would improve the ending.
 

Andodalf

Banned
Since the illusion of choice was so shattered by that ending, the obvious thing would have been to just focus on writing a good general story wrap-up with things built up to regardless of player agency. See: Whatever JRPGs that don't go for some "subversive" or "mindscrew" plot ending. Actually, maybe a subversive one could have worked; After all, the illusion of choice was already destroyed, so you may as well roll with it and explicitly un-do choices the player made to rub it in, at least then the player might think there's some kind of narrative purpose in subverting their options. But yeah, I was thinking more along the lines of a typical "trilogy" ending would be serviceable. You could even reduce the budget required for this since you technically wouldn't be writing "3" very similar endings.

Heck, let's make an exercise out of this; Imagine the ending is mostly the same but the game makes it a point to discuss your lack of options, rather than put up a mask with fake options. I bet a simple detail such as that would improve the ending.
Lol people would hate this even more. People don’t like having their expectations subverted, especially when what they’re subverted by isn’t compelling, like the Star Wars sequel trilogy.
 
Remember when devs didn’t have to explain that their game is single player ahead of time…when we just knew, based on how a franchise had been in the past? Yea, sad state that the video games industry is in these days.
 

Spukc

always chasing the next thrill
No PVP no BR mode? No battlepass? No seasonpass? Not even NFT’s?

Fuck this i’m out.
 
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Topher

Gold Member
Inquisition wasn't that bad tbh. I remain cautiously hopeful.

Inquisition was a lot of fun. The only real complaint I had about the game was that the dialogue choices and what my character actually said were often incredibly out of whack. It is as if the game wanted to trick you into saying something that would get a negative reaction. That shit got old.
 

Doom85

Member
Hopefully a new story so people don't have to revisit previous games..

That’d be kind of rude to fans seeing as the final DLC of Inquisition ended on a massive sequel hook. Not that there’s anything to speculate about if it will or not, as the final shot of the Game Awards teaser pretty much confirms this will follow what the prior game set up.
 

Inspector Q

Member
I thought Inquisition was....freaking terrible. It's like they took the feedback about DA2's repetitive environments and just put all of their efforts into creating these gigantic open worlds. Then at the end of the dev cycle they were like "Oh shit, we actually need to add things to do in these massive environments!!!!" What we got was a bunch of random notes scattered around the environment. Little to no interesting characters to interact with.

Maybe we could meet with the leader of the Templars or Mages in the Hinterlands and alter the course of the war? Nope.

Remember that Hand of Korth guy or whatever the heck his name was in that one swampy area? You fight your way to him and when you finally get there you can't interact with him in any meaningful way. No classic Bioware-style dialogue windows with loads of options. Instead, he's just another random big guy to kill. Doesn't even fight differently from all the other enemies in the game. Completely worthless...

There were some decent moments in the game that usually took place during those main quests like that one where you had to go to The Ball or whatever.

Basically, the game felt like two separate games. You had the Main Story quests that felt more along the lines of what you would normally expect from a Bioware game, but then you also had these gigantic open worlds with little to no storytelling. Just giant zones with boring enemies, boring documents, boring sidequests. Just a complete slog...and it made up 95% of the game.

Anyway, sorry for the rant, but Bioware has been a complete letdown for a while now. Giant, pretty environments don't mean shit if you don't fill them with anything of worth. If Tevinter is anything like DAI's version of Orlais...we are in for a real shitshow, lol.
 
Lol people would hate this even more. People don’t like having their expectations subverted, especially when what they’re subverted by isn’t compelling, like the Star Wars sequel trilogy.
I know it's not the ideal, but c'mon, what the ME fanbase were offered in comparison is basically "Yes, but actually no."

You could probably do SOMETHING with that set of rules and mindset in consideration that would be better than "choose between blue, green and red explosions." There's ways to be subversive that can work. (Not that I'd trust any modern schlock writer to do so, but nevertheless...)
 
Choice is good, but it only makes sense if you build the game around that mechanic from the ground up, and everything emerges from the choices you make. If it is just some half-baked supplementary mechanic that sends you on an arbitrary branching path for a moment, I don't see the point. People will just have another save loaded so as not to 'miss anything' or they will watch the results on YouTube. Make it really matter or else focus on other things imo.
 

TheStam

Member
I'm totally with you, haha. The freedom to choose what kind of person you want your character to be defined these franchises for me. The more varied choices really helped the replay ability of these games. I would play as the good guy first time round then I could go back through just being as outrageous as possible for fun. I think this is what I have missed the most.

KOTOR was damn cool in that regard, as your choices even impacted your character build with dark side / Light side force powers, altough I think you could use the other one with a force point penalty or something like that. Dark Side space wizard with shock was so OP.
 

anthraticus

Banned
Nothing wrong with choices and consequences as long as it's done well. The problem is that doing it well requires making the game 2 times bigger or more and creating content a lot of people won't see. I have some serious doubt that EA is willing to overproduce any game.

Could be a good way to deal with different ideologies though. You could have the path where you dye your hair purple, the path where you are lecher and the traditional high fantasy path.
Exactamundo. Having good choices & consequences/reactivity inherently means you're gonna be locking players out of content. A big no no when you're making these cinematic AAA type games, as they're not gonna create all this content that never gets seen by players.
 

Edgelord79

Gold Member
I remember buying Inquisition Day 1 and being so excited.

I remember my disappointment after playing through about 10 hours. This was when I realized BioWare as I knew it didn't exist any longer. The magic had gone and instead it was replaced with something that didn't connect with me.

I will not be purchasing Dragon Age 4.
 
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