Should Mass Effect's newest installment change up the basic formula of storytelling? GamingBolt weighs in.
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Mass Effect: Andromeda - Redefining Storytelling
- Thread starter Aubrielle
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I've played hundreds of RPGs in my nearly three decades of gaming and many of them have been great and memorable, but none have reduced me to tears like Mass Effect. With or without ending controversy, this game has shed more of my mantears than anything else that I've ever watched, listened to or played and wasn't related to a personal, real event in my life.
We can measure a videogame's quality in many ways. Best graphics, best setting, best OST, best voice acting, etc. And it's possible that there have been many games objectively better than the Mass Effect trilogy, but none of them has stabbed me in the feels Mass Effect has. It's just now as I write this that I remember Captain Kirrahe's "We held the line" speech or Mordin going up that elevator after saying "it had to be me" and my eyes get instantly wet. And like those, dozens of other moments. That is BioWare's achievement, and makes it for me the best game trilogy I've ever had the pleasure to play.
I am very much looking forward to Andromeda, and hoping that I feel those stabs again - I certainly won't be wearing any armour against them.
We can measure a videogame's quality in many ways. Best graphics, best setting, best OST, best voice acting, etc. And it's possible that there have been many games objectively better than the Mass Effect trilogy, but none of them has stabbed me in the feels Mass Effect has. It's just now as I write this that I remember Captain Kirrahe's "We held the line" speech or Mordin going up that elevator after saying "it had to be me" and my eyes get instantly wet. And like those, dozens of other moments. That is BioWare's achievement, and makes it for me the best game trilogy I've ever had the pleasure to play.
I am very much looking forward to Andromeda, and hoping that I feel those stabs again - I certainly won't be wearing any armour against them.
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Nice post, Emerwyn.
As for the article - kind of useless - could pertain to every game, piece of software or any other form of art ever createdd. Sure, any author/creator could do things differently. Did someone need to write multiple paragraphs of nothing to state that?
All I can hope for is a decent PC experience. I don't like using controllers, won't ever buy a console, and often just can't fully get into games like ME due to how console'y they are. I have it in my mind to try to do ME2 again...but then, I have 20-25 games backlogged atm and fill my time with CDDA and now one last XCOM run before XCOM2 hits. And I could always finish Witcher 3 or Fallout 4 (or DAI, or... - I seem to rarely finish open world games with bazoodles of hours of gameplay...I just play, dink around with side quests eternally, and eventually have just had enough - main story isn't really all that important to me in those games).
As for the article - kind of useless - could pertain to every game, piece of software or any other form of art ever createdd. Sure, any author/creator could do things differently. Did someone need to write multiple paragraphs of nothing to state that?
All I can hope for is a decent PC experience. I don't like using controllers, won't ever buy a console, and often just can't fully get into games like ME due to how console'y they are. I have it in my mind to try to do ME2 again...but then, I have 20-25 games backlogged atm and fill my time with CDDA and now one last XCOM run before XCOM2 hits. And I could always finish Witcher 3 or Fallout 4 (or DAI, or... - I seem to rarely finish open world games with bazoodles of hours of gameplay...I just play, dink around with side quests eternally, and eventually have just had enough - main story isn't really all that important to me in those games).
luj1
SasqWatch
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Redifining bull shit
I expect world-shattering player choices
- Yes - No
or extremely deep RPG narratives…..
Will you romance - the transsexual from the Gamma system, or - the three-dicked slob from the Outer belt
I expect world-shattering player choices
- Yes - No
or extremely deep RPG narratives…..
Will you romance - the transsexual from the Gamma system, or - the three-dicked slob from the Outer belt
Last edited:
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BoboTheMighty
SasqWatch
"Comprehensive story"...did we play the same game(s)? Bioware has NEVER been good at crafting well paced and sensible narrative...what they do well, perhaps better than anyone, is create simplistic, "cliche" companion characters and somehow make them engaging.
Compared to Obsidian's cast, they are nowhere near as well written as Kreia, Atton, Durance and others, but they are more "goofy", colorful and there is a stronger emotional connection to them.
What BW should do, is play to their advantage and ditch their usual End of the world storylines...those always fail, under close scrutiny with Mass Effect being their biggest blunder.
Focus on more personal stories that concern immediate characters...it's easier on the C&C and they are always better paced.
Compared to Obsidian's cast, they are nowhere near as well written as Kreia, Atton, Durance and others, but they are more "goofy", colorful and there is a stronger emotional connection to them.
What BW should do, is play to their advantage and ditch their usual End of the world storylines...those always fail, under close scrutiny with Mass Effect being their biggest blunder.
Focus on more personal stories that concern immediate characters...it's easier on the C&C and they are always better paced.
I don't know BoboTheMighty as the NPC's & dialogues of Inquisition weren't bad. So I think we will see more games like Inquisition in the future from BioWare.
As they already tried something different in DA2, and it backfired.
Honestly, I'm getting more and more critical on Bioware's storytelling.
Yes, they have the budget, and yes, an enormous amount of work has been put into writing the game.
But... as the story gets more and more bombastic, the original meaning gets lost in the spectacle. Frankly, the supposedly epic plot arc of Mass Effect (SPOILER man vs machine SPOILER END) was totally drowned between the barrage of small-scale stuff (Jacob's father issues, the lamenting assassin, etc). Hence the SPOILER transformation of Sephard into a man-machine SPOILER END left me totally cold and I felt cheated.
IMHO this is the same situation as with today's star pulp writers:
Isaac Asimov was able to write the epic Foundation novel in about 300 pages.
Nowadays James S A Corey writes Leviathan in 1000+ pages.
I still remember the plot of Foundation, and I completely forgot what Leviathan was about.
I firmly believe that Bioware must get back to smaller epics, such as the original Baldur's. More focused, much more memorable (Boooo!) and absolutely less fat.
Yes, they have the budget, and yes, an enormous amount of work has been put into writing the game.
But... as the story gets more and more bombastic, the original meaning gets lost in the spectacle. Frankly, the supposedly epic plot arc of Mass Effect (SPOILER man vs machine SPOILER END) was totally drowned between the barrage of small-scale stuff (Jacob's father issues, the lamenting assassin, etc). Hence the SPOILER transformation of Sephard into a man-machine SPOILER END left me totally cold and I felt cheated.
IMHO this is the same situation as with today's star pulp writers:
Isaac Asimov was able to write the epic Foundation novel in about 300 pages.
Nowadays James S A Corey writes Leviathan in 1000+ pages.
I still remember the plot of Foundation, and I completely forgot what Leviathan was about.
I firmly believe that Bioware must get back to smaller epics, such as the original Baldur's. More focused, much more memorable (Boooo!) and absolutely less fat.
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Foundation started as 8 short stories published in a magazine before being turned into three ~300 pages novels years later. Not quite the same type of books.
I'll give you that BioWare should scale down their stories though. They are entering caricature level of "save the world" real fast.
Saying that, ME:Andromeda themes are being pushed as space exploration and (xeno-)archaeology while trying to find a new home for "humans". I expect a very crude representation of colonialism instead of "save the world".
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BoboTheMighty
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You have to admit this is pretty damn hillarious, when you try to picture a Reaper delivering CoD taunts , half way across the galaxy.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OaRdcVYTjRw
Few of them even mention Shepard.
You have to admit this is pretty damn hillarious, when you try to picture a Reaper delivering CoD taunts , half way across the galaxy.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OaRdcVYTjRw
Few of them even mention Shepard.
Hilarious!
In booming voice:
Shepard, don't you find funny, Shepard, that the world is at the brink of destruction, Shepard, yet you are flirting with an octopus-headed alien, Shepard.
Never mind Shepard, I am just a goofy plot device, so, Shepard, just deal with your weirdo sex appetite, Shepard, I am waiting patiently, Shepard. (Can I watch, Shepard?)
Shepard, the world ends with you, Shepard.
Also, Shepard, know this: thanks to Bioware, you cannot be renamed from Shepard to Katzenberg. You must die for that, Shepard.
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I also found the stories memorable and the ME series very emotional at times. I was totally into it even though I could only ever play it once, like most current Bioware stories. I see the ME games, like DAI, as almost a movie you play through.
I like the characters and stories. I find many of the games that try to create artsy characters that are suppose to be hip and special often just end up bizarre or unenjoyable. Like some of the new ones in the expansion to Pillars of Eternity. I have so little interest in them I don't even plan on getting the expansion.
Just my play style I suspect as I am the same when it comes to books. I like some depth and emotion to characters but they don't have to be some twisted personality with mental issues. Cliche has never bothered me as long as I enjoy the setting and game overall.
I like the characters and stories. I find many of the games that try to create artsy characters that are suppose to be hip and special often just end up bizarre or unenjoyable. Like some of the new ones in the expansion to Pillars of Eternity. I have so little interest in them I don't even plan on getting the expansion.
Just my play style I suspect as I am the same when it comes to books. I like some depth and emotion to characters but they don't have to be some twisted personality with mental issues. Cliche has never bothered me as long as I enjoy the setting and game overall.