Dragon Age: Inquisition Pre-Release Thread

[Delterius]

No. Those classics were no mainstream because there was no mainstream. We have a gaming culture now.

Dragon Age sells less than 5 million copies worldwide. This is not super mainstream. DotA 2 is.

 

[eremita]

No. Those classics were no mainstream because there was no mainstream. We have a gaming culture now.

Dragon Age sells less than 5 million copies worldwide. This is not super mainstream. DotA 2 is.

Mainstream != profits. Failed blockbuster is still a blockbuster. But the main reason why DAO sold less than 5m copies is that party based tactical RPGs are still just a half way through to become a part of mainstream games in general.

Laidlaw thinks he can make RPGs accessible for new players. Imho, he certainly don't want to destroy RPG genre, but create new RPG players. He therefore thinks it's justified for genre to evolve. Wheter that means evolution or decline remains to be seen. In my opinion he's failing because majority of his new players are intrigued by creating their own avatar with whom they can interact in the world, while basically storming through combat on casual difficulty. Yet he insists on tactical combat being a huge part of the game. He's catering to core audience as well as casual hoping they will merge.

 

[Delterius]

No. Those classics were no mainstream because there was no mainstream. We have a gaming culture now.

Dragon Age sells less than 5 million copies worldwide. This is not super mainstream. DotA 2 is.

Mainstream != profits. Failed blockbuster is still a blockbuster. But the main reason why DAO sold less than 5m copies is that party based tactical RPGs are still just a half way through to become a part of mainstream games in general.

So 10 million copies, that's your definition of mainstream? Why not 5 million? Or 1 million in 1997? Or 10 thousand in the 1970s?

 

[Angthoron]

BIOWARE

What the fuck is this

 

[Jaesun]

Do you only read the last page of threads?

 

[eremita]

No. Those classics were no mainstream because there was no mainstream. We have a gaming culture now.

Dragon Age sells less than 5 million copies worldwide. This is not super mainstream. DotA 2 is.

Mainstream != profits. Failed blockbuster is still a blockbuster. But the main reason why DAO sold less than 5m copies is that party based tactical RPGs are still just a half way through to become a part of mainstream games in general.

So 10 million copies, that's your definition of mainstream? Why not 5 million? Or 1 million in 1997? Or 10 thousand in the 1970s?

No. In 1998 BW sold 3m copies of BG. How much would game like BG sold today and why?

GTA sold 20m copies. If there was a clone of GTA selling 1m, would you not call it mainstream? Profit shows much, sure, but that's not all there is when defining something as mainstream.

 

[Caim]

BIOWARE

What the fuck is this

Bioware, obviously. Says so right in the bolded text above the images.

 

[imweasel]

But the main reason why DAO sold less than 5m copies is that party based tactical RPGs are still just a half way through to become a part of mainstream games in general.

DA:O has sold more than 5 million copies.

According to vgchartz 4.5 million physical copies have been sold to date. Add digitial sales on top of that.

 

[Delterius]

No. Those classics were no mainstream because there was no mainstream. We have a gaming culture now.

Dragon Age sells less than 5 million copies worldwide. This is not super mainstream. DotA 2 is.

Mainstream != profits. Failed blockbuster is still a blockbuster. But the main reason why DAO sold less than 5m copies is that party based tactical RPGs are still just a half way through to become a part of mainstream games in general.

So 10 million copies, that's your definition of mainstream? Why not 5 million? Or 1 million in 1997? Or 10 thousand in the 1970s?

No. In 1998 BW sold 3m copies of BG. How much would game like BG sold today and why?

GTA sold 20m copies. If there was a clone of GTA selling 1m, would you not call it mainstream?

That's another issue entirely. Wether or not a game strictly like BG can pull similar numbers is different to claiming that there was no mainstream of gaming 10 years ago because the numbers were smaller.

But the main reason why DAO sold less than 5m copies is that party based tactical RPGs are still just a half way through to become a part of mainstream games in general.

DA:O has sold more than 5 million copies.

According to vgchartz 4.5 million physical copies have been sold to date. Add digitial sales on top of that.

When I brought 5 millions up I meant on the weeks of release, meaning strictly at its prime. Long term even Planescape can pull a few milion.

 

[Stainless Veteran]

BIOWARE

What the fuck is this

Well, if you're looking for the source, it's this. Some tumblerina, gif afficianado, hardcore bioware fan, author of such ~*masterpices*~ as:

etc.

 

[Angthoron]

Well, if you're looking for the source, it's this. Some tumblerina, gif afficianado, hardcore bioware fan, author of such ~*masterpices*~ as:

etc.

Uhh, thanks, I think. Not sure. Answers my question though!

Edit: Oh, holy shit, wow

 

[Azrael the cat]

Oh God, are you for real?! Okay. First this: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mainstream Are you done reading? Great. Now look up the era of Black Isle publishing Torment and Fallout. Now compare it to present state of Gaming Industry. See the difference? You should because it's pretty fucking big... By the very definition of mainstream, there's none when new (sub)culture emerges. So again, I'm not talking about period of time (you still are, applying today's standards on era, which was abolutely unique in every aspect), but about mainstream category. In mainstream world, those games would never happened. Nobody played Fallout and Torment...

Just look at new Torment - see how it's funded, developed, to whom is it marketed and what are they trying to achieve with it...

Actually it is you who is applying today's standards on a past era.

Fallout, Baldur's Gate and Planescape: Torment were all the cutting edge and the mainstream of their time. The same can be said about Wizadry and Ultima a decade prior. All of these series were profitable and all of them were played by a sizable portion of their time's gaming community. That Baldur's Gate grew to become the 'classic' that people herald it to be is History.

Wizadry, Isometric Fallout and Torment, each became part of a strong and cohesive, if small and niche genre. Ultimate would still live on further as an MMO and its greatest entries, IV, VII and Underworld, influenced countless of the greatest franchises we have today. The same can be said about Wizadry, which built a legacy across the pacific. And everyone and their mother cites Planescape Torment as a standard for excellence in video game writing. If anything, the past few years have shown, is that the legacy built by these games is no less than that of Baldur's Gate.

In light of that we can't stop at the numbers that well marketed and funded games from EA can (and absolutely MUST) pull and say 'well, that's the mainstream gaming, certain criticism doesn't apply'. I do think that Dragon Age is probably above average when it comes to writing in AAA gaming in general but that's no excuse for unholy things like Merril.

No. Those classics were no mainstream because there was no mainstream. We have a gaming culture now. Back then, the culture was just emerging, so products of that future culture couldn't be defined. Only when there's established culture can we talk about something common, because we have means to analyze it. RPGCodex as an idea was only possible because mentioned culture was taking shape. Codex is not against evolution (its members would be dumb then), but against decline. "Something" not established can't decline.

By today's standards, BG falls in certain category. That category is now considered niche. That category was nonexistent back then. Therefore, when I'm not talking about period of time, I meant era where statements like "Bioware is still above average by mainstream standards." doesn't make any sense. The same waythis statement by Athelas is nonsensical: "They were mainstream games that were profitable (Fallout even got several sequels in a short amount of time), just nowhere as much as the smash hit that was Baldur's Gate." So no, I am not aplying today's standards, thanks to existing gaming culture, I do have standards at all.

Just look at new Torment - see how it's funded, developed, to whom is it marketed and what are they trying to achieve with it...

You could say the same thing about Pillars of Eternity, which raised less than T:ToN by the way. Does that suddenly mean Baldur's Gate wasn't mainstream?

Baldur's Gate wasn't mainstream because, again, there was no mainstream. Therefore, when Obsidian anounced PoE, those bazillion of Bioware customers didn't give a shit. Why? It was a supposed to be a spiritual successor to a Bioware game, so why Kickstarter? But there was no term like "Bioware game" back then, it's meaningless. There is audience for BG now, there was no audience for BG then, because there were no means hot to define audience for anything at all.

Okay, maybe not 'mainstream', but certainly not underground. They had at least the same kind of cultural penetration as pre-major-studio-signing 1980s REM or Janes Addiction - a diehard following, but with no means of breaking out into the mass market. I remember talking BG and PS:T with friends and random tavern acquaintances at uni - most people wouldn't have been into it, but it wasn't hard to find people who were, even in a generalist location like a university tavern.

 

[eremita]

No. Those classics were no mainstream because there was no mainstream. We have a gaming culture now.

Dragon Age sells less than 5 million copies worldwide. This is not super mainstream. DotA 2 is.

Mainstream != profits. Failed blockbuster is still a blockbuster. But the main reason why DAO sold less than 5m copies is that party based tactical RPGs are still just a half way through to become a part of mainstream games in general.

So 10 million copies, that's your definition of mainstream? Why not 5 million? Or 1 million in 1997? Or 10 thousand in the 1970s?

No. In 1998 BW sold 3m copies of BG. How much would game like BG sold today and why?

GTA sold 20m copies. If there was a clone of GTA selling 1m, would you not call it mainstream?

That's another issue entirely. Wether or not a game strictly like BG can pull similar numbers is different to claiming that there was no mainstream of gaming 10 years ago because the numbers were smaller.

But the main reason why DAO sold less than 5m copies is that party based tactical RPGs are still just a half way through to become a part of mainstream games in general.

DA:O has sold more than 5 million copies.

According to vgchartz 4.5 million physical copies have been sold to date. Add digitial sales on top of that.

When I brought 5 millions up I meant on the weeks of release, meaning strictly at its prime. Long term even Planescape can pull a few milion.

So what exactly are we talking about here now? I have no problem discussing this further but i don't see what's your point now. I claim this: 1) There was no mainstream 15 years ago. 2) With Dragon Age, Bioware is still not quite sure what's their target audience. 3) When something doesn't sell much, there might be a lot of factors. But if something sells a lot, it had to impress masses with something.

 

[Delterius]

So what exactly are we talking about here now? I have no problem discussing this further but i don't see what's your point now. I claim this: 1) There was no mainstream 15 years ago. 2) With Dragon Age, Bioware is still not quite sure what's their target audience. 3) When something doesn't sell much, there might be a lot of factors. But if something sells a lot, it had to impress masses with something.

Two and three are reasonable. One doesn't make sense. Of course there was a mainstream of gaming 15 years ago, one that set up many of the rules for how things work even today. If 20 or 10 years from now a release like GTA routinely sells 100 or 200 million copies, will it be 2014 that didn't have a mainstream of gaming? The very concept of mainstream depends on the universe you are looking at.

 

[Abu Antar]

Been playing around with the Keep. I surprisingly remember a lot of the choices I made in the first game. Not so much in the second. Can't even remember who some of the people are.

 

[eremita]

Oh God, are you for real?! Okay. First this: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mainstream Are you done reading? Great. Now look up the era of Black Isle publishing Torment and Fallout. Now compare it to present state of Gaming Industry. See the difference? You should because it's pretty fucking big... By the very definition of mainstream, there's none when new (sub)culture emerges. So again, I'm not talking about period of time (you still are, applying today's standards on era, which was abolutely unique in every aspect), but about mainstream category. In mainstream world, those games would never happened. Nobody played Fallout and Torment...

Just look at new Torment - see how it's funded, developed, to whom is it marketed and what are they trying to achieve with it...

Actually it is you who is applying today's standards on a past era.

Fallout, Baldur's Gate and Planescape: Torment were all the cutting edge and the mainstream of their time. The same can be said about Wizadry and Ultima a decade prior. All of these series were profitable and all of them were played by a sizable portion of their time's gaming community. That Baldur's Gate grew to become the 'classic' that people herald it to be is History.

Wizadry, Isometric Fallout and Torment, each became part of a strong and cohesive, if small and niche genre. Ultimate would still live on further as an MMO and its greatest entries, IV, VII and Underworld, influenced countless of the greatest franchises we have today. The same can be said about Wizadry, which built a legacy across the pacific. And everyone and their mother cites Planescape Torment as a standard for excellence in video game writing. If anything, the past few years have shown, is that the legacy built by these games is no less than that of Baldur's Gate.

In light of that we can't stop at the numbers that well marketed and funded games from EA can (and absolutely MUST) pull and say 'well, that's the mainstream gaming, certain criticism doesn't apply'. I do think that Dragon Age is probably above average when it comes to writing in AAA gaming in general but that's no excuse for unholy things like Merril.

No. Those classics were no mainstream because there was no mainstream. We have a gaming culture now. Back then, the culture was just emerging, so products of that future culture couldn't be defined. Only when there's established culture can we talk about something common, because we have means to analyze it. RPGCodex as an idea was only possible because mentioned culture was taking shape. Codex is not against evolution (its members would be dumb then), but against decline. "Something" not established can't decline.

By today's standards, BG falls in certain category. That category is now considered niche. That category was nonexistent back then. Therefore, when I'm not talking about period of time, I meant era where statements like "Bioware is still above average by mainstream standards." doesn't make any sense. The same waythis statement by Athelas is nonsensical: "They were mainstream games that were profitable (Fallout even got several sequels in a short amount of time), just nowhere as much as the smash hit that was Baldur's Gate." So no, I am not aplying today's standards, thanks to existing gaming culture, I do have standards at all.

Just look at new Torment - see how it's funded, developed, to whom is it marketed and what are they trying to achieve with it...

You could say the same thing about Pillars of Eternity, which raised less than T:ToN by the way. Does that suddenly mean Baldur's Gate wasn't mainstream?

Baldur's Gate wasn't mainstream because, again, there was no mainstream. Therefore, when Obsidian anounced PoE, those bazillion of Bioware customers didn't give a shit. Why? It was a supposed to be a spiritual successor to a Bioware game, so why Kickstarter? But there was no term like "Bioware game" back then, it's meaningless. There is audience for BG now, there was no audience for BG then, because there were no means hot to define audience for anything at all.

Okay, maybe not 'mainstream', but certainly not underground. They had at least the same kind of cultural penetration as pre-major-studio-signing 1980s REM or Janes Addiction - a diehard following, but with no means of breaking out into the mass market. I remember talking BG and PS:T with friends and random tavern acquaintances at uni - most people wouldn't have been into it, but it wasn't hard to find people who were, even in a generalist location like a university tavern.

At uni? okay How about among mainstream? Just about anyone today is a gamer...

 

[Jaesun]

According to vgchartz 4.5 million physical copies have been sold to date. Add digitial sales on top of that.

Those are not sales numbers. vgcharts uses magical fake made up numbers they pull from their ass. NPD uses actual sales data.

Just FYI

 

[Lhynn]

There was no mainstream 15 years ago because computer games hadnt reached the masses. Now they have, and we get dumb shit.

End of discussion.

 

[eremita]

So what exactly are we talking about here now? I have no problem discussing this further but i don't see what's your point now. I claim this: 1) There was no mainstream 15 years ago. 2) With Dragon Age, Bioware is still not quite sure what's their target audience. 3) When something doesn't sell much, there might be a lot of factors. But if something sells a lot, it had to impress masses with something.

Two and three are reasonable. One doesn't make sense. Of course there was a mainstream of gaming 15 years ago, one that set up many of the rules for how things work even today. If 20 or 10 years from now a release like GTA routinely sells 100 or 200 million copies, will it be 2014 that didn't have a mainstream of gaming? The very concept of mainstream depends on the universe you are looking at.

Okay, hopefully I'll answer that by more detailed explanation. In science, there's something called "mainstream" views/theories. That's mainstream among scientists, that's already a niche group of people. Same with grognards for example. The reason why we can speak confidently about mainstream within these kind of groups is because they are very unlikely to change, meaning in a sense of incorporating someone else than another scientist or grognard. The group of scientists won't include white trash. Thus, those groups are basically defined and only in case of defined group (or culture), we can speak about mainstream. But that is not the case with gaming culture. Gaming culture concerns just about anyone now(same as movies/music) - the set of gamers is much much more diverse. As a group, it's defined by that now. But that happened only recently, it was not so 15 years ago (especially with CRPGs). There was no gaming culture back then, we can only speak about some kind of (gaming) subculture arising from entertainment culture. So there was no mainstream in this nonexistent culture because back then it was just an arising subculture and I refuse to speak about mainstream in case of subculture, which will eventually evolve in much more diverse group (creating today's gaming culture). Today, gaming group is defined. Today, BG/Torment/Fallout are within certain categories. Back then, there was no mainstream, because there was no culture called gaming which would be characteristic by consisting of "just about anyone" (hillbillies and scientists rejoice!).

So that answers your question I believe. It doesn't matter how much copies will future GTA sells because mainstream is already present (thanks to defined group) and will be the same (it doesn't matter how much people there actually are in a group, it only matters what kind of people are in this group and gaming culture is already "locked" in this regard imho).

 

[pippin]

This discussion about mainstream on the internet is so mainstream.

 

[dryan]

thread was ruined after an hours

 

[DemonKing]

Does anyone really care if DA3 is good (for what it is) or not? I still haven't finished my first playthroughs of WL2, D:OS and LoG2 and already got to enjoy and finish Blackguards & M&MX this year. I've got PoE, Blackguards 2 and Witcher 3 to look forward to early next year...there's really no space in my gaming calendar for anything as crapworthy as DA2 turned out to be. If the general vibe around DA:I is that it's on par with DA:O I'll probably pick it up on discount sometime but at this point in time any CRPG fan is so spoiled for choice it will be no great loss if this is a disasterpiece.

 

[Nihiliste]

There will inevitably be a 3 year gap while we wait for sequels/future projects for all these recent games to come out. It would be nice to have something to play to kill a bit of the time.

 

[imweasel]

According to vgchartz 4.5 million physical copies have been sold to date. Add digitial sales on top of that.

Those are not sales numbers. vgcharts uses magical fake made up numbers they pull from their ass. NPD uses actual sales data.

Just FYI

I guess. *shrug*

Anyway, DA:O sold 3.2 million units after 3 months, i'm pretty sure they have sold more than 5 million physical and digital units since then.

 

[Jaesun]

i'm pretty sure they have sold more than 5 million physical and digital units since then.

Pulling magical numbers out of your ass is not sales numbers. That's what vgcharts does.