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Decline This is what is wrong with cRpgs today

octavius

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Cutscenes, interactive movies, voice acting and the word "visceral" only make me appreciate books and ancient computer games even more.
 

Daemongar

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MY opinion of cut-scenes depends on the type of cut-scene:
1. Player loses control of character and view switches to first person. Player sees all that is going on but can't do anything (but maybe pick railroaded conversation options) Think FO3/NV/Oblvion/Skyrim/DE:HR
2. Player is on the screen. Text/Speech of what is going on. Lots happens while the player stands there or does pre-gen stuff: U7SI, Diablo 3, Fallout 1 & 2, Warcraft 3
3. Video plays that may (or may not) have something to do with prior events. A true video of things usually in an unrelated style from the game itself, which may be modified based on prior events (but usually isn't): U9 interactions with Raven and Guardian, FO1&2 ending video, most other games.
4. Any of the above that conveys info of other parts of the land that has something to do with the story itself. Evil guy plots on throne, invisible nemesis sends orders from the shadows/hires assassins, player home town is burnt down. Think of ... all games.

On the tolerability scale, maybe number 2 above is the most bearable, because they are usually short. However, they can all be insanely annoying when overused. My beef with games like DA:O is the use of all three above: Here is a video, then we'll take control of your character, then a conversation you only get to pick shit from, then you fight, then repeat.
 

mutonizer

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Uhm, i think this goes best for children who have a more fertile imagination.
I've yet to meet any kid would can "out imagination" me and surely not control it properly. That said, as I said, I agree it's very personal and others will have completely different experiences and approaches to this.
 

Keldryn

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Problem with cRPGs nowadays?
You got people who should be game designers who think they are artistic primadonas and movie directors and instead of focusing on allowing you, the player, to tell the story of your characters, they want to tell their own stories.

This can be an issue in any interactive medium. Some web designers are obsessed with maintaining the integrity of their site designs, regardless of the user's screen resolution. I suppose some artists are just control freaks.

I think that a lot of game designers have lost sight of what made cutscenes in a video/computer game cool in the first place. They were rewarding because they would generally be pushing the limits of what the then-current hardware could accomplish; you got to see brief glimpses of the game at a level of fidelity that simply wasn't feasible in the game itself. It was a peek at what might be possible in the future (to be able to play an entire game that looked like that).

Those cutscenes were both infrequent and brief, as they were expensive to produce and required a wildly disproportionate amount of disk space.

My poster child for RPG cutscenes gone totally out of control is Xenosaga Episode I (PS2). I sold the game after about 5 hours of "play" time, when after 45 minutes of barely touching the controller, I finally got to play again and then I triggered another cutscene 5 minutes later. This game has save points during cutscenes.

Well, as a counterexample cutscenes in Max Payne 3 are top notch. Didn't stop them from making game significantly shittier than it could be anyway. Having controls taken away from you every 5-10 seconds is incredibly annoying in any type of game regardless of cutscene quality.

Yeah, I was surprised by the volume and frequency of cutscenes that ended up in the game. When I left, we had been putting some placeholder cutscenes into the game levels (scripting the rough animations and camera moves by hand), and the design docs generally just had cutscenes bookending segments of gameplay. But, as I've stated previously, the design of the game got progressively more linear, scripted, and cinematic over time. The "Max as narrator and travel guide" vibe wasn't something that we were shooting for when I was designing my levels. I suspect that, had I stayed on with the studio, that my "games are not movies, stop trying to make the game feel like a movie" attitude would have gotten me in a lot of trouble. :)
 

the_shadow

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MY opinion of cut-scenes depends on the type of cut-scene:
1. Player loses control of character and view switches to first person. Player sees all that is going on but can't do anything (but maybe pick railroaded conversation options) Think FO3/NV/Oblvion/Skyrim/DE:HR

I don't remember Skyrim or Fallout: New Vegas having any cutscenes where you lose control of your character. If they do, they aren't that common.
 

Daemongar

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MY opinion of cut-scenes depends on the type of cut-scene:
1. Player loses control of character and view switches to first person. Player sees all that is going on but can't do anything (but maybe pick railroaded conversation options) Think FO3/NV/Oblvion/Skyrim/DE:HR

I don't remember Skyrim or Fallout: New Vegas having any cutscenes where you lose control of your character. If they do, they aren't that common.
The play shifts to first person, you are welcome to bob your head or mouselook, but you lose control of your character. "Wait there, citizen... here comes the Jarl!" "Ah, so you are the one everyone has been talking about... blah blah blah." They happen pretty often in Skyrim. Think about the introduction to the game, where you are on a cart, you can look around but not do anything. That happens quite a bit with almost every introduction or new scene. Stand here and look around while something happens outside your control... You still have 'control', but you can't influence anything.
 
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Not to mention, Skyrim often takes control away from the player during combat (kill cams).
 

DalekFlay

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The play shifts to first person, you are welcome to bob your head or mouselook, but you lose control of your character. "Wait there, citizen... here comes the Jarl!" "Ah, so you are the one everyone has been talking about... blah blah blah." They happen pretty often in Skyrim. Think about the introduction to the game, where you are on a cart, you can look around but not do anything. That happens quite a bit with almost every introduction or new scene. Stand here and look around while something happens outside your control... You still have 'control', but you can't influence anything.

That happens pretty rarely in Skyrim, and barely at all in the previous Bethesda games. If we're complaining about cutscenes and lack of player control the Bethesda games are the last examples I would use.
 

Daemongar

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The play shifts to first person, you are welcome to bob your head or mouselook, but you lose control of your character. "Wait there, citizen... here comes the Jarl!" "Ah, so you are the one everyone has been talking about... blah blah blah." They happen pretty often in Skyrim. Think about the introduction to the game, where you are on a cart, you can look around but not do anything. That happens quite a bit with almost every introduction or new scene. Stand here and look around while something happens outside your control... You still have 'control', but you can't influence anything.

That happens pretty rarely in Skyrim, and barely at all in the previous Bethesda games. If we're complaining about cutscenes and lack of player control the Bethesda games are the last examples I would use.
Not really important how often it happens in Skyrim. It was an example of how cut-scenes are handled in Skyrim. Ironically, I was watching someone play at the ... Council of Greybeards or something tonight. Here they are around the table. The player can headbob, and whatnot, but it goes on for about 5 minutes (or so it seemed.) Arguments, all that, but the player can't move while the story is advanced. Skyrim may do it less than others, but it is indicative of the genre I'm mentioning. (if this helps you understand the part I'm talking about, after this council, you have to trap a dragon.)

I was using that form of cut-scene to contrast with a FO2 cut-scene (family getting executed in the desert) or a Diablo cutscene where you have to wait for an angel/demon to tell you his life story before you kill him for the 47th time looking for drops.

Not to mention, Skyrim often takes control away from the player during combat (kill cams).
I don't see slow-mo-kill-cam in the same league as cutscene. Even more horrible, though.
 
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If the player stops to talk to other characters, it's called dialogue. The fact they are doing more interesting gestures than simply standing there staring at you doesn't really make it a cutscene, imo

Cutscenes have been with us commonly since 16bit gaming and 8bit instances exist, they've been more prevalent in certain gens, and on some platforms more than others. Anyone remember the FMV fad, when consoles finally got their CD drives? Publishers inflicted hundreds of FMV-based "games" on the public to show off this new storage medium, and they sold like hotcakes.

For a short while. They disappeared as soon as people realized they'd rather be playing the game instead of watching it. The concept of movie-game will never die though, it appeals to those people who want to play videogames without actually having to play games. (They are the gamer version of that guy who says he wants to know more about music but will not pay attention unless his favorite band is playing)
 

Abelian

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I have no problem with short cutscenes that deal with plot exposition. The types of cutscenes that annoy me most are the ones where the player character is easily captured/defeated after steamrolling dozens of opponents or where the player character can do awesome things you can never actually do during regular gameplay (basically ludonarrative dissonance).
 

Carrion

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That happens pretty rarely in Skyrim, and barely at all in the previous Bethesda games. If we're complaining about cutscenes and lack of player control the Bethesda games are the last examples I would use.
Cutscene paralysis is a pretty annoying thing in Skyrim, actually. It's pretty common for the game to steal your camera and force you to initiate dialogue at an inappropriate moment, but there are also points where the game just forces you to stand in one place like a moron and watch a scripted event play out. Off the top of my head at least the Thieves Guild has several of these moments. Of course there's not a whole lot of it compared to many other games, but it feels worse because it's an open-world game which supposedly puts a lot of emphasis on player agency and freedom, and then out of nowhere it makes you a mere observer in a way that would better fit a game of an entirely different genre (like some linear action-adventure or corridor shooter).

Cutscenes are alright in certain types of games, but ultimately they're a storytelling method that takes no advantage of the medium and sometimes work directly against it. They should be eventually dying out, being replaced by more interactive and player-driven forms of storytelling, but because everything is shit, even evolution seems to be working backwards and games are going further and further away from what they might ideally be. RPGs are by no means the only genre that has suffered from this. It all looked so good 15 years ago when games like Fallout, Arcanum, the System Shocks, Deus Ex and even Half-Life (just to mention a few obvious ones) were almost cutscene-free, telling their story and conveying exposition through the environment and pieces of dialogue and preferring to keep the player in control of his character as much as possible, but it's been downhill ever since and whatever remains of the influence of those games has been bastardized in one way or another.
 

the_shadow

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Admittedly I haven't played Skyrim's main plot all the way through, but I'm don't see an excessive number of cutscenes. There is one at the beginning, but most games begin and end with an explanatory cutscenes, so I can forgive that. Occasionally you get some of that 'paralysis' Carrion mentioned in regards to forced dialogue, but I've noticed that a lot of the dialogue in the game occurs while your character is still free to move/act. For example, I'm currently playing through Labyrithinthia for Winterhold Academy, and missed quite a bit of conversation between the 'ghosts' of the mages because I was too busy fighting monsters. A lot of plot information is also conveyed through books and optional dialogue. I'm sure there are more cutscenes in the game I haven't seen, but I'd still say it has a pretty favourable cutscene to gameplay ratio when compared with Witcher 2, which is probably why I'm enjoying Skyrim a hell of a lot more. YMMV on how good a game Skyrim is, but at least it is a game with *gameplay*.
 

Lord Azlan

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I remember reading an interview posted here with one of the guys involved in the early development of Fallout or Wasteland or something and that guy said even back in those days one of the leading designers (or now known as a respected Gaming Guru) was wasting a bunch of resources and budget on cut scenes and filming with actors. I expect a lot of developers like to think of themselves as film makers or more accurately failed film makers.

We always have this distinction in RPG where you are told the story and the game can feel like an interactive movie (Bioshock Infinite, Mass Effects) as opposed to you make your own way with an optional story tagged on (Skyrim, Fallouts). I got to admit I prefer the second option. A problem with having many cutscenes in a game is that the developers are forced to use them due to the vast budget wasted on making them. You are then forced to go play through a story already told, already defined.

Basically Bioware almost killed the RPG I like but with hope in my heart - the good guys are making a come back and lots of indie developers with backing are making the sort of games they want to play and I remember. Dragon Age felt like it was just cutscene, tunnel repeat. Looking also at the Witcher now. Did not mind so much in Mass Effect 1 and 2 though.

I reckon if there is some illusion of choice then those cutscenes won't matter so much. Recently I completed Risen and that was well defined story but within that environment there was a lot of chances to explore that island and believe me I went everywhere I could before dipping my toes into the main story.

So, in summary. Cutscenes are innocent. It was Bioware, big budget, EA and the consolisation of PC gaming that did it.

The future looks bright though!
 

DalekFlay

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Cutscene paralysis is a pretty annoying thing in Skyrim, actually. It's pretty common for the game to steal your camera and force you to initiate dialogue at an inappropriate moment, but there are also points where the game just forces you to stand in one place like a moron and watch a scripted event play out. Off the top of my head at least the Thieves Guild has several of these moments. Of course there's not a whole lot of it compared to many other games, but it feels worse because it's an open-world game which supposedly puts a lot of emphasis on player agency and freedom, and then out of nowhere it makes you a mere observer in a way that would better fit a game of an entirely different genre (like some linear action-adventure or corridor shooter).

I guess it feeling worse since it's in that kind of game makes some sense. I never really felt bothered by it, though. In contrast I can barely play a modern FPS because of how little gameplay there usually is. Anyway... I take your point.
 

Konjad

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thre's a fucking lot of games (including crpgs) without or with scarce cutscenes, but you decide to play the story driven ones full of cutscenes and then complain about the existence of cutscenes.

the fuck?
 

Abelian

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Another type of cutscene I generally dislike is the kind that gives the player information that the player character has no way of knowing. I don't have a problem when a novel or film switches the point of view, but I don't really see the point of it in a video game. BG2 gets a pass because Irenicus was such a well-written villain.
 

Bester

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Cutscenes whatever. If the game is shit to begin with, what does it matter? It's like trying to discern whether a pile of dog shit on the ground has enough fibers. It's shit for god's sake, don't touch it.

And all games I've played since 2004 are shit (except W2). And before 2004, there weren't many cutscenes. So, whatever.

If anything, cutscenes are a symptom of a giant problem. Fucking mass market, video game industries run by marketing departments, fucking acne ridden kids. Fucking kids. Yeah. I remember when they invented internet, there were no kids and internet was an awesome place. Now look at it now. Kids ruin everything. I fucking hate kids.
 

Doctor Sbaitso

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Uhm, i think this goes best for children who have a more fertile imagination.
I've yet to meet any kid would can "out imagination" me and surely not control it properly. That said, as I said, I agree it's very personal and others will have completely different experiences and approaches to this.

I largely agree. This is why I play rogue-likes without tiles in all their ANSI glory. The imagination paints an appropriate picture, certainly better looking than a tile - not for everyone though I guess. I think exposure to these games before the dawn of 3d focus and graphix helps.

For instance, in Angband, a room full of Z or a singular S surrounded by dozens of S is pant-shitting time. Examine the never before seen grey S and read the description to discover and imagine what you are dealing with. If I see a spider tile I may well confuse Shelob for one of her minions, particularly since the tile size is fixed and the portrait is likely to be the same size as her much weaker minions or any of the many other spider types. Further, when I do see a tile I will look at the tile and adopt someone else's interpretation of what she would look like (captured in a small image). No thanks.
 

bozia2012

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Wow, a movies vs books debate.

The only cutscenes that are aggravating are the ones where the bad guys walk away or some other stupid shit is happening (to which you could and wanted to react) and you just stand there. Usually happens in action games where it's even more aggravating.

Also - when there are cutscenes literally every 2 steps (IIRC Jade Empire opening - horrible game).
 

pippin

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I've been playing The Witcher and I'm liking a lot those little segments where Geralt reflects on what has been happening, and some nice paintings are shown in the background. Those are brief, interestingly written, and provide information about how our character is being developed and possibly changed because of our own choices. It's like the ending scenes in Fallout.
I do agree about the point of the mass market. AAA game studios are simply too big to produce coherent games (one guy could have an interesting idea, but it gets buried under all the bureaucracy), but ironically, small and mid sized studios don't have enough people to secure that same goal. I also dislike the lack of actual character progression in rpgs. Simple character generatior is fine for me. I've always thought that classes other than fighter/mage/cleric/thief aren't really necessary, and out of all the (arguably crappy) stuff in Dragon Age, having stuff like templars or bards being unlockable "specialties" was a nice touch. However, I do want abilities that make sense, skill that prove useful and other ways to interact with the world. In that sense, I'd say the horrid dialogue wheel is possibly more dangerous than all those cutscenes.
 

Lord Azlan

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I do agree about the point of the mass market. AAA game studios are simply too big to produce coherent games (one guy could have an interesting idea, but it gets buried under all the bureaucracy), but ironically, small and mid sized studios don't have enough people to secure that same goal. I also dislike the lack of actual character progression in rpgs. Simple character generatior is fine for me. I've always thought that classes other than fighter/mage/cleric/thief aren't really necessary, and out of all the (arguably crappy) stuff in Dragon Age, having stuff like templars or bards being unlockable "specialties" was a nice touch. However, I do want abilities that make sense, skill that prove useful and other ways to interact with the world. In that sense, I'd say the horrid dialogue wheel is possibly more dangerous than all those cutscenes.

Sometimes I think consoles killed the video game. Never had a console myself and banned it from my home so my kids are not totally retarded. When I look around at other families it can feel like battling against the tide. Interestingly I watch my boy play some of my games. He normally follows the "Where to go" compass leader in Bioshock Infinite or Dishonored. In games that are more open ended like Skyrim he just struggles to find something to do - gets overwhelmed by the freedom. I don't think the younger generation play any RPG games at all as I would define them.

Regards the classes - I sort of agree. I still don't know what the Bard is supposed to be - I don't think anyone does. Not a fighter, sort of a thief, can play an instrument. Who has time to play an instrument in the middle of a battle with 99 Skeletons? However, don't knock my Paladin or Monk. I loved Monks in the Bards Tale series and I used many Paladins in those early RPG games. Clerics just feel under developed in most RPGs
 

Bester

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I do agree about the point of the mass market. AAA game studios are simply too big to produce coherent games (one guy could have an interesting idea, but it gets buried under all the bureaucracy), but ironically, small and mid sized studios don't have enough people to secure that same goal. I also dislike the lack of actual character progression in rpgs. Simple character generatior is fine for me. I've always thought that classes other than fighter/mage/cleric/thief aren't really necessary, and out of all the (arguably crappy) stuff in Dragon Age, having stuff like templars or bards being unlockable "specialties" was a nice touch. However, I do want abilities that make sense, skill that prove useful and other ways to interact with the world. In that sense, I'd say the horrid dialogue wheel is possibly more dangerous than all those cutscenes.

Sometimes I think consoles killed the video game. Never had a console myself and banned it from my home so my kids are not totally retarded. When I look around at other families it can feel like battling against the tide. Interestingly I watch my boy play some of my games. He normally follows the "Where to go" compass leader in Bioshock Infinite or Dishonored. In games that are more open ended like Skyrim he just struggles to find something to do - gets overwhelmed by the freedom. I don't think the younger generation play any RPG games at all as I would define them.

Regards the classes - I sort of agree. I still don't know what the Bard is supposed to be - I don't think anyone does. Not a fighter, sort of a thief, can play an instrument. Who has time to play an instrument in the middle of a battle with 99 Skeletons? However, don't knock my Paladin or Monk. I loved Monks in the Bards Tale series and I used many Paladins in those early RPG games. Clerics just feel under developed in most RPGs

Huh, I had similar ideas about what my kids should play.

I'll just lock them up in a room and give them a Pentium 2 with Windows 95, along with Diablo, Fallout, Duke Nukem 3D etc. When they complete a long list of games I've selected for them, I'll "advance" them by providing a slightly more modern PC and more modern games. When a few years later they finally complete VtMB, I'll release them from their prison room and let them see the pathetic ugly world we now live in. Somehow I doubt they will be of sound mind after all that, but hey, whatever.
 

Lord Azlan

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Huh, I had similar ideas about what my kids should play.

I'll just lock them up in a room and give them a Pentium 2 with Windows 95, along with Diablo, Fallout, Duke Nukem 3D etc. When they complete a long list of games I've selected for them, I'll "advance" them by providing a slightly more modern PC and more modern games. When a few years later they finally complete VtMB, I'll release them from their prison room and let them see the pathetic ugly world we now live in. Somehow I doubt they will be of sound mind after all that, but hey, whatever.

Heh - lol. I should get them messing about with config.sys and autoexec.bat to get a game even to work. What about making them load a game on tape so they get to 90% about one hundred times and then have to start all over again. You might also want to pin all the TV channels apart from BBC1, BB2 and ITV - I have done that a few times.

Recently have played BT1, Fallout 1 and 2, Arx Fatalis and now Lords of Xulima and they have zero interest for my boy.

He did complete Half Life 2 though. I told him to try the recent Deux Ex: Human Revolution which he did but got stuck very quick. If they don't have arrows in the ground pointing where you need to go he gets stuck. He also tried King's Bounty a few times but can't figure it out!
 

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