People News David Gaider: On Romances in Games

[shihonage]

RPG romance is stupid.

It cannot believably develop from chemistry between two characters, because it requires the kind of dynamic behind-the-scenes narrative adjustment that is not possible to create. Context of player actions is ignored. You just spent 40 minutes naked, stabbing rats in the crotch, with the object of your affections continuously trying to walk through a wall, and then you kissed...

And after the romance is established on this shaky and clumsy foundation, it does not go beyond a couple of triggers that transform the very notion of romance into something mundane and boring - your partner is essentially reduced to being a mule, a piece of furniture, or an extra gun.

An RPG should do its damndest to hide the underlying strings that pull the puppets around. The world should encourage the player to accept its abstractions and to be able to immerse within its imposed rules. Romance is one of those things that exposes more of the puppetry than it should. Suddenly, that particular NPC is not bordering on barely-making-sense category as all the rest, but she exposes the entire structure as complete nonsense.

 

[Average Manatee]

GaiderDex™

I prefer the abbreviation "Gaidex" myself.

 

[l3loodAngel]

This Gaider appears to be a person of low character.

But he still has some webcred for making the Ascension mod for BG2 in my book.

This changes everything . I thought we should care about his job performance rather than hobbies...

 

[UnknownBro]

The best thing about romances in games is that you can skip them.

The moment you penis start asking for boobies is when your brain is out of the ecuation, not a good thing in turn-based tactical games... oh wait....

 

[Darkforge]

All I ask is that if you insist on this rampant faggotry is an option in the game that asks what your sexual preference, is and tailors the romances accordingly. I am not a homosexual I don't want any gay ass elves hitting on my character..

 

[deuxhero]

Next step: Allow players to romance their furniture.

Didn't Harmony of Dissonance do that?

 

[commie]

RPG romance is stupid.

It cannot believably develop from chemistry between two characters, because it requires the kind of dynamic behind-the-scenes narrative adjustment that is not possible to create. Context of player actions is ignored. You just spent 40 minutes naked, stabbing rats in the crotch, with the object of your affections continuously trying to walk through a wall, and then you kissed...

And after the romance is established on this shaky and clumsy foundation, it does not go beyond a couple of triggers that transform the very notion of romance into something mundane and boring - your partner is essentially reduced to being a mule, a piece of furniture, or an extra gun.

An RPG should do its damndest to hide the underlying strings that pull the puppets around. The world should encourage the player to accept its abstractions and to be able to immerse within its imposed rules. Romance is one of those things that exposes more of the puppetry than it should. Suddenly, that particular NPC is not bordering on barely-making-sense category as all the rest, but she exposes the entire structure as complete nonsense.

Whoooahhh.....that's really deep shit bro....It's like you got ejucations and stuff, all that Lyotard, Derrida, Lacan...man.

 

[jewboy]

It almost seems like Gayder is either trying to get fired or just doesn't care anymore. Maybe he's burned out or he is tired of droning for EA. Probably he's just jealous of all of the kickstarter devs having way more fun actually doing creative interesting stuff instead of EA_RPG2013.

 

[waywardOne]

There's a Japanese proverb I stumbled across when I was in college. "If you meet a master swordsman, show him your sword; but do not show your poem to one who is not a poet." One of the meanings of that, to me, is that it takes someone just as well-versed in a subject as you for them to be able to appreciate or judge what you do in that subject. For Gaider, he's slowly waking up to the fact that 99% of Bioware's fanbase are neither swordsmen nor poets, so to speak.

 

[Carrion]

Then again, Gaider isn't exactly one himself either.

 

[Diablo169]

Honestly I want them to release an RPG where you get cock-blocked at every turn, the amount of butt-hurt rage would be delicious.

 

[racofer]

It almost seems like Gayder is either trying to get fired or just doesn't care anymore. Maybe he's burned out or he is tired of droning for EA. Probably he's just jealous of all of the kickstarter devs having way more fun actually doing creative interesting stuff instead of EA_RPG2013.

And if he does get fired and starts his own kickstarts, the drones will follow and the Antichrist Antigame will be born.

It's best for all of us if he stays where he is.

 

[Zeriel]

Honestly I want them to release an RPG where you get cock-blocked at every turn, the amount of butt-hurt rage would be delicious.

For whatever reason, this seems like a trope in weeabo games. It's kind of amusing.