All the way through it you get drummed with "Mages are good .... Templars are bad".
Yet all the way through it the Templars are helpful and polite and the Mages are trying to eat my face.....
Kind of hard to follow a plot and take it seriously when it doesn't know what the fuck it's doing itself. In fact, the Templars don't turn "bad" until the very end and even then it's only 1 person .... who turns bad because of a corrupt sword .... made from metal Hawke found.
That is inaccurate. The game attempts to say "Some mages are good, some are bad and the same goes with templars". Not every mage in the game tries to kill you or someone else or just genreally be a jerk. For example Feynriel is an unfortunate apostate who will only do something bad if you indulged in some really horrible Video Game Cruelty Potential. For the templars there are a quite a few templars who are unabigiously evil. Take Ser Alrik, the templar who wanted to make all mages tranquil, which is considered by many of them a fate worse than death.
I agree to a certain extent, but I still believe that in light of DA:O, the templars vs mages plot felt very contrived. Think about it. In the tower mage origin story of DA:O, a mage uses blood magic and everyone freaks out! It was a big deal that didn't happen often! Even the fiance of the mage that uses blood magic abandons her trust of him and willingly submits to punishment for even associating with him. When you come back to the tower after it has fallen in DA:O, you run into mages that say they want nothing to do with blood magic or the rebellion that is taking place. DA:O did a good job of making you feel sympathetic to both the templars and mages while successfully making the delineation that negative actions were performed by a few bad apples on both sides.
Hop on over to Dragon Age II, and in the game's final act, every templar is order to kill every mage, which prompts every mage to turn into a blood mage. It felt so damn contrived and didn't match the tone of the original game at all. Not only that, blood magic was used at a far greater frequency in Dragon Age II. And for what reason? Didn't people fear it just as much? The writing in DA II was an absolute mess.
Alot of that was to show the reason for the conflict. Essentially templars fear blood magic, and so try harder to capture, imprison and possibly tranquilize every mage possible... as many codexs about blood magic and templars in both games refrence what happens when a group is on the run, hunted, assualted, and abused while simultaniously having a incredible but dangerous power at their hands? They go into no more to lose mode, use it, and go psyco. It is a cycle. templars harsher-mages scared-mages turn to blood magic-templars fear blood magic-templars harsher ect ect
Now this is a bit out but the fact that no one ever seemed to call attention to it pissed me off. In Modern Warfare 2, why is it that the Russian terrorists, perpetrating an act of terror in Russia (a region that really has supplied enough illegal weapons to maintain several wars since the fall of communism and immediately after a civil war which would have left even more arms floating around) buy their guns from a guy in Brazil? Seriously, why the fuck would you need to buy your guns from Brazil? I know it's just a deus ex machina so we'd have a level in the favellas, but it grated me nonetheless.
As I said, what really pissed me off was the fact no one else seemed to give it the same thought. Everyone else was too busy griping about nukes in space, or were unable to comprehend why that general bloke betrays you.
That bugged me as well, not to mention the bit about the oil rig workers being held hostage by the russians. Except the oil rig workers are russians so why would they bother holding them captive?
I think most of the problem lies with the fact that it's really unclear in MW2 and MW3 exactly what Makarov's reationship to the Russian Government is. Sometimes he hates them, sometimes he appears to be working directly with them. I've heard some people argue he's running the Russian Military by MW3. I really wanted to ask the IW guys exactly what's going on with that.
All the way through it you get drummed with "Mages are good .... Templars are bad".
Yet all the way through it the Templars are helpful and polite and the Mages are trying to eat my face.....
Kind of hard to follow a plot and take it seriously when it doesn't know what the fuck it's doing itself. In fact, the Templars don't turn "bad" until the very end and even then it's only 1 person .... who turns bad because of a corrupt sword .... made from metal Hawke found.
Every good Mage in Dragon Age 2: "We just want peace! We aren't all Maelificarum, We don't ALL practice Blood Magic!"
*and then*
"So...if it's Blood Magic they're expecting...It's Blood Magic they SHALL HAVE!!"
---
The romantic sub-plots in Force Unleashed and Gears of War (and potentially Halo). Starkiller saves his pilot because he's turned away from the Dark Side of the Force (or because of beastial Lust if you were into the dark side I guess) but as for Marcus and his support lady (who isn't even seen in GoW 1) and Chief and Cortana...I dunno, it felt like the romantic entanglement isn't there at all until you're told it is on the 11th hour. I'm sure there are a million other games that could go here when it comes to the romantic sub-plot that came from no-where.
Edit: SPEAKING OF ROMANTIC SUB-PLOTS FROM NO WHERE!!
Mass Effect:
Shepard: "I love you, Liara."
Mass Effect 2:
Shepard: "I'm sorry Liara but, I love Tali..."
Mass Effect 3:
Shepard: "I'm sorry Tali but I've been living a lie this whole time...I love Cortez"
Garrus: "DAMMIT SHEPARD, WHAT ABOUT ME!?" (should have been anyway)
Guys? Guys, look up what a plot hole is, then post.
It's not "characters made a decision that seems dumb or weird" and it's not "something that could have been explained but was left vague". Things that are not plot holes include:
In The Walking Dead
... if you choose not to loot the car, the owner still stalks and kidnaps Clem to punish Lee despite Kenny having a kid and never even questioning whether to steal the food.
That's not a plot hole, it's a convenient characterization inconsistency. If the crazy guy decides to go after Lee, that's what he does, regardless of whether it makes the most sense, it's not logically impossible for it to happen.
Or in Arkham City
Strange threatening to reveal Batman's identity if he doesn't play along but never doing so despite being aware of his escape. Again, that's just something inconsistent the character chooses to do, not a logical impossibility.
Sheesh.
Real plot holes in games off the top of my head? Hm. Let's see... I'm coming up empty. I guess games tend to have simple plots, so it's relatively easy to keep them straight. There must be some, though...
"A plot hole, or plothole, is a gap or inconsistency in a storyline that goes against the flow of logic established by the story's plot, or constitutes a blatant omission of relevant information regarding the plot. These include such things as unlikely behaviour or actions of characters, illogical or impossible events, events happening for no apparent reason, or statements/events that contradict earlier events in the storyline"
Basically, the stupid action of a character can be a plot hole. Your point about Walking Dead is valid and so is the bit about Strange, to a point, but most observations here are correct.
But, before you reply, here's the captcha for this post: Agree to disagree.
Fallout 3 is one of my all time favourite games but the ending was pretty horrible. I tend to avoid getting that far when I replay.
Resident Evil 6, Leon and ***** fall constantly fall farther down, from a cliff, to a lab to a mine to catacombs to another type of mine/catacomb, and then slide down a water slide, only to fall into a lake that isn't underground, it makes no fucking sense as they have been falling so much they should be pretty damn far underground at that time, also, how do Leon and Helena get onto a plane, or fake their deaths, I mean the organization they are working for has a person who is actively trying to arrest them, how does he not intercept any of their conversations that they are having with people working for the organization?
Starcraft 2. Jim Raynor receives a prophesy from a protoss friend of his that Kerrigan, Queen of Blades and ruler of the Zerg, is vital to defeating the Xel'naga who will return to destroy everything.
Now you might think that her current form, in command of a million billion zerg, had a good chance of defending against the Xel'naga. But no, Jim decides to invade her homeworld and use a magic artifact on her, transforming her into her original form, a twenty something girl in command of roughly nothing. She's prettier, but looks aren't everything when there's a galactic apocalypse coming.
yeah did you play the first game? how bout brood wars? cause if you had you would know that Kerrigan as the queen of blades makes the.....i dont know what hes called i think hes an exiled xel'naga but not sure, look like a kind and gental person. so yeah that cure would be worse then the desease.
Any and every Resident Evil game. Remind me how was Umbrella trying to turn a profit by turning everybody into zombies, again? No, I know - the zombies are by-products. By-products of what? The Tyrant? So zombies are by-products of bigger zombies? And they're selling them rather than selling cheaper, easier, more practical means of destruction? Where do they get their funding from (or their credibility), considering they've never managed to make a single successful sale? How many times has Umbrella been shut down, anyway? How come the Raccoon thing takes place as early as RE1 (or Zero), Umbrella is shut down by RE4, but then we're by RE6 and the whole thing has managed to remain a secret? Also - trying to cover up a zombie apocalypse with another zombie apocalypse? You wanna take down the president but rather than simply shooting him you seek to destroy the world? The list goes on...
On the mars mission, why did Cerberus bring land based vehicles? And if they brought them, where was the ship they brought them on? Wouldn't it have shown up on the SR2's scanners like every other Cerberus vessel does?
Who is Vega and how does he know Shepard?
So reapers attack earth and Shepard and Anderson start climbing around on the rooftops. Why? Why didn't they just take the stairs, how is this in any way faster or safer than the sensible thing?
So Legion and all his buddies have been on Rhannoc for 290 years. Why during that amount of time didn't they just pack up their shit and leave when the Quarians came? what is so valuable about a planet to a bunch of machines that they would be willing to risk everything just to keep it?
1) Yeah, that is a bit odd. Cerberus did have at least one Kodiak shuttle to pick up Dr. Eva with the Crucible info, but it makes little sense that they would use such a weak ship to escape from the reapers and any Alliance vessels around Mars. Still, not much of a plot hole, just an odd decision on Cerberus's part that could easily have a better explanation.
2) That is not a plot hole, Vega is simply stationed at the Alliance headquarters where Shepard is being kept. They've been palling around for six months, you just don't see it because that would be pointless. You just have to pay attention.
3) They leave the building through the window because the huge desk the Alliance Admirals or whoever they were at the beginning is blocking the exit. Every structure they come to after this is trashed, so rooftop climbing is probably the best option. Again, not a plot hole, just maybe an odd decision.
4) The geth may be machines, but they still need a constant flow of resources to survive. Rannoch is a valuable source of all kinds of materials, and they had already lost all the other territory they held. They decided to make a stand rather than become a wandering nomad race like they had forced the quarians to be. And they were doing pretty well until Shepard came in and screwed with their reaper code. Yet another example of "not a plot hole, but a rather easily explained detail that is hardly important anyway."
I'll concede to the first two not being plot holes (But they are still sloppy writing) however:
3: the desk shatters as it hits the wall, it's hard to see but it is what happens.
4: Again, Geth are hyper logical machines, the geth don't have that concept of "This is my home I will die defending it!" they have a concept of "The logistical value of this planet is equal to or greater than the combined value of our entire species, apparantly." And even if this were the case, why is it that the good geth never reach out and try to make nice with everyone else? Why not go directly to the council races and say "Help stop this war for us and we'll help you with the reapers?" I'm not saying this would work, but the fact that they never ever try this is dumb.
For your point on the Geth, they were actually keeping Ranoch and maintaining it specifically for their creators, they kept the planet in case the Quarians ever wanted to try a peace treaty.
One that's been bugging me since the end of Mass Effect 2 (haven't played 3, so maybe someone who has can sort this out for me), but it's established in the first game that the Citadel is the only (known) way for the Reapers to get into our Galaxy from Dark Space and yet at the end of Mass Effect 2 it's implied that a huge invasion is on it's way and that was the whole plot of Mass Effect 3 was it not? My question is how the hell did they get here? We shut down their only known way in in the first game.
EDIT: Never mind. I misunderstood what "Dark Space" meant.
star ocean 3. love it to death. except the ending. the ending is concentrated bullshit. the bad guy wins, the universe is destroyed, and they all lived happily every after. and nothing is explained. you're left to speculate on what happened between those two events.
I think it would be quicker to list the games that don't have plot holes.
But the biggest one would have to be Heavy Rain. There are more holes than plot to be honest. Once the big mystery is revealed you realize how little thought actually went into the story. I was going to list all the plot holes, but changed my mind because that would take all day.
Guys? Guys, look up what a plot hole is, then post.
It's not "characters made a decision that seems dumb or weird" and it's not "something that could have been explained but was left vague". Things that are not plot holes include:
In The Walking Dead
... if you choose not to loot the car, the owner still stalks and kidnaps Clem to punish Lee despite Kenny having a kid and never even questioning whether to steal the food.
That's not a plot hole, it's a convenient characterization inconsistency. If the crazy guy decides to go after Lee, that's what he does, regardless of whether it makes the most sense, it's not logically impossible for it to happen.
Or in Arkham City
Strange threatening to reveal Batman's identity if he doesn't play along but never doing so despite being aware of his escape. Again, that's just something inconsistent the character chooses to do, not a logical impossibility.
Sheesh.
Real plot holes in games off the top of my head? Hm. Let's see... I'm coming up empty. I guess games tend to have simple plots, so it's relatively easy to keep them straight. There must be some, though...
"A plot hole, or plothole, is a gap or inconsistency in a storyline that goes against the flow of logic established by the story's plot, or constitutes a blatant omission of relevant information regarding the plot. These include such things as unlikely behaviour or actions of characters, illogical or impossible events, events happening for no apparent reason, or statements/events that contradict earlier events in the storyline"
Basically, the stupid action of a character can be a plot hole. Your point about Walking Dead is valid and so is the bit about Strange, to a point, but most observations here are correct.
But, before you reply, here's the captcha for this post: Agree to disagree.
Fallout 3 is one of my all time favourite games but the ending was pretty horrible. I tend to avoid getting that far when I replay.
That Wikipedia entry is just very poorly written and utterly inaccurate. Instead, on TV Tropes:
"Note that a Plot Hole is inherently a contradiction: A Plot element that is merely left unexplained is not a Plot Hole unless its occurrence is impossible according to the setting's rules."
That is actually correct. When they say not to trust Wikipedia at face value they mean articles like this one.
I didn't say anything about a plot point being left vague or unexplained. That's down to poor writing, not plot holes. The definition you've got there from TV Tropes doesn't mention characters and, if anything, backs me up on that.
A character's decisions can be labelled a plot hole if it contradicts everything you know about the character. Like I said, your Walking Dead example was perfectly valid; That's not a plot hole. But the Hugo Strange one is only valid because it can be argued that nothing about his personality suggested he was really going to do what he said he was going to do.
You see character based plot holes in family movies and shitty action flicks a lot. I will admit that this is, again, down to poor writing and stretches the definition (any definition) of Plot Hole but it still counts.
I really don't want to be a dick about this, but it's a pet peeve of mine. A plot hole is a plot hole, inconsistent characterization is inconsistent characterization. Those are fairly technical and precise terms and they mean what they mean.
Can an instance of inconsistent characterization be so extreme as to cause a plot hole? Maybe, but I genuinely can't think of any examples. It's a different thing if a character reacts to information he or she doesn't have, for instance. That's a plot hole because there is a break in logic. Somebody doing something that is out of character is just that.
For the record, the key part in my quote was the "unless its occurrence is impossible according to the setting's rules" bit. Unless it's logically impossible for the depicted events to have happened in the way they are shown, it's not a plot hole, it's something else.
It gets fuzzy when it comes to ignored plot devices. Somebody pointed out that in Harry Potter time travel exists and is readily available to the characters, yet nobody thinks to use it to foil Voldemort's plans. That almost kinda works as a plot hole, but it's a bit messy around the edges, in that it's the result of a deus ex machina being used halfway through the story and not written off, so the bad writing happened in the deus ex machina bit rather than in the later ignoring of it. Still a plot hole, I guess.
This was mostly what I was getting at. But also, I'm looking more at in depth character analysis and why sudden changes in personality would be plot holes. Granted, that's not the topic and probably isn't where any of this here conversation SHOULD go but that's where I was with that. Mostly, though, I was just disagreeing because little things like that make me confrontational.
One that's been bugging me since the end of Mass Effect 2 (haven't played 3, so maybe someone who has can sort this out for me), but it's established in the first game that the Citadel is the only (known) way for the Reapers to get into our Galaxy from Dark Space and yet at the end of Mass Effect 2 it's implied that a huge invasion is on it's way and that was the whole plot of Mass Effect 3 was it not? My question is how the hell did they get here? We shut down their only known way in in the first game.
Whatever the case, it kinda renders all the shenanigans from the first game kinda moot, doesn't it? After all, if they could just fly in whenever they wanted, what the hell did they need the Citadel for?
during the hallucinogenic sequence where you have to kill Hoyt,
what the hell happened to all the guards?
It just irked me a little. Not enough to be an "oh my god this game sucks because it missed a few details" moment (not like I have those, anyway), but still, what the hell?
YOU did. The death/murder of Sam before your very eyes by the person you, at this point in time, hate above all else sends you into another drug-addled, rage fueled hallucinogenic killing spree. You will notice how Hoyt's commentary throughout the QTE become slightly more desperate - this is because you are slaughtering his men successfully to get to him. He is likely pissing himself.
One that's been bugging me since the end of Mass Effect 2 (haven't played 3, so maybe someone who has can sort this out for me), but it's established in the first game that the Citadel is the only (known) way for the Reapers to get into our Galaxy from Dark Space and yet at the end of Mass Effect 2 it's implied that a huge invasion is on it's way and that was the whole plot of Mass Effect 3 was it not? My question is how the hell did they get here? We shut down their only known way in in the first game.
Whatever the case, it kinda renders all the shenanigans from the first game kinda moot, doesn't it? After all, if they could just fly in whenever they wanted, what the hell did they need the Citadel for?
Well Relays are like a fast travel between areas. So there was a relay at the Citadel and a relay off in Dark Space that they were camping. When it activates they can get there much quickly than flying from dark space to the very first active relay they come across. It was more about Arrival, where they ambush the central government and then spread out. Instead they ended up having to start at the very fringe worlds (Batarians) and work their way to the Alpha relay (which was blown up) and then they had to work their way to the NEXT relay. Sure they can do it through standard flight, but the Relays would have been far more efficient and would have been far more effective in terms of attacking the other races.
One that's been bugging me since the end of Mass Effect 2 (haven't played 3, so maybe someone who has can sort this out for me), but it's established in the first game that the Citadel is the only (known) way for the Reapers to get into our Galaxy from Dark Space and yet at the end of Mass Effect 2 it's implied that a huge invasion is on it's way and that was the whole plot of Mass Effect 3 was it not? My question is how the hell did they get here? We shut down their only known way in in the first game.
Whatever the case, it kinda renders all the shenanigans from the first game kinda moot, doesn't it? After all, if they could just fly in whenever they wanted, what the hell did they need the Citadel for?
Actually, it took the Reapers half a year to get to the edge of our galaxy, rather than the instantaneous teleporting in the Citadel relay would have allowed them. Their MO has always been to pop into the galaxy through the Citadel, fuck shit up and take control of the Citadel, shut down the relay network for all but their use, and take over the galaxy system by system. By stopping them from using the Citadel, you both pushed back their invasion and slowed them down. The real plothole comes from the fact that the Reapers didn't go after the citadel until the very end. The whole thing would've been much easier for them if they did, as not doing so allowed people to flee the major systems, fight the Reapers on multiple fronts, and allowed a unified resistance amongst the different races.
Well there is sort of one in Spec Ops the Line. Let me just start by saying that I love Spec Ops the Line, however I can't deny that as chilling and powerful as the ending is and the twist certainly was clever in a way of defying genre, one aspect doesn't make sense.
It is revealed that Konrad, the main antagonist who Walker was in contact with, was in fact dead and had always been dead ever since the team first arrived in Dubai. So what was really happening was that Walker had gone insane, partly due to the guilt of the Mortar incident, and the part of his subconcious that knew he was doing wrong was projecting itself as the smug evil Colonel who he could now view as the 'bad guy' that he had to kill in order to be the 'hero'.
Now that works very well but where it falls apart is the fact that:
During the whole thing while Walker is blatantly talking to himself and recieving mission objectives from nowhere and mistaking two corpses as a pair of prisoners that they have to choose which will live and die... that two Delta Force operatives are with him the whole time and still obediently following him even after atrocity after atrocity is committed.
I mean seriously, it was a great chilling twist but who the hell would still be following someone this obviously crazy? If he's talking to himself nay, arguing with himself and taking orders from himself and looking at two corpses and saying 'we have to pick which one lives' then it's pretty obvious he's no longer fit for command. And yet they still follow him all the way to their deaths. It makes no sense and it really leads me to wonder what the other two characters were actually seeing while Walker was going bananas.
Of course there is also the possibility that:
The two delta force guys were already dead and Walker was just imagining them too.
One that's been bugging me since the end of Mass Effect 2 (haven't played 3, so maybe someone who has can sort this out for me), but it's established in the first game that the Citadel is the only (known) way for the Reapers to get into our Galaxy from Dark Space and yet at the end of Mass Effect 2 it's implied that a huge invasion is on it's way and that was the whole plot of Mass Effect 3 was it not? My question is how the hell did they get here? We shut down their only known way in in the first game.
Whatever the case, it kinda renders all the shenanigans from the first game kinda moot, doesn't it? After all, if they could just fly in whenever they wanted, what the hell did they need the Citadel for?
Well Relays are like a fast travel between areas. So there was a relay at the Citadel and a relay off in Dark Space that they were camping. When it activates they can get there much quickly than flying from dark space to the very first active relay they come across. It was more about Arrival, where they ambush the central government and then spread out. Instead they ended up having to start at the very fringe worlds (Batarians) and work their way to the Alpha relay (which was blown up) and then they had to work their way to the NEXT relay. Sure they can do it through standard flight, but the Relays would have been far more efficient and would have been far more effective in terms of attacking the other races.
One that's been bugging me since the end of Mass Effect 2 (haven't played 3, so maybe someone who has can sort this out for me), but it's established in the first game that the Citadel is the only (known) way for the Reapers to get into our Galaxy from Dark Space and yet at the end of Mass Effect 2 it's implied that a huge invasion is on it's way and that was the whole plot of Mass Effect 3 was it not? My question is how the hell did they get here? We shut down their only known way in in the first game.
Whatever the case, it kinda renders all the shenanigans from the first game kinda moot, doesn't it? After all, if they could just fly in whenever they wanted, what the hell did they need the Citadel for?
Actually, it took the Reapers half a year to get to the edge of our galaxy, rather than the instantaneous teleporting in the Citadel relay would have allowed them. Their MO has always been to pop into the galaxy through the Citadel, fuck shit up and take control of the Citadel, shut down the relay network for all but their use, and take over the galaxy system by system. By stopping them from using the Citadel, you both pushed back their invasion and slowed them down. The real plothole comes from the fact that the Reapers didn't go after the citadel until the very end. The whole thing would've been much easier for them if they did, as not doing so allowed people to flee the major systems, fight the Reapers on multiple fronts, and allowed a unified resistance amongst the different races.
Well I got the very distinct impression that the Citadel was the Reapers only major means of entry. Maybe I just misunderstood what "Dark Space" meant.
Devoneaux said:
canadamus_prime said:
Devoneaux said:
canadamus_prime said:
One that's been bugging me since the end of Mass Effect 2 (haven't played 3, so maybe someone who has can sort this out for me), but it's established in the first game that the Citadel is the only (known) way for the Reapers to get into our Galaxy from Dark Space and yet at the end of Mass Effect 2 it's implied that a huge invasion is on it's way and that was the whole plot of Mass Effect 3 was it not? My question is how the hell did they get here? We shut down their only known way in in the first game.
Whatever the case, it kinda renders all the shenanigans from the first game kinda moot, doesn't it? After all, if they could just fly in whenever they wanted, what the hell did they need the Citadel for?
See the idea I think was that stopping sovereign was supposed to give Shep time to build alliances and prepare for war and find a way to stop them. The problem is that the 2nd game doesn't go anywhere with this, rendering the previous struggles completely moot. You might as well just start off at ME3 and not bother with anything prior.
Not really relevant (the fact that the second game sucked according to you) since the only reason I mentioned the second game, aside from the fact that it's as far as I got in the series before I gave up on it, was that the ending introduced the impending Reaper invasion; which, as I said, I was a little confused as to how that was possible.
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