Those games are perishable. They are doomed to be shut down and be lost forever after their expiration date. It's inherently bad because good games from that model are fated to vanish completely once the server has to be shut down.Laggyteabag said:
Kotaku article re: Dragon Age 4
- Thread starter Kerg3927
- Start date
And I can see it now, and some of these developers will form their own indie company and make games that are spiritual successors to KOTOR, Mass Effect, Dragon Age, and what have you through Kickstarter....CritialGaming said:
NO, NO, NO, FUCK THAT!!!!
I WANT EVERYONE WHO LEFT BIOWARE TO COME BACK NOW AND PUT EA IN THEIR PLACE!!!!
I DON'T WANT MASS EFFECT IN SPIRIT, I WANT MASS EFFECT PROPER!!!
The issue isn't about whether or not live-service games are bad, inherently or otherwise. Warframe is a live-service game and is a lot of fun to play. Path of Exile is similarly well made, fun and and great to play. Granted both of these are F2P, but that's by the by. The issue isn't one of inherent quality, but about incompatibility with the richly told, engaging, immersive single player RPG.Laggyteabag said:
In DA:O we were cast in the role of a Grey Warden, tasked with building an army to defend Ferelden from the Darkspawn. In ME we are a SPECTRE, tasked to find Saren and stop his mission to find the Mu Relay and ultimately, the Conduit. These stories have beginnings, middles and endings. We make decisions on the way that affect the story. Live service games cannot, by design, tell a story that has an ending. They can't react to player choice in a significant way. The player cannot be a central driving force for the plot of the story (see Anthem that matches players in groups of four, then ignores other players in dialogue). The world is static, enemies respawn. Every item must be "balanced" to such a degree that no player can ever grumble about anything since it has to please everybody. That means no live-service will ever have OP classes and ability combinations.
By design, a live service game will have a static world and a story that only exists somewhere between a beginning and a middle but can never resolve, react to choice or affect the world at large. It has to please the mass audience, "balance" gameplay to a lowest common denominator, string players along to keep playing while introducing some kind of microtransactions to entice them to spend real cash. None of these things are compatible with Dragon Age or Mass Effect games. Mass Effect Andromeda got a multiplayer mode players could spend $15,000 on lootboxes, but that doesn't help a single player experience.
If EA wants to make live-service games, that's fine. They own BioWare, they own Dragon Age and Mass Effect, it's they're right to do what they want with them. It's a tragedy that what they're going to do is make live-service games for their shareholders, instead of rich, single-player experiences for gamers, but other companies will step in and create products we want to play and we're free to not give them any money.
If I had to give the most apparent example of the difference between a live-service game and the single-player experience, I would compare Elder Scrolls Online with Skyrim. Skyrim was a moddable game with a dynamic world. We could steal everything, kill anyone (except kids and SetEssential=1), got immensely powerful daedric artifacts, became the head of one or more guilds. If the player wanted to, they could go and get Ebony armour from level 1. In ESO, the world is a static, dead place. Nothing can be stolen, all weapons and gear are level locked. NPCs are invulnerable. Ranking up with factions takes hours of grinding, not completing story arcs. There are no super powerful abilities or gear. The game is designed to be less rewarding than Skyrim and pad out gameplay for longer without telling any engaging story. There's no clearer example at what we lose than these two titles.
It's time to let go Sam, we need to move on. It's okay to grieve, we're here for you, we'll get thru this.Samtemdo8 said:
Would you rather another Andromeda misfire, or a spiritual successor done right? Without Drew Karpshyn or David Gaider, I don't think ME or DA could respectively reach the heights of last decade. Mac Walters is terrible and not in the same league as Karpshyn, the crunch culture and poor management, EA's push for live-service titles, Frostbite across all subsidiaries, these things are such major obstacles that Inquisition, Andromeda and Anthem are the end result.
CaitSeith said:
Assassin's Creed OdysseyKingsGambit said:
Now, I haven't had the chance to play this game yet - and I cannot speak for its quality - but I am pretty sure that this game, or the existence of a live-service singleplayer game like AC:Od disproves the above, or has the potential to disprove the above.
Live service games can be singpleplayer
Live service games can be played offline
Live service games can tell whatever story they want
Live service games can have definitive endings
Live service games can have world-altering decisions and consequences
Most live service games so far have been multiplayer games, and it is true that the above arguments apply to online live service games like Destiny 2, or Anthem, or The Division 2, but there is no reason why the above could not be addressed by another singleplayer live service game like AC:Od.
All a live-service game is, is the plan to keep players coming back to the same game, again and again, by offering frequent free content drops that are available to everyone, to ensure that players don't get bored - sure, it is all in an attempt to get players to buy more microtransactions, but there is no inherent limitation as to what game game can be.
(Looks at Mighty no.9)KingsGambit said:
Yeah, Spiritual Successors are way preferable over the original real deal.
And so far Bloodstained looks like ass compared to actual Castlevania games, and don't get me started on the Unsung Story which was supposed to be a spiritual successor to Final Fantasy Tactics, and it never even came out.
And I-nfected was supposed to be a fixed-camara RE like game, but Greenlight Died. And they the devs decided to turn to their money making an Amnesia Clone.
I haven't played an AC game since Ezio so I don't know about it either. I did play FC5 which was single player with real-money bollocks in it. I don't know if that's what you mean specifically, but I think we're defining these games differently.Laggyteabag said:
Your point on Odyssey may well be legit, but that's not what EA is making. Deus Ex: Mankind Divided got a real money shop at the eleventh hour, FC5 as I mentioned and I'm sure there are others. Borderlands 2 offered plentiful DLC packs and cosmetics, but I wouldn't define any of these as "live service" or games-as-a-service products. You do raise interesting points but I think we're talking about different definitions here.
I'm referring specifically to the Anthem model, that could also be applied to Warframe, Destiny 2, Path of Exile type of thing, or the online component in something like Andromeda. I don't know what boxes Odyssey ticks, but i will say that AssCreed by its very nature does *not* tell a story, and certainly not one with an ending. Even as early as AC3 they realised the animus and the future/Desmond plot was a serious obstacle and largely swept it under the rug now. AssCreed is a franchise Ubisoft want to churn out year on year and thus they can never tell a definitive story and certainly not one with an ending. AssCreed will never have an ending and that's why the story has always taken such a back seat. They are sandbox games full of "content" to check off a list and any plot exists to facilitate that end.
In fact, I remember hearing, i think it was about Odyssey specifically, that parts of the game were level locked, similar to DA:Inquisition. You had to have so many fuckabout points before the player could proceed with story quests, artificially padding out gameplay and prompting grinding/farming behaviour.
I haven't played it myself so cannot say if it could be defined as live-service or not (tho it did just unlock for me as May's Humble Bundle early unlock). You may be well be right, or perhaps Odyssey just has some things in common....after all Ubisoft are all over this live service crap too. EA and Bungie aren't the only live service people. They made the Division for heaven's sake, a game where you can farm for kneepads for a +1 bonus to things. But The Division 2, clearly a live service game, is also a game with no story, a static world, no ending, balanced to the floor, microtransaction laden, grindy, always online thing. I'm not detracting from any player who chooses to play it, but The Division 2 can and will never tell a story nearly so compelling as the one where Shepard chased Saren thru the Conduit to stop a Reaper invasion of the Milky Way. Or the one where Jon Irenicus plotted to strip the player of their divine essence to assault Suldanessellar and the Tree of Life itself, to revenge himself upon the people who cast him out.
You've raised a really interesting point about how one might define a live service game, and whether or not Odyssey qualifies or the quality/depth of its story I cannot say. But I think I would define them differently and would stand by my comment that they can never tell a complete or satisfying story the way a single player RPG can. You can't have 10,000 Chosen Ones, and while I'm not saying all RPGs need to cast us as a Chosen One (far from it), the player should be the agent for driving the action and the story. My example of Skyrim vs ESO is the most apparent and clear cut one I can give (and I'm not saying anything of the quality of either by the way).
SWTOR is another good example relative to the original KotOR games. KotOR 1 and 2 told stories and had endings. SWTOR has lots of a lore, and I'm not for a second suggesting that the class storylines and companions are not well written (if not the best in ANY MMO I've played over the years (perhaps alongside Secret World)), but the world of SWTOR doesn't change. Every single planet you visit beyond the starter zones is a Sith vs Republic warzone, and they are locked like that forever. Enemies are disposable, pose no threat and respawn. Quests are of the "Kill 10 of X" and "Take widget from A to B" variety. There's no game over screen, no failure state. There are consoles to click on and hotbar abilities to rotate thru but all the classes are balanced to the floor. In fact, it originally released with skill trees, but those were too complex to balance so BW got rid of them; now every single player of a given class has identical skills as they level.
Even the agent storyline, by far the best, doesn't affect change. Major spoilers if you haven't played it, but amongst the Agent lvl 50 storyline endings are the ability to a) go rogue, b) defect to the Republic, c) reform imperial intelligence as it was. There were two further endings, but I *think* they were cut (create new "Sith" Intelligence or become right hand to a Sith Lord). Now despite the b) ending, you can never actually join the republic. Going rogue (a) or doing the opposite (c), doesn't matter, you still run around the Imperial fleet to click the auction house and item vendors. And despite being quite generous and saying that SWTOR may well have some of the best storytelling in an online multiplayer game, it still doesn't have the depth or scope of its offline predecessors (tho they absolutely do manage to make them feel quite personal and that does deserve credit).
The best part about Dragon Age: Origins is that it's a completely standalone story. I can just play it and pretend the mess of sequels that followed never happened. Mass Effect fans never got off so lucky.
I am genuinely saddened at how a great group of developers was ruined by people who are literally as bad as literal hitler, literally.
Hyperbole aside I consider Baldur's Gate II to be one of the best games ever made, KOTOR to be in my top 30 and even Mass Effect to be worth playing for 2.5 games.
Hyperbole aside I consider Baldur's Gate II to be one of the best games ever made, KOTOR to be in my top 30 and even Mass Effect to be worth playing for 2.5 games.
If it was a sequel to DS2, then I'd be with you on that. I think DS2 was exceptional. I replayed it fairly recently and it is still a brilliant game and holds up superbly. But then DS3 came along, with crafting, cover shooting, microstransactions and coop sections. I still remember the sequence on the ice planet as Isaac is cover-shooting his way thru humans getting dropshipped in and thinking "WTF game am I playing?". I also remember the quote unquote "puzzles" at the end, opening the doors in the alien ruin with the solution sitting literally next to the button. DS3 got EAd so hard it wasn't Dead Space at that point, but a horror-themed cover shooter with real money store.Hawki said:
I'd take a spiritual successor over a DS4 if the alternative was more DS3. But Visceral are gone and EA have shelved the IP. It sits on a shelf in some exec's office next to Sim City, Command and Conquer, a heap of cocaine, Syndicate, Crysis, more cocaine, Mercenaries, Ultima and all the other franchises that they've retired.
I do remember the nightmare mode of DS2 tho. I did a whole NG+ playthru as a warmup, researched strategies and tips and it was one of the most tense and exciting gaming experiences of that era. I actually tried it again after my recent playthru on PC, but somehow managed to die to the first slow-moving, noisy, glowing, explodey-arm dudes who I knew was coming and I didn't have it in me to try again. 😲 Back on the 360, I died once on the eye-poke machine, so went back to my Chapter 9 save (I think I was afraid of the drill section that turned out to be pathetically easy. I didn't realise also that the 360 version being on two discs gave us a free "checkpoint" on the disc changeover, so in hindsight could've done the saves better). I still have my foam finger on the 360
So goooood.I'm trying to find the meme of EA taking studios to open graves before shooting them. I can't find it just now, this is the closest I could get.
I found it I think:Meiam said:
I think a lot of us have suspected. I know I've suspected things weren't going well since Andromeda dropped(and I'm sure there were signs prior to that I just wasn't noticing).Silentpony said:
Regions are level gated along with the various missions in those regions, though you're given ample activities and side quests to increase your level to where you need to be. Pretty much the same way the Witcher 3 worked where anything a certain level above you might as well be a death sentence.KingsGambit said:
Which was still a step up from earlier RPGs which were also level gated but the game didn't tell you, you just wandered into the wrong area and got murdered and that was supposed to teach you not to go there yet. Dragon Age Origins had a couple examples of this, for example, the entrance to the Drawven Kingdom which was guarded by 3 dudes, who could easily murder your ass and you wouldn't know it because it's 3 dudes who don't look particularly powerful.
I don't personally think it's particularly grindy, unless you consider anything other then playing the main story quests "grinding".
The reason comparing Witcher 3's level scaling to something like Dragon Age is if you did sidequests at the level the game told you was optimal and kept your gear up to date, even on the hardest difficulty you were so overleveled that you could kill basically anything in the game by aggressively pointing at it. Add alchemy into the mix and you have one of the easiest hard difficulties in gaming... ever. The only fight to give me any trouble was Dettlaff, and I strongly suspect that's because I was rushing the main quest of B&W so my friends could talk about it around me without me leaving the room out of spoiler fear. On repeat playthroughs I crush him.Dalisclock said:
Whereas in Dragon Age, if you don't do side content you're basically screwed and you won't have a fighting chance on normal difficulty because the level scaling expects you to have gone off and done something else in between main missions. Even if you focus solely on the main quest in Witcher 3, you still come out slightly overleveled toward the back half of the game.
And it's interesting you compared Witcher 3 in that because in most RPG's doing side content is the grind whereas doing side content in Witcher 3 really feels like the stuff you're actually, really there for and the quality of the main quest is honestly a bit lacking in comparison.