The Big Picture: Mutants and Masses

Karadalis

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albinoterrorist said:
You can't rewrite Mass Effect, because it is Bioware's product!
It is not biowares product.. all rights to the series and every little bit of data, lore and creative or future creative idea of its employees belong to EA

Dont believe me? Go check out some interviews about former Bioware employees here on the escapist.


And yeah.. just as you said: Its a product, a product that is tailored to rake in as much cash as possible... it is not "bioware expressing themselves"

EA told them to construct a product that would see large sales numbers and EA doesnt give a shit about Artistic integrity... why do you think the game ended on "Oh btw BUY MORE DLC PLZ!"

Put a kork in it with the steady claim that somehow because bioware focuses more on story then any other studio suddenly their product can be called art.

Madden isnt "art" and its also a game.

This whole fiasco is just EA cutting of the real ending to sell more DLC... has been the entire time.
 

Relaver

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370999 said:
So once again Bob doesn't understand the difference between games and movies. And misrepresents the retake ME movement. Standard stuff from him them.
And on that note you cannot criticize movies anymore, because after all in your mind if you criticize movies for a living you can't criticize games at all.

To me stories are stories weather they be interactive or not.
 

370999

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Relaver said:
370999 said:
So once again Bob doesn't understand the difference between games and movies. And misrepresents the retake ME movement. Standard stuff from him them.
And on that note you cannot criticize movies anymore, because after all in your mind if you criticize movies for a living you can't criticize games at all.

To me stories are stories weather they be interactive or not.
Yeah they are. However different mediums use different conventions to tell their stories. I don't know a lot of Ballet, I did some when younger but that's it. I am completely unqualified to discuss some controversial issue in the ballet world.

Now a key part of this whole discussion concerns the ME games themselves (which Bob has admitted he hasn't played) and the western RPG at large (I do believe Bob has given a statement about western games having worse stories compared to Japanese games leading me to believe he is not very familiar with this genre) of which a crucial element is player agency and meaningful (And that is a key to this) choice.

ME 3 was promised to have that and didn't. If you can't understand this concept, not through an intellectual lack, Bob isn't a morn, but a lack of research then you position on this is going to be inherently flawed. Which is my whole problem with Bob here, he doesn't know what he's talking about.
 

Bonecrusher

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Nov 20, 2009
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So, if we have lots and lots of money, we can own everything and spoil it whatever we like.
However, if we have not that much money, we just have to accept it and shut up?

Is this what MovieBob offering?

By the way, no, I am not against changings and adaptations. Batman movie is awesome, Batman Animated series is awesome, Batman Beyond is awesome, Batman Begins is awesome, Batman Arkham Asylum is awesome. They have their own styles for Batman. However they didn't change the "core" of the main story we love.

However, Transformers movie series is not like this. Transformers G1 cartoon is awesome although they are "marketing" cartoon for toys. Transformers comics (I especially like Dreamweave series) is awesome. Transformers War For Cybertron is also awesome. I think they have different kind of tastes, but give you same core feeling.
Transformers movie is on the other end, was just a pile of explosion effects.
Yes, I know I don't own Transformers franchise, I am not a multimillioniare. If I was, I wouldn't give the movie rights to Michael Bay.

But, Movie producers should listen the "general" thoughts of "core" fans.
Look at those Batman Begins and The Dark Knight movies.
They could achieve appealing both Batman fans and the audience which knows nothing about Batman.
But, Transformers movies just focused on second group. They told to the fans "we don't care".

I am against Michael Bay to direct, produce or doing anything related with comics or cartoons. Just step away from the franchise, please.

By the way, I am a Batman, Transformers, TMNT fan since 1990,
And I loved Batman Arkham City game, Transformers War For Cybertron game and TMNT Cgi movie.
 
Mar 15, 2012
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albinoterrorist said:
Wh-what?
I'm sorry, but, What?!

You CANNOT do this to ANY form of product from an artistic industry!
You can't rewrite the new Star Wars trilogy (the prequels), because it is George Lucas's product.
You can't make Macbeth the victor mid-performance, because it is Shakespeare's (and the production's director's) product.
You can't redo David without a wang, because it is Michelangelo's product.
You can't rewrite Mass Effect, because it is Bioware's product!
No but they can and should if they want to remain profitable. As I said a page ago people do this all the time. The fact is that with the DLC model of game production you can in fact modify stuff mid performance to work better. Arrival changed the ending of Mass Effect 2. Fall Out 3 already changed the ending so the fans liked it better cause it was stupid.

If the only result of this is 50K to charity and game industry figures don't lie quite so much as they used to then it will be a good thing.
 

keinechance

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Mar 12, 2010
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Aprilgold said:
keinechance said:
Maybe if more Movie-fans "whined and bitched" about the substandard products that they are sold, the Movie-industrie would start making better movies?
Strangely, he suggested doing just that. If we recall back to one of his reviews where he talks about how since Scott Pilgrim didn't do well in the box office there wouldn't be a In the Mountains of Madness movie, and that it was all to blame on the people who liked the Expendables. I can't remember what he said exactly on this but it was to some degree that people who liked it were stupid and should basically whine and ***** to get the movie made.
I know, but I guess that is different because movies are not art, therefore they can be changed because of "whining and bitching", right ;)
 

mfeff

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Karadalis said:
albinoterrorist said:
You can't rewrite Mass Effect, because it is Bioware's product!
It is not biowares product.. all rights to the series and every little bit of data, lore and creative or future creative idea of its employees belong to EA

Dont believe me? Go check out some interviews about former Bioware employees here on the escapist.


And yeah.. just as you said: Its a product, a product that is tailored to rake in as much cash as possible... it is not "bioware expressing themselves"

EA told them to construct a product that would see large sales numbers and EA doesnt give a shit about Artistic integrity... why do you think the game ended on "Oh btw BUY MORE DLC PLZ!"

Put a kork in it with the steady claim that somehow because bioware focuses more on story then any other studio suddenly their product can be called art.

Madden isnt "art" and its also a game.

This whole fiasco is just EA cutting of the real ending to sell more DLC... has been the entire time.
Loved your entire post.

Cannot agree with the last statement, it seems contrary to real world events and excuses. There is no real ending, the ending is the ending, the narrative is to blame, along with the retconning of Shepard to give him PTSS and Cassandra Syndrome, to foist some Trojan Horse, thing on us... maybe... in a slap dash attempt to be edgy and meta...

No boss fight, to game'ie

so have a god to talk to... that's original

There is no alternate ending... cause they screwed around so much, they never got around to resolving the story they did have. Which caused more holes than a cheap block of Swiss.

To top it off, it is likely the Prothean was stripped from the original game and sold back as DLC, which further crippled the game, and had to be addressed before release. That being said, the statement that he was DLC made after the game was "in the can" is a complete lie.

Because it is.

There is no more game. That's the game. - Meta... see what I did there?

At best there is an aria DLC or some crap 'maybe'... the narrative is to blame, from beginning to the end, the problem is in the narrative, not just the ending... the ending is just the ass of the elephant in the room, starring you in the face...
 

Disthron

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Aug 19, 2009
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*Sigh* Bob, I thought you already did an entire video saying you wouldn't comment on things you don't really know about.

You may have experience with traditional story telling (ala your movie reviews) but since your response to interactive story telling is basically "it's too hard let's just give up" and it seems your "Citizen Kain" of video games has a story that amounts to a footnote in an instruction manual you probably lost over a decade ago. When you ask things like "how can you have a compelling story without it moving to a specific ending" it really shows your ignorance in this subject.

You should check out Extra Credits. http://penny-arcade.com/patv/episode/the-role-of-the-player

Respectfully
~Disthron
 

Sentox6

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Jun 30, 2008
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Frozengale said:
I'm tired of silly internet people that have to jump on someone for one simple mistake, misspelling, or misuse. How about you kindly tell them they are wrong instead of insulting them.
Generally speaking, if someone makes a "simple mistake" I'm not going to make an issue out of it. We all do it.

Still, if someone makes a mistake in the middle of an argument that I find utterly ridiculous, I'm going to consider addressing it more aggressively. Furthermore - and here's where our opinions diverge - I don't consider the use of "social contract" a simple error. It's a fairly specific philosophical and political concept. I'd wager the vast majority of internet users have never even heard of it. Consequently I find it hard to believe that someone would just accidentally 'typo' it into a completely erroneous context. You'll forgive me if I naturally suspect that it's just someone trying to lend more gravitas to their argument than it deserves; it's not exactly unheard of on the internet.
 

blackrave

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1.If TMNT movie will be just slightly better than Transformers 1st movie it will be success already
2.Michael Bay may not know much about material yet. He still has time to educate himself.
3.I don't understand outcry of ME3 ending. Anyone played Dreamfall? In the end of the game I was screaming "NOOOOOOO" to monitor (and I'm calm and adequate guy), so horribly sad and wrong was the ending. But was it worth it? Yes and yes. Same with ME3. I'm still in the middle of that game (just got Ash back from hospital), but even if it ends with "Pay 800 Bioware points to download ending DLC"-screen it still will be worth it. So chill out guys (and girls).

P.S. Anyone knows approximate demographics of Escapist visitors? Gender, age, geography, etc.? Would be interesting to read.
P.P.S. Also, while "alien" is often used in place of "extraterrestrial", it also have other meanings, like something unusual, out of place, that doesn't belong here, and green humanoid turtles with ninjutsu training are pretty unusual.
 

Frozengale

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Sentox6 said:
Frozengale said:
I'm tired of silly internet people that have to jump on someone for one simple mistake, misspelling, or misuse. How about you kindly tell them they are wrong instead of insulting them.
Generally speaking, if someone makes a "simple mistake" I'm not going to make an issue out of it. We all do it.

Still, if someone makes a mistake in the middle of an argument that I find utterly ridiculous, I'm going to consider addressing it more aggressively. Furthermore - and here's where our opinions diverge - I don't consider the use of "social contract" a simple error. It's a fairly specific philosophical and political concept. I'd wager the vast majority of internet users have never even heard of it. Consequently I find it hard to believe that someone would just accidentally 'typo' it into a completely erroneous context. You'll forgive me if I naturally suspect that it's just someone trying to lend more gravitas to their argument than it deserves; it's not exactly unheard of on the internet.
social means relating to interactions between people. Contract means an agreement between two parties. All contracts are social when you think about it. Even if you don't consider "social contract" a simple error, it still is. Stop thinking that every should know what you know. Terms a abstractions we use to define meaning. Just because I didn't use the term the way that you know it to be doesn't mean that it is wrong, the meaning is what matter. So stop getting hung up on something so simple. I should have looked up social contract online before I used the phrase, but your the one that is blowing it out of proportion.
 

Murmillos

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Feb 13, 2011
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albinoterrorist said:
Wh-what?
I'm sorry, but, What?!

You CANNOT do this to ANY form of product from an artistic industry!
You can't rewrite the new Star Wars trilogy (the prequels), because it is George Lucas's product.
You can't make Macbeth the victor mid-performance, because it is Shakespeare's (and the production's director's) product.
You can't redo David without a wang, because it is Michelangelo's product.
You can't rewrite Mass Effect, because it is Bioware's product!

Feel free to not buy their products again, after such shitty performance on bith their and Ea's parts, it's fully deserved.
However, until you are physically brought in to their studios for consultance, it is madness to believe any claims that you are "co-producers" of anything.
You have no right to rewrite their product.
By all means, return it, sell it, burn it, I don't care - just understand you will not be offered any alternatives to the ending, except on Bioware's own terms (likely as over-priced DLC).

The artistic industries do not work in the same way as other industries.
Why has it taken so long to realise this?
You are partially right that we can no longer change old work because its time for change has long passed and gone.
But you are 100% wrong that we can not change todays work. The problem with this particular BioWare issue, is they promised some very particular statements, not 2 years ago as per-speculative hype, but after the game had already went gold. Therefor, they were lying about particular items their game would and wouldn't do. So they sold a defective product. We want them to fix their defect product.
They don't have too, but if they want any of my future business, it behooves them too fix it.

Thats all this is, gamers expressing to a developer that they sold a product that did not come to the expectations that they told us to believe, and we are telling them they can fix it, or lose future business. We will not roll over and take this any longer.
 

phlegethonic

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Apr 4, 2009
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What you fail to understand, Bob, is that in the realm of Video Games, the player is also a participant in the game; and in Mass Effect in particular, the whole POINT of the series is that the player tells half of the story themselves.

Unlike movies, the player is not a passive entity. They make their mark upon the world, and moreso in Mass Effect than in most series.
In addition, this is a medium that gets content added afterwards quite often; the game even says after you finish it: "Buy some DLC, bro".
Your argument that the game can't be changed in DLC and shouldn't be changed is false. They do it in comics all the time! It's called a Retcon.
You yourself were praising the Retconning of Hal Jordan becoming Parallax in comics as a spirit possession, because it undid the work of hack writers in the 90's trying to make him edgy.
This isn't even unique in games! When Fallout 3 made you kill yourself at the end for no adequately justifiable reason, people complained; and it was fixed in Broken Steel. They changed the ending! Oh NO! It's disrespect for the creators!

Please.

Auteur theory may be heavily pushed in film school, but it's inadequate at best to explain things like this, and you have no business getting self-righteous on behalf of writers failing at their trade. You might as well defend Michael Bay for screwing up the Transformers franchise because he's a auteur and therefore beyond reproach.
 

Nick Holmgren

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Feb 13, 2010
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The bigger problem with Mass Effect is that there is signs that they made the endings weaker with the full intent to release DLC as a more complete ending.

This would be one of the most outrageous stunts by a developer of a so beloved property that it deserves outrage.
 

Crais

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May 27, 2008
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Click here for a more fan-friendsly view of the Mass Effect problem: http://www.fishandcherries.com/?p=262
 

Fatninja716

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Jun 30, 2011
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I love you for showing me that these videos still exist. Missed my weekly fix and I have to catch up
 

Dr. Dan Challis

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phlegethonic said:
What you fail to understand, Bob, is that in the realm of Video Games, the player is also a participant in the game; and in Mass Effect in particular, the whole POINT of the series is that the player tells half of the story themselves.
See, here`s the thing: players were *never* writing even an ounce of the story themselves. They were choosing from a series of pre-scripted, predetermined options that were written by the folks at Bioware. You are participant only as far as your choices and actions fall within finite parameters, parameters that you had no hand in defining. And it`s been that way since day one, no matter how good BioWare was at disguising that fact from you. The idea that Mass Effect fans have a right to claim any amount of ownership over the property is entitlement, pure and simple.

So, as loathe as I am to agree with Bob, he`s right.
 

QUINTIX

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May 16, 2008
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Dansen said:
That was fucking brilliant, reposting so that more people can see this.
Static Jak said:
That was actually pretty good.
FelixG said:
That was a very good video
mfeff said:
A guy on YouTube, who is saying he is smug, a guy on the Escapist, that lives at home with his parents
FedericoV said:
Moviebob is not only a soldout like all the bloggers who get paid to write serious shit about games and stuff.
Unlike some gaming websites, like say Gamespot, the Escapist has a firewall between advertisers and their staff. So does Screw Attack. So does Destructoid. Content creators are free to "bite the hand that feeds" and regularly do. There is nothing special about early screenings or early review copies. Neither is there anything special about "blackout dates"... hardware vendors like AMD and nVidia always do that. It's not censorship.

Mr. Infestig8ve Gurbulism is little more than a troofer with a hardon for Jim Sterling, someone who regularly proves his "the reviewers and commentarors are all bought out by the conniving publishers!" theory absolutely false.

An earlier poster said it far better than I can:

Revolutionaryloser said:
Yeah. This guy really knows what he is talking about. He says it straight. Like when he told Jennifer Hepler she was a fat cow who had to lay off the cakes and stop writing yaoi fanfiction. That taught the *****. This is one really mature and intelligent individual and we could really gain from listening to his wise opinions.