Yesterday someone asked what a “California” accent sounds like. This is a pretty interesting demonstration, but you can jump right to 1:40 to hear what I’m talking about:
Link (YouTube) |
California is one of those rare places where females and males have pronounced differences in their speech patterns. (The only other that I’m aware of is Japan.)
To me, the “Seattle” accent is “natural” to me. That matches my own accent to the point where I can’t detect any differences.
Mere words cannot convey the sense of relief that comes from the fact that my comic preceded this Penny Arcade by a single day.
Last Friday I had an article titled “Evony and Irony“. I thought it was clever in a stupid pun sort of way. Then someone pointed out that Christopher C. Livingston already used that joke a few months ago. This stung a little, since Livingston is famous for doing a GMod comic, and now I do a semi-GMod comic, and therefore I sometimes get a little crap from people for “stealing” his idea.
Anyway, it’s always preferable when the less famous person manages to fire off the joke before the more famous one. If the two Dragon Age comics had appeared in the opposite order, I’m sure I’d get flak for “stealing” the idea.
Whew.
Spying on those guys is really paying off.
My Twitter based review continues. Note that this just just an experiment. I’m not planning on reviewing ALL games this way. In the meantime, it’s kind of a nice change of pace for me.
Again, stuff in bold are the comments I made while playing. The rest is elaborations on that.
I KNEW at the opening of the game I’d get stuck in the Fade sooner or later. And that I would be sick of it long before I got out.#DragonAge
The Fade is a dream world. If you’re a mage, the tutorial section involves entering the Fade as part of a test. It was pretty obvious that all these dreamworld models, scenery, and special effects weren’t just for a short one-shot deal for one of the six origin stories.
Sure enough, there is an extended section of the game where you get pulled into the fade and have to fight your way back out.
There’s no looting or shops (since it’s all a dreamworld) and you do it without your teammates. So there’s no dialog, no companion banter, and little story progression. So, you don’t want this part of the game to go on too long.
Looking back, I’m not sure that it was really “too long”. When I wrote the comment above, I’d been at it for a long time and I thought I was only at the halfway point. I was actually very nearly done, but since I couldn’t see the finish line I was getting restless.
Again, this is something that would never get mentioned in a full review, because it seemed annoying at the time but didn’t really hurt the overall experience in the long run.
Ah, out of the Fade. Again. Good-bye screen-buffer blur effects. Again. #DragonAge
Oh yeah. I was pretty tired of how everything looked blurry.
…although I’d be very, very surprised if I didn’t end up in that madhouse again before the credits roll. #DragonAge
I stand by this prediction. I’ll bet I have at least one more trip to the Fade in store for me.
But no spoilers, please.
If you do a spoiler in the comments, just block it off with punctuation or something. Like this:
============SPOILER===============
Voldermort is Luke’s sled!
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Thanks!
Badahn (DragonAge) is clearly the same voice actor as O’aka XXIII (FFX). Who gets typecast as a merchant extra? #DragonAge
He plays much the same character here: The down-on-his-luck merchant who you help at the start and who then clings to you for the rest of the game. He’s got a positive attitude and is always cheering you on.
Zevran wants to sell me some fine Corinthian leather. #DragonAge
I can’t help but think of Ricardo Montalban. I don’t even know if the accents are even related, but they both tickle my ear.
My crew: Leliana (Rogue) Wynne, (Heals) and Alistair (meat shield). I’m a mage. (Elemental damage.) #DragonAge
I abandoned that game and started over, and I’m still using this team. You need Wynne for heals. Since I’m also a mage, that means we have two very squishy casters. So I need two meat shields, one of which needs to be a rogue for the purposes of opening chests. Dual-wielding Leliana seems a better rogue than bow-using Zevran, since I need someone who will stand in front. If I was a fighter, I’d probably swap Leliana for Zevran.
The position of “main tank” rotates every once in a while, for the sake of variety. Every once in a while I take Sten or the Shale instead of Alistair.
But Alistair is my favorite, and the one who makes the fewest protests with my moral choices.
Oh, hullo plot thread which will take me back into the fade. Sigh. #DragonAge
This trip was to save the life of one specific character. This trip was also short.
I still maintain that a major trip to the Fade will be part of the endgame.
Wow. I’ve been playing for a long time. How far along… ONLY FIFTEEN PERCENT COMPLETE?!? Wow this game is big.#DragonAge
AND YET YOU STARTED OVER ANYWAY.
IDIOT.
The usefulness of a magical item is directly proportional to how ridiculous it looks when worn. #DragonAge
This goes double for mages. If you were to offer one of these mage hats to a clown he’d refuse, “No way, man! I’d look goofy!”
This game should let you toggle the visibility of headwear. Everyone looks so much better without it.
Actually I’d love for games to completely divorce appearance from performance, as with the superhero games. Being dressed like mismatched savaging idiots isn’t really a central theme in fantasy stories. People usually have themed costumes.
Oh hello Steven Blum… VOICING A DWARF?! #DragonAge #castingfail
I like Steven Blum. I really do. But his natural speaking voice does not sound right coming out of a Dwarf.
Actually, there’s obviously no hard rule that Dwarves have to all talk like Scotsmen. I know I’m just dragging my high-fantasy preconceived notions with me, but I can’t help it. These guys are short, broad, and burly. They shouldn’t sound like gameshow hosts.
I think someone should make Dwarves that all have German accents.
Wynne needs to stop complaining about how incredibly old she is when she’s built and dressed like a 16 year old. #DragonAge
Full credit to BioWare: The AI companions in #DragonAge are not idiots and can be trusted to do something sensible most of the time.
Actually, I’ve heard this isn’t true for the offensive magic users, but for melee fighters and the healer, they can almost run themselves using the default tactics. (Of course, you’ll do a lot better if you take care of them.) Since I’m a mage, I don’t have to worry about the other characters very much except during boss fights.
On my next play through the game (assuming) I’ll probably go for a Warrior but directly control the mage. (Which I guess would be Morrigan.)
This whole “activation” for part of the game you own is hopelessly cumbersome, confusing,buggy,and asinine. #DragonAge #sucks
I won’t weary you with the tale. I got the game via Steam, because of a steep discount and in spite of my better judgment.
Why do so many humans have gruff voices and Dwarves sound like gameshow hosts? #DragonAge
Again, I suppose I’m just mired in the Old Ways, but I just can’t get used to this.
Sigh. A female Dwarf with a California accent. #DragonAge
She was actually a cute character. A Dwarf who wanted to study with the mages. I enjoyed her story, even if her SoCal accent was… difficult to accept.
I am a mage, a hero, and an adventurer. And I am dressed like a complete idiot. #DragonAge
Fear my orange Dunce Cap of Awesome Magics!
TWO NPC thief buddies, and neither one ever has enough skill to open the chests we find? Like this, they’re just lousy tanks. #DragonAge
At this point I had both rogues with me, which is a stupid idea. It was also pointless, since neither of them could ever open any chests we found. It should be noted that my character was already doing the raw damage. I just needed someone to stand in front of me and keep the bad guys off while I work my deadly mojo. So the only reason to ever bring a rogue instead of a warrior would be to open the (sigh) invincible wooden chests we’re always finding.
WHAT ARE YOU IDIOTS GOOD FOR?
After re-starting the game, I’ve made sure Leliana is focused entirely on Opening Stuff. I’ve made sure she gets each new lockpick ability as soon as it becomes available. And she’s still stumped by about 1 in 2 chests.
What the hey? How does this work? Do the chests auto-level? Am I supposed to come back later? What?
At one point there was a chest I NEEDED to open for a quest. She couldn’t do it. I left and leveled in another part of the world. I dragged her back, stood her in front of the chest, and did her level-up right there. She opened the chest. Whew.
The very next chest was once again beyond her skill.
I return to Socrates for my next assignment.
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Socrates has a job for me all right. He explains…
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This one is a little perplexing and I have to go over it with Socrates just to make absolutely sure that the crazy person in this conversation isn’t me.
Continue reading ⟩⟩ “A Star is Born:
Let’s Play Champions Online Pt. 11″
I really am curious how many other people do this sort of thing in RPG’s.
I really thought the joke would have played better with a human male main character. My ‘lil Elf is female, which kind of confuses the joke. But having a human male Grey Warden would have required starting a brand new character and playing them to this point in the game, which would have taken some hours. It’s not a big deal or anything, but it’s one of those small details that would have been nice.
I’m missing having a “default” character. It was handy to have male Shepard in Mass Effect, so that I had a recognizable “this is the main character”. Even if they’d never played the game, odds were good they would still be familiar with the face from promotional materials.
I’ve been doing a little experiment with Dragon Age. I picked it up last week, and I’ve been posting ephemeral thoughts on the thing into my Twitter as I play. I’ve read back through the feed now and I find it striking how most of these things are annoyances or trivialities that probably wouldn’t make it into one of my long-form reviews. I thought I’d go back through the feed and re-post each of the entries here, along with some additional commentary.
Stuff in bold is what I typed into Twitter. Keep in mind these are moment-to-moment thoughts, not impressions on the game overall. Also note that I’m playing the PC version, which is reportedly very different from the console versions. Do take this into consideration before correcting me on some aspect of the game, because it’s possible we’re playing very different games.
So begins my review:
I now own Dragon Age.
I got the game Wednesday Nov 25th, the night before (American) Thanksgiving.
Oh, hello Captain Janeway. #DragonAge
Flemeth (the so-called Witch of the Wilds) is voiced by Kate Mulgrew.
Aaaand #dragonage crashes like a chump when I alt-TAB. This could be an ongoing problem.
I’m not sure if it was just a one-time fluke or what, but after this crash I started playing in windowed mode. It wrecks immersion a bit, but it also lets me jump to Twitter and leave updates more easily.
This is how I play MMO games, and Dragon Age feels like a single-player MMO, so this make sense.
I keep expecting Duncan to send me to Jerusalem to knife somebody. #dragonage
The character Duncan is voiced by Peter Renaday, who also voiced head assassin Al Mualim in Assassin’s Creed.
New quest: BUY MOAR CONTENT FROM EA GAMES. Real classy, guys. #dragonage
The designers stuck a quest giver into your camp (a location you’ll visit often throughout the game) and he has the floating “I have a quest for you” icon over his head. So you have to put up with that through the whole game if you don’t want to pay for the premium content. I’m having trouble just getting through the bulk of the game so far, so I’m not really feeling a big urge to place even more detours between me and the endgame.
It’s obviously a dick move on the part of EA in an attempt to make you feel like you’re missing part of the game. Instead of selling you a few bonus pages to their book, they rip a few out of the middle and then let you wonder what you’re missing. Very cynical. It doesn’t ruin the game or anything, but you can see where this is going down the road.
Oh, hello Tuvok. #dragonage
The leader of the Dalish people is played by Tim Russ, who also played Tuvok in Star Trek Voyager.
Playing a Mage. Trying to decide if I should try another class before I go too far. 100 hours is a long time. #dragonage
I eventually did start over. As an Elf. Mage. I’d screwed up this character by mis-spending skill points, and I’d missed out on two possible companions.
Dear NPC: Thanks for the outfit. I’m sure the Darkspawn will be no match for my ass hanging out. #dragonage
People usually prefer a difficulty CURVE to a difficulty SAWTOOTH. #dragonage
Ten fights of more or less effortless combat, and then one fight that results in a TPK Game Over. This game is very strange when it comes to difficulty. I’ll revisit this issue later.
Dear Main Character: Stop talking smack to the containers I tell you to open. Thx. #dragonage
This has been going on since at least the original Neverwinter Nights. In this game they no longer challenge doors and boxes to a duel, but they still say inappropriate things when directed to (say) open a door. Odd.
Mages running laps around the tanks: Comically silly but very effective! #dragonage
I hate, hate, hate the fact that your area-of-effect magic spells do friendly fire damage. The casting range is way inside of the aggro range of most foes, the blast radius is so big, and the casting time is so long, that there is no time you can use the really big hitters without nuking your team. By the time you’re close enough to cast, the bad guys have spotted you and are rushing. And they will close the distance and interrupt your spell before you can activate it. You can fireball distant archers, but they’re always spaced out so you never really get more than a couple.
And if you do manage to get off that perfect shot at the perfect moment with the right timing and actually get to hit a bunch of guys with your nuke, the bad guys are going to head straight for you and chop your mage into little pieces, because for all the hassle they are to use, the big blast spells don’t really do that much damage. They just piss a lot of people off.
So then you have six guys who want to murder you, and one or two melee companions to try and pull them away. It can’t work. Which leads to running laps around the tanks. (Which works.)
They added all this stuff to make combat “realistic” and to keep it “balanced” and instead they traded “stupid but fun” for “stupid and tedious”.
And yes, I know that it doesn’t do this if you play on easy. I think the difficulty slider should modulate the challenge of the game, not the fun.
AoE spells should either be way easier to use or do way more damage. (I’d prefer the former. I wouldn’t mind if the spells didn’t kill everyone in the room, as long as I got the fun of using them on a regular basis.) As it is, they usually just aren’t worth the hassle and risk.
Hardest quest in the game: Locate a single person who isn’t a COMPLETE prick. #dragonage
I wrote this one after I ran into a string of NPC’s who were jerks to me for no good reason. The final straw was a guy running the docks leading to the Mage’s circle, who is a complete ass to you. The dialog tree drags his little patronizing act out for ages before it gets down to letting you persuade or intimidate your way past him. I was playing a neutral any-means-necessary character, and I was about six dialog lines past the point where I’d said, “Okay, I would have stabbed this idiot and dumped him in the lake by now if the game would let me.”
These characters usually frustrate me most when I’m trying to play evil. I’ll do a few quests where I drown some puppies for a handful of copper pieces, kick some beggars, and feed some children to the dragon for no good reason, but then I meet someone who gives my Evil Overlord some sass, and I can’t actually do anything to them.
This type of encounter is a staple of BioWare games. I’ll bet this never would have made it into a normal review, because this sort of small detail is usually forgotten a couple of minutes later. This game has hours and hours of dialog, and you usually remember the big discussion with main characters more than the brief exchanges with rude little piss-ants along the way.
Now, I really hope that everyone involved knew that this was a terrible idea from the outset. 16 people playing a 4 player game.
Link (YouTube) |
Still funny, though.
We were so upset by the server problems and real money auction that we overlooked just how terrible everything else is.
Why make millions on your video game when you could be making HUNDREDS on frivolous copyright claims?
There are two major schools of thought about how you should write software. Here's what they are and why people argue about it.
WAY back in 2005, I wrote about a D&D campaign I was running. The campaign is still there, in the bottom-most strata of the archives.
Here's how this site grew from short essays to novel-length quasi-analytical retrospectives.
What was the problem with the Playstation 3 hardware and why did Sony build it that way?
My picks for what was important, awesome, or worth talking about in 2015.
Why Google sucks, and what made me switch to crowdfunding for this site.
A game I love. It has a solid main story and a couple of really obnoxious, cringy, incoherent side-plots in it. What happened here?
Few people remember BioWare's Jade Empire, but it had a unique setting and a really well-executed plot twist.
T w e n t y S i d e d
