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 HiveFleetPlastic wrote:
At the same time, stories do not get delivered to writers on basalt tablets from God.

Cool. Never said they did.

When you're ready to respond to the points I'm making rather than resorting to hyperbole and whatever... that... was, lemme know. Until then, I'm walking away.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Lynata wrote:
It sounded like you did, given that customisation involves "hair colour and whatnot", and then going on about "removing characters out of a game"

Aesthetic choices aren't that important to the story. Mass Effect doesn't change if you have blonde or red hair, or a big nose or a small nose, for instance. The only difference these sorts of choices is what you see throughout the game. They won’t change who the character is and I doubt there’s any place where such decisions (eg. how far apart your eyes are or your style of eyebrows) is going to impact the story or the choices you’re given.

 Lynata wrote:
So, to clarify, for you it is really just a gender thing? Customisation of hairstyle, clothes and other such aspects are okay, but changing a persons gender is not? Because era-based limitations aside, I'd say that how a person chooses to dress says much more about them than what gender they belong to. And given how well Ania Solo replicates Han's style and evokes the same kind of humour in Star Wars, I just don't see why a female Indiana Jones should be impossible. Or a male Lara.

No.

It’s a character, story and context thing.

The character Cole Phelps is a straight white male because he’s a Marine just back from the war in the pacific and is a detective in late 40’s LA. A half-Latino, half-black lesbian wouldn’t make any sense in the context of that game.

The character of Booker Dewitt is a man for reasons I can only explain by spoiling the end of the game, which I won’t do outside of a spoiler tag and only if requested.

As I’ve said multiple times now men and women are not always interchangeable. You can’t take any story and just swap the gender of the main character. Context and story are important, and changing the gender for no other reason than to change the gender.

But also note that from the beginning I’ve been saying that they’re not always interchangeable. Sometimes they are. Mass Effect (and Jedi Academy) is a good example, because it doesn’t matter who or what Sheppard is. All the change of gender does is influence the pronouns people use. Sheppard’s gender is irrelevant to the context of Mass Effect, irrelevant to the story of Mass Effect and irrelevant to even the character of Sheppard. Outside of the superficial “romance options” (which can be completely ignored), the gender of Sheppard plays no role in the story. The only important aspect of what Sheppard is is his/her species (that s/he’s human).

 Lynata wrote:
"After this, Commander Shepard’s story is complete.”
- Michael Gamble on ME3

Is this the same guy who said that ME3 wouldn’t have an A, B or C ending?

 Lynata wrote:
Here's where I can't follow your logic. I could take the exact same argument and turn it around for Lara Croft or Max Payne, yet for some reason for you it's totally different there.

Again it comes back to context. The latest Tomb Raider game is an origin story for Lara Croft, explaining how she went from a simple researcher/archaeologist/whatever the hell her qualifications are into the hard-core survivalist and endangered species-hunting murder-machine of later games. Changing her into Larry Croft just makes the game generic, and what I’m saying is that Lara Croft is central to her story and her game – she can’t just be swapped out for Random Dude #448. Lara Croft’s games are about her, not about the world she inhabits. Same goes for Max Payne.

ME isn’t about Sheppard. It’s about what Sheppard (and friends) do about the situation they’re in.

 Lynata wrote:
Star Wars wasn't about the Emperor and his Death Star either, it was about Luke, Han and Leia.

This is the exactly point I’m making. You can’t just remove these characters and replace them with other people and expect it to work. Luke, Han and Leia aren’t just place-holders and things that can be swapped out at will. ME’s very structure however means that it doesn’t matter who or what Sheppard is (as long as s/he’s human). That’s the difference.

H.B.M.C. wrote:No. It’s a character, story and context thing. The character Cole Phelps is a straight white male because he’s a Marine just back from the war in the pacific and is a detective in late 40’s LA. A half-Latino, half-black lesbian wouldn’t make any sense in the context of that game.
The character of Booker Dewitt is a man for reasons I can only explain by spoiling the end of the game, which I won’t do outside of a spoiler tag and only if requested.

I have already mentioned era-based concerns as the only valid argument against customisation of race and gender twice, and I don't know the second example. Please feel free to explain via spoiler tags, however, if you think it adds something to the debate!

H.B.M.C. wrote:As I’ve said multiple times now men and women are not always interchangeable. You can’t take any story and just swap the gender of the main character. Context and story are important, and changing the gender for no other reason than to change the gender.

And as I have said multiple times, I am not talking about "any" story - I am talking about those where era-based cultural norms do not prevent the possibility.

H.B.M.C. wrote:Is this the same guy who said that ME3 wouldn’t have an A, B or C ending?

Maybe? And I still think it didn't, too.

“The story of Commander Shepard is definitely over."
- Chris Priestley

"We knew it was going to be the end of Shepard’s story, and in our minds and imaginations, the characters are still going to be together, the characters that Shepard had brought together (assuming you’d kept them alive), and maybe it didn’t come across enough, that those characters still had a future, that they had a hope going forward.”
- Mac Walters

This was also one of their reasons for why the next ME game won't be called Mass Effect 4, by the way. Similar to how they've recently dropped the 3 for Dragon Age: Inquisition to reinforce the disconnect between the story arcs.

I don't really agree with these decisions (and will continue to call ME4 = ME4), but then again it could be argued that it is sadly necessary, given the nerdrage about Dragon Age 2 not featuring "their" Warden.
Amongst the fans of the franchise, you are certainly the exception when you don't see it as "Shepard's story". Google the term and you see what I mean.

H.B.M.C. wrote:Changing her into Larry Croft just makes the game generic, and what I’m saying is that Lara Croft is central to her story and her game – she can’t just be swapped out for Random Dude #448. Lara Croft’s games are about her, not about the world she inhabits. Same goes for Max Payne.
ME isn’t about Sheppard. It’s about what Sheppard (and friends) do about the situation they’re in.

That still doesn't make any sense to me. Explain to me why Lara's gender is "central" to her story and her game? Why would the game suddenly become generic - the obvious issue of the prevalence of white male characters aside? Why isn't Max Payne generic in spite of being a dude?

Because story - and save for era-based limitations the character's gender does not dictate it. Mass Effect is the obvious example. In spite of your denial, the game is about Shepard and his/her immediate companions (which is obviously BioWare's strong point), and I can't believe that you don't see the parallels between "a game about what Shepard (and friends) do about the situation they're in" and "an origin story for Lara Croft explaining how she went from a simple researcher/archaeologist/whatever the hell her qualifications are into the hard-core survivalist and endangered species-hunting murder-machine of later games".

In your own words, both Mass Effect as well as Tomb Raider are about the protagonist overcoming a series of obstacles, yet somehow it's completely different? In Mass Effect, the romances "can be completely ignored", but in other games they suddenly become an important aspect of the character?
I have a feeling you'd argue differently if ME would offer no customisation, too.

H.B.M.C. wrote:This is the exactly point I’m making. You can’t just remove these characters and replace them with other people and expect it to work.

You are still working under the assumption that a genderswap would make them "other people". I do not agree with such stereotyping.

 H.B.M.C. wrote:

ME isn’t about Sheppard. It’s about what Sheppard (and friends) do about the situation they’re in.

 Lynata wrote:
Star Wars wasn't about the Emperor and his Death Star either, it was about Luke, Han and Leia.

This is the exactly point I’m making. You can’t just remove these characters and replace them with other people and expect it to work. Luke, Han and Leia aren’t just place-holders and things that can be swapped out at will. ME’s very structure however means that it doesn’t matter who or what Sheppard is (as long as s/he’s human). That’s the difference.

I'm going to agree with H.B.M.C on this, as someone that has never played Mass Effect 1 and 2, but has played through ME3 twice, once as a canonical Shep as I could get (Male, Soldier, etc...) and once pretty much the complete opposite, FemShep born off earth, w/e the Psychic type class was (with the cool powers), etc... My playthroughs had nothing to do with the person I was controlling, but what actions I took during the game. I could have been given no choices on character generation and I would have been fine. In fact that was one of the points I jokingly made when the frakas about the endings were made. I told my friends who had played ME1 and ME2, and said, I'm playing the game the Developers wanted me to play.


MAJOR BIOSHOCK INFINITE SPOILERS BELOW FOR LYNATA YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED!

Alfndrate wrote:My playthroughs had nothing to do with the person I was controlling, but what actions I took during the game. I could have been given no choices on character generation and I would have been fine.

In other words, you actually agree with me that it's all about the story.

Or rather, we seem to have a break between what we consider part of the story here. To continue the discussion, this may have to be addressed.

MAJOR MASS EFFECT SPOILERS BELOW FOR ALFNDRATE YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED! :b


tl;dr: What really defines a character in your eyes?

Alfndrate wrote:MAJOR BIOSHOCK INFINITE SPOILERS BELOW FOR LYNATA YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED!

Spoiler:

The girl you rescue in Bioshock Infinite is Booker's daughter. Yes it could have worked with her mother, but you rarely see alcoholic mothers with gambling problems due to the atrocities they committed at the Wounded Knee Massacre

So, just yet another example of era-based limitations which I have already addressed.

Thanks for clearing that up!

 Lynata wrote:

Alfndrate wrote:My playthroughs had nothing to do with the person I was controlling, but what actions I took during the game. I could have been given no choices on character generation and I would have been fine.

In other words, you actually agree with me that it's all about the story.

Or rather, we seem to have a break between what we consider part of the story here. To continue the discussion, this may have to be addressed.

But it's not about the character's interactions in the story. The Mass Effect series could have easily just have been, "Over the shoulder Halo Ripoff!" and people would have played the game for the actions between point A and Point Z because there was no character to generate. People were angry at the ending of Mass Effect 3 because of the "customization" that was provided to them in the first two games, and that their actions ultimately had NO EFFECT on what you did at the end of the game. I played pure paragon (or as close as I could) and I was still given the evil action. So why did it matter what I chose in every event preceding the final cutscene? Does the character I created at the beginning of the game effect the outcome of the game beyond what skin is showing on the screen? Absolutely not.

MAJOR MASS EFFECT SPOILERS BELOW FOR ALFNDRATE YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED! :b

Spoiler:

Are incidents such as carrying the cipher, meeting the various aliens, (potentially) falling in love with them and (potentially) see them die, uncovering the truth about the Reapers, defeating Saren and Sovereign, dying and being resurrected, allying with an old enemy, rescueing your friends from the Collectors, being arrested, reinstated, getting a war trauma, seeking out old friends, preparing for the final battle and making the ultimate sacrifice not "Shepard's story" in the very same way that all that happens to Lara Croft in the new game is part of hers?

It's only "Shepard's story" because we have the protagonist's name associated with the story. If I could change my character's surname so that it was Commander John Poopypants, would the actions in the spoiler not be "Poopypant's story"? What I'm saying is that games like Mass Effect 3 give you the idea of character generation being an option, but at the end of the day, you could put anyone into his role. Could Masterchief complete Commander Shepard's story? I believe he could, because the person you control is a medium for the story to be told, it isn't the story. The actions of the "character" (skin on the screen) are the medium in which you as the player experience the story. The only way for character generation to have any impact is if you have "background" pieces that make certain parts of the story harder than others. If Space Born Shepard had issues with the gravity of planets, making the escape from the weird bug planet harder, then you would have a different story because a flaw of his is impacting the game.

As to the idea of Lara Croft being the only person for Tomb Raider, I would say the same thing as above. You can take Lara Croft out of the adventure replace it with say... Nathan Drake, and the story would be plausible, and I doubt that it would have any negative impact on the story of the game.

I think the reason why people are arguing things like Lara Croft is always Tomb Raider, and Indiana Jones is always doing what he does because we've been given the story and these characters that have become icons in and of themselves that "transcend" their stories. But even then we're given something like Luke, Leia, and Han, we actually can take them out of Star Wars and drop their backgrounds into another world. If you're even remotely familiar with Eragon, it's basically Star Wars with dragons. But then we're not dealing with the nuances the actors (voice and otherwise) give to the characters, we're getting into character archetypes and delving into the work of Joseph Campbell and his book, The Power of Myth

Ultimately we're dealing with a medium very similar to reading a book. The players that play video games imprint parts of themselves into their characters actions much like a reader imprints parts of themselves into characters that they're reading about. As a personal example, when I'm imagining characters in my head as I'm reading in the scenes, they're all left handed. Why? Because I'm left handed and trying to imagine someone being right handed when drawing a sword, or raising a gun (oddly enough I shoot right handed, but I still imagine them as lefties ) just seems foreign to me. When I make a choice in a game like Mass Effect 3, I treat it like how I would do it, "What might I say in this situation?" etc... But ultimately the story doesn't change because of the choices I make at the beginning of the game.

Sometimes a story defines a character.
Sometimes a character defines a story.

Sometimes it is neither.

It depends on what the writer/developer intended.

Generally speaking, D&D/MMO/etc. games revolve around a group of characters who are participating in a story deliberately written to NOT take into concern what the actual party make up is. These are PERFECT for insane levels of customization.

Other times the story itself requires certain agents or actors to participate, random example would be InFamous. In those instances the customization layers inhibit the actual story. Sure, you may not like the main character (or his appearance, or gender, or whatever), but the game is about that character anyway. Cole MacGrath is who the story teller is trying to tell a story about. I have all kinds of extra skins but they make the game, story, and character worse.

I may not play a game where the bad guys are cats, but that has no bearing on the quality of the game in question.
(Damn you Kilrathi!!)

Alfndrate wrote:But it's not about the character's interactions in the story. The Mass Effect series could have easily just have been, "Over the shoulder Halo Ripoff!" and people would have played the game for the actions between point A and Point Z because there was no character to generate. People were angry at the ending of Mass Effect 3 because of the "customization" that was provided to them in the first two games, and that their actions ultimately had NO EFFECT on what you did at the end of the game. I played pure paragon (or as close as I could) and I was still given the evil action. So why did it matter what I chose in every event preceding the final cutscene?

See, in my opinion, a story is a story regardless of whether it is 100% or just 80% dictated by the developer. Does it really make Shepard's experiences less of a story just because there are multiple ways to approach a situation? No. It just means that your character's story is somewhat unique as opposed to being identical to what everyone else was playing.

This is even touched upon in ME3 itself, in whose final scene you find out that what you've experienced with your Shep ...


On a sidenote, I also do not agree with all the negativity about the ending. Of course I can't talk for anyone elses game, but my choices certainly mattered ... for my story.

Alfndrate wrote:Does the character I created at the beginning of the game effect the outcome of the game beyond what skin is showing on the screen? Absolutely not.

But that is exactly what I'm argueing! Does Lara's gender effect the outcome of the game beyond what skin is showing on the screen?

Alfndrate wrote:It's only "Shepard's story" because we have the protagonist's name associated with the story. If I could change my character's surname so that it was Commander John Poopypants, would the actions in the spoiler not be "Poopypant's story"?

Yes. And if Lara Croft would be Lars Croft, wouldn't it be Lars' story? What effect does this have upon the story itself that it is suddenly supposed to become "generic"?

Alfndrate wrote:As to the idea of Lara Croft being the only person for Tomb Raider, I would say the same thing as above. You can take Lara Croft out of the adventure replace it with say... Nathan Drake, and the story would be plausible, and I doubt that it would have any negative impact on the story of the game.
I think the reason why people are arguing things like Lara Croft is always Tomb Raider, and Indiana Jones is always doing what he does because we've been given the story and these characters that have become icons in and of themselves that "transcend" their stories.

... why are we argueing?

Alfndrate wrote:Ultimately we're dealing with a medium very similar to reading a book. [...] When I make a choice in a game like Mass Effect 3, I treat it like how I would do it, "What might I say in this situation?" etc... But ultimately the story doesn't change because of the choices I make at the beginning of the game.

I partially agree, however I'd point out that some games do allow us to affect the story somehow. Of course you'll always have the main plot which remains largely stagnant, but once again taking Mass Effect as an example, there is a tremendous amount of smaller things you can manipulate, ranging from the romance options to how (or if!) you resolve crew conflicts all the way to minor details such as you killing Elnora or letting her live, or even replacing Samara with her evil twin. All of these things are undoubtedly part of the larger story, with Shepard being the center through which we experience it. This is why everyone's Shepard is a little different. That we add our own choices and interpretations to the character does not affect the validity of it as a story.

And who knows, maybe some day in the future we will actually have RPGs that do not have a "hardcoded" main plot at all, but feature an AI capable of constantly re-working the environment to conform to any and all choices we would be able to make in the respective situation. That this is not the case already is merely a case of technical limitations, not theoretical impossibility.

I've been arguing, albeit terribly , that the actions at the beginning of the game don't actually have an impact on the outcome of the game. If character generation allowed me to dictate how my character would react in certain situations, then character generation has a meaning beyond the choices we make in the game, which technically don't have anything to do with the character generation options at the beginning of the game. I could make my Shepard the most fugly looking mofo ever, scars everywhere, angry eyes, aged and battered face, etc... but then once I'm in the game, he could be the nicest mofo in the galaxy.

Mhmm, that's not really the point I've been making - but rather, that everything we experience is Shep's story, regardless of how we customise him/her. And that likewise any possible customisation on Lara Croft or Max Payne would change little to nothing on those stories as well.

I fully agree with you that we've simply come to see these characters, as well as Indy etc., in a very specific and established appearance and thus cannot cope with the thought that they could look otherwise. It's the same for me. But just because it's too late now doesn't change that they could well have looked different back then without us throwing a fit - or experiencing a different story.

And although this is somewhat off-topic, I still think that any action and decision you take does affect the story, in whatever small way. This has nothing to do with character customisation, however - although there are games where it is different, see Dragon Age: Origins, which is pretty much Mass Effect with swords.

On a sidenote, though, even in Mass Effect you are occasionally confronted with the background you have chosen in customisation, such as during an interview you give or when my Shep was confronted by a former member of the gang she belonged to on Earth before enlisting with the Alliance military.

 Lynata wrote:
Mhmm, that's not really the point I've been making - but rather, that everything we experience is Shep's story, regardless of how we customise him/her. And that likewise any possible customisation on Lara Croft or Max Payne would change little to nothing on those stories as well.

I fully agree with you that we've simply come to see these characters, as well as Indy etc., in a very specific and established appearance and thus cannot cope with the thought that they could look otherwise. It's the same for me. But just because it's too late now doesn't change that they could well have looked different back then without us throwing a fit - or experiencing a different story.

And although this is somewhat off-topic, I still think that any action and decision you take does affect the story, in whatever small way. This has nothing to do with character customisation, however - although there are games where it is different, see Dragon Age: Origins, which is pretty much Mass Effect with swords.

On a sidenote, though, even in Mass Effect you are occasionally confronted with the background you have chosen in customisation, such as during an interview you give or when my Shep was confronted by a former member of the gang she belonged to on Earth before enlisting with the Alliance military.

In DA: Origins though, the actions I made at character generation affected pieces of my life. Like if I was a Human Noble Rogue, my life would be different than a Dwarf Beggar Fighter, because there were different starting pieces and helped dictate things before you went off to become a Grey Warden. From there, yes you could completely do a 180 like with other games of a similar nature, but you still had pieces of the ending that were affected by the choices you made during character Generation. My first time completing DA:O (I had like 3 characters before I settled on one I liked ) had mentions of his past in the ending pieces, that make his story different than my Dwarf Fighter who rose from nothing to become a "savior" of sorts. Though the storyline throughout the main part of the game was the same every time I played DA:O, my beginning and ending were different due to who I picked to be.

That's ... exactly what I was writing, actually.

 Lynata wrote:
That's ... exactly what I was writing, actually.

(╯°□°）╯︵ ┻━┻





THIS WHOLE ARGUMENT IS A GLASS CASE OF EMOTION

┬─┬ <(°-°< )

In retrospect, I can see how that part of my argument could come across in an unintentional way ...

To clarify, the remark about Dragon Age being "Mass Effect with swords" was in regards to the general game style in terms of narration and player choices etc, not (just) the different origins, which (as you correctly pointed out) do not exist in ME, at least not in such a pronounced form.
The origins themselves I have addressed in the first half of that sentence, where I mentioned them as a difference to Mass Effect.

In short, I was trying to demonstrate that there are games where non-visual(!) customisation can affect the story whilst simultaneously showing the similarities between both products in an attempt to relativise how much (or little) effect the origin customisation actually has on the character's story insofar that it IS still a proper story in both cases.
In one game you just get to exert more influence upon it than another, but this merely means a "change in director", not necessarily the narrative quality of the experience.

Better? I'm sorry - sometimes I just fail at expressing what I wish to convey.

It's all good