3701

Where’s that “Stop posting” animated gif when you need it?

3702

Yeah, that’s a pretty funny perspective. If someone’s compulsive enough that they feel the need to open every door, that seems like it is on them.

I guess if I’m convinced enough that I could have chosen another option, it’s just as good. In Mass Effect’s case, I had the impression they were running short on time. I’d had a distinct sense of diminishing content about halfway through the game.

3703

Probably buried under a pile of “broken sarcasm detector” images.

3704

On my third playthrough I did all of the cerberus encounters in the correct order. At first they just seem like a bunch of random missions on random planets, but there actually is a long story to go with it.

3705

Branching quest trees with meaningful differences between choices, whether they are dialogs or actions. Also the things you do having different lasting impacts on the game world and characters within it.

3706

Oddly enough this thread is 123 pages long and we’re still not talking about Fallout 3.

3707

It’s no different than the affectation of motive in Torment (i.e. 1. statement, 2. [Lie] statement, 3. [Vow] statement), which was a good thing. And there are quite few choices and quests with multiple solutions in Mass Effect. The keywords actually make it easier to know the tone of the response as well as allowing the conversation to flow like an actual conversation.

edit: PC users not using a gamepad to directly select any of the radial options don’t get to vote.

3708

As much as we can with what little we know. The enthusiasm is there, but the information is lacking.

3709

The system itself is great, the utilization might be lacking. The conversational flow and feel for what was going to be said were spectacularly improved from the past. RPGs tend to have a lack of suggestion as to just how something is going to come out of a character’s mouth, be it sarcastic or sincere, and the wording might be ambiguous. ME fixed that entirely. Fallout has always done a nice job avoiding that, but tons of RPGs, let’s just say KOTOR and The Witcher, did not.

There are a lot of times when the response doesn’t change anything (which is the case anyway in a lot of games), but it’s still a better presentation, and if used in a more open world (ME was very linear, there’s no getting around that) could easily have thoroughly branched dialog trees.

3710

You have to question a dialogue system when the tutorial tells you specifically that you can always click the middle answer and not worry about missing out on any content. Also, since the results are almost always the same, it might have made more sense if ME’s dialogues were just movies that gave you the occasional do bad thing or do good thing choice.

I’d take regular, old fashioned, Fallout style dialogue trees any day.

3711

A big part of the fun of dialogue in Fallout is reading what you COULD say.

3712

Not to mention the distinct possibility that choosing the wrong option could lead to your death.

3713

I’d appreciate a dialog system where your available responses were color-coded according to the potential severity of the NPC’s reactions. Something like-- Neutral for harmless flavor choices, yellow for minor decisions, and red for “this is going to permanently change things”. It would remove that annoying uncertainty of whether an NPC will just laugh off your ill manners, or get pissed off and refuse to talk to you again.

To take Bloodlines as an example, you can trash-talk the hell out of Damsel (the beret-sporting Anarch vamp) with no ill effect. But trying the same thing with Strauss (the Tremere primogen) can lock the player out of several quests and an entire ending.

There ever been anything like that?

3714

No shit? That’s just pathetic. I’m not a fan of “choose one wrong line, and you’re dead”, but as far as I remember, most of the time both Fallouts had an I’m really fucking angry now animation for all the talking heads (and corresponding responses for the headless NPCs) where you could still back out. If you didn’t, that’s your own damn fault, but applying even the tiniest bit of common sense to the situation, you still had a chance to not fail completely. That should be sufficient enough, I think.

3715

Actually, there was a perk that did just that… maybe just in FO:T, maybe in FO2, but I’m positive the series already had something like this.

3716

Part of me liked that it was somewhat difficult to tell if you’d be able to get away with your attitude in Fallout. I would say it added to the tension of the game but that’s not really true since I quickly got into the habit of quick-saving before starting a dialogue. In that case, the color coding sounds like a time saver and I’m for it.

3717

Yep. Fallout 1 and 2, don’t think Tactics had it.
http://www.gamebanshee.com/fallout/perks/empathy.php

3718

Well… damn. I had no idea that’s how that perk worked. I’ve never taken it, and from the description I figured all it did was tell you what someone’s current mood was.

3719

Oh, thanks. It’s been a while.

Most of the time, neither do I… like I said - it’s all just common sense, really (plus, at level 6 you can get all sorts of nifty stuff like More Criticals, Bonus Ranged Damage, Sharpshooter…).

3720

Fallout had the aforementioned perk that colored your text, which was great for pissing off Lynette (Here’s a hint-EVERYTHING pisses off First Citizen Lynette). Fallout also included actions and other descriptions of your words though, which helped.

The idea of Mass Effect’s wheel, however, is still best to me. You know instantly if something is going to be “Sure I’ll help”, “Fuck you”, “Whatever”, something otherwise dickish or nice, etc. Even grudging acceptance.

While it doesn’t have as much world effect as it could a lot of the time (though it can often enough get into or avoid fights), that’s a factor of Bioware pushing the story a certain way as much as anything. I’d love to see someone use the system in an open ended RPG, or at least more open than ME, but it’ll be a while.