Do you even live in the real world?

Thanks for the reply! I’ll reply myself on your site Sorry for the late response.

And thank you again for this kind of thoughts of yours and as well as for the exchange of thoughts!
Yours Nsae

As Nsae mentioned, Quantic Dream has always been very narrative-focused in their games and pays a lot more attention to minute details in the realistic presentation of a story. It wasn’t that apparent to me in Indigo Prophecy/Farenheit (besides the 3 alternate endings), but according to their press releases, Heavy Rain will definitely see player decisions make a difference in the narrative outcome. I quote David Cage, designer of Heavy Rain, “I developed this technique I call “banding stories”, that is about considering my story like a rubber band that the player can stretch and deform based on his actions. So the story’s always there, the rubber band is still the same, but you can change its shape and length based on what you do.” (Source: http://archive.videogamesdaily.com/features/heavy-rain-david-cage-interview-p1.asp)

Besides the morality decisions that truly influence the game, something that disturbs me more is the binary nature of it all. You can been good or evil, paragon or renegade, or everything in between on the continuum, but based on who’s judgment? I believe executing a murderer is the best way to protect future victims, but letting him go may be the one that bags me a higher morality score. Bioware attempted to address this problem in Dragon Age: Origins by removing the morality bar and having each of your actions judged by individual party members who may agree, disagree or remain neutral to different extents depending on their beliefs. David Gaider, writer of DA:O, mentioned that removing the bar “allowed us to have different options for the quests and the dialogue, but we don’t need to always have “evil” and “good.” We are allowed to put in options that are just logical. They can be very different. You can think there’s a good reason to do all of them. They can be a little in the gray area.” (Source: http://www.gamasutra.com/view/feature/4045/the_story_thing_biowares_david_.php?page=2)

Just some thoughts.

The Conan thought is EXACTLY why I stopped playing Fallout 3, this summer, too often I encounter this feel also in the last years.
And even though I never played through Ultima IV, the spirit of this game is always there in my mind, when playing RPGs or thinking about moral choices.

And after playing Kotor, I realy was disappointed by Mass Effect, it was a medium fun game, with a good to great setting, but with poor battle, and espacially poor choices, even though it had its moments.

And after reading the spoilers of Planscape Torment, I finally know why it is that much praised, no one managed to explain it until now to me. BUT now, I definitely have to play it!!!! (Thanks, thus reading spoilers is not always a bad thing *g)

I wanted to add to this discussion also two games I think are really worth mentioning.
First Fahrenheit/Indigo Prophecy, which is not a RPG, BUT I have never played a game, where choices where that free, but still with importance for the plot, and with deep consequences.
To explain that, two examples from the game:

First: a policeman is knocking on your flats door, you have killed someone the previous night, everywhere blood, you just woke up. No menu where you can choose between good or bad. Only a lot of choices: do I answer the door? Do I cover the bed? Damn! Wait, my hand is full blood? Doesn’t matter I can talk me out of that, hopefully? Shit, where are the door keys? The policeman is hammering on the door louder and louder. etc…
>>Here you have an open set of choices, with no clear line what to do, and if you do not wash your hands, he really asks you why you have blood tainted hands, and you have to respond logically, or withstand an inspection of your flat, thus you should have used the time for cleaning your flat, rather than washing your hands…

Second example:
The police are looking for you, and you cross the path of a policeman in the park.
At the same time a child is falling in the frozen pond. Quick reaction is needed; do you hide, or help the child? BUT the policeman sees you because you hasitated, and you begin to run, catch the boy, and the policeman lets you run, because you saved the child. etc.

>>Fahrenheit/Indigo Prophecy relies much more on intuition, rather than clear decisions, and lets you play how you handle your reaction, thus you probably performe mistakes, and than have to cope with its consequences, rather than saying that it was good or bad. A completely different level of interaction, just genius stuff. Some genius of programmer once said, that you have to feel free, make your meaningful choices, but still be led by the plot the programmer provides. That is something Fahrenheit/Indigo Prophecy does. Thus expect impressive things from Heavy Rain!!!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BJ_A2Tpz2UM

And the second game I want to introduce is a game called The Void/Tension. I haven’t played it yet, but I will for Christmas.
Even though I haven’t played it, it builds a lot on philosophical questions, even though I do not know how much on decisions. The problem is, it seems, that the English (its Russian) version has no voice, thus there is no good video I could link here. But look out for it, because it is probably a very atmospheric philosophical game, in the school of ICO & co., even though the art style is completely different.
But still, maybe this gives you an impression:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m402AQQ8Dfw&feature=related

Even though both games are (action) adventures, thay are very much connected to your (game) character.

I will finish, by saying, that Heavy Rain will show the future, of choices and their impacts on characters.

Yours
Nsae

But still, I want to try to summarize it:
It’s about, how we handle mistakes in games, especially for do-gooders.
And thus it is maybe an inspiration, how a programmer could evoke such fantasies or even expressions/actions in the game, which could follow out of the reaction of the gamer to mistakes, and could even have an impact on the game, rather than teaching consequences like “Choose that, and you will get that”, but rather “Lets look how you handle your choice”. Because life also doesn’t say, what is wrong and what is right.

“A fables tale!”
http://nsae-shortstories.blogspot.com/2009/12/fables-tale.html

PS: Right now I have spares time, to read all your great entries, the topic is very interesting, and I will probaly also give some inputs, and comments, and maybe also answer the open questions of my entry in that go.
Boldly go on with the inspiring inputs! Thanks.

Yours
Nsae

I’m curious how many people played ME or even KotOR to build the character. It was fun for a while, but I think most people played it for the story. It sure wasn’t for the combat.

Still, I think it’s possible to work within the traditional RPG framework and still move it to a richer, deeper experience. I think a full commercial game probably isn’t feasible, Andrew. But there are other means, maybe for an independent dev.

Heck, let’s dig out our Neverwinter Night editors and develop our ideas.

99% of games aren’t built and marketed towards thirtysomething guys looking for a commentary on the human condition. The idea of ‘mature’ games is still a weak, fledgling thing, and given the costs of commerical game development, it’s likely that we’re not going to see another watershed moment like Planescape for some time. I think maybe the key is to adjust your expectations a bit

And to sound overly confrontational; I’d have to question pulling either ICO or Shadow into the discussion. Both are wonderful games, to be sure, but both are not in any sense RPG’s. They’re able to present a enagaing minimalist story because they have the freedom of excluding player choice from the narrative.

As morally questionable as it is to go around stabbing collossi in your vaguely defined quest, you don’t have a choice in the matter. You either pick up your sword and murder a seven story golem or you play Uncharted 2. Bioware’s naughty/nice options are pure cliche; that’s inarguable. But the attempt is made for the player to make the choice of which they’ll be, as caricatured as it is.

I think it was Warren Spector who made a comment in a interview some foggy time in the past that he was terrified of the growing expectation of gamers that they’d have unlimited choice within games because it made telling a story within the framework of a game nightmarish.

I’d also say that a chunk of this problem is not purely laid at the foot of power fantasy game design. Game mechanics simply do not have a way to judge intent. You can save an NPC (+5 Karma!) only to immediately commit atrocities on that same NPC (-5 Karma!) to end up “neutral” because the game simply isn’t smart enough to figure out that you’re being a sadistic prick.

“Yet, days later, I feel like Conan the Barbarian, sitting on his throne at the end of the first film like a king who has done it all yet feels ultimately unfulfilled. This is when the spiritual hollowness of traditional RPGs grates at me.”

I’d always taken accruing enough gold in order to never worry about the cost of new items ever again to be a given when reaching the final part of a game, but never really thought of it in this light. I was focused on the righteousness of the “I’m saving the world!” story aspect while ignoring the implications of my gameplay choices. It feels good to fill your virtual coffers to the brim and be able to slay anything that moves, but it’s true that this sort of gameplay doesn’t leave you with any feeling of self-discovery or growth when you come away from the game. There is something missing from an experience, virtual or real, when you don’t come away from it with something.

Admittedly, I didn’t read the spoilers since I’m still bent on playing Planescape: Torent one day, but I would say that in games where the player can’t really accrue/obtain/upgrade/etc any aspect of their avatar or game world, such as Ico or Shadow of the Colossus (to name a typical few), you get a completely different feeling. These games don’t offer any moral choices to the gamer per se, but guess I’d say that they offer a kind of experience and feeling that is missing from “gotta catch/buy/kill ‘em all” quests or typical BioWare “be nice or naughty” RPGs, the kind that is closer to a “spiritual quest” than most games are today.