games

I still struggle with whether I like fully-voiced games

It's fully motioned

that I hate

I can take full VA, i cant take 1000000 cutscenes

yes

unless its like death stranding

not jerking off DoS2 but its another thing i hate about BG3

A good narrator leaves me with a smile or at least some memorable lines, but I do think it would be hard to shoehorn in for some experiences.

the Bioware style, people standing expositing at each other in a cutscene I'm done with

every small, TINY conversatyion has a long ass animated action

I think the issue is also, game writing sucks

its only going to get worse

the people that grew up on "good games" are dying out

The making video games more like movies has made some interesting or memorable scenes, but it really does just interrupt gameplay flow and immersion done poorly. Your more of the real gamer here spooky, but hasn't the bioware style been out of for the past decade?

its more in than ever with bg3

the bioware wheel is kinda dying

i will not be suprised if in 3 years theres 10x more

of games with long drawn out cutscenes of people standing around

but the style of, characters stand looking at each other, and the camera swaps back and forth is everywhere

even (mostly) well-written games like Witcher use it

dont remind me of the new voice actor

that whole situation is still weird

I feel like there are two strategies right now: 1) Bioware dialogue delivery 2) Disembodied voice in your head/earpiece

most games have ditched companion NPCs who talk to you in-gameplay

other than tLoU and GoW

i actually like when the earpiece character is well done

but

99% of the time its not

armored core 6 does it very well, to the point you have 3(4 kind of) distinct earpiece characters, you never see anyone in gameplay but they're all very well written and their personalities shine through quite well

Which way western man, Bioware or Looking Glass Studios

Max, I actually think you're onto something with your original point about good narrators

really now!

I think it would be a welcome change of pace

I'm going through all the games I can think of that were narrative-focused

I adore games with good narrorators so much and I feel like it makes your actions so much more grounded and sometimes give you an immiedtiete perspective on your actions

and weirdly, I think Metro was the only one that I think had an effective use of dialogue

for the narrative

which sometimes when you end up doing things "aimlessly" or brain dead

it can make you put your thoughts into perspective much more

I don't think any game will

even if it's not a true narrator, I also like games where your characters inner monologue is voiced

actually

that's why I like W3's dialogue so much I think

that quite literally is a narrorator

and also a good way to do it

well it's selective in W3

because it gives the same effect

but yeah, I think it's a cheaty way to get good dialogue into a game

and it's not overused

i think in some games it makes your adventure feel a lot more 'epic' too

but thats rare

I think the other issue is that most studios that would do a narrorator end up going "WHY DONT WE HAVE A PLUCKY SILLY CHARACTER THAT CONSTANTLY JUST TALKS TO YOU INSTEAD AND MAKES JOKES"

and just does that'

yes

the Dontnod Life is Strange style inner monologue

where your character barely ever talks, and is just doing sarcastic Marvel quips in their head about everything

i would be okay with that style if the character wasnt a

ha, that rock looks like a penis, rock hard wowzers

college girl

and talked retarded

itd be an interesting dynamic to see a predefined characters interanl reaction and feelings towards your(their) choices

I like LiS1, I think the dialogue is stupid but the overall story works with it

everything after that is a meme though

in a non you know

setting

yeah, but games with choices are rare right now

outside of the dark pictures movie games

choice is impossible to write

for some reason

your actions cant have consequences

the player should see everything on one run

or your 'choices' boil down to which flavor of faction/person ice cream you want

I'm even ok if the choice is literally between "on this run, do you want character X or Y to be your buddy"

and there are only minor story changes, it's just a different NPC you get to interact iwth

it's not great, but its better than what we have now

i mean i appreciate that but what i really want is hard questions that make you pick between options and most importantly effect your ending slide if there is one

(which is why i fucking hate BG3 didnt have it on release beecause "they didnt think people would want to see it")

sex Max

nothing you do matters in that game

all the BG3 character endings are just more sex