61 replies to this topic

[Longinus]

That's hardly fair Domi. Remember most gamers are male and therefore games are generally tailored to meet their needs. If you're going to complain about the male lead in Torment, then complain about the majority of Japanese RPGs that also have male leads.

[SimDing0]

And if they could not figured out how to allow for a female to play through that game, than *their* imagination is *seriously* lacking.

Well, uh, I'd say your imagination's also fairly lacking if you find playing a male character so inconceivable. The fact that the lead character is male says nothing about the quality of the story, or the scope for roleplaying the character.

[JPS]

I love the game, but I have to say I agree with Domi ? with a bit of work, it would have been possible to make the game playable with a female character as well. Quite a bit of work in some areas, I agree, but it could have been done.

And I don't see why "I think that having to play a male character is limiting my enjoyment of the game" is a less valid argument than "I don't think that having to play a male character is limiting my enjoyment of the game" (and as arguments go, it's a whole lot better than "I don't think that having to play a male character is limiting your enjoyment of the game"... ).

[SimDing0]

Sim, there is one huge thing you are ignoring with your statement: I am a customer, they are the developpers.

But that doesn't really have a bearing on the quality of the story or roleplaying in the game, which is what you were arguing was degraded by the lack of choice, no?

I find playing a male quite boring and a bit uncomfortable when romances are present in the game. Because unless you are a schisophrenic, you will still see the world through your own eyes. And mine are a woman's eyes.

That, I can't argue with. However, I don't have a problem projecting myself into the eyes of a character, and if that means romancing a guy, then I can write it off as something other than OMG HOMO.

When they tell me, a consumer: "like it because we think you *should* like it and *appreciate* it, because we are Oh! So great! And if you do not - well, you are just a profain mob..." Then you are facing the failure, and Torments failure in comparison to BG1/2 games is a proof to it.

While I don't think it's significant here, I also don't believe Torment's failed sales were due to their neglect of the female player base. The fact that the majority of players aren't likely to find the story appealing, that the combat utterly sucked, and that the marketting was without a doubt the most shitty for any IE game to date seem to bear more influence to me.

If you commit to creating a satisfying RPG, giving a player a gender choice is crucial imo, because that is the main difference between a book and an interactive media - being able to incorporate *yourself* into the story, not just follow the characters you like in their adventures.

I don't believe that to be true. I'm not able to play a green-haired townie in the BG trilogy, but that doesn't prevent my from associating with my character. I don't see why it should be any harder to stretch your imagination to the opposite sex than it should to an elf, half-orc, or whatever.

Edited by SimDing0, 07 June 2004 - 09:19 AM.

[raptor]

I am impressed and amassed, i never thought that *this* would be a argument for/against PST...

While i really liked to be able to customise my own character like in the BG12, IWD1/2 games, it wasent even remotelly close to PST, to change the story to allow for a female character *would* change almost entire story save the XP-feeders. also all teh NPC's would have to be remade, some of them wouldnt even accept you as a female (annah), And you actually HAVE more RP options and character customisation in PST, everything you do can change things. Unlike in BG1, where my Lawfull Good Paladin can go kill the High priest of the morninglord, and go to another temple and buy upp hes reputation again. Where A Chaotic Evil Thief returns a cat to a little girl and such.

If *you* did not like to play a "make" character then thats sad, but really you cant hold the developers responcible for it, every girl i know that like rpg's actually love Torment, and have no problem imagining themself in a male role.
Also to change NO's gender would be like making Arwen male and Aragorn female in an alternative lotr movie to please all teh masses...

[raptor]

Considering all the NPCs in PST have more dialoge each than all the npc's in bg2 combined, i would say that was a quite HUGE change, since many of those are related directlly to hes gender. Several keycharacters would have to be replaced with other gender characters (like Ravel the MALE nighthag ?!), and imagine a "female like" transulent one
Making another characterreplacement for Annah i dont think was/is a good alternative, considering the amount of work put into making the NPC's that already is in the game. There is also of corse the fact that they saved ALOT of time and money (as well as potentional story messupps) by making it 1 gender, since the background story was anyways created FOR that one character. it *could* just as well have been a female character instead of a male character, but the story would have been different, and then i doubt they would have made it posible to change to male character. (and exept a few very matcho-wannabe kids i dont tihnk that would have been a problem for most of the male's playing these games.)

Games Like Final Fantsy, with the dude with giganto sword (never played them much, only remember the FF7 dude with the 4 meter tall sword or something) and Diablo where the warrior and Sircerer is male (and the most powerfull fo the 3 classes) that is okie or wrong in your opinin ?

By all means, it could have been fun, and interesting playing as a female character, and it would increase the replay rate by 200%, but unfortunatelly that just didnt seem plausible since it would include almost 200% more work to finish the game as well. who knows, if they ever made enough money on it to make a sequel, it might have starred a female character. (funny enough, most female gamers i know, prefer male characters in both computer games and P&P)

in a line: By doing that change, you would tilt the game more towards BG1/2 style story, and thus ruin much of the personalised feel that exist in the game curentlly. IF much work to make it right, the story would be 50% changed (not including XP feeders).

[Vlasák]

Domi: it seems that we won't get any consensus. As it has been said - Torment is not "common" game. You can't apply your theory about the product and the consumer on it because it is similar as some art movie.

All spectacors in the cinema want to know what was the movie about. They are costumers and bought their product (movie). In case of normal movies - the movie has been seen - some specators are pleased becuase they like that movie, some are not because they see many mistakes in that movie etc. Normal movie is just as normal game - you can complain about the lazyness of designers, you can complain about bugs, you can complain about everything because it is normal game supposed for everyone.

But there is another sort of movies - movies by Lynch, von Trier, Kubrick, Italian movies from 60s and 70s, etc. etc. You can't expect that these movies will be normal, you can't have the same requirements for them as for the "normal" movies. They are different and that is their BIG advantage. You may be totally lost in the story of Lost Highway, but it is not bad - the movie is simply different and hardly understandable. You may be surprised by Dogville - all objects are sketched by a chalk... etc. etc. And these examples are similar to Torment. Torment is different game than others. It is known that many RPG fans dislike it, but many like it and consider it as the best game. I see your point with gender of protagonist but you must expect these differences because Torment isn't normal product as well as the art movies.

I'm not surprised that you are the rpg fan and don't like Torment. But you should try to play Torment to the end and don't give it up in Mortuary - you'll see (maybe; nad if you want) why is Torment so special, where are its advantages and why is the Nameless One the male character. As someone said - it will be totally different game with female protagonist. It is not just about female avatar animation, other party members and switching Ravel into man...

[Tancred]

Oh, I doubt that giving a player more choices would ruin any game.

IMO, it almost ruins Baldur's Gate. It takes away the necessity and challenge of 'playing a role'. BG is half an Adventure Game, not a Roleplaying Game. In BG, you're not even encouraged to play a role. It's all too easy to simply become 'Yourself-in-a-fantasy-world' in BG, and that's not a roleplaying challenge in the slightest.

Edited by Tancred, 07 June 2004 - 02:07 PM.

[Tancred]

In the CRPGs for me the main "kick" is doing it into your own story as much as possible, and doing it for yourself. Yes, writting yourself into the fantasy world. That's great. It is a dream realized in a media other than your own mind.

Aha... well, that's fair enough, and adequately explains why it is Torment wasn't for you, I guess.

[Xaositect_Crayon]

it's kinda silly ya know... you guys are complaining that it's a specific story... not every game has to be as customizable as BG2 and open ended as Vice City

what I think it is is some people want to distance themselves so far from Japanese style rpgs so much that they wont give an inch...

Edited by Xaositect_Crayon, 07 June 2004 - 02:50 PM.

[Tancred]

Books is an interesting parallel. I've read plenty of books in which I certainly disagreed with events as they played out. The author should have done this, that would have made more sense, etc. Ive read plenty of books I didn't enjoy and will never read again. I've read a few books that I simply never finished, I didn't like them. I dont see anything wrong with that, as such.

And I certainly admit that not every book is created with the consumer in mind. It would be a very dreary industry if that was so.

On Torment's lack of success: I think the marketing team in charge of that should have been fired. That box was ugly. And the trailer with BG told me absolutely nothing other than it looked pretty weird.

Edited by Tancred, 07 June 2004 - 02:49 PM.