Mass Effect

[Seika]

They make AAA RPGs. They kinda have to make combat a central pillar of their game design. You're not selling a main character diplomat. I'm just grateful they give a damn about your character's dialogue in the first place, unlike the other AAA WRPG maker.

(It's also worth pointing out that they did begin on Shattered Steel, for all that there's probably no-one left from that incarnation of the company, and very few who remember the days you could claim to have played it in your profile on the several-generations-back BioBoards).

Musing on BioWare's protagonists and how they came to end up being fighters, it's kind of interesting.

Gorion's Ward: Adventurer by circumstance (birth)
Hero of Neverwinter: Adventurer by choice
Does the SoU/HotU protag even have a title?: Adventurer by choice
Revan: Soldier of some description (choice or circumstance)/Jedi Knight conscript & Revan (birth)
Spirit Monk: Martial artist and adventurer by circumstance (upbringing & birth)
Grey Warden: Conscript by circumstance (life event)
Shepard: Soldier by choice
Hawke: Adventurer by circumstance (life event)
Inquisistor: Adventurer/Overlord of half the continent by circumstance (life event)
Pathfinder: Presumably soldier by choice

SWTOR & Sonic: lol

I remember all the discussion about how ME might represent a corner turned in terms of rejection a 'Chosen One' RPG archetype, reliant on an old boring/outdated/aristo-monarchical construct, because your character chose themselves by enlisting. Seems to me like the ME1/DA:O period might indeed have been the turning point, but it was merely away from your calling being innate (and even then NWN had already bucked the trend), rather than necessarily toward heroes entering themselves in the lists, as it were. Which is fine, I think, but interesting to note in retrospect.

[2Bad]

Bioware cares about dialogue but that doesn't make them good at it.

[Snow]

I realize they won't step away from the shooty Messiah arpg, I just wish they would.

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Or at least go for something less obvious. Like DA2 tried to.

[GhostDIGIT]

Too bad, have a Space Abraham with your Space Moses.

[Mattias]

I remember all the discussion about how ME might represent a corner turned in terms of rejection a 'Chosen One' RPG archetype, reliant on an old boring/outdated/aristo-monarchical construct, because your character chose themselves by enlisting. Seems to me like the ME1/DA:O period might indeed have been the turning point, but it was merely away from your calling being innate (and even then NWN had already bucked the trend), rather than necessarily toward heroes entering themselves in the lists, as it were. Which is fine, I think, but interesting to note in retrospect.

The first two DA games had the strongest lack of a 'chosen one' in my opinion. DA:O had a legend that needed to be fulfilled sure, but there wasn't just The Warden that could accomplish it. You also had Alistair, Loghain, and Morrigan to help you out and take that burden. DA2 you were just some rando caught between two sides in a cold war. Sure you kicked a ton of ass, but most of that stuff would have probably happened anyways, with or without you there.

[Snow]

What if I don't want to be the chosen one for once.

[Tobias]

What if I don't want to be the chosen one for once.

Mass effect: bob from accounting

[SeiKeo]

Honestly, does the actual gameplay still look more like a beta build than a finished product to anyone else? That worries me more.

[Five_X]

No improvement in character movement and lipsyncing visible in the trailer either.

fwiw apparently that's "still a work in progress"

Biohyuu

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genuinely I wouldn't be surprised if it was delayed again

[asterism42]

What if I don't want to be the chosen one for once.

Not your choice.

[Snow]

I can not play the game, that's my choice.

[Five_X]

Honestly, does the actual gameplay still look more like a beta build than a finished product to anyone else? That worries me more.

Having watched the trailer again, I'm not too sure what to think about this: most of it is rapid cuts out-of-context, and the one more lengthy glimpse of combat that we do get seems superficially similar but also vastly different from previous ME gameplay. I agree, though, that combat-wise it seems pretty unpolished. The problem with that is we don't have any way of properly judging gameplay until we get a chance at playing the game itself, which is obviously too late for anything to be changed.

It seems much more interestingly fluid than ME3, and I can believe that BioWare could do interesting things with level design, but ultimately this is a trailer. It's all made up of choice cuts, so naturally some things will be overrepresented and others underrepresented.

[Snow]

Well if these are their choice cuts, I dunno man.

[Five_X]

Yeah I have no idea. Marketing for this so far has been bizarre, honestly.

[ILurkNoMoar]

I seriously hope I'm not going to have to scour every planet for rocks and weeds to make new equipment with only marginal improvements over the last set in order to say competitive, I'd rather send npcs to do that for me. Also hope the command table/galaxy map won't be a total mess like the war room in Inquisition.

[Sesto]

I'd rather send npcs to do that for me.

i'd rather not do it at all

[SeiKeo]

Why yes, crafting unique overpowered prototype guns does ​sound fun.

[Tobias]

Bring back the nuke launcher

[Five_X]

Why yes, crafting unique overpowered prototype guns does ​sound fun.

-Collect 6000 Aspartamian Shrubweeds in order to construct the Black Widow-

[Seika]

Ze actual gameplay trailer: