Dragon Age Origins

[Xiahou Dun]

Originally Posted by doomjockey

Because it's lazy?

Using standard typical Fantasy fare, which has proven to work, is being lazy? Meh, whatever.

I'd have to say worse than that is this milquetoast version of "dark fantasy". To it's credit, there was at least one very good, very dark scene so far, the Joining.

I agree with you on that part. How the lead up to the Joining Ritual and the actual ritual itself was pretty good.

But generally speaking, I'm not sure why I thought this would have a more mature tone than other RPGs. More often than not it's just a bit of extra gore and extended bouts of hugging masquerading as sex scenes.

Considering how much trouble some game companies have been in due to excessive amounts of gore and sexual content, can you really blame Bioware for doing what they did? Beheadings, excessive blood and all the other parts for the combat in Dragon Age: Origins would rather by typical of how warfare was played out in medieval times etc, so I don't really see the point about that.

The sex scenes though, I can understand why they did that. Remember the outroar over the 'Hot Coffee' from GTA: SA?

Take from Wikipedia

In mid-June 2005, a software patch for the game dubbed the "Hot Coffee mod" was released by Patrick Wildenborg (under the Internet alias "PatrickW"), a 38-year old modder from the Netherlands. The name "Hot Coffee" refers to the way the released game alludes to the unseen sex scenes. In the unmodified game, the player takes his girlfriend to her front door and she asks him if he would like to come in for "some coffee". He agrees, and the camera stays outside, swaying back and forth a bit, while moaning sounds are heard.

After installing the patch, users can enter the main character's girlfriends' houses and engage in a crudely rendered, fully clothed sexual intercourse mini-game. Later in June 2005, a console 'hacker' known as Jay "FNG" released an "Action Replay Power Save" for the Xbox console, enabling the "Hot Coffee" mini-game. On July 12, 2005, Jay "FNG" released codes for the Action Replay game enhancer that allowed the scenes to be accessed in the PlayStation 2 console version. The fallout from the controversy resulted in a public response from high-ranking politicians in the United States and resulted in the game's recall and re-release.

On July 20, 2005, production of the game was suspended and the game received a revised ESRB Rating of Adults Only, making San Andreas the only mass-released AO console game in the US. Rockstar gave distributors the option of applying an Adults Only ESRB rating sticker to copies of the game, or returning them to be replaced by versions without the Hot Coffee content. Many retailers pulled the game off their shelves in compliance with their own store regulations that kept them from selling AO games. Rockstar North released a "Cold Coffee" patch[41] for the PC version and re-released San Andreas with an M rating. The PlayStation 2 and Xbox versions have also been re-released in a "GTA Trilogy Pack"[42] for Xbox and PlayStation 2, as well as a Special Edition for PlayStation 2 that includes the documentary film Sunday Driver.

On 8 November 2007 Take-Two announced a proposed settlement to the class action litigation that had been brought against them following the Hot Coffee controversy. If the proposed settlement is approved by the court, neither Take-Two nor Rockstar would admit liability or wrongdoing. Consumers would be able to swap their AO-rated copies of the game for M-rated versions and may also qualify for a $35 cash payment upon signing a sworn statement.[43]

A report in The New York Times on 25 June 2008 revealed that a total of 2,676 claims for the compensation package had been filed.[44]

What did you want, something from a hentai game? I can't speak for the American censorship board, but in Australia, as far as I know, there is no mainstream game (Released locally etc) with a R+18 rating, which is what anything with extreme excessive violence and sex scenes is given. Though Dragon Age: Origins was given the MA15+ Restricted rating for Strong Violence, if the sex scenes 'were' graphic, then it would've probably be given a R18+ rating and not allowed into the country.

Speaking about implied sex scenes... In Mass Effect there was some controversy about the sex scene in that. Taken from Wikipedia:

Controversy over the sexual content of Mass Effect occurred when evangelical blogger Kevin McCullough wrote an article titled, "The ‘Sex-Box’ Race for President."[96] McCullough employed strong, false statements such as "Mass Effect can be customized to sodomize whatever, whomever, however, the game player wishes," and "with its ‘over the net’ capabilities virtual orgasmic rape is just the push of a button away." The game itself does not feature rape, as each romantic sub-plot involves consent on the part of the player and the NPC and cannot be done with "whomever" the player wishes. Only two NPCs for each PC gender are considered romantic interests and furthermore the game lacks a multiplayer component of any sort.

McCullough’s article was met with an outburst from the gaming community. McCullough issued an apology by saying, "I DO apologize to the gaming universe!" He then goes on to say, "I still do concur with my original position that the objectionable content in Mass Effect is still offensive."[97] McCullough’s handling of the situation was parodied by popular gaming webcomic Penny Arcade[98] and online comedy site LoadingReadyRun.[99] The controversy eventually resulted in his article being taken down by Townhall.com.[100]

The romantic subplots each have a short cut-scene that displays a series of fast cuts of a sexual encounter between the characters, although no specific sex act is clearly shown. A New York Times article on the controversy compared the contents to U.S. evening network television.[101]

On January 21, 2008, a Fox News segment "The Live Desk With Martha MacCallum" discussed Mass Effect[101] with the heading "'SE'XBOX?' New video game shows full digital nudity and sex." MacCallum stated that the game "leaves nothing to the imagination," features "the ability for players to engage in full graphic sex" where the player gets to decide what happens, cited critics as saying that the Mature-rated game is marketed to children and teenagers, and read a rebuttal from publisher Microsoft stating that the company abides by rating systems and provides monitoring tools for parents. Psychology specialist and author Cooper Lawrence and video game journalist Geoff Keighley were interviewed. The former described sexual content in video games as teaching their active users, adolescent boys, to consider women as objects of desire valued solely for their sexuality. She added that the game's player character is a man who decides how many women he wants to be with. Keighley focused on challenging the accuracy of previous statements, saying it is a choice to play the protagonist as a male or a female. He also described Mass Effect as having an optional, brief sexual situation as the culmination of a romantic relationship in a 30+ hour game. Adding to Lawrence's inaccuracies is the fact that the main character is not allowed to be with more than one individual, sexually and romantically. MacCallum and Lawrence admitted that they had not played the game.

Electronic Arts, the parent company of BioWare, requested a correction of "serious errors" from Fox News in an open letter.[101][102][103] Fox News replied by stating that EA had been offered a chance to appear on the channel.

On the 25th, Lawrence, who had since watched someone play the game for about two-and-a-half hours, retracted her earlier statements in an interview. She added that she had been told the game was similar to pornography, and noted that she "has seen episodes of Lost that are more sexually explicit." In the interim, largely as a reaction from an offended gaming community, her latest book attracted a number of customer reviews on Amazon.com which rated it one star out of five.[101] In an editorial, G4's Adam Sessler referred to the interview as a "litany of falsehoods" and parodied Lawrence's statements.[104] The controversy came to be known for the fact that the most explicit content actually shown was the side profile of a breast and led to the popularization of the internet meme "alien sideboob."[105]

True that most of the people who complained it, were probably prudish nutbars, but because of that one can understand why Bioware toned down the sex scenes in Dragon Age: Origins.

But that's enough about the negatives, because I actually do enjoy the game in most other areas.

If I didn't enjoy the game, I wouldn't be in the middle of my third playthrough. I don't know what it is, but there's something about this game that I truly do enjoy and keep coming back to to play. The same is true for me regarding Saints Row 2, but that's another story.

I don't mean to sound harsh etc in response to your post doomjockey, just putting in my two cents worth.

[doomjockey]

Originally Posted by Xiahou Dun

Using standard typical Fantasy fare, which has proven to work, is being lazy? Meh, whatever.

Well, yes. It's lazier to follow the trend instead of trying to innovate imo.

I think you mistake me, I don't consider excessive nudity and gore "maturity". I meant that the excessive gore here is (again) a poor substitute for truly mature themes. I somehow got under the impression BioWare would be above that.

As for the sex scenes, I fathom the motives, but it's still pretty terrible to watch imo. You can't push the envelope by not pushing the envelope.

I'm not clamoring for nude bits and pieces, but the ME scene was better because it actually suggested sex. Showing people in their underwear trying to mime it is absurd. And more importantly, having read interviews where BioWare claims that the response to ME's scene did nothing to cow them, I was a bit disappointed to see that it did.

[TK]

Originally Posted by Xiahou Dun

Nothing wrong with using the template from all fantasy novels eh?

If it aint broken, why fix it?

There is something wrong with that, it's boring because it's been done a million times. It's not really the template from all fantasy novels, it's the template from Tolkien, which since then a hugely excessive number of fantasy novels have imitated (and none with anything close to the dedication and finesse with which Tolkien did it).

The game is still good, it just could have been way, way better.

[ThroneofOminous]

I don't find the universe boring so much as I see it as a horrible missed opportunity. It's obvious that this game really did have 5 years of effort put into fleshing out the universe; it's a damn shame that the writers didn't have any aspiration beyond "extremely polished high fantasy". Imagine what Chris Avellone or Brian Mitsoda could have done if they had 5 years to work on the scenario for a game.

[Xiahou Dun]

Originally Posted by doomjockey

Well, yes. It's lazier to follow the trend instead of trying to innovate imo.

I think you mistake me, I don't consider excessive nudity and gore "maturity". I meant that the excessive gore here is (again) a poor substitute for truly mature themes. I somehow got under the impression BioWare would be above that.

As for the sex scenes, I fathom the motives, but it's still pretty terrible to watch imo. You can't push the envelope by not pushing the envelope.

I'm not clamoring for nude bits and pieces, but the ME scene was better because it actually suggested sex. Showing people in their underwear trying to mime it is absurd. And more importantly, having read interviews where BioWare claims that the response to ME's scene did nothing to cow them, I was a bit disappointed to see that it did.

The sex scenes portrayed in Dragon Age: Origins are of a 'Implied Sexual Act' imo. I mean, who wants to really 'see' two computer characters getting it on? Still, I can see your point regarding that.

Tbh, the excessive violence didn't bother me at all. Guess I've become desensitized to things like that now, what with other videogames and with what's on TV nowadays. Daytime TV is enough to drive someone insane.

Originally Posted by TK

There is something wrong with that, it's boring because it's been done a million times. It's not really the template from all fantasy novels, it's the template from Tolkien, which since then a hugely excessive number of fantasy novels have imitated (and none with anything close to the dedication and finesse with which Tolkien did it).

The game is still good, it just could have been way, way better.

No game is 100% perfect imo, can get close to it... but never really there. Granted the whole Tolkien universe has been the inspiration for a lot of fantasy novels/games/etc... but when I think of sword & sorcery fantasy, I do recall the whole Elves, Dwarves, Orcs etc. In comparison with other RPG's (And this is just my opinion here) being made today, I quite enjoyed going back to the 'roots', so to speak, and being in a game with old favorites. Guess I'm weird like that.

[TK]

Well keep in mind that I've been saying this whole time, Dragon Age is a good game. I played through it voraciously. I love love love Bioware RPGs, and this one was no exception. The setting didn't make it a bad game, it's just that it's a lot of missed potential. You could have a game with a completely average setting you've seen a million times, and then it could have stellar role playing and combat elements. Or you could have a game with an awe-inspiring, totally original setting that really evokes a sense of wonder and discovery, and it could have stellar role playing and combat elements. Both could be good games, but when you know you could have had the latter, the former just feels a little bit disappointing, no matter how well executed it is.

[doomjockey]

Originally Posted by Xiahou Dun

The sex scenes portrayed in Dragon Age: Origins are of a 'Implied Sexual Act' imo. I mean, who wants to really 'see' two computer characters getting it on? Still, I can see your point regarding that.

Fairly sure I'm repeating myself, but it's badly implied to me. Tamer than network television which similarly allows no naughty bits (in America anyway). So it's not like it can't be done more convincingly within those boundaries. Maybe they're as you said, unwilling or afraid to do it.

[ThroneofOminous]

The sex scene in Mass Effect vaguely looked like a sex scene, so I don't know how they managed to drop the ball here. Different development teams, I guess. Not that I was super psyched to see some virtual coitus or anything, but what we got was pretty painful to sit through.

[Xiahou Dun]

Oh well, to each their own. Guess I was being a little too picky and somewhat obsessively protective towards this game. For me, I thoroughly enjoy this game (As it is, on my third playthrough atm.) and as I was waiting for a good RPG for awhile and this one delivered, at least to me that is.

[Neo Xzhan]

Originally Posted by TK

I yearn for a new era of RPGs. One in which people realize that you don't need to save the universe from a horrible transcendent evil to have a good story. That, in fact, this regularly creates bad stories. Why can't we ever have an RPG where we go adventuring and interesting things happen but we DON'T need to save the world?.

So, PlaneScape: Torment 2?

There hasn't been a single game like it, till this day. Extremely character/story driven. Not trying to save the universe from utter destruction. Just trying to figure out who you are, who you were and where you are going.

I'd be all over it.