Dragon Age Forum News (Feb. 19, 05)

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Here are today's Dragon Age forum highlights, collected by NWVault. Please take into account that these are only single parts of various threads and should not be taken out of context. Bear in mind also that the posts presented here are copied as-is, and that any bad spelling and grammar does not get corrected on our end.

David Gaider, Designer

Dev response: Nonviolent solutions to hostile actions?

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well, you just said epic means lots of slaughtering here. i want to point out that this is surely poor.

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Sorry? No, I didn't. I said that there was nothing very epic about being able to avoid every combat in the game. I also said that the game would focus on epic events and warfare.

That's not the same thing with equating epic with lots of slaughtering at all.

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Quote: a good crpg allows to avoid lots of fights.

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Why? What is so special about avoiding fights that it makes for good roleplaying? If avoiding combat can be done in a fun way that fits the story, then great. It's not a goal in and of itself, and that's all I'm saying.

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Quote: while you and me want to have a bag full of bloddy heads there are lots of people who want to wander around and dont fight the xth time an orc ambush.

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Your argument is a bit specious. Where does it automatically follow that not allowing for every single combat to be avoided means that the combat there is must be meaningless?

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Quote: yes. true. so i tell you make a story were you are not forced to mow down every living thing. or reduce it to an acceptable level.

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Oh? Alright. Since I hear you pay our bills now, let me send you the invoice for the millions of dollars needed for your project.

I don't know where the idea comes from that the story will automatically involve "mowing down every living thing" since I already said that combat would be avoidable when fitting, but hey... you're the boss.

Dev response: Nonviolent solutions to hostile actions?

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there is no rpg and i think no game with an adequate amount of battles in which every single encounter has a mediocre amount of story in it. most feature random battles or monsters along the way to the goal. those have only one goal, give you experience to level up.

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This isn't about whether the combat is mindless or not, though you seem to be trying to make it about that. I'm not arguing that combat shouldn't be more meaningful.

Combat is, however, a big part of most RPG's... as you point out yourself... and DA will be no different in that respect. Why? Because it's exciting and fun. Getting experience and leveling up is part of what most people find fun about it.

I get it that you think there should be story in every fight, and that you disagree with me when I say that avoiding combat is not a goal in and of itself. I believe, however, that that is an idea that only sounds good in concept and does not work in practice. There will be encounters that do not result in combat or where combat can be avoided in DA, probably more than we've even done before, but that is not the point of the game nor is it the point of an RPG.

Day/Night Cycle Part 2

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I've just one question to be answered:

Why is it that Bioware may not be placing in a day to night cycle?

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Because it's not necessary? We can still simulate the passage of time and even have a story (amazing, I know) without having it transition from day to night while you are standing there on the screen. I would say that this sort of transitioning is important if your focus is on world simulation like in Morrowind... but that's not where DA's focus lies.

All things being equal, we'd prefer to have the day/night transitions. But they're not equal. Not having them means that light sources can be cooked into the level itself, and the CPU can be freed up to put lots and lots of models on the screen instead of calculating lights and shadows. There are other considerations, but this is not a decision that is being made lightly... if we don't do it, it's because there's trade-offs to be made that are more worthwhile.

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Quote: As little as such a feature may sound, a lot of games have this feature nowadays and is quite common, be it irrelevant or not.

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And so being like lots of games is important?

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Quote: Such a feature holds great significance to most of the players in the Bioware community.

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As far as I can tell, every feature holds great significance to most of the players in the Bioware community.

Day/Night Cycle Part 2

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Will we be able to adjust the light sources of the large 'zones' of the world, so to speak, with triggers to make it seem like night and day?

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I'm not an artist, so I'm not really sure how it works. I imagine that you could take a level we had created and re-cook it with new light sources... that sounds to me like it would be a pretty minor effort, but then it might not be and I speak out of ignorance.

Whether or not light sources will be alterable via in-game scripting is not known yet (or, at least, the degree to which it will be.)

Darcy Pajak, Assistant Producer

Day/Night Cycle Part 2
We understand that many people want Dragon Age to have a day/night cycle (if that means that time passes from day to night in the game, and the level's get dark and spooky right before your eyes.)

We don't need one for Dragon Age. We're not going to have massive PW where travel takes hours. Moving from one side of an area to another would take less time then anyone would notice if the sun changed position.

On top of that we would have to put in the twighlight transitions. (Flowers closing, birds nesting down, fog rising, dew, etc.)

Will people freak out that there is no day and night cycle?
No.
And they will not because they will not notice. At no time will someone post on the board:

"Hey, I had my character sit in one level all day, and the sun never set! I'm going to return the game!"

On the other hand if someone did freak out and return the game, more power to them. If they return a game because it doesn't go from day to night, then they need the money for therapy.

That all being said. If we find that we need it (for the story, not just because other games are doing it). then we would add it.

It's unfortunate that all we can do explain what is not planned, without showing you exactly what is. In time we will show everyone what we've been doing with our time and then I hope you'll be as excited about the game as we are.

Dev response: Nonviolent solutions to hostile actions?
I think we responded to this post sufficiently. I do not want to turn this into a debate, because the direction regarding combat/non-combat has been decided upon and shared.

Locking Topic

Tim Smith, Tools Programmer

Dual core CPUs
Even NWN is multithreaded. However, I would doubt that we will take the time to try and multithread the whole game to the extent that some might wish. As already stated, multithreaded is very hard once you get past the basics. Just ask Jon Carmack of id about his first trys at multithreaded programming.

Tim Smith, Tools Programmer

Dual core CPUs
Aside from some very technical reasons, you don't want to limit a program or OS to using a specific processor. If there is work to be done and a CPU is available to do that work, then let that CPU do that work.

Programs stall much more than people realize. When you open a file, the disk drive must be accessed. This takes time and during that time the program that opened the file is stalled. This makes the CPU available to do other work.