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Quote: Posted 10/31/09 23:15 (GMT) by DLC On The Disc

Quote: Posted 10/31/09 15:05 (GMT) by Fernando Melo
<snip>
These are the main quest givers for their respective DLC, first and foremost. Regardless of how you get the DLC (or not), you will still be encountering Felix to begin your quest for Shale, or Levi to start the Warden's Keep quest for example - that *is* their role.
<snip>

I understand that you have to toe the company line, and that means denying every claim that these are intrusive advertisements for DLC, but you and I both know that they are.

I don't need to quote a company line to disagree - these are neither intrusive, nor advertisements. If you actually read my original post you'd see that as well. And I would argue that until you've played the game and talked to one of these NPCs, that you are claiming something you do not know of.

Quote: Posted 10/31/09 23:15 (GMT) by DLC On The Disc
If these NPCs were important to the basic DAO experience, they would be included in the shipped game and/or any patches without starting a questline for the DLC, maybe delivering some interesting dialogue without hinting at a quest before purchasing said DLC.

If these NPCs were not important to the basic DAO experience, then there would be no reason to include them in the shipped game and/or patches, and to only add them after the player purchases the DLC.

You can put a pig in a dress, but at the end of the day it's still a pig. These are still pitchmen, and I'm not happy about them being in the game.

Again, you've not really read what I posted last time. These are not part of the basic DAO experience, none of the DLC is. You get a complete game without ever touching any of the DLC.

These are quest givers, and work the same, and have the same importance as any other quest giver in DAO once they come in.

Quote: Posted 10/31/09 23:15 (GMT) by DLC On The Disc
So on Tuesday, when I buy my new copy of DAO, I'll pick up an MS points card, I'll put the disc in my 360, and I'll purchase the Warden's Keep, simply because I don't want salesmen in my game unless I can pay them in DAO currency. From then on, I'll make sure to keep my 360 off of LIVE whenever I'm playing DAO. Sure, it'll take an extra bit of work, but it'll be worth it to play the game the way I want to: without intrusive advertisement.

I'll buy DLC on my schedule, not yours. If that means playing an outdated version of DAO then so be it.

I appreciate you picking up WK, I hope you enjoy it and let us know what you think.

I've never argued for anyone to buy DLC on any schedule but theirs. If anything i've always encouraged folks to sit it out and read the reviews and forum posts if they are at all unsure. That is not what doing any of this is about.

And as above - if you re-read my original post, you'll notice that you'll still encounter these NPCs because they are the starting point for these quests, not salesmen for it.

Quote: Posted 11/01/09 00:18 (GMT) by Kasrkin
DLC available from the startup menu in the game makes sense.

Having NPC's in the game, hawking Downloadable Content for *Real Money* seems crass to me. Just not in the spirit of an RPG.

I agree. And that's why that is not what they do. You'll not find these NPCs ever quote you a price, or 'push' any of the content on you, or promote you special offers, or anything of that sort.

Quote: Posted 11/01/09 01:22 (GMT) by Akka le Vil
The problem isn't being advertised for things that won't come before monthes, the problem is being advertised at all

I hear you, and I understand why 'in principle' that puts some folks off - I too, do not want in-game ads. What I'm trying to get at is that I do not believe the way we've done it is advertising something in the way you believe it is - hence, it should be seen first.

Quote: Posted 11/01/09 01:22 (GMT) by Akka le Vil
I can undersand your point of view, but what I can't understand is that, as you know that it can displease lots of people, and you even know this enough to provide instructions to disable this...
<snip>
Seems the most obvious solution to me. Why the forceful approach ?
<snip>
though I understand what you're trying to achieve, I don't see why it couldn't be handled with a simple DLC tab in the option menu, that would have worked just as well and wouldn't have caused all this argument.

I never said it would displease lots of people, I said that it may not be for everyone - same as some of the social things we're doing, or achievements, or day 1 dlc, or pick any number of 'up in arms' topics we've talked about over the years that we recognized may not be for everyone but did anyway because we believed was right for the game.

If anything, I've said that I believe the majority will be pleased, otherwise we wouldn't have gone the way we did for any of those things.

As for it being obvious to offer up a solution - or implying that by not doing so we've opted for a forceful approach - not so, and given how open we've been about all this that's a bit of a stretch.

Like many other discussions so far, it would have been much simpler to ignore the forums or say 'deal with it' - in the end, it probably would work out just the same. That doesn't make it right, nor it is how we do things.

In the time available, we added options for what we believed people would want. And a commitment to evolve things over time for those that we did not, or opted to get player feedback on after launch. If we were second-guessing all our decisions on DAO it would be another 5 years in the making.

Quote: Posted 11/01/09 12:29 (GMT) by aries1001
But the problem for some of us is still this: (as I understand it)

DLC will be delivered onto our computers, without our consent, via the DA downloader. And then a quest giver for the DLC will show up in the game world with an regular quest icon (the exclamation mark!)above their head; when we speak to him, we'd learned, not up front, but later that 'to go on this ride, you'd need to pay XX amount of US dollars'.

You will have consented to it as part of the agreements when installing the game etc. And no NPC will ask you to pay xx of real world money, they are not salespeople.

But in these specific cases, given their DLC nature, to travel to that area you will need to have downloaded it - so there is an option to go and do that if you have not done so up to that point. That's it.

Whether the content download is then paid or free is irrelevant, and the quest giver doesn't care nor ever reflect that.

Quote: Posted 11/01/09 12:29 (GMT) by aries1001
To me, this sound much like, and functions much like a commercial on tv, enticing you, luring you in - with the hope that you'd buy the -ehm- product, which in this case is,- the dlc.

Perhaps, without seeing it. If it matters, I can say that we've spent a great deal of time making sure it was not the case - again, I don't know how else to try and describe that here in text. Once you talk to one of these then let us know if you still feel that way.

Quote: Posted 11/01/09 12:29 (GMT) by aries1001
As for being online to play the game, DA: Origins, I don't think you have to to be? - especially since Derek French in a post clearly stated this. I don't think you'd have to be online to play the DLC as well? The DLC, I'd guess, would just be downloaded onto your computer (once you've accepted it); you can then play it.

Correct. You only need to go online to download the DLC. Afterwards you can be offline.

While I sympathuze *snicker* with your itchiness *chuckle*, please don't start these "I don't have the game yet" threads. It'll fill up the forums.



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While it should not be on sale yet, if you do have a copy, I hope you enjoy it.


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As has been mentioned before, exclamation points only appear over the heads of optional side content quest givers. You won't be able to find all side content by looking for exclamation points - they are primarily used to indicate quest hubs. And, of course, these can be disabled in the options menu.

Edited By Craig Graff on 10/31/09 20:10

And yet, people keep making threads like this that only encourage the pirates.

Please do not post these types of threads on our forums.

thx

Quote: Posted 10/31/09 18:40 (GMT) by TalarWolf
I'm not enthused about the npcs; even less about having additional stuff added without my knowing about it. If you read the ToS and the other legal type documents, by using EA's service you're agreeing to allow them to collect information about you, your playing habits, and a lot of other things.

I think you'll find this is common for any online service - have you ever looked at the 360 or PS3 account TOS? Random web email service? Other software that uses online features of some kind?

The good news with most games is that these are fairly blanket clauses and majority are actually not used for any given title. Having 1 common agreement to maintain across whatever languages all your past/present/future games support is much easier for any publisher to do, than trying to keep track of each one separately

Quote: Posted 10/31/09 18:40 (GMT) by TalarWolf
I'm still not sure whether I'm going to get the game or not; I've seen a few statements about having to be online when playing your dlc, and having to log in every 10 to 15 days to prove you aren't a pirate. It would be nice to have a faq about the different ways to get the dlc. If it is the same as the dlc for Fallout 3, you have to be online to play. If you were on pc, you could move files around and play offline, but that wasn't exactly supported. If I wanted to have to be online all the time I'm playing a game, I'd be playing an online game. If any of the content has to come through the EA downloader, it will make my decision much easier.

You don't need to be online to play DLC. We have our own DLC updater that is included with the game so you don't need to install anything separately, and don't use the EA Downloader - you'll only need that if you purchase DA:O through the EA Store.

Quote: Posted 10/31/09 18:43 (GMT) by Akka le Vil
I get what you mean by "not incomplete quests". But they still talk and offer a quest that you can't take unless you buy the DLC.
That's not "incomplete" in the "left in the middle of a chain quest" way, but that's still "incomplete" - they ARE present and they DO offer a quest that still REQUIRE something to be bought.

I get what you're saying, I just think we're actually seeing two ends of the same very very narrow spectrum.

These NPCs don't show up to advertise or tease content coming months from now. They are there once the DLC is available.

Quote: Posted 10/31/09 18:43 (GMT) by Akka le Vil
I understand your point, but it strikes me as quite weird.
DA:O was clamored (and applauded !) as being a pure single-player game in a somewhat "old school" way (thank you for this by the way, I was sooo wishing for such a kind of game !), as in "spiritual successor of the good RPG of old".
Following this, using MMO methods, which exist on a completely different server-based multiplayer architecture, feels completely at odd with what DAO looks like.

DAO is definitely that - and for us the spiritual successor element means some very specific things, mostly around story, characters, tactical party based combat, etc. It doesn't mean we'll be delivering it on 5.25" floppy discs, nor ignoring where PC gaming and technology is at today or tomorrow.

DAO has a huge social and community element to it, and a task of seamlessly being able to expand that world. The fact that didn't exist with old school rpgs is hardly a reason to not evolve.

And wanting to evolve, why would we not look at the most widely used and successful examples we could find?

Quote: Posted 10/31/09 18:43 (GMT) by Akka le Vil
I understand the MMO methods used for MMO. I even spent four years and a half of on WoW, so I'm not that allergic to the system
But the MMO methods used for single-player is really not going to compute for me. MMO have to enforce patching, because everyone is playing the same game on the same servers, and you can't really have people with different versions playing together.
But that's purely an exception for a specific requirement. I do not want (and I'm sure I'm far to be the only one on this issue) to have a program that automatically download and update without asking my consent each time. Sometimes I want the updates (most patches - not all, some patches actually ruin the game, like the 1.3 for Empire : Total War), and sometimes I don't want them (like the DLC NPC we're talking about - if I don't plan to buy the DLC myself, I certainly do NOT want the game to download the hooks and baits for them).
I stay away from Steam precisely BECAUSE of their automated updates.
And honestly, I'm not thrilled at all hearing that Steam & MMO are the way you're planning to go when it comes to updates.

We shouldn't confuse the content with the method of delivery. Bad patches can happen regardless of the method.

As for doing content updates like that in general - given the success (and market leadership) of those services on PC, I think there are a few million players that would disagree. That doesn't mean we should simply be content to point our finger there and say 'they do it' - as I mentioned before, I fully intend to adapt what we do based on our player's feedback. But as our starting point, I'm very pleased if we are able to be at, or close to par.

Having said that, we did not presume everyone would want this. We've made sure there are instructions provided for how to disable this if you want. And post launch, we will continue to improve it based on feedback.

Quote: Posted 10/31/09 18:43 (GMT) by Akka le Vil
Well, the point here is that many of us precisely do NOT want to use this approach.
The main point, as you surely have read it countless time in the thread, is that a NPC being hooks for quest you have to pay for, is perceived as a very rude and unwelcomed intrusion of marketing/salesmen - the fact that they speak in-character is not the point, the point is that we ("we" as in "those who protest" of course) would like for them to simply not appear unless we have bought and downloaded the content they are related to.

I understand that, my point is that I don't believe that is the majority's view - especially after trying it. I think what we're offering as a way to expand the game without you ever having to leave it is something a lot of our players will appreciate.

Again, not for everyone perhaps. But I happen to believe that there are more people annoyed by having to take extra steps, go and fish on the internet for something, create a dozen other accounts for the priveledge of downloading from other sites, figure out what version of what they need, and generally spend more time trying to get content than playing it - than there are folks who are not bothered by (or prefer) that.

I fully accept that is a very non-old school way of doing things too But even in those cases, there will hopefully always be options for those folks too. And in any case, everything we're talking about is extra - anyone is more than able to get their money's worth from playing the main game and simply getting rid of any of this.

Quote: Posted 10/31/09 18:52 (GMT) by Pr1m4x

Its amazing how people think that the slap on the face is an npc in the game, and everyone is just so much of a freaking fan boy that they don't realize how screwed up it is, that their selling additional content when it should be included in the original pack. You dont sell DLCs on day one to "give players more content and make them happy" you do that *** to rip people off, and its as simple as that. I dont mind paying for 10 DLCs, but doing it on release day? Its just an insult to any normal person's intelligence. I wont be "buying" the game for this reason alone. That is all im saying...

If you actually care to hear about it - there are plenty of posts on social (social.bioware.com) and these old forums (daforums.bioware.com) made by us to clearly explain why this was done.

Edited By Fernando Melo on 10/31/09 19:52

The best answer I know to the original poster's question is this:

There is nothing about the mechanics of the game that will require you to pause it. (Though I believe that, in the console version, using AoE mage abilities auto-pauses while selecting the targets.)

As for whether or not you can get through the entire game without pausing, that will depend on how you play and if you are willing to reload when things go south.

Quote: Posted 10/31/09 15:49 (GMT) by Akka le Vil
That's the first point that upset many people : they do not want to have NPC related to non-already-included content in the game. It feels like intrusive advertisement, and it makes the game feels incomplete (not because the game itself, as per launch, is incomplete, but because these guys have quests that can be completed only through buying DLC, hence once they are added in the game, the game include incomplete quests).

We've posted quite a few times about how we plan to continue to grow DA - viewing DA:O as a platform. DLC, and in general making the expansion of that world as seamless as possible, is one of our goals.

But at the risk of going around in circles, folks really should see this before hand so we're all comparing and talking apples to apples.

My impression of the majority of the negative responses seem to be based on taking a description of a simple thing and without having seen it, proceed to blowing it out into proportions that play off of fears of the worst kind.

I'm not trying to stall - I really want feedback from players on this. But these reactions on the forums are something we've seen time and time again, for almost any feature or change throughout the dev cycle - ultimately, most of these were laid to rest once people saw how it really worked within the game context. That's why I'm suggesting the pause and to look at this within the game in a couple days.

For what it is worth - the game doesn't get incomplete quests. It's not like you are half-way through something and get a credit card entry screen to continue. The NPCs don't chase you around, and they are not salesmen with lines geared at 'pushing' any of the content at you. They are quest giver NPCs, and will act as you will expect any DA quest giver NPC.

Quote: Posted 10/31/09 15:49 (GMT) by Akka le Vil
That's the second part which is annoying : there is content that is automatically added to the game without us giving our consent. This is, very understandably, antagonizing many people.
I think you should give the choice to accept or refuse this download - honestly, I even have a hard time believing that installing something on a computer without asking was even considered, and even more, included in the actual game

You are. This is handled no different than any other game out there. For software, when you install something, or create an online account, or purchase something you should be presented with some sort of agreement that is appropriate for your locale. Like many other things folks may disagree and argue it is not done in a way that they personally would prefer it in, but it is there.

As for the general concept of getting content updates - we looked at the best examples we could find for deciding how we wanted to handle content updates for PC: Steam & MMOs. And tried to keep it in line with that.


As I've said before, I'm happy for us to adapt and change our approach - but that needs to be based on players actually using it if it is to be accurate.

Quote: Posted 10/31/09 15:39 (GMT) by LanceX2

no console creater??? so we only have presets for our PC's???

Sorry, should have been clearer. There is no stand alone character creator app like we released for the PC. The main game has the full character creation process.

The game is not supposed to be for sale until Tuesday. If some stores have broken the street date and a few fans have been able to get copuies early, I hope they enjoy the game and DO NOT spoil the game for other here.

Moving on.



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There's no console character creator.

But the main game on 360 & PS3 have the option to upload your character data to social.

Not only will you see your face (which you can also use as your avatar on social), but also your story through the game, achievements, etc. (more than the stand alone character creator PC)