Larian Studios Forums General Chat RPG Chat Are story focused RPGs dying out?

aural factor.

sound. ambience. speech. voice. music.

well at least that's what i believe. at a market place,one would expect the usual noise from crowd & all. manners of speech of people who frequent market places; uncouth sellers, polite ones, simpletons, haggler, boisterous shoppers, authoritative attitudes of (obviously) police, children running about & among the crowds like skiffs cutting through water, etc. ambient sound does a lot where graphics may fail to convey.

voice cannot be overly emphasised. where especially graphics fail to convey the emotions of characters (how? characters with static facial features, static portraits, even KOTOR fails in graphical representation of emotions), voice can provide so much even in one or two sentences. using KOTOR as example (again!), how we perceive Carth as whiny or full of emotional baggage is already success in sound department as how he is voiced has given Carth a character trait, be it good or bad. so i hope u can see how voice delivers where graphics fail.

music is where larians are successful without a doubt. kirill's styles of music blends well with the game & hence made DD especially such memorable gaming experience. that's more or less the same thing people say about the anime series Cowboy Bebop, the sound especially music defines almost all aspects of the series; from mood to atmosphere to story progression to emotions ... .

anyway, that's my 2 cents. aural experience is very very important for overall experience though people may zero in on graphics for first impressions. which is why i'm a KOSS fan.

note: graphics helps a lot in the sense that if u convey emotions succesfully (via protrait or avatar showing emotions, probably to the point of exagerration to get points across), u will worry less on localisations as u don't localise graphics. do u? <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/confused.gif" alt="" />