Larian Studios Forums Divinity: Original Sin 2 Divinity - Original Sin 2 - General I dont like that dialogue options start with "say"

I also like it as-is, for the "you can put your own words in their mouth" reasons given above.

That said, I'd be okay with having prefab lines for dialogue options that are tagged "Red Prince", "Sybille", etc, since those are specific characters and personalities talking.

Fine, I'll leave this post here in this topic:

I am going to oppose the general view. I think the generic non-specific dialogue is a reasonable idea. There are 4 origins, each of which should have a different personality and history which colors what they say.

Would a specific line really fit all 4 origins (never mind the additional origins still to come) and the generic dialogue?

There are hundreds of these generic dialogue choices in just the first act. It's not feasible to rewrite each of them in 9 different ways, so that leaves only the option to have one generic line lacking any personality or context. That's not going to be any better than the generic lines which encourage you to use your imagination to decide what specifically was said.


Larian has had good dialogue for the player characters, but that was absent from D:OS 1. Origionally it was planned that dialogue with NPC's was just going to be keyword based. No one liked that idea - and there was indeed a good argument against it, as one single word didn't provide enough context for what the reaction would be.

The transition back to full written lines had as its main casualty Larian's trademark wit. (Well possibly the EE brought it back, I'm not sure). The Vanilla version of D:OS 1 the protagonist dialogue for conversations with NPC's was pretty generic. I'm not sure that trying to go to specific lines will work any better.

I really like the new dialogue system. I can't count the amount of times I was forced to select dialogue choices that were out of character for the character I was rping in other rpg's, and I appreciate Larian for trying something different. I've actually been way more invested in my character then I ever was in any other crpg.

Here's a major instance of direct dialogue forcing my character to say something he would never say. Both these options are out of character considering the choices hes made and actions hes committed, and they contradict his rouge tag.

He would say something more along the lines of "Hes a magister, but he is trying help prisoners escape, so maybe we should let him go".He wouldn't be outright opposed to the idea of killing him or leaving him to die, but if he was going to leave him alive and save him, he wouldn't be trying to claim the moral high ground.

[img]http://images.akamai.steamuserconte...3EA7632F162184D228B982DB51B209DB2A7418E/[/img]

They've talked about this "indirect dialog" being something they're trying, it's not a placeholder. There won't be voice acting anyway, the way they're making the world and characters more interactive and responsive means infinately more dialog to write - and thus to voice - than DOS1, making voice acting infeasible.

Very controversial, this indirect dialog, but I really like it. I like that the game puts the power in my hands as to the details of what my character says, leave me room for headcanon while choosing the idea of what is said. Some say it's impersonal, it reminds them that they're a pupeteer in control of the character, not in first person. It's an interesting thing to be brought up because it may indeed have something to do with the mentaliry behind our disagreement - I always think this way. I am as a writer, controlling this character and this indirect dialog feels perfectly natural to me.

I hate it. It's lazy and boring dialogue design it feels like a cheap filler.

so now what does this mean for the devs this whole thread now has a 50/50 like to dislike of the new dialogue will they change it and risk pissing people off or leave and piss the other people off, try and do both making more work and more delays. making this whole topic pointless as they have no course of action that is clearly correct. they cant do anything unless the feedback is universally bad.

The bad dialogue design isn't really enough to turn me off. I'm still hyped as fuck and love the gameplay and general worldbuilding as well as the typical larian humor.

If the dialogue is pissing anyone that off, he wouldn't have liked DOS2 anyway and is just looking for 'excuses'.

By posting in the forum, we're not simply voting. Even if 100% of the people in this thread hate the new dialogue style, the final decision is Larian's. They could decide that the new style is still what they believe is right for the game.

Yet sometimes it only takes one item of feedback to lead to change.

We need to remember that this is not a democracy. Larian will make the choices that they feel are right for the game and the audience they want to attract.

I'm not a fan of it, personally. It feels as though my character is at a disconnect with the world around him/her. The descriptive, indirect style strikes me as passive and devoid of personality. It's especially jarring during inter-party dialogue and banter as well when everyone involved is talking via emotes.

I can understand that it's easier to translate and localize, and also the argument that it allows a player to "fill in the blanks" regarding their own character's personality, but the second point seems counter to the push for established origin characters that already have established personalities of their own. These characters are not "our" characters, they are more akin to a novel protagonist and should have direct dialogue options to help cement their identities as well as their place in the world around them.

I dislike it too, it's making it harder to actually read/understand it.

I like what I think is the intention of using indirect dialogue but it could be cleaned up a bit for example, some of the options are of the form *say ...* which is in my mind the same as actually saying that string of words. There is nothing indirect about it. Perhaps a hybrid of some kind would be best (but for sure I'd like to the the enclosing asterisks go away)

NPCs speak directly, yet all of my dialog options are indirect. This style of writing is an immersion breaker and does not work for me at all. I really hope it will be changed.

I like it personally, it lets me get into character more because I don't have to say something my character wouldn't actually say. Instead I can choose the tone or implication and fill in the blanks with my imagination.

That's the point.

Not all of the characters are premade; custom characters do exist, and this dialogue system really benefits them. I was never invested or immersed in the main characters dialogue of DOS1. It was mostly boring, and I never laughed at anything the main characters had to say. In DOS1 you would never have a dialogue option where you hit on someone, and then after they reply in kind you could stammer like an idiot in response. In DOS2 I've found alot of the dialogue funny, heartwarming, or even bad ass at times.

In regards to why the premade characters would have such dialogue is because, they are still your characters too. Ifan is a murder, but you can play him as someone that's somewhat repenting, his motivations for doing so are what you want them to be , and how he decides to voice his new view of the world (if its even changed at all), is how you want him to do it.

Funny, I find it less immersion breaking on average since the replies are somewhat 'colorless' and can fit a multitude of personalities. It can be equally immersion breaking when a line of dialogue fits the general decision you want to make but not the personality of the person in the way that it is said.

The drawback is that the 'colorless' replies are just that. They get the job done but don't do anything beyond that. It seems like Larian want the color to come primarily from the varying tag based options rather than the way that the dialogue is written. It works for me, but I can see why some would like Larian to have a higher risk/reward potential with specific dialogue text. I'm fine with it as is, and think it's a reasonable decision given the overall goals.

[quote=Pyrofox]I like it personally, it lets me get into character more because I don't have to say something my character wouldn't actually say. Instead I can choose the tone or implication and fill in the blanks with my imagination. [/quote] I agree with this. Keep it as is.

As I stated before (this topic, one of the many others) they could do both. The current stuff is already written, so that's a given. Then the many MANY people who think this is placeholder text will probably force them to write first-person, which provides the second set of dialogue options. Hopefully they have a system that can display one or the other based on a option checkbox.

Have to agree, dislike it too.