A risky concern to share: TR taking itself seriously or not

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Traxis's picture
Traxis
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3 years 10 months ago

Hello, new here!

Love the project from what I'm seeing and reading.

The concern I'm about to share is risky to share for these reasons:

1. It criticizes other people's hard work where i have none to show.
2. I am new and in fact never played TR!
3. I think few other persons share this concern with me.
4. It may be a small and hopefully rare thing.

So I watched a recent teaser video:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ctYIHmv5n9g&feature=youtu.be

The scene is professionally done in all regards, I see a lot of work put to it.

What caused my concern are the design decisions.
 

When I play MW, I tend to immerse myself 100%. I don't powergame so the game world is always dangerous. I don't read much about the content of the game outside the game so the game is always a mystery. Usually when I go into a dungeon it creates a feeling of dread/fear of the unknown.

However, I imagine upon entering this dungeon hearing the funny voice, it'd provoke a feeling that this really is just a game and the designer is playing around and the voice is deliberately made funny. Then the whole scene is a bit comic as well. This, at least to me, breaks the wall (don't remember which one though). I find this undesirable and avoidable.

The vanilla MW had a few moments like this as well, but they were rather rare.

As I never player TR I have no idea how common such scenes are there?
I hope they are not too common. It's okay if such scenes only happen in 1 out of say 50 quests. If something like that is the case then I guess this is not an issue.

For some it may seem that maybe I'm creating a problem out of nothing, but like I said I truly roleplay the game and such areas can totally kill the mood sometimes. I really hope I am not offending anyone!

I really like it when games take themselves seriously. It means their worldbuilding is believable and made to be believed.

What do you guys think? Am I on to something, or maybe this happens so rarily that it does not matter? Does anyone else think and play the game like I do?

EDIT: I suppose my concern is that TR's world may be as a whole full of funny, overly relaxed scenes like this, where the player and player character can lose their guard and forget they're an actual person who is mortal and is in an unknown world etc.
I'm also a little concerned that most developers of TR may be people who are so used to high-end and end-game materials of MW, and they are so commonplace to them, that they may create scenes where things that should be special are shown in a light or even funny view. I would like to imagine the whole Tamriel as a place where simple people live and where super special things happen and everyone has their limited perspective and when you travel through the land, you lots of common things as well, and when something special happens or is seen, it is of significance to the player character.

Mwgek's picture
Mwgek
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Thanks you for posting. You should really try the mod out. You will notice that this is a very rare encounter.

Also the last release "Aanthirin" as well as the "Old Ebonheart" release areas are designed as low level areas. Other areas have some elevation in difficulty, but it mostly follows the vanilla design: roads are safe and exploring could be risky.

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Rats's picture
Rats
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Hi! This is a good concern to share, thank you for posting it! First and foremost, like MwGek said, these kinds of encounters will be quite rare. 1 quest out of a 100 might be a good estimate. This is a WIP thing and it's the first time we're doing something like this in TR. 

I've written those -- and other -- lines for Master Bel-Betu and have been fleshing out his character and dialogue. The very first lines are a little humorous and the tone is somewhat condenscending. Our short preview video didn't give the proper context to these lines: the master is greeting the player after they've solved a magical maze that will be incredibly frustrating. Having someone greet them telepathically is meant to be a surprise - a sort of a reward in and of itself - and is meant to add to immersion and mystery - not break it. Moreover, Master Bel-Betu definitely won't be a joke. His voice is a friendly facade to a sinister inner core -- he is utterly ruthless and without any empathy, which his quests and written dialogue will slowly reveal to the player should they side with him.

I definitely like video games that take themselves seriously, so to speak. Both our Aanthirin and Old Ebonheart releases feature both humorous and also quite bleak and "philosophical" quests.

Traxis's picture
Traxis
Joined:
2020-06-04 09:55
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3 years 10 months ago

Thank you so much for your kind replies and for not taking offense to my concern!

 

Glad to hear my concern is unfounded. It's great there are more low level places, too. Thanks for making a project this well thought through!

 

Can't wait to give it a try when I have the time.