We've known for a long time that Mass Effect: Andromeda won't have the trilogy's Paragon and Renegade dialogue system - and that's probably a good thing. In the original three games, Commander Shepard's personality was shaped by either being an agent of righteous justice or a ruthless operative who got the job done no matter the cost. It was a cool concept back in the day, but in practice, all it ever really did was limit you to one course of action - stray from your Paragon or Renegade roots and you wouldn't have enough influence in that area to successfully persuade characters in certain important situations throughout the story.
BioWare arguably handles things a lot better in its other current property: Dragon Age. In Dragon Age, dialogue choices allow you to react to each event accordingly, as you're not bound to a certain perspective. Fortunately, this sounds like the kind of system that Andromeda will have.
Speaking to the Official Xbox Magazine, director Mac Walters explains what the developer is trying to accomplish with its latest project. "So, Paragon and Renegade is gone. The reason they're gone is because they felt very Shepard – they were very tied to the Shepard character, so they didn't really make sense if we weren't going to have Shepard as our protagonist," he begins.
"What we have now is based more around agreeing and disagreeing. The reason I like that is because in the trilogy it's like, 'I'm gonna play Paragon,' and then you know which way you're moving the stick on every conversation. You don't have to think about it, because you're just going to hit Paragon every time," Walters continues - and he's right. Hitting the same options again and again to increase your Paragon or Renegade score isn't exactly deep role-playing, is it?
"With agree and disagree it changes by the circumstance and it changes by the character you're talking to, so you have to actually be more engaged in what's going on, to know if you're going to do that [...] I think that gets back to that more traditional role-playing sort of feeling which is less about 'Do I want to be good or bad,' and more about 'How do I want to express myself?'" he concludes.
Again, it sounds good to us; a black and white morality system doesn't give you all that much freedom when it comes to defining your character, and if Andromeda can offer up engaging writing and tough choices, then we should be in for a role-playing treat.
Does this new system sit well with you? Choose an appropriate response in the comments section below.
[source gamesradar.com]
Comments 11
Cool, better to be more involved rather than just filling a meter
My first playthrough I chose both paragon and renegade options which felt like Shepard did the things I would do. However the drawback is indeed that near the end of the game you're missing out on choices because you dont have enough renegade or paragon.
My other playthroughs I went full paragon or renegade and I agree it made the dialogue's less interesting.
Sounds good to me. Previous system was fun but yes, could do with some tweaking. Always room for improvement.
As long as the player is fully in control over what their Ryder character says and the writing/dialogue is decent then it's all good. In ME3, Shepard spoke so many times without player input that it felt like it wasn't my Shep anymore.
So now it'll be press up and X to agree, down and X to disagree? It sounds like they've just changed the wording.
@Matroska Except agree and disagree aren't tied to morality scores, so you're free to react to each situation the way you want, without having to worry about penalties later on.
In fairness, almost all role-playing boils down to agreeing or disagreeing with what the current situation is. There's room for grey areas of course, but I'm not really sure how deep fully voiced games can take it.
@ApostateMage
Exactly. That thing of choosing something to say and your character sort of saying something else (DA:I and FO4 were both guilty to some degree) was unwelcome. I kind of think the conversation wheel has had its day too...
@CountFunkula78 Good points! I'm playing DAI now and I just go with random answers to see what happens 😀
Games like Pillars, Tyranny and Shadowrun, even Witcher, will ruin dialogue in RPGs for me. I doubt Andromeda will hold up but here's to hoping.
Seems like a fair course of action. ME3 In particular took the biscuit with limited choices throughout.
Only yes/no? At least in FO4 you have the innovative option to reply "sarcastic" =$
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