In my previous blog entry, I alluded to the idea that newer Bioware games have more in common with JRPGs than most people want to admit. I fully stand by this statement, and believe it is deserving of a bit more explanation since many people may choose to disbelieve it without understanding why I utter words that might be considered blasphemy. Now, I should say that Bioware games still are different from JRPGs in many ways. What I really mean is that post-Neverwinter Nights, Bioware games largely seem closer to Japanese games than other WRPGs.

Baldur's Gate was the very definition of a WRPG in the late 90s.

To begin my explanation, let’s start by going all the way back in time to Baldur’s Gate. Now, this game does have a solid plot in which the character has a preset back story and there is a main quest line that the player follows which touches heavily upon the nature of the main character. On the other hand, the player gets to choose the race, gender, and class of their main character and make decisions which have a fairly significant amount of weight. Overall, the game’s format is quite open ended in that the player can choose to do things that are considered evil, can tackle tasks in wildly different orders, and may have to choose some party members over others on a permanent basis. For the most part, the game is very different from the JRPGs of the time such as Final Fantasy VIII. In many cases, this game is credited with reviving the computer RPG and definitely showcased how far JRPGs and WRPGs had diverged since the 1980s.

Neverwinter Nights was, at the time, the closest thing you could get to playing real D&D on the PC.

Similarly, Neverwinter Nights was another Bioware title which was decidedly “Western” in its approach. This game was well noted for its implementation of the Third Edition Dungeons and Dragons rule set, and the accompanying tools which allowed people with very limited game design experience the ability to create their own modules. While the primary campaign was not regarded for it’s story (though the expansions had better stories and NPC personalities), the true impact of the game was its great implementation of an open ended RPG system. Many awesome modules were (and continue to be) released by the game’s player community. This breathed a lot of longevity to to the title. To me, NWN exemplifies the reason why I prefer my WRPGs to be on the PC, rather than on consoles.  When a game’s core functionality is built around openness, the experience can only be fully realized when the community for the game has the ability for to expand upon the original game. This is what makes Neverwinter Nights an experience that simply cannot be replicated on the game consoles, even today.

Great characters like HK-47 made Star Wars: The Old Republic a much better experience than Episodes 1-3.

After NWN, Bioware obtained a much coveted Star Wars license. The end result was Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic. This is the game that I feel truly began to change things for Bioware, in many ways. It signaled the end of their dependance upon D&D, and also serves as a bridge between the Bioware of yesterday and the Bioware of today. The narrative of this game was amazing, and now I consider it to have a story that blows most games out of the water. Considering the abomination that Lucas himself had created with the prequel trilogies at the time, it was definitely refreshing to see a Star Wars story featuring a great plot and many interesting characters. The problem with this game, however, is that it was far more linear that previous Bioware titles, and the game play didn’t seem as deep. The result was a far more guided experience than Baldur’s Gate or Neverwinter Nights. Although some tasks could be done in a certain order, ultimately this didn’t matter too much. The game only really significantly differed if you decided to turn to the Dark Side, which would cause the plot to diverge right before the last stage such that instead of killing the bad guy to save the universe, you do so in order to take his place. While a very good game, the replay value was clearly diminished.

Despite the increased linearity, the great story made KOTOR a critically acclaimed title which was hard to ignore. Bioware’s successes with this game sealed their destiny, and resulted in most of the their future games adopting this more linear approach, with a stronger focus on the narrative. When we fast forward to Bioware’s most recent title, Dragon Age II, you can see what the end result really is.

What we have in DAII is a game with a fairly decent story, though not as riveting as KOTOR‘s. While you get to chose your main character’s class and gender, they are always known as “Hawke” and be provided with a fixed race and strong back story. The game is possibly even more linear than ever, and progress through the game’s stages feels far more like it is on rails. It is a night and day contrast to the open ended locations of older Bioware titles, for certain. The game also plays as if it cannot decide if it’s a PC game or a console game, which leaves me with an unsatisfying experience because it has the strengths of neither. The whole experience, while still a good game, fails to amaze me the same way Bioware used to.

While I mainly fault this as being an influence of designing your game with the console gamer in mind, and not an attempt to copy JRPGs,  you still end up with a title that bears a large amount of similarities to this game:

Oh snap! It's Final Fantasy!

Yes, I said it. Dragon Age II has more in common with Final Fantasy XIII than it does with Bioware’s early titles due to its highly linear nature and decidedly non-open world. This is a massive contrast to other western RPGs, and it ultimately feels more like a JRPG than it does a Western RPG designed for the PC, such as Oblivion. RPGs on the PC tend to be known for their incredible open ended game play and amazing modding capabilities, which are things that Bioware games no longer do well at all. This is the price of focusing too much on forcing a player down a preset narrative and designing your games around the assumption that people want to play it on their XBox360 rather than their PC.

By now you’re probably writing hate filled posts in the comment section for me bringing this up, but before you hit submit, allow me to explore another popular feature of Dragon Age II and other Bioware games that will really rile you up… that is to say, the romance options.

Newer Bioware games are noted for their extensive romance sub-plots. While NWN and KOTOR each had one NPC who would end up taking a fancy to your character depending on your gender, this aspect of play became greatly enhanced starting with Mass Effect. Bioware added multiple characters that were potentially persuable as romance options (including same-sex relationships). The approach to this is fairly simple, in that NPC reactions towards you are mainly dependent upon the dialogue options you’ve selected throughout the game. This all has heavy impact on who your character ends up with as their romantic interest by the end of the game. This feature is now considered a staple of Bioware games and is often used as an example of how great Bioware’s stories and characters are. This is also a major reason why many gamers will tout Bioware’s superiority over JRPG houses such as Square-Enix, since the player can pursue an NPC romance that suits them (as opposed to a pre-determined love interest like Tifa).

An interesting point of view to be certain, though shortsighted in my opinion. Ultimately, what Bioware has done is embed this into their RPGs:

The truth revealed. Bioware is the leading maker of Western dating sims.

I’m not even kidding with this. In a supposed attempt to differentiate itself from JRPGs, Bioware has ultimately copied another Japanese game genre that is frequently railed on by western gamers: the eroge. I use this term literally, because not only do you get to pursue multiple romance options in the Mass Effect and Dragon Age games, but the end goal of this is to score. What does it all mean? It means that there is functionally no difference between hooking Shepard up with that blue alien chick and playing Tears to Tiara.

Please keep in mind that I am not bashing this type of game play, but rather pointing out how the circle has completed itself, so to speak. Many western gamers scoff at JRPGs for their linearity, and also flat out lampoon people who play visual novels . Then they turn around and fire up Dragon Age II, failing to realize that they’re playing a game which does the exact same thing as both of the aforementioned genres at the same time. Sure, the plot tropes and character designs are different by being a Western-designed game, but ultimately these are the only real story differences.

So, now that I’ve probably shattered your world-view regarding Bioware games, feel free to hit that submit button on that flame.