*Spoilers* Romancing Lady Stephanie

[sunset]

That's it? Kind of disappointing, I was expecting there to be more drama, tension or anything but it just abruptly ends. Maybe Sir Divish could have found out and if you didn't pass speech checks you could have been banished from returning to Talmberg? I don't know.

I just feel a lot of situations in the game end up like this where you complete a single quest for a very important character, they thank you and never speak to you again. The world doesn't really change based on your actions, helping those characters hasn't lead to any story related consequences that I was hoping it would have. Aside from a few most of them continue their lives as if nothing happened.

That being said it is my fault for having such high expectations on this matter. Or am I speaking too early and these things I'm hoping for will occur later?

[every1hasnames]

To be honest i took the lady stephanie romance as not a romance. But lady stephanie using Henry. Her story she tells you when reaching talmberg for the first time during the beginning she tells you the story of what happened to Divish. One key thing she says during that is Divish was returned to her and infirm feeble old man.


Now the word that is key to my theory is infirm. I took her story and especially her saying infirm when speaking about Divish to mean that divish and lady stephanie had 0 sex life.
And she does the flirting in that scene.



Then you got to think about the quest that leads up to romancing Stephanie the wedding quest. YOu basically go get things that lady stephanie wants for the wedding of forgot who her cousin i think.



She tells you to change into that shirt. And if you say ok thats it you romanced her. I mean your not really romantically pursuing her. Thats Lady stephanie wants some sexy times. Henry just happens to be the one she picked. Because she is the aggressor not henry. Shes the one pushing for sexy time.


In my mind lady stpehanie uses henry. Hell divish may even know about it as i doubt henry was the first. But looking at it this way it would kind of make sense that there wasnt more.As if divish doesnt know Stephanie wouldnt want him to.



And trust me henry wouldnt want him to either. Because it would mean a death setence. Henry would be sentenced to death most likely if divish found out. Or a life time in jail.


As far as your actions changing things overall in the game. This really isnt that type of game. As far as the story is concerned the only difference between peoples playthroughs is actions completing a quest. Meaning how they complete quest.


But quest outcomes remain the same. Main story quest and alot of side quest are linear when it comes to outcomes. My meaning is the outcomes remain the same no matter how you actually do the quest.


There are quest that the outcome is different depending on your choices and actions ofcourse. But over all the outcomes generally reamain the same. Only how you do or i do it may differ.

[theo]

I'm going outside to buy some beer today. If it doesn't change the world around me I'll be disappointed. Everything 100% must revolve around Me and My Actions.

Anyway romancing Steph has some effect on Woman's Lot DLC storyline.

[sunset]

Originally posted by theo:

I'm going outside to buy some beer today. If it doesn't change the world around me I'll be disappointed. Everything 100% must revolve around Me and My Actions.

Anyway romancing Steph has some effect on Woman's Lot DLC storyline.

Well screwing a Lords wife would have bigger consequences than going out and having a beer would it not? Your logic is rather flawed and your example is not very good.

And I don't mind that every single thing does not revolve around the main character but when there are a lot of supposedly big decisions made or events that affect other characters in the story and nothing changes then that is quite unimmersive in a game about immersing the player in its world.

[theo]

Well 9 months haven't passed yet in this game's timeline, you know. We'll see.

[sunset]

Originally posted by every1hasnames:

As far as your actions changing things overall in the game. This really isnt that type of game. As far as the story is concerned the only difference between peoples playthroughs is actions completing a quest. Meaning how they complete quest.


But quest outcomes remain the same. Main story quest and alot of side quest are linear when it comes to outcomes. My meaning is the outcomes remain the same no matter how you actually do the quest.


There are quest that the outcome is different depending on your choices and actions ofcourse. But over all the outcomes generally reamain the same. Only how you do or i do it may differ.

Yes you are right, I have come to the realisation now. I was hoping for branching narratives but honestly I can live with this.

[theo]

One must not confuse RPG and visual novel genres

[sunset]

Originally posted by theo:

One must not confuse RPG and visual novel genres

What do you mean? A lot RPGs have branching paths you could take in which your actions lead to consequences down the line, that's what makes most RPGs all so replayable for me and why I enjoy them so much. The original Fallout games have done it to perfection in my opinion and even The Witcher 2 to a lot of extents.

[every1hasnames]

Originally posted by rain:

Originally posted by theo:

One must not confuse RPG and visual novel genres

What do you mean? A lot RPGs have branching paths you could take in which your actions lead to consequences down the line, that's what makes most RPGs all so replayable for me and why I enjoy them so much. The original Fallout games have done it to perfection in my opinion and even The Witcher 2 to a lot of extents.

The difference between this game and other rpgs is its half telling about an actual real life conflict in bohemia during the time frame of the game.



Its hard to make a branching storyline and remain realitively accurate with the events of real life.


For example Radzig was based off of ( im pretty sure) Racek Kobala


and what sigismund did was real and i can not even begin to spell the name of the brother sigismund kidnapped. But the king sigismund kidnapped he was hated by alot of his subjects for lets just say not performing his kingly duties.


I cant tell you how much of the story is real events.As Im sure not everything in the game is 100 percent fact.


Im pretty sure Henry never existed. But like i said its hard to have branching story lines in a game thats depicting real life event of the time frame depicted.

[Vuyek]

"In my mind lady stpehanie uses henry. Hell divish may even know about it"

Ding ding ding.

This game is always surprising me with how deep it is and.... how humane.

[theo]

Not many RPGs have branching narrative in the first place. Some do, true. But it's not a genre defining feature you can expect in any RPG. Meaning - this is not what RPG genre is about.

[every1hasnames]

and branching narratives is an illusion anyways. It similulates giving the player choice all to end up at the same place with very few exceptions.

[sunset]

Originally posted by theo:

Not many RPGs have branching narrative in the first place. Some do, true. But it's not a genre defining feature you can expect in any RPG. Meaning - this is not what RPG genre is about.

Not many? Like more than 3/4 of the RPG market is made up of multiple ending RPGs with the player more than often being able to affect the destiny of certain characters. Seriously just look up a list of RPGs and try to find one that does NOT do that these days. Just a quick Google search will net you that answer.

Originally posted by every1hasnames:

and branching narratives is an illusion anyways. It similulates giving the player choice all to end up at the same place with very few exceptions.

Like I said I'd highly recommend you play Witcher 2 or the original Fallout games in which the choices actually matter and lead to completely different outcomes (not the same place with few exceptions). Just because most games do it poorly doesn't mean they all do. I agree with your earlier statement however. It seems Warhorse wanted to keep historical integrity and branching narratives may hurt that. Though I think it could have been done it for some of the stories they made themselves.

[theo]

These days maybe. But these days we don't really see pure RPGs but hybrid genre games instead. With very distinctive visual novel features thanks to recent trends.
All RPGs I grew up with didn't do branching narrative stuff, or only made rather weak attempts. Might&Magic series, Icewind Dale, NWN, Gothic, Daggerfall, Morrowind, Oblivion, Fable... etc.
I hate Baldur's Gate and Witcher series. Maybe this is BECAUSE those games have branching narratives. I don't think branching narrative is even a good thing. Breaks immersion for me and creates certain Mary Sue feel. I enjoy defining my character, not the world around him - it's a Role Playing Game, after all.

[myeqchars]

well it's a Side Quest (or was it an Activity?) so it's not supposed to affect the story, by definition only actions/achievements in the Main Quest would affect the ending(s).

[Disturbed]

Originally posted by myeqchars:

well it's a Side Quest (or was it an Activity?) so it's not supposed to affect the story, by definition only actions/achievements in the Main Quest would affect the ending(s).

Not 100% true. Some Quests affect others. Like these is only mentioned in the Womans Lot DLC.