Marriage in Games.

[Djeets]

The Agarest War series shoves marriage down your throat. The main character in the first gen is getting married, and there's no dodging it!

i heard the game had 5 gens

soo...5 Marriages in a row?? ~~

[Snowy_One]

Calling it "marriage" would not necessarily prevent you from doing these things.

I mean hell, you can get a threesome in Dragon Age.

I know. I just found it odd that I CAN do those things, but actually getting married requires distinctly more work and effort and, IIRC, doesn't always happen even if the Warden was in love and survives the ending.

You can adopt kids in Skyrim.

But despite the fact that it's marriage in Skyrim, that game probably has the worst romance ever. You can literally propose to a person and get them to accept the first time you meet them.

I know. I'm thinking of adding in 'it must have actual meaning' as a qualification for marriage because, in CKII, marriage is pretty much entirely political with only a select few outliers even qualifying as 'people' as opposed to 'stat-sticks in charge of lands I wish to invade'.

Some of y'all have some narrow views on relationships and marriage. Two people in a relationship does not mean that they will get married. Two people who have a connection and are "perfect" for each other does not mean it will end in marriage. Someone stated this one already, but I will as well. Two people who took part in a world changing event does not mean they will get married. This one especially. During exciting moments, people's emotions flare and are more likely to be impulsive and have relations with other people. I could easily understand two characters who were together during the game, and after the game's events they decided to go their separate ways. Relationships are complicated.

I know. I'm not complaining about the times it doesn't happen except as opposed to the times it does in sheer volume. Quite a few examples have been given here, but there are a ton more on my game shelf where two characters clearly have feelings and are at least friends with possible romantic subtext and the 'outcome' is 'beat the boss and then awkwardly look at each other before going your separate ways. If you're lucky you'll get mentioned in the sequel as having been implied to be able to actually get it on, though with who is left totally undefined at BEST.'

[Dark Sage]

Xenogears most certainly was, for a game released in '98, a very different experience that took a lot of risks in the subjects it covered in its story. It almost didn't even get released in the US because of it. The game has its problems and I wasn't claiming it was the best game in the genre, only that it was an example of a game that took the genre seriously and approached its storytelling capabilities intelligently.

Xenogears wasn't almost unreleased in the US because it had "deep and different" approaches to storytelling, it was almost unreleased because it was a massively text heavy game and the translators had almost no time to localize it. Xenogears can be hard to follow, but that's more because of length and weird translation than actual complexity. It spends part of its time ripping off scenes from movies that the developers liked; I also remember at one point the characters just explain shit to you while sitting in a chair in a void because their budget ran out. Hardly a great example of intelligent storytelling (though there are still some great moments, like how the opening FMV ties in)

The fact that it is one of the main draws is the reason it's a problem, it was the perfect example of a game series with romance options that are insincere, poorly implemented and unable to be taken seriously. It feels tacked on and emotionless.

Frankly I'm not mean enough to point out the type of person the romance (again, for lack of a better word) in the modern Persona games appeals to, but I know that it was intended because there is an audience for it. That doesn't excuse it from being shallow however.

This is a common misconception and it really needs to stop. Dating is not even close to being a main draw to the Persona games. The Social Link mechanics are compared to dating sims but the focus is on character development and cultivating friendships. Except for the male route in P3, dating is optional and only adds like, a couple of sentences to the links at most. Like, it's such a small part of the game that I wonder why people are so focused on it.

Also why the fuck is in Serious Discussion?

Edited December 5, 2013 by Jack Frost

[Snowy_One]

Also why the fuck is in Serious Discussion?

Cause, honestly, this could have gone either into 'meaningless talk about game mechanics' or into 'deep discussions on how marriage is viewed as a whole'. I thought it a bit more likely that the latter would happen since a marriage can easily have about 0 in-game repercussions beyond minor dialogue/epilogue changes.

[eclipse]

i heard the game had 5 gens

soo...5 Marriages in a row?? ~~

First Agarest game - something like five

Record of Agarest War: Zero - one, MAYBE two at most (I'm aiming for one)

These marriages affect the next generation's main character heavily, so I don't think it's something that can be handwaved over.

Another game with a forced marriage? FE4.

[Tangerine]

Xenogears wasn't almost unreleased in the US because it had "deep and different" approaches to storytelling, it was almost unreleased because it was a massively text heavy game and the translators had almost no time to localize it. Xenogears can be hard to follow, but that's more because of length and weird translation than actual complexity. It spends part of its time ripping off scenes from movies that the developers liked; I also remember at one point the characters just explain shit to you while sitting in a chair in a void because their budget ran out. Hardly a great example of intelligent storytelling (though there are still some great moments, like how the opening FMV ties in)

Also why the fuck is in Serious Discussion?

Um, no, it almost went unreleased because of its at-the-time controversial religious themes. I don't know what you're talking about as far as the translation effort is concerned. The game was rushed towards the end and the English script does suffer for it, but that was not the reason they were unconfident in a western release.

You also failed to take into account that I was talking about things within the context of the gaming industry when you addressed my post (note progressive before intelligent). Xenogears is not as intelligently written as your average professional from the same era might write a book (it tries), but it IS a good example of writing and storytelling in videogames being taken to the next level, which was the entire point of my bringing it up in comparison to series that make no effort to. It is easy for someone to write it off when you are simply referring to it from the perspective of a person in 2013.

You're more than entitled to your opinion, but please don't exaggerate where it fell short. The start of the second disc is disappointing, but I appreciate the fact that they didn't sacrifice chunks of their story for people who don't like reading text just because they didn't have the time to make the dungeons they had planned.

..In fact I almost preferred it. Personally the thing holding Xenogears back the most for me is the gameplay. I often feel that it hurts my enjoyment of the story to have to slog through it after the first time, and as a result I've only played through the game fully twice (about seven years apart to boot!). I would buy a full-series anime version in a heartbeat, but I'm getting off-topic here .

http://www.thegia.com/2013/10/02/alpha-and-omega/

^ I suggest checking that link out. It is a pretty nice and objective look at the game and its place in the industry.

This is a common misconception and it really needs to stop. Dating is not even close to being a main draw to the Persona games. The Social Link mechanics are compared to dating sims but the focus is on character development and cultivating friendships. Except for the male route in P3, dating is optional and only adds like, a couple of sentences to the links at most. Like, it's such a small part of the game that I wonder why people are so focused on it.

Perhaps because almost all of the female social links lead to them being romantically interested in your character? Regardless of how you view it, it HAS become one of the draws of the games for a vast portion of its community.

Moreover, the point of this thread is not to discuss what Xenogears and Persona did right or wrong. I'm not interested in dissecting them down to the last nuance as games. They fit my example for the purpose of the thread.

Edited December 5, 2013 by Tangerine

[Rehab]

With regard to the "marriages as just the equivalent of stat manipulations in grand strategy and Total War games" bit, I think there's actually merit to those implementations/features, despite that they're not usually as elaborated on as the representations of marriage the OP seems to be looking for. The games have settings where marriage was set up and manipulated in the name of strategy, and they're roughly depicted like so in game.

In Total War, or at the least Shogun 2, grim though it is, you can marry your daughters off to another clan in exchange for at least a token of appreciation, and the chance to strengthen or cement an alliance, or at least to make the groom's family less likely to turn on you suddenly in the near future. And getting your sons married both guarantees you'll have a clear line of succession, if and when the head of your house is lost in battle or (if the game goes that long) dies of old age, and it ensures you'll have a supply of loyal generals in your future sons and (again, grim though it is) bargaining assets in your future daughters.

While the games wouldn't be drastically or essentially altered if all the marriage business was 100% automated, I do still like that it was implemented- it's something to plan around that I think adds some nice touches to the strategy, and, while its implementation is relatively impersonal and certainly lacking in characterization and general narrative content, I think it adds enough of a nice human touch that it helps me imagine I'm actually in charge of the future of the clan I'm controlling.

And it also has some educational value regarding the history of the setting, as arranged political marriage was indeed a reality of feudal politics, of course. Games can be very powerful teachers in that capacity.

I think it'd be great if there were more choices, consequences, and overall meat provided to the feature in both story and gameplay terms, to be sure, and admittedly it's not exactly a perfect answer to the bare-bones attention paid to human social life in general which tends to prevail even in the mechanics of many narrative-heavy games, but I think it at least provides an interesting opportunity for the player to help shape and imagine the story within the gameplay, so I'd hope said way of representing/implementing/showing/whatevering marriage in games could at least get that much credit.

Edited December 5, 2013 by Rehab

[Rapier]

My guess is that they seem to forget about it unless marriage is an important plot point, as it is in Lufia, Harvest Moon, Rune Factory, etc., because most of the time it is not important for the game makers or doesn't fit the tropes for the game in question.

[Refa]

This is a common misconception and it really needs to stop. Dating is not even close to being a main draw to the Persona games. The Social Link mechanics are compared to dating sims but the focus is on character development and cultivating friendships. Except for the male route in P3, dating is optional and only adds like, a couple of sentences to the links at most. Like, it's such a small part of the game that I wonder why people are so focused on it.

Yeah, honestly I don't see why anyone would be interesting in playing Persona primarily for the dating. Demons over humans, yo!

[Balcerzak]

Demons over humans, yo!

FailureAsAHumanLaughingMohShuvuus.jpg

In other news, I honestly don't know that much about the Persona aspect. Marriage could be used to better effect in a lot of games, but I don't take offense when it's not included.

Edited December 6, 2013 by Balcerzak

[Fala]

I don't care for it because it's usually implemented in a pretty awful way.

[Gemma]

Because when you get married and live happily ever after, the killer of heroes will travel through time and murder you in front of your child in the sequel.