A Green Mushroom

A lot has been written about Dragon Age II.  There are good blog posts and reviews that discuss the overall game, but I haven't seen much said about my favorite design choice. In past Bioware games there has always been a good/evil scale that your character gets placed on.  The more you say and do good things the more you slide towards the good side of the scale.  Do dastardly deeds and verbally eviscerate others and you'll slide towards the evil end. Dragon Age II does away with this moral scale.  It's unbelievably liberating.  I can choose whichever dialog option I think fits the situation instead of feeling like I have to make my character play a part.  I love the smart-ass answers, but it's something I wouldn't have explored in the Mass Effect series because my Shepard is a good guy.  He doesn't give flippant answers.  That wouldn't be nice. My Hawke, on the other hand, is a smart-ass with a tough exterior but a heart of gold.  H...

Sex sells.  There's no denying that fact.  Be that as it may, there's a certain point where sexualizing things becomes absurd. Just look at this recent footage from TERA, an upcoming MMO.  Every time the female character runs forward the player looks up her skirt.  Skip to around the 30 second mark and you'll see what I'm talking about. I can't believe the actually included that in the game.  It's just so blatant.  I have nothing against sex in the proper context, whether it's in real life, books, movies, television, or videogames.  This goes above and beyond what we've seen in games before.  I think this is going to appeal to immature gamers and because of that I'm probably not even going to give TERA a try.  If their core audience responds to upskirts, I don't really want to be a part of their online community. I never expect sex in games to go away.  Sometimes it even works really well, like the relationships in the Mass Effect ...