Dragon Age 2

[inactionman]

So I played the demo. Suffice to say I've now cancelled my pre-order.

It's now a dumbed down console title. At least in DA:O they had two UI's (one for consoles, one for the PC). Doesn't bode well for future Bioware titles if they are doing this.

 

[PLightstar]

Is it really that bad? Heard they released an high res texture pack for the PC version. Still on the fence with it.

 

[Moriath]

i thought the demo was good ... and will enjoy the story which bioware games are renown for

 

[Fafnir]

i thought the demo was good ... and will enjoy the story which bioware games are renown for

Same here.

 

[Aada]

So I played the demo. Suffice to say I've now cancelled my pre-order.

It's now a dumbed down console title. At least in DA:O they had two UI's (one for consoles, one for the PC). Doesn't bode well for future Bioware titles if they are doing this.

Tough titties for you then eh?

I agree though i am not liking the combat but i hear in the full game you can revert to DA:O combat system.

However the game will be worth buying alone for the story.

 

[inactionman]

Nope, no way to switch UI's. All the reviews say the demo is how the game plays, with some bug fixes.

I now know why the lead designer for DA:O quit Bioware rather than work on this.

I may purchase if there's an cheap sale with all dlc, just for the story (except the reviews say this is not up to Bioware's normal standard); although I've heard it's quite a short story, with an open ending (so expect a lot of dlc to really finish the story).

The changes to ME2 worked, these just don't to me; but then I am a major BG2/PS:T fan.

 

[Raven]

Electronic Arts.

Sadly Bioware is no longer a byword for quality RPG.

 

[Mabs]

i thought the demo was ok, having said that, i know where your coming from

however:
pc version will prob be modded by someone, they modded the first one to hell and back .
And i still have faith in bioware, so will see, but as was mention, the EA-touch-of-Death appears to have spread :/

 

[Helme]

I've finished the full game, and it's utterly mediocre and unforgettable. The setting, much like the original game tries very hard to be 'gritty' fantasy, but falls far short, especially when it comes to 'shock' deaths. Ice and Fire was quoted as an inspiration for the first game and I see that they are trying something similar but the reason Martin's 'everyone can die' thing worked, and was good was because you were invested in the characters. Here instead we have things like the demos brother/sister death, I believe the player reaction they were going for was shock/outrage but I don't think I'm alone in saying that mine was just "meh" or "why should I care, I've had 1(!) line of dialogue with this person".

Other issues I had with the story is that it really boils down to a dozen or so unrelated events all mashed together into a "shocking" conclusion. The unreliable narrator the game claims to have only comes into play twice(if you played the demo, you've seen one of them) the rest of the time the unreliable narrator, is just some background cut scene to split the three acts up. I also wonder how BioWare can advertise player choice at all anymore, because between myself and a friend we pretty much got exactly the same conclusion, despite picking the opposites of the final huge "choice". I'm also getting fairly annoyed that being able to peacefully resolve situations in an RPG seems to be going out of style, because playing as a mage I clearly stood with the mages against the templars, yet I was forced to kill several groups of rebel mages without even being able to engage in dialogue. Why couldn't I let them go? Or help them? Their only crime was organising peacefully(thus far) against oppression, but that apparently was reason enough for me to murder them.

As for the gameplay itself, compared to the first game the combat flows a lot better and there's some very good improvements to it, but at the expense of any tactical sense whatsoever. Crowd control is almost entirely removed short of 2-3 second stuns, cross class combos now boils down to status modifiers that improves critical hit chance or damage by a %age. What's worse is the encounter design, there is no sense in trying to prepare for a fight tactically by using your surroundings because when you kill x amount of an mobs, reinforcements arrive from all directions, out of nowhere, and you have to kill them too(then a third wave usually arrives). Unique abilities amongst enemies from the first game are also gone, things like spiders overwhelming a target or using webs to slow them down are gone. All mobs boil down to 'archer', 'melee', 'assassin' and 'mage' now, and all mages cast two spells from what I can see. There's also a few embarrassing attempts at WoW style raid bosses that reminded me of Molten Core.

The worst part however is the re-used content, every single cave in the game is exactly the same one. I'm not even kidding, they just re-use the same cave but close off different tunnels and start you at a different entrance. They don't even bother updating the minimap. This also extends to landscapes, there's two major zones outside the city the game takes place in(also repetitive), and you'll have to clear through them both at the minimum three times, as the time advances(and nothing changes whatsoever over the seven years the story takes place).

Overall it's a very, very, uninspired game and I seriously believe BioWare's time as one of the major RPG developers are over. Here's hoping Obsidian will be getting proper budgets and timetables after New Vegas, or that The Witcher 2 will be good because else the genre seems utterly fucked.

 

[Helme]

Forgot a few things and since edit timed out...

Equipment, and especially equipment in BioWare games since BG2. When I kill a dragon, I want good loot. I don't think I'm the only one who would expect to be decently rewarded for killing a big boss in an RPG, but Dragon Age 2 has exactly the same problem as the first, and most other BioWare games before it. Everything I get, is worse than what I can buy from a vendor for a few gold. I spent fifteen minutes on a fight to be rewarded with a staff for my mage that would have been bad in the previous act(when the boss fight was unavailable).

What's worse is that if you finally do get say, some cool plate armour that would be perfect for a tank you can't actually give it to your tank, because you can't change your companions armour. They are locked into their "story" armour(because apparently, generic outfits is part of their character).

Speaking of companions, they're all very uninteresting and all of them have a clichéd dark past. It's utterly ridiculous and to illustrate my point here's some examples: escaped slave, exiled prince of an overthrown government, a mage exiled from her clan for practising blood magic, dead husband, mage merged with a demon and so on.

The two that don't fall into the dark past aren't much better, slutty pirate and wisecracking dwarf, come to think of it though as the story develops they'll have their own dark pasts... sigh.

 

[Punishment]

Bioware has had alot of its talent poached into the new Star Wars MMO, same as Mythic and they will have some EA knobhead put over them to stifle their creativity and if by mistake he doesnt manage to fuck 1 thing in it up he will claim credit for overlooking it to interfere

 

[Helme]

Actually BioWare's "good team" works on Mass Effect, the Star Wars team is almost entirely new hires, and iirc isn't even based in Canada.

 

[Mabs]

i have to ask, seein as it came out 22 hours and 35 minutes ago ;

did you whizz through on "main story" or do any of the side content etc ?

or you got a dodgy copy ?

few things :
engage in conversation with mages ? i presume you mean the "im actually a DEMON in a human body" people ? ok, have fun talking to them

shallow companions; not really, just the right balance of "hi i have a job for you" weighed against "please jump through five million hoops before trying to finish the game if you want to survive it" (hello mass effect 2)

CC : havent had much problem with really, what team did you use ?

mobs: their abilities are dictated by class, as you said, but also difficulty :- you play on easy, they will stand around, you play on night mare they will use MORE abilities, MORE OFTEN.(see above, i refuse to believe you finished everything in a day , unless you ran down the main story line on a low difficulty)

reused caves etc: yea i noticed that, but then i dont mind the minor areas being the same, doesnt really bother me. i think the city, etc, are nicely laid out areas you travel to/through a lot, if i got into a cave to get a bloke, then come back for a pair of trousers someone lost, i dont overly mind.

im sure ill have a fuller picture once i finish it, overall , thus far, i dont have a prob with it. i think its a trimmed down version for speed, playability, console tards, etc, and i think some things were lost, but i think other things have improved, so on balance, nah i think its ok.

 

[Helme]

I didn't rush the game, I just didn't see a reason to wait 3 days for my steam copy to unlock when I could just use a US proxy.

I'm not talking about the obvious blood-mages(though there was one instance where you could actually let them go...) I'm talking about a later game, templar-mage splinter group where your only option is to kill them.

I didn't say I had a problem with the quests the companions offer, I had a problem with the companions themselves not being much incentive to engage in their quests. The only real sympathetic character I found in the whole lot was Aveline.

I played on Hard throughout the entire game, and never once did the mobs surprise me. They were all pretty much identical, apart from their class, no matter if it was darkspawn, spiders or bandits. Basically, 0 difference tactically.

As for crowdcontrol, my problem was that there almost isn't any which is a serious step back in a game that supposedly is about tactical RPG combat. The few CC spells that exist are pretty much a waste of ability points, you'd be much better off getting another damage spell. It's just less options, which is my overall complaint for the whole game I would say.

 

[Rulke]

It's not a bad game, its just..... disappointing

 

[Mabs]

It's not a bad game, its just..... disappointing

that seems to be the general consensus, its an ok "game" its a bit shit "bioware game"

 

[pez]

lol

 

[Punishment]

lol

Lol use the green fh skin

Also firefox addons ftw no more advertising

 

[Z^^]

i thought the demo was ok, having said that, i know where your coming from

however:
pc version will prob be modded by someone, they modded the first one to hell and back .
And i still have faith in bioware, so will see, but as was mention, the EA-touch-of-Death appears to have spread :/

Never have been either it was Black Isle.

 

[Mabs]

helme : how long did it take you to finish out of interest ?

 

[Helme]

33 hours according to my save file but I left the game on for at the very least 3-4 hours without actually playing. I did all side quests I could find(some were excluded because I imported a save from Origins) except two, which didn't work correctly.

 

[svartalf]

It's really really good.

 

[Rulke]

Finished it on sunday, had to force myself to do the last chapter

My opinion? Rushed - 6/10

 

[Cirventhor]

Still trying to force myself through it. It is such a different game than the original -- in a bad way.

FAO Rulke: You playing Rift by any chance?

 

[Rulke]

Nah, didnt fancy it

 

[Ctuchik]

DA2 is kind of a bitch really. Especially the companions as its only extremes.

Take Merrill for example, she likes when you stand up to mages and magic in general, and then it doesn't matter if said mage or magic item is about to destroy the world, if you kill said mage or damage said magical item she WILL dislike it. Such as the quest "Forbidden Knowledge", destroying those books with her in the party means that at the end of that quest she will hate your guts.... Yes i know she's a blood mage but ffs....

Same with that tewinter elf whatshisname... He's the complete opposite and would rather have the entire world destroyed then acknowledge that some mages are actually trustworthy enough to not kill.

So playing the game morally right means that more then half of your companions wont give their bonuses to you because they won't be friendly enough or have enough rivalry...

That means that you can't screw up more then once or twice, which in my case means having to alt tab before every quest to go to da2 wiki page to see which companions are best for what mission relationship wise so i won't lose friendship points. And that pisses me off, to have to go to a walkthrough page before i even START the damn quests and not actually need help with the quests, but only to see that the companions i chose won't hate me when i'm done...

In DA:O there were at least a little bit of grey when it came to what your companions liked and didn't like that you did, here its ALL black and white.

 

[svartalf]

at the end of that quest she will hate your guts....

It's not hate, it's rivalry. I think there is no right or wrong way to go with it.

So playing the game morally right means that more then half of your companions wont give their bonuses

That's why they are bonuses and not just granted abilities, I guess.

 

[Ctuchik]

Maybe so, but its still not logical even if there is no right or wrong...

 

[Rulke]

Conversation choices are meaningless for companions as much as they are with everything else.

Standard DA2 conversation "tree"

NPC: Ok I'm evil but help me do X

1. Ok, I'll help you
2. "insert witty comment"
3. No, you die

Options 1 and 2 lead straight to helping them, option 3 just adds an extra line from the NPC about why you cant kill them then you end up helping them anyway.

For the latter half of the game i just went with option 2 since there was at least a chance it'd be amusing and it would always lead you to the 'intended' choice without extra filler lines telling you why you picked wrong.

Most of the time this is a minor annoyance but for the major story threads it's really shit. No way to save my mother, really? No way to save Bethany, really?

Good job I didn't give a f**k about either of them

 

[Mabs]

theyve released a high res patch, its a gig DL

link on launcher