Dragon Age 2

[funcroc]

via Qt3

OK I just read the GI Cover Story. A few things stick out. Some things many of you may already know. There's a lot of promising stuff. Here's some nitpicked bullet points to ponder over:

 

-Narrators are telling the story which apparently jumps around in time not necessarily chronologically to key events. This means BioWare's patented 4 Waterdhavian Creatures formula for the games narrative structure is not being used

-The games total time span is a decade

-Events start with Hawke escaping Lothering the town destroyed by the blight in the first game. Events like this from the first game being seen from a different angle mentioned.

-Choice Quote: "This is, I think, the most reactive game we've ever done" -Mike Laidlaw

-Darkspawn are less of a threat

-No Ancient Evil Foozle (maybe)

-Mass Effect/Alpha Protocol-like paraphrases in dialog

-Goodie Two-Shoe Party Members won't ever ditch you even if you're an evil ******** spawned from the bowels of Satan's anus

-Non-magical synergy combat combos added - EX: Warrior sunders a dudes armor and then a thief goes in for a backstab to create a sum greater than the two attacks done separately

-Less total number of spells (Crushing Prison returns), but now there's some new spell augmentation feature.

-Team is pulling the PC and Console versions of Dragon Age II further apart. PC retains the strategic view while consoles get a action game?

[WorstUsernameEver]

In our opinion, it might be okay for Commander Shepherd to be stoic and gruff as a rule-- he's a soldier, after all-- but that's not going to fly for Dragon Age. We don't intend to lock you into a single personality.

 

As to our solution for doing that-- well, we'll have to discuss that later on. But we do have one, and it's not something you see in Mass Effect. Dragon Age is a different game, despite the comparisons some people seem pretty quick to make based on a few common features.

[Purkake]

Talk is cheap, Gaider. Less telling and more showing please.

[WorstUsernameEver]

A possible hint that BioWare is taking the encounter design criticism seriously?

[Oblarg]

A possible hint that BioWare is taking the encounter design criticism seriously?

 

They could have cut the number of enemies to a third of what it was an have it still be rather grating at points. The level design was absolutely horrendous in DA:O.

[Volourn]

"Talk is cheap, Gaider. Less telling and more showing please."

 

What a silly comment. They aren't gonna 'show' you anything until the game is released or before that when previews start coming out. More patience, and less demanding, please.

[Gromnir]

"Talk is cheap, Gaider. Less telling and more showing please."

 

What a silly comment. They aren't gonna 'show' you anything until the game is released or before that when previews start coming out. More patience, and less demanding, please.

 

am thinking that the one being silly is vol. Gromnir is also wanting gaider to do more showing, 'cause we don't really believe his talking. that doesn't mean we expect gaider to show us anything before da2 release, but it does mean that we ain't gonna believe biowarian claims regarding their games as their imagination has increasingly been exceeding the actuality o' their product. the impact o' the origins didn't come close to living up gaider's personal and emphatic billing, and da darkness also were kinda cw network darkness at best. the balance o' da powhaz/talents and classes were bungled and we cannot help but wonders what were the point o' adding crap like Perfect Storm to a game. even more offensive is this talk o' da2 when we still ain't seen a patch for da:a... nearly FOUR MONTHS following its release.

 

again, we want showings more than talking, but we doubt anybody who has lost faith in bioware's claims will be convinced by anything save for an actual play-through of da2. we enjoyed da:o, but not because it bore any kinda resemblance to the game described by the developers on their message boards. we liked da in spite o' the fact that it failed to deliver on many of gaider's claims.

 

HA! Good Fun!

 

ps when pushed for details regarding da darkness, we did finally elicit a response from gaider that were very telling... we were told that da:o would be "dark, but not too dark." such a statement made it very obvious to us that da would only be incrementally darker than any previous title, as gaider's statement were delivered to reassure fans who were reluctant to embrace a dark fantasy game. "dark, but not too dark" made it clear to us that if bioware were actively trying to avoid alienating folks who preferred sunny and sugary-sweet cotton candy grade fantasy, there were no way they could make da very dark at all. the lesson being that if you push hard enough and gets gaider exhausted, he will be uncharacteristically honest.

Edited July 11, 2010 by Gromnir

[Serrano]

Now I can't stop thinking of David Gaider as a boss you need to grind down in order to get a dialog cutscene and a journal update.

[HoonDing]

Many of D. Gaider's posts on the Bioboards are what Michael Thorton's "suave" dialogue options should have been.

[Purkake]

"Talk is cheap, Gaider. Less telling and more showing please."

 

What a silly comment. They aren't gonna 'show' you anything until the game is released or before that when previews start coming out. More patience, and less demanding, please.

It's an expression, instead of teasing awesome stuff just show it off when you can.

[Orogun01]

"Talk is cheap, Gaider. Less telling and more showing please."

 

What a silly comment. They aren't gonna 'show' you anything until the game is released or before that when previews start coming out. More patience, and less demanding, please.

It's an expression, instead of teasing awesome stuff just show it off when you can.

They will eventually; it's hard to get excited when your girlfriend still has all her clothes on. They have to reveal something to build hype.

[Purkake]

I just hate the announcement of an announcement thing going on in the industry.

 

Some companies should really look into the Apple model of announcing something and releasing it within the month.

Edited July 11, 2010 by Purkake

[Pop]

They will eventually; it's hard to get excited when your girlfriend still has all her clothes on.

Kids these days are marvelously uncreative.

[Orogun01]

They will eventually; it's hard to get excited when your girlfriend still has all her clothes on.

Kids these days are marvelously uncreative.

I could be a 40 year old fat guy for all you know, besides I have enough imagination to roleplay. But there is a limit to how much foreplay I can get before I get tired and scream to Gaider to finally release something.

[WorstUsernameEver]

Some transcripted excerpts of the GI's article + rant.

[Gromnir]

They will eventually; it's hard to get excited when your girlfriend still has all her clothes on.

Kids these days are marvelously uncreative.

 

 

am understanding that you were not intending to broach a serious issue, but we will respond as it applies to da2... and other games being developed. to continue, Gromnir does not recognize a decrease in child creativity compared to when we were young. however, we can fully understand why it would appear that kiddies lack the creativity o' the previous generation. children, and young adults, got similar creativity as folks from our generation, but kids nowadays gots a much more limited attention span. is much more difficult for kids to reveal their creativity if they can only concentrate on passive activities with brief durations. kids needs constant and active involvement or they lose focus. we recently sat in on a 11th grade english class at a local catholic high school... most students bound for UC or Ivy schools. we watched these bright kids struggle with a poetry exercise in which they were directed to develop and maintain a single image for as long as they could. 2 lines... maybe 3. the kids didn't even recognize when they had added a new image or lost hold of the original. very bright. very creative. limited focus.

 

...

 

am feeling some sympathy for authors and game developers who is creating media for the new generation o' purchasers... and we suspect that gamer attention is gonna continue to shrink. developers of crpgs will be tasked with creating rich stories and characters for an audience with 0 patience.

 

HA! Good Fun!

[Meshugger]

Some transcripted excerpts of the GI's article + rant.

 

Pretty much spot on. Add Gromnir's points to it and we have a complete package. Parts where Dragon Age fell short where:

 

- Some skill trees not working correctly

- Lack of different enemies, making almost sure that the same tactic could be used every time

- Boring leveldesign

- Aesthetically dull

- Dull soundtrack

- Less dark than buffy the vampie slayer while still trying to be dark

 

Instead, they change the very things that worked. God almighty, what kind of idiots did they have in their focus groups?

 

My 'angar' was fueled by listening to this while writing this post.

Edited July 12, 2010 by Meshugger

[Volourn]

"Instead, they change the very things that worked. God almighty, what kind of idiots did they have in their focus groups?"

 

The kind that has made BIO a very successful company. People are always whining about what BIO does yet they gom out and buy/play BIO games, anyways. *shrug*

[Wrath of Dagon]

Wow, that whole rant was just about the voiced PC. Why do people obsess on one part of the mechanic instead of evaluating the game as a whole? Was Veilinn the one who went on endlessly about the male Shepard being used to promote ME and how that would make the game impossible to play?

[Enoch]

They will eventually; it's hard to get excited when your girlfriend still has all her clothes on.

Kids these days are marvelously uncreative.

 

 

am understanding that you were not intending to broach a serious issue, but we will respond as it applies to da2... and other games being developed. to continue, Gromnir does not recognize a decrease in child creativity compared to when we were young. however, we can fully understand why it would appear that kiddies lack the creativity o' the previous generation. children, and young adults, got similar creativity as folks from our generation, but kids nowadays gots a much more limited attention span. is much more difficult for kids to reveal their creativity if they can only concentrate on passive activities with brief durations. kids needs constant and active involvement or they lose focus. we recently sat in on a 11th grade english class at a local catholic high school... most students bound for UC or Ivy schools. we watched these bright kids struggle with a poetry exercise in which they were directed to develop and maintain a single image for as long as they could. 2 lines... maybe 3. the kids didn't even recognize when they had added a new image or lost hold of the original. very bright. very creative. limited focus.

 

...

 

am feeling some sympathy for authors and game developers who is creating media for the new generation o' purchasers... and we suspect that gamer attention is gonna continue to shrink. developers of crpgs will be tasked with creating rich stories and characters for an audience with 0 patience.

 

HA! Good Fun!

tl;dr

 

 

Also, I agree with Wrath-- the linked 'voiced PC' rant was kinda sad. One of the biggest things that DAO needed was some more personality. With a fairly cookie-cutter world, a blank slate protagonist, little in the way of plot-based mysteries, and no memorable antagonist, the game relies almost entirely on the JNPCs to hold the interest of the player in a narrative sense. Impinging on player freedom a little bit to inject some character by way of the PC is a plausible way to address this. It's not without its drawbacks, and it is perhaps not the best way to do so, but it also has some advantages.

[Meshugger]

"Instead, they change the very things that worked. God almighty, what kind of idiots did they have in their focus groups?"

 

The kind that has made BIO a very successful company. People are always whining about what BIO does yet they gom out and buy/play BIO games, anyways. *shrug*

 

Do we really have to go through with the "commercial success=greatness, great quality"-argument again when both of us already know the damn answer do we? Do you really want that? Do you really want to debate in favour of banality and mediocrity as a mean for commercial success? Do you? Please repeat the record then.

Edited July 12, 2010 by Meshugger

[Meshugger]

They will eventually; it's hard to get excited when your girlfriend still has all her clothes on.

Kids these days are marvelously uncreative.

 

 

am understanding that you were not intending to broach a serious issue, but we will respond as it applies to da2... and other games being developed. to continue, Gromnir does not recognize a decrease in child creativity compared to when we were young. however, we can fully understand why it would appear that kiddies lack the creativity o' the previous generation. children, and young adults, got similar creativity as folks from our generation, but kids nowadays gots a much more limited attention span. is much more difficult for kids to reveal their creativity if they can only concentrate on passive activities with brief durations. kids needs constant and active involvement or they lose focus. we recently sat in on a 11th grade english class at a local catholic high school... most students bound for UC or Ivy schools. we watched these bright kids struggle with a poetry exercise in which they were directed to develop and maintain a single image for as long as they could. 2 lines... maybe 3. the kids didn't even recognize when they had added a new image or lost hold of the original. very bright. very creative. limited focus.

 

...

 

am feeling some sympathy for authors and game developers who is creating media for the new generation o' purchasers... and we suspect that gamer attention is gonna continue to shrink. developers of crpgs will be tasked with creating rich stories and characters for an audience with 0 patience.

 

HA! Good Fun!

tl;dr

 

 

Also, I agree with Wrath-- the linked 'voiced PC' rant was kinda sad. One of the biggest things that DAO needed was some more personality. With a fairly cookie-cutter world, a blank slate protagonist, little in the way of plot-based mysteries, and no memorable antagonist, the game relies almost entirely on the JNPCs to hold the interest of the player in a narrative sense. Impinging on player freedom a little bit to inject some character by way of the PC is a plausible way to address this. It's not without its drawbacks, and it is perhaps not the best way to do so, but it also has some advantages.

 

I disagree. I see this as not adressing the underlying problem with uninteresting dialogue to begin with.

[Wrath of Dagon]

To be fair, you don't know yet if the dialog will be uninteresting or not.

[Meshugger]

To be fair, you don't know yet if the dialog will be uninteresting or not.

 

You are right by principle. But i do not see anything that will simply break this trend unless they hire a new main writer.

[WorstUsernameEver]

To be fair, you don't know yet if the dialog will be uninteresting or not.

 

You are right by principle. But i do not see anything that will simply break this trend unless they hire a new main writer.

 

Writers team is the same. If you found Dragon Age's writing completely uninteresting then I don't honestly see much hope for you.