Dragon Age 2

[sorophx]

like I said, it depends on the country's economy and the market. instead of comparing prices on boxes we should be looking at the production costs and recuperated expenses in relation to boxes shipped. or something. did I mention I don't understand economics?

[Niten_Ryu]

A hamburger with fries in 2000 = 49 SEK. In 2011 = 69 SEK,

A pair of jeans (Levi's 501) in 2000 = 499 SEK. In 2011 = 799 SEK.

A computer game in 2000 = 149 SEK, In 2011 = 599 SEK.

 

You figure out if prices of games have increased or not.

 

Sweden still have krona, own monitary policy and nearly balanced budged while virually every other nation in the world have to take huge amounts of debt. You can afford luxury goods.

 

In Finland luxury goods haven't risen much (or gone down in case of games, TVs or computer parts), but basic energy, food and housing prices have risen fast.

[Volourn]

Sweden is irrelevant to the disucssion since you guys make up what? .00001% of NA game publishers' sales anyways. L0L

[Bos_hybrid]

New previews:

 

PC gamer

 

CVG

 

It's not as fluid as, say, Fable, but now when you press a button to attack, your character actually does something instead of just queuing up an attack action. There's no pause. Pressing the stab button actually leads to a stab. Revolutionary!

 

It makes a huge difference on 360, despite being the kind of change that'll compel PC gamers to flame up Bioware forums. You feel more in control with a pad, and that's crucial.

 

 

Rogue armor:

 

 

(thank bio forums)

Edited January 16, 2011 by Bos_hybrid

[Volourn]

NEWSFLASH: DA WAS NOT A CULT HIT.

[Malcador]

Hm, Assassin Age.

[sorophx]

yet another armor that looks just like the stuff from Final Fantasy XI. I'm beginning to suspect their artists in plagiarism

[WorstUsernameEver]

That's such a unique design that I bet Squenix is already suing them!

[Monte Carlo]

Why is a rogue wearing steel-soled boots like he's a member of a Scandinavian heavy rock band?

 

I suppose sneaking, like er, a rogue about is too old-skool.

[Meshugger]

It's not as fluid as, say, Fable, but now when you press a button to attack, your character actually does something instead of just queuing up an attack action. There's no pause. Pressing the stab button actually leads to a stab. Revolutionary!

 

It makes a huge difference on 360, despite being the kind of change that'll compel PC gamers to flame up Bioware forums. You feel more in control with a pad, and that's crucial.

 

It's this kind of attitude that i resent in the gaming media. You are making up an arbitrary problem on the let-go to justify your need of instant gratification. That is the mark of the selfish and spoiled child that has not grown up yet, physically and emotionally. Each and everyone of you 'gamers' and 'journalists' should be given the same treatment.

[Tigranes]

Why is a rogue wearing steel-soled boots like he's a member of a Scandinavian heavy rock band?

 

I suppose sneaking, like er, a rogue about is too old-skool.

 

He's so good he's also got golden bells attacheed to the shoes, and a string orchestra as his retinue.

[Gorgon]

Hello Ezio

[Hell Kitty]

Garrett wore tap shoes and he's, like, THE master thief.

[Hassat Hunter]

I never accused you of not paying for your games. I'm only stating that you are not willing to bring out bucks for the DLC but others are.

I know. Sadly enough. Which mades devs believe nickle and diming us is all good, since it may actually be for them.

That's irrelevant and subject to each individual's tastes. I like modern games, and I like classic games. If you don't like some features of modern games, then you just don't like it. But it doesn't necessarily mean that it's UNIVERSALLY bad, only that you don't like it.

I know. It still sucks though that each and every game these day has it. EACH FPS. And each FPS/RPG even too (AP, ME2). Why can't they, you know, do both and I can skip 50% instead of making me hate 100%? *sad*

It's like if each RPG goes like Twitch-button mashing DA2 seems to go and there are no more like DA:O or Drakensang. Wouldn't that be a bad "evolution"?

After reading this I am almost 100% sure that you are an internet troll not worthy of discussion. Surely you cannot be serious to compare DLCs with Ponzi schemes and investment frauds. It just doesn't work that way.

Okay, bad example perhaps. How about building fraud. You pay 1.5x what you should, but you STILL get the tunnel/building/rails/whatever. People still get arrested for that though. Hell, Microsoft gets sued and fined for using it's position to nickle and dime players, forcing say Media Player upon us. Why keep it to MS?

Don't take my words out of context, it's not cool, yo. DLC is to monetize off the early adapters, who buy games shortly after release and then crave for more. DLC compilations and GOTY/Ultimate editions are for people who have the patience to wait until everything is packed into one neat package, such as yourself.

Then say so. I can't really go on something that's unwritten.

Anyways... that doesn't explain all the DLC 'bonusses' one gets with pre-ordering from different sources. Which becomes creepingly wide-spread too. I doubt anyone can claim those aren't specifically cut out of the game for said purpose, can we now? Often they are even on the disks, just waiting activation.

Pizza stuff

Nice example, except each topping is more like $4,- (not $1), so for $8,- (80% of the original price) you get 2 toppings, while you might aswell just get a second pizza for $20,- instead.

It's this kind of attitude that i resent in the gaming media. You are making up an arbitrary problem on the let-go to justify your need of instant gratification. That is the mark of the selfish and spoiled child that has not grown up yet, physically and emotionally. Each and everyone of you 'gamers' and 'journalists' should be given the same treatment.

Note to gaming websites/mags; Don't let triggerhappy FPS players review your RPG's... please. Also, ^.

[Vilhelm]

Okay, bad example perhaps. How about building fraud. You pay 1.5x what you should, but you STILL get the tunnel/building/rails/whatever. People still get arrested for that though. Hell, Microsoft gets sued and fined for using it's position to nickle and dime players, forcing say Media Player upon us. Why keep it to MS?

Again, I still think you are trolling me. This is not comparable. BioWare does not run a monopoly on video games and it does not force you to pay for the additional DLC. A game costs, in this case, $60. They offer you a product that generally costs $60. If you want to add features to the product you need to put down some money for them.

 

A more comparable example would be cars. You can buy a standard model with standard equipment, or you can buy a model with leather seats, some neat gadgets, etc. and pay extra for it. It's all up to you.

 

Anyways... that doesn't explain all the DLC 'bonusses' one gets with pre-ordering from different sources. Which becomes creepingly wide-spread too. I doubt anyone can claim those aren't specifically cut out of the game for said purpose, can we now? Often they are even on the disks, just waiting activation.

Again, it's all about the dough. Game store chains pay BioWare for special pre-order bonuses, these bonuses are then offered to the people who are willing to pre-order the game. If two or more store chains pay BioWare for pre-order bonuses, BioWare creates a bonus for each piece of resource (money) they have been offered by the clients. That way the stores can compete for customers based on the pre-order bonuses, but where each customer buys each game is irrelevant to BioWare because for each game sold, no matter the location, they get a set amount of money.

 

It's fair play, nothing else.

 

Nice example, except each topping is more like $4,- (not $1), so for $8,- (80% of the original price) you get 2 toppings, while you might aswell just get a second pizza for $20,- instead.

The price of toppings is irrelevant. What's relevant is that it costs extra to put toppings on and it's entirely up to you whether you get toppings or not. If you want to buy two margaritas instead of a pizza with a couple of toppings, then fine.

Edited January 16, 2011 by Vilhelm

[alanschu]

All I saw before was just like a single tree. And thought that might be it for each class, or just two to three of them. Nine is much better.

 

There's a bit more I think, because each companion also have a unique skill tree (a lot of the times having some similarities to the specialization trees, but with some differences usually: Isabela's is similar to the duelist one, for instance). We did try to go with some flavor for the characters too, so not all skill trees are available for all different NPC versions of a class. I think this helps with some silliness that would allow people to make Wynne a blood mage in the first game. Some won't like this, but I think it also helps with making unique combinations of abilities between the characters. The PC has the most variability because he/she can decide to try out different weapon styles.

 

Default female Hawke is hot. Can we remove that blood stain though? I don't understand why you would want to smear blood across your face.

 

The default version in the game is that face without the smear haha. There were a lot of people at work that felt the same way, and I think that the blood is mostly just to make the character identifiable to help with marketing. One of the more common criticisms of DAO was a very bland and generic art style through and through, so I think it was mostly just to help with the branding of the game (since we still try to appeal to new gamers and not just DAO veterans).

 

Definitely like the new skill trees. I hope different builds within the same character class are possible and are equally fun to play.

 

As usual people will have different tastes. I haven't had a chance to vary too much as I have only had a few chances to just "sit down and play the game" without focusing my time on specific systems. The one that I have had a chance to try out different styles is sword and board vs two-handed warriors, and I enjoy both. I find the sword and boarders have a bit more offensive play (and some really cool contextual animations and attacks) than they may have had in DAO, often incorporating their shield into their attacks.

 

 

I'm off to a motorcycle show right now with my Dad, but I'll finish reading up through the thread when I get back. If people have any questions I will try to answer them as best I can.

[Maria Caliban]

Gamereactor UK. He says that Sten was the most boring Origins companion, so I don't think much of his opinion.

[Labadal]

Ddidn't use Sten much myself, but he's better than some of the other characters. Zevram being the most unintresting alongside Oghren.

[alanschu]

A hamburger with fries in 2000 = 49 SEK. In 2011 = 69 SEK,

A pair of jeans (Levi's 501) in 2000 = 499 SEK. In 2011 = 799 SEK.

A computer game in 2000 = 149 SEK, In 2011 = 599 SEK.

 

You figure out if prices of games have increased or not.

 

It's unfortunate that this has been the case in Sweden. As you seem annoyed with people making sweeping generalizations which you clearly are not a part of, it's important to look at the other side of the coin.

 

In Canada, Super Mario 3 cost me $70 when it came out. Street Fighter II Turbo also cost me $70. Games for PC today typically cost me $50-$60 when they come out (tax not included in any of these prices). My general impression since I had access to software wholesalers through my Dad's work is that this has been the case throughout North America since 1990.

[alanschu]

This is not comparable. BioWare does not run a monopoly on video games and it does not force you to pay for the additional DLC. A game costs, in this case, $60. They offer you a product that generally costs $60. If you want to add features to the product you need to put down some money for them.

 

There's been a lot of discussion about stuff like this.

 

With respect to stuff being "cut" from the game, I think some stuff needs to be made a bit clearer (at least from DAO's perspective). Shale is the only DLC that was made up of content that was in some way removed from the original plan for DAO. This was in large part due to a large part of the technical issues they were having with Shale at the time, and the decision basically came to cut Shale, because they would end up running into issues with making the deadline they had from the game. Stuff was cut. This happens in games all the time.

 

With the DLC model, however, budget and manpower could be allocated to Shale. Given that there was already a lot of hooks in place, aspects of it were helped along and we felt it would be a good incentive for buying the game new. It also had an advantage of extra time because the inclusion of console systems shifted the release schedule back.

 

But Hassat said something very weird. He seemed to prefer that cut content just remain cut, and not possibly sold later through DLC, even though his entire gaming experience would be unchanged by either situation. The shipped game is still the same. This I find somewhat strange.

 

Anyways... that doesn't explain all the DLC 'bonusses' one gets with pre-ordering from different sources. Which becomes creepingly wide-spread too. I doubt anyone can claim those aren't specifically cut out of the game for said purpose, can we now? Often they are even on the disks, just waiting activation.

 

It is still content that is created specifically to accommodate the preorder, even if it just sits on the disc. The alternative would be to make the end user spend time downloading it, which is more of an inconvenience in my opinion. Especially since a lot of the time preorder bonuses are relatively simple things like bonus items and whatnot.

Edited January 16, 2011 by alanschu

[sorophx]

I think he means that the game developers are getting the wrong idea about the whole DLC business and eventually will begin cutting ready content from games deliberately to make some extra money. artificially raising the price of the product this way

[Orogun01]

DLC as an incentive to buy the game day one is a scam, DLC as a means to expand the game's live=

[Monte Carlo]

This is why sometimes I struggle with alanschu's posts, in the nicest possible way his butt's in a sling because he's in the industry and works for Bio.

 

alan, what we are saying is that the Bioware / EA DLC model appears to a lot of gamers to be sharp practice and price-gouging. It certainly looks that way from where I'm sitting, although I bought two DA:O DLC pieces and thought they were OK. I agree that paying to unlock content that's already there is smelly, buying DLC as a longevity thing after release is different.

[Tale]

Gamereactor UK. He says that Sten was the most boring Origins companion, so I don't think much of his opinion.

Yeah, everyone knows the dog was the most boring.

[alanschu]

alan, what we are saying is that the Bioware / EA DLC model appears to a lot of gamers to be sharp practice and price-gouging. It certainly looks that way from where I'm sitting, although I bought two DA:O DLC pieces and thought they were OK. I agree that paying to unlock content that's already there is smelly, buying DLC as a longevity thing after release is different.

 

I'm not sure I follow entirely. Shale wasn't entirely on the disk, there was content downloaded still. Shale was content that was originally cut and planned for no one to see it, ever. What I am saying is that without a DLC team to work on it, Shale wouldn't have been accessible to people at all.

 

 

DLC is still relatively new (very new with respect to BioWare), so a lot of different ideas and whatnot are planned. We try some stuff that didn't work (the guy in party camp. As far as I know there's nothing like him in DA2), but in general the DLC was successful. We will be looking to get gamers that enjoy DLC the type of content that they want, but at the same time the primary source of revenue is still selling the actual game. Which means we still understand that getting people a product that they are satisfied with on its own is the highest priority. Fantastic DLC doesn't mean anything if 1/10th the people you hoped for buy the game.

 

For the record I was disappointed that Sebastian was not a free DLC that you got for buying the game new. I thought that that was a great idea with Shale.