Future of the Dragon Age franchise

[Aedelric]

Eh, these were the major complaints people had with DA2, so they are saying they are addressing those.

 

Dragon Age 2 was a step back in development, these `features

[MrBrown]

Rather than being "steps back", they were more like choices made by the developers.

 

- For the armors and equipment, they decided to prioritize the unique look of followers over customizing. Apparently lots of people didn't like this, so in DA3 they're trying to do both. I don't really care, as long as I can customize something; but I did prefer unique looks on followers as opposed to DA:O where everyone just looked the same.

- For reused levels, they thought people would prefer more quests over graphics. They were wrong.

- I'm not 100% sure what "decisions that matter" refers to, but I'm guessing the end game in DA2 where you were basically forced into a neutral position. Seeing how BIO handled ME3 I'm not really that hopeful.

 

The end game thing is the only one that was a clear problem; the other two are matters of preference or prioritization.

[Aedelric]

- For reused levels, they thought people would prefer more quests over graphics. They were wrong.

 

You may be right about that being their intention, problem is Dragon age 2 included dramatically less quests compared to DA:O. So in reality what Dragon Age 2 actually did was give less/repeating areas and substantially less quests, their is not much justification for that.

 

I have not black listed Bioware but I am no loyal blind customer, they lost that a long while ago. I am prepared to give them a chance, but this customer is wise enough to wait a month after release before deciding to buy or not.

[Monte Carlo]

Bioware have always been over-confident of their writing and plotting. Which is at best so-so. That such basic stuff as the Big Three points identified even need to be reiterated just shows you the head-up-arse world that Bio devs now live in.

[entrerix]

armor would make more sense if you, for example:

 

1) kill orc

2) take orc plate armor off corpse

3) give to character to wear

4) character must get armor fitted, either at forge using own skills, or at blacksmith

5) now character can actually wear the armor, AND it has a unique visual twist for said character, since it was custom fitted for them, so it could be said to have been given flair befitting the character at the request of said character

 

voila, unique looks for every character, customizable armor, and an explanation for why orc plate can fit a 200lb male dwarf, and a 100 pound female elf.

Edited April 11, 2012 by entrerix

[Monte Carlo]

armor would make more sense if you, for example:

 

1) kill orc

2) take orc plate armor off corpse

3) give to character to wear

4) character must get armor fitted, either at forge using own skills, or at blacksmith

5) now character can actually wear the armor, AND it has a unique visual twist for said character, since it was custom fitted for them, so it could be said to have been given flair befitting the character at the request of said character

 

voila, unique looks for every character, customizable armor, and an explanation for why orc plate can fit a 200lb male dwarf, and a 100 pound female elf.

 

That works. Some people would hate the micro, but I like it.

[Gorgon]

I'm more concerned that they are going to stick to the rigid class restrictions of DA2. No weapon switching, figthers aren't allowed any ranged attacks and so on. It's just unnecessary reduction of what you expect your character to be able to do.

[HoonDing]

armor would make more sense if you, for example:

 

1) kill orc

2) take orc plate armor off corpse

3) give to character to wear

4) character must get armor fitted, either at forge using own skills, or at blacksmith

5) now character can actually wear the armor, AND it has a unique visual twist for said character, since it was custom fitted for them, so it could be said to have been given flair befitting the character at the request of said character

 

voila, unique looks for every character, customizable armor, and an explanation for why orc plate can fit a 200lb male dwarf, and a 100 pound female elf.

Only recent game I know that does this is Venetica.

 

It works well in any setting where weapons and armour are rare, but not so much in BioWare's typical high fantasy settings where one can literally find armour, weapons and magical jewelry in barrels.

Edited April 11, 2012 by virumor

[Spider]

Give me back the detached camera and zoom levels from DA:O and I'll have a look at DA3. Also, better combat design (as in stop using the same trick in Every.Single.Fight).

 

Companion Customization doesn't matter that much, but a story with stronger C&C is always nice. But if the gameplay doesn't improve, none of those matter.

 

(Since I never finished DA2, I didn't mind the story that much. I kinda liked the structure of it, at least they were trying to do something different).

 

Als, I don't think I would have minded the repeating areas so much, if they weren't implemented so poorly. For instance, if you artificially remove parts of the dungeon, don't make the mini map still show those parts as accessible. That just screams laziness to me.

[entrerix]

my idea would work so long as most armors were more or less junk to be sold, and only once in a while did you find a new piece of armor that was a real upgrade from what you were already wearing.

 

baldurs gate had armor in barrels, but most characters only upgraded armor 2 or 3 times in the whole game

[Nepenthe]

... but it would still be illogical, no amount of "fitting" would allow for the changes you described.

[entrerix]

why not, take the raw materials, craft something new from these superior materials?

[Gorth]

Baldurs gate had armor in barrels, but most characters only upgraded armor 2 or 3 times in the whole game

I don't know about BG1, but after completing BG2 the first time I started a more "roleplaying" approach to subsequent playthroughs, giving people their "signature" weapons and armour rather than finding and equipping best possible loot. Of course, some people prefer the latter.

[Humanoid]

I wouldn't mind if looting any armor was just handwaved away. At most just have "scrap leather," "scrap steel plates," etc lootable from dead foes as appropriate - and *all* wearable armor needs to be crafted for one character and one character only (I'd say by a smith, unless they add professions to the player characters which I prefer they didn't) - from generic materials like that or from rare loot like monster hides.

[Monte Carlo]

I remember in the old pen and paper D&D rules magic armour expanded or contracted er, magically, to fit the wearer.

[Drowsy Emperor]

I bet they got that idea from the back of a Durex packet

[Nepenthe]

I bet they got that idea from the back of a Durex packet

You're suggesting that the people who designed P&P D&D had seen a Durex pack?

 

HAHAHAHAHAHAHHAAHHAHAHAHAH

[Humanoid]

That's why D&D armour doesn't come in L, XL and XXL.

[Bos_hybrid]

You know, I can think of more important things that needed changes than, companion armor...

[Nepenthe]

You know, I can think of more important things that needed changes than, companion armor...

Yet, it was the thing that was most complained about right after the recycled areas. (Ok, maybe not right after, there might have been a pretty large gap there, but it was still definitely the second most-whined-about thing)

[Bos_hybrid]

You know, I can think of more important things that needed changes than, companion armor...

Yet, it was the thing that was most complained about right after the recycled areas. (Ok, maybe not right after, there might have been a pretty large gap there, but it was still definitely the second most-whined-about thing)

 

Still doesn't change the fact of it's irrelevance to me. Another case of the bio boards focusing on the little things.

[MrBrown]

The most common complaint about DA2 probably was/is "it's not like DA:O!". Of course, this doesn't really amount to anything but "I didn't like it", so it's kinda hard to answer it. With anything but marketinglish, anyway.

[Nepenthe]

You know, I can think of more important things that needed changes than, companion armor...

Yet, it was the thing that was most complained about right after the recycled areas. (Ok, maybe not right after, there might have been a pretty large gap there, but it was still definitely the second most-whined-about thing)

 

Still doesn't change the fact of it's irrelevance to me. Another case of the bio boards focusing on the little things.

Wasn't (just) the bio boards. In fact, along with the complaints directed at ME2's experience model it was one of those things that showed me that most "crpg fans" don't know **** about RPGs in general and believe that any departure from a list of tired clich

Edited April 12, 2012 by Nepenthe

[Orogun01]

The most common complaint about DA2 probably was/is "it's not like DA:O!". Of course, this doesn't really amount to anything but "I didn't like it", so it's kinda hard to answer it. With anything but marketinglish, anyway.

Yeah; maybe there was some expectation as to what DA2 should had been that caused some people to be biased, but that doesn't excuse the cluster of design flaws that plagues DA2.

[entrerix]

if dragon age 2 had featured a plethora of interesting and well designed environments to explore and interact with, i probably would have loved the game. the characters were good enough, the plot was not the worst plot ever, and the combat system was pretty fun

 

the game grew tedious because of the terrible (and repetitive) environments and weak (and repetitive) encounter design

 

the game should be designed from the ground up with a top-down perspective