Dragon Age 2 - Demo impressions

[aelf]

I liked the fact that most dwarves didn't have any sort of English accent; I assumed it was some sort of commentary, and was sick and tired of britfaggery anyway. Besides, if Ferelden is supposed to be Scotland-in-Thedas, and the Fereldans tend to have Scottish names (Fergus Cousland? Cailan mac Theirin?), why the hell are they speaking with an English accent? (Because it's a stupid fantasy trope that everybody has to have a frigging English accent apparently. I hate most fantasy tropes. And most English accents. I also want Peter Capaldi to voice a major video game character BUT THAT IS NEITHER HERE NOR THERE.)

I think, if anything, characters should simply not have distinctive accents except where they're appropriate. I must add here that the French accents in the game are worse. And the elves should not be speaking Elvish with an American or English pronunciation. That's just awful.

As for Bodahn's backstory, I think you're reading a bit more into it than I did, but I suppose he is moderately interesting - just like most tertiary characters in a BioWare game.

Not in DA:O.

 

[Dachs]

I think, if anything, characters should simply not have distinctive accents except where they're appropriate. I must add here that the French accents in the game are worse. And the elves should not be speaking Elvish with an American or English pronunciation. That's just awful.

"Not have distinctive accents"? Is that even possible?

Also, you're totally making up the "Elvish with an American or English pronunciation". Admit it, you just thought it was weird to pronounce "mas seranna" with a long E.

 

[Disgustipated]

I actually found a challenging battle. Fighting this Tal-Vashoth leader in the caverns at the coast. I can't figure out how I'm being damaged. I seem to be being damaged by the mage despite not being line of sight from him (ie: the AI is cheating). I actually died (all 4 party members)

This battle is pissing me off because party hold is not working in combat. Crappy, buggy game.

 

[DirtyFinger]

* DA2 breaks the lore (e.g. teleporting enemies),

That was lore?

Yes, actually.
Bioware wrote an elaborate background story for the world of Thedas and - in the form of lore - explained some of the more fundamental game mechanics.
Among those are, that death is final, that you cannot travel physically into the Fade and that no means exist for traveling any distance beyond putting one foot in front of another.

Considering the dimension hopping and revolving gates to the afterlife in D&D games, this indeed sets DA apart from this and many other franchises.

I liked not having some Big Overarching Threat of Doom. You're writing yourself into the history of Thedas. The basic idea behind the game is actually a really interesting one - execution wasn't great, but that's something else entirely.

I wasn't too averse to a toned down epicness either ... but the execution was utterly horrible. I didn't even join the choir of that disdained being stuck in Kirkwall all the time. You can make one city quite interesting if you do it right ... which they didn't.
The city is deserted, exploration is severely limited, it doesn't change over the years and your actions don't have any effect on the city whatsoever. Bad execution again.


Personally my biggest gripe with DA2 (and I have a big pool to chose from) is the "awesomeification" of the combat system. It can best be expressed in one picture:

And you can say whatever you want about the DA:O combat system: you can't deny that it was balanced.

 

[DirtyFinger]

And you can say whatever you want about the DA:O combat system: you can't deny that it was balanced.

And just to drive that point home: A mage Hawke in DA2 has about 150 hitpoints. A warrior about twice that.
Now guess how much hitpoints some of the bosses have....

Of course, you do enough damage to kill even those guys eventually, but this just means that one single case of friendly fire equals a party wipe.
That's another reason that DA:O had friendly fire on by default and DA2 doesn't.

 

[PhroX]

Personally my biggest gripe with DA2 (and I have a big pool to chose from) is the "awesomeification" of the combat system. It can best be expressed in one picture:

I don't get the analogy at all. Are you saying in DA:O you needed a lot of buttons? Cos all I ever touched the keyboard for was pause. Or are you saying it was somehow more complex? Cos spamming heals and hence becoming invincible is hardly rocket science. Or is there something I've missed?

 

[aelf]

"Not have distinctive accents"? Is that even possible?

Yeah, I think you can. In fact, wouldn't you say that a lot of games (including those with fantasy settings) have characters who are not American but have American accents? But many of them don't seem to be quite so jarring. It's possible to have a more 'neutral' accent.

Also, you're totally making up the "Elvish with an American or English pronunciation". Admit it, you just thought it was weird to pronounce "mas seranna" with a long E.

Dude, listen to how they pronounce Elvish words in DA. It's like they can't be bothered to make it sound any different from their normal lines.

 

[Rub'Rum]

I don't get the analogy at all. Are you saying in DA:O you needed a lot of buttons? Cos all I ever touched the keyboard for was pause. Or are you saying it was somehow more complex? Cos spamming heals and hence becoming invincible is hardly rocket science. Or is there something I've missed?

Frankly, this one can sum up a lot of today's problems.

 

[Thoughtful Thug]

The game is a piece of crap.

-sincerely yours, the Jaded Gamer.

 

[SuperJay]

IF DA2 had been a indie game from a startup developer, it would have been a decent game.

As a sequel to DAO from a major studio like BioWare, it's a pretty big disappointment. You just can't ignore all the ways they cut corners during development, and they really detract from the game.

(I guess I shouldn't pass judgement given that I still haven't finished it - got to Act III and was just too bored to continue - but if you'd told me last year that I'd be too bored to finish a BioWare RPG, I would have scoffed at your insanity.)

 

[Disgustipated]

DA:O had it's problems too, but that's doesn't excuse the problems in DA2 (and some people do seem to be excusing the problems). It is sad to see how far Bioware has fallen. I am happy a company l ike cd projekt red (don't know how to spell their name LOL) can make a pretty good rpg. Although theirs aren't perfected either (bugs aside). They also suffer the problem of a set in stone protagonist which limits actual roleplay. I'm not a big fan of the protagonist having spoken lines. Although it seemed to work in the Witcher 2 for some reason, but not here. I'm not sure why that is.

here's my ***** list so far: Some of these problems DA:O also had, but as I said that doesn't excuse them. DA:O was far from perfect as well.

1 Automatically teleporting party around (especially after battles). After one battle I was teleported next to a pertinent chest related to the quest at hand. Talk about holding my hand. Pathetic.

2. Magically rearranging mansions (bait and switch quest). After I finished the quest, the walls and openable doors changed. Please.

3. Numerous NPC's with no names (not even a generic name like Ferelden or commoner) and with nothing to say. They sand there always and do nothing.

4. Spiders carrying silver. WTH

5. Cannot even touch the water (at least in Witcher 2 you could go in a little bit, you just couldn't swim). My toon also gets hung up by small objects, or even a step on a set of stairs.

6. limited dialogue options. In many cases despite having 3 choices, the dialogue leads to the same result. They give the illusion of choice when there is no real choice.

7. can't see quest items. Utterly ridiculous. It's funny when I open a chest and there appears to be nothing in it. What were they thinking with this?

8. Can't talk to NPC's after your initial conversation. Lazy programming imho.

9. Outdoor maps are very linear. I hate this, but to be fair Bioware has beeing doing this since the KOTOR days. But even KOTOR wasn't this bad. Narrow passageways in outdoor areas don't make sense to me.

10. Ridiculous encounters. As in enemies appearing out of nowhere and contrived ambushes. I don't like being ambushed because the game says I should be (yes DA:O was horrible at this as well).

11. Resources: granted, I haven't messed around with this. But it seems like dumbed down kiddie stuff. Is collecting resources that difficult to do they had to do everything automatically? Even World of Warcraft seems like and adult game compared to this kiddie crap.

12. The minimap often shows more of the map than the regular map (although this can be useful). The regular map will still show fog of war or whatever, but the minimap will show more. Kind of silly.

13. The map seems to show multiple ways to go, but they are usually blocked off. Lame

14. Conversations that teleport my party for no discernable reason

15. I can't enter a cave, until I have a conversation with someone. Lame

16. unopenable doors

17. Unimaginative or ambiguous enemy names. Corpse for an enemy name? What the hell?

18. predictable ambushes

19. No weather effects. It seems Bioware is really falling behind in run of the mill graphics technology. Even Baldur's Gate had rain.

20. Revenents and dragons are too easy. I was a little scared when I saw my first revenent, until I realized they were nothing like DA:O revenents.

21. silly attack animations for 2 handed sword. I briefly had that one elf in my party (he uses 2 handers), he looked ridiculous swinging that thing. It looked like an arcade game.

22. Time mechanics suck. Anders says to meet up with him at night at the chantry, but when I go to darktown at night he is there. He is in 2 places at once.

23. a resource that only shows up after the enemies are defeated (this was related to a quest)

24. party hold not working in combat (see my above post how this made a battle more difficult for me).

25. Are there no secondary weapons in this game? Is there now way for my rogue to easily switch to a bow? DA:O had 2 tabs for your backup weapon. Maybe I missed it, I don't know.

26. No armor for your NPC's? I just have to trash all this nice armor I find. It limits choice of how to design your characters.

 

[LightSpectra]

I would forgive every issue with Dragon Age II if it only had compelling characters and thoughtful dialogue. Unfortunately it boils down to this:

 

[SuperJay]

That poster leaves out the obligatory "4. Let's shag, RIGHT NOW" option that's an ever-present danger in any dialogue with Anders. Heck, you're lucky if it's actually that obvious. "Please pass the salt" could just as well lead you into a steamy man-love encounter with him.

 

[Disgustipated]

Another annoyance. I actually think the storyline of being a nobody is kind of nice, but as mentioned above it isn't handled well. I'm supposedly a nobody, but quest givers act like I can do what an entire division of soldiers can't do. Kind of silly imho.

edit: I love how when I refuse a quest, I'm still forced to do it. (note: I'm being sarcastic)

That pic above is very funny. I'm hungry.

 

[PhroX]

Frankly, this one can sum up a lot of today's problems.

Spoiler :

I'm not denying that, all I'm wondering is how DA:O is more complex or whatever you call it. From my experiences (mainly hard difficulty on both) DA2 had far more tactical combat - yes it was faster paced, but in DA:O, all I had to do to get past "challenging" fights was spam heals, while at least in the sequel I had to think a little about how I was going to mitigate damage by using controls, buffs etc to cover while the heals were recharging.

I would forgive every issue with Dragon Age II if it only had compelling characters and thoughtful dialogue. Unfortunately it boils down to this:

Spoiler :

DA2 not living up to Torment. Now that I can agree with. The dialogue definitely felt rushed and unfinished (that said, even if they'd had another year to do it, it still almost certainly wouldn't have matched PST). In fact, much of the game did. Pretty sure they (well, EA) wanted to get the game out ASAP to capitalise on DA:O's success and as such the game was flawed. But those flaws are, to me, with the content. I really can't see where most of the "dumbing down" complaints regarding gameplay are coming from. It's not that different from the first one. To be honest, I get the feeling that many of the complainers (not necessarily those here, just in general) haven't actually played more than the demo and are just jumping on the internet bandwagon.

edit: Just to clarify, I think DA:O is the better of the two games, but I still think both are good. Neither though is a classic.

 

[Disgustipated]

Is there any way to get friendship points with Aveline? She's a hard woman to please. You have to do everything clean to do well with her it seems.

What do you get with friendship/rivalry anyways?

 

[Esckey]

10. Ridiculous encounters. As in enemies appearing out of nowhere and contrived ambushes. I don't like being ambushed because the game says I should be (yes DA:O was horrible at this as well).

This is my biggest problem with the game. But it is solely because of how I play, which is "blast them all.....oh wait...there are more of them? well damn wish I knew that now I gotta duke it out with them and hope I don't get swamped with ads till all my cooldowns are ready again""

 

[SuperJay]

Is there any way to get friendship points with Aveline? She's a hard woman to please. You have to do everything clean to do well with her it seems.

What do you get with friendship/rivalry anyways?

Yeah, you earn Friendship with Aveline by doing law-and-order type stuff. Siding with the city guards, refusing bribes and other corruption, basically sticking to the straight and narrow most (not all) of the time. However, you can't get into a romance with Aveline, though the game will try to trick you into believing that's possible.

Once you get to a certain Friendship / Rivalry point with each companion, they're granted a certain skill in their unique skill tree. Like with Isabella, getting her Friendship up (maybe halfway?) unlocked a passive skill whereby she and I both received a permanent +5% critical hit bonus, which was pretty cool. Some of the abilities are better than others, but I think they're all passive, "auto-on" abilities. You'd have to check each companion's unique skill tree to find the specifics.

 

[Disgustipated]

I was thinking you had to be all the way up on friendship, that's a relief. I got Varric's bonus now. It's pretty cool. I wasn't intending on using Varric, but it seems Bethany's life was cut short (bad voice acting and drama there, they could have played that out better). Varric is a pretty good ranged damage companion. I don't want Isabella as I'm already a duel wielding rogue. And I don't care for the 2 elves (one uses a greatsword the other is some kind of blood mage). Elves look funny in this game. I'm pretty happy with Anders, Varric, and Aveline. I wish there were more tank options, but that's okay. Aveline is alright. I'm finally starting to get some friendship points with her.

The game is starting to grow on me. I do like it. The action is good, and there are some interesting bits here and there. But I got the game for free (borrowed from my brother), so I can't complain about the price. I certainly wouldn't pay anything over $10 for this game. It still feels like 1/3 of a game. Act 2 is using the same environments as Act 1. And I'm getting sick of all the caves looking the same.

The battles are getting more challenging. I suppose that is what is keeping me interested. I might have to start spending more money for equipment. There were a few tough battles in the abandoned thaig. I did that shortly after reaching chapter 2. Fighting that golem and a revenent and adds at the same time was not easy. I can't see how I can even go without Anders at this point. I need that healing. And the Arcane horror and Revenent at the same time was very difficult as well. Although I keep forgetting to use poisons on these tough battles. I"m not sure if poisons affect the undead, however.

Varric has grown on me too, I didn't care for him at first (I still think his voice acting is a little weak, but acceptable). Although some of his jokes fall flat. But the dialogue writing in this game is generally very weak overall.

 

[LightSpectra]

I'm considering giving DA2 a second chance by doing all of the comedic dialogue lines instead of the chivalrous ones. Is it amusing enough to warrant the trouble of reinstalling and what not?