Dragon Age 2 - In the same cave... agian?

[Gimlii]

I'm a huge fan of the Dragon Age games. I've play through origins, awakenings and DA2 multiple times and I still find myself in love with the story and engrossed in the combat.

However, how many bloody times am I going to enter the exact same cave or room in DA2? I'm continually assaulted with the exact same map, with the exact same scenery, time and time again. I go into a warehouse in the Docks or a room to save some blood Mage: same EXACT room. Caves with Elves and Caves on the beach: same EXACT room. It's not even like they tried to mask their sliced off corner, just said "suck it up gamer"

The only changes is the stupid doors are now painted over with just enough grey to make me think that if I just get a little closer I'll be able to click on go into that section of the board. That section of the board that is shining like a golden beacon on my HUD and map as a uncharted, loot filled, secret enemy ambush house of pleasure. But then I realize that it isn't a magical place of wonder where I can get a massive amount of gold, I'm just an idiot running back in forth in search of absolutely nothing. How depressing.

With all of the love I have for DA2, each copy cat cave would send me directly into a dizzying spin of pissed-off-dom. Come on guys, you could have at least built a pair of rooms to switch back and forth with. Right now it looks like you just think we are so oblivious to our virtual surroundings that we wont notice what is right in front of high definition noses.

So, I ask the question to the great escapist forum readers: Why would DA2 use such tactics after spending so much time on the other details in the game?

 

[Kahunaburger]

I'd imagine they ran completely out of time. DA:2 would have been a great game, but was forced into an incredibly tight production schedule.

 

[MiracleOfSound]

Probably ran out of time trying to keep up with EA's deadline.

 

[cainx10a]

It's kay. You still have 7 in-game years to go. Just be glad you now know the layout of the area you are to explore, you should be grateful to your betters, hater! [/biowareragingfan]

Oh well, let's just hope DA3 offers a much better experience.

 

[Scizophrenic Llama]

I'm hoping Dragon Age 3 gets more development time. I enjoyed Dragon Age 2, but it would be nice to have a good variety of locations to go to. I don't mind visiting the same area a few times, but when it becomes a casual thing over and over I get annoyed.

 

[SageRuffin]

To my understanding, DAO was a runaway hit, and the big-wigs wanted to capitalize on the unforeseen (if I'm not mistaken, Origins is BioWare's highest selling game to date). If that one interview from the composer is true, then it's almost completely due to rushed schedule.

 

[Random Argument Man]

I believe that every docks,caves,houses or others each have a landlord. You kill the tenants of said "area"and he cleans it up and rent it to some other bloke.

What? It's a better explanation than saying "It's a new area".

 

[Cridhe]

Sequels throughout history have more or less been lacking, only to have (insert franchise name here) completely redeem itself in a third installment. Many 2's in what I've noticed and possibly in my own opinion, seem to be little more than a full feature demo just to gauge the fan's reactions. Take the bad bits out, put the good bits from the first installment in and SHAZAM! Recipe for another timeless classic.

 

[RatRace123]

Probably ran out of time trying to keep up with EA's deadline.

Ding ding ding!
That's it exactly I think. In an attempt to make the deadline rush they had to copy paste levels. I'm thinking that's also why combat in DA2 consists of waves of baddies literally phasing into existence.

I like DA2, I really do, but the fact that it was so rushed hurt the overall quality.
That still hasn't stopped me from playing it over and over.

 

[Sniper Team 4]

I believe Varric makes a joke about that in the game, "Another secret meeting in an abandoned warehouse. Do they charge rent for these things?" or something like that. Isabella does it to. "Doesn't anyone go to the warehouses just to have sex anymore?" Even they realize that you are constantly going to the same place over and over.
I'm going with everyone else on this one and saying they ran out of time. Everything else in the game I thought was perfectly fine--okay, there are also the facts that only Anders could heal (Bethany doesn't count as she leaves) and the healing aura sucked compared to the first game--but constantly going through that same cave, same dungeon, same house, got annoying. Best part though was when you'd go through someone's house and there would be a dead body. Go through a different house, and the same dead body is in the same spot.
Hopefully BioWare has listened to this complaint and they won't make this mistake again.

 

[Atmos Duality]

Probably ran out of time trying to keep up with EA's deadline.

Same problem that happened with Hellgate: London (in addition to the developer fuckups)
EA mandated a launch for Halloween 2007 even when it was clear that the game wasn't even close to finished. It needed at least another year in the oven.

So a bad game went to worse. Mismanagement on BOTH ends. Niiice!

 

[bullman422]

I am not so bothered by how much they recycled dungeons layouts over and over again in as much as they did such a shitty and lazy job in trying to convince us that it was a different one. Simply blocking off one or two areas of let's say dungeon A and then telling us that it is now dungeon B is just plain lazy. I know there were time constraints but couldn't they have at least done some very minor changes to the dungeons so that we could sort of believe that we were in a different place?

 

[Wolfram23]

Bit late to the party eh? But anyway yeah, that's one of the game's major flaws. That and... eh, nevermind. The reason why, though, is pretty easy: They had about a year to make the whole game. Just not much time at all... although I guess the profits looked great.

 

[trooper6]

Everything else in the game I thought was perfectly fine--okay, there are also the facts that only Anders could heal (Bethany doesn't count as she leaves) and the healing aura sucked compared to the first game--but constantly going through that same cave, same dungeon, same house, got annoying.

Any mage can heal, you just put points in the healing tree.
Now Anders is the only NPC who can Resurrect...but if the PC is a mage, the PC can get access to resurrection via Spirit Healing.

In my second play through I was a mage and a spirit healer. I never had Anders on my team in that playthrough and didn't miss him.

Additionally, there are resurrection potions, so with those, you don't need Anders at all.

 

[Gimlii]

I am not so bothered by how much they recycled dungeons layouts over and over again in as much as they did such a shitty and lazy job in trying to convince us that it was a different one. Simply blocking off one or two areas of let's say dungeon A and then telling us that it is now dungeon B is just plain lazy. I know there were time constraints but couldn't they have at least done some very minor changes to the dungeons so that we could sort of believe that we were in a different place?

That is exactly what I'm talking about. I mean, at least have it so that the dungeon map cuts off that area as well. They had to code the door, why couldn't they just throw in a if statement that cut off the map at that same location? It was so stupid seeing a long corridor on the map and then seeing it completely blocked.