What annoyed me the most was the blatant lack of consequence for your DAO choices and the blatant lack of DA2 choices. Gameplay was fine.
Dragon Age 2: RPG Players "don't like change"
- Thread starter Susurrus
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Conversation wheel is a subjective element. Some people love it, some do not.Susurrus said:
The same is true of the art direction. Hate it or not, the graphics are objectively better than in DA:O, which looked aged even on release.
The ability trees are not stripped down. If anything they're expanded.
Waves of enemies is not the death of tactics. It is a different form of tactical thought, but tactics are still applied. This has been a source of some confusion for me, this deeply rigid concept of what "tactics" means when applied to gaming. I can assure you the game required thought and strategy on Hard. Did it play differently than DA:O? Yes. My girlfriend is replaying DA:O as we speak. The combat feels cumbersome and awkward, and is no tactically richer, and there are STILL waves of reinforcements.
DA:O featured similarly linear maps. Bioware games are not Bethesda games, you are piped through a story and piped through environments. This is not a change, this is an ongoing feature.
In short, you are welcome to your opinion, but they're not terribly well informed, and by chiming in with "YES I BELIEVE THIS IS WHY THE GAME FAILS!" you're not doing the dialogue any favors. You're not a bad person and I'm not trying to wail on you for letting your fears and biases be confirmed by negative opinions, but you might want to refrain from speaking with authority about things you've not actually done.
If you give me a ham/turkey/bacon sandwich every night for a week, then say "it's time for a change" and give me a sandwich filled with dogshit. I'm gonna say the change was bad.BloatedGuppy said:
If I'm used to dogshit sandwiches and you give me a ham/turkey/bacon club, I'm gonna love it.
Change itself is not inherently good or bad, but it can easily be measured. The fact that you think that the majority of Escapists don't like Mass Effect leads me to believe you haven't been here long or haven't been paying attention.
Can you argue that reusing and condensing environments is actually a benefit over having unique set pieces for each location? Has there ever been a situation in which reducing a vast world to the space of a few identical rooms been a GOOD thing? (I realize it's hyperbole)
Your contention is that because change exists in Dragon Age 2, it is being reviled because RPG fans are a bunch of sticks in the mud that despise change of any type, but that is patently false when you look at the long line of highly rated and loved sequels that innovated on their predecessors (Baldur's Gate 2 being a prime example).
Dragon Age 2 isn't bad because it changed, it's bad because it made a bunch of terrible design choices.
Change is not always positive, but I think DA2 was a step in the right direction. It's a matter of personal opinion, of course, and while I have absolutely nothing against the DA:O approach to RPG's, i.e. the classic approach, there is much to be said in favour of a more fast paced game, with a playstyle that is borderline hack-and-slash. While I think that the recycling of dungeons was a little annoying, the game took place in a single city, as opposed to DA:O, where you traveled the entire country, so it is excuseable. While I prefer the classic approach, without conversation wheels and so on, I enjoyed Dragon Age 2.
BioWare seem to be attempting a hybrid between an action game and the RPG, and I think that's a good thing as far as console (non-PC) RPG's are concerned. They may not have hit the sweetspot this time, but you can't win if you're not in the game.
BioWare seem to be attempting a hybrid between an action game and the RPG, and I think that's a good thing as far as console (non-PC) RPG's are concerned. They may not have hit the sweetspot this time, but you can't win if you're not in the game.
I would think there is a classier way of making your point other than resorting to using an awesome vintage transformer as an insult.Calibretto said:
This is more like it.Calibretto said:
Unfortunately for those who seem to loathe DA2, it certainly looks like EA will be pleased with this outcome, and will likely continue this model.
I couldn't help but feel like, if there was a time to do a more open-world design for a bioware game, it was this game, considering how much of it takes place in a city. I just felt like this was a chance for a bit more immersion (lets walk from district a to district b) instead of quick-traveling from one district to another. Although, I think the relatively short development time made this idea impossible.
You are playing this on a PC, are you not? If so, your point is taken.Dexter111 said:
However, I played both on the PS3, back to back. DA2 is markedly better on the console. Which would make sense, since DA2 was designed for the console, rather than the PC, so they were able to make the most of what the console had to offer. Unfortunately for PC users, that meant a downgrade for them.
I for one, was glad the teeth and eyes of the characters didn't look like wood soaked in coffee. But that's just me.
I have just started to tune out all the crying children screaming about dragon age 2 and how it has ruined their lives so bad that they MUST tell everyone how bad this game supposedly is.
Then i did some digging on what i now call "metacrybaby...err critic" just by clicking 4, yes 4 random 0.0 user reviews i saw 11 reviews of 0.0 from people multi reviewing DA2 to drive down its score.
Conclusion : a very vocal minority /v/ has decided to try and ruin this game for everyone, im just sad metacritic hasnt at least done some housecleaning on the multiple 0.0 review users.
Then i did some digging on what i now call "metacrybaby...err critic" just by clicking 4, yes 4 random 0.0 user reviews i saw 11 reviews of 0.0 from people multi reviewing DA2 to drive down its score.
Conclusion : a very vocal minority /v/ has decided to try and ruin this game for everyone, im just sad metacritic hasnt at least done some housecleaning on the multiple 0.0 review users.
Another Dragon Age 2 thread, as if we didn't have enough already. At this point I don't care anymore, I enjoyed the game and that is all that really matters to me. Of course the game has annoying flaws, but so did Origins which I also enjoyed. Now how about that, I like both games. The only big complaint about the game I have is the laziness of the level design.
As far as complaints about combat strategy, I don't understand what people are talking about. Maybe the PC version is different, but I find myself using more tactics in Dragon Age 2 than I used in Origins.
As far as complaints about combat strategy, I don't understand what people are talking about. Maybe the PC version is different, but I find myself using more tactics in Dragon Age 2 than I used in Origins.
You quite predictably have focused in one the ONE OBJECTIVELY BAD CHANGE in DA2, the re-used environments, as the foundation of your entire argument. You don't go into any other changes, because you're perfectly aware that your like or dislike of them is entirely subjective.deth2munkies said:
So basically we have one measurably bad change...re-used environments...and your club sandwich is now a dogshit sandwich. You're right, that is a sane, rational, unbiased assessment of a game's quality.
Baldur's Gate 2 used the identical engine and had virtually indistinguishable gameplay from the original Baldur's Gate, so I'm not even sure what the heavens you're on about there. And Baldur's Gate got it's own share of critical lashings upon release. Phased real time was considered a soulless concession to twitch gamers and action fans over the stately turn based titles of yore, and famed RPG reviewer Scorpia trashed the game as not even being a real RPG.
So you know what? Unlike the myriad of flaws people see in every game that fails to catch their fancy, acknowledging that people react poorly to change in their hobbies IS measurable and observable. So pretending that it cannot possibly apply to you, or your hobby, or the people who enjoy your hobby, is a little suspect.
Cherry picked screenshots with loaded descriptions is now a rigorously supported argument, is it?Dexter111 said:No they are not, I've demonstrably shown that
Can you tell me what the weather will be like in August? I have some time off and I really want to know if it's going to rain or not.Calibretto said:
1) OK, so you're saying there is an objectively bad change with no real objectively good change, so objectively, it's a change for the worse. Where's the argument again?BloatedGuppy said:
2) BG2 expanded the world, expanded the classes, revamped the entire UI, and gave us an entirely new story. It doesn't have the number of gameplay changes that DA2 had over DA:O, but it was still quite a different game, and a vast improvement everywhere it innovated.
3) I'm not pretending that my own subjective tastes aren't influenced by stuff I like and react poorly (at least at first) to things I perceive as different in a bad way. But I'm not gonna come and spout off like my subjective opinions are fact without either hard evidence or a completely rational argument behind them. In this case, the rational arguments have already been stated by myself and others elsewhere a myriad of times. If you choose not to listen to reason, you are a fool. If you have your own rational arguments for why you think a change is good, by all means, make them. Just don't attempt to hide behind the red herring of "you hate it because it's change" to avoid having to defend what you actually say.
That problem comes back in force this time, with almost every dungeon a copy/past of the last, just with different corridors blocked off.Pointer said:
But even with it's faults it is still a great game. Though to be fair on Bioware they are undertaking 3 huge projects, Dragon Age, Mass Effect and the Old Republic MMO (which is costing the company a bomb), so eventually you will see the fruits of this corner cutting. It is just a shame it effects such a great game.
Moot point really. As I said before in an earlier post, the game doesn't really need to make as much money as DA:O as it took almost 1/4 the time to make. From a business standpoint, even if DA2 only sells half as well as DA:O, it's a win for EA.Calibretto said:
As for what it will do to the franchise, if my Econ professors from way back in the day knew what they were talking about, big business doesn't really look that far down the road. At most, they look at a five year plan, and more often, they are looking at the next year. EA will only change if sales for DA3 are abysmal. And by then, Bioware may be onto a new project anyway, since they have indicated DA is a trilogy, not an unending series like FF.
