Dragon Age 2: RPG Players "don't like change"

[teh_gunslinger]

SNIP

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?

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.

1) I do not even think it can be called an objectively bad change. It is just different, rather than a sprawling world that provides varied locales but fails to make a real connection with the area, DA2 has limited areas but are highly detailed and the fact that there are few makes the player intimately familiar with each area and makes the location more meaningful.

That would be a great point, only the environments in DA2 are not detailed in any way. They are empty and devoid of life and fails completely at making it seem like a living city. Tiny corridors and nothing more. Bioware should take a page out of the AssCreed book when they want to design a city.

Here is a solution...
If you dont like it then dont play it.... If you are going to complain about it, the Bioware forums is a better candidate for your voice on the matter to be heard.
I find it so weird that people spend so much time on things they hate/dislike, kinda contradicting themselves.

Hell no! I for one am not gonna complain on the Bioware boards. I don't want them to ban me from playing my games.

 

[Susurrus]

You misinterpreted. I was talking about NWN at that point

 

[McNinja]

Ah. Well, at the least the bananas are ripe.

 

[RedEyesBlackGamer]

So they're seeing roughly equivalent sales with 1/3rd the development time.

Mercy me, they must be shaking in their boots over at EA/Bioware.

They're not, 400.000 of those sales were Pre-Orders, especially since they had the "Signature Edition" with free content like the 7$ NPC if you ordered 1 month before release. At the time of release Reviews and public opinion didn't hit and didn't have an impact and DA2 also lived off of the relative success of Dragon Age: Origins.

Only sales in coming weeks and Dragon Age 3 can tell what impact DA2's quality has had on the franchise.

Given the average shelf-life and media/advertising exposure of such games, I think your best bet would be to wait on the sales numbers to the end of April.
I've seldom seen such a polarized response in reviews like this before; it should make for an interesting study in popularity if nothing else.

Good work dredging up the numbers.

Week 2 Charts are out by the way and seeing as there's no Pre-Orders involved one can see some real numbers: http://www.vgchartz.com/weekly.php

DA2 sold 128,897 on XBoX360 for Week2 < DA:O sold 173,230 for Week 2 http://gamrreview.vgchartz.com/sales/33505/dragon-age-origins/
DA2 sold 61,210 on PS3 for Week 2 < DA:O sold 72,304 for Week 2
http://gamrreview.vgchartz.com/sales/33502/dragon-age-origins/
There's no PC numbers for DA:O but DA2's recorded PC sales are 38,002 for Week 2 while they were 143,830 in Week1 (again that included Pre-Orders also probably not-withstanding Digital Sales)...

Anyway you can see a pretty clear trend and I don't think that'll change much in the coming weeks, imo it still sells too well and I hope word of mouth about the game's quality spreads some more. They were trying to expand the market with their "Press a Button... Awesome happens!" though so that didn't seem to work, it's also a sequel and sequels usually sell better because they have a pre-established fanbase, especially in the early weeks.

I hope that trend continues. Bioware needs to come down off of the pedestal that they have taken up in recent years.

 

[Undeadpool]

When you call yourself "Dragon Age 2", people logically expect a bit more of the same, but with some additions. When you call it a sequel, people expect the mechanics to be improved upon, they expect a more PC focused game, a long, large story, and plenty of other things.

If they simply called it "Dragon Age: Chronicles of Kirkwall" or something, there would be a lot less hate.

No, there wouldn't. People seem to be forgetting that Dragon Age: Origins met with an ASTONISHING level of vitriol and hate for not being enough like Baldur's Gate 2. I've made htis point on other forums but here it is again: The vitriol and hate seemed to die down...why RIGHT around the time Dragon Age 2 was announced! Then SUDDENLY all these haters were taking to the streets, talking about how amazing and untouchable Dragon Age: Origins was and HOW DARE they change it?!
Was Dragon Age 2 a perfect game? Absolutely not. Was it better than Dragon Age: Origins? No, but I think with what was added and what was subtracted, it's pretty damn close.

 

[Irridium]

When you call yourself "Dragon Age 2", people logically expect a bit more of the same, but with some additions. When you call it a sequel, people expect the mechanics to be improved upon, they expect a more PC focused game, a long, large story, and plenty of other things.

If they simply called it "Dragon Age: Chronicles of Kirkwall" or something, there would be a lot less hate.

No, there wouldn't. People seem to be forgetting that Dragon Age: Origins met with an ASTONISHING level of vitriol and hate for not being enough like Baldur's Gate 2. I've made htis point on other forums but here it is again: The vitriol and hate seemed to die down...why RIGHT around the time Dragon Age 2 was announced! Then SUDDENLY all these haters were taking to the streets, talking about how amazing and untouchable Dragon Age: Origins was and HOW DARE they change it?!
Was Dragon Age 2 a perfect game? Absolutely not. Was it better than Dragon Age: Origins? No, but I think with what was added and what was subtracted, it's pretty damn close.

Yeah your probably right. The same thing happened going from Fable 1 to Fable 2. At first everyone was hoping how 2 wouldn't be a completely ass game like the first. Then when 2 comes out all of a sudden Fable 1 is a "misunderstood classic".

Not to say that Fable 2 didn't have issues, it most certainly did. But it was not as bad as people made it out to be.

I guess its the same with this. Dragon Age 2 does indeed have some pretty big issues, but its not as bad as people are shouting.

 

[Saviordd1]

When you call yourself "Dragon Age 2", people logically expect a bit more of the same, but with some additions. When you call it a sequel, people expect the mechanics to be improved upon, they expect a more PC focused game, a long, large story, and plenty of other things.

If they simply called it "Dragon Age: Chronicles of Kirkwall" or something, there would be a lot less hate.

Ive seen this post before, are you just copy pasting it for all of the hate threads? Cause thats not a bad idea.

OT: Honestly, people love the game, people hate the game, can we stop seeing these threads? ive seen them since launch day and they are REALLY annoying