Dragon Age - Unpopular oppinons

[Kerethos]

So I started playing Inquisition the other day and you know what struck me the most, both during the opening sections and trying to recreate my stories in the Keep?

That I didn't know the world as good as I used to.

I felt like I had to do something about that.
So I stopped playing my dalish albino lady Inquisitor (diversity is fun, but I'm torn between mage and rogue - so I'm going mage for now) pretty much after forming the Inquisition, and I went back to play through Mark of the Assassin and the Legacy DLC for Dragon Age 2.
I had even bought the two DLC's when they came out, but I never bothered to play them; because I was so sick of repeating environments.

But in playing the game again I realized something, as the hours flew by, and here comes the unpopular opinions:

Dragon Age 2 was, at its core, a really fun game.

It took a while to get back into things, after 4 years absence followed by jumping back in on nightmare difficulty. And my god did I get wrecked at first; cross class comb-what? This ability does, stuff? But then I slowly got good again.

And in replaying it now, after years of hearing everyone complain (me included), I can see that it actually managed to be good, like really good - in many areas. It suffered horribly from reused assets, and the lack of customization sucked, and I'm not a fan of the interface either; just to name a few things.

But the characters, the music, the gameplay, the voice acting, the boss fights - hell - even the story, is actually great! It really enjoyable.

It's not a story with the numerous big choices of Origins, but it is a good character drama about Hawke and his/her friends and family. And as a character, in any Bioware game, I'm really fond of Hawke. Even though Hawke, mostly, just makes things worse while trying to make things better.

When I first played it I was really expecting to be the great hero again, able to fix everything and save everyone with my magnificence and badass combat skills, and not just be a person who tries his/her best at doing what they think right - and having that blow up in their face because of shit they can't control and stupid things other people do.

But now that I'm older Hawke's story speaks a lot more to me that Origins did, because I've suffered the deaths of family and other things beyond my control - just like Hawke. And Hawke's failings actually makes Hawke feel very human too me, even though it is, in a sense, very disempowering for me as a player to be unable to prevent tragic events when I'm otherwise so powerful in the game.

So yeah, I'm not taking back everything bad I've ever said about Dragon Age 2 - because a lot of it is deserved. But I also enjoyed my new time with it, over these past few days. Enough so that I will be playing it again, from start to finish; because it got to me, thanks to the enjoyable characters and - when you "git gud" - oh so satisfying combat.

Also, after playing the DA2 DLC's, I'm pretty sure my initial guess of who the bad guy might be in Inquisition, while playing the early parts, feels correct.

Spoiler

It's totally Corypheus, isn't it? I bet he's trying to get back into the Black City or is having another go at obtaining divine power or something, right?

That seems like it would make sense, for me at least. With the tearing of the veil and the massive amounts of blood I assume was spent opening the tear, by using the life force of those killed in the blast. It seems a clever idea to use people at a mass gathering for that, especially since you're killing of potential opposition at the same time.

You know what, don't answer that. I want to see if I'm right by myself.

TL;DR: But anyhow, to my surprise, Dragon Age 2 was a lot more fun and a lot better that I remembered it to be.

Also I think it should have been called "Dragon Age: Hawke" or "Dragon Age: Champion" (since they seem to be going for "DA: ") rather than Dragon Age 2, because it's not so much of a follow up on Origins as it is a character drama with a lot of action.

And now I need to make my mind up on if I should replay all of DA from the start, to go into DAI fully up to date, or get back on my dalish mage. First world problems are nice some times...

I'll play some more Inquisition and see what my gut tells me.

 

[Casual Shinji]

The problem I had with DA2 is that it sets itself up as this tale of grand accomplishment, but you accomplish nothing all. This to me hangs over an otherwise decent game like a bad smell.

Big things are constantly on the horizon, things you are apparently going to be at the center of, but in the end everything occurs completely outside of your control. The whole thing with the serial killer taking the cake for me. You're given hints throughout the game that this guy is doing nasty things in a manner that gives the impression you can hunt him down and stop him. But then when you actually encounter him...

Spoiler

...he'll have already killed your mother

...without you ever being given the option to prevent it. Then why give me a quest to find out clues at all, you fucking asshole game!?

I actually did like some of the characters... Well, I liked Aveline anyway. And I loved how the Black Emporium gave you the option to change your character's appearance, and I don't know why Bioware stubbornly refuses to implement this option in their following games. I'm sure I'm not the only one whose ever made a character in the editor, thinking they looked swell, only to have him/her look like garbage in-game, and then felt forced to start from scratch and have to sit through all those intro cinematics.

 

[Kerethos]

The problem I had with DA2 is that it sets itself up as this tale of grand accomplishment, but you accomplish nothing all. This to me hangs over an otherwise decent game like a bad smell.

Big things are constantly on the horizon, things you are apparently going to be at the center of, but in the end everything occurs completely outside of your control. The whole thing with the serial killer taking the cake for me. You're given hints throughout the game that this guy is doing nasty things in a manner that gives the impression you can hunt him down and stop him. But then when you actually encounter him...

Spoiler

...he'll have already killed your mother

...without you ever being given the option to prevent it. Then why give me a quest to find out clues at all, you fucking asshole game!?

I would not say you don't accomplish anything at all. I mean you do go from poor refugee to nobility to champion and infamy, doing a lot of stuff along the way. You just fail to stop any of the major events, and are just left trying to deal with the fallout.

But, yeah, it's a game that pretty much trolls you with it's story.
Making you think your in for a heroic adventure, when really your getting a fairly heavy character drama with a lot of combat thrown in.

Hawke is not a very successful hero, all things considered. Most or all of Hawke's family dies as well as, potentially, your friends and people they care about too. Or they could just abandon you, or turn against you in the end and try to kill you.

Hawke isn't really in control of events. Hawke's mostly just reacting to things beyond his/her control in the best way he/she can.

And that's very different from Origins, where you set out to fix the world before it breaks too much. You even start out much more powerful than Hawke, as one of the legendary Grey Wardens. Heroes the whole intro spends talking up.

While Hawke is just another refugee from the war the hero of the previous game fought, and won. A nameless NPC passing by in the distance, a background character, a nobody. Who become caught in the middle of, and forced to deal with, world changing events and threats as best he/she can - often with tragic consequences.

Dragon Age 2 frames itself as a heroic adventure, but it really isn't. It just the mostly tragic life of an important person, who was there when a lot of shit went down and played an important part in it - but never had the power to stop it.

I actually did like some of the characters... Well, I liked Aveline anyway. And I loved how the Black Emporium gave you the option to change your character's appearance, and I don't know why Bioware stubbornly refuses to implement this option in their following games. I'm sure I'm not the only one whose ever made a character in the editor, thinking they looked swell, only to have him/her look like garbage in-game, and then felt forced to start from scratch and have to sit through all those intro cinematics.

I quite like them all, oddly enough. I don't agree with them all, but as characters they all feel fully fleshed out and I've got a good idea of who they all are and why they do what they do. They... feel like real people, as much as the format allows at least.

And I can't but agree, the ability to change or tweak your looks after seeing your character in action was a bloody godsend. I was shocked to see how good my custom Hawke looked when I returned, and realize I must have spend a lot of time tweaking in the mirror to get everything the way I wanted.

Just like the addition of the "Flesh sculptor" made Skyrim's character creation a lot better (because using the console command could cause bugs). But in Inquisition it's back to create, review, take notes of what needs tweaking, delete and restart... sadness all around.

 

[Sniper Team 4]

No, you will find that there are actually quite a few of us out there that enjoy Dragon Age II. Or at least I do whenever I talk about it. It's just that there are some many other people constantly shouting down the game that it's hard for others to speak up.

Anyway, I enjoyed Dragon Age II. I enjoyed it a lot, despite its flaws. And then the DLC came out and it was amazing but painful, because it showed the game that DA II could have been if given more time. But I digress.
I always felt that DA II had a lot going on in the background. There was so, so, so much stuff in that game that raised a lot of lore and implication questions, but sadly Hawke and company were never able to check it out because they always had to deal with the immediate problem of survival.

"Hey! We found a dwarf city that is unlike ANY OTHER CITY on record? And it has a weird lyrium idol unlike anything we've ever seen? Hm...we should probably check this--DAMMIT! Now we have to find a way out or die!"

"What are all these strange messages written around the city? What's this about releasing some ancient evil that is now--DAMMIT! Got to stop the Templars and Mages from burning the city to the ground!"

There was so much in that game that, if Hawke hadn't had the problem of "Crap, I need to survive!" every time one of these things comes up, it would have been amazing to find out. But now I see why they did it that way. Inquisition is building off of all these small clues, and it is coming together. I think Inquisition is only going to make Dragon Age II's story all that much fascinating for me now.

 

[Elfgore]

For the longest time, I allowed the internet to spoil my memories of playing Dragon Age II. The negativity just got to me and I held the belief the game was a total piece of shit... then I played it again. I loved the hell out of it. The combat was fast paced and quite epic, the only really bad part was the re-spawning waves of enemies. The story isn't that bad either. I came to the conclusion that Dragon Age II is a bad sequel, not a bad game.

 

[Las7]

I agree with one thing in the OP - this is an unpopular opinion.
If you enjoyed tactics and RPG Elements in DA:O there is no way to remotely enjoy DA2.

 

[Rabbitboy]

Hallelujah! Another soul saved!

But seriously happy to hear you gave Dragon Age 2 another chance.

 

[EternallyBored]

I don't try to hate on DA2 too much as it's not the worst game ever, it's just very bland and boring to me, the only characters I liked were varric and Isabella, Anders character got butchered between games without any good exploration of why or how, knight commander Meredith was a crappy 3rd act villain compared to the Arishok, and the whole ending felt copied and pasted regardless of anything done previously in the game, you fight the same boss battles with almost no variation, and the whole thing felt rushed and half done, the ending was really just kind of boring in general and a bad way of setting up the inevitable mages vs. templar war, which was fixed partially in a later book release, and ultimately didn't amount to much anyway since the mages vs. templars is thrown to the wayside by the first major story mission in DA:I in favor of a villain from the DA2 DLC, makes the whole third act of DA2 feel like a red herring since the red lyrium was a much bigger part of the third game.

But the thing I cannot and will not ever forgive the game for is its copy and pasted environments and dungeons. Not in the normal sense of asset reuse that all games do, but the complete reuse of identical maps just with boulders placed or locked doors to change the layout a little bit. I am a stickler for good environments, sweeping vistas, interesting ruins and caves, architecture and nature. So DA2's absolutely paltry variety is not something I can tolerate. I know it's largely my opinion, but I just cannot stand that shit in DA2 and it is why I absolutely refused to play the game again after beating it the first time, I cannot stand the environments, even Kirkwall wasn't very interesting as a central hub, it wasn't terrible, but the city was just not interesting enough for me to want to spend a significant chunk of the game there.

I had issues with the combat system as well, the wave enemy mechanics made most attempts at tactics, placement and things like tanking kind of pointless, after the first wave it was pretty much a free for all with me just focusing on Hawke while the rest of the party just fought mobs on their own regardless of class or positioning. It was a disappointment after DA's valiant attempt to return to the D&D inspired combat of the BG games.

I hear about how the story is different and interesting, but the fact that I disliked pretty much all the characters except 2 pretty much killed most of the more personal story telling for me, I didn't give a shit about most of the characters and even Hawke by the end just wasn't pulling me in or making me care about Kirkwall's story, pretty much all my interest in the main storyline quickly died off after act 2.

The game just barely limped past the finish line with a story that had potential, but I could never shake the feeling that it wasted most of that potential on copy-paste dungeons and lame characters and dialogue with a combat system that eschewed much of what I liked about DA:O's combat.

 

[laggyteabag]

Dragon Age 2 was a pretty fun game in the end, but it was hampered by the fact that they focused the entire game on a single city and the surrounding areas, but did very little with them. You would expect that with a story that is focused on such a small area, it would play a major part in the game and be very much like a character itself, but for whatever reason, aside from after Act 2 where there was a new statue in the docks, or whenever the city was on fire, it didn't change one bit (which is odd considering that the game takes place over 10 or so years). Whenever Varric in Inquisition starts talking about how damaged Kirkwall was after the circle tower rebelled, I just kinda think that aside from the Chantry blowing up, the only real damage was that a few boxes were on fire. I just think that the game could have benefited from some choices that really impact the city as a whole (ie if the keep was damaged during the Qunari rebellion if you chose to duel the Arishok).

As for combat, I thought it was a big improvement over Origins (aside from the constantly respawning enemies that made me feel like I was playing a horde mode), but it just felt a lot nicer to play as the classes due to the obviously improved animations (yay for mages doing more than poking a stick at someone) that made the combat feel a lot more alive (played on PC so I used auto-attack. Mashing the attack button is a little weird for a RPG like this.)

But the real reason for why the DLC felt like such a success is probably just down to being able to go to other locations other than the lifeless husk of a city that was Kirkwall, and whilst the locations in the Legacy DLC weren't all that different in terms of the colour pallet, the green hills of Orlais sure were. Oh, and the enemy variety was nice too. Thank god for new things.

Was Dragon Age 2 disappointing in some or many aspects? Yes. But was it still a fun game in the end? Absolutely.

 

[IOwnTheSpire]

I'm glad I'm not alone in liking Dragon Age II. I see nothing wrong with liking DAII, or MoS, or the Hobbit movies, yet liking them seems to be a crime on the Internet.

I agree that there should have been a subtitle instead of a number. Dragon Age: Kirkwall has a decent ring, so we'd have DAO, DAK, and DAI!

Honestly, while I find DAO has more replayability, I think II's story is better, cause DAO's story is actually pretty generic when you stop and think about it. A hero and company must unite the land against an army of evil monsters is rather boring compared to a refugee who rises to power in a city that's a bomb waiting to go off (told in flashback!).

Hawke is very human at his core, you're right about that, what he/she goes through is harsh. I felt the relationship between Hawke and Varric was a true friendship (if you pursue a friendship), and it makes sense as to why Varric is wary of talking to Cassandra about Hawke.

 

[Ishigami]

Unpopular opinions about Dragon Age? ? Oh boy I got a few of those!

The tactical view of Dragon Age Origins is overrated. There I said it.
I played thru DA:O 7 times, I even forced myself to stay in tactical view for an entire play thru. And at the end of the day I can honestly say that almost all situations are solvable from the shoulder view just fine.
For a feature that gets so much praise or let?s say missing thereof so much hate I found myself not needing or wanting it most of the time!

The combat mechanics in Dragon Age 2 are just fine. - There another one.
The only actual change to Dragon Age Origin is that they removed the activation times of skill and for more powerful spells made them channeled. That?s it. It made combat way more responsive in return as you executed a skill immediately when choosing it instead of waiting the turn to end (DA:O). And it got BioWare all the hate for nothing!
But console players had to press an attack button! ? Well PC players don?t we still had auto attack.
The problem was not the combat mechanics but the combat setup. That you were thrown into unknown numbers of reoccurring waves but that?s not really related to the combat mechanics.

I agree with the OP. DA2 is flawed yes but also enjoyable.
I enjoyed my several play thrus of DA2. It is well written and got interesting companions as well. (Another one of the unpopular opinions if you will).
Heck I played one time with only selecting the witty dialog options and it was a blast! ? The world of Thedas lost a comedian in Hawk.

I never got around to buy/play the DLCs? maybe I might do that but considering their age they are rather expensive.

 

[JennAnge]

I'm the same; I loved DA2 even as I recognize that it had some mighty flaws. I've replayed it even more than DA:O - though that could also be because DA:O takes almost twice as long to run through, at least the way I play the two games. DA2 is a game that I'll pick up during game release lulls or over the summer; I did just this past summer as a matter of fact. I'll replay it like I'm rereading a favorite escapist book or comic, just to revisit the great characters (yeah, however messy their story arcs are sometimes), the humor, the drama, the romance...

I think DA:I is going to be another game like that. I'm on my second run-through, and I'm already half planning which character, specialisation, quest choices, companions I'm going to run with this Christmas. Ahh, Bioware. What you do to me...

 

[Imperioratorex Caprae]

I can't say I went into DA2 blind, I heard a lot, a lot, of negativity surrounding it and some of that I really agree with. Pretty much what the OP has already stated and thus I don't need to reiterate. I did enjoy the story, some of the changes in gameplay. I've not been a fan of inventory management on a scale like Origins, mostly because I spend a lot of time (as in Mass Effect 1) trashing/selling junk I'll never use. I enjoy some simplifications in interfaces or item drops because it allows me to focus more on my character. Of course in a tabletop setting I'm a bit ass-backwards in that I'd prefer to micromanage my character's inventory. But that setting also allows for a lot of leeway mechanics-wise and such that video games can't do. Yet. And we're still far off from that. Depth is nice, but when it becomes a chore, I don't want to deal with that at all because its no longer depth, its complexity by way of oversaturation rather than true complexity.
Overall though I enjoyed my experiences in Kirkwall, even if it was same-map/different quest. It did make me feel I was dealing with a small part of a larger world rather than ultra-savior badass. And thats really what made me enjoy that and what I want to see more of. Small-scale, not universe/world/whatever saviors... just the mini-heroes. I can stand to be D-list or C-list hero of the week because its nice to not have that ultimate pressure bearing down on me.

 

[maneyan]

I'm all aboard with that. DA:O was clunky and had dozens of really archaic mechanics. At times it felt like I was playing Baldurs Gate 2 which is a fun game but came out in the nineties, some evolution is nice. Even disregarding the feeling of Kirkwall, the characters and the sheer... personality DAII had it was way more intense, fast paced and above all else, responsive. I could FEEL the impact when I scored a critical hit or used a skill to send the enemy flying. DA:O was about as responsive as a brick wall. Also: Aveline's romance with Donnic, Varric, Isabella and Aveline's rivalry etc, all those are hall of fame moments for the franchise

Now DA:O was a great game and all obviously, and yes DAII suffered from being forced out the door before it had even brushed its teeth. But Bioware learned from it and many of the mechanics they implemented were for the better. in DAII I actually felt I was playing a role, systematically selecting the virtuous personality and really FEELING Hawke. I was not running a an adventuring business moving numbers back and forth like some obsessive WoW-player screaming at his guildmates because their DPS dropped below some value. Seriously; some parts of DA:O could be so bloody tedious.

 

[happyninja42]

I enjoyed the combat in DA 2, just not the plot and how I had no agency in it. That more than anything pissed me off, how so many plot elements all ended exactly the same, no matter what dialogue choices you made. That the only difference was which of your companions liked/disliked you more. It got so frustrating to me that I honestly wish they'd just left it out entirely, and let Hawk do a prescripted thing, because he pretty much already did.

But combat wise, yeah I had fun with the game. It was one of the few times I've actually enjoyed playing a warrior type class. It got repetitive in execution sure, but as far as the core elements of the mechanics, I didn't mind it at all.

 

[RavingSturm]

DA2 isnt bad. It just has a better put together older sibling and a greedy publisher that forced Bioware to put it out in a year.

 

[ScreamingViking]

In DA2 I felt like your character had so much more personality then the usual rpg character. As much as the dialogue wheel could occasionally mislead you, I really liked the three personality types and the way you could move from one to the other as the game progressed, it added an extra layer of role playing to the game. I would usually start as witty or friendly and then become more and more cold and aggressive as more bad stuff happened to Hawke. I'm playing as the inquisitor now, and she (or he) just feels so flat and clueless in comparison.

 

[Shocksplicer]

I actually did like some of the characters... Well, I liked Aveline anyway. And I loved how the Black Emporium gave you the option to change your character's appearance, and I don't know why Bioware stubbornly refuses to implement this option in their following games. I'm sure I'm not the only one whose ever made a character in the editor, thinking they looked swell, only to have him/her look like garbage in-game, and then felt forced to start from scratch and have to sit through all those intro cinematics.

My Elf's hair clips through his right ear I can't unsee it OH GOD PLEASE LET ME CHANGE IT!!!

*ahem*

OT: I've always been a vocal supporter of DA2. I loved the characters, the interesting interactions between them, and the way that the story is pretty unique in gaming due to its focus on a character dealing with a bad situation rather than saving the world.

I will admit that the copy/paste environments and waves of enemies sucked though.

 

[Darth Rosenberg]

Nah, it's not that unpopular an opinion. But it is a smart opinion... So welcome to the club. ;-)

I loved DAII, and am currently playing through it again whilst maybe/sorta/kinda hoping DA:I gets auto-attack patched in, at least in the [half-arsed] Tactical cam mode.

[Fem]Hawke, the party dynamics, the cultural clusterfuck between various factions in Kirkwall, your companions' stories, the fact that your companions could hate your guts but still respect you enough to hang around and be useful - I think all of it makes for a far more engaging and nuanced story and world than DA:O. Plus, I loved how Hawke is never the Chosen One, and that by the end you've perhaps been party to igniting the war, hence Varric refuting Cassandra's accusation than she/Hawke was "guilty", and he stating that it's not as simple as that.

Perhaps Origins is, all things considered, a better overall product in terms of balanced design. But DAII? For me just had far more heart, and soul. Hawke's rise, amidst Kirkwall's fall (in between your companions own misadventures. in DA:O your companions mostly just felt like RPG Party Assets to be picked for dungeons. in DAII, there's a far greater sense that they have their own lives and problems, which further grounds the idea of Kirkwall as a believable, lived-in place).

 

[TheVampwizimp_v1legacy]

Indeed, DAII is much maligned and undeservedly so. It is a good game, period. It offers things that other RPGs do not.

The combat has a major flaw in the wave format but overall it is very fun. I just finished a 4th replay and had more fun than ever. Usually I get frustrated at times the way the difficulty spikes in weird ways, but I discovered a great build for my bowman rogue that wiped the floor with the second and third act. By the time I fought the Arishok I had skill combinations that would give me about a 75% chance of a critical hit, which did 400% damage and disoriented enemies, which set them up for combos every few seconds. I felt so damn powerful, it was great.

The characters were not all great, but Varric is a masterpiece and Aveline and Isabela are tons of fun, especially together. Merrill is stereotypically moe, but her unique questline is great with an excellent ending.

OP is right about the story and Hawke's role in it. It is occasionally stupid how Hawke never seems to be able to stop anything, but you accomplish enough, and it makes Hawke much more believable and interesting.