Goddamnit Bioware

[beniki]

To be honest the gameplay was the only thing I didn't like about Dragon Age: Origins. The story was nifty, if a little generic, but they were busy setting up an original world.

The only problem I had was the way they set up fights. You could literally feel the developer making the combat puzzles. That's a bad sign... gameplay in an RPG should be much more veiled, and tied much greater with a narrative. A lot of the time I felt like I was just MMO grinding.

Same problem comes in with Mass Effect, but the single character control made the experience so much more engaging that I didn't notice.

 

[LiquidGrape]

Dragon Age 2 is BioWare's most accomplished game in terms of themes and characters.
Not a popular opinion, but I think it's worth saying after all the ridiculous hostility that game had to suffer.

That's an interesting position on this forum - how so? (Not arguing, just curious - I've never played DA2 and all I know about the story is the framing device.)

Well, in terms of theme, there was a lot going on in Dragon Age 2. Without going into spoilerrific detail, suffice it to say there's a tangible socio-political element there, and one which has far more ambiguity than the base "moral dilemmas" for which most games seem content with settling.
There is a particular decision you must make in the late third act of the game which had me stumped for several minutes. The wider implications of this one action were beyond anything I had ever encountered in a BioWare game, much due to the contemporary relevance of the dilemma you're facing.

To contrast; Origins, as finely written as it was, I felt never amounted to much more in its thematic contents than the proverbial "hit this reptilian manifestation of evil over the head with a big stick" scenario. Like I said, a finely crafted big stick, but a big, cumbersome stick all the same.

Dragon Age 2 had ambitions, and for the most part, I think it managed to deliver.

In terms of characters, Isabela is by far the most satisfactory and well-rounded romance in their canon (well-rounded in more ways than her figure, mind you), and overall, the cast as a whole actually added to the thematic arc rather than detracted from it.

These are all purely personal impressions of course, but I felt I got my money's worth, and then some.

 

[Trishbot]

TALI > Every single other video game character created in the history of ever.

/thread

 

[Kahunaburger]

Dragon Age 2 is BioWare's most accomplished game in terms of themes and characters.
Not a popular opinion, but I think it's worth saying after all the ridiculous hostility that game had to suffer.

That's an interesting position on this forum - how so? (Not arguing, just curious - I've never played DA2 and all I know about the story is the framing device.)

Well, in terms of theme, there was a lot going on in Dragon Age 2. Without going into spoilerrific detail, suffice it to say there's a tangible socio-political element there, and one which has far more ambiguity than the base "moral dilemmas" for which most games seem content with settling.
There is a particular decision you must make in the late third act of the game which had me stumped for several minutes. The wider implications of this one action were beyond anything I had ever encountered in a BioWare game, much due to the contemporary relevance of the dilemma you're facing.

To contrast; Origins, as finely written as it was, I felt never amounted to much more in its thematic contents than the proverbial "hit this reptilian manifestation over the head with a big stick" scenario. Like I said, a finely crafted big stick, but a big, cumbersome stick all the same.

Dragon Age 2 had ambitions, and for the most part, I think it managed to deliver.

In terms of characters, Isabela is by far the most satisfactory and well-rounded romance in their canon (well-rounded in more ways than her figure, mind you), and overall, the cast as a whole actually added to the thematic arc rather than detracted from it.

These are all purely personal impressions of course, but I felt I got my money's worth, and then some.

Cool - that definitely sounds like a step forward in terms of story from DA:O's "epic quest to save the world from the generic evil horde" then. I think I might have been spoiled re: the big DA2 decision by Yahtzee, and if it is what I think it is, I agree that that's a great example of storytelling.

 

[Cat of Doom]

Never played a Bioware game I havent liked, and I have played them all.

 

[Irony's Acolyte]

I don't have too many problems with Bioware at all. Sure there are choices they've made that I feel are mistakes, but overall I don't feel like they've fucked over their different series, as I've had tons of fun in ME2 and DA2 hasn't been as bad as all those complainers have made it out to be.

You may not like their games, that's cool, but I do. So yeah, nice opinion and all. And I for one liked the new design of the elves. Made them less "pointy eared, short humans" and more a different race.

 

[Lizmichi]

Why, why another BioWare hate thread? DA2 has been out for 2 months now and that hate still hasn't gone down. *sigh* This all started after DA2 came out. Anyway, I still love BioWare, the story in ME2 was good and so was the story in DA:O. I can't wait for ME3 and DA3. I understand the people don't like Bio right now or have been disappointed for some time but I'm happy with them. To each their own I guess.

A Note from the new rules: Rants
You can disagree with whatever you like but using large amounts of obscene language and CAPS is against our policies. We are sure you can find another way to voice your opinion without being aggressive, regardless of whom it is directed at.

 

[Antwerp Caveman]

<3 Jade Empire <3

That is all.

 

[Kahunaburger]

The only problem I had was the way they set up fights. You could literally feel the developer making the combat puzzles. That's a bad sign... gameplay in an RPG should be much more veiled, and tied much greater with a narrative. A lot of the time I felt like I was just MMO grinding.

Yeah, tank/dps/cc is not deep tactical gameplay, and I'm not sure why anyone thinks it is. That's one of the things I like about ME2 - on insanity, you have to vary your strategies a little depending on what you're fighting, but in DA:O it's pretty much just tank/dps/cc on any difficulty unless you want to get clever with bottlenecks and AOE spells.

EDIT:

snip

This is the best gif ever.

 

[etherlance]

While I'm dissapointed with the way DA 2 came out......I actually Liked the new design for the elves, if it were possible I'd be playing as one.

also I can't really get that much out of this thread as you have for the most part turned it into a "I Hate mass effect rant rather than making an educated arguement about what you felt could have been better.

 

[conflictofinterests]

Their characters have been dull.

Play as male Shepard?
If so, that's your problem, right there.

 

[Canid117]

Yay! A hate thread! I was just thinking we need another one of these! Especially one directed at a game that has yet to be released.

 

[Stephanos132]

So, they stop making games the way you like them and now you're upset?

Was DA2 really so bad, or did the disappointed whip themselves into too much of a hype frenzy again?

 

[Moonlight Butterfly]

Bioware seem to be going a bit nuts with streamlining things. I mean compare the temple of the urn of sacred ashes or the werewolf temple in DA:O to the mines and sewers in DA2. Yeah okay Bioware we didn't need all that extra space and suchlike but it's the equivalent of ripping all the descriptive prose out of a novel because hey saves time and paper!.

I played Mass Effect after I played ME2 and I enjoyed the first alot more. Why? because it was totally more immersive it wasn't saturated with characters and there wasn't a big orange loading screen screaming at you that 'your playing a game!'. I was dreading the infamous Mako sections as I had heard about them on the forums but I actually really enjoyed exploring the planets and suchlike. The planet missions in ME2 felt like an afterthough at best. The side missions, albeit with the same copypasta of DA:2, felt appropriately different and not like they were being lazy.

Don't get me wrong, I loved both games but Mass Effect 1 feels much more superior to me in alot of ways.

 

[nightwolf667]

Bioware has basically been comfort food for a lot of fans. It's like McDonald's, it's mostly crap but you know exactly what you're going to get. Dragon Age II deviated from the standard, the usual, and presented something that was genuinely different from the standard cliches. Better yet, Hawke had a sense of humor and could be a sarcastic bastard, which made the game that much more bearable. I liked it and surprisingly, I liked it's characters. I haven't really enjoyed anything from Bioware in a long time (including Mass Effect 2).

In fact, I really wish they'd done the Mass Effect trilogy the way they did Dragon Age II. Sure, your exploration was limited to one city, but as you progressed through time, you got to see the world grow, shape, and change with your actions. You fail to stop the serial killer. You lose people you care about. The Qunari are actually rather interesting and you can provoke them. The city is boiling over with tension between four different factions, (The Mages versus the Templars, the Chantry versus the Qunari). People don't behave the way you expect them to. The influence system is better, instead of being random and petty. This surprised me, because in Mass Effect 2 your choices are superficial, your playing the Bioware Shepard story instead of your story. Hawke felt more like he/she was following my directions. In ME 2, Shepard never really did. I cared about Hawke and Hawke's family (even Carver, which surprised me actually).

ME 2? Didn't care to be honest. Mostly because Bioware really has no clue how to write a trilogy, ME 2 felt more like a stand alone game, it felt like my choices in the previous title didn't matter, in some cases it ignored what I had done entirely. Worse it relied on me to read/look at/buy the DLCs, the books, and all the tie ins to even start getting what was going on. (Which I didn't) I don't like that the Liara DLC and the new whatever it's called DLC are going to be canon whether I played them or not. It's going to say "Shepard made these choices" when I didn't make those choices. I rolled up a new character in ME 2 without importing from ME 1 just to see how it was different and I was surprised. The game sticks it to the player. It's missing a lot of sidequest content. If you don't import your Shepard made all the renegade choices in the previous game, which could potentially seriously cripple them if they decided to play ME 3. It bothered me because it means that canon Shepard is a dick and I'm not sure how I feel about that.

 

[Choppaduel]

Bioware seem to be going a bit nuts with streamlining things. I mean compare the temple of the urn of sacred ashes or the werewolf temple in DA:O to the mines and sewers in DA2. Yeah okay Bioware we didn't need all that extra space and suchlike but it's the equivalent of ripping all the descriptive prose out of a novel because hey saves time and paper!.

I played Mass Effect after I played ME2 and I enjoyed the first alot more. Why? because it was totally more immersive it wasn't saturated with characters and there wasn't a big orange loading screen screaming at you that 'your playing a game!'. I was dreading the infamous Mako sections as I had heard about them on the forums but I actually really enjoyed exploring the planets and suchlike. The planet missions in ME2 felt like an afterthough at best. The side missions, albeit with the same copypasta of DA:2, felt appropriately different and not like they were being lazy.

Don't get me wrong, I loved both games but Mass Effect 1 feels much more superior to me in alot of ways.

good analogy!
[hr]
Replacing the open world & linear vehicle sections with planet scanning took too much out of the game despite the driving being frustrating at times.

What they should have done was: fix the vehicle sections, rather than cut & replace them with tedious button pushing.
[hr]
http://gza.gameriot.com/content/images/orig_320200_1_1257581825.png

the macro story is pretty much the same with each game, but the micro story is very different, so they get away with it.

 

[Brandon237]

I damn-well loved Mass Effect 1 and 2. When I finished my fifty-hour game of mass-effect 1 I sat back and thought "Wow, that was amazing". This is considering that it crashed 3 times in the final scene (I killed the sovereign-controlled Turian 3 times to see the outro), and still I see my experience with that game as amazing.

And the story of ME2 was truly awesome, as was the game-play. It was stream-lined with enough content, all of which was detailed and brilliant.

Sorry, OP, I could not agree with you less.

 

[ImmortalDrifter]

Please go whine somewhere else

~Everyone

 

[mavkiel]

I actually like what they did to the quarni and elves. Made them actually look like something other then an oddly skinned human.

That being said, the story (such as it is) in da2 really kind of sucked. It might have been redeemed if the campaign was longer, as they could have fleshed out the story and relationships with other characters.

What is more concerning to me is the dlc's they are hell bent on releasing. Item packs? I hope to god whomever is in charge of me3 has more sense then that.

 

[thelonewolf266]

Protip: He's called Trolldor what did you expect, a thread that wasn't meant to stir up arguments and hate?