First off I want to say that I'm not trying to convince you to agree with me. (why does everyone always assume that is the purpose of a disagreement anyway?) There are a number of things you say that I take exception to, and being the person that I am, I feel the need to point them out.
Mystranna Kelteel wrote...
Round 1! Don't fix what isn't broken!
In the recent GameInformer article, Greg Zeschuk says that you shouldn't try to fix what's not broken. Why, then, is DA2 such a drastic departure? The article goes on and on about how successful DAO was, and how that proved that fans still like the old-style RPG format. So, again, if you don't want to fix what isn't broken, why are you setting out to do just that? This doesn't make any sense. People liked DAO. BioWare supposedly liked DAO, so why does it seem like I'm going to be playing Mass Effect?
"Drastic departure" is something of a misnomer. Not only do we not know enough about the game to make such a claim, but what we do know about the game does not actually suggest that the game will be terribly different from what it was before. It does present some worrying trends and possibilities, true, but possibilities do not automatically equal departure.
Mystranna Kelteel wrote...
Round 2! Nostalgia gaming.
This can be aimed at BioWare or Joe Juba, though I assume Joe is parroting BioWare's sentiment in order to write an accurate article. Anyways, nostalgia can't hold up a series? Okay, DAO was a tribute to Baldur's Gate. So? People liked it and it sold well. Saying that nostalgia can't hold up the DA series, so it must be radically changed, is completely senseless. Why can't DA2 simply be a follow-up tribute to Dragon Age: Origins and maintain its style? What are you trying to say about today's gaming market by insisting that DA2 must be changed from DAO because DAO was too "nostalgic"? And what the hell is meant by "aging design"? All games have "aging designs", but the thing is that age of design does not alter a game's fun-factor. This whole concept evokes a rather hefty "lolwut".
They're completely right. Nostalgia is not enough to hold up a series. If there was no evolution at all, the wider market would quickly become bored with it and BioWare would stop losing money. While I am not a fan of decisions being made on the bottom line, I am still willing to accept that a company needs to aim to make a profit. The real concern here is the claims of "aging design." DA:O is not even a year old. The only thing that has "aged" on it is the models and animations, which were not at all impressive even when it brand new.
Mystranna Kelteel wrote...
Round 3! 'A Story in Pieces'
Yeah, this whole mini-article was rather strange. It basically says that the game is told in a narrative style by certain characters and implies that Hawke will be warping around the world and timeline. What's troubling is that Mike Laidlaw repeatedly says that this method allows the focus of the game to be centered around the "action" and "skip the interstitial between key action moments..." Yeah, this is basically saying the game will be broken up into a series of remarkably linear "levels", isn't it? At best it sounds like we can hope for a ME2-style of exploration, which is pretty much trash. Sounds like we won't be able to properly explore places at our leisure because we'll be forced into specific areas to suit the narration.
Don't jump to conclusions. Darth Gaider has actually implied that there will be mutliple quests within each story arc, and that there is the potential to leave some of them behind if you advance without completing them. So the story will progress in arcs, and each arc will provide multiple paths. To be honest, that sounds like it could actualy be even more open than DA:O if handled right.
Mystranna Kelteel wrote...
Round 4! LITHE SUPER-NINJA SPARTANS!!!
Apparently combat is being reworked rather thoroughly, or at the very least "redesigned". Mike Laidlaw says he wants the classes to play like "unstoppable juggernaut, a lithe super-ninja, or field artillery."
respectively to warriors, rogues, and mages. And we've all read the "fight like a Spartan!" tagline on the main site. So, I'm hoping those are hyperbole because that sounds dreadful for an RPG. He also goes on about wanting players to get in enemies' faces and cut heads off and making everything feel faster. That also sounds a little extreme. They say we can still play tactically, or "like a general", but is this going to be some stylized, watered-down action game or something?
I don't mind all the SUPERAWESOMEACTION personally, outside the worrisome image it presents of a potential more-action-than-RPG-game. But it has already been specifically said that, on the PC, the basic combat mechanics will remain mostly unchanged. That was enough to asuage most of my fears. I get tactical combat and that's a far cry from an action game.
Mystranna Kelteel wrote...
Round 5! Depth vs. Breadth
This one's straight-forward. They're saying the focus on DA2's combat skills will be on "depth" and not "breadth". Yeah, that's just fancy-speak for saying that we'll have fewer combat abilities. Granted this is countered by them claiming that we will be able to alter or improve our abilities as we go. The example given is the fireball, with claims that it will let you tailor this spell to the way you want it to be. Now, as a realist who has played many games, this sounds like a puffed-up way of saying that you're going to offer spell evolution at fixed points, such as "Reach level 5: Choose if you want your fireball to have a wider AOE or cause more damage!". That doesn't change the spell or gameplay in any specific way. Maybe I'm wrong, but, hey, I'm only being realistic. I don't see this "depth" they're claiming to be very deep.
It has the potential to go either way. Fewer abilities with some customization is not a bad thing in or of itself, though it could quickly become horrible.
Mystranna Kelteel wrote...
Round 6! Sexier Visuals!!!
We've all seen the new art style for DA2. Now, it is claimed that the goal is for people to be able to see a screenshot of DA2 and know right away that what they're looking at is, in fact, DA2. They don't want it to be confused with another fantasy IP like LOTR. Well, you've got that, BioWare, so congrats! The darkspawn grunts look horrid, and I would never dream that they were part of Tolkien's IP. That's personal opinion, though. 
The real issue here is that claim that these visuals are "sexier" and "bloodier" and more properly convey the essence of DA2. WTF does that mean? XD Seriously, I'm at a genuine loss for this one.
For titling the thread "dev-speak" you really missed a great example of dev-speak right here. It doesn't mean anything. It just means "give me attention, gamers."
Mystranna Kelteel wrote...
Round 7! Evolution Via Theft!
You want to evolve your games? A good idea is to make them each unique in their own ways by capitalizing on what makes different. Your choice here seems to be "steal things from other popular games we've made bcause they were popular and we can make them work in this time frame before release!" Yeah, we've all heard the jokes that this game is really Dragon Effect 2. And it's true. Much has been borrowed from Mass Effect here, be it the really crappy generic white-dude marketing icon, the dialogue wheel, the voiced PC, etc. I find it odd that you call this an "evolution" of Dragon Age when its really a ripoff of another game you've put out yourselves. It hasn't evolved; it's simply been altered almost entirely into something else.
Eh... the dialog wheel could end up being comepletely different from ME. It's versitile enough. So you can't really call that copying just yet. And a preset voiced character is so wide spread you can hardly call it copying anyone at all. Maybe you can call it copying FFX, since that was the first game to do it with wide spread commercial success. That was.. 9 years ago?
Mystranna Kelteel wrote...
Final Round!! HeHawke Strikes Confusion!
I'm only adding this for my own sake, and because this has been going on for 4-5 years now. HeHawke is not a good icon. You've claimed already that sticking to a default icon for advertising is going to "avoid confusion", but that's not the case. This entire article uses the pronoun "he" when referring to Hawke, and the mini-article about customizing Hawke doesn't even mention the gender option. It only says that you can customize appearance and class, which is very confusing when coupled with the exclusive use of the male pronoun. There is only one place where a female Hawke is even alluded to, and that's underneath one of the pictures in a tiny segregated blurb that simply claims that BioWare says you can choose gender. Seriously, BioWare, include some recognition for a female Hawke on your website, in a screenshot, or something. I don't care if Hawke is on the box and jimmied into all the trailers for laziness's sake, but, for the love crikey acknowledge female Hawke's existence somehow!
I appologize, but I long ago stopped feeling any sympathy for this kind of thing. You're on the board reading the news. You're reading the magazine article. You're posting long thoughts and discussion on the game. They don't need to target your for marketing. You're already hooked. As for why you even care that it be woman or a man in the pictures or the interviews or box art or whatever, it's just so meaningless. I honestly think you're
choosing to be upset by this when you could just as easily choose to completely ignore it. (when I use "you" here I mean in the general sense, and no you specifically)
And using "he" is the grammatically correct approach. When speaking of a person of unknown/variable gender, the orrect practice is to assme the gender of the speaker. The interviewee is male, and thus he correctly uses "he" when refering to a character of variable gender.
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