131 réponses à ce sujet

[soteria]

*scratch head* Gear in Da: O doesn't have level requirements on it. Just stat requirements, and occasionally class requirements.

He's talking about talents. "Attribute requirements for attributes" should read "attribute requirements for talents." At least, that's the only way I can make sense of it. I don't know if I agree, but I do think melee classes and mages should have parity there (not like Origins).

[PsychoBlonde]

soteria wrote...

*scratch head* Gear in Da: O doesn't have level requirements on it. Just stat requirements, and occasionally class requirements.

He's talking about talents. "Attribute requirements for attributes" should read "attribute requirements for talents." At least, that's the only way I can make sense of it. I don't know if I agree, but I do think melee classes and mages should have parity there (not like Origins).

Oh, yeah, like having to be level 12 to take Death Blow or whatever.  What made that especially dippy was that you could save talent points across levels so you'd still be using your level 8 point to get a level 12 ability, you just had to wait.  And it wasn't like any of the talents made such a huge difference that they needed to be reserved for higher levels, either.

[AlanC9]

There were a couple high-level talents that would make a big difference. Holy Smite comes to mind first.

[Realmjumper]

(Outdated visuals. The graphics are a bit on the old side. Okay for DAO, not for it's sequel)

I liked the visuals. I didn't think they were outdated a tall, the style also was something I enjoyed.



(Lack of a distinct art style. People see screenshots but don't know immediatly it's dragon age. SOmething needs to be done.) Is this for Dragonage 2 or DA:O? I think Dragonage 2 is lacking but DA: O did well.


(Combat is sluggish, slow and crude. ) It's supposed to be slow. If you're wearing a full set of platemail you're not going to be able to jump around and do backflips while carrying a two handed sword. What you see in Dragonage 2 looks unrealistic and completely arcade like. There is no way in hell The Champion of Kirkwall could run around carrying a sword twice his size for an unlimited amount of time. He would tire out and get beaten on with clubs by the Darkspawn. This is the direction they are taking though and good luck to them. If I wanted to play Kingdom Hearts I would have, which I don't.


(A lot of people didn't finish the game, due to length or uniformity) This I can understand, but for those that did finish the game why should we be punished for game length. There should be a compromise.


(The controls for the console versions are far behind the PC version) That's because this game was supposed to be a PC only game. The only reason it was released on consoles was to make more money.


(Some people felt it was too easy, some too difficult) A game that challenges the player is a good game. I felt Dragonage Origins was difficult and got easier the stronger you became. I felt this was the right choice.

Modifié par Realmjumper, 08 novembre 2010 - 08:28 .

[soteria]

It's supposed to be slow. If you're wearing a full set of platemail you're not going to be able to jump around and do backflips while carrying a two handed sword.

I think that's Sir JK's cue.

Have you seen evidence that characters will do backflips while carrying a two-handed sword, or is this just hyperbole on your part?

That's because this game was supposed to be a PC only game. The only reason it was released on consoles was to make more money.

Ok. So what? People who played on the console should suffer?

A game that challenges the player is a good game. I felt Dragonage Origins was difficult and got easier the stronger you became. I felt this was the right choice.

Saying "the game got easier as you got stronger" doesn't address the point that some people thought the game was too easy on nightmare and that others seemed to struggle on easy.

[AlanC9]

Realmjumper wrote...
(The controls for the console versions are far behind the PC version) That's because this game was supposed to be a PC only game. The only reason it was released on consoles was to make more money. 

True, but so what? And do you really think the PC version wasn't also supposed to make money?

Modifié par AlanC9, 08 novembre 2010 - 07:53 .

[In Exile]

AlanC9 wrote...

Realmjumper wrote...
(The controls for the console versions are far behind the PC version) That's because this game was supposed to be a PC only game. The only reason it was released on consoles was to make more money. 

True, but so what? And do you really think the PC version wasn't also supposed to make money?

You did get your $80 rebate with your purchase of DA:O? The game was a donation from Bioware, with extra cash to make it worth our while to actually play it!

[Kleli]

Edit:
Sorry posted in wrong thread.

Modifié par Kleli, 08 novembre 2010 - 08:35 .

[TMZuk]

• Outdated visuals. The graphics are a bit on the old side. Okay for DAO, not for it's sequel
  
  Tighten them up. Sharpen them. Don't make them look like a comic-book.
  
• Lack of a distinct art style. People see screenshots but don't know immediatly it's dragon age. Something needs to be done.
  
  The artstyle was just fine. The only issue I have are the repetitive generic outfits. Make more variation in NPC style, more overweight people, skinny people, stooping people. Don't use the same body-model for all females, regardless of age.
  
• Combat is sluggish, slow and crude.
  
  Twohanders were slow and sluggish, and sometimes the game was unresponsive. Speed the twohanders up a bit, and make the game responsive. Do NOT make it into an arcade hack'n slash game, with people doing silly flips and rolls, running all over the battlefield as if there was no tomorrow, no gravity and no momentum. It looks -stupid- when people change direction effortlessly while running.
  
• A lot of people didn't finish the game, due to length or uniformity.
  
  More content, less needless combat, more non-combat options, don't penalize on the xp for seeking other options than combat. The endless waves of generic opponents was annoying, especially in the fade, the Deeproads and the Mountain-temple.
• The controls for the console versions are far behind the PC version.
  
  Haven't got a clue about this, I only played the PC-version.
  
• Some people felt it was too easy, some too difficult.
  
  Make easy easier, and hard harder... I suppose it's a matter of coding. I don't like scaling anyway, I prefer fewer character-levels and fixed monsters as in BG. There's isn't really much point in levelling when every enemy levels with your character.

Much more importantly: Give us choices. In character development we are
down to one race, two genders and three classes. Sorry, but that is
worse than basic D&D from 1980.

I want warriors that can use
ALL weapons. They are WARRIORS. They are experts at warfare, and
restricting their choice in weaponry is utterly silly. If I want to have
my warrior pounding the enemies with bow and arrow, so what?
Restrictions are bad.

I want crossclasses. Not even ME/ME2 is so
restricted in classes as DA/DA2. Besides the basic warrior/rogue/mage,
ME/ME2 at least offers the opportunity to create cross-classes. (yes I
know they aren't called warrior/rogue/mage, but that is what they are,
regardless.)

I want a gameplay where you take your time. Where
you walk carefully, scout ahead, plan the appraoch, including options to
actually avoid combat. I DONT want a gameplay where "something awesome
happens when you press a button". I hate flips, rolls, teleporting,
jumping ten feet into the air, and all the other kid-stuff I have seen
in the gameplay videos so far.

I want content. More roleplay,
dialogue, interaction, choices, options and non-linearity. Less combat,
especially less generic trash-combat.

I want the possibility to
kill each and everyone if I so desire. To smack them with a fist or a
sword if they annoy my character. I want to be able to play a saint, but
also a homicidal bastard.

That's what I hoped to see in DA2.
That's what I consider improvements over DA:O. But, it's not where DA2
is headed, rather the opposite, which is why this is not a wish-list,
but a dream. Anyway, to those of you who think DA2 is going the right
way, I hope you'll have fun with it. I'll look for another game to play.
[smilie]../../../images/forum/emoticons/wink.png[/smilie]

Modifié par TMZuk, 08 novembre 2010 - 10:09 .

[FellowerOfOdin]

[quote][*]Outdated visuals. The graphics are a bit on the old side. Okay for DAO, not for it's sequel[/quote]

Try to keep the same style while using textures with a higher resolution as done in quite a few user mods and add a few atmospheric graphic effects e.g. more grass, swarms of birds flying around, sunflare etc...I would not have changed a lot as I really liked the graphics and they do not matter too much to me - Bioware never had the best graphics and, most likely, will not have them with DA 2 either (that's a good thing though, not everyone has a 3000$ PC).

[quote]
[*]Lack of a distinct art style. People see screenshots but don't know immediatly it's dragon age. SOmething needs to be done.[/quote]

Hmmmm, I tend to disagree here. Dragon Age had a certain style and I guess I'd be able to recognize screenshots taken from the game, but then again, I spent more than 200 hours on that game. The question is: does the game need a certain art style that makes it stand out among other games? A game should not be remembered for its art style, especially not a RPG.

[quote]
[*]Combat is sluggish, slow and crude. [/quote]
I don't know why so many people complained about the combat - overall, it worked pretty well, even the tactics system. Minor adjustments could be automatic ranged behavior if equipped with ranged weapons, no automatic friendly fire, no waste of mana etc. but in general, it worked. If people want a fast, easy combat system, let them go play some Diablo or Dynasty Warriors. If you play a RPG, expect some serious tactical combat. Again, minor adjustments on how the combat went would be necessary - it's ridiculous when a character stays in melee range with a bow or needs to slowly turn around to hit an enemy. To fix this, you'd need some AI improvements and e.g. more skills with a charge mechanic.

[quote]
[*]A lot of people didn't finish the game, due to length or uniformity[/quote]
And nothing of value was lost. Seriously, this is not Bioware's fault, not at all. When people buy a RPG and expect it to be finished in less than 20 hours, then tell them to go buy some FPS crap that you finish in <5 hours or some Ritalin, either way. RPGs are meant to be long and when I buy a RPG I want it to last for at least 30-50 hours...without sidequests.

[quote]
[*]The controls for the console versions are far behind the PC version[/quote]
DA2 is PC only Seriously though, that was to be expected - compare the number of keys on a keyboard to the number of buttons on a controller pad. Then again, I'd like someone to tell me why it was more complicated (no joke or sth, I really do not know!) because I don't know why. You can pause the game at any time and you could easily bind certain skills to certain buttons - let's face it, in DA:O on the PC, I did not use more than 6 skills per character, passives left aside.

[quote]

[*]Some people felt it was too easy, some too difficult[/quote][/list]Way too easy actually. I already made a veeery long post about the difficulty, gimme a second...got it.

[quote]FellowerOfOdin wrote...

[quote]Chris Priestly wrote...

Once everyone comes to an agreement on what is or is not difficult*, we will adjust our game design accordingly. Until then, we will continue to put it differing levels of difficulty to let players adjust the difficulty as they see fit.
[/quote]

I think we can go with "Cheese" here!

Anyway, first of all, thanks for the post of course. Secondly, having different levels of difficulty is cool and allows every player to pick either a very easy game or a challenging time, but that was the problem in Awakening and DA:Origins: the highest available difficulty level was neither difficult nor challenging for experienced players - and shouldn't that be the point of the hardest difficulty? [smilie]http://social.bioware.com/images/forum/emoticons/wink.png[/smilie]

To all complaining about so-called "cheap deaths" - that's your personal view and maybe, you simply did not grow up with the games of the past that were, for most parts, a lot more difficult and required a lot more strategy, tactics and meta-game knowledge. Hey, imagine a time without internet where you had to write everything down on your own and there was nothing like Gamefaqs telling you exactly what to do...that was core gaming as its best.

As to the "cheap" - those weren't cheap. At all. In the contrary, they were fair. Enemies could roll a critical hit and deal the same damage with a normal hero. They get a critical hit, they kill you. That's not unfair, that's the most fair design a game can get, granting your enemies the same chance as yourself.

Furthermore, you knew what you were getting. You knew that you could get ambushed at night and you knew that your enemies could easily land a critical hit as well. Cheap? Fair. We stil lhad different difficulties of course where enemies dealt less damage, could not score critical hits, etc., but if you played by the rules, you had a very fair game that was challenging yet extremely rewarding at the same time.

I know that most players nowadays are used to very easy games, that's just how the market works right now, but there still are core gamers who want a real challenge and having one difficulty level that's really challenging for those players would be really fair. If you aren't man enough to make it - choose another difficulty!

Now, what exactly is it that makes a game challenging, or rather, what made Dragon Age so easy?

[quote]i.) Enemies did not have enough hitpoints / armor: Even on nightmare, a tank could still kill the generic enemies with a few hits and archers usually needed a single Split Shot to reduce the health of nearby enemies by 25%.[/quote]

[quote]ii.) Enemies did not deal enough damage: Tanks were almost immune to physical damage at a very early point because of the combination of high armor + shield and a high dexterity, allowing them to either dodge or block enemy damage. Even at the end of Origins, Elite mobs and higher dealt ~10 damage or less to tanks, normal enemies did not deal any damage at all. [/quote]

[quote]iii.) Enemies did not make use of their skills / did not have enough skills: Most of the time, even on Nightmare, enemies usually resorted to auto-attacking and rarely used skills against allies, sometimes even wasting their stamina on useless skills e.g. Below the Belt instead of effective ones.[/quote]

[quote]vi.) The aggro system was flawed: To sum it up, it did not work at all. A tank usually had to run in, use Taunt and he was able to maintain aggro for the rest of the fight assuming that you play it smart and do not use any cone spells. This is a very big flaw as it resulted in fights being extremely easy and no challenge at all.[/quote]

[quote]v.) Enemies did not have a (working?) priority system: Most of the time, when the enemy had casters, they used their CC to affect the first target who gets in sight and that's, you guessed it, the tank who wants to get hit anyway. Enemies did not play it smart, rogues e.g. usually did the same instead of immediately going invisible to kite mages or other targets with low armor in order to cause maximum havoc.[/quote]

[quote]vi.) Too much CC: Every class had several ways to CC the enemy and every class had at least 1 AoE CC skill - that's quite an overkill here as it allowed you to permanently keep the enemies down while you slash them without mercy.[/quote]

[quote]vii.) Too effective healing: Healing is always good yet it's a extremely difficult factor to balance - and in my opinion, healing was not balanced well. Every mage had access to 2 healing skills (only including party heal skills here, not e.g. Life Drain) and Spirit Healers got 3 more, resulting in a total of 5 healing skills. The primary heal that everyone had access to had a very low cooldown paired with very low mana cost thus allowing everyone to spam it like there was no tomorrow - and just imagine the +healing items would have actually worked [smilie]http://social.bioware.com/images/forum/emoticons/wink.png[/smilie][/quote]

[quote]viii.) Overpowered mages: Mages were by far the best class in Dragon Age - they had everything. Lots of AoE damage, more CC than someone would have ever imagined and even healing...whew.[/quote]

[quote]ix.) Overpowered talents: Mostly Awakening where warriors get their AoE-instagib, auto crits, etc. - almost all Top 4 talents were downright overpowered.[/quote]

[quote]x.) Too predictable enemies: That's a very vital point, enemies were just too predictable! Similar to what I stated above, enemies usually auto-attacked and attacked the first target they see. Rogues go in stealth just to appear at the exact same spot, archer did not focus weak targets and worst of all: most of the time, you had the classical JRPG positioning: you and the enemies face each other and the battle begins.[/quote]
******************************************************************************************************************************

Now, what could be done to actually improve the situation (gotta be constructive at least!)?

[quote]i.) Drastically increase the enemies' armor, hitpoints and resistance, making them tougher to kill while...[/quote]

[quote]ii.) ...also making them a bigger threat by increasing their damage output both physical and magical, forcing the player to very carefully pick the targets or be devastated. [/quote]

Note: Nightmare plus took that approach and increased HP / damage by enemies...and it was awesome!

[quote]iii.) Give the enemies the same or equally strong skills as the player group and let them use them at free will. When the Mage gets stunned or disabled all the time and thus cannot heal or CC himself, you actually have to position your squad in a careful and intelligent way.[/quote]

[quote]iv.) Heavily reduce the amount of aggro gained by AoE aggro skills and increase the aggro produced by healing, magic damage and attack damage (in this order) as it will lead to a higher threat for your DDs and mages - the guys with the low armor who are most dangerous.[/quote]

[quote]v.) That's the most difficult part I guess, the AI. I can only imagine that it's incredibly hard to code a AI especially with features such a smart target choosing (weak targets first, kite targets, stun people who try to stop you from killing them etc.) so basically, it's hard to say what's actually possible or not.[/quote]

[quote]vi.) Heavily, heavily decrease CC. Limit it to 1 single-target skill for Fighters / Rogues and 1 AoE +2-3 Single Target skills for mages. Battles aren't hard when you can basically stun the entire enemy team...[/quote]

[quote]vii.) Less healing spells, all of them only available for designated healers and at least +100% cooldown while increasing aggro (see above) to weaken spam healing and encourage effective healing.[/quote]

[quote]viii.) Drastically nerf mages, making them less of an allrounder class and more of a extremely fragile class with various specializations...with a lot less CC.[/quote]

[quote]ix.) Can't say much here as it's about balance alone and that's something nobody can truly master. Then again, instagib spells / skills (especially AoE!) can easily turn out to be cheap and in the end, it all boils down to playtesting and community feedback [smilie]http://social.bioware.com/images/forum/emoticons/happy.png[/smilie][/quote]

[quote]x.) Have more ambushes with enemies attacking from all sides, enemies at hard to reach positions, have a squad trying to fall in your back, etc., more variation would be awesome, just having them placed right in your face gets boring after a while and makes fights very easy (especially with stuff like open door => close door => Cast Tempest / Inferno).[/quote]

Phew[smilie]http://social.bioware.com/images/forum/emoticons/surprised.png[/smilie]

This is not meant to be a "LOL BIOWARE THAT'S HOW YOU CODE A GAME LOL NOOBZ" thread or reply, I am in no position to give any sort of order to anyone in the team and I am fully aware of the fact that Bioware DOES know how to balance stuff (Baldur's Gate series rawr!), it's just one opinion from one guy who played Dragon Age and felt being massively unchallenged even on Nightmare.

As Chris already stated, there will never be a consensus on what "difficulty" really means yet I tried to give a short glimpse at why I think that Dragon Age was too easy and not challenging. It's one thing to say that the game was too say but it's something else when you tell people why!

So, I guess most people did not read that monster of a post anyway, but thanks to all who did!

Best regards,

Fellower of Odin
[/quote]

Modifié par FellowerOfOdin, 08 novembre 2010 - 11:02 .

[PsychoBlonde]

I don't know why so many people complained about the combat - overall, it worked pretty well, even the tactics system. Minor adjustments could be automatic ranged behavior if equipped with ranged weapons, no automatic friendly fire, no waste of mana etc. but in general, it worked. If people want a fast, easy combat system, let them go play some Diablo or Dynasty Warriors. If you play a RPG, expect some serious tactical combat. Again, minor adjustments on how the combat went would be necessary - it's ridiculous when a character stays in melee range with a bow or needs to slowly turn around to hit an enemy. To fix this, you'd need some AI improvements and e.g. more skills with a charge mechanic.

I didn't really complain about the combat, I would like to see it made better, that's all.  And it's not tactical combat as far as I'm concerned when you need to use 2, or at most 3 different tactics, which is how much of DA: O went for me.  Then again, given the paucity of skill variety, it wouldn't be much fun if there were tactics you only used once or twice, either.

Making a tactical yet "challenging" game is so difficult it may be almost impossible--the whole purpose of using tactics is to *increase how successful* you are, so the more tactical options you have, the less challenging the game is because you can find that one tactic that renders the enemies helpless in just about any situation.  Asking for both is like saying, let me figure out how to make the game easier, but somehow magically don't let me make it TOO easy by some undisclosed and impossible-to-predict measure!

I mean, the one surefire way to make the game harder is to just have everyone charge blindly into combat and then try to keep them alive somehow, yah?

I'm not sure if it works on the console, but on the PC you could get default ranged behavior with ranged weapons equipped by setting the default drop-down list to "ranged" in the tactics tab.  I found messing around with those tactics to be the most tactical part of the game--then I could sit back and watch how my allies performed.  I wish there had been some simple options like "turn off all modes on combat end".  Oo, I think I'm going to go make a thread about new tactics you'd like to see.

[Sir JK]

Realmjumper: It's an interesting read, but do you think you could explain what it is you want to see and how to improve on it rather than explain how DA2 is not it? Just because the actual DA2 is wrong in your eyes does not help us understand what it is you actually want.

Oh, and you most certainly can do backflips, springrolls, cartwheels and outrun people in Plate. Rest assured I've seen it with me own eyes.

You mention a compromise on length, what kind of compromise, what did you have in mind? How do we solve the problem? What are your suggestions?

Since you wish that the consloe market should be cut, the difficulty unadjusted. What do you propose the game should do to compensate for the loss of customers this bring? Remember, one of the goals of this experiment is to take into account that this game must be a bigger success. So if you cut out the larger market (as being assumed in the opening post) you must have some idea how to make up for those numbers. Please let us know

Finally: What is it you'd like to see improved then? And how?



TMZuk: Thank you. Just one question for you: What should it look like then?



Follower of Odin: Interesting, thank you for the very interesting read on your views on difficulty. What would you like to see improved of the things you really liked? And how?

[They call me a SpaceCowboy]

I agree with most of mage one's post as well as what others have said.



not much new to add, but I jsut hope when fioxing these things they don't go too far in the other direction, like they did with ME2.



Yes, the citadel had some large useless spaces in it, but that doesnt mean it should be tiny in the next game. Same with mission planets. Yes empty space and carbon copy dungeons on planets sucked but we ended up with tiny, but unique and pretty, mission areas in ME2.

[Ryllen Laerth Kriel]

Shinian2 wrote...

I agree with most of mage one's post as well as what others have said.

not much new to add, but I jsut hope when fioxing these things they don't go too far in the other direction, like they did with ME2.

Yes, the citadel had some large useless spaces in it, but that doesnt mean it should be tiny in the next game. Same with mission planets. Yes empty space and carbon copy dungeons on planets sucked but we ended up with tiny, but unique and pretty, mission areas in ME2.

Are you suggesting that space...ended up having no space...? If so, you are alright by me.

[TMZuk]

Sir JK wrote...

TMZuk: Thank you. Just one question for you: What should it look like then?

Fellower of Odin put together a very good post, and I share his view on this question. I liked the way DA looked, and I don't need a change in anything. If they could improve on the present looks... higher resolution, better grass and better pine-trees comes to mind, then it would be fine. Like what BG2 did to BG.

Actually, when writing this it comes to my mind that BG2 did everything right as a sequel. You had more choices than in the first game, more classes, class-varied quests, improved graphics, better loking interface etc, etc. That was what I imagined BIoware would have done with DA2... Keep the game intact and instantly recognizable, but add more options, and spice up the graphics without actually changing art-style.

[Crwddyn]

TMZuk wrote...
Much more importantly: Give us choices. In character development we are
down to one race, two genders and three classes.
...
I want warriors that can use ALL weapons.
...
Restrictions are bad.
...
I want crossclasses.

Broadly speaking, these sorts of choice/flexibility considerations would have been the first area I would have chosen to attack when sitting down and saying "how do I improve?"  Too often in Origins, I felt sort of constrained in character advancement/development choices, party configuration, equipment selection and such - what was made available to us was good, but there were things outside our grasp (races/talents/etc) or which we were not free to mix/combine to just see what shakes out.

I guess I can understand rigidity in a competitive multiplayer setting, where you have to be keenly aware of balance or the like (I'm not really sure - I don't play such games), but in a single player game, TMZuk should be able to have a bow-centric warrior, and I'd like to be free to cook up whatever useless race/class/ability combo I feel like playing this week.

[SnakeStrike8]

Sir JK wrote...Lack of a distinct art style. People see screenshots but don't know immediatly it's dragon age. SOmething needs to be done.

I disagree with this. Anyone who's played the game will immediately recognize Alistair in Juggernaut armour, or Sten holding Asala, or an Ogre grabbing Zevran.
Naturally, someone who hasn't played the game won't. We all know what Aragon looks like and can tell it's him from a screenshot, but only because we've watched the LOTR movies. If you haven't watched it, then you won't call it. Same goes for Dragon Age.

[Terror_K]

All I know is, about three-quarters of the issues I have with what I've heard of DA2 would be gone if this was a spin-off game instead... something more akin to Assassin's Creed: Brotherhood or Fallout Tactics. But no... it's the sequel and it looks like almost every aspect is being made shallower and oversimplified, just like Mass Effect 2 was. With a sequel I expect more, not less.

[Morroian]

Terror_K wrote...

All I know is, about three-quarters of the issues I have with what I've heard of DA2 would be gone if this was a spin-off game instead... something more akin to Assassin's Creed: Brotherhood or Fallout Tactics. But no... it's the sequel and it looks like almost every aspect is being made shallower and oversimplified, just like Mass Effect 2 was. With a sequel I expect more, not less.

But thats your perception of what a sequel should be rather than a criticism of the game itself. IMHO both are standalone games, a sequel doesn't have to continue the plot or characters, it can simply be a story set after the events of a previous story in the same universe. In a game franchise sooner or later major changes are going to have to be made to the engine, at what point should that be?

[hasonish]

"A lot of people didn't finish the game, due to length or uniformity."

This isn't really Bioware's fault, but I do understand some of the things that can cause people to give up on a game.  Some might quit do to difficulty, though I personally didn't find it hard at all, and you could always change the difficulty in the game.  Others don't like the gameplay or various other aspects, but that's mostly personal preference.

What really got me about the game was the numerous choices.  You are given multiple options to start the game as an elf, dwarf, or human, and various origins.  I found myself not able to finish the game because, halfway through, I ended up going back because I didn't like my choices or I wanted to see what would happen if I had did something differently.  And with the constant restarting comes the tediously repeated sections of the game.  I loathed The Fade particularly because of this.  It just took too long to get everything and do everything in there, and often times, I'd end up forgetting something.  It was cool the first time I went through, but I got tired of being stuck in a place for long periods of time.  Not only are you not allowed to leave the Tower, but you're also stuck in The Fade, just adding more time.  I ended up giving up on the game as I couldn't bring myself to stick with a character long enough to finish it nor could I stand having to do The Fade one more time.

I eventually came back to the game, started it new, and found a mod that lets me skip The Fade, and I finally beat it.  It was then that I was able to really enjoy the game really.

The numerous choices in DA:O are pretty much signature to all Bioware games, but sometimes you can really have too many choices.  The choices add to the replayability of the game, absolutely, but in situations like mine, it can hinder it.

I applaud limiting us to only one race in DA2, though I will miss being able to play an elf.  It helps to limit choices to just being a human mage/warrior/rogue, and being able to just stick with it and not worrying about if I missed something other than the generic choices within the game that I would normally just replay later to find out their consequences.  I'm not sure what it is that caused me to keep restarting though, as I never had this issue with any other of Bioware's games. 

I apologize for the long-winded post, just felt like adding my two cents.

[Sir JK]

SnakeStrike8: It was one of the assumptions made. Wether it is true or not matters not for this experiment.



It also comments on the distinct art style of the game. That it is essentially possible to look at screenshots and, if you're not familar with the setting, you might actually mistake it for another game. That is partly a marketing problem, it's bad if you cannot immediatly see it's dragon age specifically... the other is that it makes for a very generic look. Bland to some.

Now if you don't think this is worth changing, that is your prerogative. I just wished to point out why it was a issue.

[Pauravi]

KLUME777 wrote...

ptibog wrote...

Here's an interesting anecdote: a friend of mine who doesn't follow DA2 very recently told me he loved DA:O.

Needless to say, when i explained to him the DA2 changes he answered "i won't buy this sh*t"

My older brother recently finished DAO and loved it (of coarse), and said the exact same thing when i told him of DA2.

Gee, I wonder if there was any bias in the phrasing of the information given
Example: My friend enjoyed ME1.  He hadn't played ME2.  When I told him he should, he said that his other friend told him that Bioware effed up the inventory and that it wasn't an RPG anymore.  I told him exactly what changes were made and how they were implemented, and he said, "Oh, that actually sounds cool.  Maybe I'll buy it after all".

People almost always, knowingly or unknowingly, color the information that they give to people with their own opinions.  That is only one of the many reasons why anecdotal evidence is almost useless.  More useful are hard numbers, such as the % of people who finished the game.

People also like to assume that their opinion represents something close to the average, but that often isn't the case either, especially not on a forum like this.  People who are here are those who are in love with the game enough to come and spend time talking about it with other fans.  People here seem surprised that so many people didn't finish the game, but DAO can take up 100+ hours if you explore every nook and cranny, talk to everyone you can, not to mention the loads of time spend managing your inventory (something many people -- even RPGers -- consider a tedious task).  Most people simply do not get involved enough in a game to spend that much time on it.

KLUME777 wrote...

@Bioware, when are you going to release statistics of what people did in the game like you have done with ME2?

ME2 had an actual software method of reporting back to Bioware about gameplay habits.  DA lacked such a thing, so it would have to be done by poll, which is inherently unrealiable and comparatively inaccurate.

[upsettingshorts]

Pauravi wrote...

ME2 had an actual software method of reporting back to Bioware about gameplay habits.  DA lacked such a thing, so it would have to be done by poll, which is inherently unrealiable and comparatively inaccurate.

I thought DA had it too.  Hence the "extremely few people played Dwarves" metric.

[Vaeliorin]

Upsettingshorts wrote...

Pauravi wrote...
ME2 had an actual software method of reporting back to Bioware about gameplay habits.  DA lacked such a thing, so it would have to be done by poll, which is inherently unrealiable and comparatively inaccurate.

I thought DA had it too.  Hence the "extremely few people played Dwarves" metric.

It did, but you could turn it off in DA, and I don't know that you could in ME2 (I initially turned it off in DA, before changing my mind and turning it on, so I never bothered to look to see if I could turn it off in ME2.)

[Pauravi]

SnakeStrike8 wrote...

Sir JK wrote...Lack of a distinct art style. People see screenshots but don't know immediatly it's dragon age. SOmething needs to be done.

I disagree with this. Anyone who's played the game will immediately recognize Alistair in Juggernaut armour, or Sten holding Asala, or an Ogre grabbing Zevran.
Naturally, someone who hasn't played the game won't. We all know what Aragon looks like and can tell it's him from a screenshot, but only because we've watched the LOTR movies. If you haven't watched it, then you won't call it. Same goes for Dragon Age.

I think you're missing the point of what a "distinct art style" is.

What you're talking about is simple recognition of a character or weapon or monster you've seen before, not a particular style accompanying those things.  What Art Style means is, if you see something completely new, does it look like it belongs in Dragon Age?  The point is that Dragon Age's style was not distinct enough from other fantasy settings that you could look at a character, or a piece of armor, or a creature, and say "that looks like it belongs in Dragon Age" the way you might look at a piece of armor with huge pauldrons and spikes and say "that looks like it belongs in World of Warcraft", or look at the design of a star ship and say "that belongs in Star Trek" as opposed to Star Wars or Babylon 5.

For instance in your LOTR example: in those movies, you could look at a building and tell it was built by dwarves.  You could look at a weapon and know it was made by the elves.  You could do this because the dwarves and elves had distinct styles, not just because you had seen an elf holding one of the swords.