137 réponses à ce sujet

[Randomjob]

If you guys think the Nightmare difficulty is too easy just take fewer party members until it's hard enough for you. Try doing nightmare with 3 people or something.

If you are soloing nightmare and you STILL think that's too easy...well, then you are just too cool for school. Learn how to mod and make the enemies have more health or something.

[anyoldname]

Lord_Saulot wrote...

Am I the only one who thinks difficulty spikes were a good thing? They catch you off guard, make sure you are paying attention. I wouldn't want difficulty curves to ever be smooth...

You're not the only one. I like the 'Oof' when I suddenly run into something nastier than expected. Keeps the game exciting.

[Matroska]

I hope they've sorted out the consistency. I'm experienced in this genre, and with Bioware games, and I found Normal went from auto-attack-friendly to suddenly beating you to death with your own arms in the blink of an eye. Put it onto Casual and it seemed like the enemies were more there for decoration than anything. I would think it was just me, but I have another friend who's played all Bioware games and love RPGs in general, who didn't find Temple of Elemental Evil that hard or tricky, and he said the same thing. Another friend who's constantly playing strategy games like Total War, Starcraft and Civ, and he said the same thing. Both of them dropped the game but I forced myself on and am glad I did, but the inconsistent difficulty seriously marred my first playthrough. It didn't help that DEX was broken in the console version and that spell and skill descriptions were vague at best and totally incorrect at (alarmingly frequent) worst.

[Troika0]

Ya' know, I have no qualms with adjustments to the difficulty curve; but--quite frankly--it's baffling to see an entire forum of people (referring to the escapist thread) accuse a perceived class of "elitists" of e-peening whilst bemoaning the indignity of having to play on the casual setting, with no sense of irony whatsoever.

[Matroska]

Troika0 wrote...

Ya' know, I have no qualms with adjustments to the difficulty curve; but--quite frankly--it's baffling to see an entire forum of people (referring to the escapist thread) accuse a perceived class of "elitists" of e-peening whilst bemoaning the indignity of having to play on the casual setting, with no sense of irony whatsoever.

Hmmm, well it's more that they're saying they're in the middle. They're gamers that play proper games, not WaggleFest 2011 on the Wii, but yet they're being implicated to be like a housewife playing WiiFit when the setting says Casual. In fact, it only bolsters the accusations of elitism because the game (arguably) derides you for your choice to not play a harder mode.

I agree with whoever said it should be like "Cinematic mode" or just stick to "Easy" but have the description saying "For those who are playing mainly for the story" - that kind of thing. Reminds me of in Resident Evil (REmake, I think) when Easy and Hard are compared to the ideas of taking a gentle hike to enjoy the scenery and climbing a treacherous mountain for the challenge. After all, most people that put a game on Easy could learn to do it on Hard if they wanted that kind of experience, they just don't. Testing themselves with a game isn't something they're interested in (at least not with all of them).

[WidowMaker9394]

Shiroukai wrote...

On "hard" I will play then. Origins wasn't difficult for me on normal, I liked that difficulty.

Same here, though I did get my ass handed to me the first time I played Origins. 

[Lord_Saulot]

Teclo wrote...


Hmmm, well it's more that they're saying they're in the middle. They're gamers that play proper games, not WaggleFest 2011 on the Wii, but yet they're being implicated to be like a housewife playing WiiFit when the setting says Casual. In fact, it only bolsters the accusations of elitism because the game (arguably) derides you for your choice to not play a harder mode.

So they feel elitist toward "WiiFit" players or whoever, but it is deriding them to expect them to play casual? That is just ridiculous - even obscene. They want to look down on other players but get upset when they might be the ones being looked down upon. The game didn't deride anyone.

Modifié par Lord_Saulot, 02 mars 2011 - 06:17 .

[tasca1180]

AzuraLuna wrote...

tasca1180 wrote...

I'm a casual player and don't care that others might laugh. I've done all of my four playthroughs on casual and loved it. I want to charge mindlessly at my foe and kill it without having to reload. Yup, I'll have fun with DA2 on casual!

Oh, and one thing - don't call it the "noob setting". I'm no noob and haven't been for a lot of years (I feel old...). I just enjoy the game for its story and characters, not the challenging fights. 

Same here.  Can I beat the game on a higher difficulty?  Probably, but I just don't want to.  I deal with numbers and "stats" with my job, I don't want to work during my relaxation time.

It's exactly the same for me. I come home from work and I have an hour, maybe two to relax with the game I like. Could I kill Flemeth or the broodmother on hard? I'm pretty sure I could. But I don't want to spend the whole hour I've got working on that fight, because that would be....work.

By the way, I have no ego problem playing on casual. I don't care what it's called either. Though 'Rambo' was a cute idea. 

[SnowHeart1]

Troika0 wrote...

Ya' know, I have no qualms with adjustments to the difficulty curve; but--quite frankly--it's baffling to see an entire forum of people (referring to the escapist thread) accuse a perceived class of "elitists" of e-peening whilst bemoaning the indignity of having to play on the casual setting, with no sense of irony whatsoever.

<3  <3

In one interview Mike called it "story mode."  It's for people who just want to see the story content and don't care about the combat.  Yes, these people exist.

And that is totally awesome and I want people like that to be able to play the game... on casual. However, after adjusting for the difficulty spikes, if the setting is "normal", I expect people to learn how to play the basic aspects of the game. You shouldn't have to be experienced, but you should be expected to learn the basics of the game (more than "x" to move, "y" to shoot", "a" to cast). I don't think that's expecting too much; it's "normal". IMO, that's not elitist, it's reasonable.

Look at it another way. Lets accept as a starting point that RPGs were always something of a niche market. And they were dying out because of it. DAO reversed that trend and proved that you could have a financially and critically successful RPG in the late-2000s. Some folks had problems with it and found it too difficult, but it was commercially successful and RPG fans were happy. For whatever reason, that wasn't enough, and now DA2 will be easier so that more people will find it accessible and less difficult. You can call it "making it more accessible", "streamlining", or "dumbing down", but whatever you call it, it is changing the structure and design of the game in order to increase sales. Totally Bioware's perogative and, fortunately for me, they still make great stories and I will still enjoy a lot of the game, but no, a lot of folks who liked what DAO represented are not happy with this move.

(And if the stories are true that Bioware decided not to implement a FF-toggle because it would "confuse" certain players, then those players should also feel insulted because it means Bioware really does have a low opinion of the intelligence of the expanded market they're trying to reach.)

[Maverick827]

I found the Nightmare demo to be adequate considering that module is meant to be a tutorial, aside from easy kiting.
Friendly Fire is going to be a much larger hindrance now with the admittedly unwieldy AoE targeting.

[Vena_86]

Well, I played DA:O on Nightmare and it was about as hard as the average game back in the good old days. It is still on the edge of beeing challenging, but if this trend continues, the hardest difficulty won't pose a serious challenge in future games anymore, eliminating the feeling of reward for me. But seeing as they treated Normal, Hard and Nightmare differently, there is hope.

[Dr. wonderful]

The escapist?

What is he doing on my Turf?

LOL just kidding, I bet there are a huge bunch of whiners over there.

[Amioran]

Drizzt ORierdan wrote...

This is made by The Escapists, really short, but enlightening in the reasons going arcade-style for combat. Basically Laidlaw  made a point in that now "NORMAL" difficulty is the same as "CASUAL" was in Origins.

http://www.escapistm...er-Than-Origins

Did you pherhaps forgot that they patched DAO normal difficulty? Mike is talking about the original Normal here. There was too much gap from Casual to Normal in the original DAO, everybody agreed on that. It is good that they are making difficulty progression smoother.

I think Nightmare will be much more difficult this time, for example. We will see, but, anyway, want to place a bet? I will gladly accept.

Modifié par Amioran, 02 mars 2011 - 06:40 .

[TwistedComplex]

Maverick827 wrote...

I found the Nightmare demo to be adequate considering that module is meant to be a tutorial, aside from easy kiting.
Friendly Fire is going to be a much larger hindrance now with the admittedly unwieldy AoE targeting.

Cast fire storm

Wipe squad

[SnowHeart1]

Amioran wrote...

Did you pherhaps forgot that they patched DAO normal difficulty? Mike is talking about the original Normal here.

I will happily stand corrected here, but I don't think he was. If you can give a quote, source or cite for such a claim, I will happily eat my... lunch. 

[TwistedComplex]

Vena_86 wrote...

Well, I played DA:O on Nightmare and it was about as hard as the average game back in the good old days. It is still on the edge of beeing challenging, but if this trend continues, the hardest difficulty won't pose a serious challenge in future games anymore, eliminating the feeling of reward for me. But seeing as they treated Normal, Hard and Nightmare differently, there is hope.

What was the adverage game in the good old days?

If you're talking about a game like morrowind, it wasn't hard.

Have you considered that YOU'RE getting better instead of games getting easier?

[errant_knight]

Neofelis Nebulosa wrote...

Funny how they got from "DAII Normal is DAO Casual" to "We didn't knew Nightmare was doable until one guy just managed it the last days".
Either that is one heck of a learning curve, or Friendly-Fire does hurt like shiznit! I hope we can enable said one also on Hard difficulty or below (Nightmare difficulty has FF mandatory of course!).


edit://
I just recently swooped through the Cauthrien Encounter  on Hard Difficulty in DAO with my Arcane Warrior (Not really op as I don't use armor, but a modded robe that gives me 10 armor I believe, with a total of maybe twenty armor with all boni included (+spells (minus that one spell, which haven't used yet)) though I have Arcane Warrior Plus, which is somewhat heavy hitting in all aspects) with none of my companions dying in the process.
Making decent tactics (especially with Advanced Tactics by anakin) really does make a huuuge difference. I hope that to be as rewarding in DAII as it is in DAO (now).

I can see why they didn't expect nightmare to be playable. With the very fast recharge on abilities, combat balance is clearly designed to use area effects in the thick of battle without regard for your companion's locations. I suspect that at lower levels it will be very hard not to get killed if you don't do this.

[Troika0]

So then you agree, Teclo, that barring those who would like to see a greater gradualism between difficulty settings, the primary issue is one of definitions. People don't want to play on a casual setting, despite the fact that such a setting may be precisely the difficulty range they desire, simply because they interpret the label "easy" as being a stigma; a stigma which is ultimately self-imposed as there is no real outside entity providing feedback to enforce this notion [in a single player game].

I'm sorry, but the argument seems patently absurd and based purely on ego fragility; it's like the video game analogue of the small penis syndrome (hence the irony of griping about e-peening).

There's nothing inherently demeaning about the term "easy," there's nothing demeaning about playing a game on an"easy" setting, and there's nothing demeaning about calling an "easy" setting "easy" (or casual).

I hate to be the doomsayer forecasted by Upsettingshorts--though I don't think I am as I'm not shrieking about the game being dumbed-down--but people seem far too thin-skinned about this issue (and I hate making that claim).

Modifié par Troika0, 02 mars 2011 - 06:46 .

[Amioran]

SnowHeart1 wrote...

Amioran wrote...

Did you pherhaps forgot that they patched DAO normal difficulty? Mike is talking about the original Normal here.

I will happily stand corrected here, but I don't think he was. If you can give a quote, source or cite for such a claim, I will happily eat my... lunch. 

All the complaints the interviewer was talking about did rise when DAO shipped, from all those that played Normal difficulty (reviewers included). Later the game was patched also to address this issue, in fact. If the interviewer is talking about the *complaints* it's logical to assume he is referrring to the original normal difficulty of the game.

Anyway, also if he is not, I think the difficulties in DA2 will have a smoother progression. From what I tried with the demo Nightmare is more challenging (at last if you don't metagame, as someone does), while hard is about on par with hard on DAO. Naturally those are not balanced in the demo, but still, the trend is there.

Modifié par Amioran, 02 mars 2011 - 06:48 .

[Lord_Saulot]

errant_knight wrote...

I can see why they didn't expect nightmare to be playable. With the very fast recharge on abilities, combat balance is clearly designed to use area effects in the thick of battle without regard for your companion's locations. I suspect that at lower levels it will be very hard not to get killed if you don't do this.

Honestly, that is one of the (thankfully not too many) things that I am uncomfortable with in the new game.  The fact that even on Normal, I had to consider placement when deciding what spells to use was one of the things I found enjoyable about DA:O. 

[jadefishes]

Playing with group tactics to me is part of the pleasure of the DA experience, so it sounds to me as though I should just go ahead and bump up the difficulty from the outset.

This is useful information, thank you.

[SnowHeart1]

jadefishes wrote...

Playing with group tactics to me is part of the pleasure of the DA experience, so it sounds to me as though I should just go ahead and bump up the difficulty from the outset.

This is useful information, thank you.

Ultimately, that is the rational and level-headed take-away of all this. Yes. 

*goes back to irrational hysterics* 

[Amioran]

errant_knight wrote...
I can see why they didn't expect nightmare to be playable. With the very fast recharge on abilities, combat balance is clearly designed to use area effects in the thick of battle without regard for your companion's locations. I suspect that at lower levels it will be very hard not to get killed if you don't do this.

Forgetting about abilities that don't have FF, as ALL the Lightning tree for mage's spell? How convenient. Why they should work on balancing a difficulty if they would not want people to play it? What you say makes no sense.

[Lord_Saulot]

I had a thought on the Escapist article; particularly this quote:

"Our goal with the game for 'normal' is that you, as a player, should be playing one character optimally, whether that be Hawke or you focus on one of your followers. You've got one character that you've buffed up, got the right combination spells, you're playing them well. You shouldn't see huge instances of party wipes. You might lose a person or two, and there's certain boss encounters where it might take you a couple of tries to figure out the tricks," he said. "To me, that's a fair expectation for 'normal,' it presents the player with difficulty to keep them interested but without it being frustrating and fist punching our controllers."

That is precisely the experience I had on Normal after the game's initial difficulty patching.

Modifié par Lord_Saulot, 02 mars 2011 - 06:55 .