/edit - killed some weird formatting
Before I start, make no mistake, I enjoyed the game overall; the combat mechanics were a huge improvement over the first, generally the speech itself was strong. I did, however feel that the overriding storytelling in this game was weaker than it was in previous BioWare games.
Maybe it was a lack of a singular focus which caused the slightly lacklustre feeling; almost all BioWare games feature a primary objective which other elements are built around (defeat the Archdemon in Origins, for example), and while pulling yourself out of the gutter is an admirable goal, I felt that, once through act 1 I lacked any real focus, I was doing jobs for people, but not hugely caring about why, I had almost no personal involvement, not a huge amount to gain now I was wealthy... it would have been nice to feel more goal oriented, let me work towards politics, or a title (I’m not saying I want to role play an election, it just would’ve been nice to be doing things with more of an overriding purpose).
Gripe number two is the transition between periods of time. Like the concept, strongly disliked the execution. Take trying to get into the city; you side with either the mercs or the smugglers, great you think, time to earn my freedom... and then it's a year on. Obviously, I wasn't expecting to play through that entire year, but being suddenly thrown into the future and told via dialogue is a little startling. It would have been nice to say, play through a few key missions to represent the time passing, or at least be shown some demonstration of it in a cinematic format. Same applied to every time transition; afterwards, I found myself thinking "okay, what's happened to my character in the last few years?" - given how Hawke is essentially an extension of you, having to go find out what's gone on in your life second hand is probably not ideal from a storytelling perspective.
Unforeseeable consequences to decisions. This is a small one which will only affect a first playthrough, but was a little frustrating. The conversation wheel is very welcome, but there were a few entirely avoidable occurrences to what seemed to be logical actions. Bethany is top of this list. I'm aware that Mummy Hawke asked the PC not to take her into the deep roads; maybe that was what was considered a subtle hint that it would end badly, but it felt like Bethany and I had run around together making gold to make the expedition happen and pull us both out of poverty, she pretty much begged me to take her, the Templars were a threat if she stayed behind, so not taking her sounded like it would be just as dangerous... and probably make her pretty annoyed. Being as I don't care for Anders, I decided not to take him. It would've been nice to give a subtle hint along the lines of “with Anders’ grey warden experience, maybe you should take him with you”. As I said, it's not a big gripe, and something which won't affect me again, but I really liked Bethany's character, so to see her killed early due to what seemed to me to be completely unforeseeable circumstances as a result of a decision I’d made about an hour and a half ago (making me reluctant to backtrack) did make me pretty sad.
My biggest gripe was the ending. I sided with the mages this playthrough, Templars will be next and maybe that ending is a little more satisfying, however it all felt horribly unresolved. Okay, we all wandered off, apparently everyone left me for one reason or another, but really, nothing was learned. It felt like an additional 5 minute summing up was badly needed. Lacking the ability to chat to my party members after the events, not really solving much in terms of romance, or my characters future left me feeling very unsatisfied. I'm hoping that there'll be either an addon, or possibly even some sizable DLC to remedy this, adding some post-event gameplay to draw things to a conclusion. If there is (I have a feeling it may be, given as things were left wide open for one), take this complaint back.
As I said, I still really liked the game, I'd give it a 7 or 8/10 and I'll certainly be playing it through another 2-3 times, however these few elements did significantly subtract from the experience for me, it definitely felt weaker than previous BioWare games from this perspective. I was wondering if anyone had similar or significantly different feelings or experiences relating to any of the above.
Modifié par Timmeh7, 13 mars 2011 - 11:49 .
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