99 réponses à ce sujet

[Theduke2]

I've played through
Dragon Age (DA) and find myself totally puzzled by all the critical
acclaim the game has received, and wonder if I'm just an outlier or out
of touch with modern fantasy RPGs. The only criticism I've really read
so far is of the graphics, which I'm not even going to address. I'll
try to keep this spoiler free.

First, the game breaks for me the cardinal rule of fantasy: keep it
different! Instead, DA made a conscious decision to incorporate many
contemporary elements into their world: slavery, racism, castes, drug
use, and, of course, French people. This was really clever when Ultima
7 tried it 15+ years ago, but not so much today. And don't I play
fantasy games to become immersed in a world that is "fantastical", not
contemporary? Isn't the whole beauty of fantasy that you can do
whatever you like, be as creative as your imagination allows? If I want
to learn about the problems associated with social structures in India,
I'll go watch Frontline. Strip away these elements, and you're left
with an incredibly generic, Tolkien-esque universe. Yawn.

I also find myself not really caring much one way or another about
any of the characters. I can't tell whether it's a failure of writing,
design, or just storytelling. There's no emotional connection, the
romances are comical, either bad or non-existent character arcs (don't
tell me "I lost my sword" counts as an arc), and if any of the
characters died, I wouldn't care at all (except the dwarf--he's
amusing, and his VO by Steven Blum is great).

In the end, the game just feels like a retread of NWN but with
dumbed-down tactical combat. All the same conventions are there: the
"minigame" trying to earn companion's approval, a similar combat
system, even similar plots. I'm struggling to reconcile all that with
the stellar reviews and how "groundbreaking" the game is being
called...and I haven't even touched on the graphics, ridiculous
inventory management, how rudimentary ("take this item to this guy!")
most quests are, and some other elements. Other than a couple of
interesting plot twists, there didn't seem to be anything novel here.
Anyone agree, or can help me understand why they were particularly impressed with
the game?

[kab]

It's a good RPG. I've yet to see anything remotely close to "groundbreaking". There is nothing innovative here, it's just NWN2 and KOTOR regurgitated with a different, but similar, combat system. That's not a strong point though as the combat system is terribly imbalanced, ridiculously so in fact. Personally my observation has been that over the last few years the vast majority of games, especially action and RPG, have been so terrible that anything that comes along that is decent is suddenly viewed as awe inspiring. I also wonder if many of these reviewers perhaps never really played Baldur's Gate, Fallout, etc. and thus somehow think a decent RPG is new and inventive because all they can remember are terrible console games.

[Saurel]

Theduke2 wrote...



I also find myself not really caring much one way or another about
any of the characters. I can't tell whether it's a failure of writing,
design, or just storytelling. There's no emotional connection, the
romances are comical, either bad or non-existent character arcs (don't
tell me "I lost my sword" counts as an arc), and if any of the
characters died, I wouldn't care at all (except the dwarf--he's
amusing, and his VO by Steven Blum is great).

To be honest, I found myself often caring about the fates of several side npcs as opposed to the main party So they are doing something right - in that I care at all

And you really didn't like Alistair? The others I could sorta see your point. Except for his Duncan worship, Alistair is a pretty stand up guy.

Modifié par Saurel, 16 novembre 2009 - 08:50 .

[Wissenschaft]

I played both Baldurs gate and Fallout when they came out and I honestly enjoy Dragon Age more than them. Thats saying something since those games went years without a game topping them. I love the setting and especially the characters. I can spend literally hours just chating with them and there is certainly FAR FAR more party banter than there is in Baldurs gate 2.

And I join Alistair in is Duncan worship. Its amazing the effect a character whos barely in the game can have on you. It has to be that beard, its epic.

Modifié par Wissenschaft, 16 novembre 2009 - 08:51 .

[Theduke2]

"Personally my observation has been that over the last few years the
vast majority of games, especially action and RPG, have been so
terrible that anything that comes along that is decent is suddenly
viewed as awe inspiring."

That definitely resonates with me, and is probably why I game a lot less than I used to.  There's just not much thats interesting out there...all these games seems the same.  I have a hard time telling MMOs apart.  And my guess is when some developers choose to take risks and do something interesting, they are punished for doing so (like Square in the late 90s).

[Malkut]

kab wrote...

I also wonder if many of these reviewers perhaps never really played Baldur's Gate, Fallout, etc. and thus somehow think a decent RPG is new and inventive because all they can remember are terrible console games.

Baldur's Gate wasn't innovative; it simply used a pre-existing ruleset well.  Fallout was just a modernized Wasteland with a dash getting shot in the back by your party members.

[Medivan]

I think you're looking for something heavily different in terms of RPG, honestly something way out in left field usually doesn't get nearly as much attention as a game like this. Also whoever mentioned NWN2, that wasn't a Bioware game, only the first was.

[Monstruo696]

TL;DR:

BAWWWWW!

THE GAME WASN'T MADE SPECIFICALLY FOR ME!

[jones0901]

im not sure why having a world that contains real world problems would destroy your immersion. slavery, caste all that stuff creates a more vivid world to me. i also dont see how you call the world tolkien-esque..using the joseph campbell archetypal heroic elements of a story (as tolkien does), there is:
1. no "wise old man", like gandalf who leads your characters and tells you what you need to do. duncan is gone before the game really starts. similarly,
2. there is no ring of power or "ultimate artifact" that is paramont to the story,
3.also the position of the elves as second class citizens is unique to Dragon Age, or at least to all the rpgs ive seen the last decade or so...
4. the dwarven intrigue and political system is very original to fantasy worlds or again most recent fantasy
5. the character isnt marred in the chosen one mythos,

as to the characters, i guess an emotional attachment is a personal thing... but i think
1.morrigan is very original as a character,
2. i loved how sten answered in yes or no at the start, showing how he didnt trust you yet,
3. allistar is just funny, and i think the fact that he will not allow you to let loghain off no matter how high your coercion or influence is great
4. Oghren is almost as memorable as Minsc

all in all, i feel the characters in DA are significantly better crafted than in NWN or ME (add any other game)

Finally, the world decisions you make, i.e cleansing the mage tower, siding with the dragon cult are alot more involved than anything ive seen, even ME,
also i liked that your character was not constrained by conventional good or bad meters.
the only things i would have liked to see were better villians, or more involved villians. if you played Jade Empire, Master Li was the best villian of any RPG ive ever played and he was a constant in the story and a surprise. Loghain and the archdemon were essentially non-entities, present for very small portions of the game. besides hiring an assain to kill you, loghain did nothing, i didnt like that you could walk into denerim, his seat of power, and tell everyone you were a grey warden and have no reprecussions.
i also didnt see the combat as mundane. it is obviously a nod to mmorgs, but i think this is good bc in an industry trending away from single player games, bioware was able incorperate the combat elements without the worhtless grinding and inane story telling. you say that quests are "fed-ex" and this is somewhat true with some of the side quests, but i wouldnt say that its true for the main quests. remember DA was aiming for a larger world than bioware as ever created and i think they accomplished it...still you are right in saying it is not a perfect game, but i do think it is a groundbreaking game bc it co-opts alot of elements from vary video game genres, presents a original and dark world hitherto unseen ( to me at least) in terms of violence and your place in the world, and it allows for a level of meaningful replayability rare in CRPGS because of "origin stories"

[Ellzedd]

You're almost alone in the way you feel. Sorry, but goodluck.



Except for those that cry because the game is just too dark.

[Malkut]

Theduke2 wrote...

Strip away these elements, and you're left with an incredibly generic, Tolkien-esque universe. Yawn.

Yeah, I have to agree with the guy above.  If you think that having a group of stumpy cave people with beards makes a story "Tolkien-esque", then you're really selling the man's accomplishments short.

And if you don't think that Tolkien didn't touch on some pretty heavy stuff that applies just as much  to the real world as his own, then you need to reread the books with a more critical eye.

[Archfiend]

#3 is wrong. the Witcher did it (2yrs ago?)

and DA seems to have borrowed allot from that game in terms of morality quests.

[syllogi]

Nihil novum sub solum.



Sorry, every story, every game, every book, every movie you find will have common themes and motifs that are pulled from earlier sources. If this is blowing your mind, you should read some Joseph Campbell and Carl Jung, and then maybe you'll stop being a humorless nitpicker.

[Dr3xx]

100% disagree with the OP. I would say you're the minority for sure.



I don't believe DA is "groundbreaking" really... but it's definitely a strong game, and a GREAT RPG.

[jones0901]

archfiend:

3 is wrong. the Witcher did it (2yrs ago?)



and DA seems to have borrowed allot from that game in terms of morality quests.



didnt play the witched, computer wouldnt run it, but what specifically did they borrow?

[jones0901]

archfiend:

3 is wrong. the Witcher did it (2yrs ago?)



and DA seems to have borrowed allot from that game in terms of morality quests.



didnt play the witched, computer wouldnt run it, but what specifically did they borrow?

[Ninja Ataris]

First of all, I feel you contradict yourself in wanting something different and then complaining about how the DA universe is basically the Medieval ages with magic. I still feel it's something different, if you don't like the grittier feel of DA, it's your personal opinion.

While DA isn't in any means groundbreaking I'd go so far as to call it at least as good as the classic RPGs. Sure, the whole Darkspawn thing is pretty cliché, but I find the characters, the incredibly high production values, the story itself and the choices that you have to make all make up for that little bit.

Feels like you're just being picky. It's an incredible game. Is it groundbreaking? No, but extremely few games are, and that's a word being tossed around far too often IMO.

In short, enjoy the game for what it is, and take off those rosetinted nostalgia-goggles.

[salbine]

I agree with the OP for the most part. It's a decent game, but it doesn't deserve the rave reviews it's getting from "official" reviewers. I find it interesting that reaction from regular old players seems to be mixed. Some love it, some hate it, and some find it decent but nothing spectacular. I'm in the latter category. It's starting to feel like BioWare is making the same game over and over again.

[Curry Noodles]

For what it's worth, I stopped paying attention to you when you said the combat in dragon ages was dumbed down from NWN. I mean, really? You pick all these different combos, but what's the difference, the real difference, between an RDD/bard/fighter/paladin and a fighter. Smite evil and higher stats? I think that's about it.

[JamesX]

I like this game far more than I like BG1.

Not as much as BG2, but not far off.

[Lianaar]

Tastes differ. You might have found it boring, in which case it didn't address you. Slavery isn't the most actual topic of today. I would guess abandoned children, inter family violence, children's rights, divorce, drugs, alienation and falling apart of societies are the most apparent issues of today.



What is fantasy? We all picture something else. Without problems and dilemmas the world is full of fluffy pink bunnies (my nightmare). Fake and empty. Dilemmas and a hint of chaos, questions that need answers one way or another, consequences (repeat, ambiguous consequences) make a world living and breathing. It is certainly not a world you will go to escape the problems of reality. This is not good for that. But it is a world of imagination where quality story telling is possible, one that moves and involves (if you are open to such).



If you are in a state of life where you don't need extra problems and dilemmas in your life, then the game might not be for you. However it seems the market trend goes toward that direction, and in my view it is a higher quality gaming.



I liked Baldur's Gate, nothing ever moved me as much since those were made. However I find this game more involving and more real.



Most games will be the same because they tell a story. And the story usually consists of: there is a base conflict you are familiarising yourself with as the time progresses and as you struggle along. There are factors to motivate you one way or another and you have a chance to kick the bad boy in the guts in the end or be a bad boy yourself and chortle at the good boys. Kind of. It might be more or less linear, but that is what we seem to fall for.



For me the game contained emotional hooks and motivations which fall close to my idea of story telling and which dragged me into the world. The twists were entertaining and fun and I was curious to see the result of my decisions. Yep, I believe DA is better then BGII.

[Ellzedd]

You cant slate a game based on official reviews given to it by a third party, So what if somebody called it ground breaking.

You ever see a film called "the village" ? One newspaper described it as "the scariest film this year"
Which was a laugh, coincidently these reviews mean squat, since every comedy is a must see, every horror is the scariest thing since matt Damon and every game is unmissable.

Can you imagine an honest down to earth review? Yah, that'd sure as hell sell copies.

"Another AVERAGE rpg this year"

"Crap - Must buy!"

Etc etc.

Modifié par Ellzedd, 16 novembre 2009 - 09:45 .

[Malkut]

Lianaar wrote...

Slavery isn't the most actual topic of today.

According to National Geographic, there are more slaves in the world today than there were before the American Civil War. 

They just called "human trafficing" now.  It's still the same thing.

[Lianaar]

If you count the wives who labour at the households after work or men who do the same, then you can count that number higher But still, slavery is definitely not as actual of a topic as it was eg in Ancient Rome. In a way you are correct, groups of people will always repress groups of people, so it is eternally actual of a topic.

[Theduke2]

Obviously, by how well the game is selling, I'm not arguing that a lot of people won't like or don't enjoy it. It also has a ton of EA advertising dollars behind it, especially for a RPG. I also am not here to speculate on what kind of game I'd really like. I'm curious about that, but I'd rather focus on how the critical acclaim stacks up to the game I just played. If everyone agrees its a 10/10, great. I have a hard time seeing it, and, weirdly, a lot of people are almost taking it personally.



On it being Tolkien-esque: A horde of nameless creatures from god-knows-where is being led by a super evil entity going to overrun the world? That sounds pretty much like LOTR, and if we're getting literate (or lit crit), completely squares with Tolkien's entire message of the evils of mass, mechanized, anonymous warfare against the individual. Which is exactly what is happening in the main plot of DA:O.



On games borrowing from other games: Of course they do. Here, the armor system borrowed from Fallout 1&2, 4 person pause-able combat from NWN2, clickable abilities on timers from MMOs, after-battle recovery from Crono Cross, etc. And sometimes the first person to blend the right elements wins big. I never got the sense that DA:O "cracked the code". There are a couple of interesting features, but it mostly felt like NWN2, from combat down to the plot of "some evil entity taking over the land and we have to build an army and make a final stand." I enjoyed NWN2...but to replay it in another, arguably lesser form, 3 years later, was less enjoyable. And occasionally games will innovate...Gears of War and the "cover" system, Crono Cross and avoidable combat, that sort of thing. So spare me the platitudes about everyone borrowing from everyone; I didn't see anything here really fresh, and apparently you all did not, either.



It's got great production value, I can't (and didn't) argue with that. Some exceptional VO work surprised me. But games these days have practically have to have high production value, don't they? I was shocked and impressed that Fallout 3 had Liam Neeson...but it seems like that is where the bar is at, now. I can't award something 10/10 just because they spent some money on it, if the plot feels generic, the characters hollow, and the gameplay redundant. I'd probably score it a 7/10, if that.



Ironically, most people posting are *agreeing* that the game doesn't really do anything groundbreaking. Maybe my review criteria is just harsher. When the Zelda game on N64 came out and Gamespot awarded is a 10/10, it was unheard of. It was a revolutionary game, and I wholly agreed with their review. Now many games seem to earn those kinds of accolades and praise, and it's just ceased to mean much to me. If we're talking about "review-inflation to sell copies", thats another bag of worms entirely.



"It's starting to feel like BioWare is making the same game over and over again." That pretty much sums up my feeling...like, didn't I play NWN2 already? This reminds me of an Ebert review where he laments how kids loved Transformers 2 despite it being one of the worst reviewed films--they just lack the film experience to distinguish trite trash from clever, original, interesting work.