2797 réponses à ce sujet

[drgriever16]

I am just glad to see that there are many like minded people who are not blindly believing the game is the best ever, it does have its issues and yes in my opinion it was a let down, i just do not understand how no one involved in the creation of this game, picked up on any of these faults. These are not minor details that could have 'accidently' been missed, surely by now and with the success of many other titles they must know what there target group wants in game. and should not try and sell a game purely on the success of previous versions, why assume that cause DA orgins did well they can put this garbage in front of us, call it dragon age 2 on the cover, reduce quality of gaming by a exceptionally noticeable margin and think we will lap it up with a smile and call it the new best thing. i for one am disappointed, and fear for future flops like ME3
also as a side note i can no longer trust in any game ratings, if this is 94% type game. then clearly standards have dropped or raters are only fed the good 5min version of the game

[Charliea1234]

I'm still only in the first act, about 16 hours in so these are initial feelings but I can't see them changing by the end, so here goes:

Negative:

As most others have said, the reused enviroments, they sucked in Mass Effect but at least they had the excuse of that game being the first in the series, DA2 has no such excuse, I can't imagine how even more boring it will get by the time I get to Act 3!!

Kirkwall.  Not a problem with the design of the city, quite the opposite, some parts look lovely, but it's a ghost town!  We are supposed to believe that it's a throbbing metropolis overwhelmed by refugees from Ferelden and yet the streets are empty!  If your engine can't handle a lot of NPC's wandering around a la Assassins Creed: Brotherhood then you should have seriously rethought setting the majority of the game there.  It didn't matter so much for Denerim in Origins as the game was only based partly there, but it really hurts the immersion factor here.

Companion dialogue.  Not as terrible as Awakening but still off.  In the preview discussions it was mentioned that you wouldn't be able to engage in conversations whilst out and about, that's ok but I was expecting more freedom when they were back at base, as it is, so far, I've only been able to have conversations with them when a quest is in the offing, consequently I feel like I hardly know them.  I was expecting a more Origins like Camp enviroment when they were at home, instead i'm still clicking on them and only getting a reused line.  If I hear Bethany say 'I hope mother can see get our mansion back' one more time..............!!

Companion outfits.  Again perhaps a compromise between fixed outfits and freeform dressup could have been implemented.  Eg. in Origins you could equip boots and gloves on Mages and they wouldn't look any different in game and you've already introduced a helmet toggle so why couldn't you have extended that to the other wariors?
You could have even introduced armour or clothing that was only equippable by specific characters, unless you're planning DLC appearence packs of course..............................

One final disappointment for me, and it may seem a little petty but here goes:  Why oh whay did you change the voice actor for Anders?!!!  It's even more galling because his original voice is now coming out of ser Cullens mouth.  It's a real immersion breaker for me, I can accept that he's changed as a person, that's fine but he's not Anders without Greg Ellis!

Positives;

 Combat.  I may be in a minority but I think it's much better, the caveat to that however is that combat is not the be all and end all to me that it is to others around here, I tend to play on Normal and never go up to Hard or Nightmare.  But the animations are better, the speed, the effects all improved.  Again, my first playthrough is as a board and sword so I may have other views after I've done a Mage and Rogue playthrough

Skill trees.  Much improved, really like the layout and the choices are much clearer and I've had less need to waste points on talents I didn't want just to get to the ones I do.  Although I would have preffered a total level based restriction to higher talents than a points accumulated one.

Inventory.  Again much prefer the new 'junk item' system than the old 'Oh look another leather helm'  You could have been a little more creative with the accessory names though!

Crafting.  Honestly, never used it in Origins and only dumped points into rune crafting in Awakenings because the game forced me to, so glad to see the back of it here.  In fact the new system looks much better although I've only just started to discover recipes and ingredients, but anything that stops me having to collect and hold on to deathroots, elfroot etc just in case I may need them for a fetch quest later on is all good!

Graphics:  Again much improved.  I should add here that i'm playing on the Xbox, and they're a real step up from Origins.  character models are much better, areas of Kirkwall look lovely especially around Hightown.

Quests:  This area is by definition somewhat limited for me as I'm only partway through act 1 but still a marked improvement.  So far anyway, even the fetch quests are better designed and some of the larger quests have been really enjoyable, obviously I'm not going to go into specifics but the stuff with Thrask,Cullen and the bloodmages springs to mind and there have been a few tough decisions already.

Continuity: So far, anyway, I've been pleasantly surprised by the nods back to my Origins playthrough.  Meeting the Harrowmont exile and the sister of one of the uncured werewolves, the Amaranthine conspirators, Ser Cullens comments re the Ferelden Circle and the comments about Anora being married to the Hero of Ferelden have all been nice little reminders of my origins save.

That's it for now, I'm sure that there will be more as I get further! 

[jurisper]

1. More area transition points, pls. Too much time spent walking from place to place - tedious.

2. It'd be great to have the city fleshed out a bit more - what do people actually *do* there apart from rob each other, consort with demons, drink, buy sex. It'd be great to have a theater, gardens, senate, university, public places where people flaunt themselves. You can't quite fall in love with the city, as it is now - there's not enough there, there.

3. The constant bands of thugs and lowlifes are tiresome. More variety. Idea: it feels like the kind of place where duelling could be a regular part of life. Why not work that in: a code of honor which gets more elaborate as you ascend the social scale; learn the rules and duel successfully, you gain respect; and vice versa.

4. I guess you have to have giant demonic bosses to fight or people will whine, but they really are the essence of flatulence. You invest dozens of hours in the story and it ends in a crappy kids' cartoon scene. It'd be great to have at least the chance of grown up endings.

Modifié par jurisper, 16 mars 2011 - 03:20 .

[Dunhart]

While I liked the actual combat mechanics, I thought the overuse of combat waves was a horrible idea too, as they seemed to artificially lengthen meaningless scuffles with bandits ad nauseum. I switched to casual difficulty before the half-way point, not because I was having trouble with the fights, but because I got severely bored of them and wanted them to be over as quickly as possible.

I really like the story. I think it was a very bold idea to have most of the game take place in the same area but over a long period of time (overuse of certain maps aside). I loved the atmosphere and the way how important characters seem so very present all the time, even though they're not on screen. This is also the very FIRST BioWare game where I feel having only a fraction of your companions with you at the same time is completely justified. They'll all still be around the city and they have their own business to attend to when they're not with you, instead of just sitting in some camp somewhere for the entirety of the game doing nothing because I couldn't take them all with me.

However, the biggest gripe I have with the story is how it jumps into the next phase after every important event. I don't know about others but I would have loved to witness the aftermaths of these events as well, because that's when all the juiciest drama is bound to take place; the pain, the guilt and the blame. There would have been so much room for emotionally engaging scenes after the tragedies that it's a bit of a shame most of them get passed with "time went on, everyone got over it". Also for the amount of bad things that can happen in the game, there's surprisingly little crying going on.

Not that I wanted the whole thing to turn into an episode of the Bold and the Beautiful, or whatever soap opera is all the rage nowadays, but it would have made the characters seem more human if they had mental breakdowns or Heroic BSOD's after some of the horrible things they witness. There are some such situations, but altogether too little when you compare to the amount of stuff they face. It's almost as if they've gotten used to it all.


EDIT: Oh, and I personally love the fact the character is fully voiced. The conversation wheel and fully voiced main characters are the best ideas BioWare has ever had!

Modifié par Dunhart, 16 mars 2011 - 03:41 .

[klokkan]

Really enjoyed the game despite its flaws, but it could be so much better without them:blush:. Anyway, here is my criticism, a lot of it already mentioned:


Imbalanced CCCs - it is very easy to set up a Stagger combo even to crowds of enemies (Fenris with Claymore and AoE attacks, Fenris w/ talented Whirlwind and 50% Stagger on crit, Aveline w/ Shield Bash, both w/ talented stun). Disorient and  Brittle are comparatively much harder to obtain - talented Pinning Shot doesnt work properly, Confuse is small radius and only a 50% chance,  Fatiguing Fog requires a high level (both also require oh-so-useless Rush), Disorienting Criticals dont seem to work. For mages, the only two ways to get Brittle are ice spells (requires heavy investment in elemental to be reliable, also limited by cooldown) and Dessicate (single target, long cooldown, only chance). Stagger state is also largely useless for ranged rogues (only one ability that archer can use for +dmg on Stagger, and is in Duelist tree). The best way by far to use CCCs is probably playing a mage or melee rogue and using Fenris for mass staggers.

Spawning waves of enemies (makes it hard to properly assess the situation and use spells/abilities accordingly).

Reused locations (the red-floored cave and the warehouse are just egregious).

Shielded/teleporting enemy mages that can wipe half the party with one well-placed spell. Seriously, thanks to one qunari mage I had harder time dealing with Tal-Vashoth final group than with Rock Wraith (playing on hard).

Not enough companions/badly chosen classes - why would I need 3 rogues, two of which are archers? Especially if I play archer as well. On the other hand, only 1 possible healer that is consistently present - and depending on choices does not have to be.

No armor on companions - come on, let me use the great pieces of armor I found so I dont have to vendor them...

Non-constant presence of sibling - even though it makes sense story-wise, gameplay-wise it really limits our choices. Non-mages then have only one possible healer. Both siblings also seem less developed character-wise compared to the rest of the bunch.

High amount of "trash mobs" (the ones with small HP bar) - why are they even there?  I wont even use an ability on them because they die in three auto-attacks, they just stand around doing minuscule amounts of damage and make the encounters look a bit ridiculous (we kill so many thugs that Kirkwall should have its population greatly reduced even before the inevitable apocalyptic finale).

Useless skills - a lot of abilities are not very good, to say the least, especially on higher difficulties. Damaging mages are practically forced to use Primal tree on NM, archer tree as a whole is pretty useless (except the Lance skill, which can be a pain to aim, since it doesnt auto-aim if cast on moving enemy).  The Duelist tree also feels lackluster.

Aggro management and tanking - Taunt does not actually generate threat, AFAIK, just removes threat from party members, has innately short range and long cooldown, and requires 1 more point in the tree to upgrade. It is much easier to just use Fenris even on harder difficulties than bother with Aveline. Most of her abilities also make her very immobile and she spends a lot of time just standing around and taking cover behind her shield (Is Retaliation supposed to actually stop her attacks?) To be effective she also has to have a lot of stamina reserved because of sustainables (at least Shield Bash is very cheap).

edit: edited for formatting and possible spoilers

Modifié par klokkan, 16 mars 2011 - 03:29 .

[MrObnoxiousUK]

I like Bioware games,however my time and money are at a premium,so i expect a quality product .While this game  has fallen from the plinth you once occupied it was adequet,if your "suits" wish to continue making money they must be aware that a reputation for making good games can be lost very quickly and may never be regained.
The art direction had a lot of potential but was rushed and not very polished eg Meril's love scene( i have never seen such twisted and deformed flesh on a npc)
Another example is the large time skips that reduced the game to mostly fed ex quests with a small amount of main one's,not necessarily a bad thing if made to fit into the plot seamlessy and made to have an effect no matter how small.
Companion armour,if i have to buy upgrades show me a visual effect that recognises that fact,i cant dress them by myself now,so all that extra modelling work you didnt have to do should have given you the time to have done that.
The main gripe though how bloody linear the game was, no illusion of choice like in DAO,i might of bloody well been a train on tracks seeing how linear the game was.For a company that likes to parrot the virtues of choice and consequence you seem to be marching in the opposite direction.
I will put this all down to a live and learn approach but be warned Bioware alot of eyes will be watching your upcoming releases with trepidation rather than excitment now.

Modifié par Douglas, 16 mars 2011 - 03:27 .

[NedPepper]

The thing about armor for the companions....I don't see it as a big deal. Morrigan pretty much wore the same outfit in the first one. Morrigan just looked...weird...when you put the Chantry or Tevinter mage robes on her. And Leliana never looked great in the drab rogue outfits. She needed a cool static uniform. Zevran could pull it off. But warriors on the other hand should get some new gear. I loved putting Allistar in King Cailan's armor or his templar armor. And I always had Sten wearing some big cool plate armor like the Juggernaut armor. And again, Oghren looked great in the Legion of the Damned armor.

In DA2, Varric and Isabella should stick to their outfits. Aveline and Fenris would have looked pretty killer in some of that armor that I had to basically just sell because I couldn't wear EVERYTHING. Anders basically wears Tevinter robes. His outfit wasn't as defined, as say, Varric's. He and Merril both could have worn other robes and pulled it off. So, really it depends on the character.

[Iberius]

Enemies

I like the amount of enemies, just not how they randomly appear.....especially right on top of my healer who is still waiting for mind blast to cool down from a wave before. As for enemies I'm all cool with demons/skeletons coming out of the ground or randomly appearing, but regular gaurdsmen and darkspawn shouldn't be able to. Some reality does matter.....even in a fantasy setting.

Healing

The cooldown time is way too slow; therefore I couldn't even keep my tank alive without using several potions in some of the bigger fights.

Armor

The sets look great but I want more of them. Lol and some color wouldn't hurt. (I haven't played mage or warrior yet so just going what I've seen from the rogue) I'm not looking for super bright world of warcraft armor, but a little color such as on the blood dragon armor would be nice.

Battle Animations

More like Origins. Less rogue flipping though I will say I've fallen in love with the rogue backstab move.

Battle system

I think this is great. I like how quick your party is to help and how fast they follow out commands. Warriors can hold threat much better in DA2 imo. Like I said it is the animations of battle NOT the system of the battle. The lack of shuffle is quality.

Character Dialogue:

It would be nice if this were more like Origins, where I could ask my pals lots of questions right after I meet them. I want to know what makes them tick. Sometimes I will make a decision that will cause rival/friendship points for one person when I want the opposite.

Also it would be nice if I could continuously ask them the same general questions over and over again in case I forget rather than just having "scheduled" little chats. The ability to get to know the person at the beginning makes the whole story more immersive than finding out random little bits at a time.

I'm certainly not saying there should not be a progression of getting to know them better over the game, simply that there should be general questions you can ask them that will help you judge better what will p.o. them or not.

I think the perfect example of this is Morrigan and Alistair. As soon as they were in your party you could ask them different things about their history/family/etc. I would always spend like 20 min in Lothering asking them all the questions I possibly could.

Even after I had exhausted that there were still random things I could ask them. I didn't have to wait until their personal quests popped up to have a conversation.

Maps/Quests

As everyone has been mention there is WAYYY to much reusing of areas. Even on main quests that effect the story. Also I want to be able to explore the WHOLE cave not just random little areas. Blocking off entrances in caves is one of my biggest pet peaves of the game. I want to go looking around every nook and cranny in the cave (even if there is only random junk items) just because I can. This would definitley make the game feel more immersive.

How many caves have you walked into with random stone doors blocking the way

Modifié par Iberius, 16 mars 2011 - 03:45 .

[NalimX]

 Healing

One healing spell per Healer (and, for a large part of the game, only one healer) is not enough. While it works with the current state of combat, Dragon Age 2's combat could be far more tactical and interesting if enemy damage was higher and healing happened more frequently. Currently, in most fights the characters take zero to none damage while slashing throug waves on enemies. I would like to have more health management and more dangerous enemies, like in DA:O.

Random Drops

The random unnamed rings, belts and amulets are always better than the named/unique drops if you do some sidequests (which means, your level is quite high). I don't think this is intended, but it results from the drop formula. In the end, all named rings are trash, except for the top-tier ones you can buy.

Re-using of old assets

I can live with duplicated caves for side quests. However, my main point of concern is Kirkwall staying completely the same over ten years (except for some stuff blocking your way). If you use the same level, at least change some of the assets. For example, it's hard to believe that the markt stands always have the same position in a seven year time-span.

Boss drops

It's frustrating the kill a dangerous enemy and get nothing useful. Every boss-like enemy should drop something which is most likely an upgrade for one of the character classes or a significant amount of money. A negative example is the boss of the book searching quest: You skip on 10 attribute points to get to this ancient evil and all you get as a reward are trash items and really small amounts of money. The champion armor you get for killing the high dragon is a positive example.

Armor

I can live with set companion armor, because I think they selecting their own clothes is plausible. However, there needs to be more diversity for the main character: There is exactly one set worth using in every chapter (e.g. champion armor in the last one) and some always-the-same slightly overpowered trash items (see Random Drops)

Thank you Bioware for taking our opinions into consideration!

[Lucky_Rogue]

I really, really miss the cool deathblow/execution
animations from DA:O. These were so cool!  I even modded my game so they would occur
more often.  I was really disappointed that they were removed and
replaced with the exploding bodies in DA2.

Having an enemy explode makes sense for a lot of the mage spells. It actually
looks really cool when a giant fiery meteor comes crashing down or giant fist
of rock slams into a guy. For melee, however, I wish you would go back to using
the kind of deathblows you had in the original game.

My sword and shield warrior is just a little bit less fun to play now that I don't
get to see him stab a guy and then push him off my blade with his shield or lop
his opponents head off.

Please, please bring back those cool melee deathblows in the future.

Modifié par Lucky_Rogue, 16 mars 2011 - 03:44 .

[Mikeuicus]

I'll give my thoughts here since it feels like this is the main thread for constructive commentary in regards to the game. I'm a huge Bioware fan and have pretty much blindly purchased everything they've released since KOTOR and not been disappointed, until now. Let me qualify that by saying that disappointment does not equal dislike. I thought Dragon Age: Origins was a game with plenty of flaws, but the experience was greater than the sum of its parts. I would score it a 9.5/10 and Dragon Age 2 an 8/10.

I'm going to do my best to list negatives followed by positives.

Disliked: Resued environments
I'll start off by beating this dead horse. I can understand reusing the same map occasionally, especially if I'm just going into a warehouse or small cave for a quick one off battle. I noticed as much on occasion in DA:O. However, when every cave is literally the same cave it's immersion breaking and cripples my desire to replay the game since I feel like I've already played the same areas dozens of times. Normally I can't wait to start a second playthrough in a Bioware game.

Liked: New art style
While I don't like the new look of the elves, everything else looks much, much better. From the general look of armor to the makeover the Qunari and Flemeth have gotten, Dragon Age finally feels like a universe as exciting to look at as it is to play in.

Disliked: The flow of battle
The multi-tiered structure of many of the battles in the game is a tried and true game mechanic, but I can't help but feel that I thought the battles were far more superior in design in DA:O. There they felt natural: You would come upon darkspawn in the Deep Roads huddled around a campfire or what have you then ambush them, or lay traps for them, cast massive AOE blizzards etc. from afar.... Now, even engaging ruffians mugging someone results in several waves of reinforcements who were on hand for this simple robbery, often including some nonsensical rogue who teleports about 1 shotting your non-warriors and who, in spite what should be an innate fragility given their lethality and the limitations of their class/armor, has more health than nearby enemies with a sword and shield.

Coupled with the extra long cooldowns on essential spells like heal and most offensive abilities, fights become more about running far enough back so you can regroup before the reinforcements get to you than laying out a compelling strategy. Also, the fact that any type of attack staggers a character in an unending loop unless they've stacked strength (a useless stat for any non-warrior) makes dealing with these respawns even more of a headache. Escape mechanics are worthless when my character can't react to use them.

Also, the fact that most bosses can be kited to death seems like an oversight.

Liked: Combat (overall)
In spite of the above, the more energetic, stylized combat fits well in the universe. I like rogues flipping about, stabbing furiously and disappearing into a puff of smoke to backstab. I love that mages, when autoattacking, don't just wave their staff at enemies with slow moving fire/spirt/ice balls shooting forth anymore. I love watching my tank swing her shield in an arc and knock three or more enemies back at once. When I am engaged in battle I feel excited.

Disliked: Difficulty spikes
Yes, Nightmare should be hard. In fact, it should be nightmarish. I knew what I signed up for. The trouble is, bosses like the Ancient Rock Wraith have no real gating before the point of no return that warn you you may not be prepared, or that your party is less than ideal. There's no second chance to swap Bethany for Anders, or Aveline for another DPS, or change tactics at all in what is a hard fight primarily because you are forced to take a physical ranged DPS (Varric) who might not mesh with your party's synergy. Coupled with the EXCESSIVE length of this unforgiving fight on Nightmare (with non-ideal party makeups people report almost 30-45 minutes to down this guy, though one video I saw a gentleman did it in 8). I shouldn't have to read pages of theory crafting about ideal character builds and group comps to beat a boss when I have no chance to go back and respec, level more, or swap characters. There are players, like me, who will feel like they cheated turning down the difficulty, even just for one boss.

Liked: The more intimate story
I like how the story is a step back from world threatening events and instead a look at one man's rise to power. At the start you're only there to watch out for your family and I rather liked having to do oddjobs and sidequests (which were far better designed and implemented this time around) to scrape together the cash for the expedition.

Disliked: Hawke's (multiple) personalities
I found it odd that if I decided I wanted Hawke to respond with a glib remark, his tone of voice and demeanor would change to the point where I felt like I stepped into another character entirely. This is even more noticeable if a player decides they want their Hawke to be an irredeemable jerk who it makes no sense for anyone to want to follow about risking their lives with. At least Renegade Shepard was a badass who got things done, Renegade Hawke doesn't have time for anything, it seems.

Liked: Characters
Well, this is Bioware so of course it has great characters! The cameos were well handled, particularly Allistair and Cullen who say just enough to leave you wanting more but not enough to step on the various permutations of stories that can exist.

Disliked: Implementation of Returning Companion Characters
While I loved Anders in DA:O/A, the new voice actor coupled with the disconnect between my Awakenings epilogue and his current status as an AWOL Grey Warden left a bitter taste in my mouth. While a new voice actor for a character like Merrill is a bit more forgivable since she was a supporting character briefly in one of several different origins, replacing Anders is a bigger deal. It makes sense that he might sound different since he's fused with Justice so I forgave that. The one thing I can't forgive is how his sense of humor has been warped along with Justice, and now instead of being snarky, sarcastic and sometimes genuinely funny, now he comes off as jerk. Perhaps this is the intent? Still, I can't reiterate how disheartened I was to learn that, rather than serve the Grey Wardens for years faithfully as a result of the friendship he had with my Warden, he was actually in hiding in Kirkwall doing oddjobs with some fellow named Hawke and had abandoned Ser Pounce-a-lot.

Liked: Streamlining - Vendors, loot, etc.
I quite like how I don't need to watch a cutscene every time I want to sell/buy something (and usually hit escape to try to skip it and then close out of the store and start an unending cycle of minor annoyance). I also like how junk is clearly defined as such, and many unimportant quests are simple exchanges of clicking and getting a reward, even if Hawke and the NPCs comments don't always match up (for example, when informing someone of a dead relative's passing: "Looks like you misplaced this!""Oh thank you!"). Being able to sell junk en masse is much appreciated.

Disliked: Needless loot dropping
While it's nice to vendor that extra armor you get, it's painful to sell an epic set of heavy armor when your other warriors are wearing little more than a cloth teeshirt. I understand the necessity of saving time/money in lieu of redesigning every set of armor for a dozen different character models, but I always loved being able to hand-me-down sets of gear in DA:O. Being able to equip belts, rings and weapons on companions feels like a consolation prize. Why does armor not specific to Hawke's class drop at all?

Liked: The Game (overall)
I love the Dragon Age universe...it's lore, how I can read the Codex for hours to get background on the factions and creatures, explore forgotten ruins and the depths of the world and battle mythical beasts. While I am let down by DA: 2 I feel like Bioware will learn from the mistakes and mix the best of Origins with the best of DA 2 and create something truly special.

-Mike

[Safron09]

The dialog wheel -- I thought it was great during the demo and the first
few hours of play but then I realized why I wasn't drawn to many of the
conversations. I spent too much time wondering what I would say if I chose this purple diamond instead of wondering what the companions would say in response.
I like being able to read in full all the choices and worry about
hurting Alistair's feelings or wondering if this would make him blush.
In DA2, I chose the heart but never felt anything to how they responded
to it.

I think the romances were a bit lacking for me because of this. I felt like I didn't really know them even though I did all their quests and its been 7 years. There needed to be more time spent with companions than all these extra sidequests.

Some of the characters felt a bit 2-dimensional to me. They had their hooks and their faults but thats all they talked about. It started to sound like whining to me.
That one thing can't define them. Alistair being a bastard prince didn't define him. When I think of Alistair I think of a sweet, slightly shy, playful man who would do anything to protect the warden and stop the blight. When I think of Fenris or Anders I think of an elf who can't get away from his past as a slave and an apostate trying to help out other mages. Needed more scenes with them about common things. Like the dog.

I wrote positive/negatives in the open general section of reviews. Thank you for reading.

[W-ar]

Huge fan of the first game,

The constantly spawning enemies at night imo was one of the few things keeping me awake after spending about 10 hours in kirkwall.  Also the spawning chests at diff times in the recycled environments made it feel just weird, having to comb the entire area over and over again to loot things to sell.  most RPGS seem to have a few cities and tons of diff areas to explore, and more sandbox-ey, which is a huge fun point for me.

I didnt realize that the companion armor system was changed to be more like ME2, I bought Dead Space 2 and Had Blood Dragon armor  pre-O bonuses, but couldn't have a companion wearing either one, so yeah, i guess using a diff class to see the "other" story options is fun, but I dont really want to hang out in Kirkwall much at the moment lol.

The story is awesome, but so was DA:Origins, more so i think because of the different origin story.  Besides the Combat system which I think is the best thing in this game,  and the great writing in general, Id have to lean towards Fable 3, and doesn't compare to DA:O   

Awesome story though, some haaaaaaard decisions sometimes  lol

[Larry L]

If anyone from BioWare is still listening, here's my constructive thoughts on the game so that your DLC and hopefully the next Dragon Age is perfect.

Understand to me Origins was nearly a perfect 10. And I'm also a console gamer who's always loved the console versions of this genre of game. Baulder's Gate Dark Alliance 1 and 2, Champions of Norrath, Diablo 1 on PS1, Sacred 2 Fallen Angel on consoles and Dragon Age......all some of my favorite games.

I like the battle system of Dragon Age 2 a bit more that Origins, which is a shocking to me as anyone. I like the faster pace, I like combo system, and i like the secondary enemy wave, which I'm surprised more people don't like. Origins battles were sometimes too short for me. In Origins my favorite part gameplay wise was the waves near the end in destroyed Denerim.

I also enjoy the Mass Effect style conversation wheel though. I don't really find it any better or worse than the old one. Both have their advantages. For a set main character this is good, for a user made main character the old one was better.

What I don't like at all is not being able to equip my party members with armor. I've got all this useless loot saved up that I can't use but would be fantastic for my party. Maybe it was ok to take that out in Mass Effect, but you can't remove that in this type of game without you looking bad for it. You NEED to put that back in. And preferably even program that back in to Dragon Age 2 if it's possible.

And I want to be able to talk to my party members, at least the ones that are romancable, at any time to try and make them my friend or rival or start a romance. Just how it was in Origins.

Why did you change these 2 things so much? If those 2 things weren't changed I'd consider DA2 almost as good as Origins.

[LPain]

Overall the companions were the most interesting, but I have problems with Anders who simply changed too much. Changing the character and his VA was too massive step in terms of immersion. I do understand that this may be a  repetition of same actor question (I do not know what the reason for change is) but perhaps if these sort of changes were needed maybe it would have been better to either substitute Cullen with new voice actor or then replace Anders altoghether with different character. I understood that the writer has also changed - unfortunately it is too visible. Change is explained in storywise but there was simply no continuity to the previous Anders that would have made the change more believable.

I have nothing against good vo change like that of Isabela's, but that is because characters behavior is greatly in line of that of DA. Change was in a case of Anders just too great.

All other criticism I have has so well explained that I see no point of repeating it : waves, reuse of maps and lack of communication with companions.

Personally I do not see problems with ME2 type non-changeable armor of companions - in many ways I prefer it as it provides you more meaningful character building.

Hmm. Quite personal this opinion but hopefully heard despite all this.

Modifié par Drained_Warrior_, 16 mars 2011 - 04:21 .

[MIB-2]

Want to add a couple of dislikes:

1.The loss of spell combinations:

I play as a mage, and the first thing I instantly disliked about DA2 is the absence of good old things, such as shatter or storm of the century combo. As far as I understand, this is a part of dumbing down the game.

2.Glossary got really small.
In Origins, you could read and read for hours, whereas now you are lucky to have a quarter of that.

[WhiteFoxA]

I don't feel the need to repeat what other people have said in this topic, nor have I red trough all of the posts.
I think the developers already got the hint about the reusing of some levels, compagnion armors and some other issues. (atleast, I hope so)
I'm sure they are already taking it into account already (either they are working on the expension pack already if only in rough form or they are already making plans of DA3. Time is money! )

In any case, there is still something I want to say, that may or may not have been said already:

Who is the main storyteller? In trailers and such, we always hear Flemeths voice. In the game, Varric does the talking the whole time. So why put Flemeth in there in the first place, she has no real use except to link the trailers to the game for the new players. A short introduction if you wish.
Next time, either make it longer and more meaningfull or leave it out all toghether and stop using Flemeth's voice as if she had a big part in the game. It's Varric telling the story of Hawke. Use their voices?

A special note about the lack of customisation of your party members:
I feels like it was a move to shorten development process. After all, the less armor and polygons you have to make for each member, the faster the development.

But the last part is a bit of short sighted thinking that is fed by the many trolls in this forum. A person starts to see ghosts (or demons if you wish) where there are none.

[ArmedChimp]

I'd love an option to have the subtitles in conversations appear at the bottom of the screen. Being at the top of the screen just irks me as I've grown up with subtitles being at the bottom of the screen. Its very off putting like it shouldn't be there.

[bzombo]

my criticisms:

1. the map issue. 'nuff said.
2. the lockdown on armor for npc companions. it makes 75-80% of the armor i find useless trash.
3. lack of a toolset. mods made origins so much better. now, they can be done, but not as easily.
4. the new art style has grown on me, but i agree with most that the darkspawn look bad.
5. excessively long cool downs for potions.

that said, da2 is a really good game. i'm having a blast. if the above items were corrected, it would put da2 on par with origins for me.

[bill4747bill]

Ok, here is my constructive criticism:

Disclaimer: I really enjoyed DAO and am really enjoying DA2



Add options as opposed to reducing them.
Streamlining is good, but it is clear that many felt too much was 'removed' compared to DAO
As costly and as time consuming as it may be, Multiple origins would have been a way to 'blow people out of the water' Instead we have one Hawke. Perhaps Hawke could have had Multiple origins, all Hawke, but different.

I will suggest that to a large extent a game will enthrall a player or lose them very early. Example...I would bet real money that many DAO players were blown away by the Human Noble story and went forward with a positive outlook. So the goal should be to get as many players as possible to fall in love with the first half hour/hour of the game. Add in Ostagar, and I was certainly impressed!

Add classes and Talent Trees. I happen to like the new Talent trees, especially the option to improve talents.
But, People want options, and with only three core classes you need a lot of talent trees.
Related point; You have to have Archer and Duel weapon Warriors. People expect it.

Have to find a way to increase dungeon map variety...this turned out to be a big deal.

Keep the companion specific armor, but also allow npc's to wear any other armor also. best of both worlds.

Needs to have more npc's wandering around doing civilian activities in the background.



Just want to say I am very happy with DA2.

[Nhilintra]

Hello, Bioware,
Well i have a realy big problem with your Story. Actually with Anders.
In the Story of Dragon Age Awakening, Anders is still in Vigil, and helps the hero of Ferelden there. From the time where you meet Anders in Dragon Age 2, its Imbossible that he is there it the time. And also not possible becouse the Epilog of DA-A.

Well thats the first thing what i realy dislike in DA2.

The next thing what i also dont like, are the ending of DA2... i realy miss a epilog, what happend with the others with you and and and.

Well this two things, are the biggest fail in DA2. Please check it out.

BR

Nhili

[Andrew84UK]

I love the game and think BioWare have done a great job, but the recycled envionrments do annoy me. Great game apart from that, easily on par with Mass Effect (in my opinion), and that's the best RPG I've played.

[-Skorpious-]

I finished the game yet, so I will postpone my suggestions until then. HOWEVER, I would like to suggest in the mean time that you (Bioware) try to do your best to convince EA to give you a longer development cycle for DA3.
We all know EA really pushed you guys for DA2 to be released as fast as possible; that is never the right mindset to have when working on projects.

[Zan Mura]

Ooh, I'll add mine. As a disclaimer I really love this game, but only after being somewhat disappointed with it at first and then going for Nightmare. Even there I have cheated to get past the few most frustrating boss fights. It has a lot of improvements over DAO and other games too which I would *hate* to get lost under all the negative feedback. Moving on to my own critique in random order:

1) The balance fixes to making rogue / warrior gameplay more fun and far more useful to the party was great. But the power of the mage was dragged down too much. Enemy mages seem to work on a different ruleset and for example Saarebas can use spells that 1-shot your entire party... while player mages have turned from the faithful-to-lore powerhouses in DAO into nothing but utility support and healbots. Offensively, any 2h warrior or rogue will outdo your mage to a ridiculous extent in all offensive capabilities. I don't like that.

2) The whole "multiple waves of enemies from all around you" is used *far* too often. It makes a tactical approach to combat seem meaningless, undermines the taunting role of a tank and in general encourages you to react in less cinematic, and more metagaming kind of ways. For example, always running out of the respawn area, or always backing up into a corner like a bunch of sissies so your mages / rogues don't get slaughtered by the archers. In many cases I find that I am customarily forced to reload fights that have more than the usual waves of enemies because I always start off with cinematic combat. I WANT to be able to take them on while standing my ground and fighting there in the thick of things, even while using the landscape to force ranged classes to move in closer. But too often, it turns out there are 5x more mobs than I was expecting for from impossible directions like behind me in the corridor I *just* cleared explicitly so that it would be safe for my casters. Which demands that I must reload, and turn to the sissy mode in order to survive the extended time and numbers. Which again derives from the "fun" of it.

Imagine Mass Effect where the whole cover system was rendered useless when mobs just appeared out of thin air right behind you and around you, meaning you'd always have to goad one enemy and then run back 1-2 rooms and make your stand there. You can see how it wouldn't work there, and in DA2 it's *exactly* the same thing.

3) The boss fights speak of console game design. While all your games have them, none have ever been as frustrating as they are in DAO. Only a few of them though, namely that Rock Wraith thing, the High Dragon, and the Arishok (you did good here though by allowing the option of NOT going into a duel with him, some of your previous games have failed to take into account less solo-oriented protagonist builds so I'm glad there was an option). It's hard to say why exactly, but the possible short explanation could be this: Usually any boss has a tactic that once discovered, can basically guarantee a victory. You just have to keep your head cool and do your stuff right. In DA2 it seems not only is that tactic close to impossible to discover, but it's really no guarantee of anything. Even in the best case you're constantly dancing on a razor's edge. You're forced to use a LOT of expensive resources like potions, poisons and bombs that severely deplete your already *very* limited gold reserves. The fights are brutally unforgiving in that they can easily take a dozen minutes or two, where a single mistake or a stroke of bad luck will instantly kill a vital member and that will be the end of it.

4) The repetition of the maps is bad enough as it is. But it's especially bad considering that the entire game takes place in the same city. There is a serious lack of a feeling of adventure in DA2. I can't remember the last RPG I played where that problem was so bad. While I appreciate the character development aspect in this design, and I think it's cool and fun to experience this idea, I think it's safe to say that sitting in the same city for close to 10 years is *not* an epic, heroic thing. I mean, it works well enough on its own, but compared to the kind of game where you see half the world, all kinds of different weathers and locations, exotic creatures and mystical races, explore the depths and purpose of the whole world... I just like the latter option. Even if I know even DAO was trying to avoid that to an extent.

I guess that was all for now. A shame though since like said, DA2 has a lot of awesome features going for it. But some of the problems are big enough to hide the great game underneath from those who don't have the patience to delve that deep.

Modifié par Zan Mura, 16 mars 2011 - 05:59 .

[GregoriusMaximus]

LIKED:

Real-time combat: Much as I like D&D and the whole 6-seconds thing I actually grew to like this. Keep it for the next.

Special skill trees for companions: This was a nice touch, and made party customisation more fun

DISLIKED:

Junk items: These were just pointless. I actually quite liked having items in DA:O that were obviously junk in terms of gameplay but whose usefulness was nevertheless left to your discretion. Having items pre-labelled as junk just makes them a nuisance and makes the game more mechanical.

Lack of aesthetic variety in equipment: Too few skins for gear and weapons.


Lack of overall items and equipment: Too few items in general. A much greater variety makes looting and equipping more fun and less of a chore - by about half way through the game I was barely even bothering to look at what I picked up.

Lack of variety in item abilities: In previous Bioware games a lot of the items had interesting individual abilities and unique attributes; this wasn't really the case in DA2.

Stats: Not really sure why, but I wasn't really interested in trying out stat combos by equipping specific gear etc. Thisprobably ties into the previous point - there wasn't enough variety in equipment - but I didn't really feel that most of the items were having an effect on my character's abilities. The stats system was also confusing sometimes; many of the values I simply ignored as it was difficult to work out what they did and how much of an effect they were having. The system in DA:O, or the one in D&D, makes far more sense.

No little picture icons for items: Following on from this, having no little picture icons next to items is also a loss. The icons that were in the game were there to indicate the item's gameplay use - which again makes the game feel more mechanical and less immersive. I think little things like this are important in making an immersive game.

Inability to equip companions: Well this was a real bummer. Equipping companions is an important part of managing your party. Ican't imagine why anyone would take this out. People moaned like nothing on earth about lack of party control in NWN and the same thing goes for equipment. cRPG players love having as much control over the party as possible. 

Equipment stars: Didn't ever work out what on earth these meant. Somebody told me it was gear's usefulness in terms of your level - if so, that's pretty patronising. Part of the point of having gear to equip is working out what is good and bad. Putting great big stars next to it is unneccessary and again just makes the whole thing feel mechanical and 'dumbed-down'. Maybe this is symptomatic of the jumbled stats system - it was difficult to know how much various stats had an effect relative to one another so working out "good" gear from "less good" was kind of hit-and-miss.

Simplified crafting: I much preferred the old enchanting system. Also, it would be nice if there was the ability to have a blacksmith craft you customised weapons and armour - at least in the same sort of manner as DA:O

Mage prestige classes: I played a mage, so I can't comment on the other two archetypes, but the specialist classes were dull. I actually respecced away from having a prestige class in the end - the force mage in particular was pretty useless despite sounding cool. I for one miss the battle mage (or whatever it was called). It would be good to have more prestige classes and to bring back the storyline requirements for them. It didn't really feel right that I could just become a blood mage at will, there should be some reason I've learned it, even if it was just "ask Merrill".

Removal of map skills and spells: Not sure if that's the right term, but what I mean is the skills from Origins that allowed you to craft potions/have more tactics etc. The loss of these just contributed to the fact that the game was too combat-oriented. Also, spells and buffs that could be active outside of combat that help the party with things outside of combat (even just a group haste spell or something) would be cool.

Lack of race options: I know this was a plot issue, but it would be nice to have the ability to play different races.

Lack of class diversity: The three archetypes were less like archetypes and more like classes themselves. I think it would be better if you could do more to distinguish your character from the archetype - ie if there were more ways to play each of these. 

Waves of enemies: The manner in which combat was so clearly demarcated from non-combat was kind of annoying. Worst was when you could see your enemy in front of you, but could not attack because you hadn't walked over the trigger yet. Enemy encounters in general were kind of repetitive; greater variety would be nice, especially with enemy special moves. It would be nice to have more variety in terms of some encounters being with a few strong enemies and some with swarms of weak ones.

Bisexuality: Well, I'm actually bisexual and I don't really get too worked up over RPG romances but it was kind of annoying the manner in which the romance options had obviously been tailored to be androgynous - that is to say; they'd been written so that they could apply to either a male or female PC with minimal dialogue changes, presumably to save time. It meant that parts of the romance dialogue seemed odd and many of the 'flirts' that the party members engaged in seemed to almost come from nowhere. It detracted from the characterisation of party members; it would feel more realistic if party members had more individual and distinct personalities.

Conversation wheel: Didn't care for the standardisation of responses - nice, funny, nasty etc. - nor for the fact that Hawke would often say something that didn't seem to correspond to what you selected. I would prefer a wider range of dialogue options; and for those options to have more of an effect on the outcome of a conversation. On top of this, lengthier conversations would be more interesting. Also, what you say during a conversation should have an effect on what your companions think of you - this applied only during some conversations, so it was difficult to determine when to consider their reactions and when not. For instance, I could sometimes go on about how great mages were in front of Fenris or how what an ass the law was in front of Aveline; and they wouldn't care... but then the next time they would be offended.

Map repetition: C'mon... this was just lazy.

[i]Overall lack of immersion/game too combat-oriented: A lot of this game felt like a chore. Everything "streamlined" was done with the goal of teleological efficiency, but that isn't really the point of a cRPG in my opinion. Things like equipment choice felt like they were a nuisance, getting in the way of the story and the combat, rather than an important part of the game. I don't think RPGs are really all about the combat; part of the immersion of these games is doing things that have no real value in terms of the story or character improvement but are just there to add flavour. As I said before, it looks like the biggest enemy of this game was time. I hope Bioware just take greater time with the next installment and make the whole experience a lot more deep and detailed and a lot less like walking through a painting going from quest to quest to combat to combat.

Modifié par GregoriusMaximus, 16 mars 2011 - 05:38 .