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[Lord_Saulot]

An Exhaustive Discussion on the Merits and Demerits of Dragon Age 2
 
I. Introduction
***warning – long post***
I have taken the time to put together some thoughts on Dragon Age 2. This is not a gut reaction; it is not a rant or a rave. I have purposefully waited until I have completed my first play through (65 hours). This is so that I could make sure that my post is the product of thoughtful reflection and not kneejerk annoyance or enjoyment. I don't want to be put in the "hater" camp or the "fanboy" camp - I want to write an essay that is potentially interesting to both factions and to Bioware employees as well. I am hoping that I can contribute to the ongoing discussion about the game, and that my thoughts will spur interesting contributions from others as well. Note that this is a constructive criticism thread, so please keep all discussion civil and moderate in tone. I think that overall, I agree with Gamespot's assessment of the game: it is an enjoyable game, but the degree of simplification is puzzling, and it is not the marvel that its predecessor was. I would consider it to be a good but flawed game, with some shining elements, but also with a lot of wasted potential.
 
First, some background. I started writing this essay while I was about 40 hours into my first play through, somewhere in the middle of the second act. By that point, I had a lot of thoughts about the game, and I did not want to lose them while I finished the game and reflected on it, so I thought it best to start writing them down. My end goal, which I had set after starting the game initially, was to post my thoughts only at the end, for the reasons stated in the first paragraph. Some of my opinions have changed over the course of the game, but I have tried to keep this review coherent. Also, it is possible that this essay is not as thorough as I intended. I have, in all likelihood, already forgotten some of impressions before writing it. I hope that anything that I have forgotten will come back to me.
 
In any case, my first Bioware game was a gift from a relative – the original Baldur's Gate and Tales of the Sword Coast bundle, when that combo was still fairly new. I was in high school then. RPGs have always been my favorite sort of video games, and like many on the board, I consider the Infinity Engine games to be major achievements of the genre. That said, I know that every game is different, and I play and enjoy different types of games, so my nostalgia is not a prison. But Dragon Age: Origins had a throwback quality to it—Bioware described it as a “spiritual successor” to the Baldur’s Gate series and homage to their own origins. I do not wish to fallaciously tie that description to any one element, but only to note that this attracted me to the game. As Origins’ release approached, I was honestly losing interest in computer games for the most part, but that game sort of renewed my interest in the medium. It convinced me that video games were still worth my time.   I should note that I played Origins on the PC, and Dragon Age 2 as well—some of my comments will be peculiar to that platform. Also, I played DA2 on Hard.
 
I have two final qualifications before starting my commentary. First, this is going to be very long – that is necessary to cover the game in the detail I want. However, there should be no spoilers. I understand that not everyone will read the whole thing (or even up to this point), but I hope someone will read and comment. Second, I understand that opinion about games is subjective, and not everyone will agree with me. However, I have tried to look at things with a critical but also sympathetic eye, and to comment in such a way that even those who disagree should hopefully find something worth reading in my review. I really hope that people from Bioware will read this and consider what I have to say.
 
 
II. Art and Design
I will start the substantive discussion with some observations and comments regarding the game’s aesthetic qualities and design approach. The most obvious thing to start with is the new art style. This does not evoke strong opinions from me. In screenshots, the differences between his style and the old one did not evoke much of an impression, but when playing the demo, I thought it looked very different, and not always in a positive way. However, playing the full release, I have grown to enjoy the style – on my PC with the high resolution textures, the game looks quite nice. But while I can appreciate the style on its own merits, one thing continues to bother me about it. Bioware developers said they wanted to give the Dragon Age series a distinctive look, and I think they have succeeded in doing so. But, creating a distinctive look for the series is counterproductive if it means that the second game does not look at least somewhat like the first game at a glance. Looking at the art styles, I do not know if I would recognize that they were from the same series. Distinctiveness should still remain evocative of the original title, in order to retain a feel of series cohesion.
 
Unlike some players, I have no problem with most of the game taking place in Kirkwall. A story about one place is just as valid as a story about many places. Thus, I like that different areas of Kirkwall are present, and as a whole, Kirkwall feels more like a city than Denerim or Amaranthine. But, there was certain sparseness in the design. It felt like here were usually very few people to whom I could talk. I suppose that this could be the first example of the streamlined aesthetic—a term that I will use throughout this discussion. It refers to the smoothening of rough edges, the removal of fiddly bits, and the excision of anything “unnecessary” to the design. But rough edges are often what make a setting convincing and intriguing, and I think that Kirkwall often felt too stark. That said, while many areas where very linear, this was the case in Origins as well, and I was often surprised to find some little side area or something tucked away where I did not initially noticed it. That is a good feeling, and it deserves a mention.
 
An area I thought was done quite well was level design. A lot more areas seem to take advantage of the third dimension, and have paths going up and down and twisting around. There are more great views in DA2 than in Origins, and it seems like the DA2 team put a lot of effort into this. The actual design of the levels, which I think is quite good, should be distinguished from the recycling of designed levels. This has been a consistent criticism of the game, and I echo it here. I don’t think anyone thinks of this as a good thing. Too many of the side areas in this game are just repeated areas with doors moved or sections sealed off. This makes the world seem smaller and more constrained, and not in a good way, as these areas are common in side quests throughout. Many of the designs are good – and a few reuses could be acceptable, but it is rather frequent here.
 
A final thought on level design philosophy: In one of the developer interviews prior to release, a member of the Bioware team talked about how they were generally seeking a sleeker look with less of the intricate detail present in the Origins environments. I think that the example used was how unnecessary were all the individual books depicted in the background of the Circle Tower. I disagree strongly with this. That sense of detail and complexity is largely what made Origins not just an enjoyable game, but a masterful game. DA2 has design strengths, but Origins had them too, and it does not always feel like DA2 is building off of Origins’ strengths. That should not devalue the virtues of the new game, but a good sequel has its own merits while also building off of its predecessor’s merits.
 
 
III. Character Design
Now we move on to the character systems in Dragon Age 2. Generally, I thought character creation was fine. I would like to see the choice of races, and possibly actual origins, in future games, but I have no problem with restrictions that are designed to suit the story. I enjoyed being able to import my own Origins save and seeing a world where my decisions occurred. Also, it was great that Bioware included three default choices for those without a save to import, and not just one. That was a great decision.
 
I have few comments about the attributes. Their functions are very different from the prior game, and while I would prefer more consistency, the new mechanics seem to work fine. That said, I am not really sure they are an improvement on the old system, with some exceptions such as the new force/fortitude system, which I think is a good addition to combat. However, I found the way that armor requirements worked very odd. It seemed designed to give each class two of the attributes to focus on. Honestly, I prefer a system with tradeoffs, which would require investment in alternate attributes in some cases. I also prefer some consistency—while there might be particular exceptions, why shouldn’t a strong warrior be able to wear the armor that weaker party members can wear?
 
I also like the new structures for the ability (spell or talent) trees. They are more intricate and provide more options than the Origins talent lines, and I appreciate that. Choosing a talent is a more interesting choice, and I would like to see these types of ability webs/trees carried forth in successive games. In particular, they have made the specializations more interesting than in the first game. Templar is a great example of a specialization that really shines because of the new structure of the talent trees. Also, having a 10-point tree instead of a 4-point line of talents allows specializations to play a larger role in defining your character. However, that reminds me of a rather odd choice: why do specializations require no unlocking now? They system in Origins was not perfect, but at least there was some sense of having to learn the specialization, i.e., actually specialize. I would have hoped that in the new game, learning a specialization would actually occur in the story and not just be a one-time unlock, but it seems to have gone in the other direction.
 
I am skeptical about the removal of skills from the game. In some cases, I can understand that skills would be superseded, such as, for example, the new crafting system. But, choosing skills at level up, in addition to attributes and abilities, contributed to leveling up feeling meaningful. Removing skills means that there is one less choice involved in character development, which consequently feels less meaningful. I can understand that developing a character might be one of the more intimidating facets for players who are new to RPGs, but for players who are devoted to RPGs, it is probably one of the most important. For this reason, I cannot really support any decision that seems to simplify character development.
 
Finally, I have a number of thoughts on class design. The mage seems, functionally, to be the class that has changed the least. Warriors and rogues have changed a fair bit. Rogues are no longer skill-heavy characters, since that no longer applies. Instead, they are largely defined by lightning-fast dual wielding or archery. This is a bit disappointing to me—the rogue’s support role seems to have been deemphasized in favor of the damaging role. While I respect the importance of the latter role, the support aspect has always been a major part of it to me. In Dragon Age: Origins, a hunter, tracker, or scout could reasonably be a rogue. An adventure with a handful of combat tricks and a number of useful skills could be a rogue. Rogues do not feel that way anymore. Now, except for archers, they just feel like ninja assassins to me. That is a valid rogue concept, but it should not be the only one.
 
On the other hand, I am more positive about changes to the warrior. In particular, I like the warrior swing arc that allows them to hit multiple enemies, as well they sheer durability of warriors compared to the other classes. The warrior feels like a front line combat specialist. However, I do not like the loss of the dual weapon and archery trees on the warrior. I understand the interest in distinguishing the classes, and I have wavered on this issue a few times since it was first announced. But, honestly, I liked the fact that there was overlap between the warrior and the rogue, because the two do share certain things that make them similar while mages are fundamentally alien. Also, it made sense that warriors, combat specialists, would have access to the full range of weaponry, while rogues made up for their lack through their other skills. Also, in previous games it was a useful trick to put a ranged weapon in the secondary weapon slot and get some shots off while the enemies charged your position. That is no longer possible for warriors. The loss of the secondary weapon slot is also annoying, but the fact that I would not be able to use it the way I want to sort of mitigates that annoyance.
 
 
IV. Story Progression and Character Development (No Spoilers)
I have seen a few criticisms of the story on the forums, but overall I thought the story was quite good, in fact, better than Origins. It was a personal story, the tale of a man, rather than an epic off war, but one type of story is not inherently more valid than the other. The most interesting and distinctive portions of Origins’ storyline were its political conflicts – saving the world from the Archdemon was fairly typical. The political and ideological conflicts get front stage in Dragon Age 2. We are presented with different mages, the Templar order, Chantry members, and the Qun, all providing different views on life.   The optional quests help to reinforce the themes and ideas that will dominate the main quests. Altogether, they paint a picture of a city that has been waiting for years to explode and events moving toward that climax. The major plot points were more moving and emotional to me in this game than in the first game.   Characters appear and reappear, and one gets the sense of the complex interactions within the city. I the plot was more intricate than previous ones and, in my opinion, it remained strong throughout the game. In fact, though I have a lot of criticisms of the gameplay, the story kept me interested in the game and I am interested in replaying it to try out some different characters and choices.
 
In terms of length, the game took me 65 hours to complete my first play through. This was on Hard difficulty. By comparison, my first play through of Origins, on Normal difficulty, was 80 hours. I played both games in a thorough fashion, doing everything I could find, and taking pains to develop and equip all my characters reasonably well. Yes, I started DA2 on a higher setting, but overall, this is a lot of playtime on a game, and I feel that I got enough enjoyment out of it to justify the purchase. Also, I already would like to play the game through again to see some different things, and I even want to play Origins a few more times to import some different saves into DA2. I feel that the good aspects of the game are strong enough that the bad ones do not deter me from wanting to play it again.
 
One of the best story elements in this game was, in my opinion, the expansion of the lore. Just to be clear, I considered the world-building one of the most compelling aspects of Origins’ storyline. I loved the constructed world of Thedas, and seeing it expanded was one of the most exciting aspects of DA2 for me. In this regard, I do not feel let down. Even though Kirkwall is just one city, I really felt like I got to know the city and its place in the wider world. That said, some more major areas in the Free Marches would have gone a long way, but the ones that were present were pretty good. More than that, this game presented a lot of information on the qunari and the Qun, on Tevinter and slavery, and on the nations of Central and Northern Thedas and their long war with the qunari. Generally, Kirkwall, despite its xenophobia, felt more cosmopolitan than anywhere in Ferelden. Being on “mainland” Thedas, it felt connected to those other areas in a way that Ferelden never did. Playing in Kirkwall makes Fereldan isolation all the more poignant.
 
The structure of the plot, which makes use of a framing narrative, was an interesting experiment by Bioware. All in all, I thought it worked well. This is a more complicated form of narration than a standard narrative, but I think it generally worked. Seeing Varric and Cassandra occasionally pop up to discuss something, looking at the things from a perspective where everything has already happened, helped create the sense of importance and often left me curious. Cassandra’s misunderstandings are often full of their own interest. Also, I think that act structure worked well – it paced the plot and has been used in other games like Bioware’s own Neverwinter Nights. Also, I think Bioware has succeeded in creating the cinematic experience they wanted, but I feel that they have taken that too far some of the time. This is a game, after all, not a movie, and for me, it is the gameplay that has suffered while the story been excellent.
 
Generally speaking, I felt that my actions were more important in the game and that consequences felt significant when they played out over the course of the game. I felt like I was in an ongoing saga. Comparatively, there were not as many places in Origins, when I felt my choices really mattered, though there were some good ones in that game too. But with the reactivity to choices as well as the ideological issues involved, I often felt I had to think harder in this game about what choices I wanted to make. This was also bolstered by the fact that mraol issues seemed grayer in this game—less clear cut and with a great deal of ambiguity in what is the right choice.
 
Now, we come to the companions. I loved the companions in this game, and I feel that they are just as well done and developed as those in Origins. I like very much the fact that each his own house and her own life. They also have their own ongoing storylines and even seem to have friendships and rivalries with each other. Some of their stories are quite fascinating (Fenris is a good example). The companion banters are absolutely great in this game, and I feel that I hear more of them than in the first game. All in all, I think the companions in this game are well-written. However, I would prefer that you could have some discussions with companions at your own prodding, instead of just as part of specific quests. Before moving on to some mechanical issues regarding the companions, I will stop to say that there are many well-written characters in this game (the Arishok is a standout), and there are some absolutely wonderful DA:O cameos.
 
The first companion mechanic I want to discuss is the friendship and rivalry dichotomy. I like this a lot because it expands the ways that you can interact with your companions. I think it is a good mechanic and a real step forward. I have mixed feelings, however, about the companions’ personal specializations. On the one hand, they help to strongly define each character and to give them a personal touch. On the other hand, I sort of liked the way that Origins allowed you to learn specializations from companions, as well as allowed you to customize your companions with secondary specializations. In this case, I see merits to both approaches, though I must reiterate that I don’t understand why specializations are always available in this game, without any unlocking. 
 
Finally, I would like to add that I am not too happy with the way that the companion inventory was handled. I am not completely against companions having some “locked” gear. In all my play throughs of Origins, I have never given Morrigan armor other than her personal armors. Her image is too iconic for me, and I hate to change that. I do like having the option though, and even there, I still change her boots, gloves, and helm. I think the crux of the matter for me is that this mechanic is overused in Dragon Age 2. Maybe some companions might have armor, but it need not be all of them. By the same token, it need not be the whole armor that is locked – If the body armor is locked, you could still change the other parts. I think that for me, the fun of inventory management was lost to a large degree in realizing that all the armor I found was only for Hawke, and that there wasn’t much point in looking at most of it. I appreciate still being able to choose the other aspects, though Varric also has a locked weapon. Bianca is, in my opinion, a good example of an item that is validly and legitimately locked—but it is a pain because it means that you can only control Varric’s accessories. To use an Origins example, it would have been cool if Sten had his sword locked once he had it recovered, and it leveled up along with him to represent his close personal connection to the item. But, in such case, I still would have wanted to control his other inventory slots.
 
 
IV. Combat
Now we reach the combat, one of the major features of Dragon Age 2 that I think has a somewhat polarizing quality. I would have to say that, for the most part, I have not enjoyed the changes to the combat, and I will explain here why. Actually, I think that if the game had the same storyline and characters, but had combat more like Origins, I would think of this as a great game. My other criticisms of the game are not as important to me as the criticism of the combat.
 
The first issue is one that I think may be specific to the PC version. The way the camera works has been changed completely. In the first game, one was encouraged to play the game with the camera zoomed in to get a more immersive experience, and to zoom it out to survey the battlefield while in combat. This was absolutely great for controlling a party in combat, and it is hard to match with a more limited camera. In Dragon Age 2, the more limited zooming works to varying degrees. Sometimes, it is good enough to get a good view, but it suffers quite a bit in enclosed areas or corners, where I often feel like I cannot see very much at all. I seem to remember Bioware developers stating that having the full zoomout limited them in the way they could design levels, and I respect that. I complimented the level design earlier, so I appreciate the effort they put into that. But I am not sure that it is worth the loss.
 
However, the zooming is a much smaller issue than the lack of the detachable camera. Even when zoomed out completely, in DA2, the camera stays fixed on the selected character. This makes it a lot harder to aim spells, attack opponents, and move around the battle field in Dragon Age 2 than in Dragon Age: Origins. It makes managing a party far more of a chore than it needed to be. In fact, this is one of my largest complaints. Whereas developers have commented about Origins combat feeling sluggish or clunky, and DA2 as an improvement, my experience playing on the PC is the exact opposite. Now, I have not played the console version, so I am not qualified to speak about it. But on the PC, the loss of the detachable camera makes controlling a party in combat clumsy and awkward in comparison to the fine control one had in Origins. I do not think that is what Bioware wanted in this case, and I hope they will reconsider this decision.
 
Next, we have the speed of combat. As I understand it, he developers felt that the combat in Origins was too slow. I felt otherwise – I thought the speed was fine. I would not have been averse to speeding it up a little bit, but I think that they went too far in that direction. The quickness of the movements seems almost comical in some cases. And I don’t see any particular joy in having animated corpses that move at the speed of the Road Runner. One thing I have found is that with the speed the way it is, it is a lot harder to aim area effect spells unless the enemies are in a fixed position. This either means stunning them somehow, or clustering them around a melee party member such as a warrior. That leads me to wonder if this is the reason that friendly fire was limited to nightmare mode in this game. Did the combat not lend itself to using area effects otherwise? 
 
Honestly, I do not feel that the speed has improved he pace of combat. Even on the higher difficulties, which seem to be catering more to the slower, more deliberate style of gameplay (making ample use of the pause), which I prefer, the speed of combat animations seems to militate against this style of gameplay and in favor of a faster, more action-oriented style of gameplay. I liked the deliberate style of gameplay in Origins, and I do not care for any change that seems to work against that. Also, the new style of combat animations seems a bit outlandish to me. The intense speed and exaggerated martial arts moves do not appeal to me as much as the fighting in the first game. I was rather confused the first time I saw Isabella fighting in the demo.
 
Now we come to my single biggest pet peeve with the game, the one “feature” that has most harmed my enjoyment of the game: the encounter design. I speak of something that my readers will probably be familiar with, the wave structure. In Dragon Age: Origins, some encounters might involve reinforcements or foes under cover of stealth or waves pouring out to join the battle. It worked well when used in a limited fashion. But in Dragon Age 2, the majority of encounters involve a system where, when you have almost defeated the enemies, a whole swarm of new ones appear, often out of nowhere, coming from all directions. There might be three or four waves in total, and one has no real indication of how many and in what direction. In the best cases, this has forced me to think about choosing the locations of the engagement. But often, it just makes no sense. What is the point of forming a frontline with my warriors if five more enemies will pop up next to my mage as the warriors are fighting? Also, it is one thing for that to happen in a clearing, but what about an enclosed building where I have left alive nothing that breathes making my way to that point? At that point it just feels cheap and frustrating, and makes combat tedious rather than enjoyable. It also makes it seem like your decisions and tactics do not matter. That is especially bad because, as I discussed earlier, the story in this game seems to do a good job of making your decisions feel significant – combat should reinforce this, but the wave system works against that. It is especially terrible in small, enclosed spaces where it seems like the room must be literally full to accommodate all those hidden foes. There have been some good fights in the game, but they are the exception rather than the rule because of this poor encounter design.
 
I would now like to take the time to mention something I thought was a great idea in Dragon Age 2, the force system. Basically, instead of some attacks having the ability to knock down or knock back, this is an effect of force. The system has both physical and elemental force. Force is resisted by fortitude. I like this system a lot and I feel that adds a lot to the combat. It makes sense to me that knocking people around is a function of one’s strength and makes warriors with high strength a lot more fun to play. I consider this to be a good change that I would like to see retained even if Bioware should reverse the changes I have criticized. Another thing I should mention is that Bioware developers often said they wanted combat to be more responsive in this game. I think they succeeded in this regard – while occasionally I still feel like my companions are not doing what I tell them, they generally have made issuing orders more responsive.
 
However, another design aim, I feel, was not successful. Bioware developers have said they wanted combat to feel more visceral in this one. I understand this is fairly subjective, and I am sure that some people do feel they have succeeded. But I feel that combat in Dragon Age 2 feels far less visceral than in the first game. A few things contribute to this: generally speaking the speed of the encounters and the animation style for combat they have used makes everything feel gamey rather than gritty. It honestly feels to me like all the viscera have been stripped out of the combat system (I understand the irony considering the amount of gore in the game). One example developers used is the Shield Bash talent. They idea was that it was clumsy and slow in the first game, but swift and brutal in the second game. For me, the experience was just the opposite. In both games, my first character was a weapon and shield warrior. In Origins, the Shield Bash was the most visceral attack in the game, and it seemed like I could almost feel the impact as my warrior slammed his shield into the enemy if I zoomed in on my character using the talent. DA2’s Shield Bash seems like just another attack, flinging an enemy across the field, but I really do not feel the brutality of the attack. I had high hopes for this aspect of the game, because I thought the force system would improve it. But it seems like the attacks are over too quickly to ever get much feel for them. The speed is just ridiculous. Another thing that has made the combat less visceral is the loss of the finishers. Your characters still do all kinds of brutal actions to the enemies, but they are all so fast – the finishers sort of made you stop and appreciate on a visceral level what your characters were doing. I know that some aspects of the combat were over the top in the first game too, but I think that DA2 has moved in the wrong direction in terms of combat aesthetics.
 
This long section on combat has had some strong criticisms, so I will end on a positive note. I like the way that Bioware has tried to make the classes work together better. I mentioned some of the changes to the classes earlier, but here I would like to mention the cross-class combo system. While I don’t like the fact that spell combos are gone and that some of the original “cross class combos,” like the fact that a warrior could shatter a frozen enemy, are gone, the new cross-class combo system is a nice addition. I think that at its best, it could encourage players to treat their party as a unit and play tactically. While the system is new, and could certainly be refined, embellished, and expanded in the future, I think it holds a lot of promise. Another element of classes I liked was the fact that mages and archers can use melee attacks at close range. This made sense to me, though I do not fully agree with how it was implemented. As far as I know, there is no damage reduction for melee attacks by ranged characters, but if the mage or archer is using their weapon as a bludgeon, then strength should really become a factor. Also, a talent like the first game’s Melee Archer could have made an interesting addition in this situation.
 
 
V. Gameplay
After that lengthy discussion of combat, I would like to turn to the other gameplay subsystems that play a role in this game. First, I thought the quest structure was handled pretty well. Main quests progress throughout the act and one is free to do them when one pleases and to do side quests as one pleases. However, new points of the main plot open up as the player progresses through the sequences. Generally, this works quite well, and feels somewhat open while still having a narrative backbone. It actually feels similar to another popular fantasy RPG, The Witcher, in its plot structure. And just as The Witcher was set in and around Vizima, DA2 centers on Kirkwall, a city haunted by its past and troubled in its present.
 
As for the side quests, I like that they limited the job board quests and used them more sparsely than in the first game. On the other hand, a particularly dull type of side quest has been introduced – you find a random item, you somehow know to whom it belongs, and then you give them that item to get a reward. This common type of side quest has no story involved, and I was quite disappointed the first time I contacted the person who wanted the item and did not get any kind of explanation or development. Even the most trivial job board quests in Origins had more story and development. On the other hand, there are better side quests in the game, but this particular type is a real weakness. In particular, I found the companion quests to be quite good – they felt embedded in the story, and they had their own story progressions that moved through the acts, offering multiple quests related to each character. That worked well.
 
Another set of changes are the ones involving the inventory. Some of these changes seemed inexplicable to me. For example, I can find no section for plot items. I was totally baffled the first time I picked one up in game, and then, when looking for it in my inventory, I found no section for such items. I can’t seem to find any way of knowing which plot items I have in my possession. If there is such a tab, I could not find it—in Origins, it was simple to check your quest items tab. Also, while I thought the style used for the inventory images suited the game, I did not like the generic images. I preferred the Origins style in which each item had its own image. The generic character of the items made me feel less interested in them. This is especially true about accessories, where most of the ones you find have totally generic names. It made the inventory uninteresting. Another change, the “star system,” in the inventory, seems like it could be a good benefit, but I do not think its implementation has been all it could be. While any such system is going to suffer from the fact that it has to weight the value of various different stat bonuses, I have encountered several times when equivalent equipment is ranked with different numbers of stars, or even where equipment is outranked by a strictly inferior item.
 
The other inventory change that I am not totally happy with is the junk section. I like the idea of marking items that can be sold to make it easier for people, but the “junk” term and the junk icon make me wonder why they are in the game at all. Of course, Origins had throwaway items too, but since they had a picture and a description, it at least seemed like they had some substance, told you something about the world. In DA2, the inventory is too simplified and generic – reading the names of the junk items occasionally makes me wonder why an item is called junk, but mostly, it contributes to my disinterest in the inventory. I think that this could have been handled better by naming the section something like “miscellaneous.” Additionally, this raises another issue. Why don’t items have descriptions anymore? I can no longer read any information about an item unless it has a codex entry. All in all, the inventory seems to have been simplified, and I think it has suffered for that. However, I do like the fact that consumables have their own section/tab in the inventory. That is a good interface improvement. As a minor qualm, I would like to mention an oddity – shields are listed in the weapons section of the inventory, but they are listed in the armor section of the crafting menu. That inconsistency seemed strange playing through.
 
The next system change I want to discuss is the crafting system. I like this a lot. Instead of filling up my inventory with crafting items, I can find resource supplies for my crafters to use. It is a good mechanic, and I think it is a nice addition to the game, though I think that as a new system it could use some work. I like that it encourages exploration rather than hoarding. However, I do feel that it feels too passive – crafting loses any hands on sensibility. I think that in future iterations, this could be refined somewhat; it is a good idea with a lot of potential. I think that some sense of involvement could be gained in the crafting system if there were more items to find, including perhaps quests specifically to find rare reagents. Other quest ideas could involve defending resource supply lines, or even taking sides between competing merchants. They could be treated as business ventures in which the player character is a partner, in a manner similar to one good side plotline in DA2, though I will not mention specifics to avoid spoilers. Actually, that leads me to another suggestion. Instead of just one crafting merchant for each type of good, who has access to all your recipes, it might be interesting in the future to have, for example, multiple potion merchants, who might each have their own recipes.
 
Despite my general like for the crafting system, I did miss something. Why was crafting of traps removed? I never found a “fourth crafting merchant” who would allow me to make traps. It seems strange since traps are still in the game, but without the corresponding system for player traps, the enemy traps seem out of place, as if they are not fully part of the game. Finally, I will comment on the store setup. Making the store something separate to click on, rather than an option while talking to the proprietor, is an interesting option. It is convenient, but it also feels like you lose some of the sense of interacting with other characters. I feel ambiguously about this change. I also have mixed feelings about changing runes from permanents to expandable items. It makes them feel easier to use, but they felt more momentous to me in the first game because they were permanent items that you kept with you even if you changed a weapon.
 
 
VI. Dialogue and Conversation
The next topic I will discuss is one that has been contentious since the game’s announcement, the dialogue and conversation system. During the game’s development, I was not strongly against or in favor of these changes, viewing them as presentation elements that would not strongly influence my experience. Now that I have had the chance to experience them, I have some more impression of how they do impact the experience. The wheel is interesting – selecting dialogue seems to flow more smoothly. On the other hand, I do not really like the paraphrases. I do not feel that they always convey their statements accurately. The intent icons help, and I appreciate them, but overall, I think I would prefer either full lines or dialogue, or, larger paraphrases. I think that more substantial paraphrases would be a good compromise, in fact.
 
The fact of the voiced protagonist does not bother me. Seeing Hawke talk back and forth with the other characters is enjoyable, and it contributes to the cinematic experience that Bioware has sought to produce. However, while I enjoy it, I enjoy it as something different, not something better. I do not consider it an improvement over the system in Origins, only another, equally valid way of doing things, with both strengths and weaknesses. In particular, a voice protagonist seems to make it unlikely that you will have a choice of races, or a choice of voices. While the voices in Origins had limited use, it was nice to be able to choose one that fit your character. For this reason, while I enjoyed hearing Hawke’s voice in this game, I do not want Bioware to feel that they have to have a voiced protagonist in every future game. There are other compelling design choices that could be excluded if this is insisted upon in the future. In particular, I do not think Bioware created a world with elves and dwarves in it only to exclude them as playable options in all future games.
 
 
VII. Menus and User Interface
Now I will turn to the menus and user interface in Dragon Age 2. While the styling of these menus changed a lot in this game, the functionality seems to have changed as well. A good example of this is how there are now two menus for add-on content: the “Unlockables” menu and the “Downloadable Content” menu. These split up things that were handled on the DLC screen in Origins. Now, perhaps it makes sense to split up the substantive DLCs from the promo items, but the Downloadable Content menu is accessible from the root menu, while the Unlockables menu is nested under the Extras menu. It means that viewing downloadable content requires a lot more effort than in the first game. This is a very clumsy change. (Though, as a side note, I quite like The Black Emporium and The Exiled Prince. I hope that the future DLC is of the same quality) Furthermore, there seems to be no way to turn on and off the promo items like you could in Origins, which is quite unfortunate.
 
Also, the downloadable content menu suffers from a strange limitation. In Origins, there was an in-game downloader. In this game, we have to download the files separately. Why? This seems like a step backward. Of course, I also do not understand why neither game has a patching utility like Neverwinter Nights did. Surely the developers can recognize the value of such a feature. Additionally, it is worth noting that both the unlockable promo items menu and the achievements menu suffer from a rather poor design choice, at least on the PC version. I am not familiar with the console versions. You can only view one item/achievement at a time and must scroll through them one by one to get to the one you want to look at. This is far less convenient and far more frustrating to use than the ones in Origins, where you could easily select the one you wanted to look at.
 
Next, I will look at the journal section. First and most prominently, there are fewer tabs than in Dragon Age: Origins. I did not miss the DLC tab much, since I always knew what DLC I had installed, but I did miss the conversations tab, which showed a log of your recent conversations. Sometimes you miss something while the conversations are going on, and if there is no way to hear it, you need to reread the conversation. I do not see any reason why that tab should have been removed. The quests and completed sections were fine, though I found the subject matter based categorizations used in Origins to be flavorful than the more functional categories used in DA2. Still, both ways seem valid to me.
 
The codex section was a mixed bag. I liked that the codex entries were listed by name rather than the unintuitive numbers used in Origins. I also like the addition of the Locations category. However, I found it inexplicable that several other categories were cobbled together into the unwieldy Lore category. Honestly, that category was difficult to follow because it had too many different things it. It was hard to find what you are looking for in that category, and it would be better to split it into several more categories. Also, I noticed an issue that bugged me with both the Codex and Journal pages. In Origins, if a category had a new quest or codex entry, the category was highlighted yellow, at least on the PC version. In DA2, the individual entry is marked, but there is nothing to indicate which categories include marked entries. That means you have to look through everything if you have some that you did not read earlier. The old system was obviously more convenient in this regard.
 
Now, I will comment on the user interface. I actually liked the new style a lot, and I thought the minimalistic style and new iconographic style crated an evocative and cohesive style and motif for Kirkwall and DA2. I was generally pleased with the appearance of the game. However, there were a few things that I did not like. First, the cursors were the same ones from Origins. In that game, they fit very well with the rest of the user interface, but in this game, where the user interface has been a new graphic design, the old cursors look out of place and do not really suit it. Second, a lot of the text in the game, such as when you point to a character or container, looks bigger and bolder than the text in the first game. While this is subjective, I don’t like this change in text style and felt that the text style used in the first game was more subtle and refined.
 
I liked the quickbar in Dragon Age 2. I liked that potions had their own reserved spot on the quickbar, and that you still had the option to put other potions on there. The changes in the way locking/unlocking the toolbar work are quite elegant. For those who do not now, instead of locking or unlocking the toolbar manually, DA2 locks the toolbar when you are in combat, and unlocks it when you are either out of combat or paused in combat. This is a simple and elegant solution that complements my use of the toolbar quite well. Still, I am not sure it would suit everyone’s uses, and it might still be better to give the player control over it. Finally, one of my major interface complaints in DAO was that you could not expand the quickbar more than one row, and the number of icons that fit on one row was dependent on screen resolution. DA2 does not add these capabilities, but the improvements in ability design, such as the focus on upgrades for your abilities, have made it so that I do not feel pressed for space on the quickbar as I did in the first game – even my mages have enough space! This may change if the game gets an expansion and characters go up to higher levels, but for now, it pleases me.
 
A few more assorted interface issues follow. I like the way that the health and stamina/mana bars are now sized proportionality, scaling to proportions of the highest bar. Being able to see relative health at a glance is a great addition, which it makes it much easier to gauge the situation of each party member when controlling the whole party. The map screen, however, is not so positive. As with other things in this review, I have no understanding of why some things were omitted. The map screen no longer allows you to zoom out and view the whole area map, and the area maps no longer look as pretty in the first game. The map screen also does not allow you to access the world map. Now, it is seemingly impossible to view the world map except when transitioning to another area, unless I missed the interface option somewhere. That is a loss, in my opinion. The world map, while different from the first game’s, looks very nice and has a great artistic style that matches that of the rest of the user interface. It is extremely evocative of Kirkwall and its environs, and it is just a shame that we cannot view that map when we want to do so. In Origins, one could almost always look at the world map, thought it was inaccessible in a few rare circumstances.
 
 
VIII. Series Direction and Future
There is an adage that one should not fix what is not broken. The problem with that is that, in some cases, people might disagree on what is broken and what is not broken. I think that that is the case with the Dragon Age franchise. I know that the developers paid a lot of attention to the criticisms they received over the first game, and attempted to address the concerns they thought were most important. I disagree with some of the decisions they made, and feel that they have fixed a lot of things that were not broken. I think that what it comes down to is that when I read the forums prior to the release of Dragon Age: Origins, I always felt that I understood, almost intuitively, the developers’ arguments and design philosophy. I hardly found any that I disagreed with. Dragon Age felt like the game I would design if I had the qualifications and the opportunity (and the skill and the experience and the talent, etc.). With Dragon Age 2, I just do not understand the design philosophy the same way.
 
I do not understand the “button/Awesome” connection, and I do not feel that my characters “shuffled” along in Origins. Just to be clear, I was never one of the posters who jumped to the worst assumptions every time something was announced about Dragon Age 2.  If anything, I made the opposite type of error and interpreted the changes within the framework and design of the first game. I assumed the game had changed far less than it really had. That is my own fault, I suppose, at least partially. But, I have now given the game a fair chance and feel that I can legitimately criticize the changes in direction that I do not like. I should not however that I do not think this is a bad game by any means. It is a decent, enjoyable game that has entertained me for many hours. The story, with its expanded lore about Thedas, was enough to justify the purchase for me, and there are some genuine improvements to the genre that I hope I have given proper attention to in this essay. But overall, it is a good but flawed game. I do not find it to be a great game like Origins was, and it is not the masterpiece I had hoped for from the sequel. I hope this review does not sound more negative than I intended it. A ‘B’ on a test is good for many students, but it is a bit disappointing from a student who usually gets ‘A’s and ‘A+’s.
 
Overall, the disappointment for me is that I see a lot of wasted potential. With the great gameplay framework provided by Origins, and the excellent story ideas used in DA2, there was potential for a masterpiece RPG that could have made even a great game like Origins look like a rough draft. I wanted to see Bioware develop Origins, correct its flaws, refine it and improve it, and produce a better version of that type of game. But I do not feel that the game is the perfected masterwork that it could have (and perhaps, should have) been. From reading and listening to developer interviews prior to release, I get the impression that the Bioware team wanted something not too different from what I wanted. They wanted to preserve the core experience and get rid of the perceived flaws. But I think that, with all the discussions by fans and developers alike that I have read, it is hard to argue that there was not more than just a refining of Origins going on here, but rather, a substantial shift in design philosophy. I do not want to discount the large amount of things that are shared between the two games, but the changes tend to make a stronger impact on my mind.
 
I, and friends I have discussed this with, feel that Dragon Age 2’s flaws arise from trying to be too many things at once. There was a recent interview with, I believe, Mr. Laidlaw, in which he tried to answer some of the criticisms of the game. He denied that the game was trying to cover too broad a territory and said that it was designed by a core group. That may be the case, and I respect his explanation of what happened. However, in the developer discussions before the game’s release, it was often highlighted that combat could be played as both a tactical RPG and an action-RPG. This sounds nice in theory, but ultimately these genres have different design considerations, and trying to do both will inevitably lead to compromising of the genres. It also means that I is hard for someone like me to simply enjoy the game for what it is, though I have enjoyed many other things about the game, because I do not know what it is supposed to be. Game Informer’s review of the PC version, which they rated lower than the console versions, emphasized this ‘neither here nor there’ aspect. I do not know about the consoles, but I do feel that the PC versions, at least suffers from this. I have played the game more like an Origins-type game, and from that point of view, things like encounter design and the changes to the inventory seem like compromises intended to accommodate a very different genre. So that is why I do think the criticism is valid that DA2 is trying to be too many things at once.
 
 
IX. Conclusion: Dragon Age 3?
I just want to reiterate that I do not think that Dragon Age 2 is a bad game, far from it. If I really thought it was terrible, I would not have bothered to write almost 10,000 words describing my feelings about the game. It is a decent or pretty good game with some great moments and outstanding elements, but with significant design flaws that mar the experience and prevent it from living up to its predecessor. I have tried to include the negative and the positive aspects in this essay, and if I have not been clear about that, please understand everything written with that analysis in mind. There do not seem to be many highly anticipated party-based tactical RPGs on the horizon, so the future of the Dragon Age franchise is something that interests me. For those who find this too long to read and have skipped to this conclusion, I generally agree with the comments in the Gamespot  review and the Game Informer PC version review.
 
While I am disappointed with this game, it has not led me to turn against Bioware as a developer. Everyone makes mistakes, and even if these things are not truly mistakes, I cannot expect myself to adore everything a company puts out. And Bioware made it clear in this game’s development that they were trying to address certain feedback regarding the first game. That leads me to expect that developers will be reading the feedback for this game, and taking it into mind when developing their next game. It is thus my hope that developers will read and consider this long essay that I have put both time and effort into. I hope they will appreciate that effort, just as I appreciate the effort they put into designing a game, even if I do not like everything about that game. I hope that they will look at my review and perhaps rethink some aspects of the direction Dragon Age 2 has taken.
 
I would like to see a Dragon Age 3 at some point, and if I do, I hope that it is a game that hearkens back to the design philosophy of Origins, which showed that the traditional old school RPGs could be successfully modernized and could be still be well-reviewed and popular. I also hope that the best elements of Dragon Age 2, which I have tried to point out in this review, could make it into that new design, without compromising the overall game philosophy. I would like to see a traditional tactical party-based RPG for the new decade, and I look forward to the continued saga of Thedas in the Dragon Age. Thank you to anyone who has been willing to read all of this. I would appreciate any intelligent comments or reasonable discussion from other players and Bioware staff alike. I hope that this does not seem like a “hater” thread or a “fanboy” thread, but is read in the spirit of moderation in which it was intended.
 
End.
 

[John Epler]

It was a lengthy read! But thanks for posting it - it's quite detailed and you defend your points well.

Just letting you know that it has been read and taken into consideration!

[John Epler]

Yalision wrote...

JohnEpler wrote...

It was a lengthy read! But thanks for posting it - it's quite detailed and you defend your points well.

Just letting you know that it has been read and taken into consideration!

Mr. Epler, just what is it that you do at Bioware and how are these suggestions passed forward from the forums? If you can even answer that. I'm simply curious if these are saved and printed out, or points are brought up at meetings on a dry-erase board. Thanks!

I'm a Cinematic Designer, which is to say that my job is to make conversations more visually interesting, as well as handle cutscene duties where appropriate.

As to how this feedback is passed on - well, I copy/paste the posts that are outside of the big Constructive Criticism thread and then e-mail it on to myself. I've also been collecting e-mails from folks on these forums, as well as other forums. I'll be collecting it all, categorizing the feedback (Gameplay, Story, etc.) and then sending it along to the appropriate people.

I'll also be going through the Constructive Criticism thread and giving it the same treatment. One step at a time, though Where the feedback goes from there, I don't know! It will all be read, though.

[John Epler]

Jamesnew2 wrote...

JohnEpler wrote...

It was a lengthy read! But thanks for posting it - it's quite detailed and you defend your points well.

Just letting you know that it has been read and taken into consideration!

He has the concentration of.... a John Epler!

Naa seriously grats on the post. Epler  da legend!

wait a second!!!!!! Epler sounds like Templar

I've read Gravity's Rainbow.

I've gained Immunity to Lengthy as a class feat.

[John Epler]

Maria Caliban wrote...

JohnEpler wrote...

I've read Gravity's Rainbow.

I've gained Immunity to Lengthy as a class feat.

Did you like it?

I appreciated it, at the very least. I can see what Pynchon was trying to do, and I think he succeeded. 

I'm happy I read it. I don't know if I liked it per se - it was weighty and it got incredibly dense at parts. But I think it's a worthwhile read, though I recommend copious amounts of coffee while attempting it.