I am going to point out what I think is the good, the mediocre and the bad of Dragon Age 2. This is solely my opinion, and it will be opinionated. There WILL be spoilers in here, so if you have not finished the game, you have been warned. I also won’t be ling winded. I never read overly drawn out reviews. I tend to skim
Story
First, let us start with the story line. I actually liked it. I am sad that I was unable to find some sort of compromise to the situation though. I am unsure if that is even possible, since the Night Commander had gone insane from the ancient lyruim sword.
As much as I liked the story, I also felt so railroaded. You took out the RPG factor, and added adventure/action instead. No matter what my character selected, it never mattered. Unless you count making nice or not with my companions. Anything my character chose, the results were the same. Nothing really matters, except who he/she gets to have sex with. Or take to the final battles.
Dialogue Wheel, I do not like it in Mass Effect, and I don’t like it in DA2. The dialogue wheel is just a guessing game, and not a fun one. I like knowing what the heck my character is saying. Not this roll of the dice wheel.
Art
I have no idea what the artist were doing, or the concept of Bioware’s choices. This was just bad in every way.
Elves – Seriously? They look like aliens that should be baking space cookies on another planet. They are hideous, proportionately deformed. What is with the ears? They look as if someone took Silly Putty, and let someone stretch them away from their heads. DA:O that elves are pleasing to look at by humans, and then…… you go and do this? Sorry Bioware, the elves are flat out fugly. Elves have been mutilated.
Elven eyes. I kept hearing from companions how pretty the elf eyes are. No, no they are not pretty. They are freaking creepy and alien.
Human ears. Cauliflower much? Also, another horrid feature.
Physical body. The muscle structure is terrible. I would go to the doctor if my arms developed like that.
I’ll have to give some credit to area design. Some of it was really well done, and some, not that great but not horrible.
Art and character specific.
Alistair. EWWWW What the heck did you do to him? If I aged that much from my early 20’s to my early 30’s I’d have some nip and tuck done, or wonder what ill-fated disease I contracted.
Zevran. Again Ewww. He looks like he has downs syndrome now.
Nathaniel Howe. Alistair looks like crap, but Nate looks better?
Anders. He doesn’t look a lot different, but something was missing. Oh yeah, it wasn’t Ander’s but some Anders poser that sucked all his wit and charm away. Sorry Bioware. Greg Ellis made Anders, not your dialogue.
Merril. Well. Elves look like crap, but she is funny. Why is she wearing the same black and red teddy as the prostitutes after the sex scene? That was just ick. And very not Merril.
Isabela. What is with her skin? Otherwise, she looks fine. Her skin has some bizarre spotting. Also very well acted. Although, why is her ass hanging out and not armored?
Carver Hawke was just a ******, plain and simple.
Aveline Vallen was an enjoyable character.
Sebastian Vael was okay. Nothing really stands out good or bad. He was just there.
Fenris. I kind of like him. Although, I think his voice makes up for the weirdness of how elves look.
Varric. I don’t even care for dwarfs that much but this guy was awesome.
Default male Hawke looks older than his own mother. Save for the gray hair.
Cullen, also looks better. It’s a shame is part was not bigger. Greg Ellis must have been too costly? Is that why he wasn’t Anders? “Sighs”
Leliana, also better, more like the Sacred Ashes trailer.
Animations
What is with the swivel hinged hips on females? Seriously folks. If woman (actually) walked like that, we’d all need chiropractors and hip replacements.
Kissing. Gah. Alignment adjustments please.. That was painful to even watch.
Battles. I liked a lot. I liked the speed, and dynamics of the battles. The animations were pretty sweet.
Romances. They were very… Mass Effect’ish. You have stripped them to shreds and made them soulless and pointless. A carbon copy of the lame romances in Mass Effect. Quite the tune change from DA:O.
Inventory System. I HATE, HATE, HATE it.
Why in all that is holy am I burdened with tons of crap I cannot use, when my companions could? I have to run all over hell and creation to upgrade my companion armor. That is not only asinine; it is a time sink that was annoying to no end. It’s also not worth it. Why did you all decide that running around like idiots searching for upgrades was a good thing? I can manage my own companion gear.. Thank you….
Why must I have a trash section? I don’t even pick up trash!
Loot
So much junk. Why?
I’ve also yet to find a complete set of armor, other than the end game armor. I check through every body, container and whatever else is glittering. “shrugs”
Bugs.
I have a couple quests that either won’t trigger or items are missing.
Screen freezing. Gah! My system is far more than the recommended specs. I get screen freezes randomly. I guess it is good that I never experience a total crash like DA:O.
Export bugs. Exporting my own warden stories has yet to be right. Every single one, I find that the Architect was spared. I never spared him. Also, a few where Alistair is a drunkard somewhere out in the world. That would be fine, if I had ever actually used that file. Alas, I did not.
Recycle and reuse is good for plastic and cans. Not areas. That got old and redundant quickly.
Respawn of random attacks. Very overboard. First off, since when do people pop out of concrete streets? The endless stream of respawn was tediously boring. It was another senseless time sink. There are so many slaver, bandit, carta, bloodmages, followers of she (whoever the heck that was) attacks, I would have reveled in one trip through town without having to battle my way through every single time. How can there even be people left in this city, with all the ones I’ve had to slaughter?
Now that I have ranted a bit, er or a lot. I did enjoy a lot of the voice acting. There were several characters that truly shined, and some, not so much. Although, overall; this was well done.
Varric and his story telling were excellent. I found this character and the way he was portrayed fun and enjoyable.
The story plot also held some very emotional moments. I was dumb founded by a few of them, and almost wanting to tear up or rage at others. Very well done.
Sadly, unlike DA:O, Replay ability is limited. You have stripped the world down, cut it in half and removed impact of our choices. Although! Brilliant, you still got us to pay the same for half the game.
I suppose if I were to rate this on a 1-10 scale, I’d say it is a 7.5 I had some fun, but I can shelve it easily, and not want to play over and over like I did DA:O. I also won’t be buying the DLC’s as I learned my lesson from the first game.
Happy Gaming!
Modifié par Liso66, 18 mars 2011 - 05:45 .
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