206 réponses à ce sujet

[Parrk]

I have often commented that the chief difference between the two is that DAO is about a task, while DA2 is about a person.

There is no driving force behind Hawke's ascent. Story-wise, she could simply have been a mercenary for the rest of her life. She has not suffered any physical metamorphosis like the joining. She rises to fame gradually and gains respect as a result of helping people for no other reason than she wanted to.

The grey warden becomes such as a means of avoiding death, then upon finding herself the only one capable of the task, resolves to complete it.

Both are great games, but I am a strong supporter of 2.

[AlexXIV]

Parrk wrote...

I have often commented that the chief difference between the two is that DAO is about a task, while DA2 is about a person.

There is no driving force behind Hawke's ascent. Story-wise, she could simply have been a mercenary for the rest of her life. She has not suffered any physical metamorphosis like the joining. She rises to fame gradually and gains respect as a result of helping people for no other reason than she wanted to.

The grey warden becomes such as a means of avoiding death, then upon finding herself the only one capable of the task, resolves to complete it.

Both are great games, but I am a strong supporter of 2.

Well the family is the driving force, and because of that she should have been able to save her mother. But Bioware thought it is better to count on a cheap shocker moment.

[txgoldrush]

Relshar wrote...

To the OP what are you smoking? The story was crap. Your character has no influence within it. Hawke is just a supporting actor between two waring factions within the city. The game play is poor as is the maps that get recycled in each and every quest. Once your done with Act1 you seen all your going to see in the city, dungeons and caves.

You can't even choose a different race nor can you change the equipment on your companions plus the fact you cant speak to them. I felt no attachment to any of them other than Varric, and I put that down to the fact he is the one telling the story.

If people think this is a good game after playing DA:O, then they wouldn't know what a good game is if it slapped them in the face with a wet fish.

Yes, he or she does have an influence....its his or her relationships with  he companions he or she has.. The characters are BETTER, they are more three dimensional, less stereotypical, more dymanic in their emotions, and far better written. There are no farting drunk dwarves here as companions. Instead of speaking to them as glorified codex librairies (Tali in Mass Effect 1 *cough*), they are far more part of the story and can alter scenes if you take them with you in certain situations. In Origins, almost every companion outside Leliana and Wynne fits a typical Bioware cliche archetype as well asnot play any role after they are intorduced other than Allister and morrigan, in DAII, they are far more complex with dynmaic emotions instead of showing one or two emotions throughout the entire game. I have learned more about characters for what they DO during missions than what they SAY at camp.

Its also a step forward that characters other than you can make decisions as well. Too many WRPGs are in a vacuum, where you get to make all the decisions and everyone just reacts to what you do.  The world doesn't work like that.

[Aithieel]

For me ending was dazing. Ugh! Story so dark and gloomy.

Really emotional plot but a bit exhausting though.

[Skyplant]

 It's certainly dark, I'll give you that.

But it just wasn't particularly satisfying for me. The first game built up all this lore and history about the grey wardens vs the darkspawn, the storyline was cliched, but pure brilliance. For a start you travelled round the whole of ferelden, not just one city. In some ways DA 2 feels like just another expansion pack.
The death of your mother was a good plot point. In my game Isabela ran off when I tried to give the relic back to the qunari, but at the end Varric said that the only companion that stays with the champion was Isabela?? That's either a glitch, or just a complete fail by Bioware. The ending didn't mention Merrill at all, who I romanced. 
Merrill's side quest was a bit of an anti-climax, the mirror never got rebuilt, where's the fun in that?

I always thought that the baddies in dragon age were the darkspawn? but Bioware has failed to develop them at all in this game, in fact they only appear in the first act, after that they are reduced to occasionally ambushing you, nothing more than bandits. Awakenings was going somewhere with that emissary that spoke. But they seem to have reduced the storyline of this game to "escape darkspawn, sort out qunari, kill templars, run away." You're not even a grey warden. I got excited when I was playing the deep roads level at the beggining, finally a chance to discover a bit more about how the darkspawn came to be perhaps? no, you find an idol, talk to a demon, and go home. There isn't a single mention of the old gods in the entire game. Are the darkspawn just a side race now? Less of a threat than the qunari?

When I first heard about DA2 being released I was looking forward to being able to explore more of thedas, there is virtually no exploration in this game, just the same level designs over and over again. Once I thought I was going into a new cave with a different design, exploration revealed however, that it was the same level, just BACKWARDS?? That's just lazy...

What was that random bit with the grey wardens turning up in the middle of kirkwall and then buggering off??? Not explained at all. In fact the more I think about it, the more weird unexplained plot points I find. Seems to me like the entire game was made to set the scene for DA3. What is the idol? Who made it? Why is it so dodgy?

And we still don't know where the hell morrigan and her Godly baby are. Seems to me Bioware is just getting us all excited about plot points that they are never going to reveal, so we buy all the DLC like the noobs we are.

Baha! my rant is on a roll, I only meant to write a few lines 0.o

Anyway, the RPG elements of DA:2 were completely nerfed compared to DA:O why on earth would they make it so that companions can't change armour? were they just too lazy to make a load of good armour designs or something? Even the Champions armour is given to you near the end, which looks great, but as it's the best in the game, why bother giving me other lesser armour, that I'm never going to wear, and am dissallowed to give to my companions.

They reduced the number of learnable talents, being a force mage was dissatisfying to say the least, my most powerful moves remained to be the elemental ones I had learned at the beggining, with the force mage talents only causing a slight slowing down or the tiniest amount of damage or pushing enemies back slightly. Being an Arcane warrior in DA:O was amazing, buffing up till the game nearly broke, walking into a group of darkspawn, and like some sort of mad behemoth smashing them to pieces with spellweaver and the occasional force cage.

You couldn't talk to companions while on the move, instead having to trawl back to their individual places of residence for a chit chat about their dark past. All the really powerful items were just given to you, I killed the high dragon, and got...an AMULET??!?!?!!!?!?!!?!  A mofoin' amulet??? That's not impressive, you can't even see it. DA:O you got a whole suit of armour for taking one of those beasties out.

Overall, the game felt like a nerfed, prettier version of Awakening.

Modifié par Skyplant, 19 mars 2011 - 10:40 .

[txgoldrush]

Skyplant wrote...

 It's certainly dark, I'll give you that.

But it just wasn't particularly satisfying for me. The first game built up all this lore and history about the grey wardens vs the darkspawn, the storyline was cliched, but pure brilliance. For a start you travelled round the whole of ferelden, not just one city. In some ways DA 2 feels like just another expansion pack.
The death of your mother was a good plot point. In my game Isabela ran off when I tried to give the relic back to the qunari, but at the end Varric said that the only companion that stays with the champion was Isabela?? That's either a glitch, or just a complete fail by Bioware. The ending didn't mention Merrill at all, who I romanced. 
Merrill's side quest was a bit of an anti-climax, the mirror never got rebuilt, where's the fun in that?

I always thought that the baddies in dragon age were the darkspawn? but Bioware has failed to develop them at all in this game, in fact they only appear in the first act, after that they are reduced to occasionally ambushing you, nothing more than bandits. Awakenings was going somewhere with that emissary that spoke. But they seem to have reduced the storyline of this game to "escape darkspawn, sort out qunari, kill templars, run away." You're not even a grey warden. I got excited when I was playing the deep roads level at the beggining, finally a chance to discover a bit more about how the darkspawn came to be perhaps? no, you find an idol, talk to a demon, and go home. There isn't a single mention of the old gods in the entire game. Are the darkspawn just a side race now? Less of a threat than the qunari?

When I first heard about DA2 being released I was looking forward to being able to explore more of thedas, there is virtually no exploration in this game, just the same level designs over and over again. Once I thought I was going into a new cave with a different design, exploration revealed however, that it was the same level, just BACKWARDS?? That's just lazy...

What was that random bit with the grey wardens turning up in the middle of kirkwall and then buggering off??? Not explained at all. In fact the more I think about it, the more weird unexplained plot points I find. Seems to me like the entire game was made to set the scene for DA3. What is the idol? Who made it? Why is it so dodgy?

And we still don't know where the hell morrigan and her Godly baby are. Seems to me Bioware is just getting us all excited about plot points that they are never going to reveal, so we buy all the DLC like the noobs we are.

Baha! my rant is on a roll, I only meant to write a few lines 0.o

Anyway, the RPG elements of DA:2 were completely nerfed compared to DA:O why on earth would they make it so that companions can't change armour? were they just too lazy to make a load of good armour designs or something? Even the Champions armour is given to you near the end, which looks great, but as it's the best in the game, why bother giving me other lesser armour, that I'm never going to wear, and am dissallowed to give to my companions.

They reduced the number of learnable talents, being a force mage was dissatisfying to say the least, my most powerful moves remained to be the elemental ones I had learned at the beggining, with the force mage talents only causing a slight slowing down or the tiniest amount of damage or pushing enemies back slightly. Being an Arcane warrior in DA:O was amazing, buffing up till the game nearly broke, walking into a group of darkspawn, and like some sort of mad behemoth smashing them to pieces with spellweaver and the occasional force cage.

You couldn't talk to companions while on the move, instead having to trawl back to their individual places of residence for a chit chat about their dark past. All the really powerful items were just given to you, I killed the high dragon, and got...an AMULET??!?!?!!!?!?!!?!  A mofoin' amulet??? That's not impressive, you can't even see it. DA:O you got a whole suit of armour for taking one of those beasties out.

Overall, the game felt like a nerfed, prettier version of Awakening.

Its a bug....I also had one in which I romanced Anders, but killed him..and still says"except Anders".

Merrill shatters her mirror.

I like the Talent tree much better in DAII than DAO, much less trash skills.

Screw darkspawn......they are not that interesting, just chaotic evil mook fodder. I perfer human, thinking, more intellegent enemies.

Modifié par txgoldrush, 19 mars 2011 - 10:57 .

[da0Xeffect2]

It was definitely dark in my opinion. It was linear but I figured it would be since it was told in a framed narrative way. They knew he fled from Lothering and knew what what happened at the end but we just needed to fill in the middle. As much people hate it for that, I think this was a great continuation of the story. Chances are that Bioware will probably go back to story-telling like in DA:O for future games but I do hope they continue the voiced characters. It really livened up the game for me.

[Skyplant]

txgoldrush wrote...

Skyplant wrote...

 It's certainly dark, I'll give you that.

But it just wasn't particularly satisfying for me. The first game built up all this lore and history about the grey wardens vs the darkspawn, the storyline was cliched, but pure brilliance. For a start you travelled round the whole of ferelden, not just one city. In some ways DA 2 feels like just another expansion pack.
The death of your mother was a good plot point. In my game Isabela ran off when I tried to give the relic back to the qunari, but at the end Varric said that the only companion that stays with the champion was Isabela?? That's either a glitch, or just a complete fail by Bioware. The ending didn't mention Merrill at all, who I romanced. 
Merrill's side quest was a bit of an anti-climax, the mirror never got rebuilt, where's the fun in that?

I always thought that the baddies in dragon age were the darkspawn? but Bioware has failed to develop them at all in this game, in fact they only appear in the first act, after that they are reduced to occasionally ambushing you, nothing more than bandits. Awakenings was going somewhere with that emissary that spoke. But they seem to have reduced the storyline of this game to "escape darkspawn, sort out qunari, kill templars, run away." You're not even a grey warden. I got excited when I was playing the deep roads level at the beggining, finally a chance to discover a bit more about how the darkspawn came to be perhaps? no, you find an idol, talk to a demon, and go home. There isn't a single mention of the old gods in the entire game. Are the darkspawn just a side race now? Less of a threat than the qunari?

When I first heard about DA2 being released I was looking forward to being able to explore more of thedas, there is virtually no exploration in this game, just the same level designs over and over again. Once I thought I was going into a new cave with a different design, exploration revealed however, that it was the same level, just BACKWARDS?? That's just lazy...

What was that random bit with the grey wardens turning up in the middle of kirkwall and then buggering off??? Not explained at all. In fact the more I think about it, the more weird unexplained plot points I find. Seems to me like the entire game was made to set the scene for DA3. What is the idol? Who made it? Why is it so dodgy?

And we still don't know where the hell morrigan and her Godly baby are. Seems to me Bioware is just getting us all excited about plot points that they are never going to reveal, so we buy all the DLC like the noobs we are.

Baha! my rant is on a roll, I only meant to write a few lines 0.o

Anyway, the RPG elements of DA:2 were completely nerfed compared to DA:O why on earth would they make it so that companions can't change armour? were they just too lazy to make a load of good armour designs or something? Even the Champions armour is given to you near the end, which looks great, but as it's the best in the game, why bother giving me other lesser armour, that I'm never going to wear, and am dissallowed to give to my companions.

They reduced the number of learnable talents, being a force mage was dissatisfying to say the least, my most powerful moves remained to be the elemental ones I had learned at the beggining, with the force mage talents only causing a slight slowing down or the tiniest amount of damage or pushing enemies back slightly. Being an Arcane warrior in DA:O was amazing, buffing up till the game nearly broke, walking into a group of darkspawn, and like some sort of mad behemoth smashing them to pieces with spellweaver and the occasional force cage.

You couldn't talk to companions while on the move, instead having to trawl back to their individual places of residence for a chit chat about their dark past. All the really powerful items were just given to you, I killed the high dragon, and got...an AMULET??!?!?!!!?!?!!?!  A mofoin' amulet??? That's not impressive, you can't even see it. DA:O you got a whole suit of armour for taking one of those beasties out.

Overall, the game felt like a nerfed, prettier version of Awakening.

Its a bug....I also had one in which I romanced Anders, but killed him..and still says"except Anders".

I like the Talent tree much better in DAII than DAO, much less trash skills.

Screw darkspawn......they are not that interesting, just chaotic evil mook fodder. I perfer human, thinking, more intellegent enemies.

Exactly, the addition of the architect made them more interesting, I was hoping bioware would develop that more. Oh well, I like the storyline, it's just annoying they didn't finish the first storyline before starting a new one.

[txgoldrush]

Merrill shatters her mirror....

Her storyline has the worst bug ever..scenes are played out of order.

[allankles]

txgoldrush wrote...

I like the Talent tree much better in DAII than DAO, much less trash skills.

Screw darkspawn......they are not that interesting, just chaotic evil mook fodder. I perfer human, thinking, more intellegent enemies.

Yeah the Darkspawn are too mindless to be compelling villains. You can't even compare them to Tolkien Orcs which are intelligent and are all capable of speech.

[Noatz]

allankles wrote...

Yeah the Darkspawn are too mindless to be compelling villains. You can't even compare them to Tolkien Orcs which are intelligent and are all capable of speech.

They have their place, but any game using them in any great capacity has to also incorporate someone like Loghain else it will be boring.

Tolkien-esque orcs fill the same role as darkspawn - meat for the protagonists grinder. The fact that the former occasionally have some profound discussion on whether or not they should be allowed to eat someone's legs does not make them intrinsically any more interesting.

Modifié par Noatz, 19 mars 2011 - 11:33 .

[Clonedzero]

Suron wrote...

Other then being rather generic the Origins story was well told EXCEPT the Blight and Archdemon being shoved to the background for the political stuff. Which wouldn't have been a big deal if it didn't just turn out, in the end, to basically going "yay, we're united...now what..oh..crap..yah...there's this big corrupted dragon and it's army we have to kill..let's go do that."

DA2 on the other hand...is relatively good as well. But it falls apart towards the end. They go too far trying to blur the lines between both sides. 99% of the mages do in fact resort to bloodmagic/demons..reinforcing Meredith...even though a LARGE portion of even the Templars show support for the Mages in that Meredith is going way too far and needs to be removed...Whom the mages turn on as well.

Then you have Ander's little stunt...again just reinforcing WHY mages are held on a leash.

Not to mention at least in Origins you could get some real different outcomes, even if small...and the story played out somewhat differently depending on the race you chose...far far far FAAAAAAAAAAAAR above what DA2 does.

DA2 is far too linear and shoe-horns you far too much.

In the end..I really like DA2's story because it's a nice change from "omg only YOU can save the ENTIRE WORLD" to you feeling more like a citizen living in the world...yes you're above average..but your accomplishments honestly feel like they aren't so far and above ANYTHING ANYONE could accomplish...which I vastly enjoyed.

But there really wasn't much you could do to change ANYTHING. At least in Origins you could, for example, kill conner, save conner, deal with the demon, sacrifice Isolde, make Isolde kill her own son, etc...while it didn't change the story much OVERALL..it added enough variance to add more replayability to the game then DA2 could EVER muster...because almost all dialogue choices lead to the SAME EXACT OUTCOME. You can't stop Anders, you can't become amicable with Meredith, you can't keep Orsino from becoming an Abomination, you can't stop/save your mother..etc.

Darkest? maybe, but only because it's FORCED and there's no variance. Origins could become darker via your choices (killing conner, making deal with demon, exiling Alistair or executing him, etc.)

Whereas no matter if you play a saint, a joker, or a ****** Hawke the outcome is ALWAYS the SAME.

no matter how you play origins the outcome is still the same. you still save fereldan and kill the archdemon WHAT IS YOUR POINT? LOL.

[Lee337]

His point is clearly outlined, but you somehow missed it.

[Dangerfoot]

Clonedzero wrote...
no matter how you play origins the outcome is still the same. you still save fereldan and kill the archdemon WHAT IS YOUR POINT? LOL.

You are so bad at compare/contrast.

[txgoldrush]

Noatz wrote...

allankles wrote...

Yeah the Darkspawn are too mindless to be compelling villains. You can't even compare them to Tolkien Orcs which are intelligent and are all capable of speech.

They have their place, but any game using them in any great capacity has to also incorporate someone like Loghain else it will be boring.

Tolkien-esque orcs fill the same role as darkspawn - meat for the protagonists grinder. The fact that the former occasionally have some profound discussion on whether or not they should be allowed to eat someone's legs does not make them intrinsically any more interesting.

Loghain himself was a very poor villian....very idiotic motives.

[TJSolo]

Loghain was not a villain.
He was a very confused man.

[Il Divo]

TJSolo wrote...

Loghain was not a villain.
He was a very confused man.

I'd definitely say Loghain was a villian; a conflicted/complicated villain, but a villain nonetheless. He certainly is there, opposing the protagonist every step of the way.

[Trapslick]

Medhia Nox wrote...

And on a purely materialist level - I don't play a story to get the "First Part" and then if I want to actually make a difference I have to pay another 30 or 60 dollars.

hold the freakin phone! if you enjoyed this game... you can get sooo many hours out of it. in fact, i don't know many single player games with as much replay value as the dragon age series. regardless weather you believe it or not, its a solid game, maybe its just not for you. if they make an expansion or have some dlc... im probably going to buy it.

Medhia Nox wrote...

snip

dude... you really need to not spend so much time judging people... i enjoy a happy ending, dark ending or w/e, as long as its good.

count_4 wrote...
the outcome is on a far larger scale than DA:O.

are you high? complete cities and armies where destroyed, you changed the king of the greatest nation in the world... versus started a religious war?

i mean, religious wars happen in real life... the entire world isn't threatened by an unnatrual presence that even demons couldn't know there power very often.

[Noatz]

Loghain himself was a very poor villian....very idiotic motives.

His illogical plan notwithstanding, if you were just fighting the darkspawn... it may as well have been space invaders.

Trapslick wrote...

are you high? complete cities and armies where destroyed, you changed the king of the greatest nation in the world... versus started a religious war?

i mean, religious wars happen in real life... the entire world isn't threatened by an unnatrual presence that even demons couldn't know there power very often.

If we change certain things within your statement we can even make it correct!

"The king of the greatest nation in the world" should read "The king of a relatively unimportant backwater"

"religious war" should read "massive cultural schism throwing the religion most of the people of Thedas live their lives by into chaos while also generating violent conflicts involving a group of people who can potentially destroy the world"

[Thrennion]

AllThatJazz wrote...

Agree with OP. Fantastic story, populated with layered and interesting characters, and really no-one who could straight up be called a hero or a villain, it very much depends on perspective. Even my lovely and noble and well-meaning Hawke ended up as more of an accidental villain than a Champion. The themes of family, loss, failure and sacrifice were much more intriguing to me than 'Big Monster. Kill It.' And the ending left me gobsmacked. I mean, it was great in Origins to be able to say 'Squee! I'm Queen!', but an ending that leaves me saying 'what the f***k have I done?' is just as engaging to me.

My feelings exactly. I never replayed DAO because once I was Queen and the Big Bad was dead, what's the point? This game has so much nuance. I loved it.

[Sammyjb]

Someone before said DA 2 had a feeling of helplessness. Things were happening, and you couldn't do anything about it. Great mood for a story. Not so great for a choice-driven RPG.

In the end, I liked DA ]['s story better, but found it lacked purpose. But I also felt like I made an impact on DAO's world, while DA ]['s feels identical no matter how you played.

[Vandicus]

Sammyjb wrote...

Someone before said DA 2 had a feeling of helplessness. Things were happening, and you couldn't do anything about it. Great mood for a story. Not so great for a choice-driven RPG.

In the end, I liked DA ]['s story better, but found it lacked purpose. But I also felt like I made an impact on DAO's world, while DA ]['s feels identical no matter how you played.

I find this statement somewhat ironic. The difference I see between DA2 and DA:O is that in DA2, quests had decisions that were made that had results that could be seen playing out. DA:O just gave us epilogue. The four major choices in DA:O, in the grand scheme of things are irrelevant. Chosing who to rule Fereldan is a somewhat relevant choice, but I haven't seen it actually matter yet. Save or don't save a single village in an Arling, doesnt' actually affect armies in DA:O. Work with elves or werewolves, only relevant to a single Dalish tribe. Orzammer was somewhat more interesting, but only because it was epilogue, yet to see anything real from it. Save the Circle or annul it, in the long run, Fereldan will still have a Circle. DA2 made choices more personal, because the results come back to reward the player or give them a swift kick in the pants. It changed the side questing system and questing as a whole from being filler content(lyrium smuggling, killing wolves,spiders,bears, ect., collecting random gems, and I could go on forever, listing perhaps 90% of Origins quests) that had relevance almost purely in gear and xp terms, to being things that my characters did, or refused to do, based on beliefs.

To me DA:O feels the same everytime I play it. The only "new" thing is the Origins story if I haven't played it yet, and those don't really have much variation within themselves either. I sincerely despised the Fade and Deep Roads on subsequent playthroughs. I only got to see my decisions through an the viewing glass of an epilogue, and what annoys me the most now is that DA:O, which advertised as dark fantasy, had a yay everyone survives and goes home happy option now for almost every single quest, the decisions weren't difficult or complex at all.

Modifié par Vandicus, 20 mars 2011 - 05:58 .

[RosaAquafire]

I'm just lazily popping in to say that I agree completely with the OP.

It's dark, and I like it. I'm glad there's no third, happy choice, because once that choice exists, the other choices just feel like douchey choices. Choosing between "X dies" "Y dies" and "Everybody lives happily ever after," there's no moral dilemna for the player.

I hope they get the chance to do something as dark and ambiguous as DA2 again.

[ZaroktheImmortal]

I had a lot of fun playing this game. It was shorter than the first one but there was more than that. When I played Origins it just had this really epic tale feeling about it. But this one while it was a fun story with different points of view it just didn't feel like a grand adventure like Origins. I also got the feeling that the choices weren't really doing anything, it seems more of the illusion of choice but no matter what you do pretty much everything turns out the same.

[ApplesauceBandit]

The ending was disappointing, like what the hell!? I don't understand! I seriously hope they come out with expansions/DLC to continue the story because i'm not waiting another year or so for DA3 so i can actually find out what the hell happened to my character and companions.