10 réponses à ce sujet

[Jorkan]

Gamespot gave Dragon Age II an 8.0 out of 10, and I feel that is an appropriate score for this game. Personally I feel the same way many on the forums do in that DA:O was a much more enjoyable game than DA:II. That is not to say I hated DA:II, I enjoyed it very much, but I will not be playing DA:II a second or third time like I did DA:O.
 
I care very much for the Dragon Age franchise and wish to see it succeed. I guess Bioware will find out if they did better than DA:O by getting the final sales numbers, but my gut feeling tells me the numbers will not be as great as DA:O. I have been wrong before, however! Basically DA:O was a worthy successor to Baldur’s Gate II, however DA:II was not a worthy successor to either.
 
So to the point of my post, what items or features in the game do you think need to be adjusted to achieve a Gamespot review score of 9.0+? Below are some features I think Bioware could have included in the game to put it over the 9.0 threshold:
 
1.       Do not reuse game areas more than once or twice.
2.       This deserves to be mentioned again… did I mention not to use the same areas again and again? 
3.       Ties in to #s 1 and 2, but try and flesh out the game world a bit.  There was an expectation for an immersive setting that was not met in DA:II. I think the journey to Kirkwall from Fereldan could have been expanded on, perhaps Hawke needed to attain some gold for the boat ride over, rumors of Kirkwall could have been laid out for the player and perhaps the player could have met and helped some refugees?
4.       The Deep Roads trip could have been longer and more interesting, perhaps all of the companions could have come along for and a DA:O camp could have been included.
5.       There perhaps should have been one or two additional trips to somewhere outside of Kirkwall included in the game
6.       Hawke should have had more emotion invested with his/her friendship to the Vicount and his family so that the Vicounts death carried more weight with the player
7.       Party members should be more “over the top” personality wise and elicit more emotion from the player
8.       There could have been a questing hub in and around the circle of Magi or with the Templars. Perhaps outside of town?
9.       Some of the no fun side quests should have been removed. Side quests such as basic fetch this or kill that are not interesting when going back in forth in the same area over and over. Perhaps more story could have been introduced to the quests to make them less dull?
10.   The ending should have been hinted at more during the game, plus the ending should have felt “tighter” in that the game conveyed more emotional drama than it did. I didn’t really feel the ending meshed up well with the earlier acts. There was no foreshadowing (rather, there was no foreshadowing that made me emotionally vested in the ending)
11.   Reintroduce the charisma based conversation options back to the game. It was hell of fun to threaten, cajole, plead with people to get what you wanted.
12.   Make the player earn their class specialties
 
That’s the minimum number of game features I feel might’ve put the game over the 9.0 rating with Gamespot. Do you all think this would have been enough?
 

[nicodeemus327]

I agree about 1 and 2.

I disagree with a lot of the other stuff.

I'm glad they got rid of 11. I like how Hawke's reactions and conversion choices changed based on previous responses.

I disagree about 7 very strongly. Being over the top doesn't elicit emotions from me.

For 10, I thought the ending was hinted a lot towards the end. I saw it coming form the start of act 3.

For 4, yeah a longer deep rodes would have been cool but not too long like in DAO.

Modifié par nicodeemus327, 24 mars 2011 - 09:30 .

[Kelleth]

I can explain why all the caves and areas look the same... As we are being told a story, Varric most likely couldn't be assed to explain how every area looked, and just says "It was a cave like any other" and BAM, all caves are the same. 1 down, 11 to go =)

[Everwarden]

Well, the first thing you'd have to do to get DA2 from an 8 to a 9 would be to get it to an 8 in the first place.

[Thokundin]

Everwarden wrote...

Well, the first thing you'd have to do to get DA2 from an 8 to a 9 would be to get it to an 8 in the first place.

damn thats harsh

[AlexXIV]

Well Dragon Age: Origins was 9.5, DA2 8.0. User score for DA:O was above 9 and for DA2 below 8.

Conclusion: More DA:O into DA2 and you get there. Or in other words, everything a bit deeper. Dialogues, characters, quests, choices. Well story was just as deep, it is hard to judge since DA2 story was much more linear and focused so I guess it should at least have been deeper than DA:O story.

[Shockwave Pulsar]

I absolutely agree about 1. & 2., I have a love/hate relationship with this game, and the vast majority of the hate-part is because of that exact problem.
I disagree with most of the rest, especially 4., I found the Deep Roads in Origins so long, tedious and repetitive that I stopped my second playthrough there, and never finished the game a second time.

[JulianoV]

Everwarden wrote...

Well, the first thing you'd have to do to get DA2 from an 8 to a 9 would be to get it to an 8 in the first place.

Ouch! But I have to agree. An 8 seems a bit unfair not to it, but towards its predecessor. Origins did a LOT of things right. 2 did a LOT of things wrong, and all on the wrong departments. It feels short and cheap while Origins was an absolute love letter to the fans of the genre, build with care, zeal and the resources it deserved.

Reusing scenarios and pulling a freaky, painfully unsatisfactory ending are gigantic NO-NOes in any genre, the latter one being a capital sin when it comes to RPGs.

Deep Roads felt... weird. It felt like a chore to me. Which was the problem with most of the game. There was little to no interesting lore in it, most of it being uninteresting, off-top-of-head tales about particular individuals that were pretty poorly written and uninspired bothanical crazy talk that fails even to pass for lorebound scientific mumbo-jumbo.

The mechanics were great and the story was fun when it was allowed to be. Unfortunately, it was hard to relate to a character that's in it for the money and a world that has little to no character, being just screwed up. I resort to high fantasy to see greatness. I can't even freaking walk in Kirkwall, a city with great design!!! I barely see any architectural personality and 90% of the time one spends in claustrophobic caves, alleys and sewers that, looking like anything but sewers, may pass for underground passages, depending on the current story need.

The word for the game's story, setting and scope, to me, is mundane. And that is the wording that feels appropriate: Mundane.

As it is, 7.5 sounds fair. LEt's see where DLC takes it.

[jussyr]

Fix the roleplaying problems that break immersion, and I can deal with just about anything else. Even reused areas and animations. But being unable to play a consistent Templar sympathizer because you force me to leave a known blood mage who sold me out to a demon sitting in the alienage and having every Templar I run into with the exception of Meredith apparently completely blind to the fact that I'm a mage, in spite of the fireball I just tossed in his face, just completely divorces me from my character and seriously hampers my enjoyment.

[Everwarden]

JulianoV wrote...
As it is, 7.5 sounds fair. LEt's see where DLC takes it.

I don't feel right giving it a rating, myself. I can't remain objective, because the game personally offended me in the way it insulted Origins. My gut reaction would be to give the game a 5 or 6. If the game was a standalone with no 'Dragon Age' in the title I'd likely agree with your rating. 

[LadyJaneGrey]

Short answer: more time.