But I haven't always been.
I played Baldur's Gate, and I remembered liking that a lot more. Baldur's Gate II was almost immediately my favorite game I'd ever played. But my disappointment with Neverwinter Nights was deep. So deep that I didn't even give Jade Empire, KOTOR and Mass Effect a look when they came out. This despite the fact that I've always wanted to see Asian fantasy games (see Jade Empire) and a solid Star Wars RPG (see KOTOR) and like both sci-fi and the idea of grafting RPG elements onto action games (see Mass Effect). That's how off the mark Neverwinter Nights was for me. That felt like betrayal. It completely erased Bioware to me despite how much I liked BGII and despite me being the expected target audience for future games of theirs.
I mention this to just to illustrate how dangerous it is to screw with things that people love. I never lose my temper. I'm the diplomat in all of my relationships. But it took me years to give a Bioware a second chance after Neverwinter Nights. And I only gave them that chance because they made an explicit appeal to nostalgia by calling Dragon Age a spiritual successor to Baldur's Gate. "This is the new ****" is not what did the trick.
Not surprisingly my banishment of Bioware was an overreaction. I thought Dragon Age: Origins was great--my favorite game since BGII. I went back and played Jade Empire and Mass Effect and regretted not having played them earlier. And then I was so hyped up for the release of Mass Effect 2 that after I'd read every page on the Mass Effect wiki, I didn't know what else to do. I'd already drawn up every possible party combo. So looking blankly at the Mass Effect Wikia, I felt a strong urge to grab my monitor by the edges and lick the screen. So I guess I was loyal again--in a way that probably Bioware doesn't want.
At the end of the day, what I like most about BGII and DAO are a) the characters and
the decisions I have to make. The latter plays itself out both in the story (via moral dilemmas) and the combat (designing your character, designing your party, coordinating their combat). What great about being hit with a dilemma like the Dark Romance or even something as simple as whether to spare a criminal is that it forces you out of the game and into your own head. And when a game forces me to think about what I'm doing it forges a bond between me and the character I'm playing. That's what the Warden had going for him. The game encourage me to define him as the game progressed. There was character development in my head. And Bioware I think stands the best chance of any designer of delivering those sorts of experiences. So in that sense I believe in them and have hopes for them. I'm not sure it's a loyalty they want, but it's what there is. As for DAII it had those things too, but they didn't feel as much the focus as in DAO. Many have noted that Hawke felt more passive. For me it's not because of the dialogue wheel or the voiced protagonist. It's the lack of choices that make you decide for yourself what Hawke is. Choices define a character, and Hawke didn't have enough of them. I still find myself enjoying DAII though. There are a lot of great things there. And a lot of thing that are kind of cringe-inducing that need to be ignored (like the constant waves in combat). Overall though I like some of the people at Bioware and remain interested in what they plan to do next.
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