231 réponses à ce sujet

[Auroras]

Disagree. I thought the story was excellent.

[napushenko]

Disagree, DA 2 story was miles better than DAO one. In fact, story was one of major things that redempt this game as something new. DAO story was also good, but seen and played too many times to be memorable, in fact, i allready forgot it, just know that i had to kill big baddie. Other things considered, what killed this game is whiny "hardcore rpg players" (i consider myself one) with 0 % understanding of something different then BG2 style (which i loved, and play even today)

[napushenko]

Sabriana wrote...

What I hate the most is that they had a great story. It was on par to flip the finger at WotC. It was, to me, great that they went ahead on their own fantasy story. I read the backgrounds, the books, the lore, and I was intrigued and captivated. I thought they could surpass D&D. I think I expected too much. I do feel sad. Oh well, there is always Tolkien. I guess.

you mean setting ? not story ? in case you havent noticed, same setting is in DA2 as well, only much more localised version (better & more involving imo)  also, dao storyline is nothin like tolkien.. nor could it surpass forgotten realms lore ever, no matter what they did. 

[Sylvianus]

napushenko wrote...

Sabriana wrote...

What I hate the most is that they had a great story. It was on par to flip the finger at WotC. It was, to me, great that they went ahead on their own fantasy story. I read the backgrounds, the books, the lore, and I was intrigued and captivated. I thought they could surpass D&D. I think I expected too much. I do feel sad. Oh well, there is always Tolkien. I guess.

you mean setting ? not story ? in case you havent noticed, same setting is in DA2 as well, only much more localised version (better & more involving imo)  also, dao storyline is nothin like tolkien.. nor could it surpass forgotten realms lore ever, no matter what they did. 

yeah, yeah tolkien, blah blah. Explain to me sir. Except the, " we need to find allies in all Ferelden, " ( elfes, dwarfes, mages etc ) what is the same than Lord of Kings  for the story ?

Modifié par Sylvianus, 06 juillet 2011 - 10:59 .

[napushenko]

the basic plotpoints are there, in fact, the basic plot is there, but the setting is not, thedas is much more mature than middle earth, and i kinda like that fact. so, my bad., i meant to say setting instead of story.
story was a 12354123123 times already seen & played.

[Sylvianus]

Okay because for the story it's not true. I'm sick of all these lies. Yes we need to gather allies such as Lord of kings, so it will end the gathering of armies and the end of the dragon. But that's all, thank you.

Each step in Ferelden is a story within the story. Redcliffe, Denerim, the circle of Ferelden, The Warden, Orzammar, etc. etc..

There is absolutely nothing like the Lord of the Rings, nothing. Each story, each step is morever accompanied by a true background, dept, details, with a codex very specific, and a range of choices consistent. Choices so numerous that many players have been slow to find all them.

Modifié par Sylvianus, 06 juillet 2011 - 11:25 .

[DaveExclamationMarkYognaut]

napushenko wrote...

thedas is much more mature than middle earth

[Spam image removed]

Modifié par JohnEpler, 07 juillet 2011 - 12:04 .

[napushenko]

What choices ? You have 2 choices in every substory, side with elves or werewolves, side with one dwarf of another, side with earl, side with whomever, and do couple of quests between them. only quest that required some player attribute was curing some unicorn, or whatever. Look, i see your point, its a good game, but allready chewed on multiple times, at least by me. all things i saw in dao i allready seen in bg2 and nwn , but with much more nonlinearity, better setting, more dialogue, customization and character options. I didnt say story was so bad, i said it was allready seen in much better edition (except graphics).

I think i am one of the rare ppl that considers DA2 more interesting and original than any other new rpg, but , thats just my opinion.

[napushenko]

DaveExclamationMarkYognaut wrote...

napushenko wrote...

thedas is much more mature than middle earth

politics, religion, humpty dumpty, intrigues, etc. i mean, everything is more mature than lotr. 
thedas is more asoaif then lotr, so, i dont see a point for loling

[DaveExclamationMarkYognaut]

napushenko wrote...

politics, religion, humpty dumpty, intrigues, etc. i mean, everything is more mature than lotr. 
thedas is more asoaif then lotr, so, i dont see a point for loling

It's all about the execution. Dragon Age ain't exactly Game of Thrones, either. I mean, it clearly wants to be, but it just ends up being kind of silly and simplistic when it tries to do the intrigue thing.

[schalafi]

I enjoyed the game, the companions and their stories, and the writing was fine. I enjoyed Origins too, for the same reasons. The plots in both games had some good and some bad features; I don't think I've ever played an rpg that didn't have some issues, and yet were still fun to play.

As for Tolkien comparisons, there's not a single rpg having dwarves, elves, ogres, mages, etc. that doesn't somehow relate to Tolkien, but so what?

I like a game with companions, quests, conflict, and DA2 had all of that. So the ending wasn't as conclusive as Origin's ending was, I figured it's just a lead in to DA3.

Modifié par schalafi, 06 juillet 2011 - 11:50 .

[Sylvianus]

napushenko wrote...

What choices ? You have 2 choices in every substory, side with elves or werewolves, side with one dwarf of another, side with earl, side with whomever, and do couple of quests between them. only quest that required some player attribute was curing some unicorn, or whatever. Look, i see your point, its a good game, but allready chewed on multiple times, at least by me. all things i saw in dao i allready seen in bg2 and nwn , but with much more nonlinearity, better setting, more dialogue, customization and character options. I didnt say story was so bad, i said it was allready seen in much better edition (except graphics).

I think i am one of the rare ppl that considers DA2 more interesting and original than any other new rpg, but , thats just my opinion.

That's your opinion, I understand.
But, seriouly, two choices ? really ? No, no, no please. In short I will not repeat on all the choices we can make but :

Redcliffe : Kill connor, blood magic to save him, circle of ferelden to save him, save or not Redcliffe. Where are the only two choice please ?

To be with the Dalatians and kill Zatrian, to be with the dalatians and Zatrian, kill the wolves. To be with the wolfes and kill Zatrian, to be with the wolves and kill and zatrian, and all the Dalatians, to be with nobody, and forcing both sides to make peace.

It is obvious that choosing the side is not the only opportunity to show the choices.

Please tell me  where are the two choices. Unless you talked about DA2 as well ?

Modifié par Sylvianus, 06 juillet 2011 - 11:57 .

[napushenko]

DaveExclamationMarkYognaut wrote...

napushenko wrote...

politics, religion, humpty dumpty, intrigues, etc. i mean, everything is more mature than lotr. 
thedas is more asoaif then lotr, so, i dont see a point for loling

It's all about the execution. Dragon Age ain't exactly Game of Thrones, either. I mean, it clearly wants to be, but it just ends up being kind of silly and simplistic when it tries to do the intrigue thing.

there i agree, but i guess it cant be held against da,  i really dont remember rpg without simplistic storytelling, even when it tries to take itself more seriously, or in any case, none game can compare to asoaif in that regard. 

[napushenko]

Sylvianus wrote...

That's your opinion, I understand.
But, seriouly, two choices ? really ? No, no, no please. In short I will not repeat on all the choices we can make but :

Redcliffe : Kill connor, blood magic to save him, circle of ferelden to save him, save or not Redcliffe. Where are the only two choice please ?

To be with the Dalatians and kill Zatrian, to be with the dalatians and Zatrian, kill the wolves. To be with the wolfes and kill Zatrian, to be with the wolves and kill and zatrian, and all the Dalatians, to be with nobody, and forcing both sides to make peace.

It is obvious that choosing the side is not the only opportunity to show the choices.

Please tell me  where are the two choices. Unless you talked about DA2 as well ?

i remember i killed zatrian and saved the wolves than lied about it later. yeah, if there is so many options, i guess you have the point there, i didnt replayed the game, it didnt grow on me, but again, those are choices, not the story.  simplistic formula would be more choices - better story, but i dont quite agree on that point (altough more choices never hurt). 

[Sylvianus]

there are different conclusions, different resolutions, people can die or not, any side effects or not, unexpected consequences or not, happy or tragic. Means used to achieve his ends, diplomacy or not. Treason, reversal or loyalty of the Pc at the end.

To think that choosing the side is the only manifestation of a choice. It a bit sad.

Modifié par Sylvianus, 07 juillet 2011 - 12:04 .

[DaveExclamationMarkYognaut]

napushenko wrote...

DaveExclamationMarkYognaut wrote...

napushenko wrote...

politics, religion, humpty dumpty, intrigues, etc. i mean, everything is more mature than lotr. 
thedas is more asoaif then lotr, so, i dont see a point for loling

It's all about the execution. Dragon Age ain't exactly Game of Thrones, either. I mean, it clearly wants to be, but it just ends up being kind of silly and simplistic when it tries to do the intrigue thing.

there i agree, but i guess it cant be held against da,  i really dont remember rpg without simplistic storytelling, even when it tries to take itself more seriously, or in any case, none game can compare to asoaif in that regard. 

I think there's definitely CRPG storytelling in the same league as literature - I don't think they're on the LOTR level (yet), but I would put some of the best CRPG stories in the same category as above-average fantasy novels.

Modifié par DaveExclamationMarkYognaut, 07 juillet 2011 - 12:06 .

[Sylvianus]

napushenko wrote...

Sylvianus wrote...

That's your opinion, I understand.
But, seriouly, two choices ? really ? No, no, no please. In short I will not repeat on all the choices we can make but :

Redcliffe : Kill connor, blood magic to save him, circle of ferelden to save him, save or not Redcliffe. Where are the only two choice please ?

To be with the Dalatians and kill Zatrian, to be with the dalatians and Zatrian, kill the wolves. To be with the wolfes and kill Zatrian, to be with the wolves and kill and zatrian, and all the Dalatians, to be with nobody, and forcing both sides to make peace.

It is obvious that choosing the side is not the only opportunity to show the choices.

Please tell me  where are the two choices. Unless you talked about DA2 as well ?

i remember i killed zatrian and saved the wolves than lied about it later. yeah, if there is so many options, i guess you have the point there, i didnt replayed the game, it didnt grow on me, but again, those are choices, not the story.  simplistic formula would be more choices - better story, but i dont quite agree on that point (altough more choices never hurt).

You have 2 choices in every substory, side with elves or werewolves,
side with one dwarf of another, side with earl, side with whomever, and
do couple of quests between them

I just answered to this false statement. If there's one thing that no one criticizes in dao it is the lack of choice.

And for me a true importance of choices for the player must enter fully into account, so yes we are not really agree.

And I even think that since Bioware decided to give a voice to Hawke, it is important for the story to work out their new wheels, etc. All this is essential. Nothing is an independent compartment.

[Cutlasskiwi]

Sylvianus wrote...

there are different conclusions, different resolutions, people can die or not, any side effects or not, unexpected consequences or not, happy or tragic. Means used to achieve his ends, diplomacy or not. Treason, reversal or loyalty of the Pc at the end.

To think that choosing the side is the only manifestation of a choice. It a bit sad.

For me the problem is that the outcome isn't different enough to warrant another playthrough. Everything almost plays out exactly the same no matter what you decide and that made the story quite boring to me. Yes, you get different allies in the end fight and a few different lines in the epilogue cards, but that's pretty much it. So for me, the choices are not all that great and important.

The whole Dragon Age franchise seems to suffer from this. The games are not very reactive so the choices almost seems irrelevant. I want to see the outcomes while I play.

[Kail Ashton]

ACt 1 & 2 Disagree Act 3 Agreed It's a mixed bag, game was well handled til Act 3 where it all fell apart spectacuarly, though i will say the companions are some of the best in Bioware

The bigest issue was The Arishok, who was THE antagonist of the game, he was as well forumlated as Loghain, he had everything done perfectly, you got inside his head, knew his frustrations and his goals, you knew despite how the two of you got to know each other that it was all going to boil down to a big finale battle and it was all done perfectly

and then he's gone two thirds of the way thru the game, now act 3 is left with this huge story vacuum of antagonists that were never explored or even heard of til that point, Orisino first & foremost goes down in rpg history as the most pointless main storyline antagonist, i've literaly run into random townsfolk NPC's who've had more explored development than this guy, it's hillarious in act 2 the first ttime he's introduced is in the the fade and everyone was all "who the hell is this elf??"

The only thing keeping Merridith from taking the prize from Orsino is she at least has a half assed backstory kinda explained BUT ONLY IF YOU CHOOSE THE TEMPLAR PATH, so anyone on the mage side has no idea wtf her problem is, outside one of the laziest deus ex machina's in the history of bad writting "uh...the evil statue made me do it?" really? REALLY?? that's what you're going with bioware?

Sure plenty of stuff has used "evil thing made me do it!" but to their eye rollingly bad credit they at least explained wtf it was, apparantly the evil statue; despite being persistantly prominant through the game; is never explained why it's evil, it just is! cause it's red?? who approves this crap?

I'm honestly willing to believe the writters thought act 2 was it and went on vacation, someone at management realised the game was too short & hired some temps to write up act 3 which comes off as the senior lazy year of the game that just tosses in as little effort as possible

Course there's plenty more issue with act 3, the most obvious are: the brief, pointless & fairly confusing ending, while bioware rarely goes the extra mile with endings, DA2 was embrassingly bad and pretty much just slaps everyone in the face saying "$29.99 in 8 months for the real ending ****s~!" given the fact the touted "10 years" was only 7, maybe everyone at bioware can't count, would explain the disaster that is Ander's timeline

Lastly given that both sides are so monsteriously wrong why do i have to choose either? (not that there's any real choice, it'll play out almost exactrly the same regardless) the only "big choice" was made by Anders without any input from me

Modifié par Kail Ashton, 07 juillet 2011 - 01:02 .

[Kaiser Shepard]

Aside from the botched implementation of a framed narrative, which had little purpose other than jumping the story forward a couple of years at a time (and allowing the devs to say they had said narrative, there isn't that much wrong with the writing. For the rushed job that it apparently was, the dialogue is as good as ever.

The game's biggest problem, from my perspective, was the decision to just ditch the whole "go on a journey and collect 4 thingies" concept, or just ditching the journey in its entirety. The other big problem, from a design standpoint, was the lack of any relevant choices durig the main plot... at least in my game, since the choices you could make were restricted by Hawke's personality.

As KoP said, people are able to tolerate games that have bad gameplay so long as the story is interesting. On that note, I'd like to say that there really wasn't any need to overhaul the battle system: the original wasn't any good on consoles, and I pretty much only played it for the story and the choices, but... I would have easily accepted another game or two like that, assuming it meant the story would be bigger and more responsive to my actions, as opposed to just the battle system being the latter.

Also, what the heck is up with people creating these kinds of topics in the spoiler-free sections of the forum?

[Benevolent Walnut]

I thought the writing was pretty sub-par. Given the games bioware produced in the past, I expected much more from the story

[DarkDragon777]

Agree. The story was almost non-existent. I felt like I was doing side-quests 90% of the time.

[erynnar]

napushenko wrote...

Disagree, DA 2 story was miles better than DAO one. In fact, story was one of major things that redempt this game as something new. DAO story was also good, but seen and played too many times to be memorable, in fact, i allready forgot it, just know that i had to kill big baddie. Other things considered, what killed this game is whiny "hardcore rpg players" (i consider myself one) with 0 % understanding of something different then BG2 style (which i loved, and play even today)

Which of the three stories? DA2 didn't have just one.

[The Twilight God]

The writting was fine, I guess.  The overall plot was kinda pointless. (By "writting", I mean banter and general dialog. Not story and plot.)

Prelude: Escape
Conclusion: Escaped
What does this have to do with the current mage rebellion? Nothing.

Chapter 1: Ger rich or die trying
Conclusion: I got rich
What does this have to do with the current mage rebellion? Nothing.

Chapter 2: I'm the unofficial Qunari ambassador.
Conclusion: Qunari threat averted. I'm now called "The Champion".
What does this have to do with the current mage rebellion? Nothing.

Chapter 3: I run errands for the head templar and head mage
Conclusion: Nothing that logically lead up to anything...
What does this have to do with the current mage rebellion? Nothing.

Last hour of game: Anders blows up a Chantry. Templars want to annul Circle.
Conclusion: Mages rebel
What does this have to do with the current mage rebellion? Everything.

Problem: Everything that matters happens at the very end. The other 99% of the "story" is filler.  Even the stuff in Chapter 3 before the end is filler. Anders basically started everything by pushing a button. A button that could have been pushed in Chapter 1 or 2. Hawke's presense was meaningless. Circle annuled? Mages rebel. Templars defeated? Mages rebel.  


The problem with Dragon Age 2 is that it was rushed and/or lazily thrown together. Also, the story is disjointed. The ending just kinda pops out of nowhere. There is no build up. It would have gone over better if presented like a Final Fantasy game.The illusion of choice, in the absence of choice, was a bad call since there was no substance to it. Straightforward storytelling like Final Fantasy would have worked better to keep things chronological and add more depth and context to the story's various situations.

Modifié par The Twilight God, 08 juillet 2011 - 01:50 .

[erynnar]

The Twilight God wrote...

The writting was fine, I guess.  The overall plot was kinda pointless. 

Prelude: Escape
Conclusion: Escaped
What does this have to do with the current mage rebellion? Nothing.

Chapter 1: Ger rich or die trying
Conclusion: I got rich
What does this have to do with the current mage rebellion? Nothing.

Chapter 2: I'm the unofficial Qunari ambassador.
Conclusion: Qunari threat averted. I'm now called "The Champion".
What does this have to do with the current mage rebellion? Nothing.

Chapter 3: I run errands for the head templar and head mage
Conclusion: Nothing that logically lead up to anything...
What does this have to do with the current mage rebellion? Nothing.

Last hour of game: Anders blows up a Chantry. Templars want to annul Circle.
Conclusion: Mages rebel
What does this have to do with the current mage rebellion? Everything.

Problem: Everything that matters happens at the very end. The other 99% of the "story" is filler.  Even the stuff in Chapter 3 before the end is filler. Anders basically started everything by pushing a button. A button that could have been pushed in Chapter 1 or 2. Hawke's presense was meaningless. Circle annuled? Mages rebel. Templars defeated? Mages rebel.  


The problem with Dragon Age 2 is that it was rushed and/or lazily thrown together. Also, the story is disjointed. The ending just kinda pops out of nowhere. There is no build up. It would have gone over better if presented like a Final Fantasy game.The illusion of choice, in the absence of choice, was a bad call since there was no substance to it. Straightforward storytelling like Final Fantasy would have worked better to keep things chronological and add more depth and context to the story's various situations.

Yeah, it really was sort of shoved at you at the end.