Filament wrote...
How it's defined likely depends on the person using the term, and which aspects of DAO they valued which didn't carry over into DA2 like they wanted. Voiceless protagonist, art style, origins, the Warden, crafting, skills, etc etc.
Now, in honesty here, I've agreed with you that to summarize all of the dissatisfaction with DA2 as "just wanted more DAO" is not a fair assessment, but I still find it .. questionable when people insist the sentiment is altogether some kind of myth, when it so evidently exists.
DA:O (and by extension, earlier Bioware classics like Baldur's Gate I and II) is the natural comparison material, being the first game in the franchise and Bioware's last fantasy RPG before DA2. It's logical that people who loved, or at least liked DA:O, compare DA2 negatively with the first game in the franchise.
Whether they really want 'merely' an improved DA:O (or perhaps more precisely, whether they really would like such a game) is another question. I agree that the sentiment itself exists and is an honest one, but whether that would have been wise I am not sure. Personally I think DA:O is a good and enjoyable game, but I certainly did not love it to death, and I do not think I am the only one. I have heard similar sentiments from other people (friends, colleagues) who bought DA:O.
Merely fine-tuning the formula may very well have been a game of diminishing returns, with only a section of DA:O's playerbase buying DAO:2, only a section of the DAO:2 playerbase buying DAO:3, etc.
I am currently of the opinion that Bioware rightly recognised much of what could be improved in DA:O, and I get the impression that they very much were aware of the need to evolve the game in order to keep, and if possible expand, the playerbase. Unfortunately, for whatever reason, they completely botched their 'solution'. When your sequel sells comparatively poorly and is very divisive among the fans, you've done something seriously wrong. They seem to partly acknowledge it, but I don't think we should expect anything more. That is not the way big companies work, it takes a strong and unusual leadership figure to actually come clean on that.
As for what I wanted, I sort of burned out on the rather bland, repetitive environments and combat in DA:O almost at the end of my first playthrough, and only finished it in a second playthrough much later. When I first heard about DA2, I was hoping for a substantially different game, that would adress at least three issues (bland, repetitive environments, repetitive combat, claustrophobic corridors-and-rooms environments). Instead, I got a game that was actually worse in these three respects, while adding a confused narrative as a fourth issue.
Luckily I was warned by the demo, and combined by the fact that I merely liked, not loved, DA:O, I was able to wait until it ended up in the bargain bin. And then it STILL got me angry. It made me feel as if a studio I respected followed a flawed but promising first game by a poorly conceived and executed sequel. The only thing that might make me angrier would be if Bethesda botched Elder Scrolls VI, or CDProjekt The Witcher III.
Man, when I read about Kirkwall this and that, I had, for a very short time, a vision of murderous city-state intrigues and a place rich in local colour, a mix of Gent, Venice, Lubeck, Carthage and Lankhmar all thrown in one. Instead I got a feeble attempt at a Stalinist Gothic fantasy gulag.
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:lol:
