509 réponses à ce sujet

[ShadowLordXII]

I like the game, i really do.

 

I can understand why some people didn't like it aswell.

 

But i wouldn't blame EA for everything that was changed. Sure for Westwood feel free to flame EA but that's out of topic

 

To be fair I don't think EA holds blame for over the top characters and simplified story for example. I don't think EA sent someone to write the game and bypassed Bioware "hierarchy".

 

I don't think EA designed Isabela(Who i find funny and interesting... Though i'm pretty sure she shouldn't have to show her underwear all the time and it wasn't needed for her to try to choke us on with her hmm "assets". She was already interesting in DA:O, a "make up" would be enough.)

 

I don't think EA made "mage vs templar" a focal point.(It was well done in first game, took 10% or 20% of whole game, interesting, Fade was nice at first time too... In DA 2 it was all about this powermongers war.)

 

I wouldn't blame EA for lack of "companion armor customisation", it is a simple piece of code people. Check Nexus there are mods to make it happen, a simple but "ignored" process. I'm pretty sure if a modder(Probably works or studies in a different branch but coded in his/her free time) can do it, for Bioware it was piece of cake.

 

Stuff like recycled enviroments, possible bugs, events not triggering correctly, pricing, anything about distribution etc might be EA's fault. Actually EA's so called "strict" deadline's fault, not the CEO himself

 

Sure it is easier to blame distributor for everything but it simply doesn't make sense. Should we feel grateful to EA for Origins or ME series for example? No because 90+ % of it was Bioware's work. So why blame them if things went south?

 

TLDR: I'd say most of problems lies on Bioware's shoulders but EA also isn't too innocent. Though i love the game as it is so i don't mind anyway.

 

People blame EA because it's clear that EA pulled the same nonsense that they've pulled before. (Origin Studios and the last two Ultima games being prime examples)

 

It's clear that DA2 was rushed out the door for a quick buck as it only had a max of a year and a half in development and a minimum of eight months. That's laughably scant compared to how long Bioware usually develops their games in the course of 2 to 4 years.

[The Old Guy]

I have recently started replaying DA2 and I found out I enjoy it immensely. Again.

 

Yes, it has reused sceneries.

Yes, it has ugly and reused characters, faces, etc.

Yes, the male Hawke sounds a little awkward.

 

But.... is this what people really whine about?

 

Well, let me tell you how cheap this whining is and why.

 

1. I will list the "All That Remains" quest on the first spot, because, man... It takes a lot of balls to write that sad quest mid-game and leave the players with a bitter taste in their mouths...  First time I was like: Really? They killed my mother? Damn it... I actually walked off for a while, until I feel better enough to continue to play.The scene where Hawke watches as her reanimated mother dies  in her arms and tells her how much is she proud of her, is grand. Hands down. They kill your mother, FFS... Tell me again how bad the story-telling in this game is.

2. Anders - the tragic brain-damaged psychopath, who constantly struggles with his spirit - Justice. And you get to watch how he slowly loses the battle with it. Like many of us do. It's a measurement of one's strength whether he can overcome his inner demons or not... Anders is an amazing metaphor. That's why we love to hate him. How is this a poor character design, since pretty much everyone in this forum talks about him?

3. Isabela, who you must kill outright or hand her over to the Qunari, because she is responsible for everything they do to Kirkwall. But many of us choose to protect her, nevertheless. So, we become responsible for this as well...

4. Varric, who asks his brother "Where is your nobility, where is your honor?", when he witnesses what Bartrand has done with his servants... His struggle between his love towards his brother and the right thing to do...

5. Viscount Dumar and his son's tragic deaths... Especially the Viscount... Probably the only person in this mess, possessing some principles and integrity.

6. The Arishok, who you feel is right, but nevertheless you have to fight and kill, because his principles, no matter how "right" they are, could cost thousands of lives...

 

Ok, enough with the characters...

 

7. The choice you have to make to stand with the Templars, who hunt down and torture your brethren or the mages, who are your brethren, but who slowly turn into the very monsters, who are feared by anyone? Do you really have a "good" choice?

8. I spend more time playing with my companions' tactics than to play the game. It's a game within the game. And it's a genius module. Just for that module only, I would give DA2 10/10. It makes you spend time and think about strategies, so you can then watch your battles like epic cinematics. And still.... Anders dies often. Because he is an idiot.

9. Nightmare Difficulty - 90% of the battles in that difficulty put your abilities and tactics to the real test. Sometimes it's really a matter of survival and all hangs by a thread... Poor game design? I don't think so. Yes, eventually you learn the optimal build and items you have to use, in order to win the battles, but the game actually MAKES YOU SPEND TIME TO LEARN AND PRACTICE, because otherwise your get slaughtered...

All your companions die horrible death, impaled by the Arishok and you don't have any means to revive them. What do you do? What do you do?

Especially when you can die 10 times in a row before you meet Flemeth for the first time. Yes, I'm talking about the battle before the ogre at the VERY START OF THE FREAKIN' GAME...

10. Maker's Sigh - Yes, the Black Emporium is the second place I spend more time than running quests. You can try thousands of thousand varieties to build your toon and your companions, in order to have the most optimal one for the next battle. I cannot count how many times have I transformed my mage from Spirit Healer to Blood Mage, To Force Mage, to combinations, etc... 

 

I could go on and on about the really good stuff in this game, which is well worth the money you pay for it, but I think I will stop here.

My post became quite big, sorry for that and thanks for the time you would spend to read it.

[Inkvisiittori]

1. I will list the "All That Remains" quest on the first spot, because, man... It takes a lot of balls to write that sad quest mid-game and leave the players with a bitter taste in their mouths...  First time I was like: Really? They killed my mother? Damn it... I actually walked off for a while, until I feel better enough to continue to play.The scene where Hawke watches as her reanimated mother dies  in her arms and tells her how much is she proud of her, is grand. Hands down. They kill your mother, FFS... Tell me again how bad the story-telling in this game is.

 

I never cared about Hawke's mother, she rather annoyed me in fact, so watching her die had zero impact. 

 

I personally prefer having a character who's backround is left vague and has no forced family members, because I like to create my own backround for my characters. That said I still think it was interesting thing they tried with Hawke. Not all that many video games focus on your characters family or deal with the family drama. Having siblings - Bethany and Carver - was interesting experiment. I actually liked those characters and how much your choices affected them. So it was not all bad, but I do prefer the approach they took in DAI. Still in the future I wouldn't be opposed to having characters like Bethany/Carver. Perhaps like depending on which race you choose (elf/qunari/dwarf/human) you'd get a different starting companion. It doesn't need to be a family member, but maybe rather an old friend or something like that. Or a pet! Inquisition had no pets for some reason. So if you're a human you'd get a good ol' mabari, if you're an elf you'd get a wolf (like the Emerald Knights had), if you're an dwarf you'd get a... battlenug?

[Conleth1173xt]

People's DAO and DAII opinions are at full throttle on here, OMG!

[GoldenGail3]

I never cared about Hawke's mother, she rather annoyed me in fact, so watching her die had zero impact. 
 

Same here - why didn't Hawkes mum worked for money? She complained about having no money, why didn't she work for it herself?

[Iakus]

Well, this is an old thread, but sure I'll contribute.

 

First off, I want to say that DA2 is not, imo a bad game.  I will even admit it does a couple of things better than DAO.  But DAO is still by far the better game.  And it is to me, probably the last "truly great" game that Bioware has made.

 

Now what things does DA2 get dinged for?

 

1) Reused maps.  Not by itself a mortal sin, but they DIDN'T EVEN REMOVE THE DOORWAYS!  They just blocked them off

 

2) Elven features so exaggerated they looked like Night Elves from WoW.  Bonus points for vanishing shoes.  Are elves descended from hobbits now?

 

3) More pew-pew combat.  It got really sped up and everyone it seems got magic powers.  Rogues are no longer sneaky guys with knives, now they're TELEPORTING NINJA DEATH-DEALERS OF AWESOMENESS!!!!  Everyone was a superhero.  But in DA2's defense, at least they didn't artificially limit the abilities we had available at a given time, and had a talent tree that was, imo, better than DAO. 

 

4) A "Rise to Power" that wasn't.  Hawke remained an errand boy for pretty much the entire game, from penniless refugee to Champion of Kirkwall.  there was no sense of a change in station, or responsibilities.  This is most notable with the Bone Pit, a business Hawke has a stake in.  but you don't really do anything to help run it, you just clear out the monsters that periodically decide to settle in it and snack on the workers.

 

5)  Nothing matters:  Hawke is a spectator in his or her own life.  Almost a decade passes in Kirkwall, and aside from scripted events, what impact does the Champion have?  Hawke could have eared a fortune, buy the manor for Leandra, and leave Kirkwall to go off adventuring around Thedas and little of note would have changed.  Certainly not after Act 2.

[Natureguy85]

Well, this is an old thread, but sure I'll contribute.

 

First off, I want to say that DA2 is not, imo a bad game.  I will even admit it does a couple of things better than DAO.  But DAO is still by far the better game.  And it is to me, probably the last "truly great" game that Bioware has made.

 

Now what things does DA2 get dinged for?

 

1) Reused maps.  Not by itself a mortal sin, but they DIDN'T EVEN REMOVE THE DOORWAYS!  They just blocked them off

 

2) Elven features so exaggerated they looked like Night Elves from WoW.  Bonus points for vanishing shoes.  Are elves descended from hobbits now?

 

3) More pew-pew combat.  It got really sped up and everyone it seems got magic powers.  Rogues are no longer sneaky guys with knives, now they're TELEPORTING NINJA DEATH-DEALERS OF AWESOMENESS!!!!  Everyone was a superhero.  But in DA2's defense, at least they didn't artificially limit the abilities we had available at a given time, and had a talent tree that was, imo, better than DAO. 

 

4) A "Rise to Power" that wasn't.  Hawke remained an errand boy for pretty much the entire game, from penniless refugee to Champion of Kirkwall.  there was no sense of a change in station, or responsibilities.  This is most notable with the Bone Pit, a business Hawke has a stake in.  but you don't really do anything to help run it, you just clear out the monsters that periodically decide to settle in it and snack on the workers.

 

5)  Nothing matters:  Hawke is a spectator in his or her own life.  Almost a decade passes in Kirkwall, and aside from scripted events, what impact does the Champion have?  Hawke could have eared a fortune, buy the manor for Leandra, and leave Kirkwall to go off adventuring around Thedas and little of note would have changed.  Certainly not after Act 2.

 

This is pretty much what I've said. The reused maps were annoying but not a huge deal. The elves looked freakish, though I thought it was a clever joke by the developers that you can flirt with one elf that actually looks decent, only for her to say she doesn't like humans. I thought DA:O's combat needed some speeding up but I love how visceral it was and how special abilites like shield bash or stone fist seemed to have real weight.

 

4 and 5 are the big ones. A big culprit is the time skips. You don't see or play Hawke as they

 

A) Establish their foothold in Kirkwall and make a name for him/herself.

Move up in society

C) Enjoy the "honeymoon" period as Champion.

 

Nothing comes from that title other than Meridith and Orsino both wanting your support, but Hawke never impacts events. To be fair, this type of story can work, but it sucks for a game where the player is controlling the character and IS the protagonist rather than a passive viewer.

[huyre]

I did enjoy DA 2. But I did miss some things;

 

1) Party banter
The repeat of the same banter in a short amount of time and sometimes the absence of it. Like the "you're in love" comment of Merrill I only triggered when I had only her and Fenris in party. So I suspect I missed out on a fair amount of banter because I had three companions in party, not two.

 

2) Chatting with companions

This I missed a lot. In DA:O it felt like I could chat whenever I wanted with my companions and had an semi-unlimited amount of subjects I could talk about. There were of course some restrictions to it and some of it was only available after certain events or when a approval rating was high enough. But I felt like I connected with them. In DA 2 I did not feel that much of a connection; every chat I could have with a companion was scripted. Even worse, only available through quests. You want to hang out with Varric, asking him about stories he had to tell like you did with Zevran? Nope. You can only talk to him if you get an companion quest. And only dialogue related to that particular quest.

 

3) Not helping companions makes no difference
You can refuse to give Merrill the tool, but the events will still happen with the same outcome. I can see how in Anders’ case it wouldn’t make much difference; he might be able to find help somewhere else, find an alternative, etc. But with Merrill I find it harder to see how she could do so without that specific tool. In any case, I would have liked it if the outcome would change if you did not aid your companions. Like in DA:O; if no one slept with Morrigan, she would not somehow get pregnant by a Warden anyway. So in DA 2 I would have liked to see that as well; helping or not changes something. Different or somewhat even similar result (as example, the Chantry would still be blown up, but would lack the punch to damage and kill everyone or miss the main target, Elthina).

 

4) Blood mages and abominations everywhere
I understand mages became desperate, but it felt that just about every mage I came across would give in to blood magic and/or demons. Even Orsino did. Even Hawke could choose the blood mage specialization. It just gave the impression that sooner or later, every mage would lose it. I wish they showed a bit more nuanced view, that there would be mages who were not companions, who would speak out against it or show they were tempted but did not give in (so not just reformed blood mages). Or that blood magic could still be used without the mage being unhinged.

 

5) The conflict between Meredith and Orsino
I thought Act 3 was pretty short for a showdown. I would have liked more of a build up to the final confrontation. I hardly knew Meredith and Orsino and I would've liked to have interacted with them more and seen more of their power play and the consequences. I would have also liked to see more of the people supporting each party and those who were against and supportive of Elthina. Maybe even give a few options early on to Hawke to change the end story; choosing to interfere with one of the three in two different ways or let things build up until the final confrontation between Meredith and Orsino. I would have liked to be able to shape different endings based on the (in)action of Hawke & Co.

[Elhanan]

^ Point # 4 is explained in the Codex entries here; possibly others, too:

http://dragonage.wik...gma_of_Kirkwall

[Huntress]

There are few things that really gets annoying in DA2 is the truth, BUT for me the worst thing that happened was the death of dual wield warriors. No i can't get over it.

 

Thanks goodness I enjoy playing mage-hawke  in DA2. And She rules!