934 réponses à ce sujet

[vbibbi]

Didn't we have a bunch of chatter about this on these boards back then? Nobody knew how races -- or maybe ethnicites --were supposed to work in Thedas.

I have no doubt there were conversations about ethnicity multiple times in the past, during DAO and DAI's releases. I haven't been a part of them, so can't comment on the content of those conversations.

 

I'm not certain what you mean by no one knew how ethnicity is supposed to work in Thedas. To my knowledge, most of the darker skin tones in humans come originally from some islands north of Par Vollen, and those people then migrated to Rivain. So I don't think it's unreasonable to say that most humans with darker skin have Rivaini ancestry, even if their ancestors emigrated to other countries some time ago.

 

I posted earlier that Bio probably should have put more thought into this when developing DAO; they could very easily say that with the Qunari invasions, many Rivaini emigrated south to escape the conflict. That was a few centuries ago, so plenty of time for diversity in ethnicity to spread across Fereldan and Orlais. This way, people wouldn't complain that there is no rationale behind why a medieval-styled setting has modern racial diversity. But as I said, it's too late now, so it's a moot point.

[MrCrabby]

 

I'm too lazy to look for pics but I'm fairly certain Cullen has been redsigned twice, both for DA2 (because of new art style) and then for DAI where he became a major character.

 

 

 

I think that choice was made after DAO itself, before even Awakening was out. In fact I remember from Brent Knowles' blog post after he left the series and the studio, that the reason he left was them taking the series into a direction he disagreed with and didn't want to be a part of.

Why they made that choice is anyone's guess. Piecing together tidbits from interviews and articles I've read over the years, I think they did it because it was unfeasible to make another game with the scope of DAO and because they wanted to target a wider audience and draw in some of the younger crowd. I mean it was 2009 and the development cycle had been around what...4-5 years? So maybe the game had been considered 'with the times' at its inception during '04-'05, but in 2010 someone decided that it was time to shake things up....

So here we are, for better or for worse. And like Dagna says about the HoF, it was a dark time, there was one light and that was Dragon Age Origins.

 

 

 

When every game has to sell five million+ copies you have to cast a wide net. This means making a game mish-mashed with just a little of what everyone likes. In that end you wind up making a game no one loves.

[AnUnculturedLittlePotato]

People need to temper their expectations. There is only so much they can do. Can't please everybody. Like... some people want every single choice/decision they make to have lasting, tangible consequences... as if it's real life. It's a game, ppl. Understand that. Be reasonable.

Also, most people who are content or satisfied with something generally just enjoy it and move on. Forums and comment sections are always filled with complainers, but they don't make up the majority. They're just really loud and really passionate.

They may not be a majority but their not the small group you claim they are.

And it's irrelevant either way. Unless their new IP is secretly a revived Jade empire in which case sound the air horns >.>'''

Honestly just ignore the forums. That goes for you and bioware. Everyone's gonna get angry no matter what they do so there's no point trying to make this "fandom" happy. You may as well please a slug.

[Draninus]

I initially enjoyed the game. It was fun getting to return to some familiar locales from DA:O and the game is visually well-done. However, the further I progressed, the less I enjoyed it. The overall story for me ended up being exceptionally disappointing. There is way too much filler in this game. The game ultimately ended up feeling like a shiny, empty, incomplete cash grab, which really shouldn't surprise me, considering Bioware's EA Overlords are the ones pulling the strings. I don't have a ton of hope for the franchise or Bioware in general moving forward.

 

The likelihood of me continuing on with this series is very slim. The only thing that keeps me occasionally coming back to these forums is my fondness for DA:O, as well as many of Bioware's earlier titles (KOTOR is a great example).

[cindercatz]

But what does that mean, the scope of DAO? DAI is larger (if shallower). And how long was DAI's development cycle?

 

I really am surprised at how much Bio seems to be distancing itself from DAO. DA2 I can understand, even though I like the game. But when Darrah sees the third game in a series as the perfect time to change direction and "find an identity" for the franchise. Why veer away from the successful game which began the series and brought the name recognition to consumers? DAI feels less like they've found a true identity and more like they're streamlining everything and trying to copy other successful companies in game design. DAI feels very different from DAO (and DA2), so if this is the direction the games are going, DAO was a fluke?

 

/rant at Bioware

Yeah, that has blown my mind since DA2 launched. Why distance yourself from one of the most creatively successful games of the generation and a strong financially successful original IP? I'll never get that. There are things they've definitely improved on, but why also kneecap it by excising or undermining things that are staples of why people loved your game in the first place? 

 

On the other hand, I have some hope now they might finally get past that thinking, at least in terms of the game design. Trespasser is the most lauded thing released for it as far as I can see, and it's the closest thing yet to a DA:O 2. Probably has something to do with the reception. Not everything is better in the original, but the core gameplay, general design (levels, encounters, combat and programmable tactics, scaling, ai, etc), pacing, all of that was. And that's where Trespasser took a lot more from DA:O than anything since.

[Hydwn]

I was one of the rare folk who loved it from the beginning, and have the posts here on the BSN to prove it

 

(Getting to this thread late - after 5 playthroughs and a platinum trophy I've seen this game in and out, and I'm largely out of the fandom until I hear DA5 announced.)

 

Others have dissected the fan reactions here.  I do have to note that about a month before DAI came out, fan judgments out of the gate on DA2 suddenly became a lot more friendly.  See up until the release of DAI, DA2 was the evil game, the proof that BioWare had jumped the shark.  I had liked that game too, and was defending it.  Then just before DAI came out, there was an explosion of threads on the BSN about how DA2 was a good game and unfairly maligned.  It was like folk were saving up their bile and rage for the next entry in the series.

 

I've seen this dynamic before in the Final Fantasy fandom.  I'm old enough to remember that Final Fantasy 7 was widely considered by fans to be jumping the shark because of the extreme genre shift.  It's now considered one of the greatest video games ever made, but every sequel has been terrible and a disaster...until its sequel comes out and rehabilitates it.

 

I think it's something about internet culture.  People seem almost afraid to admit they like something.  Is it a fear of hoping something will be good, and being disappointed?  Is it because bad reviews are more entertaining and focus attention more on the reviewer and their entertaining takedown of a game, rather than on the game itself?  There has to be a reason why no one watches shows with names like "Friendly Joe" and "The Pleasant Video Game Nerd."

 

Still there was something specific to this game itself, though - a hatred right out of the gate.  Massive numbers of people were giving it a flat 0 on Metacritic within minutes of its release, and I'm sorry but even "Ride to Hell" and "Big Rig" and "E.T." didn't get flat zeros from critics when they were released.  There was a concerted trolling campaign to bring down this game, including a lot of people on this board with only a few posts to their names and long and vicious screeds about the game and how it was the worst ever.

 

Why?  Probably multiple reasons, but one I notice is that while BioWare has a lot of devoted fans, but it's also had a significant hate-base that does not like the progressive attitudes in its games.  Gay characters, trans characters, strong female characters tend to attract hatred, and it's something as a gay gamer I really, really notice.  There were a few nasty posts on the subject here, thankfully shut down, but on the larger internet it was worse.  They weren't even allowed to sell the game in India because of Dorian and the other gay-positive material that they refused to censor.

It's part of the reason I react so badly to the calls to make the game more like the Witcher 3.  I've watched the Witcher 3 being played, and I'm sure it's not a bad game but I've seen nothing in it that makes me want to pull away from Dragon Age 3.  It's a good enough game, shiny enough graphics for this generation, and a pretty bog-standard fantasy story that seems to hit most of the clichés like stations of the cross.  I suspect the love of it has to do at least partly with Gerralt, a husky action-hero voice, multiple (exclusively female) partners, and magical anti-pregnancy and anti-STD powers and who is very absolutely straight and male.  No temptation whatever to romance a Dorian character, or even to have that possibility raised - there's none to romance.

 

There was a hatred for DA3 before anyone could honestly say they had tried it.  Something big motivated that hate, and it could not have been the game itself so early on.  Not that people can't like a game, or like another instalment better - after the initial hatred here, people made good and informed cases for DAO or DA2 being superior - but the rage was so absolute, so sudden, and so extreme that it did not feel like a reaction to elements in the game so much as to something the game represented.

As for the bugs, there were almost none on the PS4 that I played on.  The PCers got the worst of those, and had a legitimate right to complain out of the gate, which gave me a bit of Shadenfreude.  Now you all know what it was like to play Awakening on the PS3, with no mods or patches in sight - and they never fixed that

[Darkly Tranquil]

There was a hatred for DA3 before anyone could honestly say they had tried it.  Something big motivated that hate, and it could not have been the game itself so early on.  Not that people can't like a game, or like another instalment better - after the initial hatred here, people made good and informed cases for DAO or DA2 being superior - but the rage was so absolute, so sudden, and so extreme that it did not feel like a reaction to elements in the game so much as to something the game represented.

While I'm sure there is an element of homophobia or dislike of Bioware's "progressive" tendencies, I think you're not allowing sufficiently for the irritation caused by the big changes in core design elements. DAI managed to make me viscerally hate it within about ten minutes of starting just by experiencing what they had done to the combat. I cursed and growled and ragequite multiple times and it took me four months to finish the game the first time because I couldn't stand it for more than about 30 minutes at a time (but I was determined to finish it since I'm a diehard fan of the DA story). If I had posted a score on Metacritic on day one when I was furiously mad, I would have rated it 3/10 for the nice graphics and nothing else. While I eventually came to terms with the combat, I can't say I ever liked it, so my dislike and my issues with DAI relate entirely to the design of the combat and control elements, and nothing to do with the story or characters (which I thought were fine, but not outstanding).

[Qis]

While I'm sure there is an element of homophobia or dislike of Bioware's "progressive" tendencies, I think you're not allowing sufficiently for the irritation caused by the big changes in core design elements. DAI managed to make me viscerally hate it within about ten minutes of starting just by experiencing what they had done to the combat. I cursed and growled and ragequite multiple times and it took me four months to finish the game the first time because I couldn't stand it for more than about 30 minutes at a time (but I was determined to finish it since I'm a diehard fan of the DA story). If I had posted a score on Metacritic on day one when I was furiously mad, I would have rated it 3/10 for the nice graphics and nothing else. While I eventually came to terms with the combat, I can't say I ever liked it, so my dislike and my issues with DAI relate entirely to the design of the combat and control elements, and nothing to do with the story or characters (which I thought were fine, but not outstanding).

 

Do not like homosexuality doesn't mean homophobia...in this case a player/person who do not like homosexuality being imposed or overly done in this fancise doesn't make the player/person is a homophobic. Personally, i don't like that term being used against anyone who criticized or complaint or even comment about homosexuals/homosexualism. The same with Islamophobia, just because someone don't like Islam and/or Muslim doesn't make that someone is Islamophobic. Someone who attack/assault/discriminate/oppress a Muslim or group of Muslims because of hate against Islam or Muslim can be called Islamophobic person. So the same here, disliking homosexuals/homosexualism doesn't mean homophobic, attacking/asault/discriminate/oppress a person or a group of homosexuals because of hatred toward homosexuals/homosexualism is homophobic action.

 

Do not use terminology loosely,

[Hydwn]

While I'm sure there is an element of homophobia or dislike of Bioware's "progressive" tendencies, I think you're not allowing sufficiently for the irritation caused by the big changes in core design elements. DAI managed to make me viscerally hate it within about ten minutes of starting just by experiencing what they had done to the combat. I cursed and growled and ragequite multiple times and it took me four months to finish the game the first time because I couldn't stand it for more than about 30 minutes at a time (but I was determined to finish it since I'm a diehard fan of the DA story). If I had posted a score on Metacritic on day one when I was furiously mad, I would have rated it 3/10 for the nice graphics and nothing else. While I eventually came to terms with the combat, I can't say I ever liked it, so my dislike and my issues with DAI relate entirely to the design of the combat and control elements, and nothing to do with the story or characters (which I thought were fine, but not outstanding).

 

That's all valid - I honestly did not find it all that different from DA2, and I liked what they had changed.  I get the impression that PC combat is wildly different from console combat for this - most of my fellow console players had a much better experience.

 

What I was trying to account for there was the multiple 0s out of 10.  Some of them were showing up within minutes of the official release, and while some people did have early access, the sheer number of disastrous ratings on Metacritic mean this game hovers at a 5.8 user score with an 8.5 critic score.  I don't know about you, but to me "0 out of 10" means "worse than E.T" and "worse than "Big Rigs," which got more than a 3 on Metacritic.  

[vbibbi]

I was one of the rare folk who loved it from the beginning, and have the posts here on the BSN to prove it

 

(Getting to this thread late - after 5 playthroughs and a platinum trophy I've seen this game in and out, and I'm largely out of the fandom until I hear DA5 announced.)

 

Others have dissected the fan reactions here.  I do have to note that about a month before DAI came out, fan judgments out of the gate on DA2 suddenly became a lot more friendly.  See up until the release of DAI, DA2 was the evil game, the proof that BioWare had jumped the shark.  I had liked that game too, and was defending it.  Then just before DAI came out, there was an explosion of threads on the BSN about how DA2 was a good game and unfairly maligned.  It was like folk were saving up their bile and rage for the next entry in the series.

 

I've seen this dynamic before in the Final Fantasy fandom.  I'm old enough to remember that Final Fantasy 7 was widely considered by fans to be jumping the shark because of the extreme genre shift.  It's now considered one of the greatest video games ever made, but every sequel has been terrible and a disaster...until its sequel comes out and rehabilitates it.

 

I think it's something about internet culture.  People seem almost afraid to admit they like something.  Is it a fear of hoping something will be good, and being disappointed?  Is it because bad reviews are more entertaining and focus attention more on the reviewer and their entertaining takedown of a game, rather than on the game itself?  There has to be a reason why no one watches shows with names like "Friendly Joe" and "The Pleasant Video Game Nerd."

 

Still there was something specific to this game itself, though - a hatred right out of the gate.  Massive numbers of people were giving it a flat 0 on Metacritic within minutes of its release, and I'm sorry but even "Ride to Hell" and "Big Rig" and "E.T." didn't get flat zeros from critics when they were released.  There was a concerted trolling campaign to bring down this game, including a lot of people on this board with only a few posts to their names and long and vicious screeds about the game and how it was the worst ever.

 

Why?  Probably multiple reasons, but one I notice is that while BioWare has a lot of devoted fans, but it's also had a significant hate-base that does not like the progressive attitudes in its games.  Gay characters, trans characters, strong female characters tend to attract hatred, and it's something as a gay gamer I really, really notice.  There were a few nasty posts on the subject here, thankfully shut down, but on the larger internet it was worse.  They weren't even allowed to sell the game in India because of Dorian and the other gay-positive material that they refused to censor.

It's part of the reason I react so badly to the calls to make the game more like the Witcher 3.  I've watched the Witcher 3 being played, and I'm sure it's not a bad game but I've seen nothing in it that makes me want to pull away from Dragon Age 3.  It's a good enough game, shiny enough graphics for this generation, and a pretty bog-standard fantasy story that seems to hit most of the clichés like stations of the cross.  I suspect the love of it has to do at least partly with Gerralt, a husky action-hero voice, multiple (exclusively female) partners, and magical anti-pregnancy and anti-STD powers and who is very absolutely straight and male.  No temptation whatever to romance a Dorian character, or even to have that possibility raised - there's none to romance.

 

There was a hatred for DA3 before anyone could honestly say they had tried it.  Something big motivated that hate, and it could not have been the game itself so early on.  Not that people can't like a game, or like another instalment better - after the initial hatred here, people made good and informed cases for DAO or DA2 being superior - but the rage was so absolute, so sudden, and so extreme that it did not feel like a reaction to elements in the game so much as to something the game represented.

As for the bugs, there were almost none on the PS4 that I played on.  The PCers got the worst of those, and had a legitimate right to complain out of the gate, which gave me a bit of Shadenfreude.  Now you all know what it was like to play Awakening on the PS3, with no mods or patches in sight - and they never fixed that

I think you're cherrypicking on the reasons why people might not enjoy DAI. I am a gay gamer and would prefer that DAI had followed some of the gameplay of TW3. It has nothing to do with Geralt or the Inquisitor, or romance options. It's about DAI feeling lifeless and inconsequential, while TW3 has a vibrant world and more reactivity to it. Of course I'm glad that DAI has multiple romance options for different sexualities and find some of the sexual themes in TW3 distasteful. In that regard DAI is much better than TW3 for me. But it makes up for that in gameplay, world building, even character relationships (the relationship between Geralt and Ciri is great, most companions to the Inquisitor felt like coworkers instead of friends/lovers)

 

Do not like homosexuality doesn't mean homophobia...in this case a player/person who do not like homosexuality being imposed or overly done in this fancise doesn't make the player/person is a homophobic. Personally, i don't like that term being used against anyone who criticized or complaint or even comment about homosexuals/homosexualism. The same with Islamophobia, just because someone don't like Islam and/or Muslim doesn't make that someone is Islamophobic. Someone who attack/assault/discriminate/oppress a Muslim or group of Muslims because of hate against Islam or Muslim can be called Islamophobic person. So the same here, disliking homosexuals/homosexualism doesn't mean homophobic, attacking/asault/discriminate/oppress a person or a group of homosexuals because of hatred toward homosexuals/homosexualism is homophobic action.

 

Do not use terminology loosely,

homophobia
1.
unreasoning fear of or antipathy toward homosexuals and homosexuality.

 

homophobia doesn't just mean being afraid of homosexuals, it also means if a person doesn't like a homosexual person solely because they're homosexual. Same with Islamophobia. Now, if you dislike someone for reasons other than their sexuality or religion, not because of it, that's different.

 

When people complain about being labeled homophobic/whatever-phobic or a bigot, it always seems like they just don't want to be associated with that negative term. "Hey, I don't like gay people but don't call me homophobic! There's a difference! It's mainstream now that anyone labeled as homophobic is bad!"

[Hydwn]

I think you're cherrypicking on the reasons why people might not enjoy DAI. I am a gay gamer and would prefer that DAI had followed some of the gameplay of TW3. It has nothing to do with Geralt or the Inquisitor, or romance options. It's about DAI feeling lifeless and inconsequential, while TW3 has a vibrant world and more reactivity to it. Of course I'm glad that DAI has multiple romance options for different sexualities and find some of the sexual themes in TW3 distasteful. In that regard DAI is much better than TW3 for me. But it makes up for that in gameplay, world building, even character relationships (the relationship between Geralt and Ciri is great, most companions to the Inquisitor felt like coworkers instead of friends/lovers)

 

 

To each their own, of course.  I don't think the Witcher's gameplay is so universally loved, though I have only my boyfriend's swearing while playing to base that on

 

(He found the XP system confusing and the battles frustrating.  He liked the story better than I did, but while he got about halfway through he did quit leaving it unfinished.  He beat DAI before I did, though)

 

Watching the Witcher as a spectator, I was marking off fantasy clichés like bingo squares.  At least when DAO had you hunting rats, they hung a lampshade on it

 

Also, I found Gerralt so totally unlikeable that it coloured my perceptions of the rest of the story.  And while that might seem unfair, we are comparing the games relative merits.  DAI lets you define your protagonist - and perhaps suffers in worldbuilding because every choice made has to take into account different paths for race, gender, romance in a way the Witcher does not.  I think it's a good trade myself.

 

Still, we're comparing two different A-list games.  Neither is terrible, neither is a disaster.  So why does one have a 4-point gap between its critic score and its player score, and the other has a 27-point gap?  

 

I guess my question is, where are the players giving it a "0"?  Everyone in my circle of friends who played it adored it, though that's not a scientific sample obviously.  It seems to have sold well, though precise figures are hard to pin down, and BioWare said it was their bestselling title at launch.  The critics presumably got the same version the public got but - errors and PC gameplay issues aside - gave it an 85%.  

 

So who are these anonymous thousands giving it a "0"?  If the public is buying it, the critics are lauding it, and I know no one in real life with anything bad to say about it, the 5.8 player score on metacritic seems suspicious to say the least.  And if the post a few above mine is any indication, those who consider mentions of our mere existence as "imposed" on them by a character like Dorian have not gone away (though I've seen far worse than that post above in less-polite corners of the internet about DAI).

[Darkly Tranquil]

What I was trying to account for there was the multiple 0s out of 10.  Some of them were showing up within minutes of the official release, and while some people did have early access, the sheer number of disastrous ratings on Metacritic mean this game hovers at a 5.8 user score with an 8.5 critic score.  I don't know about you, but to me "0 out of 10" means "worse than E.T" and "worse than "Big Rigs," which got more than a 3 on Metacritic.

That's assuming people are being in any way objective and balanced in how they give ratings. I honestly don't think most people rate things to the level of detail that you are suggesting (giving comparative weighting to different games). I think most people rate each game in isolation based on how much they enjoyed it; a zero out of ten means they didn't enjoy it at all, not that it's equally bad as Road to Hell Retribution. Personally, I think they should ditch the 0-10 system and switch to a Good/Okay/Bad (essentially the three colours they already use, but without the numbers) system to get away from the ambiguity of what 0/10 is relative to 2/10 or 10/10.

As for the professional/user split, that's not that uncommon. Right now Fallout 4 (on PC) has a professional critic rating of 84 and a user rating of 5.8. A lot of high profile games get fairly generous review scores that don't (IMHO) give enough weight to a game's flaws, and it's only when the user reviews start to come in that things like bugs and choppy frame rates start to get mentioned. Now most major game IPs undoubtedly have their haters, but I just don't believe that Dragon Age, not being a particularly well know series (compared to Elder Scrolls, GTA, CoD, or Assassin's Creed), has that many more haters determined to downvote it to oblivion.

[Qis]

homophobia
1.
unreasoning fear of or antipathy toward homosexuals and homosexuality.

 

homophobia doesn't just mean being afraid of homosexuals, it also means if a person doesn't like a homosexual person solely because they're homosexual. Same with Islamophobia. Now, if you dislike someone for reasons other than their sexuality or religion, not because of it, that's different.

 

When people complain about being labeled homophobic/whatever-phobic or a bigot, it always seems like they just don't want to be associated with that negative term. "Hey, I don't like gay people but don't call me homophobic! There's a difference! It's mainstream now that anyone labeled as homophobic is bad!"

 

Alright, if you don't like cheese, solely because of cheese, then you are a cheesephobic?

[AlanC9]

Alright, if you don't like cheese, solely because of cheese, then you are a cheesephobic?

That depends. How do you feel about other people eating cheese? Are you upset when you're confronted by people eating cheese?

[vbibbi]

To each their own, of course.  I don't think the Witcher's gameplay is so universally loved, though I have only my boyfriend's swearing while playing to base that on

 

(He found the XP system confusing and the battles frustrating.  He liked the story better than I did, but while he got about halfway through he did quit leaving it unfinished.  He beat DAI before I did, though)

 

Watching the Witcher as a spectator, I was marking off fantasy clichés like bingo squares.  At least when DAO had you hunting rats, they hung a lampshade on it

 

Also, I found Gerralt so totally unlikeable that it coloured my perceptions of the rest of the story.  And while that might seem unfair, we are comparing the games relative merits.  DAI lets you define your protagonist - and perhaps suffers in worldbuilding because every choice made has to take into account different paths for race, gender, romance in a way the Witcher does not.  I think it's a good trade myself.

 

Still, we're comparing two different A-list games.  Neither is terrible, neither is a disaster.  So why does one have a 4-point gap between its critic score and its player score, and the other has a 27-point gap?  

 

I guess my question is, where are the players giving it a "0"?  Everyone in my circle of friends who played it adored it, though that's not a scientific sample obviously.  It seems to have sold well, though precise figures are hard to pin down, and BioWare said it was their bestselling title at launch.  The critics presumably got the same version the public got but - errors and PC gameplay issues aside - gave it an 85%.  

 

So who are these anonymous thousands giving it a "0"?  If the public is buying it, the critics are lauding it, and I know no one in real life with anything bad to say about it, the 5.8 player score on metacritic seems suspicious to say the least.  And if the post a few above mine is any indication, those who consider mentions of our mere existence as "imposed" on them by a character like Dorian have not gone away (though I've seen far worse than that post above in less-polite corners of the internet about DAI).

Well, I'm not big on tactical combat anyway, so I will usually play on easier difficulties. I'm more interested in the story than in making a difficult combat encounter for myself. I haven't played the other two Witcher games but I've heard that gameplay is drastically improved in TW3.

 

Reviews are always going to be taken with a grain of salt; generally if I'm looking through reviews for what I consider an honest impression, I start with the middle of the road reviews. People who give the worst or best scores tend to be biased and aren't actually giving objective feedback. That's why it's annoying when so many game sites consistently give 10/10 to big company games, and then later user reviews are nowhere near as high. Professional game reviewers have lost objectivity.

 

Another factor which could be affecting those scores is of expectations. I have not played the first two Witcher games, so I only picked up TW3 after hearing people rave about it. I'm only now reading the books, so I don't consider myself a "fan" of the Witcher series in any way. So I didn't really have any expectations on the game, just hoping it would be enjoyable. The previous games weren't available for PS users, as well. And the game does a fairly good job of not requiring strong familiarity with the books or the previous games.

 

I have played all previous DA games, the ME trilogy, BG and BG2, Jade Empire. I really enjoyed both DAO and DA2, recognizing flaws but enjoying them. And then when I played DAI, I was expecting a lot from the game. It does have its good points, but it feels very different from the two games and what I was hoping to continue the story of Thedas. And DAI does not seem as self contained as it should be; it relies too much on other DA media to fill in some of its blanks. I think players who haven't read the books or comics or played the previous games won't have as fulfilling experience as those who have.

 

 

I do think that although there are fantasy cliches and stereotypes in both DA and TW3, TW3 does make an effort to subvert the cliches. I know this is based on the source material, as I'm reading the books now and see how the author's work has had direct impact into the game. And sometimes the subversion becomes identical: villager wants us to kill a monster. Surprise! the monster has been wronged by the villager, things aren't as simple as they seem! But the game does try and portray morality and characters as more gray, where Bioware's standard is the paragon-renegade continuum, and 95% of the time, the paragon option turns out to be the "right" one.

[AlanC9]

Bio probably used up their subversion quotient with DA2.

[Qis]

That depends. How do you feel about other people eating cheese? Are you upset when you're confronted by people eating cheese?

 

If upset when confronted by people eating cheese, then you're a cheesephobic?

 

I am upset seeing other people enjoying DA:I, that makes me DA:Iphobic and i should be shun upon as bigot and all my rights being taken away and being subject of persecution?

[vbibbi]

If upset when confronted by people eating cheese, then you're a cheesephobic?

 

I am upset seeing other people enjoying DA:I, that makes me DA:Iphobic and i should be shun upon as bigot and all my rights being taken away and being subject of persecution?

Ah, so it's really that if homosexuals aren't marginalized, you will be instead. Because granting the same rights that heterosexuals have had their entire lives to homosexuals means we're actually going to take rights away from others.

[AlanC9]

If upset when confronted by people eating cheese, then you're a cheesephobic?

Sure. As long as they're not cramming the cheese down your throat, it's irrational for you to be upset by their preference for cheese. "Phobia" is not precisely the right word for the emotional state, perhaps, but it does convey the irrationality.

As for the rest, I don't see how it's possible for anyone to take your rights away over you being upset that other people like DA:I, and I'm pretty sure trying to persecute you would be a blatant TOS violation. Shunning... yeah, that's a possibility, depending on how obnoxious you're planning to be.

Given your posting style, I'm not sure that would be a bad outcome for you. You haven't struck me as being particularly concerned with people agreeing with you or liking you.

Edit: I'm sticking with the metaphors rather than going after the underlying issue. Wouldn't want to see Qis stumble into a ban again.

[Ferretinabun]

Opinions were high on this game for one reason only - it was the continuation of a series which was very popular. That's a pretty damned position from the start.

 

A standalone game will always be judged on its own merits. A sequel will always be judged on whether it was the sort of successor the original game should have had. And there are simply too many opinions on that. For everyone who wanted a re-skinned DA:O, there were three more who wanted half-DA:O, half-something else. And with different idea on what that 'something else' should be.

 

Unless you can top the original game(s) in every way, people will always look at it and say 'could have done better'.

[Andraste_Reborn]

If upset when confronted by people eating cheese, then you're a cheesephobic?

 

If the mere existence of people who enjoy eating cheese with other consenting adults upsets you, then yes, I would say so. As long as nobody is making you eat cheese, what possible reason is there to care about other people doing so?

[AnUnculturedLittlePotato]

I think you're cherrypicking on the reasons why people might not enjoy DAI. I am a gay gamer and would prefer that DAI had followed some of the gameplay of TW3. It has nothing to do with Geralt or the Inquisitor, or romance options. It's about DAI feeling lifeless and inconsequential, while TW3 has a vibrant world and more reactivity to it. Of course I'm glad that DAI has multiple romance options for different sexualities and find some of the sexual themes in TW3 distasteful. In that regard DAI is much better than TW3 for me. But it makes up for that in gameplay, world building, even character relationships (the relationship between Geralt and Ciri is great, most companions to the Inquisitor felt like coworkers instead of friends/lovers)

 

I honestly would rather have has just the straight options >.> The gay ones were legitimately insulting <.<

[AlanC9]

I honestly would rather have has just the straight options >.> The gay ones were legitimately insulting <.<

I'll bite. Why were they insulting?

[AnUnculturedLittlePotato]

I'll bite. Why were they insulting?

Dorian was a bland token minority, bull was obsessed with sex. I don't think he had much banter that wasn't sex or killing.

To be honest I'm not too sure what's different between bull and zev but something is. >.>

[ShadyKat]

Thought the game was pretty mediocre. There was just way too much filler and fetch quests. The world also seemed lifeless. Yes it was huge, but huge spaces full of nothing just isn't fun.