328 réponses à ce sujet

[CronoDragoon]

Family Never meant to be a family, just there to be killed off: NO

 

I don't agree with this. I think they did a good job with Hawke's family.

[Personette]

+1 to the OP. 

 

I'd love to see a DA:II style game, at least in terms of having a really tightly plotted, zoomed-in story. A protagonist with a distinctive personality. An intimate setting but rocked by major events & with a greater impact on the world at large. A ragtag band of companions, all with very distinct and clashing goals. 

 

On the other hand, DA:II felt too grim to me, on the whole--it's a dark game & especially on replay can feel really discouraging or hopeless--you know what's going to happen, you can't change anything, everything's going to go wrong. And, yeah, visually it was dull as dirt. 

[Nette]

I don't see why they shouldn't. I liked the more personal, character centric story of Hawke. But they need to give it the proper development time. DA2 had obvious flaws that could have easily been avoided with more time.

[Aaleel]

I don't agree with this. I think they did a good job with Hawke's family.

 

How so?

 

One sibling was killed off before they said 10 lines of dialogue, and the other was possibly killed off in the deep roads, or taken while you were there if you left them behind.

 

You were in the city of your birth but how many quests revolved around your family?  You had numerous cutscenes with your dog and companions in your house, but how many times did you get cutscenes where you came home and talked to your mother, or your sister/brother.  This was supposed to be a personal story right?  Family dinners, any sisterly/brotherly talks at home about what's going on?  Anything at all.

 

Your brother was a Templar, could you go see him in the gallows?  Nope.  Your sister was in the circle, could you go visit her to see if she was being treated unfairly like the other Kirkwall Circle mages?  Nope.  Could you go into your mother's room, go through her things.  Take a ring or a locket, something to remember her memory?  Nope

 

Your chosen job before you even start the game determined which sibling died.  I honestly shouldn't have to say anything past that to show how badly the family component was handled.  

[Hiemoth]

+1 to the OP. 

 

I'd love to see a DA:II style game, at least in terms of having a really tightly plotted, zoomed-in story. A protagonist with a distinctive personality. An intimate setting but rocked by major events & with a greater impact on the world at large. A ragtag band of companions, all with very distinct and clashing goals. 

 

On the other hand, DA:II felt too grim to me, on the whole--it's a dark game & especially on replay can feel really discouraging or hopeless--you know what's going to happen, you can't change anything, everything's going to go wrong. And, yeah, visually it was dull as dirt. 

 

I don't necessarily agree on the visual aspect, I actually thought it was visually more distinct than DAO, but it did have a weird approach to it. Someone in the forums did actually a really great post about the architecture in the game and how a lot of the important buildings were incredibly detailed, but to really appreciate you had to play the game with the camera pointed at an upward, which is not necessarily the most intuitive way to design something. I've always found it really curious, as after it was pointed out, I suddenly found myself paying much more attention to the beauty of Kirkwall.

 

 

As for the DA2 being dark, I agree completely, even though it wasn't too dark for me personally. Something that perplexes me in discussions concerning DA2 is how often people miss that it is ultimately a tragedy and thus a very different beast than DAO and DAI. Thus while it is fair to say that one doesn't enjoy the game because it is dark, to me it always feels weird to critize it for not doing the traditional story as that was never its purpose to begin with. I will also add that it being a tragedy did actually make heroic Hawke even more heroic for me as that was someone who strove to do the right thing no matter how many times they were betrayed or how there simply weren't easy solutions. With the Inquisitor or the Warden, things kind of always just sort themselves to a point where they can be straight-forwardly solved and those options are clearly presented, with very little setbacks after the initial tragic motivation set. This isn't to claim they aren't heroic, but the story never truly tests that heroism similarly than it did with Hawke. Does that make any sense?

[Hiemoth]

How so?

 

One sibling was killed off before they said 10 lines of dialogue, and the other was possibly killed off in the deep roads, or taken while you were there if you left them behind.

 

You were in the city of your birth but how many quests revolved around your family?  You had numerous cutscenes with your dog and companions in your house, but how many times did you get cutscenes where you came home and talked to your mother, or your sister/brother.  This was supposed to be a personal story right?  Family dinners, any sisterly/brotherly talks at home about what's going on?  Anything at all.

 

Your brother was a Templar, could you go see him in the gallows?  Nope.  Your sister was in the circle, could you go visit her to see if she was being treated unfairly like the other Kirkwall Circle mages?  Nope.  

 

Your chosen job before you even start the game determined which sibling died.  I honestly shouldn't have to say anything past that to show how badly the family component was handled.  

 

Yet obviously you need to since people disagree with you. I felt the Hawke family was well done and felt a lot of the elements compelling. It isn't a universal truth for everybody, for example you feel differently, but neither is your apparent insistance that how badly it was done should be obvious for everyone.

 

Besides the death of the sibling was done pretty much as well as could have been in that situation. The story was built on the friction of having magic within Hawke family and how one sibling always felt the outsider because of it. For Bethany because she was the reason her family had to hide and for Carver being forced to hide because of his magical siblings. That narrative kind of goes away if you have two magical siblings or two non-magical siblings. Besides, are you saying that best solution would have been that Bioware just put a choice for the player to decide which sibling dies? Thus saboting their own story about things being beyond Hawke's control in literally first arc of the story?

[Aaleel]

Yet obviously you need to since people disagree with you. I felt the Hawke family was well done and felt a lot of the elements compelling. It isn't a universal truth for everybody, for example you feel differently, but neither is your apparent insistance that how badly it was done should be obvious for everyone.

 

Besides the death of the sibling was done pretty much as well as could have been in that situation. The story was built on the friction of having magic within Hawke family and how one sibling always felt the outsider because of it. For Bethany because she was the reason her family had to hide and for Carver being forced to hide because of his magical siblings. That narrative kind of goes away if you have two magical siblings or two non-magical siblings. Besides, are you saying that best solution would have been that Bioware just put a choice for the player to decide which sibling dies? Thus saboting their own story about things being beyond Hawke's control in literally first arc of the story?

 

The death of the sibling had nothing to do with the story.  Bioware apparently thought that players couldn't make parties work unless they were configured a certain way.  If the party doesn't have a mage it won't work, so therefore is the player picks a melee class we have to kill the warrior so the mage will be in the party.  What does this have to do with the story.

 

Both your siblings are potentially gone by the end of the first act.  When are all these feelings of being an outsider adding to the story.  They're not even there two of the three acts.  Then even if they survive you barely see them, and when they do show up it made no sense.

 

Bethany was a Grey Warden in my game.  The deep roads are days or weeks away.  But on two occasions the Qunari revolt and the ending she somehow by clairvoyance I guess knows to leave the deep roads at the right time to allow herself to arrive in Kirkwall just as all hell is breaking loose.  Really?  

 

I needed a map and a Grey Warden to find the deep roads.  But a rogue group of mages and templars finds the deep roads, sneaks up on the Grey Wardens and absconds with my sister, no Wardens in pursuit.  None of it made any sense whatsoever.

 

They were just there to be killed off.

[Gothfather]

Story wise yes Bioware should try to do a DA2 type game.

[Hiemoth]

The death of the sibling had nothing to do with the story.  Bioware apparently thought that players couldn't make parties work unless they were configured a certain way.  If the party doesn't have a mage it won't work, so therefore is the player picks a melee class we have to kill the warrior so the mage will be in the party.  What does this have to do with the story.

 

Both your siblings are potentially gone by the end of the first act.  When are all these feelings of being an outsider adding to the story.  They're not even there two of the three acts.  Then even if they survive you barely see them, and when they do show up it made no sense.

 

Bethany was a Grey Warden in my game.  The deep roads are days or weeks away.  But on two occasions the Qunari revolt and the ending she somehow by clairvoyance I guess knows to leave the deep roads at the right time to allow herself to arrive in Kirkwall just as all hell is breaking loose.  Really?  

 

I needed a map and a Grey Warden to find the deep roads.  But a rogue group of mages and templars finds the deep roads, sneaks up on the Grey Wardens and absconds with my sister, no Wardens in pursuit.  None of it made any sense whatsoever.

 

They were just there to be killed off.

 

Yeah, there was a party configuration and I am not completely certain why you are so dismissive to that issue, but there was also a story happening there. The dynamic between the remaining was constructed that one of them had magic and one of them did not. A lot of discussions and interactions in the first act reflects on this. If you didn't like that story element, I'm sorry you didn't enjoy the game, but it didn't magically make it completely unnecessary or a failure in storytelling.

 

As for when they show up, how does it not make it sense. The Grey Warden's didn't come to the Kirkwall because the Qunari were assaulting it, they just happened to be there when it happened and left to do to their own work, leaving Kirkwall to it's own luck. It was a chance encounter, which usually all encounters in scripted games are.

 

As for the rogue group of templars and mages, I have literally no idea what the hell you are talking about there. If you don't take Anders with you, the sibling dies in the Deep Roads. If you did not take them to the Deep Roads, they are not taken from the Grey Wardens.

 

As for the family being there to be killed off, I again struggle with your argument. I mean, yes, they die during the game? Showing how Hawke's each achievement is marred by losing someone or something dear to him/her? In a game that is ultimately a tragedy. What exactly is your point here? That they only have value for the story if they don't die?

[Aaleel]

Yeah, there was a party configuration and I am not completely certain why you are so dismissive to that issue, but there was also a story happening there. The dynamic between the remaining was constructed that one of them had magic and one of them did not. A lot of discussions and interactions in the first act reflects on this. If you didn't like that story element, I'm sorry you didn't enjoy the game, but it didn't magically make it completely unnecessary or a failure in storytelling.

 

As for when they show up, how does it not make it sense. The Grey Warden's didn't come to the Kirkwall because the Qunari were assaulting it, they just happened to be there when it happened and left to do to their own work, leaving Kirkwall to it's own luck. It was a chance encounter, which usually all encounters in scripted games are.

 

As for the rogue group of templars and mages, I have literally no idea what the hell you are talking about there. If you don't take Anders with you, the sibling dies in the Deep Roads. If you did not take them to the Deep Roads, they are not taken from the Grey Wardens.

 

As for the family being there to be killed off, I again struggle with your argument. I mean, yes, they die during the game? Showing how Hawke's each achievement is marred by losing someone or something dear to him/her? In a game that is ultimately a tragedy. What exactly is your point here? That they only have value for the story if they don't die?

 

That's my point, two times your sister just happens to be there when all hell is breaking loose.  It's not like Kirkwall was on the way to something.  They just happen to show up there.  They just fight one skirmish and then all of a sudden their mission is so important they can't stay.  

 

What I'm talking about with the templars and mages is after the Deep Roads mission after they become a Grey Warden.  The rogue group leaves Kirkwall and kidnaps your sibling while they're on duty in the Deep Roads.  Then you have to go rescue them.

 

And when I say they were just there to be killed off, I mean you didn't get enough dialogue or scenes with them for what was supposed to be a deep personal story.  If you had an everyday life in the city you should have been able to do everyday things with your family.  Get to know them, spend family time with them so it felt like a family.  Why would the player care about the sibling that died in the beginning hardly having spoken any words to them.  How hard would it have been to start the game in Lothering.  Have a scene where you have to hide Bethany from Templars or something, put that fear of losing her out there.

 

For example in the Cousland Origin, your mother tries to set you up so that you'll have someone and be happy.  To hang out with your sister in law and nephew and talk about dragons.  Your brother teases you about the girl he knows you're bringing back to your room that night.  Just normal everyday stuff that goes on in families.  Just because something is supposed to be a tragedy doesn't mean it always has to be bad, bad, and nothing but bad with your family.

 

Like I said in my first post, where were the scenes with your family when you came home?  You had so many with the dog and companions, but barely any with your family.  You're the champion of the city but you can't even check up on your sister in the circle, or see how things are going with your brother as a templar?  Seeing life in the circle or what templars face everyday would have made you feel closer to your sibling as well as maybe factored into your final decision.

 

There was tons more they could have done with your family from beginning to end. 

[Hiemoth]

The game actually explained why you couldn't visit your sister or brother, but whatever. Besides, I find it really weird to drag the Cousland origin in to this, as they are literally there to only die quickly in a gruesome manner. How that is considered ideal, yet DA2 is not is something I do not grasp, but then again, I don't need to. That is  a personal opionion and thus it needs to be accepted as such for the discussion.

 

The reason I continue to find the origin comparison confusing, though, is that you do get a lot of dialogue with the family members. Is it enough? That is always up to debate, but there are several scenes with the mother and if you take Bethany/Carver with you during Act 1, you get to hear a lot from them and they are far more established as not only characters, but also as siblings, than any of the family members in DAO. And while I would have preferred Leandra having her own quest or something in Act 2 to establish her better, I did also get a feeling of she was and what was her relationship with Hawke. And by the way, Leandra actually specifically speaks about setting up Hawke with someone during an Act 2 discussion.

 

As for the rogue templars/mages? Yeah, they go and kidnap Hawke's sibling intentionally because they are Hawke's sibling. I am again really confused what exactly the argument here? Did you think they just kidnapped some random Grey Warden who turned out to be Hawke's sibling.

 

Here's the thing. That last sentence you wrote about how there was tons more that could have been done with the family? That is true, yet at the same time it utterly negates the rest of the argument. There's always something more that could have been done, more depth things could have been gone to, while there is a limited amount of resources to be used on development. Especially with DA2, which was truthfully rushed to an insane degree. The choices they made were reflecting on that as was the story they told with the family. Note again the friction between the non-magic and magic sibling or loss of beloved ones while rising higher in the Kirkwall society.

 

With such limitations on resources, they have to try to tell the story with the scenes they have and try to make it work. And here's the crux of the argument, the required amount of scenes is not universal. For me, the scenes they had were sufficient for making me care about the family, thus it was resources well spent. For you, it was not. Yet there is no amount of resources that could be spent to reach a situation where everyone would be happy, as it such a personal story approach. And it kind of leads to this thread, as is your argument then as you did not feel a connection in this specific case, that they should never try it again?

[KaiserShep]

I thought Hawke's family got a good amount of material. While I would have greatly enjoyed having Bethany as a companion for the entirety of Act 2 and 3, I got enough to care about the character and was glad she made it out alive. Of course it helps to have Legacy, allowing them to reunite for another big quest.

[Personette]

 

As for the DA2 being dark, I agree completely, even though it wasn't too dark for me personally. Something that perplexes me in discussions concerning DA2 is how often people miss that it is ultimately a tragedy and thus a very different beast than DAO and DAI. Thus while it is fair to say that one doesn't enjoy the game because it is dark, to me it always feels weird to critize it for not doing the traditional story as that was never its purpose to begin with. I will also add that it being a tragedy did actually make heroic Hawke even more heroic for me as that was someone who strove to do the right thing no matter how many times they were betrayed or how there simply weren't easy solutions. With the Inquisitor or the Warden, things kind of always just sort themselves to a point where they can be straight-forwardly solved and those options are clearly presented, with very little setbacks after the initial tragic motivation set. This isn't to claim they aren't heroic, but the story never truly tests that heroism similarly than it did with Hawke. Does that make any sense?

 

These are all good points. The story is what I liked most about DA:II & good storytelling is not about pleasing everyone. I'd rather have a really creative author who puts together a compelling, interesting story than a people-pleaser who writes something bland. Even if that means I don't get what I'd want, personally. 

 

As for Hawke's heroism--Hawke's character is one best things about DA:II. You know where she's coming from, how she struggles, what she suffers--which is how you can get such a distinct sense of Hawke as a hero. Not because Hawke is more tragic, but because Hawke is more real. 

 

I do like that every game tries something new. Puts you on a different trajectory, asks you to be a different kind of 'hero'. I hope they keep changing it up. 

[DanteYoda]

Why does no one like the deep roads and the fade? I loved those parts

Its strange i loved both too..

[ZipZap2000]

DA2 did unfortunately suffer from the side effects of short development time, which resulted in reused enviroments, low-textured areas and inconsistent writing in some areas. But still, I regard it as a good game despite the many flaws of it. And for that I would like to see something similar to DA2 but with a longer more productive development time. I adored Hawke's character and story, there was so much pain and responsibilty and things insisted on never going right.

 

On it's own the game is a blast with the only exceptions for me being the ones you highlighted here, as a sequel it breaks ever rule in the book right from the CC. Story wise i enjoyed it finding Hawkes Mother, the lyrium idol, the Qunari, Isabella's betrayal, Merril's mirror and Fenris' Master being the highlights for me. Shame they made it DA2 instead of a separate saga set in the DA universe.

[Dieb]

No, they really shouldn't.

 

I loved DA2, because it was weird and unique.

 

I would like to see another game starring the Hawke siblings, though. An-other-game.

[Aaleel]

The game actually explained why you couldn't visit your sister or brother, but whatever. Besides, I find it really weird to drag the Cousland origin in to this, as they are literally there to only die quickly in a gruesome manner. How that is considered ideal, yet DA2 is not is something I do not grasp, but then again, I don't need to. That is  a personal opionion and thus it needs to be accepted as such for the discussion.

 

The reason I continue to find the origin comparison confusing, though, is that you do get a lot of dialogue with the family members. Is it enough? That is always up to debate, but there are several scenes with the mother and if you take Bethany/Carver with you during Act 1, you get to hear a lot from them and they are far more established as not only characters, but also as siblings, than any of the family members in DAO. And while I would have preferred Leandra having her own quest or something in Act 2 to establish her better, I did also get a feeling of she was and what was her relationship with Hawke. And by the way, Leandra actually specifically speaks about setting up Hawke with someone during an Act 2 discussion.

 

As for the rogue templars/mages? Yeah, they go and kidnap Hawke's sibling intentionally because they are Hawke's sibling. I am again really confused what exactly the argument here? Did you think they just kidnapped some random Grey Warden who turned out to be Hawke's sibling.

 

Here's the thing. That last sentence you wrote about how there was tons more that could have been done with the family? That is true, yet at the same time it utterly negates the rest of the argument. There's always something more that could have been done, more depth things could have been gone to, while there is a limited amount of resources to be used on development. Especially with DA2, which was truthfully rushed to an insane degree. The choices they made were reflecting on that as was the story they told with the family. Note again the friction between the non-magic and magic sibling or loss of beloved ones while rising higher in the Kirkwall society.

 

With such limitations on resources, they have to try to tell the story with the scenes they have and try to make it work. And here's the crux of the argument, the required amount of scenes is not universal. For me, the scenes they had were sufficient for making me care about the family, thus it was resources well spent. For you, it was not. Yet there is no amount of resources that could be spent to reach a situation where everyone would be happy, as it such a personal story approach. And it kind of leads to this thread, as is your argument then as you did not feel a connection in this specific case, that they should never try it again?

 

If DA:O would have been a game telling the story of a Cousland and his/her time in Highever I would have had the same complaint but it wasn't.  Dragon Age 2 was about you and your times in Kirkwall.  

 

The game made an excuse of why you couldn't see your sister/brother.  Just like they they decided for you that you weren't ready to look in your mother's room.

 

Like I said earlier, the didn't even establish your family before they killed one off, which could have easily been done in an Origin.  Furthermore, you're in the city of your birth, but I can only think on quest that pertained to your family.  

 

The mage/templar thing made no sense because you needed a Grey Warden and a map to find your way around the deep roads but some random mages and templars can navigate it, find and kidnap your sibling, and escape.

 

I'm just not a person who is going to say well it was fine considering the lack of resources and time, either it was done well or it wasn't.  Either it was a good idea or not.  A personal story will probably lead to other things on my list.  Stuck in one place, human only, fixed story.  So no I don't think it would be an idea I would want to see again.  All I was doing was responding to someone who picked out one specific point, so I responded about that one specific point and why I didn't think it was done well.

[Neoideo]

I just want to say that a small-scope story does not necessarily mean in a single city, on in the same place, all the time.

I would like vast landscapes, in a low-scale impact story. That is my perfect DA game.

[TUHD]

Correct about DA2: the basic idea

Faulty about DA2: everything else

 

If there comes a fresh team or at least new leads, perhaps it can be tried again...

[Urazz]

DA2 would have been a good side story OR as a the beginning of the storyline. It had a lot of good parts- tight writing, pacing wasn't as horrible as some people believe. The problem was that it was a step back from the freedom of Origins and people got legitimately annoyed because not everyone is interested in playing the human noble storyline. It can kill some of the replay value.

We didn't play the human noble story line, We played a human rags to riches story line in act 1.  It just involved becoming a noble as nobles are the ones who are rich in a medieval society.

 

I think the game itself was fine for the most part in the sense of the story, except for the ending which was rushed.  If DA2 didn't have the flaws it had, then I think it would've done a lot better in my opinion.

 

Like I said earlier, the didn't even establish your family before they killed one off, which could have easily been done in an Origin.  Furthermore, you're in the city of your birth, but I can only think on quest that pertained to your family.  

Err.. It's not city of Hawke's and his Sibling's birth, it's his mother's city of birth as she used to be a noble in Kirkwall.

[Dieb]

The reason the plot is "weirdly structured" and lacks a leitmotif apart from the Templar conflict, is because that's what it is. Experiencing what happens over the years. Mostly that is singular events, whose only connection is what they do to the people who experience them.

 

Not gonna argue that DA2 was badly crafted, but personally I found the characters were more compelling and so was the story(telling). Ultimately that is more important to me. I liked the funk out of DAO, but I had played what DAO was multiple times before it even came out. I don't want them to make DA2-2 either, though.

 

I simply want them to try another new approach. I like DAI a lot, as it tried mixing what people liked about DAO with ME3. It may have failed in a bunch of instances, but it is also inarguably its own beast. I personally value greatly how different each installment of this series is; it's quite the singularity really. If you try making DAO 1-5, you will inevitably have a very close ranking - from best to worst.