40 réponses à ce sujet

[Domiel Angelus]

I'm going to very seriously ignore all of the people that claim this game is a return to form, because it isn't. Dragon Age Inquisition is by no means a bad game in and of itself. It has good character designs, a beautiful score through out and has extremely well built surroundings. Its also made the different classes branch in extremely interesting directions, although it has less options than its predecessors. I would very much love this game even more if it weren't called Dragon Age, as its an extremely large departure from its previous installments. Its beautiful open world environments are far too barren for what's meant to be a sandbox game and it shows that Bioware wanted to go far more for pretty with its new Frostbyte engine than anything else. If it were able to make the surroundings that beautiful it should be able to handle NPCs that talk and combat that involves more than 10 creatures at a time.

 

The game needs to seriously return to the basics that made its fans love the series in the first place, but there are many things from the new game that should remain and I'm going to do another run down of what should stay and should go based on all three titles and hopefully some people agree. If you don't as always leave me something constructive, and keep it BW related please. There are already plenty of TW3/CDPR threads as it is.

 

• The characters in all three installments have been very well detailed and have always had very interesting things to say. Keep that because characters have always been one of Bioware's biggest selling points in all of its titles. Put it more characters I love to hate too, because that makes me feel much better when I have to make life and death decisions. In my first ME2 playthrough, I felt far too sad about sending anyone into the Jeffries Tube with the chance of someone not making it out alive. Give me someone I can hate to send on missions like that. All of our current cast have good backgrounds to the point where you know just where someone started and why they do what they do.

1.  Make it so we actually seek out characters again, DAI pretty much handed us all of our heroes with no sort of build up at all. Where's my Sten or the Dog? I want a character that I actually rescued or had some hand in bringing into the fold, not here's this letter and oh theres a messenger for you that you can't really avoid. Part of the journey should be meeting your friends along the way, not having them just dumped in your lap like a sack of coin.
2. Side point - How did broken arm elf males pass QA? Seriously?

• The crafting system needs to stay and be improved upon. I like the option to build gear and it took me in a very good direction when I found out that weapons and armor that were made would be superior if built correctly. Many games you go through to build this amazing piece of equipment and then find out "Well its still only half as good as what the game makes" and you get annoyed over the system at all. This variation on a crafting system made me want to go out and find better materials so I could craft a perfect weapon for myself. I named my massive two handed sword Caliburn and equipped it with Mordred and Morgana because it could very well betray me considering the stuff I put in it.

1. Please leave the random loot schematics at home, or make the random ones worth gaining. I absolutely abhorred having to acquire each and every schematic through loot because I didn't want to spend gold in Val Royeaux unless it was 100% necessary.
2. This part is an aside. Fix that stupid tool tip that says we can earn schematics through challenges in MP. It wasn't implemented as far as anyone can tell and it probably frustrates the crap out of more than just me. Another point here is don't ruin the crafting system that is so amazing just because you want people to buy boxes. I have 300 iron in MP that I can't use for anything other than making parts that aren't any good to use.  

• If the open world is too much, scale it back down some. DA:O and DA 2 both had far better designed areas to explore without having a need for open world. DA:I in some places felt far too open because I could easily run about for 15 minutes and not see anything at all to kill or interact with. Put more effort into keeping the world interesting and give us back NPCs that don't feel like cardboard cut-outs. When you meet up with Mother Giselle that entire area should have been people cowering for their lives and begging for you not to murder them, and when you clear out areas they could have changed their postures to something slightly less terrified. Instead it felt like you were bouncing through a small town that wasn't just under siege, it felt like they were all standing about because it was Tuesday and we all stand about and gawk on Tuesday. You only see the central of Val Royeaux when everyone in the series that's been through Orlais speaks about how beautiful the cities are. We got what felt like a prison cell when we should have gotten closer to an actual city. Lothering in DA:O and Kirkwall in DA 2 both felt far more real because we could actually interact with at least some of the NPCs at a given time. 
• Fix side quests - it can't be said any simpler than that. I don't want a side-quest that means I need to collect 5 of an item and it never really gets me anywhere. Where's the burn all the black books and face this wicked baddie quests? Very few of the DAI side quests have any sort of pay off that makes them worth doing, either lore/story wise or monetary.  At least set the rewards to be leveled, that sword in the lake would have been awesome if it weren't eight levels behind what I already have. 
• Give us AI that we can control once again, the whole favorite/don't use wasn't fun at all. The tactical camera is nice but it doesn't really place well in the RPG setting. It worked wonderfully in ME because it was a semi tactical cover based shooter and it allowed you to plan out how your combos would work out. In Dragon Age, keep the scripts for us to control how our friends work in specific situations. The fight with the dragon at the area with the Urn of Sacred Ashes only worked for me because I had perfectly fine tuned my party, none of the AI in this iteration even comes close because they all want to stand in fire and drink potions just before getting one shot which makes it a waste
• Bring back healing magic and up the limit on potions allowed on a belt. One of the best parts about Dragon Age is that its magical realm with various kinds of foci to work through. By removing healing magic you've pretty much said "Yup, they've all forgotten that bandage spell" There's no real reason for the removal of healing other than wanting to micro charge for potions in MP. 
• Give us all of the different powers and abilities that classes used to get. I do like many of the powers that are in the latter titles but DA:O got it all right based on specializations and who got to use what weapons. Why does a warrior suddenly forget he knows how to use a bow or dual weapons? Why is the Knight Enchanter not wearing plate mail (not counting that material that makes it so anyone can use it)? 

1. Side point the first. You can always open up the specializations for more gear use, I could see a duelist using either dual wielding or a sword and buckler or a sword and a cloak.
2. Side point the second. This has been fielded many times as to why Blood Magic was removed. It was far too much to deal with and would have felt cheaply tacked on considering all of the other things Inquisition was supposed to be dealing with. 
3. Side point the third. The various diamonds, lines, cubes and triangles etc to gain powers are very well done. Keep that because it lets you progress in your particular field in the order you so wish. The line progress of DA:O was good for DA:O because you also had skills and other things to learn. 
4. Why are we restricted to just one specialization on this run any how? Hawke got at least two if you wanted them and the Warden could have as many as four. 
5. Why did we lose the bonuses from gaining a particular specialization? Now you just gain a new tree to spend points in and even then you don't get the first point in the tree for free. There's no real payoff to picking a spec in this version beyond having more stuff to buy.  Your base always dictates your attribute array and bonuses, this isn't as much of a big deal as most things are based on weapon damage rather than attributes anyhow. For the big examples I'll use the DA:O warrior since I warriors: when becoming a beserker you gained +2 str and +10 hp, champion gained +2 Will and +1 cunning, reaver granted +1 con and +5  physical resist and the templar granted +3 magic and +2 mental resistance. You don't gain any of that when choosing your specialization in this iteration. 

• Can you make it so our actions mean something again? Both DA 2 and DA:I are in the wrong here. DA 2 always ends with the Chantry being destroyed and with the slaying of both Orsino and Meredith, there's no point in dealing with them nicely in any regard because you can't fix it. At least if you went with DA:I logic I could have said go away strange mage to Anders, and only dealt with him in regard to getting the map from him alive or in gooey bits on the floor (Like I did to Vivienne on one playthrough already). You also gave me a family in DA 2 which was nice but: one dies based on my choice of class, the other dies if I take the wrong party and my mother dies no matter how I handle the rogue "Jack the Ripper" esque necromancer and his apprentice. DA:I currently only has one ending and all of it culminates to that end, the song remains the same no matter whether you end up dealing with Calpernia or Sampson. I want the dynamic endings again, the subtle variations to the extreme in DA:O were awesome and did leave it open for proper expansions. 
• Is there a possibility of another What If DLC/Expansion? The Darkspawn Chronicles was one of my favorite DLCs for any game I've ever played. The sheer what if was amazing, it showed that the Warden your hero became was integral to the survival of the world, because Alistair on his own only went so far. 
• The music has stayed beautiful, kudos there and keep it coming. 
• Try having creatures level to the character/player instead of having "Nope, you're dead" zones similar to an MMO. DA:O and DA 2 both had it about right, I never felt like I was too high a level or too low for a given area. In DA:I you can walk five feet from an area you just slaughtered through and get bum rushed by a giant and mollywhomped into next week with little warning. 

1. Side point here as well: Is it possible for us to get a larger cast of monsters to deal with? Where did all the Desire demons go for instance, desire hadn't left the world so why did they? Why are the Arcane Horrors and Revenants so few and far between? We don't get nearly as many hostile NPCs with names and backgrounds either, I want a world where I can feel both loved and hated because there are people I can name that hate me enough to want me dead. Corypheus the fugly does not count.

• Please, please, please next time you're going to give us a villain, don't make it someone from a DLC, or at least make it a villain that is in both in the main story at some point and a DLC that was free that expands on him. The sheer amount of bad taste in my mouth from this made it difficult to enjoy pie for awhile. I know plenty of people that bought this game and hadn't played the DLC and finding out from Varric it was someone he and Hawke encountered before it was a total "WTF" moment for them. 

 

There is no TL:DR version if that's what you scrolled down to look for. 

 

EDIT: Added points 4 and 5 in powers and abilities. 

[PoisonSmog]

Holy crap that's a lot of text. But I agree with what you've stated. Except for leveling perhaps? While leveling enemies to ours would be good for balance for areas that quickly become irrelevant when you level up, I enjoyed enemies sometimes being stronger and more challenging to defeat.

 

Since Bioware finally got the Frostbite engine to (relatively) suit what they need for their games, hopefully they can focus more on game development instead of working around the engine. Also, since future games probably won't be on the 360 or PS3, they can worry less about hardware limitations.

[Domiel Angelus]

Holy crap that's a lot of text. But I agree with what you've stated. Except for leveling perhaps? While leveling enemies to ours would be good for balance for areas that quickly become irrelevant when you level up, I enjoyed enemies sometimes being stronger and more challenging to defeat.

 

Since Bioware finally got the Frostbite engine to (relatively) suit what they need for their games, hopefully they can focus more on game development instead of working around the engine. Also, since future games probably won't be on the 360 or PS3, they can worry less about hardware limitations.

 

In a lot of titles that have a world that levels to a character, there's usually some wiggle room. I've noticed that its normally a ten level range that you deal with, five above and five below with bosses sometimes hitting just a slight bit higher to allow for challenge when they come with minions. Its more a case of having the world having more definable constraints rather than "Nope you're just dead" spots within a world until you're ready for something. Games that don't have a level to you mechanic also usually nice enough to give you some sort of warning sign of your impending demise in a given area.

[Enigmatick]

Level scaling is god awful.

 

As is level requirements for a weapon and class based weapon requirements.

[Domiel Angelus]

Level scaling is god awful.

 

As is level requirements for a weapon and class based weapon requirements.

 

They used to do statistics instead of level requirements. That system worked out far better because if you did choose to be a mage or liked to have mages they could later pick up the real Arcane Warrior build that allowed you to insert your Magic stat in place of Strength for armor and weapons. Then again, gaining a particular specialization didn't just grant you new abilities in the previous games; you also got an attribute boost and some times a boost to resistances. You also weren't stuck with just one. 

[AlanC9]

I'm going to very seriously ignore all of the people that claim this game is a return to form, because it isn't.

The typical version of that argument is that DA:I is a return to Bio's form circa 1998 -- i.e., BG1's form, not DA:O's form. Though I suppose this is academic since you're not really interested in engaging with those folks anyway. (I think they have a point, but it doesn't do much for me since I didn't think BG1 was all that good.)

[Domiel Angelus]

The typical version of that argument is that DA:I is a return to Bio's form circa 1998 -- i.e., BG1's form, not DA:O's form. Though I suppose this is academic since you're not really interested in engaging with those folks anyway. (I think they have a point, but it doesn't do much for me since I didn't think BG1 was all that good.)

 

I enjoyed BG1, but it also had a beautiful and complicated scripting to your characters. The world felt rather alive in some regards. You also had a very nice cohesive kind of story telling in a world that was already existing, since its based in the D&D universe, so it had a rich amount of lore that they were able to draw from in addition to adding their own. If it were a return to form in that manner we may have gotten NPCs that don't suck harder than a black hole when it comes to combat tactics, and the cities wouldn't have felt like a walk among the grave stones. 

 

Comparing older games to the new ones in their current state is akin to comparing apples to hand grenades. The closest thing that may come to mind is the tactical combat being akin to the pausing in combat, but even then there's not much involved. If they were going closer to a Baldur's Gate feel I would have happily accepted it if they brought back proper scripting and the 6 person party. 

[PrayingMantis]

 

• Please, please, please next time you're going to give us a villain, don't make it someone from a DLC, or at least make it a villain that is in both in the main story at some point and a DLC that was free that expands on him. The sheer amount of bad taste in my mouth from this made it difficult to enjoy pie for awhile. I know plenty of people that bought this game and hadn't played the DLC and finding out from Varric it was someone he and Hawke encountered before it was a total "WTF" moment for them. 

 

I don't find it actually sooo bad if a character from a DLC became the villain for the next game, it just has to be done right. What I do find pretty cheap however is a character, that was already the antagonist for a DLC, to appear in the main game just to be killed again.

Preferably I would like the villain to be introduced as a more or less neutral character in the DLC - in order to spark some curiosity. It wouldn't be mandatory to play that DLC, but it could give you background information about that particular person, which would make the antagonist in the next installment less shallow and/or boring.

Generally speaking though I'd prefer an antagonistic group to a single "super-evil" person. This black and white thinking of good and evil is just so boring and cliché. The corrupted old gods are evil enough, Corypheus was just over the top (but that's just my opinion).

 

I didn't like DA2 too much, but I preferred the qunari to the demon invasion so much more.

[Domiel Angelus]

I don't find it actually sooo bad if a character from a DLC became the villain for the next game, it just has to be done right. What I do find pretty cheap however is a character, that was already the antagonist for a DLC, to appear in the main game just to be killed again.

Preferably I would like the villain to be introduced as a more or less neutral character in the DLC - in order to spark some curiosity. It wouldn't be mandatory to play that DLC, but it could give you background information about that particular person, which would make the antagonist in the next installment less shallow and/or boring.

Generally speaking though I'd prefer an antagonistic group to a single "super-evil" person. This black and white thinking of good and evil is just so boring and cliché. The corrupted old gods are evil enough, Corypheus was just over the top (but that's just my opinion).

 

I didn't like DA2 too much, but I preferred the qunari to the demon invasion so much more.

 

They did attempt to give us antagonists with the Red Templars and the Venatori but they felt extremely forced. They turn whichever faction you didn't decide to ask for assistance into a group of feral cornered dogs bent on your destruction. There's no chance of redemption as you may have seen in the other DA games. Corypheus felt like he was a last minute decision as a place holder since we all know who the real opponent is. They could have given us a new contender like they did with the Architect, since they're way more people that entered the Black City than just him. 

 

I preferred both the Blight and the Qunari, I actually empathized far too much with the secondary villains in DAI when you find out their motivations. 

[AWTEW]

Good luck OP, they are all about skyrimness now..You can partially  blame 'all the omg da2 is awful' and 'omgawd da needs to be more like skyrim'  BSN whinging for DA's identity crisis.

[Domiel Angelus]

Good luck OP, they are all about skyrimness now..You can partially  blame 'all the omg da2 is awful' and 'omgawd da needs to be more like skyrim'  BSN whinging for DA's identity crisis.

 

 

That's why I put the segment in about sandbox - open worldedness. This is their first actual attempt beyond The Old Republic (and we know how that handled due to the sudden meh I feel from a lot people) in the recent times to do sandbox/open world. If they're following Skyrim they should just stop, Elder Scrolls and Bethesda have been doing open world games since 1994, and I specified recent times because their take on the Baldur's Gate portion of Forgotten Realms and its surrounding areas did quite well and that is quite expansive. That however was a pre-existing world that they only populated with some of their own characters where as the rest was already in play, where as SWoToR and DA:I have not done so well because there's too much ground that has nothing to do in it. How they managed to make the SW universe feel so empty was saddening when I did try it for a short time. 

 

While I am on the side of the line screaming "DA:O is number 1" I will concede that DA 2 did have several very good points. I did very much prefer the Rivalry/Friendship to just the "Love me" bar just as one example of what they did right with the second game. 

[Sartoz]

Well, I would love it if they did all of that.... but I would personally enphasize the proper use of a Keyboard and mouse+mouse remapping PC control interface, not limited by the eight buttons from a console controller.

 

 

[SofaJockey]

Oh wow OP, lots to comment upon:

 

BioWare don't need to go back to basics, they should (and I entirely expect they will) refine the successful model they have in DAI.

 

Fine:

• Keep interesting characters, absolutely, I'm very hopeful of that with Patrick Weekes leading the writing.
• Keep polarising characters, absolutely yes.
• Keep and enhance crafting, yes.
• Open regions are good, the trick is what happens there.
• Changes to healing magic / potions & guard were an improvement, keep those.
• Keep limited ability use.
• Skill trees are good
• Keep single specialisation for plot/banter use.
• Music terrific
• Area based foe difficulty is right, but use JoH model with more difficulty in Hard and Nightmare

Adapt:

• Making the characters a little harder to 'recruit' would be good, though Oghren was far too late.
• Randoom loot is not broken but could use a review.
• NPC responsiveness to circumstances could be enhanced.
• More built up areas in DA4 would be welcome.
• Side quests could be more involving (with a cinematic pay off) and the decision trees less singular
• Enhance and develop Tactical options in FB3.
• Don't need to set the world on fire or be outright evil, but worth enhancing the number of key decision options.
• Slightly more monster variety is nice to have
• Please explore the mechanics/developments which support of last gen denied this time.

Don't agree:

• Elf arms is a trivial concern.
• Don't revert to health magic spam as per DAO/2.
• No need to revert to endless unused spells.
• No need to restore blood magic
• Darkspawn Chronicles was a failed 'what if' concept not to repeat
• Don't go back to scaled levelling

TL;DR

 

Please don't go back to basics, DAI direction is right, world is right, story is right,

though many of those areas could use enhancement / further development to be better still.

But we are on the right road.

[Sartoz]

 Big Snip

-----------

 

Please don't go back to basics, DAI direction is right, world is right, story is right,

though many of those areas could use enhancement / further development to be better still.

But we are on the right road.

 

                                                                                   <<<<<<<<<<>>>>>>>>>>

 

You've got to be kidding, right? The game has devolved to suit the casual gamer. The PC control interface (KB_M+Mouse remapping) is pitifull compared to the previous two games. Tactical combat was thrown out of the window. Banter became a mess because of the very large areas... meaning banter was spread out to avoid going empty before the game was finished. Grinding for resources and fetch quests for excellent boring play. Submarine pings, a "must walk next to resource" before you can pick it up.. same boring animation wether you pick up metal ores, flowers or what have you.

 

Yep, button smashing combat is the way to go... simplified skill sets = for neophytes only.

[SofaJockey]

                                                                                   <<<<<<<<<<>>>>>>>>>>

 

You've got to be kidding, right? The game has devolved to suit the casual gamer. The PC control interface (KB_M+Mouse remapping) is pitifull compared to the previous two games. Tactical combat was thrown out of the window. Banter became a mess because of the very large areas... meaning banter was spread out to avoid going empty before the game was finished. Grinding for resources and fetch quests for excellent boring play. Submarine pings, a "must walk next to resource" before you can pick it up.. same boring animation wether you pick up metal ores, flowers or what have you.

 

Yep, button smashing combat is the way to go... simplified skill sets = for neophytes only.

 

Kidding? Why would I be?

• Casual gamer focus? Hardly, particularly JoH.
• I have no contribution to make about PC controls, I play on XB1.
• Tactical combat was weak, I'd like to see that improved in DA4 but I rarely used Tactics settings in DAO/2, I found them over-fussy.
• I never had banter issues, I found them amusing.
• Why grind, just pick up resources as you go.
• Side quests were comparable with similar games, the hate they get is melodrama on the whole.
• Submarine pings were a helpful change, I missed them replaying TW2.
• Less skills mean more focus on intelligent use of abilities.

Nope, I think you have a very different view of the game to me, shame you didn't like it as much.

 

Given DAI's success I think my views are pretty representative,

but (as the saying goes) your mileage may vary.

[Fireheart]

”Make it so we actually seek out characters again, DAI pretty much handed us all of our heroes with no sort of build up at all. Where's my Sten or the Dog? I want a character that I actually rescued or had some hand in bringing into the fold, not here's this letter and oh theres a messenger for you that you can't really avoid. Part of the journey should be meeting your friends along the way, not having them just dumped in your lap like a sack of coin."

 

OMG YESSSSS. In all the time I've spent on this forum, since January, this is the first time I've seen someone comment on this, and I've never felt compelled to make a topic about it myself. Also, this connects to something else I have a problem with. The specializations. In DAO, the specializations were tied to the story. You helped Redcliffe prepare? You get Champion spec from Eamon. You accept the Desire Demon's deal in the Fade, instead of save Connor? You get Blood Mage. When I heard they were going to make the specs more story-based in DAI, I thought they meant it would actually play some part in the main story. But it didn't, at all. They turned getting a spec into another mere fetch quest, and then a few of your party members comment on your new spec. That was so awful, made me want to cry. Honestly, it was one of the things I was looking forward to the most when I bought the game. They need to bring back specs that are ACTUALLY TIED to the story, and not some fetch quest. And hopefully, expand upon it from there.

[AlanC9]

I don't find it actually sooo bad if a character from a DLC became the villain for the next game, it just has to be done right. What I do find pretty cheap however is a character, that was already the antagonist for a DLC, to appear in the main game just to be killed again.

I was OK with this only because of the protagonist switch. I never picked up that DLC, but my Inquisitor wouldn't have played it even if I had.

[Sartoz]

Kidding? Why would I be?

• Casual gamer focus? Hardly, particularly JoH.
• I have no contribution to make about PC controls, I play on XB1.
• Tactical combat was weak, I'd like to see that improved in DA4 but I rarely used Tactics settings in DAO/2, I found them over-fussy.
• I never had banter issues, I found them amusing.
• Why grind, just pick up resources as you go.
• Side quests were comparable with similar games, the hate they get is melodrama on the whole.
• Submarine pings were a helpful change, I missed them replaying TW2.
• Less skills mean more focus on intelligent use of abilities.

Nope, I think you have a very different view of the game to me, shame you didn't like it as much.

 

Given DAI's success I think my views are pretty representative,

but (as the saying goes) your mileage may vary.

LOL!

Love the "less skills.....". You must admit that less skills requires less cerebral thinking. That I agree with.

 

The main reason I disliked the game is that I am fighting the PC game controls... a poor port from the console game. DA:O and DA2 had excellent KB+M controls.  Why Bio decided not to continue with a proven PC game control mechanics is beyond me.The lack of tactical gameplay is another reason. .. again everything is geared toward game simplification which in my mind is only suitable for casual gamers = button smashing combat.

 

But, hey, you like so that's good.

[SofaJockey]

LOL!

Love the "less skills.....". You must admit that less skills requires less cerebral thinking. That I agree with.

 

The main reason I disliked the game is that I am fighting the PC game controls... a poor port from the console game. DA:O and DA2 had excellent KB+M controls.  Why Bio decided not to continue with a proven PC game control mechanics is beyond me.The lack of tactical gameplay is another reason. .. again everything is geared toward game simplification which in my mind is only suitable for casual gamers = button smashing combat.

 

But, hey, you like so that's good.

 

Don't get me wrong, I'm supportive of folk who have sub-optimal PC UI experiences being able to say so.

I remember even pre-launch Angry Joe dropped his review of the PC version specifically by a point.

The game does appear to be very much designed with a controller in mind, I would not want to be fighting the controls.

On console, playing some MEMP this week I find the DAMP controls smoother, for example.

 

Nope, I'm sticking with the view that fewer skills still requires some thinking, sometimes more so.

 

Take DAO - I knew which were the tier 4 skills I particularly wanted and I would drive my skill progression to get them.

I would occasionally use a whole host of skills, but my focus would be on the fewer 'go-to' skills I'd use repeatedly.

 

Insight into less skills = more skill, came from the ME3 multiplayer, and the same applied to DAI and DAMP.

 

Instead of (in DAO) one build of warrior/mage/rogue with access to dozens of abilities to choose

I now (in DAI) have to identify and construct a build for a particular type of warrior/mage/rogue

and balance my party so that works in a range of circumstances.

 

Sure on Casual and probably Normal, you can run around button mashing (a play choice after all) but on harder difficulties you are using a combination of skill choice, crafting, and positioning. After playing so much DAMP I now prefer real time combat rather than tactical cam and beat the game on Hard difficulty.

 

I would welcome more complex Tactical choices and anticipate them in DA4 as I'm sure that was another feature that would have had to have been built from scratch in Frostbite 3 and clearly wasn't able to be done.

 

By all means laugh away, however I think the biggest simplifications have been involved in what passes for some of the arguments on BSN  .

[Domiel Angelus]

As I said above, Dragon Age Inquisition isn't a bad game, but it doesn't really fit with the other games. They attempted open world-sandbox play and fumbled rather horrendously. The monster - npc density should have been at least twice what we saw. The second biggest issue was that they totally gave up on making NPCs do pretty much of anything. I saw more movement in Two Worlds I and II, if that doesn't tell you how bad it is that I had to reference a game set that are considered so bad that they belong in the bin with Drake of the 99 Dragons then you may have to pass off the gamer card in your wallet. 

 

Tactical combat felt far too tacked on to replace the already functional scripting. It feels like the people that came over from the ME team to assist said "This is wrong because we don't get it" and changed what worked for a mainly melee based game to what suits more the tactical shooter genre. 

 

On the point of less skills equal more intelligent choices, no no no. They did that in another massively popular game, WoW trimmed all of their trees and now everyone uses the exact same builds and that's an MMO. If you remove the options then you may as well go back to the original line design in DA:O and just say yup, this is what you get. The strongest change in DA 2 from DA:O was actually the increase in skills per category even though the removed specs and stripped down the weapon types. 

 

My preference for resources would be to have a good mix of "I can buy it" and "I need to gather that" instead of making buying it cost so much that gathering is the preferred method. With the inclusion of the Black Emporium we may see a revival of that in DA:I. 

 

The removal of healing magic made the Keeper, the Spirit Healer and portions of other specs obsolete and that's why we didn't see them. Instead we got the sword spamming Knight Enchanter (and not the very functional Arcane Warrior) and a bad re-skin of Blood Magic in Necromancy and the interesting but oddly out of place Rift Lord tree.

 

Plus you didn't do a fetch quest to gain specializations in the first game, you had to actually do something to gain them. Above someone mentioned rescuing Arl Eamon to acquire the Champion, you also had to at least feign that you would destroy the Sacred Ashes to get the Reaver and so on. You actually had a deeper meaning for your options, instead of looking up which tree is going to kill things the swiftest. 

 

@SofaJockey - DA:I was successful because they showed test footage that was using the best technology possible before taking into account the massive job of doing the game for the previous console generation and the toll it would take to keep the games somehow in line. The inclusion of the last gen consoles allowed people to play it and as far as I've seen from the comments all people are doing about it is complain. It also heavily ran on the coat-tails of the previous titles because the large amount of sales were pre-orders like myself that gave the Dragon Age team their money in good faith. 

[Captain Wiseass]

I think "departure from previous games" is an ethos of the Dragon Age series, actually. To put it more plainly, that's what they're going for each time.

[Shechinah]

(to Domiel Angelus) Why do you consider the Rift Mage specialization to be "oddly out of place"?

[SofaJockey]

*snip*

 

Dragon Age Inquisition contains the usual blend of characters and fantasy threat - it fits in with the series perfectly well.

The world is not open world, it is regional zones, so no fumble.

Frostbite 3 is a new engine, they can't just import features from past engines, they need rebuilding.

I know you don't like the skill & healing choices, I think you're wrong, but we're entitled to those views.

 

And as for your last point, DAI was only successful because of the leaked Crestwood pre-alpha demos?

You almost make me think this is a troll thread because that's just bonkers 

It is true that with last gen, the destructibles could not be implemented but all the gameplay (Hinterlands/Redclliffe and other demos)

were very authentic to the game which was successful because reviewers and gamers in huge numbers found it enjoyable.

 

Oh, and it only got preorders on the coat-tails of the criticised DA2 and ME3? That's just illogical.

I placed my pre-order in good faith and was rewarded.

 

Anyway, this thread debate seems very much to be 'I liked it' vs 'I didn't like it'.

The OP was interesting, some will agree, some won't.

Good to share these views.

[Winged Silver]

I like your points! Implementing some number of these I think could go a long way towards making improvements,

 

Even if they felt they had to have DAI end a certain way to set up for DA4, I think at least adding a sense of danger could have gone a long way towards helping the player invest. 

 

Oh you didn't do Sera's personal mission?

She just got eaten by Corypheus' dragon

 

Didn't bother to help out Dorian?

Squashed by a floating boulder

 

Just little things that would have made the ending less certain, less safe. The only time in the game that I really felt any sort of stress was when I was in the fade, deciding who got left behind. Moments like those really stand out, and I wish there'd been more of them.

 

Otherwise...there's plenty I can get behind.

[Domiel Angelus]

 

 

Dragon Age Inquisition contains the usual blend of characters and fantasy threat - it fits in with the series perfectly well.

The world is not open world, it is regional zones, so no fumble.

Frostbite 3 is a new engine, they can't just import features from past engines, they need rebuilding.

I know you don't like the skill & healing choices, I think you're wrong, but we're entitled to those views.

 

And as for your last point, DAI was only successful because of the leaked Crestwood pre-alpha demos?

You almost make me think this is a troll thread because that's just bonkers 

It is true that with last gen, the destructibles could not be implemented but all the gameplay (Hinterlands/Redclliffe and other demos)

were very authentic to the game which was successful because reviewers and gamers in huge numbers found it enjoyable.

 

Oh, and it only got preorders on the coat-tails of the criticised DA2 and ME3? That's just illogical.

I placed my pre-order in good faith and was rewarded.

 

Anyway, this thread debate seems very much to be 'I liked it' vs 'I didn't like it'.

The OP was interesting, some will agree, some won't.

Good to share these views.

 

This is one of the most sincere posts I've ever made on the forums, no trolling intended. 

 

That section about what games it was coat-tailing only applied to DA 2 and DA:O because many people were hoping for a blend of the two. 

 

I'll borrow the above video from another thread as it helps prove the point of how big a difference the product pre last gen inclusion versus post last gen inclusion. The entire scene (starting at 6:23) between Varric, Cassandra and Vivienne is removed in the version of the game we got. The dynamic weather was removed and that beautiful entrance of the massive Red Templar  doesn't exist. Even the flairs of the magical effects are toned down in the release as opposed to this Pax Prime Footage, footage that they had worked out in 2013. 

 

You love the tactical cam and its far better implemented in this 'preview' of the game. There are no slow down/speed up mechanics in play, it is only used at a planning tool.  

 

They're also showing many things that were completely eliminated from this game as well, Cassandra performs an execution stab from behind at roughly 28:30, and he speaks about multiple paths through a keep and we normally got one. I didn't even account for destructible objects which many games on previous consoles handled just fine.

 

They also dumbed down two of their ideas specifically for this game: The War Table+Agent Use and they removed the majority of in combat banter where you have someone yelling about where they're tossing a spell. They're also talking about how to balance the Templars and Mages instead of just deciding, as well as controlling your forces more effectively, none of which came into the game. In the last portion they talk about you being able to physically shape the world with your actions which you see very little of in the final product.

 

If it were just simple cuts to the game then it wouldn't be so bad.