52 réponses à ce sujet

[Myusha]

Does Dragon Age remind anyone of the original Final Fantasy? I mean you have a party, epic loot, and you venture around on your quest for good, and potentially epic tactics. Argh. God, games nowadays are so freakin unoriginal.



[Sarcasm.]

[darrenr22]

I don't think there is one sentence in the OP that I agree with.

[RangerSG]

CybAnt1 wrote...

Isn't anyone else finding this far to similar to Neverwinter Nights 2
No.  Not at all.  Not even remotely.

Biggest diff. for me:

NWN was designed for multiplayer, with single player very much as an afterthought. 
NWN2 is slowly moving toward single player party-based friendliness, but only recently arrived at a very close destination with the Storm of Zehir campaign. (IMHO, still not completely there yet.) 

DA:O has no multiplayer (although of course many want it). It's all single player. 

The similarity is both have a Toolset. But what that means for me, really, is what I've always wanted: a single player game with lots of mods! 

Hopefully, even in the future, as people master it, complete user-made campaigns/modules/settings ... for the single player. 

NWN was not "designed' for multiplayer first. The campaigns were all SP w/ some minor MP capability. The toolset and DM client allowed for some MP capability that the community took advantage of. Really NWN was designed for SP play with some co-op MP capability. The designers never thought PW-sized MP would be plausible with the toolset and scripting the way it was.

The issue is NWN2 retreated in it's MP capability by making the DM client much more cumbersome and the toolset more inaccessible to builders on any level. Now, from where I've talked to people in the NWN1 building community, they feel the toolset in DA is closer to NWN2's complexity than NWN1...so that may be an (unfortunate) area of similarity with NWN2. We'll see.

[Red Frostraven]

If anything, Dragon Age origins has much MORE than Neverwinter Nights and Neverwinter Nights 2:

It had it's OWN lore and entirely new game mechanics.



And by the gods, that is effing epic: D&D has been built and balanced since the 1980s.

Dragon Age has been built and balanced since 2005(?)...



Dragon Age was built from the ground up, and hasn't borrowed too many fantasy creatures nor lore from elsewhere.



That is something to respect, and they made an entirely new world with enemies that are much more interesting than the beast and daedra from the Elder Scroll series, which basicly was "egyptian mythology meets dinosaurs".

The ash wraiths' appearance was freakin awesome.



But... there werent TOO many new creatures, though I'm sure there's more to come.

Like the mid-game shriekers and stalkers...

[CybAnt1]

NWN was not "designed' for multiplayer first. The campaigns were all SP w/ some minor MP capability. 

I'm not disagreeing with the point that even with the first NWN1 you could play the game SP. All of its OCs could be played SP. No, the point I'm making is how good a single player game is it. You don't have to take my word for it being more focused on MP than SP; its developers said so. 

And the fact is while I agree they never designed it for persistent worlds/MMOs (tho plenty of people tried), the basic idea, and believe me I was there reading the forums as it was happening so I remember quite well what the devs. were saying, was that NWN was basically made to allow people to replicate the tabletop experience on the computer. So the idea was you would link up with 2-7 friends, each controlling their own single character (just like tabletop), and all play a module together. Or if you didn't have that many friends with a computer, Internet access, the game, & willingness to play (my problem), you still could still use a service to "hook up" with some strangers to play a module together. 

I remember the devs. saying that yes there would be singleplayer in NWN, but it was not designed for singleplayer, the real goal was to "replicate tabletop on the PC". And so BTW yes the first & subsequent NWN1 OCs had joinable companions, but they were PURE AI, there wasn't even an option to give them direct commands, and your control over that AI's parameters were very limited. And boy did the AI suck, as you'll note I keep constantly complaining. Plus the interface .... arrgh. 

NWN2 became a bit more singleplayer friendly, largely due to the hue & cry over SP in NWN1. However, Storm of Zehir is the first campaign they've released for NWN2 where you can make your entire party (and BTW I know you CAN'T do this in DA:O but I suppose I don't mind, there are only three classes, and they're all represented in the available companions), issue party-based group-focused tactics, swap in and out party members, and have an overland map with free exploration. And alas I would be elated except for one other thing - I find the epic campaigns more enjoyable in that game because IMHO 3E just gets more interesting in terms of character build at levels 21-30, but SoZ is for levels 1-12. If they release a 4th OC with SoZ's SP-friendliness and MotB's "epicness," I'm all over it like white on rice. In the meantime, I'm here. 

But I'll come back to one more point - interface. For the single player controlling multiple chars., quickbars work better than radial menus, and I think until this gets fixed I'll still keep suggesting DA:O is better for SP than NWN2. 

Neither game has an action queue (like KOTOR) ... that's what I'm hoping is coming eventually. 

[FieryDove]

darrenr22 wrote...

I don't think there is one sentence in the OP that I agree with.

Exactly my thoughts as well.

[Red Frostraven]

darrenr22 wrote...

I don't think there is one sentence in the OP that I agree with.

I agreed with these sentences here:

OP wrote...
Oh and despite previous posts opinions - for goodness why on earth is
this an 18???  Has anyone seen inside the 'SUN' newspaper that is
available to all children in the households or read its language??  Or
even watched a 12 movie??? 15??? 18 no - grow up sensors.

Modifié par Red Frostraven, 20 février 2010 - 01:53 .

[Fluffykeith]

I played NWN2 after playing DA:O. And hated it. The interface was horrible, the camera angles took an evenings worth of play to configure into something useable, it was a worse system hog than DA:O (it looked worse, was jerkier and ran worse on my current machine than DA:O), and it's story was far less engaging. I haven't gone back to it.

[wanderon]

CybAnt1 wrote...

NWN was not "designed' for multiplayer first. The campaigns were all SP w/ some minor MP capability. 

I'm not disagreeing with the point that even with the first NWN1 you could play the game SP. All of its OCs could be played SP. No, the point I'm making is how good a single player game is it. You don't have to take my word for it being more focused on MP than SP; its developers said so. 

And the fact is while I agree they never designed it for persistent worlds/MMOs (tho plenty of people tried), the basic idea, and believe me I was there reading the forums as it was happening so I remember quite well what the devs. were saying, was that NWN was basically made to allow people to replicate the tabletop experience on the computer. So the idea was you would link up with 2-7 friends, each controlling their own single character (just like tabletop), and all play a module together. Or if you didn't have that many friends with a computer, Internet access, the game, & willingness to play (my problem), you still could still use a service to "hook up" with some strangers to play a module together. 

I remember the devs. saying that yes there would be singleplayer in NWN, but it was not designed for singleplayer, the real goal was to "replicate tabletop on the PC". And so BTW yes the first & subsequent NWN1 OCs had joinable companions, but they were PURE AI, there wasn't even an option to give them direct commands, and your control over that AI's parameters were very limited. And boy did the AI suck, as you'll note I keep constantly complaining. Plus the interface .... arrgh. 

QFT

NWN1 was in fact all about the toolset and how the players could use it to create campaigns that they and their freinds could enjoy bringing tabletop style gaming to the PC and putting the construction of the game itself into the hands of the player/DM.

The OC in fact was originally just supposed to be there as a sort of "demo" to showcase what could be done with the toolset and it wasn't until the hue and cry of discouraged fans dissing the OC upon release wanting to know where the OFFICIAL GAME was that Bioware realized their mistake and did a quick turn around and started fixing the OC and making improvements to future "official releases" putting the emphasis back on the SP capaign and offering the MP option as more of a sideline. 

This was carried on with NWN2 where the devs definately gave most of their effort to making good official SP campaigns with the toolset and MP play as an optional bonus.

[Mikey_205]

NWN2 was a damn good game and I dont understand why people moan about the interface constantly it worked perfectly fine. Its not as good as Dragon Age but its still a damn good game and I thought the story was more original.

[Freezingfire]

wanderon wrote...
The OC in fact was originally just supposed to be there as a sort of "demo" to showcase what could be done with the toolset and it wasn't until the hue and cry of discouraged fans dissing the OC upon release wanting to know where the OFFICIAL GAME was that Bioware realized their mistake and did a quick turn around and started fixing the OC and making improvements to future "official releases" putting the emphasis back on the SP capaign and offering the MP option as more of a sideline. 

This is not true. The OC became marginalized by legal issues. It's explained here. And here is the design document.

Modifié par Freezingfire, 20 février 2010 - 05:45 .

[Fluffykeith]

NWN2s main interface issue, for me, was how unresponsive and generally sluggish it felt. It certainly didn't feel as smooth or natural as other games in the genre. I found I was using the combat pause, not to make decisions in the fight, but to ensure I was able to issue orders correctly. It felt like I was having to fight the game system as much as the monsters.



And that doesn't even take into account the horrible, static, combat visuals.

[wanderon]

Freezingfire wrote...

wanderon wrote...
The OC in fact was originally just supposed to be there as a sort of "demo" to showcase what could be done with the toolset and it wasn't until the hue and cry of discouraged fans dissing the OC upon release wanting to know where the OFFICIAL GAME was that Bioware realized their mistake and did a quick turn around and started fixing the OC and making improvements to future "official releases" putting the emphasis back on the SP capaign and offering the MP option as more of a sideline. 

This is not true. The OC became marginalized by legal issues. It's explained here. And here is the design document.

The fact that they had a comprehensive design document plan for the OC doesn't change the fact that the game itself was originally marketed primarily as a toolset for people to finally bring D&D tabletop gaming to the computer (the proposed next best thing  of the times) and that the OC was essentially marginalized in the process. Whether that was due to the legal issues with Interplay or not doesn't really change those facts.
 
Nor does it refute the fact that it was not until the fans outcry after release about the lack of a strong SP OC that they went back and started mending fences by fixing the issues in the OC and putting more emphasis on the SP game releases going forward.

[wanderon]

Fluffykeith wrote...

NWN2s main interface issue, for me, was how unresponsive and generally sluggish it felt. It certainly didn't feel as smooth or natural as other games in the genre. I found I was using the combat pause, not to make decisions in the fight, but to ensure I was able to issue orders correctly. It felt like I was having to fight the game system as much as the monsters.

And that doesn't even take into account the horrible, static, combat visuals.

A matter of personal taste I'd say -
 
I found the NWN2 interface to be a huge improvement from the awkward radial menu of NWN1 and found it much more user freindly. I wish the DA:O interface had many of it's features like multiple weapon slots - choices for more quick bars and freedom to place them where I wish, action que for multiple actions etc.

[51Geezerino]

I agree with the OP in the original post title: DA:O is most similar to NWN2 over the other CRPGs I've played (Gold Box series, BG, BG2, NWN, NWN2). While updated, the graphics in DA:O were seemed very similar to those in NWN2.



DA:O is less rich in its spell and character options compared to any of the D&D rulesets, but I feel this was a wise business decision on Bioware's part. That is, reduce the game complexity a bit and make it easier to port the game to other platforms like XBox 360 and PS3 (sell more titles, make more $$$, give us more quality games). I do not play console games, but from what I've read in these forums, the CRPG represented by DA:O has made a fairly good impression on console gamers.

[AmstradHero]

wanderon wrote...

Fluffykeith wrote...
NWN2s main interface issue, for me, was how unresponsive and generally sluggish it felt. It certainly didn't feel as smooth or natural as other games in the genre. I found I was using the combat pause, not to make decisions in the fight, but to ensure I was able to issue orders correctly. It felt like I was having to fight the game system as much as the monsters.
And that doesn't even take into account the horrible, static, combat visuals.

A matter of personal taste I'd say -
I found the NWN2 interface to be a huge improvement from the awkward radial menu of NWN1 and found it much more user freindly. I wish the DA:O interface had many of it's features like multiple weapon slots - choices for more quick bars and freedom to place them where I wish, action que for multiple actions etc.

QFT. Radial menus are horrible and I detest them. I was ecstatic when I found out they'd been ditched in NWN2. I also prefer NWN2's combat visuals to NWN1's.

I think most people that complained about the camera in NWN2 played it fresh after it came out with no patches. When I first started playing it I also found the interface hideous.

However, if you configured the game so you could switch between a character view for exploration, and then switched to a free moving isometric camera for combat, then the interface was fluid and extremely usable.  At that point, it's kind of like say... zooming in for exploration in Dragon Age, and zooming all the way out for combat. Oh no, that must mean DAO's interface is terrible!

[AlanC9]

RangerSG wrote...
NWN was not "designed' for multiplayer first. The campaigns were all SP w/ some minor MP capability. The toolset and DM client allowed for some MP capability that the community took advantage of. Really NWN was designed for SP play with some co-op MP capability. The designers never thought PW-sized MP would be plausible with the toolset and scripting the way it was.

I'm not sure that's completely true. The NWN1 SP campaign itself was only added very late in development; the original plan was to ship with several modules, but in a disconnected format, which were apparently bolted together later to form the OC. And of course, the henchmen were added even later than that. It appears that Bio was caught off-guard by how little interest there was in MP. Single-party co-op MP, that is, which was very much one of the design goals for the project; you're quite right that they never were interested in PWs.

Edit: I'm going from the early previews here for the early non-campaign (predates the document FreezingFire linked to), and dev posts concerning the late arrival of henchmen.

Modifié par AlanC9, 20 février 2010 - 09:47 .

[RangerSG]

AlanC9 wrote...

RangerSG wrote...
NWN was not "designed' for multiplayer first. The campaigns were all SP w/ some minor MP capability. The toolset and DM client allowed for some MP capability that the community took advantage of. Really NWN was designed for SP play with some co-op MP capability. The designers never thought PW-sized MP would be plausible with the toolset and scripting the way it was.

I'm not sure that's completely true. The NWN1 SP campaign itself was only added very late in development; the original plan was to ship with several modules, but in a disconnected format, which were apparently bolted together later to form the OC. And of course, the henchmen were added even later than that. It appears that Bio was caught off-guard by how little interest there was in MP. Single-party co-op MP, that is, which was very much one of the design goals for the project; you're quite right that they never were interested in PWs.

Edit: I'm going from the early previews here for the early non-campaign (predates the document FreezingFire linked to), and dev posts concerning the late arrival of henchmen.

Single-Party Co-op (ala BG2) operated on very much the same principle as an SP game. It wasn't DM client play. Also, the design document was a full-fledged campaign of very large scope. The only thing it had in common with the "Official Campaign's" final form was the modular components.

And wanderon, I was on the forum in the early days too. Going all the way back to the Baldur's Gate forum. So I do know more than a little of what the discussions were back then. There was nothing like the large-scale gaming that the community "ran with" in mind. In fact the devs said that would almost certainly be impossible.

The point is the distinction made by the OP about the difference between NWN1 an NWN2 was vastly overstated. The only "intended" difference between the two was a more developed SP campaign in NWN2. But the desired goal for NWN2 was to obsolete NWN1. It failed for a number of reasons that don't pertain to this thread, except that the over-complexity of the toolset was one, and perhaps DA's suffers from a similar issue.

[AlanC9]

RangerSG wrote...

Single-Party Co-op (ala BG2) operated on very much the same principle as an SP game. It wasn't DM client play. Also, the design document was a full-fledged campaign of very large scope. The only thing it had in common with the "Official Campaign's" final form was the modular components.

If you prefer to say DM Client play, fine with me.

Are you certain that design document actually goes all the way to the beginning of the project? 

[RangerSG]

AlanC9 wrote...

RangerSG wrote...

Single-Party Co-op (ala BG2) operated on very much the same principle as an SP game. It wasn't DM client play. Also, the design document was a full-fledged campaign of very large scope. The only thing it had in common with the "Official Campaign's" final form was the modular components.

If you prefer to say DM Client play, fine with me.

Are you certain that design document actually goes all the way to the beginning of the project? 

It was the original plotline for the story, before WotSC had a hissy fit. So it's what was originally planned to be released as the storyline. Now again, the toolset and DM client were allowed to permit DM-oversight play and recreate a PnP environment on-line. I don't disagree with that. I would like to see that in DA eventually. But the point is that the OP makes  a dichotomy between the purpose of NWN1 and NWN2 that simply did not exist to the designers. NWN2 was never advertised as "more single-player" than NWN1. It was advertised that we'd be able to do everything in NWN2 we did in NWN1.

That's why it failed. DA:O, otoh, was intentionally designed as an SP game.

[maxernst]

Graphically, yes, DA:O's obvious precursor was NWN2, but people make way too big a deal about 2D vs 3D...that's the mistake the nut that called BG2 a Diablo-style game made. Gameplay-wise, they're in the same family, clearly inspired by the BG style one primary PC that picks up companions through the game, some of whom are romanceable. Pausable, squad-based combat.



I don't find it particularly close, though. NWN2 had a much more linear narrative structure and a far more complicated story. DA:O is straightforward from the outset--gather the allies, overthrow Loghain, defeat the Archdemon. NWN2's story kind of splits into three parts and you have no inkling at the begining of where it's going. The first involves the shards, which had me wondering why I didn't just give the damn shards to the githyanki (yes, I know there's a problem with that, but neither me nor the gith know that for a long time). Then there was the search for Ammon Jarro's Haven, and then finally the completion of the world-saving the ritual. I honestly can't remember how the three parts connected any more.



The flavor's quite different, too. NWN2 is very much a high fantasy D&D game. DA:O is a grittier sort of fantasy...can't think of an obvious precursor. Arcanum? Arx Fatalis? Oddly, in some ways it feels a little more to me like Fallout.



The only thing about it that reminded me of NWN2 particularly (as opposed to the Baldur's Gate gaming family of which NWN2 is one of many) was the Landsmeet. That did remind me a bit of the trial in NWN2 that we wind up in a duel afterward...but even that's not a genuinely original element in NWN2. The final battle reminds me more of NWN1 in some ways, just because youre fighting through a city rather than defending a castle.

[maxernst]

@RangerSG--I agree with you that NWN2 was, as its predecessor, definitely intended as a multiplayer game. It's true that its OC was longer than NWN1 and felt less like a tech demo, but it was still intended for multiplayer. I disagree with your characterization of it as a failure, however. Although I realize that there were issues with its multiplayer, I've had a blast playing NWN2 online...I basically didn't play any other games for nearly a year when I got involved in a persistent world. Which is why I completely missed Mass Effect.

[Fluffykeith]

AmstradHero...



I agree about the radial menus in NWN. They were quite unpleasant to use...my issue with the interface in NWN2 (and I played it very recently as fully patched as I could get it) was how sluggish it felt. Even on a pc that could run DA:O fine, NWN2 was such a system hog that I was having to really ratchet down the graphics options to get the camera to pan without jerking suddenly.



And you prefer NWN2s combat visuals to NWN? Blimey. Definately a matter of taste, I guess. Personally I hated the very static way everyone stood around politely waiting for their next action, as if blethering about the weather. Standing stock still, statue like. Dodge animations? Nope. Special attack animations (Cleave for example)? Nadda. I practically headbutted the desk when I first saw the mob of evil dwarves come over the hill in the opening town battle. It just looked awful.



I much prefered the ducking and weaving in NWN, at least then it looked like the characters were fighting, getting into a combat stance, blocking and parrying and so on

[Sunder_2]

Actually the original NWN was designed for multiplayer in a sense. It was made so that people could create there own adventures for others to play. The SP adventure was only added to showcase what was possible w/ the toolset.

[RangerSG]

Sunder_2 wrote...

Actually the original NWN was designed for multiplayer in a sense. It was made so that people could create there own adventures for others to play. The SP adventure was only added to showcase what was possible w/ the toolset.

Well...that's not "all" it was added for. But it was intended in no small part to showcase what was possible with the toolset, yes.

And I'm not denying the "build and share adventures" intent. My point was only that the OP made a split between the purpose of NWN1 and NWN2 that the developers never intended. NWN2 was intended to succeed NWN1. Whether or not one likes NWN2, the fact that 4 times the people play NWN1 MP still indicates it did not replace NWN1 as a matter of fact. But I'm not trying to make this a NWN2 bashing thread either. The point is that the intent of the developers with the DA toolset is not that of NWN1 or 2. But rather to make something like what the BG2 community was like, where people added mods to the existing game, mostly within the existing framework.