BioWare Dev Explains Why Dragon Age II Is Easier Than Origins
- Thread starter Greg Tito
- Start date
oh joy, because nightmare wasnt easy enough.
if you want casual....play the god damn casual setting. why are you toning down the whole difficulty of the game so a few people dont have to bother to change the difficulty to easy? is it REALLY to much to expect from you people to just switch to easy again? you have to go and make bioware tone down the game yet again?
whatever, i suppose the gut-wrenching laughter from those hilarious darkspawn models and sentai-style attack animations will really add to the difficulty in place of an easier nightmare
if you want casual....play the god damn casual setting. why are you toning down the whole difficulty of the game so a few people dont have to bother to change the difficulty to easy? is it REALLY to much to expect from you people to just switch to easy again? you have to go and make bioware tone down the game yet again?
whatever, i suppose the gut-wrenching laughter from those hilarious darkspawn models and sentai-style attack animations will really add to the difficulty in place of an easier nightmare
Frankly, I'm glad for this. I forced myself to slog through the game on normal because I'll be damned if I'm gonna give up and drop down to the easy setting, but it wasn't really fun. I did get a lot better at the battles, and learned a lot of things that surprised me. (Like the fact that despite all my years of experience screaming otherwise, healers are actually totally useless dead-weight in DA:O. Crowd control mages are where it's at.) So it wasn't a total loss, but I think I probably would have had more fun and far less frustration on casual. Which is a very, very unusual thing for me to say.
Oddly though, I tended to have the most difficulty in battles with a large number of enemies. The times my main character was alone and the big bosses were like a break for me. It's everything in between that had me ripping my hair out. Maybe that's because I was playing a Rogue?
So yeah, I hope all those difficulty levels from the first game are still there, but I certainly won't mind being able to have my first play-through be on normal without getting my party wiped all the time. I can save that difficulty for when I actually know what I'm doing.
Oddly though, I tended to have the most difficulty in battles with a large number of enemies. The times my main character was alone and the big bosses were like a break for me. It's everything in between that had me ripping my hair out. Maybe that's because I was playing a Rogue?
So yeah, I hope all those difficulty levels from the first game are still there, but I certainly won't mind being able to have my first play-through be on normal without getting my party wiped all the time. I can save that difficulty for when I actually know what I'm doing.
Though I might point out that the DA2 demo pretty much consists of the easiest levels in the game, yes, it struck me as way too easy. The "difficulty" in origins mainly stemmed from it's learning curve, and once you got the hang of it, you were playing nightmare all the way with no problems or party wipes. Since the normal setting looks "easy" on DA2, I fear that I will be playing nightmare mode all the way through with no problem. However, it sounds like the developers might have put thought into their difficulty settings, unlike those games that simply make the engine more difficult to work with, and it is possible that hard and nightmare will be freaking awesome. Guess we find out in a week.
uphill...both waysMirrorknight said:
while the axis powers bombed our power plants
so we needed to generate electricity via hamster wheel!
hahaha anyway... were I the kinda person into games like DA:O, I don't think I'd want to admit/brag about how amazing I am at the game
but hey, no one's making the game easier here. just fixing the default setting of difficulty
e.g. the "normal" in Vanquish was pretty bloody difficult...at least for me anyway :[ I'm going through on Easy (there's like an even easier difficulty but I didn't want to insult myself further) but hey it's a blast not getting killed in one shot and it's a rental...
I never understood the complaints about Dragon Age: Origins' difficulty. The game was pretty easy if the player actually took the time to play it. I had to play it on Hard to see it present any actual challenge. The player is given tools in abundance to counter everything the game throws at him and come out a winner. And I'm not even talking about using cheap exploits. The game can easily be beaten using the "traditional" Mage+Rogue+2Fighters mix (and no, that one Mage isn't an Arcane Warrior).
Yes, the game will run you over if you just charge into each fight without preparing tactics, stocking up on potions, making at least a semblance of good decisions when picking your talents and such, but then again, Gears of War will kick your ass if you charge in with no ammo and without using cover. Does that make Gears of War extremely difficult?
Perhaps the percieved difficulty came from a number of players unaccustomed to games such as this, with combat requiring tactics and proper application of characters' abilities rather than spamming stuff and hoping for the best?
Yes, the game will run you over if you just charge into each fight without preparing tactics, stocking up on potions, making at least a semblance of good decisions when picking your talents and such, but then again, Gears of War will kick your ass if you charge in with no ammo and without using cover. Does that make Gears of War extremely difficult?
Perhaps the percieved difficulty came from a number of players unaccustomed to games such as this, with combat requiring tactics and proper application of characters' abilities rather than spamming stuff and hoping for the best?
why? you can play it on the same difficulty as origins, just now its called hard instead of normal,JaredXE said:
I played Origins on normal and occasionally on casual when I got really tired of some battle. Sometimes I switched to hard difficulty too and I noticed that it isn't much harder than normal(at least in that part of the game). The normal difficulty was so difficult that hard didn't feel "hard". Thats why I like the idea, that normal is a bit easier in the second game. Someone might complain about the game being dumbed down but haters gonna hate I guess.
Not sure if I'm going to play through DAII on Normal or Hard first.
I enjoyed the tactical party system in Origins, but I think I might also enjoy a looser style of play that focuses mostly on my own character. Time will tell, but I think my pride might forbid me from choosing the easier alternative.
I enjoyed the tactical party system in Origins, but I think I might also enjoy a looser style of play that focuses mostly on my own character. Time will tell, but I think my pride might forbid me from choosing the easier alternative.
Can people stop with this Hardcore gamer stuff, seriously. If you play games for anything other than fun and you're not getting paid for it, then to me you have very little to be proud of.Savber said:
Gaming is for fun people, never forget that.
It was a Demo to show off the combat system which imo has improved a whole lot. It showed nothing else other than the new combat and conversation system.Namewithheld said:
If you're going to base an opinion on an RPG on those 2 things... You have no idea what an RPG is.
Easier...?
...wait, Origins was difficult? I played it for a little while, the only thing i found challenging was trying to figure out how the stealth element would come into play since i was playing as an Elf Rogue.
...wait, Origins was difficult? I played it for a little while, the only thing i found challenging was trying to figure out how the stealth element would come into play since i was playing as an Elf Rogue.
For most of the game, I didn't think the game was that difficult. I played a rogue archer, shootin dudes with meh bow, Alistair tanking, Barkspawn deepsin, and Wynn healing. The only time I ever turned it to casual was during the two high dragon fights and the boss guy in the ash place.
Then I got to Orzammar. Just coming from slicing through hordes of demon abominations and Indiana Jonesing it up to find the legendary Ashes of Andraste, and I get my ass handed to me by a group of bounty hunters with little to no explanation, curled up in a ball, and turned it to casual for the rest of the game.
I have a feeling that it isn't so much the game itself was hard, but the mages were overpowered. Like REALLY overpowered. To the point where all the game mechanics were thrown out the window and it became a "which mage can throw a fireball first and win". Being in a group with no offensive mages kind of made the game impossible unless for some godly miracle the enemy AI has a brainfart and decides not to throw a fireball.
However, when you have a mage character, or even better a mage character and Morrigan, the game becomes facepalming easy. When you can Cone of Cold an entire enemy group while another mage fireballs the enemy mages, and then procede to churn out OP spell after OP spell, no one in the group even comes close to taking damage.
Around the second playthrough, when I was playing my mage, it was about the time when I solo'd a revenant that took my rogue 5 tries with his entire party to even have a hope to beat that I realised the game was broken. I loved the story, in fact it was the only reason I continued to play the game.
Luckily, after playing the Dragon Age II demo, and seeing that fireball no longers had a knockback effect, and getting my ass handed to me by the ogre, I can safely say it will be a good game.
Then I got to Orzammar. Just coming from slicing through hordes of demon abominations and Indiana Jonesing it up to find the legendary Ashes of Andraste, and I get my ass handed to me by a group of bounty hunters with little to no explanation, curled up in a ball, and turned it to casual for the rest of the game.
I have a feeling that it isn't so much the game itself was hard, but the mages were overpowered. Like REALLY overpowered. To the point where all the game mechanics were thrown out the window and it became a "which mage can throw a fireball first and win". Being in a group with no offensive mages kind of made the game impossible unless for some godly miracle the enemy AI has a brainfart and decides not to throw a fireball.
However, when you have a mage character, or even better a mage character and Morrigan, the game becomes facepalming easy. When you can Cone of Cold an entire enemy group while another mage fireballs the enemy mages, and then procede to churn out OP spell after OP spell, no one in the group even comes close to taking damage.
Around the second playthrough, when I was playing my mage, it was about the time when I solo'd a revenant that took my rogue 5 tries with his entire party to even have a hope to beat that I realised the game was broken. I loved the story, in fact it was the only reason I continued to play the game.
Luckily, after playing the Dragon Age II demo, and seeing that fireball no longers had a knockback effect, and getting my ass handed to me by the ogre, I can safely say it will be a good game.
hmm... maybe it's just me, but I think that complaining about party micromanagement in Dragon Age is like complaining about having to aim at your enemies in Halo or Half-Life. Its a part of the game. Its a tactical RPG, so I don 't see anything wrong with that. I could agree that the tactical aspect probably didn't have enough emphasis in the tutorials, but that's all. I wonder how many of you have played Baldurs Gate? Friendly fire and sending your sneaky rogue with high evade score near the enemies so the mage could blast them with a fireball was a natural part of the game.
Of course games are supposed to be fun, but it's only natural for the game to become more challenging towards the end. With Dragon Age it almost felt the other way around. So I can agree that the difficulty was unbalanced. Also playing a game that is not challenging enough makes me feel like i'm wasting my time. It gets boring after a while and I wonder if should have read a book instead.
Of course games are supposed to be fun, but it's only natural for the game to become more challenging towards the end. With Dragon Age it almost felt the other way around. So I can agree that the difficulty was unbalanced. Also playing a game that is not challenging enough makes me feel like i'm wasting my time. It gets boring after a while and I wonder if should have read a book instead.
So much QQ...
Tell you what, now it's finally been released for silver members on XBL, I fucking LIKED the demo. I even liked mashing the 'a' button (That's right, the one at the bottom. X is a talent hotkey FFS.) billions of times per battle. I liked being able to pull back on the left stick and smack pommel strike and watch hawke lean over his shoulder and deliver a gobful of hilt to the cheeky fucker trying to stick a sword through my left buttock before switching back to the guy I was wailing on before.
When I first heard about auto attack being optional, I winced. And if combat was mumorpagur air swings remeniscent of DA:O, I'd be right, But it's not. Even in the demo, combat is visceral and more remeniscent of a hack-and-slasher then an RPG. Good stuff, I say, more power to ya. One thing that always shat me to tears about RPGs is this seeming carry-over commandment from the DIKU days which says "When committed to combat, thou shalt stand there and spam abilities until thou art victorious or dead." In DA:O, good luck disengaging and kiting the boss around the battlefield until you regened enough stamina to get that necessary stun off.
Positioning your party in perfect formation and then engaging the enemy in an extended ball-kicking contest is not tactics. Calling it a wipe because DPS pulled aggro for a fraction of a second is not strategy. I blame WoW et al for fooling us all into thinking that squaredancing in this manner is a realistic representation of battle.
DA2 combat, from the very brief cross-section the demo allows, looks more intuative, more realistic, and more flat-out FUN than its predecessor. If that makes it easier then sign me up for the casual crowd. I don't buy SPRPGs to play goddamn MMO raid squaredances with myself.
Tell you what, now it's finally been released for silver members on XBL, I fucking LIKED the demo. I even liked mashing the 'a' button (That's right, the one at the bottom. X is a talent hotkey FFS.) billions of times per battle. I liked being able to pull back on the left stick and smack pommel strike and watch hawke lean over his shoulder and deliver a gobful of hilt to the cheeky fucker trying to stick a sword through my left buttock before switching back to the guy I was wailing on before.
When I first heard about auto attack being optional, I winced. And if combat was mumorpagur air swings remeniscent of DA:O, I'd be right, But it's not. Even in the demo, combat is visceral and more remeniscent of a hack-and-slasher then an RPG. Good stuff, I say, more power to ya. One thing that always shat me to tears about RPGs is this seeming carry-over commandment from the DIKU days which says "When committed to combat, thou shalt stand there and spam abilities until thou art victorious or dead." In DA:O, good luck disengaging and kiting the boss around the battlefield until you regened enough stamina to get that necessary stun off.
Positioning your party in perfect formation and then engaging the enemy in an extended ball-kicking contest is not tactics. Calling it a wipe because DPS pulled aggro for a fraction of a second is not strategy. I blame WoW et al for fooling us all into thinking that squaredancing in this manner is a realistic representation of battle.
DA2 combat, from the very brief cross-section the demo allows, looks more intuative, more realistic, and more flat-out FUN than its predecessor. If that makes it easier then sign me up for the casual crowd. I don't buy SPRPGs to play goddamn MMO raid squaredances with myself.
Since when is accessibility a bad thing? Wait, no, silly question. I keep forgetting; we're gamers, we're insulted when our medium tries to become less obtuse and insular.
But hey, the new combat is a step closer to feeling like--you know--fantasy combat, rather than step-by-step middle-management of a sword & sorcery firm!
But hey, the new combat is a step closer to feeling like--you know--fantasy combat, rather than step-by-step middle-management of a sword & sorcery firm!