BioWare Dev Explains Why Dragon Age II Is Easier Than Origins

Greg Tito

PR for Dungeons & Dragons
Sep 29, 2005
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BioWare Dev Explains Why Dragon Age II Is Easier Than Origins



The first Dragon Age could be difficult if you weren't familiar with party-based RPG tactics and Mike Laidlaw says he fixed that in the sequel.

I'm not saying that the difficulty turned me off at all in Origins - I quite liked how I needed to think through how my mage Grey Warden would paralyze opponents so that my rogue and warrior could finish them off. Others complained, however, that the normal difficulty setting was too tough and I know more than a few players who enjoyed the game much more with the slider on 'casual.' Many people who've played the demo or previewed the first few hours of Dragon Age II [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/articles/view/editorials/reviews/previews/8451-Preview-Whats-New-in-Dragon-Age-II] have noticed that the combat doesn't seem as punishing as its predecessor. Mike Laidlaw, lead designer of the game at BioWare, explained that he thought that the default Origins was too hard, and he adjusted the difficulty to compensate.

"I did feel Origins 'normal' [difficulty] was pushing too hard on the high side and no one wants to set their game to 'casual' unless they're comfortable being here just for the story, and that's fine. But as a player, I don't feel I should be able to pick what's arguably the default difficulty and get my ass handed to me again and again," Laidlaw said.

In response to that perception, Laidlaw's team created a system of rules for how they would judge the difficulty of the game. "We used an approach where we tried to develop essentially rules for the players, in terms of what our expectations were. So when we threw quality assurance and testers and focus tests at it, we knew what our expectation was," Laidlaw told me in a phone interview today.

"Our goal with the game for 'normal' is that you, as a player, should be playing one character optimally, whether that be Hawke or you focus on one of your followers. You've got one character that you've buffed up, got the right combination spells, you're playing them well. You shouldn't see huge instances of party wipes. You might lose a person or two, and there's certain boss encounters where it might take you a couple of tries to figure out the tricks," he said. "To me, that's a fair expectation for 'normal,' it presents the player with difficulty to keep them interested but without it being frustrating and fist punching our controllers."

For the more hardcore players, Laidlaw provided the higher difficulties. "For 'hard' and 'nightmare,' our expectation is the player will be playing the whole party effectively. You've been building your talents to work together and so on and so forth. As a result, the game for 'hard' becomes quite a bit more challenging because we're expecting you to be, not at 4 times efficiency, but quite a bit more efficient."

What about the masochists that want their ass handed to them on every fight? "'Hard' is there. 'Nightmare' is there for absolute ass-handing. But that was how our balance was done - through methodology and expectations."

What I took away from my conversation with Laidlaw is that Dragon Age II 'normal' is Origins on 'casual.' So if you want the same experience you had in Origins, I'd suggest bumping the difficulty up to 'hard' from the start.

That's what I'm going to do anyway.

Check back tomorrow and the rest of the week for more of my conversation with Mike Laidlaw.

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Mcface

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Aug 30, 2009
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I admit my first play through was on casual, because it had been a good 4 years since I played a party style RPG.

But bioware's games seem to be having more and more EA influence as the sequels are released. Which is a bad thing. I played the DA2 demo on normal, and it was too easy.. almost tediously so.
 

Onyx Oblivion

Borderlands Addict. Again.
Sep 9, 2008
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I'll start on hard, then.

I played Origins on Hard, except during solo segments like the Fade. Where I went to Normal. And to Casual on one occasion. Like the building full of Blood Mages and traps in Denerim. Doing that without Mana Clash is ridiculously annoying.

And my only really issue is that ice magic seems...almost useless...now. I saw a Fire damage boost skill in the tree, but not one for ice.
 

Hisshiss

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Aug 10, 2010
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Mcface said:
I admit my first play through was on casual, because it had been a good 4 years since I played a party style RPG.

But bioware's games seem to be having more and more EA influence as the sequels are released. Which is a bad thing. I played the DA2 demo on normal, and it was too easy.. almost tediously so.
Then bump it up to hard like they said. There's no reason that lighter players should get shafted just because the bettter/more hardcore ones want their optimal difficulty to be called normal.
 

Buccura

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Aug 13, 2009
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I too confess I played Origins on casual, though I think the normal level of difficulty in DAII, based on the demo, is pretty well balanced. Which makes me glad because even on casual Origins sometimes kicked my ass, and I grinded my characters to pretty high levels, almost maxing them out by the end of the game.
 

Namewithheld

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Apr 30, 2008
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Now, if they could explain why they made it suck, that would be nice!

Seriously, the Dragon Age 2 demo was so bad that it made me very very sad.

.________.

That sad.
 

Broken Orange

God Among Men
Apr 14, 2009
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Hisshiss said:
Mcface said:
I admit my first play through was on casual, because it had been a good 4 years since I played a party style RPG.

But bioware's games seem to be having more and more EA influence as the sequels are released. Which is a bad thing. I played the DA2 demo on normal, and it was too easy.. almost tediously so.
Then bump it up to hard like they said. There's no reason that lighter players should get shafted just because the bettter/more hardcore ones want their optimal difficulty to be called normal.
I second this. Games should have their easy mode be, you know, EASY! At least their will be a harder mode for people who want a challenge.
 

RatRace123

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Dec 1, 2009
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I started playing Origins on easy, I'll admit it.
Then I advanced to medium, then hard, which I ended up beating it on. Course I was playing as a tank, leaving my character free to charge headfirst into battle like a certain Sir Jenkins. I'm sure I'd face more challenge as a rogue or mage.

I got good at the tactical combat and understanding what party member is good for what role, so I think I'll start DA2 at hard.
 

Jake the Snake

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Mar 25, 2009
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I play Bioware games for the story. If the gameplay gets to hard and interrupts the progression of that story, I get pissed. Which is why I always play the games on easy the first time through.
 

Mirrorknight

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Jul 23, 2009
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Blah. It wasn't hard. Kids have it too easy nowadays. Back in my day, we had to have our characters eat food and water or they'd DIE. And we had to do it MANUALLY. Through 5 feet of snow, both ways!
 

ZippyDSMlee

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Sep 1, 2007
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I played Origins on hard and it was easy 0-o, ggaaa stop watering down stuff for the mouth breathers already!
 

frago roc

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Aug 13, 2009
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I found only one part kind of hard, and that was just after getting Liliana. The rest of the game was kind of a sinch. This disapoints me, games should not be a sit back and cruise through the action - you SHOULD have to think about what moves you make. It's called making a rewarding experience people!
 

deth2munkies

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Jan 28, 2009
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The problem with Origins and every other BioWare/Black Isle/Obsidian (I lump them all together because they're obscenely similar) was the negative difficulty curve. At the very beginning, the small encounters are just as challenging as the stuff in the middle or end of the game, but you have less gear/items/abilities to deal with it. As you get more gear/items/abilities, stuff gets ridiculously easy, to the point where, on normal difficulty, the only fights I actually had to control beyond casting Cone of Cold or pre-casting Blizzard through the wall were Revanents and bosses (god fucking damn those Revanents).

I'll bet you anything this game will fall into the same trap, with the difficulty going from acceptable to hard in the beginning and piss-easy at the middle/end. At least I hope mages (in particular their stunlocking ability through the frost tree) and Arcane Warriors aren't as overpowered.
 

Dired

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Dec 19, 2003
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I really don't care for the "small unit tactical simulator" feel of "classic" RPGs. I want to focus on one person - you know, playing a role - and have the other people be background, supporting characters. Having to constantly pause and control four people at once felt like playing pen and paper DND by yourself. As well, the constant stuns and CC of DA:O meant that practically, if your main was melee, you *couldn't" just play them as they were out of the fight all the time. I just don't accept the idea that pretending to be four people at once is more a roleplaying experience than pretending to be a single person - it instead just feels like a relic from earlier games which couldn't deal with henchmen AI and players are just too conservative to give that up even though the technology has made that unnecessary.

I for one and very happy at the change.
 

Ewyx

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Dec 3, 2008
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yeah da:eek: wasn't that difficult, I finished it on the hardest settings with my mage, and hardly broke a sweat... so yeah, DA2 should be a walk in the park.

sad.