Dragon Age II has a 3.4/10 on Metacritic, WHY!?

[Alleged_Alec]

Why is the average response in this thread either "ZOMG, PC ELITISTS BE RUINING OUR GAME WITH THEIR DESIRE FOR COMPLEX MECHANICS!" or "WHAT THE SHIT MAN, THOSE DAMN CONSOLE-TARDS DUMBED DOWN OUR GAMEZ! I MEAN, WHY DO THEY WANT A MORE INTUITIVE SYSTEM? DAMN SCRUBS SHOULD STICK TO GEAR OF WAR!"? I thought this was one of the more mature gaming fora out there.

You see, the problem is that both sides have some valid arguments, if you're willing to wade through the huge mounds of shit to find them, that is. It's just that their approach to gaming is completely different.

I understand why the ones who liked the more RPG oriented prequel dislike the changes made to the game. Let's for example think of a fictional Gear of War 3, in which the shooter elements have been mostly removed to make place for long racing sessions. Sure, it might still be a completely good game, but the game has undergone (in your mind) such rigorous changes that you're no longer able to enjoy it because it is no longer part of the genre that you enjoy.

And I also get the people who like the new changes: they might have not been huge fans of the in their minds more tedious parts of the game, but still liked it despite of those bits. These guys will be thrilled when they hear most of those parts have been altered or completely removed. These people will indeed belief that the game has been hugely improved because of these changes.

And yeah, I understand that some feel somewhat betrayed by Bioware. They used to make high quality RPGs, and were one of a very small group of companies to still do so. I understand that fans of RPGs want to prevent their favourite genre from dying out like the adventure-puzzles have done before. Of course it's immensely frustrating when a company stops making those games, especially when you feel they're a dying breed.


So, yeah, you feel strongly about something, and disagree with the other party. BUT BLOODY INSULTING THEM DOESN'T HELP YOUR CASE. And neither does it help the 'big goal' of advancing the gaming medium as a whole from it's adolescent roots.
Discuss all you want, but do so politely, for fuck's sake.

 

[Eldarion]

Holy shit.

The critic scores have a rating of like 82-83/100.

But the user reviews put it right now at a 2.8/10!! The hell is everyone so pissed about?! First glance it looks like a bunch of people are calling it "dumbed down" from its old RPG elements. I haven't played it so I wouldn't know but I do know the Mass Effect series' combat was heavily improved when moving closer to an action game than an RPG.

Well, I don't know what class you picked but I thought they dumbed down my infiltrator. In the first game (when sniping) I had to compensate for rifle sway, kickback from pulling the trigger and I only got one or 2 shots before the rifle overheated.

In the second game, the rifle sway is gone, the kickback is gone. On top of that the game slows down time for you when zoomed in. On top of that you could cloak yourself witch caused all enemies to forget you are there for 5 seconds.

The first game had a sniper class that took some level of skill to be good with, compare that to the same class in the second game and its like most of the aiming is done for you. Truly sniping for dummies. You'd have to be blind to not hit your targets in the second game.

 

[AlternatePFG]

Personally, I don't get the hate. It's just a bunch of whiny BioWare fanboys who get pissed off over the slightest little change. I think the game is just as good as Origins so far, not better not worse.

 

[bossdirge]

I don't really mind the button mashing, if I want deep complex combat I will get killed in Demon's Souls. The demo was a bit of a red herring because the environment was so bland it didn't have any graphical wow factor. And because it's not a true sequel there's no point in getting upset that it's dumbed down, besides, I didn't find it any easier than DAO which I also found pretty damn simple too.

 

[Paragon Fury]

Why?

Because compared to Dragon Age: Origins, the game is complete shit.

Hell, compared to many games, its complete shit.

- The story is incoherent and stupid. It comes together like bad fan fiction rather than the stories we've come to expect from Bioware.

- The horrible story takes longer to have any meaning than even FFXIII, and even then it's still stupid.

- The character class and skill customization is stupidly limited, and allows for no real customization of your class.

- All of the party members except for Varric suck ass. Even Anders, who was funny and witty in Awakenings gets a forced humor-ectomy.

- All of the romances completely suck. There isn't anyone interesting, or anyone not so completely disturbed that you'd want to have anything to do with them at all.

- Within the first 6 quests or so, they completely Karma Houdini Flemeth out of one your major decisions from Origins.

- The character redesigns suck ass. While everything new looks better, the redesigned people look absolutely horrible, Anders, Flemeth included.

- The Darkspawn look like absolute shit now. They don't even look threatening; they look like they have Down Syndrome. Rumor even has it that there is a challenge floating about out there for a modder to re-do the Darkspawn like they were for DA:O to replace the terrible Darkspawn from the second game.

-Its stupidly short. I just got the game yesterday, and even playing on Hard I'm almost halfway done.

Overall, the game really just plays like a poorly cobbled together set of DLCs, rather than a full-fledged Bioware game.

 

[WorldCritic]

I'm just gonna guess it's a bunch of people who get pissy whenever something is slightly changed. I get that if the planets were to align it's possible that Bioware would make a bad game (though I haven't seen it yet) but with the overall positive reviews from both fans and critics, I don't think Metacritic's users are a good source of information.

 

[WorldCritic]

Ok, I just looked on Metacritc (cringe) and one user review gave it a 0/10. One of the complaints was "the game feels too unbeleivable, with teleporting people and anime like fights." What happened to the term "fantasy game?" Isn't the point to be unbelievable?

EDIT: Sorry for the double post, when I tried to edit my first one, it didn't show up on my screen.

 

[PlasmaFrog]

I don't understand why a bad score should keep me from enjoying a game.

Just get over it, people might've actually disliked it or it was a troll raid. It's not the end of the world.

 

[Fappy]

A lot of fans boys are freaking out and giving it 1's because they're butt-hurt about how many changes they implemented. I'm about 16ish hours in and so far its been a pretty solid gaming experience. It is not quite as good as I had wanted it to be (I have more of an issue with its lack of polish than anything else), but then again, neither was Origins. I'll probably give it an 8 or 8.5 by the time I am done with it if it continues the way it is.

 

[devotedsniper]

Well i finished it last night and i have to say i was disappointed, the maps are reused and reused it gets very tiring, the combat system seemed abit iffy i don't know what it is it just doesn't seem to match up to the DA:O's system (e.g. when targets such as spiders moved while attacking you couldn't select to attack or at least i couldn't).

On a positive note i liked the storyline, and the graphics but i was just left feeling like there should have been more content such as more than one town and more than 3 locations outside of town.

 

[Twilight_guy]

Meh. Ignore it, people are idiots. There also might be someone messing with the system to manipulating the results (because his life is so small that destroying one game is worth the effort).

 

[Nifarious]

Same reason why lots of amazing, groundbreaking games get skewed negative user ratings. Idiots pick one little thing and rage over it. They're a blight on the industry. Most of them haven't even touched the game.
aka, too much Yahtzee.

 

[Kortney]

Because the thousands of people happy with the game aren't logging onto Metacritic and going mental. It's only the frustrated, annoyed, moaning minority who are jumping on and giving it a one out of ten.

Trust me, the game will be extremely well received by most who play it.

 

[Sabiancym]

You guys ever think that maybe the game just isn't as good as the original? Stop with the conspiracy theories and blaming PC gamers.

The game just isn't as good as Origins. Let it go.

 

[Legion IV]

I have been playing and would give it a 8/10. I do dislike the conversation wheel. And i do miss playing a dwarf. All in all it is a solid game IMO.

and 8! thats solid to you? Geeze.

like a 6 is a solid for me. You gotta remember 10 is perfect man. 8 is like top 50 favorite games.

 

[Legion IV]

You guys ever think that maybe the game just isn't as good as the original? Stop with the conspiracy theories and blaming PC gamers.

The game just isn't as good as Origins. Let it go.

Quoted for truth. Thank you. I love how the escapist community can hate on other games and have there user reveiws be "Amazing and insightful" THen once people hate on biowares new game which evidently isint as good as DA:O its just OMG a bunch of mad nerds bombing meta critic, what a joke.

 

[Drakmorg]

I haven't yet had a chance to play my copy yet, so I can't really weigh in on whether I think the game is good or not.

My guess is that a bunch of trolls thought it would be funny to make people think the game was horrible. Seeing as how the game hasn't even been out for a week yet, the only people who could have likely gotten all the way through would either be unemployed psychotics or liars.

 

[Awexsome]

You guys ever think that maybe the game just isn't as good as the original? Stop with the conspiracy theories and blaming PC gamers.

The game just isn't as good as Origins. Let it go.

In another post you were just put on probation for calling it another game ruined by being dumbed down by console gamers.

If you don't want people to blame PC gamers about blantant hating perhaps you should stop acting like it's naturally superior to consoles and was only dumbed down for them?

 

[Mathak]

Holy shit.

The critic scores have a rating of like 82-83/100.

But the user reviews put it right now at a 2.8/10!! The hell is everyone so pissed about?! First glance it looks like a bunch of people are calling it "dumbed down" from its old RPG elements. I haven't played it so I wouldn't know but I do know the Mass Effect series' combat was heavily improved when moving closer to an action game than an RPG.

"I do know the Mass Effect series' combat was heavily improved when moving closer to an action game than an RPG"

Haha no.

Haha, yes.

Don't diss ME1 combat, especially on harder difficulties. Trash mobs spamming immunity and taking an hour each to kill was great design.