Okay, Ecoho, I'll give you the benefit of the doubt.
ecoho said:
you know I think its really funny how people bash dragon age so much and compare it to the witcher 3 when the games are not really comparable for two reasons;
1. this was biowares first time putting the skyrim style questing into a game, were as CD project have done this all before and already knew the pitfalls. a better game of theirs to compare would be witcher 2 to DA:I at which point you would find that DA:I was the better game.
Except, of course, it's not. Because neither the Witcher 3, nor DA:I use "Skyrim style" questing.
Skyrim's quests tend to be very light on dialog. You pick up a piece of dialog at the outset, with no roleplaying options whatsoever, or occasionally a choice between, "yep, I'll do the thing," or, "nope, I'm going to go punch wolves in the face until one shits out a lockpick."
What ends up happening is, for the most part, roleplaying in Skyrim is based on the actions, and decisions of the player outside of the game. You choose to do a thing or not, because of your perspective as a player. There's no in-game incentive, just facilitation. With Skyrim, there's no attempt to reconcile whatever the player might be doing at this moment with their actions elsewhere, outside of very sporadic, and specific, instances.
With DAI, roleplaying is a function of reading from about five or six different scripts. Helpfully colorcoded to differentiate between "unrequited emo" and "flaming jackass."
With The Witcher 3, roleplaying in quests usually comes down to a problem with alternate approaches, and choosing to read from two or three different responses to queries. The difference is that Geralt is a fairly consistent character, in contrast to The Inquisitor.
Which is kind of surprising when you consider that with Hawke, Bioware managed to nail a fairly consistent tone in DA2, while still balancing out between alternate responses when prompted.
The crazy thing with The Witcher 3's quests is how many of them have full cutscenes. Random crap that DAI would pawn off to text only with no voicework, get full cutscenes and choices in The Witcher 3.
Though it is hilarious you're trying to claim that Bioware is the less experienced developer. Especially given that The Witcher started out as a mod on the Aurora Engine, and Bioware was crowing about how Dragon Age would be a spiritual successor to Neverwinter Nights or Balder's Gate, whichever they felt prouder of at the moment.
So, on one hand, you have a developer with three titles under it's belt. And on the other, you've got one with... what? Thirteen major RPG releases over the last 16 years? And they're less experienced than the company that hasn't been around for 10?
ecoho said:
2. the stories are vastly different in construction. in the witcher your continuing a story that's been going on for 3 games and many books already. In DA:I your making a new character whos main focus is not just on a central plot but on the companions you pick up and actually have feelings about.( hatred is in fact a feeling.)
In The Witcher 3, you're dealing with a new story built on the framework of two previous games, and inherits it's world state from player decisions in those previous entries, that draws heavily on the literary material that forms the core of the franchise.
I'm honestly not sure why you think The Witcher 3 is the fourth game in the series, unless you're thinking of that action game in the early 2000s that was never finished.
With Dragon Age Inquisition, you're dealing with a new story built on the framework of three previous games, and inherits it's world state from player decisions in two of those previous entries, that draws heavily on the tie-in lit that built around the core franchise, and has gradually been becoming less optional, and more mandatory as time goes by.
Yeah, I can see how profound those differences are.
In the case of Inquisition, you start by looking for a character who's out there ripping a giant hole in the universe and letting all sorts of horrific monsters through.
In the case of The Witcher 3, you start by looking for a character who's out there and has the potential to rip a giant hole in the universe letting horrific monsters through.
In the case of Inquisition, the story ultimately focuses on the actions of the Ancient elves (elves that disappeared for unexplained reasons in the distant past) and sets them up as the true villains before cutting off without a resolution.
In the case of The Witcher 3, the story ultimately focuses on the actions of the Aen Elle (elves that departed the world in the distant past) and sets them up as the true villains before continuing for another 12 hours to provide some actual conclusion to the story.
Yeah, completely different.
Yeah, I'm being snide.
But, really, Bioware set the stage. They said, "writing is important in video games." And other developers looked at that, said, "yeah, no, you're right." And while everyone else has been taking time, learning, trying to get better, Bioware... really hasn't. There's a little improvement. You stick Inquisition next to KotOR, and it's better, kinda. But, while they're doing that a lot of other developers have said, "wait, we really need to improve." And, they've been making real progress, resulting in far better written games than Bioware seems to be capable of these days.
So we get, Inquisition, a game that was literally developed by MMO designers, and feels like it. That's, not a good thing. An MMO is basically a chat room with some toys to keep you amused while you BS with other people. They took out the chat room, and left us with the sub par distractions.
It's got a story you're expected to spam through without paying attention, because the conversation going on in zone, or guild chat, is the real draw... except, that's not happening here, and the story isn't better to compensate. Inquisition remains a game you can, literally, play one handed. That's not a complement. In an MMO, you can do that, type with one, play with the other... that might have sounded slightly perverted, and participate in the game, while having your conversations. But, with a single player game? That's a bad thing.
If you honestly want an Inquisition style MMO, you're better off with ESO. The combat is more engaging than "hold down the right bumper until combat's over," and the writing is, honestly, better. That's how far Bioware's slid. There's actually better written MMOs on the market.
