Race selection is back in Dragon Age Inquisition

[Frotality]

bioware's new strategy seems to be to create one memorable and engaging game, release sh**ty sequels and spin offs and generally make it seem like they have no idea what they are doing in any field other than marketing, then release a slightly less sh**ty sequel with a bit of nostalgia painted on it, satisfying long-time fans and new ones in the end. pretty smart actually. as long as they dont completely f**k up the ending again.

 

[Doom972]

But will we get to play Dwarven mages? No, I don't care that in this world dwarves can't be mages - I want be the exception.

 

[The Wykydtron]

Again, the majority of this wasn't directed at you in particular, Wykydtron, just your comment gave me a platform to make some comments of my own.

Oh I am perfectly fine with just being a platform.

I know exactly why they included the Refuse ending, people were pissed and whined about wanting a fourth outcome. Whining that apparently blinded them to the only thing such an action would lead to. AKA losing entirely. The line from Liara saying "we tried but we couldn't win" pisses me off because Shep WOULD have won, literally 100% won no question if not for what I assume to be overwhelming personal pride holding him back.

As much as I would love Shep to shout Objection! Shoot the kid in the face, climb onto a giant space mecha, deliver a speech ending with "who the hell do you think I am?!" Then destroy the entire Reaper fleet singlehandedly it ain't gonna happen.

Bioware tho, can you make that a strictly non-canon ending and drop it as DLC? Thanks.

Sure, you can do that with a game like Spec Ops the Line when in the end, your choices don't really matter. That game was the first or only one in that franchise so they could do what ever the fuck they wanted. HOWEVER, Origins has already set the precedent that you can actually do shit if you actually put some effort into it. You can't just make a sequel that backpedals on all that saying "NOPE, EVERYTHING YOU DO IS INSIGNIFICANT NOW, HYUCK!", that's just cheap and lazy. The best choice best games are the ones that ALLOW you to fail or succeed, or hell, anything in between that. They shouldn't have the same exact outcome regardless, because there would be no point in having the choice there in the first place. And if anything, the ending was a glorified "BUY THE SEQUEL TO SEE THE EPIC CONCLUSION" cliffhanger, nothing else. I'm going to call a spade a spade and not applaud something that was just pure laziness. I sequel should IMPROVE on the elements of a previous game, not take away or regress. Now, I'm fine with a more "human" story where you aren't saving the world from the big bad whatever but I want to have at least SOME affect on the world if I'm given the choice. Hopefully the Inquisitor will be a much better protagonist than Hawke, the "Bystander of Kirkwall".

Haha, I like that. The Bystander of Kirkwall. You may have just made my day :3

Personally I much, much, MUCH prefer a small character story that really does not focus on SAVE THE WORLD LOL but rather focuses on one character or a group of characters intensely. Something DA2 at least tried to do with some limited success

Take (the best game ever) Persona 4 for example. You have a group of eight main characters that make up the Investigation Team, a few side characters, some Social Link characters and the entire game is focused on the Investigation Team solving a mysterious murder case in a the smallest village you have ever seen in the middle of nowhere.

Now I know for some reason at the end they implied that you unknowingly ended up saving the entire world instead of just the village, probably for those guys who just can't get a hard on without saving at least 1000 people but whatever, that was just a side effect barely worth mentioning and I usually ignore it because saving the world is not, and was never the point of the game.

The point was the mystery and the characters revolving around and solving the mystery. There's a reason why the main battle song is called Reach Out to the Truth y'know?

 

[Abomination]

Where melee characters engage opponents quickly rather than plod after them. (DA:O issue)

Is this a statement endorsing the combat in DA2? Wow... I didn't think you people existed. Slow and plodding made sense for melee characters, except for rogues. Slow combat was part of what made it tactical. I expect a character wearing full plate + mail to be slow, and even slower if they are carrying any large two handed weapon. DA2 had characters swinging greatswords like twigs as if they were weightless. Performing leaps into combat and all this other garbage like it was some sort of anime. The only character that should be acting like a ninja should be the rogue, but even that has its limits.

You mean how a character is able to just walk straight past my tank without so much as provoking an attack of opportunity? There being no mechanic for my tank to actually, you know, prevent people walking past them to get to the squishy team mates? No, there were only 2 ways a tank could stop someone from attacking someone else: either have threat or stun/knock over the opponent.

Voice for the main character. (DA2 benefit)

Debatable[/quote]So convincing? Lucky I'm talking about what I like in a game.

But apparently enjoying Dragon Age II makes me a part of a fantastical people you can't believe even existed. As though some aspects of a game aren't subjective.

 

[Chris Tian]

Yes! finally something about DA:I thats without a doubt or any drawback good news. I still have hope this game will show that Bioware still got it.

 

[A Weakgeek]

Noone is going to waste time creating vast amounts of content which will only apply to some players.

Have you perchance played Witcher 2 by CD project red? That game has a whole different 2nd act (there are 3) depending on your choice.

 

[Terminal Blue]

You know what? All that stuff about your big choices not really mattering in ME3? That's what pissed me off.

It's not just ME3, the entire Mass Effect series is pretty much the same in this regard.

You fight through an area, then at the end you make a single choice, generally consisting of two binary options (generally one Paragon, one Renegade) neither of which will actually impact on the game at all outside of dialogue. Did you save the Feros colony? Doesn't matter outside of dialogue. Did you kill the Rachni queen? Doesn't matter outside of dialogue.

None of these events changes the story, what they do is to build up a background which is referenced in dialogue to make you think the choices were meaningful. Outside of dialogue it really doesn't matter what choices you make because the game will, for the most part, proceed as planned anyway. The Mass Effect series was like that from the very beginning, indeed the first game had virtually no acknowledgement of your choices at all.

I think it's testimony to the excellence of Mass Effect as a series, and particularly its dialogue and level of characterization that noone seems to have actually cottoned onto this until ME3.

And it's not just Mass Effect. Did you pick Behlen or Harrowmont in Dragon Age: Origins. How did it change the story? Did you side with the Elves or the Werewolves? How did it change the story? Did you save or kill Connor? How did it change the story? The answer in every case is that it didn't (save for the somewhat meaningless allies you got in the final battle). None of your choices really mattered, because you were never allowed to make important choices. You always recovered the ashes and saved Eamon, you couldn't decide to let him rot and find some other way because that would have changed the story. You always went to Orzimmar and found the anvil of the void, you couldn't just cave Behlen/Harrowmont's skull in with a tire iron because that would change the story. You always chose to fight the final battle in Denerim.

This is how cRPGs fundamentally work. Choices can never be as meaningful in a game as they could sitting around a table with an actual GM. Thus, having your "choices" matter generally means having very small and superficial choices which are recognized in dialogue or through small gameplay tweaks like maybe having to fight through the same a map from a different direction or with different enemies. The massive amount of labour required to make a modern game, as well as Bioware very publically hanging their hat on the save import technology (which also means all choices have to be applicable not just to one game, but also to all future games in the same series) has only made this more true.

Have you perchance played Witcher 2 by CD project red? That game has a whole different 2nd act (there are 3) depending on your choice.

I sometimes feel like I should give the Witcher series another chance, but frankly there's just so much about it I can't stand.

However, the mere fact that the third act is the same suggests to me that perhaps you're overstating the difference between those two choices. Fundamentally, the story must go on as it was programmed to.

 

[Tigerlily Warrior]

"You don't anger the dwarf fans"

Damn Right

(Game looks fantastic, everything who disagrees should buy the newest game informer!)

Speaking of dwarf fans, the female dwarf looks great. Much improved since DA. Now let's hope Varic is a romanceable character...

 

[Abomination]

I sometimes feel like I should give the Witcher series another chance, but frankly there's just so much about it I can't stand.

However, the mere fact that the third act is the same suggests to me that perhaps you're overstating the difference between those two choices. Fundamentally, the story must go on as it was programmed to.

Actually the third act takes place in the same location and is dealing with the same issue but the events of the second act have huge consequences on how it plays out, it also changes what quests are available and how the entire region acts towards you depending on what version of Act II you played through as.

Geralt is essentially the wrong man at the right place at the right time who ends up unintentionally nudging decisions in ways that have staggering political repercussions. It's established at the end of The Witcher I where Geralt is collecting payment from a king personally for resolving a matter of state involving a monster.

Spoiler

Just so happens this is when an assassination attempt on the King takes place and Geralt is Johnny on the Spot, one of the most skilled swordsmen in the land, who defends the king from the assassin. Had Geralt not been there the king would have been assassinated and the entire region would have fallen into political turmoil as his only heirs (bastards too) were in the hands of a minor countess.

He can't stop major events that are already in progress but he changes how they resolve themselves.

 

[Innegativeion]

So they said the PC'll be voiced, right?
I wonder if each race and sex will have a different voice. That'd be neat. Also around the 2:33-ish mark looks like we get to see some of it. Closer third person camera, eh...

Would be, I 'spose, but I honestly doubt it.

The options, were that the case, are

*spend a lot more on voice acting

**cut down on the protagonist's dialogue


*Unlikely, I would think

**Counter-intuitive to having voiced lines the first place


I expect a male and female voice over only. Though, I could be wrong.

 

[Terminal Blue]

Is this a statement endorsing the combat in DA2? Wow... I didn't think you people existed. Slow and plodding made sense for melee characters, except for rogues. Slow combat was part of what made it tactical.

Actually, I think 90% of what you're describing is just animation. DA2 fights took about the same length of time as fights in Origins, what I think made them seem faster was the habit of throwing vast numbers of brittle-bone disease sufferers into each fight who could be killed in one or two hits.

There are lots of things which you can say made DA2 less tactical. The fact that the party was constantly swamped from all sides by wave combat was the big one, also limited friendly fire, the simplification of the armor, weapon and stat system (although differentiating rogues and warriors tactically was probably a good idea) and long cooldowns which put the emphasis on auto-attacks. But the speed of attack animations made very little difference.

Origins also had a lot of impossible animations and unrealistically acrobatic or stylized fighting. It was maybe a bit more subtle and largely confined its true silliness to the prerendered finishing moves, but they were still pretty silly. Personally, I'd like to see two-handed weapons made slower again, but only because it worked so well with Origins armour system, which was a much more interesting mechanic than just a flat percentile damage resistance.

But, frankly, a realistic game would have characters in heavy armour waddling around ineffectually hitting at each other until one of them collapsed from heat exhaustion and got finished off with a knife through the eye. Not particularly heroic or fun. I get that there's an intermediate, but I think there's room for a bit of silly in fantasy.

 

[Terminal Blue]

Speaking of dwarf fans, the female dwarf looks great. Much improved since DA.

My first instinct was that they looked too petite, but then I realize that these are Dragon Age dwarfs, who really are just small humans, and that's actually nice because it's a bit original. Dwarfs have got way too bound up in this whole fantasy warrior-race archetype over the years, it's nice to see someone step back and rethink the concept.

Actually the third act takes place in the same location and is dealing with the same issue but the events of the second act have huge consequences on how it plays out, it also changes what quests are available and how the entire region acts towards you depending on what version of Act II you played through as.

Changing what quests are available is cool, but doesn't take all that much work. DA2 also managed that, and I think noone would say that it made your choices particularly meaningful. The rest sounds a lot like dialogue to me.

However, I don't want to sound over-critical, because my point is actually that that kind of dialogue is enough, or should be. That you don't necessarily need to do more than tell the player that what they did mattered to some fictional character. If that's done well enough that the player is invested in the setting, then the choice will seem meaningful to them even if it didn't radically alter the whole arc of the story.

Still, I don't know. Maybe the Witcher 2 would be the game to change my mind. I'll probably get it when it's on sale and I actually have some money saved up.

One major reason I haven't already, though, is that I simply could not get myself to care about Geralt in the Witcher 1. They seem to be constantly trying to establish him as some kind of relucant hero who keeps getting pulled into things against his will, but unlike other such characters (like Han Solo, or Garrett the Master Thief) he's not fundamentally presented as a nice person and no choice on the part of the player seems to make him any more of a nice person.

I recognize that there were choices in that game and that they were sometimes clever and weighty, but ultimately I didn't particularly feel like those choices mattered all that much because they didn't tell me anything about who this guy I was playing actually was and why I should care about what he was doing. Maybe the Witcher 2 was better in that regard, I'll have to find out, but I think maybe this just goes further to show that the actual thing which makes choices meaningful is player investment.

 

[Unknown Warrior]

Well Bioware aren't exactly known for sticking to the lore they've established. Case in point the Qunari.

Now I'm probably wrong about this, I didn't explore too deep into the original canon, but in Origins the Qunari didn't have horns. They did explain this in DA2, but it felt tacked on, like Thermal Clips in Mass Effect.

Qunari were supposed to have horns in DAO (it'd make sense considering Ogres), but it had to be cut since it'd mean BioWare would have to make a new model for every helmet to accomodate the horns.

Have you perchance played Witcher 2 by CD project red? That game has a whole different 2nd act (there are 3) depending on your choice.

The Witcher series also offers only an illusion of choice since CDPR decides a canon to go by for the next installment. If hypothetically your Geralt chose Iorverth and CDPR preferred Roche? Well eat shit or write fanfiction 'cause it'll continue off from Roche path in Wild Hunt in case it was.

I'm riding the short bus with you on this one, my friend, as I always thought that DA2 got a bad rap. It tried to be very, VERY story-based and evidently people either didn't like that or didn't understand the story itself, I don't know. The point is that it was the 2nd chapter in a trilogy, and those rarely have solid, satisfying conclusions.

Dragon Age isn't meant to be (and never was) a trilogy. I hear it said all the time and I really wonder where that idea came from since Bioware never said it.

 

[LetalisK]

At first I was doubtful because Morrigan is in (which probably means shapeshifter)

I'm surprised when anyone even remembers that Morrigan was a shapeshifter.

 

[RJ 17]

I'm riding the short bus with you on this one, my friend, as I always thought that DA2 got a bad rap. It tried to be very, VERY story-based and evidently people either didn't like that or didn't understand the story itself, I don't know. The point is that it was the 2nd chapter in a trilogy, and those rarely have solid, satisfying conclusions.

Dragon Age isn't meant to be (and never was) a trilogy. I hear it said all the time and I really wonder where that idea came from since Bioware never said it.

They certainly never said that it wasn't supposed to be a trilogy either. Considering the fact that they went ahead and made a DA2 that ends with a big "To Be Continued" situation, I think it's pretty safe to say that they did in fact intend for it to be a trilogy.

 

[endtherapture]

Have you perchance played Witcher 2 by CD project red? That game has a whole different 2nd act (there are 3) depending on your choice.

The Witcher series also offers only an illusion of choice since CDPR decides a canon to go by for the next installment. If hypothetically your Geralt chose Iorverth and CDPR preferred Roche? Well eat shit or write fanfiction 'cause it'll continue off from Roche path in Wild Hunt in case it was.

It doesn't actually. Choice from The Witcher 1 are imported into 2 and respected and characters treat you differently for it.

I'm riding the short bus with you on this one, my friend, as I always thought that DA2 got a bad rap. It tried to be very, VERY story-based and evidently people either didn't like that or didn't understand the story itself, I don't know. The point is that it was the 2nd chapter in a trilogy, and those rarely have solid, satisfying conclusions.

Dragon Age isn't meant to be (and never was) a trilogy. I hear it said all the time and I really wonder where that idea came from since Bioware never said it.

They certainly never said that it wasn't supposed to be a trilogy either. Considering the fact that they went ahead and made a DA2 that ends with a big "To Be Continued" situation, I think it's pretty safe to say that they did in fact intend for it to be a trilogy.

1. If it was a trilogy they'd be calling it "Dragon Age 3" and marketing it as "The Final Chapter" etc. instead of building entirely new races, graphics engine, combat system etc. for it.
2. I made a post in the Bioware forums late last year and dev confirmed the franchise was not a trilogy.

 

[Roofstone]

This was the turning point. I am now gonna pre-order this.

Good job, dragon age people.

 

[votemarvel]

I'm riding the short bus with you on this one, my friend, as I always thought that DA2 got a bad rap. It tried to be very, VERY story-based and evidently people either didn't like that or didn't understand the story itself, I don't know. The point is that it was the 2nd chapter in a trilogy, and those rarely have solid, satisfying conclusions.

Dragon Age isn't meant to be (and never was) a trilogy. I hear it said all the time and I really wonder where that idea came from since Bioware never said it.

They certainly never said that it wasn't supposed to be a trilogy either. Considering the fact that they went ahead and made a DA2 that ends with a big "To Be Continued" situation, I think it's pretty safe to say that they did in fact intend for it to be a trilogy.

1. If it was a trilogy they'd be calling it "Dragon Age 3" and marketing it as "The Final Chapter" etc. instead of building entirely new races, graphics engine, combat system etc. for it.
2. I made a post in the Bioware forums late last year and dev confirmed the franchise was not a trilogy.

Then why call the second one Dragon Age II and have the stories of the three games intertwined.

It would seem to me that this is a trilogy. Sure it isn't like Mass Effect where we follow the story of one person but it is all clearly built up to the events to take place in the third game.

 

[endtherapture]

I'm riding the short bus with you on this one, my friend, as I always thought that DA2 got a bad rap. It tried to be very, VERY story-based and evidently people either didn't like that or didn't understand the story itself, I don't know. The point is that it was the 2nd chapter in a trilogy, and those rarely have solid, satisfying conclusions.

Dragon Age isn't meant to be (and never was) a trilogy. I hear it said all the time and I really wonder where that idea came from since Bioware never said it.

They certainly never said that it wasn't supposed to be a trilogy either. Considering the fact that they went ahead and made a DA2 that ends with a big "To Be Continued" situation, I think it's pretty safe to say that they did in fact intend for it to be a trilogy.

1. If it was a trilogy they'd be calling it "Dragon Age 3" and marketing it as "The Final Chapter" etc. instead of building entirely new races, graphics engine, combat system etc. for it.
2. I made a post in the Bioware forums late last year and dev confirmed the franchise was not a trilogy.

Then why call the second one Dragon Age II and have the stories of the three games intertwined.

It would seem to me that this is a trilogy. Sure it isn't like Mass Effect where we follow the story of one person but it is all clearly built up to the events to take place in the third game.

It's not a trilogy, stop being ignorant!

You can ignore what I say all I want, but the fact Bioware developers have talked of their "5 game plan for Dragon Age" and explicitly said that it is not a trilogy makes it pretty clear that it's NOT a trilogy.

What even indicates it that it's a trilogy? Nothing.

Did people assume because Final Fantasy 2 was called Final Fantasy 2 that Final Fantasy 3 would be the last in the trilogy?