So i finally got around to Dragon Age II, not very happy with Bioware.

[Ed130 The Vanguard]

Ahh DA2, in some ways I liked the game, it broke me out of the 'fanboy' mentality and saved me quite a bit of dosh in the long run avoiding games like ME3.

But yes, even on its own merits it isn't that good. Compared to what Dragon Age: Origins was (a love letter to older RPG's of yesteryear) it was a fucking disaster.

My advice for DA3 is to wait. Not for professional reviews but for the average joes to come out and state whether Bioware has well and truly gone to the dogs.

The average joes who also said that the ending to Mass Effect 3 ruined the entirety of the franchise? I get that "professional" reviewers are often full of shit. Random people throwing their opinion in like it's fact is far worse though.

Unfortunately said shit throwers tend to find more actual flaws then paid reviewers and while some can be considered petty I trust them far more then the whitewashing that permeates many sites.

Depressing isn't it?

While they do find more flaws, they overblow the severity of them so much. Nothing better than trying the game yourself before making proper judgement on it.

True, though I wouldn't mind not having to effectively bet $100+ NZD on whether or not the game is good or not. Ultimately overblown or not, short of putting down money (or resorting to less than legal methods) they are the best source of information out there.

 

[Savagezion]

One thing to remember is that Dragon Age 2 launched 13 months after Dragon Age Origins. EA surely felt they needed to cash in on the Bioware name as soon as they acquired them. First thing you do when you acquire a brand is shove a loaded turd out so that you can rape the wallet of fans. What could go wrong?

* No coherent story, randomly connecting three events together at the end just feels unsatisfying as there was no major plot goal. I'm actually shocked at the plot here, is this actually Bioware?

For me, this was a redeeming quality. I actually like that Bioware was trying a new type of plot. I like the idea of it not exactly aiming in a specified direction. It was poorly executed but what did they have for the plot? 8 months? Once you consider in bug testing and shipping to retailers, 13 months gets chopped under a year. I have always said I liked what they were trying to do with the Dragon Age series in 2. I respect it for that. However...

* RE-USED LEVELS, holy shit. I'm actually mad, like straight up fucking mad. How can re-use of all these assets be justified in any way? The one golden rule of levels is no copy/paste. The most insipid level design to come out of Bioware and I played the fade.

This was bullshit to the most retarded degree. What really pisses me off is the way they act like, "they didn't know gamers wouldn't like it". Playing stupid makes me want to knock sense into you. These are the same people who dared to use the word "integrity" as a defense. "Derp, we didn't know gamers wanted level variety, yeah... let's go with that."

* Can't zoom out and get a proper tactical view like in DA:O
* Enemies continue jumping down to fight, meaning no encounter is as it looks, you constantly have to recheck around yourself to make sure the encounter is FINALLY done. The constant waves are made even worse by the lack of a tactical camera.
* Party member interaction feels less fun, it's mostly stripped right out of the game.

Then these. At the end of the day, the game had a neat mission statement but I can't play it anymore. Playing through it once makes you feel like you had to play through it 5 times.

That's straight up put a sour taste in my mouth for Bioware and I was planning on getting Inquisition but now I'm second guessing it. I mean, how can they justify this product going on the market? I can't.

I won't be getting Inquisition either. I would rather wait for a year for the hype to die off it before picking it up. When it launches it WILL get 10/10s no matter how shitty it is. Dragon AGe 2 scored 8s and 9s and even some 10s because Bioware. Even though I like it, it ain't an 8 or a 9. Its a 5 or a 6. I have no problem admitting I like a 'bad' or mediocre game but I will tell you that. Apparently, "opinions" is the great 'justifier' in reviews. Inquistions will be the cats pajamas in reviews when it launches. It will most likely be better than 2 which will make reviewers gladly give it 10s across the board. I plan to wait for a year until people don't straight flip their shit if someone says "It's okay but has these problems..."

 

[votemarvel]

the switch to action rpg style combat (instead of the tactical combat of the other games) was one of the things i like the most about the game when i got it for my ps3

This is one of the things I don't get because it is the same combat system as in the first game.

The only significant difference is that on the consoles you had to hammer a button to do basic attacks (they did patch auto-attack back in).

Don't get me wrong, I think it is animated far better, but I will never understand how hammering a button magically improves the combat.

I first played Dragon Age II on the PC (bought the signature edition) and there it was instantly obvious it was the same system.

For me Dragon Age II is a good game, just not a very good sequel.

 

[Gethsemani_v1legacy]

the switch to action rpg style combat (instead of the tactical combat of the other games) was one of the things i like the most about the game when i got it for my ps3

This is one of the things I don't get because it is the same combat system as in the first game.

The only significant difference is that on the consoles you had to hammer a button to do basic attacks (they did patch auto-attack back in).

Don't get me wrong, I think it is animated far better, but I will never understand how hammering a button magically improves the combat.

I first played Dragon Age II on the PC (bought the signature edition) and there it was instantly obvious it was the same system.

For me Dragon Age II is a good game, just not a very good sequel.

The critique stems mostly from how they changed the encounter design for DA2. In DA:O you will generally have fewer but tougher enemies that are in a pre-defined area so that you can approach it as you want. To get through those encounters you needed to use your skills relatively well because the enemies were often fully able to kick your ass due to also using the same skills you had.

In DA2 however it changed from "few enemies that are good" to "zerg!!!". The enemies drop in from all over the place in multiple waves and there' no real strategy behind the combat because it turns into a chaos where you are better off dealing high damage to dispose of all the minions in your way as opposed to trying to use Crowd Control effects and debuffs.

Essentially the difference between DA:O and DA2 was how much time was put into balancing encounters and how they were balanced. The difference between the two approaches is the difference between intense tactical combat and mindless button-mashing.

 

[Scars Unseen]

don't know why people hate Dragon Age 2

I explained the majority of the reasons in the post above yours In short, a combination of terrible level design, less options than the first game, a switch from tactical combat to more action-rpg style, disjointed story and more. Read above to learn more.

The funny thing about it is that from my standpoint, Dragon Age was worse in one critical area that had been bugging me about Bioware games for a while: it used the same recycled plot that had been used in pretty much every game they'd made from KOTOR until DA2 and Mass Effect 2 broke the cycle(and ME2 only barely deviated).

You are the (Jedi/Spirit Monk/SPECTRE agent/Grey Warden) and only YOU can save the (galaxy/empire/galaxy/world) by going to a few places and doing side quests while searching for(the Star Maps/ the Dragon Amulet pieces/the Conduit/allies) in your quest to defeat (Darth Malak/Death's Hand/the Reapers/the Archdemon)!

ME2 changed "doing side quests" to "doing team building exercises" and took away a specific magical mcguffin, but otherwise stayed the same. DA2, on the other hand, is almost like Baldur's Gate in that it's about a guy trying to survive during a crisis and somehow doing some good for the people around him(though how much actual good Hawke accomplishes is debatable. Mostly he's just damage control). I'm not saying that DA2 is a great game by a long shot, but it wasn't a total wash either.

 

[DarkhoIlow]

The biggest mistake that they did in Dragon Age 2 aside from the obvious copy pasted dungeons and not enough time was given to work on a game, was the decision of making the combat more "action`y" instead of keeping the Baldurs Gate`esque combat.

Other than that, everyone else has noted most of it's problems. What I don't get is "If it isn't broke, why fix it?". Dragon Age Origins was a success so EA's greediness bothers me greatly.

 

[votemarvel]

The critique stems mostly from how they changed the encounter design for DA2. In DA:O you will generally have fewer but tougher enemies that are in a pre-defined area so that you can approach it as you want. To get through those encounters you needed to use your skills relatively well because the enemies were often fully able to kick your ass due to also using the same skills you had.

In DA2 however it changed from "few enemies that are good" to "zerg!!!". The enemies drop in from all over the place in multiple waves and there' no real strategy behind the combat because it turns into a chaos where you are better off dealing high damage to dispose of all the minions in your way as opposed to trying to use Crowd Control effects and debuffs.

Essentially the difference between DA:O and DA2 was how much time was put into balancing encounters and how they were balanced. The difference between the two approaches is the difference between intense tactical combat and mindless button-mashing.

I was not asking why people don't like the combat in Dragon Age Ii but why they say it is an improvement over the first.

You have the same combat system, you just have the option to hammer a button on the consoles, and as you mentioned a rush of enemies.

So I genuinely don't see how the same combat system, and scenarios that don't really support it, are an 'improvement'.

As to the story, what really irritated me was the time jumps. For a tale that is meant to be far more personal in scope, I always had the impression that most of the 'personal' stuff was happening off screen during those time jumps.

 

[Scars Unseen]

The biggest mistake that they did in Dragon Age 2 aside from the obvious copy pasted dungeons and not enough time was given to work on a game, was the decision of making the combat more "action`y" instead of keeping the Baldurs Gate`esque combat.

Other than that, everyone else has noted most of it's problems. What I don't get is "If it isn't broke, why fix it?". Dragon Age Origins was a success so EA's greediness bothers me greatly.

DAO wasn't perfect either, and there were some core parts of DA2 that were marked improvements. For one, there was very little possible variation in builds for DAO unless you were a mage. Pick a weapon style, pick a couple of specializations and pick your equipment. DA2 had a much more complex way of building classes, and you had not only to consider what your class could do, but also how the abilities and upgrades you chose would interact with how you leveled your other characters. And combat in DAO was excruciatingly slow if you played a melee class, so DA2's faster combat was a great change for me(though I do agree that there should have been an option to zoom out for a more tactical view).

Banter was just as good if not better in DA2(except for the Allister/Morrigan exchanges... you can't really top that), and I have to say that I preferred DA2's Mass Effect style conversation to the old school dialogue options. Oh, in theory I like the old way better, but I just don't think Bioware's writers have the chops to make it work as well as it did in Baldur's Gate 2. The newer games' dialogue just doesn't sit on the page with as much charm. Better to limit the options a bit and let the voice actors bring the dialogue to life than to have it silently fall flat.

 

[Scars Unseen]

As to the story, what really irritated me was the time jumps. For a tale that is meant to be far more personal in scope, I always had the impression that most of the 'personal' stuff was happening off screen during those time jumps.

I viewed the different acts in DA2 like the time jumps between the Star Wars movies(original trilogy). There's stuff happening, but it's nothing particularly interesting. Basically, the parts you play are a break from the routine of your life. Until then you're managing your finances, hunting down clues fruitlessly, climbing the social ladder, etc. You may or not be progressing, but you most definitely aren't doing anything worth showing.

I do the same thing in my D&D campaigns. I make you play through the adventure, not the training of skills, studying of spells, building of personal abodes or hiring of armies. Adventure is finished; tell me what your character is likely to be doing over the next couple of years.

 

[ninjaRiv]

I liked it, to be honest. I thought it was flawed as fuck, of course. The dialogue seemed the worst thing for me; I hated probing further into conversations because then he'd come back to his original statements and they just wouldn't make sense in the context. Especially with "funny" Hawke. I think some of the DLC addressed this, but not very well.

I was never bothered by the reused levels, to be honest. I figured it was down to the short development time, anyway.

 

[AntiChri5]

snip

Dragon Age 2 quite famously had a ludicrously truncated development time. Estimates top off at 12-14 months and are as low as 8 months. Goes a long way towards explaining the heavy asset reuse, and the fact that there are a lot of plot elements that seem to only thinly hang together, with a lot of pacing issues. In spite of this, they managed to release a functioning and for the most part enjoyable title, that didn't completely shame the franchise. Bioware should probably be lauded for salvaging what they could from an almost no-win situation. The developers run by EA haven't always been so lucky [http://www.hardcoregaming101.net/ultima/ultima10.htm].

Dragon Age: Inquisition has been in development for 3.5 years. That in no way, shape or form is a guarantee that it will represent a return to form, but it demonstrates a much better show of faith by EA and a much better opportunity for Bioware to make good on this opportunity for redemption.

I am surprised that this one has managed to be dug up again, think this game has been beaten to death enough (coming from a guy who completely loathed it, still my worst game of all time, opposite of DA:O, my favourite).

But as BloatedGuppy has covered above, it really was just a result of a really small development time, due to pressure from EA on Bioware to make a really quick turnaround - presumably as a way to cash-in on DA:O fans further, before they forgot about(logic?) the game.

I don't believe that Bioware are to blame. It was just the unreasonable pressures laid upon them.

Hopefully Inquisition will be better, but they have lost my pre-order (I'm sure they are hurting cause of that one!) for it, for sure.

I like DA2, but i do think that BioWare are to blame for it's issues. DA2 had an absurdly short dev time because Origins had an absurdly long one. Origins sold well, but it cost them much more to make.

 

[RJ 17]

* Can't zoom out and get a proper tactical view like in DA:O
* Enemies continue jumping down to fight, meaning no encounter is as it looks, you constantly have to recheck around yourself to make sure the encounter is FINALLY done. The constant waves are made even worse by the lack of a tactical camera.
* No coherent story, randomly connecting three events together at the end just feels unsatisfying as there was no major plot goal. I'm actually shocked at the plot here, is this actually Bioware?
* Party member interaction feels less fun, it's mostly stripped right out of the game.
* RE-USED LEVELS, holy shit. I'm actually mad, like straight up fucking mad. How can re-use of all these assets be justified in any way? The one golden rule of levels is no copy/paste. The most insipid level design to come out of Bioware and I played the fade.

You're pretty new around here so it's possible you missed all the hub-bub about the game when it first came out. Suffice to say: you haven't brought anything to anyone's attention that the critics of the game haven't already pointed out. Basically all you've done is stand up and shout "I AGREE WITH THOSE THAT DIDN'T LIKE THIS GAME FOR THE SAME REASONS AS THEM!" =P

But we're here anyways so I might as well do what I did back then and try to massage the situation.

That, and I know that Bloated Guppy just loves to watch me pontificate about "bad" Bioware games. =3

For starters, no one can argue about the game's mechanics (the camera, the wave-fight system, the copy-paste of dungeons, etc). What I can argue, however, is your notion that the story is a disjointed story of random occurrences with no major goal for the plot. That's...actually kinda the point. Back in DA:O, there was an over-arching bad guy to defeat: Logain for the most part, but in the grand scheme of things there was also the Arch Demon. This is because Fereldin was in a state of crisis, that is: the Blight. A nice be clear-cut conflict for our heroes to sort out.

DA2 isn't about that, however. DA2 is about describing the events which sparked a civil war between the Mages and Templars across the world. There is no evil mastermind wringing his or her hands over every move that Hawke makes, the story is quite simply the story of Hawke's life in Kirkwall. They get to the city and the first thing they have to do is get in. Well it seems that your uncle has gambled away all the family fortune and is living in poverty, so it's time to get a job. You get a job and work off your debt for a year, officially getting yourself smuggled into the city, but this is no life for your family. Your mother deserves better than living in a hovel in the slums. So you go out seeking to join up with some treasure hunters to find fame and fortune. Upon doing this you effectively buy your family's claim to nobility back and move on up to your family's old estate. Shortly after, tensions begin rising with the Qunari, and as a member of the nobility, the ruler calls upon you to try and sort the whole mess out. And incident happens with the Viscount's son, someone misplaces a sacred book, and the Qunari get all pissed off. Hawke is now thrust into the role of defending his/her new home of Kirkwall.

Throughout all of this, Hawke has born witness to the rising tension between the mages and templars. And in the final chapter that tension finally reaches its break point when some moron mage goes and blows up a church. This sparks all-out conflict between the mages and templars and - as the person that most people consider to be the city's champion for saving them from the Qunari - it's once again up to Hawke to sort out the whole mess.

The story is meant to be a "a day in the life of Hawke" story. Being free of the Blight and now living in a city where you have almost no connections - political or otherwise - there isn't going to be some main evil nasty villain for Hawke to be chasing down. It was quite simply a story of how Hawke rose from refugee to being one of the most important people in Kirkwall and how, in doing so, Hawke was at ground zero for the events that caused civil war to erupt between mages and templars, thus setting the stage for the third game.

In short: they tried something different from the classic "Here's a bad guy, go chase them down for 60 hours" story format and a lot of people didn't seem to appreciate what Bioware was trying to do. Personal tastes and all that business can explain why people didn't like it, I'm simply arguing against the notion that it was just a disjointed random assortment of events that had no real connection to one another because that's simply not true. There's a distinct narrative and flow to the story that a lot of people apparently didn't seem to notice. Then again, when you're already disappointed with a game that fails so terrifically on the mechanical aspects, you likely have little patience for trying to sort out the nuances of an unorthodox story.

 

[votemarvel]

As to the story, what really irritated me was the time jumps. For a tale that is meant to be far more personal in scope, I always had the impression that most of the 'personal' stuff was happening off screen during those time jumps.

I viewed the different acts in DA2 like the time jumps between the Star Wars movies(original trilogy). There's stuff happening, but it's nothing particularly interesting. Basically, the parts you play are a break from the routine of your life. Until then you're managing your finances, hunting down clues fruitlessly, climbing the social ladder, etc. You may or not be progressing, but you most definitely aren't doing anything worth showing.

I do the same thing in my D&D campaigns. I make you play through the adventure, not the training of skills, studying of spells, building of personal abodes or hiring of armies. Adventure is finished; tell me what your character is likely to be doing over the next couple of years.

My point was that Dragon Age II is meant to be a more personal story, yet the personal elements are cut out for the most part to focus on the big events happening in and around Kirkwall.

Yes you can head-canon events but for a personal story to skip the personal parts...well it's a bit odd.

 

[happyninja42]

I thought they hid the re-used locations quite well

Spoiler

See! It's not the same thing!

I've stood by this statement and I'll state it again because I like to hear myself speak; if Dragon Age II was released under a different name, it would have been considered good to pretty good; not great but not the worst thing to have ever happened to gaming ever that some people seem to treat it as.

Now granted, it IS a Dragon Age game so that has to be in play but I thought the game was fine. It was rough and Dragon Age I was better but II made some pretty drastic changes; some struck home and others failed badly. Overall, I thought it was a good game that could have used a lot more time to work out the kinks.

Eh, I dunno. No matter what name it was under, the game was still poorly designed. Most of the complaints I've seen put forth for why DA 2 is bad have nothing to do with "omg it BETRAYS the original game!!" Yes, some people have that complaint, but in my experience, and of most posts I've seen on the subject, the complaints usually fall onto simple structure/design.

1. The railroaded plot where you don't really have much choice in how things happen. Yeah you have dialogue wheels, but in most cases, the actual end result of your conversation ends the same. The only variation is whether or not you responded like a nice guy, or a dick.

2. The boring level design. Boring design is boring design, no matter the game. Doesn't matter if you're DA 2, ME Series, or Assassin's Creed 1, if your levels are so obviously copy/paste that everyone notices it right away, you have a major flaw in your game design, that is worthy of being pointed out and criticized.


Those were my two big problems with the game. For me it was mostly the storyline stuff that pissed me off. When your game design literally has the same result no matter what conversation option you choose...well then why even have the choice in the first place? I give them a little slack on this, in that the game was, by design a flashback event to a major riot/revolution in their culture. By design, by the end of the game, everything has turned to shit and hit the spinning fan. So by that fact, they did have to have everything break down into chaos by the end, but this is more acceptable in a movie, not a game, where the player has agency to make choices that could potentially alter events.

I think personally, what ticks me off so much about it, was that I could see the makings of a really awesome story in there, but it was crippled out the gate, and what ended up in our hands was a faulty game, with a lot of flaws.

The game does have some positive qualities though. I mean, the combat system is solid and dynamic, and fast paced, the voice acting was really good and engaging, and made me like the cast of characters (most of them anyway). And the events of the story were, at their core, leading up to an interesting climax. Sadly, the end result dropped the ball. Which to me, is the more tragic aspect of it. I don't hold it up to some higher standard because it's a Dragon Age game, though I do expect better from Bioware at this point, given their game history, but I appreciate that other factors worked against them making the game they wanted. I won't sit here and rail and flame against Bioware for all of the problems with the game, as it does seem that many of the problems stemmed from outside pressures, but I'm not going to deny that the game is a badly designed game either.

It wasn't a great game, it was an ok game, with a few good features, and a lot of bad features that were very glaring. I still plan on playing the next game in the series, despite the faults of DA 2, because I feel that Bioware as a whole, is a good company, (one of the better ones out there), who makes good games. Nobody's perfect, everyone makes mistakes, and you can't please everyone.


Dragon Age 2 isn't a good game, by Bioware standards, or by the standards of the regular gaming community. But it could've been a lot worse, as there are a ton of worse games out there, and we've all played some of them.

 

[The Random Critic]

While I would not argue that this game isn't as solid as orgin, however...

It definitely had some potential to be something different story wise. But the game is very rushed...

EDit: different as in from kotor ME etcetc. Some of the story idea used in DA2 is rehashed a bit from BG BG2. Which is long considered as Bioware's best game

 

[Eri]

Oh please. The only horrible thing about the game is asset reuse. Which is quite bad. But other than that the game is fine. Great voices, good characters.

 

[votemarvel]

I find both the voices for Hawke to be absolutely horrible. They stand out even more when you consider the voice work for the companions and other NPCs is generally pretty great.

 

[OpticalJunction]

DA2 did combat right, everything else was a let down. I liked Varric and the brother as characters though. Hawke's female voice actress was very good, the male, so so.

 

[jamesworkshop]

while under developed overall it did a few things i really liked


much longer term relationships building with a more flexible rivalry/friendship system as opposed to origins forcing you to be agreeable in spine bending ways to keep everyone on your side so they don't kill you or run away.

the time span made choice more weighty, I would never be too sure what would happen later down the line, maybe it would matter much or little, origins you just move on, who gets the dwarven throne really doesn't matter all that much, but what might holding information back from the Arishok do.


making the party actual characters, in origins you formed a party and the rest sat around the campfire collecting dust, Da2 gave them places and lives of their own to lead.

that follows in to my next point that they were less avatars of your will, they didn't wear what you forced them to and if they used bows, you weren't going to force them to tank and spank, it also kept them more visually distinct to keep their consistent look, Origins just made me laugh when i could have characters running around in their pants which i don't think even being their group leader is an order they would follow, all of my origins party were old enough to dress themselves properly with an established combat style.