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Dragon Age II

TwistedAegis said:
Lol, sad but true. As much as I disliked the way they portrayed them in DA2, I was hoping for much more of them!
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When Bioware makes DA3 if there is one single quest dealing with Blood Mages I'm going to be very unhappy. I don't even want to play the game a second time because of it. I don't even want to go back to my old DAO character who has blood magic now.
 
I liked DAO a lot more than DA2. In my opinion it's just a better game, it's a throwback to the BG/NWN type of games. DAO, I ran through it 7 times, one for each race, Origins story and enjoyed almost every minute of it, except for the fade hate that place.

DA2 I have 3 run throughs at most, on my third now as a rogue. After I'm done with this there's zero replayability. Lame.

While I enjoy DA2 and think it's a good game, it's nowhere near as good as Origins was. They don't really feel remotely related. No Grey Wardens , what the fuck is up with that shit ? World is very dumbed down and much smaller no sense of exploration.
For fuck sakes Bioware, copy and pasting the same damn back alleys,deep roads, undercity,caves etc over and over ? really ?

Only characters I even remotely cared about were Aveline, Britney, Isabella, Varric and Fenris. Merill is an absolute air head dumbass,though she does rock as a mage when nuking the shit out of baddies. I want to just stab Anders and Carver in the face and let the darkspawn eat em.

The banter between characters was awesome, thank goodness they didn't fuck that up.I like the combat, the story ? not that much. Feels all over the place and very disjointed.

I kinda feel like Bioware violated me with DA2 in a way. They almost screwed the pooch on this one and if they fuck up ME3, DA3 or SWTOR they will not be getting any more of my cash in the future.

Again, I like DA2 but I don't love it like I did Origins. They just are not even remotely in the same ballpark gamewise.
 
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18 hours in or so and starting to get near the end of Act 1 and I am actually thoroughly enjoying this game. Playing on hard is fun but frustrating at times, especially with the random enemy spawns, but I am adjusting to it. I have had to replay a few fights a few times because I got in over my head and didn't really manage the enemies the way I should have. The cross-class combos are really cool, but all I have so far is Aveline staggering enemies with shield bash and my rogue using explosive strike or Merrill dropping a chain lightning on mobs for massive damage. It's really satisfying when you coordinate one of those, especially with Merrill hitting 2 or 3 staggered enemies at once.

I am going through as a DW rogue on my first playthrough and using Anders, Merrill, and Aveline as my party. I usually run through with a healer the first time just to take in the story, but I may not use a healer in future playthroughs. I just like the idea of having one because I can use him as my controller as well. I really liked ME 1 and 2 so the change to a voiced protagonist with the dialogue wheel isn't really an issue for me.

The hardest fight for me was the enemy at the end of the Bone Pit quest line (won't say what it is for those who haven't played yet) and I had to resort to some kiting tactics as my characters were barely level 4 when I tackled the quest. If I had known I would have waited until I had some more skills and a proper healer before going into it, but I still managed to beat it.

The graphics I actually think are pretty good all maxed out, especially with the tesselation going on. I don't know why many people are so harsh on the game as it really isn't much different gameplay-wise than the first. I have been through a few of the same "dungeons" so far and I can see how it would frustrate some but it doesn't really bother me.
 
The repetition doesn't really bother me either. Yes seeing the same places over and over is dull. But in the context of the game it works, because it's the same city. In real life you see the same house everyday, same workplace, some streets and highways, same town. Slight changes here and there just like DA2, but it's mostly the same. Can't see why it's such a big issue (other than the "rushed" complaints).
 
Dallows said:
The repetition doesn't really bother me either. Yes seeing the same places over and over is dull. But in the context of the game it works, because it's the same city. In real life you see the same house everyday, same workplace, some streets and highways, same town. Slight changes here and there just like DA2, but it's mostly the same. Can't see why it's such a big issue (other than the "rushed" complaints).
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I dunno, fantasy settings are there for escapism, not the same old 8-5pm workday repetition.
 
Also, it takes place over ten years and nothing changes. Hell look at Fenris's mansion it still looks the same after killing everyone in it and living there nothing changes at all. Same with a city in 10 years time things will change.
 
Dallows said:
The repetition doesn't really bother me either. Yes seeing the same places over and over is dull. But in the context of the game it works, because it's the same city. In real life you see the same house everyday, same workplace, some streets and highways, same town. Slight changes here and there just like DA2, but it's mostly the same. Can't see why it's such a big issue (other than the "rushed" complaints).
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It isn't so bad when you are walking around the same city.

What is bad when you visit 5 supposedly different dungeons and they all have the exact same layout. That is just lame cost cutting and it quickly gets grating.
 
The length of "major" quests is also very jarring. To spend so much of the beginning of the game getting ready to go to the Deep Roads, to have the Deep Roads be 1/20th of that time was a huge disappointment and really pulls you out of the game. Same thing when you go there a 2nd time. Hey, I'm in a single hallway...neat-o. :p
 
TwistedAegis said:
The length of "major" quests is also very jarring. To spend so much of the beginning of the game getting ready to go to the Deep Roads, to have the Deep Roads be 1/20th of that time was a huge disappointment and really pulls you out of the game. Same thing when you go there a 2nd time. Hey, I'm in a single hallway...neat-o. :p
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I loved the Deep Roads. The Deep Roads didn't have blood mages or templars. It was the best place in the entire game. Despite the tone of the post I'm not even kidding. I absolutely despised blood mages by the end of DA2, Merill included.
 
Derangel said:
I loved the Deep Roads. The Deep Roads didn't have blood mages or templars. It was the best place in the entire game. Despite the tone of the post I'm not even kidding. I absolutely despised blood mages by the end of DA2, Merill included.
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I did too. It was just so damn short, you weren't in there very long. The deep roads were some of my favorite parts of DA:O, so I was very disappointed that you spent so little time there, and didn't really get to explore much.
 
TwistedAegis said:
I did too. It was just so damn short, you weren't in there very long. The deep roads were some of my favorite parts of DA:O, so I was very disappointed that you spent so little time there, and didn't really get to explore much.
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I actually hated the Deep Roads in DAO. Though some of that had to do with running into the infamous long loading bug during that time. Staring at a loading screen for two or three minutes is not fun.
 
The deep roads, while short, was at least different than all the other dungeon/caverns that were essentially just the same dungeon re-used over and over.
 
Derangel said:
I actually hated the Deep Roads in DAO. Though some of that had to do with running into the infamous long loading bug during that time. Staring at a loading screen for two or three minutes is not fun.
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That would suck...load times for both games have been a snap for me, both before and after my video card swap (gtx280 > 6970.)
 
TwistedAegis said:
That would suck...load times for both games have been a snap for me, both before and after my video card swap (gtx280 > 6970.)
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The loading screen bug only comes into play after you play the game for a significant amount of time during a session. So if you are only playing an hour or two at a time you won't really notice it.
 
TwistedAegis said:
That would suck...load times for both games have been a snap for me, both before and after my video card swap (gtx280 > 6970.)
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Yeah it was a random issue. It might have been tied to a memory leak or just some other bug the game had, but the longer you played it the longer the load times got and sometimes they would just be super long. That was why I stopped playing the game.
 
The more I've played the game the more I like it. I actually like Hawke's story because it is a different epic than what most people expected when they heard about DA2- I bet most were expecting to be a Grey Warden again, or at least have them be a main focus of the plot.

That being said I have found one thing that pisses me off about this game- the random super traps that you have to find a switch to turn off- they are rediculous and annoying beyond belief, especially since I've never had Varrick detect one and I always keep his Cunning high.
 
KamelRed said:
The loading screen bug only comes into play after you play the game for a significant amount of time during a session. So if you are only playing an hour or two at a time you won't really notice it.
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Considering I put 40 hours into DA:O in less than 2 weeks... ;)
 
CreganTur said:
The more I've played the game the more I like it. I actually like Hawke's story because it is a different epic than what most people expected when they heard about DA2- I bet most were expecting to be a Grey Warden again, or at least have them be a main focus of the plot.

That being said I have found one thing that pisses me off about this game- the random super traps that you have to find a switch to turn off- they are rediculous and annoying beyond belief, especially since I've never had Varrick detect one and I always keep his Cunning high.
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Mike Laidlaw said he wanted to increase the scope of Dragon Age, so that it was about the people of Ferelden - the Grey Wardens were only one small part of that larger story.

It's ironic that so many people complained about the mass-effect-ivisation of Dragon Age, and yet also complained about the central character not being a Grey Warden. Sticking to that one plot line would have been a very Mass Effect like thing to have done. Branching out into new territory is not.
 
Mike Laidlaw also said "Button = Awesome!".

I don't care if the main character is a Grey Warden or not, a good story can be made either way.
 
WabeWalker said:
Mike Laidlaw said he wanted to increase the scope of Dragon Age, so that it was about the people of Ferelden - the Grey Wardens were only one small part of that larger story.

It's ironic that so many people complained about the mass-effect-ivisation of Dragon Age, and yet also complained about the central character not being a Grey Warden. Sticking to that one plot line would have been a very Mass Effect like thing to have done. Branching out into new territory is not.
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Because Mass Effect is the only game to have its sequel follow the same path as the original game, amirite?! So people MUST be referring to that when they mention mass-effect-ivisation and could not possibly be referring to the dumbing down of gameplay features in the sequel compared to the first game. Thats soooo ironic, bro. Deep stuff. :rolleyes:
 
I thought DA2 was really good. I beat it last night. Unfortunately, some of the quest bugs are frustrating. I missed a few things in the game and I may have to go back to chapter 2 to get them! There is also a bug if you miss a companion armor upgrade then you won't be able to get the last one later for Aveline. There is also a broken quest in chapter 3 that just doesn't work.

I like the combat and the improved graphics. The story was decent. I wish they would get serious about making a complete product, though.
 
KamelRed said:
Because Mass Effect is the only game to have its sequel follow the same path as the original game, amirite?! So people MUST be referring to that when they mention mass-effect-ivisation and could not possibly be referring to the dumbing down of gameplay features in the sequel compared to the first game. Thats soooo ironic, bro. Deep stuff. :rolleyes:
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Dumbing down of features? We must be talking about two different games here (uh... bro). Because Origins was stupid. Utterly brain dead.

Here, my Origins guide, just for you. You can cruise through the game on the Nightmare setting if you do this.

1) You get your healers to spam their heal spells by creating custom tactics in the custom tactics menu.
2) Craft 800 health poultices.
3) Setup another custom tactic for each of your party members to heal at 50% using health poultices.

You're done. That's it. You'll cruise all the way to the end of the game and you won't even have to touch a button. And I mean that literally. Once you've set this up, you don't even have to play the game. Your character will even auto-attack.

Now, if you were to play Dragon Age 2 you'd discover very early on that the cool down meters on the health poultices and health spells have been drastically lengthened meaning you now have to use your abilities at the higher levels of difficulty, meaning the above tactic no longer works. It's still not as tactical as it should be, but to suggest that Dragon Age Origins is a deeper game, tactically, than DA 2 is just downright ridiculous.
 
Just finished the game yesterday, and boy was it disappointing. Not to say I was devastated, the final battle was cool, but overall the game had less punch than DA1 for sure. I know about the rushed schedule EA had laid out, but Bioware should have tried way, way harder to resist.

Here are some random thoughts, though they may echo several already in the thread.

- Graphics! Everything looks nice, but its pretty much expected of a 2011 game.

- Combat was more fluid than the first, but way over exaggerated. They could stand to tone it down a notch or two in their next game. Maybe leave the cool looking attacks for abilities only, because my rogue's auto attacks looked like Gunkata from Equilibrium.

- The dialogue tree was watered down with those icons, and I didn't have as much fun conversing with my teammates. The characters weren't nearly as memorable or funny as DA1 either.

- Managing inventory was a hassle, since I could not cycle through all my off duty teammates in the inventory screen and upgrade them on the go.

- Armour and weapons look better this time around, but there is still no variety. My weapons in the first 20min of the game looked the same in the last 20mins, despite going though several upgrades.

- The recycled areas didn't bother me that much, but deep down I know it's a big flaw. I would have loved to see things change over each time skip, even if it was just rearranging random stuff.

- The end scenarios in each act was horribly short. You spend hours and hours doing minor quests so you can get to the deep roads, only to come out in like 30mins. The boss in there was the best fight in the game, though.

- The story was rather weak too, but it did have more surprises than the first game. It was a short game too, and I didn't skip much.

- The music in general was improved, a big plus for me since I thought DA1's music was awful. That title screen theme is verrry nice.

Well that's all I have for now. I plan on doing another playthrough, but there's not as much drive to do so at the moment.
 
Just beat it today, I liked it a lot but i felt it couldve been better written and the ending was crappy. Why end on a cliffhanger? So stupid
 
hofan41 said:
Just beat it today, I liked it a lot but i felt it couldve been better written and the ending was crappy. Why end on a cliffhanger? So stupid
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Thanks for keeping the cliffhanger to yourself. Some of us are still working our way through this.

Again, thanks for the spoiler work guys. Really nice. :)
 
Noran said:
Just finished the game yesterday, and boy was it disappointing. Not to say I was devastated, the final battle was cool, but overall the game had less punch than DA1 for sure. I know about the rushed schedule EA had laid out, but Bioware should have tried way, way harder to resist.

Here are some random thoughts, though they may echo several already in the thread.

- Graphics! Everything looks nice, but its pretty much expected of a 2011 game.

- Combat was more fluid than the first, but way over exaggerated. They could stand to tone it down a notch or two in their next game. Maybe leave the cool looking attacks for abilities only, because my rogue's auto attacks looked like Gunkata from Equilibrium.

- The dialogue tree was watered down with those icons, and I didn't have as much fun conversing with my teammates. The characters weren't nearly as memorable or funny as DA1 either.

- Managing inventory was a hassle, since I could not cycle through all my off duty teammates in the inventory screen and upgrade them on the go.

- Armour and weapons look better this time around, but there is still no variety. My weapons in the first 20min of the game looked the same in the last 20mins, despite going though several upgrades.

- The recycled areas didn't bother me that much, but deep down I know it's a big flaw. I would have loved to see things change over each time skip, even if it was just rearranging random stuff.

- The end scenarios in each act was horribly short. You spend hours and hours doing minor quests so you can get to the deep roads, only to come out in like 30mins. The boss in there was the best fight in the game, though.

- The story was rather weak too, but it did have more surprises than the first game. It was a short game too, and I didn't skip much.

- The music in general was improved, a big plus for me since I thought DA1's music was awful. That title screen theme is verrry nice.

Well that's all I have for now. I plan on doing another playthrough, but there's not as much drive to do so at the moment.
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Resist what? EA owns 100% of Bioware and their IPs. They have no say at all and whether they like it or not if EA says the game must be out by this date they have to do it or risk losing their jobs.
 
hofan41 said:
Just beat it today, I liked it a lot but i felt it couldve been better written and the ending was crappy. Why end on a cliffhanger? So stupid
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Its less of a cliff hanger and more of a "tune in next time for the continued adventures of Dragon Age". Its not really a Halo 2 level of cliffhanger.
 
WabeWalker said:
Dumbing down of features? We must be talking about two different games here (uh... bro). Because Origins was stupid. Utterly brain dead.

Here, my Origins guide, just for you. You can cruise through the game on the Nightmare setting if you do this.

1) You get your healers to spam their heal spells by creating custom tactics in the custom tactics menu.
2) Craft 800 health poultices.
3) Setup another custom tactic for each of your party members to heal at 50% using health poultices.

You're done. That's it. You'll cruise all the way to the end of the game and you won't even have to touch a button. And I mean that literally.
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Holy oversimplification batman!

Let your mages attract aggro and they're going to die, especially when anything with knockdown capability gets ahold of them (or a Revenant). Ignore Emissaries and other spellcasters while autofighting and things will go worse than poorly. Avoid focused DPS in some of the major fights--and not only boss fights--and you're fucked.

DA:O also has some beautifully designed ambushes and fights. One of the city battles saw my tank surrounded by enemies, and the rest of the party cut off by a portcullis that came crashing down. I didn't see the lever to raise the portcullis and wound up fighting the entire battle with the tank supported by mages.

I'm not saying DA:O is hard and I understand you hate it and think it's trash, but at least be honest about your criticisms. This isn't the Crysis thread! ;)
 
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Seems like I really like to gimp myself in the first playthrough of DA- both Origins and 2.

DA:O I played with only 1 mage, Morrigan, who just had the single heal spell. I didn't spend much time on crafting anything so health potions were always in short supply. The 2nd time around I ran 2 mages, 1 a healer, and WOW so much easier.

DA2 - ran with a Isabelle, Aveline and Anders (as healer) and I was a the damage mage. Some of the fights were very difficult, even on normal.

My 2nd playthrough I'm now playing a 2H warrior. And even though I bumped up the difficulty to Hard - NONE of the fights have given me the same problems as they did when I ran a party without a 2H warrior. Some of the low level fights were a bit hard, but that was before hitting level 6 or 7. Once I got the reaver ability that ups your damage as your health drops...holy crap.

So, TL;DR version - 2H warrior in DA2 is OP as (&*@.
 
I played through DA:O again right before DA2 came out, to have a fresh save game ready to import. Beat it on normal as a noble dwarf rogue, in typical dwarven fashion: cleansing the Circle, keeping Orzamar in House Aeducan's hands even though your brother betrays you, killing off half the available party members, and generally killing anyone who gets in your way. Very satisfying; my only other completion was as a dwarven commoner, all the other origins eventually bored me.

Anyway, DA2 thoughts now that I've beaten it. I didn't like DA2 at first. The demo sucked and the combat animations are ridiculous. Gameplay was repetitive and content recycled. No more exploring a giant dungeon for the Urn of Sacred Ashes, this time around everything takes 10 minutes tops. Though I'm glad there is no multi-hour Fade sequence.

So things weren't looking good my first few hours into it.


After a few hours the character interaction won me over. Easily the best thing about DA2. Great party banter, interesting party members. I stopped worrying about the game's annoyance and kept playing to see what crazy shit Fenris would say next. I loved that NPCs had both a 'friend' and 'rival' skill. You didn't have to be friends with everyone, handing out gifts like candy to get the stat bonuses of DA:O. This time around, if you try to appease the crazier party members things get really screwy in the story.

I liked following a main character over the years as he advanced in status. Too many RPGs seem to happen "all at once" with no sense of time passing. DA:O supposedly took 2 years from Ostagar to the end, but you could barely tell.

After a while the combat annoyed me less. The key for me was realizing it was the dwarf's retelling of the story. Everything was over-the-top and increasingly crazy. Every battle became "Hawke fought 8 abominations and 2 revenants, and lived!". At that point I lowered the difficulty, blew through the combats and just enjoyed the story.
 
eggrock said:
Holy oversimplification batman!

Let your mages attract aggro and they're going to die, especially when anything with knockdown capability gets ahold of them (or a Revenant). Ignore Emissaries and other spellcasters while autofighting and things will go worse than poorly. Avoid focused DPS in some of the major fights--and not only boss fights--and you're fucked.

DA:O also has some beautifully designed ambushes and fights. One of the city battles saw my tank surrounded by enemies, and the rest of the party cut off by a portcullis that came crashing down. I didn't see the lever to raise the portcullis and wound up fighting the entire battle with the tank supported by mages.

I'm not saying DA:O is hard and I understand you hate it and think it's trash, but at least be honest about your criticisms. This isn't the Crysis thread! ;)
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My three mages were rarely ever attacked because in Origins Threat was way too powerful.

Also, if one of my mages did get attacked, I had it setup in the custom tactics for the other two mages to turn their staffs on the attacker, meaning three mages would simultaneously be shooting at the one enemy. For this reason, I rarely ever even used my mages' abilities. All they did was shoot their staffs. Everyone talks about cone of cold and the like being overpowered - I never even needed it. See, it wasn't tactical.

And then of course there were the heal spells and the health poultices with the cool down meters that were ridiculously short.

Three mages, with three maxed out health spell trees, with their staff skills maxed out, with 600 health poultices, plus a tank continuously taunting = hitting the win button.

Dead easy. And yes, ridiculously simple. Not tactical at all. One guy said to me once, okay, so don't play like that then - but that's how I did play. I was playing the game. I just can't fathom how a person who has played both games can suggest that DA 2 is the 'dumbed down' game, while Origins was the clever title - that, to me, is just so wrong.
 
Origins storytelling, quests and environments were head, shoulders (knees and toes) above DA2. That, to me, is the dumbed down part.
 
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