mothra on 13/7/2010 at 10:52
well, new information keeps coming in and it's a mixed bag for me:
New visual style:
I like the screenshots sofar, the DA:O look was pretty bad but serviceable. What I did not like was the visual design of the world, architecture, clothing and weapons. It didn't get anymore boring than that so I hope they exaggerate it a little bit more with the new look
Shepardization of the main character:
race is fixed and human, you can only choose the gender. I can see where they are coming from and I commend them for changing the formula to a sequel. Changing the whole "subgenre", a thing that made DA:O successful in the first place may seem risky. I think it is not. As with DA:O they will get the Hardcore Pause-Combat Crowd that just love this type of combat/game. They got me for sure. I played a few times through DA:O although I feel offended by the stupid, predictable quests and main plot. I love the party banter but hate the design and pre-school philosophy they throw at you. The new players they got via the extremely atrocious marketing campaign and that (I guess) mainly played it on the console or thought the game is too hard on normal (I'm looking at YOU pussy-game-journalists) will love the console-y changes. It's win-win imo.
Fear Of The Witcher:
Many articles point out that they think Bioware is just trying everything to counter their main competition in TW2 but I think they are wrong. Bioware did not make a game in the slightest reminiscent of the gameplay/style celebrated in theWitcher for YEARS. They do other, more boring and slick stuff now like underwear fetish puppet sexscenes for giggles.
DA:O would be how I explain the world and the most basic human emotions like love + hate to a moron that never read a book or heard of the holy grail or all the other recycled stuff they used in DA:O. TW1 would be a young man/teen straight out of puberty that read at least a newspaper or got a history class somewhere.
I'm looking forward to it. The new dialogue wheel will make me skip the plot-conversations even quicker, I can concentrate on companion interaction and issuing my orders :)
But what I am really curious of is the "think like a general" tagline....could there be an RTS element in DA:O ???
EvaUnit02 on 13/7/2010 at 11:26
The reasoning behind only having one fixed character Mass Effect-style is probably to do with creating more player immersion (by having a voiced character). I find that in a lot of past RPGs where your the character doesn't have a fixed name the NPCs refer to you in either the third person (ie "hey you", "boy") or by some formal and/or profession related title (i.e. Master Jedi, Greywarden).
Also possibly so that they have less work to do and can get the game out in shorter dev cycle than the original (it was in development for at least four years). They created a powerful and easy to use toolset for the first game; hence them being able to crank out the "Awakenings" expansion so quickly. The DA engine was built with modding in mind, a successor to NWN in a lot ways.
Quote:
(
http://gameinformer.com/b/news/archive/2010/07/09/five-facts-about-hawke-in-dragon-age-ii.aspx)
After yesterday's cover reveal and a few tantalizing details about Dragon Age II, fans of BioWare's epic RPG series probably have more questions than answers. The biggest mystery currently involves the new main character: Who is Hawke? You'll have to get a hold of our latest issue if you want all of the details, but we can clarify five basic facts about the central character in Dragon Age II.
1. Hawke will be a voiced character.
Unlike Dragon Age: Origins, the player's character in Dragon Age II will be fully voiced. This opens the door for a more cinematic approach to dialogue and creates an identity for the character outside of the text you see on-screen. It also eliminates those awkward scenarios where you feel like your character should be reacting, but instead just stares blankly without so much as a grunt.
2. Hawke is human.
Yes, that means that you won't be able to select Hawke's race. However, just because that one aspect of Hawke's backstory is set doesn't mean BioWare is eliminating character creation. You can still choose your class and customize your appearance. When we visited BioWare's studio, we only saw (and heard) the male Hawke in action, but the team promises that players can select either gender for the character.
3. Hawke didn't just survive the blight...he escaped it.
As the Grey Warden from Dragon Age: Origins was fighting darkspawn, Hawke was living in Lothering. Fans will remember that the small village was raided and destroyed (an event that occurred off-screen in Origins), and Hawke was one of the survivors. However, rather than stay and fight the darkspawn menace, Hawke flees Ferelden and heads north.
4. Hawke is the Champion of Kirkwall.
Kirkwall is a major population center in the Free Marches, a collection of city-states north of Ferelden. This means that at least some of the action in Dragon Age II will be set in Kirkwall itself, though Hawke will also spend time in other areas of the Free Marches. What exactly Hawke does to earn the honorary title of Champion, however, is up to you.
5. Hawke drives the story.
Dragon Age II is not about killing an ancient evil or about quelling another blight; Hawke is the driving force behind the narrative. Over the course of the game's 10-year timeline, players' actions and choices will determine Hawke's history, relationships, and regrets...all in service to answering the larger question: Who is the Champion of Kirkwall?
That Game Informer article suggests that you'll be able to customise the details of Hawke's origin, likely akin to how in Mass Effect 1 you could choose from having Shepard be a "Spacer" born colonist, an Earth born street urchin, or to be part of an Alliance military "dynasty". Also her service record, eg be the sole survivor of the Thresher Maw attack on Torfin, be a Paragon war hero or a Renegade commander who put the battle outcome ahead of her troops' lives, etc. Undoubtedly you'll be able to choose your class.
Koki on 13/7/2010 at 11:33
So it's Mass Effect with swords?
van HellSing on 13/7/2010 at 11:42
Only uglier.
EvaUnit02 on 13/7/2010 at 12:13
A new art direction? I hope that your party still looks they've been splattered by loads of ketchup after battles, that was LOL-tastic in the first game.
Quote:
(
http://gameinformer.com/b/news/archive/2010/07/12/dragon-age-ii-first-screenshots.aspx) First screenshots
These exclusive hi-res screens of Dragon Age II showcase the new artistic direction for the game, depicting the new designs for darkspawn Hurlocks and Ogres. The team at BioWare is also aware that many gamers weren't satisfied with the graphical quality in Origins; Dragon Age II not only looks better, but sports a new artistic direction that gives the world of Thedas a more distinct visual identity.
mothra on 13/7/2010 at 12:33
so even less RPG. did they reveal if they show you what you will say or will it be an even simpler dialogue wheel ala: NICE/BAD/INDIFFERENT ?
I don't care about Darkspawn, I only killed a few THOUSAND in the last game, I want better maps with multiple stages, more detail and original quests, not the HolyGrail or the Fall of the House Usher. I wanna be able to kill everyone (if I survive it) and have a few non-scaling enemies. less combat but better enemy/tactic combinations. NO CHEAP "stages" fight against bosses. When I have a boss frozen, immobilized, cowering in fear he should not suddenly regain 100 health so you can trigger the next lame bossfight stage. I have no problem with those systems but if I can break them I want them to behave correctly or not be able to break at all (higher resistances on bosses). the 1-person style at least sounds very good for your companions, the interaction with them will make much more sense (hopefully). That's what I loved about TW, that game had living, breathing history and you were walking through it. In DA:O I just felt that every 20minutes the game threw 100 random pages of unrelated history at me. the DA:O universe to me felt just like a big book I never finished reading, not something I was travelling through and experiencing.
Malf on 13/7/2010 at 13:03
I thought the original point of Dragon Age was to step away from that kind of gameplay and concentrate on a more traditional style of RPG?
EvaUnit02 on 13/7/2010 at 13:11
Dragon Age 1 was too far along in development when Bioware was bought out by EA to see too radical changes in direction. DA1 was very much a game aimed at PC audiences, the gimped ports that consoles received is proof of this. The PC version was ready several months but was held back for simultaneous release with the console ports.
My suspicion though is that Dragon Age 2 will see gameplay changes in general to pander to mainstream audience (who're largely console users) sensibilities.
mothra on 13/7/2010 at 13:49
*cry*
anyways, TW2 will hopefully be so great I can stop replaying TW1 for a change.
I won't lie, I have no real interest, hate, hype, love or indifference for/against DA2 so whatever they come up with: if it got party-combat with queueable commands, attributes to assign and a PAUSE-COMBAT "feature" I am happy. Maybe not a preorderer after DA:O but a buyer. Everything Bioware does is on the safe side and "innovation" or "experiments" are out, they won't change this formula imo so I don't expect many new surprises.
Zygoptera on 13/7/2010 at 21:57
And the really funny thing?
With all the shift towards making Dragon Effect, DA:O outsold either Mass Effect.
It's a shame really, as DAO was a decent game struggling under the weight of some of the most extraordinarily banal and repetitive encounter design ever. All the stuff they seem to think needs to be fixed is stuff that wasn't broken in the first place.
[didn't actually come straight from RPS to post, much as it might look that way. TTLG always comes first, though I hear there are techniques to fix that]
