Dragon Age 2

[Tysyacha]

Straight up--I read the review of Dragon Age 2 on GameSpot and have some serious questions:

 

1) How's the dialogue? Dumbed-down, or still as clever as it was in Origins?

2) How's the plot? Are there mysterious secrets and lots of intrigue?

3) How are the characters? I don't mean how they look, but how they ARE.

4) How's the romance? Awesome a la Origins, or censored a la ME2?

5) How's the addictiveness factor? Is it a game in which I'll be hooked in 5 minutes?

[igyman]

Straight up--I read the review of Dragon Age 2 on GameSpot and have some serious questions:

 

1) How's the dialogue? Dumbed-down, or still as clever as it was in Origins?

2) How's the plot? Are there mysterious secrets and lots of intrigue?

3) How are the characters? I don't mean how they look, but how they ARE.

4) How's the romance? Awesome a la Origins, or censored a la ME2?

5) How's the addictiveness factor? Is it a game in which I'll be hooked in 5 minutes?

 

I'm still playing it, so I can't give you 100% definitive impressions, but here's what I think so far:

 

1) It's variable. Some is short and to the point, with little to none extra info that might be interesting to hear, but some is pretty good and adds to the atmosphere.

 

2) Can't say for sure, since I'm somewhere in Act 2 so far, but there are some interesting moments, yeah.

 

3) This is my biggest disappointment so far. The interaction between Hawke and companions is crap. I'm in the second third of the game and I haven't had more than three conversations per companion, all of which were quest related, rather short and didn't give me anything new about any of the characters. There's a lot of party banter too, but it's nowhere near the banter from Origins - basically they try very hard to end each banter in a funny manner, but they fail miserably in most cases. Origins didn't do this - there were many hilarious banter conversations, but there were also serious ones.

 

4) Can't say anything about it yet, I've had one scene with Isabela and that one was short and censored nudity-wise, but it was at the beginning of her romance, so there's a possibility of something else coming up later, if I decide to follow through.

 

5) It takes time to get used to the game, both in terms of gameplay and in terms of graphics. Definitely longer than five minutes.

[Darth Payne]

Ah, crap. I can't remember how i did the spoiler thing, ah well...

 

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I was personally a bit annoyed that if you have Bethany in your party in Kirkwall, should you take her with you to the Deep Roads she ends up with the same 'sickness' Wesley did in the prologue.

 

And if you choose *not* to take her with you, the bloody Templars walk off with her when you get home again and you don't get her back into your party again until very close to the final battle.

 

Btw, does anyone know why *Anders* was the DA1 character that was lifted over into DA2 to join the 'party' there?

 

I'd kinda hoped to have Leliana, or Morrigan, in my party again as they where my favorite DA1 characters.

 

Or...

 

Ooh, Ohgren Vs Varric.

[Q]

(hidden)(/hidden), with the () replaced by [].

 

I would go ahead and use them if were you.

[Darth Payne]

In the last few days i've been working on a list of where to find the more special outfits for Hawke, specifically the ones that give you a bonus when you wear a complete set.

 

Unfortunatly, this list is not yet 100%. Though, soon, it will be.

 

If anyone is interested in this list, let me know and i'll hurry up and finish it.

 

Edit: Btw, does anyone know what the 'Rogue Daggers' are called ingame? And where to get them? (If you don't know which daggers, it is the daggers you can see the Rogue Hawke use in the character selection screen and in the middle of Korvals dagger selection on the right side of his stall)

[stoffe]

Ah, crap. I can't remember how i did the spoiler thing, ah well...

 

 

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I was personally a bit annoyed that if you have Bethany in your party in Kirkwall, should you take her with you to the Deep Roads she ends up with the same 'sickness' Wesley did in the prologue.

 

And if you choose *not* to take her with you, the bloody Templars walk off with her when you get home again and you don't get her back into your party again until very close to the final battle.

 

Btw, does anyone know why *Anders* was the DA1 character that was lifted over into DA2 to join the 'party' there?

 

Well...

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You can bring Bethany to the Deep Roads and have her survive, but I assume you must have Anders in the party as well for that to work. If he's along he'll convince some of his former Grey Warden buddies to take in Bethany and give her the Joining. So she becomes a Grey Warden and still leave your group, but at least she survives.

 

Anders was probably the most suited one to bring over both because of the above, and to tie in with the whole brewing Mage vs. Templar plot that I suspect is going to turn into the as-of-yet absent main plot. And he's probably the easiest character to destroy by turning him from a mostly jovial wisecracking guy into a brooding fanatic.

[stoffe]

Straight up--I read the review of Dragon Age 2 on GameSpot and have some serious questions:

 

1) How's the dialogue? Dumbed-down, or still as clever as it was in Origins?

2) How's the plot? Are there mysterious secrets and lots of intrigue?

3) How are the characters? I don't mean how they look, but how they ARE.

4) How's the romance? Awesome a la Origins, or censored a la ME2?

5) How's the addictiveness factor? Is it a game in which I'll be hooked in 5 minutes?

1. A bit varied. Rather straightforward and to the point in some places, but more witty and interesting in others. With the dialog icons signifying the tone of your dialog choices you can more clearly define a personality for your Hawke, which seems to reflect in their overall manner of talking after a while. Haven't finished the game yet though so can't tell what will happen later on. The dialog wheel still has the same kind of blind guesswork of what Hawke will actually say despite the icons. How hard would it be so put the subtitles of the dialog choice in a tooltip when you hover over the wheel, really? Though personally I prefer having a voiced protagonist, gives more immersion than the nodding mute that was the Warden in ÐA:Origins.
    
    
   
2. I'm only up to Act 2 so far, but as of yet there is no trace of a main plot. Tons of sidequests of varying complexity and quality, and it's mostly been about establishing the Hawkes in their new home in Kirkwall. But since it's supposed to stretch over several years I suppose the characters need to be established before the main plot catches on. Quite a bit of difference from ÐA:Origins where you knew who the end boss would be as soon as you reached Ostagar.
    
    
   
3. A fair mix of characters and personalities, the available squad members seem to be built for some in-party intrigue. You got your mix of wild, profiteering rogues, lawbook-brandishing paladins, mages and mage haters. Some of them are pretty extreme, though I've mostly stuck with the crowd that's somewhat "normal" so far. Some returning characters from Ðragon Age 1 that join you as party members too: one (well, technically two) former Warden-partymember(s) from ÐA:Awakening, one temporary Warden-party member from the Dalish elf (now Irish Elf) origin, and a certain pirate queen NPC you might have run across briefly in Denerim to learn the finer points of being a Duelist from.
    
    
   
4. The romances seem to be tied in with the storyline, so you can't finish it as soon as you get to camp like you pretty much could in Origins. Still on my first playthrough so I haven't finished it yet, but from what I've seen so far it's not censored.
    
    
   
5. If you're used to Origins it might take some re-learning since it's a new game. There are some fairly substantial gameplay changes between the two games. Some for the better and some for the worse. So far I've been enjoying the game though, no regrets buying it. If you're expecting and wanting Ðragon Age 1.5:More of the Same instead of a new game with its own merits you might be disappointed though.
   

[Thanatos9t]

ÐA:Awakening, one temporary Warden-party member from the Dalish elf (now Irish Elf) origin.

 

That's Welsh Elf not Irish they sound completely different (maybe just to an English person), Eve Myles (Gwen from Torchwood) is from Wales, although the other elves have Irish accents for some reason.

[Darth InSidious]

The Ðragon Age 2 Flying Circus continues! Roll up, roll up...

 

"The immersion and combat of this game are unmatched! A truly moving and fun epic," the Metacritic user known as Avanost wrote in his glowing review of Dragon Age 2, which he scored a perfect 10/10. "Anything negative you'll see about this game is an overreaction of personal preference. For what it is, it is flawlessly executed and endlessly entertaining."

 

Whether or not you agree with the accuracy of that assessment isn't particularly relevant. What has people up in arms is that it was apparently written by an applications engineer named Chris Hoban, who also happens to be a BioWare employee - and who made no mention of that fact in his review.

 

http://www.escapistmagazine.com/news/view/108482-BioWare-Employee-Busted-in-Dragon-Age-2-Review-Scandal-UPDATED

[igyman]

Old news, Darth, ooold news.

 

Finished the game yesterday and my final impressions are rather mixed. Overall, it's an OK game, but it's nowhere near the quality of Origins.

 

The story itself is OK, with a few interesting plot twists, but it also has many flaws - some are related to the direction they chose to take it in and others are related to the presentation itself. First off, the whole "framed narrative" concept is nothing new or revolutionary. Basically, what they did is linearize the flow of the story and divided it into acts, similarly to what The Witcher did. To clarify, if you remember, The Witcher's story had a prologue set in the fortress, then there's a small time skip and Act One is set in that village with your final objective being to enter Vizima, after that again a very small timeskip and you're in Vizima and the Swamp for the duration of the second act, etc. Similarly, Dragon Age 2 has a prologue and three more acts, where each act has a specific main goal (not always known at the start of the act) and quite a few sidequests. The difference is that all three acts take place in one location - Kirkwall. The final villain was very well done, both as a character and as a boss fight, but the pre-final villain was rather disappointing, primarily for story-related reasons.

 

Now we slowly get to the combat. Functionally, it's more or less the same as in Origins - you right-click on an enemy and your character starts auto-attacking it (unless you're playing a console version, in which case, my condolences). Your spells/abilities are mapped to numbers in the quickbar, much like in Origins and the combat can be paused at any moment. Now come the differences. The positive difference is that the combat is a lot more fluid and the whole shuffling thing, as the devs call it, has been reduced. The negative side is that the animations are just ridiculous, unnatural and way too over-the-top, along with the fact that the number of abilities has been reduced. There are still plenty of abilities to choose from and their organization into trees is a nice improvement, but overall there's far less of them than in Origins. Another negative aspect of the combat is that it's way too fast. You'll often find yourself pausing simply so you could target your next enemy, not because you want to go into some elaborate tactical solution. Another interesting thing I noticed is that this game seems to have a built-in god mode. It kicks in in several major boss encounters, starting with the Rock Wraith and basically enables you to finish the fight, which would otherwise be unwinnable. The boss fights in which it activated all had the same scenario - you fight an overpowered boss creature which at several points summons waves of moderate-to-hard enemies (i.e. Rage Demons, Revenants) to help it. Since those enemies will eventually overwhelm you, your job is to stay alive long enough for the god mode to kick in, so when your health and mana/stamina start instant-regenerating you can turn the situation around. This made those boss fights completely pointless and boring, since you knew you would win and were simply wondering when that fight would end already so you can move on to another quest.

 

And so we get to your companions. What I stated in my earlier reply to Tysy stands - companion interaction is crap. Most companions are rather monotonous and you won't really learn that much about them, nor will you be able to change their minds about an important issue. Anders, for example will start with "I hate the Circle, the Chantry and the Templars and I must destroy them" and will stay the same by the end of the game. The Justice merger element could have easily been left out completely, since you will only get one short interaction with Justice during a sidequest. You can only talk to your companions when a Companion quest is activated, otherwise they will just make short comments. I've already commented on party banter in my previous post, so I won't repeat myself.

Gameplay-wise, the way you level them up has also been restricted - meaning that Varric can't use meele weapons (he can't use any weapon other than his shotgun-crossbow Bianca for that matter), Isabela can only be a dual-wielding meele rogue, etc. On the other hand, each of them has a unique specialization with unique abilities, which is a nice touch.

 

When it comes to leveling your characters, it's important to note that the Skill tab is gone, meaning there's no Coercion, Herbalism, Pickpocketing, etc. Lockpicking is now bound to your Cunning attribute and increases with every ten points, meaning you must have a rogue with up to 40 points in Cunning to be able to open Master level locks, which is a very bad and limiting design decision, to put it lightly. The rest is largely the same.

 

Moving on to customization, as you know your companions can't be fully customized, but your Hawke can. However, the amount of armor and weapons is seriously disappointing. There are only three armor sets that provide a set bonus (unless you count the Blood Dragon armor and Dead Space 2 armor sets) and there are several Heavy armor variations that all look exactly the same, but have slightly different stats. This, of course, applies to warriors, but I'm pretty sure it's not that different for other classes. The same goes for weapons, rings, amulets and belts, with the last three having largely uninspiring names like "Ring", "Belt", "Amulet", or "Ornate Ring", "Ornate Belt", etc.

 

When it comes to the environment, there is a Pearl-like establishment, and a day and night version of Kirkwall's quarters, along with a few unpopulated areas outside of Kirkwall. They all look relatively nice, once you get used to the graphics. The biggest flaw is the reuse of caves and mansions for almost every side quest. I remember people complaining about the reuse of bunkers in Mass Effect's UNC quests, well, let me tell you: this is much, much worse.

 

Now, I know I've pointed out more negatives than positives, but remember what I said way above - this is an OK game, perhaps not worth an immediate purchase, but it's worth a playthrough. As we all know, they made it in about a year (or less), so you can't really expect it to be on par with Origins, but it's interesting enough. There are some interesting NPCs and plotlines to keep you busy. The qunari redesign works surprisingly well, but the elves and Darkspawn look really really bad. Length-wise, it's not much shorter than Origins as it took me around 54 hours to finish it on Normal difficulty. However, it's how you spend those hours that differs from Origins.

 

There you go. Wall 'o' text finished. I'm pretty sure I forgot to mention a lot of other stuff, but this post is too long as it is.

[Darth333]

FYI regarding a major and very annoying bug: Isabella's and Sebastian's friendship/rivalry bonus seem to be bugged: every time you remove her and Sebastian from your party, your base animation speed will lower by 5...and the game becomes totally unplayable at some point. For those playing the game on PC, it can somehow temporarily be fixed: http://social.bioware.com/forum/1/topic/300/index/6459070/5#6511725. I have not looked into it but I guess that for a more "permanent" but dirty temporary fix one could remove this "ability" permanently from her char using a GFF editor*.

 

So, if you are playing on console, avoid being Isabella's friend (at least until there's a patch).

 

I'd test it but now my game seems to be crash mode: I'm getting a screen telling me to reinstall * ... anyway, the list for the characters abilities is here for easy access: http://dragonage.wikia.com/wiki/Console_%28Dragon_Age_II%29/Talent_codes (211040 for Isabella?)

 

edit: Just fixed the crash issue: it was in no way game related but mobo/power related.

[Tysyacha]

Speaking of annoying: I downloaded the game from Amazon.com and it installed OK, but now the game won't even start. Please help! It won't even go to the loading screen...

[Alkonium]

Speaking of annoying: I downloaded the game from Amazon.com and it installed OK, but now the game won't even start. Please help! It won't even go to the loading screen...

 

You may not like it, but my first guess is some sort of compatibility issue not detected during installation. How old is your PC?

[Tysyacha]

I bought it in 2008. The demo of DA2 ran okay on it.

[Alkonium]

I bought it in 2008. The demo of DA2 ran okay on it.

 

Then I have no idea. Sorry. And I suppose since it's a digital copy, it's not an issue with an access key.

[Q]

Speaking of annoying: I downloaded the game from Amazon.com and it installed OK, but now the game won't even start. Please help! It won't even go to the loading screen...

What's your OS?

 

If it's Vista or 7, then before you launch the game try turning off Aero by going to Start>Control Panel>Appearance and Personalization>Personalization, then scroll down until you see the Windows Vista or 7 Basic theme and click on it. The game seems to have a problem with Aero running in the background.

[Tysyacha]

Thank you--I am happy to report that all is well now. I had to update my graphics card drivers and install the patch.

[Q]

You're welcome.

[DarthParametric]

You don't have to turn it off completely. Just set the compatibility mode of the game EXE to Disable Visual Themes and/or Disable Desktop Composition. It's something I've had to do with some games that screw up when running on a dual monitor setup.

[logan23]

Finally completed my first playthrough of Dragon age 2

50 hours to complete but did most if not all the side quests.

 

I know there has been some frustrations with Dragon age 2 and I have to say after beating it I took some time to think about what worked and what didn't.

 

This will be a spoiler free post.....and will also touch on what could be done for Dragon age 3

 

the idea of the story inside a story was a good concept but there are some issues when transferring it to a game.

 

One is that most frame narratives are not sequels or part of a series. Most Movies that use this method or one time tiles where there is not sequel to them. By placing the game dragon age 2 in this format in itself made things hard for fans to feel like its a sequel but I do believe that it is possible to use this form of narrative in a game like this. I give props to Bioware for willing to take a chance and be creative. I am sure they are learning a lot from the player constructive feedback for future dragon age games and the use of this form of narrative in games.

 

In Movies the frame narrative can be pushed forward and moments in these snap shots of time can be sped up by the use of editing. In games due to it being a interactive media this option can not be used without hurting the game's RPG factor/ questing/exploring.

 

In the First Act you need to do a good deal of questing to setup events and possible future consequences from these choices while completing the quests. The main issue is that you might lose track of the main reason for Act 1 so the player feels a lack of direction in the plot.

 

Solution:

The game could take Act 1 and place not just reward base reasons why you need to reach that goal for the final events in Act1 but also build scenes and stress that makes the player feel that if they simply lived where they are in the present that bad things will happen. This could haven even been setup from the 1 year events jump.

 

Another solution is to take Act one and have sub 2-3 acts inside that are there to help with the pacing and the large number of questing needed since Act 1 setups things for Act2 and 3 as you see your choices come back to help/hurt/ or simply surprise you. These sub acts in Act1 can help with pacing just as in Movies they use editing techniques.

 

 

Issue:

Didn't feel Epic

 

I felt that Act2 and Act 3 were better paced then Act 1 which help increase the Epic meter but I found myself waiting for a the jack in the box to pop out and show the direction of the story which did happen but on an end of Act 2 and end of Act 3 self contained ones. This goes back to the game sometimes feeling like a prologue or cliff hanger in some ways. The game and it's story are good and very deep with many consequences but this feeling is still present and I believe that if this was Dragon Age 1 and not the sequel the player's emotions on this would be different but there is little that can be done since in Movies most frame narratives are a one stand alone movie which allow the player to take in the experience and really think about it and the events.

 

Solution:

The only solution I can really think of to deal with this feeling is to have the game be a half framed narrative game. This would be presented for example Batman Begins. This movie has a framed narrative of Wayne and Ra's Al Ghul conversing about his past and the events that lead up to the present which is the end of his training. After this event Wayne/Batman continue through the narrative in a strait forward manner with a few flash back here and there to help restate key motivations or emotions of Wayne.

 

Dragon age 2 could have use something similar where the final scenes in the present which would have increased the feeling of the epic emotion.

 

 

As for Dragon age 3

 

I love the the dlg wheel with the icons since it made it very easy to know what tone or action I would be leaning toward. Also the VO PC actually brought me into the story more than Origins.

 

The exploding enemies should be toned down since after awhile it became repetitive.

 

The jumping in time allowed for me to see the effects of my choices later in the game which was a major plus in my book.

 

Dragon age 3 I suspect will return to a Epic story like Origins due to player feedback on Dragon age 2.

 

I would like to see a Dragon age 3 which has the epic feel but also have one or two jumps in time to allow the player to see events play out in game but keeping the center focus and found in Origins.

 

My 2 cents

 

Logan

[Lord of Hunger]

I've only played the demo. I'd say that there are some improvements in the combat, IMO, by otherwise this looks rushed and experimental. The graphics have, thank god, less over-the-top effects but still look sloppy. Contrary to the fans of DA:O (which I did play), I like the new Darkspawn. However, Morgana's recanonization is a bit cheezy and none of the demo's dialog gripped me in the slightest. It sounds like they also took the whole Chantry thing from DA:O to a new extreme, which I would rate down because I found the commentary on religion unnecessary.

 

I've been looking at the Metacritic reviews. Looks like it got okay ratings from major reviewers but was widely unpopular with PC gamers. Not surprised when they moved the game towards the console like twenty other major developers.

 

I do applaud the time-skip plot set-up that you mentioned Logan. It's a good idea with potential, but as you noted it needs work.

[DarthParametric]

Morgana

You mean Flemeth I presume (well actually I gather you meant Morrigan, but she's not in DA2 - only her mother Flemeth).

[Q]

LOL@ the GILFivization of Flemeth.

You don't have to turn it off completely. Just set the compatibility mode of the game EXE to Disable Visual Themes and/or Disable Desktop Composition. It's something I've had to do with some games that screw up when running on a dual monitor setup.

You're right. I completely forgot about setting compatibility mode. It's a lot simpler that way.

 

 

For those of you with Nvidia graphics cards:

It's almost certain that you're experiencing horrible framerates while playing DA2 unless you turn everything way, way down. I know I was. It's a driver problem, which even the 267.24 beta drivers won't fix. If you're using Vista or Windows 7 there is a way around this, however, but it requires a bit of tinkering. I can attest that the results will more than justify the trouble you went to, (unless, of course, Nvidia releases a new driver tomorrow that fixes the problem).

 

1) Download driver version 267.59 from Nvidia:

64-bit; US version

64-bit; international version

32-bit; US version

32-bit; international version

 

2) Download the appropriate modded nv_disp.inf file for your version:

64-bit; US version

64-bit; International version

32-bit -Please note that I don't know whether this is for the US or international driver, so you'll have to try both. Just a hunch, but I'd try the international version first because the guy who posted it over at Guru3D used broken English. Of course, he could merely have been an American retard.

 

3) Double-click the .exe like you normally would. It will unpack the files to C:\NVIDIA, then tell you that you don't have the correct hardware (unless you have a GTX 550ti) and you'll have to exit.

 

4) Copy the modded nv_disp.inf file to C:\NVIDIA\DisplayDriver\267.59\Vista 64-bit (or Vista 32-bit)\English\Display.Driver and tell it to overwrite.

 

5) Navigate to C:\NVIDIA\DisplayDriver\267.59\Vista 64-bit (or Vista 32-bit)\English, run the setup.exe, choose "Custom" under "Install Options", check the "Perform Clean Install" box and install the drivers.

 

6) Profit.

 

 

I can verify that the US x64 version installed correctly on my machine and that it provided at least a 50% increase in framerate (100%+ in some places), finally making the game playable with the DX11 renderer at very high settings with the normal texture pack and 16AF and 4xAA @1680x1050 on my GTX 460 768MB.

 

Visually, the high-res texture doesn't make much of a difference, IMO, but it will kill your framerate unless you have an uber card. Same thing with ambient occlusion and depth of field.

 

No matter what you do, it'll still be a fugly game. The fugliness will just have greater detail and run much more smoothly with this fix.

[Darth InSidious]

Another one bites the dust...

In what seems to be a norm these days, yet another player has been banned from Dragon Age 2 and it’s DLC.

 

A user by the name of tez20 had the following to say [DI sez: read the article proper. ]

 

Dear me. EA does seem to have a problem with this error.

[Drunkside]

A piece of news worth a facepalm. Nuff said.