Dragon Age 2 - * Official *

bhavv · 23 Feb 2011 at 20:02

Surfer said:
Jade Empire...hrmm ok but KOTOR? FOR SHAME!

Actually I never played it sorry.

I have it on steam from when it was a few quid, but never tried it. I'll try it now.

I did try Jade Empire and Mass Effect, couldnt get into them, and Kotor looked like I wouldnt like it.

Surfer · 23 Feb 2011 at 20:06

thats almost as bad as when my flatmate said he'd never seen Star Wars

KOTOR is one of the greats in my book. Both JE and KOTOR have really good stories. Though the combat in Jade Empire takes some getting used to. Seems more suited to console.

Just to add what i said about DA 2. It may be a simplified way of summing it up but Bioware seem to be masseffecting DA2 (can be a good or bad thing depending on whether you liked Mass Effect

)

If i had a bucketload of cash..............

i'd get a combined effort from the great rpg devs out there to do an epic party-based rpg (FIXED* isometric view but you can zoom in and out) each party member would be voiced by a hollywood A+ actor. No loading zones at all...one seamless world, day and night cycle, realistic weather patterns. But you would need to eat, drink, poop otherwise your character dies. Diseases would exist (shows on your characters face and - reaction from npcs) Buy clothes (clothes look old/new/ can get torn in battle, get wet, get snow on em. etc) Massive gameworld maybe base it on the Belgariad series by Eddings. Realistic aging (character looks older as time goes by)
Can build/buy houses. Become Mayor/ Sheriff/join lots of guilds (suitable sidequests for such professions as well as new perks, clothing etc). combat i would make hardcore turnbased like the old goldbox SSI/US Gold rpgs but you could have an option to make it semi-turn based like Baldurs Gate. All npcs have entirely realistic lives. You could also abandon the main quest (just tell Belgarath to sod off) and just go mercenary or build a pub, farm or whorehouse kidnap women (ala the hypnotizer thing in Fallout 3 hehe) and start your own business.

Could even defect from your side (good guys) and change to the other side. (so in the case of the Belgariad it would be you and Zedar and a few others vs Belgarath and Co.)

All this is doable. Its all been done before (maybe not in the one game though the Ultima series had some of this)

*i say a fixed isometric point of view because i think that adds atmosphere and allows them to concentrate on the art style in this living and breathing world.

Anything i miss?

bhavv · 23 Feb 2011 at 20:10

I've never seen Star wars either. Well, I watched about half of one of them and it was so boring I almost fell asleep, and cant really remember anything about it.

Lord of The Rings trilogy was the best film ever.

Deific · 23 Feb 2011 at 20:22

I thought even ethiopian children had seen the Star Wars trilogy

Surfer · 23 Feb 2011 at 20:29

Bhavv said:
I've never seen Star wars either

oh dear oh dear

bhavv · 23 Feb 2011 at 20:55

So if I had seen star wars, I wouldnt be a fail?

Oh lookie, methinks that female mages have developed potions to enlarge their breast size, but the effects are temporary:

Or maybe thats just where they store their mana, and after casting a few spells it depletes?

Jed Shields · 23 Feb 2011 at 21:06

Surfer said:
ok played the demo now. Havent finished it yet though

When i fought the Ogre i could actually dodge his strikes. I couldnt really do this in DA:O possibly because of input lag maybe? What i mean is sure i can react to a spell being cast by an enemy (e.g. sleep or freeze etc) by dispelling it or whatever but i couldnt react to quick strikes by the enemy. (ie dodge them)

In dragon age 2 i can do that easily.

This is exactly what an RPG isn't supposed to be like. You characters stats should determine if he dodges or not, not how quick and nimble you are with a gamepad ... groan!

Jed Shields · 23 Feb 2011 at 21:07

Oooops, double post!

Surfer · 23 Feb 2011 at 21:09

bhavv said:
So if I had seen star wars, I wouldnt be a fail?

yes and you would be an aspiring jedi padawan by now...so much to learn you still have! Watch it now - you must!

Surfer · 23 Feb 2011 at 21:11

Jed Shields said:
This is exactly what an RPG isn't supposed to be like. You characters stats should determine if he dodges or not, not how quick and nimble you are with a gamepad ... groan!

Well how do we know that it wasnt stats in the background? When you fight the ogre you have access to a much more advanced skillset afterall

bhavv · 23 Feb 2011 at 21:12

Jed Shields said:
This is exactly what an RPG isn't supposed to be like. You characters stats should determine if he dodges or not, not how quick and nimble you are with a gamepad ... groan!

Maybe for female characters, at least going by my above theory, the ability to dodge is depedant upon their current mana pool. The more mana they have, the less likely they are to dodge. The less mana they have, the easier dodging becomes because of how much lighter they are after using up their mana stores.

Evilsod · 23 Feb 2011 at 21:17

Surfer said:
However i have to say combat was much more fluid and dynamic than DA:O
When i fought the Ogre i could actually dodge his strikes. I couldnt really do this in DA:O possibly because of input lag maybe? What i mean is sure i can react to a spell being cast by an enemy (e.g. sleep or freeze etc) by dispelling it or whatever but i couldnt react to quick strikes by the enemy. (ie dodge them)

In dragon age 2 i can do that easily.

From what i remember... attacks were based on whether or not you landed the hit based on attack/defence and had no bearing on your position.

DA2 is just laughable. The first ogre i just destroyed with spells and it was no harder than killing regular darkspawn. The second ogre took its time but killed the other 2 in my squad (so nice of them to kill the ****ing mage i was using to heal right before the fight) and i basically won by running around in circles with the Ogre and the Darkspawn trying in vain to hit me. If thats the level of 'strategy' you want in your games then i hope you don't strain yourself.

Plunk13 · 23 Feb 2011 at 21:21

bhavv said:
So if I had seen star wars, I wouldnt be a fail?

Oh lookie, methinks that female mages have developed potions to enlarge their breast size, but the effects are temporary:

That's something I couldn't help but notice. Can't complain really. But I thought it was down to the storyteller changing the account of the introduction of the Hero, so the details weren't as "exaggerated"?

As for the game, well, it was ok.

Jed Shields · 23 Feb 2011 at 21:25

Surfer said:
Well how do we know that it wasnt stats in the background? When you fight the ogre you have access to a much more advanced skillset afterall

Fair point, his floundering on the gamepad might have just seemed like he managed to dodge it himself, when actually his Boots Of Get The **** Out were working in the background.

bhavv said:
Maybe for female characters, at least going by my above theory, the ability to dodge is depedant upon their current mana pool. The more mana they have, the less likely they are to dodge. The less mana they have, the easier dodging becomes because of how much lighter they are after using up their mana stores.

Could you explain this, I think I'm missing something. I took a knock and am suffering a Wisdom penalty ...

Raumarik · 23 Feb 2011 at 21:30

It is an RPG, although a very linear one. I must say I'm a little disappointed as I absolutely loved the first Dragon Age, however I've still pre-ordered it as it's fun to play regardless. Must say though that the lack of unique introductions as we had in the original is a bitter blow, I loved playing through each of them especially the Dwarven one!

This felt much more "Final Fantasy" meets Dungeons and Dragons - lite edition, but it still looks like it'll be enjoyable to play, if not as much as a proper sequel would have been. They didn't have anywhere near as much time to produce this one as the original, so it's hardly surprising that it's a tad "Diet-age 2".

Raumarik · 23 Feb 2011 at 21:33

Xerco said:
yah the cutscences annoyed / confused the hell out of me when it would stutter then jump to a different angle or completely different person talk.

I don't get that problem - is it loading from HDD that's causing the slow down? I don't have an SSD but do have a proper hardware mirrored RAID setup so perhaps that's helping.

Evilsod · 23 Feb 2011 at 21:36

There seems to be a large number of people who aren't impressed with it but yet don't mind handing over there cash at preorder to give Bioware the impression there game isn't ****e compared to the first 1...

Surfer · 23 Feb 2011 at 21:45

Evilsod said:
From what i remember... attacks were based on whether or not you landed the hit based on attack/defence and had no bearing on your position.

so whats backstabbing then? (an attack damage based on position.)

I guess i meant i made full use of the skillset. That is, each ability was very useful (as they should be) A lot of the time in DA:O there would be stupid lag when you are trying to react to a move/attack the enemy does. Maybe it was just my pc?

DA2 is just laughable. The first ogre i just destroyed with spells and it was no harder than killing regular darkspawn. The second ogre took its time but killed the other 2 in my squad (so nice of them to kill the ****ing mage i was using to heal right before the fight) and i basically won by running around in circles with the Ogre and the Darkspawn trying in vain to hit me.

Usually the Ogre charges you though? Did you just dodge? I suspect your grievances over how easy you found it, can easily be alleviated by increasing the difficulty level? Or is that a bit too low-tech a solution for you?

If thats the level of 'strategy' you want in your games then i hope you don't strain yourself.

Yeah me too, thanks for your concern for my health

bushmins · 23 Feb 2011 at 21:46

Just watched a demo video on youtube while downloading the game, stopped download it now. The fighting looked far too much like all those shallow (as in hack n' slash) games i see on ps3 and xbox. Wont give up on it completely, that would just be silly.
But DA was a step away from what i like, DA2 looks like another step, how big that step is ive yet to really see.

Turing Flemeth into the 'ice queen' was a very very bad choice.

Albino Eatpod · 23 Feb 2011 at 21:47

For those wanting to run in 3D, most of it looks great. A few problems:

Still a 2D mouse pointer
Enemy overlays are at screen depth, not object depth
Some of the dialogue sections have the character out of the screen, but the options at screen depth. Looks pretty weird.

Hopefully the last one can be fixed in the nVidia profile (convergence). The first two are down to Bioware, I think.