[phatosealpha]

I assume you're not playing as a mage then?  The combination of the setting plus a mage hero turns the entire game into one giant WTF.

[Ransom]

My Hawke's a warrior, but I must be missing something. You spend most of your time butting heads with the Templars. Isn't that an ideal environment for a mage hero?

[phatosealpha]

No, you don't spend time butting heads with them.  That's the whole point.  It takes 4 friggin' years of you running around town in a mage robe, with a staff, throwing lightning bolts for the damn templars to notice.

Despite the setting going above and beyond to point out that the Templars have gone way beyond even normal oppression, they basically are oblivious.  For years - and it's not like it's some big secret.  Ignoring the mage getup and the staff, your uncle has sold you to a mercenary company and a smuggling group as an apostate within a week of getting there.  It's nonsensical that you'd make it to year two without being drug off and tranquilized or given a quick ride on the sword of mercy.  And then you factor in that your companions include an abomination and a blood mage.....it's just absurd.

[Ransom]

Haha, well, when you put it that way it does seem silly. Although you find apostates everywhere in the setting - I'd just assumed the problem was widespread enough that the Templars couldn't afford to treat every apostate as significant. Thieves aren't exactly tolerated either but it's hardly a surprise to find them in a big city.

[Scourge of Ages]

My impressions of the game, based on the demo.

Dialogue compass: Do not like it. It's like Mass Effect, except not good. In MA, you still had more choices, and had a much better idea of how what you say will come out. I'm going to have to agree with... the first guy to hate the dialogue system.
Graphics: Mmmyes, very nice.
Combat: Definitely faster, feels pretty good. The speed makes it feel a little shallow, but I think I could get used to it. The no AOE spells is cheap, but I can see where they (the designers) are coming from with that decision.
Really don't like: Holding TAB doesn't show everybody's health anymore! I can't tell who's alive/not alive/next target at a glance. For combat that's supposed to be faster, this feels like a boneheaded move.
Also, the new Hurlock animation makes them seem to move less like semi-human evil abominations, and more like zombie orangutans (pretty frightening, but not in the right way...) or Orcs from The Two Towers.
Waves: In the demo, I didn't notice archers conspicuously popping into existence, though I know they must have. Could definitely get annoying, but didn't bug me too much. I could see this making combat more tedious than fun after a few hours.

Conclusion: Based on the graphics, and the tales of the story actually being pretty good after the first chapter, I think I might buy this when I can get the ultimate edition on super sale. Maybe December?
This review brought to you by: The Colon

[TrashMan]

No, you don't spend time butting heads with them.  That's the whole point.  It takes 4 friggin' years of you running around town in a mage robe, with a staff, throwing lightning bolts for the damn templars to notice.

Despite the setting going above and beyond to point out that the Templars have gone way beyond even normal oppression, they basically are oblivious.  For years - and it's not like it's some big secret.  Ignoring the mage getup and the staff, your uncle has sold you to a mercenary company and a smuggling group as an apostate within a week of getting there.  It's nonsensical that you'd make it to year two without being drug off and tranquilized or given a quick ride on the sword of mercy.  And then you factor in that your companions include an abomination and a blood mage.....it's just absurd.

What I find fun is using blood magic in front of Cullen....and Meredith. They are both oblivious...EVERYONE is so oblivious.
I had at least a 100 witnesses to my magic - and that is the first year in Kirkwall alone.

In the start you are a nobody and people not finding you isn't completely unbelievalbe...after all, that peasant might have seen you use magic, but he doesn't know who you are.
But once you become Champion, everyone knows you...and you can still fling spells like crazy left and right.


EDIT: Is it just me, or do the enviroments suck? I'm not talking about repetition of areas, I'm talking about how bland and empty they are. Take a look at the Dalish camp and Alienage and compare them to those in Origins. So lifeless, so small...

[Ransom]

It's pretty hit and miss, but I actually felt the opposite in some areas. I found Origins visually anemic.

The world does feel cramped, though.

Really don't like: Holding TAB doesn't show everybody's health anymore! I can't tell who's alive/not alive/next target at a glance. For combat that's supposed to be faster, this feels like a boneheaded move.

Good news! Must be different in the demo, because tab does exactly that. I've been using it the entire game.

[phatosealpha]

In the start you are a nobody and people not finding you isn't completely unbelievalbe...after all, that peasant might have seen you use magic, but he doesn't know who you are.
But once you become Champion, everyone knows you...and you can still fling spells like crazy left and right.

It's actually most troubling in year 4 - after you're a prominent citizen, but before you're champion.  They actually do address the issue after you're champion.  You're an open apostate, but you're also a war hero and politically very influential.  Meredith gives you leeway because you've got a lot of clout, she's already stepped on a lot of toes, and the local nobility ain't happy.  Openly opposing you would almost certainly lead to the proverbial hammer falling.

[Ravenholme]

And then the plot...oh dear lord, the epic "LOLWUT" of the poorly thought out plot.

So far the plot is better than Origins'.

Edit: Which, admittedly, is not saying much.

Disagree, so much. This is even more poorly thought out and put together than Origin's plot. Origins wasn't original, but it was at least decently executed. This manages neither, and does so incoherently.

The only saving graces I've really found are some of the Companions (Sebastian, Varric, Merril [Dat welsh accent, even if she can't hold it and goes Irish sometimes], Aveline and, surprisingly, Carver)

[Ransom]

Origins' plot was poorly executed, and no more focused than DA2. The only times it moved faster than a snail's pace were at its opening and ending. The rest of the time you fussed about with hilariously contrived problems that neither had any real bearing on the story nor supplied any excuse to get emotionally invested. DA2 is disjointed, but at least its centrepiece is something moderately engaging - namely, your character's personal story and rise to fame - to which its major quests actually make a meaningful contribution.

Let's be clear. I don't think DA2's plot is good. It's no counterfeit LotR, which is something, but the fantasy politics of its setting are simplistic and weighed down with their own cliches and its inability to decide what sort of political territory it wants to explore does it no credit. That said, I think there's more merit to what BioWare tried here than in the by-the-numbers bore Origins turned out to be. Both the structure and the subject matter are unfamiliar ground for them. They failed on many levels, but overall I think it's a step in the right direction.

[General Battuta]

I think the biggest failure of the plot is that (HUGE SPOILER FOR THE ENDING)

Spoiler:

in the end you end up having to fight the same two people no matter what you do, and the mages always get themselves possessed, which makes it kinda pointless to side with the mages. The game only seems to make sense if you go all hardline templar the whole time and even though, welp, Meredith.

[Ravenholme]

I think the biggest failure of the plot is that (HUGE SPOILER FOR THE ENDING)

Spoiler:

in the end you end up having to fight the same two people no matter what you do, and the mages always get themselves possessed, which makes it kinda pointless to side with the mages. The game only seems to make sense if you go all hardline templar the whole time and even though, welp, Meredith.

Yeah.
It's hard to get emotionally invested when

Spoiler:

The mages are being presented as abominations and demon consorting blood mages at every turn. What's also annoying is how Anders and Merril get pissed off when you subsequently turn in/kill these murderous mages. There is no option to say "I'd kill them/turn them even if they weren't mages. Things like this just aren't done". It's like they want me to excuse mass murder just because they're an oppressed mage [Which my Hawke is also]. Anders crossing the line into outright terrorism at the end makes me wish I could've shanked him sooner. My Fem Hawke who had romanced him did anyway, because she considered her duty to do what is right stronger than her love for a maniac/abomination who is beyond redemption

[The E]

On the subject of Merrill, I wonder if her Rivalry/Loyalty system is broken. No matter what I do, I always get rivalry points, even for giving her gifts.

[Fury]

Dunno, but I got her loyalty maxed out with no real difficulty. In any case, I just finished DA2 after a few days of fooling around with something else.

Spoiler:

As was said before, almost every mage turned to blood magic, hence justifying hard-liner templars. As I was playing a mage myself, this really felt kinda ridiculous. Hell, both Merrill and Anders were possessed and the other was even a blood mage for chrissakes. At the end the most influential mage in Kirkwall turned to blood magic. Most mage-encouners had them blood mages. It seems like Bioware didn't even bother giving the mages a chance at all, really disappointing.

Aside of that, I'm most disappointed with the repetitive enviroments. There's gotta be a limit how many times you dwell through same bloody caves and whatnot. Other than those two major beefs I have with DA2, I can live with the rest and say that DA2 is good enough game to be fun throughout at least one playthrough.

[NGTM-1R]

This game gets more and more like WFB every installment. :/

[mxlm]

On the subject of Merrill, I wonder if her Rivalry/Loyalty system is broken. No matter what I do, I always get rivalry points, even for giving her gifts.

Yeah, I just did a sequence in which I theoretically gained quite a bit of rivalry with Isabella and Merrill. Except then I actually looked at their character sheets and I had more friendship than I had before.

[Ransom]

I think the biggest failure of the plot is that [snip]

Haha. Wow, that is bad. Sounds like I lucked out. I played a character for whom that turn of events not only made sense but was the only outcome I'd have been satisfied with.

Spoiler:

My Hawke began as sympathetic to the mages but over the course of the story came to loathe them as much as the templars. She was also arrogant, and quite power-hungry - believing she could fix the whole ridiculous mess - and her decision was to play both sides against the other, crippling both and leaving her on top. Even though the game wasn't really equipped to handle that motivation, roleplaying it was a goddamn blast.

Particularly satisfying was the relationship with Anders, which began innocently enough but turned into a quiet hatred once it became obvious what he was capable of. She fed his anger toward the templars, knowing quite well how far he'd take it, and when he committed his little act of terrorism it had the air of carefully manipulated pieces falling into place. At which point she sided with the templars despite everything she'd led him to believe about her and, having no more use for him, cut the poor ****er down. I was grinning like an idiot the entire time. There's nothing quite so much fun in roleplaying as pulling off your own face heel turn.

I was worried the game would decide Hawke and the templars were friends from that point, but it gave me plenty of opportunities to screw with Meredith and of course the whole thing could only end one way. My only real disappointment was that the writers fell back on the boring device of the villain simply having gone a bit nutty, particularly since Meredith had perfectly explicable motivations without it.

None of that is an endorsement of DA2, mind you, but I did have more fun with the roleplaying here than in any BioWare game since BG2. Just sayin'.

Probably wouldn't hold up to subsequent playthroughs, though. It's all a bit of a shame. With a better writing staff and another year in the oven this game could've been great. As it is it's just something I really enjoyed but is nearly impossible to recommend. Alas.

[mxlm]

Having finished the game tonight--and damn that was abrupt, Acts 1&2 had "THIS QUEST ENDS THE ACT ARE YOU REALLY SURE YOU ARE READY?!?!?!?!" warnings, but AFAICT Act 3 did not, so suddenly it was "WE'RE IN THE FINAL STRETCH, HOLD ON TO YOUR HATS!" out of nowhere, which...well, I wasn't done yet, so sad. Anyway. As a slightly interactive movie, it's superior to DA:O. In every other respect it is inferior. I only regret my purchase insofar as it helps Mike Laidlaw keep his job, though. In terms of entertainment it was worthwhile, but I no longer expect DA3 to be particularly engaging.

So, the ending

Spoiler:

Since ****ing when is "And then the templar leader pulls out a sword-that-is-not-a-sword-but-is-instead-Lyrium-possessed-by-a-demon (that was what it was, right?), jumps a thousand feet into the air and then brings scores of giant statues to life" something that makes sense in Dragon Age?

[TrashMan]

On the subject of Merrill, I wonder if her Rivalry/Loyalty system is broken. No matter what I do, I always get rivalry points, even for giving her gifts.

Rivalry and Freindship are misleading.

Rivalry = friend, but one that disagrees with something important to you.

When it comes to Merrill, rivalry is the proper way to go about with her, even if it is difficult to say "no" to her. Ultimatively, as true friend has to be brutally honest and say "Messing with demons is bad, m'kay?2

[mxlm]

I was bored at work and found myself thinking about DA2. I had an epiphany: the encounter design isn't the problem with the combat. The problem is that someone--hi Mike!--made the decision that DA2 needed to be AWESOME! In order for the game to be AWESOME! our heroes need to be AWESOME!ly powerful. Thus, a substantial proportion of enemies can be one or two shotted by a substantial proportion of our AWESOME! abilities--there's little short of a miniboss that can survive a whirlwind/spirit pulse combo from Fenris, at least on normal. If memory serves, this is true of hard as well (I think the primary difference is that your characters become less durable as you up the difficulty?). Which means, if all the enemies started in the same spot, you could kill or severely wound the majority of them using a single character's AoE attacks. And you have four characters, all of which can develop AWESOME! AoE abilities. Well, maybe not Aveline. She's not AWESOME!

So. If reinforcement waves spawned in sane places, and together, every encounter would go like this: Fenris walks up, uses AWESOME!singletargetstrike on the beefiest enemy, followed by whirlwind and maybe spirit pulse. First wave is now dead, except for maybe archers off in the wings. Second wave spawns, Bethany makes them eat a fireball and then a firestorm, so they're all dead now . Third wave spawns, Merril pops Tempest and chain lighting, now they're dead too, battle is over, ten seconds have passed.

I exaggerate slightly, but only slightly. Make sense to anyone?