Editorial Dragon Age 2 is Declining RPGs

[Serious_Business]

The market has always been driven by sales, but nowadays the publishers and producers are sacrificing genres in order to make more money.

This.

If Bioware wouldn't be a greedy fuck, they would make a normal cRPG. Possibly it wouldn't sell as good as this shitty DA2, but it would sell enough to make lots of money. But no, Bioware is not satisfied with 2 milion copies, they want 3 million. Other developers would kill even for 1 million, but the guys at Bioware need a new yakuzzi.

They can't help it since they became EA's lapdog. Its impossible to go to work every day doing something you don't believe in. Either you quit or you have to convince yourself that being a greedy cockmongler all along was what it was about.

This is inane. You don't have to take such a vulgar moralising stance to figure out Bioware's decision-making pattern. Of course, a lot of their strategy revolves around limiting their ambitions in terms of overall design - which has made them successful and mediocre (I'm not saying these are synonyms, mind you). If anything, they are making the games they want to make, with a "realistic" out-look on the business. They are fat, lazy, untalented, but will capitalize on all their ressources to reach the stars while molding entire generations of new youth as to what the standards of rpgs (guided by their successful and mediocre ideals) are supposed to be. And that's admirable, right? Yes it is. You are fighting a lost battle. So fuck you!

 

[Ruprekt]

KoTOR is not a complex or challenging RPG. But it is still an RPG: a CRPG implementation of D20 StarWars.

And it would be better if companies like EA would try being "realistic" for a change. Focus on 1) the bottom line 2) quality.
The problem is that they don't. That's why being bought by an EA is the kiss of death. A successful company becomes a 'revenue stream' that can be diverted to some derping exec hoping to ride the next 'big idea' to glory or to the next aquisition.

 

[Kaanyrvhok]

Many of us enjoyed Dragon Age: Origins and felt it was a worthy successor to the legendary Baldur’s Gate series.

They lost me right here. DA:O was as big a step backwards as anything to come around.

BioWare delivered on a number of levels: an engaging story and world, an intelligent combat system and a wonderful character customization system.

If you have to drive your story with 300 unnecessary filler fights then its disengaging. The roleplaying system sucked too. Tell me why a 1st level fighter isnt strong enough to wear armor.

 

[racofer]

Tell me why a 1st level fighter isnt strong enough to wear armor.

He needs to engage into a romance as to get buffed and be able to wear armor.

You don't start with a romance on level one.

 

[Stainless Veteran]

now make the dwarf one

Well, I did, but it wouldn't have the same effect. Bio hadn't gone full retard with dwarves, more like 3/4 retard.

 

[sgc_meltdown]

Bio hadn't gone full retard with dwarves, more like 3/4 retard.

well bro as konjad might say 3/4 retard is 3/4 more retard where dwarves are usually concerned

 

[Stainless Veteran]

Bio hadn't gone full retard with dwarves, more like 3/4 retard.

well bro as konjad might say 3/4 retard is 3/4 more retard where dwarves are usually concerned

True. Well, dwarves hadn't been na'vified and lolified only because they aren't starring in DA2 main game feature (not that it makes the game any better).

 

[Multiple Sarcasm]

[pics]

Goddamn, do Bio's look like flaming homosexuals.
Not that a 1000 and 1 useless belts make for a character to be taken seriously (or am I not expecting TW2 to contribute to decline in its own ways), either, but still, I can understand what makes Bio's games so successful.

 

[Drakron]

...I can understand what makes Bio's games so successful.

Brand Name?
Since BioWare right now is pretty much "brand name",just like Square Enix.

 

[Shannow]

Somewhat relevant:
snip

And Dragon Age is the grimdark game?

OT: Even the Bio-cock-sucking casuals are starting to bitch.

*looks at author's name*

"Chris Priestman"



Also:

 

[Multiple Sarcasm]

...I can understand what makes Bio's games so successful.

Brand Name?

Since we're seriously serious about it, "Brand Name" doesn't really mean anything unless one likes its products, to begin with. If you hated one or two and expect the rest to be the same, you wouldn't be buying any more of that brand, right?... Right?... Guys?...

Square Enix

Doesn't ring any bells. But I'm somewhat out of touch with general gaming, these days, so I'll assume they're widely-known for some thing or another.

 

[turul]

More and more we see games being transformed to cater for only one type of player and quite frankly, many of them are starting to become unidentifiable from each other. Publishers want you to play the game as quickly as possible so you can move on and buy their next title. Ultimately though, this way of doing business will hurt the industry as a whole. A storm is brewing and it’s one that publishers are calling on themselves.

http://www.hookedgamers.com/editorials/ ... rpg-3.html

sony and microsoft are both losing money on their consoles and can't sustain that business model forever,

Actually Sony is not losing money on the PS3 since June, 2010, and I think the Xbox 360 became slightly profitable even before that. Of course we are talking about a small profit margin here (especially in the case of Sony).

They still haven't nearly recouped their prior losses though. Microsoft needs another 2 or 3 years of similar profit to break even.

Well, they just gonna have to force the devs to keep pumping out short and uninspiring games, with 3/4 of the budget is poured into advertising. The games can't have a lasting appeal, neither replayability, otherwise you won't buy the next one 2 weeks later. There has to be a lot of porn in it. Porn sells, same with graphics and violence. Violent graphic porn = winning combo. <-- 21st. Century gaming.

 

[tindrli]

im going to install exile 3 AGAIN!!

 

[Destroid]

Out with the old, in with the new.

 

[Cynic]

Just had to post this http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YQE-J9QCBdQ

 

[Storyfag]

Just had to post this http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YQE-J9QCBdQ

 

[Konjad]

Bio hadn't gone full retard with dwarves, more like 3/4 retard.

well bro as konjad might say 3/4 retard is 3/4 more retard where dwarves are usually concerned

Well said, Bro, have a potato

 

[YourDaddy]

I don't think that DA2 will sell good at all.

You don't? It has already received at least one "RPG OF TEH DECADE" title from a major gaming magazine, you know.

 

[Konjad]

Looking at the Polish internet stores it is already one of the best selling games at the moment. And it hasn't been released yet.

It will sell good and Bioware will dumb down DA3 even more (although I can't really imagine how would it look like)

 

[Commissar Draco]

Even Hitler agree that DA2 is the of RPG.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ep_OTLZO ... detailpage

 

[FatCat]

Somewhat relevant:

Iorweth a bad-ass Scoia'tael commando driven by hate towards humankind.

VS

Random faggot elf of dragon age

 

[Crooked Bee]

Even Hitler agree that DA2 is the of RPG.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ep_OTLZO ... detailpage

 

[meanwhileInPoland]

Iorweth a bad-ass Scoia'tael commando driven by hate towards humankind.

VS

Random faggot elf of dragon age
_________________

and the point is?

i a m also lost with the dwarves... generic bad-ass dwarf with axe and iroquis... oh no we havent met like thousands of them in crpgs the second one is shaved, uses crossbow and is more a cunning rogue than a dumbass warrior... definetly homo

 

[Admiral jimbob]

Shit, you guys were actually right about the 2011 members.

 

[Dantus12]

They managed to completely ruin Zevran , this is Zevran from DAO
He looked decent in DAO.
DAO
http://images2.wikia.nocookie.net/__cb2 ... Better.png

The same thing happened to Merill:
in DAO
http://images2.wikia.nocookie.net/__cb2 ... sh_elf.jpg

In DA2
http://images2.wikia.nocookie.net/__cb2 ... leaned.png

Also the dwarf from the pic is not a generic dwarf it's Zoltan Chivay

The Witcher characters look simply amazingly detailed.
The other dwarfs look great too, one of them was arm wrestling Geralt and after losing He says:

Spoiler

I believe I'd split a rock with my dick sooner than beat you in an arm wrestle."

I had a rather immature laugh from the comment, looks like voice acting is getting much more attention than in the first game, and it works.

Here is Dandelion:
http://vnmedia.ign.com/screenshots/witcher/94246064.jpg

Reducing the poly count saves work hours, they look like mouses now in DA2.
_______________

 

[Befuddled Halfling]

The article is shit.

Knights of the Old Republic took the classic cRPG formula and placed it within the vast Stars Wars universe

For someone claiming that KOTOR is a "classic cRPG", this is pretty hypocritical.
I couldn't bear to read two more pages.

We need smarter people to battle the .

Yeah, we need smarter people than you. At last we get an external article (outside the Codex) that sees the problem, argues it reasonably well, and has its facts broadly right, and you .......... shit on it because you disagree with what the author called KOTOR? That's what discredits the author and everything he subsequently writes?


Go fuck yourself if no-one can do anything right ever, unless they first recite 5 times that the only 2 cRPGs ever were Baldur's Gate and Morrowind, and continue their their premise only on that basis.

Your argument is EXACTLY the same as this biotard in the comments:

This article is shit. Isn't it just a little silly to talk about the Baldur's Gate tradition and then complain about the fixed identity and background of the DA2 protagonist? In BG you played a Bhaalspawn. Who came from Candlekeep. With a known father, mother, half-sister and half-brother. This is different from DA2.... how?

So that one detail invalidated all 3 pages for him. And guess in whose interests it is to invalidate this article, genius? Us, who want more depth in future games, or Biotard apologist whose job it is to go on the forums and say how dumbing down is just making RPGs more accessible to a wider audience?

 

[YourDaddy]

unless they first recite 5 times that the only 2 cRPGs ever were Baldur's Gate and Morrowind

It's Fallout 1 and Torment, dummy. This invalidates your whole point