Dragon Age Dragon Age 2 was released ten years ago

[Larianshill]

• It tried to sell us a story of the conflict between templars and mages, and tried to make the mage's case that the templars are overzealous dickheads because they treat every mage like they're a bloodmage. They reinforced this by making 99% of the mages in the game you encounter, an actual bloodmage.

They tried to make a Witcher-esque storyline, where neither side is truly good. What they made is a story, where both sides are irredeemably evil, and you don't feel like investing yourself in the story, because there's no sympathetic characters, no one to root for. In the Witcher, you might not like the Order and humans, but you'll probably like Siegfried. DA2 had no one like Siegfried - no one it doesn't kill off in order to fuel the "compromise is literally impossible" narrative. At one point of the game, a third side of the conflict briefly emerges, and you're briefly led to believe that they might be a sane alternative, but then you find out they kidnapped your loved ones and are also composed of insane blood mages.

 

[Orud]

At least they did the proper thing in DA:I and merely stated that DA 2's entire location just blew up, dropped off a cliff and/or floated off into space.

 

[Gargaune]

Once more Codexians discover that shit does indeed taste like shit.

What does a rabbit Codexian say when he eats his own shit plays a new BioWare game?

Spoiler

"Just this last one, it's fresh."

 

[Nano]

Little did people know that the worst was yet to come.

 

[Tavar]

While the level recycling and the wave combat was annoying, I was one of the few people who actually enjoyed playing Dragen Age II back in the day. It felt much more focused than Origins which has no respect for your time and often bogs you down in tedious, boring combat (looking at you, deep roads). I can totally understand why so many people hate part II, though.

 

[AW8]

Limiting the player to a single city and its outskirts, and seeing it change over time as the player goes from poor immigrant to renowned hero was a really nice concept, even if the execution left a lot to be desired.

It was certainly more interesting than the tired "save the world" story in your typical Bioware game. I wouldn't mind seeing another studio take a crack at the concept. Mankind Divided already kinda did with Prague (a single location changing over time, not the rags to riches part).

 

[BarbequeMasta]

I think DA2 might actually be the worst game I have ever finished by far, what a giant pile of reused garbage. It makes the average shitty AAA RPG feel like a masterpiece in comparison.

 

[J1M]

Bioware downward spiral started with Jade Empire.

 

[Humbaba]

Was DA1 any good? To me it always reeked of mid 2000's leftover edginess from the 90's, not to mentioned the blatant homo propaganda by it's equally homo director as well as the cringy romances.

 

[J1M]

Was DA1 any good? To me it always reeked of mid 2000's leftover edginess from the 90's, not to mentioned the blatant homo propaganda by it's equally homo director as well as the cringy romances.

Yes, it was pretty good. A shame the party size was only 4 and you had to pause to cast spells, but it had many things going for it as an engine for future games that make its sequels all the more confusing.

Just ignore all of the "discount LoTR" stuff it shoves in your face in the intro.

 

[Butter]

Origins is a single-player MMO with cringe romance and generic Dark Fantasy™ setting.

 

[Fedora Master]

Origins is a single-player MMO

No, that's Inquisition.

 

[Greek Anime God]

Dragon Age 2 is the game where BioWare started it's slow but ever accelerating downward spiral.

Reminder: Bioware was decline from the start.

Larian is saving the BG series by returning to the turn based roots that gold box enjoyers crave.

 

[Butter]

Origins is a single-player MMO

No, that's Inquisition.

Combat is about cycling through cooldowns (reminded me of the Hunter 10-second rotation) against copy-pasted trash mobs. Quests are frequently "go find me 3 of x and come back". The only redeeming element of Origins is that you can play combat from a top-down perspective.

 

[Camel]

What's refreshing about it? It's three different, almost entirely unrelated stories with no common theme or central element.

Although, the plot of the first chapter is so thread-bare, it could conceivably qualify as an extended introduction/set-up for the main plot. "Breadwinner of a family of rapefugees is trying to survive in a weird multicultural city" - sure, decent enough excuse for a bunch of side-quests leading up to a dungeon crawl.

But then, either the Qunary arc or the Templar arc would need to be removed (I'd nix the horny commufascists, their story in DAII is irredeemably retarded), and whichever one remaining would need to be fleshed-out properly and given some satisfying C&Cs in order to work as the second half and conclusion of the game.

Also no time-skips. And more than three maps for side-quest exploration. And combat that isn't shit. And above-reddit-tier writing. And no SJW crap. And either commit to a pre-generated fixed protagonist, or allow for a fully-customizable one, this weird Commander Shepherd-style hybrid was the worst of both worlds.

And for the love of crap, wtf was that "lesbian inquisitor interrogating unfunny dwarf guy" framing device? They didn't have time/resources to erase blocked-off passages from the minimap to make the asset reuse less embarassing, but still put in all the work for numerous annoying cutscenes that amounted to little more than "let me tell you how the game that you're playing happened, also here's a sequel hook that never pays off"?

Shows where their priorities were at.

Well, an idea was fresh but execution was bad, rushed game or not.
I think most people agree that the Qunari leader was a well-written character(one of the few), him going batshit crazy because he was fed up with Kirkwall and slaughtering degenerates of the corrupt city was funny and justified. The Qunari were feared and masculine then.
Cassandra is not lesbian and I never found Varric funny and never understood what BioWare fans liked in him. The writers made him a subversion of the dwarf stereotype for subversion sake - surface dwarf, trader, uses a crossbow instead of an axe, jokester.
SJW stuff started to become more obvious while political correctness was subtle in DA:O.

They tried to make a Witcher-esque storyline, where neither side is truly good. What they made is a story, where both sides are irredeemably evil, and you don't feel like investing yourself in the story, because there's no sympathetic characters, no one to root for. In the Witcher, you might not like the Order and humans, but you'll probably like Siegfried. DA2 had no one like Siegfried - no one it doesn't kill off in order to fuel the "compromise is literally impossible" narrative. At one point of the game, a third side of the conflict briefly emerges, and you're briefly led to believe that they might be a sane alternative, but then you find out they kidnapped your loved ones and are also composed of insane blood mages.

BioWare saw the game stats that the players overwhelmingly sided with the mages in the Tower of Magi quest of DA:O so they decided to make every single mage a blood mage in DA 2. Retarded decision. There was one token good Templar who helped and hid the mages in DA2 and, you guess it, he's killed by the blood mage.
I've also read that left-wingers supported the mages and right-wingers supported the templars while if you take gun control their positions are opposite.

At least they did the proper thing in DA:I and merely stated that DA 2's entire location just blew up, dropped off a cliff and/or floated off into space.

Good riddance.

Little did people know that the worst was yet to come.

Precisely.

Limiting the player to a single city and its outskirts, and seeing it change over time as the player goes from poor immigrant to renowned hero was a really nice concept, even if the execution left a lot to be desired.

It was certainly more interesting than the tired "save the world" story in your typical Bioware game. I wouldn't mind seeing another studio take a crack at the concept. Mankind Divided already kinda did with Prague (a single location changing over time, not the rags to riches part).

Pretty much. If some devs can do it properly it would be interesting to try.

Bioware downward spiral started with Jade Empire.

They still had good devs and writers then and produced ME1-2, DA:O.

 

[Skinwalker]

I think most people agree that the Qunari leader was a well-written character(one of the few), him going batshit crazy because he was fed up with Kirkwall and slaughtering degenerates of the corrupt city was funny and justified. The Qunari were feared and masculine then.

It doesn't make any sense for Kirkwall to be hosting the military leader and his cohort of the most hostile and alien political faction in the entire world. It's like the Soviet marshal camping for years at a time in Luxembourg during the Cold War era, with a bunch of his generals and elite Red Army soldiers, for completely unknown reasons, completely unwanted and uninvited, for an indefinite period of time - this ridiculous status quo could never even be established in the first place, let alone last for years.

Their motivation for staying in Kirkwall was also retarded. Why would they give a shit about the original tome of their philosopher? They have plenty of copies, I assume. If there is any faction in DA that should have a purely utilitarian attitude towards antique items and give zero shit about relics, it's the Qunari. They don't even have funerals for their dead, what tome of Koslun, nigger, this isn't the Chantry lol.

 

[Gargaune]

Yes, it was pretty good. A shame the party size was only 4 and you had to pause to cast spells, but it had many things going for it as an engine for future games that make its sequels all the more confusing.

Origins was already gushing decline through several orifices - BioWare's new ruleset was lackluster, encounters suffered, the "camp" was emphasized and general level design was a significant regression even relative to the less fortunate parts of NWN - but it skirted by on its written content and plot agency. Basically, it earned a pass for letting you "kill all the elves."

 

[Fedora Master]

Stop pretending they put any effort into writing this.

 

[Camel]

It doesn't make any sense for Kirkwall to be hosting the military leader and his cohort of the most hostile and alien political faction in the entire world. It's like the Soviet marshal camping for years at a time in Luxembourg during the Cold War era, with a bunch of his generals and elite Red Army soldiers, for completely unknown reasons, completely unwanted and uninvited, for an indefinite period of time - this ridiculous status quo could never even be established in the first place, let alone last for years.

Their motivation for staying in Kirkwall was also retarded. Why would they give a shit about the original tome of their philosopher? They have plenty of copies, I assume. If there is any faction in DA that should have a purely utilitarian attitude towards antique items and give zero shit about relics, it's the Qunari. They don't even have funerals for their dead, what tome of Koslun, nigger, this isn't the Chantry lol.

I never said that the DA2 writing was good. The Qunari motivation is dumb and the Kirkwall degenerates' motivation in not immediately calling a crusade against their Ottoman empire is dumb too.

 

[Larianshill]

I've also read that left-wingers supported the mages and right-wingers supported the templars while if you take gun control their positions are opposite.

It's hardly surprising. Think mutans from the X-Men.

 

[Ravielsk]

• It tried to sell us a story of the conflict between templars and mages, and tried to make the mage's case that the templars are overzealous dickheads because they treat every mage like they're a bloodmage. They reinforced this by making 99% of the mages in the game you encounter, an actual bloodmage.

They tried to make a Witcher-esque storyline, where neither side is truly good. What they made is a story, where both sides are irredeemably evil, and you don't feel like investing yourself in the story, because there's no sympathetic characters, no one to root for. In the Witcher, you might not like the Order and humans, but you'll probably like Siegfried. DA2 had no one like Siegfried - no one it doesn't kill off in order to fuel the "compromise is literally impossible" narrative. At one point of the game, a third side of the conflict briefly emerges, and you're briefly led to believe that they might be a sane alternative, but then you find out they kidnapped your loved ones and are also composed of insane blood mages.

The problem is that Bioware writers(and most people in the industry it seems) understood the "there are no good guys" as "everyone is a bad guy" when in reality its means that there are no bad choices. The witcher does not have sides that are never "truly good" it has sides that are never wholly in the wrong. Choosing either can be justified and logical argued to be the "right choice", both have consistent and reasonable motivations and goals that in most ways are entirely utilitarian even if the individual members do not always act that way.

Bioware and most modern writers cannot write this sort of stuff because they are stuck in binary mindset of a child. They self evidently cannot wrap their minds around the idea that two or more mutually contradictory mind sets can exist without either being malicious. Its the one thing positive thing about twitter, that it exposed how much these "industry writers" are disconnected from reality.

 

[Skinwalker]

I read the templars vs mages conflict as more of a police vs antifa allegory, rather than gun control. Guns are a commodity and pro-2A people want to keep it that way, whereas mages are an insular and "enlightened" group of people who are born super-special, and are terribly misunderstood and oppressed by the cruel, bigoted society.

 

[Humanophage]

Bioware's downward spiral can be seen at least as early as NWN, with its 2-man parties and shitty over-the-shoulder camera. Some argue that BG2's player-centric theme park design is the nexus of their decline. DA2 can only be seen as a shocking decline if you, for some reason, had any expectations of quality going into it.

NWN campaign was terrible, no doubt. But BioWare still had KOTOR, ME and DA:O after that.

NWN was no decline at all. It just had a boring OC. The core gameplay was perfectly fine, the skill system actually became significantly more complex compared to Baldur's Gate, and it was a thoroughly bold project.

The decline began with KOTOR, but it was concealed by the fact that it was a fun game. However, you could clearly see that consoles started playing a key role for Bioware, whereas NWN was entirely free from console taint.

Then Mass Effect was full-on console decline, and Jade Empire was heavily consolised too. They rebounded slightly with Dragon Age, but were ultimately buried by consolisation.

Dragon Age 2 was when they died for the mainstream public as well.

It can be argued that the decline started with TOB, in the sense that it's heaping absurd railroaded epicness at the player, but it's only an add-on.

 

[IDtenT]

I can't believe it's only ten years ago, tbh. It was just that awful.

 

[Roguey]

The time to make this thread would have been back in March or at least back in April when Gaider posted a bunch of tweets about it, not now.

For posterity

https://twitter.com/davidgaider/status/1382001252641370116

DA2 was the project where my writing team was firing on all cylinders, and they wrote like the wind- because they had to! Second draft? Pfft. Plot reviews? Pfft. I was so proud of what we all accomplished in such a brief time. I didn't think it was possible.

DA2 is, however, also where the goal posts kept moving. Things kept getting cut, even while we worked. I had to write that dialogue where Orsinio turned even if you sided with him, because his boss battle had been cut and there was no time to fix the plot. A real WTF moment.

So I think it's safe to say DA2 is my favorite entry in the DA franchise and also the sort of thing I never want to live through ever again. Mixed feelings galore.

I am a little confused here, help me out here please! How exactly was the cut boss battle with Orsino supposed to work out? How it would've kept him from turning against the player?

It means that, if you sided with the templars, the entire boss bottle at the end would have been against Orsino and the mages. No fight against Meredith. The end decision would have been more divergent.

https://twitter.com/davidgaider/status/1382020480585003009

I would personally say that DA2 is a fantastic game hidden under a mountain of compromises, cut corners, and tight deadlines. If you can see past all that, you'll see a fantastic game. I don't doubt, however, that it's very difficult for most to do that.

https://twitter.com/davidgaider/status/1382022524813209602

On one hand, DA2 existed to fill a hole in the release schedule. More time was never in the cards. DA2 was originally planned as an expansion! On the other, if we had more time, would we have started doing that thing where we second guess/iterate ourselves into mediocrity?

I should add I'm not, by any means, against iteration. Some iteration is good and necessary. The problem that BioWare often had is that we never knew when to stop. Like a goldfish, we would fill the space given to us by constantly re-iterating on things that were "good enough".

https://twitter.com/davidgaider/status/1382035087462600704

"If you could Zack Snyder DA2, what would you change?" Wow. I'm willing to bet Mark or Mike (or anyone else on the team) would give very different answers than me, but it's enough to give a sober man pause, because that was THE Project of Multiple Regrets.

I mean, it's the most hypothetical of hypotheticals. It's never gonna happen. I wouldn't be surprised if EA considered DA2 its embarrassing red-headed stepchild. We'd also need to ignore that in many ways DA2 was as good as it was bad BECAUSE of how it was made. But that aside?

First, either restore the progressive changes to Kirkwall we'd planned over the passing of in-game years or reduce the time between acts to months instead of years... which, in hindsight, probably should have been done as soon as the progressive stuff was cut.

I'm sure you're like "get rid of repeated levels!" ...but I don't care about that. All I wanted was for Kirkwall to feel like a bigger city. Way more crowded. More alive! Fewer blood mages.

I'd want to restore the plot where a mage Hawke came THIS close to becoming an abomination. An entire story spent trapped in one's own head while trapped on the edge of possession. Why? Because Hawke is the only mage who apparently never struggles with this. It was a hard cut.

I'd want to restore all those alternate lines we cut, meaning people forget they'd met you. Or that they knew you were a mage. Or, oh god, that maybe they'd romanced you in DAO. So much carnage.

I'd want to restore the Act 3 plots we cut only because they were worked on too late, but which would have made the buildup to the mage/templar clash less sudden. Though I don't remember what they were, now. Some never got beyond being index cards posted on the wall.

As I mentioned elsewhere, I'd want to restore Orsino's end battle so he wouldn't need to turn on you even if you sided with him. And I'd want an end fight with the templars that didn't require Meredith to have red lyrium and go full Tetsuo.

Heck, maybe an end decision where you sided with neither the mages nor the templars. Because it certainly ended up feeling like you could brand both sides as batshit pretty legitimately, no? That was never planned, tho. No idea how to make that feel like an actual path atm.

Maybe an option to go "umm, Anders... what are you DOING?"

And, of course, a Varric romance, because Mary took that "slimy car salesman" character we'd planned and did the impossible with him. I can feel Mary glaring at me for even suggesting this, tho.

Lastly, the original expanded opening to the game which allowed you to spend time with Bethany and Carver BEFORE the darkspawn attacked. And, um, that's about it off the top of my head. Zack Snyder, WHAT PANDORA'S BOX HAVE YOU OPENED.

Shit, I remembered two more things: 1) Restore the "Varric exaggerates the heck out of the story" at the beginning of every Act, until Cassandra calls him on it. Yes, that was a thing. 2) Make DA: Exodus. Yes, I am still bitter.

God damn it, I meant "Make DA: Exalted March". The DA2 expansion, NOT Exodus since that was DA2's original name and makes no sense. Because the expansion ended with Varric dying, and that will always be on my "things left undone" list.