Review Dragon Age II Is Mediocre, BioWare Is Becoming Terrible

[Twinkle]

Water: It's Wet - The role-playing game from BioWare. A dumbed down stream-lined popamole shit box console trash designed for the lowest common denominator.

You'll never look at water the same way again.

"I WANT TO BE A RIVER TO MY PEOPLE!"

Fixed.

 

[attackfighter]

Putting the focus of bioware on general market appeal aside I find the BG2 evocations laughable.

I dont know about DA2 but how can someone who has a minimum of objectivity consider BG2 a better game than DA:O?? I am not saying there are not plenty of reasons to criticize DA:O, or any other recent offering by Bioware, but comparing it with BG2 is definitely not a good basis.

Seriously, I dont know if its the usual mix of amnesia/nostalgia, putting on those rose-tinted glasses, or just blindness to BG2's flaws. There are almost 0 specific aspects of BG2 that would compare well to its equivalents in DA:O, and the ones that might hold up are arguable to say the least. Not to mention that BG2 at its heart was an adaptation to the PC ( even if a competent one) of an old and quite shallow edition of DnD, a system designed and created for PnP play.

Graphics
BG2 has colorful handdrawn backgrounds that still look good today. The character models are a bit lacking, though. Good looking spell effects for its time.

DAO has substandard 3D graphics in various shades of brown, ugly textures, and annoying sparkly effects.

Encounters

BG2 had a wide variety of handplaced monsters and NPCs, each with handpicked spells and abilities, and a decade of modding support for people looking for an extra challenge.

DAO has the same encounters copy/pasted ad nauseam, with a handful of interesting bosses.

Combat

BG2 has the advantage of being adapted from a tabletop PnP system, making the rules transparent and giving the player plenty of choices with over a dozen classes (probably close to 30 if you count kits), abilities, and spells.

DAO has 3 classes, each with several spells or abilites, however many of those abilities tend to be passive or useless outside certain builds. DAO also has specialties, which were an interesting idea with an utterly botched execution.

Story

BG2 has a fairly simple story about a mage seeking godhood and revenge, with each step being fairly easy to follow and making logical sense.

DAO has a retarded story about saving the world from an army of darkspawn that everybody knows is coming but ignores until you do a quest for them. Also nothing the antagonist does makes any sense at all.

Writing

They're both about equal, really.

Companions

BG2 wins here just from sheer choice, but both games have decent characters as well as annoying ones.

So yeah. Also sup Drog.

Basically all of this.

Don't forget the quests and overall amount of content. BG2 had some pretty elaborate side quests and I don't know how long it takes to play through the game but it's pretty long. DA's side quests were mostly just "fetch 10 elf roots" or "go kill this random mob" type things and almost all of them were assigned through the chanter/fighter/mage boards with only a few lines of flavour text. The length of DA was pretty long as well, but it still fell short of BG2 and also it had the aforementioned trash mobs, fetch quests, etc. padding it out, so if you take out all the useless crap it's probably less than 20 hours of content.

 

[attackfighter]

What's this Gaider ending to ToB?

Ascension. You can talk the monk out of fighting you/get him to join your group and the final battle's completely changed so you have to fight Melissan and every Bhaalspawn at once plus Bodhi (who you can get to join your group if you couldn't get the monk) and Irenicus. That last aspect seemed like bad fan fiction to me (Well, it is Gaider...), but they were already on that track with Sarevok coming back, so eh.

I fucking hate that mod. It's literally impossible to beat if you don't have Bhodi/monk as side-kicks, but with them (the monk especially) it's a piece of cake. Also it crashed a billion times on certain bosses.

 

[Volourn]

"Don't forget the quests and overall amount of content. BG2 had some pretty elaborate side quests and I don't know how long it takes to play through the game but it's pretty long. DA's side quests were mostly just "fetch 10 elf roots" or "go kill this random mob" type things and almost all of them were assigned through the chanter/fighter/mage boards with only a few lines of flavour text. The length of DA was pretty long as well, but it still fell short of BG2 and also it had the aforementioned trash mobs, fetch quests, etc. padding it out, so if you take out all the useless crap it's probably less than 20 hours of content."

Bullshit.

 

[relootz]

this shit isnt funny

 

[Phelot]

We should have another Codex contest for best Bioware game name.

Like,

Blade Dragon: Burning Vengeance

 

[Pegultagol]

How about Medal of a Champion: Lyrium Chronicles

 

[MrJones]

how can someone who has a minimum of objectivity consider BG2 a better game than DA:O??

 

[deus101]

Baldurs Gates is miles better then DA....

But...i understand the codexers are getting pumped up hearing about the goold old days but everyone is thinking of the IE games in that respect.

 

[godsend1989]

Thank you bioware for gaying me up with Anderson, worst influence system ever.

 

[Virtual Vice]

Sorry for not coming back on this since I was the one that brought it up, now I have the time to try to make a proper reply. Besides there was not a single post indicating a single flaw of BG2 versus DA:O so I feel obliged to post something even if it’s a futile long winded rant.


CHARACTER DEVELOPMENT:

BG 2 uses the venerably shitty 2nd edition of ADnD, which means such wide and fascinating ranges of options as assigning weapon specialty points and increasing the occasional class specific skill, DA:O which is not so venerable although it certainly also has its shitty points, allows you to actually distribute attribute points, and select from a considerable range of skills, a good number of them being active and not passive skills.
Of course in DA:O the branching options once a class was chosen were not that varied, except in comparison to BG2 they feel like a veritable cornucopia of options for character development and customization depth. BG2 allows you to multiclass certain characters, DA:O allows for specializations, and has more options in that front as well. Of course in BG2 you have more choices of classes for your created character, but there is little you can do to customize it besides what is described above. Also the available RPC’s and their compatibility relations do not leave you with many viable options for party makeup in BG2 so say the least, unless you decide to use the multiplayer trick and lose out on all the great NPC follower related content. Simply put in terms of character development DA:O when compared to BG:2 seems like an outstanding example of depth and genuine innovation.

COMBAT:

The only plus in this regard BG2 in comparison to DA:O is the possibility to control 6 characters. That is it. Which when you consider the character development aspects isn’t really that relevant in comparison.
There is the superior amount of learnable spells of course, but the problem is BG2 keeps the venerable shitty tradition of memorizing spells during rest for wizards, sorcerer’s are free of this bane to a degree but they lose variety, druid or ranger spells are simply poor.
DA:O uses a mana system, this alone allows for more tactical options and versatility on the part of your caster’s, and although it is certain that some spell lines are less effective than others, no matter what spell you selected in whatever order it never became useless in practice after you progressed to a certain point, the same cannot be said for alot of BG2's entire spell selection. Not to mention the differences in effectiveness when it comes to spells in BG2 were a lot more significant, in BG2 some spells were simply stupid choices.

In Melee combat in BG2, you get one or two active skills with some classes, another couple with paladin’s and such. In DA:O you get well… more, and again I never felt that an active skill selection became useless eventually, simply put charge limited skills and spells alongside a mana/stamina system work well in DA:O, and certainly better than the 2nd edition ADnD crap and combat in general in BG2.

As for tactics well, I certainly felt more challenged ( when a challenge actually arose) than in BG2, why? Simply because in DA:O when I changed my tactical approach in some way, and if that way was an adequate approach I got positive results, consistent results. In BG2, where undeniably there are a few serious challenges, the best tactical approach in challenging encounters seems to be to rely on consumables and/or simply reload, any other tactical considerations in BG2 are secondary to this. In BG2 there is simply too much emphasis on stats tied to rolls with a very wide range. There is too much variability and randomness in BG2’s mechanics which seriously fucks over its tactical aspect, which is to say BG2 Is transparently flawed when it comes to its combat ruleset.

ITEMS AND LOOT:

An important enough aspect I think. DA:O has more of the ph4t l00tz than BG2, allows for more combinations of it, and adds another layer of customization with Runes.

CHOICES AND CONSEQUENCES:

There is not much that can be said about the quality of DA:O C&C versus BG2’s, except that there is more of it in DA:O and the actual consequences side is more developed (although far from perfect), in BG2 there are simply fewer instances of anything resembling CnC ( who do I kill for whom? Whats my alignment? Done. Oh ok, doesn’t really matter), and DA:O at least makes a recognizable effort in the storytelling front to give the player a sense of C&C. Unless of course you consider that simply engaging in certain side quests in BG2 C&C.

CHARACTER INTERACTION:

Well this category makes sense mostly because it is about comparing BG2 to DA:O, I am far from being a fan of DA:O bioware approach of having each damn follower part of a preset “multi dimension” interaction system, I cared little for the love bar as well. I find bioware’s approach to follower NPC’s in DA:O just takes away the focus from what should be more interesting aspects of the game’s story and NPC interaction in general.

But what I cannot deny is that despite the loss of focus and annoyance that comes from the system in DA:O I will still pick DA:O character interaction both in regards to followers and other NPC’s, especially considering some of the content related to NPC followers can be avoided . Most of the BG2’s NPC followers were one dimensional and in general cringe-worthy ( I suppose for some people they are just colorful), this not including the failed attempts at humor which actually managed to be more puke inducing than similar efforts in DA:O. That being said as far as general NPC’s go and the interaction possible I think it’s clear DA:O is superior, although BG2 has a few memorable character’s.

LOCATIONS:

In BG2 there were a couple of memorable ones no doubt, or at least somewhat interesting ones like the underdark. But in this aspect I think overall DA:O does a better job. I understand you can classify some locations in DA:O as generic and uninspired and I would agree, but the fact is there are simply more of those kinds of locations in BG2.

STORY:

In BG2 a series of some times miraculous and many times illogical events allow you to progress and to kill the baddie. In DA:O a serious of some times miraculous and many times illogical events allow you to progress and to kill the baddie, except who the baddie is and what other baddies you have to kill to get to him/it is not that clear. And in DA:O at the very least there is a lot more going on in between, and its delivered more convincingly.

 

[Hamster]

DA:O uses a mana system, this alone allows for more tactical options and versatility on the part of your caster’s,

DA:O has more of the ph4t l00tz than BG2

In BG2 there were a couple of memorable ones no doubt, or at least somewhat interesting ones like the underdark. But in this aspect I think overall DA:O does a better job.

0/10

 

[Claw]

But will it have romance?

A bottle has been mentioned, I believe.

 

[attackfighter]

DA:O uses a mana system, this alone allows for more tactical options and versatility on the part of your caster’s,

DA:O has more of the ph4t l00tz than BG2

In BG2 there were a couple of memorable ones no doubt, or at least somewhat interesting ones like the underdark. But in this aspect I think overall DA:O does a better job.

0/10

 

[GarfunkeL]

Does someone really put that much effort into clueless trolling or have we really encountered a genuine, living, breathing Biowhore-retard?

I could go into VD-style line-by-line trashing but why bother when nearly everything it wrote is wrong.

 

[Edward_R_Murrow]

Sorry for not coming back on this since I was the one that brought it up, now I have the time to try to make a proper reply. Besides there was not a single post indicating a single flaw of BG2 versus DA:O so I feel obliged to post something even if it’s a futile long winded rant.

Hey, this is Codexia. Everything is a futile, long winded rant.

BG 2 uses the venerably shitty 2nd edition of ADnD, which means such wide and fascinating ranges of options as assigning weapon specialty points and increasing the occasional class specific skill, DA:O which is not so venerable although it certainly also has its shitty points, allows you to actually distribute attribute points, and select from a considerable range of skills, a good number of them being active and not passive skills.

I'm not going to disagree that BG2's system of character development is rather crappy. The problem is, Dragon Age's is almost just as much so. Picking talents is, for a warrior, is mostly about filling up the specialization picked for them. Same with Rogues. Mages get their spell selections, which is good, but not much better than BG2 and the Sorcerer.

Skills weren't that great either. Some were completely overpowered/overvalued (Coercion, that combat one) and others were plain idiotic to be set as skills (Tactics slots). The rest were mostly things that could be "muled out" onto unwanted NPCs, like the crafting skills.

Also the available RPC’s and their compatibility relations do not leave you with many viable options for party makeup in BG2 so say the least, unless you decide to use the multiplayer trick and lose out on all the great NPC follower related content.

This was my problem with Origins. You needed a meatshield and a mage, so Alistair was almost mandatory, as was Morrigan/Wynne if your main character didn't have those skills covered. Making only two mages and rogues, as party members compared to six or seven warriors was a poor choice. At least BG2 gave you quite a decent mix of classes.

Simply put in terms of character development DA:O when compared to BG:2 seems like an outstanding example of depth and genuine innovation.

To me it was more like a minor improvement...not much to be proud of.

DA:O uses a mana system, this alone allows for more tactical options and versatility on the part of your caster’s

How is a mana system more tactical than AD&D casting? How is it less versatile? The biggest flaw I found in Dragon Age's magic, which I find in most mana systems, is that potions became a source of near unlimited spellcasting, an enormous reserve of power for your mage. There was little to no need to ration spells in battle. As for versatility, BG2 style casting allowed you to experiment with different spells for different fights. In Dragon Age, you have to use the same spells you chose at level ups in every fight.

and although it is certain that some spell lines are less effective than others, no matter what spell you selected in whatever order it never became useless in practice after you progressed to a certain point, the same cannot be said for alot of BG2's entire spell selection. Not to mention the differences in effectiveness when it comes to spells in BG2 were a lot more significant, in BG2 some spells were simply stupid choices.

True, some spells in BG were more useful at lower levels and some were more useful at higher levels. And some were just niche spells. That's okay though, because in BG2 you could always just swap out spells. In Dragon Age spells were more universal to situations. Both games had different designs of spellcasting because they had to meet different objectives.

The problem with Dragon Age was in how poorly documented spells (and everything else, really) were. You had very little idea of how exactly spells worked from the descriptions, making the choices at level up a bit of a shot in the dark. I thought Animate Dead would be awesome. Turns out...it didn't work at all. D'oh!

In Melee combat in BG2, you get one or two active skills with some classes, another couple with paladin’s and such. In DA:O you get well… more, and again I never felt that an active skill selection became useless eventually, simply put charge limited skills and spells alongside a mana/stamina system work well in DA:O, and certainly better than the 2nd edition ADnD crap and combat in general in BG2.

The thing is, combat skills in Dragon Age were terribly implemented. Stamina would be drained incredibly quickly for most warriors, and activated abilities (like sweeps, shield bashes, etc.) had very little impact on the outcome of a fight. In fact, I felt my BG2 warriors had more impact, even excluding Throne of Bhaal high level abilities, if only from activated abilities of weapons, armor, and accessories. That's certainly not a good thing for Dragon Age.

In BG2, where undeniably there are a few serious challenges, the best tactical approach in challenging encounters seems to be to rely on consumables and/or simply reload, any other tactical considerations in BG2 are secondary to this. In BG2 there is simply too much emphasis on stats tied to rolls with a very wide range. There is too much variability and randomness in BG2’s mechanics which seriously fucks over its tactical aspect, which is to say BG2 Is transparently flawed when it comes to its combat ruleset.

Then you played wrong, that's all there is to it. BG2 certainly does have some stupid, cheesy moments (Kangaxx the demi-lich comes to mind), but an overwhelming majority of encounters can be fought in many different ways while providing an interesting challenge. Dragon Age can't really boast of that, seeing as 75% of the combat is complete trash filler, serving no purpose than to eat up time. And even some of the more unique encounters were complete drek. Take for example Flemeth and/or the High Dragon. Both fights mandated that you have a designated "tank" to endure copious amounts of punishment from the scaly beast and draw it's attacks, and that you have a healer or two to keep them alive, while the rest of the party slowly chips away. This leads to absurdly stupid gameplay where Alistair is being thrown about for a good 20 minutes in the dragon's mouth, meanwhile my party mages are healing him periodically and pew-pewing the dragon to death with their staves. Any deviation from this strategy results in instant death. What brilliant encounter design....

To be fair, Origins had some decent encounters, namely the Broodmother fight, the corrupted spider queen, the golem foundry, the sloth demon, and the archdemon to name a few...it's just that they were in the minority, and in a far smaller quantity than BG2 had.

An important enough aspect I think. DA:O has more of the ph4t l00tz than BG2, allows for more combinations of it, and adds another layer of customization with Runes.

So Dragon Age's deluge of boring, generic loot with small bonuses here and there was better than BG2's highly differentiated items that do plenty of unique things? Where is the Dragon Age equivalent of things like Celestial Fury, the Daystar, Staff of the Magi, or such? Simply put, Dragon Age was terribly boring on this front.

There is not much that can be said about the quality of DA:O C&C versus BG2’s, except that there is more of it in DA:O and the actual consequences side is more developed (although far from perfect), in BG2 there are simply fewer instances of anything resembling CnC ( who do I kill for whom? Whats my alignment? Done. Oh ok, doesn’t really matter), and DA:O at least makes a recognizable effort in the storytelling front to give the player a sense of C&C. Unless of course you consider that simply engaging in certain side quests in BG2 C&C.

Mechanically, Origins, BG2, and all Bioware games have the same style of choices and consequences. Choices you make typically result in only consequences within the questline or in some sort of character reward, be it stats, gold, or items. They never have true branching paths that alter the storyline.

Origins, however, does do well in flavoring things, what with the ending slides, as well as the general presentation of the choices themselves. It's certainly better than BG2 here, but not by leaps and bounds...it's merely a refinement of the Bioware formula.

But what I cannot deny is that despite the loss of focus and annoyance that comes from the system in DA:O I will still pick DA:O character interaction both in regards to followers and other NPC’s, especially considering some of the content related to NPC followers can be avoided

Huh...IT IS TOTALLY IMPOSSIBLE TO AVOID PARTY MEMBERS IN DRAGON AGE! Sorry, let my inner Andhaira go there. Not really sure what you're talking about here. Is it that party member quests were optional? I mean, that's good and bad. It's good in that you aren't forced into content you don't want, but bad in the sense that it makes party members feel less like their own people.

Most of the BG2’s NPC followers were one dimensional and in general cringe-worthy ( I suppose for some people they are just colorful), this not including the failed attempts at humor which actually managed to be more puke inducing than similar efforts in DA:O. That being said as far as general NPC’s go and the interaction possible I think it’s clear DA:O is superior, although BG2 has a few memorable character’s.

Huh....can't disagree with the fact that Bioware characters are generally sub-par. Dragon Age did do a decent job on some characters, particularly Sten and Alistair, though others were just as lame as the average Bioware flunky, Morrigan's awful characterization quickly comes to mind.

Thing is, there isn't some sort of marked improvement on the Bioware formula. Mechanically, both BG2 and Origins feature plenty of instances in which were party members may break with the player character over certain decisions, and both games feature the ability to influence party members. When it comes to writing, it's generally the same old tropes recycled over and over.

I don't see a marked difference here.

In BG2 there were a couple of memorable ones no doubt, or at least somewhat interesting ones like the underdark. But in this aspect I think overall DA:O does a better job. I understand you can classify some locations in DA:O as generic and uninspired and I would agree, but the fact is there are simply more of those kinds of locations in BG2.

Practically every location in Origins is filled to the brim with useless trash combat. This part shouldn't even be up for debate. BG2's dungeonpunk setting versus Origin's Grimdark fantasy is a matter of taste, sure, but in terms of mechanical design of locations BG2 wins hands down.

In BG2 a series of some times miraculous and many times illogical events allow you to progress and to kill the baddie. In DA:O a serious of some times miraculous and many times illogical events allow you to progress and to kill the baddie, except who the baddie is and what other baddies you have to kill to get to him/it is not that clear. And in DA:O at the very least there is a lot more going on in between, and its delivered more convincingly.

Honestly, I don't mind the main narrative of both BG2 and Dragon Age: Origins. Not every story needs to be some brilliant, unique affair. I can live with a simple "STOP DA BAD DUDES!" or "KILL THE BAD DUDE WHO WRONGED ME!" yarn. My issue was how poorly executed Dragon Age's story was. In it's rush to adhere to the "four hubs" design, Bioware really took away from the urgency of the darkspawn threat, making them play second fiddle to a bunch of localized narratives. Let's not even comment on the idiocy that was Loghain. At least with BG2, Bioware kept the pursuit of Irenicus the focus of the game, even giving players a way to bypass the sidequesting for 20,000 gold in Chapter 2 (via the vampires).

Summing it up, both BG2 and Origins are Bioware combat-fests. BG2 is an entertaining D&D romp with good, quality encounters, and a decently executed, if generic, story. Origins has an MMO-esque combat system, tons of trash encounters, and a terribly executed story.

 

[waywardOne]

i destroyed zoeller in a series of emails and a quickly deleted thread @ bio social. now he's letting biofags carry his banner. pathetic.

 

[MrJones]

Most of the BG2’s NPC followers were one dimensional and in general cringe-worthy ( I suppose for some people they are just colorful), this not including the failed attempts at humor which actually managed to be more puke inducing than similar efforts in DA:O. That being said as far as general NPC’s go and the interaction possible I think it’s clear DA:O is superior, although BG2 has a few memorable character’s.

I could have liked the Dragon Age characters more if they didn't feel to me like just being there to torture me with loss of relationship points on every small remark I do in a conversation. Or if I didn't have to try 20 presents on them with reloading and retrying just to hear a bit about their past.
-> nice party member discussions ruined

Simply put in terms of character development DA:O when compared to BG:2 seems like an outstanding example of depth and genuine innovation.

For fighting and character system, clearly this:

As for versatility, BG2 style casting allowed you to experiment with different spells for different fights. In Dragon Age, you have to use the same spells you chose at level ups in every fight.

-> mage tactics ruined

You needed a meatshield and a mage, so Alistair was almost mandatory, as was Morrigan/Wynne if your main character didn't have those skills covered

-> party mix tactics ruined

activated abilities (like sweeps, shield bashes, etc.) had very little impact on the outcome of a fight.

-> warrior tactics ruined (there were useless anyway since DA:O has a higher focus on mages and your fighters just take the damage)

I personally found DA:O to be very, very disappointing.

There is too much variability and randomness in BG2’s mechanics

Sure, but at least the fights had some sort of variation. Dragon Age just had a fucked up boring story, tactics see above, party member discussions see above. What remains? A game that tells me I need to fight the big arch daemon monster but before that, please proceed through 100 looking-alike areas and kill tons of looking-alike monsters with the deep tactics shown above, kthxbye. Why would I want to do that?

I never finished DA:O's totally boring and failing final quest, since the only thing DA:O did right was CnC and that kinda stopped with the siege of denerim with a huge row of meaningless fights (even more of them than in the quests before, which is really an achievement in some odd way). Also CnC alone doesn't make a good game.

 

[Volourn]

"The thing is, combat skills in Dragon Age were terribly implemented. Stamina would be drained incredibly quickly for most warriors, and activated abilities (like sweeps, shield bashes, etc.) had very little impact on the outcome of a fight. In fact, I felt my BG2 warriors had more impact, even excluding Throne of Bhaal high level abilities, if only from activated abilities of weapons, armor, and accessories. That's certainly not a good thing for Dragon Age. "

Bullshit. How cna anyone thinkt hat having yoru character do nothing but swing repeatedly with no special attacks is somehow better boggles my mind. LMFAO

 

[attackfighter]

"The thing is, combat skills in Dragon Age were terribly implemented. Stamina would be drained incredibly quickly for most warriors, and activated abilities (like sweeps, shield bashes, etc.) had very little impact on the outcome of a fight. In fact, I felt my BG2 warriors had more impact, even excluding Throne of Bhaal high level abilities, if only from activated abilities of weapons, armor, and accessories. That's certainly not a good thing for Dragon Age. "

Bullshit. How cna anyone thinkt hat having yoru character do nothing but swing repeatedly with no special attacks is somehow better boggles my mind. LMFAO

Well in DA:O you just picked a bunch of overpowered abilities and spammed them the moment their cooldown was finished, so essentially it was the same thing as in BG but with more clicking and flashy animations.

Mana bars suck, they encourage potion spam and they make for a less strategic game as you don't have to manage your spells as much. I liked BG's system more, partially because the spell system encouraged variety and made you ration your spells; if it followed DA's system you'd merely be spamming Horrid Wilting every battle.

 

[Volourn]

No.

 

[GarfunkeL]

Not to mention that in BG you would have one or two fighters on the front which still left you four other party members to manage. Fighter being boring doesn't matter if it's only a minuscule part of the overall combat design.

 

[Xor]

Even then, most NPCs have special abilities, like Minsc's rage, that you have to manage. In DAO the game pretty much plays itself on normal, and on hard you can still rely on the AI 90% of the time.

 

[Volourn]

You can rely on AI in BG2 90% of the time. FFS GUYS FFS

 

[J_C]

You can rely on AI in BG2 90% of the time. FFS GUYS FFS

No you can't.