Game News Dragon Age III News From Edmonton Comic Expo

[Gurkog]

I might be in the minority, but I feel that DA:O is a mediocre BG for consoles. If it weren't for EA forcing Biowhore to make console shit the game MIGHT have been pleasantly satisfying overall. The story made me want to gouge my eyes out with rusty spoons though, the graphics suck harder than Paris Hilton, and the UI was a complete clusterfuck. (well... at least it was not as bad as any Bethesda UI... ) Mass Effect suffered from the same symptoms of whoritis. Bah, what do I care... I never bought any Biowhore games after BG2:ToB until DA:O came out since they all had completely shit graphics and/or console interfaces.

I can't wait for the Kickstarter RPGs to release so I can play some games with functional UIs.

 

[Marsal]

Tread carefully newfag.

Joined: May 12, 2010



In b4 "I was lurking since 1972"

 

[circ]

I might be in the minority, but I feel that DA:O is a mediocre BG for consoles. If it weren't for EA forcing Biowhore to make console shit the game MIGHT have been pleasantly satisfying overall. The story made me want to gouge my eyes out with rusty spoons though, the graphics suck harder than Paris Hilton, and the UI was a complete clusterfuck. (well... at least it was not as bad as any Bethesda UI... ) Mass Effect suffered from the same symptoms of whoritis. Bah, what do I care... I never bought any Biowhore games after BG2:ToB until DA:O came out since they all had completely shit graphics and/or console interfaces.

I can't wait for the Kickstarter RPGs to release so I can play some games with functional UIs.

DAO preceded EA takeover though, no? There's no one to blame but BioWare here. Still isn't. It's not like DA2 and ME3 would have been gaming masterpieces with the writing and design teams at BioWare. Unless you're delusional. Not you specifically but you know.

 

[Cynic]

I might be in the minority, but I feel that DA:O is a mediocre BG for consoles. If it weren't for EA forcing Biowhore to make console shit the game MIGHT have been pleasantly satisfying overall. The story made me want to gouge my eyes out with rusty spoons though, the graphics suck harder than Paris Hilton, and the UI was a complete clusterfuck. (well... at least it was not as bad as any Bethesda UI... ) Mass Effect suffered from the same symptoms of whoritis. Bah, what do I care... I never bought any Biowhore games after BG2:ToB until DA:O came out since they all had completely shit graphics and/or console interfaces.

I can't wait for the Kickstarter RPGs to release so I can play some games with functional UIs.

Of course it is far worse than any IE game, no one is questioning that at all. As I said, it had problems, and I would never play it again, but for a single play through the game was good enough for a bargain bin purchase (which is what I did).

 

[Gurkog]

I might be in the minority, but I feel that DA:O is a mediocre BG for consoles. If it weren't for EA forcing Biowhore to make console shit the game MIGHT have been pleasantly satisfying overall. The story made me want to gouge my eyes out with rusty spoons though, the graphics suck harder than Paris Hilton, and the UI was a complete clusterfuck. (well... at least it was not as bad as any Bethesda UI... ) Mass Effect suffered from the same symptoms of whoritis. Bah, what do I care... I never bought any Biowhore games after BG2:ToB until DA:O came out since they all had completely shit graphics and/or console interfaces.

I can't wait for the Kickstarter RPGs to release so I can play some games with functional UIs.

Of course it is far worse than any IE game, no one is questioning that at all. As I said, it had problems, and I would never play it again, but for a single play through the game was good enough for a bargain bin purchase (which is what I did).

ya, I was able to tolerate it enough to play it some, but I am butthurt from paying full price.

I played the DA 2 demo and knew the game was going to be shit, but I bought a new copy off Ebay within the 1st week of release for under $20 (probably a bad sign as well). The only reason I could tolerate playing through DA2 once was the improvements in combat for Nightmare difficulty. DA 2 introduced characters that I wanted to stab in the face and light on fire the moment I met them (Anders and anime elf fag); and for that Bioware lost any chance of redemption. I didn;t buy ME3 (bought 1 and 2 off ebay for dirt cheap) because of that shit.

 

[attackfighter]

attackfighter bro I disagree with you, but rather than go on about it, can you please tell me why if they are the same game, DA2 caused so much rage while DA:O was mostly liked? I mean the number of people I see saying they fucking hated DA2 but loved DA:O is not small. How do you explain this? Also are you saying that This Is The New Shit marketing was any different to DA2 marketing?

It has mostly to do with marketing.

DA1 had that New Shit trailer, Marylen Manson music in some of their interviews, but otherwise there was nothing about it to facepalm over.

DA2 marketing otth was entirely made up of embarrassing, insulting and inappropriate stuff. It alienated Bioware's traditional fandom and gave them ammo to ridicule the game. It snowballed out of control and the games public image went really bad. Unthinking manboons wanting to conform joined the ranks of haters, convincing themselves of their own propaganda and inventing the notion that the decline was sudden, that DA2 was the antithesis of DA1. That is basically why DA2 is hated to such an extent while DA1 is not. In reality DA2 was just more typical Bioshit.

 

[Cynic]

attackfighter bro I disagree with you, but rather than go on about it, can you please tell me why if they are the same game, DA2 caused so much rage while DA:O was mostly liked? I mean the number of people I see saying they fucking hated DA2 but loved DA:O is not small. How do you explain this? Also are you saying that This Is The New Shit marketing was any different to DA2 marketing?

It has mostly to do with marketing.

DA1 had that New Shit trailer, Marylen Manson music in some of their interviews, but otherwise there was nothing about it to facepalm over.

DA2 marketing otth was entirely made up of embarrassing, insulting and inappropriate stuff. It alienated Bioware's traditional fandom and gave them ammo to ridicule the game. It snowballed out of control and the games public image went really bad. Unthinking manboons wanting to conform joined the ranks of haters, convincing themselves of their own propaganda and inventing the notion that the decline was sudden, that DA2 was the antithesis of DA1. That is basically why DA2 is hated to such an extent while DA1 is not. In reality DA2 was just more typical Bioshit.

The marketing had little to no effect on me. I preordered, played the demo, and promptly cancelled the pre order. Pirated, played for a bit, and then uninstalled. Yet I played DA:O through to completion. Many people did similar things. Are you saying all of them are mindless people brainwashed by marketing?

 

[attackfighter]

attackfighter bro I disagree with you, but rather than go on about it, can you please tell me why if they are the same game, DA2 caused so much rage while DA:O was mostly liked? I mean the number of people I see saying they fucking hated DA2 but loved DA:O is not small. How do you explain this? Also are you saying that This Is The New Shit marketing was any different to DA2 marketing?

It has mostly to do with marketing.

DA1 had that New Shit trailer, Marylen Manson music in some of their interviews, but otherwise there was nothing about it to facepalm over.

DA2 marketing otth was entirely made up of embarrassing, insulting and inappropriate stuff. It alienated Bioware's traditional fandom and gave them ammo to ridicule the game. It snowballed out of control and the games public image went really bad. Unthinking manboons wanting to conform joined the ranks of haters, convincing themselves of their own propaganda and inventing the notion that the decline was sudden, that DA2 was the antithesis of DA1. That is basically why DA2 is hated to such an extent while DA1 is not. In reality DA2 was just more typical Bioshit.

The marketing had little to no effect on me. I preordered, played the demo, and promptly cancelled the pre order. Pirated, played for a bit, and then uninstalled. Yet I played DA:O through to completion. Many people did similar things. Are you saying all of them are mindless people brainwashed by marketing?

Either that or they have hangups over minor things.

 

[waywardOne]

DAO preceded EA takeover though, no? There's no one to blame but BioWare here.

In the midst of both ME and DAO, and at least one delay of DAO was explicitly because of EA console-oriented directives. That's just what we know about (can prove). I remember when DAO wasn't even named yet ('06?), when faggot gamers were more concerned about games than faggotry, "Origins" was looking to be something special.

 

[Dexter]

It has mostly to do with marketing.

DA1 had that New Shit trailer, Marylen Manson music in some of their interviews, but otherwise there was nothing about it to facepalm over.

DA2 marketing otth was entirely made up of embarrassing, insulting and inappropriate stuff. It alienated Bioware's traditional fandom and gave them ammo to ridicule the game. It snowballed out of control and the games public image went really bad. Unthinking manboons wanting to conform joined the ranks of haters, convincing themselves of their own propaganda and inventing the notion that the decline was sudden, that DA2 was the antithesis of DA1. That is basically why DA2 is hated to such an extent while DA1 is not. In reality DA2 was just more typical Bioshit.

At the peril of being stoned to death... here's my experience from back then xD

http://www.escapistmagazine.com/forums/read/326.156227-Dragon-Age-Origins-PC-An-In-Depth-Review
http://www.escapistmagazine.com/forums/read/326.271648-Dragon-Age-2-A-Review

Dragon Age 2 in fact was so fucking horrible overall that I finally decided on fully joining the Codex (e.g. see Release Date and Join Date), I think I lurked somewhat for several years before and might've had an account from 2008/2009, but I certainly forgot the Login, I always couldn't fully get behind the Bioware (and especially Baldur's Gate 1/2) hate before then xD

DAO preceded EA takeover though, no? There's no one to blame but BioWare here.

In the midst of both ME and DAO, and at least one delay of DAO was explicitly because of EA console-oriented directives. That's just what we know about (can prove). I remember when DAO wasn't even named yet ('06?), when faggot gamers were more concerned about games than faggotry, "Origins" was looking to be something special.

It was supposed to be a PC Exclusive from the get-go, Oct 2007 EA acquired BioWare and it was supposed to come out some time in 2008.
EA changed its title: http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/dragon-age-named-trailer-dated made it a Multiplatform release and pushed the release back by almost a year till all the Multiplatform versions of the game were ready in Nov 2009.

 

[Volourn]

The fact you think BG is a better game than DA proves your stupidity.

 

[circ]

DAO preceded EA takeover though, no? There's no one to blame but BioWare here.

In the midst of both ME and DAO, and at least one delay of DAO was explicitly because of EA console-oriented directives. That's just what we know about (can prove). I remember when DAO wasn't even named yet ('06?), when faggot gamers were more concerned about games than faggotry, "Origins" was looking to be something special.

CHRIST JUST STOP WITH THIS FUCKING SHIT ALREADY. Have you not played Jade Empire, BioWare's previous masterpiece, free of EA involvement. Or the other interim games: KoTOR and NWN 1. Boy, BioWare sure delivard thar!

ORIGANS WAS NEVUR GOING TO BE SPESHUL. NEVER. NEVER NEVER NEVER.

Special Ed maybe.

 

[Dexter]

DAO preceded EA takeover though, no? There's no one to blame but BioWare here.

In the midst of both ME and DAO, and at least one delay of DAO was explicitly because of EA console-oriented directives. That's just what we know about (can prove). I remember when DAO wasn't even named yet ('06?), when faggot gamers were more concerned about games than faggotry, "Origins" was looking to be something special.

CHRIST JUST STOP WITH THIS FUCKING SHIT ALREADY. Have you not played Jade Empire, BioWare's previous masterpiece, free of EA involvement. Or the other interim games: KoTOR and NWN 1. Boy, BioWare sure delivard thar!

ORIGANS WAS NEVUR GOING TO BE SPESHUL. NEVER. NEVER NEVER NEVER.

Special Ed maybe.

Jade Empire and KOTOR were both console (more exactly Xbox) games, in fact if EA didn't swoop BioWare away, Microsoft might have a year later or so and it would've been only "Exclusive this, Exclusive that", the fact that Mass Effect even came out on PC in the first place is because of EA (bought Oct 2007, released June 2008).
Jade Empire came out 2 years after the initial console release, KOTOR came out on PC 5 months later. They were both consolized games, but not inherently bad.
Neverwinter Nights was a shit game with a really shit campaign, but it succeeded in what it tried to do with its Online component and "Modules". I think people are still running persistent worlds based on it. xD

 

[attackfighter]

At the peril of being stoned to death... here's my experience from back then xD

http://www.escapistmagazine.com/forums/read/326.156227-Dragon-Age-Origins-PC-An-In-Depth-Review
http://www.escapistmagazine.com/forums/read/326.271648-Dragon-Age-2-A-Review

Dragon Age 2 in fact was so fucking horrible overall that I finally decided on fully joining the Codex (e.g. see Release Date and Join Date), I think I lurked somewhat for several years before and might've had an account from 2008/2009, but I certainly forgot the Login, I always couldn't fully get behind the Bioware (and especially Baldur's Gate 1/2) hate before then xD

First of all at the end of your review you stated that DA2 "wasn't bad" - so not horrible. Secondly I'm going to go through your review and correct the flaws.

• • There's no "camp site", where you can equip/un-equip your party with items. Instead you have to rotate through them to do that (curious because DA:O had that exact same feature and it was much appreciated)
  • Unlike Dragon Age: Origins, the same-sex part of the game is a lot more "in your face", the two male romances literally jump on you the moment you talk to them first and if you "discourage" them to do so you get Rivalry points. Every single time you speak to Fenris, romantic music starts playing in the background which kind of... doesn't exactly fit to his general overall characterization and the bordello has an unusual 2:1 male-to-female ratio with a hidden transvestite to boot.

The camp site in DA:O didn't allow you to equip party members, and at least one of the gay characters in DA:O tried to seduce you the moment you met him (Zevran the BDSM Elf).

Why can't the game start in Lothering instead, where you might start to appreciate your "home" with the hot topic around town being the currently waging war... introducing the characters for about an hour and forming a bond/connection to them till the Darkspawn come about and start ravaging everything so you can actually care?

Because no game does that.

During that Prologue, as one of the first things you also meet your first Companions aside from your own family, Jaheira and Khalid (now named Aveline and Wesley).

Jahiera and Khalid were Druid and warrior, wife and husband, freed half elves with nowhere to call home. Aveline and Wesley are not.

Of course once you get in you find out that it isn't exactly as full as they make it out to be, either that or they purposely lied to you... because aside of the few vendors that don't really want to talk to you and let you rummage through their coffers instead and a few decorative NPC groups that look like they've fled Everquest for higher-resolution pastures which you can literally walk through, there's barely anyone around.

Amn, Tarant, Los Angeles (VTMB), Denerim and Balmora were all sparsely populated despite supposedly being large population centers.

The city of Kirkwall is just a set of repeated building-blocks and textures and looks more akin to what could be produced with the Neverwinter Nights 2 Toolset (or a Lego set) some years ago, rather than an actual "living city".

It was better than Denerim.

The combat and out-of-town (as few as they are) areas and dungeons are usually entirely linear, you'll be lucky if there's a single fork in the road that goes two ways.

DA:O was almost as bad.

Varric, the local storytelling dwarf and teller of your tale gradually skips a few chapters so he can get to the uninteresting parts depicting your character Hawke collecting 50 sovereigns

Collecting money so you can go on an expedition isn't uninteresting.

Despite of the skips through time several times and certain things happening around the city, not much change takes place in either the Free Marches or the city of Kirkwall and although 7 years might have passed people

The political climate changes, that's the whole purpose behind the time skips.

Almost altogether gone though are the short "atmospheric" quests of DA:O or previous Bioware games about the little dwarven girl that wants to be a mage

BG2 didn't have those, and it was Biowares best game.

For instance the wave mechanic, which breaks any kind of tactical pretense the game might give you.

Liar.

in DA2 where I always start a fight by rushing right in and mainly pressing 1-2-3-4 whenever the cooldowns are down and the situation requires it. "Cheesy" tactics also generally seem to work on a lot of bosses including dragons, where you just run around them while everyone else is killing them

The game also seemed to require a certain group composition at times to be effective (inspired by MMOs with the "Holy Trinity" between Tank, DPS and Healer/Support with an "Aggro" mechanic and skill cooldowns) which I don't particularly WANT in an SRPG but whatever. On Normal afterwards, during Act3 it was pretty much a Cakewalk... click enemy, enemy explodes in a comic manner and fills both your screen and floor with ridiculous red goo, move on. I don't think I had to reload a single time and the class system also has an ancillary role.

Another reason why the combat seems unfulfilling overall (especially in the higher difficulties) is that the normal enemies just seem to gain more HP and damage resistance while most of them don't seem to pose much more of a tactical threat (unless they spawn right into your squishies...) and you'll fight the very same group composition of baddies, most of them also looking the very same or similar over and over. The higher the difficulty, the longer it takes to dispose of them (double or triple the time, not just slightly longer), it usually seemed more tedious than challenging. A perceived difficulty induced just by larger health bars and respawning enemy waves never feels as rewarding as it does frustrating and cheap. Pause, outside of Boss fights didn't seem to be a very required feature on either mode, I generally used it to target a specific enemy cause the camera didn't seem to allow that when they were right in your face and jumping or running around.

The lack of a proper overview is probably also the main reason why friendly fire is only available on Nightmare, I can't really imagine having it on while I can barely see a few steps around me and can hardly control my party members effectively in battles aside of using the Tactics menu...
I guess it's one of those reasons all those RTS games use that weird isometric perspective instead of a 3rd person over the shoulder camera.
Oh yeah, and all the fun and different spell combos you were able to do in DA:O... they got replaced by a "if the enemy has a glowing symbol above his head use a certain skill" system.

The same is true in DA:O.

is another step back, while the first Dragon Age had a respectable book layout that could be navigated easily with the mouse,

Codex was a shitty text dump, inventory was merely passable.

about every conversation piece had mainly 3 options "diplomatic", "jerk" and "aggressive". Clicking on any one of them usually leads to very similar results, if there's any difference in the outcome it's the "Friendship" or "Rivalry" points you get out of it. More often than not there is the illusion of choice where there barely is one... Want to kill a certain apostate during a certain quest? You can't. Want to hand her over to the templars? She'll come back later and hate you for it. Want to let her go? She'll come back later in the same scene and hate you for it in both cases turns to blood magic.

Same is true for every other Bioware game since KOTOR.

 

[Infinitron]

The problem with this argument is that anybody who can't see how DA2 is worse than DA:O is too stupid to spend time arguing with.

 

[attackfighter]

The problem with this argument is that anybody who can't see how DA:O is as bad as DA2 is too stupid to spend time arguing with.

 

[Infinitron]

Good, then we can let this stupid thread die in peace. Stupid.

 

[hoverdog]

The fact you think BG is a better game than DA proves your stupidity.

I wanted to argue, but then I saw it's Volly. Hello, Volly. Good day.

 

[Marsal]

Good, then we can let this stupid thread die in peace. Stupid.

What?! No, you fucking can't! Drag this shit for at least 30 pages and then (and only then) one of you is allowed to post: PLANE TICKETS, BITCH!!! We'll go on from there.

Don't be newfags and make it so!

 

[attackfighter]

what's wrong codex am I shattering your delusions of eliteness by exposing your holy cow, Dragon Age Origins, as the overrated, dumbed down, mainstream WoW turd that it is? are you so butthurt that you can only spam nonsense and brofist each other in a pathetic attempt at saving face

 

[Radisshu]

Yes, hating DA on the Codex is incredibly edgy

 

[tehRPness]

Yes, hating DA on the Codex is incredibly edgy

One might even go so far as to call it... brave?

 

[Executer]

Codex game of the year

 

[Jasede]

DA and DA 2 suck dick because the writing is bananas and the fighting is cockwaffles.
The character system and inventory are both watermelon.

 

[Hobz]

DA and DA 2 suck dick because the writing is bananas and the fighting is cockwaffles.
The character system and inventory are both watermelon.

Do you mean that the character system and inventory are deliciously juicy and tasty but plagued with seeds that are a pain in the ass unless they are very small, in which case you can swallow them without noticing?