DA2 had better concept for an RPG story imo and game structure. Game got rushed in a year with shit gameplay. Waste of a good setting and a good plot idea.
Dragon Age 2 has a interesting concept. They totally fucked it up, but the concept is interesting. Dragon Age 2 seems like BioWare just couldn’t help themselves, because the whole buildup to release, the pitch was: Smaller personal story that isn’t end of the world stuff. But the whole end of the game is “end of the world” stuff. All that game needed to be was you trying to get by in that city over the years as some adventurer that goes into the Deep Roads. And the Deep Roads was already set up in DA:O as the ultimate dungeon in the Dragon Age setting, so building a whole game around that seems like a good idea. Even back when Dragon Age Origin was new I thought BioWare should make a game just completely built around dungeon exploration so they could really focus on how your party interact with each other. A big thing for BioWare at that time being having different party members with you would give you different interaction between those party member.
The idea for the game is even perfectly built for the shorter amount of time they had. All they really needed for the idea that Dragon Age 2 was going for is the Deep Roads dungeons you explore. You could make other locations that could be traveled to by way of the 2D town map. But all those larger bland town areas could be completely cut at the most, or be constructed as smaller but more distinct sections of the city. Like it’s hard for me to have any sympathy for the amount of time they had, when the idea they’re going for meant so much of what they did do was just superfluous.