Drakron said:
Well it IS a glowing review, especially here were Arcanum have a mystic reputation (that I just dont get, the game is borked) as I understand why Toilet Age looks good on paper but its piece of crap because of poor implementation when said implementation was actually done instead of being placeholders or half-assed.
I've never ever, not once, said "as good as Arcanum". There is a huge and obvious difference between "best since" and "as good as".
As for the review, come on, guys, put a few points into reading comprehension next time you level up.
From the review:
"Dragon Age takes place in a very familiar land of humans, dwarves, elves, and blood-thirsty monsters. You'll find knights and mages, undead and ogres, dragons and giant spiders, werewolves and golems. It's a Tolkien-esque world aimed at creating instant recognition, familiarity, and comfort, if you're easily confused by unfamiliar worlds and anything original. The world is threatened by an equally generic Blight, represented by waves of annoying, orc-looking monsters who continue to be up to no good throughout the game, until you're ready to fight an anti-climatic battle, slay the dragon (come on, it's DRAGON age, what did you expect to kill in the end?), and save the world.
The main quest (or it least the background) is less awe-inspiring, unfortunately. A long time ago mages had attempted to rival gods, which corrupted Heaven and created the first darkspawn. The darkspawn lurk underground, rarely rising to the surface, which makes it easy to ignore them as a minor and mindless inconvenience. However, every now and then the darkspawn manage to find and corrupt one of the ancient dragons sleeping underground, at which point the corrupted dragon becomes a general of the darkspawn, uniting them into a horde and leading it to the surface to raid and destroy. Such an event is called the Blight and it plays the same role as the Reapers do in Mass Effect: a horrible threat that doesn't make a whole lot of sense and lurks quietly behind the scene while you're busy convincing people who don't take the threat very seriously to act, in-between taking your time exploring and levelling up."
^ Gives anyone a hard-on? Reminds you of Arcanum and the good, ol' days?
"You get 3 stat points when you level up. Unfortunately, the reasons to invest into more than 1 (rarely 2) stats are missing, while the combat talent requirements give you a very good reason to keep dumping points into your primary stat, which:
* creates bloated stats that no longer make any sense;
* makes stat bonuses pointless (for example, Champion class upgrade for your Warrior gives you +2 to Willpower and +1 to Cunning; in a more balanced system these bonuses would have made sense - if you had 10 points in Str, 5 in Willpower, and 6 in Cunning, upgrading to Champion would have plugged holes in your build and significantly increased secondary stats, but in a system with Str 40, Willpower 10, Cunning 10, increasing Cunning by 1 gives you no benefits whatsoever);
* makes the injury system meaningless as in most cases it gives easy to ignore penalties.
...
I'd say that the decision to fill the game with generic combat was THE worst DA design decision, because it drowns truly memorable fights in an ocean of combat filler and makes replaying the game and making different choices - an undeniable strength of the game - so much harder. When I started playing the game I kept making mental notes about my next character's choices and admiring all the possibilities, but by the time I finished the game the combat price to try different non-combat things was way too much for me.
Unfortunately, the bloated primary stats make most penalties a minor inconvenience at best, and the irrelevant secondary stats make the corresponding penalties easy to ignore. For example, a warrior with a head trauma (willpower penalty), a cracked skull (cunning penalty), a concussion (magic penalty), and a torn jugular (constitution penalty) will NOT notice these effects at all. A warrior with several attack and damage penalties will be noticeably less effective though, especially against more challenging enemies. To make matters worse, a quick visit to the camp will heal all the injuries instantly."
Glowing review?
