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[JoeBoy101]

A 1 hour origin story with Hawke and his family in Lothering doing menial peasant things would have done wonders for the start of the story.

This. My largest complaint with the game is the first two hours, because they should have been four. Should have been:

Spoilering for first couple of hours of the game:

Spoiler

Pre-Blight Hawke Family -> Destruction of Lothering -> Shit Mountain -> Choose Group to Work For -> Work Off Debt -> Establish Self in Kirkwall

instead, we get:

Spoiler

Shit Mountain -> Choose Group to Work For -> Establish Self in Kirkwall

That is a serious glossing over major events and reinforces my view that the game was seriously rushed.

 

[Truant]

Is there some backstory to the shit-mountain meme, or is it just because the demo area looks like a mountain made of shit?

 

[vocab]

So, is there more to the Exiled Prince DLC after "Duty?"

I finished that part, and now Sebastian just stands there in the chantry with no "real" dialogue. Is shit glitched or is there more to it?

Sounds exactly like me2. Dlc characters had zero personality outside of their main mission. I think shale is the only dlc character that is done right. Correct if I'm wrong because I'm just guessing based on what I've heard.

 

[Data West]

There no console command this time? I'm not above cheating to improve friendships. Fenris is the Morrigan of pleasing.

 

[Trickster]

Spoiler

Shit Mountain -> Choose Group to Work For -> Establish Self in Kirkwall

Are you joking? is the start of

Spoiler

the demo

where the game actually starts?

 

[antonz]

Are you joking? is the start of

Spoiler

the demo

where the game actually starts?

yep its basically the whole beginning

 

[EviLore]

Is there some backstory to the shit-mountain meme, or is it just because the demo area looks like a mountain made of shit?

Not just the demo. Almost *all* of the pre-release media was captured from Shit Mountain, including for the game's official unveiling:

 

[dimb]

Can someone confirm or deny whether or not all of the ladies are bisexual or not :x

Because people get mad about spoilers:

Spoiler

Two of the three are. Avelene has an extended quest that ends with a big tease. It's actually a pretty hilarious chain.

wait wait wait wait for the love of god. No persuasion??? That means that there is no way you can get characters and enemies to not fight based on your charisma/persuasion skills and such? Or you can alter quests via the dialogue thanks to them?

That can't be right, I have to read that wrong. That is like one of the main ingredients of an rpg, the ability to charm your way up trough people with dialog. Please tell me I'm wrong, because I was gonna get DA2 but this is one of the few things I just cannot stand not having in an rpg.

The misinformation about this game is growing to absurd proportions.

Rather than having some arbitrary stat that makes you a gift of gab god you actually have to make decisions. Like, all over the place. And the consequences are actually impactful on both the larger story and how the game plays out. This is one of Dragon Age 2's biggest strengths.

While there are certainly some flaws with the game, they don't tend to be the ones people bring up.

 

[Hyphen]

If you're going to revolve the entire story around a city, one would think Bioware would have made the city's art much more appealing. Kirkwall is just bland as fucking hell.

Wait a minute (I've yet to purchase the game) - Are you seriously telling me that the majority of the exploration I'll be doing in the game will be confined to this Kirkwall city that I was trying to get to in the demo? I'll be exploring... a city!? But... that's crap! Isn't it?

 

[Max]

OP is way too funny.

 

[Enduin]

This. My largest complaint with the game is the first two hours, because they should have been four. Should have been:

Spoilering for first couple of hours of the game:

Spoiler

Pre-Blight Hawke Family -> Destruction of Lothering -> Shit Mountain -> Choose Group to Work For -> Work Off Debt -> Establish Self in Kirkwall

instead, we get:

Spoiler

Shit Mountain -> Choose Group to Work For -> Establish Self in Kirkwall

That is a serious glossing over major events and reinforces my view that the game was seriously rushed.

I have to agree. Im like 11+ hours in. Why they would pass up two really key moments so far in the story's timeline that would have been really interesting to have actually played is beyond me.

Why we didnt at least see, if not actually play through, the destruction and escape from Lothering is beyond me, and then not actually having us work off the debt is equally baffling and definitely felt like content was cut as others have said. It seemed like a perfect way to introduce players to the majors areas of the city along with some of the important factions and people, as well as putting us through maybe 3 or 4 quests of doing some dirty work for one of these groups. Instead its just a 10 second cutscene. I hope there arent more moments like that.

Also I despise the Elves in this game so much, they look ugly as sin and feel 100 times more generic now than they did in DAO. And my god the crappy Irish accents for the Dalish are really terrible. But other than that I am really loving the game so far, and I actually like Merril's character too despite her being absolutely atrocious looking. How that design change got by focus groups is beyond me.

 

[Mr_Zombie]

Is the default Hawke model used in the game like he was in the demo (during the "legend" fight at the beginning), and does he ever appear afterwards if you customize his/her face?

 

[Ceebs]

This. My largest complaint with the game is the first two hours, because they should have been four. Should have been:

Spoilering for first couple of hours of the game:

Spoiler

Pre-Blight Hawke Family -> Destruction of Lothering -> Shit Mountain -> Choose Group to Work For -> Work Off Debt -> Establish Self in Kirkwall

instead, we get:

Spoiler

Shit Mountain -> Choose Group to Work For -> Establish Self in Kirkwall

That is a serious glossing over major events and reinforces my view that the game was seriously rushed.

The journey from shit mountain to Kirkwall being a quick animated cutscene is much more glaring omission. You could have explored a port town in Ferelden that is in chaos as masses of people are fleeing across the sea to escape the blight. They could have shown the journey by ship which would let you see what sea travel is like in the world (they could have done some sea monster combat or pirates as well). The description of Kirkwall in the animated cutscene also sounds about 10 times cooler than the bland city we ended up with.

About 6 hours in and every quest I have done so far could have been pushed into that year when you were working off the debt. No reason to gloss over that and then have me start doing sidequests right away so I can make an arbitrary amount of money to do the next story mission.

 

[Truant]

Performance is terrible with DX10 and DX11 on nVidia cards. Someone needs to fix this.

It runs at 60 one moment, and 10 the other. It's more of a weird stuttering, actually.

 

[2San]

I think shale is the only dlc character that is done right.

Yeah, but was Shale basically ripped out of the original game for the sake of selling new copies.

 

[Lonewolf_92]

Wait a minute (I've yet to purchase the game) - Are you seriously telling me that the majority of the exploration I'll be doing in the game will be confined to this Kirkwall city that I was trying to get to in the demo? I'll be exploring... a city!? But... that's crap! Isn't it?

Think of it this way, DA:O was to Startrek: TNG, what DA2 is to Startrek: DS9. In DA2 you primarily adventure in and around Kirkwall, but Kirkwall is much more robust than the cities in DA:O and most of your game will be spent dealing with the various factions in Kirkwall, either working for or against them.

 

[Woo-Fu]

Wait a minute (I've yet to purchase the game) - Are you seriously telling me that the majority of the exploration I'll be doing in the game will be confined to this Kirkwall city that I was trying to get to in the demo? I'll be exploring... a city!? But... that's crap! Isn't it?

I'm level 10 or so and have yet to run into any area large and/or open enough to require what I'd call exploring.

The game is basically a fast travel map tying a handful of tiny---read: console memory footprint friendly---areas. Most of these areas are unlocked via story/quest, not exploration.

There are a couple largish areas in Kirkwall, but they're mostly barren, lifeless areas where the quest NPCs show up on the minimap and the rest of the NPCs are standing around saying little and doing less.

The game follows the Mass Effect 2 method, streamline out most of the gameplay in favor of storytelling

Spoiler

dumb it down for console

. I still like both games, but neither of them are what I want out of a CRPG.

 

[Kunohara]

Managed to just walk into a Futureshop and grab one of two copies of the signature edition. No pre-ordering shit. Traded in Reach cause I'll be getting another copy from that Live deal. On top of the $25 gift card I had, only had to pay $12 for it.

Played for 5 hours yesterday, and I am fucking loving it. I had to stop myself cause I had to sleep for work.

 

[mujun]

Just put an hour in. Love it so far. Seems like exactly what I wanted out of the first game but didn't get, Mass Effect in a fantasy setting basically. Still I've only played an hour, maybe I'll end up hating it and wanna complain about it like most of the other people in this thread

 

[hiryu]

I'm only about 2 hours in but I'm quite enjoying it. The first ogre fight was really difficult on hard difficulty. My whole party died and I ended up kiting the remaining Urloks for 10 minutes. I had completely used every potion I had too. I'm playing as a mage but I might restart as a warrior or rogue. I don't want my main character to be the heal bitch.

I do really miss the pulled back iso view from the first game though. Sometimes in combat lining up a spell can be a pain in the view I have.

 

[Moofers]

Put in a few hours yesterday. I think its great so far. I'm really liking the characters and writing and I do feel like I'm out on a grand adventure. Looking forward to putting in more time tonight.

My only complaint so far? My Signature Edition sword looks kind of like a giant bowling trophy. Seriously, it's got a weird design. 3 handles and a big chunk of metal that looks more blunt than sharp. But whatever. Small potatoes. As long as the story is good and I get to bang some chicks along the way, I'm happy.

Also, I got the extra-XP trick to work in a few quests that end with cutscenes. Its weird because the cutscene plays again absent the speaking character but you get the xp again afterwards.

 

[whatevermort]

Performance is terrible with DX10 and DX11 on nVidia cards. Someone needs to fix this.

It runs at 60 one moment, and 10 the other. It's more of a weird stuttering, actually.

Even with the update nVidia put out that claims to fix Dragon Age 2 problems? (You're looking for Beta 267.26, which has special fixes for Dragon Age 2 and Homefront included.)

 

[shantyman]

One simple question: If I loved the first one, what will I think of this one?

 

[loganclaws]

I just love the polarizing reaction this game is getting. It's so clear cut, console players are loving it, PC players are hating it. I guess Bioware succeeded in meeting their objective.

 

[Truant]

Even with the update nVidia put out that claims to fix Dragon Age 2 problems? (You're looking for Beta 267.26, which has special fixes for Dragon Age 2 and Homefront included.)

Yep. No noticeable improvement. I'm on a GTX295, so it's not a DX11 card, but I'm using the DX11 renderer because it scales to DX10.

 

[Hyphen]

Think of it this way, DA:O was to Startrek: TNG, what DA2 is to Startrek: DS9. In DA2 you primarily adventure in and around Kirkwall, but Kirkwall is much more robust than the cities in DA:O and most of your game will be spent dealing with the various factions in Kirkwall, either working for or against them.

Other than viewing a handful of Star Trek: TNG episodes, my knowledge of anything 'Star Trek' is quite limited. But I think I know what you mean. However, I have to admit that I'm not looking forward to "dealing with various factions in Kirkwall" if that makes up the majority of the game. A large part of my 70-hour love for Origins stems from the feeling of being part of a huge adventure - Such us going after the

Spoiler

Urn of Sacred Ashes

or venturing into the

Spoiler

Fade

. What made these parts of the story so exciting for me was reading about them in the codex first, and then realising that parts of my main quest would involve them. Now it's all about dealing with factions in a city? I realise that Dragon Age 2 is a different story from Origins, and so it will be whatever Bioware decide it to be, and not what I want it to be. I just hope it will give me that same feeling of adventure that Origins did. But reading about being within a city (no matter how large it is), and dealing with factions doesn't sound like an adventure to me. However, Moofers has stated that after only a few hours he feels like he's "out on a grand adventure", so maybe I'm just worrying over nothing.

I'm level 10 or so and have yet to run into any area large and/or open enough to require what I'd call exploring.

The game is basically a fast travel map tying a handful of tiny---read: console memory footprint friendly---areas. Most of these areas are unlocked via story/quest, not exploration.

There are a couple largish areas in Kirkwall, but they're mostly barren, lifeless areas where the quest NPCs show up on the minimap and the rest of the NPCs are standing around saying little and doing less.

Hmm... Not what I was hoping to hear. Thanks for letting me know though.

 

[Fimbulvetr]

Still don't like the fact a huge chunk of the game consists of omg you need gold to advance the story so spend hours running back and forth in the same city with repeating dungeons and houses that are identical inside.

Wait. So copy/pasta quests are now mandatory?

 

[Ceebs]

Wait. So copy/pasta quests are now mandatory?

The first quest after the intro is literally "Go earn 50 monies to finance an expedition into the Dark Roads"

 

[Moofers]

Managed to just walk into a Futureshop and grab one of two copies of the signature edition. No pre-ordering shit. Traded in Reach cause I'll be getting another copy from that Live deal. On top of the $25 gift card I had, only had to pay $12 for it.

Played for 5 hours yesterday, and I am fucking loving it. I had to stop myself cause I had to sleep for work.

What is this you're talking about?

 

[JudgeN]

I'm level 10 or so and have yet to run into any area large and/or open enough to require what I'd call exploring.

The game is basically a fast travel map tying a handful of tiny---read: console memory footprint friendly---areas. Most of these areas are unlocked via story/quest, not exploration.

There are a couple largish areas in Kirkwall, but they're mostly barren, lifeless areas where the quest NPCs show up on the minimap and the rest of the NPCs are standing around saying little and doing less.

The game follows the Mass Effect 2 method, streamline out most of the gameplay in favor of storytelling

Spoiler

dumb it down for console

. I still like both games, but neither of them are what I want out of a CRPG.

Still don't like the fact a huge chunk of the game consists of omg you need gold to advance the story so spend hours running back and forth in the same city with repeating dungeons and houses that are identical inside.

This sounds awful, will wait till "ultimate edition" is released.

 

[kai3345]

One simple question: If I loved the first one, what will I think of this one?

You will most likely hate it

 

[Arjen]

Still not sure about getting it. I could use a new game, but no customising your party's gear, walking in the same city 80% of the time are making me hesitate.

 

[cleveridea]

Not feeling it so far after 2-3 hours. I don't feel connected to the world, and I think I blame the simplified towns (LOL no S needed). I miss stealing more than I expected to - not because I think its such a well done feature (most items were boring in origins and you didnt fear being caught) but because. combined with the fact that EVERY villager etc would speak, it felt like places were populated with real people. In DA2 most villagers etc are meaningless background scenery. Similar with the lack of ingredients eg herbs.

Also, I found playing the Rogue didn't really gel well with the faster combat system - instead of planning my attacks carefully, I felt like I needed to just get in there and attack as fast as possible (and spam powers). Also, I find the teleport backstab cool in theory, but in practice annoying and disorienting.

First time I have ever been disappointed by a Bioware release (loved ME1, ME2, DA:O, KOTOR, even Jade Empire to a lesser extent). I'll give it the benefit of the doubt, and try a different class (Mage).

 

[Kinspiracy]

same site who gave Mass Effect GotY.

So in other words very trustworthy then.

 

[Rubezh]

First time I have ever been disappointed by a Bioware release (loved ME1, ME2, DA:O, KOTOR, even Jade Empire to a lesser extent). I'll give it the benefit of the doubt, and try a different class (Mage).

I'm only 5 hours in and I can relate to your experience. It's been underwhelming especially with the series of copied and pasted quests. I'm hoping after the Deep Roads the game will pick up and there will be some more meaningful story.

 

[Salaadin]

Anyone else on PC getting some bugs?

For one, the skill description that appears when you mouse over wont go away at points. Itll stay up during cutscenes and fights and wont go away unless I mouse over another skill. Its annoying.

Another is when Im switching characters mid battle. Ill pause, switch to Beth, issue a command, and then switch back. Upon switching back and unpausing, I can no longer issue commands to my character. Party members and enemies are unclickable leaving me standing there worthless. The only way I found to fix that is my using the party member section of the UI and reselect someone there and then switch back again. Suddenly it works again.

 

[Patryn]

The journey from shit mountain to Kirkwall being a quick animated cutscene is much more glaring omission. You could have explored a port town in Ferelden that is in chaos as masses of people are fleeing across the sea to escape the blight. They could have shown the journey by ship which would let you see what sea travel is like in the world (they could have done some sea monster combat or pirates as well). The description of Kirkwall in the animated cutscene also sounds about 10 times cooler than the bland city we ended up with.

About 6 hours in and every quest I have done so far could have been pushed into that year when you were working off the debt. No reason to gloss over that and then have me start doing sidequests right away so I can make an arbitrary amount of money to do the next story mission.

So much this. I don't necessarily have a problem with making the main quest be earn 50 Gold, as that's directly cribbed from Baldur's Gate 2, if you recall. But the problem is that they could have taken some of those quests and had them pushed into that year and it would have given some flow to the narrative.

As it is, they frame that you have to make this great sacrifice for your family, and it's a terrible price to pay, except you never actually pay for it. You supposedly start to make a name for yourself, but the game never explains how.

It's cheap and lazy storytelling.

 

[Lonewolf_92]

Silly question - how do you even change party members? There doesn't seem to be an option in the wheel.

Look for a big horn around the entrances of their normal hangouts (like the front door of The Hanged Man), click it to select your party.

So....do DA:O saves do much other than passing references? I recently moved and didn't bring my PC (which I played DA:O on). I am considering buying it for the PS3, but if DA:O actually means something in DA:2, might just wait to bring my PC with me then.

Spoiler

You can encounter several major and minor characters who either interacted with or were effected by the Warden. You can have an encounter with a former Werewolf that was part of the group that could be saved by the Warden who is being threatened by an Elf whose mother he had killed while he was a Werewolf, for example.

 

[Gvaz]

WTF? a 9.2 from Gametrailers?!

Edit: They gave Origins a 9.1

If you watch the video, you notice he actually has a LOT of complaints, but then goes on and gives it 8 and 9s in everything but presentation (which was a high 7 iirc)

The end result doesn't match what's said leading up to it. :\

 

[Darklord]

If you watch the video, you notice he actually has a LOT of complaints, but then goes on and gives it 8 and 9s in everything but presentation (which was a high 7 iirc)

The end result doesn't match what's said leading up to it. :\

That's like all reviews so far it's weird. "Lots of backtracking, gets boring being in one area, copy and paste dungeons, will replay right away. 8.5" Err, what?

 

[Rahxephon91]

If you watch the video, you notice he actually has a LOT of complaints, but then goes on and gives it 8 and 9s in everything but presentation (which was a high 7 iirc)

The end result doesn't match what's said leading up to it. :\

Yes and he also points out that the game is really fun and that the story are still great.

Just because a review also states the flaws dosent mean it can't still give a game a high score.

 

[webrunner]

Now that people are playing it.. is the dialog wheel locational like ME (ie, is Upper Right always nice?)

 

[Gvaz]

That's like all reviews so far it's weird. "Lots of backtracking, gets boring being in one area, copy and paste dungeons, will replay right away. 8.5" Err, what?

Probably some ingrained expectation that anything below a 7/10 or similar means to the industry "SHIT GAME" and they certainly won't get invited to review the game before release again.

It's kind of stupid because while 7/10 is not bad, it's much more deserving of a score for this game, to me. Origins was a 9/10 for me, while ME1 was an 8/10 and ME2 was an 7/10 or 7.5/10.

I actually prefer a 5 star system because of the huge disconnect and gap between 1-7 and how to quantify it.

So in this case I'd say 3/5, 4/5, 3.5/5, and 3/5 respectively. Doesn't look so bad now, does it?

 

[Kunohara]

What is this you're talking about?

I'm not sure if it is still going on, but if you sign up for a year of Live through the dashboard, it's 20% off, and you get to choose from 4 games to get for free. Reach, Fable 3, and two other Kinetic games. If you don't see the ad on your dashboard, it's most likely over by now.

 

[Riddler]

Now that people are playing it.. is the dialog wheel locational like ME (ie, is Upper Right always nice?)

No, Actually you get alot of "?" and many more actual choices. Reminds me of Witcher how the choices actually effect how things play out in future events.

 

[Lonewolf_92]

Now that people are playing it.. is the dialog wheel locational like ME (ie, is Upper Right always nice?)

Generally, yes. Although certain conversation lines can lead to one or more being replaced (for example, I ended up with two flirt options and one "heartbreak" one during a conversation with Anders. Which is really kind of annoying as I didn't want to flirt with him with my male mage Hawke, yet I want to be his friend. Just not that kind of friend. ;p)

 

[Confidence Man]

So are there items like traps that the rogue can set? Can you swap between two weapon sets during a fight (e.g. can rogue swap out daggers for a bow on the fly?) And how exactly does coercion work?

 

[bluedeviltron]

After about 4 hours of playing, all I can do is laugh at the clowns comparing this game visually to Origins.

And the gameplay is really [no... really] more Dragon Age: Origins. The backlash is insane.

That said, there are a couple of technical issues on PC that need to be addressed immediately:

-Stuttering in cutscenes (I'm on an ATI 4870, so it's not exclusive to Nvidia cards), and less often in-game.
-Poor dialogue mix. I have to turn up the volume in every cutscene to understand what people are saying while the sound effects and music destroy my eardrums.

 

[dark10x]

-Stuttering in cutscenes (I'm on an ATI 4870, so it's not exclusive to Nvidia cards), and less often in-game.

Actually stuttering? I'm on a 5870 and I don't see any stuttering, but all of the animation is played at 30 fps. So, even when FRAPS reports 60 fps and you can see particles flying around at 60, the actual camera motion and character animation all runs at half that rate. They DO like to cut between realtime and video at times, which makes the transition less jarring, but it's still disappointing. DA:O has this same issue.

 

[Stahsky]

After about 4 hours of playing, all I can do is laugh at the clowns comparing this game visually to Origins.

And the gameplay is really [no... really] more Dragon Age: Origins. The backlash is insane.

That said, there are a couple of technical issues on PC that need to be addressed immediately:

-Stuttering in cutscenes (I'm on an ATI 4870, so it's not exclusive to Nvidia cards), and less often in-game.
-Poor dialogue mix. I have to turn up the volume in every cutscene to understand what people are saying while the sound effects and music destroy my eardrums.

I've seen some wild and crazy FPS drops in cutscenes (thought my game crashed each time)

I felt the pacing was pretty horrible for the first 4 hours, but I spent nearly all of that time doing side quests, so that may have been partially my fault. Once I actually started working on the main story, it began to pick up pretty well. I'm having a lot more fun now.

As far as PC playing is, it feels pretty much exactly like Origins. Just missing a couple of minor elements. Combat is a bit faster, too.

And yeah, aside from shit mountain, the rest of the game looks pretty nice with the High Res textures. Nothing to brag about, though.