Re: The Dragon Age Thread

[DSharrah]

I am disturbed by the amount of threads on BSN asking for qunari romances...

Well...I could see romances with someone of the Qun, Tallis for example...but Qunari in general - I guess someone has to love them...

[DSharrah]

I would postulate that the writers were hinting at long term plans, some of which were meant to be in DA2 but never panned out.

A lot in DA2 didn't pan out

I think that people don't give DA II the credit it deserves...if you look beyond how the game looked and played, and you look at the lore, there was alot of great things in DA II.  I wouldn't be surprised if you are right...I think that they always knew that they wanted to take the universe to a place that would have Thedas in conflict over Mages.  And not just because of the current climate of the world, but because it is such a great example of being "doomed to repeat the mistakes of the past"...and in a way, it allows players to "play and expierence" the conflict b/w the Chantry and Mages that creates such a huge part of the background of Thedas w/o having to do a "prequel".

Ahh yes, the lore.  Where mages can't simply "teleport" because magic doesn't work that way.  But they learned to cast spells that turn them invisible and let them run to a new destination at the speed of light where they appear at the same time they disappeared elsewhere.  Where a booming metropolis (by medieval standards) doesn't notice they're living in a portal to Hell, complete with demons living under the cracks in the sidewalks.  Where a man discovers the secret to the black powder, the most closely guarded secret in the world, and no one even asks how he learned it because the rest of the plot is too much of a clusterfuck to bother with something that's at least potentially explainable.  Where the majority of the story requires everyone involved to be functionally retarded to work.

Indeed, let us not look past the lore.

That's not fair Rif...some of that stuff is gameplay/mechanics not lore...and the rest is story mechanic meant to drive the story to a specific point. Now if you want to argue about the specific direction (or lack thereof if that is your opinion) of the story, fine...but I meant the lore from things like The Lost Thaig, Arwegian Scrolls, The Enigma of Kirkwall, etc.

[Rifneno]

I am disturbed by the amount of threads on BSN asking for qunari romances


...

Well...I could see romances with someone of the Qun, Tallis for example...but Qunari in general - I guess someone has to love them...

No they don't. Qunari lore. They don't have romantic relationships. They don't have sex for affection, love, or pleasure. They do it when they're told to, with whom they're told to, by the qunari in charge of figuring out who to breed with whom to make better genetic descendants. You may recognize this as a tighter, more restrictive version of something the nazis did. Aren't qunari grand?

That's not fair Rif...some of that stuff is gameplay/mechanics not lore...and the rest is story mechanic meant to drive the story to a specific point. Now if you want to argue about the specific direction (or lack thereof if that is your opinion) of the story, fine...but I meant the lore from things like The Lost Thaig, Arwegian Scrolls, The Enigma of Kirkwall, etc.

No, what's not fair is that people paid $60 for that piece of shit. The only part of that that's gameplay mechanics is the teleportation thing, and I'm quoting Gaider's official word on it. He claims there's no teleportation, but there is "invisible, run so fast you instantly appear elsewhere, and then instantly remove invisbility". It's canon. It's retarded, retarded canon. The story of DA2 was pure shit from start to finish. If you need to make everyone act in a manner that's impossible to believe for no reason other than to advance the story, then you've written drivel and it shouldn't be published by anyone, anywhere, at any time.

[Steelcan]

@Rif, at least the nazis enjoyed it

[Norlond]

http://blog.bioware.com/2013/08/28/the-dragon-age-keep/

[ZerebusPrime]

(in mock disbelief) You mean I don't have to sit here and replay all of Origins, Awakening, and Kirkwall Xtreme three times over to set up my save files?!  


Seriously, though. I think we all expected some sort of history generator.

[shep117]

Just a random thought on Dragon Age 2

I find DA2 pretty good, there are problems with it but I think it did exactly what ME2 did. We got bits about the chantry, the tension between the Templers and mages, The Qun and their extreme ways, and in DA2 we got to explore that in depth. Wrex and Tali tells us about their culture and we got to explore that in ME2. I think one of the problems with DA2 is that the narrative and the visual representation didn’t go side by side. The environments are way too bland, repetitive. In the original Bioshock most of the story is conveyed through environment, where as in DA2 it didn’t do much. Like in Varric’s mission, we meet a  servant who is terrified what Bartrand has done, and when we go in its just a empty generic room with Bartrand standing, if there were amputated body parts that could have made that encounter memorable I guess. Lore wise I find DA2 pretty interesting.

[Rifneno]

Just a random thought on Dragon Age 2

I find DA2 pretty good, there are problems with it but I think it did exactly what ME2 did. We got bits about the chantry, the tension between the Templers and mages, The Qun and their extreme ways, and in DA2 we got to explore that in depth. Wrex and Tali tells us about their culture and we got to explore that in ME2. I think one of the problems with DA2 is that the narrative and the visual representation didn’t go side by side. The environments are way too bland, repetitive. In the original Bioshock most of the story is conveyed through environment, where as in DA2 it didn’t do much. Like in Varric’s mission, we meet a  servant who is terrified what Bartrand has done, and when we go in its just a empty generic room with Bartrand standing, if there were amputated body parts that could have made that encounter memorable I guess. Lore wise I find DA2 pretty interesting.

- Comparing krogan, quarian culture to Tevinter and Qunari culture?  Not in the slightest.  We went to Tuchanka and the Migrant Fleet; we interacted with those cultured firsthand and saw how different they are and how they're paying for the sins of their ancestors.  I think the Ascension novel provided even better feel for the culture of the quarians, but that's neither here nor there I suppose.  Anyway, that is not what happened with DA2.  We did not go to Tevinter.  We did not go to Par Vollen.  We did not see these atrocities of cultures.  We have the word of a bitter emo scumbag and the "insights" of some bacteria representing the disease known as the Qun.  That people on BSN are asking for a qunari romance, let alone a qunari PC option, shows just how much that culture was NOT explored in DA2.  People wouldn't ask the impossible if they knew it was the impossible.  I only know it's impossible from reading dev chat logs in the DAO days.

In DA2, aside from the Deep Roads and DLC (half of which is the Deep Roads), we spend the entire game (sans tutorial) in one city and its immediately surrounding area.  The last game I played that so heavily restricted its story one small area was Chrono Cross back in the PSX era, and it sucked ass for doing it too.  We saw nothing but Kirkwall's ways, and Kirkwall was an eternally damned beacon of madness and tragedy.  Which was a huge secret.  What kind of game makes such a huge plot point such a deeply hidden secret?  Pretty much only message boarders know about the Enigma of Kirkwall and its implications.  It completely changes the morality of what's going on (and makes every character not native to the area an idiot for not noticing it).

But really the game is just a miserable failure because it's a framed narrative that's railroaded into a specific wall and there's nothing you can do to stop it, even though you should be able to.  Western RPGs, ESPECIALLY Bioware ones, have always been about giving players choices and letting them deal with consequences.  How many people do we have to let walk away even when Hawke should be given the option to kill them or do something with them?  Petrice is the most obvious mention, but there's also Cullen kidnapping Bethany for their concentration camp, Anders if he kills that girl in the sewers, FFS how can you seriously play a character that isn't 100% anti-templar when you consider Merrill?  She's a known blood mage, she's the most naive person to ever exist, and all you can do is help her bring a cursed murdermirror back to Kirkwall.  What the fuck?  That girl is a ticking time bomb protected only by triple-forged adamantine plot armor.  But you can't turn her in for being a dumbass blood mage trying to fix a portal to Hell because screw player choice.  Anders is possessed and you just watched him butcher some innocent girl?  LOL, good luck bringing him to justice (no pun intended).  Oh, now Meredith wants you to investigate some escaped mages?  Well suck it up, now you're pro-templar and you're going to hunt those mages down whether you like it or not.  If ME3 was like DA2, your options with the genophage cure would've been "encourage Mordin" and "tell Mordin not to, then look sad when he says he's going to do it anyway" without any "stop Mordin" option.

It even takes back choices made in the last game by retconning the fates of Cullen, Anders, Justice, and Leliana.  Oh, and any boon you asked for that wasn't selfish or giving the Wardens Amaranthine.  Gave the Dalish their lands?  Retconned.  Gave the Circle their freedom in Ferelden?  Retconned.

And you think this pile of dogshit is in any way acceptable?  "pretty good" even?  You need to get some higher standards.  DA2 was an epic failure on every level.  From storyline to gameplay, even graphics, everything was utterly pathetic.

[shep117]

Just a random thought on Dragon Age 2

I find DA2 pretty good, there are problems with it but I think it did exactly what ME2 did. We got bits about the chantry, the tension between the Templers and mages, The Qun and their extreme ways, and in DA2 we got to explore that in depth. Wrex and Tali tells us about their culture and we got to explore that in ME2. I think one of the problems with DA2 is that the narrative and the visual representation didn’t go side by side. The environments are way too bland, repetitive. In the original Bioshock most of the story is conveyed through environment, where as in DA2 it didn’t do much. Like in Varric’s mission, we meet a  servant who is terrified what Bartrand has done, and when we go in its just a empty generic room with Bartrand standing, if there were amputated body parts that could have made that encounter memorable I guess. Lore wise I find DA2 pretty interesting.

- Comparing krogan, quarian culture to Tevinter and Qunari culture?  Not in the slightest.  We went to Tuchanka and the Migrant Fleet; we interacted with those cultured firsthand and saw how different they are and how they're paying for the sins of their ancestors.  I think the Ascension novel provided even better feel for the culture of the quarians, but that's neither here nor there I suppose.  Anyway, that is not what happened with DA2.  We did not go to Tevinter.  We did not go to Par Vollen.  We did not see these atrocities of cultures.  We have the word of a bitter emo scumbag and the "insights" of some bacteria representing the disease known as the Qun.  That people on BSN are asking for a qunari romance, let alone a qunari PC option, shows just how much that culture was NOT explored in DA2.  People wouldn't ask the impossible if they knew it was the impossible.  I only know it's impossible from reading dev chat logs in the DAO days.

In DA2, aside from the Deep Roads and DLC (half of which is the Deep Roads), we spend the entire game (sans tutorial) in one city and its immediately surrounding area.  The last game I played that so heavily restricted its story one small area was Chrono Cross back in the PSX era, and it sucked ass for doing it too.  We saw nothing but Kirkwall's ways, and Kirkwall was an eternally damned beacon of madness and tragedy.  Which was a huge secret.  What kind of game makes such a huge plot point such a deeply hidden secret?  Pretty much only message boarders know about the Enigma of Kirkwall and its implications.  It completely changes the morality of what's going on (and makes every character not native to the area an idiot for not noticing it).

But really the game is just a miserable failure because it's a framed narrative that's railroaded into a specific wall and there's nothing you can do to stop it, even though you should be able to.  Western RPGs, ESPECIALLY Bioware ones, have always been about giving players choices and letting them deal with consequences.  How many people do we have to let walk away even when Hawke should be given the option to kill them or do something with them?  Petrice is the most obvious mention, but there's also Cullen kidnapping Bethany for their concentration camp, Anders if he kills that girl in the sewers, FFS how can you seriously play a character that isn't 100% anti-templar when you consider Merrill?  She's a known blood mage, she's the most naive person to ever exist, and all you can do is help her bring a cursed murdermirror back to Kirkwall.  What the fuck?  That girl is a ticking time bomb protected only by triple-forged adamantine plot armor.  But you can't turn her in for being a dumbass blood mage trying to fix a portal to Hell because screw player choice.  Anders is possessed and you just watched him butcher some innocent girl?  LOL, good luck bringing him to justice (no pun intended).  Oh, now Meredith wants you to investigate some escaped mages?  Well suck it up, now you're pro-templar and you're going to hunt those mages down whether you like it or not.  If ME3 was like DA2, your options with the genophage cure would've been "encourage Mordin" and "tell Mordin not to, then look sad when he says he's going to do it anyway" without any "stop Mordin" option.

It even takes back choices made in the last game by retconning the fates of Cullen, Anders, Justice, and Leliana.  Oh, and any boon you asked for that wasn't selfish or giving the Wardens Amaranthine.  Gave the Dalish their lands?  Retconned.  Gave the Circle their freedom in Ferelden?  Retconned.

And you think this pile of dogshit is in any way acceptable?  "pretty good" even?  You need to get some higher standards.  DA2 was an epic failure on every level.  From storyline to gameplay, even graphics, everything was utterly pathetic.

You’re right we never did go to Tiventer or Par Vollen, I never thought it that way. All your points make sense, the game is restricted and the events in Kirkwall are polarized leaving not much room for thoughts and I agree with you about the Enigma of Kirkwall. It’s been long since I played DA2 and sine you mentioned about the Amaranthine, Dalish lands. Come to think of it, all the important stuffs you did in the Origin did not matter, importing saves didn’t make much difference. I guess DA2 is not worth any vouch.

[Norlond]

News from PAX: Playable Kossith (male/female) and tactical combat view is back
And apparently Leliana is a companion

[Vizard355]

News from PAX: Playable Kossith (male/female) and tactical combat view is back
And apparently Leliana is a companion

I didn't hear the Leliana thing, but when I heard the words "Qunari" and "Playable" in the same sentence I fangasmed.

[Steelcan]

News from PAX: Playable Kossith (male/female) and tactical combat view is back
And apparently Leliana is a companion

[ZerebusPrime]

Well, that takes care of Qunari romances.

But are they still considered deadly? That'd be an awkward way to kill a companion...

[Rifneno]

Leliana?  Companion?

[ZerebusPrime]

http://kotaku.com/the-next-dragon-age-is-crazy-ambitious-1232404991

Some might consider this spoilerish.

[RavenEyry]

"Accessories will actually have names and descriptions, a sorely-needed shift from the nondescript rings and necklaces of Dragon Age II.

"There will probably be one ring called 'Ring,' though," joked Laidlaw. "This ring was found in Kirkwall!""


Oh dear, I don't want to get hyped this early but Inquisiton, whatever the final quality may be, appears to be being made with care and effort.

[lex0r]

There is something off about how everything looks and moves. I don't know.

I'm sure it's a late alpha or early beta but I didn't expect it to look like this.

Show me moar damnit.

[Rifneno]

"Accessories will actually have names and descriptions, a sorely-needed shift from the nondescript rings and necklaces of Dragon Age II.

"There will probably be one ring called 'Ring,' though," joked Laidlaw. "This ring was found in Kirkwall!""


Oh dear, I don't want to get hyped this early but Inquisiton, whatever the final quality may be, appears to be being made with care and effort.

Humor was never a problem.  I'm not really worried about gameplay this time around.  I am, however, extremely doubtful that we're going to get any decent storyline with a coherent and acceptable moral.

[Jusseb]

It's indeed doubtful if we get any decent story line, because they have to build upon a story of DA2 that they didn't even finish.

The first gameplay video's show promising. Let's hope when we know more about the story line that it's just as promising.

[RavenEyry]

"Accessories will actually have names and descriptions, a sorely-needed shift from the nondescript rings and necklaces of Dragon Age II.

"There will probably be one ring called 'Ring,' though," joked Laidlaw. "This ring was found in Kirkwall!""


Oh dear, I don't want to get hyped this early but Inquisiton, whatever the final quality may be, appears to be being made with care and effort.

Humor was never a problem.  I'm not really worried about gameplay this time around.  I am, however, extremely doubtful that we're going to get any decent storyline with a coherent and acceptable moral.

The joke that made me laugh and the other comment were kinda separate but I foolishly put them together  

I also worry about the story, we know so little about it and it's the part that could ruin the whole thing even if the mechanics are the best in the franchise (ME3 )

[DSharrah]

Just saw this...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_detailpage&v=k8nOa0DzbVs

That gameplay footage looks pretty sweet.

[ZerebusPrime]

That looks.... dear me, I may need a new graphics card.

[shep117]

[Guest]

Honestly, it all looks damn good.

It only needs to measure up in the story department, imo. Still not ordering it (PC, non preorder or collectors) until that becomes clear to me.

[DSharrah]

Honestly, it all looks damn good.

It only needs to measure up in the story department, imo. Still not ordering it (PC, non preorder or collectors) until that becomes clear to me.

Not sure I will pre-order regardless...the benefits seem to come to the masses eventually anyways...it would have to something that really blows me away to pre-order, and as good as it looks (and as excited as I am to play it), nothing has come close yet...

[Sponsored content]