Yahtzee's mad because the story...wasn't good enough? He's right, that's just not usually his style. Usually he bitches about how much a game with a good story won't just shut up and let him randomly murder people. Here he's saying the opposite.

Oh, and he's wrong about the combat, that's the saving grace of DA2, the combat is way more fun than the first one, even if it probably doesn't translate very well to a console controller.

I've been playing Dragon Age II and I'm enjoying it, but not nearly as much as I enjoyed Dragon Age Origins. This one feels rushed and I don't like not being able to put different armour on the companions.

The combat spawns are very annoying and the combat in general feels more hack and slash with less strategy...

Tags for this video have been changed from 'yahtzee, ramblomatic, Dragon Age, RPG' to 'yahtzee, ramblomatic, Dragon Age, RPG, freud freud, after eight mints' - edited by calvados

It always baffles me how Yahtzee often chooses to play the console versions of games when there is a PC version available the same day. That would have taken care of the gripes about auto targeting and mashing the attack button. And since the control is so much better, it does allow you to concentrate on tactics and positioning. I guess maybe he knows most viewers will be playing on consoles as well, and wants to share their pain.

Ultimately I thought the game was worthwhile because it's about 70% of what you'd expect form a Bioware game, and that's still better than most RPGs. Disappointing, but an enjoyable sort of disappointment.

>> ^entr0py:

Ultimately I thought the game was worthwhile because it's about 70% of what you'd expect form a Bioware game, and that's still better than most RPGs. Disappointing, but an enjoyable sort of disappointment.


Totally agree. I was disappointed, but only because I expected more from a Bioware game. It's still better than most of the stuff out there.

Bioware seems to be on a feature-removal streak in the last couple years. First they gutted ME2 and now DA2.

I'd probably enjoy both games more if they weren't Bioware games because then I wouldn't have KOTOR expectations. Of course if they weren't sequels to overall superior games, that would help, too.

The only RPG that I've been able to finish since KOTOR was ME and ME2, only because the shooter mechanics was fun. I don't know if the writing in RPGs is getting worse, or I'm just growing old and jaded, but everything since KOTOR seems so cliche and boring.

>> ^entr0py:

It always baffles me how Yahtzee often chooses to play the console versions of games when there is a PC version available the same day. That would have taken care of the gripes about auto targeting and mashing the attack button. And since the control is so much better, it does allow you to concentrate on tactics and positioning. I guess maybe he knows most viewers will be playing on consoles as well, and wants to share their pain.
Ultimately I thought the game was worthwhile because it's about 70% of what you'd expect form a Bioware game, and that's still better than most RPGs. Disappointing, but an enjoyable sort of disappointment.


I'm surprised you say that.

I felt that Dragon Age Origins was not quite there, but the best RPG released since baldur's gate/fallout (proper fallout, not oblivion wasteland fallout) days. I was very disappointed by Dragon Age 2. Felt completely rushed. If they had released more of the same (same engine) then i'd have accepted that and been happy to have it. If they improved on it, i'd be impressed. Instead, it seems they rushed out something which went counter to the brilliant setup they made for themselves with Origins.

I felt that Dragon Age Origins was 200% of what i'd expect from a "modern bioware" game, which made the game enjoyable. I felt that Dragon Age 2 was about what i'd expect from a modern bioware game, which is why i didn't play it past about 15 minutes.

By modern bioware, i mean past about 2005. Sorry, i'm not a console player, i have much higher standards and i do not accept mass effect as a good rpg. I'm a bit snooty about my rpgs, you can blame that on being spoiled by an extremely high standard of bioware/interplay rpgs when i was a kid.

He is right on every point. The combat is far worse if you ask me compared to the original. Yes it has a lot of flash and style and gibs raining everywhere but unless your a huge Soul Caliber fan you'll find battles are over so quickly and things are so chaotic that there is absolutely no tactics to them what so ever. Even the big battles with the dragons require no more thought than the random gangs that look like each other that assault you at every other point in the game. And I played it on Hard even as I had heard that it adds a bit more challenge and lets you strategize much more, but I found it just wasn't the case in all but perhaps three or four fights through the entire game.

In the end the game is a down and out failure and EA knows it. The game had zero actual plot, crack addict (or 2 year old attention span) combat, no exploration, completely linear zones, the same two dungeons for 15 different events and largely boring characters with a tenth the draw and character of the originals companions.

My biggest complaint about DA2 is the lack of content. Sure it's a fairly long game but I spent 45 hours in the game and I did every single thing there was to do. I did every quest, found every resource node, every single bit of lore to be found, all of it. Likewise I did the same with my first run through of DA:O only it took me around 200 hours for that one because it was so deep of content and rich of story that I enjoyed every second of the game. Some I'm sure (if not most of the console players) ran through the game and ignored all the little interesting bits of story you could find, lore you could discover and all the side events and cool tidbits you could gain by exploring the world and it's deep history. But I personally love that stuff so when I discovered that it was sorely lacking in the sequel I was most disappointed.

I'm not saying Origins was without fault, but as a PC game that harkened back to the golden days of cRPGs it was amazing. I understand on the console the combat wasn't very good because it lacked the camera angles and the strategy of the PC version (It was developed as a PC game, EA just forced the game to be pushed back half a year so a console version could be made). But it was easily the best cRPG from Bioware since Baulder's Gate 2. Now I just hope EA learned a lesson. You cant push a game out in 1.3 years and expect it to even remotely compete with the original and perhaps the greedy fucks will give Bioware 2-3 years to make the third game.

>> ^Xaielao:

He is right on every point. The combat is far worse if you ask me compared to the original. Yes it has a lot of flash and style and gibs raining everywhere but unless your a huge Soul Caliber fan you'll find battles are over so quickly and things are so chaotic that there is absolutely no tactics to them what so ever. Even the big battles with the dragons require no more thought than the random gangs that look like each other that assault you at every other point in the game. And I played it on Hard even as I had heard that it adds a bit more challenge and lets you strategize much more, but I found it just wasn't the case in all but perhaps three or four fights through the entire game.
In the end the game is a down and out failure and EA knows it. The game had zero actual plot, crack addict (or 2 year old attention span) combat, no exploration, completely linear zones, the same two dungeons for 15 different events and largely boring characters with a tenth the draw and character of the originals companions.
My biggest complaint about DA2 is the lack of content. Sure it's a fairly long game but I spent 45 hours in the game and I did every single thing there was to do. I did every quest, found every resource node, every single bit of lore to be found, all of it. Likewise I did the same with my first run through of DA:O only it took me around 200 hours for that one because it was so deep of content and rich of story that I enjoyed every second of the game. Some I'm sure (if not most of the console players) ran through the game and ignored all the little interesting bits of story you could find, lore you could discover and all the side events and cool tidbits you could gain by exploring the world and it's deep history. But I personally love that stuff so when I discovered that it was sorely lacking in the sequel I was most disappointed.
I'm not saying Origins was without fault, but as a PC game that harkened back to the golden days of cRPGs it was amazing. I understand on the console the combat wasn't very good because it lacked the camera angles and the strategy of the PC version (It was developed as a PC game, EA just forced the game to be pushed back half a year so a console version could be made). But it was easily the best cRPG from Bioware since Baulder's Gate 2. Now I just hope EA learned a lesson. You cant push a game out in 1.3 years and expect it to even remotely compete with the original and perhaps the greedy fucks will give Bioware 2-3 years to make the third game.


It's fucking EA man. I haven't trusted them since battlefield 2 recieved shocking support. Releasing new expansion packs before they'd fixed a single bug in order to cash in. Releasing packs too soon so the game didn't even find a foothold.

I said i'd never buy an EA game ever again until it had been out an entire year and everyone uniformly said it was awesome. Someone told me 5 months or so ago that EA were changing their development cycle in order to shake off the ... atrocities to gaming that they'd contributed.

Guess they didn't get round to that after all? Colour me surprised. They are the major player in the gradual degradation of games over the years. These guys are spoonfeeding people warm shit, and people are going back for more. When did expectations get so low!?

Every change they made from DAO to DA2 was bad. In DA2, Combat is a confusing mess. Crafting, runes, armor, and even weapon mods are all completely pointless, tacked on as an after thought, and you can easily complete the game without any of that stuff. The interface was overkill. The DA:O interface is as easy to use as wikipedia, the DA2 interface felt like someone wrote a crappy and unnecessary flash overlay for wikipedia.

The change most people seemed to enjoy the most was the fact that the player character has a voice in this game. And yet oddly, I am more satisfied with the lack of voice in DA:O, because it required some imagination on my part. I felt attached to my Warden, where as in DA2 I felt detached, like I was watching a fictional character play out a story. Worse yet there are no maps in DA2, even though all the locales are attached o one another. The lack of geography added to the detachment.

Which brings me to comparing stories. DA2 had a very linear story. There were no game changing decisions to be made until half way through act 3, where you have to decide on Mages vs Templars, and that would decide what ending you get. DAO had half a dozen major decisions, and a couple a dozen minor ones, and new story arcs always opened up depending on your choices. In DAO, I controlled the fate of Ferelden, and in DA2 I was forced to surrender to fate.

Bottom line, DA2 did not really feel like a true RPG. Its like they left the RP part out and I was playing just a G (video game). Had they kept the DAO engine, and DAO combat, and DAO crafting, and NPC customization, and just made some graphic improvements, the game would have been a hell of a lot more fun.

*dead

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