Dragon Age 2

I have never been as disappointed by a video game as I was by Dragon Age 2. It's not that it's a terrible game (I'd say it's slightly below average). Rather the problem is that it's considerably worse than Dragon Age Origins in almost every respect.

Almost all of this game's faults come down to two factors. Firstly it seems incredibly rushed, as though Bioware have shipped a half finished game to cash in on the first game's success. Dragon Age Origins took five years to make, and it showed. The sequel took less than two years, and it plays like the developers just couldn't be bothered to make a better game. Secondly there have been numerous changes to try and appeal to those who didn't like the first game, but in doing so most of the things that made the original great have been lost. This means that gamers who didn't enjoy the first game might enjoy this, but anyone like me who loved Origins will feel really let down.

Dragon Age 2 is just under half the length of Origins. While this is still longer than some other games on the market the game is also much more repetitive than the first. The whole game takes place in one city and a few outlying areas. This would be OK if the city was interesting or changed over time, but it doesn't. The same people are standing in the same places years later, often saying exactly what they were years ago.The repetition is made even worse by the fact that maps are re-used again and again. One cave, one tunnel and one coast map are just recycled over and over. While previous games like Mass Effect and Origins re-used maps a little bit, I have never seen it done on such a scale as it was in this game.

The combat has also been changed to make it faster but less tactical. For the first few hours of this game I actually preferred the changes but over time it soon became dull. There are less spell combinations in this game, less abilities generally, and less variety in how enemies fight. Also you now have to constantly press the A button to attack instead of just needing to do it once. All of this I could live with if it weren't for the constantly spawning waves of enemies. When you kill some enemies, a fresh wave will just magically appear out of thin air to surround you. This makes tactical positioning of your party pointless.

Visually the game also looks at its worst in combat. Although Origins was certainly no oil painting, its combat at least looked better than in this game. Some of the animations make this game look more like a cartoonish Japanese RPG than a Western one. This would not be a problem in a new series, but why change from one game to its sequel? If gamers want a Final Fantasy game they can buy one. I bought this game as I wanted a game that would be similar to the first Dragon Age. Petite characters like Fenris swing gigantic swords with ease, while enemies explode in a spray of gore even when stabbed with a dagger.

The appearance of several major races like the elves and Qunari has also been completely altered. It's not that they now look bad; it just further serves to make the game feel unnecessarily different to the first. Weirdly the game is also set in an almost squeaky clean sci-fi like setting, even though it is meant to be a medieval fantasy.

The poor combat and graphics could have been forgiven if the game had a good plot and interesting characters, the things Bioware are famous for. It lacks either. The writing is the weakest I have ever seen in a Bioware game. At their best the main quests feel like they could be side quests in Origins, while the majority are just MMO style fetch quests that it's hard to care about.

Personally the most appealing feature of Origins and other Bioware games is the chance to make choices that alter the game world as you play through it. Dragon Age 2 gives the illusion of choice, but usually your decisions have little effect on the game. You can side with a faction throughout the game but you will still be offered the same choice to support or oppose them later on, making all previous decisions meaningless.

The characters in this game are also inferior to those in Origins. Varric is at least funny, Merrill has excellent voice acting and Isabella has her moments, but none of them has as much personality as the characters in the first game. Some of the games best moments come when Origins characters make cameos, which highlights the decline in this game's companions.

The best part of this game is the background dialogue between your party. Even if your interactions with companions are a bit lacking the way they chat to each other can be genuinely amusing. I ended up choosing my party based not on their combat abilities but on who I would rather listen to, and this feature of the game is probably the only thing that kept me going to the end. The only other positive I can think of is that your character has homosexual and well as heterosexual romance options, showing that Bioware are still one of the most progressive game makers.

In this game you now have a fully voiced character, which would be a step forward if the dialogue wasn't significantly worse. Bioware have borrowed a version of the Mass Effect dialogue wheel but it simply doesn't work in this game. Instead of getting to choose what you say you now have to choose a symbol and a few words which rarely represent what you will actually say. You can choose to 'decline quest' and end up badly insulting the quest giver.

One innovation in this game is that if you frequently choose good or evil dialogue options your character's voice will actually become more aggressive or friendly for all other dialogue. This doesn't really work in this game as the choices are usually about choosing a faction to support rather than being good or bad, but I would really like to see this feature used in Mass Effect 3 where it would work with the Paragon/Renegade system.

While I could continue listing this game's failings all day I think this is a fair summary of some of the biggest ones. If you didn't enjoy the first game and want a passable action game with some amusing background dialogue you could try this game, otherwise you are much better off just sticking with Origins.

First off, let me say that I am one of those die-hard fans of Dragon Age: Origins and, like the rest, I expected the second game to be on the same level, even if the producers decided not to continue the story of the original character, which was a letdown for many.

The first Dragon Age was one of those experiences you never forget, like a fantastic movie, but with much more personal involvement, since you get to model the fictional world according to your preferences. That game could hold you "trapped" in its magical world for hours on end, keeping you anxiously waiting for what will happen next. You would live through your character, laugh or cry with him/her and the rest of the companions.

That being said, Dragon Age II is nothing like its predecessor. At times, I felt sure I was playing a not so good DLC rather than a sequel. The general feeling I got from the game is that it was done in a BIG hurry. Which was to be expected, since the time of production was worryingly short for a Bioware game. But it's not just the short production time... I feel that this game has EA written all over it. It was made for fast profit, despite letting down so many fans. There are people out there who have been playing Bioware games since they first appeared. For them, this game is a very low blow.

In my opinion, Dragon Age II brings very few improvements upon the original. Since Origins was one of the biggest hits in RPG history, maybe the "if it ain't broke, don't fix it" principle should have been applied for the sequel. In terms of story, which is Bioware's strong point, the game mostly feels like a chore, like a rush through tedious obstacles in order to get to the "good part". For me, that part never really came.

The environment is perhaps the worst part of the game. The entire action takes place in one city (which feels smaller and smaller after running on errands for a couple of hours) and the surrounding area (also very limited). But that's not the worst part. You get to run around in the same caves and mansions over and over and not because you revisit old places, but because the "new" places are actually old ones copied and pasted. Yes, recycled maps, what JOY!

The characters are... interesting. The voice acting is amazing, but their personalities are very unilateral. X is totally against this, Y is totally for that, Z is completely obsessed with that... It gets boring and frustrating. Plus, you can't communicate with them whenever you want, like in Origins, but only at specific times, when the game tells you that you can. I love Mass Effect, but the dialogue wheel had no place in the Dragon Age world. And the fact that the main character is voiced doesn't make up for that.

I can't say much about the graphics, because I don't really care about that in a game, I much prefer a deep and engaging story. Some say it looks better than Origins, I say that the redesigning of certain races is not only bad looking, but also a bit of a disappointment. You can't create a universe that everyone knows and loves and completely change it in the sequel, because you think it looks cooler. What's up with that? Apples look like oranges now?

The combat is interesting, but I think they went from one extreme to the other. In Origins, combat was slow-paced and very tactical, in Dragon Age II it's ninja-style. You literally glide towards your chosen target and whack it with lightning speed. Also, you never really know how many guys you're fighting, since, when you think you've killed them all, a new batch falls LITERALLY from the sky (or, at times, magically appears behind you).

The inventory and leveling were completely redone and simplified. Well, simpler is not necessarily better. While the leveling feels somewhat better, since you don't have to go through numerous abilities you don't want in order to get to the ones you do, the inventory is awful. You get a new category of "junk" which is literally that, JUNK. You can only sell it (for very little coin, as well). The rings, belts and amulets have generic names, except for very few. You can't dress your companions, which is kinda cool, because their clothes are part of who they are, but that means that every single piece of armor you find that is outside of your class is useless.

To sum up this very long and incoherent review, I have to say that Dragon Age II is kind of bleah. It's an ok game with some interesting parts, but for Bioware's standards it's a joke. It's boring at times, repetitive, linear and you often feel like you have no idea what you are doing there, why you became a champion, what your ultimate goal actually is. You can't really relate to the other characters, since you get scheduled times with them, the NPCs are pretty bland, the quests all feel the same and nothing ever seems to change until the very end. It sometimes reminds me of MMOs where your goal is to do some identical missions in order to level up.

I was and still am very disappointed and I doubt I'll give it another go (I replayed Origins until my fingers bled). Some may like it, some do like it, but it's not my cup of tea. I had high hopes for this game and now I'm terribly worried about Mass Effect 3 and the future of this company in general.

I played through this game and was very disappointed - in fact I have since traded it in. I had high hopes for this game but its a let down in every department compared to Dragon Age Origins. You might say its pointless comparing it to the first game, but its a sequel, therefore its always going to be compared to the original - especially when its inferior!

The gameplay really suffers from the same type of quest, time and time again, in the same locations time and time again. The lack of a decent storyline, any character development is a massive let down. You basically turn up at Kirkwall, have to make a name for yourself by beating up a few people on some pretty meaningless quests, you end up in the middle of a civil war between the mages and templars, there's barely a reference to the original game other than the odd mention of Alistar, and Zeveran showing up towards the end of the game.

The truth of the matter is that the only thing thats improved from Origins is the graphics which you would expect, the rest is a shadow its former self.

If this hadn't been called Dragon Age 2 this game might have passed as a respectable title, the fact that claims to be a sequel to one of the best RPGs out there and fails in almost every department means its hardly worth 3 stars.