I loved DAO and I really like DA2. If it were not for one or two gripes, I would say that I enjoyed it even more than DAO. Loved the art direction, the new companions, the more personal story with stakes relating to family instead of "saving the world." The dialogue writing and voice performances were solid across the board and in particular Jo Wyatt (FemHawke), Victoria Kruger (Isabela) and Eve Myles (Merril) were especially engaging. Merril's Welsh accent was cute and when she was in the party it felt a bit like hanging out with Torchwood. I was blown away by the character design for the new Qunari and the default FemHawke was simply stunning.

With the high res texture pack installed, at Very High Quality on 1920x1080, DX11, SSAO, Diffusion DOF, High Quality Blur, 16 x AF, 2 x AA, the game looked fantastic and I was surprised that I got excellent frame rates playing on my laptop. The detail in some of the scenes with shiny golden statues, grey clouds moving in the background, even a few birds in the sky, was incredible, even when projected huge on the wall with my 1080p projector.

I have no idea about the experience on console, but playing Nightmare on PC the game is far more tactical and balanced than DAO, which seems to be the biggest improvement. Nightmare in DAO was a joke because you could simply spam cheap healing potions to get through anything. In DA2 I have to plan carefully and use all of the party together in a tactical way, especially when setting up cross class combos or complicated 100k-200k Assassinate crits that require lots of debuffs. And I still get my ass handed to me.

You also have to weigh your options a bit more carefully when deciding which talents to get and which companions to bring along. In general there are more benefits and drawbacks for all of these kinds of character progression decisions than there were in DAO. These character progression choices were very carefully designed and seem to be better balanced than DAO, where I found mages to be fun to play but massively overpowered in comparison with the other classes.

I haven't played all the way to the end yet and I understand some have complained that your quest-related choices during gameplay don't have enough impact on the ending. I can't comment on that yet, but if that is the case I would certainly see that as a disappointment.

I have put in about 110 hrs on my first playthrough (rogue Hawke up to beginning of Act 3) and then I started a new playthrough (mage Hawke) to help beta test Patch 1.02, currently up to 60 hours in the middle of Act 2 on that one. By my calculations, it seems that if you play on Nightmare and micromanage every party member instead of using tactics (I don't use tactics, instead I control all the party members), each playthrough is going to last a really long time (150hrs+). This is a lot longer than any of my playthroughs of DAO.

And I'm still enjoying it a lot after all this time. Yes, there are recycled maps, enemies spawning from thin air, and the city kind of feels a bit empty, but none of those things really bothered me. The fact that Disorienting Shot is bugged did bother me, but hopefully that will be fixed in Patch 1.03.

The only thing I really dislike about the game is all those side quests where you find an object in a chest and then a random person on the street gives you some gold. You end up only reading the journal to find out about these quests retroactively to figure out why the hell the guy just gave you gold. If only these quests could be given in a dialogue with the quest giver, or at a minimum as a posting on the Mage's Board or Chanter's Board, then they would feel like real quests. This was a big problem for me. I hope with DLC or expansions we will get a lot more meaningful side quests.

I suppose I also disliked the way that certain types of loot were turned into generic "junk." Maybe it's just the look of the "junk" icon or the fact that you can't click on any of these "junk" items such as books, including the book you get from Keeper Marathari. It all becomes meaningless crap. I don't mind the convenience of having a "sell all junk" button, but for those of use who like lore and role-play, it would be nice to be able to discard some of these items and see what they look like, or be able to read some of the books. I'm embarrassed to admit I had a lot of fun in New Vegas arranging some dinosaur toys in a pattern in my hotel room, for example. But this was a minor gripe compared to the fetch quests.

It's harder to care when my own character is a blood mage himself. The key difference is that Hawke is not a weak idiot who goes bat[censored] insane at the slightest provocation.

Well Archery in DA2 is much beefed up.

I prefer archery of Origins TBH. Not as flashy, but the skills and modes are more varied. Pinning shot is supposed to be the same, but with DA2's combat it seems useless. In Origins i usually pinned archers or mages to let a melee fighter close in on them, in DA2 it doesn't seem necessary with the melee fighters being able to close in faster (not to mention Scythe or it's Rogue equivalent), and the fights are generally fought over shorter distances. And there's nothing like Scattershot or Arrow of Slaying. Well, there are (Bursting Arrow and Archer's Lance), but they just don't compare.

Gabriel, you know my stance on it.

Obligatory posting of http://th03.deviantart.net/fs70/PRE/i/2011/079/c/7/da2__orsino_spoilers_by_fishmas-d3c451x.jpg

The game world doesn't really change all that much even though the game is supposed to be a ten year tale vwhich was supposed to be a big part of the game. I wasn't expecting any super major changes but Kirkwall feels extremely stale. While I support Some of the combat changes I don't like how waves of foes just appear out of nowhere. A good deal of the side quests aren't very interesting. The main story feels disjointed and disorganized but that just might be me. I could go on but I don't really feel like it. Overall it's a decent game.

Well, Dragon Age 2 got my attention more fast then Origins and Awakening, IMO I find the art-style unique compared to the DA:O one, the battle is ok for me and the story is average, better then Awakening but not as Origins, Overall the game felt like that Bioware tried to mix some Mass Effect content, it doesnt work like that, Dragon Age should be unique, and Mass Effect too, so, I hope to see the mechanics of the original Dragon Age for the next game,

BTW. what is this Jade Empire 2 rumours anyway?

You mean http://social.bioware.com/page/da2-patches?



It's not.

I do too, I'm just saying that they made basic attacks much more powerful.

In DA:O whats the best magic for a damager mage? I am trying to stay away from elementals. Also, how many of you dress your mage in armor? I find that there is not nearly enough variety in clothing like there is in armor (specifically heavy armor)

With or without friendly fire?

Mana Clash does the highest damage in the game, but only vs. spell casters.

To deal lots of huge damage in DAO, you need to do spell combos (most involve elemental magic)

Here is a list
http://dragonage.wikia.com/wiki/Spell_combinations

Im playing on normal so friendly fire isn't a factor, I don't care about killing the other random npcs that aren't in my group.

That's a very useful list.



But friendly fire is active on normal in DA:O...

Not to my party though.

http://dragonage.wikia.com/wiki/Difficulty_settings#Effects Unless you're playing on casual or maybe with some mods.

edit: Oh wait... you're not playing on a PC, are you? <_<

xbox

As I am playing through ME2 again, I realized that I started chapter three (?) in DA2... and never picked the game up again. I am still a bit astonished at the very wide gap between DAO and DA2 -for me. I played that first game four or five times through, the first playthrough remains one of my most enjoyable gaming experiences. I didn't think DA2 would be able to match it... but I honestly did not expect to be basically indifferent to the game. It just strikes me as odd - what worked in a fun way for Mass Effect 2 was utterly wrong for Dragon Age. There were just so many things that the did do that felt and play wrong, and so many things they didn't do that are sorely missed. I know a fair amount of it could be because the obviously rushed the game for whatever reasons. But they cut out the good character development and sharp dialogue and story telling that they were well known for. They pitched DAO as a spiritual successor to the excellent Baldur's Gate series, and they hit a lot of notes right. And then they... I dunno... chucked it out the window? It's like DA2 is a mockery of the kind of RPG they wanted to model the IP on.

I know I will go back one day and finish it. But happily playing ME and ME2, even replaying Ego Draconis... and watching the release date for the Witcher 2 approach... it may be a while before I am bored enough to finish Hawke's rather predictable and un-engaging tale.

You could go entropy and get the group paralyze and death cloud, but other then that elemental is where the damage is goign to come from for area effect. My latest Da:O mage did the Crushing prison and paralyze tree's and was pretty awesome at dueling since tough guys by himself and holding them up so the rest of the party could beat on them without return fire. Actually made the Revenats easy compared to my other PT's. spell combo list is a good tool to have as well.

I managed to play through the whole thing but it often felt like a chore. For my second run through, I'd intended to pause it while they did the patch, but now it's done I feel no real inclination to resume. The characters are good but ultimately I think it's definitely a bit of a "B list" game: fun (ish) at the time but not something that can really tempt me back for another crack at it. Which sets it apart from DA:O and the Mass Effects, sadly.


Dragon Knight Saga is good if you don't already have it: nicely rebalances the game and the expansion is enjoyable. Reminded me a bit of Tribunal inasmuch as it seemed like it would be claustrophobic but once I got into it I really lost myself.

It's interesting how I seem to be so opposite compared to so many people posting here. Although DA2 was definitely a bit weaker RPG than DA:O was, I was much more amused, shocked and surprised at the same time while playing DA2 than I was playing DA:O (don't get me wrong, I love playing DA:O just as much, just for different reasons). Whereas while playing ME2 I was just... meh. Neither amused, shocked nor surprised nor anything else. For me ME2 just lost the feeling of RPG-ing mixed in with space exploration that ME1 had and in fact it lost both - it is neither a proper RPG nor does it have that great feeling of exploration which ME1 had (although granted it does give you the ability to romance Tali... ARRRRRR). Yes, I agree, navigating that can-with-springs of a vehicle was certainly a bit of a scarring experience, but nevertheless exploring that square mile of terrain (as Yahtzee would put it) on those planets' surfaces was FUN and AWESOME and randomly discovering something which leads to a side-quest while exploring a planet instead of having EDI tell you "o hai, btw, you'll get a side-quest by landing here on this planet" as you approach a planet is so much more... there aren't even adjectives which could describe what "much more" it is, but it is. Funny things, tastes. :shrug:

The other schools aren't really about doing direct damage; some spells can, yes, but they don't have the damage capability of the Primal school. They're more about crowd control (generally Spirit), weakening (generally Entropy), or defense (generally Creation).

Personally, I like the Entropy spells. Paralyze enemies, put them to sleep, stun them with nightmares, have them kill each other, weaken them with hexes, and drop a nasty cloud on them. Aside from that, Spirit is effective, the Force Field line of spells in particular is excellent at shutting enemies down (and Crushing Force is powerful).

And, of course, Blood Magic. Blood Wound is the most overpowered spell in the game.

Being on the receiving end, I think that the entropy spells were always my least favourite: so it figures that they might some of the more effective things in a mage's arsenal. For some reason they never seem a compelling allocation of points compared to more visibly obvious things like fireball etc, but they are effective.

I've always preferred my magic to be more...subtle. I mean, sure, shooting a fireball into fools' faces is neat, but it's just so...basic. Now, doing something like making people freeze up, fall asleep, do things they would never imagine themselves doing, or just mind-controlling them...it's just so much more fun and dastardly!