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Dragon Age 2 - [PLEASE POST IN NEW THREAD]
Dashui
Registered User regular
Registered User regular
Experience the epic sequel to the 2009 Game of the Year from the critically acclaimed makers of Dragon Age: Origins and Mass Effect 2. You are one of the few who escaped the destruction of your home. Now, forced to fight for survival in an ever-changing world, you must gather the deadliest of allies, amass fame and fortune, and seal your place in history. This is the story of how the world changed forever. The legend of your Rise to Power begins now.
Dragon Age 2 thrusts players into the role of Hawke, a penniless refugee who rises to power to become the single most important character in the world of Dragon Age. Known to be a survivor of the Blight and the Champion of Kirkwall, the legend around Hawke’s rise to power is shrouded in myth and rumor. Featuring an all-new story spanning 10 years, players will help tell that tale by making tough moral choices, gathering the deadliest of allies, amassing fame and fortune, and sealing their place in history. The way you play will write the story of how the world is changed forever.
Key Features:
* Embark upon an all-new adventure that takes place across an entire decade and shapes itself around every decision you make.
* Determine your rise to power from a destitute refugee to the revered champion of the land.
* Think like a general and fight like a Spartan with dynamic new combat mechanics that put you right in the heart of battle whether you are a mage, rogue, or warrior.
* Go deeper into the world of Dragon Age with an entirely new cinematic experience that grabs hold of you from the beginning and never lets go.
* Discover a whole realm rendered in stunning detail with updated graphics and a new visual style.
You are a Grey Warden, one of the last of a legendary order of guardians. With the return of mankind's ancient foe and the kingdom engulfed in civil war, you have been chosen by fate to unite the shattered lands and slay the archdemon once and for all.
Key Features:
* Immerse yourself in a shattered world on the brink of annihiliation
* Experience complex moral decisions that have game-changing consequences
* Sculpt your hero in your own image or fantasy
* Engage in bone-crushing, visceral combat against massive and terrifying creatures
News
08/25/2010 - The final Dragon Age: Origins DLC, Witch Hunt has been announced. It will be released on September 7th, 2010. For more information, visit the following link: http://dragonage.bioware.com/dao/witch_hunt/
08/17/2010 - The debut trailer for Dragon Age 2 has been released. You can view it at http://dragonage.bioware.com/.
07/08/2010 - Dragon Age 2 officially announced for the PC, PS3, and Xbox 360! A debut trailer will be released on August 17th, 2010.
07/06/2010 - Dragon Age: Origins - Leliana's Song addon is now available for purchase!
"Assume the role of Leliana, a young bard involved in a criminal ring that deals in political secrets. Accompanying her mentor Marjolaine on a high-risk mission, Leliana soon finds herself entangled in a game of intrigue that she cannot escape with just her beauty, charm, or stealth. The only way out of this game is to kill or be killed."
05/18/2010 - The Dragon Age: Origins - Darkspawn Chronicles addon is now available for purchase!
"You now fight as the Darkspawn! The city of Denerim, jewel of Ferelden, girds itself for war. As a hurlock vanguard, you alone hold the power to make thralls of your fellow darkspawn and drive them into the heat of battle. Heed the archdemon's call--Denerim must burn!"
03/16/2010 - Dragon Age: Origins - Awakening expansion pack is now available for purchase!
01/29/2010 - Dragon Age: Origins - Return to Ostagar addon is now available for purchase!
"Your memories of the battle of Ostagar will haunt you for years to come. It laid waste to your order and claimed the lives of many great men and women, including the brash young King Cailan and your mentor, Duncan.
Now, there are rumors that a fellow survivor of the battle has escaped from captivity and is seeking the Grey Wardens' help. The time has come for the Grey Wardens to make their return to Ostagar and exact their revenge upon the darkspawn."
11/03/2009 - Dragon Age: Origins is now available for purchase!
10/22/2009 - Dragon Age: Journeys is now available to play.
It's a 2D flash game, free to play in your browser, and set in the Dragon Age: Origins world. Playing the game will allow you to earn exclusives items for use in Dragon Age: Origins. http://www.dragonagejourneys.com/
10/13/2009 - BioWare's Social Network website is now live! http://social.bioware.com/
From here you'll be able to access friends, groups, uploaded character information, and more, as well as being able to download the Character Creator. You can make a character, save it for use with the full game, and even upload your character to the Social Network website.
You can also download the Character Editor directly from the following link: http://files.bioware.com/dragonage_cc_dl/DragonAgeOriginsCharacterCreator_en.exe
Dragon Age: Origins - PC Mods
Dragon Age Redesigned - This mod redesigns nearly every single NPC in the game, including party members and major characters, to better fit the lore of the game. "Nearly every change is done purely from my understanding of sliders. I wanted each design to stay as faithful to the lore of Dragon Age, but to enhance and improve upon the originals." This mod is compatible with most other mods and includes a variety of installation options. As the author has gone through a number of redesigns for various characters, you're able to choose which design you'd like to install.
Camp Chest - Too much equipment and too little inventory space? This adds an invaluable chest to the player camp for all the pack rats out there.
More Hairstyles - This mod adds new hair styles to the character creator.
Skip the Fade - Don't like the Fade mission, or just want to get through it quickly on a another playthrough? This mod teleports you directly to your companions instead of going through the entire section, as well as giving you all the attribute points, experience points, and codex entries you would have normally earned if you completed the Fade.
Lock Bash - This mod allows you to bash or force locked doors and chest opens, with a number of configuration options such as item breakage and stat requirements.
Character Respecialization - "This addon allows the player to reset the base attributes, specialization points, spells, talents and skills of the hero character and any of the party members to the default values and returns the remaining points so they can be spent again. The addon takes into account every bonus point the characters receive during the game including CE and DLC items, tomes, bonus points from the Fade, etc."
Madd Gift Guide - This mod edits the item description for gifts with the name of the companion it is intended for.
Gift Guide - Awakening - This is a companion mod to Madd Gift Guide that adds support for The Stone Prisoner, Return to Ostagar and Awakening.
Fenod Weapon Pack - This mod adds a number of new weapons to the party camp merchant.
Jojjo Weapon Pack - This mod adds a number of new weapons with included special effects to the game.
No Helmet Hack 1.6 - This mod makes helmets invisible "by placing helmets in the cloak slot. Each character maintains their own visibility setting. The helmets are visible on the inventory paperdoll for comparison and easy swapping."
Leliana's True Sacred Ashes Armor - This mod gives you an armor for Leliana modeled after the one she wore in the Sacred Ashes CG trailer.
Gray Warden Runic Armor - This mod gives you a powerful set of armor, three shields, and several swords as a variant of the Warden armor.
Dialogue Tweaks - This mod "changes companion dialogues for consistency, bug fixing, and adds new minor options. All dialogue is voiced by original game voice actors; these are changes to scripting, text, and dialogue conditions to make use of or correct existing dialogue." The creator suggests using the following two mods in conjunction with Dialogue Tweaks:
Alistair Dialog Patch - This mod "fixes many endgame dialogue issues relating to Alistair and his status, as well as some other adjustments to Alistair's general dialogue and romance-related dialogue."
Endgame Dialogue Fixes - This mod makes "corrections to endgame dialogue issues relating to Alistair and his status, as well as optional endgame slideshow changes to expand on the original story."
Dragon Age 2 - Articles & Reviews
1up Preview
Five Facts About Hawke In Dragon Age 2
Comic Con impressions from another forum; read it you silly geese!
Dialog System:
-IGN got a whole lot of things wrong about this. While the dialog system is now in a wheel, the intention of the wheel is to retain Dragon Age's dialog system while adding voice acting. Firstly, there are up to five response slots and five investigate slots on each wheel, and none of the response types in this wheel are static. There are a lot more response types than the three IGN listed, and the idea behind the symbols is to show the intent, not the result of your actions. Since there are only five response slots and more than five symbols, the types of responses you can make in each situation change as well. To give an example of how this works, you might be talking to a bandit who stopped you on the road and have the response types of friendly, aggressive, sarcastic, and flirty. Instead of defusing the situation, choosing the friendly option might result in you getting robbed since the bandit isn't scared of you, while choosing the aggressive option might scare them away. Since there is no morality meter, there is no arbitrary penalty for choosing one option over the other. However, if you're say, talking to a ten year old boy, some of the options like flirty might disappear while others are added in.
-The other thing they wanted to do was make your personality very mutable despite having voice acting. BioWare views Shepard as having a very pre-defined personality, where he is a stoic marine no matter what type of dialog you choose. With Hawke, they implemented the intent icons so you know what your character will do when choosing a dialog option. One of the issues with Mass Effect is that choosing the paragon option might result in you punching someone in the face, which could be the exact opposite of what you intended to happen, even though it would ultimately be the paragon choice. With Dragon Age 2, only the aggressive option would result in you punching someone in the face, but the morality of that decision won't be indicated. However, since you always [know] Hawke's intent, you can choose to make your character have the same generally friendly demeanor to both the kid picking flowers and the serial murderer if you really want to.
Combat System:
-I'm not entirely clear on what they changed for the console version of the game, so I can't really shed any light there.
-For the PC game, it largely plays the same, but so far they have announced three notable changes.
* The first change is that they wanted to remove what they viewed as the "Dragon Age Shuffle". When playing the game near release, they started to notice several issues with their combat system, and they gave three examples of the types of issues they wanted to solve. The first is that, after shield bashing someone, it would take so long for your character to get into place to attack again that the person you shield based would already be getting up, causing you to only get one hit in before they got back up. The second is that you could get into situations where your warrior would try to attack an enemy, but that enemy would be going for you mage, and your warrior was so slow at attacking that the enemy would be able to just run on past them. Once your mage started fleeing the oncoming attacker, you would end up with a situation where the mage, the enemy, and the warrior would run around in a train chasing each other, with none of them being able to attack or use abilities fast enough to change the situation. The third they listed was that after telling your rogue to shoot someone with a critical strike arrow, your rogue with start to pull an arrow out of the quiver, but in that time, the enemy may have moved out of range, causing your rogue to move back into range and then start pulling an arrow out of the quiver again. By the time your rogue was finally ready to fire an arrow, the target might already be dead. Their solution to this was to make all the abilities much more immediate and rework the engagement system so that you don't walk around until you're facing one of the exact angles the game expects you to be in to actually attack. If you want to fire a critical arrow, your arrow will actually fire instead of having a 1+ second warm up time, and instead of spending shuffling into position, your warriors will just leap into battle and start attacking.
* Another thing they changed was that they felt that almost all the interest of the battle system revolved around controlling your mage, so in order to try and make the other classes more interesting to use, they added combination attacks to the other classes as well. For example, sundering armor now increases the damage of backstab. Combined with the previously mentioned change, they feel that the other classes will be more interesting to play now.
* The final change they listed was that they felt there were a lot of mage spells that were either clones of other spells, pretty much useless, or so situationally useful that they were pretty much irrelevant. So for Dragon Age 2, they lowered the total number of spells with the goal of making a larger number of useful spells, and they also added a customization system to each of the spells allowing you to make fairly large changes to the way they work over the course of the game.
Companions:
-BioWare felt that in Dragon Age 1, when talking with your companions, the game penalized you for choosing any dialog options except the one that would make their reputation go up, causing players to always choose the dialog option their companions preferred, even if it disagreed with how their character acted during the rest of the game. In order to address this, BioWare changed the dialog system so that you could have an antagonistic relationship with your companions while still unlocking bonuses and not having them abandon you solely based on their reputation. However, having an antagonistic relationship with a companion character will change their combat behavior in ways they haven't revealed yet.
Dragon Age: Origins - Articles & Reviews
Witch Hunt the Penny Arcade Dragon Age comic
5/5 - Giant Bomb review - "However, as the sort of guy that has lovingly played an Infinity Engine game at least once every year for the past decade, I can think of no higher praise for this throwback than to say that Dragon Age: Origins leaves me feeling fairly confident I won't need to dig out the classics for this ritual next year."
9.5/10 - GameSpot video review - "If you're hungry for a fantastical original fantasy setting, an awesome story filled with memorable characters, and fun multi-layered questing, Dragon Age will fill you up. This is the RPG you've been waiting for, the one that's going to keep you up at night and invade your dreams."
94/100 - PC Gamer UK - "Roleplaying games now have a great deal to live up to."
9.2/10 - UK IGN PC - "Bioware’s achievements in all this are incredible. It cannot be stressed enough at the depth of the universe they have conjured. Every corner you look, there is a sense of age, of something old. Entire mythologies for multiple cultures have been brewed up, entire religions mapped out in their own belief systems, history that stretches back hundreds, if not thousands, of years. Cities look lived in, worn – majestic and squalid places that spill with times gone by and a sense of place. The castles look like they have been there for centuries, and truly, there is an uncertain sense that they have been. That Ferelden and its inhabitants were waiting patiently in the wings for all this time, waiting for their chance to shine. Well, like the Grey Wardens, their time has come. Let us unite then, and in the words of an old friend: We shall show those cursed Darkspawn our hearts – and then show them theirs."
92/100 - Absolute Games review - "It has everything that is sought by the most jaded fans of the genre..."
9.1/10 - Gametrailers video review
90/100 - Game Informer review - "Even more than Mass Effect, the nation of Ferelden feels like a fully realized setting with its own history, conflicts, and power groups."
8/10 - Eurogamer PC review - "In its desperation to infuse this setting with 'maturity' - be it of the sober, political kind, or the game's painfully clumsy gore and sex - BioWare has forgotten the key ingredient of any fantasy: the fantastical. Without it, you're still left with a competent, often compelling, impressively detailed and immense RPG, but it's one that casts no spell."
The People of Dragon Age: Origins – An Interview with Sten, Wynne and the Tower Guard
Dragon Age 2 - Screenshots
Dragon Age: Origins - Screenshots
Dragon Age: Origins - PC System Requirements
Windows XP Minimum Specifications
* OS: Windows XP with SP3
* CPU: Intel Core 2 (or equivalent) single core running at 1.4Ghz or greater
* AMD X2 (or equivalent) running at 1.8Ghz or greater
* RAM: 1GB or more
* Video: ATI Radeon X850 128MB or greater
* NVIDIA GeForce 6600 GT 128MB or greater
* DVD ROM (Physical copy)
* 20 GB HD space
Windows Vista Minimum Specifications
* OS: Windows Vista with SP1
* CPU: Intel Core 2 (or equivalent) single core running at 1.6Ghz or greater
* AMD X2 (or equivalent) running at 2.2GHZ or greater
* RAM: 1.5 GB or more
* Video: ATI Radeon X1550 256MB or greater
* NVIDIA GeForce 7600 GT 256MB or greater
* DVD ROM (Physical copy)
* 20 GB HD space
Recommended Specifications
* CPU: Intel Core 2 Quad 2.4Ghz Processor or equivalent
* RAM: 4 GB (Vista) or 2 GB (XP)
* Video: ATI 3850 512 MB or greater
* NVIDIA 8800GTS 512 MB or greater
* DVD ROM (Physical copy)
* 20 GB HD space
* OS: Windows XP with SP3
* CPU: Intel Core 2 (or equivalent) single core running at 1.4Ghz or greater
* AMD X2 (or equivalent) running at 1.8Ghz or greater
* RAM: 1GB or more
* Video: ATI Radeon X850 128MB or greater
* NVIDIA GeForce 6600 GT 128MB or greater
* DVD ROM (Physical copy)
* 20 GB HD space
Windows Vista Minimum Specifications
* OS: Windows Vista with SP1
* CPU: Intel Core 2 (or equivalent) single core running at 1.6Ghz or greater
* AMD X2 (or equivalent) running at 2.2GHZ or greater
* RAM: 1.5 GB or more
* Video: ATI Radeon X1550 256MB or greater
* NVIDIA GeForce 7600 GT 256MB or greater
* DVD ROM (Physical copy)
* 20 GB HD space
Recommended Specifications
* CPU: Intel Core 2 Quad 2.4Ghz Processor or equivalent
* RAM: 4 GB (Vista) or 2 GB (XP)
* Video: ATI 3850 512 MB or greater
* NVIDIA 8800GTS 512 MB or greater
* DVD ROM (Physical copy)
* 20 GB HD space
Xbox Live, PSN & Origin: Vacorsis 3DS: 2638-0037-166
Dashui on
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Horrible.
https://medium.com/@alascii
https://medium.com/@alascii
1) Party members cannot leave the group.
2) Pissing them off will bring different bonuses than being best friends.
The first thing I kind of hate. I want to be able to tell some stupid cow to get the fuck out.
The second thing is pretty outstanding. I've always hated having to game Bioware's party system to get the characters I want to work together.
edit: Also, new art style. Cool? Seems to me like they just made everything pointier.
Or possibly, and in a less ridiculously strawmanning manner, because some people like to see what the actual conversation options are, instead of getting one or two word summaries that can often take the conversation in completely unintended directions.
Preference doesn't come down to hating "modern day" RPG mechanics, this is just a different manner of conversation system, not an old one.
Actually, the way I read it is that they won't instantly leave the group. Which actually seems a step backwards in terms of reactivity, unless they're setting us up for an epic Yoshimo reveal.
And the more I look at the screen shots, the less I appreciate the change in art style (even ignoring the worse textures and maybe even polycount). DAO was not a bad looking game, so I don't know why they'd release such early screenshots that make 2 look even worse
I don't recall saying differently. But bringing out the "they just hate new things because they're new" argument doesn't do much. And is dumb. So please don't do it.
So if this isn't about the blight, what's with the blight dudes in the screenshot? Or is the blight just being minimized in its role, like the geth in me2?
Because in RPGs more options are better. Sure 3 of them might be slightly similar but I choose the one that is something my character would say. Much better than choosing Good, Neutral, or Bad.
You're forgetting half the options! You also have (persuade) good and (persuade) bad. Neatly color coded, of course
More frequently, it was just unrelated.
My guess would be that the Darkspawn remain, but that DA2 won't take place during a Blight. Which I find an interesting move on their part because all Bioware had to do was go, "Hay guys, want to go fight Darkspawn elsewhere in the world?" and people would've bought the game in droves.
I'll be interested to see further details about this game.
Besides, didn't they go out of their way to say that dwarves were unreasonably bitter about surfacers thinking of darkspawn as nothing more than a myth because they never went above ground except for blights
Speaking of the Dwarves, wasn't their underground road system supposed to stretch across most of the known world? If so, it is not unbelieveable that Darkspawn could be anywhere. Of course, I'm the first person hoping that they don't make them the main antagonists, but it would be weird to play Dragon Age and not see them.
Grow your settlements from mere camps to huge and sprawling cities
Decide on Elvish policies, Embrace or Shun them?
Quickly locate those who have magical abbilities to send to The Circle of Magi!
Train and grow armies to fight against the dreaded darkspawn!
Point #1 seems like a hasty extrapolation to me. Being a dick might not cause them to leave, but there are probably still character specific triggers that do.
Things can exist without being the focus. Darkspawn as sidequest content seems more than plausible. We're far north of Ferelden, closer to where Darkspawn are a more normal thing to see in limited quantities.
White FC: 0819 3350 1787
"Do you know of the legends of The Grey Wardens?"
"I know about their sweet ass Griffons"
"Would you like to hear a tale of The Grey Wardens?"
"Does it have Griffons in it?"
"Blah Blah Blah The Grey Wardens swoop in and protect mankind"
"...Griffons?"
Also, I really hope they don't streamline too much combat-wise on the console and I think the dialog setup in Alpha Protocol might work well (which I think was mentioned in the last thread).
The mage headgear is so godawful looking, I hope this is addressed in DA2.
At the end of Dragon Age, I really enjoyed how you got small summaries of what happened all across Ferelden thanks to your choices. It'll be great to see the long-term consequences of your choices happen in real time in the game.
As long as the sense of time is done better than DA:O.
I refuse to believe this is a promo image and it was actually leaked or released by accident.
It's some serious n64 graphics going on there
and no matter which one you choose, the outcome is the same, it's only the dialogue has changed
I was really disappointed in doing a ME2 run that was 100% renegade then another that was 100% paragon. There was very little actual difference between the two
Heh, my first playthrough as devout human noble rogue I was inclusive even to the "evil" characters.
My second playthrough as elf mage with chip on shoulder about elf discrimination not so much. Somehow Leliana wormed her way into my camp, but Wynne is rotting on top of the Mage tower and Zevran is rotting on the ground where he dared ambush me. Alistair will GTFO during Landsmeet.
It kinda looks to me like the second two mods might conflict. Anyone have any thoughts? Are these worth using?
You'd think some of this stuff might make it into an official patch.
He's right. I think DA2 looks fantastic, though obviously I am heavily biased.
I'm a neutral party, so you should e-mail me whatever info you have on the game and I'll let you know. :winky:
I'd be surprised if it didn't. I'm sort of surprised those were released, tbh.
It's not nearly as bad as people are making out though. RPG fans, flipping out? Never. I will say that I like default Hawke! He looks neat.
White FC: 0819 3350 1787
You would, philistine.
That's because he was made to pander to the unwashed masses and not the h@rdcorez such as I.
That being said, while I do like default Hawke, I always make my lead character black so I won't be using him.
And let me tell you, having a black character in DA:O for the human noble background was aaawwwkkward.