Dragon Age 3

[Sagacious-T]

Dragon Age 3 will be Bioware's focus at this upcoming E3.

The fanbase is pretty split after DA:2 took the series in a differe direction. DA:O fans are looking for a return to form, but DA2 fans want more action-based gameplay.

What do you guys want out of this game?

[Parn]

Dragon Age 2's combat was absolutely awful because it didn't know if it wanted to be an action game or an Infinity Engine RPG.  What I want is for them to make a decision to go with one or the other, and whichever is chosen, to follow through completely.  A pseudo-action game where you are mowing down enemies that come in waves but important abilities like provoke are on a 30 second recast timer is garbage design.

[Taelus]

Are fans really split? I was pretty sure almost everyone preferred DA:O's combat? I enjoyed DA2's fighting, but the encounter design was borked.

I'm open to this game. I dont' have any investment in the DA world, so as long as it's a fun and well-written RPG, I'll sweat out the details later.

[Yoda]

http://www.rpgfan.com/boards/index.php?topic=11646.msg270742#new

/eusis /yggdrasil

[Kevadu]

I'm still trying to figure out how DA2's combat is any different from DA:O's...

Sure, maybe it plays out slightly faster (but it's still pause-and-play so who gives a fuck), the animations are flashier, and by default you had to push a button a lot to attack (but that could be turned off and it was the first thing I did when I started the game...), but the nuts and bolts of the two games are exactly the same.  I guess I'm struggling to see how there can be so much outrage over such trivial changes.

The worst thing about the battles in DA2 wasn't the actual combat system, but the fact that the encounters were set up in such a way that enemies just spawned out of nowhere so there was no way to hold a meaningful formation.  No sense in sticking your tanks in front of your mages if new enemies are just going to magically appear on top of your mages.  So yeah, that part was completed borked.  Is that what we're complaining about?  Because to me that's an issue of encounter design, not the combat system.

Basically that's just yet another symptom of the blatant corner-cutting in DA2, just like the constant reuse of the same couple of dungeons.  It's just easier to make enemies spawn out of nowhere than to set up intelligent encounters.  DA2's biggest problem, by far, was just how rushed the game felt.  And I do find it at least a bit encouraging that they seem to be taking longer on DA3.

(Despite it all, I still liked DA2.  Better than the first one in some ways.  But then, I like politic-heavy stories that aren't necessarily about saving the world.  The conflict they set up in DA2 just felt more real.  Of course it was partially spoiled by some shitty characters...)

[Annubis]

A script that doesn't take me for an idiot.

[Eusis]

I'm still trying to figure out how DA2's combat is any different from DA:O's...

Sure, maybe it plays out slightly faster (but it's still pause-and-play so who gives a fuck), the animations are flashier, and by default you had to push a button a lot to attack (but that could be turned off and it was the first thing I did when I started the game...), but the nuts and bolts of the two games are exactly the same.  I guess I'm struggling to see how there can be so much outrage over such trivial changes.

That's kind of the problem actually: it was essentially the same gameplay system, but they made it PRETEND it was an action RPG, especially with how auto attack wasn't even there at all originally for consoles and had to be patched in. And I haven't seriously dug into the game yet but I'm generally tired of wave-based encounter design anyway, combat is a key part in these games but fuck's sake that doesn't mean I want to spend forever fighting things.

I hope they just fully embrace their Infinity Engine-style system, it's really disheartening how so many developers/publishers ostracized turn based combat starting in the late 90s, and it's even worse now that even systems like what Infinity Engine and Dragon Age have are considered unacceptable too. It's one of the things that made me kinda turn back to JRPGs, and why I pledged to the Divinity Original Sin Kickstarter.

[Alisha]

i played and enjoyed dragon age 1 and 2. though i got bored early on in awakening. my only problem with DA2 was how its all centered around one town as well the removal of several classes i liked in DA1.

[kofvscapcom]

I actually liked the skill progression in 2 better. In 1, if you were a dual-wieldiing/sword and shield/2 handed warrior, there was only really one skill path you could take while 2 kinda expanded that (for warriors at least). 2s combat problem was that you only get a few active skills and their cooldowns were FOREVER, so you're just stuck pounding away on that auto-attack. If the game's about a particular place again, I'd hope it'll be like Awakening. That expansion was really good and I enjoyed upgrading my keep and stuff. It's cool how that affected the ending you got.

[Carter83]

 I played both DA:O and DA2 and I liked the DA2 fights way more.
 Gameplay-wise, I consider DA2 to be the best of BioWare games, even more "fluid" and "responsive" than ME3.

 It's true that the combat system is a weird hybrid, though - it should either have been true turn-based (something like Fallout, with action points based movement), or more action. This way, the friendly fire can be incredibly annoying, because you party requires plenty of "babysitting".

[Ashton]

If you played DA:O on consoles then the problem might be much harder to spot. Playing DA:O on a computer made me see why people hated DA2 so much: DA:O was basically a RTSRPG. Positioning was important, and so were the right skills, the right setup, and the right equipment, especially on higher levels.

For everything DA2 did right (better story, better equipment variety, better ability progression, some better character development/dialogue, more focused world building) it did quite a bit wrong (wave-based combat bankrupting the gameplay, less equipment customization, some worse characterization, cut and paste dungeons, focusing on only one city). BioWare just needs to keep the good and leave the bad, but lots of companies say they will do that and very few follow through.

[Eusis]

Focusing on one city isn't even inherently bad, problem is they seemed to just go copy paste with "dungeons" rather than make this one large, realistically (ore at least plausibly) fleshed out city. I think people would either like that or at least respect that as a legitimate variation more than what it apparently ended up.

[Taelus]

If you played DA:O on consoles then the problem might be much harder to spot. Playing DA:O on a computer made me see why people hated DA2 so much: DA:O was basically a RTSRPG. Positioning was important, and so were the right skills, the right setup, and the right equipment, especially on higher levels.

For everything DA2 did right (better story, better equipment variety, better ability progression, some better character development/dialogue, more focused world building) it did quite a bit wrong (wave-based combat bankrupting the gameplay, less equipment customization, some worse characterization, cut and paste dungeons, focusing on only one city). BioWare just needs to keep the good and leave the bad, but lots of companies say they will do that and very few follow through.

All of this, though I agree with Tooker that focusing on one city isn't inherently bad, it was just their execution in this case.

[Annubis]

I always liked this interpretation of DA2: http://www.neogaf.com/forum/showpost.php?p=26194844&postcount=1

Part of me can imagine Bioware adding quick time events... everyone loves pressing buttons, right?

[Yoda]

I always liked this interpretation of DA2: http://www.neogaf.com/forum/showpost.php?p=26194844&postcount=1

Part of me can imagine Bioware adding quick time events... everyone loves pressing buttons, right?

I loved that. Thanks