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.”
Sounds fantastic, right? Sounds epic, right? Nothing could be further from the truth.
Dragon Age 2 (DA 2) is the much hyped sequel to Dragon Age: Origins (DAO). You play a human character called Hawke, who has fled Ferelden with your family during events in DAO to Kirkwall. There, you become a refugee and embark on your journey to becoming the legendary figure known as the Champion of Kirkwall.
For the gameplay, DA 2 introduces a linear framed narrative story where your choices affect how your saga is told by one of your old companions, a dwarf named Varric. I’ll comment more on the ‘consequences’ of your choices later on in the review.
The game begins with a character creation screen. Pick a gender and class for your character, either: Warrior, Rogue or Mage. One thing different from DAO in DA 2 is that I have found is the Rogue is more useful here. You rarely end up getting killed. Later on in the game, you will be able to customize your character’s appearance, attributes and skills.
The leveling up process itself is quite simple. For Attributes, you will need to allocate points to the different traits such as STRENGTH, DEXTERITY, etc. DA 2 features a skill tree to level up your passive and activated abilities. Once you reach level seven and level 14, you are allowed to access the three specializations available for each class.
The first thing you will notice in DA2 is its animation. When compared to Mass Effect 2 and some other games out there, you can’t help but notice that the animation is below the standard you would expect from the market nowadays. Textures seem flat. Facial expressions seem stiff and bland. Only the great voice acting helps to save and sell the story.
Another disappointing feature that becomes quickly apparent is the level designs. Even though the locations you can explore are limited, the layouts for the different areas do not vary much (or vary at all) such as in warehouses, mansions and so on. You feel a haunting sense of déjà vu as you traverse from one area to another.
DA2 carries on Dragon Age’s traditional party system, allowing you take up to 3 companions as you explore and battle your way through the story. Each companion has a homebase where they will wait if not selected as a party member. Here is also where key companion conversations take place and quests are given.
Although DA 2 touts strategic combat as a key feature, I found that it’s more of a click-n-slash combat system like God of War. Even the “cross-class combos” did not have any dramatic impact on the outcome of the battles.
You can also customize the combat tactics for your party members but I found that made little difference in the gameplay.
I found that I still had to pause, direct my party members to fully utilize their powers and to make sure they didn’t get knocked unconscious. If your health bar is knocked into the black, don’t worry, your character loses consciousness and player control is transferred to one of your remaining conscious party members. This player control switch continues until all party members are down, then it’s game over.
DA 2 allows you to upgrade the weapons and armour for you and your companions by adding runes to the enchantment slots. Do they make a drastic difference in battle? I couldn’t really tell to be honest.
This brings us to the story itself. What set Bioware’s games apart from most others are their endearing characters and great dialogue. DA 2 did not continue this tradition. Most of the companions’ personalities and stories in DA 2 seemed lacking in depth. Still, there were a few companions such as Isabela and Varric whose dialogue stood out for me.
Depending on how the companion reacts to your choices, they will develop Friendships or Rivalries with you. This has an impact on certain events in the game.
Other than the relationships with my companions, there was very little consequence for my actions. Events that were supposed to lead to a future consequence were left hanging. An example of this was Hawke being asked by a magistrate to bring in a wanted man. Depending on how you chose to deal with the man, the magistrate could thank you or threaten you by making sure your family never reclaims its noble title. I kept waiting in the game for the magistrate to cause me trouble but he never did. It made events in the game feel unresolved and the story itself incomplete.
During quests, I would try save before key conversations and battles. Try a dialogue option then reload the save game and try another dialogue option. I discovered, much to my surprise and disappointment, that no matter which dialogue branch I chose, the end result was the same.
For me, the ability to romance companions, another staple of Bioware games, was another letdown as well. However, unlike previous Bioware games, in DA 2 almost everyone in your party will be able to romance Hawke, regardless of the character’s gender. I felt that this took away some realism to the story and characters.
I believe the root of the problems which DA 2 has is that it couldn’t decide what it wanted to be: an action or a rpg game. In the end you get an action game that has traces of RPG elements. Hardcore RPG fans would be disappointed in DA 2 and action enthusiasts will feel the action dumb down and lacking. The quests themselves were more like set-ups for battles and more battles. After playing act after act, you will get tired of them as they were predictable and formulaic.
After completing DA 2 at 51 hours, I had felt that after a promising start, the game quickly went downhill and wasn’t worth my time in the end. DA 2 feels cobbled together and lacks the epic mood of a truly great rpg game. Due to its flaws in gameplay, game design and story, DA 2 is not polished enough to make it a gem of a game. I recommend giving it a miss.
Source: Hotlink Game Review
Source: Hotlink Game Review
