So, some more spoiler-free grumbling about DA2.
Other people have already talked at length about the problems with auto-scaling challenges which prevent you from ever reaching the feeling of being amazingly powerful. In DA2 you will *never* recapture the fun you had in the first five minutes of the game where they let you play yourself as a 'legendary' version and kill everything easily with your super powers.
But there's also this thing nowadays of expecting players to constantly cycle their equipment, and that's built into the level advancement systems as well. (4e does this and I whine about it there too.) What that means is that if you're bored with the game and cheat to give your characters extra levels? They become weaker, not stronger! Your equipment doesn't level up with you, but the monsters do, and suddenly your dagger is a butter spoon.
Which you will have to replace with another, equally nondescript dagger. For no reason.
Obviously they are trying to give you a money sink and loot is traditionally one in an rpg, if they hadn't sucked every possible bit of enjoyment out of looting. But the autoscaling and the fact that you are mostly facing the SAME ENEMIES that you were all along makes this feel extra artificial. Why could I cut this human with a knife five minutes ago but now it bounces off? What sense does this make?
Despite that people generally hate weapon damage, I would have been a lot happier if I could pay to repair/upgrade my existing equipment as a money sink rather than having to constantly swap out identical drab kit. Varric gets to keep his beloved crossbow and scale it up with him, why can't *we* have the option of developing attachments to our equipment?
Being able to patch up my own equipment would also have allowed me to pick things for style. They're so fixated on keeping the companions looking right that they won't let you change THEIR armor at all, but YOU still have to change what you're wearing all the time. Argh.
Thursday, 30 June 2011
Wednesday, 29 June 2011
about combat
As for the combat stuff... enh. I set the difficulty to casual and completely ignored it most of the time. The game is absolutely not set up for me to enjoy thoughtful turn-based combat - attempting to play in a thoughtful way, the game would fight me every step of the way, and it would be a disaster. But I can also enjoy stuff just blowing up with little input from me. So I generally took control of a mage and boomed stuff. Number of fights where I actually had to pay attention, using this method, is probably five or less.
Similarly, the reused dungeons honestly didn't bother me. This isn't a dungeon crawler. That, in some ways, is a good thing... it meant there were fewer levels of ENDLESS TEDIUM. Things tended to move along at a good pace, there were no huge fortresses you had to pick through room after room after room of enemies standing still waiting for you to show up. (At least, I don't remember any.)
Similarly, the reused dungeons honestly didn't bother me. This isn't a dungeon crawler. That, in some ways, is a good thing... it meant there were fewer levels of ENDLESS TEDIUM. Things tended to move along at a good pace, there were no huge fortresses you had to pick through room after room after room of enemies standing still waiting for you to show up. (At least, I don't remember any.)
summing up
So, I have finished my first runthrough of DA2. Not going to talk about plot in this post, just some gameplay stuff.
There were things they did well, there were things they did mediocrely, there were things they did very badly. The thing that annoyed me most was not necessarily what you'd expect - it wasn't the combat, or the reused dungeons, the things that got the most whining in blogs at launch.
It was the LOOTING.
Bioware has never been the best at loot. I've complained before about the proliferation of barrels with stupid crap in them and the lack of putting actually cool things in rewarding places. Somehow they took everything they've ever done wrong and made it vastly worse. Loot was not a fun minigame, it was a painful chore.
Why? Well, for starts, all your party members except Hawke have fixed armor throughout the game. That means, from the very beginning, two-thirds of all armor you can find is completely worthless. No one can wear it. It's not right for your class, and no one else can wear armor at all.
On top of that, it appears that each act features a special named suit of armor designed for your class, with good stats and special abilities and a bonus for completing the whole set. Which means that, after act 1 where you had to scrounge your way up, you're likely to spend the game wearing special armor, and every other piece of armor in the game is useless. The special ones aren't even hard to find!
But the worst offender is the accessory category - belts, amulets, and rings. 90% of which are simply labeled "Belt" or "Ring", no matter what their powers are. They have no names. They have no graphics. They have no description. If you mouse over them, you'll get a quick popup of the stats they alter, and that's it. They have a range of effects, but they all look absolutely identical so you can't possibly remember what you've got in your inventory, and you certainly can't care when you find yet another 'Ring' somewhere.
Weapons are slightly better, since the majority of them do get names. They still don't get descriptions or icons, though.
Then there's the vendor trash category, which again gets no icons or descriptions, just a name. You have no way to tell what any of it is worth (well, you can guess that 'Torn Pants' is probably not very valuable, but is a pair of pants worth more or less than a chip of beryl? That's NOT obvious) until you actually sell it to someone. Sure, maybe my character is supposed to be stupid, but at the least after selling things a few times you'd think she'd get some idea and be able to provide information on what to throw out.
Naturally, inventory space is limited. And there doesn't seem to be a convenient way to pick and choose objects when you're looting either. So you pick up all this crap, almost all of which is JUNK, some of which might be usable but it's pretty hard to tell with the generic names, and... It just sucks, okay?
Once I look up cheat codes I am probably going to attempt to loot NOTHING for my next playthrough. Looting is THAT anti-fun.
I would far rather be equipping 'Pustulent Greaves Of The Whale' than 'Ring'. What were they thinking?
Yes, it's extra work putting in all that fluff and no one pays much attention to it. But the lack of that fluff kills the atmosphere and lays bare the sheer drudgery of item upgrading.
There were things they did well, there were things they did mediocrely, there were things they did very badly. The thing that annoyed me most was not necessarily what you'd expect - it wasn't the combat, or the reused dungeons, the things that got the most whining in blogs at launch.
It was the LOOTING.
Bioware has never been the best at loot. I've complained before about the proliferation of barrels with stupid crap in them and the lack of putting actually cool things in rewarding places. Somehow they took everything they've ever done wrong and made it vastly worse. Loot was not a fun minigame, it was a painful chore.
Why? Well, for starts, all your party members except Hawke have fixed armor throughout the game. That means, from the very beginning, two-thirds of all armor you can find is completely worthless. No one can wear it. It's not right for your class, and no one else can wear armor at all.
On top of that, it appears that each act features a special named suit of armor designed for your class, with good stats and special abilities and a bonus for completing the whole set. Which means that, after act 1 where you had to scrounge your way up, you're likely to spend the game wearing special armor, and every other piece of armor in the game is useless. The special ones aren't even hard to find!
But the worst offender is the accessory category - belts, amulets, and rings. 90% of which are simply labeled "Belt" or "Ring", no matter what their powers are. They have no names. They have no graphics. They have no description. If you mouse over them, you'll get a quick popup of the stats they alter, and that's it. They have a range of effects, but they all look absolutely identical so you can't possibly remember what you've got in your inventory, and you certainly can't care when you find yet another 'Ring' somewhere.
Weapons are slightly better, since the majority of them do get names. They still don't get descriptions or icons, though.
Then there's the vendor trash category, which again gets no icons or descriptions, just a name. You have no way to tell what any of it is worth (well, you can guess that 'Torn Pants' is probably not very valuable, but is a pair of pants worth more or less than a chip of beryl? That's NOT obvious) until you actually sell it to someone. Sure, maybe my character is supposed to be stupid, but at the least after selling things a few times you'd think she'd get some idea and be able to provide information on what to throw out.
Naturally, inventory space is limited. And there doesn't seem to be a convenient way to pick and choose objects when you're looting either. So you pick up all this crap, almost all of which is JUNK, some of which might be usable but it's pretty hard to tell with the generic names, and... It just sucks, okay?
Once I look up cheat codes I am probably going to attempt to loot NOTHING for my next playthrough. Looting is THAT anti-fun.
I would far rather be equipping 'Pustulent Greaves Of The Whale' than 'Ring'. What were they thinking?
Yes, it's extra work putting in all that fluff and no one pays much attention to it. But the lack of that fluff kills the atmosphere and lays bare the sheer drudgery of item upgrading.
Monday, 27 June 2011
so how much do indies earn?
An update on the ongoing story of The Oil Blue, a game which got a bit of coverage but not a lot of sales.
playing with hearts
Despite the adorable elf, it was Anders I ended up going for.
Partly because he gets emotional at you very quickly while Merrill seems rather flustered by the concept and makes me not want to push her.
When this character is finished I expect I will do a male/male run with Fenris. He makes me nervous.
Partly because he gets emotional at you very quickly while Merrill seems rather flustered by the concept and makes me not want to push her.
When this character is finished I expect I will do a male/male run with Fenris. He makes me nervous.
Sunday, 26 June 2011
my hawke
Close enough to default settings that she keeps a default Bethany, who you can see lurking in back. Yes, I have finally begun playing the game. And like everyone, I can't help but be charmed by Merrill. So far, though, my rp choices tend to please and piss off people in equal measure... well, except Bethie who is my BFF and Fenris who kinda gives me the creeps.
Saturday, 25 June 2011
Wizorb
This looks cool - it's like breakout meets NES Zelda.
Not out yet though.
Wizorb Debut Trailer from pixeltao on Vimeo.
Not out yet though.
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