So, let's state the flaws which are not coming from the lazy PC alone (which indeed is one of the biggest flaws of the game -> maybe I'm also just spoilt by "good game design" on PC, who knows...):
- boring, tedious action combat, especially for melee characters (there is no real skill involved, it's just simple plain button-mashing)
- incredibly tedious tactical combat with a more or less useless tactical perspective
- dumbed down tactical options for companions
- dumbed down RPG mechanics (like not being able to decide on stats yourself)
- pointless party system since you usually just let the AI control your companions (since tac cam is a chore in itself)
- overpowered generic crafting system which involves tedious ingredient collection basically all the time and which involves constant tedious micromanagement
- a badly designed inventory (which makes stuff like crafting even more tedious but also just normal navigation)
- dumbed down dialogues with almost no moral or hard decisions involved (there is not even one morally "grey area" tackled in the game)
- romances are (despite the promises) not more sophisticated or more lifelike than in previous games (virtual sex requires some flirting here and there and a 10 minutes fetch quest...)
- the main hero ist just flat without having any special character
- incredibly bad story pacing (thanks to open world design and bad narrative staging -> core strength of Bioware games lost)
- decisions have almost no bigger consequences (the outcome doesn't change no matter what you do, bad choices or good choices don't pay off in any way)
- boring, dumbed down skills, almost completely giving up passive or defensive magical powers, everyone is just a damage dealer
- pointless skyhold upgrade system with no implications for the game
- pointless, boring "war table" mechanics with no implications for the game (reminds a lot of stupid tablet "companion apps" for other games like Assassin's Creed)
- a lot of quests are just plain, simple, boring fetch quests
- open world regions are "mathematically" designed as areas of stuff in which stuff is statistically located: a camp here, a landmark there, an enemy fortress there (there is almost no sense of natural, homogenic exploration, it's all designed for the purpose of working down a list of stuff to do instead of just visiting a place)
Dragon Age Inquisition is indeed a lot like Skyrim, but only by copying its bad parts. By copying stuff from Assassin's Creed, Skyrim and MMOs Bioware achieved to ruin their own strengths, new and old: proper storytelling with tension and proper staging (like in Mass Effect), moral decisions that have weight (Mass Effect again), a sophisticated main character on whos character you can decide for yourself (almost any previous Bioware game), proper RPG mechanics (BG2, Kotor,...), good and engaging group combat (BG2, Kotor,...) and so on. And for what? For making the next generic MMO-like open world RPG? Skyrim at least was made with sandbox in mind, giving people the option to just forget the story and "tell their own stories". DAI doesn't do that. It's still a kind of story-driven game...
For me Dragon Age Inquisition is a game which you continue to play waiting for better stuff to happen (much like Skyrim if your refuse to tell your own stories). "Hm, maybe if I get there a cool quest will finally appear or something cool will happen." Problem is: that almost never happens. You really put dozens of hours in a game that rarely steps out of pure mediocrity. There are a few highlights, like some main quests and some character interactions that are well narrated, but that's about it. The rest is generic, Skyrim-like mediocre running around and slaying generic enemies. Of course the world is beautiful with nice, shiny graphics. But that doesn't define a good gaming experience for me. Tbh in the case of DAI the graphics at least make some of the content bearable. Without the shiny graphics the many flaws of Dragon Age Inquisition would be even that much more obvious...
Short: DAI is a game made for the absolute mainstream, trying to copying all the alleged current trends in gaming. Opposite to previous Bioware games the game doesn't stand out in any possible element anymore. As a game made for the biggest possible audience it's a game that lacks heart and soul and any kind of focus in design. It's a game that tries so hard to be inclusive as possible that it forgets that you need focus and often self-limitation to craft a remarkable experience. Just adding "more" without looking at the bigger picture isn't the path to glory, it's the path to mediocrity. And that what's happend here. And that's why it should be used as a big warning for CDPR. Making a game like Dragon Age Inquisition is the best way of turning a story-driven, tense and focused RPG into a monster of a mass-marketed, dumbed down, almost goal-and-focus-free game.
Don't take me wrong: I still kind of like the game. But I don't love it. I don't adore it. I even kind of hate it for it's huge waste of potential and focus. I'd rather play a much shorter and condensed game, focusing on its strengths than literally wasting a lot of my leisure time with mediocre content waiting for better stuff to come. And that's not a Dragon Age specific issue. When I look at Witcher 2 I see this dense world with a well staged storyline in regions that have a size which allows you for some freedom and exploration without giving up staging and pacing for example. When I look at Witcher 3 and its "huge open world approach" I just see the big danger of having another Skyrim clone for all the wrong reasons that doesn't fit to the actual game design you originally envisioned...
And in the end: isn't it better (at least from the point of view of a passionate game designer who loves his own work) to be loved by few than to be kind of liked by many?
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