Dragon Age: Inquisition

[EmperorZorn]

I hope this is in Witcher 3 favor.

I'm sure it is, my friend ~ *

I've read a German review of DA:I and it had a line that I found quite amusing:
It said that despite the very pretty graphics and panoramas, DA:I didn't even come close to
an atmosphere as immersive as the Witcher 2 had in Flotsam.

And that told me that the reviewer had an idea of good RPGs, even if I found 59/100 a bit low of a score.

But we'll see. I haven't played DA:I yet and perhaps it really isn't that good.
Or perhaps the reviewer is just very picky.

oh boy, do they even care anymore!?

...wait.... this is in the game ?! Oh boy...

 

[Žymantūnas]

I'm sure it is, my friend ~ *

I've read a German review of DA:I and it had a line that I found quite amusing:
It said that despite the very pretty graphics and panoramas, DA:I didn't even come close to
an atmosphere as immersive as the Witcher 2 had in Flotsam.

And that told me that the reviewer had an idea of good RPGs, even if I found 59/100 a bit low of a score.

But we'll see. I haven't played DA:I yet and perhaps it really isn't that good.
Or perhaps the reviewer is just very picky.

59/100 :hmm: is it 4players.de? because I think I seen their score on Metacritic.

 

[EmperorZorn]

59/100 :hmm: is it 4players.de? because I think I seen their score on Metacritic.

Yeah... they give rather low scores, but usually they have valid points of criticism.
At least you know that if a game gets a good score there it's really good.

..plus they gave Call of Duty a really low score, so they have my respect. xD

 

[Žymantūnas]

Yeah... they give rather low scores, but usually they have valid points of criticism.
At least you know that if a game gets a good score there it's really good.

..plus they gave Call of Duty a really low score, so they have my respect. xD

from what you said they have mine too.

 

[Veleda.980]

59/100 seems like a fair score to me.

I have to hand it to Eurogamer and the German PC reviewers, they hit the nail on the head.

 

[EmperorZorn]

59/100 seems like a fair score to me.
I have to hand it to Eurogamer and the German PC reviewers, they hit the nail on the head.

I'll translate the pro/contra for you guys, just give me a few minutes ~

 

[Žymantūnas]

I'll translate the pro/contra for you guys, just give me a few minutes ~

 

[KadashmanEnlil]

I'm sure it is, my friend ~ *

I've read a German review of DA:I and it had a line that I found quite amusing:
It said that despite the very pretty graphics and panoramas, DA:I didn't even come close to
an atmosphere as immersive as the Witcher 2 had in Flotsam.

And that told me that the reviewer had an idea of good RPGs, even if I found 59/100 a bit low of a score.

But we'll see. I haven't played DA:I yet and perhaps it really isn't that good.
Or perhaps the reviewer is just very picky.

I think he’s a bit picky, but also analytical. It all comes down to a believable, immersive ‘illusion’. The Witcher I and II and the Elder Scrolls both approached this in a slightly different way. Witcher’s visual design is more cohesive (very 1250-1450, with some earlier and later stuff) and they paid a lot of attention to making things look lively and believable, whether that was in Vizima, Flotsam, Vergen or the Kaedweni military camp. Skyrim and Oblivion also try to make things lively and add lots of item interactivity; the dynamic quest system and the weather in Skyrim is another example of trying to create a dynamic world. So do little details like ants crawling over a log, or salmon swimming upstream.

I haven’t played DA:I yet, but it’s attempts to mimic Witcher or Skyrim appear to be fairly limited. Crowds appear mostly static, items are not interactive, meaning a table with stuff on it is just one 3D ‘model’, there is no dynamic weather etc. Visual design still isn’t particularly cohesive, pretty much a mish-mash, but it overall looks better than DA:O and DA2 from a technical point of view. Individual items (clothing, arms, armour) appear to have more detail and more effort put into it, though the ‘design logic’ is still pretty poor in many cases. Sometimes you can see they just ripped off other fantasy IP’s or took something from the Internet they liked, or combined them.

I did get the impression they ‘Nordified’ Ferelden, in the sense that it has a stronger ‘quasi-medieval Scandinavian’ vibe to it than in DA:O. That vibe was always there, but they reinforced it for DA:I, to the point I think they took a good look at Skyrim, but also took some Viking-era stuff almost 1:1 from the Internet.

All these things add up, but people don’t always notice. I’m exceedingly picky myself, but if I really enjoy a game I am willing and able to overlook these kinds of things.

 

[EmperorZorn]

Dragon Age: Inquisition review by 4Players.de

Pro

+ a huge gameworld
+ beautiful panoramas and landscapes
+ a lot to do and many things to collect
+ 4 races, 3 classes are available
+ realtime and paused combat is possible
+ rewarding and devastating combos
+ climbing in canyons and caves is possible
+ multiple dialog choices
+ choices that have consequences
+ can send troops on missions at the strategic table
+ possible romances with exclusive quests
+ crafting of weapons, armor and potions
+ (good German localization)
+ fast-travel option and mounts
+ saving is possible anywhere
+ 4 difficulties
+ you can influence the political situation


Contra

- rushed introduction
- weak presentation, mediocre plot
- big contradictions between narration and in-game
- no believable reactions toward the players behaviour
- (no reaction on theft, using weapons or picking fights in the middle of the cities)
- can't really play an evil Inquisitor (no real renegade options)
- can only level character attributes indirect (via Inquisition boni)
- very few towns/cities which have little life in them
- can't switch weapons during combat
- sterile menu- and item-design
- hectical, fast-paced combat despite the pause mode
- can barely zoom out in paused mode to get an overview
- no real tactical options with the terrain (height, cover... etc..)
- orders such as "hold position" are ignored by the AI
- too little reward for exploration
- death of party members is without consequences (no debuff..etc..)
- childish minigames without challenge
- collectible quests don't fit into the story, a lot of generic fetchquests
- stiff facial animations
- awful riding animations
- weak dialogs, especially during sidequests
- a lot of redundant Inquisition boni to pick from
- the map table barely requires any strategy
- the different factions are barely present and feel passive
- PC controls are there, but apparently the game was optimized for consoles
- grafic glitches, lots of collision bugs (characters get stuck)


...there you go.

 

[Unkindled]

I've gotten a bit further into the game now that I realized that it doesn't matter how much you take your time and that you'll be levelling up basically at their speed. Unless you want to spend your life fighting waves of enemies every time you walk somewhere.

And I think I've finally come to the point to where I'm this close to getting my money back. This is just a mess. Honestly, I think I liked DA 2 more at first. The beginning of DA 2 made me care more about the story than what I've seen here so far.

I feel like I'm trapped in Starwars, except it's the political talking part that no one likes. I enjoyed the fighting, but that finally lost its novelty.

 

[wichat]

I'll have a whole year (more or less) to be convince myself for buying this game....

Gato escaldado del agua fria huye... (once bitten twice shy)

 

[Unkindled]

Sigh, I don't even want to play anymore. I think I'd rather catch up on those hours of sleep I lost so I can be alert for Farcry 4. Should have played that first.

I was even lucky enough to have class get cancelled today, but I don't know if I want to waste it with this. But I will, for the sake of research. If I don't start liking it more after today, maybe the day after as well, I'm turning my key back in to Origins for good. Which really saddens me, because I do like my character, and Cassandra. Except the dialogue options for my character are meh to the max. Ugh.

Rather'd be playing Vampire Masquerade.

 

[KadashmanEnlil]

I've gotten a bit further into the game now that I realized that it doesn't matter how much you take your time and that you'll be levelling up basically at their speed. Unless you want to spend your life fighting waves of enemies every time you walk somewhere.

And I think I've finally come to the point to where I'm this close to getting my money back. This is just a mess. Honestly, I think I liked DA 2 more at first. The beginning of DA 2 made me care more about the story than what I've seen here so far.

I feel like I'm trapped in Starwars, except it's the political talking part that no one likes. I enjoyed the fighting, but that finally lost its novelty.

Is it because it's political stuff, or is it because of the way it's presented? My own background lies in political history, but BioWare politics always bore me to death or annoyed the hell out of me, because of the way it was done.

 

[Unkindled]

Is it because it's political stuff, or is it because of the way it's presented? My own background lies in political history, but BioWare politics always bore me to death or annoyed the hell out of me, because of the way it was done.

It's because of the way the story is presented. They do try to make it at least a little interesting.

Spoiler

A templar knocks the shit out of this bitch ass Chantry chick, lol.

But, I just really didn't care about mages and templars, like at ALL, which is what prompted this scene, so what should have made me stand up and cheer for joy since I hate those bitches, made me go "Huh, that happened huh?"

And god, I hope Val Roeyox or however you spell that gets shoved up a broodmother's asshole. That place is so obnoxiously.... Orlesian, lol. Not a comment about my liking or disliking of the game. Just some commentary.

Oh, and this game has the worst pacing of any game I've ever played.

 

[octavian123]

I remember how bored I was the first time I fired up DA:O, TW1 and ME. Very few RPGs seem to have a good introduction, except TW2, which was almost flawless. Maybe it's the same here.

 

[Unkindled]

I remember how bored I was the first time I fired up DA:O, TW1 and ME. Very few RPGs seem to have a good introduction, except TW2, which was almost flawless. Maybe it's the same here.

Oh no, it's nowhere near at this level.

 

[Shavod]

I watched many materials from this game and there is one thing that keep pushing me away from it, which is an (kinda) open world. The locations may be large and have a lot of content, but it lacks one basic thing that most open worlds have, which is life. All the NPC's on the street just stand there doing nothing, there is just a few who are walking around aimlessly. It's the same level of artificial life like a Citadel from Mass Effect 1 and yet the first Witcher managed to make this aspect much, much better and even add dynamic weather on old Aurora engine. The fact that BioWare after so many games still fails to do that makes them look really lazy.

And just like Veleda said, it looks like a single player MMO with it's dead open world and combat animations. Even Total Biscuit, despite liking the game so far, in the podcast admitted that and complained about way too many boring fetch quests that make open world seem more like a filler. For now it looks like BioWare decided to take some notes from Skyrim, but didn't know how to combine it with Dragon Age like experience and didn't want to put into that any additional work to make sure they're not going to end up with a lifeless mockup. Luckily, CDPR puts a lot more thoughts into that, so I'm sure they will mostly avoid it.

 

[Unkindled]

I was having tons of fun with the combat system yesterday. The sword and board class felt really good, and you can finally block on your own, though it's through an activated ability you press and hold. Shield wall like we've had before, but more useful arguably. Combat for that class was really nice, but they ruin it with endless spawning enemies in the exploration zones, which I also realized had nothing to it story wise or in the way of even moderately sized traditional sidequests, which was lame and just like the reviewers said. Also, this sort of system really falls flat with no healing magic. This was and is something I actually like just for the combat, but it doesn't work too well here because you'll be doing tons of backtracking and fast traveling to camps for potions, especially on hard difficulty. Especially.

There's just not enough incentive to do all these little tasks around the map. Yea you get xp, but barely. Someone that takes time to do that much work should be rewarded a good deal more for it. I wasted all that time when I could have been getting further into the actual game, and I'm still a level four...

Maybe I should have played it the way I said you would need to before the game even came out. Pretty much just do what you need to to advance the actual story, or to get the resources you want for armor and other schematics, not that you'll need to, then move the fuck on and ignore everything else. They'll entice you to do them anyway with the beauty of the world, but just fucking ignore it all. It's all meaningless.

 

[Veleda.980]

Bioware obviously hasn't learned anything about how to market a game. "PC was the lead platform! Origins tactical camera is BACK baby!" Uh, no. You lying shits did it to us again. They really need to sit down with CDPR and Arkane and take copious notes about how not to oversell your game. Sure, you might get some sales from suckers like me, but Bioware really needed trust points with this game more than anything, and they burned the last ones I had.

Also, the promise of giving race choices I think creates false expectations that it'll be like Origins, too. There have been good passing references to my character's background, but the chance to form a character you can connect with as avatar is severely lacking. I suppose for me it didn't help that I found the character creator pretty frustrating and I hate the female elven body model. The voiced PC thing bothers me, too. I'm choosing responses based on what I'd like to say, but not only is it sometimes not what I actually wanted to say (because there's just a paraphrase), the emotional tone is all over the map.

 

[octavian123]

From what I gather from the internet, responses are mixed. Some people enjoy it, some don't. I'm going to wait for what TB and AJ have to say before making the plunge. That way I won't get burned.

---------- Updated at 12:34 PM ----------

From what I gather from the internet, responses are mixed. Some people enjoy it, some don't with a few trolls here and there that give the game a 0. I'm going to wait for what TB and AJ have to say before making the plunge. That way I won't get burned.