The Dragon Age: Inquisition Thread

[Quillon]

All it really needs is some drastic editing, cut out about 75% of the side-quests and all of the proc generated shit, get rid of the levelled loot and replace that with hand-crafted genuinely cool unique items and a crafting system that was frugal enough with components that it meant something, and it would easily be the best DA, and be a solid contender for top AAA RPG of its generation, up there with Twitcher 3 except different.

I remember it was something like 95% shit quests and 5% main quests. Cut out 75% of the shit, there'd be little game left, less shit tho.

 

[Prime Junta]

I remember it was something like 95% shit quests and 5% main quests. Cut out 75% of the shit, there'd be little game left, less shit tho.

Every game needs a little bit of shit to highlight the good stuff. Since DA:I has procedurally generated shit, you can push it to as close to 100% as you want, just keep grinding those requisitions baby

 

[Quillon]

I remember it was something like 95% shit quests and 5% main quests. Cut out 75% of the shit, there'd be little game left, less shit tho.

Every game needs a little bit of shit to highlight the good stuff. Since DA:I has procedurally generated shit, you can push it to as close to 100% as you want, just keep grinding those requisitions baby

Yeah but compared to W3 the disparity is huge: About 5% of the quests is handcrafted in DAI vs W3's maybe 100% handcrafted quests. So "to be a solid contender for top AAA RPG of its generation" they'd have had to delay the game for 2 years and craft the rest of the game.

 

[DalekFlay]

As much as we pretend it doesn't happen in our fav RPGs, running errands is the staple of RPGs ffs There is always non-RPG games that use same combat systems as any RPG so no need to play RPGs for you then.

Every RPG has bullshit fetch quests, but if you dress them up with enough flavor and lore they are still enjoyable. Good RPGs also have well designed quality quests, even if they're more rare compared to basic ones. DA:I has neither of these things, that's the problem. It has a decent core plot and then everything around that is shit.

 

[Sordid MCA/Prosper Hybryd]

I agree that combat is the only decent thing in ME:A, but DA:I doesn't have even this. It's the worst BioWare game I've ever played (haven't played Anthem).

At least combat-wise ME:A understands what it tries to do. It's an action RPG with direct controls. Whereas DA:I is some horrible mutant. Neither a proper action game, nor a real time with pause one.

 

[rusty_shackleford]

DA:I and Andromeda fail because nu-Bioware has completely forgotten the basics. From the start you are bombarded with LOOK AT ALL THIS EPIC SHIT. But the magic of RPG is in the journey. Best stories always follow the same pattern, they start ambiguously and slowly unravel.

You don't have to be literally starting in a basement with a wooden stick and killing rats, but a 50 hour game needs to take it slow. If I'm fighting with a Demon King within first 30 minutes and then suddenly I find myself doing filler quests and picking flowers, clicking on uninstall.exe becomes inevitable.

DAI is far, far above MEA. It might not be popular on Codex, but it was fairly well received overall.
Compare that to MEA being regarded as terrible even by mass effect fans.

Also, I really don't remember that many fetch quests in DAI. Not more than any other similar game(e.g., Witcher 3) anyways
Ubisoft formula in Witcher 3 was far worse imo, running around to icons on your map to clear them is cancer design.

 

[DalekFlay]

DAI is far, far above MEA. It might not be popular on Codex, but it was fairly well received overall.

They have very similar problems and design philosophies. DA:I was better received because tons of people were story fags, and it has a much better story.

 

[Dishonoredbr]

DA:I at least good characters moments (Solas , Dorian , Varric and BlacWall) and Treppaser is actually good. ME:A has only a decent combat, not even companions are actually good and that was one of ME best things since ME2. Also even Coripheus is slighty better than whatever Villian was in ME:A.

 

[Tim the Bore]

DA:I and Andromeda fail because nu-Bioware has completely forgotten the basics. From the start you are bombarded with LOOK AT ALL THIS EPIC SHIT. But the magic of RPG is in the journey. Best stories always follow the same pattern, they start ambiguously and slowly unravel.

You don't have to be literally starting in a basement with a wooden stick and killing rats, but a 50 hour game needs to take it slow. If I'm fighting with a Demon King within first 30 minutes and then suddenly I find myself doing filler quests and picking flowers, clicking on uninstall.exe becomes inevitable.

While I agree with the sentiment, these aren't even close to the worst problems DA:I or ME:A have. They don't even have the same problems.

DA:I's main problem is bloat. It's chock full of fetch this, gather that, craft the other, and mechanics like the vile levelled loot are there to force it on you. Strip out all that and you end up with a superficially much smaller but much more focused game, with a loot system where finding or crafting a cool piece of gear actually means something. The story is more than good enough to keep the game going, intro Pride Demon and all. All it really needs is some drastic editing, cut out about 75% of the side-quests and all of the proc generated shit, get rid of the levelled loot and replace that with hand-crafted genuinely cool unique items and a crafting system that was frugal enough with components that it meant something, and it would easily be the best DA, and be a solid contender for top AAA RPG of its generation, up there with Twitcher 3 except different.

ME:A's main problem is shit content. The companions are shit, the story is shit, the side characters are shit. It just completely fails at selling itself to you. The gameplay is actually fine, at least as good as in any of the other MEs, the problem is that the game entirely fails to make you give a shit about any of its shit. Shit, there's a lot of shit in this paragraph, like the game. Which is shit. It's basically unsalvageable; only thing you could keep from it is the core gameplay and systems, but you'd have to build pretty much the entire game over from scratch.

No offense man, but you're tripping. The only thing to save Dragon Age Inquisition would be to completely recreate that game from scratch. There is not even one thing that works properly in DA: I - maybe some of the companions (but then you have Sera as well, so...).

Sure, game is bloated as hell. Enemies' health is ridiculously bloated, loot is more common than grass, there is a hundred of unnecessary fetch quests.

But there are much more things - basic things - that are broken. E.g. - possibly the worst combat system ever designed, combined with this game's inability to choose between being an action game or an RPG. You could lower enemies' health by 70%, but it would only make the problem less annoying - it wouldn’t fix it.

You would have to recreate the mechanics of character creation and progression - making it so that your choices would matter (combat- and narrative-wise). Right now it’s impossible to create a "character" in this game, because there is no tools for this character to express itself. You would have to rewrite most of the dialogues, 'cause right now they are written in a very linear manner (heck, you would have to change the whole modus operandi of BioWare and convinced them that the game should be about players and theirs characters, not developers creations). So, new mechanics, new dialogues. Then you need to make sure that these things work smoothly and that they’re interconnected – something that BioWare was never good at.

Still, it's not enough. Now you have to make the story somewhat interesting (because c'mon, DA:I is better than Andromeda, but it's still crap). But, and this is crucial, you would have to to make it responsive to players' actions (since the whole point of the game is that you're a powerful political leader and you're choices matter – or they should anyway). And that requires a lot of changes, basically new script.

Since we at this, you can’t just cut side-quests and leave this like that - you have to make a new ones to fill that gap. Ideally they should contain a huge amount of C&C, because that what the game is all about (or so it claims). In the same time, you’re stuck with the environment that was already made – unless you want to change that as well.

New mechanics, new combat system, new story, new dialogues, new main protagonist, new quests - sure, fix of all that and DA: I might be a good game (then it’s all about execution). But you may also just give up, because at this point you're making a new one.

 

[sullynathan]

Solas was interesting but trespasser is a couple hour long slog just to get to that ending.

 

[InD_ImaginE]

Anders character change in DA2 is kinda explained in game tho. Basically he has a negative feedback loop with his residing Justice spirit, his animosity towards Templar slowly corrupts Justice into a Demon which in turn possess him and pushing him more and more to extrimism.

Contrast that to Wayne, which from wiki summary of one of DA novel, managed to co exist with her Faith spirit until she was dead. And she didn't become some ass religious zealot too.

While annoying I find that aspect to be good on DA2 part. Not all characters need to be written to be likeable.

 

[Prime Junta]

E.g. - possibly the worst combat system ever designed

Worse than DA:O or DA2? Hardly.

making it so that your choices would matter (combat- and narrative-wise)

You're wildly overstating the case.

(1) Combat-wise, your choices do matter. Classes play very differently. A ranged rogue does not play like a fighter, who does not play like a mage. Builds within classes also matter: an arcane warrior does not play like a rift mage, and a battlemaster does not play like a tank.

(2) Narrative-wise, your choices also matter. In particular, they matter a lot with companion interactions. The main story arc is the same, but the companions are the sounding board for your narrative development, and this in fact is one area where DA:I succeeds really well -- much better than anything Obsidian has managed in recent years for example.

Sure it'd be nice if there was more C&C in the main story other than that one big decision, but that would be chrome. It's not even close to the top of the list of problems with the game.

make sure that these things work smoothly and that they’re interconnected

Again something DA:I does much better than average. The whole conceit of the Inquisition and the war table actually gives a reason and a structure for all the random questing, and spices it up well with the "off-camera" missions handed to your advisors.

you have to make the story somewhat interesting

Nah it's fine, it's good enough to tie all the adventuring together. Trying to push more story at you would make this style of game more annoying. It's an open world style game, those need fairly simple stories, or else just an emergent story with faction mechanics which DA:I doesn't even attempt.

But, and this is crucial, you would have to to make it responsive to players' actions (since the whole point of the game is that you're a powerful political leader and you're choices matter – or they should anyway).

Again, disagree. This is cool when it's done well but it's by no means something that every game, or every RPG, has to have. There's nothing wrong with a simple story arc that's about collecting allies to kill the big bad, and then killing the big bad.

New mechanics, new combat system, new story, new dialogues, new main protagonist, new quests - sure, fix of all that and DA: I might be a good game (then it’s all about execution). But you may also just give up, because at this point you're making a new one.

This, I think, sums up your position rather nicely: you expect a certain set of features in a game and if it doesn't have it, you think it's objectively bad, same as the people who hate the Twitchers because they have a fixed protag, or because they're aRPGs. Preferences are perfectly legitimate but they're not really all that interesting to anyone else than you and market researchers, and they don't have much to do at all whether a game is good in any more objective sense.

 

[Quillon]

Whatever the underlying system is, DAO's combat played better than DA2 & DAI or PoEs /mostly cos it didn't turn into visual clusterfuck as often with the help of it being 3D/custom viewing angles

 

[Prime Junta]

Whatever the underlying system is, DAO's combat played better than DA2 & DAI or PoEs /mostly cos it didn't turn into visual clusterfuck as often with the help of it being 3D/custom viewing angles

I know a lot of people feel that but I actually hated DA2's combat the least. It flowed better, it didn't try to be anything other than aRPG and rolled with it. I strongly disliked DA:O combat actually, it was stuck halfway between being a party-based tactical RPG and halfway between an aRPG. It had massive problems everywhere: systems, AI, and execution.

- Systems: really badly balanced, archers for example are complete shite yet they get their own talent tree and one of the main companions is an archer (and you pretty much have to keep her in the party until you get Zevran unless you're a rogue yourself, because of locks and traps); the whole thing is a badly made copy of D&D without the bits that made it interesting. Also aggro-based mechanics are really fucking retarded and tank-and-spank is putrid.

- AI: it's really dumb basically, characters rushing madly where they're not wanted, using their talents badly, and so on; this makes for masses of micro, constant hitting the "halt" button, and degenerate tactics like kiting and pulling enemies behind a corner one by one

- Execution: it's just half-baked in general. For example, there's no way to control the battlefield space: there aren't really any collision circles so both allies and enemies can scoot right through each other. It's not even possible to hold a choke point without stuffing a tiny one-person doorway full of three melee fighters.

Nah, DA:O combat is bad any way you look at it. And if you think any of the DAs play better than either of the Pillars games I really don't know what to think, other than that maybe you just don't like RTwP party-based combat?

 

[Quillon]

PoEs' combat is great when its a small scale fight and not dozens of characters firing on all cylinders and latter is often the case where you can't see shit; at that point fuck all your sophisticated underlying systems which I'm sure many a DND nerd would disagree anyway. You are probably right on all three points, it's been years since I last played DAO, tho there were mods for it; one mod especially fixing and greatly expanding AI. Anyway, visually clear and consistent combat is more important than logical conclusions in a visual entertainment imo, plus I prefer flexibility of 3D over however beautiful 2D backgrounds anyway, 3D ain't ugly now and weren't ugly in DAO as some of you put it.

And RTwP is my fav. prolly DAO made me like it so much back in the day :D

 

[Prime Junta]

prolly DAO made me like it so much back in the day

Ah that would explain it. You can only fall in love the first time once.

 

[Reinhardt]

I blame DarkUnderlord for this. Nameless people can do most vile and evil things like talking about DAI.

 

[Daidre]

Nah, DA:O combat is bad any way you look at it. And if you think any of the DAs play better than either of the Pillars games I really don't know what to think, other than that maybe you just don't like RTwP party-based combat?

Or maybe some people actually like RTwP and know how to play it?
Halt Mode and extreme AI customization makes DAO most easy-to-use RTwP on my memory.

AI: it's really dumb basically, characters rushing madly where they're not wanted

Even unmodded AI programming in DAO is decent enough to be... as dumb as person who configured it. Or tried to.

 

[Prime Junta]

Nah, DA:O combat is bad any way you look at it. And if you think any of the DAs play better than either of the Pillars games I really don't know what to think, other than that maybe you just don't like RTwP party-based combat?

Or maybe some people actually like RTwP and know how to play it?
Halt Mode and extreme AI customization makes DAO most easy-to-use RTwP on my memory.

AI: it's really dumb basically, characters rushing madly where they're not wanted

Even unmodded AI programming in DAO is decent enough to be... as dumb as person who configured it. Or tried to.

Hell hath no fury like a fan of a mediocre game scorned.

 

[Quillon]

prolly DAO made me like it so much back in the day

Ah that would explain it. You can only fall in love the first time once.

Well I played 1 or 2 RTwP games before DAO, its not like I didn't have at least 1 game to compare it to Was DS2 RTwP? The other one was NWN2.

 

[Prime Junta]

The other one was NWN2

LOL OK, NWN2 is an object lesson on how NOT to do RTwP. Yeah compared to that DA:O isn't so bad. (The systems in NWN2 are way better though, because D&D.)

 

[DalekFlay]

Nah, DA:O combat is bad any way you look at it.

I'm not gonna sit here and say DA:O is some amazing thing, but seriously what the fuck are you talking about? It has MMO style cooldowns and other quirks, but at least it's a real tactical RPG. You can pull out the camera, issue orders and plan placement, and on harder difficulties a lot of encounters actually require strategy and proper use of powers/equipment. The battles are actually designed well a lot of the time, outside the slog that is the deep roads. In contrast DA2's battles feel barely designed at all, they just spam bullshit at you, and DA:I is mostly an action game with MMO fodder battles. I'm seriously baffled how any PC gamer could prefer the combat of 2 and 3 over 1.

 

[Daidre]

Hell hath no fury like a fan of a mediocre game scorned.

I liked DA:O well enough when it was released but system is too castrated to send me into the same, D&D-ish level of fangirling next to BG, IWD, NWN and Kingmaker. And enemy/dungeon variety is horrendous.

Actually, only reason I remembered it is Kingmaker's survey about how perfect console-friendly RtWP for retards should look like and my sudden realization that DAO is probably best example.

DAI made my hands hurt. Both with mouse and gamepad.

 

[JDR13]

It's funny to see you guys arguing over which of those turds is the least turd-like.

Regardless of which DA is best, they're all massive decline compared to the IE games.

 

[TheImplodingVoice]

It's funny to see you guys arguing over which of those turds is the least turd-like.

Regardless of which DA is best, they're all massive decline compared to the IE games.

All DA games were shit. with DA 1 being the least shit. But shit is still shit.