Dragon Age 2 - There Be Spoilers Below

I hadn’t really planned on picking up Dragon Age 2, but curiosity got the better of me and I decided to try out the demo. I was pleasantly surprised by what I found. I had heard about the changes in the dialogue system (a good choice I feel, considering Bioware’s writing strengths), but I had no idea that they had changed combat as much as they did. Rather than gritting my teeth in frustration every time a new group of enemies would spawn, I grinned in anticipation. The combat in Dragon Age 2 wasn’t the boring slog of it’s predecessor; it was actually fun! So fun in fact, that I was a little disappointed when there were no more enemies to kill and I actually had to listen to some of the story.

At this point I was thinking that I would wait for a price drop and  pick up the game then (combat was fun, but the characters and writing weren’t really catching my interest). Then Flemeth showed up. You see, one of my major complaints about Dragon Age: Origins was how forgettable the character designs were. They were serviceable to be sure, and outside of the funny hats, Morrigan’s outfit, and all of the heavy armor, they were pretty realistic, but it wasn’t good design. I couldn’t pick any of the characters in DA:O out from their silhouette. Don’t quite get what I’m saying? Then how about an example. Here’s Flemeth in Dragon Age: Origins:

And here she is in Dragon Age 2:

The design is wacky, even hilarious (older gal’s got quite the body), but it’s strong, has presence, and most important of all, it’s memorable. Seeing her character design sold me on Dragon Age 2, and that very night I pre-ordered it. I should have listened to my first thoughts.

Dragon Age 2 is not a bad game. It’s quite fun, and there’s a lot of good things to be found in it. I might even be tempted to call it a good game in certain situations. That said, it’s a broken, buggy, unfinished mess.

Quests fail to trigger, trigger early, and become uncompletable. There are multiple game breaking-bugs (there’s a way to permanently lower the main character’s attack speed everytime a party member leaves your party). Almost all of the quests in the game use one of five maps, with only which doors are locked to differentiate them. I hated this in Mass Effect, and I hate it still (though Mass Effect at least had a fluff reason for the buildings to all be identical). All of these I can deal with, assuming some of the bigger bugs get patched later on. What I cannot handle is how unfinished the game is.

It’s hard to describe exactly what I mean by unfinished. It’s like, the second half of everything that’s in the game is missing. Quests end before a full resolution can be made, or you don’t get to see the most important parts (Hawke’s return from the Deep Roads, Hawke getting the estate, Aveline confronting the corrupt captain of the city guard, Aveline’s marriage, etc...). Fights never progress in design beyond, enemy appears, you kill them, second group of enemies appear, you kill them, third group of enemies may or may not appear. Even bosses follow the same exact routine. The entire game is a dark build-up. Hawke (the main character) grows more and more important, but he loses more and more each time. The entire game is filled with points where no matter what Hawke does, he can’t succeed. All of this culminates in the final hour or so of the game, becoming one complete and utter failure for Hawke as a hero. And then, when things are at their darkest, the game ends.

I’m a fan of many different kinds of endings. Dark endings, sad endings, happy endings, crazy endings, even wtf endings. The one thing all of these things have in common is that they are endings. Dragon Age 2 doesn’t end. Everything goes to shit, and that moment when Hawke actually has the chance to do something, to make up for all the things they couldn’t change throughout the entire game, and Bioware doesn’t give it to us. This is not The Empire Strikes Back folks. Things got dark in that movie, but it had a true and proper ending. There was a final fight and the heroes lost. That doesn’t happen here. Sure, there’s a final fight, and you even win, but then the story basically acts like you lost. You can’t have it both ways and call it an end.

The fact is that we’re either going to get a proper ending in Dragon Age 3, or more likely since Flemeth is almost assuredly going to be the big-bad in that game, it’s going to come as DLC or an expansion pack. Before you try to explain to me how expensive video games are to make and how dirt cheap they are for entertainment, I’ll just say that I know, and I’m not like that. I’m fine with selling extra bits of content, things that couldn’t be finished in time, or anything like that. Even paying for content already on the disk doesn’t bother me that much. But the goddamn ending to your story better be in the fucking game when it ships, especially when the game is as buggy and needing of some playtesting as this one. Fallout 3 had more of an ending than this game, and I hated that game’s ending.

One thing I’ve avoided discussing is the game’s writing. I wanted to save this for last, being the area where I have to most knowledge, and thus the most to complain about. I’ve always enjoyed Bioware stories. They may not have the best writing, or the most complex ideas, but they’re fun It’s like playing an action movie.  For the past few games, Bioware seems to have understood what they’re good at, making games where the main character is increasingly badass and well... action hero-like. They didn’t do that this time. Bioware decided to take a page out of Obsidian’s book, and tried to make a darker story, with more difficult choices and less clear-cut good guys. Bioware tried to make DA2 a game that’s less about black and white, and more about shades of grey... and occasionally the succeeded at it. There is a long chain of quests regarding someone killing women in the town, and it gets quite dark and tense towards the end. When it hits the end of the quest though, Bioware cops out. They make the murderer a complete stereotype (and completely unrelated to everything else in the quest), and they completely deny his impact.  I’m impressed that they tried something so difficult, but the fact is that you really should stick with what you’re best at, especially in writing. Obsidian gets away with making morally complex stories, because they have very talented writers that understand morally complex situations. Bioware has decent writers, but they’re about as morally complex as white bread. They just don’t understand the different scales of evil enough to write those kinds of stories. On the other hand, I have no doubt that Obsidian writers would fail flat on their faces if they tried to write a story as black and white as the original Knights of the Old Republic.

The companions in this game are, much like the writing a very mixed bag. Aveline manages to strike the perfect balance between being a stuck-up bitch, and an actually likable person (she’s probably one of the most complex characters in a video game, not to mention a strong female character). Meanwhile, Anders is whiny, annoying, and generally just a terrible person. They had something interesting going on with Merrill being nerd-bait/girl-next-door but having horrible dark things happen to her, but in never goes anywhere (her character is exactly the same the entire game). Fenris could have been a great joke about emo-characters if he wasn’t taken so seriously within the game. I didn’t use Isabella enough in my play-through to see what her writing was like. Hilariously, their best character turns out to be Varric. Upon first meeting Varric you would assume that he’s a typical con-artist. Nice and friendly, then he takes your money and runs-off. Instead you get a decent person with a good sense of humor. He’s basically the best friend I’ve seen in a video game. He’s a wonderfully fresh take on the charming rogue. I mean, he even calls Fenris “broody” (note Varric has a nickname for every character except for Aveline, seeing as how she’s the only character developed enough to avoid being a stereotype I find this hilarious).

Speaking of Aveline and Varric, they both happen to be the only companions in the game (ignoring DLC characters and siblings) that can’t be romanced. Considering two of the best characters in Mass Effect, Wrex and Mordin, are also unromanceable, I find this to be quite telling about Bioware’s writers. Personally, I subscribe to the belief that every good story is at its core a romance story. Sadly, romances in video games have rarely helped prove my point (although it may help explain why so many video game stories are so bad). Bioware in particular has always had very awkward romances. They didn’t break that tradition in this game, and I believe that I may have found part of the reason why:

"I don't believe in happy endings when it comes to love." - D. Gaider (Lead Writer for DA2)

I’m not sure of the veracity of this quote; I found it on a forum online. Regardless, of whether it is true or not, it accurately depicts my feelings on Bioware’s writers when it comes to romance. have you ever read anything written by somebody who was just dumped? I have, and they get written just like in DA2. Bioware romances tend to come in three types. Purely physical, where it’s all about sex and power (Miranda in Mass Effect 2). Painful, where the character doesn’t want to be in love (Morrigan in DA:O). Or last, but probably creepiest, true love, where the character admits love immediately and becomes super-attached and creepy (Liara in Mass Effect). I honestly can’t think of a Bioware romance that seems actually healthy, but considering how few relationships actually are in the real world, I could deal with that. What bothers me is how incidental romances are in these games. In an action movie the guy getting the girl is just as important as saving the day, and often being forced to choose between the two is the antagonist’s final weapon.

I know I’ve listed a lot of faults, and it may seem that I hate this game. In the end,  I found Dragon Age 2 to be a fun, albeit unfinished game. If I had paid $40 or less I would have been perfectly satisfied with what I get, as it is I am only mildly disappointed. So long as you don’t go into this game expecting GOTY 2011 and you assume that your choices will only effect dialogue rather than the story itself, you should have a fun time.

Comments? Criticism?

Edit: Found the actual quote, "I suppose my problem is I don't believe in happy endings when it comes to love. Anyone who's played in one of my tabletop campaigns would probably wholeheartedly agree with that."