[contains minor spoilers]
I spent half of my blog entry on Dragon Age: Origin griping about how difficult the game was, so imagine my surprise when I sauntered into Dragon Age 2 and found it to be even harder. I'm not sure what compelled BioWare to double-down on the unforgiving nature of the series, but double down they did and man oh man did it give me a rough time. My playthrough took nearly sixty hours and I'd say a good twenty of that was spent in menus, meticulously equipping and re-equipping my companions, staring blurry-eyed at their skill trees, hoping to find an OP ability somewhere. But no, Dragon Age 2 told me there would be no easy paths through life, and by the end I've grown to like its tough attitude—and it's not just the gameplay that gets tough.
As damning as this observation is to make, Dragon Age 2 reminds me most of Deus Ex: Invisible War. Both games are competent titles that have gotten bum raps from trying to streamline a beloved older brother. In Dragon Age 2's case, it looks towards Mass Effect 2 for inspiration, narrowing its scope and preferring combat to be flashy rather than mundane. But these changes are taken to their extreme, reducing the world of Thedas to a single city and having every single character—even the mages!—exaggerate their attacks as if they're middle school LARPers.
However, these issues—low locale variety and over-the-top action—are detrimental only on first glance. While Kirkwall undoubtedly would've benefited from more dungeon layouts, trapping you in the city means that you'll grow attached to the solitary setting, gradually learning more of its uncomfortable history with time. And the flashy combat is mechanically a non-issue—you can turn off button mashing in the options and basically play the game like Dragon Age: Origins, auto-attacking enemies and adjusting companion AI to suit your party's needs. For console players, not only does the spell wheel return fully intact, but it now boasts a vital new command: "move here", a tiny feature which quickly becomes an essential part of your arsenal.
Dialogue is unfortunately one aspect that's been definitely downgraded. Folks online cheekily dilute Bioware's dialogue wheel to "good choice, evil choice, sarcastic choice," but Dragon Age 2 is where the meme must've come from, because those are precisely your three options. Sure, occasionally you can lie or let one of your companions handle things, but you're no longer spoiled with the multitude of responses Origins provides, let alone the variety. Most of the choices in this game will result in binary outcomes—and even then, you're lucky if they don't inevitably turn into the same boss fight. The best thing I can say about the dialogue wheel is there's a new "mood" icon in the center of it, although good luck figuring out what "five-pointed star" and "purple diamond" mean.
That's not to say your choices don't matter or that the narrative feels weak however. The story in Dragon Age 2 is solid, but... kind of strange. Whereas most of BioWare's other games provide a central plot looming in the distance (Saren, the Reapers, the Archdemon) Dragon Age 2 doesn't have one. There's an array of offbeat story arcs and shady characters to be on the lookout for, but Hawke has no core motivation beyond a hazy "protect my family" instinct. Dragon Age 2 is a tangle of side quests that may or may not interweave with one another, knotted around three distinct threads that are mostly unrelated from one another. You'll bounce from one story, to another, to another, until eventually the game decides it's finished and rolls credits.
But like I said, this pivot isn't a detrimental move—by removing a titanic evil looming in the distance, Dragon Age 2 instead focuses on the layperson and their individual plight. Rather than deciding the fate of kings and kingdoms, you help folks find their lost shipments, foolhardy sons, and missing wives (or... what's left of them.) In turn, the conflicts in Dragon Age 2 feel more personal, as years down the line you may be forced to deal with the ramifications of your actions, forced to confront—or kill—someone you once aided. And that should scare you because a lot of outcomes in Dragon Age 2 are fairly bleak: by the end, my love dumped me, most of my relatives were dead, and I was morally obligated to execute my best party member. The narrative can certainly get frustrating at times—its overly binary and has no qualms about removing companions key to your party makeup—but it's a frustration that helps keep you on edge. Hard decisions are constantly pushed in your face, making you question whether or not you can survive the outcome.
And that bleakness wouldn't feel as potent if it weren't for the brutal gameplay design. By far the most unforgivable part about the game is that it will drop enemy reinforcements around the perimeter of the area, which has several nasty consequences: new enemies are quick to target squishy characters, area of effect spells have low utility, and you're never really sure when a fight will be winding down or starting up. Since warriors are atrocious at pulling aggro (Taunt has a 20 second cooldown!), your best bet is to spec for offense and learn to identify-then-dispatch of the problem children immediately: mages, horrors, assassins, and venomous spiders. If you don't stay on top of your party's health and positioning, you'll either blow through all your expensive consumables or watch as your ranged characters are downed fight after fight. Origins eventually dropped off in difficulty whereas Dragon Age 2 starts hard and ends hard—and this is without getting into the absurd boss fights (I hope you enjoy fighting 70 adds and navigating rock walls!)
Like with Origins, you'll eventually learn to adapt to the game's surprise drops, even if you never become a fan of them. Given that combat is considerably more lethal, you'll be spending even more time combing over your skill trees and equipment perks. Both of these features have been simplified from Origins, but it's a minor thing you'll hardly notice once you accept that you're not in charge of your companions' body armor. In fact I think I like the skill trees in Dragon Age 2 more because they let you spend talent points on modifiers to your existing abilities, which makes up for rotating through a long list of similar-feeling spells. Not a single time did I ever feel like Dragon Age 2 was tactically inferior to Origins; my biggest gripe will forever be that the game needs to take a chill pill when it comes to sending sending enemy reinforcements at you. And that magic resistance is too swingy. Aaand bosses are too tanky.
Going into Dragon Age 2, I was prepared for a neutered experience that was all style and no substance. Instead I got a game that was deep, full of good character moments, and much harder than either Doom Eternal or Sekiro. My experience wasn't all sunshine and smiles of course—the word "frustrating" immediately comes to mind—but I respect the game for challenging me with its narrative, economy, and gameplay. There's plenty of value to be found in Dragon Age 2, but you need to head into it understanding that it has an insatiable (and somewhat unfair) penchant for punishment.
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Images obtained from: microsoft.com, superior-realities, reddit.com, youtube.com
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