Maybe my corporate-speak translation is off, but to me, that sounds like 'we're not going to give you the tools we used, we might update the DA:O modding tools to work on DA2, but we're thinking long and hard about whether that would interfere with our DLC sales first'.

DA:O had a metric fuckton of DLC, and most of Origins was made before the EA takeover. Now we're looking at a game made completely under EA oversight, and the tally stands at seventeen items, a character, a dog, two missions, and multiple stores as DLC ON DAY FUCKING ZERO. What we're seeing here is the game-makers being very careful to speak in vague terminology to reassure the fans without screwing himself over if the word comes down from on high that they truly are going to withhold modding tools for the sake of improving DLC sales.

 

I hate most DLC. I'd rather have expansion packs and pay 30 to get quality content, then to get nickel and dimed for overpowered bullshit that you have to get if it's got online competative content. I also don't like at all their move with Shale/Warden's Keep.

If I buy the game, regardless of where I buy it, a digital download or a box copy, I shouldn't have game content locked to me just because of how I got it. Secondhand purchases the devs see zero money from it, so I suppose I can agree with EA wanting to charge secondhand users a fee to use a game they got no revenue from on their servers, but the rest of it, screw that. Which reminds me, I have an extra DA:O Shale content code if anyone's got the legit version and needs it.

Edit: Just played the demo.

.. this isn't Dragon Age 2, this is Demon Stone 2 First thing I noticed was how bad the graphics look. After playing other newer games, maybe I'm expecting too much out of the DAO engine. I don't remember having any troubles whatsoever with DAO's graphics though, whereas DAO2's graphics jerk a lot, and are running only 28-30 fps max.

The combat as a mage is annoying, stop flourishing your damned staff and kill the enemies already. Nonstop loading, loading while in the middle of talking... really? DAO rebuild the wardens. DAO2 sounds like you got to rebuild the Chantry. Games just crashed on me twice, and I'm not redoing that part again since the game thinks you don't need to save. So far it needs a ton, ton of work

It's not as bad so far as ppl have said, but it's pretty close.

 

Again, the demo is an old build. The loading issues have been fixed since the demo build and the build they have now. Save was simply disabled in the demo. As far as the crashes go, don't try and use DirectX11 as this is also disabled in the demo. Trying to use it simply causes crashes.

Graphic wise? Meh. I thought the game looked decent enough. Hardly anything to complain about in my opinion. Then again, I'm playing it on the Xbox 360 as I don't have a computer capable of running games past 2008.

 

Until we see a new build, I'm calling bullshit on this. The demo was released just about two weeks before the full game gets release. If they're *still* taking care of such large bugs, I fully expect this game to be fucked.

 

This. I've been saying this for so long now and its nice to be validated.

 

Only one DLC costs money ($7.00). All the rest are promotional efforts. Why would you worry about collecting them all? I played Dragon Age: Origins vanilla, purchased zero DLCs and enjoyed the game. I will do the same this time and if I walk away having enjoyed the game, hooray. If I haven't, it can join the long list of games that don't impress me.

A lot of the people whining on here weren't going to pay for any of it in the first place because spending money for digital media is beneath them (read: they're poor and have shitty scruples). They were (or are) going to torrent Dragon Age 2 when it becomes available. I'm sorry most people don't have the ability to restrain themselves from getting nickled and dimed; they're making their choices and they weren't forced into them.

Watching a few of the usual torrenters bitch about it is particularly amusing, though. "I wasn't going to pay a cent for this in the first place! Now they've added more stuff I'm going to steal!? Outrageous!"

 

I'd buy more games if they didn't try to nickel and dime me. Slapping huge chunks of content out a week or two, or even a month after the game's launched, with an uber small download is bullshit. It proves it came on the disc already, and we're just unlocking it, and I have a major problem with that mindset. If I pay full price, I want access to everything on the disc, not to be limited to X because I bought it from X dealer. Throw in rushed out games, bugfests, nonstop patching, shortness of content, totally braindead story, etc, etc.

I buy games that are worth supporting like DAO (ME1 and 2, even though I hated 2 and felt it was rushed, Marvel Ultimate Alliance series, Spore for the idea of it, even though the implementation was garbage, etc). Hell I usually buy the collector's edition's of them since I'd read the devs get more money from those. I can honestly say I know several hundred "usual torrenters" that went out and bought DAO to support the game, and to show a detailed game like that is wanted, and needed, in the sea of Call of Duty fail fest clones that've come out lately. For our support, we get treated to a rushed out, half assed together sequel that rips the game we loved to shreds. So you're right. It'll be pirated in probably mass numbers, EA will claim the same thing they always do, that pirating is the reason they don't give a shit about pc gaming, and we'll see the same thing we've seen the last few years, horrible console ripoffs shoved down PC gamer's throats.

No saving in demos is a stupid, stupid habit of developers that needs to go the hell away. As for xbox graphics? Maybe it's decent, but for PC graphics it's barely midrange. Rift, a MMORPG with a ton of shit going on at once, which usually means it'll have dumbed down graphics to compensate for a hundred players at once against 50 mobs doing crazy detailed stuff, beats the everliving hell out of these graphics.

 

These are the kind of people we can blame the consolization of DA:2 on. Normally I like Angry Joe, but it's very clear that he is the audience Bioware is going for with this POS.

 

Eat shit and die.

Are these people high or something? I mean, that's the impression I'm getting from them. Either that or they've suffered brain damage.

 

I don't know, I like the notion of playing Dragon Age with a friend or two. Only problematic I would see that arises from this, would be on who makes the ingame choices and how it affects those in general, but surely there could be a way around that.

Then again, I am a person who enjoys playing with other people more than I do playing alone, so, just my take on this.

 

Or we could go back and play Fable 2/3 again, realize that trying to do everything is a terrible idea which leads to average games, and let Bioware work on their games the way they used to be allowed to make them. /:

 

Exactly, trying to shoe-horn co-op into a tactical 50 hour+ RPG based on a character driven story is asinine to say the least.

Edit:

This is my thinking exactly. I'm one of the "usual torrenters" I suppose. I do it quite often (though for ebooks I generally abstain from the practice unless the pricing is just plain unreasonable), but for games of a high standard, I generally buy them new. Bought ME:2 new, same with DA:O (two copies actually, ps3 and PC), and SC:2 (again, two copies. One euro account, one US).

I've still got the game pre-ordered, and if it's good than I'll happily call myself out on my own bullshit. However right now the chances of that happening are looking slim.

 

@Everyone with obscene loading times. For some reason keeping it on direct x9 and turning off v-sync sped the loading up for me. That said the demo is buggy as fuck but it's something to give a try.

Also if you're sick of looking at default Hawke there's a mod (or hack rather) to enable to Charater Creator *and one that opens the inventory* here

 

Just to note, the demo's Character Creator isn't finished and isn't meant to be accessible. Some of the sliders don't work right. Plus some other issues. It's still mostly usable though.

EDIT: Just tried it out again, and it worked much better than when I tried it before. So maybe I'm wrong. Still, I'd rather have the arrows back than be forced to actually, erm, slide the sliders. I feel that it's more precise.

 

Just to note, I didn't have any issues with really long loading times, rather it was the short little hops (1-2 seconds) *during* conversations that annoyed me. I can't think of a better way to break immersion than to have characters just stare blankly at each other for two seconds or more between each reply.

 

Turning off the v-sync fixes that.

 

I assure you, it doesn't.

I don't play with V-sync on ever. I turned it off as soon as I started the demo.

 

Works for me. >_>

EDIT: Wait. I think I completely misunderstood you. D'oh. :facepalm

 

Ah yeah I know what you mean. Supposedly those aren't in the full game. Let's hope that's actually true.

 

So, guess what finally leaked early?

Edit: Leak was console only. On the PS3 it requires firmware 3.56, which hasn't been cracked yet. It'll take another day before a signed eboot comes out .

Edit2: PS3 eboot already out.

Bioware will not be happy about this.

Edit 3:

Played the first half hour or so of the PS3 version. I'm too tired to continue, but I can state at the very least, that the game looks like ass (on the PS3). I mean, I really thought it'd be tough to make DA:O look good, but DA:2 really accomplishes that perfectly. Certain segments (the video when they enter Kirkwall) really looks like it could be a PS2 game, no joke.

On the other hand, the loading segments I bitched about earlier are gone. So I call myself there. I was full of shit, and should have listened to the excuse that it was an old build.

The voice acting seems to get better the farther you go in, so that's a point in it's favor I suppose.

Anyway, I'm going to go pass out and play it tomorrow morning, have Friday off work, so I can spend it with DA:2.