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Dragon Age 2 is like Drakengard if it wasn't self-aware and also unconscious to the idea of intratextual criticism.
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Mar 17, 2020 20:06
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drkeiscool posted:Okay, everyone tells you that you’re influential and are actively courting you for favor. What can you actually, concretely do with this influence? How can you affect the gameplay or the narrative of da2 with Hawke’s influence? You can't, and that's one of the themes of the game. The forces Hawke is caught up in are bigger than them and you're ultimately unable to save anyone. Its a pretty bleak message.
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Mar 17, 2020 20:18
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NikkolasKing posted:This is specifically why for my "canon" runs of DA1-3, even though I played a Human Male Mage who was radically Pro-Mage for the first two games, I decided to be a Female Elf Templar who was proud to be the Herald of Andraste in the third. look at this shem
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Mar 17, 2020 20:18
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Zore posted:You can't, and that's one of the themes of the game. The forces Hawke is caught up in are bigger than them and you're ultimately unable to save anyone. Yeah. The whole point of DA2 is that at the end of the day you are one person thrown into a chaotic mix of forces beyond your control. Your decisions have little impact because again, you are only one person. That's why Hawke's story is a tragedy. They had power but they couldn't do anything to stop the conflict because the mage/templar war was building for years before Hawke was even alive. That's why the stories surrounding Malcolm Hawke and Bethany are important too. Players rage against this because they want a super powered protagonist that can do anything. But Hawke's poignancy lies in the fact that his story reflects real life: that we are helpless in the face of a broader cold and uncaring universe and that we can only make meaning with the people we love and care for. e: its one of the gutsiest decisions Bioware ever made and I'm very bitter that we'll never get another poignant story like this because gamers are completely unable to handle not being an overpowered god protagonist.
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Mar 17, 2020 20:26
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HIJK posted:Yeah. The whole point of DA2 is that at the end of the day you are one person thrown into a chaotic mix of forces beyond your control. Your decisions have little I always point to the High King of Skyrim mod as a good example of this. Legendary Dragonborn who saves the world isn't enough for some people.
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Mar 17, 2020 20:43
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NikkolasKing posted:This is specifically why for my "canon" runs of DA1-3, even though I played a Human Male Mage who was radically Pro-Mage for the first two games, I decided to be a Female Elf Templar who was proud to be the Herald of Andraste in the third. Being a pro Andraste Qunari mage is the best for that mentality. "Yes, I am the herald of your valued and precious saint who is true voice of the Divine, magic is an abomination that exists to be aggressively controlled, what was your question again?" "uh, you have horns?"
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Mar 17, 2020 20:52
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drkeiscool posted:Okay, everyone tells you that you’re influential and are actively courting you for favor. What can you actually, concretely do with this influence? How can you affect the gameplay or the narrative of da2 with Hawke’s influence? I'm not sure what kind of answer you're looking for. Everything that happens in Chapter is explicitly because Hawke is champion. The two most powerful organizations in the city are trying to get you on their side to make the other back down. What else are you looking for? You can be a literal god in an Elder Scrolls game and the gameworld will barely acknowledge it. DA2 at least backs up its claims that it's about the Champion of Kirkwall.
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Mar 17, 2020 21:29
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chaosapiant posted:I'm not sure what kind of answer you're looking for. Everything that happens in Chapter is explicitly because Hawke is champion. The two most powerful organizations in the city are trying to get you on their side to make the other back down. What else are you looking for? You can be a literal god in an Elder Scrolls game and the gameworld will barely acknowledge it. DA2 at least backs up its claims that it's about the Champion of Kirkwall. They’re more the most desperate organizations in the city. The Circle doesn’t really have any power, which is part of the issue
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Mar 17, 2020 21:31
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chaosapiant posted:What else are you looking for? To be honest, influence over the conclusions of the game's various narratives, like what so many other modern RPGs have done. A lot of RPG's have an epilogue, kind of a slideshow or video that explains what happens to various people, factions, parts of a city, your companions, things like that. I love things like Awakening's castle or Inquisition's War Table, where there are systems dedicated to having the player involved in making choices about particular things and showing off the results. I'm not bothered that DA2 has an inevitable, tragic ending, I'm bothered that it felt like I couldn't try to resolve it and fail. HIJK posted:The whole point of DA2 is that at the end of the day you are one person thrown into a chaotic mix of forces beyond your control. Your decisions have little impact because again, you are only one person. And I actually agree with you that this is the story the writer's were trying to tell. I just disagree as to whether they told it well, which they didn't. I think it would've been fascinating if Hawke had actually been made Viscount at the start of Chapter 3, had some kind of gameplay system or Templar/Mage trust bar that you had to balance, and have it all blow up in your face regardless of what you did. Wars are definitely bigger than one man, and it could've made for a very poignant story. HIJK posted:Players rage against this because they want a super powered protagonist that can do anything. But Hawke's poignancy lies in the fact that his story reflects real life: that we are helpless in the face of a broader cold and uncaring universe and that we can only make meaning with the people we love and care for. I don't care about having a super powered protagonist who can do anything. Or I should say, I do enjoy power-fantasies, and Bioware is great at making them, but I'm not disappointed by DA2 because it has a protagonist who failed to stop something beyond his power to stop. I'm disappointed because I sincerely feel like he couldn't try. Not wouldn't, couldn't. As if the story just cut off branches before I could try to climb them, because the writers already knew the ending, instead of letting me try to climb them and fail on my own terms.
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Mar 17, 2020 22:37
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drkeiscool posted:To be honest, influence over the conclusions of the game's various narratives, like what so many other modern RPGs have done. A lot of RPG's have an epilogue, kind of a slideshow or video that explains what happens to various people, factions, parts of a city, your companions, things like that. I love things like Awakening's castle or Inquisition's War Table, where there are systems dedicated to having the player involved in making choices about particular things and showing off the results. I'm not bothered that DA2 has an inevitable, tragic ending, I'm bothered that it felt like I couldn't try to resolve it and fail. Given the way Bioware handled trying and "failing" in ME3 with the Kai Leng fight on Thessia I'm okay with them not letting Hawke try.
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Mar 17, 2020 23:01
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Admiral Ray posted:Given the way Bioware handled trying and "failing" in ME3 with the Kai Leng fight on Thessia I'm okay with them not letting Hawke try. lol remember when Kai Leng poses out in the open to recharge his shields and the gunship fires at you, and if Shepard (who has killed like eight gunships on foot) fires at it, Kai Leng makes fun of you
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Mar 18, 2020 02:19
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Pattonesque posted:lol remember when Kai Leng poses out in the open to recharge his shields and the gunship fires at you, and if Shepard (who has killed like eight gunships on foot) fires at it, Kai Leng makes fun of you The renegade option to kill Kai Leng was definitely the most enjoyable one in the series though even if he was the most overwrought villain in a series full of them.
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Mar 18, 2020 04:54
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Kai Leng was goofy as poo poo, but his presence in the game never bothered me. Mass Effect already has tons of goofy characters and I never took the series seriously enough for Kai to be offensive amongst them.
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Mar 18, 2020 06:22
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Good ol piss cereal cyborg ninja.
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Mar 18, 2020 06:54
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i think the weird thing with kai leng was his 11th hour appearance that made no sense unless you had been following the cross-media prequel stuff or whatever and also that even in that it was really bad (like the cereal stuff)
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Mar 18, 2020 07:33
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chaosapiant posted:Kai Leng was goofy as poo poo, but his presence in the game never bothered me. Mass Effect already has tons of goofy characters and I never took the series seriously enough for Kai to be offensive amongst them. they hadn't built him up at all was the issue, and all of a sudden he shows up and does stuff like "jams melee weapon into the ground and closes to melee distance with your squadmates, who are so astounded by this move that they miss every shot"
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Mar 18, 2020 14:17
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Admiral Ray posted:Nah, I don't think so. It seems more likely they were formed from the Titan's and worked in harmony with and within them. To willingly leave doesn't seem like it would have been prohibited simply because it wasn't done. The case might be made that the Titan's sing to the dwarves in a similar way that the Demon Supreme's sing to the darkspawn and that severing the connection and making their world silent would make them go mad, but given the large amount of non-mad dwarves it'd probably just suck for them for a while. The Dwarves aside, I do like the theory that the Elves fought with the Titans to use their blood (lyrium) to fuel their spells, and that the blight was somehow a result of that and may have been an elven super weapon designed to help them defeat the Titans. And Solas said gently caress that because the Blight was going to destroy the world if it wasn't put into check, and the elven gods didn't care to stop it.
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Mar 18, 2020 15:00
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e: double post whoops
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Mar 18, 2020 15:13
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Pattonesque posted:they hadn't built him up at all was the issue, and all of a sudden he shows up and does stuff like "jams melee weapon into the ground and closes to melee distance with your squadmates, who are so astounded by this move that they miss every shot" I think the idea is supposed to be that he's the evil counterpart to Commander Shepard, TIM's replacement for Shepard after she went back to the Citadel, but he's just another one of those characters suddenly introduced at the last second of the trilogy who ends up meaningless as a result (see also Vega and Starchild).
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Mar 18, 2020 15:14
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Cythereal posted:I think the idea is supposed to be that he's the evil counterpart to Commander Shepard, TIM's replacement for Shepard after she went back to the Citadel, but he's just another one of those characters suddenly introduced at the last second of the trilogy who ends up meaningless as a result (see also Vega and Starchild). yeah like that'd all be fine had they built him up and not caused him to constantly win because of cutscene incompetence on the part of your companions and Shepard
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Mar 18, 2020 15:17
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chaosapiant posted:Kai Leng was goofy as poo poo, but his presence in the game never bothered me. Mass Effect already has tons of goofy characters and I never took the series seriously enough for Kai to be offensive amongst them. It wasn't his characterization, it was that I completely loving wrecked him whenever I got control of Shepard back. The way BioWare handled Shepard failing wasn't by actually creating a good encounter that we would fail no matter how well we played or what decisions we made, but rather by taking control away and having Shepard fail in a cutscene. It was bad design.
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Mar 18, 2020 17:31
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remember when kai leng defeated your squad of elite badasses by throwing one of them into the other?
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Mar 18, 2020 20:07
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Cythereal posted:I think the idea is supposed to be that he's the evil counterpart to Commander Shepard, TIM's replacement for Shepard after she went back to the Citadel, but he's just another one of those characters suddenly introduced at the last second of the trilogy who ends up meaningless as a result (see also Vega and Starchild). And also the random media person that they made up and stuck on your ship instead of the other 2 reporters that they had already introduced in the series.
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Mar 18, 2020 22:29
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Alexander Hamilton posted:And also the random media person that they made up and stuck on your ship instead of the other 2 reporters that they had already introduced in the series. d'oh ho ho, that wasn't just a random media person, it was Jessica Chobot
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Mar 18, 2020 22:36
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drkeiscool posted:d'oh ho ho, that wasn't just a random media person, it was Jessica Chobot Wikipedia posted:Chobot gained exposure when Kotaku published a photo of her licking a Sony PSP online in 2005. lol
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Mar 18, 2020 23:08
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drkeiscool posted:d'oh ho ho, that wasn't just a random media person, it was Jessica Chobot idk what they were thinking, she did a not-horrifying job I guess but how many people out there were on the fence about buying ME3 until they learned she was in it? Meanwhile they killed off the reporter character everyone knew on Twitter
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Mar 19, 2020 02:47
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Finally in Inquisition in my trilogy play through. Last time I really played was prior to Witcher 3 coming out. I'd forgotten just how gorgeous this game is, and yea, it's got a poo poo-ton of fetch quests, but the world is gorgeous and feels super alive, and has an amazing cast of characters. If Dragon Age 4 is anywhere near as good, I'll be happy and impresed.
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Mar 20, 2020 06:49
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If I was only going to do one run through of DAI, what's the best choice for the Inquisitor and followers?
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Mar 20, 2020 06:55
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Khizan posted:If I was only going to do one run through of DAI, what's the best choice for the Inquisitor and followers? I'd say female elf mage, so you can get tied to the best parts of the lore. That's what I'm playing now.
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Mar 20, 2020 07:19
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Khizan posted:If I was only going to do one run through of DAI, what's the best choice for the Inquisitor and followers? The usual recommendation is elf rift mage, and female so you can romance Solas. But if you think having to romance Solas might sap your enjoyment of the game too much, male mage or dw rogue romancing Cassandra is also good.
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Mar 20, 2020 07:35
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I ended up just rolling dice to make a character, I'm a dalish rogue for DAO. Between her default robes and the chasind robes, I forgot how long it takes to get Morrigan any stat-useful robes that aren't also cringey fetish gear. Also all the light armour looks awful but I knew that going in.
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Mar 21, 2020 00:09
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Edgar Allen Ho posted:I ended up just rolling dice to make a character, I'm a dalish rogue for DAO. What's up fellow dalish person. I was female dalish elf warrior with the default name (I think it's Lyna?) Also cringy fetish gear fits morrigan's character
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Mar 21, 2020 01:07
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Does it?
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Mar 21, 2020 01:18
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SyntheticPolygon posted:Does it? One of her early conversations is about how she used girl appeal to lure templars to
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Mar 21, 2020 04:43
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I like to keep Morrigan's robes just because I like to keep each character with their particular look as much as that is possible. I hate it when the first thing you do after getting a character is strip them out of their gear with a unique appearance and slap them into a set of boring standard armor that makes them look like generic bandits or soldiers. One of the things I really liked about Dragon Age 2 was that all your companions kept their unique armor appearances and you were never forced to choose between appearance and performance.
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Mar 21, 2020 09:02
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Khizan posted:I like to keep Morrigan's robes just because I like to keep each character with their particular look as much as that is possible. Yeah DAO has that problem all around and it doesn't help that there is more lovely-looking gear than good-looking. Other than Sten everyone looks better if you keep them how they came for the whole game. Another thing that really irks me is how often and how quickly gear that should be important to you gets woefully outclassed- like the dalish warden gets a ring from their keeper, the Cousland gets the family sword, etc. Every warden gets something unique. I'd like if those items especially all got unique looks and instead of swapping out your gear, you got upgrades to keep them relevant. Just have some NPC doing some bullshit in gratitude at every story area to the Cousland sword or mom's boots or the Keeper's ring or the fine dwarven blade or whatever, so you aren't selling your heirloom in the first quarter of the game because you found something better. poo poo I'd love if DAO got a remake.
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Mar 21, 2020 14:21
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I always like to get Cailan's armor and put Alistair in it. Looks good and makes sense.
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Mar 21, 2020 14:48
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I just remembered, DAO has a ton of mods on the steam workshop. You can probably find aesthetic armors/robes/whatever there. Although given how this usually goes I suspect most of them will look more sexualized, not less.... E: I highly recommend playing with the mod that hides all the crazy status effects when you're in a cutscene. That poo poo got annoying as gently caress Yaoi Gagarin fucked around with this message at 19:31 on Mar 21, 2020 |
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Mar 21, 2020 19:27
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VostokProgram posted:I just remembered, DAO has a ton of mods on the steam workshop. You can probably find aesthetic armors/robes/whatever there. Although given how this usually goes I suspect most of them will look more sexualized, not less.... oh god please link this. playing my arcane knight with a million sustained effects is giving me a headache
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Mar 21, 2020 20:34
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babypolis posted:oh god please link this. playing my arcane knight with a million sustained effects is giving me a headache It wasn't workshop, it was Nexus. But I think this is what I used: https://www.nexusmods.com/dragonage/mods/98/ After all this time I don't remember how to install mods for DAO but I'm pretty sure it's not too hard Oh, there's also a mod that makes helmets invisible so you can see characters faces but still get the stat boost. That's on Nexus somewhere too
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Mar 21, 2020 21:38
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