Damn You Bioware!Follow

how long have you been playing wow?

some douchebag executive (not kotick) announced last week that he figured out how to combat piracy and make a killing at the same time: release a broken game for $30 and then charge for all the dlc that makes it playable.

Yeah, I'm quite happy with my PS3 when I read stuff like this. No piracy crap, just push 'n play.

As for Bioware, I loved Dragon Age (up to the point of feeling bad for Spoilerkilling the elves who hadn't done any wrong and deciding not to continue and get the trophy as a result). I've spent days trying to get the DLC to work (pigeon chats with Shale are hilarious!) but I gave up after I found out I needed to get US PSN credits. I've found an alternative but I simply haven't gone out of my way to pick a US PSN card up at the local gamestore. It's still definitely on my list to platinum.

I'll admit, I feel kinda annoyed about the fact that I paid 60 bucks for it when I bought my PS3 a month or so back, and it's recently dropped to 30 bucks. It did, however, give me the incentive to wait for Awakenings to drop in price.

Bioware>Your face


There is a respec mod for origins, its not perfect, but it works.

Reamed on DLC cost i dont have to pay?

Sounds like bioware raped someones dog and burned down there house.

Bioware games are great, get over it.

If I felt like I hadn't been delivered a full game, and needed to buy DLC, I'd agree. However, DA:O feels pretty well-designed from a story and game standpoint without any of it. All you get from the additional content is really extra gear and some nice new insights to the story that are irrelevant to your main mission. Like one gives you some back story to the wardens as to why they were once exiled. Another allows you to go back to Ostagar Spoilerand kill the darkspawn that took out Cailan, lay him to rest if you wish, and recover some of his and Duncan's gear.

Only Shale is really deeply involved in the story, as it was originally going it be a default character. And, even then, that's only for one sub quest that it isn't required for (it just adds more depth). Even if you download the character, you don't even have to bring them with you.

But there's a DLC where you get to play an alternate story where your MC dies early on and you are a Darkspawn instead. No reason that should be included, but it's a great little addition if you liked the game.

DLC is here to stay, for all games, really. I'm fine with that, as long as the initial product is worth its price. If I'm paying 60 dollars for the husk of a game, I'm gonna be pissed.

And you know what, there are games that have pitiful DLC that give less replay and first-time value than DAO. The Force Unleashed, for example. It thought it was fun, yeah. But I finished it in like half a day. One more play through for the other ending and I'd be done. At least with DAO you get to experience different story lines with each one, if you want. There are a few different endings, many different epilogues and tons of ways to get there.

It's because there's no point in it. Why would you bother going up to someone and saying "I hate the games you like" and then argue with them nonstop about it? I didn't enjoy DA:O at all, but I don't see any reason to come here and start telling people how wrong they are for enjoying it.

There's a big difference between making a two word post of "<company> sucks" and saying, "I didn't like it because A, B, C..."

Ones just a crappy attempt at a +1, the other actually brings conversation into the thread.

He probably still would have been rated down, but at least he could have been justifiably grumpy about it!

I enjoyed DA:O. I don't think it was the greatest game I ever played, but I did enjoy it. I didn't purchase any DLC for it, and feel that I got my money's value out of the main game. I didn't find the game to be too wordy, and the sex scenes only happen once anyhow (and you don't even have to pursue the relationship-building to play through the game).

I made a couple of posts describing specific issues I had with Alien Swarm. I wasn't going up to people who liked it and saying "no, you're wrong". The last time we had one of these Bioware threads, you spent the better part of two pages trying to convince people how bad their tastes were. I agreed with you but the thread itself was still irritating.

People asked me why I didn't like Bioware games; I told them. Don't really remember telling people they had bad taste for liking them. Heck last time I posted about DAO it was mostly constructive criticism and quite a few people seemed to agree.

I'll be honest, I don't like bioware and valve games because of how the company designs them. I like them because they have the good sense to recognize that on rare occasion the community might figure out a better way to do it, and fully supports the mod community (atleast on the PC). Atleast, where DA:O is concerned, in Bioware's case. Its amazing how much a different feel the game has if you have a play around with mods. Same with Fallout 3. That said, I do agree with some of the things said on the game's downsides. I think it comes down to if you liked the old Baldur's Gate style games. Personally, I did not. The only game of that style I really liked was Planescape Torment, just because the story was really fun. That's my 2 cents on the matter.

I am glad you actually outlined your reasons, Shintasama, because honestly there are a lot of people who hate on things purely because they are popular, and it saddens me when I see people know don't stop to think. These kinds of people tend to be the type who will pop on a forum just to say "x sucks" without a reason, because they have none. I think it is good to stay as far away from being associated with such mindless drivel as they.

Apparently, your only option for race in DA2 (which was just announced) is a human. As such, the entire game is going to be VA-ed by a male or female based on your chosen sex (at least, as far as I know you get to choose). I have to say I like that.

I think my BIGGEST complaint about DAO is that the voices you can choose from are just generally annoying. I hated all the male human ones, and my current character is a female elf. Hers is way better, but I still think I'd mute her if I could (I play on my PS3).



That's pretty unfair, imo (exaggeration aside, of course). Is there a lot of conversation? Yes. But everything but your own choices are voiced. And you still spend a lot of time exploring/killing stuff. I'll give you that the written quests are kinda irritating, of course. I wish there had been a better way to implement them. But I can't think of a way to do it without actually adding a quest giver for each one. And I can't help but feel that it would just be overwhelming to have that many people seeking your help in each town.



It could definitely be approved, but there was 2 or 3 times I found it actually annoying. And that's true of just about every game I've played. Even ones with controllable cameras can be irritating at times. But, I'll admit I generally prefer the latter. DAO is somewhere between controllable and automatic. You CAN control it, but you pause the game and potentially change targets in doing so.



Fair, to a certain degree. But no more so than any other game I've played in the last 5 years. And, on the other hand, no game has given me as much freedom to play as *I* wanted to be. Idk, maybe I just haven't played them? But it was really refreshing to actually cultivate my own character from the provided back story.



I do think the "recruit the armies!" thing was a little boring at the end. But I also found out there's actually an intended order that I didn't really follow (it's arranged by min levels for enemies). Looking at it after the fact, I could see how it would actually improve things to a certain extent. I think my real problem was that the quests were essentially isolated conflicts. Nothing about the Dalish had anything to do with Orzammar. I wish your choices there influenced how your interactions with OTHERS worked. That would have made everything more interesting than "pick who you want to help in the final battle."



What ISN'T a LotR rip off? 99% of what the West produces is so clearly based on Tolkein's work that it's ridiculous to attack Bioware, specifically, for it. But I actually respect that, when you really look at the lore they've established, it feels REALLY different from LotR. The ambience and feel may be incredibly similar, but the actual history of that universe is pretty interesting and "un-Tolkein"



I 100% disagree here (at least about DAO). If your AI sucked, it's because you sucked at setting up the AI. I've had NO problems with it, and have managed to create some really well-oiled tactics for my characters to execute nice strategies without me needing to direct them at all. The ONLY gripe I have is that you can't tell them to use an ability based on a status conditional. And the reason for that is because Bioware wanted Spell Chains to be a conscious decision.



THIS is fair. Darkspawn are only so interesting. Yeah, you get 4 different types based on 4 different races. Add bears, wolves, giant spiders and regular races. Yup, that's not that cool. But I will say that some of the boss encounters were extremely interesting, even if the regular designs weren't so much. Though I find the enemy design of Awakening, besides being the same in general as Origins, to be far more interesting because of the villain.



Recent patches have fixed the vast majority of them, but fair. I would probably feel differently if I played then.



1. Shale was available free for all the initial purchasers of the game. He was DLC, yes, but still free. You only had to pay for him if you got your copy second hand. And, in that case, it was because Bioware wasn't getting anything from you anyway. I VASTLY prefer some DLC that isn't free for used copies than other DRM out there. By a loooooong shot.

2. The game release was delayed after he had been cut. The rest of the development for him happened after the final disc versions were being tested/prepared. They aren't going to hold up all that just to include him. He was originally planned to be released a month or two after release.

3. The only way, then, to include him in the game was to make the DLC for him free. But, either way, you'd need to sit there and download it--they wouldn't have made something like it a patch--it's just too big. The system they chose means ALL people who buy the game from them get Shale, and anyone who buys it from someone else has to buy him.

4. All the rest of the DLC is reasonably priced, IMO, and far from being necessary for the original game. None of it has anything to do with your main mission, it just develops the lore more in a side direction. And they frankly couldn't really do much more of that in the original game without bombarding new players with info. DLC was a nice treat for people that were interested in learning more, but not game-changing enough to make it necessary. I paid $5 for a DLC that gives me new gear and adds a whole new level to the game lore, because I cared, and is actually quite a bit of game time (I'll get more from that $5 than I got from 1/6 of The Force Unleashed). If you don't care, there's NO reason to buy it.

5. I see pros and cons to in-game advertising. On the one hand, it points out that it exists, when MANY people would probably never click that DLC button otherwise. And, for something like Shale where there's a good chance you already have a free DL, it's a reminder to use it. I think that was a good choice. I think the Warden's Keep guy shouldn't have been in the party camp, though. I'm not sure how best to handle that. There are definitely ways where advertising DLC inside the game can be a great decision for the player's enjoyment and for the company. I don't profess to know how to do it. But it's also important to note that ONLY these two are advertised. Nothing else is found in game.



It just sounds like you sucked, no offense, which could be because you weren't interested in it. But it's a STRATEGY game. If you are getting stun locked, it's because you didn't even bother to plan out a strategy for an encounter. And I was constantly hitting different abilities on my Rogue and DEFINITELY on my Mage.

As for saving, that's what you get for playing on an Xbox. PS3 automatically saves regularly. And you DO know that you can skip every single line, right? Don't blame the game maker for your own mistakes.

Is Bioware perfect? No. Do you have some valid points? Yes. But I think you are definitely being unfair in a lot of ways.