(Originally Written April 2020)
I have a strange history with the Dragon Age Series. I first played the third installment Dragon Age: Inquisition and loved it to death putting 120+ hours on my first playthrough back in 2017. Then I played the first entry Dragon Age: Origins and loved that game just as much as Inquisition. Finally, I have sat down to play the middle game.
THE NEGATIVES FIRST
There is no New Game+. For many this may seem like not a big deal because they are ok with just starting over the entire game with a new character. This is not the case for me. I hate the fact that none of the Dragon Age games have New Game+, it's horrible and a complete waste! I don't like starting over with a new character. Not just because of all of the powerful quest items and gear I worked for, for 30+ hours of my time, but because of the attachment I have to my character.
When I make a character, I really take my time to make a face that is appealing, relatable, and attractive (depending on the limits of character creator). The character designs in DA2 are the best the series has to offer. Compared to it's successor DA: Inquisition which has ATROCIOUS character design, it is questionable why Bioware did not keep DA2's character designs. The look is surreal and cartoony, this style fits perfectly in the DA universe more than a realistic approach.
CHALLENGING OR LAZY DESIGN?
There are many instances in DA2 that give the illusion of challenge and adversity to overcome. However if one looks closer at the situation, some of the most difficult battles consist of hordes. Copy and paste hordes of enemies! For instance, during the level when you bust into the mages hall to chase after Orsino, you get bombarded with demons and mages. It isn't clever design to just overflow the player with ridiculous amounts of enemies. It may be fun and satisfying the first few times, but after a while it becomes tedious and leaves you yearning for more. You have to see what I mean, it gets pretty overdone. This formula occurs a few times in the game and it shows the lack of thought put into the combat.
A trick around getting hoarded by enemy NPCs is to be aware of their spawning borders. If you let your companions go across a specific border it will unintentionally spawn more enemies than you can handle. So being that the ally A.I is not the smartest, sometimes you have to micromanage their every movement, even if you adjust or modify the tactics of the A.I. This can be frustrating and take away the enjoyable flow of battle, but it is necessary during the cheap repetitive battles.
This cheap progression however really shows it's underbelly when you have to trudge through similar, copied levels. There are a good amount of levels, dungeons, landscapes, and areas that you go through over and over again. Some levels are more forgivable than others, but sometimes it just test your patience.
REPETITON
The game gets away with hiding it's repetitive nature from you for a short time. However by the end of Act 2, it goes down hill gameplay wise. Each new quest and side quest, brings you to levels that are copied and pasted. Multiple times you go to the same dungeon for varying quest. This recycling of the same path over and over again has a way of wearing down at your motivation and patience. The only reason why it is ok in some instances due to the different side quest you must complete.
In terms of combat, this is the weakest formula in the DA series. Combos are mindless, button mashing. Once in a while a special ability adds a bit of fun.
However when the game gets combat right, it can be really satisfying and addicting. Some of the boss fights are well balanced like the Deep Roads Ancient Rock Wraith boss. The two final boss battles, Meredith and Orsino, fell flat. Now visually speaking, fighting Meredith was stunning and awesome too see all of the statues come to life and try to crush you. I loved the concept, but the delivery fell flat. Orsino was just too easy to fight, his lard-ass form didn't really do much for me. It was easy enough to just focus all of my companions attacks on him and just watch his health meter drain slowly. Then he would spawn corpses and arch mages. Not much excitement here.
I wished for more boss battles like the Deep Roads Ancient Rock Wraith, because it felt more classical. I thought it was cool how you would have to dodge his attacks with your group by hiding behind pillars or dodging his rolls to the best of your ability. It really pushed the limits of how well you can coordinate and organize your crew. The Dragon you have to fight in the Bone Pit later on is the closest you'll get to a great beast slaying like the Deep Roads monster. Both of these beast had good levels to maneuver around as well, when compared to the bland square arenas of Orsino and Meredith. So in terms of boss battles, I'm gonna have to give the award to the Deep Roads Rock Wraith.
NPC LIFE
The game's design fails in NPCs, another problem I had with the game was it's lack of wildlife and npc. It mostly consist of humans, mages, templars, bandits, demons and limited animals. There is not much spice offered, as the cycling of the same kind of enemies are exposed as you progress. At least in DA: Origins for example, the wildlife was plentiful and even was crossed with the blight, adding unique enemy creatures to fend off.
CHARACTER CREATION
Now in Dragon Age, I always play as a female Mage, with a mix of offensive and defensive powers. I always have the abilities to heal my team, while also being able to do aerial attacks with either primal magics or other. I always need to be a healer, because when I was younger, I would never have any healer, relying heavily on potions, death would be too common. This ruined many experiences and would erupt impatience with some games. But that was when I was young and inexperienced with RPG games like DA.
In the first game, DA: Origins, I could make a good custom character. In DA 2, I made a character similar to my Origins character. Except I have to say the second game got the character designs beautifully. The heads do not look like mushed potato, or deformed beats like in the third game, Inquisition. Face models are simplistic, attractive, sleek, and stand out with a little time in the character creator. Plenty of good hairstyles too choose from as well.
A big killjoy in Inquisition was, no matter how good you would make your character's face. It was always off! From the front, your character would look beautiful, but the moment you turn it a little to the side, it looked ugly as sin. When you would turn it all the way too the side, it was something completely different. I don't know what the character modeler's did, but they screwed up big time in Inquisition. Which is ridiculous because they had a solid base from DA 2 they could have drawn from.
The models in DA2 were definitely some assets used in the MMO Knights of the Old Republic, but I like that style and I'm sure many other people do too. I don't like ultra realism, because it doesn't look good. It ruins the experience of playing a fantasy game. If you want real life, just get off your ass and go outside, talk to people! That's not what a game should be, a game should not substitute reality, it should take you out of it.
LACK OF VARIETY
One thing obviously lacking is the choice of DA's unique races like Dwarves, elves and even Qunari. This was an opportunity for Bioware to flesh out the story even more. Imagine being a Qunari and having a dialogue with the Arishok? There could have been many potential great moments with different races. I don't like to always play as a human, I want to get more of the fantasy experience.
IMPORTANCE OF SPECIALIZATIONS
The most underrated feature of the whole DA series is that you can choose specializations. Each class has three different sub-classes. In Origins and Inquisition, the specializations offered more benefits and intuitive mechanics to the gameplay.
In Origins existed these 4 Specialization:
-Shapeshifter
-Spirit Healer
-Blood Mage
-Arcane Warrior
In DA2 only 2 specializations remained (watered down), with one new class:
-Blood Mage
-Spirit Healer
-Force Mage
Both Blood and Force in DA2 were simply for outputting damage onto enemy combatants. With force mage, it is a mix of offensive abilities, but they do not operate efficiently as a class by itself. Force mage has some good spells, but most of them do not pack enough of a punch.
I did a mage playthrough so many times. Blood mage is the best option to use, just because you can heal a bit with a mix of offensive. However, you can have many trees of skills, with multiple spells instead of depending on one.
CONTROLS, PC OR CONSOLE?
Controls are magnificent, sleek, responsive and smooth on PC. However I could understand why people on console had some issues. I played Inquisition on Xbox One, and Origins on Xbox 360. But this is the first Bioware game I played on PC, and what a difference. Playing on the keyboard and mouse is definitely the top way to play an RPG game of this caliber. Play this on Xbox and you will see the difference, I'm not talking about frames, I'm talking about the overall play style. The Xbox or consoles feel a little wonky, slow, and heavy. On PC, it feels light, fast, and intuitive. All of your spells are all ready and able to use on the top numbers, and when you run out of room you could just use the mouse to use a spell or ability., On a console, it was less intuitive too have multiple spells as high as 10 even, due to the limitations of a controller so it is understandable. However I highly recommend PC for this one. On console, the unintuitive framework can break the flow of the game, and add to some unnecessary repetition which could be well avoided on PC.
HAWKE, THE CHAMPION OF KIRKWALL, BEST MAIN CHARACTER OF THE SERIES
DA 2 has some great voice acting and amazing moments. Most importantly, I loved the voice actress for the female Champion you play as. She did an excellent job, and is as relatable and interesting to listen to as the male Commander Shephard voice actor from ME. Very memorable, and fitting of the character you create. The Champion of Kirkwall has a compelling story compared to the first and last DA game. After the Blight ruined Fereldan, Hawke and her family escape to Kirkwall. However it is a treacherous journey, embarked with her brother Carver, her sister Bethany and mother Leandra. Since I play as a mage, Bethany dies by an Ogre darkspawn attack. If you play as a Warrior/Rogue, Carver would be the one to die.
After you barely make it out of the blight filled land, you enter Kirkwall as refugees. Not much too your name, you start off from dirt. Doing dirty jobs just to make ends meet, and living in your Uncle Gamlen's slum house, who wasted all of the Hawke's family inheritance which was left to Hawke's mother Leandra. She never came to claim the inheritance due to running away with a mage and having children with him.
It really makes a difference on which dialogue options you choose. You can be graceful, sarcastic, or unforgivingly mean. DA 2 mixes up the kind of responses to a nice mixed bag. I didn't find myself always picking the good nice choice like I did in the Mass Effect games. In Mass Effect 2 for example, (This is not a criticism) but I knew I had to be the good guy and pick all the good choices to preserve my allies for the final Suicide mission. But honestly it was always hard to pick the renegade options against your buddies like Garrus, Mordin, Jacob, Thane, Tali, Liara, etc. However in DA 2, it tends to be somewhat ambiguous on what is good and what is bad. And really makes you respond differently to each unique character you encounter.
Playing as a female Mage, I saw it best for Hawke to romance with Ander's, a mage who has a spirit named justice who possesses him at times. Ander's is part of an underground resistance to free and save mages from the restricting, tyrannical circle and templars. He abhors the practice the templar's use to forever silence the mages. A mage who fails the harrowing (a test of becoming an abomination, or showing their ability to restrain the temptation of power) or has broke the law of the circle, is made tranquil. To be tranquil, means to have no emotion, no feeling, they become robotic servants, castrated, mindless vessels. Their only purpose left in life is as servants at best. The templar's fear the mages for practicing Blood Magic, a forbidden practice, that leads to many evil abominations throughout the DA series. The templars have good reason for not trusting mages who have such power or have the potential to use it. There are many examples of you "Hawke" witnessing the evils of blood magic or the unrestraint powers of mages..
On the other side, is the argument that mages are oppressed, persecuted, and deserve freedom. That not all mages practice Blood Magic and can mostly be trusted. Yet there is no way to truly check this, without heavy surveillance by the circle and templars, despite this some mages still slip into the practice of blood magic. What I love in DA 2 is how it balances out both sides and really doesn't make either one look evil. It is either, you think the mages should be free of the templars as free people, but there will be some out of hand mages. Or, take the side of the templars who believe in controlling the mages due to precedented events of mages doing catastrophic harm to ordinary people. Both extremely reasonable and plausible arguments, making it somewhat morally ambiguous. I like this. It feels more like a political situation of this universe, adding intrigue, cunning, I'd go as far as to say I always enjoyed the political intrigue in the DA series more than the ME series.
ANIMATION
DA2 has some very stylish animation. The running cycles are smooth and excellently crafted. The game does not hide it’s faults of animation with the cheap tricks of motion blur like in DA: Inquisition. Each class has unique animations that stand out. A two-handed warrior who uses a large weapon runs around with heavy motion and slogging weight he must carry. Each swing is massive, fatal, such attacks are slow but pack a huge punch. A rogue using dual-wielding blades feels light, quick, and piercing. Animations for archery are lacking, the bows and arrows feel like they have miniscule effect on the enemy. The best is Varric’s use of his crossbow “Bianca”, he shoots from the hip most of the time showing Bianca’s weight and power. When he shoots with his crossbow, it’s recoil feels impactful, that each shot matters.I found his animation to be the most satisfying to watch as he chops away at the enemies. The mage has spectacular animations, the most lively of the four classes. As the mage shoots out energy or creates aerial attacks, it’s a hell of a show. Twist and twirls, spinning the staff, smashing the staff against the ground to summon an electric bolt to fry your enemies. Raising her hands to the sky to summon an electrical storm or fireball rain. This is the best the DA series has to offer.
Animation for dialogue is as to be expected from Bioware. Eyes are not uncanny and work well, lip sync of character’s voices fit perfectly, and action cutscenes are entertaining. Sometimes I wish in these games the animators would add more body, and hand animation. They use these techniques once in a while but not as often as they should. Most Bioware games offer the same dialogue animation for most characters, and standard camera angles to watch these scenes in. What makes up for this is the good writing and a large quantity of dialogue. Due to the lack of hand and body animations during dialogue, it feels less natural, and artificial. If the creators put more time into dialogue animation as suggested, they could really create unique personalities and moments.
CHOICES
Here is a good example of intrigue, betrayal, and ambiguity in this game's story. One of the best moments is near the end. After defeating the Arishok, and driving out the horned Qunari cult out of the city of Kirkwall, the stranglehold between the Templars and Mages tighten. The Arishock murdered the Viscount of Kirkwall and his son, leaving the city without a leader, and an heir to the throne. This gave the templars the opportunity to create a police state, and control the people. Originally planned to be temporary, the templars do not give up their power. The struggle is represented with two characters, Meredith, the leader of the Templers. A tough, unmerciful, bare to the bone kind of woman. And Orsino, a cultured male elf, head of the mages of Kirkwall, a bookworm type, highly intelligent.
ROMANCE, INTRIGUE
Anders, Hawke's love, tells her he devised a formula to remove the demon 'Justice' from his body, to get rid of the possession for good, and move on with his life with her. The plan involved gathering some ingredients, and then going to the city's chantry, you would distract the grand cleric as Anders would sneak in and do something he kept omitted from you. As a fellow mage, Hawke's relationship with Ander's fits very well. Only another mage would be able to be with a man possessed by a demon, without fear of her own life.
Ander's does not go into detail, but as his partner, Hawke goes along with his plan. After you do what he needs, you don't hear anymore about it for a while. As you quest and progress more through the story, the final mission begins. Meredith and Orsino are arguing near the city chantry with their groups of mages and templars. The final moment of where you choose to tide the power. At first it was clear to me to side with Orsino, too aid the mages and free them of the circle. However things became complicated and very interesting. The Chantry erupted a giant beam of red energy into the sky, obliterating all of the Chantry men and women.
This was Ander's true plan. He manipulated your love and kindness, to decimate the chantry, and force you into a position to choose one side or the other. This alone was a shock, an amazing moment of betrayal, this left me astounded. The drama was riveting, epic! Too make things more interesting, I did not choose to obvious choices. As his partner, Hawke should have stuck with Ander's and sided with the mages because (true love, right?) SCREW THAT! That would be too easy. Instead I mixed things up a little.
I took his actions as betrayal, and deception. Instead of siding with him and the mages, as he probably expected, I sided with Meredith, and agreed with the templars that the mages go too far. I had the choice to kill Ander's on the spot, or let him go. I figured it was enough that I let Hawke drop him like an old shoe, and I let him go. Hawke tried to convince him to help her and clean up his own mess but he couldn't go back on what he did now. And so, Meredith announced "The Right of Annulment", the genocide of mages in Kirkwall. A right that has been performed in cycles over the centuries, to cleanse the mages from becoming too powerful. Woah. I love this game. It's decisions and cinematic build up are on par. I do not want to say more, but I am just giving you an idea on how mixed and exciting the dialogue and story can be. It is much more diverse in this area than Inquisition felt. And certainly it couldn't have been this successful if not for the well designed, well voiced characters.
I remember when I was younger in middle school, Dragon Age 2 came out. Now at the time, I never even thought of touching Dragon Age because I was directly into Mass Effect, Mass Effect novels, Mass Effect comics, and science fiction. Anything else I did not want to even think about. The one thing I remember is all the hype and love the first Dragon Age game had. Once the second one released, my friends liked it, but mainstream gaming and most players seemed to really hate it and trash it to oblivion. I didn't really care though being a hardcore Mass Effect fanatic. Boy am I glad I decided to balance my gaming life and play the Dragon Age games.
COMPANIONS RANKED BEST TO WORST
Out of all three DA games, Dragon Age 2 is the most modest, but it packs a solid punch. It delivers on the best story I've probably seen Bioware tell. Yes, I enjoyed this story arc as much as Mass Effect. Compared to Origins and Inquisition, the character development, story, progression, and relationships are pure mana, perfection. You want good, memorable characters, ones you could relate too? This game has it hook line and sinker.
1. Varric - "I've got an idea, but the story... the story will go where it wants to go. The characters drive it, not me. A good story, you don't really write. It was always there. You just uncover it."
Being the best, coolest and funniest rogue I've ever had the honor of killing mages, darkspawn, demons and carta gangs with. A creative man, a storyteller, writer, who tells the story of you "the champion", carrying your legend to time and eternity. Varric comes to life not only with his design overall, but also his voice acting. It is superb, and truly brings his voice to you like a real bar buddy.
2. Fenris - “I shall endeavor to exist with less offense.”
An emo-elf who doesn't know who he is, and has lyrium magic inscribed in his Dhalish-like tattoos. Sounds cliché from that description, but Fenris as a character really shines in dialogue and the situations you face along with him. He hates mages, and if you play as a mage, it can make for some interesting compromises.
3. Anders- “I'd be in the Gallows, templars all around, holding the brand for the Rite of Tranquility. Then you'd burst in and break my chains.”
A bit flat at times, but his character evolves around the story.
4. Aveline- “Do you know what I remember? When [my father] read to me. Stupid things, dragons and heroes. He wouldn't turn a page until I reached over and took his hand. That big man made every step of the story my choice. I loved that. He died of the wasting, in a Denerim ward. Those last weeks I read to him. I had to take his hand to turn the pages. And I couldn't tell if he was too weak, or if it was the old game...No one tells you how to mourn. And when someone says, "move on", you take their hand and say "my choice."
A serious woman who gets the job done. She shows her vulnerability when she needs Hawke to set her up with a Guardsman she has her eyes on romantically, and creates some good moments to connect with her. Aveline comes out very human, and doesn't try to act tough. She just does what she needs to do, no bragging, no sas, she's loyal to the end. Someone you definitely want on your side. I would have put her at number three, but Anders stepped up his game by committing the epic betrayal in the story. Still she's very good!
5. Isabella - I found Isabella to be a Miranda Lawson clone. I know I will get heat for this, but there is not much to both of these characters in my view. They're eye candy for sure, but they don't really add much to the story like some other supporting characters do. I have supporting reason for this especially with Lawson but that is for another review. Isabella really plays a lame plot purpose of having a certain object that becomes important in the game. Lets just say I decided not to help her out, and she didn't stay on my companion list.
6. Tallis - She is a good character, but there wasn't enough time with her. She really was just made for a short two hour DLC. Not enough time to really explore her character which is a shame. The worst part is, Tallis should have been a part of the whole game from the very start! Why? She’s an elf who converted into the Qunari religion. This would have constructed perfect experiences and alternate views in the main story. The first half of the game, you fight the Qunari out of the city of Kirkwall. It would have been interesting to have Tallis and her unique point of view throughout that story arc.
7. Sebastian - Pretty default, not much to say here.
8. Merill- The Worst character, takes herself too serious. Her sequences tend to be over dramatic, and drawn out. I didn;t care for her at all, and did everything against her. She practices blood magic and was banished by the Dhalish due to her practices. Of course there are references to the Dread Wolf, but the game does not delve into that. I found it entertaining to deny her every time she wanted me to do something. "I'm trying to help you. Stop using blood magic ya moron!"
SOUNDTRACK
The soundtrack provides a good atmosphere and really shines during some exceptional companion dialogue. Some of the coolest sounds come from the menu and character selection screen.
MECHANICS: Imperfect, momentary
REPLAYABILITY: 9.5
STORY: 9.0
GRAPHICS: 8.5