Dragon Age II Reviews, Wave Four

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Written by BuckGB on March 10th, 2011

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Overall, Dragon Age 2 simplifies some of the combat and inventory management, and the game plays a lot faster as well. Visually, it also looks better, but still looks kinda dated, with low res textures and a washed out look. Story wise, it's not as good as the previous game, and the dialogue cut scenes tend to go on for longer than necessary. Dragon Age 2 might not be the best RPG to recommend for veterans of the original game, especially if they're hardcore RPG fans who like a challenge. In many ways, Dragon Age 2 is a lot easier and simpler to play than the original. For better or worse.

Fortunately, the tale of Dragon Age II was intriguing enough to maintain my interest. Players in search of a traditional action RPG will have no trouble sinking dozens of hours in BioWare's latest epic.

I do not know how they do it. How Bioware come up with these decisions to revamp a game, and it just improves it and takes it beyond great. Dragon Age II is a masterpiece from the ground up and especially now it feels more at home on the consoles that Origins did, it has vastly improved. The addition of your main character having a voice and the levelling, dialogue and most importantly combat improvements have improved this game so much. I am glad to see Bioware putting so much thought into their sequels and hopefully Mass Effect 3 will be something similar to this magnitude when it is released. A top game and a fine addition to the 2011 roster.

When creating game sequels, developers often forget what made the original popular in an attempt to attract new players. Dragon Age 2 has kept enough of the Origins' elements to provide an entertaining diversion without alienating fans of the original.

Like many BioWare games, you're creating a skein of memories in Dragon Age 2. The Edmonton dev studio knows how to craft dramatic plots, strong characters and compelling conflicts. It made me, with my lifelong aversion to fantasy trappings, care about dwarves and mages and templar knights. Dragon Age 2, through improved gameplay, offers a grand adventure that lets players learn a little bit about themselves, too. Huzzah to that.

The game doesn't have nearly as compelling a story this time around, with no main villain to take on and hardly any appearances by folks from the original game. There's still plenty of ground to cover through, and the way you can equip items and mix up your weapon types is pretty slick. You'll be picking up special skills and spells along the way as well, making your character even more intimidating than ever before whether you're a man or a woman. (Equality!) Despite some simplicity, the combat is absolutely top-notch in Dragon Age II. The routine combat moves work very well, even though some enemies take a lot more damage than they look like they are. (If you swipe a sword at a large demon, you should receive better indication they're taking damage, yes?) There's also a variety of spells and other techniques to learn, and executing these on larger groups is a wondrous sight. Furthermore, you can switch between characters in battle, should someone be growing a bit too stale for your tastes.

Bioware might not win GotY 2011 with this (since Mass Effect 3 is coming), but they have certainly done a damn fine job on the game putting to rest any fears that I might have had about it since the demo. It isn't Dragon Age, but frankly it doesn't need to be since it's its own animal and that's the one thing you have to remember. There are a few minor niggles with it, such as the repeated locations and a few issues with object interaction in terms of selecting crates and so on to loot...it's all minor though...

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