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[Catastrophic lolcats]

The reason why they made the only choice for the player being "Hawke" in Dragon Age 2 is because it's easier to get rid of the whole varying origin stories (one of the better things in DA:O imo). It was also trying it's little heart out to be Mass Effect when it grows up.
Mass Effect started out with some clear RPG elements but were soon phased out to make the game a heavily story focused action game (which sorta worked since it was all futuristic and such). EA just wanted to try and make the money strike twice by emulating it, ignoring that one of the main attractions of DA:O was being a callback to cRPGs of the past.

EDIT: I think this will be "Bioware's" last chance before EA fully cannibalises the company. 

[Kansa]

I think it's all down to the main character being voiced, it is well established that each area and each race in the Dragon Age world has a different accent. So that means to have the same degree of choice as you had in DAO you would need to hire at least 6 different voice actors to play the main character instead of just 2. I think this is the main reason as it would be pretty easy to just add elves and dwarves as a playable race and only have small cosmetic and stat differences.

[Catastrophic lolcats]

Why does the main character have to be voiced again? Oh yeah, Mass Effect did it.

DA:O did a very good on the majority of the origin stories and they really did seem to add to the immersion of the game. I will always prefer customisation of the main character than to hear him voiced in the same bland white North American accent every single character that has ever existed seems to have.

[Kansa]

I completely agree with you there. I hope they bring origin stories back for DA3 even if they are just for human backgrounds

[Korva]

One of my biggest peeves in their recent games is the dialog wheel. It is really hard to feel like my character is my character if I can't actually decide what she will say instead of having to play a guessing game of "what will this brief cryptic line on the wheel actually turn out to be". It annoys the living daylights out of me, and I honestly cannot see a single reason for doing it this way. It looks "cooler" than the traditional old line-by-line list of the full, actual dialog choices? Shorter lines are less of a chore for the twitch kids to read between action scenes? I just don't get it.

Add voice acting for the protagonist and the guessing game gains the additional component of trying to anticipate how my character will say whatever option I chose. Not fun at all.

It is impossible to make a game that really appeals to everyone, and IMO trying too much to do that -- as Bioware appears to do with their "RP goes mainstream action" approach in the ME series and DA2 -- just sacrifices too much.

[Catastrophic lolcats]

I agree there. Was never a fan of that dialouge wheel nonsense. Alpha Protocol is perhaps the best example of doing it wrong. Criptic as dicks and on a very short time limit, usually forcing you to pick a dialouge from panic rather than anything else.

[fenrif]

It's tempting to think Bioware going downhill is all EA's doing. But then you read forum posts by David Gaider where he (and I'm paraphrasing here) says to a fan complaining about decisions not carrying over to DA2 "it's my story not yours, I make the decisions not the player." The infamous Halper "I don't video games" line. "Button - Awesome." Etc. It's pretty obvious that there are problems within Bioware that are completely seperate from EA.

Also I heard somewhere that DA2 was originally meant to be a side story, and not part of the main franchise. Not sure how true this is, and I can't even remember where I heard it, but it'd make a lot of sense.

I always thought it made complete sense that Dragon Age 2 used a new character instead of the warden for one simple reason. For many players at the end of DAO the warden was dead, by making a sequel including him/her you are basically either ignoring the sacrifice that he/she made or excluding a section of your fan base. DAO ended the warden's story there is no reason he/she should be included in any future game.

But then you're ignoring all the people who left the warden alive? One of the major problems with Bioware games is that they like to pretend that it's all about player choice and agency, but when it comes right down to it most of your choices are meaningless because they're so afraid of people missing out on content that every outcome is essentially the same. If this is why they changed characters in DA2 then it's one of the worse ways of handling it by far. They need to realise that people WANT to miss out on things, and get different missions/quests/characters/etc based on the choices they've made. Otherwise the entire thing is meaningless and Bioware may aswell just tell a traditional story in cutscenes with no player imput whatsoever.

[kerlc]

Well, i didn't like DA2, but i liked ME3 (not the ending, the ending was horrible, but the game was solid.). I also loved DA:O.

call me stupid, but i am cautiously optimistic about DA3.

[fenrif]

Well, i didn't like DA2, but i liked ME3 (not the ending, the ending was horrible, but the game was solid.). I also loved DA:O.

call me stupid, but i am cautiously optimistic about DA3.

Stupid!

[Kansa]

But then you're ignoring all the people who left the warden alive? One of the major problems with Bioware games is that they like to pretend that it's all about player choice and agency, but when it comes right down to it most of your choices are meaningless because they're so afraid of people missing out on content that every outcome is essentially the same. If this is why they changed characters in DA2 then it's one of the worse ways of handling it by far. They need to realise that people WANT to miss out on things, and get different missions/quests/characters/etc based on the choices they've made. Otherwise the entire thing is meaningless and Bioware may aswell just tell a traditional story in cutscenes with no player imput whatsoever.

But if they continued with the Warden in DA2 they would be doing exactly what you said they shouldn't be doing and that is ignoring the decisions that you made in the previous games. The fact about people wanting to miss out on things would not work in this situation either as it would basically bar them from any game that comes out within this franchise, even if they changed protagonist after that game it would still stop those people from continuing as the events in the 2nd game would be completely different if the protagonist wasn't there. I do agree that Bioware need to make choices matter more but continuing with the warden is not the way to do that. What they should have done is make your choices your warden made affect Hawke and see how your choices affected the world at large.

The infamous Halper "I don't video games" line.

In reference to this line all she was saying is that people should have a choice to skip combat and see how the story turns out, which overall I agree with. It's just adding an extra way to play the game to people who really don't like the combat.

Also I don't think DA2 was as bad as everyone is saying it was, it certainly wasn't a great game but it's not the scourge that everyone is making it out to be. DA2 simply needed more time in development it has glimmers of good ideas in there they just needed more time to develop

[Rex_Nex]

Hell, I hated DA1, and you tell me DA2 was worse?

Since they are nothing alike, that would depend on why you disliked the original.

I also loved DA:O.

Its hard to pin down why I disliked it down to one thing, but the entire experience seemed bad to me. Combat was the majority of the gameplay, and it was boring. I felt like they knew that the combat was generic and bland, so they tried their hardest to make the best darn story they could, even if the story turned out to be... generic and bland.

I mean, there were little things I thought were neat and have become accustomed to seeing in bioware titles, mostly related to character development. I liked how integral characters were more then just meatshields. I liked the story behind Alistar, Morrigan, etc. But it was just a cherry on top of a bad game, in my opinion. Gameplay was shallow and linear, fighting was boring, and the story was generic fantasy nonsense.

Maybe it's just not my type of game, but when I pick up a Bioware title, I know I am getting it for the story and not the game. Not a single recent game of theirs has had interesting fighting mechanics or groundbreaking gameplay. Its just... bad. They are usually good at telling an exciting story, but DA has no exciting story. So... I'm not sure what I paid money for. Boring gameplay on top of a generic story.... eh.

I cant tell which I disliked more, ME1 or DA:O. They are both worshiped as amazing games, but I just dont see it. I beat both just because I wanted to see the goddamn endings, but the entire way through I was thinking "Everything but the cutscenes are terrible."

[fenrif]

But if they continued with the Warden in DA2 they would be doing exactly what you said they shouldn't be doing and that is ignoring the decisions that you made in the previous games. The fact about people wanting to miss out on things would not work in this situation either as it would basically bar them from any game that comes out within this franchise, even if they changed protagonist after that game it would still stop those people from continuing as the events in the 2nd game would be completely different if the protagonist wasn't there. I do agree that Bioware need to make choices matter more but continuing with the warden is not the way to do that. What they should have done is make your choices your warden made affect Hawke and see how your choices affected the world at large.

In reference to this line all she was saying is that people should have a choice to skip combat and see how the story turns out, which overall I agree with. It's just adding an extra way to play the game to people who really don't like the combat.

Also I don't think DA2 was as bad as everyone is saying it was, it certainly wasn't a great game but it's not the scourge that everyone is making it out to be. DA2 simply needed more time in development it has glimmers of good ideas in there they just needed more time to develop

The point is that it shouldn't be "the warden is magically alive" or "totally new character guys" it should be based on the decisions you made in the game. If you kept him alive in DA1 then why not let him be your character in DA2? If not then yeah throw a new character in (ideally let the player make their own again). They instead decided that everyone gets the same experience, regardless of choices.

[Jelle]

Got to agree having the warden in 2 would've been a bit inpractical. But I totally agree with being able to make ones own character with racial background, instead of just being stuck with either male or female human.

[Korva]

But then you're ignoring all the people who left the warden alive?

No. There is a huge difference between not continuing with the same character, and completely invalidating a character by retconning their choices out of existence. It would also be extremely bad form IMNSHO to know in advance that you're offering "false choices" which you will then ignore in the sequel in favor of a single canon story, just so you can continue using the same character. I don't personally care for DA2 and have no intention to play it, but the decision not to continue with the Warden is not among the reasons for that opinion.

Admittedly, I'm slightly biased in this case because I chose the Sacrifice and cannot imagine ever going with anything else. I had been hoping for a good ol' heroic death option ever since the release of the Calling trailer, and the Sacrifice was a perfect fit. Still, I wouldn't want it to become "canon" anymore than the Ritual should be "canon". It would be wrong either way.

One of the major problems with Bioware games is that they like to pretend that it's all about player choice and agency, but when it comes right down to it most of your choices are meaningless because they're so afraid of people missing out on content that every outcome is essentially the same.

Now this I fully agree with. It is one of my old pet peeves, not just with Bioware. In order for choices to actually matter, you need consequences. To be precise, you need both positive and negative consequences. Players shouldn't feel entitled to always get their cake and eat it too. As an extreme example: how willfully stupid would a player have to be to whine about not having any companions after they chose to murder their companions? Apparently, that is exactly why the ability to kill followers was removed from TOR. That sort of attitude shouldn't be pandered to, it should be laughed at and slapped down hard. It should, IMO, be quite possible to get stuck and lose a game because you fucked up the story with selfishness and stupidity so that no one trusts your word or your leadership anymore -- or because you ignored clear signs that Doom(TM) is headed your way and you need to get ready for it instead of chasing sidequests and ogling NPCs.

[nenjin]

I thought the Blight was actually the most endearing and interesting part of DA1. The rest of it struck me ME Soap Opera plus your bog-standard RPG. The Blight was the only thing that really drove me to think critically about my choices or how I used my time. And even that wasn't enough to get me to actually finish the game.