Are you trying to be funny OP ? I can't decide if this is a subtle joke or you actually mean it.
The "It is a Bioware game" as a mark of quality could be used in the past. But with the Dragon Age era, I can only come to the conclusion that they don't deliver what I expect from a Bioware game. New times and Bioware changed for whatever valid reasons, but the mark of quality Bioware stood for is no longer valid. You like Dragon Age and that fine, but those who know what "a Bioware game" is will not put Dragon Age in that category I think.
The style of game is somewhat the same, and yet Dragon Age games are nowhere near the same standard as old Bioware games were.To me the phrase "its a Bioware game" did not only describe the game style but also the quality.
Both dragon age games seem so shallow if you played older Bioware games, but if you didnt I guess Dragon Age Origins is pretty decent. "Its a Bioware game" phrase is hollow nowadays, and used by those who don't understand it :P
User scores mean absolutely nothing. DA2 got perfect scores all over the place, while Witcher 2 got some high and low scores. That alone doesn't mean anything, clearly, since a lot of people like Witcher 2 while all I see is bitching about DA2.
Good critic scores that ignore the fact the game has recycled maps, a poorly written story, and other major failings? Yeah, critic reviews are GREAT! And by "great" I mean worthless. Waaaaay too biased by the companies.
no idea how anyone can even remotely claim witcher 2 was better than da 2 ^^
witcher 2 only needed a pig at the beginning of the game whiping everyone who tries to start it, then it could be "gothic 3 - part 2"
It doesn't take much to make better game than Dragon Age 2 which was awful. Just look at user scores on metacritic or read forums official and unofficial to see how negatively taken was DA2.
So yeah, thanks to DA2 BW in my eyes went from "awesome" to "meh, nothing special"company
User scores mean absolutely nothing. DA2 got perfect scores all over the place, while Witcher 2 got some high and low scores. That alone doesn't mean anything, clearly, since a lot of people like Witcher 2 while all I see is bitching about DA2.
I happened to like DA2, but I recognise the areas it went wrong. I don't actually mind the reuse of maps, because I never notice the environment anyway. I'm fine with it so long as it doesn't get in my way or obscure my view. I'm easy to please. But I still understand from a design standpoint for such a hyped game, they should have tried harder. Despite that, it was not a bad game. Past games may have been better, but something that was 'better' doesn't automatically make everything else 'bad'.
I agree with Wojtekpl though, Bioware's been known for their stories, but every one of their games are plagued by bugs. Most eventually got patched, but DA: O, as good a game as it was, was so plagued with bugs that eventually players banned together and fixed them rather than wait on Bioware's slow patching. They did a better job of it than Bioware, too >_>
I find it kind of funny how many people toss all other games aside and only take DA2 as the best of the most recent of BioWares work when thinking about BioWare games.
It doesn't matter that the game released before that ME2 was GOTY and won tons of awards and was well liked by critics and community alike.
I mean if you looked at some of the games Bethesda sticks their name to, most people would be disgusted, yet, when TES Skyrim comes out, people have no qualms about it being the best free roaming RPG to date.
I never really liked DA:O and only played the DEMO for DA2 long enough to know it still wasn't for me, but I love ME and ME2, and I'm looking forward to SWTOR and ME3.
And you have to think about it... if DA2 was the worst game in BioWares catalog to date? Thats still pretty damn good.
User scores mean absolutely nothing. DA2 got perfect scores all over the place, while Witcher 2 got some high and low scores. That alone doesn't mean anything, clearly, since a lot of people like Witcher 2 while all I see is bitching about DA2.
Good critic scores that ignore the fact the game has recycled maps, a poorly written story, and other major failings? Yeah, critic reviews are GREAT! And by "great" I mean worthless. Waaaaay too biased by the companies.
Yeah. Even as someone who liked the game I wouldn't have given it perfect scores. I've been suspicious of 'professional' reviews and critiques for a while but that pretty much was the clincher. I don't even bother reading them anymore. Usually I stick to reader reviews, but after the huge fan praise that both Witcher 2 and Fable 3 got (both of which were disappointing to me), I think I've had enough of those too.
"Forums aren't for intelligent discussion; they're for blow-hards with unwavering opinions."
And you have to think about it... if DA2 was the worst game in BioWares catalog to date? Thats still pretty damn good.
No, it's not. It is clearly lacking as a game on many levels. That's why the sales of it have dropped tremendously since the first week despite EA putting it on sale and bundled games with it left and right. It's ok if you sitll liked it, many games that aren't up to par still have fans. That's normal. Fact is though, DA2 was and is a bad game and only the "professional" reviews really disagree.
I agree that Bioware has released better games lately (ME2 was good). DA2 is not a good game, however. Of course, DA2, the ME series, and TOR are all made by different groups in Bioware. It is rather silly to say one being bad necessarily means the others will be.
User scores at Metacritic mean very little. Perhaps you get a fair few, if you remove any score below 3 and any score above 8 for this title, but still I would focus more on the critic score.
Critics are so heavily influenced by big companies due to ad revenue and game access that they can't be trusted. It unduly weights their reviews and makes critic reviews worthless.
I agree a random user review is probably not helpful. However, I maintain the average of all user reviews does provide a helpful score. It gives an excellent indication of the player reaction to a game (and I know a NO game where this is not the case when there are several hundred reviews). Sure, an individual user tends to give an extreme review, but each little bit does reflect satisfaction or disatisfaction and when you look at them all together that provides helpful information.
User review averages are high for good games and low for bad games. You simply cannot say the same about critic reviews.
Sorry, but average user score means a lot less than critic scores. Users have no oblications for honesty or integrity. The very high scores or low scores are usually not driven by a honest rating criteria, but one based purely on emotion. At least with major publications and critics, you get a baseline. There are many fair gaming publications that I have personally followed for years, and they have never been far off with their ratings. You also get to know some of the reviewers and know the genres they like and dislike.
The fact in this instance is also that the negative reaction (from the fans of DA:O), followed by further trendy outburst from non-Bioware fans, produced relatively large number of 0s. I think we can all agree that this game was no where near 0 or 1 or 2 or 3, nor was it 9 or 10. A fair assessment, taking in account personal preferences and perhaps negative tantrums, the lowest score for this game could have been a 4. It is after all fairly well polished game that gives roughtly 25 hours worth of gaming experience that is above average when it comes to RPG-genre.
"The person who experiences greatness must have a feeling for the myth he is in."
User scores mean absolutely nothing. DA2 got perfect scores all over the place, while Witcher 2 got some high and low scores. That alone doesn't mean anything, clearly, since a lot of people like Witcher 2 while all I see is bitching about DA2.
Good critic scores that ignore the fact the game has recycled maps, a poorly written story, and other major failings? Yeah, critic reviews are GREAT! And by "great" I mean worthless. Waaaaay too biased by the companies.
Yeah. Even as someone who liked the game I wouldn't have given it perfect scores. I've been suspicious of 'professional' reviews and critiques for a while but that pretty much was the clincher. I don't even bother reading them anymore. Usually I stick to reader reviews, but after the huge fan praise that both Witcher 2 and Fable 3 got (both of which were disappointing to me), I think I've had enough of those too.
I've found the average user review is roughly within 1 point of what makes sense, though I haven't played Fable 3 so maybe that's worth than a 5 or a 6. Anyhow, user reviews are a far more helpful metric than critic reviews (for games anyhow). Not perfect, but they have a use.
I am much more inclined to trust professional critiques than user reviews. Far less biased imo. It is user reviews I find useless. I always ignore user reviews. Hell, if I had to stick to user reviews I would never try a game....
As for DA2, some people liked it others didn't It really depends on what you are looking for. DA2 actually had more fun combat but I enjoyed DA1 more because of your companions. The story was okaish but it was characters like Morrigan and Alistair that made the game great. I hated everything else - combat etc too boring for me but I played it through because of the story
Mission in life: Vanquish all MMORPG.com trolls - especially TESO, WOW and GW2 trolls.
And you have to think about it... if DA2 was the worst game in BioWares catalog to date? Thats still pretty damn good.
No, it's not. It is clearly lacking as a game on many levels. That's why the sales of it have dropped tremendously since the first week despite EA putting it on sale and bundled games with it left and right. It's ok if you sitll liked it, many games that aren't up to par still have fans. That's normal. Fact is though, DA2 was and is a bad game and only the "professional" reviews really disagree.
I agree that Bioware has released better games lately (ME2 was good). DA2 is not a good game, however. Of course, DA2, the ME series, and TOR are all made by different groups in Bioware. It is rather silly to say one being bad necessarily means the others will be.
Thats my point, but more-so you won't ever find a company thats sold pure gold with every title. I don't like DA2, but I don't like DA either. I do like KOTOR and I do like ME and JE and NWN and so on, but I'll click the little "opt out" button when it comes to DA.
I can't speak much on DA2, but I can say, most of the time, the game is much better than people want to admit, even if it doesn't live up to the standards BioWares other titles did. Thats not to say the game is worth the purchase, or anything, its just to say that in the video game spectrum, DA2 would be closer to the good end then the completely unplayable, buggy, broken and boring end.
User scores at Metacritic mean very little. Perhaps you get a fair few, if you remove any score below 3 and any score above 8 for this title, but still I would focus more on the critic score.
Critics are so heavily influenced by big companies due to ad revenue and game access that they can't be trusted. It unduly weights their reviews and makes critic reviews worthless.
I agree a random user review is probably not helpful. However, I maintain the average of all user reviews does provide a helpful score. It gives an excellent indication of the player reaction to a game (and I know a NO game where this is not the case when there are several hundred reviews). Sure, an individual user tends to give an extreme review, but each little bit does reflect satisfaction or disatisfaction and when you look at them all together that provides helpful information.
User review averages are high for good games and low for bad games. You simply cannot say the same about critic reviews.
Sorry, but average user score means a lot less than critic scores. Users have no oblications for honesty or integrity. The very high scores or low scores are usually not driven by a honest rating criteria, but one based purely on emotion. At least with major publications and critics, you get a baseline. There are many fair gaming publications that I have personally followed for years, and they have never been far off with their ratings.
The fact in this instance is also that the negative reaction (from the fans of DA:O), followed by further trendy outburst from non-Bioware fans, produced relatively large number of 0s. I think we can all agree that this game was no where near 0 or 1 or 2 or 3, nor was it 9 or 10. A fair assessment, taking in account personal preferences and perhaps negative tantrums, the lowest score for this game could have been a 4. It is after all fairly well polished game that gives roughtly 25 hours worth of gaming experience that is above average when it comes to RPG-genre.
The critic scores ARE worthless. They are always horribly inflated. At least user reviews will have biases to increase scores and biases to decrease them. That makes the biases more likely to cancel out at least in part. Critic reviews are just biased towards games being great...especially if they are from big companies. The idea they have some obligation for honesty is ridiculous when you look at bad games from major companies and see how "professionals" give such games 8s, 9s, and 10s. They're a joke.
DA2 IS below average. For crying out loud, it is RECYCLED MAPS. That's a horrible, horrible mark against it. It has no cohesive plot, but instead has 3 rather unrelated acts (bad plotting). It has undeveloped "villains", an unbalanced combat system, a horrible "wave" mechanic that destroys tactical elements of the combat system, etc, etc. The game is playable, but it is below average -- many below average games are playable.
User scores at Metacritic mean very little. Perhaps you get a fair few, if you remove any score below 3 and any score above 8 for this title, but still I would focus more on the critic score.
Critics are so heavily influenced by big companies due to ad revenue and game access that they can't be trusted. It unduly weights their reviews and makes critic reviews worthless.
I agree a random user review is probably not helpful. However, I maintain the average of all user reviews does provide a helpful score. It gives an excellent indication of the player reaction to a game (and I know a NO game where this is not the case when there are several hundred reviews). Sure, an individual user tends to give an extreme review, but each little bit does reflect satisfaction or disatisfaction and when you look at them all together that provides helpful information.
User review averages are high for good games and low for bad games. You simply cannot say the same about critic reviews.
Sorry, but average user score means a lot less than critic scores. Users have no oblications for honesty or integrity. The very high scores or low scores are usually not driven by a honest rating criteria, but one based purely on emotion. At least with major publications and critics, you get a baseline. There are many fair gaming publications that I have personally followed for years, and they have never been far off with their ratings.
The fact in this instance is also that the negative reaction (from the fans of DA:O), followed by further trendy outburst from non-Bioware fans, produced relatively large number of 0s. I think we can all agree that this game was no where near 0 or 1 or 2 or 3, nor was it 9 or 10. A fair assessment, taking in account personal preferences and perhaps negative tantrums, the lowest score for this game could have been a 4. It is after all fairly well polished game that gives roughtly 25 hours worth of gaming experience that is above average when it comes to RPG-genre.
The critic scores ARE worthless. They are always horribly inflated. At least user reviews will have biases to increase scores and biases to decrease them. That makes the biases more likely to cancel out at least in part. Critic reviews are just biased towards games being great...especially if they are from big companies. The idea they have some obligation for honesty is ridiculous when you look at bad games from major companies and see how "professionals" give such games 8s, 9s, and 10s. They're a joke.
DA2 IS below average. For crying out loud, it is RECYCLED MAPS. That's a horrible, horrible mark against it. It has no cohesive plot, but instead has 3 rather unrelated acts (bad plotting). It has undeveloped "villains", an unbalanced combat system, a horrible "wave" mechanic that destroys tactical elements of the combat system, etc, etc. The game is playable, but it is below average -- many below average games are playable.
Sorry, but average user score means a lot less than critic scores. Users have no oblications for honesty or integrity. At least with major publications and critics, you get a baseline. There are many fair gaming publications that I have personally followed for years, and they have never been far off with their ratings.
Sorry but... LOL. I will trust people that anrt being paid by EA marketing to review a game far more then those that are.
Personally I would give DA:2 about a 6. That little below average sure, but why DA2 makes me worried about SWTOR and other future bioware games is that DA2 is their lastest game and should have been good. It had good characters, it had a good working engine, it had a interesting story, it had a good ip with lore but inspite of that, it still sucked. Their lazy combat design, level design, quest design and story development made the game suck. That just show new(EA) poor standards, imo.
I will not play a game with a cash shop ever again. A dev job should be to make the game better not make me pay so it sucks less.
no idea how anyone can even remotely claim witcher 2 was better than da 2 ^^
witcher 2 only needed a pig at the beginning of the game whiping everyone who tries to start it, then it could be "gothic 3 - part 2"
It doesn't take much to make better game than Dragon Age 2 which was awful. Just look at user scores on metacritic or read forums official and unofficial to see how negatively taken was DA2.
So yeah, thanks to DA2 BW in my eyes went from "awesome" to "meh, nothing special"company
Since they have put out far more awesome games than crappy ones (Only one in my opinion) they are still an awesome company. Especially when the only crappy game came from a different team.
I'm not sure if this is a good comparison, but I believe that putting critic scores above user scores is quite similar to believing that a small elite is better at making choices regarding elections than the general public.
Maybe you should actually read what I said, because it is clear you didn't comprehend it the first time. I've never said user reviews anywhere are perfect. I said the ones on metacritic tend to be USEFUL, and that critical reviews are definitely less useful.
It is a rather odd thing, certainly. I don't have a lot of experience with other user reviews save for Amazon. There I find them a good bit more hit or miss -- appliances with significant problems sometimes get high scores even so, for instance.
no idea how anyone can even remotely claim witcher 2 was better than da 2 ^^
witcher 2 only needed a pig at the beginning of the game whiping everyone who tries to start it, then it could be "gothic 3 - part 2"
It doesn't take much to make better game than Dragon Age 2 which was awful. Just look at user scores on metacritic or read forums official and unofficial to see how negatively taken was DA2.
So yeah, thanks to DA2 BW in my eyes went from "awesome" to "meh, nothing special"company
Since they have put out far more awesome games than crappy ones (Only one in my opinion) they are still an awesome company. Especially when the only crappy game came from a different team.
Well, technically TOR is coming from a different team too. Just saying.
The critic scores ARE worthless. They are always horribly inflated. At least user reviews will have biases to increase scores and biases to decrease them. That makes the biases more likely to cancel out at least in part. Critic reviews are just biased towards games being great...especially if they are from big companies. The idea they have some obligation for honesty is ridiculous when you look at bad games from major companies and see how "professionals" give such games 8s, 9s, and 10s. They're a joke.
DA2 IS below average. For crying out loud, it is RECYCLED MAPS. That's a horrible, horrible mark against it. It has no cohesive plot, but instead has 3 rather unrelated acts (bad plotting). It has undeveloped "villains", an unbalanced combat system, a horrible "wave" mechanic that destroys tactical elements of the combat system, etc, etc. The game is playable, but it is below average -- many below average games are playable.
Ok, I will bite.
So rating of 79 in metacritic is not average for you from critics? To me it is. Most Bioware games get 90+. 79 is a fiasco for them.
You have little over 1700 user ratings, from which over 900 are negative, and from those 900 majority are either 0 or 1.
Also, with critic ratings you can actually look at their history in the site. Compare their scores for similar titles etc. This gives you a valuable comparison tool instead of looking at the near useless scores given by a random Internet user.
"The person who experiences greatness must have a feeling for the myth he is in."
Originally posted by thexrated Also, with critic ratings you can actually look at their history in the site. Compare their scores for similar titles etc. This gives you a valuable comparison tool instead of looking at the near useless scores given by a random Internet user.
Not really. Reviews even at companies are done by people and not just one person does all the reviews.
I will not play a game with a cash shop ever again. A dev job should be to make the game better not make me pay so it sucks less.
problem with ME2 and DA2 is they first games was far better, its like they lose track on what they was doing or supose to do, ME2 get a huge hit on gameplay and combat mecanics, too little customization, because (stupid)people complaing its was too difficult, same with DA2 you can't change armor of companions, with make several armor pieces useless if you can't wear it, so not reason to go after something, also it lack the discovery feeling, everything on both are just there and in case you miss something in the map you can get back to get it, also in ME2 we have a strange lack of weapons with the first we had plenty and teh strange change in the world, before weapons could shoot till heat or you could control the heat on your weapon be it by mods or small bursts, with in me2 you don't and you can't shoot with "ammo", DA2 lack of customization on party members and lack of you liking then,other then one funny part here and there and the good and old talk with each other party thing chars are too simple...
problem is with each game bioware do they lose things made then great, now is almost a generic thing with not really can called RPG
Also, with critic ratings you can actually look at their history in the site. Compare their scores for similar titles etc. This gives you a valuable comparison tool instead of looking at the near useless scores given by a random Internet user.
Not really. Reviews even at companies are done by people and not just one person does all the reviews.
For some, some use peer review and editors etc, to make sure it is not too subjective etc. I think for some reason you have unrealistic picture on what critics do. Somehow you think they all just write what big companies tell them to write regardless of consequences. I am sorry to burst your bubble, but there are some very good reviewers out there. People vote with their money, a site with clear bias will probably lose a lot of viewers. This happened with gamespot for example.
Instead of harboring nearly irrational negativity towards them, perhaps you should just stop reading all kind of reviews and try demos/betas yourself? That is always an option, after all, reviews are just there for people who like to get a different perspective before making their buying decision. They are not ment to be end-it-all views on a subject.
"The person who experiences greatness must have a feeling for the myth he is in."
The critic scores ARE worthless. They are always horribly inflated. At least user reviews will have biases to increase scores and biases to decrease them. That makes the biases more likely to cancel out at least in part. Critic reviews are just biased towards games being great...especially if they are from big companies. The idea they have some obligation for honesty is ridiculous when you look at bad games from major companies and see how "professionals" give such games 8s, 9s, and 10s. They're a joke.
DA2 IS below average. For crying out loud, it is RECYCLED MAPS. That's a horrible, horrible mark against it. It has no cohesive plot, but instead has 3 rather unrelated acts (bad plotting). It has undeveloped "villains", an unbalanced combat system, a horrible "wave" mechanic that destroys tactical elements of the combat system, etc, etc. The game is playable, but it is below average -- many below average games are playable.
Ok, I will bite.
So rating of 79 in metacritic is not average for you from critics? To me it is. Most Bioware games get 90+. 79 is a fiasco for them.
You have little over 1700 user ratings, from which over 900 are negative, and from those 900 majority are either 0 or 1.
Also, with critic ratings you can actually look at their history in the site. Compare their scores for similar titles etc. This gives you a valuable comparison tool instead of looking at the near useless scores given by a random Internet user.
Is an 8/10 about right for DA2? No, I have to say it isn't. The game is decidedly below average and an 8/10 is in the "good game" category. A game, on the other hand, that gets random people to hate it, does actually mean something. There must be something wrong with a game like that -- far more useful information and more accurate of the game's state as well.
And I personally haven't ever seen a source of critic reviews that was remotely consistent even for similar titles. They have different reviewers for games in the same genre and they are biased in favor by different amounts depending on how big the company is. There is a tremendous amount of noise there, and it is noise that is difficult to measure the magnitude and doesn't tend to cancel itself out.
Frankly, DA2 has major flaws and an 8/10 does nothing to even hint at that. The best argument you can come up with is "well it is lower than other Bioware games", but that's not an argument that indicates critics are rating the game fairly on its own merits. 8/10 is still significantly too high.
And you have to think about it... if DA2 was the worst game in BioWares catalog to date? Thats still pretty damn good.
No, it's not. It is clearly lacking as a game on many levels. That's why the sales of it have dropped tremendously since the first week despite EA putting it on sale and bundled games with it left and right. It's ok if you sitll liked it, many games that aren't up to par still have fans. That's normal. Fact is though, DA2 was and is a bad game and only the "professional" reviews really disagree.
I agree that Bioware has released better games lately (ME2 was good). DA2 is not a good game, however. Of course, DA2, the ME series, and TOR are all made by different groups in Bioware. It is rather silly to say one being bad necessarily means the others will be.
Thats my point, but more-so you won't ever find a company thats sold pure gold with every title. I don't like DA2, but I don't like DA either. I do like KOTOR and I do like ME and JE and NWN and so on, but I'll click the little "opt out" button when it comes to DA.
I can't speak much on DA2, but I can say, most of the time, the game is much better than people want to admit, even if it doesn't live up to the standards BioWares other titles did. Thats not to say the game is worth the purchase, or anything, its just to say that in the video game spectrum, DA2 would be closer to the good end then the completely unplayable, buggy, broken and boring end.
I think DA2 suffered from a bad case of money managing monkeys forcing a sequel out before the designers were really ready to make one. It reminds me of the line from the song Have a Cigar "You've got to get an album out. You owe it to the people. We're so happy we can hardly count."
That said, I actually think the fact this game is being made by a rock solid RPG company like Bioware is its biggest selling point.
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I would have to say that with the gaming ratings 8/10 is about right for the game. If you take it lower than that, you would have to lower many games scores even further. Games tend to be rated higher than for example movies or music, but thats how it is. 79 is just about right, but I would personally rate it probably around 70. And while it is probably Bioware's poorest game ever, its production quality, regardless of those issues you mentioned, is much higher than your average RPG.
(talking about metacritic, in response to one of the previous posts)
"The person who experiences greatness must have a feeling for the myth he is in."
problem with ME2 and DA2 is they first games was far better, its like they lose track on what they was doing or supose to do, ME2 get a huge hit on gameplay and combat mecanics, too little customization, because (stupid)people complaing its was too difficult, same with DA2 you can't change armor of companions, with make several armor pieces useless if you can't wear it, so not reason to go after something, also it lack the discovery feeling, everything on both are just there and in case you miss something in the map you can get back to get it, also in ME2 we have a strange lack of weapons with the first we had plenty and teh strange change in the world, before weapons could shoot till heat or you could control the heat on your weapon be it by mods or small bursts, with in me2 you don't and you can't shoot with "ammo", DA2 lack of customization on party members and lack of you liking then,other then one funny part here and there and the good and old talk with each other party thing chars are too simple...
Well, personally I think some people harp on the equipment bit too much. I've often felt many RPGs are too equipment focused, when that's simply not what the fantasy genre is like outside of games -- heck, many games do demonstrate you don't need to have a lot of equipment upgrades and drops to have good RPG elements. It's always struck me as a bit weird how you have a trash heap of legendary weapons by the end of a game....just doesn't feel right. For ME2 it is a bit different, but still a military outfit is going to have more or less standardized equipment. While some customization of characters is good so you can specialize them in different ways for tactical or fun reasons, I don't think a lot of equipment is really the best way to go about that, imho.
ME2's main failing to me was the lack of companion banter. ME1 had a lot of that problem too. Companions often felt like cardboard cutouts for that reason. Otherwise it was a really strong game, with a good story, good characters, and so forth. Well, it was also a bit lacking in big choices compared to ME1, I will say, but I can understand the difficulty with that over a trilogy.
Comments
Are you trying to be funny OP ? I can't decide if this is a subtle joke or you actually mean it.
The "It is a Bioware game" as a mark of quality could be used in the past. But with the Dragon Age era, I can only come to the conclusion that they don't deliver what I expect from a Bioware game. New times and Bioware changed for whatever valid reasons, but the mark of quality Bioware stood for is no longer valid. You like Dragon Age and that fine, but those who know what "a Bioware game" is will not put Dragon Age in that category I think.
The style of game is somewhat the same, and yet Dragon Age games are nowhere near the same standard as old Bioware games were.To me the phrase "its a Bioware game" did not only describe the game style but also the quality.
Both dragon age games seem so shallow if you played older Bioware games, but if you didnt I guess Dragon Age Origins is pretty decent. "Its a Bioware game" phrase is hollow nowadays, and used by those who don't understand it :P
"I am my connectome" https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=HA7GwKXfJB0
Good critic scores that ignore the fact the game has recycled maps, a poorly written story, and other major failings? Yeah, critic reviews are GREAT! And by "great" I mean worthless. Waaaaay too biased by the companies.
I simply think the case of Dragon Age 2 is similar to that of Spore.
I find it kind of funny how many people toss all other games aside and only take DA2 as the best of the most recent of BioWares work when thinking about BioWare games.
It doesn't matter that the game released before that ME2 was GOTY and won tons of awards and was well liked by critics and community alike.
I mean if you looked at some of the games Bethesda sticks their name to, most people would be disgusted, yet, when TES Skyrim comes out, people have no qualms about it being the best free roaming RPG to date.
I never really liked DA:O and only played the DEMO for DA2 long enough to know it still wasn't for me, but I love ME and ME2, and I'm looking forward to SWTOR and ME3.
And you have to think about it... if DA2 was the worst game in BioWares catalog to date? Thats still pretty damn good.
Yeah. Even as someone who liked the game I wouldn't have given it perfect scores. I've been suspicious of 'professional' reviews and critiques for a while but that pretty much was the clincher. I don't even bother reading them anymore. Usually I stick to reader reviews, but after the huge fan praise that both Witcher 2 and Fable 3 got (both of which were disappointing to me), I think I've had enough of those too.
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No, it's not. It is clearly lacking as a game on many levels. That's why the sales of it have dropped tremendously since the first week despite EA putting it on sale and bundled games with it left and right. It's ok if you sitll liked it, many games that aren't up to par still have fans. That's normal. Fact is though, DA2 was and is a bad game and only the "professional" reviews really disagree.
I agree that Bioware has released better games lately (ME2 was good). DA2 is not a good game, however. Of course, DA2, the ME series, and TOR are all made by different groups in Bioware. It is rather silly to say one being bad necessarily means the others will be.
Sorry, but average user score means a lot less than critic scores. Users have no oblications for honesty or integrity. The very high scores or low scores are usually not driven by a honest rating criteria, but one based purely on emotion. At least with major publications and critics, you get a baseline. There are many fair gaming publications that I have personally followed for years, and they have never been far off with their ratings. You also get to know some of the reviewers and know the genres they like and dislike.
The fact in this instance is also that the negative reaction (from the fans of DA:O), followed by further trendy outburst from non-Bioware fans, produced relatively large number of 0s. I think we can all agree that this game was no where near 0 or 1 or 2 or 3, nor was it 9 or 10. A fair assessment, taking in account personal preferences and perhaps negative tantrums, the lowest score for this game could have been a 4. It is after all fairly well polished game that gives roughtly 25 hours worth of gaming experience that is above average when it comes to RPG-genre.
"The person who experiences greatness must have a feeling for the myth he is in."
I've found the average user review is roughly within 1 point of what makes sense, though I haven't played Fable 3 so maybe that's worth than a 5 or a 6. Anyhow, user reviews are a far more helpful metric than critic reviews (for games anyhow). Not perfect, but they have a use.
I am much more inclined to trust professional critiques than user reviews. Far less biased imo. It is user reviews I find useless. I always ignore user reviews. Hell, if I had to stick to user reviews I would never try a game....
As for DA2, some people liked it others didn't It really depends on what you are looking for. DA2 actually had more fun combat but I enjoyed DA1 more because of your companions. The story was okaish but it was characters like Morrigan and Alistair that made the game great. I hated everything else - combat etc too boring for me but I played it through because of the story
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Thats my point, but more-so you won't ever find a company thats sold pure gold with every title. I don't like DA2, but I don't like DA either. I do like KOTOR and I do like ME and JE and NWN and so on, but I'll click the little "opt out" button when it comes to DA.
I can't speak much on DA2, but I can say, most of the time, the game is much better than people want to admit, even if it doesn't live up to the standards BioWares other titles did. Thats not to say the game is worth the purchase, or anything, its just to say that in the video game spectrum, DA2 would be closer to the good end then the completely unplayable, buggy, broken and boring end.
The critic scores ARE worthless. They are always horribly inflated. At least user reviews will have biases to increase scores and biases to decrease them. That makes the biases more likely to cancel out at least in part. Critic reviews are just biased towards games being great...especially if they are from big companies. The idea they have some obligation for honesty is ridiculous when you look at bad games from major companies and see how "professionals" give such games 8s, 9s, and 10s. They're a joke.
DA2 IS below average. For crying out loud, it is RECYCLED MAPS. That's a horrible, horrible mark against it. It has no cohesive plot, but instead has 3 rather unrelated acts (bad plotting). It has undeveloped "villains", an unbalanced combat system, a horrible "wave" mechanic that destroys tactical elements of the combat system, etc, etc. The game is playable, but it is below average -- many below average games are playable.
Its about above average according to you then.
http://xbox360.ign.com/objects/080/080342.html
http://www.google.com/products/catalog?q=Dragon+Age+2&um=1&ie=UTF-
http://www.google.com/products/catalog?q=Dragon+Age+2&um=1&ie=UTF-8&tbm=shop&cid=2717806998863339319&sa=X&ei=_4DeTeXJGKrY0QHIhLXPCg&ved=0CDkQ8wIwAw8&tbm=shop&cid=14663541402962616383&sa=X&ei=_4DeTeXJGKrY0QHIhLXPCg&ved=0CDUQ8wIwAg
I don't care about innovation I care about fun.
Sorry but... LOL. I will trust people that anrt being paid by EA marketing to review a game far more then those that are.
Personally I would give DA:2 about a 6. That little below average sure, but why DA2 makes me worried about SWTOR and other future bioware games is that DA2 is their lastest game and should have been good. It had good characters, it had a good working engine, it had a interesting story, it had a good ip with lore but inspite of that, it still sucked. Their lazy combat design, level design, quest design and story development made the game suck. That just show new(EA) poor standards, imo.
I will not play a game with a cash shop ever again. A dev job should be to make the game better not make me pay so it sucks less.
Since they have put out far more awesome games than crappy ones (Only one in my opinion) they are still an awesome company. Especially when the only crappy game came from a different team.
I'm not sure if this is a good comparison, but I believe that putting critic scores above user scores is quite similar to believing that a small elite is better at making choices regarding elections than the general public.
Maybe you should actually read what I said, because it is clear you didn't comprehend it the first time. I've never said user reviews anywhere are perfect. I said the ones on metacritic tend to be USEFUL, and that critical reviews are definitely less useful.
It is a rather odd thing, certainly. I don't have a lot of experience with other user reviews save for Amazon. There I find them a good bit more hit or miss -- appliances with significant problems sometimes get high scores even so, for instance.
Well, technically TOR is coming from a different team too. Just saying.
Ok, I will bite.
So rating of 79 in metacritic is not average for you from critics? To me it is. Most Bioware games get 90+. 79 is a fiasco for them.
Now lets look at the user scores here:
http://www.metacritic.com/game/xbox-360/dragon-age-ii
You have little over 1700 user ratings, from which over 900 are negative, and from those 900 majority are either 0 or 1.
Also, with critic ratings you can actually look at their history in the site. Compare their scores for similar titles etc. This gives you a valuable comparison tool instead of looking at the near useless scores given by a random Internet user.
"The person who experiences greatness must have a feeling for the myth he is in."
Not really. Reviews even at companies are done by people and not just one person does all the reviews.
I will not play a game with a cash shop ever again. A dev job should be to make the game better not make me pay so it sucks less.
problem with ME2 and DA2 is they first games was far better, its like they lose track on what they was doing or supose to do, ME2 get a huge hit on gameplay and combat mecanics, too little customization, because (stupid)people complaing its was too difficult, same with DA2 you can't change armor of companions, with make several armor pieces useless if you can't wear it, so not reason to go after something, also it lack the discovery feeling, everything on both are just there and in case you miss something in the map you can get back to get it, also in ME2 we have a strange lack of weapons with the first we had plenty and teh strange change in the world, before weapons could shoot till heat or you could control the heat on your weapon be it by mods or small bursts, with in me2 you don't and you can't shoot with "ammo", DA2 lack of customization on party members and lack of you liking then,other then one funny part here and there and the good and old talk with each other party thing chars are too simple...
problem is with each game bioware do they lose things made then great, now is almost a generic thing with not really can called RPG
For some, some use peer review and editors etc, to make sure it is not too subjective etc. I think for some reason you have unrealistic picture on what critics do. Somehow you think they all just write what big companies tell them to write regardless of consequences. I am sorry to burst your bubble, but there are some very good reviewers out there. People vote with their money, a site with clear bias will probably lose a lot of viewers. This happened with gamespot for example.
Instead of harboring nearly irrational negativity towards them, perhaps you should just stop reading all kind of reviews and try demos/betas yourself? That is always an option, after all, reviews are just there for people who like to get a different perspective before making their buying decision. They are not ment to be end-it-all views on a subject.
"The person who experiences greatness must have a feeling for the myth he is in."
Is an 8/10 about right for DA2? No, I have to say it isn't. The game is decidedly below average and an 8/10 is in the "good game" category. A game, on the other hand, that gets random people to hate it, does actually mean something. There must be something wrong with a game like that -- far more useful information and more accurate of the game's state as well.
And I personally haven't ever seen a source of critic reviews that was remotely consistent even for similar titles. They have different reviewers for games in the same genre and they are biased in favor by different amounts depending on how big the company is. There is a tremendous amount of noise there, and it is noise that is difficult to measure the magnitude and doesn't tend to cancel itself out.
Frankly, DA2 has major flaws and an 8/10 does nothing to even hint at that. The best argument you can come up with is "well it is lower than other Bioware games", but that's not an argument that indicates critics are rating the game fairly on its own merits. 8/10 is still significantly too high.
I think DA2 suffered from a bad case of money managing monkeys forcing a sequel out before the designers were really ready to make one. It reminds me of the line from the song Have a Cigar "You've got to get an album out. You owe it to the people. We're so happy we can hardly count."
That said, I actually think the fact this game is being made by a rock solid RPG company like Bioware is its biggest selling point.
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I would have to say that with the gaming ratings 8/10 is about right for the game. If you take it lower than that, you would have to lower many games scores even further. Games tend to be rated higher than for example movies or music, but thats how it is. 79 is just about right, but I would personally rate it probably around 70. And while it is probably Bioware's poorest game ever, its production quality, regardless of those issues you mentioned, is much higher than your average RPG.
(talking about metacritic, in response to one of the previous posts)
"The person who experiences greatness must have a feeling for the myth he is in."
Well, personally I think some people harp on the equipment bit too much. I've often felt many RPGs are too equipment focused, when that's simply not what the fantasy genre is like outside of games -- heck, many games do demonstrate you don't need to have a lot of equipment upgrades and drops to have good RPG elements. It's always struck me as a bit weird how you have a trash heap of legendary weapons by the end of a game....just doesn't feel right. For ME2 it is a bit different, but still a military outfit is going to have more or less standardized equipment. While some customization of characters is good so you can specialize them in different ways for tactical or fun reasons, I don't think a lot of equipment is really the best way to go about that, imho.
ME2's main failing to me was the lack of companion banter. ME1 had a lot of that problem too. Companions often felt like cardboard cutouts for that reason. Otherwise it was a really strong game, with a good story, good characters, and so forth. Well, it was also a bit lacking in big choices compared to ME1, I will say, but I can understand the difficulty with that over a trilogy.