BioWare announces Dragon Age 2. ETR March 2011

[HeartsOfFire]

BioWare has recently announced that Dragon Age 2 is in development, with a tentative release date of March 2011.

According to early reports, Dragon Age 2 will be a story taking place shortly after the events of the Dragon Age Blight, and spanning the course of the next ten years that follow. The player will assume the role of a commoner by the name of Hawke, one of few people who survived the Blight and its destruction of your home. Forced to fight for survival in an ever-changing world, you must gain allies, amass fame and fortune, and seal your place in history.

Debut Trailer is coming 08/17/10

A commoner rising to power to become champion of the land? It's a story that's been told time and time again. Even King Maric and Loghain Mac Tir led a similar path on their rise to greatness.

I'm excited. I'm on my fifth and final playthrough of Origins myself. Then I plan to play Leliana's song, and get back into Awakenings to clean up the rest of the achievments I missed.

[Mike F]

It’ll be interesting to see what they do skills and talents wise. I’ll be much less excited if I just end up spending the majority of the game trying to re-build up one of the characters I ended Origins with.

[Cain]

I love the idea of Bioware games but I've had a lot of trouble staying interested.

Bought both dragon age and mass effect in the last year and played the start and then stopped for various reasons.

Does dragon age improve throughout or near the end? Mass effect's ai for your party members just killed it for me, but I had the ability to turn it off in dragon age.

[HeartsOfFire]

With Bioware games, if they don't hook you in the first 5-30 minutes, then it's not likely they will keep you interested enough to keep playing.

I personally love BioWare games. I dive right into the role easily, no matter the character. But a co-worker of mine who rented Dragon Age for the PS3 on my suggestion said he just couldn't get into it. The immense amount of dialogue bored him.

You either love them or not, it seems. It's not a case of 'just give it a chance.'

Of course both games improve as you advance, but if you can't maintain your interest then... what's the point, right? I totally get where you're coming from.

[Komskies]

I love DA:O, but I simply couldn't get into ME2. Maybe it's because I didn't play the first one, but I just didn't find it entertaining.

[LChoy]

If anyone in Edmonton is interested, I got an invite to be a tester for Dragon Age 2
on July 15th, 16th, and 17th
PM me and I'll see if you can go in my place
I'm moving out of Edmonton so I won't be able to be part of Bioware's focus group anymore

[HeartsOfFire]

Originally Posted by Lchoy

If anyone in Edmonton is interested, I got an invite to be a tester for Dragon Age 2
on July 15th, 16th, and 17th
PM me and I'll see if you can go in my place
I'm moving out of Edmonton so I won't be able to be part of Bioware's focus group anymore

On a completely related point, I hate you.

I would love to go in your place, IF I could get the time off work, and get up to Edmonton.

[Esoteric]

I just want Bioware to make a game where I sit around a campsight on talk for hours on end. They have amazing writing and voice acting, and these are probably my fondest memories of all the Bioware games.

[Hemi-Cuda]

Originally Posted by Komskies

I love DA:O, but I simply couldn't get into ME2. Maybe it's because I didn't play the first one, but I just didn't find it entertaining.

playing ME2 without playing the original Mass Effect first is like watching The Empire Strikes Back without ever seeing Star Wars. it probably has the most direct story continuation of any video game sequel ever made

[MickMcGeough]

Awesome.

[Hack&Lube]

No multiplayer co-op in Dragon Age = Bioware fail.

And my own family members work on this game up in Deadmonton. For shame. The most important facets of playing Baldur's Gate and Diablo was the ability to play with friends.

[HeartsOfFire]

Uhhh... explain to me how you would incorporate co-operative play in Dragon Age, a dialogue heavy experience? What's the Co-Op Player supposed to do when the Main Character player is reading codex entries or engaged in dialogue? Sit and twiddle their thumbs?

Diablo is a different story of course. It is TOTALLY made to be a co-operative experience... but it was made by Blizzard, not Bioware.

And I'm pretty sure that the original Baldur's Gate games were not co-operative. You must be thinking of the overhead-hack-and-slash knockoffs, Baldur's Gate: Dark Alliance.

[steveo]

I used to play Baldur's Gate with my friends in junior high over tc/ip on our dial up modems haha. used second phone line to talk to each other and play. it wasn't bad. everytime dialogue happens, the host server would just let us know whats happening and what hes picking before we continue with our mission haha. memories.

[Hack&Lube]

Originally Posted by HeartsOfFire

And I'm pretty sure that the original Baldur's Gate games were not co-operative. You must be thinking of the overhead-hack-and-slash knockoffs, Baldur's Gate: Dark Alliance.

Your memory is wrong and obviously not having experienced these games in this manner, you don't know what you are missing.

Baldurs Gate 1, BG2, Neverwinter Nights 1, NWN2, etc. basically all the spiritual ancestors of Dragon Age, were all co-operative playable and dialogue heavy and that's how I played through all of these games. Yes, the 2nd player basically watched and read with the 1st player as he engaged in talk and read story and texts. BG was more primitive, NWN series allowed all players to watch the 1st player engage story elements, we'd often chat to decide amongst ourselves which dialogue choices to pick. If you have friends that enjoy that experience of reading or watching the story unfold with you, that is perfect. If you have zero attention span, then go with the DA model and have no co-op at all. Dungeon crawling experienced with friends in your party is 10x more fun than a single player experience.

[HeartsOfFire]

My apologies. I have zero experience with the true Baldur's gate and Neverwinter Nights games. The notion that co-operative play in a BioWare game, especially ones developed on the Aurora engine AND though technically doable, is completely foreign to me.

But I guess that's because the friends I have wouldn't have the patience to listen to all the dialogue, nor would they agree with my choice of response.

And what characters do your friends take hold of anyway? Other party members? How awkward would it be if your buddy took hold of the party member you happened to be romantically involved with?

Can you say 'awkward'?

[Hack&Lube]

Originally Posted by HeartsOfFire

My apologies. I have zero experience with the true Baldur's gate and Neverwinter Nights games. The notion that co-operative play in a BioWare game, especially ones developed on the Aurora engine AND though technically doable, is completely foreign to me.

But I guess that's because the friends I have wouldn't have the patience to listen to all the dialogue, nor would they agree with my choice of response.

And what characters do your friends take hold of anyway? Other party members? How awkward would it be if your buddy took hold of the party member you happened to be romantically involved with?

Can you say 'awkward'?

No, the NPCs that exist in the game are separate from the charaters your friends make. The people your friends make are all player made characters in true RPG tradition. They are just along for the ride while the host of the server is basically the star of the show and the story and all the storyline characters exist as well. Your friends are members of your party as their own custom made characters to accompany you and there were various ways to make the game scale up the difficulty to account for the larger parties. The amount of coordination that is possible to do battles when you have friends with their own characters is much better than in game AI.

[MickMcGeough]

Originally Posted by HeartsOfFire

How awkward would it be if your buddy took hold of the party member you happened to be romantically involved with?

Can you say 'awkward'?

Who even thinks of this?

Plus, if you're playing co-op start to finish, you'd be the one starting the romance with your buddy anyway. You could just, you know, not try to bed your buddy.

[Komskies]

If you preorder before midnight tonight you get a free upgrade to the signature edition.

http://www.amazon.ca/Dragon-Age-2-Bi...ref=pd_cp_vg_1

The Dragon Age II BioWare Signature Edition

Pre-order Dragon Age II before January 11, 2011 and receive an automatic upgrade to the BioWare Signature Edition - a special, collector's edition version of the game that contains loads of additional content, exclusives, and other perks. This special edition version of Dragon Age II is only available for pre-order before January 11, so pre-order now. The full BioWare Signature Edition contents include:
View larger.

• A full copy of Dragon Age II for PC
• A download code for a bonus character and missions
• A downloadable game soundtrack
• An exclusive in-game digital armory featuring multiple weapons
• Additional downloadable items

[Hack&Lube]

I'll get it on Steam including the signature edition and all the dlcs and bonus items and collectors packs for $9.99 in two years Even by then, I won't have finished the first one. I actually have a relative working on this game in Edmonton. He's totally sick of it.

[3 Justin 3]

A video game thread and I am post #20, I am ashamed of myself.

I got the signature edition pre-ordered from EA store, so in that 3-5 day span it will take to ship I'll beat Dragon Age: Origins again, hopefully.

The game looks bloody good, the graphics are way smoother and the fighting is much tighter. My only gripe is that you can only be Hawke, rather than a bunch of different characters, but I guess in Origins that was the point of the game so I am not too bother, plus Hawke looks pretty bad ass and you can still change who he is (Rouge, Magi, the other one).