Dragon Age 2 Review (PC)

Dragon Age: Origins was one of the great games of 2009 and by far one of the top 5 RPG games of the past decade. It not only had the fantastic storytelling that we've come to expect from Bioware, but also introduced us to a new, fantastic world for us to explore. As more and more information came out about the game's sequel, people started wondering whether or not it would be able to stand up to the original. Now that it's out, the big question for those who have yet to play it is, "Can it?"

PROS
* Major improvements to the conversation system
* Combat looks brutal and hits feel solid
* Pretty graphics and great animations
* High replay value

CONS

* Story takes a bit to get into
* Some graphical glitches and clipping
* Crazy difficulty spikes
* Not for DA:O purists

A New World, a New Problem
The story of Dragon Age 2 is actually being told by Varric, a dwarf companion you get early in the game, and is done so in 3 acts, each separated by one to several years. He is being interrogated by a Chantry Seeker, who I can only assume is the world's version of a CIA agent. Dragon Age 2 begins towards the beginning of Dragon Age: Origins, immediately after the defeat at Ostagar. After your character leaves Lothering, you learn that the village was destroyed by Darkspawn. In DA2, your character is escaping from said destruction with his/her family. Your sister, the Mage, your brother, the warrior, and your mother. While fleeing, you meet Aveline and her husband Wesley, a Templar. Immediately after, you'll be ambushed by Darkspawn, where both Wesley and either your brother or sister, depending on the class you pick, will be killed. Who comes to save you from this ambush? None other than Flemeth, the Witch of the Wilds and Morrigan's mother. She offers to help you escape the Darkspawn if you agree to deliver a medallion to an Elven camp. After agreeing to her task, ask a nifty, artsy cut-scene, you end up in Kirkwall where you're family is supposed to be well known, and where you will spend the rest of the game. Unfortunately, you aren't the only people fleeing the Blight in Ferelden, and you must work to earn your right to live in the slave-prison-turned-city. Through your time in the game, you'll progress through the social ranks and learn that, while the Darkspawn are no longer a threat, the city's political instability is just as dangerous to the world.

Changes Abound!
A lot has changed in Dragon Age 2. One of the major issues people had before the game launched was the fact that, instead of playing as a totally original character, you instead play as Hawke who has one specific background.

This, of course, meant that we couldn't import our DA:O characters. We believed that all of that hard work had gone to waste. Thankfully, we were wrong. Instead of importing a character you import your world. Every major good/bad decision, and even a large amount of the small ones, have a major effect on your Dragon Age 2 story. From who you chose as king of the Dwarves, to who you chose to take Cailin's place, to whether or not you slept with Isabela to get the Duelist class.

Speaking of good/bad decisions, those have been scrapped from the game. No longer is good or bad as clear as black and white. Instead, your choices will have different effects depending on previous choices and character personalities. If you try to talk your way out of a fight, some of your companions might think that you are weak and will cause your friendship level to lower. The choices in the Mass Effect adopted conversation wheel are no longer in Good, Neutral, Bad order, nor are they colored like in Mass Effect. Instead, they have symbols that show how your character will speak the choice. The mask tends to result in a smart-ass remark, the raised fist is always angry, the wings and halo are always kind, etc. From what I've seen, there are about 6 or more different normal symbols, not including the question mark for Investigate options or the star which I'm still not sure what that means (the choices never seem to be anything special). A smart-ass remark could make an NPC laugh, or it could only irritate them. This adds a whole new depth to the character interaction, forcing you to really pay attention to the different characters, as making the wrong choice could result in another enemy.

Another major change involving character interaction is the altering of the Relationship meter from the original game. Instead of just being a straight ______ either hates you or loves you, its now a matter of being Friends or Rivals, and neither is necessarily bad. While obviously being a friend with a companion means that they will open up to you more, being a rival is not without its perks as well. Making a companion either a total friend or a total rival will unlock a new talent for them that increases their stats, as well as give your character bonus stats. Being a rival seems to give the best stat boost, as the cost of having the character act coldly to you.

The actual dialog and interaction is as good as it's always been, if not better. Things you do and say in the game will dramatically influence how the game plays out making the replay value of this game higher than most any other game thus far.

Through meeting several characters from DA:O, they'll hint that they are preparing for even bigger dangers that are coming, making it obvious that there will be a Dragon Age 3. How DA2 will effect DA3, we can only imagine.

It's a Small World
One of my biggest gripes about Dragon Age 2 is the fact that the entire game takes place in Kirkwall (Day and Night) and the immediate surrounding areas, unlike DA:O where you get to explore an entire continent. Exploring this new world was one of the great things about the first game. Exploring the underground Dwarven city, fighting werewolves in the Elven forests, fending off the undead in a small city, and even being ambushed in the back-alleys of the capitol city. All of these things made the world feel big, even if traveling from one to the other was just watching a blood blot spread across a picture of a map.

However, this also gives you a chance to really get comfortable with the city. Instead of going from one place to another, knowing that you probably won't be back, you're forced to think more carefully about your decisions because its going to be your home for the next 6 years. The city is separated into several areas, each about the size of a city from the first game, and each having their own unique look and feel. Hightown feels rich, while Darktown feels like a cesspool.

Bioware seems to have also pulled a Mass Effect 1 on us here and copy-pasted a lot of areas. You'll find yourself visiting the same cliff-side and the same caverns over and over again with the only changes being some areas are closed off and different enemy spawns. It's also weird to be walking through a cave, see that there is still more cave on the map, but when then a load screen takes you to some dead-end ruins. I mean, the least they could've done was edit the maps so that they end when the area ends rather than showing us that the area would've normally just kept going.

Picture
By the end of the game, you'll have a good 6 or so more locations on this map.

Polish and Shine
Even though the world isn't as varying as the first game was, I have to say that it looks SIGNIFICANTLY better. In DA:O, character clothing was mostly flat. Things that should've had details in the model such as belts and what-not were only visualized in the textures. In DA2, the models are MUCH more detailed, and the high-resolution textures (something DA:O lacked) make everything look great, regardless of if you've seen it before.

The animations are also incredibly better. There are significantly more facial expressions, gestures, and animations this time around. Women actually realistically walk and run like women. Faces genuinely show the emotion being conveyed. Hair bobs and sways when characters move or when there is wind. Eyes glisten in the light. Its all simply beautiful. While the game could have definitely have been prettied up way more in some aspects (some equipment still lacks detail or just seems flat), it definitely stands its ground in the visual department.

The effects have received a nice revamp. Enemies can now be gored in all sorts of ways, some of which cause them to just plain explode into bits, leaving behind splattered blood on the walls and floor. The mage spells are amazing looking. Everything from falling fire balls to energy shields have the details they've always deserved.

As for the music? It's the epic soundtrack that you'd expect from Bioware. Not much to say there.

That's not to say that everything is perfect, however. I've encountered a few graphical glitches such as facial hair not being connected, gaps between the neck and clothing, clipping, etc. At the moment there is also an issue with playing with DirectX 11. Sometimes the game will crash and will refuse to start up while attempting to use it, so you'll often times be forced to play in DX9, which also prevents you from turning the graphics to Very High. DX11 DOES pretty the game up a bunch and enables things like tessellation, though, so its definitely worth using.

More Ways to Dismember
Aside from the auto-attack receiving a new, awesome animations, skills have been totally re-imagined. No longer do you just pick from a small selection of skills. Instead, each class has about 6-9 talent trees from the start with companions having their own special talent tree. To unlock different trees, you use a separate pool of points from your skill points, and are received much more frequently than DA:O's class points who would only give you with 2 total skill points the entire game. This means that instead of picking only one tree, you can mix and mach much more easily. My mage has a fully unlocked and upgraded Primal spells tree with skills and talents from Elemental, Spirit, and Force mixed in as well.

Upgrading talents not only increases their damage and effectiveness, but also have other effects such as causing Brittleness, instantly destroying a debilitated enemy, or making all of the damage critical. These upgrades also allow for you to pull of class combos. Class combos are when a specific class causes a certain status ailment on an enemy, and then another class follows up with an attack that takes advantage of that and 1-hit K.O.s them. These combos are not universal, meaning that while my mage's Petrify will Brittle a foe and allow a warrior to instantly destroy the enemy with a specific skill, my Frost spell's Brittle will not offer the same combo, and will instead only work with a Rogue. This restriction forces you to think more carefully about who you have in your party and what kind of skills you have set up in your companions' Tactics.

Queue the Drama
One of the things people love so much about Bioware is their ability to tell a great story and to create lovable (or love-to-hate) characters. Nothing has changed here.

The characters in DA2 are as deep as they've always been. From the escaped slave lamenting his past, to the Dalish elf outcast for practicing Blood Magic for the sake of uncovering her race's history, each of the characters have their own charm and deep, emotional story. They all have their own quirks that makes you like them even if you hate them.

The actual story is somewhat lacking in the first act, though that's mostly because it's an introduction to the problems of the city and it's residents, as well as involving you mostly just trying to make your name known. Once you get to the end of that Act, however, things pick up. This is where you really start to realize how well Bioware can tell a story and make you care about their characters. Even in DA:O, while I liked the characters, there wasn't much in the game that made me angry or sad. In DA2 however, there are many events that totally changed my opinion of certain factions, giving me a deep-rooted hatred, or caused me to feel legitimately sad for Hawke, or get pissed off that a certain person actually did something like that (avoiding spoilers is hard!).

In a Nutshell
To wrap things up, Dragon Age 2 is a worthy successor to Dragon Age: Origins, however, DA purists might not like the changes. While the story takes a bit to pick up, its definitely worth it. Putting the time and effort into getting to know your companions makes the game all the more enjoyable and really makes the characters shine as some of Bioware's best (Merril is awesome). Combat is fun and looks great. Aside from the lack of a large world to explore, my only real complaint about the game is that you can't equip new armor on your companions. The only person who can equip armor is Hawke. Everyone else has permanent armor that only changes when certain requirements are met, though you can upgrade it via special items found and bought.

If you liked Dragon Age: Origins and aren't afraid of some change, then Dragon Age 2 is definitely worth checking out.

Read more reviews from this author at http://www.massivemoleculemedia.com

Matt White is the founder, owner, and site administrator for Massive Molecule Media. While going by a new name, this group has been making video game related entertainment videos since 2005. Matt himself has been doing game reviews, previews, scripts, video editing, etc for roughly the same amount of time.