Has anyone else picked this up yet? What are your initial thoughts? I'm still at the "why on Earth did they change x, y and z?!" stage.

I'm enjoying it to an extent but, apart from the huge improvement in graphics (one of the worst parts of the XBox version of DA1) and the wonderful new combat animations, I'm finding the story far less "epic" and many of the gameplay changes frustrating.

Admittedly I haven't finished it yet but it does feel more like Awakenings than Origins - fun, but a little like an add-on.

Really? I quite enjoyed it. I'm already on my second play through right now. Sure it lacks some of the expansiveness of the first game which spread across an entire country, but I've been really enjoying the choice/consequences function of the game. Make certain choices in the first part of the game, then "Years later" the consquences of those actions comeback to possibly bite you.

I've also really enjoyed the dialogue system. The protagonist feels much more like a characters instead of a place holder. Also, I LOVED the smartass personality. The interactions with various characters and that personality type are awesome.

I'm in two minds about the dialogue. After years of the industry claiming that they didn't give their main characters voices because gamers liked to imagine their own, Mass Effect came along and showed just how much better a game could be if the main character did speak. The problem is that it needs a really good voice actor to pull it off. The actors in Mass Effect were excellent in that regard but, in DA2, I'm not so convinced. To me, the male Hawke sounds like he's been made Tranquil most of the time, and the female Hawke enunciates every word so precisely, that she sounds like a BBC news-reader - diction that's so perfect and accent-less that the character seems to have no real personality at all. The so-called "charming or amusing" dialogue options seem to fall especially flat. I'd still rather have the dialogue than not, but - unlike Mass Effect - I can't help feeling that the actors in DA2 have been employed because they were cheap rather than because they were good!

Other than that, I feel everything seems to be a little ... skimped. I'm already bored of every quest being in the same streets. The few quests outside the city are in identical caves, completely lacking in variety or imagination, and the banter between the supporting characters seems mostly plot-related, rather than amusing in its own right. Merrill has some great "off topic" lines but there are so few of them that they get repeated far too often.

It's not all bad. It still has that "must see the next bit" quality that keeps me playing but, compared to DA:Origins, everything just seems a little ... not quite as good as it could or should have been. Someone else wrote somewhere that it feels like it was put together by Bioware's B-Team and, from what I've played so far, that's a pretty good summary of how I'm finding it.

I don't think you should automatically blame the VAs for this one. Often the voice-acting director is to blame; after all he's the one who says "no, say it again" or "that's a wrap!" Maybe the ME director is simply more cinematic-minded (a very likely possibility, considering DAO vs ME2).

Based on what I've read so far, I think I'll actually skip DA2 and just buy Heroes of M&M VI, maybe. If I really feel a hankerin' for DA, I can always get the DLC quests for DAO that I haven't bought/played yet.

mlai
Based on what I've read so far, I think I'll actually skip DA2 and just buy Heroes of M&M VI, maybe. If I really feel a hankerin' for DA, I can always get the DLC quests for DAO that I haven't bought/played yet.

I actually traded in my copies of DA:O and Awakenings to buy the Ultimate Edition (it's pretty cheap online) which has both of those and the DLC. Well worth doing, I think. Most of the extras are not especially important (I don't think I even equipped the Dragon Age Armour Set!) but the additional character (Shale) is excellent and makes a replay of the whole game a must!

The add-ons are quite short but they're worth playing. Witch Hunt is an interesting epilogue and Leliana's Song is not only a fun little prequel but shows just how much better a game can be when the voice acting is done right!

I wouldn't dismiss DA2 completely, though. It is an engrossing game, just - in my opinion - not as good as DA:O. I'd put it on your "games worth buying but probably not at full price" list!

I dunno. I think they're going to pull the "Oh look! Tons of DLC we've made AFTER you've already purchased the game" just like Mass Effect 2.

I picked it up yesterday and have played the opening, up until the blight is over and he meets the camp dwarf. So far is is excellent but I have barely scraped the surface.

Genejoke
I picked it up yesterday and have played the opening, up until the blight is over and he meets the camp dwarf. So far it is excellent but I have barely scraped the surface.

Yeah, the beginning is great. And - without giving anything away - the end isn't too bad either (not epic in the vein of DA:O, but still a lot of fun!)

In fact, I actually played those opening scenes several times, using a different class each time, just to get the feel for how differently it would play. The new animations make the rogue much more fun to play than it was in DA:O!

It was the repetitive nature of the episodes between the beginning and the end that I felt let it down. Maybe I've now lowered your expectations enough for it not to be a problem but, once I'd reached Kirkwall, I very quickly became aware of just how little variety there was in the environments.

I'm now a good way through the game for the second time, making different decisions based on my experience of the first play-through. As with any Bioware game, it's always interesting to see just how much difference those decisions make to the story itself.

I won't be playing it any farther for a little while as my ps3 died before I got a chance to go back to it. Should have got the 360 version instead.

I loved Dragon age 2... not as much as the first one, but it was still great story-wise and character development. I even loved some of the character designs and stuff.

The only thing I didn't like about the game:
1. The clothing/armor limitations. I actually got an mod to get rid of that, made it more enjoyable for me.
2. less character interactions. oh, there's still character interactions and you still can romance them, but it just feels like there aren't as many as there was in Dragon Age: origins.
3.Limited places to go in DA2. I hope that in DA3 they make it at more open and stuff... like maybe become a sandbox game? *cross fingers and prays for this to come true*

DAJB
Has anyone else picked this up yet? What are your initial thoughts? I'm still at the "why on Earth did they change x, y and z?!" stage.

Exactly the way I felt playing the beta, so I didn't bother purchasing the game. I actually preferred the micromanagement capabilities that the original had. But I must have been a very small percentage of people, as they somewhat dulled down the combat mechanics.

I do like a good story, but I also look for something that gives me a good challenge and feeling of accomplishment.