I wonder if the animations and timing is really the issue here. Seems to me the ignorant writer was excepting a true real-time combat system, and apparently wasn't even aware of the tactical approach during combat ala BG/KOTOR.

Maybe I haven't followed DA closely enough (doesn't appear to be for me), but isn't that what it's trying to do? To bring BG style combat to a modern audience? Certainly never appeared to be true real-time - and seems to have D&D style "rounds" under the hood, and as such there's no way an informed person would expect animations that look entirely realistic or responsive. At least, I've never seen a combat system of this nature that managed to appear truly fluid.

Anyway, that's what I thought.

What PW told is that it's possible to make DA combat eye-friendly but, to do it, they would have had to give up some of the factors which keep the gameplay of DA as it is originally intended to be. My guess is that, in Mass Effect 2, Bioware will probably choose a game-play which would have fewer conflicts with graphics. The gameplay of Dragon Age was originally designed for PC platform, as a spiritual successor of BG series, and there are intrinsic limitations compared with role-playing games from Betehsda. While World of Warcraft can totally rely on PCs due to the nature of MMORPG and I've gotten an impression that DA first aimed at something like that in its earlier development stage, Bioware went for console platforms, giving up the multiplayer implementation. I understand that they need a larger denominator enough to keep a big game such as Dragon Age, whether they will rely on PC multi-player market or console market for the denominator. If the choice they did is good or not is still remains to be seen. You could make the thread into yet another console/MMORPG vs single player PC argument, but, before that, it would be suitable for you to ask yourself who should pay the bill enough to keep the development of the "traditional" gameplay with good graphics.

There's your problem - this writer clearly isn't "informed". It's perfectly reasonable for everyone to have their own biases but when you're writing a professional preview, either try to keep them balanced or make some sort of effort to understand the intended market.

Paying attention to the developer's presentation might be a start.

Not only that, but let's remember that DA is a *party* based RPG. All those detailed animations and blocks and parrys and what not may be important for single character RPGs, where you only control yourself. In a party based RPG I expect less at the micro and more at the macro level of tactics, just like in Drakensang.

And that's exactly why I said in another thread that a reviewer must be very familiar with the genre (in this case, playing 3000 hours of WoW doesn't make you familiar with the cRPG genre), and at least have played a few games in the sub-genre (he shouldn't be previewing a party-based RPG if he hasn't played BG, Drakensang or similar. I would even say Dungeon Siege doesn't apply to DA)

But 3000 hours of WoW (or 3, really) should at least teach him the difference between RPGs where your character hits, cools down, and hits again, and button mashing beat-em-ups where you click faster to hit faster. My 7 year old son has a better concept of RPGs. This reviewer's idiocy is unexplainable.

I think you are right but…somehow, despite Dhruin's apparently rational comment here, I cannot get rid of an impression that he adopted one of sacrificial rituals bad habits from hardcore RPG boards, where web hosts put a poorly written article with a cynical comment as "news," letting board members bite it off into pieces as if it were a cow fell into a pool full of piranhas. You can see yet another victim here.