Dragon Age 4 - Rumors of its Existence

I haven't played DA:I yet. Too many more interesting things to do. Guess I'll wait and see what sort of game they make this time before deciding how interested I am. Keeping an open mind...

This ended after the first game. Note I don't use the word "series". Just.....let it go.

Easy solution: if you don't want DA4, don't buy it or play it.

I'm interested, even though I thought DA3 had too much filler content.

Ovenall said:

Easy solution: if you don't want DA4, don't buy it or play it.

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No need to worry, I'm sure that's what people will do.

I don't like DAs as much a MEs. While there aren't many RPGs in space setting like ME, there are plenty in fantasy settings. It's a shame because I enjoyed DA:O+A quite a bit. Disliked both DA2 and DA:I. Also DAs didn't really feel like a series. Each game is just too different and different protagonists also adds to that.

Didn't know JDR was such a fan of the Bioware.
This could be, eh? The ending was interesting, egghead has a lot of villain potential.
Dragon Age has potential as sandbox( or even MMO), but Inquisition felt stuck somewhere in the middle of two genres.
Will be interesting how they go about this without Gaider.

NewDArt said:

If Bioware can do no good no matter what, then the loss involved with developing a game other people like would be….. what?

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When Age of Decadence was released it was marketed as a completely different type of rpg. There's even a blurb about it when you first start the game.

However, Steam forums were full of people complaining about not being able to do some of the same things they can do in mainstream RGPs (mainly power fantasies where choices in character creation are largely irrelevant due to not being able to fail) even thought that is exactly what that game is about.

There was one particular interaction with Vault_Dweller (the AoD dev) and a steam user. The user basically made the same complaints as above, and VD responded by saying it's a completely different type of rpg with different goals and different types of experiences. The user was basically completely confused with this kind of response and basically called VD arrogant for ignoring decades of modern game design. As if this is now the default design for all RPGs to come forever and ever.

My long winded point is that games that market themselves as RPGs but are nothing more than action/visual novels/fantasy games with RPG elements does a disservice for people who want more focus on systems and combat. DA:I might very well be an enjoyable action fantasy game with interesting dialogue and characters, but as a fan of more old school turn-based RPGs, its involvement in the RPG universe does nothing but harm the genre that I love in the form I love it. What AAA rpgs have turned into are basically HL1 with more story and some rpg elements.

Of course, this might just be a "get off my lawn you damn kids" moment, but let's not pretend developing ANY game doesn't have consequences. They most certainly do.

-Bioware and its IE games popularized RTwP as a mechanic for mainstream rpgs
-Action based Diablo popularized action in RPGs in general and gave birth to the ARPG genre (which is really how I'd classify all AAA rpgs made in recent years)
-Bethesda's games popularized the FPS viewpoint in an actioney way (ass opposed to blobber FP), amid horrible combat, and gave us FO3 and FO4, which are miles away from the originals.

Anyway, what I'm trying to say is that a game being released has much bigger consequences than a group of people enjoying it in their own little corner of the world. Also, it's a slow Friday

NewDArt said:

I really enjoyed DA:I - and I would love to see more of it. Lots of room for improvement, though.

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Yeah very flawed, but how many RPG where I chained two full plays, very few. I enjoyed it a lot too, despite the flaws, and despite first 10H of raging and hate, ha ha.

We are talking about EA Bioware here.
To me the last good honest "by gamers for gamers" game they made was Mass Effect 1,right before they were bought by EA.
Everything else since and in the future will be tainted by corporate agenda priorities.
I have no hope whatsoever for seeing anything good from Bioware again.

BoboTheMighty said:

Didn't know JDR was such a fan of the Bioware.
This could be, eh? The ending was interesting, egghead has a lot of villain potential.
Dragon Age has potential as sandbox( or even MMO), but Inquisition felt stuck somewhere in the middle of two genres.
Will be interesting how they go about this without Gaider.

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Ok but:
- How many Skyrim quests aren't much than a simple MMO quest? For me not much.
- Is Skyrim collecting and crafting better? No way for me.
- How many trash combats have Skyrim? A ton, not much difference there.
- Skyrim dragons? Much more repetitive and MMO like than those of DAI.

Then there's activities, they certainly contributed a lot to build the MMO feeling:
- Stars puzzles and collect quests? How about ignore them if they bore you?
- Crystals? In fact it's not that bad, ok activity to reveal them should and could have been more fun. But reach crystals can be quite fun with the complex map structures, sometimes it's cool puzzling.
- Pictures quests, in fact it's great stuff.

The problem is Bioware was used to do small areas, RPG focused on stories and companions, a lot of linearity, more. And then they felt they had to try do their own Skyrim, otherwise too many players will consider they don't make RPG anymore, or just to get a lot of cash as Bethesda.

The Witchers series did quite the same, and they also decided they had to do their own Skyrim clone, probably for same reasons. But they focused on trying improving quality, writing, world living, more. And they achieved their goals, more or less.

DAI at reverse tried innovate a lot more, The Witcher 3 blueprint is much more close to Skyrim blueprint than DAI is. So yeah DAI failed more, but took more risks.

And the optimist view is, they are on the learning to do different RPG blueprints than what they was used to do. And it's quite a change because as some articles highlighted, it's like mostly all their RPG followed a similar blueprint.

Japol said:

We are talking about EA Bioware here.
To me the last good honest "by gamers for gamers" game they made was Mass Effect 1,right before they were bought by EA.
Everything else since and in the future will be tainted by corporate agenda priorities.
I have no hope whatsoever for seeing anything good from Bioware again.

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Usually such comment try be more manipulative and try include DAO as a non EA release.

I doubt many players agree with you, for many DAO will be put quite over ME1, and I read a lot more comments quoting ME2 more than ME1. For me it's not 30s and an end that will blind me, DA3 is the best of ME series, ok I could be alone in universe with that opinion.

Who does AAA party RPG? Just EA, so I'm not ready at all to just ignore them because they seem unable to do non flawed RPG. Party flawed RPG is better than non flawed single character RPG, for me.

Dasale said:

Usually such comment try be more manipulative and try include DAO as a non EA release.

I doubt many players agree with you, for many DAO will be put quite over ME1, and I read a lot more comments quoting ME2 more than ME1. For me it's not 30s and an end that will blind me, DA3 is the best of ME series, ok I could be alone in universe with that opinion.

Who does AAA party RPG? Just EA, so I'm not ready at all to just ignore them because they seem unable to do non flawed RPG. Party flawed RPG is better than non flawed single character RPG, for me.

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I imagine that most people don't agree with me.After all,EA has been shutting down one legendary studio after another and ruining their games in the process and people still support that company.
Its true that noone else does AAA party based RPG but i personally would take Pillars or Divinity or Shadowrun Returns over the baggage that comes with the term AAA ,anyday.
Also yes DA:O was good and i forgot about it,but all the rest of the games fall into what i said earlier.Maybe that game was already on track when EA took over,who knows.
Everything went downhill from there on however.

Japol said:

I imagine that most people don't agree with me.After all,EA has been shutting down one legendary studio after another and ruining their games in the process and people still support that company.
Its true that noone else does AAA party based RPG but i personally would take Pillars or Divinity or Shadowrun Returns over the baggage that comes with the term AAA ,anyday.

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It's very clear none of them are AAA, and all are very flawed too. Myself I want them all, and some EA party RPG too. And frankly all those with Bioware label are much better than the Amalur crap (played only the demo).

There's already some arguing about that in the thread, and I have yet to see any answer to the simple question, what's the problem if EA release some RPG? Don't buy.

I'll never buy any Dark Soul, I won't lost one second to argue it's a boring fake RPG.

EDIT: I don't support EA at all, I have yet to see a EA Bioware RPG i wouldn't have buy, yeah despite the flaws.

EDIT2: It's coherent to have critics, and argue this RPG has this flaw or that flaw in your opinion. It's better when it's constructive. And regarding Bioware it's almost never constructive, just series of insistent complains, like if everything is flawed and it's the worse RPG ever released. Nope.

Dasale said:

Who does AAA party RPG? Just EA, so I'm not ready at all to just ignore them because they seem unable to do non flawed RPG.

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Bioware
Bethesda
Square Enix
Blizzard (if you count MMOs)

I guess CDPR counts as well?

Dasale said:

Party flawed RPG is better than non flawed single character RPG, for me.

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-Well Bethesda games have always been single player.
-Diablo 3 and WoW are single player in that you only control one character.
-I haven't played a FF game in ages, so no idea if that's SP or if it's still party based.
-DA:I to me, looked a lot like SP with AI controlled part IMO.
-ME series looks like it's only SP? Dunno, never played an ME game.
-FO3 and FO4 are SP

So...where are all these party-based rpgs you speak of? Just having companions doesn't make it automatically party-based.

I'm looking forward to the 4th DA... Suck it*.

(* = to whom it may concern)

Dasale said:

The problem is Bioware was used to do small areas, RPG focused on stories and companions, a lot of linearity, more. And then they felt they had to try do their own Skyrim, otherwise too many players will consider they don't make RPG anymore, or just to get a lot of cash as Bethesda.

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I take it you only played JE, ME2, DA2 and ME3…

BG1 is an open world game by the way the areas connect to each others and you are free to go everywhere but Baldur's Gate after the "intro". BG2 has a lots of zones, most of them for side content and chapter 2 is entirely up to the player and like 90% of the game. ME1 has lots of optional planets to land on and you can do most of the game missions in the order that you want. KoTOR also allow you to do most of the game missions in the order that you want, zones are smaller though.

BioWare tried to go back to those old game design with DAI while adding gameplay concepts from other franchises (mostly Ubisoft and WB "open world" games, not Skyrim or MMOs) and being constrained by old gen console hardware.

Dasale said:

EDIT2: It's coherent to have critics, and argue this RPG has this flaw or that flaw in your opinion. It's better when it's constructive. And regarding Bioware it's almost never constructive, just series of insistent complains, like if everything is flawed and it's the worse RPG ever released. Nope.

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Criticism of a game helps people think about the game differently. It presents flaws in a way you might not have noticed or thought of before. Games are generally more than the sum of its parts, so you might not notice how a mechanic here or there can be a flaw.

You might go through a game and say "hey that was pretty fun", and leave it at that. Or you might replay it a few times and notice that your character can join ALL different types of guilds and be just as successful in all of them. Then you might think "oh that's kinda crappy. I guess my choice in class didn't even matter at all. " Then you go through the same process with another rpg and see the same flaw, but you notice it right away on your first play though. Which kind of dampens the experience, as you might suspect there are other fake choices in the game.

I think if more people thought about these flaws in games they played then games can only get better. Of course, you can just end up turning into a cynical asshole about modern RPGs in general. C&C and all that.

Dragon Age Origins was one of my all time favorites. Loved it. If a 4th game is anything like the 1st I'd pay big bucks! I think the chances of that are quite low however.

Dasale said:

Ok but:

The problem is Bioware was used to do small areas, RPG focused on stories and companions, a lot of linearity, more. And then they felt they had to try do their own Skyrim, otherwise too many players will consider they don't make RPG anymore, or just to get a lot of cash as Bethesda.

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Gameplaywise, the philosophies behind an open world and a level based world are different.

In the past, the difference was marked by technolog, so much that, in the same vein as the tale of the RPG elements, people were inclined to tell that loading screens between areas was the determining factor to tell about open world and non open world.

These days, though, with the advance of technology, loading an area can be handled no matter what.
A level based world can be loaded seamlessly. Nevertheless, the philosophical difference remain. The technological marker has disappeared.

Bioware products fall in the category.

Mustawd said:

Bioware
Bethesda
Square Enix
Blizzard (if you count MMOs)
I guess CDPR counts as well?

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You just bring examples to my arguing, no MMO doesn't count seriously, none are Single Player RPG. And JRPG is another domain, I can't bear anymore their teens heroes and clichés, without to mention the combats systems, in general. And yeah Bethesda seems bound to never ever publish/make any party RPG, for now it's not different with CDK.

Mustawd said:

-DA:I to me, looked a lot like SP with AI controlled part IMO.
-ME series looks like it's only SP? Dunno, never played an ME game.
...
So…where are all these party-based rpgs you speak of? Just having companions doesn't make it automatically party-based.

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ME1&2&3, DAO, DA2, DAI. For MEA ok not fully party, still more than all other.

Yeah AAA party RPG, it's very rare, let see... just EA Bioware.

azarhal said:

I take it you only played JE, ME2, DA2 and ME3…

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I didn't mean all, and obviously I didn't want include BG1. It started with BG2 but not yet fully. BG2 could have many zones, but also many are involving a relatively linear progression, zones started be tiny or at least rather small, but yes it's not yet fully clear with BG2. I mean the incapacity to design areas not small.

Typical areas that aren't too linear past BG2, is 2 crossroad, 3 linear paths, with luck one linear underground or building. It's not that they could do much better, it's because areas sizes are too small to develop a good exploration and progression gameplay. Comparison point, Gothic 2.

Past BG2 and ME1 Citadel, I don't see any single counter example, full NWN series, KOTOR, (didn't played Jade), full ME first trilogy, DAO and DA2. Until DAI and MEA, alas too flawed both, but at least they tried.

azarhal said:

BioWare tried to go back to those old game design with DAI while adding gameplay concepts from other franchises (mostly Ubisoft and WB "open world" games, not Skyrim or MMOs) and being constrained by old gen console hardware.

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I don't get what's this " old game design", there's nothing of BG1&2 in DAI or MEA, perhaps you evoke Citadel and MEA?

For Far Cry series (past 1), for sure there's some influences of it in some gameplay elements of DAI as the ridiculous attempt of generating dynamic combats from three different factions wandering the world, they failed reproduce this gameplay aspect of FC3. Other than that DAI and Far Cry 2+ gameplay are hugely different. And for MEA it's even less right, in fact MEA evokes a bit Borderlands 2, not much, but more than any Far Cry.

For Warner Bros games I don't see what you mean. Perhaps last Batmans I didn't played, I played a bit first Batmans, I don't see any link with DAI or MEA.

Ok, Far Cry 2+ or Elder Scroll, but probably both. There's been plenty release with a very open approach, and a very positive feedback. It's probably the whole that influenced those blueprint evolutions attempt. I noticed that recently some negativity is growing against those open blueprint, for now centered against Ubi, but could be more general, finally more players see the negative aspects of those too open too huge games.