**UPDATE**
Kotaku preview DA2
PC Differences
There are some changes PC fans should know, about how their version will differ. First, and this is sort of a non-difference, but the PC game won't be made separately this time. All versions of the game are being made by BioWare's internal teams.
The bigger change, however, is that the game will no longer support an overhead tactical view on any platform. This was an art and combat-design decision, the BioWare rep told me today. Support for that Baldur's Gate-sty.le view forced the artists to design rooms and scenes that didn't have important things on their ceilings and skies — which top-down players wouldn't see. It also forced the designers into an awkward spot where they had to accommodate top-down turn-taking players and behind-the-back action-first players. By catering to the more reckless of those playing sty.les, the designers were forced to make the game's difficulty fairly low. Making all players play from some sort of from-the-rear camera view alleviates that. But! PC gamers, your version will include a special option to zoom the camera out, just not up. Console gamers won't get that.
The PC version will also handle combat commands a little differently, letting a player click to issue a continued attack command, instead of forcing them to button-mash. Leave that to the console gamers.
"The bigger change, however, is that the game will no longer support an overhead tactical view on any platform. This was an art and combat-design decision, the BioWare rep told me today."
"PC gamers, your version will include a special option to zoom the camera out, just not up. Console gamers won't get that."
"There are some changes PC fans should know, about how their version will differ. First, and this is sort of a non-difference, but the PC game won't be made separately this time"
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Video Games Daily interviewed BioWare's Robyn Theberge on BioWare's answer to Fable 3, Dragon Age II.
Hi Robyn. This might not be the best way to start the interview, but what do you think of Fable 3?
You know what, I haven't played it!
I just ask because BioWare seems to be heading in a very Lionhead-ish direction with its RPGs – the key features haven't so much been changed as "digested", arranged in a more intuitive way. How far do you think you can follow that approach before the underlying complexity of your game suffers?
We've kept a lot of those core values, especially on PC. On consoles, we've definitely moved into more of an action-based RPG just so, you know, we're going to quarry that line, between the core group and the [casual] people. We want to sell videogames. We want to appeal to as many people as possible. And that was one thing with our feedback – we have forums, we have a ton of great fans and we definitely listen to them, and respond to their desires and what they'd like to see, what direction they'd like to go in. And that's where a lot of the key changes that we've made to Dragon Age 2 have come from.
"the casual people. We want to sell videogames. We want to appeal to as many people as possible"
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Dragon Age II Interview
"I just button-mash my way through, I just wanna get to the next part of the story, so I don't always want the epic combat, I just want to beat it and be done with it"
Dragon Age 2 associate producer Heather Rabatich
Games On Net interviewed Dragon Age 2 associate producer Heather Rabatich about all the improvements we can expect to see in Dragon Age 2.
games.on.net: Let's talk about the upgraded art sty,le Why the change in art direction this time around?
Heather Rabatich: Well, we wanted Dragon Age 2 to stand out from the generic fantasy genre. Origins was a very specific type of fantasy game and Dragon Age 2 isn't that type of fantasy game, it still has a lot of the carry over, but we don't want it to get lost in that mix. This is a very specific type of game and we wanted to give it that cleaner updated look. So we still have these beautiful cities and vast landscapes and we haven't departed completely from it, but if you look at a screen shot you'll know its Dragon Age 2. It's actually an ever growing market, half the games out there right now seem to be fantasy and I think our sty,le is now setting us apart from that, it matches the combat, it matches the new type of story we're doing.
games.on.net: And how do you make it more accessible?
Heather Rabatich: Well, you press a button and something cool happens! There's like a cause and effect, its happening before your eyes, you're not having to pause and set up a scene if you don't want to, and you're not getting annihilated if you don't play that way. So the pause, and the tactics, and and strategy is there, and you might not even realise you're being strategic initially, but after a while you start seeing how cool it is when you combine abilities and party members specialties, and you've got everybody fighting together and its interesting to be able to jump between the characters, and I just think its still a strategic game, but we have sort of made it a little lighter in the sense that you can just pick it up and play it and know what to do. It's a very satisfying combat system for both types of player.
games.on.net: From your personal opinion, what is the single biggest improvement between the two?
Heather Rabatich: There's so much I liked about the first game, but personally, for me combat-wise, that is a big thing for me because I'm tactical to a certain degree but then sometimes I just button-mash my way through, I just wanna get to the next part of the story, so I don't always want the epic combat, I just want to beat it and be done with it. And it really depends on where I'm at in the gameplay, so I like this type of combat, I feel like its faster and the pace is faster so I would say that for me that's one of the things that, as someone who's playing the game everyday, watching the combat improve and seeing how the game is changing in that way has, for me, been a very satisfying experience.
games.on.net: Now, as I mentioned to you, I dropped out of the first one because the combat was difficult, I got stuck last time, have you maintained that level of difficulty for the second one?
Heather Rabatich: The difficulty is there. Again we have easy to hardcore, you can play any which way between from the difficulty levels. And what we wanted to do with improving the combat was make it so that if combat isn't your thing or it takes a little while for you to get familiar with it, we've made it more accessible for that kind of audience.
games.on.net: GON has some hardcore PC users, are there any benefits or changes in the PC version, over and above the console version?
Heather Rabatich: I would say the PC version hasn't changed that much, we have slightly altered how we're doing the tactical camera, but the fact that we're building this across all three platforms, we've created this very natural feeling game for all three systems so, PC people are not necessarily at an advantage by playing it on the PC, the graphics will look great across all, and its going to feel natural. I know people who played it on XBox and played it on PC just to see the differences, whereas in this one the differences will mostly be in your HUD, you'll get more quickbar options, it's not that different but its still a good gaming experience on the PC. We have a ton of PC gamers at Bioware, so we make sure its tested across all systems."if combat isn't your thing or it takes a little while for you to get familiar with it, we've made it more accessible for that kind of audience"
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Oh, the memories....:(
Speaking to MTV Multiplayer, BioWare co-founder Greg Zeschuk revealed that Dragon Age: Origins may be ported to consoles.
Any time we undertake something we have a goal of creating franchises… PC for now is what we're focusing on, but there is a console future for the franchise. We haven't really talked about what that's going to be, but one thing we're focused on, as folks probably have seen in regards to "Mass Effect" on the PC, is whenever we do a platform choice, we're very definitive and very specific. We don't splash it across all the platforms. Like in the case with "Mass" PC we worked really hard to make it even better than the console version. The PC gives us more tools to do that with. That s the approach we're taking with "Dragon Age" and other games at BioWare.
As the spiritual successor to BioWare's Baldur's Gate, Dragon Age: Origins is fantasy Role Playing Game that features a dark and mature story and gameplay.--------------------------------------
My hype for this game is really fading away:?:(
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