Dragon Age II

Started playing DAII this morning, and I'll admit it does play incredibly better and much smoother than that demo did. And being that this is pretty much designed as an action/adventure title with an optional pause/tactical system that feels like it was tacked on, I decided that I'm just going to be playing it for the story.

What I mean is that I'm playing in on Casual mode {easiest option}, thus I don't have to think too much in the battles or use the pause feature much. Had this the DA:O isometric view that I prefer for games of this nature I'd have chosen say the nightmare difficulty that I played through DA:O on instead.

Anyway, so far its not bad, just got to Kirkwall and I'm working through the mundane tasks to get into the city now...

{Scratch that, the mundane tasks ended up being one whole quest to beat up a merchant and then an entire yr passes...LOL Not so sure I'm going to like these advances in time.}

Just about 5 hrs playtime thus far and I'll admit I'm enjoying the story and the side quests. And since I tend to play games for their story and lore as priority one always, that will be enough for me to continue and finish the game.

However there are a few negatives I've run into, one of which being the recycling of dungeons or areas. I mean seriously not but 20min after I finished this rather large dungeon, I go into another one and its the same layout, but I started from the other side instead...lame.

It would seem that every area save for Kirkwall is just a bunch of long and very skinny pathways with the occasional; slightly bubbled area where most fights or conversation points tend to take place in. And another thing I find to be extremely lazy design is the multitude of little dead ends that branch off of these paths that almost always have a skeleton, corpse, pile of rocks or a chest/crate/box to loot. Why there is hardly anything to loot along the paths besides enemies is odd.

i am about 4 hours in and yeah the reuse part can be a little blah but overall the love the game, even those we can't pick a race it is awesome

Well I'm about 8 hrs in now, and I'm having doubts of choosing to play as a Mage. I mean its ok, but it feels kinda boring just sitting back casting AoE that eats through massive fights with ease. I tried playing as Avaline for a few battles who is a Sword/Shield tank and I did enjoy that much more being toe-to-toe with tons of mobs all around.

I suppose now would be the time to do so since I'm not that far yet, and according to many reviews it took them about 40 hrs to do everything, including all side quests. Of which I'd do too of course...hrm

Anyway, I tried restarting, made a new char as a Warrior but after a few min didn't feel like having to play through everything I've done already so I'm kinda at a crossroads on what to do. Suppose I'll sleep on it and see how I feel tomorrow.

Well, a good sleep was worth it and I decided to continue with my Mage. There are other games already out I'd like to play as well as many new releases over the next few months, so I can't linger in this one longer than necessary.

I just hit 11hrs, and finished the Deep Roads expedition which was the final part of the first year in Kirkwall. And while I believe I finished every quest possible before moving on, I didn't search every nook either, but it was quite a few and plenty. Nothing was marked or lingering that I saw so good enough I say. I greatly enjoyed the Deep Roads part and wish it was much longer, that was thus far the best part, and the boss fights even on casual were a bit challenging leaving me at just one char alive in two of them; having to run around and pick them off slowly...LOL {I havn't used the pause feature once}

I am a bit perplexed as too where all the wealth came from at the end, the story says we made a fortune, though keeping track of my funds I spent 3x as much paying for access into the expedition than I earned from all the loot in there. I guess it must be the huge pile of other gold that you couldn't pick up they were talking about...ah well.

And I'll admit once again, the story is captivating me. The suspense as too what this is all leading into from the cut scenes with Varric and the Seeker have me greatly hooked. I just hope from some of the reviews I skimmed over that said they thought the ending sucked are just they didn't enjoy it, but I suppose we'll see eventually...

15hrs and just starting the 3rd part. I rushed through the 2nd not bothering with any side quests unless necessary. This blatant reuse of the same 5-6 layouts for all the areas is absurd, and having to keep playing through them for all the side quests has gotten annoying.

I know I'll be missing out on a ton of additional story, but even that has become questionable at best. It just feels so "all over the place with no structure" I wonder sometimes why I'm even still playing, but I gotten this far so why not finish it...

Well, its been a week now and I can't get myself to even bother loading the game. I've heard so much negativity towards the ending I dunno if I care to finish it. And with my prolly starting Rift here in the next few days, my thoughts have turned too, "just delete the install and saves and never look back on it."

Now I'll admit some of the stories are ok, and I suppose I wouldn't mind finishing it, but the worst part is the blatant re-use of areas that kills the fun, and with every battle taking place in the same spot every time, there is no surprise or mystery. Its all about run here, watch some story and answer/ask some question, run there and repeat, with a few massive fights in-between. Thats another thing, where do all these enemies come from, there are dozens in every fight and the city isn't that big!

Anyway...

More than two full weeks now and I havn't had the slightest interest in loading it up to continue. So I decided to uninstall and delete my save file...I'll never touch this massively-repetitive junk of an RPG again.

Besides I'm quite busy with Rift now, plus I've got a ton of LEGO gaming to get through that is far better worthy of my time. And I've already got 2 major projects about to get started on this year:

• Putting up over 200ft of 6' wooden privacy fence
  
• Major renovations to the basement of the house I'm in, moving one wall back 3', building a new 12' x 8' wall and installing a better floor over the concrete, plus possible new sliding glass doors, etc!
  
• Oh and I recently got a job with 30hrs a week planned to start soon.

All in all, my free time is going to become quite scarce, but better spent on robust and greatly needed projects. Thus my gaming while it'll not quite suffer, I'm gonna have to become quite picky in what to invest my time in. And it needs to be worth it!