Ben-DutkaSome people like continuity. They want to be able to experience what they had before in a new setting.
Therefore, BioWare will give you such an option – minus the transporting over of the main character – in Dragon Age II . Many RPG fans have asked if we'd be able to import an older save file from Dragon Age: Origins into the upcoming sequel (as they could do in Mass Effect 2 ), and the studio has responded in the positive…sort of. Bear in mind that this time around, whoever was your Warden in Origins has been replaced by Hawke in DAII, and you obviously can't make Hawke disappear. However, in speaking to NowGamer , BioWare lead designer Mike Laidlaw tells us we can still "import the world."
"We look at it as importing the world really. I’ve always seen Dragon Age as a franchise as about more than any one character. It’s about entire an entire span of history and the whole world that’s affected by what happens. So that was our approach and I think the importing stays true to that in the sense that the decisions your Warden made and the person they were all affects Dragon Age II. You know, who’s in charge of Ferelden, what happened with the Dwarves, who’s running Orzammar? All of these things are reflected and accounted for in Dragon Age II."
That's sorta cool. Some of the more hardcore RPG fans have complained about Hawke, in that it's a solidified main character, meaning players won't be able to create their own from scratch. But you can still turn Hawke into one of three different classes (Warrior, Rogue, or Mage), which Laidlaw calls the "holy triumvirate of fantasy role-playing." That not enough for you?
Related Game(s): Dragon Age II , Dragon Age: Origins
You forgot Arcane-Warrior. 😉 As for the World-Save feature,its a bonus nothing more or less.
Arcane warrior is a part of the Mage's specializations.
Well I'm happy with this way of doing it.
I felt that Dragon Age 1's weak spot was the fact that the main character had so little, well, character.
My character's name never being spoken aloud, it felt that he didn't really exist in the game world. Worse, he didn't have a voice to participate in the fun banter going on around him all the time.
And keeping the world we changed rather than the artificial character is a good continuity idea.
Why would anyone complain about Hawke? That's just silly. Having a real personality as a main character will be great and make DAO2 much better than the first.
The RPG purists and elitists have the problem. The ones who say it's not a "true" RPG unless you can create your own character (i.e., your fantasy self) from scratch.
Hmm… that falls down to a matter of preference, really. I'd personally prefer making my character have his own personality a la DA:O, in a game like DA:O.
Last edited by WolfCrimson on 10/6/2010 12:20:37 PM
You can still get good personality out of characters that you have created from scratch, try playing icewind dale 1 or 2. You create your whole party from scratch, but each has a unique voice and attitude based on their class and position on the good evil scale
Well from my point of view won't DA:O 2 still have conversation choices?
Then apart from beeing called Hawke and having a *locked* appearance… There won't be any differences right?
I mean even if you could make your own appearance in DA:O you still could only do as much as the game gave you for choices.
If they really want D&D then they can just hook up with their D&D buddies and make up their own characters from scratch and even make them say whatever they want no?
The game is going to tell a tale in which we will have a huge impact by deciding what the main character will do or how he will act and I think that is good enough for a game even for the hardcore type. And I agree with what some people already said: *that having a more solid main character will just make the story even more believable* no? 😀
Well thats my opinion.
Last edited by Neo_Aeon666 on 10/6/2010 8:58:35 PM
The difference is that in DA:O the main character serves as your shell. It's YOU there. In DA2 you are just the puppet master pulling the strings of a precreated individual.
If the latter is your preference then you could have switched to controlling one of your party members instead then you'd have just been an observer.
With a precreated character and the limitations that brings stops me from becoming fully emersed.
I know I'm not a Dwarf but when I go home tonight and boot up DA:O then for that half hour of game time I AM the Dwarf. I AM the lead character; I'm not just steering someone else and observing THEIR story.
There is a place for both styles but I wish Bioware had kept with the original approach in DA.
Last edited by Gabriel013 on 10/7/2010 12:52:10 AM
Out-freaking-standing. Dragon Age is by far one my favorite games. I am glad I didn't delete my game saves.
You guys come from the console world where you got your set character and that's it. Us PC peeps are used to creating custom characters and leading them through the game world. While having a set hero who can talk and all that jazz is nice, I'm still not 100% sold on the Hawke thing. I would have liked to continued my warden's story.
Dragon Age Origins Gets Ultimate Edition
http://www.thealistdaily.com/news/dragon-age-goes-ultimate/
I'm okay with this since my hero got toasted on the move to the new hard drive, and my second playthrough is as a total b*tch. So I'm going to screw up Ferelden really bad for DAII.
Now, we must be this Hawke person, but can't we still create his/her appearance from scratch? That's really all I care about. In JRPGs you get a set character, in WRPGs you make one, that's the rule.
Yes World, you can customize your Hawke's appearance to look however you want him/her to look 🙂
The set things for your Hawke are as follows: Hawke is a human, and will only be a human, Hawke must be either be a male or female, and lastly, Hawke has to either be a warrior, rogue, or mage, as their class.
I usually do my first play with a human anyway, but it kinda sucks we won't have as many origin stories.
I hadn't realise that being human was the only limitation, that wasn't the impression I'd picked up. Apart from the lack of race choices I'd still say I'm relatively pleased that the character approach is more akin to that of Mass Effect than FFX. (Before anyone jumps on me, yes I did love FFX and I still have it in my collection.)
One little continuity I'll add to DAII when I play it will be my Hawkes' genders. I have 2 males and 2 females, to respectively, I'll have 2 males Hawkes and 2 female Hawkes.
It's just something I want to do, because I want to do it =P lol
The pic of default Female Hawke looks awesome btw =D
Last edited by Victor321 on 10/6/2010 3:25:57 PM
Dont like the armour, looks like a spikey dustbin!
Lol XD
sounds great to me. I approve. I thought this was always known though.
I was gonna play a female Hawke anyways, but damn, that default design – as seen in the picture – just confirmed it was a good decision =)
I don't understand people complaining about the new hero. I like playing a character that actually speaks and has a proper name. I can still customize her class and face, so who cares?! If it ain't broke don't fix it.
I don't think ME's "Shepard system" is broken ^^
This sounds pretty cool. I think having a set initial character you mold will be better, if only because it's easier to have a voiced PC, much like Mass Effect. My major gripe about DA:O was how silent my character was (which was also my gripe about another BioWare classic, Star Wars: koTOR). Will be nice to actually hear my character interact instead of just stand there during conversations.