I came to the realisation that most gamers are morons after spending about five minutes reading comment sections. Then I realised that I AM THE SAME KIND OF MORON after writing a few comments myself. Can definitely understand the urge to go crazy and 'let lose'. Too bad there is not more wit, time and intellegence applied. The intent to scream is not inherently bad. It needs to be channeled into something a little bit civilised. I think most of us have NEVER LEARNED how to give a considered and REASONABLE argument. To sum up its childish and ignorant. What is gonna be shocking is finding out that most of these '3 year olds' are probably in their 30s. Big brats having the childhood tantrums they somehow missed. Most of us really SHOULD KNOW BETTER. The key is probably to engage the comments with reason, and demonstrate a little argument rather than call lawyers and go out to 'shame' these 'scumbags'. Anti-Troll reactions tend to develop their own trollish characteristics, smug in their superiority. The cure is not screaming at the screamers, its adding a bit of intelligence into the mix to get it out of the emotions and into the intellect.

Shogun 2 ROCKS! Thx CA!!!! Seriously they should look at the longest running Strategy Theme of them all: The Chinese 3 kingdoms period. First think of the market size for the product. Then there is the fact that a lot of the content parallels what we have in Shogun 2. With 3 kingdoms there is always the beatiful problem of trying to use diplomacy to hold of the moment when its a clear 2 vs 1 war. The heroes and the uniforms and the terrain are all awesome.

A little self spiel: why the obsession with maps. I was an archaeology major, and in our home circle of AD&D the dungeon master (1980-1984) Our maps were actually cartography grade, caverns were based on actual phenomena, geology and flora was based on actual environments, and buildings on viable variants of historic Celtic, Slavic and Neolithic models. A case of the amateurs far out doing the pros, since few games (with the possible exception of Skyrim) reached that level. Origins was actually very sound in terms of cartography though the map of Denerim was not up to standard. With DA 2 you REALLY HAVE dumbed it down. Why not make a viable world? Why not create an engine that let's the players enjoy it? Damn, we did it in our studies! You have a budget for such things for godsake hire people with vision and real world skills who can do it.

I hope Mike goes and reads my latest review on DA2 in the Metacrititic User reviews (orctowngrot, March 31) Print it out blow it up ad stick it on your studio wall. Despite my rantings I actually ENJOY DA2. I liked the end, and I think the writing is GREAT. I'm looking forward to the DLC and I can live with the combat system and everything else. Despite that the game fails in too many ways. It compromises terribly and it was a major fail both as a continuation of the franchise and as a way to re-invent the game. Other than drifting into a grey zone, you guys failed to patch up stupid conventions in fantasy RPG's such as treasure sitting in chests everywhere, and spiders dropping coins. If you are going to shakethings up, why not throw out all those old cliches? Instead you threw out all cartography. After 3 games Thedas is vague and the overall point of the series doesn't exist. Total Fail dudes! But number one gripe is why of why have you thrown out the RPG genre and created this passified, zombified new genre where the players get stuck as idiots who just click their way through YOUR stories. Power to the players guys! Let the players write the tale and you will be showered with critical acclaim.

DA2 also has an important design fault with the implementation of NPC.s. There are too many, they are always the same, they are always loyal. Too much of the game is spent keeping them happy. Too many quests flesh out the NPC's but we can't get XP without them, so hence we can't piss them off, even if we don't like them. All in all, the NPC's become a kind of burden, and an entrapping web of plots we can't shrug off. They are well written to be sure, so we can appreciate that, but its simply another way of tying the character down to pre-written plots and stifling the RPG element of free association with the game world.

The following posts are in reverse order. I posted a longer idea, but each paragraph runs backwards in time so you have to scroll from the bottom to get the right flow of ideas! thx! otg

But more than that, players should be able to create multi class characters, wizards who can also stealth etc. This was all invented and found to be fun 30 years ago. There are obviosly many approaches to this, and the examples of Rift, Eldar Scrolls etc etc show us other possibilities. The DA2 approach is actually pretty good, but it doesn't really resolve it. Yet race class and final outcome ALL MUST BE OPEN. Players also should have a chance to be evil if they wish. Enough of your time and mine for one day. Thanks for DA 2. Mistakes will be made, but people need the courage to make them, so I appreciate that it is indeed hard to balance all possible design criteria with IP as great as Dragon Age. Please give us good, integral DLC for DA 2, and all the best for DA 3. warm regards. Orctowngrot.

I'm not sure 20 pages would be space enough to elaborate all the things that can be done better in the franchise. Yet having enjoyed all the games, (even with gripes) they are all forgiveable and they can all be remedied. For DA 3 you will be wise to treat all up to now as background history. (Grey Warden, Hawke, Morrigan). Let players start again, in the world as if it is new, but give them a map of all Thedas, even if they can't access it all. Then let then explore and unlock the cities, post blight, including Denerim, Lothering, and of course Kirkwall. To make the genre work though, Bioware has to cease its 'episode' design, and stop players from being the passive followers of plot points created by your writers. You need instead a different kind of campaign. There should be a number of key set (and scripted) major adventures, which are level specific (unlocking when players fulfill plot, XP or other requirements). Outside the cities and wilderness needs to have a capacity to generate random events, so that players can truly wander about and discover the world with all kinds or random trouble along the way. Certain areas should be very dangerous (irrespective of difficulty settings). Magic items should be rarer and less powerful, hence more appreciated when found. Class specialisations should be unlocked by meaningful interactions with NPC's (ie: joining a thieve's guild).

Mike you should note how complete useless and irrelevant that last 3 major pieces of DLC for Origins were. Good DLC is reusable in game to expand the adventure (return to Ostagar, Warden's Keep, Shale). They make the game bigger. Episodes outside the main narrative (Witch, Leiliana, Golems) don't lend XP to the main games, so have zero replayability once the achievements and goodies are unlocked. Why make DLC that can't be integrated in the story and enjoyed (sic) with every playthrough. Its simply STUPID! If you make DLC it should expand the central story and expand the XP pool and choices in every playthrough, every time. This is basic, game design 101.

The root problem is the design decision of Bioware to create powerful narratives and place the players in the role of passive plot followers. This is obvious in DA 2 but it was also the case in Origins, where players can choose the order in which to witness the narratives, but they are trapped by narratives that make each area effectively 'ONE USE' (Then forget em). WHY? It surely makes more sense to have some areas revisitable: the dark roads for example would logically respawn dark spawn, so players should always be able to traipse off to the dark roads if they feel like killing something (or want to get some XP). Not so. Seems that doesn't pay enough, so instead we get episodic DLC. Because each game has limited XP and no spawning zones, players become obliged to wait for DLC if they want to build their levels. This borders on the abusive. It certainly tells us that Bioware values revenue over quality games. Sell your soul to the devil anyone? Great to see nice bug scores like 2/10 at metacritic for the DLC for DA2. Precisely what it deserves, if not fat juicy 0s. Total cynicism by the developers, but worse than that, BAD GAME DESIGN. Irony is it costs you money in the long run..