14 DAY TRIAL // I like the narrative and the way it progresses better in Origins than in Dragon Age 2 and, while my review proves that I enjoyed the sequel, I would have liked the developers at BioWare to have taken more time in order to create a more complex and choice-laden story.
One area where I feel that Dragon Age 2 shines is in the utilitarian writing, in the party banter and some of the interactions with non-playable characters.
So BioWare has become pretty good at the small details of characters and story while apparently failing to increase its writing ability when it comes to building the big picture.
One problem is the very linearity which is built into Dragon Age 2, denying the player the chance to experience the different acts in any order, like Origins did with the four main quest areas.
The changes made from Origins to Dragon Age 2 might mean that in the future the BioWare fantasy franchise might choose linearity, one central location and long time frames over different locations and the freedom to explore them at will.
That's not necessarily a bad thing, although a lot of gamers will feel a bit betrayed if a more linear experience is all that is to be offered, as long as the developers take advantage of the possibilities available when longer-term linear stories are the focus.
For one BioWare must embrace the idea that locations and characters should undergo significant changes when moving forward through history, especially when momentous events, like the Qunari struggle in Dragon Age 2, take place.
The developers also need to make acts more different from each other, perhaps expanding a character’s powers in one, only to take them back in the next, playing with the expectations of the player and providing variety in terms of gameplay eve as they limit it in terms of story and location.