Talk:Dragon Age II

gameinformer

for anyone that feels like doing a write up, gameinformer has a couple of articles up on their website with early details (first details + character details). 61.68.25.249 (talk) 07:37, 10 July 2010 (UTC)

I was gonna say...I had previously put up the Morrigan thing on here but it was removed. I swear though, I swear there was a part in the Game Informer Magazine article (the one with DA2 on the cover) that one of the developers stated "We Certainly aren't done with Morrigan's story..." —Preceding unsigned comment added by 96.245.154.250 (talk) 18:20, 22 August 2010 (UTC)

Wikia references removed

I have removed all references to Wikia as an unreliable source. Like all open Wikis, Wikia is open to editing by anyone, and cannot be accepted as a reliable source. Additionally, Wikia sites do not pass the "established expert" exception in WP:SPS; Wikia contributors are considered experts no more than are Wikipedia contributers. They are, rather, random people on the internet.

Yet further, it should not be used as a source even if it is reliable since all of their own content is sourced to other sites. If those sources are reliable, and they mostly are, then cite them. Someguy1221 (talk) 23:40, 4 September 2010 (UTC)

Redundancy & Grammar

There are several bits of repeated information. The page needs to be better organized, and there are some grammatical errors.--FUNKAMATIC ~talk 18:57, 17 September 2010 (UTC)

You're free to edit the article :)  Davtra  ^(talk) 22:56, 17 September 2010 (UTC)

Creatures

There is only one entry under creatures and that is for something that only appears in the DLC. Can anyone fill in this section with more relevant creatures? Otherwise I think this section might as well be removed Lady of the dead (talk) 18:36, 22 December 2010 (UTC)

If you actually looked at the reference, you would find it goes to the game's official site and that striders are a relevant creature. In other words, they're not just a DLC creature. I will fill out the section with the rest of the creatures that Bioware lists when I have the time tomorrow. --24.205.50.219 (talk) 10:45, 23 December 2010 (UTC)

Is a creature list really necessary though? I mean this is wikipedia, not the Dragon Age Wikia. 202.53.199.23 (talk) 05:33, 10 January 2011 (UTC)

If you look at the game's official site it gives a picture a a paragraph worth of description. This isn't much of an indicator to the importance of the creature to the game or how much it features. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Lady of the dead (talk • contribs) 22:40, 10 January 2011 (UTC)

It's information backed with a reliable reference. It would make sense to delete it if the page was overflowing with other, more important information, but it is not as of yet. It's information with a reliable reference and has something to do with Dragon Age 2; it meets the requirements.--24.205.50.219 (talk) 22:37, 11 January 2011 (UTC)

Formatting issue?

There seems to be a formatting issue on this page. There's a massive gap after second paragraph in the Plot section. Makes people think the page hasn't loaded completely because everything else is below that gap - JohnP —Preceding unsigned comment added by 123.231.90.179 (talk) 04:46, 7 March 2011 (UTC)

This is because the two templates on the right do not work well together, so it looks mildly bad right now as opposed to terrible. Lesser of two evils. ▫ JohnnyMrNinja 21:34, 8 March 2011 (UTC)

Edit request from Gokudv, 7 March 2011

{{edit semi-protected}}

• Dragon age 2 Walkthrough

Gokudv (talk) 06:22, 7 March 2011 (UTC)

 Denied - That is not the sort of link we put on game pages, please read WP:EL. ▫ JohnnyMrNinja 07:22, 7 March 2011 (UTC)

Review Scores, Reception & Press Coverage

Here's some stuff that could be added to the Reception Section:

• Eurogamer 8/10: http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2011-03-08-dragon-age-ii-review?page=3
• Joystiq 4/5: http://www.joystiq.com/2011/03/08/dragon-age-2-review/
• RPG Site 80%: http://www.joystiq.com/2011/03/08/dragon-age-2-review/
• CVG 9/10: http://www.computerandvideogames.com/292490/reviews/dragon-age-2-review/
• Gamespot 8/10: http://www.gamespot.com/pc/rpg/unnameddragonageprojectworkingtitle/review.html
  
• Game Informer 8.25/10: http://www.gameinformer.com/games/dragon_age_ii/b/xbox360/archive/2011/03/08/dragon-age-ii-console-review-amid-improvements-bioware-leaves-story-behind.aspx

Also, one of those sites, RPG Site, has conducted an interview with the Voice Actor for the Male version of Hawke, the main character. He reveals that recording lasted all the way from June 2010 through til November 2010. That may come in handy for the "Production" section of the Wiki.

• http://www.rpgsite.net/articles/247/262/nicholas-boulton-interview.html
  94.169.8.67 (talk) 18:33, 8 March 2011 (UTC)

Dragon Age II page is locked.

This game has already received a library of reviews since it's release earlier today. If you lock the topic, you are responsible for its continued growth. Either begin updating it with new information about its reception, or unlock it so that other people can edit it for you. Let's try to keep it the "Free" encyclopedia!

Thank you.

Corbenine (talk) 22:34, 8 March 2011 (UTC) {{editprotected}}

Someone locked this page, but nobody is updating it. The game was released March 8th, and there is significant reaction already. I would recommend WP:PC, or to remove protection. We are discouraging new editors by sending them away, and discouraging readers by not updating. ▫ JohnnyMrNinja 03:06, 9 March 2011 (UTC)

The protection was due to persistent vandalism. It expires this evening anyway, so I'm reluctant to remove it early. I guess whether it stays unprotected depends on how much vandalism occurs after the protection expires. — Martin (MSGJ · talk) 15:25, 9 March 2011 (UTC)

Why is this page STILL locked? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 108.18.116.177 (talk) 15:08, 12 March 2011 (UTC)

This is just...

Terrible. I'm sorry but I would expect Wikipedia to be the last to lock this, it's received terrible scores from most but the top journalists and is thought by most to simply be paid off. Closing the Wiki page just furthers this idea overall.

A start with the Metacritic page (3.9/10 for User Reviews, 8.9/10 otherwise) is a good start. While there have been many troll reviewers giving it 1/10 simply to offset the people giving it absurd 10/10 when the game clearly isn't THAT great, it goes to show that the game isn't as good as the scores imply and locking this page definitely says a lot about wikipedia game articles and being influenced by outside parties. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Pyro Fyr (talk • contribs) 04:55, 9 March 2011 (UTC)

Completely agreed there. Please unlock the article, so that *real* reviews get edited in. But first thing to do is to remove the bogus reviews that are currently written in that section. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 79.178.201.97 (talk) 07:18, 9 March 2011 (UTC)

the funny thing is that most sales happen in the first few days and weeks. So if the article is locked early enough the units are sold already and even if the wiki page is corrected eventually, it's too late.

The reception part is extremely biased. On metacritic it's got 84/100(pc), 83/100(360) and 83/100(ps3) which is far from how it's represented here.

78.53.125.128 (talk) 09:31, 9 March 2011 (UTC)

Okay, I've unprotected the article. Please help to revert any vandalism, so that it can stay unprotected. — Martin (MSGJ · talk) 15:27, 9 March 2011 (UTC)

The last statement in the reception paragraph states that the game holds a user score of 3.0 on Metacritic. First off, there is no citation for this claim. Second off, I have read literally over a hundred articles related to video games, and not once have I ever seen the user score for Metacritic posted in the reception section. If the game did not meet your expectations that's fine, but why is the user score relevant in this article when its not in any other? (Note: The closest thing to a user score I have seen posted in an article was related to Modern Warfare 2's PC version due to its lack of Dedicated servers. - George. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 75.77.6.190 (talk) 17:39, 9 March 2011 (UTC)

It's very easy to go and check the metacritic sites for yourself. The user score is relevant because it's so far off the reviewers score that it's worth noting. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 193.157.218.207 (talk) 22:26, 9 March 2011 (UTC)

I've seen that a good portion of the reason for the 3.0 score is trolling and many more gave it a hyperbolic score of zero. Also, you better be damn prepared to back that claim up about the paying off, rumors don't qualify as reliable sources, and that's a huge accusation to make. It's locked because of vandalism to da max (The internet is freaking out over this game), not because Bioware paid anyone off. 99.110.54.111 (talk) 03:21, 12 March 2011 (UTC)

Bolding it up for clarity; You should all know that the random board on 4chan has launched a trolling campaign against the game. That's the reason for the plethora of negative user interviews and why there's such a big difference between professional and user critics. It should be disregarded entirely. --77.215.75.103 (talk) 22:30, 12 March 2011 (UTC)

So because Bioware, the developers of this game, have said that 4chan (The scapegoat for every bad thing happening on the internet) are behind the negative user reviews this means that the user reviews are no longer valid? And no, it was not the random board that got worked up about this, it was 4chan video game board. (And you should know that each board on 4chan has an entirely different "culture" form the other) They were tired of Dragon Age 2 only getting reviews praising the game, often as 'the best RPG ever made', and decided to voice their opinions on the metacritic user reviews page. There were some troll reviews submitted, as there often are when 4chan is involved with something, but these were removed by the metacritic moderation staff. So from what I can see, you are horribly misinformed. The metacritic user reviews actually contain valid opinions. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 93.179.10.6 (talk) 14:03, 13 March 2011 (UTC)

Has BioWare said this? I was not aware. What I'm aware of, however, is that the random board on 4chan was indeed involved, as there were numerous threads there on the 8th and 9th encouraging people to "bring BioWare down a notch" by submitting a false review. It was blatantly obvious (and still is, if you read the negative reviews on the site) that most of them haven't even been near the game and are blatantly trolling. I'm not saying that there aren't some people that are legitimately disappointed with the direction the series has taken - though I'd think most of them rate low out of principle, to lament what they perceive as the death of the RPGs of old, rather than because of the game in itself - but the metacritic scores are entirely disproportionate to what people actually think (I really doubt there's a 4-some difference between game reviewers, who are also gamers themselves, and everyone else, on a 1 to 10 scale). Basically, when we know that a website has been overrun with 4chan folks and trolls alike, it's no longer a legitimate wikipedia source and only makes people confused as to why there's such a seemingly gaping disconnect between reviewers and users when that dubiously is the case. --77.215.75.103 (talk) 14:25, 13 March 2011 (UTC)

Yes, Bioware were the first to mention a 4chan 'raid'. And talking with a few different people, I've found nothing about /b/ being involved in the metacritic thing. The only board involved was /v/. And whether the reviews are good reviews or not, I'd say the low user scores do deserve a mention. 93.179.10.6 (talk) 14:52, 13 March 2011 (UTC)

Actually, it seems to be the other way round - Bioware has launched a smear campaign against 4chan. They have proved that they are unwilling to listen to criticism on their own forums, and while they're not in a position to censor Metacritic they're doing the next best thing: trying to discredit the reviews themselves, not to mention suspicious edits to the Wikipedia article itself. 82.4.15.210 (talk) 14:26, 13 March 2011 (UTC)

Saying 4chan has any influence over a 25 million dollar game is ludicrous, apart from their trolls (which is nothing new) saying so. What evidence is there that backs up the claim that they have any effect on the score?

What the...

"The game currently holds a meta score of 8.2 across critics. However, this score has been badly skewed due to a 4chan orchestrated campaign of fake bad reviews accross multiple sites to 'try and bring Bioware down'"

What is the source for this currently unsourced and seemingly bizarre claim? Presumably 4chan can create bad user reviews but it can't influence the ratings of major site...DannyLee9 (talk) 21:28, 9 March 2011 (UTC)

Apparently 4chan is trying to "take down Bioware" by giving the game terrible user reviews and telling everyone about it (maybe Bioware disrespected a cat or something). So we'll see more editors adding crap like this... Still better than having the article stagnant two days after release. ▫ JohnnyMrNinja 01:54, 10 March 2011 (UTC)

4Chan has been working yes, but many users are disappointed too, and no, it's not about a cat (thank you for being so edgy and hilarious. We all appreciated that). It's about Day One DLC's, removal of the things that made DA:O great, reusing the same areas over and over, graphics comparable to something from 2005, arrogance from the developers part, and several other such things. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 87.54.43.226 (talk) 07:41, 10 March 2011 (UTC)

May I ask why the user scores from metacritic are being displayed on the reviews table? This is not done on other videogame pages, so why do it for Dragon age 2? Also about 4chan being behind the low metacritic user reviews, we need a good source to confirm that- we cannot make baseless claims.--81.156.111.3 (talk) 16:09, 10 March 2011 (UTC)

The user scores are notable because they are so much lower than the scores given by the professional reviews. That is enough of a reason to have it in the article. Atheuz (talk) 11:16, 11 March 2011 (UTC)

Please re-read my comment. I specifically mentioned the review table, not the article itself. I don't really care whether the user reviews are mentioned somewhere in the article, but they don't belong on the review table which is supposed to display critic reviews only. It seems now that someone has removed the metacritic user scores from the table anyway, so all is well.--81.158.57.125 (talk) 23:13, 11 March 2011 (UTC)

Maybe its just a shit game? All professional reviews have been average also. Atlantica45235432 (talk) 03:41, 12 March 2011 (UTC)

And then you actually read the professional critics cited on this very wiki page and realised most of them have been positive. --77.215.75.103 (talk) 22:31, 12 March 2011 (UTC)

You're making it sound like 85 score is positive on a major reviews site. Fact is, 80-85 is the minimum score a professional reviews site will ever give to a blockbuster game from a major studio. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 79.178.201.97 (talk) 07:46, 14 March 2011 (UTC)

80-85 on a scale of 1 to 100 is indeed a positive score. Wikipedia isn't a place for "but they only get high scores because they're big studios with lots of money"-basement conspiracies. --77.215.75.103 (talk) 13:37, 14 March 2011 (UTC)

Suggested addition: DRM and lockdowns

The game has SecuROM and EA's online DRM (http://www.reclaimyourgame.com/content.php?769-Evaluation-Report-Dragon-Age-2). Being banned from EA Community (which can happen for forum activity) will also prevent you from activating your purchased copy of Dragon Age II: this has happened at least once (http://digg.com/news/gaming/bioware_forum_bans_affect_access_to_your_game). —Preceding unsigned comment added by 130.234.187.167 (talk) 02:16, 11 March 2011 (UTC)

Its linear

"Dragon Age II has a non-linear framed narrative story, mainly based on the protagonist's choices"

Its a linear game there's really only one large path though the game.

DID BIOWARE WRITE THIS LINE because it sounds more like an ad then a professional wiki entry!

Atlantic45235432 (talk) 03:39, 12 March 2011 (UTC)

If you have a better way of phrasing this line, feel free to be bold and edit it in. --生け花 13:36, 12 March 2011 (UTC)

I have to agree. This game is linear. It gives you the illusion that it's non linear, but no matter how you play the game you'll end up in the same place in the end. I imagine a better way to phrase it would be to remove the "non" part. Tommkin (talk) 13:48, 12 March 2011 (UTC)

I agree, I don't see anything NON-linear about the game. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 99.196.128.59 (talk) 22:49, 12 March 2011 (UTC)

I agree, but you could do a little better job reforming your emotions when saying it.. The game, save for a few minor choices plays essentially the same regardless of what the player chooses. You get the same ending results and with no epilogue as DA:O had. The ending , after all your 'choices' in the game add up to offer 0-3 optional minor battles depending on who you made friends with during the game

Unrelated to the discussion at hand but please do not change people's signatures while making your own edits. --生け花 15:08, 13 March 2011 (UTC)

Non-neutral Article

I've noticed in the history of this article that many edits trying to make the article more neutral, including some of the less great perception it recieved such as the metacritic user scores, have been reverted. Was there any reason for this?

I've also noticed that the entire article is written in the game's favor, and some opinions are written as if they were facts. I don't know about you people, but this article almost seems like propaganda to me. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 93.179.10.6 (talk) 13:28, 13 March 2011 (UTC)

Read the talk page before posting. To reiterate, in regards to Metacritic user reviews: "Bolding it up for clarity; You should all know that the random board on 4chan has launched a trolling campaign against the game. That's the reason for the plethora of negative user interviews and why there's such a big difference between professional and user critics. It should be disregarded entirely.". As for professional reviews, even the less-favourable reviews from the usual reviewers are already included in the reception section. I don't really see how the article isn't neutral, as it includes both positive and negative reviews, some of which indeed focus on the differences between the first and second game which seem to have pissed off some fans and/or angry basement dwellers. --77.215.75.103 (talk) 13:39, 13 March 2011 (UTC)

– This is wikipedia and if a smear campaign has been launched it should not be ignored, but written down. Tommkin (talk) 13:59, 13 March 2011 (UTC)

This is Wikipedia and if a trolling campaign has been launched it should be ignored as we want the information to be as accurate as possible. We don't negotiate with trolls and terrorists. --77.215.75.103 (talk) 14:11, 13 March 2011 (UTC)

Except:

One; it was not a 'trolling campaign'. It was not done /b/-style 'for the lulz'. It was simply a campaign to voice /v/'s opinion.

Two; even 'trolling campaigns', as you call them, are written down if they get big enough. 93.179.10.6 (talk) 14:20, 13 March 2011 (UTC)

I think we should pertain this discussion to the "This is just..." section above as it'll probably turnout similarly. --77.215.75.103 (talk) 14:31, 13 March 2011 (UTC)

There is no source regarding supposed "raid", frankly IIRC it was only a claim made by one developer of the game in response to overwhelming negative reviews of the game by users.--MyMoloboaccount (talk) 23:13, 13 March 2011 (UTC)

4chan action (if it even happened) is a "raid" only in EA/BioWare's twisted mind. Let's face the truth: people that come to 4chan are normal users just like everyone else and have the same right to have their voice represented. It's not like they are all bots of some evil hacker. Every one of them is a person, and if they feel that the game deserves to be rated 0, then I can't see how their rating is any less credible than the rating of someone who heard about Metacritic on a Xbox forum and came to rate the game 10. Furthermore, you can't claim that the result is skewed because the reviewers were somehow organized, because if you claim that, you'd need to discard every user rating given to a game after someone posts the link to metacritic on a forum and calls everyone else to vote for or against the game. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 79.178.201.97 (talk) 08:01, 14 March 2011 (UTC)

False information about DRM

Parts of the "DRM controversy" section is based on false information. There is no SecuROM in the game, and there is no controversy. Rather, the game uses/used a program called Release Control to make a simple release date check. The program deletes itself once the check is done. It's clarified by the developers here; http://social.bioware.com/forum/1/topic/141/index/6509752. Please rectify this and rename the section. --77.215.75.103 (talk) 15:16, 13 March 2011 (UTC)

The user did in fact call EA "the devil" and asked if "BioWare had sold their soul to the EA-devil?" —Preceding unsigned comment added by 77.18.66.21 (talk) 01:04, 14 March 2011 (UTC)