1661

I can’t imagine Sten, Morrigan, Shale, or Wynne trying to jump your bones simply because you were “nice” to them. Leliana? Sure. Alistair? Maybe… he seems to need a hug after all. But the idea that simply being cordial will net you puppet sex seems a wild over-exaggeration based on my three replays.

1662

The writer responsible for Jacob has admitted that things did not work out at all the way he intended with that character. I never even got to the final conversation, because the very first time I had Shep flirt with him I felt like I owed him a thousand apologies for sexually harassing him. And I play games that are explicitly about touching boys, so if I think it’s over the line…

1663

I like Miranda a lot when I (first) play as she-perd. The second playthrough as the canonical man-shep pretty much ruined Miranda for me with that ham-fisted romance.

In fact most of the romance in ME or DA feels like it is written by a 15 yr boy trying to fulfil his sexual fantasy. The worst in DA is between female avatar and Alistair. Alistair is emotionally fragile already, with his unresolved daddy issue. Should the leader of the war party try to confuse him even more by having sex with him on the eve of an orc (sorry, darkspawn) invasion? Bioware says yes.

Yeah, the worst in ME2 is definitely She-perd and Jacob. Not only are the ‘flirting’ outright sexual harassment, it comes from Jacob’s commanding officer, which makes it double plus BAD. The payoff is a shirtless Jacob (analogous to Miranda getting her top off…), adding creepiness into the mix, kind of like those cougar teachers seducing strapping teenage boys.

1664

Which is not necessarily a bad thing.

I’m thinking now of the quests in Guild Wars leading up to where you recruit Keiran Thackeray, the new hero they just released. The last quest has you searching a certain map for him, and when you find him, he and his girlfriend (who is in your party) have an emotional, touching reunion. That was the intention, anyway; when I did it, he stumbled upon the party while we were engaged in fighting a big mob of minotaurs, and I can tell you that hacking up monsters doesn’t really convey the atmosphere they were going for.

Similarly, in DAO you could get some cool moments of banter between party members, but those moments could also be lost because you came across some monsters, or a cutscene kicked in, or whatever. It isn’t as bad as in BG2, where party banter could start up regardless of the circumstances which led for some hilarious moments, but it did still happen.

1665

I’m talking about even in some cut scenes (I’d go so far as to say many) where combat can’t intrude. You basically have companion A and companion B dialog where they just had different voice actors read the same lines.

And it’s really not an either/or situation, so I am not arguing with you. I’m just saying ME2 went so far as to remove character from it’s recruited NPCs in most missions that weren’t explicitly tailored to them (or at least that was my impression when I replayed missions with different characters in my party).

Banter could have improved that (and did in DA:O), but better yet, don’t compartmentalize the characters so much. Yes, it’s harder to write for multiple dialog exchanges because of varying party members, but I think the experience can be richer for it.

1666

I’ve only pursued a romance with Liara so far, and the Shadow Broker stuff felt alright to me. I think they hit the right note there.

1667

For anybody worried about Dragon Age 2 and/or obsessed with it, Scooter and Kat talk about it extensively on Active Time Babble this week. Most of my fears are assuaged at this point - I can put the game on Casual and it’s an ARPG for the 360 (assuming that the party controls are as haphazard this time as they were the first time) and it’s a lot like the same game as its predecessor on Normal. Lamentably, apparently you can still have conversations while literally dripping gore from your latest fight, because not only do rats in the Imagination Universe explode like blood balloons at the slightest provocation, but the standards of hygiene are such that nobody even bothers to wipe themselves off after their enemy explosively death splooges all over them.

1668

They think bathing makes people sick.

1669

Also, that could be a good setup for the romance scenes.

1670

Well, you can have your dog lick it off you in the first game, so…that’s romantic, right?

1671

For some reason Bioware never seems to handle romantic relationships as well as platonic ones. I think part of the problem is once a character is flagged as a romantic prospect, that becomes the primary - sometimes sole - defining point to their character arc. Everything you do with them revolves around how you do (or do not) advance the romance, which limits the plot & character development of that character and thus makes them less interesting. I think part of why the Tali romance works better than the others in ME2 is because she got defined as her own person in the first game; in the second you get to build on that rapport a bit more naturally than would otherwise have been the case. From what I’ve read, the same is true of the Garrus romance.

Or maybe I’m over-analyzing things and it could just be Bioware’s writers suck at writing sexy talk.

1672

If you pervert him to the dark side he looks like Darth Maul (he’s the same race as Maul), which was pretty cool I thought.

What a wasteland of humanity those boards are. I hope DA2 trolls all of them into hysterics.

1673

Ewww, who would play the dark side…

1674

Still worried about combat in DA2 and don’t want to wait for the demo? http://www.livestream.com/electronicarts/video?clipId=pla_e1af7357-aff9-4758-b744-c98a28fb5806&utm_source=lslibrary&utm_medium=ui-thumb

1675

I’m practicing that idle animation right now.

1676

Ah, that one. The perversity is in ME1, not ME2, so you didn’t see it in the Shadow Broker. Liara in ME1 started off as a geek girl, the heroic Sheperd sweep her off her feet, just like THAT. Another Bioware hallmark romance subplot.

I only romanced her for fem-shep, just to see the ‘controversial’ interspecies sex (it was actually pretty tame, more like cosplay lesbian sex). Also because Kaidan is a whine baby.

1677

Ok, that video convinced me it is indeed more Dragon Age. YAY!!!

Hmm…maybe I should preorder now…

1678

Comedy English accents ahoy! Night/day system looks quite interesting. Conversation wheel fine by me. Combat looks a bit Benny Hill really, as if the film has been sped up… the contrast with the suddenly silent paused moments is a bit comical. The richer, brighter city seems a bit… brown, and by night it’s… grey :) Large breasted woman 2 has an interesting backstory going on… Machinegun crossbow seems a leedle daft. Blood splotches are go!

If they played some music over that party select screen it would be like a British office party, with all the not quite committed bobbing about.

Combos between characters might be nice…

Probably a buy for me, but the combat does not look good IMHO.

Edit: Hang on - 10 year story? I like the sound of that…

1679

Edit: Hang on - it’s a 10 year story? I like that.

1680

Damn that stone armor does look sexy; maybe for the first time I might roll a mage as a starting character.
Also, love to see they borrowed lots of good stuff from other games (equipment comparison, hiding helm, etc).