[imisssunwell]

Updating the confirmed facts. source: http://social.bioware.com/forum/1/topic/141/index/3064634/1

From the press release:
The main character's surname is Hawke

Hawke survived "the Blight"

Hawke is known as "the Champion of Kirkwall"

Hawke is a "refugee"

DA2's story will span 10 years

DA2 will be released in March 2011 for PC, XBox 360, and PS3


From the forums:

Morrigan is NOT Hawke's mother; Hawke is NOT the "god baby" [Victor Wachter]

Hawke can be male or female [David Gaider], [Mary Kirby], [Chris Priestly]

Hawke is human [Chris Priestly]

DA2 is a single-player game [Chris Priestly]

"More than half" of the Dragon Age left by the time Awakening begins [David Gaider]

"Hawke can, indeed, be a mage." [Mary Kirby]

There will be more DLC and patches for DAO before DA2 is released [Chris Priestly], [Chris Priestly]

No word so far on different editions [Chris Priestly]

There is no "morality meter" in the style of Mass Effect's Paragon/Renegade meter [David Gaider]

The game does NOT take place "10 years after Origins." It SPANS a 10-year period. When it starts hasn't been revealed. [David Gaider]

There will be companions/followers [David Gaider]

From GameInformer (take with a grain of salt, some links not available):
Hawke will be voiced [Five Facts]

Hawke lived in Lothering during the events of DA:O, fled north to Kirkwall [Five Facts]

Kirkwall is a major population center in the Free Marches [Five Facts]

"Hawke will also spend time in other areas of the Free Marches" [Five Facts]

Game will use imported save from Dragon Age: Origins [Print magazine]

Flemeth will appear [Print magazine]

Intra-party conflict may be more significant (?) [Print magazine]

Mass Effect-style dialogue wheel with paraphrased lines and symbols denoting tone [Print magazine]

“Dragon Age II has a framed narrative structure, which means that
the exploits of Hawke occured in the past, but are being retold in the
present.” “Narrators with unique insights into the events in question
tell the tale of his past adventures.” [Print magazine]

Events from Dragon Age: Origins may be seen from a different viewpoint [Print magazine]

PC combat largely unchanged, console combat changed to better suit the controller [Print magazine]

From elsewhere:
Kirkwall is located on the southern edge of the Vimmark Mountains, north of Ferelden [this map]

[booB]

Originally Posted by imisssunwell

Updating the confirmed facts. source: http://social.bioware.com/forum/1/topic/141/index/3064634/1

Omigod, the game is going to hell! It'll be exactly like Mass Effect!!!! Or maybe Pac-Man!!!!!!!! Damn you, Bioware!

[imisssunwell]

Originally Posted by booB

Omigod, the game is going to hell! It'll be exactly like Mass Effect!!!! Or maybe Pac-Man!!!!!!!! Damn you, Bioware!

This game needs moar nerdrage, me thinks! Only thing missing from DA2 forums now is those awesome guys asking if Infinity Engine would be used for DA:O .

[imisssunwell]

a coupe of pics that have leaked for 2-3 days now, but now they're on gameinformer.





They had promised "super shot" graphics for DA2. I wouldn't call these super hot but as long as they're above a baseline when DA2 is released I guess it should be ok.

[Roper Klacks]

What the hell! lol
That second pic is so bad! I know it will look A LOT better than this, but why release this awful pics to the public?

[imisssunwell]

Originally Posted by Roper Klacks

What the hell! lol
That second pic is so bad! I know it will look A LOT better than this, but why release this awful pics to the public?

I really hope they significantly improve. I didn't judge the game based on rumors but graphic quality can be gauged and release graphics need to be significantly better to make it lucrative.

Two pics from witcher, another rpg coming out next year:





The quality gap is pretty obvious.

[D.C.]

To tell you the truth I was all kinds of surprised to learn that people didn't like the original games graphics after I finished playing. I thought it looked amazing. I was fully immersed the entire time. I know they weren't cutting edge or anything, but they most definitely stood up nicely. I agree the two new screenshots aren't the best, but it's usually the screenshots that Game Informer don't print that end up on the website.

I wouldn't judge the game on these two shots alone.

[Intrepid Homoludens]

Too early for me to tell. I place zero value on those screenshots knowing that many graphical features haven't yet been implemented and the game won't yet be gold for another year.

[booB]

Originally Posted by imisssunwell

Two pics from witcher, another rpg coming out next year:

The quality gap is pretty obvious.

Keep in mind, The Witcher 2 has been in production for at least a year, whereas Dragon Age 2 has not.

[imisssunwell]

These indeed are not release screenshots, considering the game is to be released March '11, Bioware still has ~6 months to work on it and allot of improvements can happen till then.

But still, they will need to put allot of work into it to make graphics on par with other games out there, including some of their own games.

Anyhow, let's hope Bioware makes this a great game, but until then, these images stand as rather unimpressive.

[Gabe]

Dragon Age's companion tactics style gameplay(fighting with 6 companions and vast amount of enemies) was whole different than Witcher's single gameplay ,i dont mind if they cant draw high detailed graphics coz of that epicgameplay style.

[Crunchy in milk]

The Dragon Age 2 screenshots seem to be lacking any post processing lighting effects, or depth of field. The original Dragon Age had these in spades to get its average quality graphics over the line.

You can clearly see the lighting and depth of field effects in the Witcher 2 screenshots, It makes a big difference.

Having said that I still expect the original Witcher to look better than Dragon Age 2 will, CD Project just have some phenomenal artists (textures, models, world design) on their team. That and they're not having to design their games around the disc based loading system of the xbox 360.

You may eventually see more level playing field comparison shots if Assassins of Kings gets a console release.

[booB]

Originally Posted by imisssunwell

These indeed are not release screenshots, considering the game is to be released March '11, Bioware still has ~6 months to work on it and allot of improvements can happen till then.

But still, they will need to put allot of work into it to make graphics on par with other games out there, including some of their own games.

Are they really planning on putting the game out that quickly? It seems to me that large RPGs usually take much longer than a year or so to produce.

At any rate, these are likely just conceptual shots, not images that will actually be used for in-game graphics. They probably have no relation to what the final product will be.

[imisssunwell]

Yes, the game is set for March '11 but if a delay means better graphics, I'm happy to wait.

It is true that lighting is off and that affects visual quality, however my problem is more with texture quality. Also the armor I see, is low-poly and I perceive that as "slacking" with graphics. Ok, maybe slacking is maybe too harsh a word to use but I think my point still stands.

They would need to make good textures+change polygons. I don't have first hand experience on how long this usually takes, but if DA2's size is close to DA:O's, it should be quite a bit of work.

Anyhow, Bioware usually keeps me happy with their games and in the two cases I couldn't get into the game, it wasn't because of the graphics. So far they never released unpolished games, so if someone can upscale the looks of a game in 6 months, it's Bioware.

[imisssunwell]

David Gaider commented on graphics

I'm not really one to comment on the art. All I can really say is that the game already looks better than it does in those screenshots-- there's a lot of work being done on all content, and while I get what people are saying regarding the number of months left you have to consider that we're not dealing with a long development cycle here. Instead of thinking months, think "percentage until complete". It's still pretty early, as far as we're concerned. Hopefully you'll like what we show you in the months to come. From my perspective, I think what I'm playing looks quite striking.

If all that remains to be done is mostly graphics upscaling, maybe 6 months are enough.

[imisssunwell]

more screenies:






art:



Fire looks quite cool, my opinion on textures still the same tho.

[aries323]

According to http://www.rpgwatch.com/forums/showthread.php?t=10963 (with info first appearing in the German magazine, Gamestar.de) these are the companions revealed at this time.

The figures
Already have already revealed some characters from Dragon Age 2 was. We put the figure briefly.
Hawke: The choice of male or female hero is the main character of Dragon Age 2, and leads the player through the 10-year history.
Bethany: Hawkes sister is a magician and supports her brother in the battle with fire spells.
Cassandra: The Inquisitor has a burning interest in the hero did Hawkes.
Varric: The dwarf Hawke has accompanied on his travels and is the storyteller in Dragon Age 2nd
Flemeth: The mighty shapeshifts and mother of Morrigan from Dragon Age: Origins is also in Dragon Age 2 again with the party

And according to David Gaider, the lead writer for the game, this time around there will be

No exclusive organization. No saving the world. No ancient evil.

(source: http://social.bioware.com/forum/1/to...ndex/3127485/1)

Maybe, they'd finally listened to those of us that's gotten tired of playing a member of a secret organisation combatting an ancient evil...Or they have been tired themselves from making these games?

[haptsonir]

Hahah, wow. Suck it down.

[D.C.]

It will be interesting to have Flemeth in the party. I liked her character a whole lot in the first game.

[rayvio]

my main concern is the release date. Awakenings was very obviously rushed and with DA2 due so soon after I can't help but wonder whether the same will happen again. I'd much rather they push back the release date and finish it, but somehow I suspect EA disagree