Metacritic users drag down Dragon Age 2 rating
Lewis Denby March 9, 2011 - 2:56 pm
Metacritic users have dragged down Dragon Age 2′s rating rather spectacularly, leaving the PS3 version with a 2.9 out of 10 average user review score.
A sea of 0 out of 10 and 1 out of 10 user reviews have criticised BioWare’s decision to make the game more accessible. For many of them it isn’t clear whether they’ve actually played the game, but the sentiment is certainly a strong one, and seems organised.
The press’ response has been roundly positive, with Dragon Age 2 review scores generally falling in the 7-9 out of 10 field.
Are we press-folk really so out of touch? Or do people just not like change?
Or, perhaps more likely, do negative voices just tend to drown out the positive ones?
Comments (21)
Wow, wow, wow. This is just so sad to see. That users would take down a game in such a way.
I think it’s more about negative voices drowning out the positive if I’m being honest with you. Such a blatant disrespect for the game, the company that made it, the industry, and anyone that happens to enjoy the game.
I wish people would think things through before taking measures such as these. And for what? To prove a point that in the end doesn’t matter? Ok point has been proved. Move on and let the game get back to where it should be in ratings.
im betting most of them are doing this because they hate Bioware. its actually not that a bad game.
I’m sure that most of them not even played with it more than 1 hour. They just sad what they don’t like, most of them can’t take the changes. Sadly I’ve been influenced too. But I still wanna play it.
It’s more of a principle thing though…which I could be down with…It’s more of a statement rather than a review of the game…because even if they thought DA2 was an incredible game in its own right…the point is that the whole idea behind DA to begin with was to fill a dying niche in gaming of the hardcore, tactical, super nerdy adventure game…which has now become an action-rpg…so it’s like…c’mon bioware…you didn’t make enough money off of mass effect that you need to water down your other franchise to try and make more money?? totally lame.
But would you not also say there is a better way of handling it, versus showing that in such a disrespectful way?
When companies see stunts like this, and stunt is exactly what it is, it doesn’t really change anything in terms of making anything change. Feedback given in a more respectful manner will always be looked at with a closer eye then something that is stunt-ish.
Companies also tend to look at what is successful on the market. It’s possible BioWare felt they needed to go this route in order to make the game an even bigger success. Hard to tell, as companies generally have a lot of things they look at when creating and doing certain things with games, it’s not always clear to those of us on the outside.
Lots of the buyers think that a bad oppinion will make them to get back to the roots (and it will be a good idea), but sadly the gameindustry does not care.
I’ve read lots of comments, like: “O hell, I’ll rather put back Baldurs Gate 2 back on my PC, than play DA2.”. And sort of I agree, Dragon Age: Origins, had something of that game, but lost it on the sequel. (But that doesn’t mean Dragon Age 2 is bad at all, just not what they wanted).
But I agree, there could have been some more respectful way to tell this.
@blakehu
Unfortunately what it usually means is they want the same thing as the original, for things to not be changed, etc. That’s really boring, if a company is going to release a second (or more in a series) and yet not really add anything else to it. Gets dull.
I’ll probably have a better formed opinion after I give DA2 a try.
@Beef-ette
I actually singed up just to mention how sick I am of hearing that argument, matthew threw you a perfect pass and you fumbled it.
It’s not that we want “the same thing as the original”. We want a sequel that reflects the same paradigm as the original, the same design values and direction, evolve it all you want, but revolution calls for a new franchise.
They marketed this franchise as a spiritual successor to Baldur’s Gate, which we got in the first (granted, it was evolved. having another BG isn’t even important though, it’s the ‘feel’ we’re after; the genre). For the second they decided to follow the same formula their ME2 market focus group concocted.
Why? You already have your niche fans hooked, they’ll provide fervor, word of mouth advertising and they’ll pre-order. So screw them, they’ll be collateral profit anyways. So Bioware creates ME2 with dragons for mass appeal to cover their asses (if the niche hates it, mainstream won’t, if mainstream finds it tedious, niche will still have bought it, double points if they both like it).
Now, in any other industry this would be fraud (this is not a hyperbole, it’s literally illegal), but because genres are hardly definitive, it’s easy to get away with misleading us like this. At the end of the day those of us who appreciated BG and DAO can see DA2 just doesn’t have the same soul.
Imagine if someone entirely unknown came home from work one day in your wife’s body. To casual acquaintances it would go largely unnoticed. To those who cared about her it would be plane as day.
And to those of you saying these people are disrespecting the game companies, you’re twisted. It’s like rebuking a guy for shoving someone who just blatantly and intentionally kicked him in the nuts for a shot at his wallet.
@Abraxis
Welcome to Beefjack.
Fraud. Hmm. First of all – there was no misleading that I could see. If you’ve read or watched any of the numerous previews for the game, they’ve been very clear about what’s been changed this time around.
Secondly, the accusations against the devs and reviewers are completely uncalled for – the people at Bioware are obviously massive fans of Baldur’s Gate and similar – why do you think they ended up working there? They’ve put their utmost effort into making this game the best they can. There was no intent there to upset people. And reviewers do what they do (for little pay, usually) because they love games.
Thirdly, these games are works of art, and all art is subjective. Artists who let themselves be dictated by their audience usually end up making uninspiring art.
Fourthly, it’s really not as different as people are making out. I can’t see that the jump is a whole lot bigger than the jump between Mass Effect 1 and 2, and certainly numerous other game series have made much larger paradigm shifts.
For the record – I’ve played maybe four hours into the game. I neither love nor hate it, at this point. I adored the beginning of DA:O, but found the grindy combat destroyed it for me maybe two thirds of the way in. Interestingly, I had the same reaction towards the end of Baldur’s Gate 2, back in the day.
I think the combat is a lot more interesting in DA2, but the world and characters feel a bit bland, at this point. I really love the concept of telling a story over a longer period than is usual in an RPG, but the setting and characters need to be strong in order for that to be interesting, and I’m not sure they’re quite up to it.
So, mixed feelings from me, but there’s really no need for the anger. No-one was trying to screw anyone over. Sometimes things just don’t play out the way you want, and that’s life.
@Saul
I actually didn’t follow development at all, I did for DAO though, which was marketed for and was a “love letter” to the old BG fans. Why then would they not continue along that path in this franchise? They obviously know how, and they’re good at it. Yet we now have DA2, which any BG fan will agree has totally lost sight of its inspiration.
It’s not the developers I’m blaming, it’s the publisher. It’s obvious from DAO they loved BG, and that’s great, but they were clearly pressured to maximize profits at the cost of artistic integrity.
When you go to the hanged man tavern, there’s a “Talkative Drunk” saying “Isn’t it strange how everyday tasks seem to be getting simpler? Everything from eating to combat is much less complex than it used to be”, totally out of the blue with no context what-so-ever. The lead designer quit in early development for god’s sake. You don’t quit a job like that just on a whim.
It may just be speculation, but c’mon, we know how publishers are (if it were up to the developers we would rarely have broken games on release day) if this doesn’t say disgruntled developers I don’t know what does.
ME2 was obviously seen as more successful by the publisher and the devs were pressured to pump out another blockbuster under a name niche fans had come to admire.
It’s just a shame their reputation didn’t allow them to continue using BG as their inspiration rather than all these “revolutionary” gimmicks.
@Abraxis
I can see where you’re coming from, but I truly doubt that EA had much to do with it. Bioware are known as the best at what they do, and it would be foolish for a publisher to make too many creative demands of them.
The safer commercial option would probably be not to make many changes (DA:O actually outsold Mass Effect 2, from memory). I honestly don’t believe (from my experience in the game) that the things they’ve changed are “gimmicks”. Some of them are experiments, sure, but experiments are always risky.
I believe that Bioware were actually legitimately attempting to improve on some weaknesses of the first game and trying to innovate. In some of those areas, I think they succeeded. In others maybe not, but I admire the attempt. It’s always better than stagnation, in my book.
As far as I understand games of the past, which the “hardcore” demograph seems to so nostalgically look back on all the time, were hard to use/play because the technology didn’t exist in order to make them with with a good – easy-to-use – user interface in the first place. Yet it’s funny how I don’t see these same “hardcore” players wishing for us to be back in the days of Windows 3.1 or older.
haha, that’s a good comparison.
I think it’s one of those deals where most only remember the good/positive of something, and not how it really was from all aspects.
I’ve played Icewind Dale, BG2, and the original NWN. I loved them back then, but I don’t want my games to be like them anymore. Personally I like DA2 much better than Origins. Maybe it’s the fact that I don’t have as much time as I used to so I like combat and story moving at a bit faster pace. Origins combat was not fun imho.
Agreed. I found the combat extremely trying, and it was enough to make me give up on the game, as I wrote here:
http://beefjack.com/features/must-try-harder-dragon-age-origins/
Here’s my favourite quote from one of the Metacritic user reviews:
“At the time of writing this, the user score (based on 143 ratings) is *3.6*; the critic score (based on 12 ratings (11 “positive”)) is 8.4. You could not have a more embarrassingly obvious exposition of the vapid, dead vacuum-of-integrity that is games journalism. Really, it should be obvious to everyone now that the people who wrote these reviews don’t have a single atom of sincerity or regard for truth.”
Oh deary, deary me.
They just mad cause Canadians make better games than anyone in the world ( Im looking at you Activision / COD fanboys)
@Saul – well said on everything!
@ABRAXIS – change (any time, minor or major) seems to ruffle feathers. From what I’ve read, what I said was right on. I’ve followed a lot of this on various sites just to see what some have been saying, it’s unfortunate that some decided to go about it the way they did.
I’m sorry I also have no idea what you mean by “I actually singed up just to mention how sick I am of hearing that argument, matthew threw you a perfect pass and you fumbled it.” Either way you look at it, giving something negative remarks the way this particular situation was handled really doesn’t help anyone or the industry.
And welcome to the site.
I’m going to test it and I think I will drag it down too. They started with Baldur’s Gate – great game, lots of advancement options, tons of customization. This was full RPG experience. Now we have DA2 – reduced to I think even less complicated than Diablo II game with MAYBE a good storyline. This game is 15+ (or 18+ even) SO MAKE IT MORE CHALENGING not just point ‘n’ kill. So IMHO they started as cRPG creators and ended with action + RPG elements + movies…
I think people are going about this the wrong way. You can’t review a game based on what you *want* it to be because of how you loved the first one so much. Things change, look at the Final Fantasy series where nearly every iteration messes with the combat and in two instances now have been MMOs!
You can be upset that a game isn’t what you wanted it to be but you can’t base your review score on the merits of the previous game in the series. Despite the differences, DA2 is a solid game. I’m about to start my third playthrough and, for the record, I spent well over 100 hours playing Origins and loved every minute of it.
Negative voices “drowning out” the positive ones?
There are many many many more bad reviews than positive ones so why would anybody complain about a focus on the negative? Does this person believe that it’s terrible when a game gets mostly positive reviews because the positive voices are drowning out the negative ones?
It’s also unclear from this snippet if the writer actually played Dragon Age 2, but his sentiments are clear. He thinks that professional reviewers should be entitled to an opinion, but that the consumer is too stupid to know what he or she is talking about.
One time there was a cockroach on a hamburger I ordered. I complained and the chef told me “What’s wrong? Don’t you like change!?!?”
Dragon Age 2 was obviously a poor sequel, and I suspect that many of the reviewers were pressured into giving it a good review. Large companies are perfectly capable of buying or intimidating their way into better press coverage, and if this is not what happened here then clearly the press folk need to be fired and replaced with people who are not so out of touch.
Hmm. This story was posted the very first day the game was out, and it was pretty clear that many of the posters hadn’t actually played the game. Honestly, I didn’t end up liking it much at all, but it took me a good bit of play before I could come to a considered opinion about it.
I think the moral of the story is: most users who review games on metacritic have a very black and white view of scoring. After observing the phenomenon of everyone voting 10 or 0 a few times, I have concluded that user reviews should get a simple thumbs up/down system like they have on YouTube.