My response to DA2 blog and comments

And I romance him every time...

----"Ander's is a perfect example of the dichotimey between Dragon Age: Origins and Dragon Age II"

http://jeff-vogel.blogspot.com/2011/04/dragon-age-ii-review-get-grip-folks.html

This article is actually very much describing how I feel towards DA2, and reviewing in general. The fact is a reviwer must look at a game as a Reviewer first and a fan second. Here is my comment reprinted:

"I think the over all point here is for people to be able to judge on more than one level;

1)A sequel to Dragon Age: Origins

2)A game in its self

3)A game leading up to another game.

I understand people were upset about no longer being able to create your own character, and I understand that. Yet you have to be able to make Hawke your own. In origins the truth ,as I see it, Yes you had the ability to make your own character, but it really effected very little of the overall game. I played as an elf and I played as a mage, and as a Cousland. For most of the game it had no effect on how I was perceived outside of the Origin. At least with Hawke you play a human, and if your a mage there are reactions to it. Someone tell me a legitimate difference the origins made in the gameplay except you're aware of other story elements?

I do believe DA2 was incredibly rushed, and everyone seems to agree with that.

While some people found the characters dull I found listening to their interactions enjoyable. While Aveline and Isabella are very different they posses a strange kind of affection for each other that was different than the friendship between Oghren and Anders in Awakening. That said, the characters are a bit stagnant, but that is mainly in their opinions. I just felt like with the way the game is written and designed there should be an ability to somewhat alter the course of characters. I was constantly hoping I could change characters actions but found the game very linear in that sense. On one hand I do understand that some opinions are set in stone, but it felt useless to say certain things to people. In particular Anders was UTTERLY inconsistent between Awakening and DA2 to a unbelievable extent. Anders was a snarky, selfish, laid back, but lovable mage in Awakening. Yet under the care of a new writer he became an entirely different character. In DA:2 Ander is supposed to have matured and tossed away his childish selfishness in favor of seeking justice. The hope continued from the Expansion is for Justice to have taught Anders that his selfishness ultimately leads him and other mages no where. Yet all Ander's snarkyness and his ability to simply bounce back with a joke is replaced by wavering uncertainty and obsession. There is almost zero connection between Anders and *brood* Anders.It's almost as if no one actually read what the lead writer for Anders was writing. Heck it didn't even feel like the writer played Awakening. It was just inconsistent. In terms of presenting a character. Also and this is particularly prevalent with Anders and Isabella there was so very little... indication of romantic interest. For Anders they essentially use the excuse "sense you showed interest, for the past few years he's been really into you...". It felt rushed and awkward to have him so intense when I had been so playful, and my mind kept flashing back to Awakening. Fundamentally it seemed like Anders was previously prone to using humor to protect himself instead of confronting issues. Even with the situation there should be something humorous about how he approaches Hawke, and how he feels towards others. With Isabella she was a tease but she never showed real interest in Hawke exactly. She was never really directly talking to Hawke like she would others(like casual lover Fenris).The inconsistent writing was just annoying. Then you have a character like Carver who has not a single redeeming quality about him. I get that he is supposed to be resentful toward Hawke, but he is such a positively negative human being its absolutely INSANE. All he does is complain at you, and you never find a redeeming quality in him.

I hate how people complain about the direction they took with the game. Honestly the gameplay felt exactly the same in terms of combat. Except playing a rogue felt and looked more like how a rogue should be. The game plays absolutely NOTHING like Mass Effect or other series, and the comparison (outside of the dialogue wheel) thoroughly makes me suspect that half of the people complaining have never actually played Mass Effect or Mass Effect 2. I have played both thoroughly and they are not similar in combat. In terms of the "tree" system, I can say that it is far more functional than either Mass Effect leveling systems. I also found it easier to really see where my mage was focusing on than in Origins. The Tree layout encourages one to focus their traits and their companions traits. You see where your powers are progressing to, upgrade abilities, and the specializations are immediately open to you so you can start on them from Act 1.

The wheel based dialogue honestly is a more organized system because you see which options end or continue a conversation. In the Baldur's Gate series there were times where you could only pick one or two questions out of five REALLY good ones. With the wheel you can go back and pick questions without re-readying all the options(like in Origins. This makes the system a bit more organized. There is also the fact that you can avoid selecting a choice that is very vague or seems neutral, but is the exact opposite choice you want to make. The symbols make it easy to understand roughly how the dialogue will be perceived. In other Bioware games it is really easy to perceive a dialogue option one way and instantly have a NPC perceive it another. I would often choose a very neutral choice when talking to Morrigan or Sten only to earn disapproval. Finally there is the fact that just because Origins and older Bioware games have had more dialogue choices does not mean that the responses to those choices were different from other responses. Having 15 options of what to say and only six responses to those options is really kind of a waste.

Ultimately Dragon Age 2 was flawed. It felt incredibly short in terms of game length. Act 3 feels rushed to conclusion with a sort of fake urgency. Every time I get to "The Last Straw" I think "Oh yea end of the game, right." Part of that is the fact that the game leaves so very much unexplored. For instance in terms of the Lyrium Idol, I found myself wanting to know more not so much out of curiosity but out of realizing I knew nothing at all. Not to mention no explanation as to how You-Know-Who got a hold of it.What worsens this problem is the fact that the Quanari plotvline seems to be loosely tacked onto the Mage-Templar story line. The two plots feel utterly disjointed in terms of how they connect. If there was more of a build up involving the Quanari presence in the city it would be better. If there was ,for instance, a case of mages running to join the Quanari(only to face the cold hard reality of there views) or say elves in the alienage joining in mass and the elders of the alienage asking you to stop them, there would have been more tension. Overall the game's story lines fell flat and felt horribly short.

It seems to me that in the end the developers chose to use the "time skips" of the game to deal with the lack of build up in terms of story. It is a lot easier to say that "four years have passed and tension has been increasing" than to actually show cases of it.

Then there is the fact that the number of graphical and technical glitches in the game are just pathetic. Having to reset Isabella in order to upgrade her armor? Undead that get frozen while rising from the ground? Quests that cannot end, start, or if completed give XP? . Playing with the near micro-sized subtitles on(and sometimes off) will lead to a graphical error in cutscenes in which the characters jump shape popping from one size to another in order to fit. It appears as the adjustment for characters while having the subtitle box is somewhat broken. I hate constantly going back to Mass Effect, but dear lord in ME the subtitles are a reasonable size and because there is no special box that alters the screen it's not an issue. The words appear over the cutscene as if it were a movie. This not only helps keep the player immersed but it is also SOLVES THE PROBLEM BY ELIMINATING IT AND EXTRA WORK. Simple fixes, and worse off fixes implemented in other games made by the same developer. A few glitches are completely understandable but the sheer number of glitches and bugs are ridiculous . On this level the game, as a game, is full of fail. I find it inexcusable. I am left with the constant feeling that the game was only half tested, and its quite obvious that it was not as thoroughly run through as other games. It is as though they simply said "Fuck it we'll fix everything in the patch(s)," If you scroll through the Dragon Age Wiki, you will find that most of the quest pages have a section entitled "Bugs" as will some of the characters, and numerous items. This is beyond my comprehension. I have not experienced such base glitches in a game. In honesty I have to chalk this up to laziness and the desire to put the game out as quickly as possible. The desire for this is ultimately understandable, and to a point reasonable from a monetary perspective. The more time it takes to work on a game the more money is put out not only on the game itself but on employees. Then there is also the fact that if they are not careful they may lose some of their audience after the initial thrill of Origins wears off. I'm not saying the latter is true, but a company may perceive it that way. Yet it is unacceptable to essentially screw over your fans. Whether or not you enjoyed the game, you have to admit being too cheap or too lazy to tweak/fix OBVIOUS problems within a product before shipping it out to loyal consumers is essentially a big "Screw you" to the consumer. It could be unintentional and perhaps numerous problems weren't caught until produced in mass, but even then that reeks of being too lazy to thoroughly test every aspect of your product. Bioware is known for quality, and it is in there and our best interest to keep that consistent. Usually I am far more tolerant of bugs and glitches but this is simply...maddening.The game is such a disappointment because it was honestly below the quality of most Bioware games. When you set a high standard for yourself and then for no reason, other than hubris or greed(on the cooperate side) produce a mediocre product you must expect criticism. "

Well there is my comment in it's entirety. If you can't tell my biggest gripe is the writing of the game and in particular Anders. In a few weeks will go in depth on my views of the overall writing of DA II because ultimately it is part of a larger issue with writing in general.

Keep reading and I'll still keep writing. Well I'll write regardless, but at least enjoy it.

Oblivion and Why I Find It Dull and Boring.

I will go on the record now as stating that at times I did in fact enjoy playing...but I will also say this only happened after the third time of re-buying the game. My brother has recently bought the Anniversary addition of the game, which has inspired me to go into and Dissect Oblivion and my reasoning for finding it un-enjoyable.

Why Oblivion Has Such A Great Modding Community...

Whenever I read or see something about Elder Scrolls: Oblivion I come across one word, "Mods", and the assertion that the game is best played with them. However I play the game on the xbox 360, and while I have no access to such mods I can totally understand why Mods make the game better. If you've ever read

this blog you probably noticed I played the Baldur's Gate Trilogy, and if you know anything about the series you probably know there is/was a very successful modding community full of ridiculously amazing mods. However, unlike Oblivion the BG series was thoroughly immersive and interesting on it's own without the mods. BG had a distinct world with a unique and well defined sense of appeal. The mods exist to make the game more re-playable and to add a bit of color to the game. In Oblivion the mods are needed to make the game interesting for more than five minutes. The world within Oblivion is MASSIVE to the point of obnoxiousness, and to a certain extent I like that but the world is really full of nothing. There are dozens of NPCs, areas, and quests but none of them have any urgency nor anything special about them really. Admittedly there are some quests I prefer over others, that's a given with anything, but honestly most of them were kind of dry and dull. The NPC's are all the same, (literally they have the same voice actors), the quests do not have any real weight to them, and the game gave me no true sense of being a hero/asshole figure. In a "Vanilla", not modded, game you spend your

time wandering from point A to point B occasionally stopping to talk to misc. NPC 2 in order to gain some bit of nonsensical information that apprently leads you to area 6 in order to kill/steal/defend something and then return to NPC 1...and that's if you can find them. Needless to say all of this eventually becomes tedious and boring beyond words. Even during the quests I enjoyed I found myself going "Now what?" half way through a fight. I am pretty sure that is NOT the feeling Bethesda was going for...I hope, but honestly who can be too sure when the majority of quests are about as interesting as a sad clown or a brown dog. Actually...I like dogs and they can be interesting so scratch that last bit. There is a reason the game comes with tools setup so that Modder's can have a field day. The developers were frickin lazy and could not be bothered to add a unique element to any of their quests, so they went "Let's let the players do it" or I imagine it somewhat like this:

Writer " Did you guys notice how redundant the quests are?"

Designer "We can't be bothered with that."

Writer "But won't that pretty much make expanding out general audience hard if they do not find something intriguing about the game"

Designer "Good point let's just throw in some stuff so people can make their own and...what are you doing outside your cage?"

I know some of you may be going "You're just Bioware biased," or "How do you know about those cages?" Well the truth is yes I have been spoiled by Bioware, but can you blame me? I am a gamer who loves a good story and a distinct immersive world with people in them that act and feel like real people. I like having quests that are distinct and are fascinating in more ways than one. In Oblivion the only way to really get that seems to be in the form of Mods and that is a crying shame. Even if you do not buy even half of what I'm saying, I must ask you how good is a

game where AT LEAST half the fans admit they can only play it when they mod it. If the game itself is only relatively enjoyable and becomes more of a chore than a pleasure how good is it? I have read countless boards and forums and I consistently hear the same thing, "Oblivion gets boring rather fast if you don't have mods". For that reason you must question the strength of this game on it's own. I full heartedly support any and every modding community from ModtheSims to Spellholdstudios, but their works must not be the sole reason to own and play this game.

Size of the Game, the World, and Geography.

This next part is somewhere between good and bad and "eh" f

or me, as this is a major thing with Bethesda. Whether it's "Fallout" or "Elder Scrolls" Bethesda believes in one thing over all and that is open ended gaming. You create a character, are walked through a tutorial, and from there are given the entire world to explore. At first this is a major plus for the game. I thoroughly enjoyed walking and wandering through Cyrodil and simply exploring, but eventually the novelty begins to wear thin. After a half hour of simply trying to get from Point A to Point B you eventually find yourself tired and bored. The game alleviates this by having random bandits and creatures wander the path and attack you. It does help, but occasionally it is simply annoying random encounters. After killing another set of bandits you look at your map and realize "Oh crap I'm barely half there". And I know some of you are about to comment and mention the fact that there is fast travel. Yes there is.

However like almost every other game with Fast Travel you must go to most areas first to access travel to that area. That fact is perfectly reasonable, as it is reasonable to assume that if your character visits an area once or twice they may devise a "short cut.". My issue is that the existence of Fast Travel seems to be absolutely necessary otherwise traveling is a migraine beyond reconciliation. The world is so massive that once you visit every major place you do not want to walk anywhere except for a change of pace and even that decision you may come to regret. Perhaps I'm just pulling hairs here, but I simply do not think it should be almost necessary to use fast travel in order to make traveling tolerable. For instance in Fable there III there is a fast travel option, and I did use it often. Yet in Fable I did not get a sense of dread when I needed to walk. Fable has a large interconnected world but it was interesting and small enough to be fun to wander through. The novelty did not quite run thin because it was just the right size to not be overwhelmed. Though I will say in both games the random encounters would work my nerves sometimes(but thats just a me thing). Both games have fast travel; In one it is impossible to go without it, and in the other it is a perk not always used.

Having said all that I will go back to the positive of this large world. I honestly enjoyed the graphics of the various areas. The world itself was a pretty but occasionally redundant plain that seemed like it should have a life of it's own. Cyrodil was populat

ed with both peaceful and aggressive animals and people who wandered the roads. At times it was simply pleasant to stop and look at the scenery. Another big bonus is that you get to sense what your character goes through while traveling. At times I would feel that mix of tediousness, weariness, calmness, paranoia, and excitement that goes with traveling by ones self. There are times when you can positively let your guard down only to be attacked from behind by a crab or bear forcing you to defend yourself. Yet as I said the novelty of this wore thin after a few hours of game play.

Furthermore whether you are using fast travel or riding a horse there are negatives. If you use fast travel you can easily not level correctly. I will address leveling later on but basically in Oblivion enemies level at the same rate you do. That sounds fine and many games do something similar but not to the extent of Oblivion. Each character has a set of skills and if you do not raise your various combat skills, i.e get into a ton of fights, your enemy's will be far stronger than you. This means that you HAVE to do a fair bit of random wandering throughout the game to balance the various other skills you have. If you focus on your Acrobatics skill and not your Blunt Weapons skill you can easily end up with a character whose combat skil

ls are roughly at level three, but everyone else in the world is level 7 because you are an amazing acrobat. The game all but forces you to wander along the roads and wilds while only promising the reward of proper leveling. I found myself annoyed because at various points I was content to wander the cities only to realize I need to go kill a few wolves so they would not be stronger than me. There is no incentive not to fast travel beyond that. Exploration becomes an overly tedious endeavor due to the massive nature of the world, so that excuse flies out the window. But here lies the games biggest offense, none of this is clear until fairly into the game. I am a purist of sorts. I try not to look at a manual and rely on a game to explain itself to me when I first begin to play. You first begin to play and after a few hours begin using fast travel not realizing the sin you have committed by using a near readily available tool. Honestly it is like the game's designers held out two pieces of candy, one coated in lint and dirt and the other perfectly fresh and clean. Then expected you to pick the dirty one for the delicious caramel filling that is SO obviously inside. They give you a tool and then tempt you to use it knowing full well that the seemingly best way to get

better at combat is for you to wander back and forth for what seems like hours on a never ending stretch of country road. The only counter for this seems to be the occasional fights that come from quests and The Arena( think gladiators). That brings me to...

Leveling is an Unfair Maiden... Apparently.... http://xbox360media.ign.com/xbox360/image/article/662/662178/the-elder-scrolls-iv-oblivion-20051027034439286_640w.jpg

If you end up particularly doing a lot of jumping or speech craft for a period of time without doing a lot of heavy combat, you will level up your enemy/yourself too quickly. Essentially the game uses real world sense in this, if you do not train a particular ability or skill you cannot be good at it. On one hand this is perfectly reasonable, and on the other it becomes a hinderence. My character Andrala was a Redguard with a propensity for jumping, running, and stealing. I played her as a classical thief/assassin character, but the game is not made for that really. She was an average fighter but the quests I focused on involved far more stealing, underhandedness, and communication than anything else. S

he would regularly go to The Arena to train but that was not a priority after a while as she began doing other quests. Eventually she ended up leaving the city only to find herself easily bested by various creatures and people who were allegedly of the same level as her. Every creature I fought was the same level as I in name, but in truth they were far higher level than me. She was good with small groups and did her best to dodge but eventually it was just overwhelming. Her combat skills were significantly lower while her acrobatics skills, lock picking, and even some of her magical skills were near matching. Eventually it became clear that Andrala was no match for the creatures of Oblivion and I started over. It was a thoroughly disappointing experience for me as I was trying desperately hard to like the game.

The moral of the story is do not go into Oblivion without a game plan...and then be prepared to abandon that plan entirely. You cannot quite play as a mage character, and you cannot quite play as a thief, and you cannot quite play as a warrior...so you have to be in between. You cannot just focus on one or two skills because if you level up your character in these skills without working on the others you will end up seriously faulted in the other areas. You can have a general direction of your character, but you must become somew

hat of a Jack-of-All trades type. I suppose there is nothing inherently wrong with that ideology, but it's implementation created somewhat of a broken system. Forums are filled with comments by gamers(including myself) arguing over whether Oblivion was balanced or not. Those who were lucky enough to immediately be able to jump into the game without help or even with use of the manual are quick to call players like myself utter idiots over this issue. Yet any position has merit so long as there is a reason with evidence and...from the thousands of testimonies of gamers, to the Elder Scrolls wiki, to blogs/articles detailing the issues, and concluding with the decision to streamline Skyrim there is evidence of legitimate problems with the game's leveling system.

I give credit to the attempt to take leveling in more of a real world direction. We all know that someone who focuses on athletics and never studies will not usually pass their chemistry test. We also know that the best artists practice their craft above all else or at least take a significant amount of time on it. They attempted to take a similar approach with character leveling and structure by having it so that the skills you focus on most can level independently and faster than other skills. That in itself is perfectly reasonable. Ho

wever, the fact that by leveling a skill of two you can over-level yourself, and the inclusion of enemies that level at the same rate you do across the board is more of a hindrance than a help.

Yet there is another minor-major issue I find I cannot let go. As stated enemies level up with you regardless of your actual skill level. There is a serious issue I take with this and one I cannot quite let go because when I say enemies I mean EVERY character you will/can fight

in the game will be at your level. For instance if one of the rats from the tutorial wandered outside while you were walking by and your level ten...then essentially so is the rat. This basically totally discredits Bethesda's attempts at pseudo realism with the skill leveling. Fine I can accept the rats of this world are huge, like...New York rat huge, but not the same level as someone who just came back from an Oblivion Gate. There is some sense to the leveling system in that certain creatures are encountered only at certain levels due to their individual attack strength and power, but that only does so much ultimately. Keep in mind this is a simplification of wha

t happens.I am double checking the wiki as I type this because the entire system structure baffles me on this point. Essentially creature and people of the world level with you until being replaced by a stronger version of themselves, which still does not balance the issue really. I simply do not see the sense in not having a truly standard level of enemy depending upon type. I just prefer my rats to have 6 hp and stay that way depending on the environment they live in. For instance a wild rat may be scrawnier than a sewer rat, but is quicker, and a sewer rat may be thicker but its stronger. Various creatures have base attack strength and level up relative to each other so that a rat is not the equivalent of say a bandit. Also keep in mind I'm using the rat as an extreme example. The fact is sense enemies level in relation to you there is a sense of "who told the

m I was coming?" or "Why are these wolves suddenly here and different than before" But here I digress

Main Quest and immersion

I had absolutely NO incentive to complete the main quest of the game and never actually got around to purposely trying to any of the three previous times I had the game to play. According to my last save file and my journal I spent at least a week consistently playing the game and in that week I can accurately guess I spent between four and five hours playing the game. I can tell you this wasn't for lack of trying with the main quest. I just found myself doing other things for the simple fact that outside of wanting to please Patrick Stewart(Oh Captain My Space Captiain). Truly the quest seemed utterly unimportant and trivial outside of the occasional reminder that the Emperor had been murdered. Seriously if you removed the entire story line the game would be exactly the same. You are given absolutely no reason to care about this world at all. After being in a city for a while all the NPC's blur together due to the repeatedly used voice actors and lack of creative and different dialogue. I talked to dozens of different characters and they had the most 2D personalities ever. This is even worsened by how the game starts out really. Beyond a mild desire to find out who exactly the Mythic Dawn assassins were, and Patrick Stewart being his voice actor, I could not give to flying figs about Emperor Uriel Septim. You nev

er even find out why you start off as a prisoner, and for all you know you could be a child rapist or serial killer. I suppose part of this is so that you can imagine what your character is like and who they are. Yet there is a sense of being pulled out of the game by these nagging questions, and the lack of ability to give your character an even remotely unique perspective. The game is set up so that by befriending people you can gain quests easier and you must do so in the form of a mini game that makes about as much sense as watching a chicken run around and land on a color card with a choice on it. Also...I am amazing at the speech craft mini-game but it really is the MOST random way how holding a conversation. Essentially you have a wheel with mul

tiple choices of how to act:

Joke

Brag

Threaten

Admire

And as you move about the wheel you watch the NPC's face to see how they will react if you select an object. The goal is the put the least emphasis on what will annoy them and the most on what will make the happy.

....You think I'm joking don't you?

Nope apparently this is the SOLE scope of human interaction. On the record I will say that my beloved Bioware typically only gives players a few choices of how to respond, be a jerk, be a good guy, be funny, ask questions. However at least you know what your character is saying and typically there is a neutral option so one can easily brisk through conversation. In Oblivion once you start a conversation you see it through until every choice on the wheel has been selected once. This mini-game ONLY exists in order to level up your speechcraft skill and gain quests. It is not bad exactly, but it ruins any sense of immersion one may have, and is honestly rather stunted. It pulls you out of the game.

Being pulled out of the game is a major issue I have with Oblivion because the moment you feel even a bit interested in the world you get pulled back out. The sensation of playing Oblivion is one I can describe as like being a traveler in a world not your own. Part of this is because you are suddenly tossed into the world, and the only back story that exists is in your head. Honestly this could have been fixed by coming up with two or three back stories for players to choose. Truthfully if the intent was for the player to come up with a back story for the character it is kind of ruined by having the player start off as a prisoner. It makes it incredibly hard to imagine your character being a farm boy visiting the city, a woman training to fight in The Arena, a man training to be part of the city guard, or a tavern wench when you automatically start off a prisoner. Simply a voice over explaining how different backgrounds land the character in prison would be nice. A farm boy who accidentally insulted a noble and ends up in jail on false charges and then having a distinct bonus in certain skills would make sense. Perhaps I ask too much but it is the little things that set up the world.

The world itself is also the issue. The fairly small group of voice actors and thousands of NPC's becomes a bit distracting at times, and I'm pretty sure the voice actors had no clue what kind of character they were voicing at times. The biggest variation seems to be either to sound grumpy, cheery, polite, or hungry. Far worse than that fact is that all of the NPC's seem like dull stereotypes without any of the humor or self parody to make enjoyable .It all blurs together and the lack of distinction makes you feel like your surrounded by aliens/robots, thus leading you to wonder why should you care about them. There is also the fact that because of the limited dialogue you fall short of actually knowing the few distinct characters well, and once their quests are done they are quickly forgotten. The only thing that sticks out in my mind about the game world at this point is the landscape which was far more interesting than any of the NPC's. In the Fable series players gain interactions by points/leve,l and the dialogue structure is somewhat similar to Oblivion but far more lucid and flowing. You are granted a changing set of interaction option based on what skills you know how to due successfully. From there a set of humorous/sweet actions occurs. Fable provides an amusing context to their "dialogue wheel" that does give you some limited sense of what each random NPC is like. The reason Fable is far more redeemable to me than Oblivion is quite simple. Oblivion puts on the facade of having a good and deep dialogue system that mostly comes off as frustrating, boring, and without truly redeeming qualities to it. It feels like your being forced to interact with dozens of NPC's whose voice actors and writers even got bored with them.

As much as I harp on the NPC issue I am going to restate a fact I said before, the world feels full of nothing. In the attempt to populate the world with people the player can kill, talk to, and listen in on the designers crippled the world. A frequent and eery joke in Oblivion is the fact that all the NPC's must have killed the children because the only indication of a child( and not just a very young PC) comes in the pair of "Child's Overalls" found in a crypt. In fact someone even added a mod so that children existed in the world because the fact is it is empty. You end up in a city and constantly feel like you have not really explored it. On the map it is massive but only a few dozen interchangeable NPC's inhabit it. The cities feel like outposts and the villages feel like taverns with houses around it. You run around and get the eery feeling like half the town has died, and that half was the interesting half. That has always disturbed me really, and it sort of distracts from the game after awhile. You find yourself not so much in a world anymore the more you stay in one area. I would prefer to have dozens of characters go about their daily business and not interact with me than those who interact poorly with me.

This leads to my next point....

Interactivity and Stealing.

Part of the open ended experience with Bethesda games is the ability to pick up and steal damn near anything and everything. This is...by far the stupidest mechanic ever because they make is damn near impossible to do so. If you steal an object in one town and fast travel to another you are immediately arrested in that town. Furthermore if you try to sell stolen objects no one will buy them because apparently they have serial numbers and a database for those numbers...I'm just guessing. It is a mechanic I have never encounter in a game before, and it is easy to see why. Stealing is such a temperamental system it constantly puts you on edge and you face being jailed fairly often. The worst part being most of the time I Accidentally picked up an object and put it in my inventory and the guards were summoned. There is no reasoning or simply being able to quickly drop it. The moment you pick it up you are done. Why in blazes would any player really steal a vase right in front of someone? You have to be quick and quiet and the house must be empty in order to be successful, and heaven forbid you have to kill someone innocent. For all the characterization options in Oblivion you honestly can't be an evil bastard. The guards ALWAYS know if you have done wrong as do the merchants. There is no rationale to the guards knowing if I stabbed someone in that persons basement at midnight when they live alone. There is certainty no reason for people in other towns to know. It is frustrating on multiple levels as you constantly have to be the good guy and unless a quest dictates otherwise you have to pay for your crimes even if they were not purposely committed.

In conclusion.

In the end I currently find myself asking one thing "Why should I play this game? Even if I did enjoy it on some subtly marginal level is it really worth getting into again?" Honestly I'm finding the answer to be no not really, if for no other reason than I despise the tutorial level. Oblivion is game that very die hard fans of the series will most likely enjoy. If you like story, a sense of urgency, fair leveling, and complete immersion however...you may find yourself in a rut. Overall I would still recommend renting the game or playing it at a friend's house because at least then you can see for yourself. It is a game worth playing at least once whether or not you end up liking it. I am glad to have had the experience and have learned from it. As I said die hard fans will fall head over heels for this game. I just honestly cannot find too much that is redeeming about it to really invest my time into it. In the end it's an experience, and it honestly made me value the modding community a bit more even if I can't partake in it.

Top Ten Games and short Reviews

Let's get this party started:

I'm an avid video game player, and notoriously picky yet eerily lax. I should state here that I've never really cared for 1st person shooters but I still know a good one when I see it.

I am not reviewing MMORPG's at this time. Keep in mind I did this when I was of sound mind yet ridiculously tired.

Here is the criteria I look for in a good game:

1) Good Plot/story, I'm a writer and I love stories that make me want to keep playing

2) Replay value, I like games that keep me coming back for more like a junkie to her dealer. I mean if you gonna buy a $60 game you better be able to make the most of it

3) Game Mechanics, The basics of gaming---Camera angles, Glitch number, game controls, enemy AI, etc.

4) predictability, Simply put a game that's plot and battles have become boring a tedious. You know what is going to happen before hand

5)addict ability a game can be redundant but for some reason you can't put it down

10. Pokemon because it is Pokemon. I honestly don't know why beyond these facts
- It is addictive as pure crack.
- Anyone can play it at any time and have fun. It is a simple fun game, and incredibly lighthearted to the point you feel like a kid again.
- You never have to stop playing and there's a new version out every few years.
-everyone wants to own a Pokemon
Yet it is flawed. It can become redundant and you are forced to capture the same 150 pokemon from the first game to complete your Pokemon. Then there are the useless ones, most people get because they have to...ya know what just search VGcats Supereffective and read it.

9. Legend of Zelda.
Not one LOZ all LOZ's for every possible reason. You are given areas to explore, interesting characters, WONDERFUL plots. To top it off a sexy hero to play with....I mean "As" to play as >.>
Any who Great challenging yet not overly hard puzzles, Great camera,great controls, and great plots. The only problems you'll find are in Windwaker and the N64 versions. Though those problems are minor and mostly occur from using a new style; 3D for the N64, and the whimsical cartoonyness of Windwaker

Oh well there is one thing that always bugged me but only in Phantom Hour Glass. As the DS is modern but still a hand-held console you are forced to return to the same few temples multiple times. Oh but don't worry about the temples being exactly the same, the enemies will increase in difficulty-speed, size, power, hearing, and visual spectrum. Which is annoying considering the fact that for that temple you have to use the stylus 9/10 times >.>

I honestly have few problems with the game, my only problems are my own skills it seems.

8.Harvest Moon.
Simply put it's a farming game where you can get married. In the newer ones you can have a son or daughter whose destiny you control by influencing them. In most of the GBA and the first 2 DS games your child never grows up and you can just keep on playing. Yet once you see all the cut scenes you get bored and put it down and move on to the next harvest moon.
It is addictive because it is pure simple fun with wacky characters. It can get a bit boring after a while but it's a game you can ussually pick it back up no matter what the version.

7. Spiderman 2 Gamecube
Mostly for the fact that you feel as though your submerged within a world where you can go almost anywhere you wish within the city. The controls can get a bit wonky and seem annoying but once you get use to them, well your use to them. The only problem is the Fun yet redundant fights between gang members, muggers, robbers, and car jackers. It gets old quick but if you stop playing for a few hours you will be fine with those battles just to get to the really good ones. Besides...using Spiderman's moves is SO much fun, blasting an enemy in the face with webbing is just a thrill. That sounded suspicious... oh well on to number 6

6. Marvel Ultimate alliance
I loved every moment of playing it whether solo or with my brother. The game has some of the best and most interesting characters in the Marvel universe from Nick Fury to Captain America. My favorite part of the game is the team make up. Say you unlock Storm, Human Torch, Iceman, and Thor you get a Forces of Nature Boost, or if you have an all female power house you get a Femme-Fatale-power-boost, or if you have Iceman, Wolverine, Storm and Colossus you get an X-men boost. Which is very clever and technically makes sence the Avengers, X-men, and Fantastic Four know how to work with each other therefore they get a boost. The forces of nature powers double which makes sense because well you basically have a group of near pure elements together. Not to mention the great plot which is just too much to go into, but in short you make decisions that effect the out come of the game and in doing so the world. As in you can accidentally cause Jean Grey to become the phoenix or anti-mutant Senator Robert Kelly to become pro-mutant( in a reference to the conversation between him and Storm in the movie).

There are only four major flaws:
-The camera angles can cause you to get confused and lost, a recurring theme in superhero games, which means you must look at the small corner map to figure out where you are. Needless to say this is annoying, not terrible but annoying.
- The sheer mass of henchmen and beasts can become over whelming if you do not have a balanced team. If your playing multiplayer this can lead to problems if you all do not communicate and work together.
-henchmen and beasts can become overly redundent. after beating on the same guy five hundred times you wonder how many incesterous twins does he have.
- Finally you want more control over the games outcomes and a more interesting exploration of the main characters in specific areas of the plot. I am a writer and I want to feel for my characters no matter what.

Still great game and I plan on getting Ultimate Alliance: Fusion for my Wii when it is released

5. Resident Evil 4.
What can I say that hasn't been said. The game is a fun pulse pounding zombie game with fantastic characters and fascinating intrigue. You will find your self gripping your seat through out the entire game. The only down side is the fact that towards the end of the game you end up doing basicaly one long dragged out escort mission for the presidents daughter. Sure you can see if coming sense she is the one your supposed to rescue, but jeez does every non-overly sexualized female non lead character have to be weak, whiny, needy girl? Oh and I will write a post about that stereotype in the world wide media.

4. Sims 2. Why? because I love playing god that's why. You get so much more than the first game; varied interactions, more sim customization, they have wants and needs, they actually "woo hoo", all of which allow for great interaction. But unfortunately this means it takes a lot to run it. By a lot I mean my comp can run WOW but barely run the Sims2 if I install an expansion it takes 15-25 minutes to load on it's lowest setting with nothing running in the background

3.Baldur's Gate Throne of Bhaal
The final chapter to the best game trilogy I've ever had the luck of playing. I'm not gonna repeat myself on how it runs so just read the two reviews below. The main thing that changed was that there is a new class of Wild Mage. Sounds exciting right? AHHH wrong, it's not that interesting. Basically the wild mage is described as this on http://www.gamebanshee.com

"Wild magic is a new type of magic that is characterized by powerful and dangerous surges and unpredictable effects. Generally considered to be an unfortunate byproduct of the Time of Troubles, wild magic has recently begun to attract the attention of many a curious or scholarly wizard.

Wild Mages are wizards who specialize in the study of wild magic. They have access to spells to protect themselves from Wild Magic and bend it to their wills. Wild magic is extremely unpredictable and should be used with caution.

Every time a Wild Mage casts a spell there is a 5% chance that the spell explodes in a Wild Surge. A Wild Surge does some completely random magical effect. A roll is made on the Wild Surge chart (see the Tables section of the manual); higher rolls are usually better than the lower rolls. A Wild Mage’s casting level also varies slightly whenever he casts a spell - anywhere between five levels lower and five levels higher than the Wild Mage’s true level. There are also three brand new spells available to the Wild Mage and ONLY the Wild Mage. These spells are Chaos Shield, Nahal's Reckless Dweomer and Improved Chaos Shield. "

In short it's an unpredictable powerful magic class, which considering the fact that you get incredibly powerful magic items at this point and most likely have a character you've been using for a good 4 weeks barring RL appointments, is pretty pointless. By this point your character is about levels 19-30 or more depending on how you level(I've ended the game at being level 42). Meaning that your freakin amazing and according to Elminster more powerful than he.

My main problems with this chapter comes from the fact that their was drama going on with the various developers that harmed the game. It was originally intended to be a full 3rd game but it was restricted to an expansion. Unfortunately not a very good expansion in comparison to the other games. Here is my summary:

After you save Suddenesslar from it's troubles, which in retrospect could have been avoided in the first place, you are kicked out of the city because you are considered dangerous. They give you a few items and Ellesime gives you some advice to go to a grove where the gods "speak" to you...or something. You are then attacked by the Bhaal Spawn Illesara and kill her, long story short you wind up owning a "strong hold", a pocket plane of exsistance. You then are charged by the mysterious Mellisan to save the city of Saradush and kill the other 4 bhaalspawn.

For some reason you can not return to Amn, you can summon old allies or continue with those that are already in your party, but either way there's not much to do. You are stuck with the main quest and a few other side quests. Outside of reloads the game goes by pretty quick given enough free time and with the proper skill level you could beat it in 4 days. In the beginning you are trapped within Saradush only able to access the pocket plane to rest and go through tests of spirit. Honestly Saradush is boring, hard to imagine a city under seige by freakin fire balls and giants as boring yet it is. Saradush is ruled by the paranoid half-orc bhaal spawn Gromnir(who actually has a reason to be paranoid) who has built up a small allegiance of bhaalspawn in the city. Yet part of me wonders why there is not as much intrigue as the other games. You do not find out anything about Illesara or Gromnir other than they want power and want to kill you. There is no way to get around them. I mean why can't the more powerful PC win over his army and build up an allegiance dedicated to protecting the civilians and weak bhaalspawn of Saradush? I'll tell you why the game developers were hard pressed to finish their "art" which harmed their creation and in a certain way themselves. Moving on...

After Saradush there are around Seven other areas you can travel to. None of which are truly interesting beyond Ameketheren or the former Temple of Bhaal. I understand they want you to focus on the main quest, but I look for my PC being confronted by what her "relatives" have caused and how the general population feels about her. I would have reveled in there actually being a plot where she is kidnapped/arrested ,as if she was a drow, no matter her reputation. Nay for you are bound to continuous fighting that goes unbalanced by interaction. Do not mistake my words, the battles are tough and if you install the Weidu mod "Ascension" or the other mod "Improved Anvil" it becomes Hellish...they're great battles. You stop having dream sequence's too, I guess in favor of the Solar's talks with you. Still the dream sequences reflected the characters fears/desires and I would have loved to have the dreams depend on your reputation and alignment. I would have liked a sequence of a good character who was romancing their beloved walk with them then suddenly turn into the slayer. If the PC expressed the desire for children or in Aerie's case has a child maybe have a slaughter of those possible children. It would be shocking frightening and give you the sense of what your character is fighting for=his/herself and everything he/she cares for.

Oh speaking of Romance, between BG2 all the Bioware romances that have gone unmodded end with sex until the epilogues which all suck except for Viconia's. Honestly I would have liked a bit more between Anomen and my PC. I mean she's fighting for her life and their future together, yet he doesn't say anything nor comfort her or express his worries about her. It's the same way for the male romances which is truly a shame. If you get a few mods you can get more out of the game from NPC's to quests.

Despite all of this, it is a fine conclusionary chapter to the Baldur's Gate series. Not to mention very very cheap, my brother got it for me for around $6.99 excluding shipping. If your not willing to spend that much you could probably find it for free as a download. I am not advocating illegal downloads, but I am saying most of the game developers wouldn't care cause it was not their true vision, and in truth isn't what they wanted. As I said the problems come down to company/developer troubles and a lack of time given to the developers. They did pretty well despite their troubles and hell, I'm glad I got the game. ^_^

2.Baldur's gate.
The first of a great trilogy combines the best of any pen&paper roleplaying game. It has vast areas to explore, Dozens of quests that require a number of tactics, and a immersive plot. I did not become a serious gamer until I played this game. You create a character selecting from a range of D&D 2e classes and start off as a youth in Candlekeep. A citadel on the sword coast dedicated to learning, you were brought there as child by your foster father Gorion and your only childhood companion was Imoen. One day Gorion says you two are leaving so you pack your few possessions and flee the walls you've been within for as far back as you remember. In your travels at night you are attacked by an armored figure and Gorion is killed. You flee in terror with one instruction go to an inn and meet up with his trusted former companions. Imoen saw the entire ordeal and accompanies you figuring you could use someone to trust and a thief. As you go on you learn that the armored man wanted you and you are confronted by assassins, a plot to start a bloody war, and the actions of the deities of the realms. You go on a journey to figure out why you are hunted and seek revenge for your father.
The game runs on the Infinity engine which is my personal favorite, the system was organized easy to customize to your own preferences and generally awesome. When you play it you are truly within a world with characters with their own goals and beliefs and companions who could leave you if they disliked your actions. That's the best thing about the game, being able to be good or evil or neither if you wished. You were given a number of characters with different alignments who expected you to fall in line within the range of their ideology and if you were too good or too evil they say "Frack you I'm gone" and leave you.

The problem lies with a few things. There is the fact that the world is so freakin large you can get lost and or distracted very easily initially forgetting what you were doing. Though the large world is trully what is alluring. You feel as though your in this world with people with their own lives. Plus you get to explore massive areas, an element lost in BGII

1.Baldur's Gate: Shadows of Amn. (bioware)
The best game I've ever played. The summary of the plot is as follows; After being proclaimed hero of Baldur's Gate you and your companions (which they have thrown together the most likely companions people used in BG1) are captured by the evil mage Jon Irenicus and taken to the Country of Amn with no reason or want to go back north of the sword coast...for some reason. Your journey begins with your trusted childhood friend Imoen being kidnapped and two of your other companions being killed. Your journey takes you from thieves to paladins, from evil drow to noble dragons it is an epic adventure. Hell you even run into Drizzt Do'Urden towards the end of the game and get a chance to gain him as an ally you can't control him but hell it's Drizzt Do'Urden and let's face 75% of characters are based off him or Elminster. It has references to the old D&D cartoon and quiet a few hilarious(insane) characters.
The game ran on one of my favorite game engines the Infinity engine. It is easy to use, well organized, and easy to keyboard customize to your own preferences. The organization has been improved from the first game so that it's a bit more friendly for those who naturally glance left to right. You can either import yout character from the previous game or create a new one. The game is based on the 2e AD&D rules which is fantastic as far as I am concerned.
Unlike the first game this one has quite a bit of character depth and npc interaction even romance options. It gives you a real feel for the characters, even the villains which are always more than what they seem. The art is beautiful and makes you feel as though you've entered a world of its own, which is what everyone wants in a game.

Ok Now for the bad news. As much as I love this game it does have flaws. First off remember what I said about a real feel for the characters? Well that's not always good because well some of the characters are just...dicks or whiny or well let me go down my list.

1) Anomen the fighter cleric. He is a good person and fighter, but he is a dick and my friends and I refer to him as Assomen. He is arrogant, contemptuous, and annoying. He thinks he is better than everyone because he joined the Order of the Most Radiant Heart and strictly sees the world in black and white. He will constantly be boasting of his apparent victories and trials and such but eventually I just clicked through it. He does have a tragic family life- dead mother, drunken father who hates him, and a beloved little sister forced to stay with their father. Plus he can become incredibly sweet in the romances.Yet when you romance him being constantly yelled at or told "your like my sister Moira" gets old.

2) Aerie the Mage/cleric. You either love her or hate her, I hate her. She is a winged elf who was captured and sold to a circus where she had to have her wings amputated because of an infection. Tragic right? Well Aerie sure thinks so because she will whine about it all the time. I'm not being cruel because she does and I understand it's horrible but MY GAWD things could be worse ask the PC. She is incredibly naive almost to a fault and hard to keep alive without using some sort of mod to make her an epic level because she combines two of the most vulnerable classes= mage+cleric. In theory great combo in practice....not so much. If your male you can romance her(god knows why you'd want to), but in the event you do in Throne of Bhaal you can have a child. But oh dear in SOA if you go too fast and get her in the sack she'll think you manipulated her and end the relationship...when she asked for it. Oh and in the romance be prepared for more "Woe as me" Bullocks. Before I forget if Minsc is in your party at the same time she can become his new witch and you can't kick out one without the other. Have fun.

3) Cernd the Druid. Oh at first you meet him and go "Wow a druid this will be awesome" and then you fight with him and then....not so much in fact not at all unless you mod him and set him 7 levels hire than he should be. Cernd constantly spats some sort of nature gibberish at you and the other NPCs who all, but Aerie, find him annoying. Even Jaheira finds his babbling useless particularly as a druid. Then you get his quest and find out that he left his wife to be a druid. Oh did I mention she was pregnant and never told him? She remarried a possibly abusive mage and had Cernd's baby then died. Oh and everyone thinks he's a bastard for leaving his wife, who according to him was sad but understood he had to follow his destiny. The entire quest involves his former friends berating him and the implication that his ex-wife was murdered. Was she murdered by her new hubbie? Why was there a lich with her mage husband. Will you ever know? Oh sorry nope never because the game developers dropped the ball.

4) Valygar the Ranger. I do like Valygar and he has a great quest, but he's dull. He is supposed to come off as brooding and reflective due to his troubled family history and hatred of magic. For some reason I have the feeling he was supposed to be a romance but sadly the Game developers ran out of time for it. On my second run through I actually thought he was romance able and it wasn't until I looked him up that I learned he wasn't, which made me sad. You go through his interactions thinking "OMG something's going to happen" enhanced by finding out he has a vow of celibacy only your let down to find out nothing will. I was so pumped thinking "HE'S THE ONLY BLACK MAN IN THE REALMS AND I CAN HAVE HIM!!" coming from a girl who tends to go for white guys that was a godsend lol. But nope

That's the short list of coarse. It's this entire thing of you know how they wanted the characters to be but they failed....horribly.

Oh yeah and there are these romances

For males:(easiest to hardest)
Aerie....yea culminates in baby, and her finding her place
Viconia you can help her learn to trust again...it's not half bad
Jaheira the hardest because she just lost her husband and you must heal her wounds

For Females
Anomen. You can change him into a slightly better person and I mean slightly
yeah...he's the only one. I guess it's because they figured many women wouldn't play the game. Ironically the BGII modding sector is about 55% women. Anomen yells at you is appalled by your heritage and well is generally an ass. Albeit a very sweet ass, he does have his moments and you control whether he becomes Sir Anomen of the order or if he fails his test and goes off somewhere most likely to die alone or become like his father.

That's right everyone as according to Bioware Love=therapy. Every single one of these characters has an issue of some sort and only love can fix it. The worst part of this is if you don't romance them their epilogues all culminate in a "crisis of faith" even Jaheira. For some reason these characters just do, without love they're lives are ruined. Viconia's epilogue is sad no matter what but for Christ sakes she's smited by Shar.

Oh an MY BIGGEST PET PEEVE....the strong holds. Oh yes there's only one that is vaguely interesting: Nalia's Keep. Yeah that's it. You are given a choice between a Thief strong hold, a playhouse, a freakin cabin/town, a druid groove, and I believe a Paladin get the order building, clerics get their temple, and mages/sorcerers get the planar sphere...A SPHERE THAT FUCKING TRAVELS THE PLANES. Either way they all suck even the quests that are involved with them all suck. You can get a fucking planar sphere that's huge and amazing, but it does nothing. As a mage to Cowled wizards force you to take on three mages who make basic magic items that by the time you get the sphere you could buy or mod into the game. There is nothing at all with any one of these that actually makes the strongholds useful.

Well to correct those flaws the Infinity engine was made easily moddable meaning there are entire online communities dedicated to modding BG2. There are even huge plot altering quests to the game. Even a mod that was based on info given out by the game developers as to what they would have done if they had more time. There are more well balanced romances, quests, and even class kits and a fixpack that changes game flaws such as creature AI. Combing mods with this already great game is simply orgasmic. With communities like Pocket Plane Group, Weidu, Gibberlings 3, and Spellhold Studios it's hard not to mod the games. I won't lie though some mods I find unappealing to me and I mostly stick to quest add-ons and NPC's, but there are really good mods in general.