Awakening -- Opinions so far?

[ell46]

I enjoyed it but to me it wasn't an expansion it was just a mini game.

 

My biggist gripe has to be that it didn't follow on from DAO as my endings were almost all about Alastair and me rebuilding the GW's and strangley Zevren tagged along to help rebuild in all my endings as well, so I felt both of them had a right to be in the expansion and there was no explanation for Alastairs absence, also as others have said 'where is my dog' no way would I have parted with him.

 

One more thing that REALLY annoyed me and that was the voice of Ines. I'm a Lancashire lass (North of England) and her accent was atrocious, :sick: for heavens sake couldn't they get an actress who had a genuine Northern accent, in fact it annoyed me so much IF I play it again I don't even want to speak to Wynne who I couldn't stand in Origin.

 

At the moment I don't feel that I want to play it through again like I did with DAO and if I do I'm not sure I want to import a character. I imported a mage who arrived with no staff, but unlike some here at least I had clothes on :laugh:

 

I didn't like the camp prefered the one in DAO, didn't like not being able to speak to party members and what was mind numbingly boring is having to keep taking party members outside the keep to sort out weapons, armour and gifts.

[Venegal]

I agree with Riddleofsteel, Expansions can be great, awesome, Legendary, better than the OC even, as was Shivering Isles for Oblivion, Mask of the Betrayer for Nwn II and Road to the underdark and and and...

 

So this crap was kinda disappointing for such a grgame like DAO, I mean it barely cared about what you did in OC, Alistair is GW Commander, your dead, Leliana comes with you to VK, nothing, was kinda dumb and still is

[blissful]

I finished Awakenings pretty quickly. It didn't feel like an expansion since it really didn't have much to do with Origins. All of the choices I had made, except for becoming queen, were basically ignored. It felt kind of impersonal - I wasn't overly impressed with the companion interactions (or lack of). If you weren't paying much attention, you could miss the conversations going on behind you. I had a really high approval rate with Oghren in Origins but had nothing in Awakenings. Did I do something in the 6 months between to tick him off? I wish we would have been able to have more options as far as previous companions than just Oghren.

 

I did like the harder battles and the Architect was pretty cool (I read "The Calling" where he was mentioned and was really excited they included him). **SPOILER** I really didn't like the way the battle with the Mother ended and *poof* there were the end slides! o_O The ending felt rushed. I am hoping that the next expansion 1) feels like an expansion, building on to the game, not ignoring it and 2) is a little longer (especially for the price). I think I would rate it a 6 or 7.

 

But for anyone who hasn't played it, play it first and then form your own opinion. :thumbsup:

[mctaff]

After cracking open my fresh copy of Awakenings, I was disappointed to find that the Wintersbreath (DLC) I had in my hands was gone, despite owning both the vanilla and DLC versions. This, along with a fair few other items (and the runes within) are never to be seen again - as well as all of the good stuff my party members were wearing.

 

After posting here regarding recovery of these items, I'm disappointed to say that I expected better. I don't want to have to reload an old save, painstakingly go back to a merchant and equip my companions with rubbish and carry around 110-odd units of armour and weapons in the Final Battle and do the whole thing all over again.

 

My character was the type to ask for everything back on behalf of Ferelden and the Grey Wardens; so I'd like to at least begin Awakening with a vault full of the crap I'd collected - especially the stuff I hadn't even managed to use yet! (Carefully stored in the party chests).

 

Unfortunately I think this is a huge oversight by Bioware, it's a little ordinary to just leave untidy loose ends like this in a game, considering things like "Winter's Breath" and "Wintersbreath" would have been easy to swap over (to exchange the DLC one with the vanilla one for the player would have been no problem while they were writing the filter code), or in the very least pulling all of the stuff off your old companions and shoving it in a merchant, chest or vault somewhere for retreival.

 

For now, it looks like I'll simply forget about playing Awakening until something gets a little easier in this respect, such as a player mod, a patch, or workaround - mostly because as far as roleplaying goes it's a silly notion that you'd simply wander away without your prized weapon, and secondly because after having a handful of Tier 7 superweapons that I worked very hard for, it's a bit average to now be walking around without anything at all.

[littlemisslulu]

i've finished awakening pretty quick too, i do enjoy the apostate male mage (forgot his name :p ) his character is almost like allistair when he's making jokes.

oghren, well he's just being oghren, still drunk and all. what surprise me is the howe's son and justice character.

 

i dont like that we can not have a conversation with our companinons, cant have romance with them, and the lack of alistair character

 

i think its a bit disapointing, but the areas and enemies have some good imrpovement. i love it, i juts dont like the characters as much as DAO

[Christine777]

An Abrupt Ending Indeed. :biggrin:

 

[Venegal]

Ha ha ha, thats incredible xD

[modluv]

- Less re-playability. I played Origins for months. I played Awakenings once and I think I'm done.

- I can't help feeling (with the exceptions of Nathaniel Howe & Justice) that the new followers were the idea rejects from Origins that got dusted off for a quick reworking and popped into the story.

- It just felt like the writers, artists, etc were rushed, like they did a quick knock-up of Origins formulas just to put out content.

- While playing, I kept muttering "nothing I did in Origins matters here." Very disappointing.

- Seeing old characters was cool. Not really getting to interact with them = bittersweet/disappointing. Oghren is... well, Oghren. He doesn't count.

- The Archetect/Brood Mother story is under-developed. Big time.

- The ending is seriously abrupt. Was that a van that just side-swiped me or is the game over? Oh, the game is over.

- Awakenings crashes on me more frequently than Origins did.

 

Overall comment:

I feel like Awakenings is the unnecessary afterward to the juicy novel that was Origins. It's a snack of canned peaches in light syrup when what I really was really in the mood for was an all-you-can-eat buffet.

[tinylewtgriffon]

Well, I bet this was just a "Warm up" for Bioware, and the next expansion (2011?, I dunno) will be better. I personally liked Awakening, even if it was shorter then I imagined and there were no romances

[Azraphel]

As many have already stated, I, too, was disappointed. There is an obvious deficiency to this expansion, which can hardly be called an expansion, as the actions taken in Origins cause no effect on this installment. The characters get annoying, and the 'camp' setting in Vigil's Keep pales in comparison to that of Origin's. Not worth the money.

- Less re-playability. I played Origins for months. I played Awakenings once and I think I'm done.

- I can't help feeling (with the exceptions of Nathaniel Howe & Justice) that the new followers were the idea rejects from Origins that got dusted off for a quick reworking and popped into the story.

- It just felt like the writers, artists, etc were rushed, like they did a quick knock-up of Origins formulas just to put out content.

- While playing, I kept muttering "nothing I did in Origins matters here." Very disappointing.

- Seeing old characters was cool. Not really getting to interact with them = bittersweet/disappointing. Oghren is... well, Oghren. He doesn't count.

- The Archetect/Brood Mother story is under-developed. Big time.

- The ending is seriously abrupt. Was that a van that just side-swiped me or is the game over? Oh, the game is over.

- Awakenings crashes on me more frequently than Origins did.

 

Overall comment:

I feel like Awakenings is the unnecessary afterward to the juicy novel that was Origins. It's a snack of canned peaches in light syrup when what I really was really in the mood for was an all-you-can-eat buffet.

Sums it up quite nicely, if I do say so myself. In regards to Electronic Art's "title lineup for its fiscal 2011 year (April 2010 through March 2011)." a "new Dragon Age title is set for release on console, handheld, and PC." If that is the case, let us only hope it satisfies more effectively than this 'expansion' did. Cited Source