Will or should DA4 return to the darker roots that DAO had?

I mean dark as in DAO and DA2 levels of dark. While DAI has its dark spots, in comparison to the first 2 games, DAI is very sterile and safe.

True, DA2 was sufficiently dark for my tastes, but it mainly suffered from a smaller, less grand scope, and awful design shortcuts that detracted from what could have been a masterpiece of role playing.

BioWare does have the tendency to over correct on things it perceives as mistakes, so Inquisition might have just focused on the wrong things.

Well I don't look at DAO as being "dark" because it's larger purpose is setting up the rules of its universe, like this is how it is. DA2 is dark game because it expands upon what was setup in DAO, they decided to go that path of being "dark". DAI is the same level of darkness that DA2 setup. The possible assassination of the Empress, Breach, Divine's death, Cory, and most importantly the setup of Solas. So, I don't see how DAI is more lighter in tone then DA2 where a lot of DAI's plot stems from DA2. 

Complex villains have always been present in Dragon Age. This includes Inquisition where we had one called Solas. I'd argue the lack of complex villains applies more to Mass Effect after the death of Saren. 

Well we will see how complex they keep him in DA4 when he is the central villain and not the "ninja villain"

So, you think the destruction of the Conclave and the opening of the Breach (that no doubt caused more death then in anything DA2) is lighter then anything in DA2? i would disagree, as that story is focused on a family as opposed to Thedas, but agree to disagree I guess.  

I hope that doesn't mean there won't be any choices at all soon. I've seen his tweets where he basically says he won't allow the player character do this or that and I don't like it.

Lol those are tame compared to the things seen in DAO and DA2.

The focus is irrelevent, the point is that as the player, we were exposed to more tragic and depressing events in DAO and DA2 compared to DAI where most of the tragic stuff was done off camera (like the destruction of the conclave).

You are in the extreme minority of people who think DAI is on the same level of tone as DAO and DA2.

Corypheus was quite complex... or did you miss the man out of time, lost and confused while losing his faith arc?

Actually, he was motivated by his crisis of faith more than any lust for power. Due to what he experienced with what he believes to be the Black City, Corypheus thinks that the world is godless and that thought shook him so badly that he resolved to becoming a god himself whose existence was undeniable and whose presence was felt in the world. It ties into Inquisition's theme of faith.

Now I do think that Corypheus should have had more dialogue (and a few more victories) to better explore this motivation but even as it is, his motivation is presented including in the conversation with him at Haven.  

I actually thought he was really interesting as well and it annoyed me so much that they didn't expand on it! There was that really cool codex from in the fade with the nightmare demon that I thought really showed into Corypheus as a person. I felt like they had everything set up but didn't quite push it through. If they even had a few cutaways to Corypheus during the game like they did with Loghain to see his point of view I think it would have worked. But then this is just another part of the wider issue that DAI had was they focused too much in the codexes and didn't show it to us. I loved the game but felt sometimes they missed with the build up of emotions and pushing themes because most of the stuff is in the background and can get really easily lost. Part of this I think was cus it was firsttime on frostbyte engine so more things got cut.

Ok, I really like Patrick as a writer but this bothers me A LOT. It reminds me of a tweet he made during DAI's development in which he said "we are firmly against torture as something that heroes do" and it does make me worry that future DA titles will go in a more sanitized direction than DA:O and DA2. (Whoever thinks that DA2 isn't dark, I want some of what you're smoking.) Having your own reasons for not wanting to depict torture in a game is one thing (though it's particularly rich coming from a franchise where the first game included monsters forcibly raping a dwarf then having cannibalize her friends and comrades to become a brood mother), but if the reason is "that's not what the good guy should be doing," it's a 100% completely inadequate reason that basically amounts to bad writing. 

The reason why I play Bioware games isn't to "be the hero" -- although some of my protagonists are the arch typical goody-two shoes hero types, the point imo of an RPG is to play any type of protagonist you want, which is why I'm drawn to Bioware games in the first place as they're ostensibly committed to giving you that sort of choice. In addition to moving away from the dark themes in DAO and DA2, Patrick's statement seems to imply more limited choices that will rail road your protagonist into being an arch typical "good guy." This is especially bad timing as we're heading to Tevinter, which basically necessitates darker themes considering what we know about how fucked up Tevinter society is with all the blood magic and slavery run amuck. 

Also, on torture specifically, I find his aversion to torture in Daredevil particularly odd because I think the torture element came from the Punisher arch? Daredevil was in no way glorifying torture or the Punisher -- the whole first half of season 2's plot arch was between Daredevil being strongly routed in Catholic morals (IE: being anti-torture) versus ruthlessly seeking revenge like the Punisher. That's an important and interesting and entirely appropriate theme to explore. That's the sort of theme I LIKE to explore in games, movies, books, etc, particularly in Dragon Age and Patrick seems driven to avoid giving us the opportunity to explore those darker themes in DA (regardless of whether the context is torture or something else).

Also, the torture in Jessica Jones is much more brazen -- it's probably the darkest (and simultaneously the best) Marvel show. Most of the torture just happens to be psychological but there's even physical torture that Kilgrave inflicts upon others (IE: forcing the man to dismember and put his husband through a food processor in the final episode). I would imagine that Jessica Jones would be a lot more triggering to most people than Daredevil so I'm also concerned that Patrick doesn't seem to have a very nuanced grasp of what torture entails...

But anyway, back to DA, my Inquisitor absolutely would have tortured someone not because she's a mustache-twirling psychopath but because she's an intolerant anti-mage ideologue to stamp out magic and anyone who opposes her politically at all costs. (I decided to model her off the real world inquisition, in which torture was an unfortunately common occurrence.) Conversely, my warden would never have entertained the notion of torturing another living being. And my Hawke probably wouldn't opt for torture unless you fucked with his friends/family. (IE: Killing Leandra.) And it's not like you'd have to graphically depict torture on screen -- just have the option and then later the Inquisitor or whoever else can face the repercussions of those actions. (IE: You torutre someone but since torture isn't reliable you get bad intel and that fucks the inquisitor over -- meaningful consequences like that.)

I don't mean to root this all in torture, bu that's the context it came up in. I guess my long-winded point is that I think Bioware should give us the opportunity to RP several types of protagonists while exploring multiple themes -- no matter how dark or uncomfortable -- and that includes giving us some pretty dark options and story lines and NPCs. I don't want a sanitized product like DAI that strips a lot of this away because it usually makes the story a lot more boring and less intellectually challenging for the player. I WANT to be challenged with the decisions I make and the story I consume just like DAO and Jessica Jones. DAO was first marketed (and in many ways was) a dark fantasy RPG. That's one of the reasons I started playing and that's the sort of game I want to play. I don't want the DA team to shy away from exploring those themes and I definitely don't want them to curtail options for my character because they have a certain view of how a protagonist should behave. But I fear from Patrick Weakes' comments that he'll be taking DA in the more sanitized direction we saw in DAI. 

Also, we really need to stop using buzz words like "politically correct." That's a virtually meaningless phrase now fyi. 

And no, I don't want a story to be dark just for the sake of being dark. But when you're dealing with themes like you deal with in DA a lot of the time it's unavoidable and they shouldn't shy away from that. (I also did enjoy the horror elements in DAO though.)