Things I Think I Love; Things I Think I Hate

Taash is not non-binary. One of the devs (i think it was Weeks?) confirmed it.

I don't think so. She has less armor on her in Lighthouse screenshot, but that's it.

Nice idea for a thread.

Love

1. Rook- I've been quite enamored with this title since I first heard about it. Granted the DA protags have all been pretty strong in the name/ title department but nice to see its continuing the tradition.



4. Visiting Northern Thedas- Seeing some locations that I have fallen in love with the stories and lore slowly over the course of the series. Wanted to visit Tevinter and the Anderfels since Origins as I fell in love with the stories of the IMperium and the Wardens then dealing with Josephine and the Antivan Crows + their stories in Tevinter Nights really makes me want to visit Antiva. Not as excited about Nevarra but can't win them all...

Hate

1. MIght be too strong of a word but...the new demon design- Like I get it things change and new tech and art standards and I get what they are going for but on the other hand I don't think the art design matches their stated intention and comes off as a bit contradictory. Nothing I can't get used to but still.

2. The three ability limit- And again know they probably have their reasons for it and still trust BioWare and we've had a lot of conversation in Schmooples about this...but given games out there like HL and a few others it does seem like a bit of a missed opprotunity. Could be fine though.

If that's the case then a poor assumption on my part, but the rest of my complaint stands.  They set my expectations up for one thing and did the ol' bait and switch.

Yes, that's a good one...I've been wanting to visit these other places since Origins.

With regards to your stuff hidden under the spoiler tag I got the other half of that prediction right so I figure we can just combine and say oh, yeah we nailed it.

And the whole "love" / "hate" thing is only what I think at this point, sometimes a thing I think I'll love or hate ends up being the reverse. I've only been wrong about one thing or another a million or so times in my life.

likes
graphics
hair. Even though I'm not a big fan of Varric I liked the movement of his long hair. Looking forward to seeing that on my main character.
outfits, at least for the mages the main character was fighting. Hopefully those outfit's are available for the main character.
the scepter Neve has. I wonder if playing as a mage I can have dual scepters?
Neve's hat. Hopefully my character can wear a hat like that though when playing as a mage I like for the robes and hats from DAO to return.
Neve's pipe - Was that a pipe she was smoking? If so, I want that for my main character. In fact I want the whole roster to have one. We can call ourselves The Smokers.



dislikes
combat - did everyone eat a bunch of energy bars to do all that hopping/jumping. It was overkill. Seeing Neve, a mage, jumping at the baddie. 
only two companions allowed and not playable. two features I enjoyed with the previous games. 
No chance to complete the game solo 
the ability wheel not being available from the beginning
Varric - I like his look from DAI. His look in this game make's him look younger even with the beard. And his constant friend stuff about Solas. What could he say to convince chuckles to change vs what anyone else would say. If anything, I would rather have the Inq in that scene doing that. 
the dialogue wheel. I didn't see any choice for a ruthless/renegade dialogue. 
the demons- when first seeing them, they looked like giant frogs on fire. The pride demon. All I can do is shake my head. I like the look from the previous games.
as much as hate Solas, I like his look from DAI better than what was seen in the gameplay.

Good idea for a thread!

Things I Love

- The graphics look beautiful. Everyone and everything is gorgeous, I can't want to run around in it and kiss everybody.

- I'm excited to visit northern Thedas and see all the places we've heard about second-hand for so long. Bring on Rivain, Weisshaupt and the Grand Necropolis!

- The combat trees look so good I want to eat them.

- Everything I hear about the character creator has me itching to play around with it. Maybe I'll give my thicc Qunari purple hair!

- After an entire fucking decade we are finally getting the second half of this story, whatever it is.


Things I Hate Have Misgivings About

- I can see why they've moved on from the Keep, but I'm already missing it. The advantage of having that huge tapestry available is that the game had loads of information to react to, not just in large ways but in small ones. Since they now have to boil three games worth of choices down to a manageable checklist, I suspect we'll get way less reactivity than we had in DAI. I'm going to miss little things like the dwarves at the Winter Palace having different dialogue depending on who was made king of Orzammar.

- Similarly, I can see why they're moving away from the open world and towards a mission-based structure. But that doesn't mean I'm not going to miss the open world, even if I'm the only player that enjoyed it. Inquisition was the first BioWare game since BG1 that gave me a real feeling of exploration, I'm sad that DAV probably won't have that. There's just something about galloping through the moonlit desert of the Hissing Wastes that no amount of focused curated mission-based content can replace for me.

- Still on the subject of stuff where I can see why they went in this direction but I'm not sure it's going to work as well for me personally: I think going with all pansexual romances was the right call, but I'm going to miss stuff like making a male character to romance Cassandra or Dorian and having certain love interests reject the player out of hand because they don't like men or dwarves or whatever.

- It seems like they're going to kick the can of the deep dwarf lore - whether it's Kal-Sharock or the Titans - down the road again in favour of yet more elf stuff. I know they have to save something for DA5, but the longer we wait the more likely it is that the series will end without explaining any of this at all. Also we've had two elfy games in a row now, I demand that DA5 be a dwarfy one. Or a Qunari-.. y? one.

- The redesigned demons are hit and miss for me. I like rage fine, but the others are meh so far.


Things I Actually Do Hate

- BioWare laying off Mary Kirby, Lukas Kristjanson and the other developers that were let go is absolute bullshit. They need to be credited and properly compensated.

Get out of here with your nuance, you fence sitter!

I like a lot of the same stuff others have mentioned: The visuals are the best of any Dragon Age game so far. It's cool that we're finally visiting Northern Thedas and that they took the chance to go all out and make it look different. Hard to tell without playing the game, but combat looks more fun than in DA:I/DA2 at least. At a glance, the skill trees look enticing. I like that they're walking back the open world and stressing narrative.

In principle, I think less companions with more content is a good idea from a story perspective (we still technically get one more companion than in ME1), and as a side effect, I think genderblind romances are the best choice. And it's great that we're getting backgrounds separate from race/class again, even if there are no playable origin stories. That too makes me think of ME1.

On the negative side... I wish the Inquisitor wasn't back at all, but I should be able to tolerate them for a bit. The writing didn't pop for me as much as I'd like—the whole 'stop the powerful bad guy by the audacious technique of making something heavy fall on them' feels overdone, even within DA—, but I'll reserve judgement until we see more; I at least like the character concepts and plot beats they seem to be going for.

On a sillier note, I too am heartbroken we aren't getting a voluptuous lady qunari, or voluptuous lady anything. I am too Hispanic in this one respect, and these white people beauty standards are killing me, man

It's because they haven't yet invented sports bras in Thedas...   Running from things shouldn't be painful after all.

Sport bras are nice, but I'm an even bigger fan of yoga pants 

That's my biggest dislike. I understand the keep is frequently down and maybe expensive, but I feel we're losing so much. As you said, the small dialogues and miscellanous stuff (like war table missions) made the world feel much more alive and reactive, but also we're probably going to get some cameos spoiled as the decisions related to their caracters show up before the game even starts.



You're not alone, DAI's open world is a guilty pleasure of mine. The meaningless fetch quests and empty open areas are great fun to mindlessly do for a few hours before jumping back into story content in ways I don't know how to explain. Hinterlands, Exalted Plains, Emerald Graves... I'll miss them dearly, but I'm glad that the series is going back to mission-based. Love the janky open world, never want to see it on a different game