Polygon's open-letter to BioWare regarding their open-world-like games.

1. Character Creator is definitely a valid criticism and something I've been critical of as well. It's far too limited and the presets are far from attractive.

2. Cutscenes aren't skippable or dialogue? I've never had an issue skipping anything to my knowledge, besides the opening cinematic for the game.

3. Manual saving is only disabled on priority missions. That being said, I do see it as a nuisance, although it hardly kills my experience. Quick save is a nonissue, in my eyes, as long as the auto save function works well.

4. Yep. I believe we've all established the animations are far from perfect.

5. I'd bundle this with wonky facial animations. In general, BioWare seemed to have a breakdown in their conversation system and how characters emote.

6. All BioWare games have fetch quests. I honestly can't remember any of the fetch quests in Jade Empire, and it's one of my favorite BioWare games. As long as you aren't a completionist, that content is entirely optional. I certainly prefer all of the fetch quests in MEA over the "requisitions" in DAI.

7. What platform are you playing on? I barely had any issues on PC. It seems problems are more likely to occur on consoles. Other than that one Nomad quest bug and some enemies clipping in the environment, my experience was  smooth.

8. Auto-dialogue has been an issue since ME3. That's more of an issue with BioWare design and not something specific to MEA.

9. Quality of dialogue is subjective. For an inexperienced group of young explorers, I didn't find most of the dialogue to be that jarring. Only a few minor exceptions where BioWare probably could have toned it down a bit.

10. I'll just assume you obtained all of the memory fragments. I also believe a lot of her character's background is explained in the Uprising novel. It's still possible we could learn more about her in DLC, but I also would have liked to have seen a bit more of her.

11. The system more or less seems to be a holdover from ME1 with how it handled "hazards." I don't particularly have an issue with it as it largely gets the point across of "don't go there."

12. As you indicated, you can skip most of the travel time now. This galaxy map was originally supposed to be in ME1 but was cut due to a lack of ram on the Xbox 360. I don't mind BioWare showcasing the beautiful galaxy they created, but it should have been skippable from the start.

Many of your criticisms are more so complaints about BioWare, in general, and not necessarily specific to MEA. I also wouldn't say any of your criticisms are downright devastating towards the game. Aside from wonky facial animations and a limited CC, I think most of your complaints are either subjective or relatively minor. I didn't have your bug issues, so that's really something that differs between every gamer.

I found DAI's environments to be an absolute chore not worth exploring. I did them because of the completionist in me, but I definitely did not enjoy myself. I found MEA to be a vast improvement over DAI's design, personally. Not sure I'll even ask what your problem with ME3 is, but I suppose it's a positive you like MEA more?

While I definitely understand your hesitation, DLC is more or less a requirement to experience in BioWare games these days. With DLC like Arrival, Legacy, Leviathan, and Trespasser, you miss crucial story beats if you don't buy the DLC. You are ultimately free to do what you'd like, but I can almost guarantee you BioWare will tie MEA2 to one of these DLCs and move the story forward. It's inevitable given the last four games and the DLC they produced.

That being said, I think a lot of your issues with the game will be resolved by BioWare as they improve the game with the upcoming patches that are planned.

I can understand the appeal but i prefer myself to watch a story unfold as intended. HZD is just amazing another game i praise like crazy. You watch her grow up and feel pain when the kids throw a rock at her.

To see her become this strong women and the hidden story it's just unreal. I think it would lose that appeal if they went with MEA style.

Sometimes a story needs a set hero that you guide. 😊

I've had a feeling she's a Sue ever since i saw the initial gameplay, but I want to play it because it sounds interesting. I played Ace Attorney 5 which also featured a female protagonist who had to go thorugh tremendous hardship! 


But it turned out she just managed everything anyway and every character in the story supported her and every time something bad happened you had to feel sorry for her *sob sob*, just like Shepard in ME3 which I hated so much.

Hope I'm wrong though. I'm picking up HZD when it drops in price.

As I said, it's not just cuz Geralt is an old white guy.  I've read the reviews and the storyline for TW3 and it just doesn't sound like a game I'd like.  My husband's played it and he agrees.  Also, being forced into a single non-customizable character is like a constant jab under my skin.  I just don't really like it, and tend to stay away from games that have a main character that isn't customizable.

I play games that don't really have a main character, or where the main character "pov" isn't really crucial, like the Civ games and the Warcraft games.  I've also played games where your main character is kinda limited but you can generally choose the gender, like Guildwars, Diablo, etc.

But when it's a mostly main-character PoV and the mainc haracter is locked into one look and gender, it does bother me during the entire game.

I've played Planescape Torment, Overlord, Overlord II, and several other games that were male-only protagonists. Didn't really like Torment, really had fun picking the concubine in Overlords. Wish that I had been able to pick male concubines. Oh well.

Yeah I just felt I was making no progress after like, 3 days, plus lots of crashes and an uncomfortable chair. I didn't like the game enough to mod it, but I sure had lots of fun modding ME2. I remember playing as Garrus and Thane a LOT.

"I don't like the Witcher and I'm not going to play it to verify the things I say about it, arguments about my ability to properly discuss elements of the game be damned"

the vibe I'm getting from a lot of posters here.