@rvone: I liked it quite a bit, but only in spite of all the open-world busywork stuff. I liked the companions, the quests associated with them, and the main story--at least, once you factor in Trespasser, so it actually has a proper ending and decent villain. Almost all the side-quests, and the open world zones that contained them, were utter tedium, though--and that's speaking as someone who generally counts good side-quests as one of the very best things about RPGs.
In a good open-world RPG, you're left feeling like a new adventure awaits over every hillock--because the world, while large, holds enough stories, enough characters and enough compelling side-quests to fill out that space effectively. The Witcher 3 and Fallout: New Vegas are the two best modern examples of this sort of game I can think of, while Inquisition is one of the worst--it was an enjoyable game, but by the end, I was left feeling that it would've been much, much better had they just straight-up cut out the open world segments. (Though, obviously, I'd have ideally liked them to have kept the open-world, but filled it with stories instead of dull activities that I had little interest in.)
Inquisition had plenty to recommend it, but the open-world stuff - at least, to my taste - was a yoke about its neck. (This is all just opinion, obviously.)
I'm hoping Andromeda improves on Inquisition's failings in open-world design, and gives us planets with stories to explore. Honestly, my fondest hope for the game was that they'd make each planet less like an Inquisition open-world zone, and more like an episode of Star Trek: The Next Generation, with a focused story that you'd progress through... But that's clearly not what we're getting. So I'll instead wish for a decent ratio of actual, story-driven side-quests to explorable area, and leave it at that.
I'm getting the game regardless, 'cause as I said, I'm still glad I played Inquisition, and I care about the Mass Effect franchise a decent bit more than I do about Dragon Age.
Log in to comment