| Sal.Paradise said: I don't watch handegg, so I can't understand your anaolgy, but I'm sure it's great. Yep, apparently they couldn't fix things with only a few months left, I don't know much about the development process of these big games but I do know that getting your game off to and back from cert is a hassle, so they probably had to hurry. I'd like to think it was just higher-ups pushing the team for time, but frankly with the caliber of their last three releases I wonder if they have any swriters of significant talent left. Don't even get me started on what was wrong with the endings. Holy shit. They dun' goofed. |
"Handegg." You're one of those people. Rather than educate you about why watching some C-grade actors run laps for over an hour while faking injuries actually isn't entertaining, let's stick to Mass Effect. 
I can't agree that the writing team isn't still good. The game was filled with terrific moments. So many great scenes, a bunch of great dialogue, and, my personal favorite, a lot of top-tier conversations between your squadmates. I would have preferred that the latter was more 'in addition to' the Shepard-teammate discussions of ME2 than 'instead of', but I can live with it. To be honest, I thought the writing was great, even up to that final dash towards the light. It's only after things start to go wrong that things start to go wrong, which does suggest that time was the big issue.
That said, a quick look through the internet implies that the ending was solely in the hands of two writers, one of whom was the head writer. I'm curious to hear what those two in particular were responsible for writing in the rest of the game, because they certainly chose poorly. Perhaps they're just the two bad apples that have spoiled the bunch?
I do, however, take your wider meaning. I'm glad I didn't actually pay for DA2, because it was just a bad game all around, writing included. And I've heard that The Old Republic is, erm, uneven in its quality. So it might be that Bioware has just expanded too quickly and too much for the writing talent to stay solid throughout all their products. Lord knows good writing takes a ton of time and effort to develop...and that videogames are rarely the first choice for talented writers.
