Dragon Age 2 - GamesCom Roundup

Understandably, there's quite a bit of interest in Dragon Age 2 at GamesCom.  Let's start with a bullet-point preview at GamePro:

The jump in graphical fidelity between Dragon Age: Origins and its sequel is pretty stunning. Whereas the first game was overshadowed by the visuals in Mass Effect 2 – Bioware's other major RPG that released a few months later –- Dragon Age 2 stands amongst the company's best work. Along with the more detailed characters, Bioware has infused the game with what Silverman calls “an ownable style.” The menus and characters are a bit less 'generic middle ages' than Origins, exuding a grittier look.

IGN has an enthusiastic article and manage to mention the PC version briefly:

In terms of the PC version, BioWare's leaving a lot of the user-interface the same, though they have added a quick command for stamina and health potions on the right side of the action bar. You can still pause the action with the space bar and issue commands to your team, but you should expect to see some changes to how you view fights. Although what we saw wasn't final, it looks like Bioware is developing a new camera for the PC version that's focused less on getting a bird's eye view and more on zooming in around the battlefield and enemy locations. It looks great so far, but expect to hear more about closer to the game's launch.

An "Interrogation Room" back-and-forth between two editors can be found at GameSpy:

Will Tuttle: See, while I think it's pretty obvious that the PC version was the real version of Origins, I don't feel like that's the case here. It's pretty clear that the development team wanted to emphasize the differences between the two versions a lot more this time out, so the console version feels like a completely different animal altogether. It really feels a lot more like a hack-and-slash action-RPG this time out, a fundamental shift that I'm all for -- especially since it means I'll be much more likely to play the game to completion. Dragon Age 2 looks like the game I wanted Dragon Age: Origins to be, and I have a feeling that it'll help to bring a lot of new fans to the table. I'm definitely looking forward to see what hardcore Dragon Age fans think about the changes, though, as I'm sure this game will have a few outspoken opponents.

An updated hands-on from GameSpot explains the narrative concept:

In short, what we saw at Comic-Con was an example of Varick exaggerating your heroic adventures. That combat-focused demo showed a fast-paced battle with Hawke going up against waves of Darkspawn and essentially making mincemeat of them. Playing as the human warrior class, we had numerous spells and abilities at our disposal and managed to tear through those enemies very quickly. We could practically hear the Darkspawn saying “Thank you sir, may I have another?” after a sword slash.

But fast-forward to the end of the demo, and you see Cassandra confront Varick, asking him if that’s how things really went. Varick flashes a coy smile and then offers to tell her the version of the story that--one would hope--more closely resembles the truth. You’re then sent back in time and forced to do that same battle over again, and the result is something that feels more akin to the combat in Dragon Age: Origins--albeit with a few noticeable differences.

Rock, Paper, Shotgun has a two-paragraph mention in the middle of a roundup of all the games they saw. It's interesting because it's the only article I've seen to take a different view of the new combat:

I was disappointed. Turns out it plays more like Fable, with that anime-style animation where your weapons is raised high above your shoulder in one frame, and then in the next it’s at the end of the blow, with a glowing light indicating where it passed through. More than that, 3rd person melee combat with no block or dodge button feels deeply wrong to me. As a warrior, you run up to enemies and hammer the attack button, popping off special abilities as and when they’re ready. I guess you could play an archer, or a mage. But still. Air through teeth.