Dragon Age 2 - Mike Laidlaw Interview

Dragon Age 2 Lead Designer Mike Laidlaw has been interviewed at Gamasutra, with partiular emphasis on "how the team arrived at the decision to change core elements of the game" and building the world:

You talked about the three main points that you wanted to address with Dragon Age II. You said "combat is a big one." People were scared to hear that you were mucking about with combat.

ML: Yup. I think so. It's not specifically just that we're changing combat. It's that the combat has become responsive and faster. I think that from a certain point of view that means ‑‑ to use internet parlance ‑‑ "OMG you are dumbs down like action game!"

And of course, RPGs, people are pretty protective of them. They liked elements of Origins that were very tactical, that were very methodical. So when they hear that now I can jump and attack guys, well, that must be! That is an action trope, therefore it must now be an action game.

That's not true, but I understand how you can make that jump there, because what it represents to me is people saying, "I really like that thing you did. Could you not take it away?" Which I love. I love that.

So for us, it became very careful to be, I guess, protective of the elements of Origins that did work really well, that resonated with the people that like the tactical gameplay, because controlling a party is increasingly rare.

To keep DA2 stuff in one place, there's also a Mage update a the BioWare site.