Beamer wrote on Mar 20, 2012, 15:35:

SXO wrote on Mar 20, 2012, 15:33:

Beamer wrote on Mar 20, 2012, 14:06:

Yakubs wrote on Mar 20, 2012, 11:44:

Acleacius wrote on Mar 20, 2012, 11:32:
Probably too much to hope for but let's hope this means they are pulling their head out of their nether region.

I doubt there's anyone left at BioWare with any talent. Talent is not compatible with a marketing- and focus-group- driven approach.

Much of the DA2 team is from the DA team, right down to the lead designer.

I'll never get the blame on marketing here. These companies don't have enough marketing intelligence and skill to make calls like this. It's the developers and designers that are making these choices.

Same lead designer, eh? Sorry Charlie, but that's is just plain false. The lead designer for DA:O was Brent Knowles who was also lead designer for NWN, who decided to leave Bioware soon after DA launched because he didn't like the direction the company wanted to in with DA2. This is from his owns words mind you, he has a blog online you can read. Mike Laidlaw was the lead designer for DA2, and he's the one known for famously saying he didn't want to target RPG players exclusively, hence the changes in DA2.

I was on Brent's blog prior to posting this.
Mike Laidlaw is also listed as lead designer. There were 3. One now writes fiction. One made the most recent TRON game. And one made DA2.

3 lead designers. Brent was just 1.