Objectively, Dragon Age and the Witcher are both superior to the Legend of Zelda in terms of writing. Zelda is ultimately a pretty basic story with a standard plot but some clever ideas thrown in. I myself prefer the Witcher's setting to Dragon Age's (and actually, Zelda's setting is probably the only writing aspect of the series that could compare to or surpass the others, but it has had far more time to develop its setting), but Dragon Age has better characters (I'm not far through 2 though).
In terms of gameplay Zelda easily beats both though. Dragon Age is a fairly standard tactical RPG, and the first Witcher frankly had sort of ass gameplay. 2 is better, but still doesn't match up to the real-time action and exploration Zelda provides.
All three are good series, so it really depends on what you're looking for in a game. I like them all just fine. I will say that Majora's Mask and Wind Waker are two games I probably like more than any Witcher or Dragon Age game.
From a pure series point of view, The Witcher wins everything. The source material for it is a pretty good series of fantasy books that's actually fairly popular.
Dragon Age comes second. Bioware are among the best worldbuilder in the western videogame industry, and Dragon Age shows that. It sets up very interesting situations, and throws its own spin into the otherwise Tolkienian fantasy. That said, the games suffer the fact that the plot has little to no cohesion.
LoZ is the worst in terms of both writing and storytelling. It's very basic, doesn't try to be genre savvy too often, and instead focuses on gameplay. The storyline focuses on some themes in Tolkien's work, but they are ultimately to superflous to my liking.
As for my favourite series among them, it's Dragon Age all the way. RPGs like that have always been my favourite game genre.
Originally posted by trexalfaBased on Witcher 2 the lore is pretty awesome but pales in comparison to the scale of the Dragon Age universe.
From a pure series point of view, The Witcher wins everything. The source material for it is a pretty good series of fantasy books that's actually fairly popular.Dragon Age comes second. Bioware are among the best worldbuilder in the western videogame industry, and Dragon Age shows that. It sets up very interesting situations, and throws its own spin into the otherwise Tolkienian fantasy. That said, the games suffer the fact that the plot has little to no cohesion.
LoZ is the worst in terms of both writing and storytelling. It's very basic, doesn't try to be genre savvy too often, and instead focuses on gameplay. The storyline focuses on some themes in Tolkien's work, but they are ultimately to superflous to my liking.
As for my favourite series among them, it's Dragon Age all the way. RPGs like that have always been my favourite game genre.
The world is much more detailed with a far more in depth history than Witcher 2 anyways.
Zelda is pretty basic but some people really love this shit so I figured I'd toss in this average series.
I never played The Witcher or finished a Dragon Age game (never had time, unfortunately), but I feel I can safely attest to most of what NemeBro had to say about them. I feel like his/her mention of "clever ideas" in regards to Zelda's writing was more or less a reference to its "deeper" story/lore elements. With that in mind, I think everything s/he said was pretty much solid.
These are all terrible franchises to compare btw. They're pretty damn different tonally and in genre. They may all be fantasy but Zelda is light and kiddy, Dragon Age tries to be darker but it's really pretty stock High Fantasy and the Witcher is actually legitimately dark, realistic and hardcore medieval bollocks. Which you find more appealing is a matter of personal taste, though I maintain that it's Witcher>DA>Zelda in terms of quality.
But that's just my opinion. Because I find the more mature tone and writing to be a mark of superior quality. Others would disagree.
Originally posted by Nephthys
But that's just my opinion. Because I find the more mature tone and writing to be a mark of superior quality. Others would disagree.
I would disagree only with the premise that "maturity" alone is the inherent component of quality. I mean, we might otherwise be kidding ourselves with the idea that Twisted Metal is better written than the Avatar series. That said, I don't take you for the type to think in such shallow terms, so I see where you come from. (I would hope as much, anyways.)
Oh, and...
Originally posted by FinalAnswer
Go play Majora's Mask
👆👆
Originally posted by NemeBro
Objectively, Dragon Age and the Witcher are both superior to the Legend of Zelda in terms of writing. Zelda is ultimately a pretty basic story with a standard plot but some clever ideas thrown in. I myself prefer the Witcher's setting to Dragon Age's (and actually, Zelda's setting is probably the only writing aspect of the series that could compare to or surpass the others, but it has had far more time to develop its setting), but Dragon Age has better characters (I'm not far through 2 though).In terms of gameplay Zelda easily beats both though. Dragon Age is a fairly standard tactical RPG, and the first Witcher frankly had sort of ass gameplay. 2 is better, but still doesn't match up to the real-time action and exploration Zelda provides.
All three are good series, so it really depends on what you're looking for in a game. I like them all just fine. I will say that Majora's Mask and Wind Waker are two games I probably like more than any Witcher or Dragon Age game.
Agreed.
IMO, these games aren't really comparable to each other. Skyrim's probably a closer comparison to Zelda (Hell, it even has a stupid water puzzle.)
Haven't played Witcher yet. But Dragon Age and Zelda have the good points and bad points. I would have to say thought that Zelda's bad points are kinda irrelevant to the experience. A lot more writing went in Dragon Age and actually being able to pursue love interests is a major plus. But the act of moving around and talking to people seemed kinda unnatural and when I wanted to go explore over there for the **** of it I felt like the game just got tedious and boring. But story wise its hard to flaw it.
The Zelda games are just a beast and is more mentally engaging then most aspects of Dragon Age. Its still one of the true problem solving adventure games and personally I just like the intelligence and thought put into the transition of the games. The story just flowed organically I supposed while Dragon Age was more mechanical.
Also the intellectual complexity put into the setting/story of Majora's Mask out shines any Dragon Age I've played.
P.S. I didn't want to be a Grey Warden... :'(
Originally posted by Dramatic Gecko
Haven't played Witcher yet. But Dragon Age and Zelda have the good points and bad points. I would have to say thought that Zelda's bad points are kinda irrelevant to the experience. A lot more writing went in Dragon Age and actually being able to pursue love interests is a major plus. But the act of moving around and talking to people seemed kinda unnatural and when I wanted to go explore over there for the **** of it I felt like the game just got tedious and boring. But story wise its hard to flaw it.The Zelda games are just a beast and is more mentally engaging then most aspects of Dragon Age. Its still one of the true problem solving adventure games and personally I just like the intelligence and thought put into the transition of the games. The story just flowed organically I supposed while Dragon Age was more mechanical.
Also the intellectual complexity put into the setting/story of Majora's Mask out shines any Dragon Age I've played.
P.S. I didn't want to be a Grey Warden... :'(
F**k. Now I wished I had played more of each game so I could have the working knowledge to provide similarly concise comparative input. I feel half f**king stupid right now. 🙁
Originally posted by Dramatic Gecko
The biggest problem I had with the plot was that they didn't let me stay in the forest. The game just booted me out and made me a grey Warden. You think with so much "supposed freedom" I could stay in the forest like happy elf hippy and hump the trees till I'm bored. But no lets go kill a dragon.
BioWare games are never free. They take pride in that. That being said, I encourage you to give DA😮 another shot because after all the introduction stuff, the game is amazing.
You aren't free to do what you want but this is the best BioWare has to offer and you can tackle a storyline literally in dozens of truly, truly different ways. DA2 sucked and DA3 was nothing special.
For the others, I barely played Witcher and while the gameplan is great I just couldn't get into it. I'm sure it's quality and better than DA2 but I don't see myself playing it soon.
Zelda is unfair to lump in since it's glory days and it's impact on gaming were way before the time of either DA or the Witcher. The other tow are PC RPGs and the freedom on developing it is unfair compared to Nintendo consoles. I'm not knowledgeable on the lore of Zelda but it must be pretty in depth to have years and years of canon debates about the timeline. Regardless, Zelda should be left to its own thing.
As for Witcher or DA, DA takes it but that's only because DA😮 was one of the best RPGs imo.
Originally posted by ares834How ****ing dare you.
For me it is Zelda > Witcher > Dragon Age.I’ve said it several time before but I’m just not a big fan of the DA games. The world and story are rather standard and pedestrian fantasy fare nor is the gameplay good enough to make up for the rather lackluster plot.