BioWare Apologizes For Dragon Age II. Announces Dragon Age III. (April Fools Joke)

The release of Dragon Age II caused much controversy amongst BioWare fans this year, casting doubt on the future of the series and on the company as a whole. For some players, the repetitive dungeons, the lackluster level design, the lack of structure, the lack of choice, being unable to equip your party members, the removal of origins, the lack of exploration, the lack of character depth, the extensive list of Day One DLC, the disconnect from Dragon Age: Origins, the pointless and ridiculous sidequests, being forced to play as a human, the glitches, the accidental removal of auto-attack for consoles, the minimizing the content, being unable to talk to your party members for most of the game, and the general trend toward zazz over depth, spelled doom to those who had waited to get their hands on the sequel to BioWare's hit RPG.

A company that most believed could do no wrong (myself included), suddenly found themselves pissing off a great many of their fans and consumers.

In an interview with Gamespot, DA2's Lead Designer, Mike Laidlaw, defended the changes to the game, which were made in order to click with an audience that, in his mind, has almost certainly been on the fence about medieval/fantasy/tactical RPGs:

"We wanted to make RPGs, especially fantasy RPGs, accessible, cool, and interesting to people who have been playing RPGs for the last seven years and not realizing that every time they ate food or went for a long run in Grand Theft Auto San Andreas, they were essentially grinding constitution.

To me, that represents a huge audience that may have disregarded RPGs, especially fantasy, as being too hardcore or too confusing."

Perhaps remembering that BioWare already shares a market with the Fable series, World of Warcraft, and their own Mass Effect series, the most accessible RPGs known to humankind, the company has retracted their previous statements, and have extended an olive branch to their dedicated legion of fans:

"We wanted to take this opportunity to thank our many supporters for the veritable mountain of feedback that we've received for Dragon Age II. This title represented an opportunity for BioWare to both experiment and expand in different directions. We didn't want to repeat ourselves; we didn't want to make DA: Origins twice, but we also do not want to disappoint our fans twice.

So, it is my pleasure to announce the production of Dragon Age III. With this sequel, we want to prove that we've heard our fans loud and clear, and that we'll be making a game that will satisfy all of the criticism that's been leveled against us."

The BioWare representative went on to outline the changes that would be made for the much anticipated third entry:

"One of the big things that fans complained about, and reasonably so, was the dungeon that we reused for most of the game. We really didn't think that people would notice , but it just goes to show how perceptive our fans can be. For DA3, we will be solving this problem by removing ALL dungeons and anything that resembles an enclosed area and/or tunnel. We believe this will satisfy any who found dungeon-crawling too tiresome and repetitive in DA2.

Another factor that many took umbrage to was the lack of exploration and depth. We're pleased to say that this, too, has been remedied. In Dragon Age III, you will be able to go anywhere you want.

As long as that anywhere is in Kirkwall. Through your feedback, we determined that the reason most of you were itching to get out of Kirkwall and explore the lands we've put nearly a decade into developing was because the city itself wasn't interesting enough. Dragon Age III will have Hawke, this time with the fixed name "Ethan," returning to Kirkwall just as a catastrophic malfunction forces all of the city's gates to be closed and locked. From there, Hawke will spend the next fifty years exploring the new and improved Kirkwall.

Thanks to an improved engine, and three days' worth of strenuous effort, the city of Kirkwall is more alive than it's ever been. As you can see in this first screenshot, the end result in DA2 was less than perfect. One crowd and bland colors in a city that's supposed to be a city-state with hundreds of years of history to its name?:

We have recognized the folly in this. The city-state of Kirkwall in Dragon Age 3 will be exactly DOUBLE the size of its last iteration, allowing players large instances of roaming with unparalleled freedom:

Amazing! A spectacle of graphical wizardry, if I do say so myself.

Spells and attacks will be mapped to one button. That pesky dialogue wheel and those boring interactive choices will be removed in favor of a "respond" option (which will also be mapped to the same button). Mages, warriors, and rogues will be removed from the game and replaced with a singular, versatile class: the "Lumberjack." Companions will all be replaced by a set of medieval supermodels, male and female, with chiseled abs and large breasts respectively (we were leaning in this direction, anyway). And there will be one boss, one ending, and, also, the game mostly plays itself.

We feel these changes will appeal to all of you, especially to our target demographic: the Grand Theft Auto and Call of Duty demographic. The first piece of DLC for Dragon Age III - which includes a companion with more than FIVE lines of dialogue - will be released May 25, 2011, followed closely by the actual game itself on June 25, 2011.

Thank you for your continued support."