So... Dragon Age 2 is soon out, and my expectations are high. They remain high even after having tried the demo that, frankly, wasn't great. The changes to the core gameplay are huge, but I'm still hoping that it will turn out to be the fantastic game that it should be. I do hope it will not be another Command and Conquer 4 experience.I am, however, growing a bit tired of the constant stream of extra items that Bioware/EA are constantly throwing out to hype the game. In case you have missed it there are loads of extra in-game items to be had as rewards for jumping through various hoops. If you pre order you get special items, pre order very early (Bioware Signature Edition) and you get even more, play the Dragon Age Legends Facebook game and get a few, sign up for the Dragon Age 2 newsletter and get another one, sign up for the newsletter again (?!) to get one more, make sure that the demo reaches 1 million downloads to unlock two items and finish said demo to also unlock an item... phew... does it never stop?
The latest of these hoops is to "share" Dragon Age 2 posts on Facebook, and after a certain number of "shares" another item will be unlocked.
I can deal with a few in-game perks as incentive to preorder, or as part of a deluxe edition, that's pretty common and can be somewhat fun. But this is, in my opinion, just ridiculous. To unlock all those items feels more like work than anything else. I don't want to suddenly be an EA marketing employee and spam my friends' Facebook walls with commercial messages, I've already got a job, thank you very much. Either put the content in the game or don't, don't make us "earn it" by doing chores when we're already paying a hefty retail price for the game.
Ok, I'll calm down now... deep breaths... but it annoys me, it really does.
All the best
