Quote Originally Posted by Vivi22 View Post
I still stand by my assertion though that anyone criticizing Bethesda's writing while praising Bioware's might as well be an alien to me. The Bioware games I've played were at best competently written versions of pretty mediocre stories and characters. So if I was going to give credit to one of them for their writing, at least Bethesda has the ability to write some decent lore and world build.
For me, decent lore and world building should be married with rich character development. Without one or the other, the game becomes jarring with story-telling.

A game with fantastic world-building but questionable character development becomes somewhat hollow; a great world, but relatively empty with dialogue or development. On the other hand, fantastic character development with a poor world-building leaves you with stringing together a series of moments, without much of a big picture.

Dragon Age, for me, combines both well. There's a great lore in the world, some of it cliché, but for the most part even the clichéd elements are well written with plenty of mystery. The characters are great, fleshed out, and there's several moments of humour.

Mass Effect has these as well, but I've always felt more connected to the world of Thedas.