Dragon Age Origins
I spent this Thanksgiving break finishing Dragon Age Origins, and let it be known, I was not disappointed. Bioware has been the first company this generation to succeed in creating a modern RPG with a narrative that I couldn't leave alone. Other games have tried, but this is the only to succeed.
The leveling system for dragon age feels half-assed and boring.
The combat system in this game is fun enough, with an interesting concept of sustained abilities that have upkeep costs, that when running just hack a certain amount of energy right off the top, allowing one to have "sustained" bonuses, if you will. Outside of that it brings nothing new to the table. But it doesn't need to. The combat system is tight enough that one doesn't have to suffer through it to get to the story, it takes care of itself, while still allowing you to interact and not get bored.
The game's narrative shines so brightly, though, that none of the rest really matters. The attention to detail that Bioware has shown in creating their fictional world is refreshing and glorious. It is as immersive as any book I have read. The histories they have fabricated are slowly fed to you, in such a way that you get enough to hold you, while always wanting more. And to J's constant complaint, wondering why one would play an RPG rather than watch a similarly plotted movie, Bioware has shown that we are finally making progress on the RP part of RPGs. The thing that stuck out to me the most in this game was the choices one is forced to make. Dragon Age is constantly forcing you, the player, to make decisions that affect the entire story, most often existing with no right answer. Choosing the lesser of two evils becomes commonplace when trying to save the world, it seems.
I enjoyed this game thoroughly, and am currently fighting the urge to play it again and make some different choices this time around.
9 comments:
So.. did you get the golems?
Been talking with Alex Dayton.. and.. the whole Ozrimmar bit seems to highlight what you're getting at there. Especially if Dayton was right about the differences in going with Harromar over Princeypoo - Bheren? Belen?
I went with Harrowmont, and destroyed the anvil. It appears I got a less than stellar ending for the dwarves, at least from what I ascertained from the final story.
Also of note, I finished the game on Normal difficulty. I would say that if you are struggling, switch it to easy because frankly the narrative is too good to get frustrated with combat.
As I said to MA17 sometime this weekend, I was raised on the Dark Forces style of game-based decision making. Either you must kill a trainload of fetuses or you must feed a thousand starving kittens.
Ethical nuance and subtley have no place in RPGs.
That being said, I can appreciate that Dragon Age affords individuals a compelling story. Some people want that.
I want to college gear and level.
Also, the single player focus seems odd. That is a wealth of time to invest in a character which cannot do anything other than sit in a save file.
J.
You just called Dark Forces an RPG. And freudian slip'd your wants in a game
"College gear"?
wait.. Wait Wait Wait Wait.
Single Player Focus seems odd, and leads to sitting in save files.
This from the man who MONTHLY logged into bnet to keep his characters live, without playing, and invested in a second GBA, so he could cart Pokemons over from previous cartridges.
I KNOW THEE NOW, AND NAME THEE THUSLY! HYPOCRITE, SLINGER OF MUDS!
I think he meant KOTOR. We probably talked about that and how good and evil are binary choices that usually take the form of "help this dude out no matter the cost" and "burn him down and eat his family".
I'm not too far in with DA:O just yet but it is kind of fun to have to make the RP choices Kyle was talking about. A lot of games just tell you who your character is, and those that don't typically only let you pick where on the Jesus-Satan continuum he falls. DA:O appears to be a bit more complicated.
Of course, Fallout has had some good RP stuff going on. There were some shades-of-gray situations that needed some other answer besides selfishness or selflessness. However, the choices seemed to mostly affect reputation in local and overarching spheres (eg. people in Town X love you, bandits, in general, hate you). That does have a bearing on how exactly the game proceeds and concludes, but it felt as though the world at large was more or less set and all you could really control was how it reacted to you being in it.
I'm looking forward to seeing what DA:O is going to do with all of these little choices. Even if all it's doing is asking questions and ignoring my answers, the questions are pretty interesting, and I do enjoy trying to keep a character who both has some guiding principles but is also open to alternatives.
also, apparently you can log on to the interlog and show people your precious character build
if you need people to say 'good job of dressing your dwarf' to feel gout about yourself
yeah, i just can't get myself to register with bioware for that. if you want me to, i will, but it's just so meh to me.
It's the only way j can know that he is alive, though!
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