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This review is based on my initial thoughts after 50 hours of gameplay. I am only 12% of the way through the main story line and am blown away by the magnitude of content in Dragon Age. I will skip the description of the game and describe the top three things I love about the game. My single best feature of the game is the combat system. Using a pause feature, you can easily move from player to player customizing your attacks. This proves handy when dealing with large number of bad guys (and demon gals). The quick bar at the bottom of the screen allows for access to all spells, skills, potions, you need on the fly. Wanna pause and whip up a couple of quick healing potions? Just do it! You have three player classes to choose from with loads of specializations, skills, and talents that make this game get ridiculously cool after awhile. The second best feature of the game is the decision engine (at least that's what I call it) allowing for different story lines and enhanced relationships between you and your ever growing pool of friends. I said the wrong thing to one of the females in my group and it cost me dearly. It took several gifts I found laying around to raise her approval level back up to normal. Evidently, if they disapprove of you too much they leave your team. The final thing I appreciate about Dragon Age is its adherence to a traditional RPG structure. There aren't any crazy innovative ideas in plot or design and I like that. You have one plot line that you work toward but have hundreds of quests that you can also choose to complete. I finally had to quit going off on these quests as I completely forgot there was a main plot to complete. Of course, these quests are great ways to build your money for the purchase of those big ticket items you may need later on. If you want a game that will cause you to look up at the clock after an hour or two of gameplay and realize that it is actually 5:00 am in the morning then this is definitely your game.Read full review
Big thumbs-up for the graphics, plotting, and NPC character development. Equal thumbs down for playability: utterly inadequate manual, unexplained cryptic notation describing (NOT!) properties of armor, weapons, etc. Controls do not work (e.g., number pad / does NOT shift from running to walking, so characters always run). No way to speed through interminable cutscenes. Cannot save during or even just before combat, which often follows immediately upon cutscenes, so if you have to reload, you have to sit first through the cutscene yet again. Inadequate healing resources for PCs and NPCs, even if you have spellcasters. I personally am going back to Neverwinter Nights Community Expansion Project games until BioWare comes out with one or a dozen patches or, perhaps, until someone develops a reliable way of accessing the developer console (the current Internet instructions--like the numpad / -- do not work on all operating systems) so I can correct the flaws myself. All in all, I consider this BioWare's equivalent of Microsoft's VISTA. Great idea, wonderful eye-candy, cutting edge features, flawed to the point of marginal useability.Read full review
Pros: Endless content. Choices of good/evil are completely intuitive and have real consequences. Great character design and customization of spells/abilities. Spectacular graphics. Driven story and interesting character quests/backgrounds. Movie quality voice acting and cinematics. Expansion to be released in spring. Tons and tons of user mods available online for ultimate customization. Tactics system gives you full control over your NPC teammates; Set conditions like "If X occurs, use Y ability." Better than any AI, as it is doing specifically what you want it to do. Cons: Game may need to be restarted every few hours to prevent load screens from taking several minutes(PC Version). Looting can be slow sometimes. But there is a mod for Auto-Looting available online; A must have. Overall: Excellent game, well worth buying. Likely to win MANY awards including RPG of the Year, and potentially, Game of the Year. 10/10.Read full review
Bioware has done it again with this game. In the spirit of the Baldur's Gate series, the games features a high fantasy adventure of sword and sorcery that can span dozens of hours of play that never seem to get old or boring. What drives the enjoyability of this title is first and foremost the awesome story telling and voice acting. It is one of those few games that will draw you into the universe in which it takes place, and forces you to identify with characters you meet and fight along side of, as you progress. The game play featured is also top notch with an easy to manage pause and order system that allows you to strategically fight the many battles you will encounter in your travels across the world of Ferelden. You can either try and play in "realtime" by quickly choosing talents while you fight, or use the pause and plan way. I found it almost impossible to manage a fight effectively without pausing now and again to switch party member orders and spells. Others who are quicker on their feet might find they can negotiate battles a bit faster without having to pause now and again. Along with the battle system, you can also give your party members a bit of AI, by setting up what are called combat tactics orders. Anything from attack nearest enemy to more detailed commands that stack on one another. This really helps in those longer bigger fights. Character creation and customization are also wide ranging and fun. You can play anything from a rough and tumble dwarf warrior, a sly human rogue, or an explosively powerful elven mage. I have played thru a number of different classes so far, and they are all enjoyable in their unique ways.(My favorite character is actually a Golem you find on your travels named Shale, who is unlockable with an extra download) As you progress in the game you are also able to unlock talent specializations. These will further empower your characters with added abilities and traits. For example, as a warrior you can become a beserker, or as a mage, a spirit healer. Another thing that keeps this game interesting and adds to replay, is that the story is not linear. There are many paths one can take to get to the end credits. Main characters/party members can be killed off if you so choose, and as an added note you can increase/decrease your standing with playable characters with your actions and gifts. If you make them happy they get bonuses that can greatly increase their stats and powers. Lastly. The artistic design and world construction is also very well done. There are wide variety of landscapes/environments you traverse as you make your way through the game. Each dungeon area and battlefield has it's own unique feel, aswell as having enough different enemies therein to ensure fun engagements. If I have to give this game a rating. It would be a 10/10. Buy it, and get lost in a wonderful world of sword and sorcery.Read full review
I bought this as a gift for a friend after becoming obsessed with it on the PS3. Actually it wasn't so much a "gift" as "I AM BUYING THIS GAME FOR YOU AND YOU WILL PLAY IT AND LOVE IT SO THERE." Of course, I didn't need to coerce him for long; he got sucked in almost as quickly as I did and now we babble about it to each other all the time. See? You don't have to lose your friends to a video game! Just get them to play it! Seriously, though, this game is engrossing to near-dangerous levels. Not only are the story and the gameplay both interesting and challenging, but the real genius of the game is in the "choose your own adventure" aspect of it, which starts right from the beginning when you select a new game and choose your playable character's race, gender, class and fighting style. Of course, many RPGs have this feature, but usually once you make these choices for yourself you're plunged into the exact same story and the only difference your choices make are in the types of weapons or armor you can equip and the types of attacks or spells you can perform. In Dragon Age: Origins, each character type has its own unique "origin story", starting in completely different parts of the world and under completely different circumstances, which each character has to complete before everyone converges at the same plot point and the main story takes off. By this time, however, you as a player have gotten to know and identify with your character, his or her race, culture and background, and his or her emerging "personality", so that by the time you reach the first common story point, your path is already uniquely set. The choices you make in your origin story, and through the rest of the game, can and will make enormous differences in your success or failure at certain tasks, your dealings with key characters in the game including members of your party, even the final outcome of the game. Very few things in Dragon Age: Origins are set in stone and there are rarely any clear-cut "right" or "wrong" choices. That's one of the things that keep the game discussions between me and my friend so lively; he and I have had markedly different (but equally enjoyable) playing experiences so far, and while we like to compare notes on similar things that happened, we also like to hear what the other one has done, seen or heard that was nothing like what we experienced. It's truly a wonderful achievement on Bioware's part and I can only imagine the amount of work that went into this game, not only for the technical side of things but just the amount of voice acting that had to be recorded for all the possible responses to all the different types of characters in all sets of circumstances! Anyway, as for this PC version, it's supposed to be the best of the 3 available platforms but I'm glad I didn't buy it for myself, as the video card on my own PC is not powerful enough to handle the graphics. It works fine on my friend's laptop, though, and as I said he's having a blast with it. So check the specs on the game and your machine and if you can't buy it for the PC, get the PS3 version. Just get it, full stop. But then buy your best friend a copy too.Read full review
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