Thursday 26 July 2012

Dragon Age Origins & Dragon Age II

Part I












Dragon Age Origins (2009) and Dragon Age 2 (2011) are perfectly well produced games by Bioware. Before I further analyse them according to my likings though, I may have to tell you all that I played Dragon Age 2 before I went for Origins so I favour Dragon Age 2. But I will come to that later on in Part 2.



 Let us begin with Dragon Age Origins (I added the trailer above as well). It was announced in 2004 and was  released in 2009. That's 5 years of developing showing itself in the product. From the story development to the music Dragon Age Origins displays the highest qualities of hard work. The outcomes of the choices you can make vary so much that you may have to go through with at least 4-5 playthroughs on each race to explore every single one of them. The map navigation is unusual when compared to the games like Oblivion or Skyrim but getting used to it should be no problem.

 The companions are so real that you run high risks of getting too involved in the story. If you check the Bioware Forums you will see people with crushes on specific companions, fans and even fan made stories and artworks of them. Many, fervently support those fictional game characters as if they were a real life persona and I suppose this is a testament to how real they seem as you play


The game does involve a score of video cuts. I believe it was the first step into video cuts in Dragon Age 2. Something I fell in love with as I played. But those video cuts in the Origins never involve speeches of your own character as he/she is unvoiced by a voice actor. The format of interaction with the companions and npcs are like in the old games, you get a choice of options at the bottom of the screen as you watch the reactions and replies of the rest of the world (I think you can see it on the picture on the left as well). This of course has got its advantages and disadvantages but I will discuss them further later on as I comment on Dragon Age 2.

The soundtrack is excellent. The tracks were composed by Inon Zur and performed by the Northwest Sinfonia.  Dragon Age Origins also won the award for "Outstanding Music Supervision" at the Hollywood Music in Media Awards. There are two songs in this soundtrack that I actually uploaded to my mp3 player and love listening to them outside the game. Those songs would be: Lelianna's Song and Love Song both sung by Aubrey Ashburn.

However...
The technology is old enough. The character movements during the fights look and feel like in slow motion (dont be surprised if you keep saying: "Strike already!" in a fight) And lets face it, the graphics look old and it aint a pretty looking game. As a matter of fact I find it unclear; even blurry at times. I have to add here that I played the game mostly for the plot and not for the fights. In my third play through I downloaded a mod which enabled me to skip the fights and it was a nice breather. I knew exactly where to go by then and who to fight, I had done it twice already and by that time all I wanted was to explore the different outcomes of various choices and the stories of different races.

But the worst is the character creation and not because it lacks choices. The problem with the character creation is that you can play with it for almost an hour, make a character which looks good on the creation screen and then you log into the game. It takes quite some time till you get a close up on the character you created and then the shock follows because it looks almost nothing like what you have made. Character creation without mods is simply a nightmare in Origins...

But that's the thing, there is an endless choice of modding in Origins. From extended scenes to video epilogues from extra dialogues to even extra companions; not to mention the extra armours, weapons, graphic and character creation enhancements. I am going to level with you all and go out on a limb here and say: If it was not for so many mods I do not believe I would have played Origins more than twice (as I did in Skyrim). But the mods enrich your gaming so much that you go for many more rounds. Here is a link you can visit if you wish to mod your Dragon Age Games: Dragon Age Nexus Mods. If you'd like to ask which mods I liked the most I will be happy to help you out with them all.

There are a lot of expansions to Dragon Age Origins. Some of those are embedded into the story and one is a stand alone expansion: The Awakening. I played all the expansions on my 1st play through and in second one I only went for the Awakening. Third and Forth times I never even touched them so in my opinion they are less intricate and more sloppy than the original game. However they do offer the closure you need on many occasions. 

So, Dragon Age Origins is a game which would easily lure you in and chain you to your computer desk for many weeks and maybe even a few months. Although the graphics are old you will find yourself wanting to play it again after some time just for the sake of the story, well made characters and moving scenes. Before I purchased the soundtrack I even used to load some saves just to hear some of the music.

But sometimes new indeed is better...

To be continued on Part 2, stay tuned for Dragon Age 2 in comparison to Dragon Age Origins.

6 comments:

  1. Very nice presentation Tinny. I did not know you've played it so many times :) My copy is still wrapped waiting for me to play it. I have it on ps3 so no mods for me. I'm sure fights will be more frustrating since I will use a controller and not mouse/keyboard but that's ok. I would like a game with compelling story so when I get back from vacations I will probably start playing it.
    Have you played Kingdoms of Amalur or Dragon's Dogma? I'm not sure they are released for PC though.
    Are you interested in non-fantasy RPG? If yes, I would definitely recommend Deus X: Human Revolution for its great story and the fantastic gameplay.

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    1. Thanks Filaraki :) Yeah I did play it so many times but mainly because I wanted to transfer my Origins files to DA2 in order to see what footage I get. I really have no idea how they managed to enable skills on consoles in this game because the format of battle is pretty much classic online game click-on-skill system. It would have been nice to see how it works on the consoles.

      As for Kingdoms of Amalur and Dragon's Dogma, I have never heard of them before but hey thanks for the heads up. I will definitely check them out on the net and find out if there are any PC versions :)

      The only non-fantasy RPG I have played to my recollection would be Resident Evil 4 on PS2. And boy was it an excellent game! :) I have been recommended to try ME3 by bioware but havent gotten to it as yet. Deus X: Human you say...hmmm *mental note to self* Should check that one out as well :)

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  2. OOOh, a very nice introduction to the game sis, well said :))

    My first memory of playing RPG games on a computer was a game called The Secret of Mana on the Super Nintendo console. It received massive acclaim at the time of it's release (in 1993), and is still considered by many as the forefather to many modern day RPG games. It utilised real time battles and allowed for co-op multiplayer where the other players could join or leave the game at anypoint rather than at specific points. Also, it was one of the first games to use a ring command menu system, something which is still used today in mant games.

    Anyways, this hooked me on RPG games, and after that I played many more, mainly in pc format, including the original Deus X game.

    On your reccomendation I purchased the Dragon Age series and like you, I started with DA2, and I have to admit, I got addicted very quickly :P. But I will save comments about that game until you have added part 2 of your post.

    What struck me about this game was the storyline, though I agree that after playing it a couple of times it is good to make use of mods to shorten the fights (they do get tedious at times). And the varity of choices you can make throughout that will subtly change the outcome are all credit to the amazing job the developers did on the storyline. My favourite mod for this game has to be the Alistar Wedding ending, which is so nice to watch over and over again, and my favourite character is of course Alistar :)) He is so clumsy, yet so endearing and was perfectly voiced by the British actor Steve Valentine. Though Morrigan comes in a very close second :P

    Of course, it does have it's flaws, the older looking rough graphics, the failed character creation as already mentioned and personally speaking, I feel there are too many companions to chose from. I found myself leaving the same characters behind constantly as I just had no use for them, and didn't have to heart to tell them to leave :P

    All in all, a great game which I am sure I will revisit again some time :D

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    1. Oh yes sure I forgot to mention that. Fewer companions on DA2 certainly did the trick but as you said too we will discuss it further when I add the part II :) That will be such a fun article to write :D

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  3. Tinny if you decide to enter the marvellous world of Mass Effect do yourself a favour and play the 3 games in order. Otherwise, you will miss tons of lore and you will probably not be connected to the characters much, which is a shame. What is very important is that you can import your character from one game to the other so all decisions you have made carry on to the next installment.
    Unfortunately, I have not played Mass Effect and I began with the second part which was released on ps3. I'm expecting a price drop in order to buy ME3 which it will probably be done in Christmas.

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    1. I have read a lot on ME3 on Bioware forums and the fans are very dissatisfied. But then again they are dissatisfied with DA2 as well so I think it is wise that you form your own opinion after you have acquired and played ME3. I hear nothing but the highest praises on the first two games though :) So yeah thats the reason why I am not purchasing ME3 right away. I want to begin from the scratch and play them in sequels :)

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