| 18 November 2009
Title: Dragon Age: Origins
Developer: BioWare
Publisher: Electronic Arts
Platform: Xbox 360, PlayStation 3 & Windows PC
Rating: Mature
Release Date: Nov. 3, 2009
Introduction
I had very high expectations for this game, and I'm slightly disappointed with the final product. I loved Mass Effect, Oblivion, and Fallout 3, so I couldn't wait to dive in here. There are some very annoying UI bugs and its overall light on the zones and exploration. But overall, the story is engrossing, the graphics are solid, and there's a lot of replay value here, if nothing else then to explore the other character paths. There was some sense of satisfaction on my first play-through, but I don't like the overall philosophy and presentation of this game.
Graphics
Very nice atmospheric lighting and the village/city designs were excellent. Irritating clipping and texture errors on the world map (the Blight suddenly became blocky and the layers didn't mesh). Some levels and set pieces were nicely-done, albeit a little repetitive, like The Deep Roads and The Trenches. For such a large amount of character customization, the facial animations of your avatar are nonexistent. It wouldn't have been a problem, but the in-game cinematics insisted on numerous close-ups for emotional effect. Not a smile, a tear, or a fit of joy even when a High Dragon wants you for a tasty snack. You also get some nice "300" movie moments upon killing elite and boss enemies. They get repetitive after you see it about five times, though.
Story
Excellent script for the voice acting. Excellent character introductions and back stories, and I really enjoyed the side conversations and "approval" system. The Mass Effect-like "Codex" lore portion didn't entice me one bit, as it did in Mass Effect.
Sound
Excellent voice acting. Not a single annoying character voice and very clear, clean, and deep dialogue. The music was a bit over-the-top, cliché solo-girl-sing-chanting, but it picks up nicely during the larger boss fights. The music is forgettable. There isn't a unique theme like Mass Effect's signature keyboard/electronic space minimalism, or Oblivion's dreamy, ethereal orchestral score.
Gameplay
Combat – Spell-casting and melee combat is relatively simple across the three classes (warrior, mage, rogue). Rogues have to awkwardly slip behind their enemies for bonus damage, and sometimes you pray the pathing is good, or you will clip and loop the character animation and will waste time. You are going to pause so you can heal and strategize on the Normal and harder difficulties.
AI - Your party members automatically fight with you, and follow custom/preset AI-script functions. Very well done, and you can purchase more slots through leveling up. Nothing says awesome like being able to tell your tank-bot to auto-taunt an enemy off your character.
User Interface - I had the most irritations here. The biggest issue was simply keeping track of your items. If you receive an item upon quest completion, you're not told the name of it. While you hunt in your inventory, you notice a "New Item" yellow square around the item icon. But when you're scrolling up or down hunting for it, you cursor over new items, never giving any indication it was new. This could’ve been easily solved by placing a "New Item" tab in the UI. Keeping track of all the readable documents in your travels was a living nightmare. The game will place them in your Codex in three different spots, and in your inventory in 3 other slots. It makes reading some note you looted off a mob a real challenge and time-sink. While the game attempts to help you by automatically bringing up to the latest Codex entry, you're out of luck if you already proceeded to the next shiny-look-at-me item. If you don't religiously keep up on them, you will become lost in all the new entries. It was frustrating to figure out where and when you could switch your party members to get them some action, spend their level-up points, or to engage in their side-quests. Sometimes you can do it in a certain sector of a large city. Sometimes you can't. It doesn't feel consistent.
Final Thoughts
Now I am doing a lot of assuming here, so take this with a grain of salt. I feel somewhat slighted. There could have been so much more to this title upon release. There are only 5-6 unique zones to explore, and some are very empty and barren, IE trekking inside the final level's fort. The world map is empty of levels to explore, and the game world feels about 20% the size of Fallout 3 or Oblivion. It feels like development was spent mostly in telling the 6 possible character backstories. The presentation at times felt artificial, hokey, and just plain uninspired. It's a shame the UI felt rushed, like a dummied-down PC port not optimized for the 360. I had hoped for more epic weapons (Hell, even a dwarf-like reforging quest), more items in general, more enemy and boss designs, more zones to explore, less backtracking, and a less-punishing, more user-friendly UI. There seemed to be extra "clutter" that I never ended up using. I hardly used any of the extra skills, like Herbalism, Trap-Making, etc. I hope that changes on my next playthrough.
I fear this game will become an investment and money-sink with downloadable content. While I'm not necessarily against this (I have all the Fallout 3 expansions), I was hoping for a few months worth of content before having to shell out another $25 on XBL just to get a few new dungeons. I wish it was just built into the original game. Right now, it feels like I paid $60.00 for an unfinished game world that I can't fully explore without downloading poorly-timed add-on content. I wish EA/BioWare would have shifted their focus to more dungeons and exploration for loot, more meaningful lore, as it just doesn't feel finished, ready, and quality. There's too much un-used and unrealized-to-its-full-potential material, and not enough basic RPG concepts, a la unique loot, unique bosses, and numerous, unique levels. I had some fun though, and am looking forward to a sequel.
Rent this for a few nights, then decide
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