Dragon Age: Origins Review
Note: The following review discusses gameplay and general user interface. No story spoilers have been included.
Bioware’s new Dragon Age: Origins CRPG arrived in the mail on Wednesday. Confused marketing prior to the release had me wondering whether to buy it. I don’t understand why Bioware insists on using their concept art to market their titles. The art is always dark and murky, a little pulp, and never reflects the actual mood of the story. But my problem was neatly solved when my brother got it for me for my birthday. Thus far, I’m about 54% percent of the way through the game, and quite a bit below the 100 hours of game play promised - I’m only at about 30 hrs recorded thus far.
Unlike Mass Effect, the mechanics of the game UI seem to be geared more heavily for PC users rather than console play. Drilling down into the action menus is unintuitive and time consuming - on the Xbox, you have to hold down the left shoulder trigger religiously to get anywhere, and a slight slip of the finger in battle means that you’re suddenly exposed, or have to struggle to get back to the menu item again, costing you real time and taking up valuable play time.
The much-touted Eclipse engine seems dated and handicapped next to comparable contemporaries. (It does allow for significant end-user development, but as I am not much of a modder, I haven't heard about how well it works in this regard.) Having played other action adventure games like Lionhead’s Fable 2 and Bethesda’s Fallout 3, I have to say, the movement and action controls on Dragon Age: Origins are clunky and overloaded. Fighting is ridiculously difficult in real-time and the transparent overlapping menus have way too many options for battle. The in-game event notices - a huge banner with swirly blood that pops up every time some quest is updated - are badly proportioned and difficult to see on my 32" flatscreen from any distance farther than 2 feet away. There are no multi-camera angle controls (annoying!), no jumping, no swimming, no looting, and no at-will wanton killing. (To the last complaint I say, "so much for being the spiritual successor to Baldur's Gate!")
The Dragon Age: Origins name comes from the conceit that the game boasts six different customizable origin stories for the player, based on the variables of race and gender. In terms of game story customization, this is an interesting move towards greater replayability and player-character engagement, and I predict that we will see greater variety and development on this front in future games. Story-wise, however, I am not impressed. There have been no surprising twists (given the advertising, I expected more hard decisions and betrayals), and the characters lack the hook of previous Bioware fare. (How I missed Minsc and his miniature giant space hamster, Boo!) The game’s target audience is, admittedly, in the 17-22 year old range, so perhaps the absence of real emotional "hardness" isn't surprising. Although the naivete and lack of dramatic pathos in the plotline seems to suggest even younger crowd; belying the “M” for mature audience rating.
Overall, I find this a step back from the game play and story development exhibited in Bioware’s previous release, Mass Effect. But for Baldur’s Gate and Neverwinter Nights nostalgia, it seems like a timely revisit to the sword and sorcery genre. As an avid gamer who grew up on the Final Fantasy franchise and the Bioware RPGs, it’s nonetheless a must-play for the True Believers. But after years of the same thing replayed again and again in different settings: Bioware, I am ready for more of a change.
Bioware’s new Dragon Age: Origins CRPG arrived in the mail on Wednesday. Confused marketing prior to the release had me wondering whether to buy it. I don’t understand why Bioware insists on using their concept art to market their titles. The art is always dark and murky, a little pulp, and never reflects the actual mood of the story. But my problem was neatly solved when my brother got it for me for my birthday. Thus far, I’m about 54% percent of the way through the game, and quite a bit below the 100 hours of game play promised - I’m only at about 30 hrs recorded thus far.
Unlike Mass Effect, the mechanics of the game UI seem to be geared more heavily for PC users rather than console play. Drilling down into the action menus is unintuitive and time consuming - on the Xbox, you have to hold down the left shoulder trigger religiously to get anywhere, and a slight slip of the finger in battle means that you’re suddenly exposed, or have to struggle to get back to the menu item again, costing you real time and taking up valuable play time.
The much-touted Eclipse engine seems dated and handicapped next to comparable contemporaries. (It does allow for significant end-user development, but as I am not much of a modder, I haven't heard about how well it works in this regard.) Having played other action adventure games like Lionhead’s Fable 2 and Bethesda’s Fallout 3, I have to say, the movement and action controls on Dragon Age: Origins are clunky and overloaded. Fighting is ridiculously difficult in real-time and the transparent overlapping menus have way too many options for battle. The in-game event notices - a huge banner with swirly blood that pops up every time some quest is updated - are badly proportioned and difficult to see on my 32" flatscreen from any distance farther than 2 feet away. There are no multi-camera angle controls (annoying!), no jumping, no swimming, no looting, and no at-will wanton killing. (To the last complaint I say, "so much for being the spiritual successor to Baldur's Gate!")
The Dragon Age: Origins name comes from the conceit that the game boasts six different customizable origin stories for the player, based on the variables of race and gender. In terms of game story customization, this is an interesting move towards greater replayability and player-character engagement, and I predict that we will see greater variety and development on this front in future games. Story-wise, however, I am not impressed. There have been no surprising twists (given the advertising, I expected more hard decisions and betrayals), and the characters lack the hook of previous Bioware fare. (How I missed Minsc and his miniature giant space hamster, Boo!) The game’s target audience is, admittedly, in the 17-22 year old range, so perhaps the absence of real emotional "hardness" isn't surprising. Although the naivete and lack of dramatic pathos in the plotline seems to suggest even younger crowd; belying the “M” for mature audience rating.
Overall, I find this a step back from the game play and story development exhibited in Bioware’s previous release, Mass Effect. But for Baldur’s Gate and Neverwinter Nights nostalgia, it seems like a timely revisit to the sword and sorcery genre. As an avid gamer who grew up on the Final Fantasy franchise and the Bioware RPGs, it’s nonetheless a must-play for the True Believers. But after years of the same thing replayed again and again in different settings: Bioware, I am ready for more of a change.