Bioware return to the realm of fantasy to deliver a remarkably solid and satisfying RPG game
It may however make my review of DA:O a little bias, but, for all the praise I sing onto this game, there are few faults.
Firstly, the premise.
With any Bioware game, the narrative is vastly important, and Dragon Age: Origins has an epic one at that. In the country state of Fereldn, a land populated by Humans, Dwalves and Elves, you play as a Grey Warden, a group who are charged with the task of defeating the evil Darkspawn. But things aren't as easy going out and slaying the big bad uglies. Along your journey, you must build an army from the different races, and rally the whole of Fereldn which has erupted into civil war to fight the Blight.
The most interesting thing about DA is in how the game opens. You are given the choice with six different background stories to kick the game off, depending on the way you went about creating your character. This alone makes for several replays, exploring different character makes. Each opening is lengthy, with some lasting up to two hours, though, it really depends on how much interest you allow into the game.
Even though you might want to play through the game six different times, you'll be surprised that it wont play out exactly the same way each time. The missions will be the same yes, but the way people react to you, as well as certain side missions will be affected by which race and class you choose at the beginning of the game. Fereldn is rife with racial tension, so playing as an Elf will certainly have you encountering difficult humans and distrust.
Graphically, DA sort of falls short, as far as the 360 version anyway. The reason for this is possibly because it has been in development for several years now, and the original engine wouldn't had been upgraded to "modern" standards. It certainly isn't close to the technical brilliance of Mass Effect's modded Unreal engine, but at least it has no texture pop ins. But to say the least, the character models are well detailed, and the animations are of a high level. The environments have a lot of detail in them, and never look ugly. The only problems with the visuals is that they just seem dated.
The combat system is in real time, and plays very similar to KOTOR, yet a bit more streamlined and tighter. You can pause the action with the radial menu, where you can cycle through your party and punch in commands. You can also set up tactics for your party members, make them stand back from battle and hold their ground. It truly allows you to have complete control over everything in battle. I'm not a heavy fan of RPG battle systems, have would be content with pushing buttons to attack until one persons dead, but, I can see the work gone into this system, and its a system that works. It takes a while to learn the system, but for more avid fans of earlier fantasy RPG's will probably be right at home.
The soundtrack of the game is exactly what you'd expect from a fantasy game, but with a lot of dark overtones, which fits the game's overall dark tone. The recorded dialogue is less superior to Mass Effect's, mostly because of the sometimes strange forced English accents. The main cast of characters have excellent voice acting, but all minor and bystander voice is rather weak and annoying. The biggest problem in terms of sound and dialogue is the lack of recorded dialogue for your main character. This is a throw back to earlier Bioware games, including KOTOR, however, after Mass Effect, with a fully fleshed out and personality driven character, it feels like a step back to not allow your character to be heard.
Like many of Bioware's games, morality is a huge factor in gameplay. This time around however, the obvious good and evil meter has been dropped altogether. This is a great step forward (one that will be overshadowed by the fact ME2 will undoubtedly have one), meaning that no longer we are restricted to wondering whether we're too good or bad. Instead, your actions are reflected in the manner in which your party members react to you. Annoy someone too much with your actions and they will leave altogether, or they may simply betray you, or attack you. Gaining the trust of your party members will open up conversation trails, and even new quests. It's a fairly interesting system and shows potential to where the morality system in games could head.
All up, Dragon Age: Origins is a fantastic game. It offers up a rich, fully realized story with interesting characters. It also offers up hundreds of hours of gameplay, with lengthy story missions, as well dozens upon dozens of side quests. One playthrough can take you anywhere between 30 to 50 hours to complete, and thats not even stopping to do everything that comes your way. Needless to say, this game will consume a lot of your time, so better take some time off work!. Fantastic package
Story: 10
Visuals: 8.5
Sound: 8.5
Gameplay: 8.5