A good follow-up to Baldur's Gate
The story is pretty generic-orcs, dragons, etc.-but with a slight twist to create something that is believable and enjoyable. While the hero-who-must-save-the-world thing has been done to death, little nuances such as showing off the might of Fereldan's army before it's obliterated is a nice touch to make this rerun seem somewhat fresh.
The user-interface worked well, and I rarely found myself clicking on something that I hadn't intended. One small problem happened often; when I began to click on a pile of treasure and my NPC ran up from behind to join my character, initiating dialogue that took too long to exit from.
The music is sweeping and beautiful, with an opening track that draws me into clicking "resume" over and over. Props go to the owner of the haunting voice, and to the music director for creating something that I wouldn't mind listening to away from the game.
But what really added color to the canvas was the NPCs. Conversations among your group were rich and entertaining, fleshing out the personalities and backstories for each person. Romancing some of your NPCs was also a nice diversion from the hack-n-slash gameplay, and there are four possible liasons to choose from. Finally, there was the inclusion of NPC-specific quests, which I question why only a few of the NPCs had them.
On the negative side, the graphics look dated when compared with Mass Effect 2 (another Bioware game that was released within months of this title), the world is pretty restricting and closed off, and the party system is limited. For example, blocks of textures can be seen on the windows. Like KOTOR, each level is rather linear, with little chance for exploration and discovery. You're on ride whether you like it or not. Last, I think Bioware should have gone with a five-person party. Too often I was artificially restricted between choosing to take along a healer or a rogue. Why the limitation? I understand some limitation (you don't want to be able to bring along 10 people), but four seems so arbitrary and frustrating.