Dragon Age Origins

[Lady Jaye]

As a Bioware fangirl, I'm really looking forward to this game's release (2 more months to go!). For only the second time ever (first time was for Wind Waker), I'm actually pre-ordering the game at EBGames. I'm also getting the Collector's Edition (another thing that I don't usually do). I'm not usually disappointed by Bioware, and chances are that this won't be the case once again.

Who else is thinking of picking up the game?

[chicnstu]

I'm really excited for this, this generation is really missing medieval hack n slash games. This one is more strategic but sill looks very addicting. I've bought every Bioware game (except the first Baldur's Gate) and have hated them all. I keep thinking "No, this one will be different, the story is awesome!" then I'm disappointed and the battles feel cheap, like they didn't put much time into it. I really hope I enjoy this one, it sure looks fun.

I know Dragon Age is supposed to be over 100 hours, but does anyone here know how much armor/weapons will be in this game compared to others?

[carlcarlson]

Me! Though I'll be picking it up down the road a ways after it gets cheaper. Bioware makes a good game but this one seems kind of generic, really. I think Fallout 3 kind of spoiled me, I'm not as interested in the swords & sorcery rpgs now. I'm looking forward to it but I'm not super pumped.

[JunkTheMagicDragon]

i'm getting it, if only for the fact that it's bioware and for the preorder bonuses. it'll tide me over until me2 gets here.

[Kid Fenris]

Gee, I'm just not sure if I'm MOTHERFUCKIN' READY FOR THE NEW SHIT.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AcyR9adOuMI

The game mechanics sound promising, but the generic dragon-and-elf setting and awkward sex scenes? Not so much.

[Oobgarm]

Yes, please.

[Damaramu]

medieval hack n slash games

Uh oh. This will be an instant buy for my wife. She loves this genre. :rocker:

[ScourDX]

I don't know if I want to get the collector edition. It doesn't seem to worth $65 for 2 DVD plus extra DLC. This is what Bioware should make for Collector Edition just like their Neverwinter Nights.

http://img524.imageshack.us/img524/7959/cimg1931.jpg (http://img524.imageshack.us/i/cimg1931.jpg/)

Size comparison, the NWN box is huge and it cost about $70. Collector edition isn't what they used to. :(

[chicnstu]

Uh oh. This will be an instant buy for my wife. She loves this genre. :rocker:

Be careful though, it's more strategic. You tell your character to attack and they will attack automatically until they enemy dies or until you choose something else.

I'll be getting this on PS3 because Bioware is considering putting some of the better user mods up for download, plus I hate playing with a keyboard and mouse.

[mezrabad]

I am so far behind on the Bioware games I want to play that I think I'm going to hold off on this one. I recently started replaying Baldur's Gate so that I could finally take a character through BG, BGII and BG:TOB. After I've done that, I want to do Neverwinter Nights and the modules available for this. Then Neverwiner Nights II, then the StarWars Old Republic games and then Jade Empire. What scares me is that I know I'm missing something in there and will have to find and play that as well. So, as keen as Dragon Age looks, I must wait. I will enjoy hearing about it though.

[Zthun]

Collector edition isn't what they used to. :(

It seems like now, if they toss in ANYTHING extra, then it's a collectors edition. Collectors editions should come with cool stuff. Not just an extra dvd or two.

[Lady Jaye]

I am so far behind on the Bioware games I want to play that I think I'm going to hold off on this one. I recently started replaying Baldur's Gate so that I could finally take a character through BG, BGII and BG:TOB. After I've done that, I want to do Neverwinter Nights and the modules available for this. Then Neverwiner Nights II, then the StarWars Old Republic games and then Jade Empire. What scares me is that I know I'm missing something in there and will have to find and play that as well. So, as keen as Dragon Age looks, I must wait. I will enjoy hearing about it though.

Actually, NWN 2 was not developed by Bioware, but by Obsidian. And you're missing Sonic Chronicles on the DS and, especially, Mass Effect.

[kupomogli]

Is this multiplayer? I'm not a fan of games like this if not.

[Lady Jaye]

Nope, it's a one-player offline game.

[The 1 2 P]

If this came out for the 360 I'd get it. It's one of two Bioware games(along with Star Wars: The Old Republic mmo) that I wish Bioware would bring to consoles.

[Lady Jaye]

It is coming out for consoles -- it'll be out for PC, 360 and PS3.

[The 1 2 P]

It is coming out for consoles -- it'll be out for PC, 360 and PS3.

Well then "yes" I will be picking this up. Bioware's track record for making good games is 98.6%. Those are hard odds to bet against.

[Trebuken]

Preordered the collectors edition a couple of months ago. Also Demon Souls (PS3). The only to games I have preordered so far.

Usually a save the big RPG for after Chrostmas (Fable II last year), but this year I'm going to jump into Dragon Age instantly.

There will likely be a ton of user created content for it so I want to finish the game before it hits. I also expect that we will see multiple expansions from Bioware. There is a giant FAQ on the Dragon Age homepage...

[BHvrd]

Honestly this game reminds me very much of Silver (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Dxe9PxA8ZU0&feature=related) on the Dreamcast. I must admit that I found that game very satisying at the time and beat it more than once.

It's a good concept for sure and should be quite dramatic (they have Tim Curry! :D) and epic in scale but at this time I have Demon's Souls and Borderlands on preorder so it's gonna have to wait i'm afraid.

[heybtbm]

As a Bioware fangirl, I'm really looking forward to this game's release

You should really play Mass Effect then. It's their best game IMO. I started my 2nd playthrough recently and forgot how awesome it was.

[Lady Jaye]

I do have Mass Effect. Didn't get very far yet, mostly due to lack of time.

[Lady Jaye]

First review out by a mainstream source: Game Informer gave it 9/10.

http://gameinformer.com/games/dragon_age_origins/b/pc/archive/2009/10/05/review.aspx

Can't wait to see more reviews (I prefer going through a site like Metacritic to get a better perspective), but so far, so good.

[Porksta]

Will be getting the collector's edition (a cloth map seems too badass to pass up) but I am waiting for Amazon to get more in and give the 360 version a $10 credit.

[carlcarlson]

Annnnd it's out! Who's got it, who's playing it? Let's hear some impressions!

I'm starting to get a little overwhelmed with games I really want to play. First I got the Fallout 3 GOTY (which I'm still playing), then came Borderlands, this weekend I found Torchlight, and now this is out. And of course all bets are off next Tuesday when Modern Warfare 2 comes out. This is a great problem!

[Porksta]

Don't forget to play Dragon Age Journeys, an in-browser game where you can unlock items for Origins!

[Lady Jaye]

I got the collector's edition but won't be able to play till tonight. :)

[Half Japanese]

Gee, I'm just not sure if I'm MOTHERFUCKIN' READY FOR THE NEW SHIT.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AcyR9adOuMI

The game mechanics sound promising, but the generic dragon-and-elf setting and awkward sex scenes? Not so much.

Christ, somebody shitcan the marketing department. Between hiring the "How is babby formed" guy to narrate the trailer and the horrendous use of nu-metal, it's clear someone doesn't understand what their job is supposed to entail. And how exactly is it "new shit" when everything in the trailer looks to be pretty much stock fantasy fare?

[chicnstu]

I was really worried about this game since it's BioWare's first PS3 game and because of people saying the framerate is terrible. According to GameSpot the framerate is worse on PS3 but it's still better to buy on PS3:

if you're choosing between the two console releases, the PlayStation 3 has the upper hand.

I have it preordered on Amazon, it should be here tomorrow. Hopefully I can handle the framerate, Mass Effect was almost unplayable for me.

[Nate Nanjo]

I got the game today. The PS3 version. I notice a few visuals skipping like the disc is scratched, but the voices and sound do not skip.

I'm not a real big fan of games like this, but its been a long time where I've been sucked in by the story and charaters of a game.

[Oobgarm]

I like the fact that when I talked to the dog, it proceeded to piss on something.

[GrandAmChandler]

Heads up, the Collector's Edition of the Strategy Guide (http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/076156246X?ie=UTF8&tag=retrcom-20&linkCode=as2&camp=1789&creative=390957&creativeASIN=076156246X) is 40% off today:

http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/51DfpsH1YjL._SL500_AA240_.jpg (http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/076156246X?ie=UTF8&tag=retrcom-20&linkCode=as2&camp=1789&creative=390957&creativeASIN=076156246X)

[The 1 2 P]

So is everyone giving this game a thumbs up? I haven't picked it up yet but Bioware very seldom does any wrong(except selling themselves to EA but thats another story).

[Trebuken]

I've played for about three hours and am sorta' still in the introduction period of the game...

I have the PC Collector's Edition. Visually the game is good enough (perhaps akin to Neverwinter Nights 2), I had hoped for better, characters are still a little polygonal to me and the colors are too dark, but the gameplay works. The camera is a little awkward but adjustable.

The game itself is cool, along the lines of Baldur's Gate in gameplay.

No frame rate issues on the PC. Not too demanding thus far -- I suspect the larger battles and magic will cause some issues later in the game though...

Good fun so far...

[Lady Jaye]

One annoying detail about the 360 version: if you download content (which I did since I bought the CE and also got more extras off the browser DA:O game), your 360 must be online when you continue your game. That's dumb since it should be able to work offline. My modem is temporarily relocated to the kitchen for the next 2 1/2 weeks (because I'm working from home while my sprained ankle is healing), and I find it annoying to have to disconnect/reconnect every day to play DA:O (neither my 360 nor my work computer have a Wi-Fi adaptor).

Oh, and I dunno about pre-orders in the US, but here the 360 preorder codes from EBGames/Gamestop were delayed a week. I incidentally have a copy of the PC codes instead (and no, they don't work on the 360).

I didn't play long enough to get the hang of fighting yet. Still have the urge to use the Oblivion controls instead...

[brykasch]

Enjoying it greatly at the moment. Had all my preorder codes etcright when I picked it up on launch day. There are some minor graphic hitches here and ther but nothing gameplay affecting. And for those that seem to be so hung up on the graphics, the story and gameplay are tremendous.

[FxMercenary]

I Pre-Ordered this game months ago from Amazon, and went with the 1-day shipping. They didnt even ship it until friday... I guess they ran out?

[BHvrd]

One annoying detail about the 360 version: if you download content (which I did since I bought the CE and also got more extras off the browser DA:O game), your 360 must be online when you continue your game. That's dumb since it should be able to work offline. My modem is temporarily relocated to the kitchen for the next 2 1/2 weeks (because I'm working from home while my sprained ankle is healing), and I find it annoying to have to disconnect/reconnect every day to play DA:O (neither my 360 nor my work computer have a Wi-Fi adaptor).

Oh, and I dunno about pre-orders in the US, but here the 360 preorder codes from EBGames/Gamestop were delayed a week. I incidentally have a copy of the PC codes instead (and no, they don't work on the 360).

I didn't play long enough to get the hang of fighting yet. Still have the urge to use the Oblivion controls instead...

Wait, so when you updated the game with extra content now the game will not let you play it unless you are online? If so there has to be a way around it otherwise yeah that sucks, unless i'm misunderstanding what you're saying.

Also what are these "minor hitches" and bugs everyone is talking about? A little explanation might help.

[Nesmaster]

I Pre-Ordered this game months ago from Amazon, and went with the 1-day shipping. They didnt even ship it until friday... I guess they ran out?

Preordered the CE and CE book from them as well... it was supposed to ship November 3rd. They sent the guide alone November 4th with the game supposedly shipping the 6th (Friday). Then they bumped it to November 17th. Now they're claiming "they don't know". At this point I said fuck it and managed to score the CE locally, for $10 less than the quoted price on Amazon anyways. So now I've got the stupid guide coming in the mail alone and since the order dropped under $40 I'm likely going to be charged shipping which is looking like another 6 bucks. I never gave them authorization to "split" my order like this and now I'm going to be charged more money for something I wouldn't have even ordered without the game. It's not the 6 bucks that bugs me, it's how I feel like they've somehow cornered me like a schoolyard bully into giving them my lunch money...

Onto the game itself... very early impression here but to me it feels like Fable 2 (playing 360 version here), only not like how Fable 2 ended up, but how I thought Fable 2 would be before playing it, does that make sense?

All I know is in my first hour of play I've screwed over and lied to "The Boss", been told I like to or want to/have had sex with my sister, pretended to be someone I'm not and getting unmasked like some Scooby-Doo villian, and ended up naked in jail. All the while laughing my ass off. All of this in the first hour spells a good game at hand.



Also what are these "minor hitches" and bugs everyone is talking about? A little explanation might help.

In the first hour I've seen things like stuttering (in the cutscenes mostly), floating weapons, and geometry overlapping. Nothing gamebreaking and hardly annoying at all, but I did notice and didn't even really care. Might not be a polygon pusher but the game, so far anyways, feels technically solid, minor hitches aside.

[Lady Jaye]

Wait, so when you updated the game with extra content now the game will not let you play it unless you are online? If so there has to be a way around it otherwise yeah that sucks, unless i'm misunderstanding what you're saying.

According to a Bioware rep, it's not supposed to occur. Looks like a downloading bug from EA, we're supposed to be able to play offline once the DLC is downloaded. I tried playing without logging into XBL, but the game forced me to log in to EA's serrver. Which would suck. I really don't feel like plugging and unplugging my modem constantly for an actually offline game.

[Ze_ro]

Preordered the CE and CE book from them as well... it was supposed to ship November 3rd. They sent the guide alone November 4th with the game supposedly shipping the 6th (Friday). Then they bumped it to November 17th. Now they're claiming "they don't know". At this point I said fuck it and managed to score the CE locally, for $10 less than the quoted price on Amazon anyways.
Strange. I pre-ordered two copies (one for a friend) through Amazon.ca. They originally said it would ship Nov 6th, and arrive sometime the week after. However, I ended up getting an email on the 2nd telling me that they had been shipped, and I received them the next day. And now I just received an email from them with two redeem codes for pre-ordering, which I didn't even know I was getting.... Of course, I ordered two copies of the game and only got one set of pre-order codes, so I guess my friend is out of luck :(

Anyways, as for the game, I've been enjoying it quite a bit so far (the 360 version). It's a pretty standard D&D style western RPG, which I like. Nice change of pace from all the turn-based Japanese ones. The storyline and setting are original, and not based on anything... they're not very original, but fairly decent, and the game world is quite deep. You'll often run across things that add information to your "codex" which you can read in the sub menu. These readings add a lot of backstory, and explain the history of the world. So far I'm only a short way into the game, but there are a few things that bothered me a bit:
There are some graphical flaws... the graphic are nice, but not so incredible for the 360 as to explain the occasional poor framerate. Strangely, it seems most noticeable in the cutscenes, while actual gameplay seems relatively smooth to me. Speaking of the cutscenes, most show your character up close, and the textures used for your weapons look noticeably low res. Once in a while, I'd also see flickering textures... only 2 or 3 times so far, but very noticeable when it happens. There are also all kinds of clipping issues, usually with your weapons. Lastly, there's not a lot of physics going on... you'll see characters with their hair in long braids, but the braids are locked in place and move with the characters head rather than obeying gravity.
I created a female elf character, and the opening story involved my character and a friend discovering a cave with a strange mirror in it that cursed us both... my character survived by becoming a Grey Warden, by my friend was assumed dead. There wasn't a whole lot of meat to this opening section, and it seemed more like just an introduction to the storyline and gameplay. While I have yet to try any of the other 5 openings, I assume they're similarly short. On the plus side, many character that I've encountered since leaving for the Grey Wardens have specifically mentioned my characters gender and race... so I'm guessing the game actually does follow through on that aspect. One thing I haven't really gotten so far, is that almost every dialogue choice I'm given includes at least one option to get defensive about humans treatment of elves... but so far, I'm not really feeling it. Part of the intro story included a part where my parents were killed by humans, but I only got this story by coercing someone into telling me, and I could very easily have missed it... occasionally I come across humans mistreating elves, but I can't seem to take it personally enough to fight for them or anything. We'll see.
The game world doesn't seem very interactive. All the chests, crates, etc that have something of interest in them are glittering to show that you can search them, but anything that is not glittering is just a static part of the scenery. I guess Oblivion spoiled me by allowing me to ransack entire houses and open every cupboard and drawer in town. Likewise, there are a lot of generic characters in the game. If you see someone who's just named "Soldier", then you know they won't have anything useful to say. From what I've seen so far too, the game seems fairly linear. I haven't seen any world map, or really had any option yet about where to go or what to do, nor do my in-game dialog choices seem like they could have steered me differently... though from what I can tell, the opening story is still unravelling, so maybe I just haven't gotten far enough yet to choose where to go.
In order to do anything with DLC, including redeem codes, you have to log into some retarded EA thing. What is the point of this? All my other games just use Xbox Live to store all the content. It's not convenient at all, and it seems like it's just another trick for EA to harvest email addresses or something. I would have gladly chosen not to participate, but then I wouldn't be able to redeem any of the codes that I got with my CE copy.
Combat is pretty straight-forward. Just select a target, and press A and your character will start attacking, with no input needed. You can activate various effects you have learned to change your attack patterns. For example, I'm trying to style my character as an archer, and two of the abilities I have allow me to either fire rapidly (at the cost of no critical strikes), or to fire more accurately (higher damage, slower speed). These are both toggle effects that have effect until I specifically disable them, though they consume a portion of an ability gauge that I haven't quite worked out yet (I assume this is so you can't stack too many of these abilities). There are a few problems I had with combat though... for one, when your target dies, your character just stands there. As an archer, it was sometimes not immediately apparent that my target had just been killed, as they were some distance away, so there's some wasted time there. There's actually a whole tactics screen where you can change what characters do in some situations, so maybe this is just a case of me not knowing what I'm doing yet. Also, the A button is used for much more than just combat... searching dead bodies, disarming traps, etc... so in the heat of combat, you can't search a body... even if your next enemy isn't even on the map yet, but you're aware of them, you have to run over, kill them, then find your way back to the body. Likewise, my character discovered a bunch of bear traps while other monsters were attacking. I pressed A trying to attack them, but my character instead dropped to the ground and started disarming traps. Lastly, it's kind of neat that your characters get blood splattered on them in combat... but the effect is WAY overused. You'll kill a single wolf, and your character is *covered* in blood.
Anyways, these are all fairly minor problems in my opinion, and I've been finding the game very enjoyable all around. The interface is functional, load times were reasonable, there is a pretty wide variety of loot that you can carry around and switch out, plenty of abilities to gain and NPC's to fight with. All the areas of the game that I've seen so far have included extra things to find, which turn into quests. If you just rush through the game, you'll miss out on these. It's also nice to see a role playing game where you really CAN choose a role and play it, even if that means being an enormous asshole rather than a saint.

--Zero

[Porksta]

For those of you cursing the whole "sign into EA to do stuff online", blame EA. Remember how during the Xbox years you couldn't play Madden online? One of the ways (only way?) EA would agree to Microsoft's rules was that everything EA related would be hosted on their own servers, not on Microsoft's servers. This is why they can shut down game servers (NBA Live 2006 and so forth).

[chicnstu]

I must be the most stupid person on this site because I'm dying constantly when almost everyone else says the game is way too easy even on hard. I've had to reload maybe 70% of my battles. I'll walk into a room with a couple of mages and three warriors and I'll die in less than 15 seconds.

I'm a Dwarf Warrior and my party members so far are Alistair, Leliana, Morrigan, Wynne, Zevran, and Sten. For a while I thought having my traveling party be Wynne, Sten, and Leliana or Zevran was a good choice. But I read that it's best to have mages so I've tried putting Morrigan and Wynne together and I have the same result. I loved FFXII and it's Gambits so I've tried setting my party member's tactics lists in a way that seems logical to me and I still die. I target the enemy Mages in a battle first but the Warriors will swarm around me and take me out. I try managing each party member during the battles but it feels like there's too much going on too quickly to be able to accomplish what I want. I'll switch over to Wynne to use Heal or Revival but she's either out of Mana or the spell needs time to recharge. I'm equipping the best armor and weapons on all party members as I find it.

I play a lot of RPGs and most of them I play I think are too easy, so what am I doing wrong in Dragon Age? I'm playing on PS3 BTW.

[brykasch]

tank, mage/healer, rogue, and dps warrior is my group makeup and its worked great. Go in and adjust your tactics, make sure there set to drik potions etc as well, it makes a big difference.

[Trebuken]

I must be the most stupid person on this site because I'm dying constantly when almost everyone else says the game is way too easy even on hard. I've had to reload maybe 70% of my battles. I'll walk into a room with a couple of mages and three warriors and I'll die in less than 15 seconds.

I'm a Dwarf Warrior and my party members so far are Alistair, Leliana, Morrigan, Wynne, Zevran, and Sten. For a while I thought having my traveling party be Wynne, Sten, and Leliana or Zevran was a good choice. But I read that it's best to have mages so I've tried putting Morrigan and Wynne together and I have the same result. I loved FFXII and it's Gambits so I've tried setting my party member's tactics lists in a way that seems logical to me and I still die. I target the enemy Mages in a battle first but the Warriors will swarm around me and take me out. I try managing each party member during the battles but it feels like there's too much going on too quickly to be able to accomplish what I want. I'll switch over to Wynne to use Heal or Revival but she's either out of Mana or the spell needs time to recharge. I'm equipping the best armor and weapons on all party members as I find it.

I play a lot of RPGs and most of them I play I think are too easy, so what am I doing wrong in Dragon Age? I'm playing on PS3 BTW.

It's not easy. There may be routes in the game that make the game easier, but likely anyone finding this easy is sitting down with their oversized strategy guide or browser open to the ultimate walkthrough -- or simply lying as they play it on easy.

Perhaps there are dificulty differences amongst the different versions of the game...

We got the same reaction from Demon's Soul's. It turned out that certain character classes and straegies did work better initially and that made the game appear easier to some...

Anyways...good game...better because it can be tough...

[Lady Jaye]

Finally, the offline mode does work on the 360. If you try to play offline and you get the message that it's missing DLC, follow the directions in the below thread. It worked for me, I managed to boot the game offline without any problem.

http://daforums.bioware.com/viewtopic.html?topic=703093&forum=135

[chicnstu]

Some things I haven't liked:

- The menus are very annoying. Three different ways to move left or right through the categories.
- When you get a new item from someone, it just says at the bottom left "Items aquired", it doesn't tell you what the item is. So I think "I'll go and see what it was". But you can't always check because the new item may be near the bottom of the list. New items are highlighted but when they are at the bottom of the list they are automatically unhighlighted when you move over them. You don't get a chance to see what item was new.
- I don't understand the item limit. I'll find something in a chest to take but it'll say "Inventory Full". So I'll go to the inventory and remove something then go back and try to take the item but it still says the same thing. Does each item have a weight? How do I check that? Also, I tried to buy some elfroot from that elf merchant and it said inventory full. But then I can walk around their village and pick some from the plants...
- The quests are hard to follow, you have to find everything yourself so you can eventually get the arrow on your map. Always having something on your map would be nice.

I'm convinced this RPG is hard because it depends on luck and not skill (thought). I can go into a fight and die three times in a row, reload, then on my fourth try the battle goes by quickly with no problems. Almost all I play is RPGs, I really enjoy figuring out the right strategy to win the battles. This game though...I'm just not seeing it. I refuse to lower the difficulty. I've tried setting my party members to use potions when their health gets low (<50%) but they still die almost immediately. I'll just struggle through it, doing every battle five times before I get lucky and win. Then I might sell the game, I haven't used any of the four DLC codes.

What makes me feel even more dumb is that I SOMEHOW MISSED the dog and I can't go back. I'm the OCD type that searches everywhere and everything so I can collect everything making sure I don't miss something. So how did I miss it?

Listen to me whine...

[chicnstu]

I want to add that I'm not completely hating the game. It's very well written and the combat is fun when I actually understand what to do.

Also, I do appreciate the advice I've been given, sorry if I seemed like I ignored you guys.

[Trebuken]

The dog was in Ostragar. You had to pick a flower in the wilds to cure it and then it bonds to you (shows up later to join you).

The inventory screen has a bar with a number on the bottom. I think it starts at 70. When you reach 70 you get inventory full. It does seem a little wonky. A couple of Elfrootsseem to weigh nearly as much as chainmail...it might be the number of items. Backpacks add 10 units, but they are overpriced.

I'm not having trouble following the quests...make sure you unlock as many as you can. There are the Chantry/Mage/Mercenary sets of quests. The Journal and Codexes are good guides for your quests...

[chicnstu]

The dog was in Ostragar. You had to pick a flower in the wilds to cure it and then it bonds to you (shows up later to join you).

The inventory screen has a bar with a number on the bottom. I think it starts at 70. When you reach 70 you get inventory full. It does seem a little wonky. A couple of Elfrootsseem to weigh nearly as much as chainmail...it might be the number of items. Backpacks add 10 units, but they are overpriced.

I'm not having trouble following the quests...make sure you unlock as many as you can. There are the Chantry/Mage/Mercenary sets of quests. The Journal and Codexes are good guides for your quests...

Yeah, I know the dog was in Ostegar, it's just disappointing that I missed a great feature of the game. I know the bar is there but my problem with the inventory is that I don't know how to tell what each item weighs. Also, the quest problems I had were getting them started, actually doing the task is simple.

[Nate Nanjo]

I actually got my Dog by starting as a Human Warrior, but I don't remember which location I choose to do that. The dog is better than like any other character I have right now.

[Lady Jaye]

If you play as a human warrior, you get the dog at home during the Noble origins story, since he's your dog to start with.

[chicnstu]

Good news. I spent a couple of hours setting up my Tactics and testing them. I haven't had any problems so far. Even the wolf random encounter people talk about went by with ease. I thought about how I had my Gambits in FFXII and made the Tactics similar and I chose abilities that seemed logical. I set my party members to attack the same enemy I'm attacking (couldn't find this option before) but I'm considering setting it to "Enemy with lowest health" since that worked so well in FFXII. I think things like this should have been explained better in-game.

Also, I was 26 hours into the game when I realized I missed the dog. I was thinking the whole time "When does the dog show up?" because I had a bunch of collars and warpaints saved for it. I checked online and found out it was right in the beginning. Can't go back now. I've read that you can still get it in a random enounter (not the same encounter for completing the dog quest).

[jedimind7]

Just purchaed. Im going to have to try to find time to play it. Modern Warfare 2 and being in several Madden 10 online franchises is taking up my gaming time.

[Zthun]

Gay dwarf elf sex. Nuff said......

[Raedon]

Lol! Yea I didn't get this game for the Elf / dwarf love scene "No one can resist a Dwarf." EGHH! :P I just saw that posted on gametrailers.

I just got the PC version of this one. From all the reviews I've read the PC version allows for more precise gameplay so I went that route (plus I don't own a 360 right now.)

From what I've heard from the few hardcore MMORPG nuts I keep in touch with, Dragon Age is a game that someone who's played a lot of a REAL MMO (i.e. not WoW) will be right at home with.

I like games that have the Warrior as the one and only meat shield agro machine. So many games give the people playing a Warrior class the ability to pick dmg output as an option. WoW really pissed me off early on when Warriors were outdamaging the rogues. They got plate AND could DPS tit-for-tat with the 'Main damage class' ... as Rogues were touted as by Blizzard.

I'm far more interested in Bioware's upcoming Star Wars - The Old Republic MMORPG (http://www.swtor.com/). The last Star Wars MMO was crap and I love that universe. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DOvbv-LkK6w

Anywhoo, Eternal Tune won't play WoW with me (even though I was gonna twink the shit out of her) so I need something to play. I'm all out of RPGs to finish until I buy a new PS2 (mine finally died.) This RPG will kill a few weeks at least.

[Raedon]

>.>

<.<


I pirated this one. Sorry devs. :( I'll be paying you guys back with the large chunk of change I'll be throwing your way to play Star Wars: The Old Republic. :pimp:

[Porksta]

>.>

<.<


I pirated this one. Sorry devs. :( I'll be paying you guys back with the large chunk of change I'll be throwing your way to play Star Wars: The Old Republic. :pimp:

Are you planning to pay more than the base subscription fee? If not, you aren't really paying them back.

[nebrazca78]

Some things I haven't liked:

- The menus are very annoying. Three different ways to move left or right through the categories.

No crap. Almost as bad as Silver for Dreamcast. What's funny is I played Silver for the first time RIGHT before getting Dragon Age Origins.



- I don't understand the item limit. I'll find something in a chest to take but it'll say "Inventory Full". So I'll go to the inventory and remove something then go back and try to take the item but it still says the same thing. Does each item have a weight? How do I check that? Also, I tried to buy some elfroot from that elf merchant and it said inventory full. But then I can walk around their village and pick some from the plants...

It seems like you can have 70 of 70 items but still get things that are allowed to have multiples with only one icon. For instance, go to a chest that has multiple items with your backpack full. You won't be able to grab any weapons or armor but you should be able to grab a poultice or something like that unless you have it maxed out at 99. Due to your comment above about buying elfroot it seems this isn't the case when buying but only when picking up.




- The quests are hard to follow, you have to find everything yourself so you can eventually get the arrow on your map. Always having something on your map would be nice.



If you read your codex it pretty much tells you where to go for every quest.




I'm convinced this RPG is hard because it depends on luck and not skill (thought). I can go into a fight and die three times in a row, reload, then on my fourth try the battle goes by quickly with no problems. Almost all I play is RPGs, I really enjoy figuring out the right strategy to win the battles. This game though...I'm just not seeing it. I refuse to lower the difficulty. I've tried setting my party members to use potions when their health gets low (<50%) but they still die almost immediately. I'll just struggle through it, doing every battle five times before I get lucky and win. Then I might sell the game, I haven't used any of the four DLC codes.



I think this is because the battles go differently based on tiny differences in what you do. Fractions of a second count here. Everyone's position and the computer's reaction charges with every little difference. Plus there is the randomization of your criticals and stuff like that. Even a normal attack randomly varies in strength almost every hit. It does take away slightly from the strategy aspect of the game, but this is an action RPG not a strategy RPG or a straight up strategy game.

The thing with setting your guys to use health is that often they don't use it in time because they're getting toasted OR because they get attacked right while they're using it and it gets canceled. Unfortunately even if you set your strategies the computer is often slow/stupid when executing. An example of how the computer is stupid is when the enemy they are attacking is immune to the attack type they are using yet they keep using it over and over anyway.


As far as my personal take on the game, I like it overall. Some of the graphics are laughable (low polygon counts) but some parts are really nice. The frame rate is a joke during some cut scenes. I mean really, some of the animation reminds me of Atari 2600 games. How can the 360 not handle a single guy walking across the screen during a cut scene? There are also some places where polygons are just totally missing. You'll look over at a mountain and there's a big ugly off-color square where a textured polygon should be. It does give the game a rushed and unfinished feel to me. At least almost all the chicks in the game have giant racks. It helps distract from the graphical problems.

Despite these graphical flaws and the sometimes cumbersome menu system it is still a fun game. You get a decent amount of attributes to use in building a character. The battles are very controllable you just have to keep your left trigger finger active constantly. Using this technique slows the game down immensely though. You have to pull the left trigger every few seconds in order to input commands for all four people.

I found that I ran out of spaces for the spells I needed in my assignable range, especially with Morrigan. The computer is also sometimes very easy to get cheap on. I went to fight Witherfang long before I should have been there. I was able to beat him/her (tranny) by hiding behind one of the trees that is growing in the werewolf lair. The computer AI would get really confused and kind of freeze frame or stutter as if it couldn't figure out exactly where I was while I blasted it incessantly. Sometimes it would come towards me at a snail's pace or not move towards me at all. That made it easy.

The high-level Revenants are a bitch! The mass pull spell they use is annoying as hell. Even worse when his buddies are Devouring Skeletons.

[Raedon]

Are you planning to pay more than the base subscription fee? If not, you aren't really paying them back.

What can I say ... I'm a scoundrel.

[chicnstu]

Yeah I finally figured out all of my problems on my own. They are still annoying though. You shouldn't have to search through your massive codex to find the steps for a quest. I've had to do it for a few quests. I also would like a "Swap and Destroy" option when viewing items in a chest. For example, sometimes I'll be at or on my item limit and find a sword I want a character to equip. Since I'm full I can't take it so I have to get rid of something other than an item already equipped by a character because if I unequip something it adds to the item amount. What if I don't want to get rid of anything other than a sword a character has equipped, possibly after going down the line equipping everyone with a hand-me-down better sword? If the sword is equippable by everyone, it would be nice to be able to swap for the weakest sword being equipped by any character then destroy it.

[calistarwind]

I have really enjoyed playing through this game so far. Some things that are troubling though are certain random encounters can be so difficult that you end up dying right as soon as the battle starts. Maybe it is because I'm playing a rogue, but one almost made be quit the game. Other than that I have enjoyed the story line and character interactions.

[Raedon]

The love triangle aspect of this game always has me laughing.

Female humans X Leliana - hot steamy Lesbo plate armor on leather action!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=luk6nt0qtKQ
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NMf8J_wMT7s

Leliana is such a whore.

I also love how you go about becoming a Blood Mage in The Fade at the start to the game. Pleasure the demon woman! HAWT!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=juN7IVSoU4M

[Raedon]

This is a fantastic game.

[BydoEmpire]

I've run into an annoying bug several times now when I save right before I go through a door (360 version). If I open the door and die, then reload, the door is closed but there's no icon to open it, often trapping me in a room I can't get out of. Nothing to do but go back to a previous save. I don't know exactly what the circumstance is - I think I have to open the door but not go through, then save. Anyways, watch out. Save early, save often.

[Raedon]

I've found several bugs in the PC version. After you start gathering new members in the shanty town if you leave them all to walk around the town alone you can't gather up a force again until several things have been triggered ... all of which need a force more then just you. I had to restart way back because of it.

Most of the other bugs were trivial but rather blaring when trying to suspend disbelief.

Also gamers who don't understand crowd control and assisting on mobs will die quickly. You need a magic class you might not be familiar with if all you do is play WoW and jRPGs. You will need two support casters. One for heals and one for crowd control. The stratagy is to stop the 10 mobs in their tracks and pick them off one by one.

The first major Boss is a pain. You'll need lots of potions because there is no real healer. Even IF YOU are trying to play a healer you won't be strong enough to heal 3 with your wimpy heal with its cooldown.

[Eternal Tune]

I wonder if I should celebrate? I got an email from amazon stating my copy shipped. >_<

I ordered the Xbox 360 collector's edition in the beginning of the month. I wonder if they produced more or something?

[monkeychemist]

I think it's best to wait 6 months for a "fixed bugs" copy for half the price :)

[Raedon]

Thought I'd throw out some tips - take them or leave them.

If you are not playing the Warrior class then use Alistair as your main tank. Not only because he is set up that way but also because he provides much of the stories wit. Sten has to be respecced (console cheat) to be an effective tank. He looks big but he is specced to do DMG not agro tank. Shale is also a good tank.

Use Wynne as a healer and use Morrigan for Crowd Control/range dps.

[Octopod]

This is the new shit.

[Porksta]

This is the new shit.

Stand up and admit?

[shopkins]

I thought I'd have more fun with this if I played it on hard, but last night after getting wrecked five or six times in a row in an encounter with some weak bandits I had to bite the bullet and put it on normal.

I'm just not fast enough to micromanage the whole battle, I guess, even when constantly pausing it. My main character really draws a lot of aggro for some reason, too (he might be using threaten when I'm not controlling him, I've seen him do it a couple of times), so it's incredibly hard to keep him alive without constantly feeding him potions. It's difficult enough on normal, anyway, I've still managed to lose party members during battles.

[Raedon]

I thought I'd have more fun with this if I played it on hard, but last night after getting wrecked five or six times in a row in an encounter with some weak bandits I had to bite the bullet and put it on normal.

I'm just not fast enough to micromanage the whole battle, I guess, even when constantly pausing it. My main character really draws a lot of aggro for some reason, too (he might be using threaten when I'm not controlling him, I've seen him do it a couple of times), so it's incredibly hard to keep him alive without constantly feeding him potions. It's difficult enough on normal, anyway, I've still managed to lose party members during battles.

if your main is a rogue or just some other high DMG class, allow your main tank enough time for aggro before running in.

A mistake made by all first time mages is to go into the fight throwing high DMG fireworks right at the start of any fight. There was this Lock I played with in WoW long ago who would lead off with an AoE nuke just as the fight started. 8 mobs would roll his way and *SPLAT* Nuke them dead when they hit 50%.

Also, you have to CC in this game. they always chunk 6-8 mobs at you when you open a door. Set up Morrigan (or whoever is running your magic CC) to cast sleep or micromanage the CC while the game is paused. (a feature 360 doesn't have ... PC gamers can pause the game.) I think the trade off was there is no friendly fire on the 360 version. There are some great AoE spells I'd like to use but don't because all the mobs are with my melee.

[Raedon]

One thing I've noticed that will help those who are thinking of playing this.

flame / Ice / Lightning on weapons is great. But if you are going into a tower full of flaming demons and hell hounds a fire weapon will not only be IMMUNE to your mobs but can actually heal some of them. Those little stones that add +5 fire to your slotted weapon threw enchanting are nice fighting werewolves. If all the mobs are already on fire ... well.

[Trebuken]

Either get Morrigan Mass Heal or get Wynne Fireball...helps from having to choose between the two.

The difficulty is uneven. It can be really tough at times, but I found the end of the game easyish.

I beat the PC version in 63 hours (taking my time) and only recieved 37 of 85 achievements. It also said that I finished only 39% of the game...

TIPS:
Brecilian Forest/Dalish to get elfroot for potions - your own camp for other ingredients.

[nebrazca78]

(a feature 360 doesn't have ... PC gamers can pause the game.) I think the trade off was there is no friendly fire on the 360 version. There are some great AoE spells I'd like to use but don't because all the mobs are with my melee.

You can pause the game on 360 by using the left trigger. If you want to pause for more than just a little bit you can go into your items list and leave it there. Or you can cast a spell that requires confirmation and not confirm it. Plus there is friendly fire damage. It tells you which spells can cause friendly fire damage in their descriptions.