Dragon Age Central

BioWare is considering doing DS versions of Mass Effect, Jade Empire, and Dragon Age, plus a couple of others.

[...] Miles Holmes, lead designer of Sonic Chronicles, said the developer was looking at "basically anything that reinforces the franchises".

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[greg zeschuk] The idea really came from the work we did o the original Baldur’s Gate and this is almost a spiritual successor to that game to “Neverwinter Nights.” When we finished on the “Neverwinter Nights” series, we said, “Let’s take the things we’ve learned, the knowledge in creating all those great games, and make our own fantasy world — with some twists. We call it dark heroic fantasy, where the old sort of high fantasy with elves happily sashaying across the countryside and happy Hobbits — the world of “Dragon Age” is effectively the reverse of that. It’s brutal. It’s harsh. Really gritty, very realistic and filled with surprising situations that you see don’t see high fantasy characters in.

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The reference point of the “Lord of the Rings” films as probably the pre-eminent visual representation of fantasy and what those big battles would be like certainly played a role in what we built. I think a lot of what it comes from, funny enough, is what we did in tiny pixels back in the “Baldur’s Gate” days. When you pull it back to what we have now with all the technology — animations and mo-cap — it just looks that way. That’s the surprising outcome of just creating a game based on [its] principles.

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Origins is a return to BioWare’s roots. But also, the origin stories are personal individualized experiences players get to start the game. Doing something in that origin story [determines] in large part what you’re trying to do in the world. There is a story arc that everyone goes through, but it is personalized and quite different depending on how you go through the origin.

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When we looked at “Dragon Age” we sat back and thought we wanted the player to reflect their own inner voice. This was a very conscious decision. [...] There’s a lot of choices in this game about how you portray yourself and how you experience it. We wanted players to have an additional sense of — even though I’m picking a line — I’m the one saying it in my head.

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Typically for a lot of our games, particularly “Mass Effect” and “Dragon Age,” we do a lot of face-work because you’re coming in close and you see the face. It’s astounding how much time is put into that. The surfacing and the detailing you see on the armor, a lot of that has to do with the materials systems. They’re a really big thing that’s happened this generation that didn’t really exist before. It used to be very simplistic.

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I think there are elements, but it’s not an out front thing. They [made up languages] are used.

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On the system specs side, we haven’t finalized specs. The engine is quite robust and is able to scale down. That was one of our focuses, particularly because we have tactical combat with four people and up to 20 enemies. We’re trying to make sure it can crunch down. I don’t think system specs are going to be a big challenge for it.

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Any time we undertake something we have a goal of creating franchises… PC for now is what we’re focusing on, but there is a console future for the franchise.

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[nominee, best pc game & best rpg, e3 2008]

[winner, best rpg (pc)]

[best pc rpg runner-up]

[best all-platforms rpg runner-up]

[best e3 role-playing game runner-up]

[#5 "best of e3" pc games]

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The title looks back as well as forward: Origins refers to the game’s "origin stories" system that will "change the way the world perceives you, and how you perceive the world" - in other words, you’ll define your character and the story by your words, actions and moral choices, choosing to be a "hero, martyr, or tyrant".
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Warriors and mages? Check. Fire and ice schools of magic? Check. Ogre boss? Check. Charging, roaring army of fang-faced orc-a- likes? Check. Trios of conversational options, neatly split between obsequious, wary and rude? Check. Raven-ringed spires? Ponderous council-of-war cut-scenes? "Will you kill the prisoner or set him free?" Check, check, check.
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The game focuses on the war with the Darkspawn, that numberless mutant horde. We’re introduced to the game as a human warrior who belongs to the Grey Wardens, a neutral order of wise men dedicated to the eradication of Darkspawn, which inspires equal amounts of reverence and mistrust in the more politically-minded characters that we meet. It’s not clear if all players will join the Grey Wardens, however; play later switched to a female elven mage, and one cut-scene did show a council of mages opposing the Grey Wardens’ advice.

You’ll choose between three basic archetypes - warrior, wizard and rogue - and presumably specialise within these
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Dragon Age is an entirely single-player game, but you’ll often be leading a party of four. This party is neither entirely pre-ordained nor left to you to select from a pool; events and conversations will often give you the option to add certain non-player characters to your party, like the fresh-faced tower guard seen in the demo.
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Combat happens in real time, with skills selected from a time-honoured action bar and the character manipulated with WASD controls. You’d be tempted to say the game played like an offline World of Warcraft, if it wasn’t for the optional "pause and play" system. Once paused, you can cue up series of commands and switch between members of your party, and this is where we suspect the real meat of Dragon Age’s combat lies.

NPC party-members are controlled by autonomous AI in real-time, but once controlled offer up their own limited action bars, providing some variety and tactical flexibility. Pause also allows you to string together combos neatly, across single or multiple enemies, and BioWare is clearly working to provide skills that play off each other within combos - such as the warrior’s shield bash being used to open up enemy defences for more direct strikes, or the mage casting a slick of oil before setting alight with a fire spell.
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BioWare reps confirmed that we will run into said dragons at some point
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Our demo began with an introduction to the Gray Wardens, better known as the Good Guys, and their epic struggle against the Blight. The Blight are a the blue and green skinned orc lookalikes that you, your party and the Gray Wardens will battle throughout. They’re of a varied species, some standing ten feet tall with sprouted horns, others more human like
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Dragon Age: Origins has the dialogue tree interface the company is well-known for, with Mass Effect style camera angles paired with more isometric, full party view angles
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The game also has the BioWare patented "pause and play" method of controlling your party members actions with a turn-based/real-time combat engine.
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Wandering around the king’s courtyard, we came across a caged man, one who promised us a key in exchange for feeding him. Instead of opting to find food for the poor caged soul or ignoring him, our "hero" decided to go with another choice — kill the prisoner and take his bartering tool.
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This kicked off a brief mission in which we were instructed to light a tower beacon, gathering up disposable party members along the way. These "red shirts" weren’t important to the story, but, as we saw later, you’ll come across playable teammates that do affect the plot.
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Our BioWare rep switched the action to a separate scene, showing off the skills of a higher level elven mage, one gifted with elemental powers. She casted fire and ice spells
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The ogre, twice the size of the Gray Warden and his party members, was hurling chunks of the floor, picking up the less fortunate and bashing them to death as the four-person hero squad attacked. [...] after whittling down the ogre’s health bar, ended with a sword through the skull cinematic attack.
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[best rpg]

[best pc game runner-up]

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You play a fledgling Grey Warden, a sect of warriors who are sworn to serve King and Country in a war against the Darkspawn. So far, after a few battles, the war has gone well. Unfortunately – that’s all about to change.
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[it] has sweet particle effects, plenty of atmospheric and ambient touches that help immerse you into the universe. There’s an epic feel about the battles as you can see literally hundreds of people (and monsters) on the screen at once in some cases. Decal effects are in, as the blood and gore stays on you, even after you zone into new areas.
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It mixes real-time and turn-based mechanics offering players who want to micro-manage their parties more of an active hand in doing so. You can also jump into any party member at any given time so that’s a plus too. Thankfully, Dragon Age isn’t a button masher, as melee classes get a wide selection of weapon styles and combo attacks that you can slap unto your hot bar.
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Both characters and monsters have special attacks as well as standard combo and style moves. In one fight our group had against an ogre, it was able to pick people up, punch them in the face and then throw them around.
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As far as magic goes, mages serve as healers, buffers and damage dealers. [...] the spell system seemed very open and interactive. You could, for instance, put out fires with ice spells or even light oil ablaze with a fireball. If you have two AI mages in your party they will actually work together to weave cool little combo effects together
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On the bottom they had a 20 button hot-bar
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one of the biggest concerns people have is: does the content scale to your character’s level ala The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion? In Dragon Age’s case, that is going to be no. Monster levels are pre-set so if you don’t follow the storyline odds are you’re going to get your face eaten off by something much tougher than yourself.
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BioWare invited us to check out an extended demo
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at the start of the game you’ll be assuming the role of a recruit signing up with the gray gardens[sic, should be wardens]--a group of paladin-like warriors tasked with defending humanity from enemies such as the orc-like horde they refer to as the blight
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A starving prisoner being kept in a cage awaiting sentencing pleaded for help as the protagonist approached, and offered to exchange the stolen key that put him in there for food and water. After some interactive conversation, three options presented themselves; help the guy out, ignore him, or kill him and take the key.
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The cinematic camera angles did a great job of showing off the detailed character models, as well as how great the lip-syncing in the game is already.
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Heading toward what was left of the tower, he went from something resembling a traditional Baldur’s Gate camera view to a third-person view more like that used in action and MMO games. The control interface was also reminiscent of those featured in many popular MMOs, since all of the character’s moves appeared to be bound to a row of 20 buttons along the bottom of the screen.

In Dragon Age you won’t just be controlling a single character. Rather, you can lead a party of up to four characters that, at times, will include guys as generic as the "tower guard" who offered to help with the mission alongside characters who can presumably stay with you long-term.
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When the party entered the tower the guy running the demo opted to swap out one of its number for an elven mage with an impressive arsenal of spells at her disposal. The reason for that became obvious when, moments after stepping through the door into the tower the greasy floor was set ablaze by an enemy hurling a fireball at it. The mage was able to extinguish the fire by calling down a swirling blizzard that left a thin layer of snow on the floor. That was impressive, and things only got better when we were shown how Dragon Age, like other BioWare games, gives you the option to pause combat at any time and give instructions to your characters while time stands still.
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the mage showed off a number of other spells that included a lightning-like tempest that engulfed the entire room, a flamethrower attack, a glyph of paralysis that slowed down enemies, and her ability to heal other party members. Oddly, she was also able to cast a "grease" spell that coated an area with the same flammable substance the party had almost been killed by earlier. An unusual spell for sure, but an extremely effective one when used in conjunction with a well-placed fireball.
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The first thing the ogre did was hurl a boulder toward the mage who was keeping her distance, and then it pounded the ground to briefly knock over the rest of the group who had moved in the for the kill. The ogre’s most impressive attack saw it grabbing a member of the party and then punch him repeatedly. We’re told that characters armed with shields will have a chance to free themselves with a "shield bash" move when this happens
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[greg zeschuk] We’re focusing on PC first. We’ve said we’re going to be looking at consoles, thinking about the plans there. We’re not in any big rush; we want to make sure we make the right platform decision.

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When you pull back, look at the whole battlefield, take your four characters, arrange them against the enemy... Fighting 20 guys, figuring how you’re going to lay them out. Are you going to protect your mage? How are they going to defend themselves? It has a sense of urgency, even though you can pause at any time. It’s still exciting.

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[ep] BioWare is famous for its moral choices throughout its games. With Dragon Age, you have Martyr, Tyrant and Hero alignments. Can you tell us a little more about those?

[gz] Those aren’t specifically the archetypes you can be, as much as they’re indicative of the types of actions you have to undertake. Once again, we’re coming in with a good system of alignment and how people see you in the world. What’s interesting is that we tie back into the origin stories. We’re not going into detail about these; we’ll talk a bit more about them later in the year. But at the beginning of the game you go through a personalized experience that kinda gives you a lens on the world. It also affects how the world sees you. You tie that together with your alignment and the decisions you make. Many decisions you make throughout the game are influenced by what happens at the beginning. It personalizes the whole thing more.

The Hero, Tyrant, Martyr concept has a lot to do with the big epic feel to the choices you make. If you think of the analogy with Lord of the Rings, you’re sitting in Mount Doom, do you throw the ring in or not? Those are the kinds of epic decisions that we want try to reflect in this game.

[ep] Taking that analogy, whether I throw the ring in or not makes a big difference to the plot. How divergent is the story in Dragon Age because of my choices? Whole new areas, different battles?

[gz] There’s a moderate change. If I play off the example of Mount Doom and the ring, I imagine if you kept the ring, Sauron would reign and the world would be destroyed! So probably not that big. The choices you do make affect armies, kings... We thought of ways of [adding] a very epic feel to the decisions you make, so you actually do change the world. As far as new content associated with that, there’s always some degree of this, but it’s not enormous. It doesn’t turn off half the world, or turn on another half.

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Dragon Age will be played as a single player game, even with the stuff you create with the tools.

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