Dragon Age - First Impressions
 

Hello,

well, I do know tht I'm THAT late … ;)

But I'll write down what I find, regardless.

First - it's called the age of the dragon(s) … But so far (I haven't started the game yet) I cannot find any hints towards that in the game.

Second - the handbook doesn't exactl describe all points of the menu. It just seems to jump to and fro from character classes, feats, stats etc. descrption with a few menu options (like game difficulty) embedded within these.

So, I still don't understand what "plot support" actually means.

Third, there's an imho really bad part from the handbook.

You'd imagine this would be a carefully translated game into international languages ? Bioware is capable of that, and EA has the money for that.

So now read this (translated by me) :

Okay, what does this mean ? It means basically nothing but "we were too lazy to properly adapt all of the keyboard descriptions and layouts to international keyboards ( = Non- North American Keyboards). Everyone is playing with North American Keyboards, so why should we care ?"

This is - in my opinion - simply bad behaviour against international customers.

To show what effect this has on me, I'll try it the other way round :




Background :

For example we here in Germany just don't hve a stand-alone key with \ on it.
We here in Germany can ONLY access the \ character with pressing ALT + CTRL + the key labelled on German keyboards as "ß", which is a common letter called a "sharp s" here in Germany.
Fortunately, someone once invented the AltGr key, which makes things much shorter. Now, we Germans only need to press AltGr + "ß" , and then we get "\" .

The actual KEY which has on "North American Keyboard" the \ character, is on German keyboards the key having the "#" on it.

It's more along the lines of:


I think, I don't have the handbook (Digital Deluxe edition), it might mean options that affect the plot. Coercion, which is a sort of persuade/intimidate skill, can be used to affect how the plot goes whereas taking the Rally talent wouldn't. I think most of the skills do factor into at least one quest, but I could be wrong.

Okay, I see it a bit clearer now.

By the way … almost 3/4 of an hour for the installation - is that normal ? o_o

It's a huge game. I think it takes up about 14-15GB, and that's not including the DLC and Awakening.

Ostegar or what's the name heavily reminds me of Osgiliath, by the way …

Plus, I've seen a few more things : The theme of "fallen gods" which can turn into some kind of demons isn't new, either. The lore of TDE has at least one example of that. But Charyptoroth never came back …

The whole game is so closely modelled after (A)D&D (without being so) I'm surprised no-one sues them for copyright infringement.

You'll notice a lot of parallels with other fantasy universes, not just D&D.

The thing with Dragon Age, in my opinion, is that it tweaks existing fantasy clichés. I don't know what Origin you did, so I won't go into it as it could spoil how you experience the others.

I did the Danish , err, Dalish Elves. ;)

They appear a bit like Gypsies to me, with some north-american Natives intervoven … Just imagine NA Natives would be expelled like the Dalish Elves in DA, then you'll have it, I think. And - in reality, they actually *were* expelled to some extend. "Only a dead Indian is a good one" - the full cliché of "white" racists not even knowing that the Natives had different cultures and names each.

The whole culture is rather grim - or rather : the world. The Grey Wardens ace a little bit like a mixture of scientists/policemen to whom the people listen, because thy are the only available spearhead of civilization. Without them, everything would go down.

The … "enemies" … they remind me a little bit of the … Morlocs, or what were their names ? Of the old time-travelling story … Uh, my bad name memory …
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Morlock

At one point I thought : What, if in a Sci-Fi enviroment, these … "enemies" were machines ? Robots, sort of ?

And humanity has got to fight them ? Or they'll go "the borg way" ?

The enemy mostly reminded me of Tolkien's orcs. Quite a dull and faceless bunch actually. The non-darkspawn side of the game is fairly interesting though.

You'll find tonnes of parallells to other fantasy worlds and the real world. Some links are genuine, some are just figments of our imagination. The human mind is very good at seeing patterns even if there is none!

Yes, I do know that, especially, since I'm writing my own fantasy short stories myself. ;)

I use inspiration every now and then. ;)


Another thing that struck me as odd is two sentences - or rather parts of them - in the hand book, about the "Origins" :

Translated by me :

"An arranged marriage gives the hope to get away from this life of discrimination and indignity - even if only for just another day."

"The subjection under a local crime lord seems to be the most safe way to stay alife - even if only for just another day."

Personally, I'd add :

"To the author of the hand book it seemed a best way to incorporate chewed-through clichés into the hand book for surviving in the company - even if only for just another day."

At first the Dark Spawn’s look like the typical Tolkins Orc’s, but then you get to know the lore, they actual remind me of the Zerg from Blizzards Star Craft series, as a over mind (the Arcdemon) control them, and the land gets corrupt then they stay there fore a longer time.

The Dark Spawns get a lot more interesting if you have read The Calling.

As someone who's read that book, I strongly disagree. The implications of The Calling, bar the very final events, have absolutely no bearing on Origins. If Alrik goes onto Awakening then I'd possibly recommend reading a summary, but that's it.

The book is really not that great, and it raises more questions than it answers. It's rare that I give up on a book halfway through, and The Calling is one of those few books.

I disagree, I think it’s a great book, it do settle the ground fore some important event in Origins and Awakeing, even if it did not that it’s still a fine book to read, but that is of cause a matter of taste. I fore one love it.

I was playing a long way through it - this night, actually.

The plot apart from the fighting is imho quite interesting.

What struck me was the amount of detail that was put into the game to make it "mature".
There are very rough and cruel themes among all of these things … I'm speaking of the refugees in Lothlorien … err, what was the name of the first town ? ;) I mean the town after the Battle Of Ostagar (not Osgiliath, though ;) ).

I wonder, by the way, why these "arch-demons" have chose shape or body of dragons ? Why not anything else ? Why not quadruped, for example ?

I'm astonished how much detail was put into this game to let it look "bloody" in so small details as … the waiting screen when a new area is loaded. Other games use progression bars, status bars or something … But Dragon Age uses a circling thing that looks like a circling thorn-crown of some sorts. And to show the progress, there are more and more blood spots added to that screen.

It's kind of … as if they were thinking that people would enjoy the look of blood spots everywhere within the game.
It' kind of … as if they were thinking that people would actually hate such things like colourfulness, friendly, sparkling fairies and of course Unicorns. ;)

Everything looks so much … bland. There's only muted colours … No, that is not right. thre *re* colours there, but thre is NOT any colourfulness to be seen. This world is totally devoid of - anything that looks like a Rainbow.

To a sensitive mind, this game is so much … strongly made, almosed pressed into being grim, that it is almost over-the-top again … And THEN I could find subtle hints that someone actually tried to avoid that, this "over-the-top" image. Because there someone tried to put a kind of balance into the graphics : Bloody, grim-looking, yes, but not too much… The above mentioned loading screen isn't *full* of blood spots - no, it is only for 1/3 or 1/2 of the loading screen, whereas the rest consists of a more or less decaying parchment …

So, someone must have thought : "okay, we represent the grimness by using the looks of decaying materials, and the cruelness and the violence of this world by using [and carefully placing at some places] blood dots."

It looks like … as if someone was rummaging in a drawer to do as if there was chaos within it … But everything within the drawer is carefully layed so, so that it appears to the unthinking mind that there might be chaos. (I have this idea from a bok we had to read during school, where a malevolent teacher does exactly this; it's called "Der Schüler Gerber". There, this teacher - a truly logically working mind - tried to trick any people who might look onto ir into his desk that he was a "bohéme", someone unsteady. But he was the exact opposite of that. His "chaos" was carefully planned and layed out. )

What disturbs me most of this game is the impression that someone - a whole team ! - might've been thinking that people actually [i]enjoy8/i] this grimness and the cruelty and the blood.

Because it is still a "game", not a movie like "Apocalypse Now!"

And now here we have the spirit of a "game", of actual "playing" being intervoven with … well, how do I call this watching and - in a way - participating of a cruel world ?

Isn't this in a way raping the spirit of playing ?



Edit : Or it could be an entirely new thing … I'd call it "interactive fiction", or an "interactive movie". There's no "playing" there anymore, then, only "participating". The "playing" part is on its way to be replaced by "participating".

Which could mean that video games - interactive video games ! - are the birth of a new genre of … media, of art. Of something entirely new, maybe. Like a movie where the watcher goes into it and "changes" things (or not).

And then didn't succeed :p

Lothering ;)

I think that's more to do with what the god was before. One of the codex entries briefly touches on it, but I think it's basically Old Gods = Dragons.

I know. It's so boring, isn't it? What's wrong with the good ol' load bar.

So, so, so true. And have you seen what they've done with DA2? It's the complete opposite! I think only Free Realms manages to be more colourful.

I just think it was BioWare trying too hard. They've said that it's the spiritual successor to Baldur's Gate (OK, perhaps a successor to a Baldur's Gate game drenched in the blood of a thousand whales) and that they took inspiration from George R.R. Martin's A Song of Ice and Fire series, which is one of the most popular (If not the most popular) dark fantasy series around.

But, unlike the Witcher, it looks like they've decided to throw buckets of blood everywhere in the hopes that it looks even slightly mature. No, it doesn't. It looks silly.

No, I think you have misunderstand something, its not new, its jus another genre that you are used to? There are two kind of Fantasy genre, High Fantasy and Dark Fantasy, there Bioware has tried to make Dragon Age the later.

High Fantasy.

Used in games: Newerwinter Night, Drakensang and Divinity.

High Fantasy is much Tolkin inspired, elf are noble, dwarf are grumpy and orc are evil. The colour patten is often colourful, and often more cute creatures can be found, like pixies and unicorns.

The them in High Fantasy is often a unlikely hero save the world from a greater evil, against all odds. The villains are often evil, just because they are evil.


Dark Fantasy.

Used in games: The Witcher.

Its much more like the real world put in a fantasy setting, but often got a dark grim gothic look to it, and have thing like violence and sex in it.

The them used here is often real world problems like racism, politic, intolerance and war. The villains in Dark Fantasy are often driven by more human feeling as greed and lust, but sometime also driven by misguided good meanings.


While the main plot in Dragon Age actual are typical High Fantasy (save the world against a greater evil), anything else in the game is Dark Fantasy.

Dark grim gothic: Check.
Violence: Check (in buckets, even if you only kill a rat?)
Sex: Check (even gay sex).
Racism: Check (elf are threaded as native Indians in 1890)
Politic: Check.
Misguided villain: Check (Loghain)

Swords & Sorcery, Urban Fantasy, and so forth. There's by far more than two forms of Fantasy. What about Conan? That's not dark fantasy, nor is it high fantasy - It's the Sword & Sorcery series (If not the one that strongly inspired the subgenre).

You are right, but I was merely explaining the different between that Alrik think Dragon Age is (or at least that I think he think) and what it is.

Out of curiosity can you explain how Sword and Sorcery are different from High Fantasy, a genre I have never read (or maybe I have and confused it whit High Fantasy?) And are it wort look into, if you like High and Dark Fantasy?

What you did was (I mean no offense here) list a bunch of clichés and tropes in each genre along with examples.

Almost all fantasy, by definition, is "high fantasy" in that it takes place in a world that isn't our own. Forgotten Realms, The Witcher, Drakensang, Dragon Age and so on (But not Lord of the Rings). That's one of the key definitions of high fantasy. But I wouldn't say Drakensang and The Witcher were similar types of "setting".

The Witcher is thematically darker but its world is no less realistic. What we see via the two games and Die Hexxer (I think that's its name, the TV show/movie) is a very dreary world with a lot of deprivation and suffering. That's the sort of setting Dragon Age has tried to replicate, but hasn't managed to. It's added a ton of blood (The Witcher is surprisingly tame in regards to blood) and taken away, at least in terms of atmosphere, the level of suffering people experience.

Sword & Sorcery is and isn't different from High Fantasy. Conan is a great example of your typical Sword & Sorcery adventurer. It's generally more about a warrior carving a path for himself rather than a warrior (or group of warriors) saving the world from, say, a demon or something like a dragon.

Okay, thankls for your input.

I wrote this text in the middle of the night, and my brain wasn't functioning properly anymore.

Besides, I wouldn't place Drakensang into "high fantasy". The setting is rather "low fantasy".

There's uncertainty about the definitions of high fantasy and of low fantasy - but nearly everyone who's playing TDE / Aventuri places it into "low fantasy".

The TDE setting of Myrnor/Güldenland instead is clearly positioned as "high fantsy".

I'm not sure, but I think that one point in the definition regarding high or low fantasy is the available amount of magic. The more magic, and the more … unique the creatures are, the higher is the chance or/and tendency to place a setting into "high fantasy". It begins with everyday use of magic. In a "high fantasy" setting - or so I understood it - magic is quite "norml", whereas in a "low fantasy" setting, magic is rather rare (as a tendency).

Unfortunately, due to the overwhelming popularity and dominance of (A)D&D as a system that is rather outlined to be for "high fantasy" settings, everyone assumes that in a fantasy world magic should be normal, or in other words : that "high fantasy" settings are relatively normal.

Which leads to people wondering wh there is "so few interesting stuff" to be found within the Drakensang games.

This is my opinion.


Edit Please note that in my opinion "low" fantasy is NOT the same as "dark" fantasy !

I'm not sure, but I think that "dark" fantasy could be both within a "high" fantasy or a "low" fantasy setting - according to my own definition.
For me, I rather define "dark" as a kind of "mood" rather than a "setting" … oh , my, now it becomes complicated … ;)

Another edit : I'm still not quite sure what to think of the "Sword & Sorcery" term, although I have read it several times now … I think I should research this a little bit …

And yet another edit ;) : The "high roads" concept is also something I know from TDE … but only from the Myranor setting. Sometimes I tend to think that someone at Bioware browesed through recent game world settings and themes, and took what looked interesting to him or to her. ;)

But I must admit that I sometimes do the same. ;)

I have found a few new bits again :

- In Redcliffe, the people are stupid. There are boats out there on the lake. Why don't they just gather on them and outdrive the approaching "hordes" ?

- A plot question :

- Another plot question :

- And I've found a rather serious, but not at all game breaking bug, just a nuisance :

I think I've found another case of "stupidness", too,
but I can't remember anymore, what it was.

- And what I found quite lame was the demon of the Tower - not the last boss, the one before that … because it followed so closely the cliché of "you didn't defeat him at all. You defaeted just another form of him".

- And the day before yesterday I was thinking of writing a lengthy "rant" here as well … Something about Dragon Age rather leaving a taste of bitterness in my mouth than entertaining me. Which led me to the thought that Dragon Age might appeal to other "senses" than just "fun". Because I cannot find much "fun" in such a dreaded world.

But I must also say that I just can't understand why people actually like horror (movies, novels), gothic and movies like "Saw". I just can't understand it. It's beyond my "senses".

Coming from board games to pen & paper role-playing games and at the same time to PC adventure and role-playing games, "gaming" as such has always the factor of "fun" in it. I just can't understand why people do like horror-themed pen & peper RPGs. I fail to see any "fun" and "en-joy" factor in it. (Enjoy -> en-joy -> joy)

Dragon Age is like a … an exciting novel, the plot is imho quite interesting in some places, but it plys rather than a novel of grom times than something fun and colourful like … Commander Keen, for example. ;) There are WORLDS between both (two worlds ? ;) )

Okay, enough ranting. I think you already know me good enough to know how I think. ;)

To the first spoiler : Yes, but how, in fact ?

To the second spoiler : Well, I fear that I might have used it too early, perhaps … I'm wondering right now whether I should try an older savegame ?

- In Redcliffe, the people are stupid. There are boats out there on the lake. Why don't they just gather on them and outdrive the approaching "hordes" ?

The undead just pull a "pirats of cariaben" then :D

Hello, yes, I understood and used it now.

Strange, that in my first try, Irving was dead. Now, I used it any time I needed to.

Unfortunately, there's a strange … kind of "magic storm" that kills absolutely EVERY surviving magician after the fight on that platform - except Irving. That wasn't necessary.

And now, I found out that help for Redcliffe can be gathered there seemingly ONLY if Irving survives … Interestingly there's actually "two endings" depending in survival of Irving. The "main Templar" at the entrance of the Tower says actually different words, then.

Another oddity I noticed : The "Kodex" speaks of - regarding Redcliffe -

Did a few random quests today - saving a bunch of people from the "Horde", as I call them.

What goes on in a mind that decides that players shouldn't have the chance to save all or at least most of the refugees ? I might sound harsh, I might sound weird, but to me it is a bit sadistically to let players only witness - with relative helplessness - as hurlocks are killing quite helpless refugees one-by-one. The premise of the game seems to be : You don't have a chance, so use it ! Or "no matter how hard you'll try, you won't succeed".

The designers there decided seemingly towards a kind of gameplay that puts forward rather strong emotions within the players. Either through blood, gore ( [cynism]but we already all know that those who play these kind of games ren't emotionally affected by blood and gore anyway, to them it's just like water : yet another fluid[/cynism] ) or through instilling the feeling of helplessness, of pitifulness within the player. Such as with strong, menacing killing-machines like the hurlocks kill helpless, homeless refugees one by one, with the player trying hrd to prevent it, but not having any real chance to suceed in any way.

I know I sound harsh, but I have my concerns about what designers of games with this premise might think of players, or how they decide to treat players. "These are pixelated peasants, nothing more", they seem to think, "you shouldn't care about them, or rather we'll teach you not to care about pixels".

This is like a slam into my face. In a pen & paper session, I'll immediately leave such a sadistic GM.
But on the other hand, I do know that sadistic GMs actually exist. They have some kind of fun in putting a group against odds where they cannot win - or only barely.

On a more serious note, I have begun to think whether players/gamers who play hack & slay and shooter games have lesser or even rather underdeveloped mirror neurons than others.

HSPs often have too much developed mirror neurons, it seems to me (and I am one), which leads to HSPs having a far better understanding in/to social matters.

In order to be able to kind of "kill" "pixels in the shapes of humans", one must shut off a portion of his or her own mirror neurons, because the mirror neurons are what makes you respond to something that looks similar to you. Or so I understood it.

Real-life killers and solders I think must shut off quite a huge part of their mirror neurons - because otherwise they wouldn't be able to shot and kill other people.

I begin to wonder in how far gaming affects the mirror neurons. Or whether certain genre attract a certain kind of people. In a recent study I read about in the local newspaper, it was shown that hunters don't "believe" in animals having emotions, but vegetarians rather tend to do so.

Which *could* imho be a hint towards "tell me what you play and I'll tell you how many mirror neurons you have", kind of. ;)

High fantasy, low fantasy, dark fantasy??

I think you're grossly over-analyzing things. ;)

That's just the way I am. ;)

And I really should stop writing late at night … :rolleyes:

I don’t find that encounter sadistic at all, it show you that even through you are a Gray Warden, you are no super man, and you can’t set everything right, just by being there. If that was the case, I think the game would be boring, its like seeing one of those Hollywood action movies, there the Hero kill hundred of bad guys, while they shoot thousand of bullets after him, and hit anything but him, I find those kind of movies boring, you know after the 1st action screen, that the hero is invulnerable! That’s the challenge in that?

Dragon age is a Grim affaire, but then you do succeeded something, the feeling of victory is that bigger.

By the way you did better at me on my 1st play through on Normal, I did not manage to save any at all. All through Im at my second play through now, on nightmare, here I succeed on saving two :)

Excuse me, I'm playing on "easy" and all gore turned off. ;)

And yes, I understand that it is a grim world - and in-game the phrase hs already been said : "The darker the times, the bigger the hero" or so (no exact wording) …

That means to me that I'm just another kind of player and that I don't fit in into what they (at Bioware) had intended.

I just think that I don't fit into any regular "D&G" themes at all. I just don't like it, but regarding the sales and everything, a majority seems to like it.

Which leads me to the question of whether "D&G" reflects sort of "real life", - in an "indirect way" ?

I think I'll never understand why people - and a majority of players ! - actually likes this kind of setting - dark and grim worlds, full of blood, gore, helplessness, and little achievements.

I have the feeling - I wrote it several times already, I know ;) - that more and more people feel drawn into this kind of setting - more and more people seem to like it.

And I'll never understand why.

And because I can't understand it, I must try finding reasons that help me understand it. One of them is the guess that "dark & gritty" might reflect - sort of - real life in games. World economy crisis and so on.

Me, I'm playing games rather for escapism, which means to me : "relax from real-life affairs". And I do need some sort of colourfullness, otherwise I'm not able to "stop it" in my brain/mind, and relax from the real life.

But Bioware seems not to produce for people who want to relex the way I do. They seem rather produce for people … Well, I can't really say. It's like Max Paine to me (from what I've heard about the game). A game full of emotions, but almost only negative emotions, not positive ones.

What leaves me helpless, unfruitful, is the try to find an answer to the question what their intention was, when they produced this game.

Another thing : There's a - for me - quite big "immersion breaker" : You know, that I'm somewhat language-oriented :D , and that's my problem.

In every speech I listen to, if there is any name, and person's name, any character's name, and town's name, even with several special words which can only be understood with the context of this world -

the names are spoken with an american-english accent. No exception.

I … really don't know how to transfer this experience to you to show you how it breaks the immersion or me … Others wouldn't have any problem(s) with it at all.

It's a little bit as … Try to imagine Gothic with all person's name, character's names, names of towns, names of animals, names of regions, all spoken with a distinguishable German accent. With no exception.

The problem I have here is kind of … I'm supposed to kind of "live" within this world, "be part of it", so I'd suppose that everything would have an accent of "my" language … But now, every word has a *different* accent … one that is totally … foreign from within this world, so to say … It's as if Ferelden hd once been invaded by a different nation, which hd later withdrawn or died out - but their foreign names have rmained. It's a little bit like the Hyksos reign of ancient Egypt.

But it did :D The Tevinter Imperium :)

Because we're not pussies…. like you.


jk ;)

Well, the *real world* is already grim enough for my taste, thank you. ;)

On a more serious note : I know that I'm sensitive - and tht I'm quite much sensitive. Which means that I perceive things much "harder" and a little bit "sharper" than others do.

And that might be reflected by how I perceive this game and its contents.

I'm moderating within an HSP forum, which is basiclly a forum of HSPs, so I'm used to that kind of "perceiving", which means that thre are much more "pussies" out there than you might be aware of. ;)

Only within the last 2 weeks there have been about 10 newcomers there.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Highly_sensitive_person

Visited the Brazilian Wood and the Lady Of The Lake … Or so. ;)

When I saw the "Lady", I had the thought that "she looks very amrican". She reminds me of an higher-tier employee of McAfee I once talked to at the CeBit in Hannover, Germany. Similar hairstyle, a distinct looks of … what I'd call "american". I cannot put it into words, it's just the style or look or so …

The ruins let me think as if someone there at Boware had set down to draw with the goal to tell all Drakensang designers : "Well, THAT's the way a proper ruin should look like !" - In Drakensang 2, you can sort of "visit" ruins, too. They reminded me of them.

Which reminds me of anoher "silliness" … - Browsing through the walkthrough in research to find the reason of a few inconsistencies in a quest let me find out that this game actually has a character called "Forgrim" in it - is that tue ???

I don't know who had this name earlier - but two RPGs with almost the exact name being released at about the same time is not a thing of randomness to me.

I often have the the rather serious feeling as if someone at Bioware had studied Drakensang 1 very closely … I'd even say that someione had studied Drakensang 2 even more closely, because there are elements which are very similar within these ruins … but that simply can't be, since there's too much time between both.

That was the Lady of the Forest. I honestly couldn't say that she looks American. She looks naked, but that's about it.
Then again I wouldn't know what an American look is and haven't been able before to identify someone based on their looks as American, but maybe you have some talents in that area ;)

I don't recall anyone named Forgrimm in the Brecilian Forest. Where was he, or was he mentioned in a book/letter?

Well, Gamebanshee mentioned someone called "Forgrim", but not within the forest, but somewhere in the whole game.

Cant rember him either, maybe it's one whit a very small role. Now we are at the translation, "For grim" means "to Ugly" on danish :D